A Torch Against the Night (46 page)

“You are a fool,” she whispers, unsurprised at my request. “Accept death, Elias. You would be free of want, worry, pain. I will help you pass on, and all will be quiet and peaceful. If you become Soul Catcher, your life will be one of repentance and loneliness, for the living cannot enter the Forest. The ghosts cannot abide them.”

I cross my arms. “Maybe you’re too soft on the bleeding ghosts.”

“You may not even be capable—”

“I am capable. I helped Izzi and Tristas pass through. Do this for me, Shaeva. I’ll live, save Darin, finish what I started. Then I will tend to the dead and have a chance to redeem myself in full for all that I’ve done.” I step toward her. “You’ve repented long enough,” I say. “Let me take over.”

“I would still have to teach you,” she says, “as I was taught.” A great part of her wants this, I can see it. But she is frightened.

“Do you fear death?”

“No,” she whispers. “I fear that you do not understand the burden you ask for.”

“How long have you been waiting to find someone like me?” I wheedle. I
have
to get back. I
have
to get Darin out of Kauf. “A thousand years, right? Do you
really
want to stick around here for a thousand more years, Shaeva? Give me this gift. Take the one I’m offering you.”

For a second, her pain and suffering, the truth of her existence for the last millennium, is writ in her expression as clearly as if she’d screamed it out. I see the moment she decides, the moment the fear is replaced by resignation.

“Hurry,” I say. “Skies know how much time has already passed in Kauf. I don’t want to get back to my body just in time for it to burn to a crisp.”

“This is old magic, Elias. It is not of jinn or man or efrit but of the earth itself. It will take you back to the moment of death. And it will hurt.”

When she takes my hands, her touch burns hotter than a Serran forge. She clenches her jaw and releases a shrill keen that shakes me to my core. Her body glows, filled with a fire that consumes her, until she is no longer Shaeva but a creature of writhing black flame. She releases my hands and spins around me so rapidly that it’s as if I’m enveloped by a cloud of darkness. Though I am a ghost, I feel my essence draining away. I fall to my knees, and her voice fills my head. A deeper voice rumbles beneath it, an ancient voice, the Waiting Place itself, taking possession of her jinn body and speaking through it.

“Son of shadow, heir of death, hear me: To rule the Waiting Place is to light the way for the weak, the weary, the fallen, and the forgotten in the darkness that follows death. You will be bound to me until another is worthy enough to release you. To leave is to forsake your duty—and I will punish you for it. Do you submit?”

“I submit.”

A vibration in the air—the taut silence of the earth before a land tremor. Then a sound as if the sky is being torn in half. Pain—
ten hells, pain
—the agony of a thousand deaths, a spike through my soul. Every heartbreak, every lost opportunity, every life cut short, the torment of those left to mourn—it tears through me endlessly. This is beyond pain, the pinprick heart of pain, a dying star exploding in my chest.

Long after I’m certain I can handle no more, the pain fades. I am left shaking on the Forest floor, filled with a rightness and a terror, like twin rivers of light and dark joining to become something else altogether.

“It’s done, Elias.”

Shaeva kneels beside me in her human form once more. Her face is streaked with tears.

“Why so sad, Shaeva?” I wipe her tears with a thumb, feeling an ache when I see them. “You’re not alone anymore. We’re comrades in arms now. Brother and sister.”

She does not smile. “Only until you are ready,” she says. “Go, brother. Return to the human world and finish what you have begun. But know you do not have much time. The Waiting Place will call you back. The magic is your master now, and it does not like its servants to be away for long.”

I will myself back to my body, and when I open my eyes I see Tas’s frantic face. My limbs are free of the exhaustion I’ve felt for ages.

“Elias!” Tas sobs with relief. “The fire—it is everywhere! I cannot carry Darin!”

“You don’t have to.” I still ache from the interrogations and the beatings, but with the poison gone from my blood, I understand, for the first time, how it stole away my life bit by bit until it seemed to me that I had always been a shadow of myself.

The fire blasts up the stairwell and races along the beams above, creating a wall of flames behind and ahead.

Light flares above, visible through the fire. Shouts, voices, and for the briefest moment, a familiar figure beyond the flames.

“The door, Tas!” I shout. “It’s open!” At least, I think it’s open. Tas staggers to his feet, dark eyes filled with hope.
Go, Elias!
I throw Darin over one shoulder, sweep the Scholar child up in my arm, and fly up the stairs, through the wall of flame, and into the light beyond.

T
he men of Gens Veturia surround my parents and sisters. The courtiers look away, embarrassed and frightened by the sight of my family having their arms twisted around their backs, marched to the throne, and forced to their knees like common criminals.

Mother and Father submit to the manhandling silently, and Livvy only casts me an imploring look, as if I can somehow fix this.

Hannah fights—scratching, kicking at the soldiers, her intricate blonde coiffure collapsing about her shoulders. “Don’t punish me for her betrayal, Your Majesty!” she screams. “She’s no sister of mine, my lord.
She’s no kin of mine.
”

“Quiet,” he roars at her, “or I’ll kill you first.” She falls silent. The soldiers turn my family to face me. The silk-and-fur-clad courtiers on either side of me shift and whisper, some horror-struck, others barely restraining their glee. I spot the new Pater of Gens Rufia. At the sight of his cruel smile, I remember his father’s scream as Marcus cast him over Cardium Rock.

Marcus paces behind my family. “I did think we would have the executions at Cardium Rock,” he says. “But as so many of the Gens are represented here, I don’t see why we shouldn’t just get this over with.”

The Commandant steps forward, her eyes fixed on my father. He saved me from torture, against her wishes. He calmed angry Gens when she attempted to sow dissent, and he aided me when his negotiations failed. Now she will have her vengeance. A raw, animal hunger lurks in her eyes. She wants to tear my father’s throat out. She wants to dance in his blood.

“Your Majesty,” she croons. “I’d be happy to assist in the execution—”

“No need, Commandant,” Marcus says levelly. “You’ve done enough already.” The words carry a strange weight, and the Commandant eyes the Emperor, suddenly wary.

I thought you would be safe
,
I want to say to my family.
The Augurs told me—

But the Augurs, I realize, promised me nothing.

I force myself to meet my father’s eyes. I have never seen him so defeated.

Beside him, Mother’s white-blonde hair shines as if lit from within, her fur-lined gown draped gracefully even as she kneels for death. Her pale face is fierce. “Strength, my girl,” she whispers to me. Beside her, Livvy breathes in short, panicked gusts. She whispers rapidly to a violently trembling Hannah.

I try to grasp the scim at my waist to steady myself, but I can hardly feel it beneath my palm.

“Your Majesty,” I say. “Please. The Commandant
is
planning a coup. You heard Lieutenant Faris. You must listen to me.”

Marcus lifts his eyes to me, their flat yellow chilling my blood. Slowly, he draws a dagger from his belt. It is thin and razor-sharp with a Blackcliff diamond as its hilt. His prize for winning the First Trial, so long ago.

“I can make it quick, Shrike,” he says quietly. “Or I can make it very, very slow. Speak out of turn again and see which one I choose. Lieutenant Sergius,” he calls out. The Black Guard I cowed through blackmail and coercion just weeks ago slinks forward.

“Secure the Shrike and her allies,” Marcus says. “We wouldn’t want their emotions to get the better of them.”

Sergius hesitates for just a second before signaling the other Black Guards.

Hannah sobs quietly, turning imploring eyes to Marcus. “Please,” she whispers. “Your Majesty. We are engaged—I am your betrothed.” But Marcus doesn’t spare her any more attention than he would a beggar.

Marcus turns to the Paters in the throne room, and power exudes from him. He is no embattled Emperor now but one who has survived a Scholar rebellion, assassination attempts, and the betrayal of the strongest families in the land.

He twirls his dagger in his hand, and the silver catches the light of the sun now rising overhead. Dawn illuminates the room with gentle beauty that sickens me when I think of what is about to happen. Marcus paces back and forth behind my family, a brutal predator deciding whom to kill first.

My mother whispers something to my father and sisters.
I love you.

“Men and women of the Empire.” Marcus slows behind Mother. Her eyes burn into mine, and she straightens her spine and throws back her shoulders. Marcus stills the movement of the dagger. “Observe what happens when you fail your Emperor.”

The throne room falls silent. I hear the silver blade dip into my mother’s throat, the gurgling tear it makes as he draws it across her neck and into her artery. She sways. Her gaze slides to the floor, her body soon following.

“No!” Hannah shrieks, giving voice to the despair that has gripped my body. My mouth is salty with blood—I’ve bitten through my lip. While the courtiers watch, Hannah keens like a wounded animal, rocking over my mother’s body, not caring about anything but her wretched, all-consuming grief. Livia’s face is empty, her eyes confused as she peers down at the blood pooling, soaking the knees of her pale blue dress.

I cannot feel the pain in my lip. My feet, my legs seem so far away. That is not my mother’s blood. That is not her body. Those are not her hands, lifeless and white. No.

Hannah’s scream yanks me from my daze. Marcus has grabbed her by her ruined hair. “No, please.” Her frantic eyes seek me out. “Hel, help me!”

I strain against Sergius, a strange wounded snarl coming from my throat. I can barely hear her as she chokes out the words. My baby sister. She had the softest hair when we were girls. “Helly, I’m sorry—”

Marcus draws the knife across her throat swiftly. His face is blank as he does so, as if the task requires all of his concentration. He releases her, and she thuds down beside my mother. The pale strands of their hair mingle.

Behind me, the door to the throne room opens. Marcus sneers at the interruption.

“Y-your Majesty.” I cannot see the soldier who enters, but the crack in his voice suggests that he wasn’t expecting to walk into a bloodbath. “A message from Kauf …”

“I’m in the middle of something. Keris,” Marcus barks at the Commandant without looking at her, “deal with it.”

The Commandant bows and turns to leave, slowing as she passes me. She leans forward, putting a cold hand on my shoulder. I am too numb to flinch away from her. Her gray eyes are remorseless.

“It is glorious to witness your unmaking, Blood Shrike,” she whispers. “To watch as you break.”

My whole body shakes as she throws Cain’s words back at my face.
First you will be unmade. First, you will be broken.
Bleeding skies, I thought he meant when I killed Elias. But he knew. All that time while I agonized over my friend, he and his brethren
knew
what it was that would truly break me.

But how could the Commandant possibly know what Cain said to me?
She releases me and saunters out of the room, and I have no more time to wonder, for Marcus is before me.

“Take a moment to say goodbye to your father, Shrike. Sergius, release her.”

I take three steps to my father and fall to my knees. I cannot look away from my mother and sister.

“Blood Shrike,” my father whispers. “Look at me.”

I want to beg him to call me by my name.
I’m not the Shrike. I’m Helene, your Helene. Your little girl.

“Look at me, daughter.” I lift my eyes, expecting to see defeat in his gaze. Instead, he is my calm, collected father, though his whisper is ragged with grief. “And listen. You cannot save me. You could not save your mother, or your sister, or Elias. But you can still save the Empire, for it is in far graver danger than Marcus realizes. Tiborum will soon be surrounded by hordes of Wildmen, and I hear tell of a fleet out of Karkaus, heading north to Navium. The Commandant is blind to it—she is too fixated on the destruction of the Scholars and on securing her own power.”

“Father.” I glance at Marcus, who is watching from a few yards away. “Damn the Empire—”

“Listen to me.” The sudden desperation in his voice terrifies me. My father fears nothing. “Gens Aquilla must remain powerful. Our alliances must remain powerful.
You
must remain powerful. When war comes to this land from without, which it inevitably will, we cannot falter. How many Martials in this Empire?”

“M-millions.”

“More than six million,” my father says. “Six million men, women, and children whose futures rest in your hands. Six million who will depend on your strength so that they may remain untouched by the torment of war. You are all that holds back the darkness. Take my necklace.”

With shaking hands, I pull off the chain I used to bat at as a child. One of my first memories is Father leaning over me, the Aquilla ring dangling from his collar, the embossed falcon in full flight catching the lamplight.

“You are Mater of Gens Aquilla now,” Father whispers. “You are Blood Shrike of the Empire. And you are my daughter. Do not fail me.”

The moment my father eases back, Marcus strikes. It takes my father longer to die—he has more blood, perhaps. When his eyes darken, I think I cannot hurt any more. Marcus has wrung me dry of all my pain. Then my eyes fall upon my littlest sister.
You fool, Helene. When you love, there is always more pain.