Exile of the Clave

Exile of the Clave - Chapter 2

Sera was filled with restless energy.

Every cell in her body was screaming at her to get moving now, find a solution now, save him now, but she needed to think. After spending the equivalent of nearly an entire day sleeping, there was no way she was going to sleep now, so she may as well stay up and plan. She raided Seraphine's study for a notebook and a pen, reminded with a pang that her own notebook was still in possession of the Consul in the Gard.

She hopped up into one of the bar stools at the kitchen counter and set her pen to the page to begin scrawling. Her Mnemosyne rune was practically prickling as she started dredging through her memories for absolutely anything she could scrounge up about the Fey or the Wild Hunt. If she was going to find a way to free Rayce, she was going to need to learn the nature of the trap that had ensnared him.

Dozens of cities flashed through Sera's mind as she flipped through the catalogue of safe-houses she had established all over the globe with her creatively-won fortune. Some were no more than a tiny flat tucked away in a nondescript apartment building, but others were much more comfortable, like her Las Vegas home.

The common link between all of the locations she had chosen was their proximity to major hubs of traffic for Downworlders and Shadowhunters alike. She had been able to mingle from behind the safety of her powerful glamours, keeping a finger on the pulse of the world as she had watched and waited for the time to come to safely bring Rayce out of the Seelie Court. Five years was a long time, and she had met a lot of Downworlders. The only question now was which ones were going to be useful to her. And which ones could keep their mouths shut.

She was so lost in her scribbling that she hardly noticed as the room slowly brightened around her, the new dawn breaking over the lake through the wall of glass behind her. She was staring vacantly at the tap on the kitchen sink, lost in thought, when she heard a key slide into the lock of the front door.

Sera pushed back the stool and rose, her hands spotted with ink from the pen, and she crossed the kitchen to the hall where Seraphine was just pushing open the door. The warlock's eyes were red and she had clearly been crying. This had certainly been a night for that.

"Sera!" The tiny warlock threw her arms around her friend's waist and squeezed, tears beginning anew. Her clothes smelled of ashes and smoke.

The Shadowhunter gently stroked Seraphine's mop of black curls, careful to avoid the cat ears, since she absolutely would not abide anyone touching them. Sera shushed the warlock gently and whispered, "It's okay, Seraphine. We're going to get him back."

The smaller woman pulled back and looked up at Sera with unrestrained sadness in her eyes. "Oh, Sera, it's not just him. It's Alicante!"

"Alicante?" Sera felt a lurch of fear rush through her heart.

"It's burning!" The warlock buried her face back into Sera's chest, tears spotting the white corset that was now smeared with ash from her own clothes. "The Unseelie were planning it all along, the whole thing, ever since the Dark War ended! They quietly hooked lines of ley magic into all of the restorations they did, and last night they surged the whole system! It's... I just can't. I can't even..." She dissolved back into tears as Sera rocked back on her heels.

Destroyed! Her mind flashed back to a dream she had written in her notebook about Alicante resting on a chain of volcanoes that had all exploded at once. She'd never imagined something like this, though. The Shadowhunter home city razed in a single blow... the world wasn't prepared for this.

Seraphine hiccoughed and dropped her hands from around Sera. "I Portaled to Idris as soon as I heard, but the wards kept me from getting right into the city." She brushed at her eyes. "I have to go back; there's so much to do, but I wanted to be the one who told you."