by Zoe Marriott
Ion’s eyes flicked to us as we made our noisy arrival, but Luca’s head never turned. The bandages that were still wrapped around his face showed white through the uneven tufts of growing hair at the back of his head, like bone.
“Reinforcements have arrived,” Ion said hoarsely. The movement of his throat pressed the knife a little deeper. A bright droplet of blood slid down his neck. “Don’t you want to say hello?”
Luca said nothing, but the knife in his hand seemed to tremble. Then it twisted. The drop of blood became a rivulet.
I stared at his still figure. Luca had been shouting a moment before. The wreckage in the room showed that there had been a fight. And yet now, when he had his knife at Ion’s throat, Luca had frozen.
Arian eased past me, his sword still at the ready. “Luca…” he whispered, voice tentative, soft, as if he were speaking to a frightened animal. “It’s all right. You don’t have to.”
Luca’s face snapped round, his eyes burning almost black against the bandages. “I don’t need your help.”
“Look out!” I screamed.
Ion’s hand shot up and caught Luca’s wrist, wrenching the knife sideways. The tip opened a shallow cut along Ion’s jaw. He barely flinched. Luca grunted with pain, though, as Ion twisted his wrist to force him to drop the knife. Luca kicked out at the same moment that Arian surged towards them. Ion caught Luca’s boot and shoved him back into Arian, who had to drop his sword to avoid stabbing Luca with it. They both went down.
In a blur of speed, Ion leaped over them and ran at me, clearly intending to make a break for the stairs. I whirled my axe up into attack position. Ion stopped with a jerk, his face registering caution mixed with something I could have sworn was pleasure.
“Well! If it isn’t Wolf Girl! Fancy meeting you here.”
Before I could react, he seized the white bell rope in both hands, took a step back and leaped over the low stone wall, out of the tower. The bell clanged loud enough to deafen me. I brought my axe down and sliced through the taut rope.
There was a yell from outside. I ran to the opening and looked down. Ion, still clutching the end of the rope, had landed on the rampart below. He straightened, sent me a cheery wave, and then jumped onto the steep, sloping roof. He slid down it and out of sight.
“You let him go.” Luca’s voice came out as a snarl between gritted teeth. “I had my knife at his throat, and you let him escape.”
I turned to see Luca slapping away Arian’s hands as Arian tried to help him up. He flipped to his feet unassisted, fury showing in every line of his body.
“You might have had your knife at his throat, but you couldn’t do it,” Arian said wearily. “Could you? For the Mother’s sake, Luca, you couldn’t do it!”
Luca looked at him with something like hatred. “You have no idea what you’re talking about. I was going to skin him like a rabbit. Now he’s running. This place is a maze – he could hide forever, thanks to you.”
“Stop it!” I yelled. “This isn’t Arian’s fault.”
“If you hadn’t interrupted—”
“Exactly the same thing would have happened,” I said angrily, shoving my axe into its sheath. “You’d have stood there until he took the knife from you and gutted you with it. You know it, Luca. I can see it in your face.”
Luca made a choked sound. “You can’t see anything in this face, you idiot.”
He shoved past us and fled down the stairs.
Thirty-three
By the time we reached the bottom of the tower, Luca was already gone, vanished as swiftly as his brother.
“Where now?” I asked.
Arian tilted his head, as if listening for something. Then he took two strides to the edge of the rampart and looked down into the courtyard. He beckoned me.
Below us, a few hill guards were still skirmishing on the east side of the courtyard, but their opponents seemed to be household servants, armed not with swords or axes but kitchen knives. One even held a broom. The hill guards were forcing them back steadily. As I watched, one of the servants at the front tripped over a loop of rope and fell, taking two of his comrades with him. The hill guards swarmed into the opening, and within moments the servants had laid down their weapons and were surrendering.
Almost all of the gourdin lay dead. Those few who were still alive were trussed up like market-day chickens against the wall of their barracks. Most of the hill guards were engaged in leading out small parties of crying Sedorne women and children, many clad in their nightclothes.
Six Sedorne men – older and better dressed than the others – stood to attention against the inner wall. Were these the rebel leaders, the Sedorne lords who had been too proud to accept exile, and had followed Ion here? They were trying to act proud now, but their lifted heads and scornful faces could not hide the fact that they were bound to one another, hand and foot. None of them looked to be injured either. They had been taken without a fight.
“It worked,” I breathed. “Luca’s plan really worked. I wish he could see this. I wish he could see what his men did for him.”
“I don’t know if he cares any more,” Arian murmured.
I opened my mouth to disagree. Then closed it again. Finally, I said, “We can’t keep chasing him. We’ve done all we can now. We should go down and help them.”
I pulled the baton from the iron ring at the door cautiously, but no enraged Sedorne burst through to attack us. As we headed down to the ground floor I found the house already transformed. Instead of silence and darkness, the long corridors rang with the voices and footfalls of fellow hill guards and shone with the light of their lamps and torches as they combed the place for hidden enemies.
We found Livia in one corner of the strangely shaped room leading to the courtyard. She and Rani were unpacking healing supplies on one of the tables. Someone had put lights in the sconces for them. Several men and women, including two of the Rua prisoners that Arian and I had freed earlier, were lying on blankets on the floor. Some of them only looked to have minor injuries. Others were in a bad way. Hind was among them, her tunic cut away to reveal a bloodstained bandage that covered most of her upper body. She lay quietly, eyelids flickering faintly.
“How is she?” I asked Livia.
The older woman made a troubled face. “She’s bled a lot. She kept asking for Luca before she passed out. Where is the captain?”
“He managed to corner Ion, but Ion got away. They’re both running around somewhere here. Be careful,” I said.
Arian asked, “What can we do to help you?”
Livia looked surprised, then offered Arian a genuine, if tired smile. “There are plenty of injured out there, but they’re too stubborn to stop for treatment. Some of them will start dropping soon. Could you try and get them to come here? They’ll listen to you.”
Arian nodded. We headed towards the door. What Livia hadn’t said – and I knew all too well – was that there must be plenty of dead out there too. Friends as well as enemies. I braced myself as I stepped outside, eyes quickly scanning the courtyard.
The air was icier than before, the smell of smoke like a tarry coat on the tongue. Tiny flakes of snow were just beginning to fall on the shivering groups of rebel women and children. I counted about thirty grown women, some of them servants, some of them nobles, and around the same number of children, ranging in age from babies to adolescent girls. I saw barely any adolescent boys. Were they among the gourdin, living or dead?
“We can’t keep these children out here in those clothes. It’s too cold,” I said. “Luca should be here organizing this. Could we double-check the empty barracks for weapons and then put the civilians in there, where they can be warm and out of the way?”
Before Arian could respond, there was a stir and a murmur from the hill guards.
It was Luca. He stood atop a pile of boxes at the eastern edge of the courtyard. It was as if he had materialized out of thin air. As we watched, the captain jumped down from the boxes. His movements wer
e jerky, as close to clumsy as Luca could ever be. He drew his sword and stalked through the space without a glance or word of greeting for his men. They parted hurriedly before him.
He reached the gourdin tied up by the barracks, seized the closest one by his bound hands and walked back to the centre of the courtyard, forcing the man to scrabble after him on his knees or be dragged.
“Where is he?” Luca demanded. His deep, commanding voice rang out in the near silence. Even the rebel women and children had stopped crying. “Where is Ion Constantin?”
The gourdin squinted up at Luca wordlessly. I couldn’t tell if his face was sullen or just confused. Luca released the soldier’s hands and dealt the man an open-handed slap that knocked him sideways. “Speak.”
The man shouted something in Sedorne. I didn’t know most of the words – but certain phrases are always going to be tossed around in a military camp, and I had learned enough of those to pick out “traitor” and “coward”.
I started forward. Arian’s hand closed on my upper arm, jerking me to a halt—
Luca stabbed the defiant gourdin through the heart.
The man collapsed without a sound. I didn’t need to look at his wide, vacant eyes to know that he was dead. As I stared, frozen with shock, Luca turned away. The captain’s glittering gaze lighted on another gourdin. He was much younger, this one, no older than fourteen or fifteen. His face was still soft and round, and he had a sleek braid of honey-coloured hair. He looked ridiculous in the dark, lacquered armour which was clearly a size too large for him, but his expression was defiant.
Luca walked towards him.
“That is what will happen to anyone who refuses to speak to me. Do you understand? You are the prisoners here. You have no rights. You have no one to defend you. If you want to live, you answer me.”
He reached out and caught the young boy’s braid, jerking it savagely. His sword swung up, splattering droplets of blood across the boy’s face. “You look the type to catch Ion’s fancy. I’ll bet he showed you some of his little hiding places. Or maybe one of your friends knows? Speak up!”
An older woman standing among one of the civilian groups cried out; her heavily accented Ruan was made more difficult to understand by her sobs. “My son is innocent. We do not know where Ion is. Leave us alone, please!”
“Why?” Luca gave the boy a shake, yanking at the long braid until I could see tears springing up in the boy’s angry eyes. “Why should I leave you alone? You watched as your men went out of this place each day, to go thieving and murdering and kidnapping in the hills. You’ve lived happily off the spoils of their crimes for years. How many boys like your son have suffered and died at your husbands’ hands? At Ion’s hands? You’re none of you innocent.”
The woman reached out pleadingly. “But he is a child! He has done nothing!”
Luca’s face twisted under the bandages. “Someone here knows where your leader has his hiding place. Someone knows, and they’re not telling.” Luca shoved the boy roughly, knocking him down onto his bound hands and knees. “Perhaps you’re more scared of him than you are of me. That is going to change. If someone doesn’t speak up in the next ten seconds, I will cut off this boy’s fingers. Then I’ll take out his eyes and his tongue. And when I’m done with him I will choose another, and another, until I find the right one. The one who can answer me.”
Luca began to lift his sword again.
You have to believe in me.
The echo of Luca’s words, words he had spoken to me months ago, rang through my bones. The movement of his blade seemed to slow as I watched, drifting up as gently as a feather. The snow hung motionless in the air around me.
If you give into anger you will become the thing that you despise.
I could feel the world sucking in its breath. Waiting. Waiting for history to shift. Waiting for me to choose.
It can’t take your soul.
I was the fulcrum on which this moment turned. Only I had the power to stop it. I had made a promise to the Wolf, to my father, to the Holy Mother. I had made a promise to myself. I would never run away again. I would fight for what I believed in.
I believed in Luca.
I shook off Arian’s hand and stepped forward. The snow began to fall again. Time sped up. The world let out its breath.
“No.”
Luca swung round. Dark droplets scattered from his sword onto the snow-dusted dirt.
“What?”
“I said no. I won’t let you.”
Luca barked, “Arian. Get her out of my sight.”
I didn’t look around. I didn’t have to.
“Not this time, Luca.” Arian’s voice was low, rough with pain. “I can’t do what you want this time.”
“Someone arrest both of them,” Luca shouted. “Now!”
A couple of reinforcement hill guards moved. Hind’s shout stopped them. The injured lieutenant was clinging to the open door of the house, a dark stain spreading across her bandage. Rani stood behind her, arms ready in case she fell.
“Stay where you are,” Hind called. “No one interfere. This is between them.”
Luca gave a hollow imitation of a laugh. “I see. You’ve planned this together. You’ve all betrayed me.”
“No one has betrayed you,” I said. “You proposed suicide and we agreed. You broke ranks and abandoned your men in battle and we still carried out your plan. We’ve done everything you asked of us, without question. But not this. We’re not murderers, Luca. We have to be better than them. You taught us that.”
“I was wrong,” Luca snapped. “I was stupid. Playing nice, preaching honour, where did that get me? They don’t follow the rules. They do what they want and then they laugh in our faces. We’ll never win that way.”
“You have won! You’re here, aren’t you? We’ve completed the mission. We’ve taken back the House of God. What more do you want?”
“I want Ion dead!” Luca roared. “I want him to suffer. I don’t care about anything else. You won’t stop me!” He whirled around, raising his sword above the boy at his feet.
I wrenched my axe free of its sheath and lunged forward.
Axe blade and sword met with a long, trembling whine of metal as Luca bore down on me and I struggled to force his sword up.
From the corner of my eye, I saw a blur of motion as Arian grabbed the Sedorne boy, flung him over his burly shoulder and darted away. The boy’s mother and the rest of the small group of women fled after him.
“This isn’t you,” I ground out through clenched teeth. “This isn’t you, Luca!”
“You don’t know who I am,” Luca panted. “The person you knew is dead.”
“No!” Sparks flew between us as I disengaged and spun away out of range. “You didn’t die! We thought you were going to. We searched, and we prayed, and we watched over you, and you lived. It was a miracle. You’re throwing that away. You’re throwing everything away.”
“I don’t have anything left!”
Luca’s desperate, glittering eyes flicked to where the group of civilians were sheltering against the wall behind Arian.
Arian hadn’t drawn his sword, and I knew he wouldn’t. Couldn’t, not against Luca. He would put himself between Luca’s sword and whatever victim Luca chose, but he wouldn’t fight him. I didn’t know if Luca would really cut through his brother, his best friend, but I couldn’t take the chance.
I stepped into Luca’s line of sight.
“No,” I repeated.
“Ion could be getting away right now.”
“Then look for him. Take this place apart stone by stone if you want, but leave the civilians and the prisoners alone.”
“I can’t find him that way!” Luca took a deep, gasping breath, as if he were about to break down. Then he straightened, shoulders going back, chin lifting. “Very well. You’ve disobeyed my orders. You’ve betrayed me. If I have to bring you down I will. But this isn’t a sparring match, Saram Aeskaar. We’ll fight to the death.”
&
nbsp; “Frost…”
I heard Arian’s horrified whisper, but it was already too late. I had made my choice. I had to fight – and I had to win.
I was fighting for Luca’s soul.
Thirty-four
I stared into Luca’s face. The snowflakes drifted gently into his shorn hair. A faint chill that was nothing to do with the snow skated over my skin. The Wolf was stirring. Go back, I told him firmly. I don’t need you.
There had to be something of the old Luca in there. Something of that golden man who had broken through my shell of fear and distrust. The man I had fallen in love with. He couldn’t be gone forever. I wouldn’t let him be. I just had to get him to listen to me. To see me.
I swallowed hard. Then I whispered, “Begin.”
Luca came at me so fast that for an instant he seemed to blink out of sight. I panicked. Pure instinct had me bringing the axe up to block the vicious slice at my side. Luca flicked his sword away into another cut at my shoulder. Again, I whirled the axe round just in time to deflect the blow.
Luca snarled and, whipping his sword round, flew into a spinning kick. I dodged. Luca’s boot passed my stomach by less than an inch.
“You can’t win if you don’t attack,” Luca said as he landed. His words reminded me painfully of the many times we had sparred with each other. But this time neither of us held a blunt practice weapon. And this fight wouldn’t stop if one of us drew blood.
“I don’t want to attack,” I said, watching warily as Luca circled me. I shifted to keep him in sight. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“That puts you at a serious disadvantage,” Luca said, “because right now I don’t care if I hurt you.”
He lunged, sword aimed at my belly. I skidded sideways to avoid the blade and moved right into a punch. The blow landed squarely on my cheek and knocked me back a step. I ducked hastily to avoid a sword slash that would have laid my face open, and spun my axe in a wide two-handed sweep, driving Luca back.
