Chapter Twelve
Those who think they can and those who think they can’t are both right.
As I ran behind Cyrus, I inspected my stomach. Shock almost knocked me flat. Nothing. No bullet wound. No scar. Not even a bruise or a hint of pain. Just smooth, unbroken skin.
When Ember healed me, she really healed me. I owed her everything. Cyrus and Domino too.
But we weren’t out of danger yet. Far from it. My actions had opened an entire train cart of problems. “By the way, I lost my goggles, yet I can see. Nothing is upside down or dark. Everything is upright and well lit.”
“That’s because Soalians see past the darkness and automatically correct the RVM.
For us, the lens is the problem.” Cyrus shouldered his way past a cracked door hanging by its hinges on a brick building threatening to topple at any moment.
“That’s why CURED keeps a log of all goggles worn into the field, and by whom.
If anyone deactivates a pair and survives an outing, they know why. ”
Uh-oh. “Maybe I should go back and find mine.”
We’d passed the door, entering an outside courtyard overrun with thorny vines.
“No need. I picked yours up while Ember worked on you.” He spun and tapped the metal band secured around his neck, different from the one over his eyes. “The lens remains activated. You can put it on when we’re closer to the base.”
“Thank you.” He always thought ahead. But. Um. “Maybe I should take the lead. I can see without hindrance. You can’t.”
“The goggles I’m wearing are inactive. I store their chip in the heel of my boot and swapped the lens for a fake that doesn’t restrict my vision.”
Smart.
Cyrus led me across another portion of the battlefield.
We jumped over bodies, picking up discarded weapons along the way, all while skirting around the feeders ignoring us in favor of dining on slain glowers, all-you-can-eat-buffet style.
The grotesque sight left me gagging. Didn’t help that a fetid stench of rot coated the air, carried by wafts of smoke.
Speaking of. “Why didn’t the smoke affect me?” I rested my finger on the trigger of a harbinger, ready to punch holes in anyone who approached me. “I’m a new Soalian. I should’ve gone down.”
He kicked a severed limb out of our path with more force than necessary. “My guess is your link to Domino impacted your reaction.”
I winced. “About that.” But “link” wasn’t the right word. Unless he knew something I didn’t?
“Later,” he stated, as if he didn’t trust himself to have the discussion now. “What I don’t know is why certain glowers froze.”
That, I could explain. “Lolli shot them with strange green bullets.”
Cyrus hissed something under his breath. “She’s determined to deliver Ember to the emperor. A gift to garner his favor.”
Evil, awful woman. “Lolli is the one who shot me.”
A moment of stunned silence. “What makes you think so?”
“Not think. Know. For starters, she told me she wants something only you can give her, and that she’ll do anything to win you.”
He snorted. “Lollipop loves herself and power. There isn’t room for anything else, least of all a former boyfriend. Our relationship never developed beyond a surface level and isn’t worth repeating. Whatever she said, she only hoped to intimidate you and distract me.”
No. I didn’t believe that. How could she not want him for her own?
He was the epitome of power, with a brand on his face to prove it.
I mean, look at all he’d survived. He was honest and faithful, the two best traits.
His intensity never slackened. Whatever life threw at him, he handled with confidence.
He was rugged and smart. And his dry wit.
He was always so serious yet somehow also witty. Not now, of course, but usually.
“I was told you dumped her when she fell for you.”
The muscles between his shoulders bunched. “Is that why you—rumors are wrong,” he grated. “She never loved me, and I never loved her.”
Maybe he hadn’t. But. “She is the one who shot me. Before I collapsed, I saw her standing a few feet away with a smoking gun aimed in my direction.”
Another beat of silence. Then, “I’ll handle her.”
An undercurrent of rage accompanied each word, and I shuddered. Lolli’s gonna get it. “I watched a feeder claw your throat, but you are uninjured.”
“I wore a protective covering,” he said, an odd note in his voice. A note I didn’t understand.
But I didn’t press. Not here, not now. “Your brother seems nice-ish,” I said, making small talk as we raced on.
“He isn’t. Since the death of his wife, he’s been . . . not right.”
I had a million other questions, but a few dozen feeders raced our way. As I aimed, intent, they stopped short. Hmm. They didn’t attack but stared at us while huffing and puffing, as if they’d never wanted anything as much as they wanted to eat us.
Cyrus helped me spring over a stack of dead bodies made of soldiers and feeders alike. Don’t look, don’t look. The vans were long gone, no living lords, ladies, knights, barons, or royals left behind.
My gaze landed on one of the slain, and my chest squeezed. Cash. His blank eyes peered at nothing.
He’d survived the attack at the base only to die in the field. Tears welled, but still I motored on.
We cleared the rubble and came across more staring feeders. They kept their distance, observing us, all but drooling for a taste.
“What’s going on?” I threw a glance over one shoulder, then the other. “Why are they avoiding us?”
“They sense the healing power flowing through your veins. It’s strong enough to kill them.”
“I don’t understand.” Although, yes, I did feel different.
Not just stronger, but clearer, more confident and driven, with a frenzy of heat burning soul deep.
“If Ember is the source of this healing power, she carried it inside herself before passing it on to me, yet the feeders weren’t afraid to approach her. ”
“The power isn’t hers. She’s merely a conduit for Soal’s power, the same as we are. Some are better conduits than others, able to contain more. She’s one of the best, and yet she only contains the barest taste.”
Well, well. Becoming a better conduit suddenly topped my to-do list. But, um, exactly how powerful was Soal? Because wow. If this was simply a taste . . .
“Having experienced the healing power for myself, at Victors’s hands, I can tell you the bonus effect will last about an hour.
The problem is, we’re at least three hours from the base.
” He picked up a fallen CO2 dagger and rotated without missing a beat, shoving the weapon into an empty sheath at my waist.
“Thank you,” I said, already dreading the loss of this wondrous power.
We turned the corner of a cracked wall made of some kind of glistening crystal, and Cyrus ground to a halt.
What the—ah. A statue of Astan loomed to the left, his wings stretched wide.
The head was gold, the midsection and arms silver, the legs iron, and the feet a mix of metals caked in mud.
Most other sculptures were made of marble, bronze, limestone, or terra-cotta.
I’d never encountered one like this. His thick horns had raised another inch.
I licked chapped lips. With arms spread wide and a smirk lifting the corners of his mouth, he appeared to survey the battlefield beyond us.
Astan’s horns will straighten. When they reach maximum height, they will release a blast across both realms.
Tick tock.
Dread attempted to infiltrate my mind. Focus. There was nothing I could do about the horns right now. They weren’t even the most imminent threat.
I gave Cyrus a little nudge. “Let’s go.”
As soon as we cleared the depiction of Theirland’s leader, Cyrus looked back. Confusion and longing etched in his features. “I remember . . .” He pursed his lips and cursed. “Nothing. Memories form only to slip away just before I grasp them.”
The same used to happen to me when I wrestled with anxiety. Calm would help, but considering the look he’d just given the statue, I didn’t have any to spare. “Astan has chosen you,” I stated. We might as well put everything out in the open.
“He has, yes.” The high prince drew in a fortifying breath. “That doesn’t mean I’ve accepted his offer.”
Wait. If he’d already made an offer . . . “He’s spoken to you.”
“More than once,” Cyrus confirmed.
My grip on the gun tightened. “Don’t make me drag details out of you. Start talking.”
Aggression crackled around him, an invisible barrier that dared anyone to step too close. “I’ve not seen him, but there have been times I’ve heard his voice inside my head, mingled with mine, as if I’m thinking his thoughts.”
Acid singed the edges of my composed facade. “Go on.”
“He likes to remind me of my last visit to the library, when I read a portion of my book. A snippet of the future. It claimed I must . . . let you go. Astan alleges I can keep you, if I serve as his host.”
“For starters, Astan lies, always, without exception.” Using Cyrus’s revelation as a key, I must assume the god intended to tear us apart.
But. My book predicted the same. Astan and Soal never shared the same goal, and yet, they seemed to do so now.
“I was supposed to stay away from you while we’re in Theirland,” I admitted.
Cyrus spun, and I crashed into him. He clasped my hips, holding me steady as he seethed. “Did you read it in a book, or did the order come verbally from the librarian?”
“Both,” I said, and winced. “He inferred you had been chosen by Astan, and I would be chosen by another. That you would say yes, and I would say no, which supports the snippet where we seemed to be enemies.”
“The war. Yes, I remember that part.” His nostrils flared. “I will continue to refuse Astan. I will never harm you, Arden. Tell me you know that.”
I didn’t need to consider my response. “I do know that. I trust you. As you can see, I didn’t stay away.” The reason we were now in trouble. Inner flinch. “You don’t need Astan to keep me.”