Chapter 47: The Danger of a Name

I felt pressure around my stomach, a powerful arm hooked across my ribs. Then I felt the swell of sweet Seelie magic all around me, the brilliance halo of silver and softness. My uncle was holding me against him, my back to his chest. And he was holding a knife at my throat. THE knife.

Why was I still alive?

Then my eyes focused, and I saw Sy.

He was standing free of his chains—and the chains themselves lay in broken pieces behind him, splinters of black metal embedded in the wall. Sy was irredentist with golden magic, wrapped in it, as if he were standing at the center of a hollow golden sun. Magic sparked from his fingertips and his wrathful dark eyes.

"Let her go," he snarled. There was granite in his voice.

I waited for Jarrah to make a mocking retort, but there was nothing. I strained my eyes sideways, toward where I thought Jarrah would be standing. All I saw was a dark, sooty smear on the flagstones. One of his dark boots lay half melted at one end.

I didn't have to as