Page 154 of The Stolen Throne
“We need—” I have to stop and clear my throat. “We need to find Vida’s family. We promised. She said Eidolon—”
“Already working on it,” Vos says. “One of the Vanished who knew her well…”
Oh. “I’m glad. Let me know if—”
He finally looks at me then. “It’s being handled.”
My stomach drops. Is this anger at my leaving or blame? Or guilt because he cleared the Vanished as potential spies. All of the Vanished…including Vida. I still can’t tell. Does it make me a coward that I don’t want to know the answer? Instead, I clear my throat again. “Did any of you get to Savanah or Mariana before coming here?”
“Savanah,” Pella says. “And Queen Wynega had never heard of any amulets but said she would check in their archives.”
Vos leans back with a snort. “There’s a character.”
I’m not surprised by the comment. I’ve met Wynega just once at my—and by mine, I mean Tabra’s—coronation and wedding celebration. In the two minutes we spoke, she told me to listen for the voices. Couldn’t I hear them? No, I couldn’t, by the way. Then she proceeded to have a whispered conversation with someone or something not there before wandering off.
After my encounters with ghosts and spirits, not to mention shadows and trapped souls and amulets with goddesses, I’m starting to wonder if she really was communicating with an unseen, unknown thing.
Hakan grunts. “I wouldn’t expect much from my former queen.”
My eyebrows try to climb into my hairline. For someone who doesn’t talk much, he just said a lot. “And King Panqui?”
“We have yet to lay eyes on the King of Tropikis,” Cain offers with a wry hitch to his lips.
“Um.” I glance around, because we’re in Panqui’s palace. And what about the guards who let us into the dominion when no one else was allowed? I figured they must have met with the man to get permission.
Pella finally sits down. “His majordomo admitted us on the king’s orders. Apparently, during Xathena, Panqui is not seen until the night of unmasking, which is the final night.”
“When is that?”
“After the night the humans are renewed.”
A few nights, then. That’s good. It gives us time to do what we need to do. Hopefully we can be back before then.
The hole of Reven’s absence is getting wider by the second. Why has not a single person in here mentioned him? I’m done trying not to look too pathetic by asking. “Where is Reven?”
Vos gives a little cough. Which leads into another and another. It lasts long enough that we’re all frowning by the time he can take a decent breath again.
“Vos?” I don’t hide the worry that creeps from my chest into my voice.
“It’s fine,” he says.
“Doesn’t sound fine.”
Tziah gives him a pointed look, I think agreeing with me.
He waves a careless hand. “I figure the Rites have that covered. Besides, you have bigger issues.”
“Reven?”
Vos’s mouth is a grim slash. “Let’s just say he didn’t take the separation as well as he did when you were with Eidolon in the palace.”
The boulder of dread that has been teetering over me since the second I left the zariphate drops, the weight of it threatening to crush me. “Tell me.”
Horus grimaces. “He has to be in absolute darkness to hold Eidolon’s Shadows inside.”
My legs go wobbly. It’s bad. Worse than I thought. “Take me to him.”
“No way—” Cain cuts himself off with a grimace and lowers his voice. “I don’t think it’s safe. He’s—”
