Chapter II. Heroes #2
“I nodded. ‘And I’ll ask none to walk it with me. I need no company in hell.’
“Baptiste sighed. ‘Gabe, I know you loved Dior. I know you’re grieved at her death—’
“‘Grieved doesn’t come anywhere close, Baptiste. That girl died because of me.’
“‘And so ye set out alone to throw yerself at the throat of Fabién Voss?’ Lachlan shook his head, silver burning on his skin. ‘If ye’ve a desire fer suicide, I can think of warmer places to end it all. Hell of a lot less walking involved, too.’
“‘I’ve no intent to kill myself, Lachie. I’m killing him.’
“‘How?’ Aaron searched my eyes, frowning. ‘The legends of the Order speak plain, Gabriel. No man of woman born can slay the Forever King. You tried once already in vain. And that was before the light of your faith failed you once more.’
“I gritted my teeth at that, but wasn’t surprised; Aaron was always a sharp one, and he’d grasped the root near as quick as I.
The reason why I’d not felt those wretched approaching ’til it was too late.
Why he could gaze at me with those pale blue eyes, so full of pain and pity and love, where he could barely stand to look at Lachie at all.
The reason you can look at me right now. ”
Jean-Francois glanced up from the sketch he was working on; a beautiful portrait of the silversaint and his three comrades, drawn with his usual flair.
“Your aegis had lost its glow,” he murmured. “Again.”
Gabriel nodded, staring at the chymical globe.
“I’d turned my back on God when he’d taken Astrid and Patience away.
Aaron himself had told me afterward, it mattered not what I held faith in, but that I must hold faith in something.
So I’d chosen to hold faith in Dior. To believe in her destiny, in the idea she’d somehow make all of this right.
That belief had been enough to rekindle the power in the ink on my skin.
” The silversaint sighed. “And like the fire of my aegis, it had gone to the grave with her.”
“But why does it remain dead, de León?” The historian gestured to the tattoos upon Gabriel’s skin, silvered but lightless. “You know the Holy Grail of San Michon did not die at Maergenn. How is it your aegis is yet unkindled?”
Gabriel scowled, taking a long swallow from his goblet. “I told you at the beginning of this story. All this is a waste of time, Chastain. The cup is broken. The Grail is gone.”
“But how?” Jean-Francois demanded, leaning forward in his chair.
The Last Silversaint only shook his head.
“Patience.”
Thunder rocked the skies outside, clawing at the tower walls with frozen hands. The historian scowled, returned to his portrait. The silversaint set down his wine.
“I studied Aaron, standing in the snow, tall and fey and bloodless. I realized that terrible blade he carried was Epitaph—the greatsword that had once belonged to Nikita Dyvok, a thousand men ended on its edge. Aaron’s face was cold as stone, the glow from Lachie’s skin mirrored in his gaze, marking my own faithlessness all the more.
“‘You’re right, brother,’ I nodded. ‘I tried to slay the Forever King before, with both faith and blade intact. And I’ve nothing to show for it but gravesoil. But I’ve a weapon now even Fabién Voss can’t hope to withstand.’
“One blond eyebrow rose slightly. ‘Weapon?’
“Reaching to my bandolier, I drew out the parting gifts Dior had given me; or more truthfully, the gifts I’d taken as I said good-bye. I hoped she’d not begrudge me them, drained from her corpse as I’d wept, held up now before Aaron’s widening eyes.
“Three glass vials, brimming with red.
“‘The blood of the Holy Grail.’
“Aaron recoiled a step, as if he could yet feel the sacred power caged in that treated glass. Baptiste reached for his beloved, but Aaron snatched back his hand as if it burned.
“‘A blade of enchanted starsteel anointed with this blood burned a Prince of Forever to ashes,’ I hissed. ‘And I wager it will do the same to the Forever King. So I go to deliver it. My blade, her blood, right into the rotten fucking heart that sleeps inside his chest.’
“‘Gabe—’
“‘I’m not interested in debate, Lachie. I didn’t ask for your help. That whoreson is at the heart of all this. Mayhaps he has some answer to daysdeath. Mayhaps—’
“‘Yer nae looking fer answers, Gabriel. Yer looking for revenge.’
“‘That’s why I’m looking alone.’
“Lachie placed a hand on my shoulder, and in his bright green eyes, for a moment, I could see a shadow of the boy I’d fought on the walls of Báih Sìde. The paleblooded son of a monster unrivaled, who I’d taught day by day to be the best man I ever knew.
“‘Never alone. Yer back, my blade. Remember?’
“Baptiste nodded. ‘I’d be dead if not for you, brother. And Aaron would still be slaved to that bastard Nikita.’
“Aaron nodded. ‘We stand with you, Gabriel. Always.’
“‘No,’ I snarled. ‘I’ve led enough people to their deaths already.’
“‘We all have blood on our hands, Gabe. God knows you’re no one’s saint.
’ Aaron smiled sadly, looking down at his palms. But when he lifted his eyes, beyond the chill of death, the pain of Lachie’s aegis, I saw love undimmed.
‘But you are a hero. We’ll not leave you to fight this darkness alone.
For all you’ve lost, you yet have some famille left. ’
“Baptiste nodded. ‘You have us.’
“Lachlan squeezed my shoulder so tight my bones creaked. ‘Brothers forever.’
“My heart was cleaved in two, then cleaved again; to know I led these men so surely into danger, and to know they’d not let me face it by myself.
It’s strange to stand beside another in battle, coldblood.
To place your life in their hands, and ask them to do the same for you.
It forges a bond, that hellfire; an alloy of love and loyalty no time nor tide can rust. And though I’d set out on that road with none to help me, I’d be lying if I told you that my battered heart wasn’t buoyed up by the thought of these men riding at my side.
Charging headlong into the battle that must surely be our last, unbowed and unbroken.
“‘I’m no hero, Aaron.’ I sighed, looking among the trio. ‘But I surely know a few.’
“I looked to the night above me. The war ahead of me. The men beside me.
“‘Together, then.’”