“And where we can find her,” Darroch added with a single nod.
Vareck waved them off. “It’s taken care of.”
Cadoc tilted his head at the king. “Is she dead?”
Vareck’s brows lowered, sensing the challenge. “No.”
My brother pursed his lips. “Then it’s not ‘taken care of’.” Cadoc looked at me with judgment. “This is the poon you mated yourself to?”
A piece of meat came shooting out of Corvo’s mouth. “He called you a poon!” He nearly choked on his laughter, almost rolling off my lap. Vareck glared at his familiar, then took a deep breath.
“For once, I agree with your brothers,” my dad said, and my mother rolled her eyes.
I sighed, long and loud. The testosterone in the room was too much. “Cadoc, stop being a dick. Lou, just ... fuck off. Dad, not now,please. Sadie should be our focus, right? If she was looking for me, it would stand to reason she would have come to Faerie. I couldn’t tell her about the contract, but she figured out a lot about my work without me saying much.”
My dad took a moment, then released a breath, conceding. My mom dipped her head, giving me a gentle nudge with a look of hope. “Do what you do best, dear. We’ll be quiet.”
I pressed my lips in a tight smile, thanking them for dropping it, and then began to center myself. Reaching for my power, I searched for the gold line that would lead me to my sister. Energy flooded me. My surroundings blurred as I pushed everything I had into finding her. I heard the muffled comments from my brothers about the vibrant shade of green my eyes had turned. I felt the soft vibrations of Corvo’s purring on my lapas my hand rested on the soft fur of his back. Seconds passed. Maybe minutes. I saw nothing. Not even a flicker. When I let it go, my voice quivered. “I have no path.”
My mom choked out a gasp, covering her mouth with her hand. A sheen of tears threatened to spill. “Does that mean she’s dead?” Never in my life had I seen my mom scared. It nearly broke me.
“I could only be so lucky,” Lou grumbled.
A short whistle sounded as Cadoc’s knife flew through the air at a remarkable speed. Vareck’s reflexes were swift as he moved his hand out of the way. Lou grunted, leaning forward slightly. He reached for his shoulder. “What the fuck,” he growled, wrapping his hand around the hilt of the blade.
“Leave it where it is.” Cadoc pulled another knife from his side and began twirling it. “Or I’ll pin your hand to your chest with the next throw.”
“Do it anyway,” Fearghal egged him on. “Just for fun.”
Cadoc ignored him, pointing the blade at Lou while he spoke, his voice menacing and low. “You’d better hope she’s alive, leprechaun. If we find her otherwise, your luck will have run out. Nothing, and I meannothing, in this world or the next will save you.”
“Meera? You have no path. What does that mean?” my dad asked, his arm wrapped around my mother’s shoulders as they waited for me to answer.
I shook my head. “It doesn’t mean she’s dead. She’s just not in Faerie, or ...”
“Or what?” my mother said quickly.
I took a breath. “I can’t track to realms I haven’t been to before. I’ve only been to three.”
“I thought you could track between realms,” Cadoc interjected, and the hope in his voice pulled at my heart.
“I can. But I don’t get a direct path. It’s more like a feeling? The direct path appears when I’m in the same realm as what I’m tracking. All it means is that Sadie isn’t in Faerie.”
“But you should feel a path to her, right? Something,” my mom urged. “If you don’t feel a path at all?”
I sighed. “She might be in a realm I’ve never been in. Or she’s in a realm that doesn’t have passage between it and Faerie, so I won’t feel that nudge here. I need to go back to Earth and see what I can pick up from there.”
My brothers all cursed at the same time. My dad swallowed thickly, and his eyes lost focus the way they did when he was thinking. No doubt, he was mapping out risks and possibilities. Finally, he refocused and looked at me. “We have no choice. If Meera can’t find her when we’re back Earthside, then we search the realms.”
I tucked a curl of my hair behind my ear, nodding in agreement. “We’ll need a witch for portals. Amelia might be able to help us?—”
“I’d leave her out of this one,” Lou said quietly. When I met his gaze, there was a stern crease to his brow, and a hardness etched in the lines around his eyes I’d never seen before. He gave the most subtle shake of his head.
“Why is that?” Vareck asked, covering him in shadow as he stood tall behind Lou’s chair.
Lou didn’t bother to turn around, and he answered without missing a beat. “Amelia’s prices are steep, as of late. And she doesn’t accept coin.”
I chewed on my bottom lip. Amelia was the only witch I really knew well enough to ask.
