Saoirse's blood dances with iron and trickery, a secret that is no longer sheathed, nor hers to keep.
When Saoirse's cunning and charade is torn asunder by her very own hands, she finds herself in a precarious peril, fighting to salvage her life an...
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CHAPTER ONE
DARKNESS BEFELL SAOIRSE.
No matter what time of day or night, it was darkness of a kind she had never encountered. It was an ebony not too dissimilar from the velvet of night, only, there were no stars to bespeckle it, or moonlight to soften it. It was darkness that persisted because it was all she could see.
Saoirse's teeth sank into her lower lip, and she gnawed at mouth marbled with iron scars.
Her mother had often warned her not to cry. Saoirse knew why she couldn't cry. Yet, a moon ago, she did. Those tears of ironblood blinded her, robbing her of sight she hadn't known to value until it was too late.
With her sight thieved from her, Saoirse did as she always did—soldiered on. The darkness was not frightening any longer, not in the squalid, drafty dungeon she now called home. Her other senses became more acute, lending to a keener ear, and a sharper, far more sensitive nose. There wasn't much that she needed her eyes for, locked away as she was. But as for when she was free--and there was no question as to whether or not she would be set free, it was a surety, in Saoirse's mind--Saoirse didn't know what to think.
That's a dilemma for another day, her thoughts were drafty.
A shiver crawled the length of her spine, and she straightened, refusing to keep her back bowed for anyone or anything. The alabaster slope of her back rose, fine and fragile as a flower, yet unyielding as a mountain.
Her thoughts tumbled down a sad path, trodden with misery. She tasted her own sorrow on the air. It tasted of salt and ash, embers of an emotion she had come to despise. In response to such a vast, engulfing memory, her Ironsong rose to crescendo, piercing through the fog. It crooned in her ear, gentle and serene. Though her magic slumbered in her veins, it gave off an intricate song only intelligible to her. It was beautiful, whispering of magic, crooning of power, feeding strength to every ivory blade of bone in her body.
Saoirse turned an ear inward, relishing in the comforting song. It had been her only true companion for however long she had been down in Elfhame's dungeons. Calanthe visited sparingly, yet often as possible. Initially, their voice had been thick with anger, then it had softened to sly mirth, regaling Saoirse with stories. Isibeal visited once, voice tremulous and on the verge of tears. She had taken one look at Saoirse's predicament and fled. Sorcha visited once. It was a most peculiar visit for she had said nothing, only hummed a jaunty note, and left Saoirse to her thoughts. She remained shadowed enough in her dungeon that they never remarked upon her eyes, and she gathered that it was because they couldn't see their now silver sheen. Nor, it seemed, did they realize she was blind.
The Alder King never visited.
Saoirse's mouth curled. It was telling. She didn't know whether to laugh or be miserable that he never deigned to see her, if even to scorn her. But in those long gaps of silence, where she was on her lonesome, a smile happened to tick her mouth up. Being imprisoned, she wagered, was better than being dead.
