The Unbound Empire

by Melissa Caruso

  This was what I had let happen, when I walked out of the room as he begged me to stay. I’d abandoned him to suffer alone as Ruven stripped his very humanity from him. The knowledge burned like a bucket of coals in my stomach.

  “We’ll fix you,” I told Marcello, ignoring Ruven, my voice rough with emotion. “We’ll find a way to change you back.”

  “There is no going back.” Marcello turned his fiery orange eye on me. “This is what I am now, Amalia. A monster.”

  “Indeed.” Ruven rubbed his hands. “Shall we illustrate the point? Break something, Captain Verdi. Perhaps her fingers, so she can’t use any of her clever little artifice devices.”

  Oh, Hells.

  Marcello hesitated only a fraction of a second before stepping toward me. I backed away from him, stumbling over a soldier’s body, panicky energy coursing down my limbs.

  Lucia stirred suddenly, hauling herself to her knees as blood trickled from her mouth. “Run… my lady.”

  “Stay down, Lucia,” I called, my heart leaping painfully. Her chances of survival were much lower if she attracted Ruven’s attention. “Stay out of this.”

  Marcello paused, half turning toward Lucia. Ruven’s eyes flicked to her, narrowing with annoyance. “How rude you are, to interrupt us.”

  Lucia’s hand dipped into her coat and came out with a slim flintlock pistol with an engraved silver barrel. “I’ll… hold them…”

  A resounding crack split the air. Ruven flicked his head as if attempting to avoid an insect; for one brief instant, a red hole appeared in his throat, but it closed almost immediately. By the time the sharp scent of gunpowder reached me, the battered and bloody shot clinked on the cobblestones, and there was no sign Ruven had ever been wounded.

  “Now, now. This interference is intolerable.” Ruven advanced on Lucia, who dropped her spent pistol and reached, swaying, for a knife.

  “You promised she’d live through our talk,” I reminded him sharply. Graces, please, don’t let another person die for me.

  Ruven sighed. “You’re right, I did.”

  He reached out and touched Lucia’s hair, gentle as a benediction, ignoring the dagger she swung at him; she collapsed limply to the cobbles, the knife clattering free.

  “There.” He turned back to face me, with all the forced calm of a performer still frustrated after a disruptive heckler has been removed from the theater. “I can’t have you distracted, so now she will both sleep and survive for at least an hour—so long as you give me your complete attention, Lady Amalia.”

  He gestured with polite grace to Marcello, his lips curving into a smile. My gaze pulled against my will to the silver scales gleaming down the haunted lines of his face.

  “Carry on, Captain Verdi,” Ruven said softly.

  Marcello took another step closer to me. My pulse raced painfully through my veins. I couldn’t read his face; his human expression was guarded, and his slit eye stared with pure animal madness.

  “The Marcello I know would never hurt me,” I said, trying to sound confident.

  His lip curled. “The Marcello you knew is dead.”

  I shook my head, clutching instinctively at my flare locket; my fingers found Kathe’s necklace instead. “I refuse to believe that.”

  “You’re a scholar. You shouldn’t let what you want to believe get in the way of what you know to be true.” Marcello’s voice was raw with anger. “I’ve learned that lesson now. I was naïve, Amalia. I believed that the Mews was a good place. That the Empire wanted the best for its Falcons. And I believed in you.”

  There was a glimmer of the real Marcello there, under that pain. I had to reach him, somehow—to draw him out before he slipped away forever. “You see the good in things. That’s different than being naïve.” The claws at my throat bit into my palm. “It’s one of the things I—I admire about you.” There was no way in the Nine Hells I was going to tell him I loved him for the first time now, like this, in front of Ruven.

  Marcello advanced another step, his orange eye and the green one both fixed on me. “You still can’t say it, can you?” He was too close, his words dropping low enough that only I would hear, but I didn’t back away. “I can. Fear is another thing he killed in me.”

  “Marcello,” I whispered, my eyes stinging. “Don’t do this.”

  “I love you, Amalia. Even now.” He reached out and gently slid his fingers through a dangling lock of my hair. “I don’t think I could bring myself to kill you.”

  Something prickled my neck. His nails formed curved claws, like a cat’s. I jerked my head away in horror, leaving a strand of hair hooked in his grasp.

  Marcello’s eyes narrowed. “But oh, I think I can hurt you.”

  He moved so quickly I had no chance to react, seizing both my forearms. I tried to twist away, but his claws pierced deep into my arms, hooking into my flesh. I shrieked, as much in shock as in pain.

  Marcello flinched at the sound, but didn’t let go. All the gentleness I loved in him was gone from his silver-scribed face. His green eye stared into mine with pleading despair, just as it had before the door closed between us; the slit in his orange eye narrowed to a bare slash. For a moment, I thought the Graces might have mercy on me, and my heart would actually burst from pure anguish, and I would die.

  But I was still trapped here, catching my breath in a great ragged gulp like a sob, Marcello’s claws hooked into my arms. He gritted his teeth and twisted them deeper, trembling as if he could feel the pain in his own flesh. Ruven watched from a few paces behind his shoulder, smiling with delight.

  I had to think of some way out of this, for Marcello and Lucia as much as myself. I tore my eyes away from Marcello’s and caught Ruven’s instead.

  “I thought you wanted to talk,” I gasped through the pain. “Are you a liar, then?”

  Ruven’s eyes narrowed, and he lifted a lazy hand. The claws retracted from my arms. Marcello backed away, his hands bloody and trembling.

  “Far from it,” Ruven said. “I merely wished to show you what is at stake in our conversation.” He rested a hand lightly on Marcello’s shoulder, the same one he’d left a bone shard in; Marcello shuddered.

  I folded my bleeding forearms tight against my chest in an effort to subtly put pressure on the wounds. I didn’t dare look at Marcello’s face, or I would fall apart; I couldn’t let Ruven see how much he’d gotten to me, or how much it hurt.

  “If this is still about your supposed desire for an alliance,” I said shakily, “your tactics are far from convincing.”

  “But I have so much to offer you!” Ruven spread his hands. “I am the only one who can restore Captain Verdi to his former state. Or a close approximation of it, at least; sometimes one does find it difficult to get the small details right.”

  Marcello’s jaw clenched, and the claws in his fingertips flexed and retracted. Whatever changes Ruven had wrought in him, he still held no love for his new master.

  “In return for what?” I asked, struggling to keep my voice controlled and neutral.

  “You know what I want.” He extended a hand. “Come to Kazerath with me. Use your knowledge, your imperial power, and your blood to help me lay down my mark upon the land and claim all of Vaskandar, one piece at a time.”

  “While you invade my country?”

  “Of course not!” Ruven affected shock. “I would withdraw my troops at once. Even with your help, it will take sufficient effort to conquer Vaskandar that the Empire can consider itself safe for quite some time—from not only myself, but any Witch Lords. And after that, well, if Raverra does not attack me, what quarrel could I possibly have with it?”

  In the gray shroud of fog, with the cold reaching through my bloody coat to pierce my bones—with weeping holes in my arms, and Lucia badly wounded on the ground, and Marcello suffering before me—it was almost tempting. I could almost make myself believe that all I would sacrifice was myself. My own life would be miserable, certainly, living in Ruven’s thrall and bleeding for his e
nchantments, but I could save the Empire and Marcello both.

  Ruven saw my hesitation. He stepped forward, his violet-ringed eyes lighting eagerly. “Well? Is it not a fine offer? You can save thousands of lives, and your dear captain, too. I’ll even heal your guard here, since you seem concerned for her life.”

  But it wasn’t so simple. My mind was full of the Empire’s secrets, which Ruven must not learn. My mother was the doge now, and I was on the Council; power over me meant power over Raverra. And if my blood truly could unlock Vaskandar for him to claim, that would make him so powerful that not all the might of the Serene Empire could stand against him.

  “I am a member of the Council of Nine,” I said slowly. “My life is not my own to give away. And my service belongs to the Serene Empire alone.”

  Ruven clicked his tongue reprovingly. “Don’t be so hasty, Lady Amalia. If you fail to give my offer due consideration, there will be consequences.”

  He snapped his fingers, and Marcello doubled over with a muffled cry. His uniform doublet rippled as if impossible movement scurried beneath it.

  “Stop,” I called sharply, barely catching myself from reaching out to him. Don’t show weakness. Don’t let him see it’s working. “I’m merely pointing out the difficulties. Only a fool jumps into an alliance without taking time to think.”

  Ruven’s eyes gleamed with satisfaction. He made a brushing movement in the air with one lazy hand, and Marcello went still, then slowly straightened. I forced myself not to look at him; I had to keep the appearance of control, and if I saw his eyes, I couldn’t.

  Shouting rose up in the distance, coming nearer—not the panicked cries of earlier, but the more disciplined calls of a trained military force approaching. It sounded as if the Ardentine forces had regained control.

  “Take your time to think, then, if you must,” Ruven said. He crooked a finger at Marcello, who turned, his shoulders rigid, and began walking away. “In fact, I want you to think about my offer every single day.” Ruven relished the words on his tongue, lingering over them. “But don’t take too long to consider, or I’ll change him further and further. He might look nice with spikes growing from his back, don’t you think? Or perhaps a few more arms?”

  I couldn’t keep the twist of revulsion and fury from my face. “Don’t you dare.”

  “But I’ll leave the one human eye,” Ruven said thoughtfully. “Even when the rest of him is changed beyond all recognition, he’ll always keep that one green eye, so you can still know him, and witness the moment his mind is lost to madness.”

  “You are a vile piece of work,” I said, contempt dripping from my voice.

  Ruven nodded graciously, as if acknowledging a compliment. “I’ll see you again soon, Lady Amalia Cornaro.”

  And as the shouts and running steps of Ardentine soldiers approached, he turned and disappeared with Marcello into the fog.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Curse it, we shouldn’t have left you,” Domenic grumbled.

  He reclined on a gilt-embellished divan in the Blue Room in the Serene Envoy’s palace, his leg propped on a velvet cushion. Shadows beneath his eyes and sweat beading his temples suggested that a mere hour hadn’t been enough to recover fully from the chimera’s venom, but it was good to see him alert and out of danger, at least.

  I tried to focus on that. I could feel everything that was terrible waiting like the Demon of Madness, hovering with a thousand claws and teeth to fall on me and rend me to pieces. I had to fix myself on the few good things, with all the vigilance of a traveler in a vast winter wood keeping one spark going to light a fire.

  “Nonsense,” I said, more curtly than I’d intended. “If you’d stayed with me, you’d be dead.”

  “I can vouch for that,” Zaira agreed from her protective perch on the divan’s arm, above Domenic’s head. “I thought I was dragging a dead body for a minute there. A heavy dead body.” She shook out her wiry arms.

  “But Lucia could still die,” Domenic said, his face grave. “I don’t like the idea of trading her life for mine.”

  “Neither do I.” I rose from my own seat and started pacing, my bandaged, aching arms crossed on my chest. I couldn’t stand being still; I had to be doing something, anything. “The physicians seem to feel they can save her, however, and you would certainly have died without the tincture. We can’t change the past. The question is what we can do now to salvage the future.”

  Domenic rubbed his forehead. “I’ve got people working on a barricade in the huge gap in my city wall, but Ruven’s destroyed any chance we may have had of withstanding a siege. We have to stop his army before it reaches the city.”

  “That’s my job,” Zaira said, with grim resignation. She met my eyes then, the dark rings of her mage mark piercing mercilessly through whatever fragile shell of armor I might have erected between myself and the memory of everything that had happened this terrible morning. “So he’s a chimera,” she said. “What are you going to do about it?”

  I released a long breath, flexing my fingers. The motion sent jabs of pain up my arms, but I didn’t care. “I’m going to hit Ruven back where it will hurt him most.”

  Zaira snorted. “I’d like to kick him in the bollocks as much as anyone, but I’d just break my toe, and he’d make some stupid remark about the magical omnipotence in his trousers.”

  Whether from blood loss or simple inurement, I didn’t even flush. “No, in his true vulnerable point. His domain.”

  Domenic frowned. “I thought Witch Lords were infinitely more powerful in their domains.”

  “His domain is the source of his power,” I agreed, with a humorless grin. “But he’s made a mistake. He’s told me himself how to steal it from him.”

  “With the special magic blood you got from your great-grandma?” Zaira lifted a dubious eyebrow. “How? You’re no Witch Lord. You’re not even a vivomancer.”

  “No,” I agreed, “but I know where to find one who I’ll bet is willing to help me.” Kathe had no love for Ruven, and I suspected the sheer cheek of snatching pieces of Ruven’s domain away would appeal to him. An unexpectedly fierce yearning came over me to have his clever, unpredictable strength at my side right now.

  A grin spread across Zaira’s face. Before she could reply, however, a servant peeped in the open doorway.

  “Lady Cornaro, Your Grace, there’s an armed force approaching the city.”

  Domenic started to struggle to his feet; Zaira held him down with a single well-placed finger on his forehead. “Ruven’s army? Are they here already?”

  “No, no,” the servant said hastily, waving her hands. “A Callamornish cavalry unit, coming to assist us. Perhaps two hundred riders. Lady Cornaro, your cousin, Princess Brisintain Lochaver, appears to be leading them.”

  If any circumstances existed under which I would truly have been emotionally prepared to face the cousin whose brother I’d killed a scant two months ago, I could state with some certainty that these were not them.

  Bree’s cavalry made a stirring sight as they rode up to the western gate of Ardence in the golden light of early morning, the hills rising behind them, with their horses’ manes tossing and cuirasses gleaming. But I felt nothing but dread as I stood to meet them, my eyes locked on the heroic figure riding in the lead with her hair a windblown tangle and a white cape streaming behind her.

  When they approached within yelling distance, all two hundred of them reined to a halt, with admirable coordination. Bree regarded me for a moment from horseback, then slid down and approached on foot. I stepped forward from the welcoming contingent arrayed around me, coming to meet her halfway. I was painfully aware that Lucia should have walked in my shadow, and Marcello should have been there to give my hand an encouraging squeeze. Their absence left me unsupported, as if the ground around me crumbled with each step.

  Bree stopped in front of me, looking regal and martial in her gold-chased cuirass with a saber at her side. She reminded me of our grandmother. The morning sun
picked out the freckles I knew so well, but also grim lines by Bree’s mouth and a hard look in her eyes that were new to me. And, most likely, my fault.

  “Hello, Amalia,” she said, as the wind in the open valley blew strands of hair across her face.

  “Hello, Bree.”

  We stared at each other with the deep, expressive silence of a connection binding as blood, strong with a lifetime of knowing each other. Words would have only weakened what passed between us.

  I’m sorry, I told her in that silence, meaning it with my entire soul.

  I know, her grieving eyes replied. I still don’t forgive you.

  Bree’s gaze traveled to my bandaged arms, then searched the hollows of my face. “You look like the Ninth Hell,” she said bluntly.

  “I’ve had a difficult morning,” I admitted.

  “Come on.” Bree slapped my shoulder with her riding glove. “Let me get my people settled and our horses stabled, and then we can go have a drink.”

  Two hours later, Bree leaned on the scarred wooden bar before us and stared at me. “Grace of Mercy. That’s terrible.” She tossed back a swallow of wine without breaking eye contact.

  I had told her that there was no way a tavern would be open two hours after dawn in a city that was about to be under attack. She had told me that I understood nothing about taverns. And here we were, in a small, grubby place with a thick layer of dust on most of the bottles behind the bar, working on our second bottle of wine—though Bree was more than half responsible for the first. I’d toasted Lucia’s health after a report came that the physicians had pronounced her out of immediate danger, but was trying to indulge only lightly.

  “It’s been a rough year, by which I mean the past few days, and it’s not looking to get any better,” Zaira said.

  “And Graces preserve me, what am I going to tell Istrella?” I groaned, cradling my forehead in my hands.

  “Don’t tell her anything,” Zaira urged. “Fix him first, then tell her. No point upsetting her.”