46. Chapter 46
Chapter forty-six
Glass shattered across the floor.
“Cyrus!” Essandra gasped. She’d followed him from the main hall and into his study.
He flung another chair across the room, and it splintered against the wall.
“What’s going on?” Her voice was high and laced with worry.
But he couldn’t speak. He was furious—furious at the Shadow King, furious at Norah and his brother. But mostly, he was furious at himself.
He threw open the side double doors and strode out onto the balcony, sucking the air into his lungs and trying to calm himself.
Essandra came behind him. “What happened?”
He still couldn’t answer her.
She put her hand on his arm, but he pulled away. “Cyrus, what happened?” she asked again.
It took a while for him to be able to get it out. “I lost it,” he finally managed.
“Lost what?”
“I hurt Adrian. And I struck her.” He clawed at his head. “Why did I do that?”
“You struck Norah?”
He nodded. “And I tethered us.”
Her eyes widened. “What?” Alarm rang through her voice. “Why?”
“War is inevitable now.”
“Why did you tether her?”
He gripped the stone railing as he leaned against it.
“You have to break it,” she told him.
He shook his head. “No. They won’t let harm come to her. If we’re marching to war, then I need it.”
“Cyrus,” she pleaded. “She’s trying to help you.”
“She’s trying to help herself! Because I succeed. I kill the Shadow King.” He drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “She saw me. She saw me in a vision.”
The line between her brows trenched deeper. “That’s not possible.”
“Somehow it is.”
“Seers are shielded from visions. You’re covered by a shield.”
“Am I?” he cut back. He ripped open his tunic. “By the same shield that’s supposed to protect me so that I don’t need so many of these gods-damned markings?”
“You need a lot of markings because you have a lot of power,” she countered.
“Or maybe I need a lot of markings because I don’t have a shield.” He paced back into his study, and she followed.
“You’re the most powerful seer I’ve ever known,” she said.
“It doesn’t matter. If they can see me, they can see what I’m doing, what I will do.”
“Whatever there is to see, there’s a high probability that it’s already been seen,” she argued.
“I need to stop them from seeing more. How can I do that?”
She shook her head. “I don’t think it works like that.”
“How does it work, then?” he snapped.
She quieted.
He pushed out a long breath and drew in another. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to take this out on you.” He reached out and pulled her close to him, cupping her face in his hand. “Leave me for a while, until I’m better company.” He was angry and frustrated, and she didn’t deserve that.
“No, it’s fine—”
“Just a little while,” he said. “It’s not fine.”
She sighed, staring back up at him. “Just a little while,” she echoed.
He bent to kiss her softly on the lips, then she slipped out of the room.
Cyrus sank into the wingback chair in the corner. He should be happy—fate intended for him to kill the Shadow King.
But he could lose this opportunity if he wasn’t careful.
He’d told Norah that fate couldn’t be changed, but he didn’t entirely believe that. Part of him feared he’d manifested this destiny, that he’d forced it into existence with his relentless compulsion, and that he was hanging on to it by a thread. Or perhaps fate had just taken pity on him.
But it was foolish to think that once fate revealed her intention, all work was finished.
No.
He would need to strategize and plan. Meticulously. Commit. Then execute. He would need to give everything, perhaps even his own life. And this vision would be his reward.
Cyrus sat, thinking. Then he sat longer.
It wasn’t until his study door opened that he realized the rays of the sun had given way to darkness. It was night.
Essandra stood in the doorway.
“I fear I’m not better company yet,” he said softly. He had several solid war strategies against the Shadow King, but they all required the element of surprise. A single vision could bring them all down.
“You will be,” she said. “I have a solution.”
He straightened in the chair. “You can stop them from seeing me?”
She smiled. “Possibly something even better.”
Something better… He stood slowly. That was when he noticed the bowl she held in her hand. She swept into the room and set it down on the desk.
“I can’t stop the Eye from seeing you,” she said. “But I can stop it from showing anything to anyone.”
The Eye in the Aether. That was what gave seers their visions.
“You can stop it from showing me to other seers? From showing them what I’m going to do?”
She nodded.
He narrowed his eyes. “How?”
“If seers can’t enter the Aether, they can’t access the Eye. If they can’t access the Eye, they can’t get the visions. Any of them.”
He still wasn’t sure he understood the how .
“This would also keep seers from going into the minds of others,” she added. “They need the Aether to do that. That means even for the visions they’ve already seen, they can’t reshow them to anyone or go back and study them.”
Cyrus still didn’t quite get it, but he didn’t care about the how anymore. He understood the result—no one would be able to see him, and not just him. They wouldn’t be able to see anything. He could only stare at her, speechless.
“I know it’s not perfect,” she said.
He stepped to her and took her face in his hands.
“What are you talking about? It’s absolutely perfect.
” And he kissed her. “Don’t you see? A shield would have only hidden me.
This will hide our army, hide our plan of attack.
From the Shadow King. From Gregor. From everyone.
” This woman could do anything. He was so fucking proud of her. He kissed her again. “Do it.”
“I thought you would say that.” She pulled at his tunic. “Take this off.”
He pulled it off over his head and smiled.
“Don’t get too excited,” she told him. “This isn’t going to be pleasant.” She picked up the bowl and brought it up between them. “If you don’t mind,” she said, flashing her dagger.
Cyrus knew what she required. He held his palm open over the bowl.
Her brow creased. “I’m sorry. I need a lot for this.”
He offered his other palm as well, but as she moved to slice his flesh, something caught his eye. He grabbed her wrist, pushing back her sleeve to find a new set of markings on her arm.
“You’re using dark magic,” he said.
She pulled her wrist from him but didn’t reply.
Cyrus shook his head. “No. We’ll use something else.”
“I’ve already cast the spell and paid the debt,” she said.
Dark magic was corrosive and destructive to the one who wielded it, and she’d committed to not using it anymore. His eyes bore into her.
“It’s already done,” she added. “Use it for your benefit or everything I’ve already given is for nothing.”
He still didn’t like it, but he needed this spell, and what was done was already done. He offered up his palms again, but angrily this time.
“No more after this,” he told her.
“No more,” she promised.
When Essandra had said she needed a lot of blood, he hadn’t realized she’d nearly drain him dry. When the flow from his left hand slowed, she moved to his right.
An unsteadiness hit him as the bowl brimmed. “Are you sure this isn’t the part where I die?” he jested.
She cut him a smirk. “You’ll live.” She stirred the blood in the bowl with the mixture of herbs that she’d already prepared.
Tendrils of smoke rose into the air.
For a moment, her face paled, and she wavered.
“Are you all right?” he said, stepping forward. “Is it the dark magic?”
“I’m fine,” she told him.
“Essandra—”
“I’m fine. Really.” She pushed his bloody hands away and focused her attention on him.
Carefully, she lifted the bowl above him, stretching up on her toes, and poured it over the top of his head.
She dipped her thumb and lined a mark between his brows and on his chin, which felt completely unnecessary given the warmth trickling down his back and the sides of his face.
But he stayed silent and let her carry on.
Essandra knelt down and poured the rest of the blood from the bowl onto the floor, creating a large puddle.
He shuffled back to avoid it.
“No, step into it,” she told him.
This was getting weirder, but he complied.
“Now, this is very important,” she said as she set the bowl on the desk and then stepped into the puddle with him. “You can’t leave the blood through this next part.”
He glanced down at that crimson pool that had now spread wide all around them. That shouldn’t be a problem.
Essandra moved close again with blood-coated fingers and drew a line down his chest. When she reached his stomach, she drew a triangle inside a circle.
“This next part is going to hurt,” she warned. She held up her dagger, and he watched as a black flame lit across the blade.
He paused. “Will Norah feel this?” He’d still do it, but he hated the idea of Norah feeling pain. Cutting his palms was bad enough.
“No. Not this. You will, though.”
“Do it,” he said.
But he instantly regretted those words as she plunged the searing dagger into his stomach. A growl ripped from his throat. That hadn’t been what he’d expected, and he gaped down at the hilt protruding from the center of the blood-encircled triangle.
“I’m so sorry,” she gasped as she pulled it free.
He stared down at it, panting heavily, then looked back at her. “What did you do?” She’d stabbed him. She’d stabbed him. He stepped backward, but she caught him.
“Stay inside the pool!”
Then his eyes widened as a black serpent slipped out from her sleeve, winding itself around her arm.
It was the same one he’d seen before. It grew larger, and larger still.
Its black scales changed to red, and a hood opened wide around its head.
It slithered upward, rising off her arm, as if to strike him.
He tried to step back again, but she clung to him. “Stay inside the pool!” She gripped him tightly. “Close your eyes,” she begged him.
But there was no way he was closing his eyes.
The snake struck. Only it didn’t bite. Instead, it buried its head into the wound in his stomach.
Cyrus bellowed and writhed, instinctively trying to grab at it, but she seized his hands. He threw her off, but as he clawed at his stomach, the last of the snake disappeared inside him, the wound vanishing as well.
He staggered back, panting and gaping down at his stomach. “It’s inside me?” He tore at his flesh. “Get it out!”
She grabbed him again. “It’s in the Aether!”
“Get it out!”
“It’s not in you; it’s in the Aether!”
“Get it out!”
She caught his face. “Cyrus!” She held him tightly. “It’s not in you. It’s in the Aether.”
He gripped her, steadying himself as her words sank in. “In the Aether?” he asked hoarsely.
“It’s not inside you,” she assured him.
Slowly, he sank to his knees as panic still rippled through him, his chest heaving. The violation still lingered.
She sank down with him.
“Is that it? Is it done?” he asked shakily.
She nodded. “It’s done.”
He gave himself another moment to calm, but calm wouldn’t come. “How long will it last?” he asked. Fuck if he had to do this again…
“It’s made of your bloodline power. So as long as that remains, so does the serpent.”
“So, as long as I’m alive.”
She nodded.
Thank the fucking gods.
“Are you all right?” she asked him.
“No,” he panted. “I’m not.”