Rider's Resolve (The Rider's Revenge Trilogy Book 3)

by Alessandra Clarke

  K’lrsa was flung backward, slamming into the wall with a heavy smack. She stumbled back to her feet, leaning against the wall, stunned, her body aching from head to heel.

  And then the fury started to burn through her veins.

  After all she’d been through…For the Lady to so casually attack her…

  She was done. Done with the gods and their manipulations. Done with their petty little tests and hollow threats.

  She didn’t move towards the Lady or reach for her knife again, although she wanted to. Instead she pulled herself up straight and met the Lady’s silver gaze. “I may not be able to harm you, but I can oppose you. I can stay here forever and refuse to kill Aran or destroy the Toreem Daliphate.”

  The Lady’s face flickered briefly, revealing something dark and fathomless lurking underneath. “Do that and the world will end.”

  “So be it.”

  “You don’t mean that.”

  “Those horrors you forced Vedhe and I to witness?” She shook her head. “The things that we’ve been through, that others have been through. Maybe it’s time for it all to end.”

  “You must do this.” The Lady’s eyes blazed silver.

  “No.”

  The air in the small space swirled as if they were caught in a spring storm, whipping K’lrsa’s hair about her face. K’lrsa stood firm in the midst of the storm and smiled. The gods wanted her to believe that they were all powerful, but she knew the truth. They weren’t. They depended on mortals like her to act for them.

  She moved towards the exit.

  “Where are you going?” The Lady’s voice shook with thunder.

  “I’m tired. I think I’ll rest for a bit. And when I’m done, I hope you’ll have a different answer for me about my parents. Because I promise you, if you don’t, I won’t be helping you defeat Aran.”

  She was almost at the doorway when the Lady hissed. “What about Badru? We freed him to help you. Would you leave him out there alone?”

  K’lrsa paused on the threshold—she’d forgotten about Badru, but she couldn’t let the Lady see her worry. “He was a Daliph, he can take care of himself.” She turned back. “Just remember, you aren’t his gods. If he wins, alone, without my help, who knows what will happen to you.”

  The wind whirling through the room whipped higher and the silver pitcher flew through the air, slamming into the wall next to K’lrsa’s head.

  With one last feral grin, K’lrsa fled the Lady’s wrath.

  Chapter 36

  K’lrsa found the others gathered together around a small fire in the tree-filled room, Herin and Garzel huddled off to the side, K’lrsa’s parents chatting happily with Vedhe, Lodie, and M’lara, F’lia curled up asleep at L’ral’s feet.

  K’lrsa headed for L’ral, wondering what she could say, what she wanted to say, but knowing she had to say something about what she’d seen.

  She still hated him for leading her father to his death, but she knew now the truth of what L’ral and her father had both tried to tell her—that L’ral had changed his mind in the end. More than that, that he’d sacrificed himself to try to save her father.

  L’ral tensed as she came closer, his hand moving to touch F’lia’s hair, as if protecting her.

  K’lrsa stood far enough away so he’d know she didn’t mean him harm but close enough so she wouldn’t have to shout. She swallowed, searching for the words to say. She wasn’t going to apologize. He didn’t deserve that. But he deserved something.

  Licking her lips, she finally managed, “Take care of her, please. I know I can trust you to look after her while I’m gone.”

  She held his surprised gaze for a long moment until he nodded slightly.

  Satisfied, she turned away.

  It probably wasn’t as much as he deserved, but it was the best she could do. She’d carried her hatred of him for too long to just let it go.

  She glanced at her parents, but there was no point talking to them until the Lady fixed them. They were babbling like a small stream and with about as much direction.

  M’lara pulled free of them and ran up to her. “Guess what?”

  “What?”

  “Garzel is teaching me how to speak with my hands. See?” She made a small gesture next to her hip. “This means ‘be careful’.” She made another gesture that involved brushing her ear. “And this means ‘listen, do you hear that?’ Isn’t that neat?”

  K’lrsa looked towards Herin, Lodie, and Garzel who were now watching them. “Is that how you’ve been communicating all this time? With your hands? You mean those grunts of his don’t actually mean anything?”

  Herin shrugged. “Eh. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don’t.” She bared her teeth in what for her passed as a grin. “You think you’ve figured out my secrets, child. You don’t even know the half of them.”

  K’lrsa shook her head. Even after all the time they’d spent together and fleeing the Daliphate and coming here, Herin still kept her secrets. “You know, Herin, it might be about time for you to give up the last of your secrets. What if one of those little things you’re holding so close to the chest is the difference between defeating Aran and losing to him?”

  Herin snorted. “Pzah. Obviously I’m not the one to give advice on defeating that man.” She wiggled her stunted fingers in front of K’lrsa’s face. “See how many times I tried and failed. At least Lodie managed to kill him. Too bad she couldn’t make it stick.”

  “But that’s exactly my point. If Lodie had known that he was a death walker, she might’ve killed him in some other way. But because you didn’t tell her, he died in such a way they were able to bring him back.”

  Lodie came to join them and Herin flicked a glance at her. “Prettied yourself up I see.”

  Lodie’s form shifted until she once more looked like the old woman she’d been when K’lrsa met her. But then her hands closed into fists and she glared at Herin as she reverted back to the young woman she’d become in the labyrinth. “And why shouldn’t I? Isn’t that one of the perks of being dead? Getting to look like I want to and not what time has forced me to become? What’s wrong with choosing to claim back the years I lost to Aran and revenge? You might try it yourself.”

  Herin cackled, her laughter like two rocks rubbing together. Tilting her head to the side, she too transformed. Gone was the old, wrinkled hag that K’lrsa had always known. In her place sat a woman almost as beautiful as the Lady Moon herself, her hair long and luxurious, cascading around a face with high cheekbones and stunning green eyes, her form svelte and lean, skin a deep, rich ochre.

  “Is that how you used to look?” K’lrsa couldn’t help but stare.

  Lodie laughed. “Hardly.”

  And then she too transformed to look stunningly beautiful, her skin shining with health and vitality, eyes sparkling with mirth.

  K’lrsa looked back and forth between them. They were still themselves, still recognizably Lodie and Herin, but somehow the best, most perfect versions of themselves. “So I take it neither one of you actually looked like this in real life?”

  Lodie shook her head. “No. You’ve lived in the tribes, you know that wouldn’t be possible. Too much time spent outdoors, never enough food. But if we’re going to be our younger selves, why not be the best versions we can be, right?” Lodie turned to Garzel. “What about you, old man? Ready to shed the years you lost to Aran?”

  Garzel shook his head and flashed a short series of hand signals at her before leaving the room.

  Lodie shrugged and settled down next to Herin. K’lrsa glanced towards where Garzel had disappeared, but then back to Herin and Lodie once more. There was something transfixing about such beauty. She didn’t understand it, but she could feel it tugging at her attention, demanding her focus, obliterating her focus.

  “What did Garzel just say?” She forced the question out, trying to focus her attention elsewhere.

  “He said he earned those years and he wasn’t about to give them up like they’d never ha
ppened.” Sighing, Herin shifted back to her older self, maimed fingers and all.

  Lodie crossed her arms, keeping her younger appearance.

  Herin snorted. “Not like it matters. As soon as we pass beyond we’ll shed these bodies anyway.”

  K’lrsa moved closer. “Where is beyond? Do you know? Where do we go after the Promised Plains?”

  Herin shrugged one shoulder. Lodie didn’t even acknowledge the question.

  Frustrated, K’lrsa turned towards Vedhe and her parents. “So, Vedhe, what do we do now? Just wait for the Lady to decide whether she’s going to heal my parents or not?”

  Vedhe stood and motioned for K’lrsa to join her away from the others. K’lrsa glanced back at Herin and Lodie, but neither one seemed to care, and her parents were a lost cause. The roof could fall in and they’d keep on talking as if nothing had happened.

  She joined Vedhe. “What?”

  “I think it’s time I tell you what the Lady and I discussed earlier.”

  “You talked about more than just rescuing Lodie?” K’lrsa stiffened, suddenly wary.

  “Yes. I asked if we could choose more powerful objects than the ones we already have. Ones that can actually defeat Aran.” She met K’lrsa’s eyes. “Like the sun orb.”

  K’lrsa shuddered, imagining the damage that would be done if the orb fell into the wrong hands. Look what Luden had managed with just the necklace. Imagine what he could have done with the power of the sun…

  But at the same time, a small part of her thrilled at the possibility of having access to that kind of power.

  How easy it would be to defeat Aran and destroy the Toreem Daliphate if she could just burn them to the ground. Destroying not just Aran, but all of those men who’d chosen to support him in his evil rather than stand against him. All the slavers and abusers like she’d seen in the labyrinth. All those who caused harm, spreading the poison of their hate throughout the world…

  It would just take a moment. One thought. And they’d be gone. Purged from the face of the earth in god’s fire.

  She stepped back, shaking her head to clear it.

  “What is it?” Vedhe asked.

  “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

  “Why not?”

  K’lrsa bit her lip. “Because I’m not sure I can trust myself to stop with just Aran. Not after the visions I saw in the labyrinth. I’m not that strong, Vedhe.”

  Vedhe’s smile was fierce and predatory. “And why should you stop with just Aran when there’s so much evil in the world and we’d finally have the power to stop it?”

  Chapter 37

  K’lrsa dragged Vedhe farther away from the others, into a deep shaded nook. “Who else would you attack, Vedhe? The slavers? The other Daliphs?”

  “Them. And more. All who are evil or support evil.” Her eyes blazed with fervor.

  A chill rolled down K’lrsa spine. “All who support evil?”

  Vedhe smiled slightly, like she was confused by K’lrsa’s question. “Yes. We’ll start with all of the people in the Daliphana.”

  “Not just the Toreem Daliphate. All of them?”

  “Of course. Why is the Toreem Daliphate deserving of destruction but the others aren’t?”

  K’lrsa didn’t have an answer to that. “What about the women and children?”

  “The women raise their sons and daughters to be that, don’t they? Let their daughters be locked away? Live their comfortable lives on the backs of slaves? Raise their sons to treat others as contemptible?”

  “But…”

  “What? You think they can’t fight back? Resist? Refuse to be part of it?”

  “They’d die if they did. You haven’t been there, Vedhe. You didn’t experience what I did. Every single day they beat you down, make you doubt yourself, tell you over and over again that you’re less than, that you’re nothing. You don’t understand how that can wear at you. And I was grown when I went there. What do you think it’s like to be raised in that?”

  Vedhe shrugged the argument away.

  K’lrsa stepped closer, grabbing at her arm. “They may not be chained like the slaves, but the women of the Daliphana are as much victims as the slaves.”

  Vedhe snorted. “Except the slaves want to be freed. The women will just rebuild what they know and understand. You saw that for yourself with the women Aran sent across the barren lands.”

  “You can’t know that! And some of the men don’t like the way it is either.”

  Vedhe shook free of her grip. “Have you so easily forgotten how quickly Luden turned on you? How he kicked you and F’lia off the Council and took control?”

  “That wasn’t…He was trying to protect the women and children. It wasn’t about…”

  “About being used to having his way and not wanting to be thwarted by a woman who was stepping outside her place?”

  K’lrsa shook her head, trying to clear it. “We can’t just kill everyone who thinks differently than we do.”

  “We can if their beliefs cause harm.” Vedhe’s voice was flat and cold, determined.

  K’lrsa wasn’t willing to give up just yet. “Define harm.”

  Vedhe shrugged away the question.

  “Vedhe? Define what you mean by harm.”

  Vedhe met her eyes. “If they make the world a worse place by being here, then they should die.”

  “But what does that mean? Where do you draw that line?”

  Vedhe shook her head, looking away, arms crossed. “I can’t explain it. But I know where it lies.”

  K’lrsa half-laughed. “But…Where does it stop?”

  “When all who need to be, are dead.”’

  “That would be…Thousands? Maybe more?”

  “And?”

  K’lrsa covered her mouth to contain her growing horror. “I saw the same nightmares you did in the labyrinth, but…What about those people you kill’s children? Or their spouses? Or their parents? Or their…anyone? Their neighbors. Their friends. Think how much harm you’d do. How much harm you’d cause.”

  The look Vedhe gave her froze her soul. “Would you want a man like Ivan as your father? Would you want him to come home, his hands bloody from the murder of innocent women and children, to play stones with you? Would you want to be married to a man like that? To lay with him at night knowing what he’d done that day? Or to give birth to a man like that? To know you’d been responsible for creating someone like him? That you had brought him into the world to do that kind of harm?”

  Vedhe shook her head, dismissing K’lrsa’s argument. “We’d be doing those people a favor by killing the evil ones.”

  “It’s not that simple. I saw Harley with Mistress Hawthorne. No matter what he’d done to you or me, he was a good man to her. He treated her well.”

  Vedhe’s expression went flat. “Well. As long as he was a good man at home, who cares how many slaves he left to die in the desert? Or how many he whipped so badly they were permanently scarred.”

  “That’s not what I was saying!”

  K’lrsa paced back and forth, trying to work through the conflict between what her gut was telling her and what her mind was telling her. “Look. A part of me wants to wipe every single person like that from the world. But another part of me is screaming that that’s not the way to solve this. That the more people we kill, the worse it’s going to get. The more deaths, the more pain, the longer the hatred lasts.”

  “So we should leave Aran to do whatever he’s going to do?” Vedhe raised an eyebrow in scorn.

  “No. I’m not saying that. He’s proven over and over what kind of man he is. But beyond him…I mean look at Badru. He was raised in the Toreem Daliphate, but he’s a good man. If we kill them all, we kill good men like him.”

  “What makes you so sure Badru’s a good man?”

  K’lrsa’s heart skipped a beat as she turned to look at Vedhe. “What are you saying?”

  Vedhe refused to answer.

  “Vedhe? Did you look at him with the l
ooking glass? Did you see something I should know?”

  Vedhe shook her head slightly, dismissing the question. “No more than I see with every person I look at. We are, none of us, pure or clean. We have all inflicted pain on others. We have all put ourselves first when we could have helped another. It’s just the way we are.”

  “So where does it stop then? If none of us are any better than the others? If we’re all flawed?”

  Vedhe didn’t answer, but the expression in her eyes said it all. For Vedhe there was no stopping. If she took up that type of power, she’d break the world.

  K’lrsa’s stomach dropped.

  Vedhe would be no better than Aran…

  She might even be worse.

  K’lrsa buried her face in her hands. What was she going to do now?

  Chapter 38

  Father Sun strode into the room.

  The only part of him that burned were his eyes, but K’lrsa backed away from the sheer intensity of his presence as he stomped over to her.

  She quailed before him, wanting to run and hide.

  But she couldn’t.

  Not if she wanted her parents to be restored to themselves.

  It took all of her will to stand tall and meet his gaze, but she managed it even though tiny tremors coursed through her entire body. The man was a god. One thought and he could probably erase her from existence.

  He didn’t, though. Because he needed her. And as long as she was willing to say no, she had the power to demand his assistance.

  Didn’t make him any less intimidating as he loomed over her, though. “You make demands when you’re the one who can’t keep your promises?” he roared.

  “I do.” She raised her chin, forcing herself to meet his eyes. “What’s the point in keeping my vow if my parents are already gone?”

  His eyes flashed fire and it was all K’lrsa could do not to step back. “They’re not gone. They’re right there.”