The grafter’s forearm thrust upward and blocked the blow, opening Rone up for retaliation. Kazen landed a fist on Rone’s sternum. Rone slipped back, his shoes still wet with blood, and wheezed.
Kazen launched at him, throwing another fist, which Rone blocked just as Kazen had blocked his blow. Kazen kicked; Rone blocked with a knee. Threw a fist. Blocked. Kazen returned the gesture.
It was a dance Sandis had come to recognize. Kazen had always been so hands-off until tonight. She’d never realized he knew seugrat. She tried to find a way in, a way to slow Kazen, but the men moved too quickly. When she launched at him, a wayward kick hit her side and sent her skimming across the floor, just outside the blood pool.
Kazen deflected a blow and grabbed Rone’s wrist, turning it over his head as if they were dance partners. He pinned Rone’s arm behind his back, and from the way Rone’s face contorted, it hurt dearly. Sandis’s own hand pressed to her side, to the bruising ribs there. Each breath strained against the bones, threatening to snap them one by one.
The flicker of silver made Sandis’s breath hitch. A knife. Kazen’s. Its point pressed into the skin below Rone’s ear. A trickle of blood traced the side of his neck.
“Kazen.” Sandis’s voice was oddly even. She pushed herself onto her knees. “Kazen, don’t.”
“You cannot thwart destiny.” Kazen’s voice was breathy, his eyes wild. “You’re a sick dog, Sandis, crawling back to those who have already disposed of you.”
Rone’s jaw clenched at the words. Slowly, so slowly, his free hand moved to his trouser pocket.
“Kazen.” Sandis tried to stand, but her bare feet slipped in a smear of blood, and she fell. Her toe touched something cool and metal—the ceremonial sword. She turned back to Kazen. Put one foot under her. “Kazen, listen. I’ll do it.”
“Oh, you will. You don’t even realize what you’ve done. What I will do.” He dug the knife in harder, sending more blood down Rone’s neck. Sandis gasped.
Rone shifted from the pain—but no, he was using the movement to shove his hand into his pocket without Kazen noticing. He pulled out three familiar gold loops surrounding a sparkling center. The amarinth? Had the other she’d seen been a fake?
Sandis glanced at the sword beside her.
With a flick of his thumb, Rone spun the artifact.
Kazen peered over Rone’s shoulder.
Sandis’s hands flashed to the sword. Grabbed its hilt. Her sticky feet found purchase on the floor, and she ran, holding the long blade like she would a rifle, its pommel pressed under her shoulder.
She screamed as she ran.
The point drove into Rone’s belly above the navel, sliding through shirt and skin like they were butter. There was the slightest resistance as it glanced off what Sandis guessed to be his backbone, then further resistance as it met a well-tailored vest, skin, muscle, organs.
Sandis crashed into Rone, the sword buried into him up to the guard, the length of the blade passing through his torso and Kazen’s.
Sandis let go and stumbled back, the gentle whirring of the amarinth singing between her heavy breaths. Kazen looked at her, his pale eyes perfect circles, his mouth slack.
Rone pushed forward, pulling the sword out of Kazen before grabbing the hilt and yanking it out of himself. The blood that stained his shirt was from what the ox and Galt had left on the blade; otherwise, Rone was whole.
Kazen fell to his knees, then forward, onto his hands. Down onto one elbow as the life dripped out of him.
Rone leaned forward and put a hand on his shoulder. “Better luck next time.”
He spun around and grabbed Sandis’s hand, yanking her toward the door.
That’s right. Run. They had to run.
Sandis looked back at Kazen, saw a sliver of him as they passed through the doorway. There was no one in the hallway. Had Rone disposed of them all? Had they fled? The vessels . . . were they still in their room? And Alys. They’d left Alys . . .
Around the bend. Past the doors. One man looked up from an adjoining corridor as they flew past. He didn’t fight, but gaped at the blood-covered girl and the man dressed like one of them. Everything whizzed by Sandis as if in a dream. The rooms, the colors, the fight at the exit as Rone spun and jabbed, taking out men she didn’t have the thought to count.
They ran, ran, ran, underneath a black, smoke-filled sky. Until her bare feet bled. Until the guns shooting behind them silenced and there was only her, Rone, their breaths, and her frantic, broken heartbeat.
Chapter 26
Sandis picked a sliver from her foot as Rone scooped water from a horse trough into his mouth. They were at a stable behind an inn about a half mile from the east city gate. Water dripped from Sandis’s hair and clothes. The blood still stained them, and she thought she felt some scabbing at the roots of her hair, but she was so tired she couldn’t bring herself to scrub anymore. The sky was beginning to lighten at the very edges, and a breeze brushed by. Sandis gritted her teeth to keep them from shivering.
Rone scrubbed his face, kneeling over the trough.
Ignoring her aching feet, Sandis stood and walked away, hugging herself to keep the warmth in. She limped on both legs. At least the markings on her arms were gone, though blood still painted a line under her fingernails and toenails.
She made it out to the street, lit by lamps on the outsides of buildings, before Rone’s tired shuffle sounded behind her. He caught up with her, out of breath.
She kept walking.
“Sandis—”
“You can go.” She didn’t look at him. They passed under a lamp, and another breeze raised gooseflesh on her back, reminding her that she still wore her vessel’s shirt, exposing her script to the world. She should have panicked, but she was too tired. Instead, she reached back, grabbed the loose folds of fabric, and tugged them together at the base of her neck, where Ireth’s broken name tattooed her skin.
“I’m not going to leave.”
“Yes, you will.”
Rone sloughed off his jacket and handed it to her. She didn’t want to take it. Didn’t want the smell of him enfolding her, his residual warmth protecting her from the chill. But she couldn’t let anyone see her script. Especially now, when she had so few defenses to call upon.
So she took the jacket and pulled it over her wet shirt. She walked. He followed.
“A thank-you would be nice,” he said.
She stopped and turned toward him. “You can have it back.” She began removing the jacket.
Rone held up a hand. “Not for the jacket. For the rescue.”
Sandis stared at him. A single, hard cough—or was it a laugh?—ripped up her throat.
“Thank you? Thank you?” she asked, sour energy fueling her voice. “Why should I thank you? You’re the reason I was there, Rone.”
Tears burned her eyes, and she turned away from him, walking forward with new vigor if only to hide them. She brushed them away like stray embers from a fire.
“Sandis.” He jogged to catch up with her. “You don’t understand. My mother—”
“I hope you didn’t leave her in Gerech.”
He looked like she’d slapped him. “Of course I didn’t! Look, I came back for you. It’s just . . .” He groaned. “It’s messed up. It’s a heaping pile of crap, and I can’t sort it out one way or another. But I came back for you. I couldn’t let . . .”
He choked on the words. Silence fell between them. Sandis hugged herself and kept walking, her feet numb. Her eyes on the street. Somewhere, a block away, a horse pulled a wagon, or perhaps a carriage, judging by the sound.
Rone wiped his hand down his face. “We’ll fix this. We’ll sort it out. Kazen’s dead, so you’re free, and we’ll figure out this stuff with Ireth—”
“Ireth is gone.”
Rone stopped. Sandis didn’t, forcing him to catch up once more. “What do you mean?”
She wheeled on him again. “What do you think I mean, Rone? Use your head. A bound vessel can only be
used to summon the numen she’s bound to. Kazen couldn’t summon Kolosos into my body unless Ireth was gone.”
“Keep your voice down.”
She scowled at him. Crossed the street to put space between them.
Rone caught up once more. “Gone? Like dead?”
Tears clouded her vision. God’s tower, Sandis was so tired of tears. “You can’t kill a numen. They’re immortal.” Her throat constricted. “He’s been bound to someone else.”
Saying the words out loud tore at her insides, like Isepia had attacked her instead of Kazen. She’d left Alys alone, again. She sucked in a deep breath to steady herself. Trudged forward.
“Oh, Sandis. I’m sorry.”
“You should be.”
Rone sighed. “Where are you going?”
She didn’t answer. Passed two homeless people sleeping huddled together on the street corner.
“Sandi—” He stopped. Sandis kept walking until Rone uttered, “No. No . . . no, no, no.”
She turned around. “What?” The word whipped from her mouth.
Rone checked his trouser pockets, then his shirt. Darted to Sandis and grabbed her—no, the jacket. He checked the pockets, inside and out.
“Take it off.”
His panic pushed away her questions. She slid it off, keeping her back to a shop’s wall to prevent any lurkers from seeing light glinting off the thick gold marks. Rone turned the jacket inside out. Shook it. Squeezed the fabric in his hands. Dropped it and checked his pockets again.
Curse words spilled from his mouth the way blood had spilled from Galt.
“It’s not here,” he said, and Sandis’s stomach sank. “It’s not here.”
She stepped closer. “The amarinth?”
He checked his pockets yet again, then grabbed fistfuls of his hair. “It’s not here. I must have dropped it—”
His face paled. “I don’t remember grabbing it.” He shook his head. “You . . . Kazen fell, and I grabbed you, and I didn’t take the amarinth. It must still be there. We have to go—”
“Rone.”
He looked up at her.
Every inch of Sandis had turned to stone. Her eyes would fall from her head if she opened them any wider.
“You left it,” she whispered.
“We can go back for it. We can—”
She lunged forward and grabbed fistfuls of his shirt. “Was it still spinning? Rone, was it still spinning?”
“What? I don’t know, I didn’t see—”
Sandis fell to her knees, her mouth dry, her heart pounding in her ears.
“Sandis? Sandis!” Rone knelt in front of her.
She shook her head. “Kazen. If Kazen took it . . . You spun it right in front of him.”
He grabbed her shoulders. “Kazen is dead.”
“If he took it while it was still spinning . . .”
Rone’s eyes widened. She met them. “Does it work that way, Rone? Does it transfer?”
He swallowed. “I don’t know.”
Anvils pressed into her chest. Sandis dug her nails into the cobblestones, struggling to breathe. Kazen could have taken the amarinth. No, knowing him, he had taken it. He had seen his salvation . . . if the amarinth was still spinning . . . if its powers could transfer . . .
Then Kazen was alive. He was still alive.
She couldn’t breathe.
“Hey. Hey.” Rone rubbed her back. “Inhale, Sandis. Come on. It’s . . .” He hesitated. “It’s so unlikely . . .”
If Kazen was alive, then more grafters could be recruited. She would be hunted. The other vessels would be used, maybe they’d be killed, one after another, as Kazen sought to find a host for Kolosos. And the amarinth . . . how would they get the amarinth back?
She had lost Ireth, and now Rone had lost his immortality.
Rone’s hand stilled on her back. She looked up. Judging by the horrified look on his face, he had come to the same conclusion.
But he shook his head. “It’s unlikely. I just dropped it. It’s . . .” He didn’t finish his sentence.
They sat like that, together, in between shops, for a long time. Until Sandis’s hyperventilating made her lightheaded and she forced her breaths to lengthen, deepen. She couldn’t think like this. She wouldn’t.
But she had nowhere else to go. No one left to trust.
Except.
Blinking, Sandis pulled away from Rone and grabbed the jacket. The dawn was coming, and the first-shift bells would ring soon. Donning the jacket, she scanned the area, gaining her bearings.
North. She needed to go north and . . . west.
She crossed the street.
“Sandis,” Rone called after her, but when she didn’t stop, he peeled himself off the road and followed. “Sandis, I can get it back. I can—”
“Then go.”
He drew back like her words hurt. Why? He’d already thrown her away. He didn’t care about her or what she said or thought or felt. Why feign the hurt now, when he’d already gotten what he wanted?
The amarinth wasn’t hers. It never had been. It was Rone’s problem.
“Sandis.” He grabbed her arm.
She wrenched it from his grasp. “I’m going to find Talbur.”
He rolled his eyes. Rolled his eyes! Fury burned her hotter than any of Ireth’s visions.
So she ran. Her sore feet slammed into the cobblestones. She ran past a group of factory workers dragging their tired bodies to work. Past a dog sniffing around an overflowing garbage bin.
Ran until her lungs burned and forced her to stop. She doubled over and put her hands on her knees.
She didn’t know whether to cringe or cry when Rone’s footsteps closed in on her. If only she could forget. If only she could pretend that it was all right now, that nothing bad had ever happened between them. If only she could throw the broken pieces of her heart into the gutter and ignorantly hold on to Rone’s arm, the way she had the day he’d sold her to the evilest man in Dresberg.
But she couldn’t. She couldn’t.
“Sandis.” He was wearing her name thin with how much he said it. “Where. Are. You. Going?”
“I have an address.”
He stood straighter. “What?”
Taking a deep breath, Sandis squared her shoulders and looked Rone in the eyes, forcing herself not to feel anything.
That much, at least, she could pretend.
“I found the bank record in Kazen’s office. The one with Talbur’s name on it. I know where he is.”
Rone planted his hands on his hips. Looked at the ground. Nodded. “All right. Where?”
“I don’t need any more of your favors, Rone.”
His expression darkened. “Where?”
She pressed her lips together. Held his gaze for a long moment, until the intensity of it forced her to look away. “Fourteen Magdara.”
She started walking again, ignoring the waking flies on the garbage bins she passed.
“Wait, what?” Rone called behind her. He sprinted in front of her, forcing her to stop. “What did you say?”
“I was clear, wasn’t I? Fourteen Magdara. It was a recent record. I’m going.”
His jaw slackened. Sandis stepped around him.
“Stop.” He grabbed her arm.
Again, she wrenched it free and kept walking.
“Sandis, for the love of the Celestial, stop!”
She stopped. Glared at him. “Why? Why should I?”
His eyes were wide, his face slack. He looked young, vulnerable. Sandis thought to reach out to him, but both arms remained glued to her sides.
“Because,” he said, low and dark, “that’s the address of the man who hired me to turn you in.”
Of all the things Rone could have said, those were the last words she expected.
She retreated. “You’re lying.”
“I’m not.”
“Then it’s a shared building—”
“It’s a single-story office space with a basement,” he pressed.
“Outdated. Barely enough room for a small shop. If he used that address on the bank record, then he either owns the place or is the sole renter.”
Sandis shook her head. “You’re lying.”
Rone sighed, his shoulders slumping. “Why, after everything I’ve done, would I lie about this?”
She didn’t know. She didn’t know anything about him. Not anymore.
“Fourteen Magdara,” Rone repeated. “It’s the same. I’d show you the paper if I still had it.”
“I’m going anyway.”
The declaration surprised her as much as it did Rone. Silence cut the space between them for only a second before Rone threw his hands into the air. “Are you insane?”
They must have been close to a clock tower, for the first gong of the hour vibrated down Sandis’s body and into the cobblestones.
“I’m going.” Second gong.
Rone shook his head. Turned away from her. Third gong. Spun back.
“He sold you.” Fourth gong.
Sandis glowered. “You sold me.” Fifth.
Roan growled. “That’s not fair.”
Now Sandis threw out her arms. “How is that not fair?”
Sixth gong, and the clock quieted.
Rone winced. Rubbed his eyes. “Fine. Fine. But I’m going with you. I don’t trust the guy.”
Sandis scoffed.
“You’re going the wrong way.” He turned around and trudged back for the main street. “Unless you want to get caught in the red-light district.”
Sandis opened her mouth, closed it. Balled her hands into fists.
Ignoring the splintering in her chest, she followed him.
The building wasn’t grand in the slightest. It was an old structure in an even older part of town. Nondescript, wedged next to a set of flats with updated windows and fancy, curling eaves. An iron fence surrounded it on three sides. The sky was overcast, so even with the sun up, everything looked gray and dreary.
But appearances could be deceiving. Sandis had learned that in the hardest way possible.
“Are you sure?”
She didn’t look at him. Didn’t respond.
She should be the one to open the door. She half expected to find it locked, but the handle turned easily with a little pressure.
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