Chapter 23 #3
Frozen, Roy looked down at the crumpled, damp papers, but dared not touch them. He knew what they were.
“Pick them up,” the Governor demanded, his voice monotone. “Read them.”
Roy picked them up. There was nothing else to do, no way of escape. He wished the ghosts would wreak havoc upon the Governor and his guards, that they would drive them beyond the brink of madness, that they would steal into their minds and memories and crush every thought they’d ever had.
Instead, Roy unfolded the papers. There were four sheets of parchment. They were soggy, but the writing was legible.
In essence, the letter—penned by Irene—detailed the urgency of Briar’s mission, which was to inform Roy what had transpired during the time they’d been separated, as well as to relate the ever-shifting relations of Governorship and the Radiant Droves’ barbarous acts of harassment inflicted upon the middle class, the lower class, and the academic community.
Some scholars were scarred and flogged. Others were stripped naked and forced to survive the worsening climes.
At the end of the missive, Roy was petrified to find a blueprint of the Burrow, which Irene claimed Farrek had stolen from Drove’s military coat.
Everything was in this letter. Almost everything, anyway, but Roy didn’t believe that the Governor was foolish enough to think Irene, Briar, Tessa, and Farrek—and whoever else Briar had recruited into her secret circle of conspirators—were not aware of what had taken place in Rasileus.
If word got out, Northgard would spiral deeper into despair and desperation, exacerbated by the Old Ones’ continuing assault, and the Governor would have to pick up the pieces.
Word hadn’t gotten out, though. It was in Roy’s hands. And before him was the despot who had proven he had no compunction leaning into the darkness if it meant keeping just a bit more control.
Just like he’d done fifteen years ago when he’d ordered all those bookshops and libraries burned.
The Governor met Roy’s horrified stare. His skin was limp like melted wax, but there was something thrashing and alive in his green eyes.
“Roy,” Percival whispered, looking wide-eyed at him. “Roy, what—”
“I was fortunate to make sense of it,” the Governor said.
“I guess I should thank your sister’s friend.
Had it not been for Tessa, I might have been oblivious to Irene Larifor leaking military secrets.
Her mother and father have demonstrated their unswerving loyalty and devotion to my cause, so I should think that they will be pleased to attend their traitorous daughter’s public execution tomorrow.
And your sister . . .” He smiled. “Well, Briar Dawnseve might have escaped my notice, too, had Tessa been a little more careful not to reveal telltale information. Therefore, Briar will be joining her friend—or lover, I suppose, according to the nature of some of their letters—on the execution block. A final reunion, at long last.”
Roy had thought he’d sorted carefully through the outcome of Briar’s treachery, that his and Percival’s deal with the Governor had circumvented the safety not only of his country but of his sister.
But as dread crawled through his bones, Roy began to doubt everything that he’d worked for, everything that he’d given up.
“Please,” Roy murmured, then said aloud, “My sister is an asset, a second heir. Briar’s . . . She’s exempted from the Law of—”
“Nobody is exempted from justice,” the Governor snapped, apoplectic.
Spittle flew from his lips and struck the carpet at Roy’s feet.
“Law is undeniable; it is the answer.” He pointed a shaking finger at Roy, gave him a vicious, spiteful smile.
“Your sister did me wrong, boy. She aimed to ruin me and mine.”
Mine.
He means the city. Its people. Northgard.
He truly believes they belong to him, and him alone.
The ghosts had vanished without a trace since the Governor and his entourage had stopped in their tracks before the Orphic Basilica’s entryway. The library was silent but for the occasional raucous blast of thunder or lightning, and no loitering entities monitored the bookshelves.
Now they returned, peering out with their iridescent crimson eyes through the risers of the iron staircases and uttering low, aghast moans.
Books and scrolls started shuddering and toppling from the shelves again, filling near and distant pockets of the library with booming cracks and thumps, repeated and amplified by a persistent echo.
But it was all faint and other to Roy, so painfully far away.
He was rooted in place, his mind spinning around the Governor’s words. Nobody is exempted from justice.
Roy sprang forward, overcome with uncontrollable rage.
He took no more than three steps before one of the guards lunged and tackled him to the ground.
Roy uttered a nearly soundless gasp, the air whooshing out of his lungs.
He reached up, attempting and failing to claw at the guard’s face, when the guard suddenly wound his hand around Roy’s long hair and pulled hard.
A bolt of agony shot through his scalp and spread across his skull. His head felt like it was catching flame. He screamed, tears streaming down his face. He couldn’t think clearly through the pain, couldn’t wrap his mind around what had occurred, what the Governor had said, what he meant—
Above him, the guard yanking at his hair shouted and went flying off Roy, skidding across the carpet.
Roy scrambled to his feet; his hair tangled across his tear-streaked face.
He brushed it back with a quivering hand, clearing his vision, then glanced to his right, where the guard had disappeared.
He was squirming on the ground, digging the heels of his boots into the carpet and leaving smears of muddy snow.
A horde of ghosts, maybe four or five, was upon him. They pulled at his arms, his legs, his skull. They shrieked in his face, babbled in his ears. His eyes rolled up into the back of his head. He raked his fingernails down his cheeks, drawing shallow trenches that slowly filled with blood.
The second guard marched forward, then reached in through the cloud of ghosts surrounding his companion and pulled him out by the collar of his coat.
The incapacitated guard staggered to his feet, and after a moment, the ghosts slinked farther back into the gloomy alcoves and reading rooms on the first floor.
Percival looked frantically from the dazed guard to Roy, then finally landed his gaze on the Governor, his arms hanging motionless by his sides.
The Drove returned to his station, mumbling incoherently underneath his breath and feverishly shaking his head.
“Please,” Roy whispered, his skull throbbing. “Just grant my sister mercy.”
“I’m afraid I cannot do that, Roy,” the Governor said.
Somewhere past the ringing in his ears, Roy heard the Governor say: “You both have three weeks to stop the Old Ones and to tear this blasphemous building down. I trust you know the consequences you will be subjected to, should you not meet this new deadline. But at least you have those three weeks. As your sister and Irene can attest, justice in Northgard is usually much swifter.” Then, with a pat on Roy’s face that was abnormally paternal, the Governor smiled and said, “Consider it a demonstration of my generosity.”
Then he twisted on his heel. One of the guards hauled open the door, letting the Governor depart first, accompanied by his companion, and then himself after. The door banged shut.
Roy fell to his knees and screamed.