Yarrow laughed. “As tempting as that sounds, I’m afraid I have to pass.”
Bray exchanged a sideways smile with him, full of warmth and expectation. They’d had little opportunity for intimacy, what with the world’s greatest villain as their perpetual audience. They had plans for this first evening on their own.
She was thrilled when the guards unhitched Quade’s cage from their gig. He was officially no longer Bray’s responsibility.
Their goodbyes were a rather drawn-out affair, mostly because Arlow was still trying to abscond with Yarrow.
“I’ve kept several of your books hostage. You’ll have to come for them,” Arlow said with an imperious look.
“Don’t believe him,” Mae said. “Your books are all in there, and all the new Fifth prophesies as well. Arlow figured you’d like to have them.”
Arlow crossed his arms and shook his head. “Betrayed by my own wife. Fine. Go. Abandon your dearest, oldest friend.”
Bray laughed. She couldn’t help herself. He was so ridiculous, and her heart was so light. “We’ll visit,” she promised.
Arlow wrapped her up in a hug she was not at all expecting. She stiffened for a moment, but then melted, patting his back. “Goodbye, Arlow.”
At last, they were able to make their escape. Bray clicked her tongue and switched the leads, setting off at a pace too fast to be long maintained. She wanted to distance herself from Quade with all possible speed.
“So,” Yarrow said, leaning back in the driver’s seat and snaking his arm behind her. “What next?”
She arched a brow at him. “We’re going to the Temple.”
“I thought perhaps we should marry,” he said with affected nonchalance.
“Did you, indeed?” she asked, a laugh in her voice. “I think that proposals are generally questions, not statements.”
“Are they?”
She waited for him to ask, and the quiet stretched long. He appeared to be content in his silence. She laughed. “Are you really not going to ask?”
“Well, not right now. You’re expecting it. I’ll wait.”
Still grinning, she shook her head. “And what if I ask you first?”
“I would be honored and delighted.”
She opened her mouth, as if to speak, but closed it again. Mischief danced in her eyes.
They rode along the outer perimeter of the city, towards the forest north of Accord. The air was electric, but it had not yet begun to rain. She found she didn’t mind if the weather held or not. Either way, they were together. Rain would do just as well as sunshine.
It was his turn to laugh. “Are you really not going to ask?” he said, mimicking her, his gray eyes alight.
She lifted her chin and flicked the reins. “Not right now. You’re expecting it.” She winked. “I’ll wait.”
Hooves thumped merrily against the street as they made their way. She slipped her hand into his and sighed.
The sun began its descent and turned the sky magenta. The road ahead was long and inviting. Bray sucked in fresh air with greedy lungs.
“It’s actually over, isn’t it?” Yarrow said, his voice full of wonder, as if this fact had only just occurred to him.
“Yes,” Bray said, darting a kiss on his cheek. “It’s over.”
And now we get to begin.
Queen Chae-Na drew the curtain and gazed up at a gray sky. The rain had died to a drizzle, but it was still a dreary day. Thunder rumbled faintly to the west.
“You look well,” Veldon said in his cool, gravelly voice. He leaned in the divide between his chambers and hers.
She sent a slight smile his way. “I’m glad you think so. It was difficult to choose a dress.”
She had meant the comment lightly, but the words sounded twisted and bitter—like her thoughts.
Veldon approached tentatively, as if uncertain whether she desired his company. “Is everything alright?”
She released a heavy breath. “It is. I just thought I would be…” Happier. She shook her head in self-reproach. “I am glad Quade has lost, and will be gladder still when he is dead and we can move on. But…it won’t change anything, won’t fix anything.” Her voice dropped to a whisper, “It won’t bring him back.”
Jo-Kwan. Logically, Chae-Na had known that defeating Quade wouldn’t bring her brother back to life. But now, with this gnawing sense of disappointment in her gut, she realized that some childish part of her must have believed otherwise. And now the truth sat before her, stark and unchanging.
Regardless of whether Quade lived or died, Jo-Kwan was still gone, still dead, and she would not see him again. Not in this lifetime.
“I miss him too,” Veldon said. “I cannot remember a time when he was not my friend. Now, it is like that sensation when you’ve walked into a room for a reason, but you cannot recall it. Or a dream when someone is running just ahead of you, but always turning the corner and slipping out of sight.” He cleared his throat, his cheeks warming in an endearing way. “Sorry, that was all nonsense. It’s hard to find the words.”
Chae-Na swallowed. “No, not nonsense. That is precisely what it feels like.”
She wrapped her arms around his waist and pressed her brow to his shoulder. He was solid, familiar, dear. Something like love bloomed in her heart. Veldon held her close, and they stood quietly together in their shared grief.
In the distance, bells tolled the hour. She reluctantly pulled from his embrace. “It’s time,” she said. “We should go.”
They marched down the hallway, not holding hands, but allowing their fingers to graze at irregular intervals.
Arlow and Mae were already waiting in the foyer, the little Linton cradled in his mother’s arms.
Mae had a vicious kind of grin on her face. She’d been crowing ever since Asher arrived in the city, taking great pleasure in his every misfortune. When the crowds of Accord had spit and shouted and thrown mud and worse, Mae had practically danced in her saddle, slinging taunts and laughing wildly all the while.
Chae-Na was glad that someone was enjoying herself.
“Come, highness,” Mae called up the stairs. “Some hustle, if you please. I’ve got somewhere to be.”
“So bloodthirsty, my wife,” Arlow chided. His tone was light, but his eyes were grave.
Mae clucked her tongue. “Don’t fault me my vengeance.”
“Have you changed your mind?” Chae-Na asked Arlow. She was surprised to see him here, after his firm declaration that he had no desire to take part in the execution.
“I have not,” Arlow said.
Mae transferred the baby into Arlow’s hands and kissed his brow. He immediately began to fuss. “Ma’s gotta see to some business, little Linton.”
She uttered the name with such fondness, but also a particular gravity. He was named for the brother Quade had stolen, and now Mae would have her revenge.
Arlow rocked the babe, speaking in a cooing voice. “Come, little man. Your da is going to teach you how to recognize haute couture.”
Arlow inclined his head to Chae-Na, then turned down the hallway, swaying his hips for Linton’s benefit.
“Well,” Chae-Na said. “Shall we?”
“We shall!” Mae answered, as if they were off to a party. She slung her arm around Chae-Na’s shoulder and they walked together, Veldon trailing close behind.
The hall just outside the courtyard was crowded. Chae-Na knew there were a hundred people, but it seemed a great deal more. The murmur of their voices hummed loud as thunder.
Far more than a hundred wanted to see Quade die, but Chae-Na had no wish to give the man an audience. That would be his preference: to make himself a martyr, to have an extravagant execution that would long be remembered.
Chae-Na did not intend to give him anything he wanted. And so they had drawn lots, and chosen a secluded location.
The manner of death had also been a topic of furious debate. Mae had argued in favor of a grislier means of execution, like drawing and quartering.
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Chae-Na didn’t wish to see anyone’s entrails, Quade Asher’s included. But nor could he be given a simple, clean death like a hanging or a beheading. His crimes were too egregious—mass murder, regicide, treason.
Rape.
No, his execution must suit his crimes. And so they had eventually agreed upon an ancient punishment: death by a hundred daggers. Ten-by-ten.
They’d had to hunt down the traditional set of blades, which had gone long unused. Chae-Na saw that they were now laid out upon a table near the doorway. She took hold of one of the identical daggers, leaving ninety-nine in place. It was small in her hand, the blade itself thin and vicious. It was similar to the stiletto Ko-Jin had gifted her, but not nearly so long.
The idea was to bleed the criminal slowly. It was death by the hand of the community, not by any single executioner. It seemed, to her, symbolically resonant: Quade had harmed the people, and the people would make him answer.
At her entrance, the conversation dimmed. The group waited for her to speak. She had planned nothing grand to say—she’d been too consumed with her own troubled thoughts—so she spoke briefly and plainly. “You have your order and the blades are here. You will go through this door, deliver your blow, and continue across the courtyard and through the far exit. I will go first to announce his fate and hear his last words, then you will follow one by one. Remember, we do not wish to give him the scene he so desires. His greatest fear is a mundane death. Let’s give it to him.”
She didn’t expect them to applaud, but they did. She waited for the sound to die before proceeding, the small dagger in her hand slick with sweat.
Chae-Na marched to the door, reminding herself to breathe. Facing Quade Asher would not be easy, but at least this would be the last time.
She’d tried to offer Mae first blood the night before, but her friend had insisted on being second. “He’s taken more from you than me.”
And he had. He’d taken so much. She was harder and wiser and far more cynical now, because of this man. But she wasn’t broken, and she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing her tremble.
She raised her chin and marched through the door.
The air was moist with a rain so light it hung like mist. Overhead, the sky was a spiral of gray.
The courtyard was comprised of slate pavers and was lined with rosebushes. At its center, Quade Asher was tied to a pole. He had been stripped of his filthy clothing and wrapped in only a loincloth. He’d also been bathed, a necessity after all the foulness that had been thrown at him the day before.
“Chae-Na,” he said.
It helped that his voice was so unfamiliar. If he had spoken her name in his honeyed tones, it would have reminded her of that night.
If she was being honest, she was still reminded of that night. Her heart battered in her breast, and it took an incredible effort to maintain a neutral expression. She paused, breathing, steeling herself.
This is the last time. After this day, she would never see him again.
“Quade Asher.” She spoke as if addressing a crowd, despite the fact that he was the only person present apart from a guard. “You have been found guilty of murder, regicide, treason, arson, and war crimes. In accordance with the law, you are to be executed by means of a hundred daggers. Do you have any final words?”
He gazed as her with dark, level eyes. Yesterday he had seemed a wild beast, but today he was more composed. In fact, he looked almost bored. “So this is it, then? No public execution?”
Chae-Na made herself meet his eye. “No public execution.”
“As insignificant as a beetle beneath a boot?” There was a cruel, sarcastic edge to his voice.
“If you like,” she said.
She walked nearer to him. His gaze raked over her body, and her blood turned cold. She gripped her dagger tighter. The final few steps were an agony, every muscle in her body tensed to flee. “You have no final words, then?”
“I do, actually.” He grinned, squirming within his bindings. “But they aren’t for you, they’re for my sister. I want you to tell her that this is her fault. All of it, everything I have done. It all traces back to her. She should never have run from me. Bray Marron can help you find her. You’ll pass on my message, won’t you, dear?”
Chae-Na’s lips thinned. “Do I look like a carrier pigeon to you?”
And she stabbed him, the blade entering between his ribs. She left it there. A streak of blood ran down his side, crimson on white. He hissed through his teeth, his head bowing forward.
She turned her back to him and walked away.
“You have to tell her,” he cried, losing all his assumed cool. “It’s my final request, so you must.” She kept striding, her pace sedate, and did not turn back. “Chae-Na! CHAE-NA!”
She spun around at the door, facing him with a bland expression. He panted, tendons straining. The ropes squealed as he struggled. Chae-Na nodded to the guard standing by. “Gag him now. He’s had his last words.”
She could hear his muffled protests, but did not look again.
Once through the door and out of sight, she succumbed to her fear of him. Her whole body shook, and she clutched her arms against her chest, trying to contain an expanding hollowness.
She wasn’t aware that she had company until she felt warm hands on her shoulders. She looked up into the blue eyes of her husband.
“Veldon?” she asked. “Shouldn’t you be coming after Mae?”
“I gave up my dagger to a maid. I thought you might need moral support.”
She sagged into his embrace. “You’re a very good man, you know.”
“I do know, actually,” he said, a smile in his voice.
The door flew open and Mae joined them, but her countenance had changed—gone was her joyful gloating. Her brown eyes held an ocean of disappointment, the same emotion that Chae-Na had been grappling with since the evening before.
“Are you well?” Chae-Na asked her friend.
Mae shook her head, her strong jaw clamped tight against her emotions. She breathed heavily through her nose, but remained mute.
“It doesn’t bring them back,” Chae-Na said knowingly.
Tears spilled over, coursing down Mae’s cheeks. She wrapped Chae-Na in a rib-creaking hug and sniffled into her shoulder. “It really doesn’t,” she said.
After a time, Mae pulled away and jerked her shirt straight. The woman was officially a queen, but she still dressed like a street ruffian. A male street ruffian, at that.
Mae wiped her face dry. “Well, let’s go find my husband. We’ve got a nation to set to rights.”
“Perhaps we should wait…” Chae-Na said. It wasn’t that she wished to linger and watch Quade bleed, but she needed to know he was dead before she could move on.
“No need,” Mae said. “I took him in the jugular.”
Veldon huffed in surprise. “It’s supposed to be death by a hundred blades.”
“Well, he’ll still get pricked a hundred times, but it was the second one that did him in.” She shrugged, unrepentant. “I had a score to settle.”
Chae-Na burst out laughing. It was almost certainly an inappropriate reaction, and the result of exhaustion and stress, but all at once everything seemed quite funny.
“You’re certain he’s dead?” Veldon asked.
Mae snorted. “River of blood, eyes turning glassy. Yeah, I’m pretty sure he’s dead.”
“Well then,” Chae-Na said, suddenly in a lighter mood. “Let’s go have tea. And put the nation to rights.”
Mae smiled and looped her arm around Chae-Na’s waist, and the two queens set off towards a brighter purpose.
Behind them, a man hung slumped against his bindings, dead. And—unseen by the people of Accord, who continued in their bloody task—a shadow sat in the courtyard with hungry intent.
Quade Asher had only ever wanted to change the world. And he had.
He was like the spark that starts a fire—important, but less so than the resulting
blaze.
A new era had begun, and he was only the impetus, not the story itself. The people would shake off his darkness and move forward; they would push through their nightmares. Persist. Evolve. Adapt.
People always do.
Epilogue
A knock sounded on the door frame.
“Pardon me, Captain Gelson, but you’ve got a letter.”
Peer straightened, abandoning the boots he’d been oiling. He smiled at the messenger, who was plainly a new arrival. “Thanks. Remind me your name.”
The boy bobbed his head. “It’s Jenson, sir.”
“And are you Chiona or Cosanta, Jenson?”
“Cosanta,” the boy said, posture straightening with pride.
“Well, I’m sure you’ve got other good qualities,” Peer said with a grin. The boy appeared uncertain how to respond.
“Ignore my husband, lad,” Whythe called from the corner of the room, not looking up from his drawing. “He might be in charge, but he’s still an idiot.”
The messenger glanced between them uncomfortably. To spare him, Peer held out his hand for the letter. “Off with you, then.”
After the curtain fell back in place and they were alone, Whythe cleared his throat. “You really have to stop making that joke,” he said lightly. “You’re meant to be setting an example. Unity, et cetera.”
Peer’s attention snagged on the envelope in his hand. He recognized Bray’s handwriting. She wrote like she lived: boldly and without unnecessary flourish. He missed her always, but it hit him harder just then, a blow to the chest.
“Are you listening?” Whythe called to him, his voice breaking through Peer’s reverie.
He didn’t feel particularly guilty, as his bevolder was more focused on his latest drawing than their conversation. “No. This is from Bray. Read it for me, will you?”
Whythe set his work aside, perhaps hearing the eagerness in Peer’s voice.
Their home was still rather sparse on furniture. They had no comfortable chairs, let alone a sofa, only a pile of brightly colored cushions and pillows in the far corner. So that was where they collapsed.
The Complete Marked Series Box Set Page 148
