by Jay Kristoff
“The girl nodded, gasping to find her breath. ‘Yer b-bonny … prince…’
“My belly filled with tiny cold butterflies. ‘Danton.’
“‘He rides,’ Saoirse gasped. ‘But a handful o’ miles south. A dozen men and horses.’
“‘Horses?’ Bellamy demanded. ‘I thought beasts of earth and sky feared the Dead?’
“‘The blood,’ I told him. ‘Drink three times over three nights and you’ll be a slave to your master’s will. No matter how much you fear him. Danton could have thralled a hundred men and horse by now.’
“‘Nae that many.’ Saoirse straightened, met Chloe’s eyes. ‘But plenty.’
“‘Gabe?’ Chloe asked. ‘Do we fight?’
“I looked to my old friend, standing wide-eyed in the snow with her ragged company: Slayer and Soothsinger and Priest and Pet. In truth, I gave not a speck of shit for any of them save her. But last of all, shielded behind Chloe like she might protect him from all the hurts of the world, stood the Boy.
“My Bait.
“He’d brought Danton to me. Just as I’d hoped. And with a mere dozen men at his side, I put my odds about even I could get my hand around that bastard’s throat. I owed his famille blood. And the longer we ran, the longer Danton would have to build a force I couldn’t hope to face. Stray wretched, sellswords, other highbloods seeking the Forever King’s favor. Better to strike now, with some fodder to throw, with a bandolier full of silverbombs and the faith of two true believers to blind him. I could protect Chloe. What matter if the others fell? What were these people to me?
“Nothing.
“Nothing and no one.
“But the Boy. The Bait. The Blood. Washing across those open necks and sealing them closed. Burning in the gullets of those wretched and setting them aflame. I’d known the truth for years. There was no magik silvershot, no divine prophecy, no holy fucking chalice that would bring an end to this darkness.
“This was our here and our now and our forever.
“Wasn’t it?
“Looking skyward, I found myself trying to remember what it had been like to actually see stars overhead. I could recall them dimly from my youth—cradled like diamonds in the midnight arms of heaven. All was blackness now, only the crescents of dim red moons to light my way. But for the first time in as long as I could remember, I wondered.
“‘Gabe?’ Chloe asked, desperate now. ‘Do we fight?’
“‘No,’ I sighed. ‘We flee.’”
XI
A BLACK CROWN
“‘RIDE FOR THE river!’
“Wind whipping our skin. Sleet slashing our eyes. Jezebel was an engine of muscle and bone beneath me, the company at my back. I took the lead, riding as hard as the others could follow. The light from my hunter’s lantern bounced and strobed, throwing mad shadows ahead. I could hear Chloe and Dior behind, Saoirse and Rafa coming next, Bellamy in the rear. Chill snatching the breath from our lungs, we rode. We rode as if all our lives hung in the balance. As if the devil himself rode behind us. Because of course, he did.
“And he was gaining.
“Grace three times the tongue of man or woman with the blood of the kith, and they will be a slave. But not some callow serf, with broken back and battered heart. Some measure of unholy strength will be gifted, master to thrall, making them more than a match for any man. Horses and hounds aren’t so different to humans, save the former tend to die with dignity and the latter with blubbery. I knew not where Danton had found his mounts or his men, but it mattered little in the end. He had both in abundance—a burly dozen, their thralled sosyas running harder and faster than ours could hope to match. And behind, with all the insufferable arrogance of a bastard who believes in his bones that he was born to rule, came the youngest son of the Forever King.
“The Beast of Vellene.
“He’d returned to Dhahaeth after I’d left, and he’d fetched his fucking coach. But rather than the corpses of murdered girls, it was now drawn by four swift sosyas, the horses’ eyes flushed crimson, their mouths frothing blood. I hoped the folk of Dhahaeth had given Danton what he wanted without resistance—that he’d been so keen to avenge himself on me, he hadn’t stopped to wreak vengeance upon them.
“I hoped. But I doubted it.
“Riding off road was too deep a risk in the dark—one rabbit hole or cruel branch under Chloe’s horse and all would be undone. And so we hammered down a muddy road, dying trees at our flanks. I glanced to the silver sister, the boy behind, the pair riding fierce as they dared. The fate of the world just a few feet away.
“‘Why run, de León?’ came a call from behind. ‘When I can follow forever?’
“The bastard spoke true and I knew it—at this pace our horses would break within a few miles, and on foot, we could never outrun a highblood. I’d no clue how far the river could be, and if Haemun’s Bridge was still standing …
“Chloe cried out, hand to brow. Her horse thundered on, but Dior had to lunge for the reins, clutching the small woman in his arms.
“‘Sister Chloe!’
“‘He…’ Chloe gasped, wincing. ‘He’s in … m-my head…’
“I turned in my saddle and saw him. Like a shadow at morning striding behind you. His eyes were red and full as children’s graves, sharp teeth and a butcher’s smile. He leaned out the carriage window, hair swept back from his widow’s peak. On the driver’s perch sat a girl with dark skin and pretty green eyes. Faint red stain at her chin. I recognized the serving lass from the Perfect Husband. Refusing to remember her name.
“‘Guard your thoughts, Chloe! Fill your head, force him out!’
“She clutched the sevenstar at her throat. ‘The Lord is my shield, unb-breakable…’
“Danton’s riders swept before him, now only a dozen yards off our backs. Farmers and masons, a few militia members among them—once men with lives and wives and dreams, now naught but slaves to his will. I held my pipe between gritted fangs as I fumbled for a phial of sanctus. I’d no time to measure, tipping the whole lot into the bowl and spilling most, tamping it down with my thumb. I tried a half dozen times to light my flintbox, finally dragging down a ragged, burned lungful, feeling that potency unfurl, the beast in me awaken. And reaching into my belt, I drew my wheellock, twisted in my saddle.
“Danton actually laughed to see the pistol in my hand. Against the skin of an ancien Voss, the shot would be less than worthless. And so I took aim, struck the trigger, black ignis flaring as the muzzle flashed and the shot cracked …
“‘Sorry, boy…’
“… right between my target’s big brown eyes.
“The lead horse dropped like a rock, brains smashed to pulp. As it collapsed, the horse behind it screamed and collided with its fellow, and I saw Danton’s eyes grow wide, his smile fail as the horses collapsed in a tangle of snapping harness and bone. The lead spar crashed into the earth, the crack of splitting timbers rang out in the night, and Danton’s carriage flipped end over end, that dark-haired lass with the pretty green eyes thrown like a rag doll. I turned away before she struck the earth, closed my ears to the sound of her breaking, telling myself over and over that it’s always better to be a bastard than a fool.
“Her name …
“‘Better to be a bastard than a fool,’ I hissed.
“Her name was Nahia …
“Several riders stopped to help their fallen lord, but the rest rode on, crossbow bolts hissing through the air. Rafa cried out as one struck his shoulderblade, and Saoirse cursed as their horse almost spilled. Bellamy twisted in his saddle, unleashed his own crossbow into the closest thrall. The man bucked, coughed blood, but stayed upright. A dagger flashed through the night, struck the fellow in his throat and sent him tumbling, another already in Saoirse’s hand.
“‘How far to the river?’ Chloe gasped.
“‘That’s Haemun’s Hill ahead!’
“Reaching to my bandolier, I snapped the seal on a glass phial and hurled it. The silverbomb explode
d, blasting thralls from their saddles in a blinding flash. But the others came on. And in the distance, among the riders who’d stopped to help him …
“‘Fuck,’ I hissed.
“‘Gaaaaaabe!’
“‘I see him, Chloe!’
“‘No, Gabe, ahead, ahead!’
“We’d rounded the bend at Haemun’s Hill, horses frothing, hearts pounding, and ahead I saw a sheer, dark bank dropping ten feet into the black rush of the Dílaenn River. The mooring stones were intact, crusted with blooms of maryswort. But beyond …
“‘Mothermoons, the bridge is down!’ Saoirse roared.
“‘Keep riding!’ I bellowed.
“‘But Gabriel—’
“‘I’ll hold them, Chloe! KEEP RIDING!’
“I pulled up on Jezebel’s reins, slowing the dray and drawing my sword. Ashdrinker gleamed in my lanternlight, a silver smile on her hilt and a silver whisper in my mind. She seemed more certain tonight, her voice steadier, closer to what she’d once been.
“No mercy begged, Gabriel. And none bestowed.
“The first thrall reached me—a militiaman with a long ashwood spear and suit of stout chain. I split the man’s spear in half, sent his guts spilling into the dark. I heard Bellamy whooping, Chloe yelling, ‘Hold tight, Dior!’ the boy screaming as their horses plunged into the rapids below. Three riders barreled past me, and I took one off his horse, another’s arm off his shoulder as they flashed by. I grunted as a sword pierced my ribs, cutting leather and meat and bone, twisting as it came.
“Much faster ye were in thy youth, Gabriel.
“I lashed out at the man who’d stuck me, blood spilling warm and wet down my side. ‘Nobody asked your f-fucking opinion, Ash!’
“Ye mayst use me as a walking stick if ye hast need?
“The thrall gurgled as I drove Ashdrinker through his throat, twin arcs of blood fountaining into the sky as the blade scraped his spine.
“Ah, much better, much b-better indeed. The snik and the snak and the red red red.
“The swordsman clutched his split neck and collapsed into the road. But looking farther down it, I saw him coming again now, a black shadow, no smile on his face anymore—the beast he’d been named for surfacing as he bared his fangs and roared.
“‘De León!’
“‘Gabriel!’ Chloe wailed.
“‘Face me, you callow wretch!’
“The first of seven, Gabriel. First of s-seven. As Fabién took from ye, take like from him.
“One scream in front of me. Another behind. The vengeance that had dragged me northward into this lonely winter, or the promise of perhaps finishing it once and for all.
“One foe in sight. One friend in need.
“No choice at all.
“This t-time, I swear I—
“Ashdrinker fell silent as I sheathed her at my waist, slapping Jezebel’s rump. The dray kicked up and bolted, her breath like a blast furnace. I thought she might have balked at the edge—that I’d have to force her into the plunge or simply leap from her back to the water below. But she charged toward that broken bridge as fearless as any horse I’d ever known. And as Jezebel leapt out into the breach, dauntless, plunging toward those dark rapids after Chloe and the others, I held tight to her mane and whispered, ‘I need to give you a better name, love…’
“We plunged into dark water, all the world muted. The river was freezing, and I almost inhaled a lungful as the shock reached my spine. I crashed to the surface, slinging a whip of waterlogged hair from my eyes and dragging a shaking breath into bleeding lungs. I saw Jezebel beside me, reached toward her, trying to float with the flow when—
“A thrall crashed atop me, his sword plunging into my shoulder, scraping my ribs. I roared in pain and clutched his throat, dragging us both below. He slipped his blade free, stabbing again, into my belly this time. But my thumbs had found his eyes by then, and they sank in, knuckle deep, muted scream and a bird-brittle crunch rising over the rapids’ roar. He stabbed me again before it failed him—that strength which he’d been gifted but to which I’d been fucking born. And then he went limp, the water warm around my hands. Kicking free of his arms, I lunged back up to the air.
“‘Gabriel!’
“Chloe’s scream, ragged with terror. I searched the dark, spied her a little ways downriver, clinging desperately to her panicking horse lest her chainmail and sword drag her to her death. But her eyes were filled with purest horror.
“‘Dior can’t swim!’
“‘Oh, blessed facefuckery…’
“I looked about, kicking upward for desperate vantage. I saw spitting spray and grinning rocks and tumbling black. But of the boy, there was no sign.
“‘Gabe, you have to—’
“The rest of Chloe’s words were lost as I plunged below the foam. The bloodhymn kept the agony of my wounds at bay, and I swam through sunken boughs and a cold as deep as tombs. For the longest time, I saw nothing save the dark, and the folly of all I’d done. But ahead, cresting the jagged edge of a long-sunk stone, I caught it—a flash of pale. Fangs bared, I lunged, kicking with boots full of water and pockets full of hope, and finally, finally seizing hold of a fine frockcoat, midnight-blue with silver curlicue.
“I surged to the surface with a ragged gasp. The rapids roared in my ears, the sword wounds in my belly and shoulder bled red into the rushing black, and my heart sang in my chest as I saw Dior gasp for breath. And then the boy realized where he was, water all around, water beneath, and I saw panic clench his jaw and he grabbed hold of my throat and dragged me right the fuck back under.
“He thrashed and bore us down, boots kicking my bleeding belly. We crashed into a sunken stone, something inside me ripping. I roared and tried to hold him, but his panic had him by the short and curly ends. His thumb found my eye and his heel crashed into my bollocks and I felt him slip from my arms. Half-blind, I seized a fistful of ashen hair, dragged us back up in an explosion of half-drowned breath.
“‘You kicked my balls, you fuck-eyed little pigdick!’
“‘I c-can’t—’ he gulped and gurgled as he sank again.
“‘Stop arsing about and hold on to me!’
“He tore at me a moment more, two fingers hooked in my mouth and his other arm wrapped over my eyes. But I was yet my father’s son, a strength beyond strength in the curse he’d gifted me, and with the boy gasping on my back, I swam. The bank was too tall, the current too swift, and so we ran with it, along a rising shore, searching for the others.
“And then, like a hammer on my skull, I felt him.
“Lonely dark and nightmare deep. The weight of blood-soaked centuries on the backs of my eyes. I peered into the gloom above and I saw him, smelled him, felt him, stalking along the high-flung bank like the father of all wolves. Clad in a long frockcoat and silken frills, a blood-red hunter just a few feet and a thousand miles from his kill.
“Danton Voss.
“The rapids rushed swift, but he flitted tree to tree, licking dagger-bright teeth and watching with large, liquid eyes. Dior saw him too, and I heard the boy gasp as Danton’s gaze fell on him. Hand outstretched.
“‘Come here, Dior,’ the vampire breathed.
“‘Listen to nothing he says,’ I warned, paddling backward from the bank.
“‘Come to me.’
“‘He’s Voss, he’ll get into your head,’ I hissed, kicking hard to keep us afloat. ‘Think of nonsense, think of nothing. Fill your mind with noise, loud as you can.’
“The vampire held Dior in his black gaze, and I felt the boy tense like steel. But strangely, I saw Danton’s eyes narrow, his fingers clench. Dior stared back, ashen white hair plastered across his eyes, but I could tell in a heartbeat that, somehow, he was the stronger. That for all the centuries in Danton’s veins, the lad’s mind was a locked room.
“‘’Tis true, then.’ The vampire smiled, bewildered. ‘All true…’
“I kicked away into the rapids, ever closer to the northern shorel
ine. Danton followed on the babbling river’s edge, dark eyes swallowing Dior whole.
“‘I’ve no wish to hurt thee,’ the Beast vowed. “’Pon my royal blood, I swear it, boy. My dread father bids me spirit thee to his side. A black crown shall he place upon thy brow, and do thee homage, as a priest to Gods of old. Fear. Pain. Hatred. Dread sovereign of all this shalt thou be. The Forever King himself shall bow to thee, Dior.’
“‘Dead tongues heeded are Dead tongues tasted,’ I spat.
“‘Worthless wretch,’ the vampire snarled. ‘I speak not to thee.’ One hand, pale as marble, still extended. ‘Come to me, Dior. And I will show thee a life undreamed of.’
“I felt the boy tense on my shoulders. And for one terrible moment, I thought he might let go. But instead, half-drowned, wheezing, he pulled himself up and spat like poison.
“‘F-fuck you.’
“The Beast of Vellene’s lips twisted in a dark smile.
“‘You must say please, love.’
“Danton lowered his hand. His eyes fell on mine, and I could taste it between us—all that blood unspilled. What we each had stolen, and then had stolen from us in kind. The vampire pressed tongue to teeth and spoke into the black rainbows between us.
“‘Thou shouldst have stayed buried, de León…’
“We reached the northern bank, low enough to the waterline that we could stagger onto it. I helped Dior, dragging the boy through the shallows by his collar before dumping him on the shore. When I turned to face Danton again, he was gone. But his shadow remained, heavy and cold as the water and blood pouring off me in floods. The Beast had forever, but he wouldn’t keep me waiting that long. Still, he’d given me one more kernel. One more sign of how desperately important Dior seemed to be to these bastards.
“They want him alive …
“I glanced to the shivering rat at my feet. ‘You aright, boy?’
“‘I’m all r-right,’ he wheezed.
“‘Because you look like shit twice stepped in.’
“Dior squinted up at me and coughed. ‘We look n-nothing alike, hero.’
“I almost laughed, shaking my head in wonder at his front. ‘Most folk would spare a merci for the man who just saved their lives, Lachance.’
