Breath of Winter, A

by Edwards, Hailey

  I couldn’t tell if his reaction was that strong or if his preparation to resist was that thorough.

  If it was preparation, had this happened before? What did it mean? What was she trying to do?

  Henri set the plate on a low table, ending their session. “You need to stop now.”

  Furious at his dismissal of her performance, our ward screeched until we covered our ears.

  When I snarled at her, she preened. No. It was Henri she was looking at. It was him she meant to impress with her tantrum. Mercy be. She was infatuated. Did she honestly believe that deafening him was flirtatious?

  Given our full attention, our ward began her song again. Her soft hum transformed into high notes that swelled to fill the bastille. My ears vibrated with music until my bones ached from her keening crescendo. Her voice was not Araneaean, her words as alien as her wings and claws, but the heartbreaking loss concealed in her tune shredded my soul, exposing my every sorrow to her whims.

  This was it. This was how the harbingers lured souls from the brink. By promising them the respite found only in death. It was a cruel lie, a vicious betrayal to summon a soul and tether it in a body that was rotting. No peace was found there. No rest awarded to the dead. No. She sung her lies, and all those plague-riddled corpses bought into the integrity in her words and they rose to serve her.

  Years from now, I would recall this day as the moment I recognized the power of the Necrita.

  They were necromancers, shaping their race from the ashes of ours. In each clan there were those who eschewed the old ways, the old gods, those who spoke of evolution and pondered distant Araneaeans past who might have lacked our silk or our venom. Never had I given those wild notions credence. Even in my anger for my brothers, never had I truly doubted the existence of my gods. But never had I witnessed an act such as this, one that defied all the rules and beliefs I held as absolutes.

  If such distant cousins of ours had ever existed, what would they have thought if confronted with an Araneaean? What would those poor creatures have thought if we trapped them in silk bonds and sank fangs deep in their throats? What would their final thoughts be as the venom ate them from the inside out? How could they look upon us and our skills with anything less than abject horror?

  Today I knew how they would have felt, if such frail creatures had ever existed. Right now I understood what it was to stand in the presence of a superior being and marvel at its terrifying glory.

  I knew now what it was to realize the full scope of what we—as a fractured nation—faced.

  As it turned out, I had kept my faith closer to my heart than I realized.

  And while the harbinger sang, I prayed the gods granted us mercy.

  Eardrums pounding, I met our ward’s eyes. “That’s enough.”

  Her eyes narrowed while she sang on, her voice soaring to a deafening pitch.

  “Keep this up and Henri will never feed you.” I winced. “Don’t you want to eat?”

  She didn’t stop. I hadn’t really expected her to.

  Nothing in life was that easy. Not in my life at least.

  “Zuri,” Henri said.

  Our ward didn’t care for that at all. Her forehead bounced off the bars from the force of her charge. Her arms shot through the gaps, hands raking the air in my direction. Spittle flew past her lips. I eased out of range, careful to avoid any of her saliva touching me where I might have cuts.

  If a riser bite caused plague, I had to believe a harbinger’s spit would too.

  As her fists clenched over empty air, her roar stunned me until warmth trickled down my throat.

  My ears were bleeding, and I wasn’t the only one.

  “Stop this,” I demanded.

  Her response was to increase her volume until spots swam in my vision.

  Giving up on the idea of negotiating with her, I spun silk plugs for my ears and shoved them in hard enough I grimaced, then directed the others to do the same as well. The peace in my head was sublime, but how long we could withstand her tantrum without vacating the bastille remained to be seen. Short of slapping my hand over her mouth, which wasn’t about to happen, I was out of ideas.

  I used the one weapon left to me—her name.

  “Stop this,” I screamed at the top of my lungs. “Lailah, you will stop this now.”

  At the sound of her name, Lailah did what I had warned Henri she would do.

  She flew into an even greater rage, springing into the air and ramming her head into the rock ceiling of her cage, falling to the ground and thrashing, kicking her legs, scratching at her wings.

  While she flailed, she kept right on screaming. The more furious she became, the more her wailing began to press on my head like a grape her horrid voice could smash between its octaves.

  As quickly as her fervor began, it ended. Even with the silk in my ears, they rang in the silence of the small room. I shook my head, and I would have sworn my eyes bounced in my skull.

  Never in my life had I experienced such stabbing pain in my head, my eyes, my ears.

  Shaking my head had been a very bad idea.

  A worse idea was Henri’s.

  He approached the cage with his arms out and hands held up for her inspection. I hoped he had kept his blowpipe up his sleeve. Since he hadn’t used a dart to quiet her yowling, he must either be reluctant to or had tried before and the poison didn’t work on her.

  The way her head cocked right, the pop of her bottom lip, told me he was talking to her. Afraid of what he might do, I pulled the stoppers from my ears and was met with the eerie and absolute silence inside the bastille.

  “Shh,” he said softly. “It’s all right. Hush.”

  “Lailah,” she repeated.

  “That is your name.” He stood dangerously close. “Do you remember that?”

  “No.” She shook her head until mine began hurting again. “Not her. Not me.”

  “It is a pretty name.” He studied her. “It seems a shame to waste it.”

  In a soft voice, she said, “Bad name hurts.” She touched her chest. “Right here.”

  “Then we won’t use it again,” he promised. “What do you want to be called?”

  Wings aflutter, she crooned, “Zuri.”

  “That’s my name.” Sensitive as my ears were, I flinched from my snappish tone.

  Lailah pressed her face to the bars and smiled as prettily as she could for me. “Mine.”

  “We have had this discussion before.” Henri held firm. “You must pick a different name.”

  With a huff, she turned her back on us. “I like Zuri.”

  “I’m glad to know you care, but it’s my name and you can’t have it.” I rubbed my forehead. “It would confuse Henri if there were two Zuris running around, not to mention the second world isn’t ready for there to be two of me.” Figuring using Henri was the best ploy, I added, “It would make Henri very sad if he couldn’t tell us apart. You don’t want to make him unhappy, do you?”

  Lailah pointed at me. “Change yours.”

  While I gritted my teeth until my jaw popped, Henri eased between us, breaking our eye contact long enough for her to scoop something off the floor of her cell. She held it up for my inspection.

  It couldn’t be. “How did you…?”

  Henri’s spine stiffened. “Who gave that to you?”

  The mosaic pitcher, the one so fond of reappearing in my room, the one I had drunk from countless times, was clutched in her hand. My stomach knotted. Coincidence. I didn’t believe in them. I scanned the faces of those who had spent the most time with her, those who might be at risk.

  Braden was rubbing his face. Malik was frowning at the pitcher. Fynn, he was smiling.

  I choked out his name. “Fynn?”

  “She figured it out,” a silky voice cooed. “Finally.”

  My head snapped toward our ward, who lounged against the bars.

  Gone was her wild-eyed look. Our harbinger’s gaze was—not crazed—but cold and assessing.

&n
bsp; The tension in my gut twisted. I approached Lailah. “What have you done to him?”

  “Why don’t you ask him yourself? Oh, I forgot.” She tittered. “He doesn’t talk.”

  “What have you done?” I growled. “Answer me.”

  “To him…nothing much.” She shook the empty pitcher. “You on the other hand… Fynn.” She rested her elbow on the bars. “Restrain your sister.”

  I was too caught off-guard to evade him. Fynn grasped my chair’s handles and spun me around.

  “What are you doing?” I pried up his fingers.

  Lailah clapped her hands. “Do tell her.”

  His answer was a scowl, which gave me hope he retained a shred of control if he could fight her order to speak. His lips whitened from him smashing them closed. His jaw bulged from grinding.

  “Males, they can be so difficult to train.” Her dramatic sigh made Braden flinch. “Not that one. He came to me sweetly.” She gestured toward Henri. “But that one refuses to obey even the simplest commands. I had such high hopes for him. He would have made such a fine vassal for our monarch.” Her lips twisted. “I suppose that means precious Idra must fend for herself. How sad that is for her.”

  “What are you talking about?” I stared at her. “Have I gone mad? What am I missing here?”

  Cold sweat poured down my back when I realized Henri wasn’t talking back. He was barely breathing. His gaze was locked on Lailah, eyes heavy, lips trembling with words that wouldn’t form.

  “You are so confused.” She leaned in my direction, stroking the bars of her cage seductively.

  That made me very, very nervous. “Why don’t you clarify the finer points for me, then?”

  “You saw in me what my son told you to see.” A dimple shined in her cheek when I paled.

  “Hishima knew?” If that were true, his entire agenda had been a ruse.

  “Oh, he knew.” Her dainty mouth curved. “How do you think I became this way?”

  The best guess I had was the obvious one. “You were infected by the plague?”

  “Yes and no.” She waved her hand, dismissing the topic. “All that matters is he had me made.”

  “Why would he do that to—” I bit off the insult I had been ready to sling, “—his own mother?”

  “I was dying.” She began pacing, which made Braden twitch. “He saw an opportunity. You see, the Necrita approached the Segestriidae. They offered us an alliance.” She waved her fingers at Henri. “The Araneidae wanted answers, and they had the gold to purchase them. How precious Maven Lourdes is, pursuing her cure, determined to find the missing dead, those missing males.”

  “The Necrita approached the Segestriidae for their gold?” I sounded doubtful.

  “We approached the second most powerful clan in the Araneae Nation, one that was content to let the plague lie, one that was desperate to eclipse their northland neighbors, and one that was in desperate need.” Lailah ran her fingers across the bars as she went. “What the Segestriidae don’t know is their greatest resource—their only resource—is but a few years from running dry. They have mined their crystal caverns to their deaths, and only Hishima and I knew that.”

  The Necrita must have known too. What other leverage could they have used against Hishima?

  “I hate to state the obvious, but why not force Hishima to marry into a wealthy clan?”

  “I tried. He loved Kaidi, obsessively, a nasty familial trait I’m afraid. He refused to break their betrothal and wed a more suitable female.” Her steps slowed. “Pascale of the Araneidae was my choice. Her scandalous reputation would have been cleansed by a good marriage to an upstanding male, to a paladin no less. What a perfect match they would have made.” She sighed. “But his hatred of the Araneidae made the pairing an impossibility.”

  Now Hishima’s willingness to sacrifice his mother made more sense.

  “He had to choose,” I said, working it out. “Either he gave the Necrita his future wife, Kaidi, cementing his political ties to their people. Or…he gave them the clan’s matriarch and the ruling maven. He chose to give them his reclusive mother, who he had all but stripped of her powers.”

  Metal groaned as the bars—enforced with Araneidae silk—bent in her hands.

  “He threw me to them. I was old and feeble, sick and dying. Instead of caring for me, he let me pay the price for his future happiness.” Yellow tears sprang to her eyes. “They made me this way, turned me into this…thing.” Her voice dripped with ice. “He made me a monster. But I am a monster who will survive the changes coming to this pathetic world. If you join with me, you can be spared.”

  The one thing scarier than Lailah making conversation was Lailah making recruiting offers.

  “Join you?” The idea boggled my mind. “Become like you?”

  “This existence is a gift.” She reached behind her to trace a wing with her fingertip. “It took me a while to understand that, but Idra opened my eyes. She showed me the strength of this new form, all its possibilities.” She curled her finger, and Braden went meekly to her. “Males are chains around our ankles, anchoring us to the ground when we were born to fly, born to rule this miserable world.”

  “Braden.” I reached helplessly for him. “Don’t go to her.”

  “He can’t help it, can he?” she baby-talked him. “He has to do whatever I say.” She grasped his collar. “You could wield this power.” She cradled his jaw. “The power of life and death.” Wrenching his head to the left, she snapped his neck. “Death is easier.” She let his body drop, dusting her hands.

  Fury curved my fingers around my wheels. “Why kill him?”

  “I kill because I am bored, because I am hungry, because I can.” She snapped her fingers. “I tire of this game. I have done as the monarch asked of me, and I am ready to return to my covey with or without you, Zuri.” Her fingers snapped again. “Be a dear and open the door, Henri.” When he held his ground, glaring at her, she screamed, “Open the door or so help me, I will kill her. Do it. Now.”

  “Don’t listen to her.” I shoved Fynn away from me. “Think about what you’re doing.”

  “I am,” Henri managed through clenched teeth. Defeat bowed his shoulders as he opened her cage.

  Lailah tapped the end of his nose. “Males. So predictable.”

  “Why invite me to join you?” I stalled for time, hoping inspiration would strike, but without Henri or the key, I was trapped. We all were. He was the only means of escaping the bastille or the laboratory.

  “I won’t bore us both by listing your attributes, but you are an ideal candidate.” A fond sigh. “We work very well together, you and I. You played your role up until this point to perfection.”

  “My role,” I said, temper flaring as I began to grasp what she meant. “You planned this.”

  Her eyes glittered. “Did you really think you could have captured me otherwise?”

  “How did you know I would bring you to Erania?” Even I hadn’t expected to come here.

  “Simple. When Kaidi arrived in Titania with Mimetidae warriors at her back, I knew an alliance had been forged. When I overheard what she planned—to study me—a prime opportunity presented itself, and I allowed you to catch me.”

  I snorted. “You were too busy eating your son’s face to notice.”

  “Perhaps,” she said softly, as if the memory was a fond one.

  While she reflected, I asked, “Why did you burn Titania?”

  There was no obvious answer as to why the city itself had to be so thoroughly destroyed. Kaidi had talked of nothing else until her curiosity was burned into my brain.

  “It seems wasteful, doesn’t it?” Lailah hummed to herself. “Our monarch is not what I am or was. She was never Araneaean. Love is a concept she doesn’t understand, and she never will. I tried to explain to her once why I loved a place as much as I had ever loved a person. She dismissed me as being sentimental for my mortal life. My attachment to my son, she understood. She herself is fond of her created daughters, i
n her way, and that is why Idra assigned value to Hishima’s life.”

  “She ruined the city to…what?” I couldn’t grasp what she meant. “Teach you a lesson?”

  “With my gift, I could have saved Titania. I could have restored the city to its former glory, but Idra saw my devotion to Titania as a weakness, as a sickness of the mind in need of purging. She set my city ablaze, then she watched it burn to cinders before finding me in the caverns to inform me of what she had done for my benefit. She was generous, she said, in sparing the people’s lives.”

  “How did she think that would help further her agenda against the Araneidae?” I asked.

  “Idra was of the opinion that if Hishima lost his precious clan home, he would become more eager to rally our clan and lead an attack on the Araneidae to seize their nest as his own. And if I no longer feared what might happen to my city, I would become a better ambassador for the Necrita.”

  “She ruined your city, so you killed her champion.” Revenge I could understand. That part was easy.

  “Yes.” She studied her claws. “It was shortsighted of me, I know.”

  Shortsighted. That was one word for it. “You aren’t…sorry…for killing your only child?”

  “I regret the necessity of his death.” She clacked her fingertips together. “My son had grown to fear that which he helped create. Oh, he visited me most days. He fed me well, kept me in fine clothes, left me pretty guards to entertain me. I could have forgiven him the rest, if his obsession with Kaidi hadn’t cost me my city. That I could not forgive. When I saw she had come in search of me with a new male, one she had an obvious attachment to, I knew Hishima’s hopes to wed her were as the ashes of my city. His death served a greater purpose. It convinced you of my insanity.”

  If this conversation was meant to convince me of her sanity, Lailah had a ways left to go.

  I speculated, “That’s when you decided to use me to hitch a ride to Erania.”

  “Cathis lacks the resources to accomplish what Kaidi had in mind. With Titania destroyed, it was a safe bet to assume Paladin Vaughn would assess the situation and determine the best place to keep me hidden was below the earth in his brother’s new clan home. It accomplished two feats. It kept his clan out of harm’s way and gave his sister-in-law that which she desired, a source, an origin, for the plague.”