Two Twisted Crowns

Ravyn wakes up tied to a pole next to the Nightmare, Jespyr, and Petyr in a fort. Two women, Otho and Hesis, sporting bone masks, arrive to question them and identify themselves as the infected that were cast out in the mist. They are openly hostile to Ravyn and Jespyr, as they are Destriers. Ravyn attempts to provide proof that they are not in league with Quercus by mentioning the fort his family had opened to help infected children, but they do not believe him. They want revenge for all the death and violence the infected have experienced at the hands of Destriers, and Hesis breaks Ravyn’s nose. They drag in Gorse, whom they have captured, and Otho blows a magic, alchemized smoke that provokes rage and hate in all their faces. Ravyn and the Nightmare quickly turn on each other, making cutting remarks to one another over losing Elspeth. Soon, Jespyr also comments on Ravyn’s ineptitude as Captain of the Destriers, and the fight devolves as Gorse gets involved. When cut loose, Ravyn kills him. As the rage smoke clears, Opal Hawthorne, Ione’s mother and Elspeth’s aunt, appears. She comes to the Nightmare and quickly realizes Elspeth is not in control of her body. As Opal distracts Otho and Hesis, Ravyn secretly releases the Nightmare from his pole. They apologize to one another, and as Hesis approaches, the Nightmare knocks her out. They escape the fort.

Elm and Ione head to the catacombs, a place where Hauth would often act out his brutality against Elm when he was a child. As Ione admits to still not trusting him, Elm confesses that he has known Elspeth was infected since Equinox and didn’t turn her in. They arrive at the royal Providence Card vault, and Elm tests the Maiden Card contained there to see if it is Ione’s. It isn’t, but he takes a Prophet and Mirror Card with him. They retreat to the library, where he asks whether she would prefer to forget everything that happened between them in the cellar, and she says she prefers to remember. Baldwyn comes to find them and makes Elm sign the document that officially makes him heir. He asks for Ione to stay as a witness to the signature. Four women look on, one of whom, Elm notices, is using a Maiden Card, which accounts for two out of the three Maiden Cards in the castle. When the library empties of people, Ione uses the Prophet Card and sees that, in the future, she will meet the Yew family and Erik Spindle in the stone chamber at Castle Yew, and the-Nightmare-as-Elspeth will take the Twin Alders from her.

Ravyn, the Nightmare, Jespyr, and Petyr hurry through the forests, guided by the trees. They arrive at a thick wall of alder trees and stop for the night. The Nightmare fixes Ravyn’s broken nose, and to distract him from the pain, he invites him to speak to Elspeth in their shared mind. When his nose is mended, the Nightmare announces that while Gorse died at his hand, so too did Ravyn’s identity as Captain of the Destriers. Later, as Jespyr and Ravyn banter, the Nightmare comments on how he, too, once had a sister, whose name was Ayris.

Elm attends the third feast while keeping an eye out for Ione. Everyone is dressed as one of the Providence Cards, and when he finds Ione, she wears the Nightmare costume that was given to her by the king. They leave to search for her Maiden Card in the gardens, since she spent time there with Hauth at the last Equinox celebration. After they search nearly every statue, Elm grows uncomfortable with their shared silence and asks what she would have done had she won their wager and gotten to use his Scythe Card. When she tells him of her plan to compel herself to find her Maiden Card, he offers the Scythe Card to her. The compulsion, however, fails. When they arrive at the last statue, one of Brutus Rowan, in the center of a pond, Elm swims out to it but still finds nothing. His search, however, topples the statue and makes him lose his charm against the mist. Ione rushes to him and shares her own charm with him before the mist compels him to run to the forest. They return to his room for his spare charm, where Filick finds them. Hauth has awakened.

As the group rests, Elspeth delves back into Taxus’s memories and watches as Ayris and Tilly ask him to come swing with them at a yew tree. As per usual, Taxus refuses on account of his work. Ayris berates him for it and leaves with his daughter. He talks with the trees, asking for a final Card that will dispel the mist and the infection. Taxus offers anything in exchange for this power, and when he next wakes, he finds the Twin Alders Card. However, he’s lost the ability to use any of the Cards. Years go by as the kingdom handles the mist’s presence and Brutus begins to exile the infected. He and Taxus argue over the presence of unfettered magic and the barters Taxus has made for the Cards. Taxus threatens Brutus, telling him that if he uses his Scythe Card to torture and kill another person, he will kill him. Bennett then visits him and suggests making peace with Brutus. Taxus refuses and tells him the degeneration isn’t all bad for everyone, as Bennett has never experienced it. Of all people, Bennett has the power to undo everything Taxus has done should he so wish. In the next memory, Taxus tells Ayris he plans to go find the Spirit and barter to have her withdraw the mist. Ayris insists on accompanying him, and in the alderwood, she dies.

Elm, Ione, and Filick go to Hauth’s room. Elm enters alone, and the smell of rot is overwhelming. Hauth stirs in bed but isn’t responsive. The King tries to contact him through the Nightmare Card but fails. When Ione enters the room and steps up to the bed, Hauth opens his eyes and stares at her, then promptly loses consciousness again. After this encounter, Elm speaks in private with the King. He comments on Hauth’s condition, refusing to call him his brother. The King demands to know whom Elm has chosen as a wife, but Elm refuses to answer. Fearing that the King will use his Scythe Card to compel him, Elm uses his own Scythe Card to prevent his father from doing so. He steals away on a horse to scream out his rage in an empty field, then goes to Hawthorne House to collect Ione’s dresses. He gives them to her so she can be a bit more like herself, and he asks her to attend the next feast with him.

The next morning, Ravyn, the Nightmare, Jespyr, and Petyr head to the edge of the alderwood. The forest is too dense to enter, however, and they must barter for passage since these trees only obey the Spirit and not the Nightmare. As payment, one of them must give up their charm against the mist. The afflicted will then become a guide to the center of the alderwood but will be unable to return and will be fed upon by the alder trees. Ravyn insists that there must be another way, as only Jespyr and Petyr aren’t infected, but the Nightmare maintains there isn’t—it was why he had wanted to use Gorse. Jespyr volunteers out of love for Emory, as does Petyr, and they toss a coin to decide who goes. Ravyn tries to lie and say Petyr was chosen, but Jespyr knows him too well and takes off her charm in offering. As the mist takes hold of her, she starts running in the woods.

At the next feast, Elm has eyes only for Ione. When she arrives, she tells him she recently visited her father to ask about the missing Maiden Card. He didn’t know where it is and expressed regret at his role in what has happened to her. He knew Ione was too drunk the night Hauth hid the Card, but he did nothing to stop them from being alone together. As she and Elm dance together, he reveals he has stolen his father’s Nightmare Card, which he wants to use to search Ione’s mind in hopes of learning where the Maiden Card is hidden. Under the cover of loud music, Ione consents to let him use the Card on her, and Elm goes through her memories of Equinox, reliving her experience of Hauth’s mistreatment and finding out that she had been observing Elm for some time. When Hauth has her hide her Maiden Card, Elm recognizes the location and wants to stop intruding into her memories, but Ione insists he see the rest. He witnesses how, at Castle Yew, she’d asked to annul their engagement if only to have the Maiden back. Then, at Spindle House, when Hauth discovered that Elspeth was infected, he shoved Ione out of a tower window. She fell to her death, but the Maiden Card slowly brought her back to life.

Haunted by what he’s seen, Elm brings Ione to one of the unlit hearths in the throne room. Under a loose brick, she finds her Maiden Card, as well as weapons Hauth had used against Elm as a child. Sitting on the throne, Elm proposes that he and Ione marry, since the marriage contract she had originally signed with Hauth only specified a marriage between her and the heir to the throne—which Elm now was. In his proposal, he promises never to be her keeper, only her servant, and to get to know the real Ione beneath the Maiden. They leave the throne room for her chambers, and Ione disengages the Card’s magic.

Petyr remains behind to wait for them as the Nightmare and Ravyn run after Jespyr. The forest proves to be full of obstacles, but the Nightmare and Ravyn press on, as Elspeth feels increasingly helpless. They arrive at a valley floor littered with dead bodies belonging to the people who have been caught by the mist. They keep running, and at the top of a hill they find a pair of twined alders, one white, one black, and Jespyr lying between them. The infection is spreading through her body. The alders take hold of Ravyn and ask what he seeks. They show him a portal, on the other side of which is a shore where he can speak to the Spirit, but they, in turn, will keep Jespyr to use her as food for the mist. Ravyn refuses to leave Jespyr or the Nightmare and Elspeth behind. Elspeth realizes the Nightmare, when he was still Taxus, had been faced with the same dilemma and given up his own sister—which was how, after everything he’d sacrificed, he became a monster. Elspeth demands that the Nightmare not allow history to be repeated, just as Ravyn asks for his help. The Nightmare draws some of his blood and imprints it on the pale alder, demanding both trees let go of Jespyr or lose their roots. The alders chuck Ravyn through the portal and fight with the Nightmare, but he manages to free Jespyr, and together they too make it through the portal.

The Maiden Card’s magic slowly evaporates. As the torrent of her repressed feelings hits her, Ione asks Elm to leave her alone. He does, returning the Nightmare Card to Hauth’s room and telling Linden, who kept watch, that Hauth isn’t worth the effort. He walks back to Ione’s room and sits against the door, listening to her sobs as he too weeps. When she opens the door, she invites him in, and they fall asleep together. The next morning, they talk about their first memories of one another. They ride off together, with Ione once again able to feel joy from horseback riding. They then have sex in a copse of trees, and as they spend the afternoon in each other’s arms, they tell each other their life stories. When they return to Stone, Hauth is waiting for them in Elm’s chambers.