Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Five
Soft sway the leaves of the willow tree fair,
Its reeds are thus gentle, bended in prayer.
No switch shall be crafted from branch, stalk, or bark.
Its canopy waits, respite from the dark.
So, too, I demand, the Physician must be.
His words whisper soft as breeze through a tree.
From the white spring flower to the depths of his root,
His wisdom is pure, his healing absolute.
W hen the first lash fell, a cumulative scream shot through the crowd. The man, stripped of his tunic, moaned wordlessly, blood falling down his back and pooling into the stones at his feet. The woman, tied separately, watched with the rest of us, her eyes wide and glassy.
Oppressive as smoke, the veil of death fell over the square. It strung itself through the crowd, crawling through my nostrils down into my throat, choking me. Tears pricked my eyes, and when the Destrier cracked his whip again, the sound ripped through me, so visceral I doubled over.
Elm put his hand on my elbow and did not stir, as if cast of stone. Only when Hauth addressed the crowd did his face shift, his green eyes narrowing and his mouth drawing into a tight line at the sight of his brother.
The red and black lights of Hauth’s Cards surrounded him like a venomous cloud. “This man and woman betrayed your trust.” The whip lashed again. The woman cried silently, defeat stamped onto her brow.
“They did not report the infection,” Hauth continued. “They kept their child hidden, allowing the infection to fester, putting all of Blunder at risk.” The whip ripped again, and I jumped, a long, helpless wail echoing across the square. “And now, they pay the ultimate price.”
I craned my neck, searching the crowd. “Where is the child?” I whispered, my voice breaking.
Elm shook his head. His green eyes had gone cold.
Around me, Blunder’s citizens were frozen to the cobblestones.
Their faces were drawn, colorless. Some had tears in their eyes.
Others hardly seemed to blink. Some bore heavy brows, their expressions twisted.
There were no cries of triumph—no support for the High Prince and the Destriers. They did not claim this violence.
But they were too afraid to stop it.
When the Destrier with the whip moved back, Hauth stepped in front of the prisoners, pulling the Scythe from his pocket.
He tapped it three times. “Give me your charms,” he commanded.
The prisoners dug at their clothes, their eyes dull and unfocused. Hauth waited with his palm extended, like a tax collector awaiting his coin. The woman pulled a rabbit foot from her shift. The man, his hands bloody, an owl feather.
They handed them to Hauth, who crushed them beneath his boot.
“The infection is a blight,” he called, his words cutting through the cavernous silence.
“It is poison that seeps through the mist, fashioned by the Spirit of the Wood. Those who fail to report it commit treason.” He turned to the prisoners.
“By the authority of the King, I, Hauth Rowan, High Prince of Blunder, sentence you to death.”
The sudden sharpness of the Destriers’ shouts hit my ears, painful after all that terrible silence. “Go!” they called, flanking the crowd. “To the gates!”
Pushed in every direction, Elm and I were carried with the tide, bodies pressed all around us. The Prince clung to me, his fingers tight on my arm as we jostled about. I heard the moans of the prisoners behind us but did not turn, forced forward by Destriers on horseback and the sway of the crowd.
We flocked out of the square back onto Market Street. I whipped my head around for any sign of Ravyn or Jespyr, but the crowd was too vast, onlookers joining us by the minute.
The shadow of Black Horses surrounded us.
The Destriers led us to the edge of town. We moved through the tall fortified gates, then followed the road some fifty paces. There was nothing, just road and a wide, open field. Hauth stood at the edge of it, joined by Linden, two other Destriers, and the bloodied prisoners.
Behind them, not fifty paces, the mist loomed, waiting.
The crowd came to a crashing halt. I was pressed up against several others. I heard the boom of Destrier voices, the whicker of their warhorses. “Make room!”
Half of Blunder poured onto the road. We looked grotesque in our house colors, our clothes too bright—too alive—for what we were about to witness. I was wedged tighter into Elm’s side as the crowd split, making room for the Destriers, Hauth, and the prisoners.
A carriage rolled through the gates, its horses snorting steam. It came to an abrupt halt near Hauth and the prisoners. Out of it spilled two men clad in white, between them a boy no older than twelve.
I clenched my jaw, something inside me boiling over, the Nightmare’s hiss blistering through my mind.
Like his parents, the boy was tied at the wrists. I expected tears—wails of despair—but the boy was silent, his shoulders high, his hands balled into fists. His shirt was torn at the neck, his hair strung with sweat. Whatever had happened, he had put up a fight.
I leaned close to Elm. “What will they do to him?”
Don’t you know? the Nightmare whispered.
Elm’s voice was lifeless. “He’ll be made to watch his parents disappear in the mist. Then he’ll be taken to Stone. If my father deems his magic without use…”
I blinked away tears of rage. “He’ll be murdered.”
Elm did not answer. His eyes were back on the carriage. I turned just in time to see a third Physician step onto the road. He was taller than the others, his frame leaner—his eyes unnaturally pale.
Orithe Willow, head of the King’s Physicians.
Elm jolted beside me. “Hauth shouldn’t be doing this, not in front of everyone.” His head whirled. “Where the hell is Ravyn?”
Up ahead, the Physicians and the boy between them joined Hauth. Orithe folded the length of his white sleeve back several inches, revealing a clawlike contraption with long, angry spikes reaching out from each of his pale fingers—a device made for only one purpose.
Blood.
When the Physician flexed his fingers, the metal spikes made a grating clang, an ominous knell that cut through the crowd. The boy tried to move toward his parents, but Orithe extended a spike to his throat, forcing him to remain still.
A single drop of blood fell from the boy’s neck. Not a fatal wound, but enough for Orithe Willow to sentence him to death.
Orithe’s voice boomed in the naked silence.
“This child carries the infection. His magic is unsanctioned—dangerous. Let his death, and the death of those who harbored him, be a warning,” he called, his pale eyes wide.
“There is no hiding the infection. Whether today, tomorrow, or years ahead, we will discover every fever—every degeneration—every unsanctioned magic.”
Hauth raised his Scythe over his head. “Card magic is the only true magic. Everything else is sickness.” He tapped the Card three times, turning once more to the prisoners.
“We of Blunder surrender you who have broken our laws to the mist.” A cruel smile curled his lips. “Be wary. Be clever. Be good.”
The prisoners turned toward the mist, their movements jagged, their legs shaking. For a second it seemed as if they would not step off the road.
But there was no fighting the red Card.
The woman stepped forward with a bloodcurdling scream and took slow, rigid steps into the field. Her husband followed a pace behind, casting his gaze backward, shouting something I could not hear to his son.
Their feet dragged through dead grass. In a minute, they would be swallowed entirely by mist.
The sound of the Nightmare’s hiss—the tap of his claws—juddered in my ears, hollowing out my fear until all that was left was rage. When the shadows grow long, when our names turn to dust, what we loved, what we hated, will spoil to rust. All will be forgotten, save one truth, unshaken…
What did we do when the children were taken?
My heart raced, my cheeks burning with tears. “We need to do something, Elm.”
The Prince’s green eyes were locked on the prisoners, who drew closer and closer to the mist. I felt a tremor in his arm, the muscles of his jaw rigid. “We can’t risk Orithe seeing you,” he said.
“I can handle myself.” I looked down at my red dress, marked by the spindle tree. “Give me your cloak.”
The Prince’s shoulders stiffened. “Why?”
I tugged at his sleeve until it slipped off his shoulder. “Trade me masks.”
The Prince cursed beneath his breath and shrugged out of his cloak. When I put it on, my red dress disappearing behind the clasps, the wool was so dense it swallowed the light. So, too, was his mask. My fingers shook as I fastened it behind my head.
Elm turned, searching the crowd once again.
I knew who he was looking for. But there was no time.
I wrapped my hand around his arm, searching his green eyes.
“You don’t need Ravyn,” I said in a low, urgent voice.
“That boy is innocent, just like Emory. You are the strongest magic user I have ever seen. You have a Scythe.” My voice hardened. “You must do something.”
Hauth and the Destriers faced the mist, watching the prisoners, talking in low voices. Hauth tilted his head back in a sharp, ugly laugh.
The sound of his brother’s laugh snapped something in Elm. His green eyes narrowed, prey to predator. He reached into his pocket, retrieving his red Card, muttering something under his breath I could not make out—prayer or curse.
An audible gasp ripped through the crowd. The Physicians turned to the mist with wide eyes; the Destriers’ backs stiffened. Laughter died on Hauth Rowan’s mouth.
The prisoners had stopped walking. They stood, frozen mid-step, as if cast into stone, caught in the battle of the Princes—Rowan against Rowan.
Scythe against Scythe.
Elm slipped away from me. “Stay out of sight,” he said, eyes ahead. “Don’t do anything stupid.” He twirled the Scythe between his fingers and stepped through the crowd like an actor at encore, all of Blunder his stage.