And yet some Houses the death passed over, when a member of that family had clearly been touched, but had never fallen ill. Suspicions were aroused—Why my House and not yours?—and blood oaths taken. More lives were claimed, this time by violence.
Until each House was closed to outsiders, and the spread of the plague was halted.
Cari looked down at a welt now healing on the inside of her elbow—so ugly. The mage plague had taken her father, and it had almost taken her. She remembered too well the burn inside her. Remembered screams ripping up her throat—but she had somehow lived through it. If this smothering quiet was living, that is.
Even whispers of staff and family were banked by half breaths, so they sounded more like the sighs and hisses of the fae who watched from the other side of the veil.
The common conclusion: Some ruthless House was orchestrating a takeover, Shadow against Shadow. They meant to cripple magekind, their own people, with fear and death, and usher in the Dark Age themselves as Lords of a fallen land.
She should be striving to find out who was doing this, who had killed her father, and almost her. But somehow she was trapped in yesterday, so tired, so heartsick, and she was just now discovering that the past turned frigid as time pushed relentlessly forward.
And yet, there were so many things to take care of now that her father was in ashes. So much work. She’d always thought of him simply as her father, but to everyone else he was Caspar Dolan, and that meant something. She had no idea where to start beyond trying to remember to breathe and blink.
Her father answered voicelessly inside her: Secure the succession.
Right. But the acknowledgment came bitterly.
The House guards had done that by dragging her away when her father had fallen to one knee, midstride, in the courtyard of their family’s business compound, his skin mottling with gray eruptions. Murdered. By then every mage House knew it was a contagious kind of attack, so she couldn’t even hold her father’s hand. The strain of bucking to get free of the guards still racked her body. All sound had been drawn out of the memory, but she could still see her father collapsing in front of her.
How ironic that she’d caught the mage plague anyway. And both guards had died as well.
She closed her eyes and pressed the heels of her hands to her lids.
But yes, technically she’d survived the attack, so the Dolan succession was secure. Now she had an unfathomable amount of work before her but no heart to begin. Father?
Protect the House.
She nodded to his memory, which had a bit of his warmth. Yes.
House meant family, and she had a lot of it. Her stepmother Scarlet, and her stepsisters Stacia and Zel. And her uncle on her birth mother’s side, and cousins, their spouses, children, indentured mages, assorted dependents, who’d taken shelter within the wards. Dolan House was full to bursting, and she had to provide for them all.
Cari felt lightheaded with the load of work ahead.
She’d have to look into the Dolan finances immediately. Get a grip on the money.
Pitch, Cari swore to herself, thinking of Zella’s betrothal and the political dancing that it required.
And then there was DolanCo, the family business, which she must now run. The special project that her father had thought would sustain the House through the advent of the Dark Age could not be ignored. The fact hadn’t changed—it had actually grown more imperative—that they would need a highly valuable source of revenue or trade when the human markets collapsed, and DolanCo’s more mundane products wouldn’t provide for the House. Now that was up to her, too.
She broke in a half laugh-half cry at the absurdity of it all, took a shuddering breath, got a nose full of her father’s smoke, and wheezed into a sob, tears spilling over swollen banks.
No, no, no. She wiped at her face. Tears accomplished nothing. She was the Head of the House now.
Maybe she ought to start with a list. Yes, that’s what she’d do.
Her father would have paper and a pen in his desk.
She was wiping her nose when she pushed into the study. She expected to find Stacia or Zel, who’d shadowed her every step since yesterday afternoon, watching and worrying and trying to feed her.
But seated in front of the desk was a strange woman. Her deep red hair was impeccably coiffed. She’d dressed in sleek black slacks and a vibrant blue silk blouse. Her ankles were crossed, legs angled to the side. The room positively simmered with her presence. She had to be greatmage Kaye Brand, High Seat of the Council, the one who’d started this civil war in the first place.
Cari’s heartbeat tripped.
How had Brand gotten through the Dolan wards? Was she infected? Had she brought more death here?
Brand slanted her gaze Cari’s way. “Are you done feeling sorry for yourself?”
Cari’s attention narrowed, yesterday and today colliding in a silent cataclysm, and with an inner burst of heat, she finally felt her sluggish blood rush.
Kaye Brand was going to die. If not for her, none of this would have happened. Cari’s father would still be alive.
“Please, sit.” Kaye gestured to the chair at Cari’s hip. She didn’t seem the least bit worried for her safety, even here within the House of an enemy. “We have a lot to talk about.”
“How did you get inside?” Cari demanded. Then, to the closed study door she barked, “Zella!”
“I have a vassal, Marcell Lakatos,” she said, “who has an aptitude for crossing boundaries. He assisted me.”
Very handy person to have on hand. And too dangerous to live. Lakatos should be killed.
But Brand seemed healthy enough, in spite of her transport. How dare she come here at a time like this? Anger felt good. Felt strong.
The door opened and Cari’s eldest stepsister leaned partway inside, her white-blond hair sliding over her shoulder. She held a plate with a sandwich. The hopeful look in her eyes turned to alarm when she spotted Brand.
“I need a weapon,” Cari said. When Zel didn’t move, she added, “Now, please.”
Mages killed their enemies.
Kaye Brand examined her manicure. “I’ve done nothing to harm you or your House.”
Zel had left the door open and was summoning the guards, what few they had left. Rapid footsteps sounded down the hallway.
Cari sputtered. Nothing to harm her? If not for Brand . . . “You divided magekind, set House against House.” She’d started the conflict that had just taken the life of her father.
Which would be enough to kill Kaye here and now, and yet there was more. Kaye had also betrayed magekind to the Order of angels. The Order, who’d again and again throughout history struck Shadow down, trying to wipe the soulless mages from the world. The Order would not allow magic to rise. But Kaye had taken an angel for a lover—his prick a key in the lock of their Council, opening their ranks to intrusion.
The bloodshed had started soon after, Houses turning on each other, each climbing over another to topple Brand from the High Seat. And now this latest assassin, slowly working his way through magekind with his plague . . . Everyone would know the killer when he claimed the High Seat for himself.
Guards burst into the room, guns drawn and aimed at Brand. A commotion sounded in the great hall as other family gathered for this new crisis. Her uncle’s voice rose. One of the kids started crying again. Staff murmuring. Her stepmother demanded to know what was going on.