The Wound
Reality returned in pieces.Her hand, covering Lio’s unblemished throat. His lips, cold upon her wrist. Mak was holding him for her, massaging Lio’s jaw. Lyros had his arm around her.
“I can’t get him to bite.” Mak’s voice, angry, urgent.
Lyros pressed a strong hand to her forehead. “Cassia? Are you back with us?”
“I’m here,” she said, dazed.
But Lio wasn’t. Her heart raced, and she felt his matching pulse under her fingers. How could his mind be so far away?
“I—I can’t reach him. Not even in Grace Union.”
Thank the Goddess for Lyros’s steady voice. “Try to describe how your Union feels. Does he seem asleep, unconscious? Or is his presence weakening?”
Cassia took a deep breath through her fear and focused on Lio’s aura. “I can feel his mental wounds. His magic has never been like this. As if he actually exhausted it.”
“Is it getting worse?” Lyros asked.
She caressed Lio’s neck, listening, waiting. “No. He’s not slipping away. But he’s not coming back to me.”
Mak swore and closed his hand around Lio’s chin, pushing. Lio’s fangs sank into Cassia’s wrist. Mak took her other hand and showed her how to work Lio’s throat.
Drink, she begged in their Union. Please, Lio. Drink from me.
Her Grace lay there, pale and still, while her blood trickled out of his mouth.
Dame nudged Lio with her nose, then licked his face. When he didn’t respond, she let out a devastated whine. Knight leaned his bulk against Cassia. If not for him and Lyros, she thought she would collapse.
She fisted her hand, squeezing more blood onto Lio’s tongue. “Why won’t he swallow?”
“Cassia.” Mak looked stricken. “What happened in there?”
She struggled for words while Lyros rubbed her back. She had to explain to them. For Lio’s sake. “Kallikrates somehow followed him out of Miranda’s mind and invaded his. The Collector made a mental attack on Lio that appeared in his mind’s eye as a relic dagger in his throat.”
Horror passed through Lyros’s aura. “How did Lio break free?”
Cassia swallowed. “He couldn’t.”
Her Trial brothers said nothing, and the Blood Union was heavy with their dread.
“I banished Kallikrates,” Cassia said. “I shut him out of our Grace Union.”
Mak’s eyes widened. “That’s our Cassia.”
She shook her head, her lips trembling. “I wasn’t fast enough. Kallikrates still managed to strike a blow before I pulled Lio to safety.”
She stroked his throat desperately, Willing him to swallow. Why wasn’t her blood enough? Why had the Ritual circle healed Miranda, while it did nothing for Lio?
Mak slammed his fist down in the pool of blood. “Goddess above, where are our foregivers now?”
Cassia rested Lio’s head on her lap, calling into their Union again and again, hoping to catch a whisper of his voice in her mind. “We have to find him a healer.”
Lyros didn’t hesitate. “Any chance of reaching Solia’s forces in Hadria?”
“They Kyrian mages won’t know what to do with this.” Mak shoved a hand in his hair. “He needs a mind healer.”
“Ukocha’s village? Tuura could help, if we can avoid extradition.”
“Is he stable enough to step that far?”
With calm words, Mak and Lyros fought for Lio. Cassia was so grateful for that. But listening to them try, she knew there was only one answer. “He needs Rudhira.”
They fell silent. Lyros gripped her shoulder. “Yes. He does.”
“You two can escape,” Cassia said. “I will surrender and plead with them to put Lio in a bed, not a cell.”
“We’re coming with you,” Mak told her.
Cassia’s throat tightened. “Half of us should stay free for whatever comes.”
“Not a chance,” Lyros said. “We started this together. We finish it together.”
She blinked hard. “You haven’t even asked if Lio got the information we came for.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Mak said. “No secrets are worth his life.”
Lyros gave her a smile. “He got your magic. He would say that’s what matters.”
And this was the price he had paid to restore her power to her. She would save him, if she had to march into Kallikrates’s own mind to do it.
“So, Black Roses,” Mak said. “All agreed? Our quest ends at Castra Justa.”
Lyros nodded gravely. “Victory or defeat, we face it as a circle.”
“You have my gratitude,” Cassia said.
“We’ll be with you every step of the way, tonight and always,” Lyros promised.
Mak eased Cassia’s wrist off of Lio’s fangs. “Let us step you.”
Cassia picked up her dagger and avowal cup. “I don’t want to move him. I’ll bring the Charge to us.”
Mak and Lyros exchanged a glance, but neither questioned her.
As she tapped into her power, the murmurs from her pendant grew louder. She sent out a lone wolf’s call through the Lustra. Her heart beat. Again. A third time.
Kalos appeared at the edge of the Ritual circle. His gaze swept over them all and settled on her. “By Hespera’s Cup and Habuch’s Wings, do you know how glad I am you finally let me find you? I’ve spent every waking moment tracking you across the kingdom, fearing what had become of you. All we had to reassure us were tales. The Lustra itself hid your trail from me until I heard your call.”
Kalos had seldom said so many words at once. She held out a hand to him. “I’m glad to see you, too.”
He knelt beside her. “Silvicultrix, what can I do?”
“Bring Rudhira. He can do as he wishes with me, if only he will heal Lio.”
“And we won’t leave Lio and Cassia’s side,” Mak said. “Those are our terms of surrender.”
Kalos shook his head. “Our prince doesn’t want you to surrender.”
“Ha,” Mak replied bitterly. “What do you call his attempt to arrest us Paradum, then?”
“Soothsaying,” Kalos said.
Lyros frowned. “What?”
A suspicion came over Cassia. “Kalos, please explain.”
Kalos leaned forward, his hands on his knees. “Whatever words you thought you heard come from Rudhira’s mouth, that’s not what he truly said. It was because of the letting site’s wounds. You saw how it affected the animals and plants, didn’t you?”
Mak still looked wary. “Yes. The damaged beast magic scared them off.”
“And the loss of Cassia’s plant magic made the land barren,” Lyros supplied.
Kalos nodded. “The third power of the Silvicultrix was running amok there, too. The corrupted soothsaying twisted Rudhira’s words to you—and yours to him.”
“I knew it,” Cassia said. “I couldn’t believe Rudhira would say such things. I sensed that something wasn’t right. If only I’d trusted my instincts….my magic.”
“What did he think we said?” Mak asked.
“I explained all of this to him,” Kalos answered. “He knows you didn’t mean what he thought you said, either. Please, hear him out when he comes.”
“We’d appreciate a warning about Rudhira’s frame of mind,” Lyros said grimly.
Kalos rubbed the back of his neck. “He could explain it better. But Goddess forbid he talk about feelings. So I’ll try.” The scout gestured helplessly at them. “You’re warriors. And Hesperines. You know how easy it is to blame yourself for things that aren’t your fault. But he’s also a healer, and our prince. He always fears he’ll fail those of us who need him. Meeting you at Paradum rubbed that wound raw. He doesn’t deserve to feel as guilty as he does.”
Cassia had never thought of her Ritual father as someone who needed to be handled with care. But after everything the Black Roses had seen, she thought she understood what lay under Rudhira’s eternal strength. And that gave her hope of clemency for Lio.
“We’ll be gentle,” she promised.
Relief crossed Kalos’s face. “Hold on.”
He stepped away. Mak and Lyros waited with her through the longest minutes of her eternal life.
At last, royal Hesperine power rolled through Hagia Boreia, a cleansing storm. Despair lifted from the Blood Union, and Cassia couldn’t help but feel that deliverance was nigh.
The First Prince appeared before his mother Alea’s Sanctuary with Thorn on his back and a red healer’s satchel in hand. Cassia could read nothing on his pale, grim face, nor through his veil spells. But his magic wrapped around the Ritual circle and held all of them.
Before she could speak, Rudhira knelt beside Lio and tore open his satchel. “All of you are alive. Nothing else matters, do you understand me?”
She couldn’t afford to feel weak with relief yet, but she did. She nodded.
Rudhira pressed his fingers to Lio’s temples. “Can you tell me what happened?”
Mak and Lyros repeated what she had described to them, and she sent them her gratitude through their Union. She feared if she had to relive the duel again, she would lose what grasp on herself she had left.
She held onto Lio’s hand in both of hers. Blood soaked into Rudhira’s scarlet battle robe as he poured more theramancy into Lio’s mind. The prince’s magic washed over her Grace’s wounds and filled his diminished aura. But their Union remained silent.
“Can you heal him?” Cassia finally asked, although she feared the answer.