by Jay Kristoff
She’d spent much of her childhood inside her parents’ apartment there. Far more than in Crow’s Nest, truth told. Sitting with her mother and their servants, playing with her baby brother. If Crow’s Nest had been their refuge, Godsgrave had been their world. She’d never managed to escape its pull for long.
The thought of her familia made her chest hurt, her eyes mist, all she’d broken and stolen, all the lives she’d taken and miles she’d run and years she’d studied, all of it would soon be justified. In two short turns, the magni would begin. In two short turns, she’d fight for her life and stand before Duomo and Scaeva upon that bloody sand, and scream her name as she slit their throats, ear to fucking ear.
It will be worth it.
She looked over her shoulder, down in the shadows of the hold beneath her feet. She could feel their stares upon her. The ones who’d called her friend.
All of it will be worth it.
“I knew you were a cold one, Crow,” said a voice behind her. “But I never knew just how much ice flowed in your veins until now.”
Mia stared at the Godsgrave skyline as Furian joined her by the rails. The Unfallen’s long black hair blew in the sea breeze, bronzed skin glistening with a faint sheen of sweat. His chest was pitted and scarred, the flesh still scabbed, but with the three weeks he’d rested aboard ship, he was almost hale. Despite the three suns burning above, Mia’s shadow trembled as he leaned closer. Glancing to their feet, she saw Furian’s did the same.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
Furian looked out at the City of Bridges and Bones, dark eyes narrowed against the light. “I’m told you’re to wield the blade in the execution bout.”
“Domina needs the purse.”
“O, I know it,” Furian nodded. “And I know it is Domina’s right to designate their executioner. I just didn’t think you’d be willing to put Sidonius and the others in the dirt.”
“We’re the only two gladiatii Domina has left standing, Furian. Your wounds are barely healed enough to risk you in the magni. Unless Domina wants the execution purse to go to another collegium, who is she going to field? Should she stick a sword in Magistrae’s hand and ask her to do the deed?”
Furian smiled. “Now, that would be a sight.”
“Aye,” Mia sighed. “It would at that.”
Furian’s smile died slow on his lips, his voice dropping to a murmur.
“Why did you do it?” he asked. “I’ve been meaning to ask.”
Mia glanced at him sidelong, lips pursed. “Do what?”
“You know what I mean,” he growled. “Bladesinger and the others thought of you as a friend. Yet Domina tells me that as soon as you got wind of their plan, you brought it straight to her. And not only did you foil their escape, but you fashioned a way they’d be captured alive, so they might be brought before the mob for justice.”
“If they’d just been killed in their escape, Domina wouldn’t have recouped a single coin for their loss,” Mia said. “Leonides would have shut down the collegium. We wouldn’t be here. But now, between the Whitekeep purse and the execution bou—”
“Aye, aye, I know all that,” Furian growled, his temper fraying. “What I don’t understand is why you didn’t help them.”
“Because I’m not a fucking hero, Furian. They want help, they can help themselves.”
Mia turned to walk away, but the Unfallen grabbed her arm, teeth bared.
“Who the ’byss are you?” he demanded. “No nameless slip from Little Liis, that much is sure. I look in your eyes and I see intent. I see design. Ever since you set foot in our collegium, I’ve felt your hand at work. Like some shadow puppeteer ever pulling the strings, and we, the marionettes.”
Mia snatched her arm free with a snarl. “Don’t touch me.”
“You’ve no loyalty to Leona,” Furian growled. “I know it now. Even in our match at Whitekeep, risking your life to save Bladesinger, all of it was to further your own ends. You’ve betrayed those who called you sister. Murdered and lied and stole, all to stand here on the sands of the magni when you could just slip between the shadows and claim freedom any time you chose. So why in the Everseeing’s name are you here?”
Mia stared into those bitter, chocolate eyes, the darkness trembling at her feet. She’d once thought she and Furian were as much alike as truelight and truedark. But she saw that was a lie now. Saw the similarities between them, as deep as blood and bone. Both prisoners of their past. Both obsessed beyond reason with winning the magni, Furian for the sake of redemption, and Mia for revenge.
Mia clenched her jaw, shook her head. Tempted to speak. To look into his eyes and see if he’d grant her some measure of understanding. He of all people should. But this was pointless and she knew it. Furian sought absolution for his sins from the hands of a god. Mia sought to strike down the hands of that same god for their own sins. For one of them to stand the victor, the other would have to fall. And neither would be willing to step aside so that the other might win. This was no storybook. There was no love between them. No fellowship. Only rivalry.
And there was only one way it would end.
“Get your rest, Furian,” Mia said.
She turned her eyes back to that blinding skyline.
“You’re going to need it come weeksend.”
* * *
Drip.
Silver at her throat.
Drip.
Stone at her feet.
Drip.
Iron in her heart.
Mia sat in the dark beneath the arena, simply listening. Salt water fell from the ceiling above, splashing on the cell floor. All the years. All the miles.
On the morrow, one way or another, it would all end.
They’d been brought ashore yesterturn, once the administratii had sent approval for the execution bout. The calendar was packed—there had already been five full turns of games, and hundreds of prisoners had already been murdered by the state. The editorii were hard-pressed to find room for another execution bout in the morrow’s festivities, but an entire gladiatii stable turning rotten could set a vile example for other collegia. And so, the Falcons of Remus were to be delivered to justice in a five-minute window after the final equillai race. Their lives snuffed out as folk waited for food, or dashed off to the lavatory before the main event.
And after midmeal, after their murders, the magni would begin.
Drip.
Drip.
Mia had sat alone in her cell and listened to the festivities, the roar of the colossal crowd shaking the very stone at her feet. Champions of each collegium were afforded a little privacy—her walls were stone, her bed was clean, two small arkemical globes shedding a warm, constant light. A small hatch in her heavy oaken door let in a whisper of fresh air, the smell of the kitchens, of blood, of oil and iron. She wondered what kind of conditions Sidonius and the others were being kept in. How much more they’d be forced to suffer before they walked onto the sand for the final time. Mister Kindly sat in her shadow, watching her with his not-eyes. Whispering that soon, one way or another, all this would be over.
She made no reply.
As she and Furian had been marched through the crowded marrowborn district and into the belly of Godsgrave Arena yesterturn, she’d been awed at the sheer size of the structure. She’d seen it as a younger girl, of course, but never this close. The arena’s great oblong was carved directly out of the Spine itself, stretching a thousand feet, concentric rings of bleachers reaching four tiers high. Graceful arches and fluted buttresses, solid marble and gravebone throughout, statuary of the Everseeing and his Four Daughters encircling the outer ring. It was a marvel of engineering, testament to the ingenuity of the folk who’d designed it, the suffering of the slaves who’d built it, a monument to the awesome power, vision, and, above all, cruelty of the Itreyan Republic.1
The venatus was done for the turn, the crowd pouring out into the street with bright smiles and wide eyes. Cathedral bells tolled all over the city, cal
ling the faithful to mass. With all three of the Everseeing’s eyes open in the sky, the more devout citizens of the Republic were preparing for a nevernight of prayer and public piety, and the less religious sorts, an eve of private debauchery.
The excitement was arkemical, anticipation for the magni at a dizzying high. Mia could hear the thrum of the great mekwerks beneath her, as the priests of the Iron Collegium tested all would be ready for the morrow. This was the greatest event in the Itreyan calendar, a celebration of the Republic, and the God of Light. Tomorrow, the grandest spectacle beneath the suns would play out before the crowd’s wondering eyes, the consul himself would crown Itreya’s mightiest warrior with a laurel of gold, as the Hand of God himself granted that warrior their freedom.
It was the stuff legends were made of.
Drip.
Mia stared at nothing.
Drip.
Saying nothing.
Drip.
Listening instead, to the echoes of the retiring crowd, the legionaries patrolling the arena’s bowels, the swish of a broom as a slave made his way up the corridor outside. And most of all, to the thoughts inside her head.
This is not where I die.
She shook her head, clenched her fists.
I’ve far too much killing to do.
The broom stopped outside her door. She heard a whisper of cloth, the soft tune of metal on metal, the gentle click of the mekwerk lock at her door. A man entered, sweeping as he came, his back bent with age, gray hair standing in a unruly shock above a pair of piercing, familiar eyes.
“Well,” the old man said, closing the door. “The accommodations are nothing to write home about, but the residents in this place are downright deplorable.”
“Mercurio!”
Mia rose from the floor and crashed into his arms. The bishop of Godsgrave grinned wide, wrapped her up in a fierce embrace. She almost sobbed, feeling all the sorrow and pain of the last few turns suddenly weigh a little lighter. The tension bleeding out through her feet into the uncaring stone beneath her. She held on to him so tight he struggled to breathe, and he patted her on the back until she eased her grip, dragged her knuckles across her eyes.
“’Byss and blood, it’s good to see you,” she breathed.
“And you, little Crow,” her old mentor smiled.
“You look good,” she said.
“You’ve looked better,” he replied, touching the scar at her cheek. “How you faring in here?”
“Well enough,” she shrugged. “Truelight is making it hard to werk the shadows. The food is shite. And I’m dying for a smoke.”
“Well, the first two, I’ve no remedy for,” the bishop said. “But the third . . .”
Mercurio reached into his threadbare tunic, pulled out a thin silver case. Mia’s face lit up as he pulled out two cigarillos, lit them with a small flintbox. She practically snatched the offering out of the old man’s hand, dragging the smoke into her lungs as if her life depended on it. Groaning, she leaned against the wall and tilted her head back, breathing a plume of clove-scented gray into the air and licking the sugar from her lips.
“Black Dorian’s,” she sighed.
“Best cigarillos in the ’Grave,” Mercurio smiled.
“Maw’s teeth, I could kiss you . . .”
“Save your gratitude for the morrow,” he said. “You can thank me by not getting your fool self killed.”
“That’s the trick of it,” she replied.
“Our young Dona Järnheim has filled me in on the particulars of your adventures while you’ve been absent the ’Grave,” Mercurio said. “Thank the Black Mother she wasn’t sending me regular updates or I’d have had a fucking heart attack.”
“I’ll admit the plan went slightly . . . awry . . .”
“Awry? It’s all over the shop like a madman’s shit, Mia. Solis has been on me like cheap silk on a two-beggar sweetboy. I’ve fended him off well enough ’til now, but his patience is worn thin.” Mercurio grimaced, dragging on his cigarillo. “You’re traveling in northern Vaan as we speak, just so you know. You missed catching the map bearer in Carrion Hall by a single turn.”
“That was sloppy of me,” Mia murmured.
“Aye, well, you were never my brightest student.”
Mia smirked, inhaling another lungful of warm, sweet gray.
“I received a visit a few turns after you left, by the by,” Mercurio said. “A friend of yours came poking around the necropolis.”
“ . . . I don’t have friends, Mercurio, you know that.”
“A girl named Belle? She said to say you sent her.”
Mia blinked, a slow remembering creeping up on her like a thief. She recalled the fourteen-year-old girl in the braavi pleasurehouse, with the bruise on her lip and too much hurt in her eyes.
“She came looking for you?” Mia smiled. “Good for her.”
“I’m not in the business of taking in every stray that walks in off the street, Mia,” he growled. “I’m a bishop of Our Lady of Blessed Murder, not a fucking charity worker.”
Mia folded her arms, fixed Mercurio with her dark stare.
“I recall a stray who walked into the parlor of Mercurio’s Curios not so long ago,” she said. “A girl without a friend in the world, and a whole Republic arrayed against her. You took her in. You gave her a place to belong. You gave her love in a world where she’d thought there was nothing left but shit. And thinking on it now, I don’t ever think she said thank you.”
Mia placed a gentle kiss on the old man’s cheek.
“So, thank you. For everything.”
“Get off,” he muttered, pushing her away.
“I know what it’s cost you to help me,” she said. “I know what you’ve risked to get me here. Scaeva and Duomo took my familia away, but I found another in you.”
The old man cleared his throat, scowling.
“You’re not going soft on me, are you, little Crow?”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.”
The old man blinked furiously, wiped his face.
“Fucking dusty in these cells.”
“Aye,” she smiled, pawing at her eyes. “It is at that. Is Ashlinn ready?”
“All’s prepared. Do you still trust her?”
“With my life.”
“I think she’s got a soft spot for you.”
Mia grinned around her cigarillo. “She always had bad taste.”
Mercurio sighed, looked her deep in the eye.
“Are you certain you know what you’re doing?”
“If I’m not, it’s a little late to switch the song now,” she shrugged. “I’ll just dance until the music stops, and see where the steps take me.”
“It’s not too late, Mia. You can still change your mind.”
“But that’s the thing, Mercurio,” she said. “I don’t want to. Even if Mister Kindly and Eclipse weren’t with me, I wouldn’t be afraid. Every turn of the last seven years has been leading to this moment. I’ll play the role that fate has given me. And tomorrow, when the curtain falls on the final act, Scaeva and Duomo fall with it.”
“Just remember,” Mercurio scowled. “The play’s final act needn’t be your own.”
“I’ve no wish to die,” Mia sighed, crushing her smoke out against the wall. “To be honest, it sounds far more interesting to be the most wanted murderer in the Republic.”
“A noble goal for any lass to aspire to,” Mercurio smiled.
Mia grinned. “Well, you told me once I’d never be hero.”
Mercurio’s eyes filled with tears. He wrapped her up in a tight embrace, pulled her close to his chest. And there in the dark, just the pair of them, holding the girl he thought of as his own, the old man whispered.
“I might have lied.”
1 Godsgrave Arena was commissioned late in the reign of the Great Unifier, King Francisco I, though construction was not completed until his grandson, Francisco III, took the throne some thirty-six years later.The principal architects were a husband an
d wife; Don Theodotus and Agrippina of the Familia Arrius. Theodotus was a man of sheer brilliance when it came to mekwerk, but his wife was simply a genius. The pair toiled their entire lives on the structure—it was rumored that Agrippina gave birth to their son, Agrippa, at her drafting table.Agrippina died three turns after the final stone was placed in the arena’s outer ring. Heartbroken at his love’s passing, Theodotus joined her barely a week later. Statues of the pair stand side by side in the Visionaries’ Row of the Iron Collegium, hands entwined, testament to the power of persistence, ambition and passion.The script at the statues’ base reads, “In love and stone, immortal.”That’s the story, gentlefriends.No punchline.No sarcasm.I thought you might want to hear something sweet, given what’s about to happen . . .
32: gently
Furian followed the path of a twisting canal through the marrowborn district, flanked on all sides by houseguards of the Remus Collegium. The hour was late, the heat only slightly eased by the cool nevernight winds blowing off the Sea of Silence. Revelry spilled from every taverna, smokehouse, and bordello, handsome dons and donas walking arm in arm, song and merriment ringing in the air.
The Unfallen had stomach for none of it.
The guards escorted him over the Bridge of Solace, along the edge of the Spine to a row of fine villas. They stood in the shadow of the fifth Rib, pale stone and ochre tile, flowers in the windowsills. Not the finest abodes in all of Godsgrave, to be sure, but closer to a palace than any place he’d slept in his life.
The guards escorted him to the front door, where Magistrae awaited in a flowing gown of ocean blue, a sour look on her face.
“The domina requests your presence,” the old woman said. “If it please you.”
With a last glance at the guards, Furian stalked into the villa, up the winding stair. The walls were polished white marble, silken curtains rippling in the breeze, rich red carpet beneath his feet. He walked slow, unsure of the way, finally arriving at a set of double doors at the end of the hall.
