Page 106 of The Court of Venus

Roland stared in horror as his shin bones sank into his ankles, shaving inches off his height. His chin sharpened, his hair faded to blond. His rings only fit his thumb now, the others tumbling over his knuckles and onto the floor.

But this was not a time for vanity, even for him. The light in my eyes dimmed, then winked out. It was the last of my strength. “Edward Guildford,” I whispered into his neck. “You are no longer a prisoner of the Archimago Tomb.”

Roland gaped down at me with Edward’s face. “How do you manage to break the rules so spectacularly?”

He stuffed his rings into his pocket and hoisted me up, bracing me against his chest. We crept through the ruined nave to the corner of the chapel, where lichen had taken root and the ceiling sagged. One after the other, we crawled through one of the smashed-in panes of a large triptych window.

A narrow set of stairs led up to the ramparts. Roland and I fought our way up the steep climb. Together, we peered down at the ten-foot fall to the ground. Smoke still clogged the air, and hungry flames licked the northwest tower.

A shatter behind us. The Guildford men had entered the chapel down below.

“Do it,” I said, turning back to the sheer drop. Our only escape.

“I’ll go first. I’ll catch you.”

He hauled in a rattling breath, then leapt from the top of the rampart, landing with a terrible hiss, a crack. A branch, or one of his bones.

“Roland?”

“Hurry,” was all he said. Behind my shoulder, guards were tearing through the chapel, stomping on glass. There was no choice. I lowered myself down, then jumped after him.

I hit his chest hard, the wind torn from me. I muffled a cry of pain into my fist by biting down.

Only feet away from the rampart walls, the Tomb’s boundary shimmered, faint as midwinter’s breath. Once we’d dragged ourselves through it, Roland collapsed on the forest floor, trembling there until I beckoned him on.

We crept low, careful to stay in the shadows, grasping each other’s hands tight so we wouldn’t faint. In the distance, torches carried by men on horseback passed back and forth on the road. Up above, the clouds had turned red, fed by the fires and the smoke.

I had never seen such an ominous sky. But I had read about one in stories. It was a blazing night like this one when King Armel fell in battle, the heavens left smoldering until Oberon rescued his king’s ghost from beyond the Saturn veil.

We were lucky it was night; we could navigate to the river unseen, following the stars. Moonlight broke through the canopy. We walked in a wide sweep around the Tomb, both of us retching into bushes from pain, holding each other’s hair back until we could bear to continue. I huddled into the thin fabric of Roland’s shirt, clutching my arm against my chest. Roland’s mind was open to me again—there was anguish, but also relief and gratitude and a rare hint of self-consciousness.

“Are you worried you’ll look like Edward forever?” I whispered, ducking under a tree limb.

“No.”

“Pretty Roland. Now, not so pretty.” I stuck a finger into his ear, and he swatted me away.

A branch snapped. He covered my mouth with his hand and motioned for me to crouch. A man on horseback wandered out, peering at the river. After a sweep through the forest, he shook his head and spun his horse around, disappearing back into the trees.

We continued along the rocky banks. The Snake widened farther downstream, our trail of blood washed away by the rapid current. Roland gripped my good hand tighter whenever I grimaced.

As dawn approached, a planet brightened overhead. “Venus,” he breathed in relief. The morning and the evening star.

He propped me against a boulder, pulled down the sleeve of my shirt so my shoulder was bare, and used his burgeoning strength to stitch the arrow wound. It was careful work. His magic slowly guided fresh tissue across the tear, sealing it shut. He threaded his magic through my bone, too, filling thin cracks. As he labored, he grew visibly strained, the shadows beneath his eyes deepening.

“Enough for now,” I said.

“A minute more.”

“Roland. You’re still weak.” I cupped his cheek so he’d look at me. “We must find someplace safe.”

Roland had a number of houses he’d collected as favors from the king. A town house in the city, a castle in Courtney, a large manor in Stanich, a smaller castle an hour’s barge ride away.

But all of his houses, and all of his land, were gifts, and so they would be parceled off to new courtiers, as Prospero’s had been. The Guildfords would search for us at each of them. “There is only one place they won’t look,” he said with a weary sigh. “The knowledge of it died with Prospero.”

We found a boatman to ferry us downriver, hastily explaining we had been robbed on the road, while Roland stood in front of me protectively, hiding my bare legs. The boatman’s wife offered a wool gown—itchy, but better than nothing.

Roland shrugged his shirt back on. As his muscles rippled, I saw a flash of the healing wounds on his back and went cold.