by Callie Bates
He chokes. They’re wrestling. I lunge toward them, trying to push Mother off, but I’ve got Lathiel in my other arm. He’s screaming. I reach for Mother, but he bangs his forehead into my chin. My head snaps back. I feel a hand fisting the back of my shirt. Terror bursts through me; I try to run but Mother holds me tight. Her hair swings against my neck, falling loose from its knot. She’s breathing hard in my ear. Something wet drips onto my shoulder—my brother’s blood.
I have to break free. I have to save Lathiel—
Hold still, darling! Mother orders me in a singsong voice, but I don’t hold still. I’m trying to break her grip. A stinging pain lances into the skin behind my ear. I catch a glimpse of Rayka’s body crumpled on the ground. I’m screaming. I missed, Mother says petulantly. She tries to grab me tighter, but this time I break loose, bolting for the steps. But Mother charges after me, wrestling me to the ground. I lose Lathiel. He’s crawling away. I try to push Mother back. Her eyebrows are knotted. She reaches for my cheek. I’m trying to save you, darling.
Shouts echo above us on the steps. My father barrels into us, knocking Mother down. She slashes at him with the knife. But I don’t see the rest, because Madiya is there, terror white in her face, saying, Jahan, are you all right? And Mother, no longer calm, is screaming, He’s my son! I’m going to save him! You ruined his mind, and I’m going to get it out! I’m going to fix what you’ve done!
Father slaps her. She starts to sob. Madiya is kneeling by Rayka, saying, He’ll survive, it’s all right. I watch, dazed, my chest aching. I’ve been crying. Madiya rushes over to her workstation, then comes back to me with a delicate bottle of laudanum. I open my mouth, numbly, to let her drop a tiny bit onto my tongue. The bitterness of the opium is a balm. I let it carry me away into darkness.
And the memory closes. I’m back in the small room behind the temple, sweat drenching my shirt, Madiya holding me upright, too close to her, Elanna digging her hands into Madiya’s shoulders. I can’t seem to find my breath. This is why she made us forget. This is why she thought she’d done my mother a mercy.
I gather myself, and this time, I shove Madiya away. She rocks backward into Elanna. Quietly, I say, “I did not give you permission to touch me.”
Elanna nudges Madiya away from her. She staggers against the wall, but she’s not shaken. She straightens her clothes. Her eyes have narrowed; she’s not done with me yet. “Your mother loved you, I suppose,” she says, each word weighted like a knife. “It was why she tried to murder you, in her madness.”
“No,” I say. Not denying it. The memory seemed too real. The grief, the terror of it, felt too right.
This isn’t the answer I wanted. This isn’t the truth I was hoping for.
But I’m not denying the truth. I’m simply denying Madiya the power over me. Denying her interpretation of this story. “But that’s not the only memory you took from me. Every day you took memories. My mother didn’t try to murder me that often.”
Madiya’s mouth compresses. Reluctantly, she says, “It was a corollary of changing how your minds work. Making room for sorcery…took away other things. It suppressed your other memories.”
“Our memories of breakfast were sacrificed for walking through walls?” I say caustically.
“I didn’t know it was happening at first,” Madiya replies, her posture stiff. “Neither you nor Rayka told me. You acted as if I was deliberately punishing you. It was an accident.”
An accident—until she discovered what was happening and didn’t stop doing it. Until she did it deliberately to my mother. To me. To Rayka. To Lathiel.
The truth, the real truth, hits me then like a horrible punch in the chest. “Why was our mother mad?”
Madiya stays very still. But her eyes dart back and forth. Behind her, Elanna stares at me, stricken. I can no longer see Lathiel in the doorway. I don’t know if he’s listening. I want to close his ears to this—but at the same time, I want him to listen. I want him to know.
“She wasn’t always, was she?” I say, dragging the words up from a deep place. An ugly place. A place where, it seems, I’ve always known the truth. A place where I saw the laudanum bottle on my mother’s vanity, and thought nothing of it. “You gave it to her, too—the opium. Once you realized you could destroy our memories, you tried to take hers. You sent her mad. Little by little. Every day.”
Madiya just stares at me. This is not something she ever wanted me to guess. And now I suspect why she finally gave me back the memory of my mother trying to kill me—to make me more loyal to her. To make me, at last, stop mourning my mother.
But I never will.
“When did you do it?” I demand. “At night? She took the laudanum to help her sleep. Because she had nightmares. Did you come up to the villa then, and destroy pieces of her mind?”
“She was going to betray us!” Madiya bursts out. “She kept writing those damned letters to her sister! I don’t know why Ghesar never took the pen and paper from her—”
I stand up, and Madiya shrinks back. “That,” I say, “might be the only honest thing you’ve ever told me.”
I stride out of the room, Elanna on my heels. Lathiel stands there in the corridor, his eyes large. He’s trembling. Has she been giving him the laudanum? I reach out a hand, but he twists away from me and bolts, not even bothering to be invisible.
I start after him. “Lathiel!”
“Jahan, let him be.” El grabs my elbow, slowing me. “Let him come around.”
I stare at her. I want to break free and run after my brother, but maybe she’s right. I turn back, one last time, to face Madiya. She’s standing on the threshold of my chamber, more hesitant than I’ve ever seen her.
“What have you done to him?” I demand.
“Nothing!” she says, but guilt crosses her face, just for a moment.
I stalk back toward her. “He’s frightened of the whole damned world. On Pira, he asked me if I knew how to kill a man without touching him!” I draw in a breath and say again, “What have you done to him?”
“It was just an experiment,” she mutters. “Like any other.”
I take another step toward her, and she must see, at last, that I’m not afraid of her. She begins to babble. “They were destined for hanging anyway. Convicts. I had him sneak us into the prison, make us invisible, muffle our sounds. There were two men in the cell. He had to drain the life energy from one to take the life from the other. The old theurges could kill people without touching them, by squeezing their hearts until they burst. So we tried it.”
I swallow down my horror. She actually did what I always thought she did—made someone kill a man. But instead of Rayka or me, it was my littlest brother. No wonder his eyes are haunted. “You mean you forced him to try it.”
She eyes me warily. “The boy’s soft. He did it, weeping the whole time as if he was dying. He cried for two days straight afterward. I tried to take away the memory, but he hid from me. Your father tried to talk to him, to tell him it was something he needed to learn, but he wouldn’t listen. I thought he was going as mad as your mother.”
As mad as she made our mother, she means. “Why?” I demand. “Why does a twelve-year-old boy need to kill a man without touching him? Why does a twelve-year-old need to kill anyone?”
“The witch hunters,” Madiya begins.
“It’s always the damned witch hunters!” I shout. I lean toward her, lowering my voice. “If you ever touch him again, I will see you imprisoned for life. I will see your magic removed. You will never see daylight again. Do you understand?”
Her chin hardens. But when I lift my eyebrows, she nods minutely.
I put my back to her. El’s waiting. She holds out a hand; her fingers twist around mine. I’m more grateful for her touch than I can say. Together, we leave Madiya behind, though my thoughts chase themselves around my head. She forced Lathiel
to kill two men, and the horror of it overwhelmed him. Yet, instead of finding me at Aexione, he went to her. Her hold over him is that strong.
We emerge into the sunshine, and I spot him. He’s huddled between the parapet and one of the burned-out trees, shaking. I release El’s hand and approach him. His eyes, enormous, track my every movement.
I stop a few feet away. I don’t want to force my presence on him, but I need him to know what I’m going to say.
“You never have to go back to her,” I tell him. “You don’t owe her anything. You don’t belong to her. Your body is your own—your mind is your own. You never have to let her touch you again.”
He blinks at me, wordless.
“And—” I swallow hard. “—I’m sorry. I’m sorry I left you there with her. I’m sorry I didn’t take you with me when I left. I’m sorry I didn’t go back for you.”
I wait, but still, he doesn’t speak. His shaking, though, has lessened. I want to hug him. Ruffle his hair. Give him all the reassurance I’ve withheld for six years. But his posture is still too wary, his eyes too frightened. So instead I just say, “I promise I’ll be here for you now, if you want me. Always.”
He just stares.
I sigh and, turning, go back to Elanna. She’s waiting for me farther down the parapet. Below, I glimpse Rayka climbing up the steps from the lower temple, the sunlight shining off his hair.
Madiya ruined us more than I even imagined—she took away our mother, piece by piece, not all at once but over years and years. She stole Mother from us. And she stole our memories, too. Does that make us mad, like Mother?
No. Not exactly. But our minds have been changed. They’re full of holes, and maybe we are, too, in the fabric of our being. The holes of grief we don’t remember and can’t even express. But even if those gaps can never be filled, even if our memories can never be returned, we can reconstruct the truth around them. We can survive. And maybe even, slowly, day by day, we can heal.
Elanna wraps an arm around me. I put mine around her. She doesn’t speak, and neither do I. Yet her presence makes the old, ugly grief bearable. It makes it seen. We hold it between us, as we hold each other, and we breathe.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
We’re still standing there when Rayka arrives at the top, minutes later. For a moment, I think relief eases his face. He strides over and grabs my arm, dragging me from Elanna. “Come on.”
I let him pull me over to the wall overlooking the city. “I hear and obey…”
I stop. All thought of Madiya and our childhood flies out of my head. Metal winks below us in the streets; in the haze of shock, I didn’t see it before. A river of muskets and bayonets, marching toward the lower temple. Bells ring. The earth groans as cannons are winched along.
“How,” I begin, and then stop. Another man is coming up the steps, Tullea on his heels. He wears a jaunty black suit, but his familiar smile isn’t there. Tullea looks grim.
“The militia followed him.” Rayka spits, “And Madiya.”
Bardas Triciphes strides over to us, breathing hard from the long walk up the stairs. “Jahan!” His gaze flickers behind me. “Lady Elanna. We’ve been found out. The damned Saranons suborned one of my servants, or…”
“You shouldn’t have come through the streets,” Rayka tells him, as if he’s an idiot.
Elanna comes up beside me, brushing her hand unobtrusively down my arm. A steadying gesture. I’m grateful for it. “They followed you? What about Empress Firmina?”
He shrugs helplessly. “I don’t know! They’ll use it as an excuse to search her chambers. Maybe arrest her. We have to get her to Aexione.”
“Aexione?” I repeat. “Why not just bring her here?”
Bardas shakes his head once, vigorously. “She needs to get to the emperor before anyone else does. Before Augustus and Phaedra.”
Everyone seems to be looking at me. I hear myself say, “I’ll gladly take a score against the Saranons,” but I’m looking down at the guns winking in the city below. I can’t leave everyone in the face of a siege—on top of a hill that doesn’t have defenses.
More than that, I don’t want to leave my brothers here, alone. With Madiya.
“My cousin has a plan,” Bardas insists. “She can save us all, if she just gets to Aexione. She can stop this attack.”
Do I believe him? I see the panic in his face. He’s worried about Firmina, if nothing else. If she is imprisoned—or killed—we lose the one person in power who might help us.
El touches my arm again. Her face is fierce. She must have reached the same conclusion I have. “You go, Jahan.” She looks at Tullea, who hesitates, then nods. “Tullea and I will manage. We’ll let the entire city know that the Witch of Eren is here to defeat them. That’ll put some fear into them.”
“We need to close the lower temple,” Tullea says. “Bring everyone up here.”
Elanna glances at Mount Angelos looming in the distance. “If only I could make that mountain walk, we could scare them into surrender.”
She needs her power back. I look at her, at the collar gleaming around her neck. Maybe with the power of Tirisero’s font—Mantius’s font, now that I know the truth—I can break it.
“Let me try something,” I say. She turns to me, startled, as I touch the collar. Within the smooth metal, the witch stones hum, nudging me away. All the same, I feel with my mind for the metal itself, pulling all the power of the font into me, a stream of unseen fire. Break, I order the collar.
Elanna gasps. My eyes fly open. She’s dropped to her knees, clutching her neck and hissing with pain. Tullea’s run over, crouching beside her.
I drop down, too. “El, what’s wrong? Did I injure you? Are you—”
“I’m fine,” she manages, her voice choked. She opens her hands. The collar still clamps her neck, and now an ugly red flush stains her skin. “It’s hot, that’s all. I could feel it thinning, almost. I thought it was going to break.”
But it hasn’t, and I can’t bear her disappointment. I reach for her hand.
“It’s all right.” She shakes me off and clambers to her feet, her chin set. “My name will have to be enough.”
“But no one knows you’re here,” Tullea points out. “Or that you’re even alive.”
Elanna bares her teeth in a smile. “Then we will tell them. You have magic. All of you do. We’ll proclaim it to the world. Jahan, we can manage without you. Go.”
Only a fool ignores the Caveadear, but still I hesitate. There’s a lot of metal glinting in the streets below. And Lathiel still huddles on the far side of the parapet, watching me now. “You can defend the steps. Destroy them if you have to.”
Rayka shoulders forward. “I already have a plan for that.”
Elanna and Tullea exchange a glance; they both seem prepared for battle already. They don’t need Rayka’s help, at least not yet. I shake my head. “You need to show me the route through the cisterns, to the Old Palace.”
He sighs with disgust and stomps away down the stairs. I take a step after him, but pause. The troops are only getting in position now. If I go quickly, perhaps I can return before they attack.
“We need to strike at the head of the empire,” Bardas says. “That’s what you and Firmina must do.”
“I suppose you’re right.” I glance back, though, at the rescued prisoners who are gathering behind us, Lucius Argyros among them. Madiya’s come out of the temple. I give her a hard stare. She flinches. I say to Elanna, “Don’t let her anywhere near Lathiel, unless he asks for her. Even if he does…”
El grips my arm fiercely. “I won’t. I’ll talk to Lathiel.”
I should talk to him myself—but the army approaching through the streets reminds me I have no time. My brother will have to wait. Irene and Sabina approach, passing me bread and cheese, and a cup of thin tea. I drink it quickly an
d pocket the food for the long walk through the cisterns. I don’t like leaving, especially not with Madiya lurking here like a vulture, but my head is full of Bardas’s argument. If Firmina can do some good in Aexione, it may make all the difference. And we can’t afford to lose her.
I turn to El. “I’ll put out the word,” I say. “I’ll tell the world the Witch of Eren is alive on top of Solivetos Hill, ready to make a stand.”
She grabs me by the collar and pulls me in for a kiss, right there in front of everyone. Heat burns into my face, but all the gods, who cares if anyone sees us now? I kiss her back, hearing scattered laughter around us. When she draws back, she’s grinning. “The Witch of Eren, and the Korakos.”
“Yes,” I say. I kiss her again, swiftly, and then I follow my brother down the hill.
* * *
—
THE CISTERNS BRING us to the secret tunnel burrowed beneath the Old Palace. Through a series of natural caves to our left, the sea thumps. I wonder if the Saranons still know they have this escape route—or secret entrance. The waist-high grate leading into the tunnel isn’t guarded.
“Well, you can handle the rest on your own,” Rayka says brusquely. He’s been burning to get back to Solivetos Hill and enact his plan with the steps. He hardly spoke two words to me the entire way here. When I tried to talk to him about Madiya—tentatively, not even sure how to broach the subject—he just soldiered on ahead, silent. He doesn’t remember what happened in the cave any more than I did, and he certainly doesn’t want to hear about how he almost died at Mother’s hand. He doesn’t want to know that Madiya was slipping Mother’s memories away all along, sending her to the place where, at last, she broke.
It’s just as well. My bones ache with a kind of lifelong grief. I don’t know if I can speak about it without breaking down.
