by Stacey Filak
Whatever was happening, Tollan suddenly knew that it was his responsibility to help them. It was House Daghan that had held the mage women as slaves. His grandfather and great-grandfather had forced them, against their will, to serve the crown. He would not sit idly by while the Under bore the brunt of his family’s failings. “We have to help them,” he said, meeting Wince’s gaze.
To his credit, Wince simply nodded and drew his sword. Tollan stood, looking down at Elam. “I’ll be right back,” he said softly. And he was grateful that his voice trembled only a little.
They strode into the room with more bravado than Tollan felt. Katya was sobbing against Gemma’s chest, and Lady Brinna had Devery on his knees. She was drawing a mage mark in the air, and Gemma was trembling.
Across the room, someone shrieked. Princess Elsha stood before the throne, wearing a crown of silver that he’d never seen before. “You!” she screamed. “You’re dead! You’re … you’re ruining everything!” Where once had been the cool, poised princess he saw a woman who had given over to madness. She looked at him with such a particular hatred, as if he had personally done something unforgivable to her, as if he’d murdered all that she loved. The intensity of her gaze sent a shiver through him.
Suddenly, both mage women were scrawling characters in the air. “You have to die,” Elsha said, as her mark began to take shape. Her voice had taken on a mechanical quality. “Everything I’ve done, everything I’ve given up. You have to die.”
Then Gemma shrieked, and he couldn’t help but look at her for an instant, even though Elsha was taking aim at him. But it was only an instant. Because suddenly, Gemma was moving toward Lady Brinna with the same awe-inspiring grace and speed that Devery had once possessed. “Balls!” Wince groaned, drawing his attention back to Elsha, who wore an expression of glee.
The mark that she drew was intricate and terrifying. It bore all the characteristics of the other marks he’d seen, but there was something sinister about it as it took shape. The pattern shivered with dark sparks and even his untrained eye could see the menacing nature of it as she made the elaborate swoops and curving lines.
As she finished the mark with a flourish, Elsha stepped back, watching as the writhing black miasma she had made took on a life of its own. It pulsed and throbbed, waiting to be released by its maker. Elsha smiled coldly at him. “Time to die, Tollan. There’s nowhere to escape to this time.”
Before Tollan could do anything, Wince pushed his way in front of him. He didn’t even have his blade up—he just thrust his chest out, waiting to catch the death mark as it raced toward them.
Their friendship flashed through Tollan’s mind. The hours they had spent training together, the endless games of tag and Four Fat Fathers. Their rides with Uri and their secret trips into the city. Agony erupted in the pit of Tollan’s stomach. He would not let Wince die for him. Wince had accepted him for who he was even when he could not accept himself. He wouldn’t let that be stolen from the world.
“I love you, brother,” he said, as he pressed his foot into the back of Wince’s knee and watched his oldest friend tumble to the floor. It was a damned dirty trick, but one he had played on his friend a dozen times. He stepped over Wince to meet his fate, and as the darkness swallowed him, he felt no pain. He felt pride for the man he’d become.
Wince could see that Tollan was dead, could tell by the vacancy in his eyes. Whatever brightness the goddess had breathed into him upon his birth had gone as the swirling black death mark struck him.
The throne room was silent. Wince tried to breathe but air refused to move in or out of his lungs. He pressed a hand to his mouth and bent over, trying to unsee what he’d seen. Tollan couldn’t be dead. He’d only just begun to live.
Wince’s field of vision narrowed until all he could see was the gray of Tollan’s eyes. He could see in them a history that was now lost—the three of them, Tollan, Wince, and Uri. They had left him alone in a world he didn’t want to face without them. A tear slid down from his eye, and as it hit the polished stone floor, sound flooded back into his ears. His gaze widened. Air filled his lungs.
A sound—the keening of the truly brokenhearted—shattered the silence. Elam had run to Tollan’s side and collapsed beside him, sobbing into Tollan’s stilled chest. “Why did you do that? Why didn’t you get out of the way, you stupid, beautiful man?”
Wince thought that perhaps he should go to him, but he couldn’t quite wrap his mind around what Elam was saying. Why hadn’t they gotten out of the way? Why had he believed that he had to die to protect Tollan?
In Above, he had been raised on stories of knights that battle beasts to save a damsel in distress and men that died to save the ones they loved. He nearly choked on the irony as he realized once again how foolish the things he had learned Above had truly been.
His eyes were drawn to Elsha. Her laughter was like a knife. She looked like Devery. They had the same eyes, though Wince doubted that any warmth had ever touched Elsha’s gaze. Her face was split by a smile that spoke of absolute victory. There were no damsels in this room that required rescuing. She had accomplished her goal. The House of Daghan was dead, when they could have simply jumped out of the way.
Suddenly, Gemma crashed into Elsha at inhuman speed. With two flicks of her wrists, Devery’s sister was missing both of her drawing fingers.
Elsha hissed at her. “Do you think that will stop me, you sewer rat?” She stuck out her tongue and licked at the stump of her right hand. A mage mark flared on her tongue, and Wince watched in awe and disgust as the severed finger grew back. “You can’t win,” she said, then licked at the other hand. “Don’t you know that, yet? There’s nothing you can do that I haven’t prepared for. I was born for this. Revenge is my entire purpose.”
Gemma had not expected that. Hadn’t Devery said that there was no mark to grow body parts back? Apparently, his sister knew something he didn’t, but Gemma didn’t have time to wonder because a voice behind her drew her attention.
“Stop it!” Katya pleaded. “Please, Aunt Elsha! Stop! You don’t have to …”
Gemma stared at the little girl, wide-eyed, for the span of a heartbeat. Elsha snapped a mark into existence in front of her, and it came flying toward Gemma, its edges sizzling like acid. At the last instant, Gemma dodged to the side, then launched herself at Elsha. Her blade bit into the Vagan woman’s side, leaving a rent in her gown six inches long. The mage mark hit the wall and ate a hole through the paneling.
Katya ran toward them, putting herself too close to the fighting for Gemma’s comfort. “Please,” she cried, as tears streamed down her face. “Please listen to me! It doesn’t have to be like this. The end of this doesn’t have to hurt!”
Elsha howled in pain, but then she placed her hand on her side. A visible wave of mage work spread outward from her and she grimaced, “Silly Katy, in the end, everything hurts.” She turned her attention back to Gemma. “Do you really think that a knife is going to kill a fully trained mage queen?” She flicked her wrist, and another mark sparked into existence—this time a ball of flame. It catapulted toward Gemma, who ducked, then somersaulted toward Elsha.
“Your mother’s dead, Elsha. We’ll free the other—” Elsha interrupted her with a mark that turned into a sword. It shot through the air like an arrow directly toward Gemma, who had to dive to the side to avoid being impaled.
As she launched herself out of the way of the flying blade, Gemma caught a glimpse of Katya, who was standing stiffly, her head tilted to the side as if she were listening to something with all her attention. “Mite, get out of the way! She’ll kill us both if we’re not careful!”
“It just goes to show,” said Elsha, her gaze lingering on Gemma’s blade, “how little you really understand about anything. I have nothing left to lose. Nothing!” she screamed, her eyes bulging with the effort. “I’ve lost the only person who ever loved me. I’ve given up everything for this vendetta, and I …”
“That’s not true, Aun
tie. I know it seems like it is. I … I can hear the pain inside you. You miss him so, but …” Katya’s voice was as sincere as Gemma had ever heard her. “You can still have him. He’s alive,” she said, solemnly. “Cadry is alive.”
Gemma couldn’t help but glance at her. Katya meant every word that she was saying. The little girl’s heart was written across her face and she wanted Gemma to let her aunt live.
Gemma turned to look at Devery. She needed to know what he thought. She didn’t know whether she should trust Katya’s instincts, but she knew she could trust his. But the man that she loved was collapsed in a heap on the floor, his breathing shaky and shallow. Devery didn’t have time for her to waste.
She glanced back at Elsha, whose eyes were wide with shock. “What did you say?” Tears filled her eyes. “Are you sure? Is it true?” Her voice shook.
Just then, Gemma saw Elam stand up behind Elsha. He grabbed the mage woman by the hair and yanked her head backward. “No, Elam!” The words had barely left her lips when Elam slammed the blade of his dagger into Elsha’s throat, then yanked it sideways. Gemma could only watch in horror as a gurgling noise bubbled up from the opening in Elsha’s throat. Elam spat through his tears, “You’re wrong, Princess. You didn’t prepare for everything. You didn’t prepare for me.”
He continued to hold her by the hair as blood spurted down Elsha’s regal gown. Her cold blue eyes whirled in panic for a few seconds, and then they just stared fixedly into nothing. After a few more seconds, the blood stopped spurting and Elam tossed Elsha’s body to the floor like trash.
“Prick!” he howled, staring down at his bloody hands.
Gemma didn’t know who to help first. Wince still sobbed over Tollan’s body. Elam, hands bloodstained, stood as if he were lost, his gaze fixed on Elsha’s corpse. Katya was huddled on the floor, sobbing into her hands, and Devery was pushing himself to stand.
With a grunt of decision, she moved toward Katya. “Oh, mite, I’m so sorry. That must have been awful for you.” She bent over and wrapped her arms around the girl’s shoulders. She really was just a spit of a thing, far too small to have seen such horrors.
Katya looked up and met Gemma’s gaze. “I … I didn’t know, until … I couldn’t hear her, before. But in her mind, she was so sad. She just wanted him back, the boy that Grandmother took from her.”
Gemma stared at her. “What do you mean? In her mind? You could … you could hear her thoughts?”
Katya nodded. “I can hear everyone’s thoughts, if they’re loud enough.”
“Loud? I don’t …” Gemma looked to Devery, who had managed to join them. He glanced sadly at his sister’s corpse, then met Gemma’s gaze.
“Katy,” he said. “How long have you been able to do this?” The look in his eyes told Gemma that this was a revelation to him, as well.
Katya wiped her face on the sleeve of her dress and stood up, forcing Gemma to stand up, too. The three of them stood, ignoring the bodies and the blood around them as Katya replied, “Always, though I didn’t know what it meant when I was little. I’ve always heard thoughts that are strong. Feelings that are pure and true and honest.” She blushed, slightly. “That’s why I knew to trust you, right away, because my Papa thought so loudly about you.”
Devery, silver-haired and wrinkled, winked at Gemma. “It’s true. I do have some embarrassingly loud thoughts about you.”
Gemma couldn’t bring herself to smile. Not after all that had happened. “What did you hear in Aunt Elsha’s thoughts, Katy?”
Katya met her gaze with large, sad eyes. “It’s so sad. She was in love with a boy at Magehold when she was young, but Grandmother took him away from her. Kept him locked up, so that Auntie would do as she wished. I heard Grandmother think about him often, but I didn’t know who he was, until today. Aunt Elsha thought that he was gone forever, and that is why she wouldn’t stop. She thought there was nothing left for her in the world.”
She glanced at her aunt’s body, then said, “I could never hear her thoughts before. She kept everything so quiet and hidden so deep inside of her, I don’t know if she even knew it was there. But something broke inside of her, today. The broken thing exploded within her, slicing through her until she was only rage and ruin.” Katya drew in a deep breath. “She said that in her thoughts. ‘I am rage. I am ruin.’ She kept saying it, over and over, like she was trying to convince herself of it. But the thing that she wanted loudest … she just wanted to be loved again.”
Devery coughed wetly, and Gemma looked up at him with a rush of panic. If she hadn’t known any better, she’d have thought the man standing with his arm around the little girl was Devery’s father. He had aged three decades and was getting older before their eyes.
“Hey, beautiful,” Devery said, as he reached up to brush a tear from her face. He groaned as if that much movement had pained him. “It’s not your fault. Elsha chose her path. We all choose our path.” The weight of everything that had ever passed between them—the precious and the painful—was encapsulated in his expression.
She met his gaze, and a sob slipped from between her lips. “You’re getting so old.” A sad, fearful chuckle escaped her.
“What?” he said, grinning lasciviously. “You don’t find older men attractive?”
She wrapped her arms around his fragile frame and breathed in the smell of him, afraid to let him go.
He leaned into her and said, “I chose my path, too. Don’t cry for me.” She could smell his skin and feel his breath against her neck, and though he didn’t look the same, she would know this man anywhere.
“Gemma,” Katya interrupted, tugging on Gemma’s shirt sleeve. “Papa … I think I can fix it. But I need some help.”
The little girl was so full of hope, even now. She still thought that stories came with happy endings. Gemma didn’t think that there was such a thing, as she heard another sob force its way out from between Elam’s lips. His chance for a happy ending lay dead on the floor, and hers was aging before her eyes. She watched as Elam went to join Wince in mourning what would never be and her heart broke into more pieces than she could count. She cried into Devery’s shoulder as he trembled against her, soaking his shirt with tears he’d asked her not to shed.
“Will everyone please listen to me!”
Gemma jerked away from Devery as Katya’s voice, amplified by a tiny silver mark that shimmered before her mouth, echoed throughout the throne room. All eyes turned toward the little girl whose hands were on her hips. Her eyes flashed with exasperation in a way that reminded Gemma so much of Devery that her heart ached with love for the child.
“I know you’re all sad,” she said, staring straight ahead as she continued. “I’m sad, too.” Her voice trembled, just a little, as she continued. “Though my grandmother and aunt were wrong in the way they did things, they weren’t wrong in why.” Her voice dropped a little as she said, “And I loved them, in their own way. They deserved that much.” Her gaze shifted to the mage women who had been captive for so long. The mage women that Gemma had completely forgotten about.
Katya looked at Devery and said, “I think they might be able to help you, Papa, but we have to help them, first. They’re screaming, inside. They’ve been screaming for a long time. Since the day I arrived in Yigris, I’ve been listening to their screams.”
The blunt horror of that statement hit Gemma like a punch to the throat.
Katya stepped forward and held her hand out. The silvery mage mark disappeared and her voice returned to normal. “May I have your knife, please, Gemma?”
Gemma handed the knife over to the girl, who seemed to have aged a decade before Gemma’s eyes. The day’s events would have changed her, left their mark on her in the unpredictable way that tragedy does. Gemma could only hope that Katy had seen the difference between letting love raise you up or allowing it to tear you apart. All she could do was serve as a guidepost. The rest was up to Katya.
“Great-grandmother.”
Gemma watch
ed as Katya knelt beside one of the mage women. Gemma thought it was the one she had seen with Tollan in the Black Chamber, the day they’d first met. That day felt like a lifetime ago, and maybe it was. The woman she had been had died that day and she would have to learn what kind of woman she had become.
“My name is Katya Nightsbane. I am the daughter of Devery, son of Brinna. I’m going to free you, now. Please remember that I mean you no harm.”
Katya stretched out the mage woman’s arm and pointed to a lump near the crook of her elbow. “I need to cut that lump out and remove the gold that’s in there. This might hurt a little, Grandmother, but soon it will all be over.”
Gemma glanced at Devery, who shook his head in response. Katya sliced through pale, parchment-thin skin, and squeezed out the small lump of gold. It flashed with dozens, if not hundreds, of mage marks. Then they faded and died, leaving only a chunk of pure Yigrisian gold sitting in the palm of her hand. She spat on it and threw it as far away from her as she could.
Then Katya began to draw a mark upon her great-grandmother’s skin, and the cut began to heal on its own. Gemma watched as the woman before her began to transform. Katya looked up and met serious indigo eyes that had been nearly colorless a moment before. The mage woman’s pale, wrinkled skin grew pink, and her white hair turned a honeyed brown as they all watched in open-mouthed amazement. Thin lips lifted upward into a smile as the mage woman’s eyes met Katya’s.
“Oh, you are very special, indeed. Aren’t you, grandchild?”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
GUILDHOUSE
Gemma stood in front of Guildhouse and watched as the last of the supplies were loaded into the wagon. She was sure her city would sleep more soundly knowing that the foreign mage women were finally free of their borders and it felt something like a happy ending—the mage women finally going home.
Devery rounded the corner of the porch and grinned slyly up at her. He took the stairs two at a time, and even if he wasn’t as agile as he had once been, at least he was no longer stooped and rapidly aging. Hannai had refused to replace the mage marks he had once borne, but she and her surviving daughters had guided Katya as she used her magery to make him seem like a man in his twenties once more. He would age at a normal rate and live a long life. He and Gemma would have many years together.
