The Unleashed Storm: The Inkweaver Archive, Book 4 (paperback)

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Chapter 1

Drip, drip, drip.
Drip, drip…
Silence.
Arya’s eyes snapped open at the sudden cessation of a sound that had been her only companion for what felt like a very long time. The threadbare blanket over her knees slid off as she shifted, readying to stand. Maybe…
Drip.
Drip, drip, drip.
A sigh escaped her. She settled back against the wall, eyes sliding closed, senses attuned to any shift in the atmosphere that might indicate she was finally going to be released from the cell she’d been in since her arrival at Blackstone prison.
Four paces wide. Four paces long. Stone floor and walls. Damp, cold, air. A narrow bench with a single blanket and a bucket in the corner for waste. No exit apart from the thick wooden door. So dark she couldn’t see her fingers in front of her face. The only light she ever saw was flickering lamplight when the slot in the bottom of her cell door was opened and a tray of food was shoved through, a hook then dragging out her bucket before replacing it with an empty one. The meals came irregularly, and she’d soon given up using those to keep track of the time.
She shifted, trying to get comfortable on the hard surface. It was hard to remember what feeling comfortable, warm, full, felt like. The cold ate into her bones, opening pathways for despair. Foolishly, Arya hadn’t planned on being placed in solitary confinement. She’d assumed they would lock her up with the other prisoners. And as the long hours, and then days, passed, dread had slowly settled into her bones.
They could leave her in here for months. Years. Forever.
And none but the Nightstalker and his newly discovered heir knew where she was.
It had been a tactical error. But she’d known from the beginning that this plan was risky, relied on too many things that could go wrong, that were out of her control. It was why she hadn’t wanted to use it unless she had literally no other choice. And now she was stuck. Possibly forever.
Arya tried to stay optimistic, to not let the despair win. She forced herself to be active, filling the impossibly long hours with stretching and strength exercises, keeping her body strong and limber. And as she pushed herself to exhaustion and beyond, she told herself it was because she was going to get out of this cell. And as soon as she did, she needed to be strong, so that she could do what she’d come to do and then escape.
The food was never more than slop that did nothing to satisfy her appetite, and she could feel the flesh melting from her bones, leaving only corded muscle and bone. When she wasn’t exercising, she sat on the bench, huddled, shivering under the blanket, staring into nothing.
Waiting to get out.
A door slammed in the distance. Arya snapped out of her thoughts, body poised to move, but for a long moment, nothing happened. And then a high, breathless, scream. It was human. Terrified. And in pain. The scream came again. Another slamming door.
The silence settled back over her cell. Its damp and icy air fought a triumphant battle against the thin blanket wrapped around her shoulders. Her heart thudded as she huddled, shivering, wondering if they were coming for her next.
The more time that passed, nothing but formless darkness surrounding her, the harder the waiting got, but a spark of stubbornness, of fire, inside her refused to go out. She reminded herself why she was here. That she’d come with a purpose. The first step of her plan—to ally with the Dunidae warlords so that they would march at her back against the Nightstalker—had failed when the Nightstalker had allied with Khadini to invade Dunidaen itself. The Dunidae were now fighting for their lives and would be lucky if they had much of an army left, if they didn’t lose entirely.
Or maybe they’d already lost. She’d been in this darkness so long. When she’d been captured, the Nightstalker’s army had been marching on Gateport, allied with the fearsome Khadini Rangers. Her brother had been leading the Dunidae army. Was he all right?
Arya wished she were there with every breath she took. She was a soldier down to her bones, a war leader, a general. The battlefield was where she belonged. Instead, she’d chosen to abandon them for another path, a gamble, a chance at finding the knowledge she needed to face the Nightstalker and win. So that her son would be safe, and not hunted relentlessly like she’d been all her life. So that she could be with Kirin. So that the rest of her family would be safe too.
And so that she could sit the throne of Andahar as its queen.
But fear and worry continued to creep in at her darkest moments. What of her Sky Lords, her cairdre? The Nightstalker had made a deal with Darmanin to keep Arya alive, but she had no way of knowing if that deal extended to Essa, Leanir, or Chiarn. And what of Peemla and Anjurin, presumably trapped in the north at Heathrock while war raged in southern Dunidaen? Laskin and her old Icecliff shield? Her rebel Andahari army? Elendryl, her wyvern, a literal piece of her soul.
If anything had happened to them…
She’d already lost Taze, a grief that was a live animal in her chest, a constant companion. Every time the memory of him exploded like shards of glass in her chest, she sucked in a deep breath and pulled herself back from the precipice.
And she kept waiting. Kept fighting back hopelessness.
For Kirin. For Rorin. For her cairdre.
For Andahar.