by Claire Luana
Olivia tried to channel that resolute confidence, but terror’s icy fingers pulled at her thoughts with a tenacious grip. Tears slid down her cheeks. In a few minutes she would be gone. Impaled on a sword. She wondered if it would hurt. Yes, it probably would. Badly.
The axe blade had formed a gaping hole now, and the face of a preternaturally handsome Aprican was visible on the other side, his straight, white teeth bared in challenge.
“Really wish I had a bow right now,” Griff muttered.
Olivia backed up as the hole grew larger and splinters of wood flew at them with every strike of the wicked axe.
Marina’s fingers gripped Olivia’s painfully, but Olivia relished the feeling even as she clutched the slick short sword in her other hand. At least she wouldn’t die alone. That was better than some people got.
The axe strikes stopped, the room falling strangely quiet but for the ragged breathing of the guild members.
And then the door exploded in towards them in a shower of wood and furniture.
Olivia cried out as a chair smashed into her legs, sending her sprawling onto her side. The sword clattered to the ground as it slipped from her hand.
A man was silhouetted in the doorway, dwarfing it with his huge bulk. He stepped inside, sword in one hand, axe in the other.
Olivia heard a whimper escape her lips.
The man strode forward towards Lennon, who held his sword before him in shaking hands.
Olivia squeezed her eyes closed. She couldn’t watch as her friend died.
The ground shook with a thud and Olivia’s eyes flew open. She struggled to comprehend what she saw. The huge brute of an Aprican soldier had tumbled forward, bowled into by a man in plain clothes. A bearded man—Dash.
“By the Beekeeper,” Olivia breathed as Aprican soldiers flooded the room, falling into position behind Dash. But they weren’t attacking the guild members or Ansel’s mercenaries or Griff’s sailors. They were attacking the huge soldier. Dash and the soldiers...were on their side!
Olivia scrambled back as the legionnaires swarmed the god-like soldier like ants at a picnic. Blood appeared from a dozen cuts as the soldier roared, moving with impossible speed, trying to take down his attackers. But they were too many.
He fell with a thunderous crash, and it was Dash himself who made the killing blow, surging forward and sliding his blade through the man’s throat all the way to the hilt.
Dash pulled back as the soldier fell. He whirled about, his green eyes wild, his handsome face blood-speckled. “Olivia?” he called. “Has anyone seen Olivia?”
Olivia pushed to her feet, her heart spasming back to life within her. “Here I am,” she said, her voice blessedly sure.
Dash’s head whipped her way and a hand flew to his heart as he breathed out. “I thought...I thought I was too late.”
She shook her head and then he was before her, his arms wrapping around her and lifting her off her feet, spinning her around with a whoop.
A disbelieving laugh escaped from her as she buried her face in his neck, reveling in the very real, very welcome presence of Dash.
Shouts sounded outside the door, and the muffled clash of metal sounded.
“What is that?” Trick asked, his eyes wild.
“If I knew, I would tell you,” Lucas said, running a shaky hand through his hair. What the hell was he supposed to do now? Bran and his men had abandoned them, they were about to be skewered by two giants, and the emperor wasn’t even the real threat. His spirits sank. It was over. They were done.
He shook his head at Trick. “It’s over. Even with the emperor...there’s no way we can beat Daemastra. All along, we were targeting the wrong man.”
“I wouldn’t be too hard on yourselves,” the emperor said. “He outwitted me, and I had many more resources than you.”
“What does he want?” Trick asked. “Can we bargain with him?”
The sounds of fighting were intensifying outside the door. Lucas strayed towards the door, straining his ears as the emperor answered. “He wants ultimate power. To be a god. To be invincible—and immortal.”
“Is that all?” Trick snorted.
“I’m afraid there’s no reasoning with him,” the emperor finished.
The room shook as a crash sounded outside.
Trick crept up to the other side of the door, and they both placed their ears against the walls, listening. Faint voices were audible, but not the words.
The door handle jiggled and Trick met Lucas’s gray eyes, his own wild. His breath caught, his inhale sharp. Who was trying to get in?
They both backed away, Trick pulling his bloodied sword from its sheath.
“I love you, little brother,” Lucas said, widening his stance, bracing himself for what would come through that door.
“You too. I hope...Ella made it.”
Lucas nodded. “She’s a survivor. She’ll be all right.”
Lucas braced himself when a knock sounded on the door. Three polite raps. He straightened, letting his sword droop.
“Uh, who is it?” Lucas called.
“Thom!” a muffled voice said. Trick’s eyes went wide, and his sword clanged to the floor as he reached for the crossbar to throw it back.
“Wait!’ Lucas cried. “It could be a trap—”
But it was too late. Trick was pulling the door open.
Thom ran into the room, barreling into Trick with the force of a hurricane. They clung to each other, tears and muffled words mingled as they rocked back and forth.
Callidus walked in next, his pale face twisted in distaste as he wiped a knife blade on the sleeve of his black jacket.
Lucas shook his head in disbelief. “You—you were not who I expected.”
Callidus sniffed, straightening his waistcoat. “Yes, well… I’m frequently underestimated.”
Hale’s fingers tightened painfully around Wren’s as they beheld the monsters that the formula had wrought. Wren didn’t care; the pain was the only thing keeping her grounded, keeping her fear from bearing her away on its rising tide.
“Willings, take these two back to the holding cell. We’ll deal with them when the rest of the palace is secure.”
“And you?” Willings asked.
“I’m off to visit my old friend, the emperor. I think it’s time I help him lay down his heavy burdens.”
Willings grinned and motioned to Wren and Hale, nodding towards the hallway. “Move.”
Wren couldn’t feel her body, couldn’t seem to make it cooperate. Her breath came in ragged bursts.
“Come on, move!” Willings said, but then he coughed, grasping his chest with a hand. He seemed to steady himself, as whatever he had felt passed. He stood up straight again. And then his face...rippled.
Wren’s eyes went wide. She looked at Daemastra, who was watching Willings with alarm.
“What is it?” Daemastra asked.
“I don’t know,” Willings said. “You tell me! It’s your—” He coughed again, stumbling against the countertop.
Wren and Hale backed up, away from the man.
A groan of pain escaped Willings’s mouth as his face rippled again. The high cheekbones, the thick hair and dewy skin—it all began to morph. A cry of agony escaped his lips and he fell to his knees, one hand to the ground, the other to his chest. When he pushed his head back, Wren gasped. He was getting older, his skin growing lined, sallow, sagging. His hair turned gray, his muscles shriveled, atrophying before their eyes. “What’s happening?” Willings cried, but Daemastra launched into action, throwing open the icebox door, pulling out another two, three jars, cradling them to his chest.
“Hale,” Wren breathed as Daemastra turned, because his face was rippling as well, the features undulating and morphing like a bubbling river.
Hale launched into action, running towards Daemastra, cracking the man across the jaw with a powerful punch.
Daemastra reeled back against the counter, the jars in his hands falling to the floor, shattering in
an explosion of glass and liquid and dust.
Daemastra snarled and threw a punch of his own, sending Hale stumbling back towards her.
Wren shrank into the corner, not sure which scene was more appalling: Willings—writhing on the ground now, his limbs shriveled and weak, the skin of his face sunken like a corpse, or Hale and Daemastra grappling in a breathless contest of brute strength and violence.
Hale shoved Daemastra off him with a boot to the man’s chest, and Daemastra fell back against the counter, slipping into the mess of broken glass and formula. The change was coming on quickly now and he let out the keening cry of an animal as the muscle and vitality and magic drained from him, taking his life essence with it.
Hale, his chest heaving like a stallion, backed up next to Wren. Her hands shook before her mouth. She was unable to look away from the unnatural magic ripping through the man before them.
Willings had stilled—his body skeletal—hardly human.
He was dead.
Daemastra fell to the floor, his hands scrabbling through the liquid and glass, leaving bloody streaks behind. “I don’t understand,” he said through twisted lips, through teeth rotting and falling.
Hale pushed forward, walking to just beyond Daemastra’s reach. He crouched down, looking at the pitiful wreck the man had become. “Compliments of the Spicer’s Guild. A gift from Guildmaster Pike himself. The magic of time. Fast-forwarded.”
Daemastra let out a garbled wail of fury. The keen grew quiet, then snuffed out.
The man’s shriveled head thunked to the tile floor.
A sob escaped Wren’s lips, and she closed her eyes, relief flooding her with such strength that her knees went weak.
Hale was at her side in two strides, and he wrapped his arms around her. “It’s all right chickadee,” he soothed, stroking her hair, which only made her cry more.
Joy and sorrow, relief and regret mingled together with the scent of Hale in the sweetest combination of all.
“Wren!” a voice cried from the doorway, and Wren looked up to find Lucas and Trick, flanked by Thom and Callidus, looking aghast at the desiccated bodies on the ground.
“Lucas!” she cried and ran to him, crashing against him, crushing him in a hug as tight as she could make it. It didn’t matter that he might still hate her. It only mattered that he was alive.
“Gods, Wren, I thought...” Lucas breathed out, burying his face in her hair, cradling her head, stroking her back. “When we learned what Daemastra was doing...gods. I thought I was going to be too late.”
“You almost were,” she said, releasing him. “But Hale saved me. He saved all of us.”
Hale and Lucas looked at each other across the room, a whirlwind of emotions between them.
They had been on opposite sides. Hale had helped the Apricans murder the rest of Lucas’s family. He had killed Virgil himself. She didn’t know if Lucas could set that aside. Could ever see him as anything but an enemy.
Lucas untwined his arms from around her and walked stiffly to stand before Hale. He looked down, blowing out a breath.
Hale regarded him with wariness.
“I used to think I knew what was right and what was wrong, that everything was black and white. I don’t have those compunctions anymore. I’ve learned there’re only people you can count on, no matter how dark it gets, how bad it looks. And everyone else. If what Wren says is true, then you have my thanks.”
Hale nodded.
Wren fought back the tears that were threatening to pour from her. And then a thought struck her like a bolt of lightning. “The poison,” she said. “Hale, Daemastra said without his antidote taken each day, you’ll die.”
Hale nodded but walked across the room, stepping over Daemastra’s body to open one of the cabinets. He retrieved a vial, and then pulled another vial out of his pocket. He poured a few drops of the one from his pocket into the other. “Another gift from Guildmaster Pike. The real infusion Daemastra was looking for. The one that slows time to a crawl. The one that makes something permanent.” He threw back the antidote, drinking it down.
The black lines in his hands began to recede and disappear, leaving healthy tanned flesh in their wake. It was a miracle. The Spicer’s Guild potion had made the antidote permanent.
“Don’t worry about me, Wren,” Hale said with a tired wink. “I have a way of getting lucky.”
Chapter 49
They walked through the palace slowly, stepping past limp and shriveled bodies that had once been Daemastra’s supernatural soldiers. Lucas had his arm slung around Wren’s shoulders, refusing to break contact. That was just fine with her. She didn’t think she ever wanted to leave his side.
“I thought you were dead twice over,” she murmured into his shirt. “I can’t believe you’re really here. That it’s really over.”
“Callidus saved me,” Lucas said. “And Thom.”
“What?” she asked, turning to Callidus in disbelief.
He nodded sagely, a smile tugging the corner of his thin lips. “The Confectioner’s Guild doesn’t leave any behind.”
Wren looked from Callidus to Hale as gratitude flooded through her like a shot of powerful whiskey. “No. It doesn’t.”
Callidus looked at Hale for an inscrutable second before nodding, clapping Hale on the shoulder. “No one’s insulted my suits in at least a week. Welcome back, Mr. Firena.”
Hale just grinned.
With each step, they gathered more allies.
“Where did all these legionnaires come from?” Wren asked, marveling at the uniformed men who fell into step behind them.
“It seems Dash didn’t betray us after all. He stayed behind to rally some friends to our cause,” Thom said, his hand intertwined with Trick’s.
The emperor met them in the junction of the hallways.
“Will you honor your promise?” Lucas asked, one hand tightening on his sword, the other wrapped protectively around Wren. “Will you surrender?”
“You’ve rid us of my troublesome cuisinier?” the emperor asked, raising one furry eyebrow.
“He rid us of himself,” Hale responded. “With his lust for power.”
The emperor nodded, straightening. “Then I don’t have long before that wretched poison takes me. Yes, Lucas Imbris. I surrender to you. Alesia is yours, and Tamros, if you can take it. The Apricans are a troublesome bunch, so I wouldn’t suggest trying to extend your influence so far.”
“All I want is Alesia,” Lucas said. “So I can give it back to the people.”
“Very well,” the emperor said. He raised his voice. “Let it be known that on this day, I cede my claim to the country of Alesia to King Lucas Imbris.”
“Thank you,” Lucas said.
Wren squeezed his hand, fighting back tears.
They walked together towards the palace gates, past the bodies of fallen Aprican and guild guards alike. “I don’t have much time,” the emperor said. “I need to get my affairs in order.”
“You know,” Hale said as he stepped forward, “I think I might have a remedy for what ails you.”
“Do tell,” the emperor said, drawing nearer.
But a group of people running through the front doors drew Wren’s attention. Olivia and Dash and Ella. And so many more, people she hadn’t seen in weeks—Lennon and Marina and Chandler and Bruxius and all the rest. Guildmaster Pike, with one arm around Griff’s shoulders, the other in a sling. His legs were shaky and his face pinched in pain, but he was alive.
Wren ran to him and wrapped careful arms around him, pulling him tight.
“I heard a commotion and I thought I’d take a peek,” Pike said. “I found this one looking like a wild banshee.”
Griff laughed before her eyes went wide. “Excuse me,” she said. “I think I just saw a ghost.”
Wren looked back as she watched Griff stride up to Hale, punching him in the arm with all her might.
Wren turned back to Pike, smoothing his hair back from his slick brow. She saw that
the arm strapped to his chest was missing from the elbow down. The little jar in the workshop... When she spoke her words were quiet. Reverent. “What you did...what you sacrificed...you saved us all. Every last one of us.”
“I just did what she would have done,” Pike said, his voice hoarse.
Wren pulled him back into a hug, kissing him on the cheek. “It’s the best any of us can do,” she whispered.
She turned back from Pike, the scene glittering through refracted tears. Hugs and tears and kisses were being passed around, and Wren was surprised to find herself in Ella’s arms next, the princess squeezing her soundly. “Thank you. For Maradis,” she said, then she turned away, no doubt before she was caught with her icy demeanor down.
“Lucas,” Ella called.
Lucas strode over from where he was shaking hands with a bloodied-but-whole Guildmaster Chandler.
“Look what I found.” Ella pulled an emerald cloth out from under her arm. “Would you like to do the honors?”
Wren peered around Lucas’s shoulder trying to decipher what the siblings had exchanged.
“You know, I always resented this thing,” Lucas said. “But I think I never understood the cost. Come on.”
Lucas pulled her through the gaping front doors of the palace into the courtyard, where the first glimpse of morning sun was peeking over the eastern horizon, highlighting the snowcapped crags of the Cascadian mountains. Into the courtyard. To the flagpole that flew a sky-blue flag stitched with a golden sunburst.
“Hold this?” Lucas handed the green cloth to her. He untied the rope, and hand over hand, pulled the Aprican flag down.
Wren handed back the bundle and watched with tears in her eyes as Lucas replaced the flag with the emerald green banner of Alesia.
Lucas hoisted it up to cheers and clapping from the people gathered below, finally tying off the rope as the flag reached the top of the pole. He wrapped his arm back around Wren’s shoulders, kissing her temple. She hadn’t realized the cost either. Until now. This was her home. These were her people. And there wasn’t anything she wouldn’t give for them.
