“A black bat. Then why not simply call it a black bat?”
“Say ‘black bat’ ten times fast.”
I really tried very hard not to obey. But blackbat, blackbat, blackbat, blackbat began looping through my mind. Suddenly, blat made much more sense.
“Besides,” she said, “they aren’t just black. They’re made of pure darkness. Shadow. Like the abyss.”
“I see.”
She stared. Her fellow aristos all stared.
“Uh … thank you for explaining?”
“Who are you?” Sky-Blue asked.
“A special envoy from Orania,” Baz said. “She’s here to discuss matters of the empire.”
Could the man not have chosen a place I was actually familiar with for his deception?
“Did you find Our Dominance?” Sky-Blue asked.
Baz hesitated. “No. My father the emperor’s whereabouts are currently unknown.”
The nobles gasped, forgetting the weapons dangling from their limp hands. As if the blats were cunning enough to spot the advantage, dozens of them materialized from the darkness and dive-bombed. They swooped at the nobles as bats would, but left behind trailing shadows like showers of fledgling-raven feathers—very much unlike every bat I’d ever seen.
The lady’s maids shrieked, ducking, and plastered both hands over their careful hairdos. Sky-Blue squealed and dropped his bedazzled dagger, with which he evidently was not going to maim a single blat. His only trophy was to be a battered ego. And a man swathed in a sheath of iridescent indigo-blue dusted in gold, like a proud male trufy bird, screamed as if he were being consumed alive—fancy pantsuit and all. Impromptu weapons clattered to the floor, where shadows that swirled along the walls stretched to slink over them, eliciting more shrieks … which startled the group all over again, leading to even more yipping—and very much less of the calm Aziza had implored.
Night was shaking his head. “Like the trufy.”
“Only the females do this. The males have incredible plumage,” Félix said.
“Hey,” Aziza protested—just another squawk amid the litany of them.
“It’s true,” Night said.
“Still.”
The blats performed several looping circles of the room, diving to attack only the nobles, never us, and then only their poofed hair and wigs. When they finally retreated to the high, vaulted ceiling, the party was left panting, their hands clutching their chests—and their weapons too if they’d managed to hold on to them.
“Dramatic much?” Aziza muttered quietly. “They’re supposed to be tougher than this. They don’t even need to breathe, for dragon’s sake. Every one of them is a sänglure.”
And as such, they would be able to hear her despite the reserved volume. But none ceased their theatrical gasping fits. I hoped they weren’t in competition with each other to see who could create the greatest fuss.
A petite woman stuffed into a too-cinched bustier pressed the back of her hand to her forehead and swooned back into a chaise.
Indigo-Trufy-Pantsuit abandoned his own distress to skip to her aid.
Aziza rolled her eyes. Ed frowned in disapproval.
Anticipating the next attack, lords and ladies darted pinched looks up to the ceiling and back.
“Why don’t you just go somewhere else?” I asked them.
Sky-Blue was the only one looking at me already, seeming to be admiring my veil. He tsked. “This damnable fortress won’t let us leave! Every time we try, the doorways loop on themselves. We exit but enter immediately back through the same opening. It’s maddening.” He faced Baz. “With you here now, my warrior prince, we are saved. Will you lead us to safety?”
As one, the attention of the room shifted to him. There was no such thing as safety within Mauldrene’s walls, and probably not on this entire blasted island. Even if there was, Baz could access it no more than any of the rest of us.
Even so, he said, “You may count on me, Drake Milliand. I’ll do whatever must be done to protect you.”