by David Estes
The child smiled, and Roan smiled back, making a funny face.
Roan couldn’t help it; it was kind of nice knowing more than the two scholars for once.
“You look like a dog who just dug up a bone,” Windy said. “Tea?”
She held a long-handled pot in the air. “Yes, please,” he said, though he only said it to avoid an argument over the “benefits” of the foul concoction.
While Windy poured him a sludgy cup, he said, “There’s another fatemarked we didn’t know about.”
His words had the intended effect: Windy stopping mid-pour, nearly spilling the tea, and Yela looked up from her reading.
Roan knew it was he who was being dramatic now, but he let the silence extend as the information sunk in. Windy, however, was never patient when it came to knowledge. “If you don’t tell us this instant I’m going to dump the contents of this pot over your head.”
“Rhea’s daughter,” Roan said.
Windy’s eyes lit up like she’d just been given a prestigious scholarship award. “Yes,” she said. “I remember something…”
“What?” Yela asked. “There was no mention of a child anywhere in the literature.”
“There was,” Windy said. “But I didn’t tell you. Either of you.”
Roan gripped the table, trying hard to keep his voice even. “What are you talking about?” This was becoming a pattern with Lady Windy, who believed in the literal meaning of ‘knowledge is power,’ hording information like a miser might collect sacks of gold.
“I’ve got it somewhere…” Windy said, scrounging around in the several pockets on the outside of her dirty frock. “Ah, there!” She extracted a torn scrap of parchment, pinched between thumb and forefinger.
Yela audibly gasped—she seemed more shocked by the fact that her tutor had defaced a book than anything else.
“What does it say?” Roan asked, fearing his firm grip might break chunks off the edge of the wooden table.
Windy quoted from the scrap. “‘Preceding the Fall of All Things, a child shall be born, and she shall be marked with peace, the bringer of death before life, tragedy before triumph, and the final rulers shall fall. They shall fall. Such is their fate.’” Windy looked up. “Kind of pessimistic, don’t you think?”
Fifty
The Southern Empire, Phanea
Shae Arris
“You heard what I heard,” Erric said. “What Roan Loren showed us.”
“Yes,” Shae said, trying to think. She was counting lives. Hers. Erric’s. Others too—Roan and Lisbeth and Sir Dietrich and Gwendolyn and yes, even Bane. Seven. A lucky number, some would say. Seven deaths to save the Four Kingdoms.
But seven was wrong, for there was another now. A child.
Stop thinking about her like she’s someone else’s baby! she thought fiercely. She’s Grey’s. She’s your niece.
“Shae?” Erric said.
She knew what he would say, that she needed to take emotion out of the decision, needed to think about things logically. Seven—no, eight—deaths? After all the war, the killing, the blood spilled and vengeance wrought…eight versus the multitudes should’ve been an easy decision.
Instead it was impossible.
“We can’t do this,” she said.
“We must consider it.”
“Must we?” she snapped. “Because I thought we already had, back in Pirate’s Peril. We agreed it was too drastic, that the failsafe was created by the Oracle to be used as a last resort.”
Erric’s voice was so calm it was infuriating, and Shae wondered if this was how Grey had felt after he’d been reunited with her only to realize that she had changed into a stranger he had to get to know all over again. “Everything is different now. Bane was a known threat, and he was acting alone. But this man, this leader of the Horde…he has an army. You saw what Lisbeth showed us. You saw the darkness in their hearts. They have no compassion. No mercy. If we fight them, even if all the fatemarked and nations ally themselves together, thousands will die. Maybe tens of thousands. I’m only asking the question: Are we willing to sacrifice so many when we could end everything right now?”
Shae’s wall crumbled. “I—” Oh Grey. This world is a harsh place and getting harsher. “I don’t know.”
Fifty-One
The Southern Empire, Phanea
Shanti Parthena Laude
Shanti had been running from the harsh truths of a harsher world her entire life. When her entire family had been enslaved, she’d fought back. When she’d been abused, she’d vowed vengeance. When they’d taken her family from her, she’d put that vengeance into action, breaking the Slave Master’s magical chains, which no others had been able to break.
But now, Shanti could run no longer. Hiding wasn’t an option either, for she’d seen the truth. They’d freed the slaves. They’d defeated the slave-loving Phanecians. They’d accomplished the impossible. And yet it wasn’t enough—was never enough. Jai Jiroux had still died. The Horde was still coming to destroy them all. She still remembered the images cast into her mind by Roan and Lisbeth. The barbarians moved with unspent violence. They would not kill with mercy, instead drawing out each murder with pleasure. In particular, she sensed, they would delight in the deaths of the hundreds of Phanecian and Teran children she now watched playing in the canyons.
Shadows sliced across the terrain as the sun moved on, each seeming to impale one of the children.
A swift death is a mercy, she thought. The only mercy we have left.
Procuring the fireroot had been too easy. Her position as lead engineer of all things explosive proffered her a certain level of trust amongst those guarding the supplies, including the powder. Once, the sacks of fireroot had been used by the slaves in the mines, blasting away rock to discover precious metals and gemstones.
Now it will be our salvation, she thought, watching the ghosts moving amongst the children in the canyon below.
She tried not to think about what Jai would think of her, because that didn’t matter now, right? He was dead. Gone. Nothing could bring him back.
Shanti placed another satchel of fireroot powder in the small cave she was watching from, careful to hide it behind a jutting rock. It was the fiftieth she’d planted already. Only a couple hundred more to go, and then her work would be finished.
And then I shall save them all, she thought.
Fifty-Two
The Southern Empire, Phanea
Rhea Loren
Rhea felt electrified, like lightning was running through her. She was also having trouble breathing. The former was because she’d finally shared her secret about Noura’s fatemark. The latter was because of the fear of losing her.
So innocent, she thought. She wished the world could be a different place, a place safe for her daughter to grow up in. Then again, Rhea also knew she had helped to create this very world.
Noura was an angel sleeping, and Rhea could almost see the outlines of her wings folded around her. She laughed lightly at her own imagination. The torch set close to the bassinet danced from a light breeze, flashing its light across the sleeping babe. Images flared from her cheek but then the torchlight moved on and her skin was just skin again. Why her? she wondered, for the thousandth time. After everything, why does it have to be my daughter?
Rhea took a deep, shuddering breath. It had to be somebody’s daughter. The better question was: Why not mine?
Rhea thought of the good people she had known in her life. Loyal, honorable people who always seemed to do the right thing. Ennis. Roan. Gareth Ironclad. Even Gwendolyn Storm. All people who would make the right choice if Noura were their child. She isn’t just yours, she thought. She’s his too. The thought gave her some comfort because, yes, Grey was good. Pure hearted. Maybe not the old Grey, back when he was the rapscallion Grease Jolly, but the new Grey.
I’ve changed too, she thought, trying not to forget the coldhearted snake she’d been back in Knight’s End. But was the woman she’d become enough?
For a moment, Rhea couldn’t speak. He looked so…perfect. Dashing. Like the prince she could never have. There was no blade on his missing hand, just a leather sheath. She just stared at him, feeling an ever-widening gulf between them, despite the tender moments they’d already shared. Because he would want to do the right thing with Noura, allow the fatemarked to study her and determine whether she could help them against the Horde.
Grey moved so quickly she didn’t have time to react, to consider whether she should stop him or flee or pretend to be ill or—
His arms were around her and his lips pressed against hers and she felt that familiar feeling of falling for a boy who was no longer a boy but a man, strong and experienced, scooping her up as if she weighed less than a feather and carrying her to bed while their child slept nearby.
Every touch was tender, and he didn’t try to go further than he should, not so soon after childbirth, when her body was still sore.
Tears streamed down her face as he kissed her, touched her, and eventually he felt the hot wetness between them.
He pulled back, his brow knitted with concern. And she felt it. The true feeling behind the concern, driving his every action in this moment.
Love.
“What’s wrong?” he said. “Did I hurt you?”
By the gods, she thought, her heart beating furiously. Why are you crying when this man loves you? Why are you so unbearably sad when you have everything you could ever want in a man and a child and a life?
And she knew.
Because she loved him too.
So she lied, because it was the only way to hide her true intentions from the one person she never wanted to lie to, not ever again. She lied because it was the only way to save their daughter.
“Nothing,” she said. “And no, you’ve done nothing wrong. I’m just happy. So, so happy.”
He smiled at her false words and she hated herself as he leaned in to kiss her once more.
Fifty-Three
The Southern Empire, Phanea
Shae Arris
Having the power to save the world was proving more complicated than Shae could ever imagine. More so because she shared the responsibility with a one-legged pirate king who liked to analyze every angle of every problem until the problem began to look like the solution and the solution began to resemble day-old porridge, a congealed unrecognizable mess.
“So you think we should do it?” Shae asked, hating herself for even considering the possibility.
“I didn’t say that,” Erric said, running a hand through his long sandy-brown hair. Recently he’d begun wearing it draped across his shoulders rather than tied back. It made him look older, somehow. “I said we should continue to weigh our options.”
Shae knew he wasn’t trying to be difficult, only practical. Whereas she relied more on faith and instinct, he went into his head. Usually, it was a good dynamic where they arrived at the same answer swiftly, like back in Pirate’s Peril, or in the Bloody Canyons.
Usually, but not now.
“Here are our options,” she said. “We end it right here, right now…” She couldn’t believe she was saying it, but someone had to. Erric opened his mouth to object, but she pressed a finger to his lips to silence him. It didn’t feel awkward, because they touched often to feel the power they shared. Every touch was purely platonic—he was far too old for her—but it didn’t change the fact that she felt something pure when they held hands, or fell asleep at each other’s sides. “Or,” she continued, drawing her finger back, “we stay the course, support the fatemarked in the coming battle. If the battle turns against us, we will still have the option to finish it. A last resort, like we always planned.”
Erric shook his head. “We can only use our power to strengthen the fatemarked thrice in short succession,” he said.
“Lower your voice,” she said, though they were alone. It was a secret they had only just learned themselves. During the fight for the Bloody Canyons, they’d strengthened Roan, then Lisbeth, and with their hands clasped tightly together, their energy sapped, their eyes had met and they’d both known the truth.
One more surge of power and they would both be fully drained.
In the days since the battle, they’d felt as their energy—their power—was replenished. But they also knew the same rules would apply the next time.
“We should tell them the truth,” Erric said. It was an argument they’d had on multiple occasions, but so far they’d agreed not to.
“No,” Lisbeth said. “They don’t need to know. It might sway their minds on how to proceed, and we can’t have that.”
“Fine. But we can’t end it now either. Even if all the other fatemarked agreed to it, we can’t kill a child…”
Shae wanted to argue, because what was one life—or even a hundred lives—next to the fate of the entirety of the Four Kingdoms?
But if we kill this one child in the name of peace, then what the hell are we fighting for?
“So we strengthen the fatemarked in battle,” she said. “That is our decision. Agreed?”
Erric didn’t respond for a long time, not until she took his hand in hers, immediately feeling that warmth, that energy streaming between them, until they felt of one mind.
“I don’t know,” he said, and the spell was broken.
Fifty-Four
The Southern Empire, Calypso
Raven Sandes
It was the eve before she would face her aunt in the arena, and Raven couldn’t sleep.
Whisper burst into her room, bones clanking at the doorway. She stood there for a moment, her chest heaving, like she’d run a long way. Her hands were fisted at her sides. She wore full battle leathers, her waist regaled with all manner of weaponry. Their eyes met and Raven felt like she was looking into the eyes of not only a sister but a dear friend. They’d been through so much together in such a short time. Pain, loss, victory, survival…theirs was a life of extremes.
“You are the most beautiful Sandes woman I have ever laid eyes on,” Raven said.
“I don’t want to be beautiful,” Whisper said.
“Well, you are. You always will be.” Raven took the first step to cross the gulf between them, because, after all, she was still the eldest. She had to be strong for Whisper, even when she was strong for herself.
“I’m going to kill Gat Vaid,” Whisper said.
Raven continued walking, opening her arms. “No, you’re not.” She drew Whisper’s body against hers. Though her sister’s body had developed the curves of a woman grown, she could feel the muscle and bone—the strength. Her sister stiffened, her arms taut at her sides, but then, slowly, she relaxed, roping her own arms around Raven’s back.
“I love you, sister, I hope you know that,” Raven said softly.
“I do,” Whisper said. “And I, you. More than anything in this godsforsaken world.”
“Don’t say that,” Raven said.
“Why not? It’s true. If you die on the morrow…”
“I won’t.” It was a half lie, Raven knew. Though she would fight to the death in the arena, she couldn’t promise she would emerge alive.
They broke off their embrace and Raven looked upon the changed face of a girl who’d become a woman in the pits of Zune. Though Whisper’s hair was pulled back and tied, she could still tell it had been washed and combed. She was smooth locks to Raven’s coarse hair, soft skin to Raven’s callused and scarred, gentle curves to Raven’s hard edges. And yet she was as fierce as any—she’d proven that in the pits—a Sandes through and through.
“I am proud of you, sister,” Raven said.
“Are you?” There wasn’t anger in her tone, exactly, but doubt. Raven tasted bitterness on her tongue. She deserved such a response. For too many years she’d underestimated her youngest sibling simply be
cause she liked feminine dresses and pretty colors and colorful flowers and—
“Yes,” Raven said. “So proud.”
Something changed in Whisper’s demeanor, and for a moment, a bare, naked moment, she was the young, innocent girl Raven remembered. The moment passed and Whisper stuck out her jaw. “That, above all else, means the world to me,” she said.
Raven felt the weakness in her knees, but she would not break, not in front of her sister. Showing strength was the one gift she’d always been able to give Whisper. “I need you to promise me something,” Raven said.
“Anything.”
“If I die tomorrow—”
“You won’t. You said it yourself.” Whisper’s eyes were those of a wildcat, not to be denied of its prey.
“I know. But if I do, promise me you won’t close yourself off from the world.”
“Raven, you’re not going to—”
Raven grabbed her sister’s chin, forced her to look directly into her eyes. “Promise me.”
Whisper didn’t so much as blink as she said, “I promise.”
Raven pulled her into another hug, the sound of bones clinking softly nearby as starlight illuminated their embrace.
Later, on the same sleepless night
Footsteps jarred Raven from her thoughts.
They were muffled, as if the intruder was trying to be quiet but doing a lousy job of it. Her guards should’ve stopped anyone dangerous, but she wasn’t willing to risk it, so she stole from bed to the door, sliding soundlessly into the shadows.
Darkness obliterated the moonslight through the cracks in the threaded guanik bones. A large form, big enough to fill the entire doorway. Had her aunt managed to send an assassin to do her dirty work for her? Or was this someone acting of their own volition, someone who hated the Sandes and all they stood for? Anything was a possibility at this point.
