The Defiant Heir

by Melissa Caruso

  “And here we are at last, Lady Amalia. Just the two of us.”

  My hands formed tight fists, my nails cutting into my palms. “They were your own people. Emmand looked up to you. Do you have no shame whatsoever? A good ruler’s life is lived as a sacrifice for the sake of those they rule.”

  “What a dreadfully dull way to live.” Ruven shook his head. “Shame is a symptom of weakness, my lady. It is not for those who stand astride the world, such as we do.” He held out a hand toward me. “Come. We have perhaps an hour before Mount Whitecrown erupts. I’m directing the blast to the south, into the Empire, but still, best to not be too exposed when it happens.”

  He didn’t cast so much as a glance at Zaira, lying crumpled at my feet, the wind stirring her hair. Afterimages of balefire still danced in front of my eyes. I wrestled to contain my anger.

  “You have quite some nerve, to behave solicitously toward me after all this. Do you truly expect me to believe you care for anything but my bloodline, when you cast the lives of your own people away so easily?”

  Ruven’s eyes widened. “But, my lady, you are so much more than your bloodline! No, no, you do not understand how highly I value you.” He shook his head. “This won’t do at all. Why, for instance, I still have a stockpile of the excellent potion that boy used to make for me. Just think of the possibilities, with the Cornaro heir under my dominion!”

  I did, and my stomach twisted.

  “There was another man who thought an alchemical trick was sufficient to subvert the Council of Nine,” I said coldly. “He paid dearly for his error.”

  Ruven chuckled. “I never can intimidate you, can I, Lady Amalia? You are not so easily cowed. Ah, it’s no wonder I admire you.” The hand he’d stretched out dropped to his side, and he shook his head. “I look forward to many more wonderful conversations with you as my guest. But first, there is one small matter to take care of.”

  I didn’t like the shift in his tone. I slid one of my last rings into my palm. “And what would that be?”

  “Your warlock.” He sighed. “I’d hoped to control her, but I fear my father was right about her after all. She’s simply too dangerous to live.” He reached for Zaira’s windblown hair, like a curious child hoping to catch some in his fingers.

  I slapped my ring down on the volcanic rock at my feet. A circle of golden light instantly blazed up around Zaira and me. Ruven pulled back from the ward, like a cat with an unexpectedly wet paw.

  “This will last at least three hours,” I lied. “Your guests are waiting for you in the castle. Do you truly wish the other Witch Lords to come and find you here?”

  Ruven’s eyes narrowed. “Very well. Stay up here in the open for the eruption if you wish. You are still in my domain; I don’t need to be here in person to exercise my power upon you. The land itself will detain you for me. I’ll be back for you once my guests and the mountain are both settled—if you survive.”

  He turned, his black coat swinging behind him like a wave of deeper shadow in the night. “Enjoy the view,” he called cheerfully. “I can think of no better display to celebrate my ascension.”

  I waited tensely, counting the heartbeats as he paced off across the bald crown of the hill. The trapped villagers cringed away from him as he passed, lit from below by the fading lines of light beneath their feet, but he didn’t so much as glance at them. Emmand’s corpse lay stretched toward him, sad and still, his hand flung out on the rock.

  Once he was gone, I counted a few minutes longer. Then I reached for the ring lying next to Zaira on the cold stone, but the protective circle sputtered out before my fingers touched it.

  “One moment,” I muttered to Zaira’s unconscious form, and I ran to the control circle, ignoring the stab of pain in my side as I moved.

  A faint red light still shone from the graven lines in the rock, making it easy to examine the design Namira had carved there at Ruven’s command. It was a complex circle, with patterns inside patterns and long arcs of runes spelling out terms and rules with careful precision. This was the work of a master. Grace of Wisdom, grant me insight.

  My heart descended into the murky forest below the hilltop as I studied the design. Ruven was right. It had already discharged the magic that would drop the containment and create a sudden release of the pent-up pressure in the mountain; that was done. And the artifice circle included no way to reverse or undo it. Mount Whitecrown would erupt, with whatever force remained to it after our efforts to decrease the pressure, and it would erupt within a few hours. There wasn’t even time to evacuate.

  The only section of the circle that seemed to still be active was the second stage of the enchantment, which would open a path for the eruption and point the force of the blast down the passes into the Serene Empire, toward Ardence. A single rune indicated the direction, painted on rather than graven, so Ruven could choose his target himself when he triggered the eruption. That second phase hadn’t taken effect yet and could still be altered. But this wasn’t pure artifice; it was designed to connect to and work with Ruven’s vivomancy. Without his blooded connection to Mount Whitecrown, merely moving the targeting rune would do nothing.

  A blooded connection to Mount Whitecrown. The door and the Truce Stones had recognized my blood as that of the Lady of Eagles. It was worth a try.

  I placed my hand on the warm stone, feeling the carved lines of the artifice circle beneath my fingers, and closed my eyes.

  I knew the stone. The planes and angles of this wind-worn slab of rock occupied a comfortable space in my mind. My awareness didn’t reach beyond to the hill below me, or the trees at the edge of the open space, but this rough, grainy rock beneath my fingers I knew. And I could wrap my mind around the enchantment worked into it, and feel how the magic connected to the rock, and to something else as well. Something massive and ancient, with a terrible fire rising up within it, raging with a power beyond that of any Witch Lord.

  But it knew me. Half the mountain belonged to my bloodline. All the awful majesty and destructive fury—it recognized me.

  I could do this.

  My eyes snapped open. I memorized Ruven’s painted rune, then rubbed at it with my sleeve. It was still wet and smeared off easily enough, ruining the deep blue velvet.

  I drew my dagger and cut my finger, freeing a trickle of blood.

  And froze. Hells. I had to redirect the eruption somewhere. There were villages and fortresses all around Mount Whitecrown. Whatever I chose, someone would die.

  The artifice design offered four possible locations for the direction rune, corresponding to four vents or weak points in the mountain.

  I pictured the map of the border that I’d pored over in Highpass, with all the little forts and passes and villages marked carefully in different colors. I had to balance innocent villages against vital alliances, and key defensive fortresses against the lives of people I knew and loved.

  One option aimed back into Kazerath, toward Ruven’s castle, and it was tempting to direct the blast there. But not only would that likely kill Zaira and me, as well as wiping out a few villages whose twinkling lights I could spy in the valley below, it would mark the end of any budding alliances I might have built with the friendlier Witch Lords. And I doubted it would do more than inconvenience Ruven himself.

  The currently marked one certainly wasn’t feasible; it would destroy our border defenses on a critical pass, killing hundreds or thousands of soldiers, and likely wiping out the town that supported the border fortresses at the foot of the mountain, which would add thousands of civilians to the death toll. A third option would force the blast westward, into a river valley scattered with villages and packed with both Vaskandran and imperial troops facing off across heavy fortifications. While the angle seemed more likely to keep the devastation mostly on the Vaskandar side of the border and might decimate their forces there, it would lead to heavy loss of life, including many civilians—and I stood a strong chance of killing Marcello, Terika, and the escaping Falcons as th
ey crossed the mountain’s western shoulder on their way back home.

  The final option was to skew the eruption eastward, along the ridge of the Witchwall Mountains. The terrain in that direction was too rough for farms or villages. But I might well catch Roland and his crew in the blast, since they were positioned on the eastern flank of the mountain, altering artifice circles.

  There was no way around it. People were going to die. I had to choose whom to kill: Marcello and Terika and the other Falcons, Roland and his soldiers, or Zaira and myself.

  My belly clenched with nausea, and a soft whimpering sound escaped my throat. This was terrible. I’d almost rather Ruven had dragged me back to the castle as his unwilling guest than kneel here, my friends’ faces vivid in my mind, and choose which of their lives to snuff out forever.

  But this is what my mother does. This was what the Council of Nine did, every day. Choosing between good and evil was easy. Choosing the lesser evil, and knowing that your choice damned people to death, was the part that hacked off pieces of your soul.

  This was the task I’d been born to, and that I’d taken up willingly when I accepted my role as my mother’s heir. This was part of the duty I’d accepted when I came to the Conclave as a Serene Imperial Envoy.

  I took a deep breath, reached out a trembling hand, and sketched a new target rune in the eastern quadrant.

  Please don’t be there, Roland. Grace of Mercy, protect him, I beg you.

  There would be few civilians, if any, in the rugged stretch of the Witchwall Mountains that bordered Mount Whitecrown’s eastern flank. The imperial border fortresses in those passes lay farther south, and should be protected by the next line of peaks. The headwaters of the River Arden might become even more choked than they had been by the eruption of Mount Enthalus three years ago, but we already had plans in the works to mitigate that issue, and I could apologize to Domenic later. It would be a red stone I owed him, a minor grievance; easy to make amends.

  Only Roland and his handful of soldiers would have to die.

  Only my cousin, so serious and brave, who had finally talked our grandmother into letting him go to the border, on my advice. The cousin who had played with me in the halls of Durantain castle when I was small, and helped me up into the branches of the apple tree in the garden. Roland, who would give his life for me in a heartbeat; who would give his life for anyone. Roland, heir to the throne of Callamorne, who would never see what a good king he would have made despite all his doubts.

  I rose, legs trembling. My eyes were dry.

  He might still make it to safety. The eruption might be minor enough to spare him, if our alteration of the other circles had had time to do its work. But that wouldn’t change the fact that here, in this moment, I’d been willing to kill him.

  This was what it was to be a Cornaro.

  Chapter Forty-Three

  The power of the binding ring must have faded while I was working on the control circle; Ruven’s villagers had fled, taking the bodies of the innkeeper and the old woman with them. Emmand, friendless, lay where he had fallen.

  I shook Zaira’s shoulder, with increasing vigor. I needed her awake. Not just to spare my cracked rib the pain of carrying her down the hill, but to save me from the dark spiral of my own fears. She stirred at last, groaning.

  “Come on,” I urged. “I don’t know how long we have until the eruption.”

  She blinked her eyes open and lurched to a sitting position, one hand on her temple. “Hells on a stick, my head hurts. Please tell me I imagined the part about not killing him.”

  “Ruven is disgustingly alive,” I admitted. “And I couldn’t stop the eruption, but I …” I swallowed. “I redirected it. It’s probably safe here, but we can’t take chances.”

  “Fine.” Zaira let me help her to her feet. Her eyes lit on Emmand’s still form, and she froze. “I didn’t kill him, did I?” Panic stretched her voice raw.

  “No,” I said. “You didn’t. Ruven did.”

  She averted her eyes as we passed him, mumbling, “That poor little bastard.”

  As we plunged once more into the darkness of the forest, the ground under my feet trembled, and the trees shook their leaves in a rising whisper. I thought for a moment it was Ruven moving the land against us but then realized the truth.

  “An earthquake.” The words took on a corroded edge of dread in my mouth, tasting like old iron. “Just a small one. Mount Whitecrown is getting ready.”

  “You’re sure we’re safe here?” Zaira asked, face pale in the speckled moonlight.

  “If the magic works as it’s supposed to, and nothing unexpected happens, yes. But this is the first time anyone’s tried anything like this. So, no. Not at all.”

  Zaira hurried a bit faster.

  The blood rune I’d sketched on the control circle seemed to have given me a lingering sense of Mount Whitecrown, and the volcano pressed at my awareness with overwhelming urgency. The forces built up within the mountain could move the earth far more than that little tremor, and the fires raging within it dwarfed even Zaira’s inner inferno. I supposed that was one good thing; if Mount Whitecrown dominated my senses even with such a weak connection, Ruven must be blind to anything else. He might well not realize we were escaping, and I doubted he could pinpoint where we were.

  Kathe met us partway back to the castle, limping up the path, a crow riding on his shoulder. Seeing him clearly injured sent an unexpected pang through me. I almost ran to him; much as I hadn’t forgiven him, I didn’t want him to get hurt on my behalf. But I caught the wild gleam of his mage mark through the darkness and held myself in check.

  “Are you all right?” I asked, trying to sound like I didn’t care.

  “Better off than you.” He lifted his face to catch the moonlight, seeming to strain to listen. “What’s happening? Something is stirring, all across the land.”

  “Mount Whitecrown. We were too late. It’s going to erupt.” I caught my breath, wincing at the sharp stab of pain from my rib. “I’ve redirected it away from … from most people, I hope, but you should still take cover.”

  “As should you.” He glanced behind him. “I’ve taken care of the immediate pursuit, but there’s an uproar at the castle. Ruven is sending more forces after you, and the new Witch Lord of Sevaeth is after your blood as well, Lady Amalia. She blames you for her mother’s death.”

  “But I didn’t kill her!” I protested.

  “I, ah, may have neglected to correct her assumption that you were responsible,” Kathe admitted. “Suffice to say it’s not safe for you at the castle anymore. You need to get out of Kazerath as quickly as possible, while Ruven is still distracted with the Conclave and this coming eruption. If you’re still here in the morning, he’ll be able to bring his whole domain to bear on capturing or killing you.”

  “We’ll head to the border by the shortest route, then. Maybe we can catch up to Marcello.” It meant running toward Mount Whitecrown, which seemed foolhardy in the extreme, but in all I’d rather take my chances with the volcano than with Ruven.

  “I have to get back to the castle.” Kathe reached out and put a hand on my shoulder, warm and gentle and strangely hesitant. “I should have told you about the trap. I’m sorry.” The words fell strangely off his tongue, as if it might be the first time he’d spoken them.

  Sorry was a start, but anger still simmered in me like chocolate too hot to drink. “Yes, you should have. I might even have played along.” His crow half spread its wings, muttering deep in its throat, and I caught its beady eyes. “Wait! Can you send a message?”

  “For you, my lady? Anything.”

  “To my cousin Roland.” I caught both his arms in my urgency. “He’s in the path of the eruption. Warn him to run and take shelter, please.”

  “I’m not sure he’ll have enough time for a warning to do any good,” Kathe said dubiously. “But all right.”

  He stroked the crow’s beak, whispering to it in some strange guttural tongue. The crow mad
e a noise of protest and flapped its wings. He soothed it, stroking the feathers of its chest, and finally it fluttered off, cawing.

  “Will it be all right?” I asked, feeling suddenly guilty.

  “That depends on the size and nature of the eruption. I’ve told him to be quick and careful, and not to get himself killed.”

  I felt a bit odd, worrying over a crow. But there’d been enough death already, and more was coming. I squeezed Kathe’s arms. “Thank you.”

  “Now, hurry.” Kathe leaned forward, hesitated, and placed a quick whisper of a kiss at my hairline. “I’m heading back to the castle, to do what I can to make sure the other Witch Lords know that the volcano is Ruven’s fault, and that the Lady of Thorns’ death is … well, that it’s no loss.”

  “We may need to have a talk after this is over.” I sounded like my mother, letting a younger me know the only reason she wasn’t reprimanding me right now was because guests were watching.

  Kathe laughed. “I suppose we should. Good luck, Lady Amalia. Don’t die.”

  “I’ll try not to.”

  The ground shuddered again under our feet as Zaira and I fled through the cold silver night. Through the gaps in the trees, we could glimpse a pale gray light rising in the east, washing out the farthest stars. A breeze picked up, growing stronger, swaying the highest tree branches to point deeper into Kazerath; I hoped it was Jerith, raising up a wind to protect the Empire from falling ash.

  So much now depended on factors out of anyone’s control. How big an eruption could magic trigger, if the volcano wasn’t naturally ready? How much pressure had Ruven’s enchantment built up, and how much had our sabotage released? How much of the mountain would be blasted skyward when it unleashed its fury? How precisely could the control circle direct such a terrible and untamable force? They were the sort of questions I would have enjoyed discussing over a pile of books with Venasha and Domenic, had they been purely theoretical. But now they chased each other around my head with bleeding-sharp edges, answerless and echoing.