Chapter 5
Chapter
Five
I n the two months that follow, life at Wyntra wraps itself around the upcoming Trials. It’s all the cooks and maids whisper about when they gather in the kitchen to eat leftovers and gossip. They beg Ayc to tell them what he knows. So, he listens closely while he serves dessert to Yris and her Five, as the names of the victors are declared.
“Mienna from Audori,” Fennix says over winterberry pie, a stain streaking from the corner of his lip. “She’s a fire elementist. She’ll be a strong competitor.”
“Marcellus from Lux Aester,” Jenesis sighs over an apple and cinnamon crumble. “But of course.”
“Sterling from Bromalis,” says Onanna over chocolate cake covered in molten sauce that she does not touch. In all these years, Ayc has never seen her eat, just like he’s never seen her face past the hood of her dark cloak. He’s only ever glimpsed her blood red lips and eyes that always glow silver.
“They don’t stand a chance,” murmur the twins, Kol and Krane, Yris’s Fourth and Fifth. They, too, are sorcerers and share an eerie ability to speak in unison .
From his place in the corner, Ayc thinks that underestimating the people around Sterling might be their undoing. Then he thinks about naked skin and soft screams and yellow hair turned gold in the moonlight until Yris snaps, “Human, stop smiling like a fool and go do something useful.”
Noxumbra hosts a tournament to decide their victor. Yris has the reports and rosters brought to her every day but doesn’t attend the tournament she must have won fifty years ago. She is Noxumbra, like her father and mother before her, and when she won her Trials, she did so as Noxumbra’s victor. Now, she watches through reports as her own daughter competes. Each day, Lora’s name rises and rises, until there are only two names on the top. Loraphne and Wylder.
Ah, Wylder. Ayc remembers that asshole well. How could he forget the cocky son of a bitch who thought being the son of the Noxumbra regent meant he was destined to be the greatest fighter of his generation? And perhaps he would have been, if Lora wasn't better than him, which was proved every time Wylder visited Wyntra, which was frequently, coming either for school or when his father came for business.
During Wylder’s visits, Ayc unfortunately got to know him far too well. Wylder attached himself to Lora’s side, and when he wasn’t with her, he was eagerly joining in on Yris’s game of tormenting Ayc. He was particularly skilled. Somehow, Wylder saw pieces of Ayc no one else did and aimed a metaphorical knife right at his most tender places.
Ayc would like to forget all that. He would especially like to forget about the time when he was eighteen, and he found Wylder and Lora together in some dark corner of the stables, his mouth at her throat, her skirts raised around her waist, his hips thrusting into hers with the same violence with which he wielded a sword. Ayc hurried away before Lora’s eyes—wide open and fixed high above her—could turn to Ayc. Try as he might, that dreadful image is permanently branded in his brain. He can’t shake it, just like he can’t quite rid himself of wondering if, in the four years they trained together at Adamant, they continued their sloppy lovemaking.
He doesn’t know why it even interests him. They deserve each other: the villainess and her dark knight. And now they’re in a tournament, battling against each other for something they both want. How awkward for them.
Ayc is certain Lora will win.
When the paper comes the next day, only one name is on top.
“Wylder for the Noxumbra,” Yris says flatly, but she crushes the paper into her hands, and Ayc senses danger coming from her in waves. He slinks out of the room, leaving the pan of cinnamon rolls for them to serve themselves.
As winter begins to wind down, each day brings less icy sea breezes and a little more promise of spring. More victors are named, and Ayc begins to hope Lora won't be his next ruler, after all.
Hason from Sal Maris, a high-ranking captain in the navy.
Ruatha from Lycendi, a woman skilled in both sorcery and alchemy.
It leaves only Totus Omni. Ayc knows little of Lora’s father but knows that he belonged to the Totus Omni. Meaning Lora has one more chance to be elected as victor.
“She’ll have limited choices in her Five if she wins their vote,” Fennix says, sucking on a caramelized apricot. “The Totus Omni’s Council of the People always gives guidance the victors have little choice but to follow.”
A bit of disdain rings through his voice. Most of the clans have an elected council, whose purpose is to represent the wishes and desires of their people to the clan regent. The other clans refer to this as the Council of Elders, as strict age limits are enforced on who can be elected into the position. But the Totus Omni refer to it as the Council of the People, because they are the only clan who intentionally ensure that the council seats are equally shared by both the experience of the elders and the vision of the youth.
“If it isn’t Noxumbra,” Yris says, barely looking up from her plate, “she needn’t bother. There’s never been a Totus Omni winner. They’re all weak and pathet— For divine’s sake, human !”
“I beg your forgiveness, my lady,” Ayc gushes, as he grabs a napkin to mop up the lukewarm pitcher of tea he has ‘accidentally’ knocked over into her lap. She snatches the napkin away and wipes furiously, growling at him to get out. He does.
The word comes on a late winter morning which threatens that spring—and the beginning of the Trials—is all too near.
Loraphne has been chosen by Totus Omni.
She is the seventh and final victor.
Ayc thinks long and hard about running, but he already knows, he has no where to run.
EIGHT YEARS AG O
Ayc couldn’t breathe.
No matter how much he fought he couldn’t lift his head above the water. His lungs burned. Screamed. Begged. Perhaps, this was how he would die.
The hand tangled in his hair ripped his head above the surface of the fountain. He gasped for air, his vision blurred by the water pouring into his eyes. Peals of laughter rang out around him from the group of fae children who gathered to participate in his torment. He recognized them as children who lived here in Wyntra. They were his most frequent tormentors, always finding new ways to terrorize him: cornering him, shoving him into manure carts, and now, nearly drowning him in the fountain.
Ayc had refused to learn their names, least they tormented his dreams, too.
“Should we dunk the cinnamon roll again?” asked the leader of the group. Despite his scrawny build, the grip he had on Ayc’s hair was too strong for Ayc to escape.
Cinnamon roll. It was the nickname they tormented him with, not just for the treats he baked, but for how pathetic they found him. Soft. Doughy. Weak.
“I think he’s sufficiently drowned,” said a voice Ayc knew all too well.
He couldn’t see past the four children who stood at the edge of the fountain, but he knew Lora watched everything from a few feet away. She always watched his tormentors, ever the villainess with her minions. If she wanted, she could stop it. The children admired Lora, perhaps because she was the Sovereign’s daughter or perhaps because of her unyielding strength and talent with the blade. If she told them to stop, they would. But she never did.
The children uttered a collective moan of disappointment. And Lora adds, “But you can do it one more time, just to be sure.”
The hand shoved Ayc under once more. Something deep within roared at him to fight back, but Ayc couldn’t bring himself to do it. If he clawed and flared and lashed out, someone might get hurt in the process. Probably himself, to be honest.
He was on the verge of his lungs bursting once more when the hand released him. He surged upward and grasped for the fountain’s edge. The children were already walking away, laughing and shoving each other. Only Lora remained, a few feet further into the courtyard garden, leaning against the statue of a full-figured, beautiful fae warrior who Ayc didn’t recognize.
Ayc scrambled from the fountain and tumbled onto the ground in a pile of awkward, lanky limbs. Two pristinely polished boots appeared in his vision.
“For divine’s sake,” Lora said, “why can’t you ever just try to defend yourself?”
Ayc shoved himself upright and sprinted out of her reach. He kept going, past the hedges, into the area of the large courtyard set up for training. His own boots squawked at him with each step, the worn, patched things logged with water. Lora’s footsteps crunched on the gravel as she pursued him. She didn’t run, but merely strolled comfortably behind, knowing she’d eventually catch him.
He knew he made a pathetic sight. A tall, gangly boy being chased by a girl a head shorter, but he didn’t care. Because his pounding heart and crawling nerves reminded him he knew exactly what that girl was capable of, and gods, hadn’t he been tormented enough for one day?
He made it to one of the exits in the Wyntra Castle, stepping into the darkness of the arched walkway before realizing his mistake. At the other end, two fae guards stood motionless. Beyond, the homes and barracks of the aerial armies pressed together, clustered around streets wide enough to hold a gryphon.
“Ayc, stop!” Lora called from behind him, but Ayc had already halted.
He couldn’t go any further. Yris might have allowed his door to remain unlocked during the day, but only because she had more than enough eyes in this castle to ensure he never made past the courtyard. All she had done was widen his prison. And Lora, of course, was his most dedicated prison guard.
Ayc swung around to face Lora, right as she lunged. Ayc’s back slammed against the stone wall of the passageway. He didn’t see Lora draw the knife, but its point was pressed against Ayc’s throat within a blink. Every nerve in his body focused in on that millimeter of flesh where the metal hovered, close enough to touch but not enough to break skin.
He was taller than Lora now, and he looked down the slope of the blade, into her cool eyes currently the color of earth after a spring rain. They watched each other for a long moment in silence, breathing in and out in unison. This was all, by now, a familiar pattern: the children’s torment, her blade at his throat. And he was so sick of this song and dance. So sick of being afraid, of everyone always having so much power over him, of everyone finding so much delight in his fear.
And so Ayc took a breath and forced himself to smile. Not a wobbly smile, but one that was easy. Light-hearted. Unaffected .
“Hey, Lora,” he said, in the tone he often used when he’d whisper a joke to her at mealtime–one she never laughed at.
She responded predictably, with a low growl. “Do not.”
With the small act of defiance that was his smile, Ayc found his usual terror fading. She hadn’t killed him yet, and if today was the day, well, at least he would be done with all the games. His smile was a lie, but it at least gave him a little power.
“Did you hear the one about the beehive without an exit?” Ayc said. “It was un- bee -liev-able.”
She wrapped her hand around his shirt collar and yanked it tight around his neck. “I think I’m really going to stab you this time.”
He only forced his smile to be bigger. “If you stab me, do you think your mother would still make me bake her apple crisp for the third time this week? I’m so sick of peeling apples. A stabbing would be preferable.”
The muscles in her cheeks spasmed, like she was barely withholding some emotion. “She would probably still make you.”
“Damn.” Ayc sighed. “You’re right.”
Lora released him with a thrust and sheathed her blade in a smooth motion. Ayc took his first full breath in several minutes.
She planted her hands on her hips and huffed out a breath, her chest rising and falling. Ayc fixed his gaze on her nose, so his traitorous eyes wouldn’t follow the movement of her body. He needed to keep pretending that he hadn’t noticed that his own body wasn’t the only one that had changed over this summer. If he thought about the changes in Lora, it made the already humid air feel downright suffocating. He should feel nothing other than fear and hatred toward her, and he didn’t appreciate whatever nonsense went through his head when she was near. He didn’t even like noticing that she’d begun wearing her hair differently since she returned from visiting her father this summer. Gone was the updo that resembled her mother’s. Now, her curls spilled around her shoulders, their tight spirals held back only by clips on each side of her head. He liked it so much better, and he hated himself for it. He had no business liking anything about her.
“Why won’t you ever just try to defend yourself?” she snapped, repeating the same words from earlier. “Can’t you just use your power?”
He moved away from the wall, backing toward the courtyard, so he was positioned toward an escape route. “I’ve used my power.”
She arched a single eyebrow. “The little sparks in your hands? Pathetic.”
Ayc had practiced for weeks before he dared show Yris the trick he’d been working on, so he was sure she wouldn't notice the powder. She hadn’t, but she wasn’t impressed, either. She and Fennix and Onanna didn’t stop coaching and pressuring him for more. Bigger flames. Brighter flames. Shoot it farther and make it take shape the way elementals could. None of those things he could deliver.
Ayc shrugged. “I guess the divine didn’t bless me with much.”
Lora took a step toward him. Her hands didn’t fall on the hilt of her dagger again. Still, his heart pounded with something that wasn’t fear, exactly, but wasn’t exactly not fear either. “You have to start doing something . Onanna thinks you’re hiding your true gift. My mother disagrees. She thinks that man at Creed Castle lied, and you don’t have magic at all. She’s got a plan to make you reveal the truth once and for all.”
A shiver ran down Ayc’s spine.
“What plan?” Ayc demanded.
Lora shook her head. He couldn’t read the emotions on her face. Was it amusement? Surely, she was amused that their game was about to be over.
“Dammit! What plan, Lora?”
The fierceness in Ayc’s voice startled even him, as did the step he’d involuntarily taken toward her. She slid her feet apart, into a fighter’s stance, her hand back on her blade. He drew himself short.
Lora’s other hand fluttered at her side. Anxious? No, of course not, because when she spoke, her voice was cold as ice. As cold as her mother’s. “I don’t know. But I hope you haven’t been lying. Because my mother will find out the truth, and if she finds out you’ve been lying this whole time, she’s going to make me kill you.” She paused and released her dagger. “I really don’t want to have to kill you, Ayc.”
Something within Ayc broke in that moment. It wasn’t the sudden shattering of a window by a thrown rock. Instead, it was the rupturing of ice that had long been splintering and needed only a snowflake to lead to complete ruin.
“Don’t pretend to care!” he growled, his voice echoing against the stone. It didn’t sound like his own voice; it sounded more like a monster. “You’re a cold, heartless bitch, just like your mother.”
She took another step back, her eyes wide. For a second, it almost seemed like his words hurt. Then she shook her head, and her face was stone once more.
“Fine. I won’t pretend.” She marched up to him, yanked herself to her full height, and put her nose within an inch of his. “I wish she would have let me slit your throat two years ago. Then I wouldn’t have had to listen to your awful jokes this entire time.”
Her hot breath brushed his chin, and his traitorous eyes dropped to her lips and his stupid head wondered—not for the first time—what it would be like to kiss her. And he hated himself for it. What kind of person did that make him? That he wanted to kiss someone so heartless. Someone who treated him like he was nothing. Someone who wanted to kill him.
He whipped around and stormed away. She hurled words after him. “Figure it out, cinnamon roll! You don’t have much time left.”
Back in his kitchen, Ayc admitted Lora was right.
Ayc’s time was running out.
Later that night, he stood at the window in his kitchen, the one that looked out into the courtyard, which was now bathed in the deep violet of dusk. He watched Peregrin walking away from the training rings in the courtyard, the last of their students gone to wherever they went at the end of the night. Just as she did every night, Tempest came to meet Peregrin and walked with them on their way back home. As though sensing she had an audience, Tempest cocked her head to the side so one silver eye shone back at Ayc. She lifted a wing, as though to wave. Ayc waved back, and she added a little prance to her step.
When the warrior and their steed disappeared from view, Ayc let his head fall onto the window. Dampness clung to the glass from the humidity in the air. How many days did he have left? Surely, it was two years more than he should have had; by rights, he should have died in the massacre of Creed. But he was only fourteen. He wanted more .
He fiddled with the buckles on his bracelets, the ones he’d promised his mother never to take off. Just like he’d promised to stop doing those little tricks he was so, so good at as a child—disappearing and not being found if he didn’t want to be. She warned him of all the things that might happen if he continued. But now, the little trick might be his only shot at escaping this place.
Where would he go if he left? Out there was a land he didn’t know. He couldn’t return to Aluina. No one in Wyntra would speak to him about Aluina’s fate, but he gathered enough from whispers to know the Drakr ruled over Aluina now. There was no home left to return to. Surely, that’s why Yris didn’t bother to have this window locked. Even if he could slip out the window without someone seeing him, she knew he had no where to go.
And what would happen if he tried to run and Yris caught him? He shuddered at the thought.
But he couldn’t stay here either. His time to convince her had run out. Yris would call his bluff and kill him. Maybe, in a month. Maybe, tomorrow. He could stay and die, or he could take a chance and live.
Considering it that way, Ayc didn’t have much of a choice.
He slipped off his bracelets and laid them on the window sill. Darkness had completely fallen by then, and the world outside was black enough his own reflection could be seen in the glass.
The shadows brushed over him, like fingers touching his skin, and he willed it to cover him, to surround him. To become him. He found it as easy and natural as taking a breath. Like it was a part of him. And that terrified him.
When he looked back in the window, his reflection was gone. He took a breath. Let it go. His face returned.
He could do this.
Two hours later, he was ready, a bag packed with food from his kitchen. He always kept spare, preserved food, in case Yris got annoyed with him and dismissed him before he ate his share of food at mealtime. A spare change of clothes was also in the bag, as well as a little bit of the money from the scant wages Yris paid him.
Then he took off his cuffs, slipped out the window into the shadows, and ran .