Chapter 28
Chapter
Twenty-Eight
T he twin steeples of the Lux Aester temple loom above Lora as she ascends the front steps, which are so white they blaze like untouched snow in the afternoon sunlight. Grand double doors tower at the top, formed of twirling golden wire and blue stained glass. It’s far more grand than the chapels and sacred groves in Totus Omni, where anyone, from any race or continent or faith, is welcome to find peace any time day or night. But these temple doors only open once a week for worship and on holidays, and even then, only citizens who have met certain strict conditions may enter.
She studies the doors for a second, sizing them up, before glancing behind her. A dark shape soars in the distant sky, far enough away to look like a large bird, but not far enough away that Tempest can’t see everything that is happening.
Half an hour. That is what Lora has before the rest of her Five will storm this place. They are within a copse of trees nearby, ready to act sooner if they sense anything going wrong.
Lora has done what the letter asked. She is unarmed, her faithful twin blades handed over to Bronwen. The enchantment around the temple ensures she would not have been able to climb the steps of the temple if she—an outsider—carried a blade on her person. Marcellus and Wren have made a foolish mistake thinking that has weakened her. Adamant warriors are not allowed weapons their entire first year, not until they grow to fully understand what their greatest weapon is.
Themselves.
Their minds and bodies and unbreakable spirits.
Lora brushes her fingers against the leather cord around her neck, ensuring it is in place and that the end is still tucked within her armor. She snaps her focus back to the doors—these fucking doors that keep out the people they should serve. She charges toward them and kicks them open with a force that slams them against the inside wall. They shatter, and she enters in a shower of blue glass.
Inside, a half dozen priests leap from the pews and draw their swords. Warriors of the divine, they like to call themselves, armed with faith and silver. She doubts few priest have trained past the limited time they were granted at Wyntra and the Noxumbra specialty school; Lux Aester can never release its grip on its people for long. But they continue to train with one another here in their temples and are at least formidable.
Six of them, against one of her. Good. At least it will be a challenge.
“Where is he?” she demands. Her voice echoes in the sanctuary, all the way to the altar at the front and into the spiraling dome above.
“The high priest stated you are to wait for him here,” answers one priest, taking a step from the line they have formed. “We will go get him.” He nods to another priest, who turns and saunters toward a door on the side of the sanctuary.
“Wait!” Lora barks at him.
The priest turns back, and all six of them stare at her with sneers upon their faces.
Whatever happens to them, she will feel no remorse. They are helping Marcellus; they may have harmed Ayc. And even if they are innocent of anything other than being guard dogs, they have still participated in the oppression of the Lux Aester people. They’ve arranged the marriage of fae who aren’t even out of childhood; they have done unmentionable things to Bronwen and fae like her to ‘break’ them of what they see as sins. Maybe, they will cooperate, and she won’t have to hurt them.
She hopes they don’t cooperate.
“Fuck Marcellus,” she snarls.
The lead priest’s pale face turns a molten red. “I will ask you to show some respect. This is a holy?—”
Lora advances a step. “Don’t try me with your pious shit. If someone doesn’t agree to take me to Ayc by the time I count to ten, I’m going to see how black your hypocrite hearts are and then find him myself. One?—”
“You are not in charge here,” the lead priest snaps.
“That’s where you’re wrong. Two. ”
“You’re unarmed!”
“I know.” Lora smiles. “But you’re not. Three. ”
The priests exchange an uncertain look. They adjust their grip on their blades.
“Four.”
The head priest gives a nod. “As the high priest ordered. If she doesn’t cooperate, kill her.”
Four of the priests prowl forward, their blades held high. Something flares to life within Lora, like a simmering storm releasing its first bolt of lightning. It sharpens her focus and makes her eyes burn with silver.
Anger.
Lora is angry, but then, she’s always been angry.
Angry at her mother and all the things she saw her do. Angry about how, no matter what Lora did, it was not and could never be enough to make her mother proud. Angry at her father—unfair as it was—for leaving her. Angry at every injustice she saw—Creed castle and Aluina and Lux Aester—and the powerlessness she often felt to make it better. And here, in this moment, angry that her enemies dared lay a hand upon Ayc— her Ayc —someone who is good and kind and silly, despite all that has been done to him.
Sometimes, the anger builds within her until she thinks she might erupt with it, until the most dangerous place to be is within her own body and mind.
Peregrin has always seen it. When she was young, they gave her exercises to work out the tension. Taught her breathing and how to hide the way she fluttered her hands and sometimes, simply gave her a safe place in which to scream and slap the ground and implode upon herself when it all became too much. Peregrin trained her, and then told her to go to Adamant, where she trained even more. And, somewhere along that journey, Lora learned something more important .
She is not helpless. And her anger does not make her weak.
It makes her powerful .
Lora grabs the strand around her throat and yanks it free of her neck. She grasps the bottle that hangs from the end, the one Xylie gave her, and heaves it at the feet of the priest. It explodes in a cloud of gray dust. The priests cough, stumbling back, rubbing at their now-burning eyes. The protective charm Bronwen placed on Lora holds as she lunges into the cloud after them.
The first priest’s neck snaps like a twig. She pulls his sword from his lifeless fingers. She swings toward the others, all five of them.
Then Lora unleashes her rage.
- AYC -
“If he tells one more joke, I’m going to stab him,” one of the priests says, seizing the hilt of his sword and taking a step toward Ayc.
His fellow priest grabs his shoulder. “We can’t. The high priest said he wants him alive.”
Ayc grins at them cheekily from where he still hangs from the ceiling by his wrists. He’s needed distraction from the agony rippling from his suspended arms all the way down his back, acute pain morphing with the chronic. If he focuses too much on it, he’ll lose himself to it. So he’s been telling joke after joke, from the childish ones he torments Lora with, to the raunchy ones he generally reserves for special company. Seeing a grown man blush has been the most delightful experience. Ayc pities their wives.
“Did you hear the one about what the sign outside the out-of-business brothel said?” Ayc asks.
The priest bares his teeth and growls. This time, his fellow priest releases him, and he stalks forward.
Ayc keeps smiling. “The sign said, ‘We’re closed! Beat it!’”
He laughs as the fae stops before him, but the sound turns into a croak as the fae slams a fist into Ayc’s right cheek. The force propels Ayc backward, swinging on the chains. His feet collide with the altar behind him, but he’s unable to latch a foot on the top before he swings back around.
“Or how about the one—” Ayc begins.
The next punch lands straight into his nose. Black interrupts his vision, and blood pours down his face. But the force is enough that he spins on the chains. He uses whatever remains of his strength to curl at the waist and then plants his feet at the top of the altar. Relief, blessed relief, ripples through his arm muscles as he stands.
“What are you doing?” demands the priest.
Ayc really isn’t sure. He’s kind of just… improvising.
“Thought I’d take up praying,” he says, facing them. “Is this not how it’s done?”
The priest grabs for his leg, and Ayc kicks out, slamming his boot into the priest’s face. The priest stumbles backward, but the other priest surges forward. His sword hisses as he pulls it from his scabbard.
Then a sound rips out from outside the doorway—loud and piercing and dripping with terror. It’s echoed by more. It’s such a departure from the quiet of the temple that it takes a moment for Ayc to register it.
Screams.
“Oh,” Ayc says, and this time the smile that crawls onto his swollen cheeks is genuine, “I think Lora’s here.”
The priests whirl toward the door. The one closest yanks it open. A long stone hallway stretches before the sanctuary, lined with doors. And there’s Lora, her face already drenched in blood as she pins a trembling priest against the wall, her hand curled around his throat.
“Where is he?” Lora demands, and the priest thrusts a finger in his direction. Her eyes snap toward Ayc. They burn silver, bright in the dimness. She tosses the priest to the side and draws a sword from where it’s been tucked in her belt. She holds two swords, longer than her own, matching the ones the priests carry, as she charges down the hall. Her cape ripples behind her.
Ayc’s heart stands still. She is magnificent. Glorious. He has never believed in any higher being, but at that moment, there is a goddess of life and death. And it is her.
Another priest flings himself through a door in the hallway and swings a sword at her head. She ends his life in a merciless and effortless spray of blood. And Ayc should not like that. Her violence certainly shouldn’t strike his body like lightning, lighting it on fire, and yet he is burning for her, as he always does.
She’s come for him.
The priest who struck Ayc leaps forward to grab the door and slam it shut. It’s closed only for a moment, before it’s propelled open again. It collides with the priest, flinging him backward against the wall. He slumps to the floor with a gasp. The other priest defends one of Lora’s blows, but her other sword drives into his gut. When he lays on the ground, Lora’s narrowed silver eyes focus on the other priest, but he holds up his hands weakly. In them, he holds a set of keys.
“To the chains. Just take him and go.”
Lora kicks the priest’s blade from where it fell. It slides across the bloody stone, out of the priest’s reach. She whirls toward the altar. Her eyes fade from silver to black. Ayc wills a grin upon his face, hoping to hide the way his very soul shivers in her presence.
“Fancy meeting you like this,” Ayc says.
She searches him over. “Who did that to you?” she growls, her eyes flashing silver once more.
He blinks, and she gestures at his face with her sword. He forgot about his swollen cheeks and the warmth of blood still trickling down his chin. “Oh, this?” Ayc shrugs and flicks his fingers toward the slumped priest. “He didn’t like my joke.”
She weighs one of her swords in her hand. “Is that right?”
Without looking, she throws the sword like a spear. It pierces through the priest’s right shoulder and pins him to the wall. He screams.
Ayc fights to keep his smile from curling wider. There’s something deeply wrong with him. “Seems a steep price for a poor sense of humor.”
“What do you mean?” Lora asks, marching toward the altar. “That was merciful.”
The heat in his blood burns brighter as she vaults onto the altar. Her body presses against his as she stands on her toes to reach the chains. He takes a deep, calming breath, trying to focus on anything but her presence. Anything but her strength and beauty and the fucking smell of anise in her hair—least his body betray him to the point she’ll notice.
The chains release. He rubs at the raw skin, right above where his bracelets sit, and recalls the reality of their situation. “You shouldn’t have come, Lora. This is a trap.”
She bares her teeth, revealing those sharp canines. “I’m not a rabbit to be ensnared.”
“No, you’re a dragon.”
She meets his eyes, the irises lightening from black to the deepest of purples. His heart betrays him once more. If it keeps stopping like this, surely it’ll kill him.
“Let’s get you out of here.” Lora leaps down from the altar, and Ayc takes the opportunity to breathe.
Ayc hurts too much to jump, and so he sits and slides off.
Lora reaches toward him but drops her hand before she actually touches him. “How bad is it?”
“How bad is what?”
“The pain.”
Ayc studies her, noticing the way that now-familiar line of worry has appeared between her brows. She said it almost like she knows. But what does she know, and who told her?
“I’m fine,” he says.
She narrows her eyes skeptically, but only says, “Never mind. We can discuss not lying to me later.” She adjusts her grip on the one sword she still holds. “We have to go. We only have ten minutes before the other four storm this place.”
She pauses before the door and peers out into the hallway, before beckoning to him. The hallway beyond lies empty and quiet. Still, goosebumps tease over Ayc’s arms. He listens, but all he hears is Lora’s soft exhale as she steps into the hallway. Ayc follows.
He sees only a flash of silver before sharp, blinding pain rips through him. When his vision clears, he finds a blade protruding from his side. Blood pours across the linen of his shirt. A hand wraps around the hilt, floating in the air momentarily, until another hand rises and pulls down the hood of a cloak that has rendered him invisible. Marcellus appears, grinning that snake-like smile.
Ayc feels the doors of the trap slam shut. As he collapses to his knees, he closes his eyes, red flashing behind them, and grinds his teeth against a scream. This is the trap.
Ayc has always been the trap.
- LORA -
It’s a familiar sound. The soft, squelching sound of flesh parting beneath a blade. Fear, thick and rancid, boils on Lora’s tongue as she reels around to see Ayc collapse. Marcellus tears back his blade and lets Ayc go. The blood drains from Ayc’s face, the light shuttering out of his brilliant eyes, before he closes them. The world tinges in silver. Rage, like she has never felt before, rattles through her soul.
“You’re a dead man,” she snarls, charging toward Marcellus.
“Ah, ah, ah.” He takes a step back, wagging a finger. She lifts a blade to sever that hand, when he says the next words like a rush. “If you kill me, I’ll never tell you what poison I put on my blade. Nor will I give you the antidote. ”
Lora freezes, realization dawning. Marcellus’s whole trap felt too easy, insultingly so, because it was. This was the plan all along, and Marcellus has pulled the noose taut before she realized it ensnared her.
“What do you want?” she demands.
“Lora,” Ayc begins, his voice strained. He clutches his side, his hand already soaked red. “Whatever it is?—”
“Not now, cinnamon roll,” Lora snaps, before he can be sickeningly noble and say something like “Let me die.” She swears she’ll punch him right in the face. “What do you want, Marcellus?”
The high priest is still grinning. “What would you be willing to pay for his life?”
Anything. Everything.
Lora grits her teeth against the words, her sharpened teeth digging into the inside of her lip. “Let me guess? You want me to take off my chronicler?”
“No,” Ayc growls, but Lora only glares at Marcellus.
“And win by default?” He laughs. “I don’t want you to bow out, Loraphne. I want to beat you. I want you to stand down and do nothing for three days. If you—and your Five—do nothing but wait for three days, I will return and give you the antidote.”
“No.” Ayc grabs the door to the sanctuary and tries to haul himself to his feet. More blood drains from his face, and Lora shoves him back down with a hand on his shoulder. “He only has two more quests left, Lora. You can’t agree. He’ll win.”
Lora counts the lit stones on Marcellus’s chronicler to confirm what Ayc said. Her hands want to flutter; her throat aches to scream so she can release the rising pressure. She forces herself to inhale slowly. In and out .
“You could have just stabbed him back in Totus Omni and given me your ultimatum then,” she says, buying time to think. “Why go through the trouble of bringing me here?”
“For two reasons. First to confirm my suspicion that he’s your greatest weakness. And second, once all of Everadyn finds out you slaughtered a mass of fae priests just to save one human, who will ever willingly follow you?”
He’s right, of course. When Lora began these Trials, she swore she wouldn’t be like her mother. She wants to be a leader whom people love, not fear. But Yris’s frequently-offered advice drifts back to Lora, a haunting echo.
Who needs love if you can have fear? Both will give you devotion, but only fear can keep it.
Lora shakes the thoughts away. It’s a worry for a different day. “Three days? And you swear you’ll have what it takes to heal him.”
“Just three days.”
It is not just three days. It might as well be a lifetime, because Marcellus will win by then. Ayc is right. This is more than risking Marcellus win the Trials. It is guaranteeing it.
Ayc bares his teeth and growls in frustration. “I could be dead in three days, anyway.”
Her hands flutter, her sword vibrating. She tightens her grasp. “Will he survive?” she demands of Marcellus.
“If he’s strong, he’ll survive until then. If not—” Marcellus shrugs. “It’s a risk. You must decide if you’re willing to take it. The choice is yours.”
She says nothing, only imagines all the ways she’ll kill Marcellus when she gets the chance. Slowly. Piece by minuscule piece.
Ayc seizes her wrist, so tightly his fingers dig in. All her nerves hone in on that bit of flesh where his skin touches hers. A drop of sweat weeps down his face. She studies his face, but she can’t tell if he’s in pain. He must be, but he’s had so much practice hiding it.
“Lora, don’t. I’m begging you. I’d rather be dead than face what happens if he wins.”
She shuts her eyes to shield herself from the desperation that contorts his face. She knows he’s talking about more than just the fate of Everadyn. Ayc will suffer personally, Bound to obey Marcellus’s every wish. How long would it take for Marcellus to realize the power he holds over Ayc? It would take only seconds for him to decide to abuse it.
She shudders, but then she imagines the alternative: Ayc, cold and gray with death. No more smiles. No more ridiculous jokes. No more sparkling light in her gray world. And her, left to survive the aftermath.
Perhaps she should have listened to her mother, all those years ago. She should have been stone, should not have let herself get attached. But it’s too late. Perhaps, it was too late from the moment she burst through that door ten years ago to find him holding a pan of cinnamon rolls.
“Decide, Loraphne,” Marcellus says. “Do you agree?”
Lora opens her eyes. “I agree.”