Page 8 of Revels on an Angel’s Grave

With each second that passed without an answer, the walls of the manor pressed in tighter. A trapped feeling crept up her throat and secured her wrists in chains.

She needed out.

Emmeline shoved upright and fled the dressing chamber, crossing to her balcony doors and pressing a hand to the glass.

Orange groves unspooled across the Chancellor’s land, mystlight lanterns dotting the paths between the trees. Beyond the silver gates, Valyn sprawled. A city thrumming with life that overwhelmed her but right now seemed a lot more informative than where she currently was.

Her sister could be out there somewhere. For the first time in years, they were likely on the same continent—perhaps even in the same city. Emmeline’s heart inflated at the thought.

But there was also a chance Addie was still within the temple network, and that could have led her…anywhere.

She needed to be out there, not on this side of the looking glass.

Turning her back on the view, Emmeline crossed to her writing desk. If there was any news, she would have received a letter already, but writing one more time tonight couldn’t hurt. She pulled a piece of parchment to her, ignited the mystlight lamp hanging on the delicate silver chain overhead, and opened her top drawer.

She froze.

“Fate’s fuck,” Emmeline hissed.

With her distraction at the market today, she’d skipped out on Mystique ink. The empty jar laughed up at her now.

Emmeline glanced over her shoulder at the allure of a night-cloaked city beyond the manor’s walls. Then, her gaze drifted to her dressing chamber, thoughts on the bag she’d stuffed behind the racks beside her evidence wall.

“I guess the night awaits.”

Before she slipped outside, she peeked back over her shoulder at the rack of overly expensive skirts hiding the notes that held her shredded dreams.

“Roremar,” Emmeline whispered, “I’m going to find you.”

Chapter Three

Roremar

Roremar Silventa was stuck in an endless loop of blank fucking memories.

The Fate of Chaos and Revelry had used him to kill eight women plus his brother, and he couldn’t recall a damn moment of it. He tried to fill in the blanks, but there was nothing. And that emptiness—the knowledge that he was guilty without being able to remember it—was slowly driving him insane.

Not that he wanted to know how it felt to kill, but didn’t he deserve to remember those horrors? To be plagued by the silence that followed a life being ended?

Or perhaps the gaps were a better punishment. Never being able to flesh out what had happened, always searching for an explanation.

Fates fortunes, he didn’t even know where he was now. He’d been escorted from the Trade House after Emmeline’s magic blew it to rubble and was imprisoned by Lyra Isle Guard. He hadn’t seen any of his family before a hood was slipped over his head and he was loaded onto a cargo ship.

From there, he’d been passed between multiple boats, some transfers in the dead of night, some on rocky coasts he couldn’t recognize thanks to the scratchy burlap blocking his vision.

Whatever punishment he received, it wouldn’t be enough, but Roremar would happily take the repercussions if it meant everyone he loved was safe from the threat beneath his skin. That was the one saving grace in all of this, and even that wasn’t enough of a light to bleed into the darkness of killing Nico.

Nico.

Guilt sharpened in his chest, piercing deeper with every inhale. Each time he breathed and his brother didn’t was a punishment.

He couldn’t get the feel of blood off his hands, sticky between his fingers. Iron clung to the stale cabin air.

Roremar’s stomach rolled as the boat rocked. His head dropped back against the wooden wall, the sway of the lantern overhead not helping to steady his nausea. The cracked, clouded glass cast dizzying, broken shadows on the floorboards, chain squeaking repetitively with every swing.

He tried to remember both the recent murders and when Dryvius used him to kill his father ten years ago. The amnesia the Fate’s possession caused had become Roremar’s own personal abyss.

Maybe if he could pick up all the pieces, he could put images to those lost hours. Like one of his puzzles. That’s all he had to do, and then he would be able to see it better.