The Warrior's Curse

by Jennifer A. Nielsen

  “Joth attacked Tenger.” Fear caused deep creases in Trina’s brow. “Maybe the vibrations ended because Tenger won.”

  “Or because he lost.”

  Trina’s hand flew to her mouth, but when she removed it, she said, “Joth must have gotten past Tenger and attacked the Brill.”

  Which could only mean one thing. I asked Gabe, “Did you see Joth’s attack?”

  Solemnly, he nodded. “Tenger fell with a single touch of Joth’s hand. It reminded me of one of Kestra’s attacks.”

  “Is it possible that he has Kestra’s magic?” Trina asked.

  “Joth told me they had connected powers,” I said, wondering exactly what that might mean for them, and for us.

  Gabe cursed and breathed out, “Perfect.”

  I withdrew my sword, and the others did the same. We entered the palace through two doors that had been blown from their frames. A horse rushed past us out the doors, rearing up in a panic.

  “I recognize that animal,” Gabe said. “It was Kestra’s.”

  “But where is she now?” Trina asked.

  I looked around, trying to orient myself within these lavish halls. If the Alliance won tonight, the Scarlet Throne would be mine. That thought should have enticed me to fight harder, but it did just the opposite. I couldn’t imagine myself here. I didn’t belong in this place, nor would I want to become a person who’d ever be comfortable here. This building of marble and gilded gold simply wasn’t me.

  “She is wherever Endrick is.” I pointed to the grand staircase toward the throne room. “He’ll be up there.”

  “Wait,” Gabe said. “If it’s just the three of us, we have to agree on our priorities.”

  “Helping Kestra defeat Endrick is most important,” Trina said.

  Gabe’s eyes flashed. “Harlyn is here somewhere. We have to find her.”

  I turned to Trina. “Go and find Harlyn. Get her safely out of this palace if you can.”

  “I’ll go with Trina,” Gabe offered.

  “No, I need you with me,” I said.

  “I won’t help you save Kestra at the expense of Harlyn’s life.”

  “I know that.”

  “So let me find Harlyn.” Gabe marched toward me, his face reddening with anger. “Maybe you don’t care what happens to her, but I do! She was taken while on watch with me, and I’m going to find her now.”

  “Trina can find her as well as you.” I nodded at Trina. “Go and find her.”

  Furious, Gabe advanced on me. “We said we would do what we could to help Kestra succeed, but she’s already here, more powerful than the two of us put together. Do you remember our agreement? If Kestra tries to take the throne, we will stop her. How dare you break that promise now?”

  “I’m not!”

  “Then what is this?” he asked. “One last attempt to save her from herself, the same as what failed last time, and the time before that, and the time before that?”

  “No!” I lowered my voice before we alerted half of Antora to where we were. “Gabe, if she tries to take the throne, I won’t be able to do what has to be done. You can.”

  He paused and lowered his head, then he spoke. “I will act with honor, Simon. This has never been personal.”

  “I know that.”

  Gabe put an arm around my shoulder and gave it a pat before we began walking forward. But we didn’t get more than ten steps before Trina emerged again.

  “You’re supposed to find Harlyn,” Gabe said.

  Trina tilted her head in obvious annoyance and then took three more steps forward until we could see that she was not alone.

  Directly behind her, with a knife at her back, was Darrow, Kestra’s father. Fully alive. And he clearly recognized me and Gabe.

  “This is as far as you three can go,” he said. “I overheard your plans for my daughter, and I will stop you here. But don’t worry—it’s not personal.”

  Harlyn didn’t stand at first—maybe she couldn’t, I thought. But eventually, with a fierce grimace, she put one foot square on the marble floor, then another, and finally straightened up and faced me.

  I looked her over for any possible injuries—she must have had them to be reacting the way she was. Then I saw the anger in her eyes and realized something else entirely was happening.

  “There is no purpose in making us fight!” she shouted to Endrick. “Kestra has magic. We all know how this will end.”

  Her defiance must’ve earned her a pinch inside her chest, because she contracted before standing upright again.

  “I did not come here to fight her,” I said, advancing on Endrick. “I came here for you.”

  “And I have no objection to that.” Endrick raised his hand, fingers apart. “Shall I kill this one, and then you and I can begin?” All he had to do was draw his fingers together, and it would crush Harlyn’s heart. Her eyes widened. She knew what was coming as well as I did.

  “Stop!” I raised the Olden Blade toward Harlyn. “If we fight, it must be fair. I won’t use magic.”

  She shook her head, doubting my words, but if she refused to fight me, the consequences would be immediate and absolute. So I charged at her, forcing her to raise her sword, and when she did, we clashed hard.

  Suddenly finding her will to fight, Harlyn struck back at me. She was better than I had anticipated, particularly with a sword longer than the dagger I carried. The Olden Blade could defend me, but I would never get the better of her this way.

  I attempted twice to steal her sword, but Harlyn anticipated me both times and moved away. Behind me, Endrick laughed. “If this is all you can do, Infidante, then I have nothing to fear from you.”

  “This isn’t all you can do,” Harlyn said, quietly enough that Endrick couldn’t hear her.

  It was all I could do under the terms I had agreed to.

  “I’ve seen enough,” Endrick said. “I now understand you, Infidante. Or shall I call you the Insignificant?”

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered to Harlyn. On her next swing, I touched her hand just long enough to pull strength out of her body. As she began to collapse, I struck the side of her head, not as hard as it appeared, but enough to make it look like the reason she had fallen unconscious was the consequence of our fair fight. It never was. I had lied to her and cheated.

  But I had also saved her life.

  With Harlyn now in a heap upon the floor, my attention turned to Endrick. My heart raced with anticipation, but Endrick didn’t seem the least concerned. Maybe that was why I felt so nervous. Did he know something I didn’t?

  Endrick stood and began the descent down the stairs leading away from his throne. With each step, he clapped for my victory, but it was a flat, mocking applause, intended to embarrass me.

  I dismissed that, unwilling to entertain him with any reaction whatsoever, and tried instead to remain focused on my plan.

  Endrick’s strategy would be to keep me as far from him as possible, but I needed to get close. So I charged toward him with the Olden Blade ready to strike.

  Casually, he swiped his hand sideways, and I was thrown in that direction, landing hard on my left shoulder. I stood again, summoning Joth’s half-lives to surround me. I didn’t want to repeat that.

  Immediately, I felt their presence, but they had an effect on Endrick too. His eyes began darting in all directions.

  “I can see them, you know.” His expression remained even, but his voice was notably shaking. “And if they think I cannot do any worse to their present curse, they are mistaken.”

  I smiled, advancing on him. “If you think I cannot do any worse to you, then you are also mistaken.”

  But he raised his hands again, forcing me back. He drew his hands into fists, and I perceived some degree of pain surrounding me. The half-lives.

  With a curl of his lip, Endrick extended his hands wide open, and in that same instant, all that I had perceived vanished, like a hundred masses of energy had at once ceased to exist.

  The half-lives in this ro
om had all just been erased. They were dead, truly dead.

  I felt their loss like a crushing weight on my shoulders, heavier than I ever could have imagined, but I had to keep moving. He was distracted, giving me an opportunity to push closer to him. I was within ten steps of him, Olden Blade ready in my hands, when he finally turned to me.

  “You truly expect to kill me here?” he asked. “And then what?”

  “Then the throne will be mine.”

  “Until a new Infidante comes for you,” he said. “And the cycle continues.”

  I stepped forward. “I will not be so foolish as you were, to lose this blade. I will use any magic that is mine to help Antora, not destroy it, as you have done.”

  That made him laugh, an awful sound, and one I’d only heard issue from him when something terrible was about to happen. “If it is true, my dear, that you and I are the last two remaining Endreans, then I expect the kind of ruler you will become shall make me proud. You will be cruel, you will be sharp, you will control the people as I never could.”

  “Never!”

  “It’s inevitable now. I know what is inside you, but it’s all wrong. Corruption is heat, not cold. Fire, not ice. Yours feels like ice because you are fighting against it. Why would you do that?”

  “I fight it because you embrace it,” I said.

  “Oh, I do embrace it, and you will also. Once you understand what it truly is, once you feel its warmth, you will know how empty you have been until now.”

  “I will never accept it.”

  “You will, and it will begin here.”

  I rushed forward, my blade ready, and nearly made it to him before he swept me off my feet and I landed harder on the floor than before. The wind was knocked from my lungs, and my head throbbed where it had crashed.

  He laughed. “Go to your knees, girl.”

  I pulled my blade beneath me but clutched at the marble floors, hoping for anything I could use to protect myself from what was coming. Yet I found nothing, no help, no comfort.

  “To your knees!”

  “I won’t. I’m stronger now, and I won’t.”

  Endrick waved his hand, forcing consciousness back into Harlyn’s body. With a gasp of pain, she returned to her knees, one arm holding the place where I had cut her, and with tears streaming down her face.

  Endrick said, “Obey me, Kestra, or you will see for yourself how much pain this girl can endure before she dies. It will be more than you think.”

  There was no reason I should have cared what happened to Harlyn. She had pried Simon’s affections away from me, manipulated his illness to force me to leave the Hiplands, and only days ago shot me with a disk. If our positions were reversed, Harlyn would eagerly seize the opportunity to watch me die.

  But I remembered how it had felt to hear I might be responsible for the death of Simon’s sister. I could not also be responsible for the girl he intended to marry.

  Somewhere deep inside, I knew it would be wrong to let Harlyn suffer for my refusal to kneel to Endrick now. Which meant I would have to suffer instead.

  Rolling to my knees, I said, “This is only between you and me, but you must know anything you do to me will fail. If you attempt to take my powers, I will simply pull them out of you.”

  He shook his head. “I’m not taking anything from you, child. I’m giving.”

  He came at me from behind, put a hand to the back of my neck, and sent something into me. It wasn’t pain; it was a burn that spread through my chest to my limbs, evil flooding through me.

  I tried fighting it, but it was enveloping me, taking me. Its kiss was like sweet molasses that coated my throat in its deliciousness, and from there it spread. But it was poison, not molasses, burning its way through me. And its power was growing. I wanted more. I wanted all of it, and for it, I was willing to do anything that was required of me.

  “Give yourself to it,” Endrick said.

  I closed my eyes, and the corruption embraced me, filling me with warmth that burned away what had been ice before. How foolish that was, to believe the ice was power. No, this was power, and the more of it I absorbed, the more I wanted. I pulled it into myself until I was the corruption. Soon, I knew, I could not separate from its grasp without splitting myself in half.

  Never sacrifice more than half of yourself, Loelle had said. Then the poison asked me to surrender my other half, and I obeyed.

  At Endrick’s command, I opened my eyes and saw how pleased he was with what he had accomplished. But he did not trust me yet. Instead, he gestured to the Olden Blade still in my hands and pointed at Harlyn. “Kill her.”

  I smiled. The idea of killing was so simple now, so pleasurable. Even the thought of it sent a rush of the purest joy through me. Lord Endrick walked me over to Harlyn, his hand on my back.

  “Prove yourself,” he said. “Show me that you can do this.”

  I could do this. I wanted to do this.

  Harlyn shook her head, her eyes widened in a desperate fear that added to the heat within me. “Please don’t, Kestra. You’re not yourself.”

  “Isn’t this exactly who you’ve accused me of being?” I countered. “Am I not now the very person you believed I would become when you shot me with that disk? If I will be accused of being part of the Dominion, I’ll do better—I will be the Dominion itself. And for that, I must kill.” I raised the blade, but rather than bring it down on Harlyn, I twisted and thrust it directly into Endrick’s chest.

  He gasped; his eyes grew in alarm and horror. I only smiled at him in return.

  “You are mine,” he said. “I made you.”

  “And I shall replace you,” I said.

  He grabbed my wrist holding the blade, sending fire up my arm and leaving a burn on the back of my hand. I withdrew the blade and he staggered away, but the wound I had created was expanding from its center, creating a dark mass of smoke and blood. His eyes widened in disbelief and he clutched at his body to try to hold it together, but that only seemed to make the wound spread faster.

  “I curse you—” he shouted at me, but got no further before what remained of his body faded into a thick black smoke that tightened into a small ball before it suddenly pulsed in, then exploded. The force of it was so strong it shook the earth beneath my feet, and chunks of the ceiling fell around me. The explosion was loud enough that I heard it continue to echo as it spread from beyond the palace walls.

  I had crouched low to protect myself, but when everything went silent, I opened my eyes and saw the smoke beginning to gather again. It rushed for me, nearly choking me at first for its thickness, but when I finally had to take a breath, I felt it enter my body, filling me with his powers. All his knowledge, all that he could do, all his understanding, became mine.

  Harlyn stood, raising her sword as if that would matter at all. “Kestra, I can’t let you—”

  “Silence!” I stood tall, sheathing the Olden Blade at my waist, then clutched my burned hand to my chest. I could heal it, if I took the strength from Harlyn. But I was repulsed at the idea of benefitting from her, even against her will. So I gritted my teeth against the pain in my hand and said, “I will spare your life for only one purpose, that you go and tell the people what I’ve done. They are free of Endrick, but they are mine. I have his powers, all of them. And I have the Olden Blade to keep control over my power, as he never could. Go now, for if you say a single word, I will change my mind.”

  Harlyn stared at me for only a second longer before she dipped her head at me and ran.

  I drew in a deep and satisfying breath, then ascended the steps to the Scarlet Throne. After running one finger along the arch of the chair, I rounded it once, then sat.

  The Scarlet Throne was mine. I was the Dominion now.

  Whatever happened inside the throne room was powerful enough to throw me off my feet and send both Darrow and Gabe careening against one wall. Only Trina was able to keep her balance but just barely. Anything not attached to something stable toppled over, including a
large marble bust of Lord Endrick that nearly hit Gabe.

  In a nearby room, I heard what sounded like an enormous chandelier crash to the floor, followed by sounds outside of decades-old trees falling to the ground.

  The destruction was followed by a minute of such absolute silence that it filled me with dread. Something terrible must have happened.

  Echoing my thoughts, Gabe asked, “What was that?”

  “It’s Lord Endrick,” Trina said warily. “Though I don’t know if it means good news or bad.”

  “Kestra was in the throne room with him,” Darrow said. “Whatever just happened, she is involved.”

  “Was involved,” Gabe corrected him. “It’s quiet now. Too quiet.”

  “We have to find her,” I said. “Maybe we can help.”

  Darrow rolled his eyes. “I already know what your help means for her.”

  Standing again, I added, “Sir, Kestra is a danger to herself, and certainly is at risk of endangering all of Antora. Help us to help her, that’s all we ask.”

  “Tell me how killing my daughter will help her.”

  “Tell us how ignoring the truth about Kestra will help Antora,” Gabe countered.

  “Are you certain that she is still in the throne room?” Trina asked. “What does it mean that everything has become so quiet?”

  I took one cautious step forward. “Darrow, take me to her. You know enough of my feelings that if there is any way to save Kestra, I will.”

  “You’re too late.” Harlyn ran toward us from deeper inside the palace. A long cut was on her right arm, her dress was torn in several places, and her face and hands were dirty.

  My heart stopped. “What do you mean we’re too late? Is she—”

  Harlyn shook her head. “No, she’s alive, and she completed her quest—Endrick is dead. But I think it’s only made things worse. She assumed all his powers, and she holds the Olden Blade!”

  I took her hands in mine. “Are you all right? What happened?”

  Harlyn drew in a deep breath before speaking. “Before she killed him, he forced her to her knees. He did something to her there, corrupting her further, I think. All I do know is that Kestra is Endrick now, in power and demeanor, and in the way she thinks.”