The Complete Marked Series Box Set

by March McCarron

  “Ma was never the same after da was killed. She went a bit wrong in the head, convinced herself that Quade was a sweet boy and that I was just being ‘sullen.’ Quade liked that, really fed off her addle-minded affection.

  “That Da Un Marcu when he was marked was the finest day of my young life. I should have been scared, that a boy like him would receive some special ability, would learn to fight. But that he was leaving was all I thought of, that we would finally be rid of him. The day he left, I must have gone a little insane, thinking I would never see him again—or hoping. I did the stupidest and bravest thing of my young life. Before he got on the carriage, I pulled him aside as if to wish him well. When I hugged him, I whispered in his ear all the things I’d always wished I could say.

  “I wanted to hurt him, even just a little, for all the hurts he’d dealt me and others. I used to think about it, late at night, staring at my bedroom ceiling, what exactly I would say to hurt him. I knew that saying I hated him or feared him would cause no pain, on the contrary he would have been pleased. No, if I hoped to hurt him I knew I needed to attack the one thing that mattered to him: his own sense of worth. So I whispered right into his ear the speech I’d practiced over and over again, protected by the crowd surrounding us. ‘Since the day you were born,’ I said, ‘I have pitied you. From your first breath, you have been a pathetic creature, incapable even of earning the love of its own family. You say you wish to be remembered? The truth is, dear brother, only those who can inspire devotion are ever truly admired or loathed enough for historians. No person could hold a cold thing like you in esteem. Your death will be as trivial as a beetle beneath a boot.’

  Peer let out a long whistle. “Spirits…”

  Beside him, Bray scribbled furiously, her lips tugged up in an appreciative smile.

  “When he shoved away from me, I saw his face and I regretted saying it instantly. You see, I’d never once seen him angry before. He had always been so cool. But, in that moment, he was utterly without control. All the veins in his neck and head protruded, his pale face turned ashen, nostrils flared—and his eyes.” She shivered. “They slitted into a look of such intense, black loathing. His mere expression made me break into a sweat. If we had been alone, I’ve no doubt he would have killed me then and there. But he could not. Instead, he boarded the carriage that would take him to the Temple, and as it pulled away, he glared out the window. He spared a parting glance for nothing but me—at me, he stared with a kind of promise, or threat more accurately, until he was out of view. I saw that look in my dreams for years afterwards.”

  Ellora took a deep breath and leaned against the table. “Things were better for a time. I had nightmares and stomach pains from the terror I couldn’t quite let go. Without da to bring home a regular income, my ma and I had to get work. I was lucky, though; after a time I got hired by Leeson College of Art—just to clean the rooms and organize the supplies and such, but I had opportunities to learn and practice too. And I began seeing Redge then, who did the two best things that one person can do for another: he loved me and he encouraged my passions. By the time Quade showed up again, we were already engaged.

  “He came as soon as he was permitted, just after turning eighteen. I remember, the instant he walked in the door, I was terrified. And then I saw his face—and it was so welcoming, so handsome and honest. And then, worse, he spoke, and his voice was like…a charm. It seeped into you, made you feel warm and content. By the time he’d crossed the room and demanded a hug from his favorite sister, I had forgotten who he truly was. I can recall feeling so glad he was there, happier for it, I was desperate to tend to his needs. I told him how much I missed him. My ma was just the same. She gushed, and petted his hair, and said he was the best-looking son a mother could want.

  “Later that night, he paid me back for what I had said to him.” Ellora lifted her maimed hand from her lap, turning it back and forth so the sunshine highlighted all of the scars, the misshapen bulges of poorly healed fractures, the missing fingers. “He took what I loved most—my art. He spent hours at it, the most painful of my life. But what was worse, he made me ask for it, made me beg, made me say that I…that I liked it. It sounds insane, I know…”

  “No,” Peer said—he sounded calm, but his heart rate accelerated. He rolled up the sleeve of his shirt to reveal the criss-crossing white scars.

  She stared at his arm for a long moment, then squeezed her eyes shut. “I’m sorry for that,” she half-whispered.

  “’S no fault of yours.”

  A tear slipped down her cheek and she visibly collected herself. “He came often after that. He was working on an archeological dig out at Easterly Point, but he’d come once a month or so. He’d torment me and I’d enjoy it. I’d beg him to stay. I’d miss him when he left for a while, but then his effect would fade and I’d be horrified. I tried to hide from him once, unsuccessfully. He found me before I’d gotten far from Leeson, made me regret trying to leave.

  “Redge was worried. He thought, at first, I was only depressed about what had happened to my hand—a purported accident. I tried to break it off with him. I didn’t want him to get pulled in too. I didn’t want him to suffer for me. But Redge wouldn’t be written off so easily. He pressed, and eventually I told him all of it.” She smiled and shrugged. “That he even believed me is still a wonder. Anyway, we arranged it together, in the end. Acquired new identities, snuck away in the night. We went on foot until we were far enough away to not fear a talkative coachmen.

  “That was the end of it—at least I hope that is the end of it. We eventually found our way here, established the art school. It’s been nearly two decades since I’ve seen my brother, but a week does not pass that I do not wake in a cold sweat, terrified and convinced he’s found me at last.”

  Having finished her tale, Ellora breathed heavily through her mouth several times, her shoulders slackened.

  Bray worked her hand open and closed to ease a cramp. She slouched deeper in her seat, a thoughtful dimple appearing above her left brow. “I can’t figure him out,” she said, her tone frustrated. “If he has no empathy for his victims, why does he bother making them like him? People who are indifferent to the feelings of others sometimes put on a charming face when it’s necessary for manipulation, but they don’t keep up the facade when it’s no longer needed.”

  “Power.”

  Peer angled forward so he could see Su-Hwan, who, having been out of sight and silent for so long, he had forgotten was present.

  “I think he sees it as the ultimate sense of dominance—to make those you harm love you. It sustains him, the good opinion of others. He gets high off of it, like a drug.” Unwillingly, Peer thought of the manic expression in Quade’s face as he cut him. He had to agree. “I suspect he took those words of yours to heart. He believed that he must be seen in a positive light if he hoped to build a following. He wanted it enough to be gifted in that way.”

  “Do you have any idea,” Bray asked, looking up at Ellora, “what his ultimate goal is? Where does this end in his mind?”

  Ellora shook her head. “To be remembered, I suppose, is what he wants most. Remembered for what, I do not know. I shudder to think.” She stood, wiping her palms on her dress. “I think that is enough for today, if you don’t mind. I have a painting class in a few minutes.” She gave a nervous laugh. “It’s silly I know, but I always have the fear that he’s like the Spiritblighter in children’s stories—that if you speak of him too often, he will appear.” She pushed her chair in and turned to the door, pausing with her hand on the knob. “I’m making a roast for dinner, you’ll join us won’t you?” And with that, she quitted the room.

  “It makes you wonder, does it not?” Su-Hwan asked, her tone too flat to actually sound inquisitive.

  “Hm?” Bray asked, clearly lost in her own thoughts.

  “Why the marked are chosen. Why Quade Asher, of all people, should have been Chisanta?”

  Peer had not been thinking anything so lar
ge-scale as this, but once the question was raised his mind shifted in that direction. It did seem a cruel act of fate, to give a man like Quade such an ability. Of course, Peer could never understand why he himself had been marked either. He was unexceptional, certainly not deserving of such a distinction.

  “I’m willing to bet his sister is a soft spot,” Bray said, tapping her pen a few times to get rid of excess ink. “She’s probably his ‘one that got away.’”

  Peer ran fingers along the scars on his arms, his gaze out the window, towards the docks. There were children running up and down the planks, their laughter carrying on the wind. He had to respect Ellora Asher—she had somehow carved happiness out of a miserable life. If only all people could be so fortunate.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Yarrow returned to himself in slow, disorienting steps. First, he became aware of the earth beneath his knees, of the quiet and stillness around him.

  Jae-In?

  But the face that his mind summoned, before even his own name, was not hers—this face was fair, fiery-eyed, her mouth set with a kind of wry self-assuredness. Bray.

  “Are you alright, my friend?”

  Yarrow swiveled to the sound of Adearre’s voice, and the rest of his wits were restored. He was not Charlem Bowtar at all, he was Yarrow Lamhart. Charlem was long, long gone from this world. The thought was a wrenching one.

  “I appear to be.” Yarrow pushed himself to his feet. He eyed the Confluence with his bottom lip clenched between his teeth—he felt it again, the sense of regret, a dereliction of duty. Only now, he fully grasped the cause. “Why did they do it? Why burn man’s connection to the Spirits?”

  Adearre pursed his lips. “Resentment, mostly, at being denied. A not totally unfounded sentiment. Once, long before what you witnessed, the Tree Guard had let all men and women enter. Only after an incident that threatened the Confluence did they reinterpret their mission of protection as a mission to isolate.”

  Yarrow could appreciate their fear, given its eventual realization. The sacredness of this place made him want to hide its existence, too. If people knew—knew that they could speak to the dead, could receive gifts of knowledge—they would come in droves, the good and the bad alike. It made Yarrow ill, the idea of someone like Quade stepping foot here, tapping into the secrets this space held, sullying this hallowed air with the vileness of his presence.

  “If Bray or Peer were to come here, would they be able to speak with you as well?”

  “I believe so. If you would not mind, could you pass that fact on to Peer for me, love? I have words he needs to hear.”

  “Yes, of course.” Yarrow shook his head, a crease forming between his brows. “It’s hard to comprehend how our kind could have forgotten this. How could we have lost track of what we…are?”

  He thought of the concept of bevolders, spirit-mates. A smile trembled on the corner of his lips. It was new information, and yet somehow it seemed as if he’d already known, had always known. What he and Bray had felt from the very start—it was something that went far beyond attraction.

  My spirit recognizing its other half in her.

  “You two were lucky,” Adearre said, once again seemingly reading his mind. “To have been of the same year, to have been put in the same carriage. Most never meet their spirit-mate. We have so foolishly remained divided, and in doing so have robbed ourselves of our greatest gift. In a strange way, Quade’s insanity has done some small good. Having kept Chiona and Cosanta together, some of those children have found their other halves, though they do not understand why they feel such a tug to another—an opposite.”

  “Does Quade know of this?”

  “Do you believe him attuned to matters of the heart?”

  Yarrow snorted humorlessly. “Indeed not. Fair point.” Looking up, he noticed that Adearre’s visage had faded, sunlight piercing his form. “You’re leaving?”

  Adearre’s golden eyes flicked down to take in the increasing transparency of his hands. The tips of each of his long, slender fingers had nearly disappeared. “I am being pulled back, it would seem.”

  Yarrow’s chest tightened. This was likely the last conversation they would have. He felt there were significant things he should say in this, his final opportunity, and yet his mind could summon nothing, significant or otherwise.

  “Remain strong, my friend.” Adearre said, his voice growing distant and tinny. “Do not allow yourself to become the monster you oppose. And tell Peer—” His voice diminished beyond hearing, his body growing fainter than a shadow before vanishing entirely, leaving Yarrow, once again, alone.

  He exhaled mightily, then drew a deep breath, hoping to fill the hollowness within him. It seemed a cavernous void, in that moment. So many losses—his own, Adearre’s, Charlem’s. He could not help but linger on the indiscriminate nature of suffering and death. That people like Adearre and Jae-In should die young—it was a bitter injustice, not just for those taken from life too soon, but for the world that would be darker for their absence.

  Mustn’t let such thoughts distract me, Yarrow reminded himself with a second heaving exhalation. He opened his sack and rooted for pen, ink, and paper. There will be time enough for grieving later.

  He slipped a square of dried beef into his mouth and heard his jaw pop as he chewed. Then he set about his task. Dipping his pen in the ink and tapping off the excess with a soft clink, clink, he considered where to begin. It was a daunting prospect, endeavoring to transcribe an experience that he had smelt, touched…lived, in mere words. He’d never had a skill for such things. Still, it was knowledge that needed preserving, so he began at the start—with Charlem Bowtar dodging constables in the bustling streets of Nerra—committing the story to ink as best he could while the details remained fresh.

  Time passed immeasurably, as the sun overhead never strayed from its zenith. Page after page filled with Yarrow’s tight, slanting script. He breathed easier as he wrote on—the smell of the ink, the feeling of the pen in his hand, even the knot forming in his right shoulder blade, all soothingly familiar.

  As he neared the end of Charlem’s tale, Yarrow’s hand abruptly stalled with a startled jerk, a blot of black ink spreading like blood from his pen point. His heart galloped into motion.

  Within his mind, alarms rang—the knells of fear, pain, panic. His parents and siblings.

  Yarrow jammed his notes in his sack, abandoned his ink and pen in the grass. With a definitive pop, the Aeght a Seve vanished, and Glans Heath exploded before him.

  He materialized in the lawn before his childhood home. His mouth and nose instantly burned from smoke, his sight streamed as wind blew ash in his eyes. It was ablaze—his home, his family’s shelter.

  There was screaming, not within the house, but coming from two covered wagons sitting in the drive. He had only a second to absorb all of this before his ear detected a faint whiz and a stinging pain lanced his neck.

  He peered down, to glimpse a feather. A dart?

  Even as his mind understood, it began to slip. His vision pulled to the side, lost its sharpness. A figure approached, a black shadow against the bright fire. Yarrow focused his mind on a point in the distance and tried to teleport, but it was no use. His knees hit the dirt.

  The notes, he managed to think. Can’t let Quade…

  With the last of his energy, he swung his sack from his shoulder towards the flames. His face thunked against the dirt, but before darkness consumed him, he saw the canvas of his bag alight.

  Thank the Spirits…

  Ko-Jin glided through the forms of the Ada Chae, bare feet tracing patterns in the damp sand, Taking Flight shifting fluidly into Graze Leg. To his left, the ocean lapped at the shore. At his back, the ruin of a foundered ship poked forlornly from the sand, stark and solemn as a tombstone, a thing he did not like to look at. Overhead, the sun shone hot and bright, as if to compensate for its infrequent presence of late. Slow Lash transitioned into Wafting Arms. His tension eased.

  The Aeght
a Seve beckoned him—a call he rarely answered. There was bodily vulnerability in seeking mental retreat. Fist through Sand, Lover’s Quarrel. The hush and peace of the beach was so preferable to the cottage, he was tempted to pitch a tent. Anything to be away from the quarreling, the clanging and heat—Dedrre was hard at work on some new invention, a firearm of some kind. Ko-Jin hadn’t realized how noisy such work could be. Foreigner’s Negation, Warm Hands Over Fire. He supposed tinkering was to Dedrre what calisthenics were to him, necessary for the preservation of sanity. He only wished Dedrre’s sanity would not come at the expense of everyone else’s.

  Ko-Jin turned, beginning the forms once again, but dropped his arms when he saw a figure approaching: Chae-Na, plain skirts tugging in the wind.

  Ko-Jin pulled his shirt back over his head. “Anything wrong?”

  “No,” she called back, picking up her pace. Then, when she’d reached him, “I merely had an aching head, so I came for a walk.”

  He snorted. “Understandable. Jo-Kwan?”

  “Reading, still.”

  Ko-Jin nodded and offered his arm to her. She smiled and slipped her hand in the crook of his elbow, and they began to stroll up the shore. “Quite the scholar, isn’t he? Could almost out-read Yarrow.”

  The princess sighed. “He tends to become rather…immersed, once he has a notion. Those books, he would never have had access to them before. His tutors would never permit anything that questions the monarchy.”

  “You sound like you don’t approve.”