“I’m glad I found you,” she said. “I’ve been looking.”

Kell’s gaze flicked past her, to the palace doors. “Why?”

She caught the look, and smiled. “To deliver a message.”

“If you have a message for the crown,” he said, “deliver it yourself.”

“My message is not for the crown,” she pressed. “It is for you.”

A shiver went through him. “What could you have to say to me?”

“My king needs your help. My city needs your help.”

“Why me?” he asked.

Her expression shifted, saddened. “Because it’s all your fault.”

Kell pulled back, as if struck. “What?”

She continued toward him, and he continued back, and soon they stood in winter, a nest of bare branches scratching in the wind. “It is your fault. You struck down the Danes. You killed our last true Antari. But you can help us. Our city needs you. Please come. Meet with my king. Help him rebuild.”

“I cannot simply leave,” he said, the words automatic.

“Can’t you?” asked the messenger, as if she’d heard his thoughts.

I am leaving.

The woman—Ojka—gestured to a nearby tree, and Kell noticed the spiral, already drawn in blood. A door.

His eyes went to the palace.

Stay.

You made this prison.

I cannot let you go.

Run.

You are an Antari.

No one can stop you.

“Well?” asked Ojka, holding out her hand, the veins black against her skin. “Will you come?”

* * *

“What do you mean he’s been released?” snapped Rhy.

He and Lila were standing in the royal prison, staring past a guard at the now empty cell. He’d been ready to storm the men and free Kell with Lila’s help, but there was no Kell to free. “When?”

“King’s orders,” said the guard. “Not ten minutes ago. Can’t have gotten far.”

Rhy laughed, a sick, hysterical sound clawing up his throat, and then he was gone again, racing back up the stairs to Kell’s rooms with Lila in tow.

He reached Kell’s room and flung open the doors, but the chamber was empty.

He fought to quell the rising panic as he backed out into the hall.

“What are you two doing?” asked Alucard, coming up the stairs.

“What are you doing here?” asked Rhy.

“Looking for you,” said Alucard at the same time Lila asked, “Have you seen Kell?”

Alucard raised a brow. “We make a point of avoiding each other.”

Rhy let out an exasperated sound and surged past the captain, only to collide with a young man on the stairs. He almost didn’t recognize the guard without his armor. “Hastra,” he said, breathlessly. “Have you seen Kell?”

Hastra nodded. “Yes, sir. I just left him in the courtyard.”

The prince wilted with relief. He was about to start off down the stairs again when Hastra added, “There’s someone with him now. I think. A woman.”

Lila prickled visibly. “What kind of woman?”

“You think?” asked Alucard.

Hastra looked a little dazed. “I … I can’t remember her face.” A crease formed between his brows. “It’s strange, I’ve always been so good with faces…. There was something about her face though … something off …”

“Hastra,” said Alucard, his voice tense. “Open your hands.”

Rhy hadn’t even noticed that the young guard’s hands were clenched at his sides.

Hastra looked down, as if he hadn’t noticed, either, then held them out and uncurled his fingers. One hand was empty. The other clutched a small disk, spellwork scrawled across its surface.

“Huh,” said the guard. “That’s odd.”

But Rhy was already tearing down the hall, Lila a stride behind him, leaving Alucard in their wake.

* * *

Kell reached out and took Ojka’s hand.

“Thank you,” she said, voice flooding with happiness and relief as her fingers tightened around his. She pressed her free hand to the blood-marked tree.

“As Tascen,” she said, and a moment later, the palace courtyard was gone, replaced by the streets of Red London. Kell looked around. It took him a moment to register where they were … but it wasn’t where they were that mattered, but where they would be.

In this London, it was only a narrow road, flanked by a tavern and a garden wall.

But in White London, it was the castle gate.

Ojka pulled a trinket from beneath her white cloak, then pressed her still-bloody hand to the winter ivy clinging to the wall stones. She paused and looked to Kell, waiting for his permission, and Kell found himself glancing back through the streets, the royal palace still visible in the distance. Something rippled through him—guilt, panic, hesitation—but before he could pull back, Ojka said the words, and the world folded in around them. Red London disappeared, and Kell felt himself stepping forward, out of the street, and into the stone forest that stood before the castle.

Only it wasn’t a stone forest, not anymore.

It was just an ordinary one, filled with trees, bare winter branches giving way to a crisp blue sky. Kell started—since when did White London have such a color? This wasn’t the world he remembered, wasn’t the world she’d spoken of, one damaged and dying.

This world wasn’t broken at all.