Ravenna Nightblade's Arc

Chapter 5 of 8

That night the cat would not settle. It paced the edge of the hollow, tail high, eyes on the dark spires below. Ravenna sat with the sealed order flat on her knee. She still had no way in. Finnian never left the throne room without guards. She could not reach him, and she could not strip the crest from a man behind a wall of spears. A cold light bent the air near the tarp. It gathered into a small shape in a white gown, black hair falling loose. Ravenna's breath stopped. She knew the face. Her mother. Elara had been dead for years. "Mother," Ravenna said. Her voice cracked. She had felt no grief the day the stronghold burned. She felt it now. Elara did not reach for her. Ghosts could not touch. "You cannot go through the gate," she said. "You die on the causeway." "Then I have nothing," Ravenna said. Elara looked at the cat. "You have him." She said it plain, no softening. "Small. Quick. No door stops a cat. He walks in. He takes the crest off the boy who wears it. He brings it back to you." Scarlett had woken. She crouched by the poles, bow in hand, staring at the pale figure. "A ghost," she said flatly. "And she wants us to trust a cat with the whole plan." "Trust him," Elara said. "He came back over the pass alone. He can cross a moat." Ravenna knelt and took the cat's face in both hands. "The crest," she said. "On his crown. Bring it to me." The cat pressed its head to her palm. Then it slipped over the rim and vanished down the slope. They waited in the dark. Elara stood at the edge, watching the keep, saying nothing. The moon crossed a hand's width of sky. Ravenna did not speak. Scarlett did not lower the bow. A guard's shout carried up from the water, then silence. Ravenna's chest went tight. Fenrir's ears flattened. Long after, a red shape came over the ridge, low and fast. The cat dropped something heavy at Ravenna's feet. The crest. Ancient metal, twin gryphons and a small throne worked into the shield, a crown above. Finnian's crown. She lifted it. It was warm from the cat's mouth. "He wore it in his sleep," Elara said. "Now he wakes to nothing." She was already fading, the white gown going thin as smoke. "Take back your seat." Then she was gone. Ravenna held the crest to her chest. Below, a bell began to ring in the keep, hard and fast. Torches spread along the walls. Finnian had woken and found his crown missing. His orders meant nothing now, but he still sat the throne, and he knew she was near. "He's coming out," Scarlett said. Ravenna stood, the crest in one hand, her sword rising in the other. "Good," she said. "Now I only have to remove him."