“Yes,” Talon finally says, lifting his eyes to the camera. “It’s true.”
“It’s not like that!” I interject, tugging at the chains behind me, but they hold fast. “Talon, don’t do this.”
“Who are you?” Bridar demands, squinting and searching as though blind. “Whose voice is that, Blinnsdale? I demand to see who is with you.”
“I’m afraid I can’t grant that request just yet, Haraway. What do you say we cut to the chase?”
Feihria stirs, and more muttering breaks out. Several weapons clink, and Bridar silences them. I’m shocked that Bridar didn’t know Talon was here. I thought they knew. Talon told me they were angry, and that was why he couldn’t go home. How could they not know he was here, and alive?
“Very well,” says Bridar. “You have my attention. What do you want from me?”
Tyrus dusts his hands, slanting his head to one side. “Thirteen years ago, your entourage invaded my land. Thirteen years ago, you killed my father to avenge your son’s death.”
“Any decent father would have done the same,” says Bridar. “It was justice.”
“Yet Talon lives,” says Tyrus. “And it’s because of him that my father is dead.”
With a snarl, Tyrus boots Talon’s back as though he’s nothing more than a mongrel begging for scraps. He then unhooks the claw from his belt, and my heart leaps, knocking against my chest. He can’t take Talon’s magic—he can’t.
Instead, Tyrus cradles the clicking tool on his fingertips in the camera’s direction as though offering it as ransom for something. “You see this, Bridar? You know what it does?”
“Magic is our property,” says Bridar. “Our right. Your utter lack of respect for that fact is revolting, and if you lay another hand on my son I will kill you myself.”
Tyrus rumbles a laugh, glancing to Lewis, whose shoulders also shake with laughter.
Talon is shoved forward again. I expect him to wheel around, to take Tyrus down and prove the truth of the situation. Broken legs won’t stop a fighter like him—I’ve seen him go against unbeatable odds and come out on top.
Yet, he kneels there, forehead nearly touching the murky stone as he stares sideways at the camera. Odis narrows his eyes at Talon. His head shakes for the smallest moment as though communicating something. He shifts the device currently being powered by the constant stream of stolen magic frothing at his hand.
Talon knows him. If that’s so, why isn’t he helping us?
Tyrus signals Odis to move closer before stalking over and crouching down. “It’s not him I intend to kill, Bridar. It’s you.”
“What?”
“You killed my father. Your sense of justice robbed me in the worst possible way, and it’s time I made you answer for it. So here is what I propose. Meet me here in Valadir. Face me. Fight me, answer for your crimes. And in return, I let your son live.”
“Father, don’t listen,” Talon says, raising his head. “Don’t give in!”
Tyrus releases a wicked snarl and kicks Talon hard in the stomach. Talon coughs, gagging, but doesn’t make any effort to defend himself.
I attempt to rise to my feet, to go to Talon, but Tyrus backhands me again, hitting the bruise already forming on my cheek. I fall to the stone, the chains tearing at my shoulder sockets. I crouch there, shaking and digging inwardly—I channeled despite the Prone once. Angels, if only I brought the teardrop with me.
“Your son is already set for execution, Bridar. But if you face me, I will spare him. Bring your entourage again, if you like, so you know you won’t be ambushed. Come fight me. Or your son will pay for your crime.”
Indignant, bitter revulsion flashes in Bridar’s eyes. “You have done so much more than kidnap my son and the heir to the Feihrian Triarch. It is clear that Itharians cannot defend themselves against you. It is clear you will not stop these underhanded attempts for power. You will not stop until a power stronger than you meets you head on.”
“And you think you are stronger than we are?”
“I wouldn’t leave the Arbors otherwise.”
Tyrus’s lip curls. “I think you’ll find us up to the fight.” He doesn’t finish, but instead slides a look so pointed at Talon that the rest is obvious. Thanks to him. “In fact, I guarantee it.”
“Your threats don’t scare me, Blinnsdale.”
“But they should.”
“How so?”
“I have in my possession,” Tyrus says toward Odis still holding the camera, “a rare set of tears.”
The last word comes out as if through water. Talon’s head bolts up.
“What?” I demand.
The Feihrians on the large screen give him their attention as well. Bridar’s eyes narrow. The man with the beard and the other with curling hair straighten in disbelief.
I want to smack the smirk off Tyrus’s face. He’s got them right where he wants them, and he knows it. But why tell them this? Why show his hand?
Talon’s eyes narrow. I can tell he’s wondering the same thing.
“Tears can’t give you that much power,” says Bridar, his voice sounding uncertain for the first time since this interlude. “Not against an army the caliber of ours.”
“Oh these can, I assure you,” Tyrus says, stalking around the space between cells as if he has all the time in existence. “These are more powerful than any ever shed. They are wizard’s tears, Bridar. They’re about to give me access to a tactic you Feihrians have never dreamed of. And now that my men are equal to your maneuvers—” He gestures back to Talon. “—nothing can stop us. Not even you. I will get my vengeance,” he adds through gritted teeth.
The men and women in the screen give off indistinct shouts and threats, raising their spears, charging forward as if they can attack Tyrus through some kind of portal from where they stand near a backdrop of trees directly into the Triad’s deepest dungeon.
Talon ducks his head once more. I plaster my eyes to him, to the brush of hair swooping down just enough to hide his face from me. Look at me, I plead. This isn’t your fault.
Bridar quiets his crowd, gesturing with his palms toward the ground. The bearded man beside him breathes heavily through his nostrils.
“I’m done with you, Blinnsdale,” says Bridar. “No amount of training can give you the full flex of what we are capable of, and no amount of stolen magic can match it. I accept your challenge. We are coming, and you’d better pray to whatever gods you worship for mercy before we get there. And Blinnsdale, if you lay another hand on my son before then, I will kill you.”
The screen goes black, leaving an eerie silence behind save for the occasional drip of water. Tyrus crosses his arms over his chest, hugging his biceps. Talon’s father’s threat leaves a chill over me, but a smirk leaks its way out from beneath Tyrus’s mustache.
I look to Talon, waiting for him to try to rise, to fight the chains at his wrists, to be the warrior I know he is. But he kneels there, head drooping and staring at his hands.
“How could you do that?” I say, the anger flowing from me. He made Talon out to look like a criminal.
Tyrus raises an eyebrow at me. For a moment I think he’s going hit me like he did before. I brace myself, willing strength into my back, determined to trip him or take him down if I can.
Tyrus glances to Naylor. “You can kill her now, Adrian,” he says. “She’s seen what I wanted her to see. She knows what I wanted her to know, before she dies.”
My pulse rises and he steps forward, bending to breathe the next words directly into my face. “What a traitor her lover is. What a lost cause she thinks she’s fighting for.”
A traitor. A lost cause.
Talon.
“No,” I say, jaw trembling with the effort of keeping it still. “You’re the traitor.”
But Tyrus is already moving on. He and another soldier drag Talon back into the cell he was in before. “Lock him in,” Tyrus orders before crossing to where Odis is putting his equipment back into their various black c
ases, rolling up cords in a long weave along his elbow and hand. Tyrus claps the boy on the back and begins speaking to him in low tones.
Adrian Naylor—his gold tooth jutting out of his wicked grin—steps forward, sliding a metal strip over his knuckles. First one hand, then the other. Talon is frozen, hunched over on the floor as if he’s no longer cognizant.
Naylor glowers, sauntering toward me, readying his fist.
I back away on the soiled floor, praying, calling my magic, but nothing happens. Naylor’s boots tromp through the muck. They’re almost to me.
“I have the tears!” I cry in a pathetic attempt to divert him. “Kill me, and you’ll never know where they are.”
Tyrus’s laugh rumbles, echoing through the chamber. “I already know where they are, Miss Csille.”
“Miles,” Talon says in desperation, pushing himself shakily up on his hands. “Help us!”
Odis ignores him and secures the clasp on another case, leaving no evidence that a heated conversation took place minutes before.
“Ambry,” Talon says. “Tyrus, don’t do this.”
Tyrus leans in toward Naylor, and though he’s speaking to the shorter man, his eyes are on Talon. “Kill her and let him watch. Then come find me.”
“As you wish, sir,” Naylor says, golden tooth gleaming from his malignant smile.
“Talon!” I cry as I’m being backed into the cell beside his. “What do I do? Talon, please!”
All at once the tears pound hard at my skull like they used to. A sound warning—a goodbye, perhaps. Unknowingly, I start to hum—out of nerves, out of unease, I’m not sure, but the hum climbs its way up my throat, soft and barely perceptible.
Talon drags himself toward the bars separating my cell from his. “Adrian,” he says in an accent so like his father’s it’s uncanny.
Naylor only sneers harder, closing the cell door behind him and securing himself in with me. There’s no escape. Even if I didn’t have shackles around my wrists, I can’t get past him now.
Fear takes form in my ribs, plucking them like a harp and becoming more audible the closer he gets. Naylor cocks his head to one side, then the other, a low crack escaping each time.
The air turns hazy with my humming, the sound teasing the hair on my arms and thrumming between the metal bars of this cage. Behind Naylor, Odis reels, eyes glassed over. He tilts, using the wall for a crutch. For a moment, confusion strikes.
Estelle said it was a one-time only.
I wasted the sirens’ song on my brother, and even then, it hadn’t worked the way I planned. Still, the harp strings in my chest come to life like a flower branching out its petals at the first break of sunlight. Momentarily, I reach behind to feel for wings, but as far as I can tell I’m still me.
Naylor sniggers, advancing toward me. Panic overtakes me, but the song is stronger, pulsing its way up, leaking out of my lips in ghostly tones. The chains around Talon’s hands clink as he sags against the wall; the other remaining soldiers grow tipsy, clinging to the stone wall before slumping along its edge. Blood oozes from one of their mouths, which drops as he turns in my direction.
Naylor doesn’t stop though. He doesn’t waver in the slightest, just stalks toward me, smiling. The act accentuates his big nose and the gold where his teeth should be white. He rears back. I raise my hand to block, but he bludgeons my ear with his metal fist.
Pain explodes in the side of my head and I stagger back, colors splotching across my vision as the humming dies.
“Ambry!” Talon cries, wakening from his stupor now that I’m no longer singing. He’s yanking at the bars, reaching his hands through as far as they’ll go, which isn’t much.
“Siren song won’t work on me,” Naylor says as I teeter. My vision polka-dots, blacking in and out, and I clutch my throbbing ear. I lift my hands to the thumping above my ear to meet what feels like syrup. My fingers return red instead of flesh.
“Ambry, watch out!” Talon shouts.
I barely notice the brass-knuckled hand grit and make for me again. This time I have the sense to dodge it. The metal hits stone, and he flaps his hand with a curse.
I wobble toward the corner, still trying to figure everything out. Who is Naylor? Why didn’t the song work on him?
“Back off, Adrian,” Talon says from somewhere to my left. “We can offer you more than Tyrus ever could.”
My head throbs, but I force myself to think. Shasa mentioned the name in that seaside shack when I first met her. She said the sirens would fight in this war. Talon claimed the sirens wouldn’t; that they never leave their mountain.
They will now that the Arcs have a siren, Shasa said.
I was so frustrated, felt so lost during that conversation, but now it’s starting to make sense. Adrian Naylor rank tears and received immunity to siren song. He even kidnapped one of them. He’s the reason Estelle was willing to consider trading the song for my tears in the first place.
“Adrian,” I say now with realization.
He grins, showing several gilded teeth toward the back of his mouth. “Glad to know you’ve heard of me.” His voice is higher-pitched than I expect. I hadn’t noticed earlier. I hadn’t cared earlier. “And if you have, you’ll know that siren hex doesn’t intoxicate me. Though I do wonder how you got a hold of it. You’re no vixen.”
Adrian lifts his brass again.
“No!” Talon yells, raising his fists and lunging toward the bars between his cell and mine. I drive my arms upward to block, but it’s not enough. Adrian knocks my head in almost the same spot as before, the metal knuckles hitting like a hammer.
My eyes roll in my skull, and I clutch my head.
“I’ve bested the wenches who own that song,” he continues to goad, wiping my blood from his metal knuckles on his shirt. “Got one on my side, even.”
Talon’s glance is ardent. He motions with his hands, but I can’t comprehend it. Everything spins, everything knocks. I struggle to stay upright, let alone follow sign language.
Talon motions again, gesturing to Adrian and then toward himself, and then I understand. Head heavy, I make my way up, using the wall for support. With every last bit of strength, I barrel forward, knocking my head right into the Arc’s gut. He lets out a grunt as I plunge him into the bars.
Swiftly, Talon’s hands lift over Adrian’s head, and he lowers the chain connecting the shackles around the Arcaian’s throat. I squeeze my eyes shut, head pounding harder than the battering ram they used to knock down the dungeon door. But it still doesn’t block out the sounds of struggle. The scraping of Adrian’s boots against the stone, the gagging noises choking their way out. Moments later, Adrian sags down, head sloping to his chest.
He doesn’t move again.
Talon works to undo his shackles from the Arc’s bruised neck. No longer supported by the chains, Adrian’s body falls to the side.
Talon grips the bars for support, chains chinking with the movement, never taking his eyes from me. “Are you okay?” he asks with effort.
I cradle my head, kneeling on the ground opposite from him. His hand finds its way to mine. “You saved my life,” I say, just realizing the fact.
“You saved mine.”
“I’m the reason you’re in here, Talon. I’m so—” Sorry doesn’t seem to be enough.
A voice cuts in before I get a chance to go on. “Good, you’re still alive.”
Through the bars, Odis fiddles with the ring of keys Shasa left behind. A girl wearing the fitted khaki uniform lingers behind, bending for one of the cases holding the camera equipment. She gives me a tip of the chin, and I stiffen, wondering if Tyrus has come back to ensure Adrian carried out his part of the deal.
“Miles,” Talon says, a stem of hope in his voice.
“I led the others away, but it won’t be long until they come back down to check on you two,” says Odis, inserting a key into the lock of my cell. Moments later the door creaks open.
“Miles, help her,” Talon says, his voice desperat
e.
I rack my brains, trying to remember interactions, to remember if this Miles Odis was a threat. He was behind the camera. He nodded something to Talon at one point. That’s it.
Miles’s face is kind and handsome, with wide, warm eyes and full lips. His black hair is buzzed close to the scalp, and he cradles my head with gentle fingers. The touch sears, and I can’t help but cringe at the purple of his palm.
Violet magic ignites like a flare, but it doesn’t burn. Instead, it shoots cool and crisp through my veins, up my jaw and squaring its way up toward my ear, taking the pain with it as it goes until I’m left with what feels like an ice pack against the side of my head.
I lift my bloody fingers once more, startling when the touch doesn’t hurt.
Miles Odis keeps his warm brown eyes on mine. “Better?”
I swallow, allowing him to help me stand. I can’t help but notice the girl behind Miles, hugging her arms to her chest as if trying to remain out of sight. “Better,” I answer, still trembling and wondering who she is. “Thank you.”
“Hurry,” Talon says as Miles darts out and around the open cell door. He inserts a key into Talon’s cell and opens it. While Talon’s leg is still injured, at least his knees are no longer broken. He stumbles his way to Miles, taking the other boy’s arms and allowing him to insert sprigs of purple electricity into Talon’s body.
Again, the girl hugs her arms to her chest, folding her chin downward. “Are you okay?” I ask her. Something tells me despite the badgeless uniform, she’s not here as a soldier.
She presses her lips together and stares intently at the muck on the floor.
Miles continues supporting Talon, watching him keenly for any signs of a problem. The magic from his hands continues spiraling around Talon’s arms and legs, slithering its way up to the bruise along Talon’s forehead, healing every scrape, every hurt I noticed and those I didn’t. Second by second, Talon stands straighter. The strain erases from his brow, though it still bends in concern for his friend, until finally Miles releases him and Talon treads out of the cell with him.
Such a Daring Endeavor Page 10
