Crown of Cinders

by Rebecca Ethington

  A wide grin spread over Thom’s own tear-streaked face. “Hey, Silnỳ.” His voice was soft and weak, his gaunt face pulling oddly under the smile.

  I hadn’t noticed how much weight he had lost while he had been lying in the bed day after day. Now, seeing him standing, he was little more than skin and bones. His arms were sticks, the muscles and sinews popping out along his joints and neck like the seams of a puppet. Even his eyes seemed sunken.

  I realized I was scared to touch him as I stopped mere inches away before I collided into him. It was something he noticed, and he smiled.

  “What? No jubilant greeting for me?” Wyn taunted, her smile as strained as the rest of us, although her joke was unsurprisingly pure.

  “I see you every day, Wyn, so don’t be greedy.” I contemplated hitting her then stopped when Ry stepped around me in an attempt to reach his brother, shock on his face.

  “Hello again, brother,” Thom said, his voice just as weak as his body looked. “We meet again.”

  Ryland chuckled uncomfortably before stepping forward, embracing Thom as though he had known him longer than the few days before Thom had been plunged into his never-ending sleep.

  “As long as you stick around, I’ll be glad for it,” Ryland gasped out, his voice strained. “What brings you here? I didn’t expect to see you—”

  “We need to see Dramin,” Wyn said, pulling my focus from the men and back to her, back to the bottles she was holding and the door that stood behind us. The door might as well have a spotlight on it.

  “We need to say good-bye,” Thom continued.

  Their words hit me hard in the chest, sending the stationary room into a spin as a sight tried to take control, tried to pull me down.

  Pushing it away, I shook my head, willing the people before me to come back into focus. Still, my heart pounded in my chest.

  I was not a fan of being in the same room with my brother, of seeing him one last time … of never hearing what he had been trying to tell me.

  I didn’t think I could be there when they pulled that sheet down. I didn’t know if I could see that without it destroying me. I was positive it would.

  I had seen Dramin’s funeral far too many times in sight. I knew the moment we all stood on the mountain side and placed that handkerchief on his face was a gateway to something bigger, and now it was here.

  I still didn’t want to accept it.

  Wyn interpreted the horror on my face as any good friend would. Her eyes softened as she placed her arm across my shoulder, the glasses clicking behind my back. “Don’t worry, Jos,” she whispered low enough that the men who were inches from us couldn’t hear. “We’ll wait. You don’t have to be there.”

  Mi lasko? Ilyan’s voice filled my mind, his soft, soothing words pulling me from the horrors of what Wyn was planning.

  Ilyan. I hadn’t been certain my stomach could wind itself up in heavier knots. I was wrong.

  One word and everything in me was iron and ice.

  “Is it done, then?” I asked aloud, forgetting that Wyn was in front of me.

  She screwed up her face in confusion, but I waved it off, and her confusion was quickly replaced by an eye roll and a scowl of irritation.

  I ignored her. I was getting pretty good at that, especially when I wanted to hit everyone.

  Yes, I’ve just left the council.

  I tensed, feeling his trepidation. I could feel the fear that was traveling alongside his magic.

  I shivered.

  How did it go? I didn’t want to ask.

  His magic pressed against me, the sound of his steps hollow as they moved across our connection, from his ears to mine. He wasn’t far. I didn’t know if that made it better or worse that he was running in my direction.

  That bad, huh? I tried to put a joke into the words, but it didn’t stick. It melted away like the emotional bomb we were surrounded by.

  It wasn’t good, he finally answered, his voice tense in my head as the door opened with a smack, and everyone turned at the sound, looking at Ilyan as he strode into the room.

  “How not good was it?” I asked before anyone else had a chance to speak.

  The look of joy they’d all had at the sight of Ilyan vanished with my question, their heads bouncing back and forth in confusion that slowly slipped into fear. They all knew where he had been, what he had been doing.

  Ilyan walked toward us, his lips pulled into a tight line as flashes of images from the council began to filter into my mind through our connection. The yelling faces and hurled rocks smacked me right in the chest.

  “You’re not giving me much confidence for what we’re going into,” I gasped as I pushed the memories away. My voice was broken and strained, so much so that it barely made it past my throat.

  “If you don’t have much, then I don’t have any,” Wyn said, her voice hard as she held onto Thom, taking a protective stance in front of the emaciated man. “I was at that bloodbath we tried to pass off as a council. I highly doubt this one could have gone any better.”

  Ilyan reached us then, his hand firm on Thom’s shoulder. The touch was meant to be comforting, but the look he fixed me with fell short of that.

  I didn’t want any more bad news.

  “They aren’t giving me much hope for what is coming,” he said with a sigh, and my shoulders tensed as the bands of his memory began to loosen, letting the misery that was plain on his face fill me. “Many of them wish to leave.”

  I could have never expected that.

  Neither could anyone else.

  Ryland finally took that step back while Wyn took one forward, forgetting about poor Thom who struggled a bit to hold his own weight. Luckily, Ryland was paying enough attention to at least notice and catch him.

  It all happened in a matter of a second, a shuffle of movement that fluttered around me while I stood in place, thinking if anything else were to happen today, the barrier would fall, and then we would all be screwed.

  Hell, we were already screwed.

  Sain really had won. All of his planning, all of his deceiving, had worked. I had never been more ashamed to be his daughter.

  The emotion swam toward Ilyan, and he moved his hand to my shoulder, pulling me toward him as if he were afraid I would suddenly take off and try to kill that vexing man. Not that it would be a bad thing.

  “How many?” Wyn asked, her question awakening the memory in Ilyan’s mind, pushing it back into mine.

  My magic flared at the invasion, a sight glistening around me as my magic showed me the same moment.

  Beyond the empty hospital, I could see the council in shadows, see the wide majority of people step forward in the hall, their hands raised above their heads. A solitary vote for dissension. For leaving.

  “More than half,” I answered for him, watching the scene continue as more and more joined them. Only a handful were left on the outskirts, sheepishly standing their ground, although many of them looked unsure of their choice. They wouldn’t last long. “No more than two-thirds.”

  Thom groaned, Wyn swore, and Ryland looked like he was about to throw up. His jaw worked wildly as he tried to find words, his skin turning pale as he twitched a bit, looking at something far over my head with enough anger that I could have sworn the ceiling had offended him somehow.

  “I guess it’s better for them to leave than to fight,” he said to the ceiling, his voice strong despite everything about him looking weak. “We couldn’t trust them … We can’t save them anymore.”

  “Where are they even going to go?” I asked, the sudden ridiculousness of their request hitting me in the gut. My pride bristled at the treachery I was enfolded within.

  “Some payback for saving them—walking away. Where are they going to go? Into the infested city with no escape? Dumb,” Wyn asked, putting all of my irritation into words. “They’ll be lucky if they survive.”

  “It is their choice,” Ilyan said, his voice strong as he straightened himself up to his full height, his anger
and frustration clear. “We can’t save everyone. If they choose to die, so be it. All we can do is save ourselves and do our best when the time comes to enter Imdalind.”

  “You mean, kick some trash,” Wyn spat, anger radiating off her. She smashed her fists together before stepping back to Thom, though she didn’t offer to take his weight from Ryland. She stared at Ilyan and me so intently I could feel my magic prickle in expectation.

  Breathing deeply in an attempt to control my magic, I pushed it away. I really didn’t need to bring down the hospital, too.

  “I can take down Sain on my own, anyway,” Wyn continued, the same anger pulsing within her. “You just need to get me there.”

  I really didn’t need to remind her again that it was my job.

  “I’ll get you there.” As far as I was concerned, she could have it. Although I didn’t see many complications with killing my own estranged father, I knew it was wishful thinking.

  “How many are left?” Ryland asked as he finally looked away from the ceiling, pulling the conversation away from Wyn’s murderous tendencies and back to the new complication.

  “Less that twenty,” Ilyan answered.

  This time, I joined in Wyn’s over-exaggerated frown. That was worse than I had thought.

  “Did you let them go?” I asked, knowing he had no other choice.

  He nodded, his lips a tight line of defeat, of fear, of acceptance. It was a simple move he could not control and one that might have sealed our fate.

  “Good riddance, I say.” Wyn smiled through the dark cloud that had covered us. The usually joyous expression was full of far too much savagery to be comforting. “If it’s only the four or us, we can get in, kill your dad”—she pointed at me—“and all y’all’s sister”—she waved toward the boys—“and we’ll be set.”

  “Excuse me. There are five here,” Thom interjected, pulling away from Ryland in an attempt to stand on his own.

  “Are there?” Wyn asked, her banter loud as she placed one finger against his chest and pushed him back into Ryland. Luckily, his brother was ready for him. “I see four unless you were planning on me pushing your wheelchair into Imdalind …”

  “I will walk on my own, thank you.”

  “You can barely stand!”

  “That doesn’t mean I can’t fight.”

  They continued to bicker, Thom’s smile deepening as Wyn’s exasperation grew.

  Poor Ryland was stuck between it all, looking as lost as a child in a theme park.

  I was looking at them, but I barely heard. I barely saw. My mind was locked with Ilyan’s, running over the map of every possible scenario, running over what Wyn had said.

  There were four, possibly five, of us. Not many. Too few to really be noticed if we went in under a shield. Too few for anyone to know what was going on before it was too late.

  Just like in Rioseco.

  Just like now.

  “If what we have heard is true … Edmund’s men don’t like him,” I spoke aloud, forgetting that a million other things were happening around me.

  The battle of the banterers ceased, everyone looking toward Ilyan and me in confusion.

  They are planning something, Ilyan said, his eyes intense as he caught up to where I was.

  If only I could see into his camp … if only my sight would show me something!

  “But even if it can’t, my love,” Ilyan interrupted, “it still shows that he does not have full control. They are fighting him.”

  “We could slip in and out. We could cause havoc, and no one would know we were there.”

  “That’s it!” Wyn yelled, pulling me from my reverie to look at her. All three of them looked slightly uncomfortable. “No more secret conversations. I’m done. You two are driving me mad.”

  I was ninety-nine percent certain at this point that was she was about to explode. I could feel the heat coming off her skin.

  “Spill.”

  “You’re right, Wyn,” I said with a smile, the emotion feeling odd against the painful puffiness of my eyes. “We can all sneak in and destroy him—”

  “Take note that the Silnỳ said all, Wyn. That’s important,” Thom interrupted.

  I ignored him, plowing forward.

  “No one would even know we were there. We could end this.”

  Wyn smiled before her face fell, the manic bloodlust falling right beside it. “You are forgetting one thing,” she said, pointing her finger toward the ceiling. “We are trapped here.”

  Plan foiled.

  Sighing, I squished my face up in frustration. My heart, however, didn’t really stop fluttering in my chest. My breathing didn’t really slow down. My sight flared with one image of Míra before she vanished in Dramin’s, one image of my father underneath the cloak as he vanished from the streets of Prague.

  “They got through,” I said to myself, grateful for Ilyan’s understanding sigh behind me. At least someone was paying attention.

  “So can you,” he said, his voice the same powerhouse it always was. The power and strength in the man swept over all of us. “Tomorrow, we will have the ceremony of farewells,” Ilyan continued.

  Ryland’s tears came back in full-force, yet I didn’t understand why. It was only when Ilyan replaced the words with the more familiar “funeral” that everything began to swim around me uncomfortably.

  No.

  Before the one word could seep into my mind, my tears had swollen to match Ryland’s, Wyn’s, and Thom’s.

  Ilyan stayed strong, the strength of a king shadowing all of us. However, I could feel the tremendous loss that was crippling him.

  “Then we will fight,” Ilyan continued, his voice breaking. “We will find a way in, and we will destroy them all.”

  “It’s time.”

  19

  Our steps echoed around the empty courtyard like the slow tolls of a bell at midnight: solemn, rhythmic. The tents were gone. Those who had inhabited them had already been removed from underneath Ilyan’s barrier. All who remained had been placed in the hospital, both to help the sick and guard the dead before they were laid to rest and their souls returned to Imdalind. All told, there were twenty-three of them. Twenty-three against an army.

  My heart tensed painfully, the sounds of our steps growing louder as we turned into the massive stone hallway. They echoed the sadness we felt in their monotone chimes, each beat hitting against my chest.

  I tried to ignore it, exactly as I tried to ignore the bloodied footsteps that guided us toward our room, the prints too small for an adult. Too small for what had happened.

  My back straightened painfully, and Ilyan’s arm tightened around me as he sensed the sudden change in emotion. Sensed the pain.

  “How are you holding up?” he whispered into my hair, his voice soft as his own pain seeped into me.

  “I should be asking you the same,” I joked.

  He didn’t laugh. I couldn’t even force one out from myself.

  “Let’s look at it this way,” I finally said after a moment of silence. “We are both still standing, and we are both still moving forward.”

  “Are you calling that a success?”

  “This time, I am.” I sighed, leaning my head against his chest, letting the sound of his heartbeat rumble through me.

  He looked at me as we walked, sadness and misery lining his face. There was a spark of joy there, but it was masked, the hopelessness of this day overwhelming it.

  His finger was soft as he ran it across my face, over the cemetery of tears trailing down my jaw to the bridge of my nose and finally brushing the hair out of my face in an attempt to see me better.

  His touch sent ripples of pleasure over my skin and down my spine. The sensations floated through my stomach in a tickle of want that, for a second, made it hard to keep walking, to keep breathing.

  “Beautiful woman,” he gasped aloud as he pulled me to a stop right before our door, pressing me against him then leaning down, his movement slow, his touch gentle. With a flutte
r, his lips barely brushed against mine. The feeling was more breath than contact as he chuckled, his laugh increasing the tangle of knots he had already infected my stomach with.

  “Butterflies” was an understatement.

  I gasped and tried to pull away, but he came in closer, still not quite kissing me.

  I gasped again, not able to find words in the goo of whatever he had left me in.

  He didn’t miss that and smiled, the bright blue of his eyes glistening in the dim light of the hallway. The love I had seen before was still there, still strong. It was merely clouded by what was coming.

  “Do you want to escape with me?” I whispered, knotting my fingers underneath his shirt to touch the skin of his hip, teasing him with my real meaning.

  He chuckled, the touch calming him, even with the pain. The sound made me smile, the bittersweet emotion sneaking in whether I wanted it to or not.

  “I would love to escape with you,” he whispered back, pulling me against him as we escaped into our room, tripping over each other on the few steps before we fell onto the bed, our arms and legs tangling around each other from the fall.

  “Come with me, můj kamarád,” he whispered, closing his eyes without another word, his magic prodding me. The invitation to enter the Tȍuha was clear.

  My smile deepened as I, too, closed my eyes, leaning into him and allowing his magic to take me completely. The warmth of him consumed me as his fingers trailed up my arms, over my collarbone, and across the lines on my neck.

  I didn’t dare open my eyes.

  I shivered from the touch, the ripple of pleasure moving down my spine.

  “My Joclyn,” he whispered the moment his finger connected with the raised brand on my neck.

  My magic swelled as his wrapped around me in an equal crescendo, pulling me, mind and body, into the sacred space we shared, the place that was even more of a sanctuary in this moment than I could have ever hoped for.

  I heard the waves before I opened my eyes, the hot sand against my skin a comforting blanket that I was eager to be wrapped up in.

  Ilyan’s hand was a gentle caress against my skin. The soft touch created a powerful trail of desire behind it. It was filled with power as it always was in this space.