Chapter 5 The Forgotten Martyr
Five
The Forgotten Martyr
Dav watched the blade come down, his immortal body powerless to stop her. Nora’s outcry echoed through the Blood Union, a lifetime of anguish lashing out in one act of fury.
Dav’s magic roared from him in answer. That flash of power revealed the truth. He was the target of her blade, but not her anger.
He seized the magic her pain had summoned to life, and his Will to survive bent his reborn power to his command. He spun his theramancy deep into her thoughts.
Her memories flared in his mind’s eye, like lightning strikes that overlay the present. Her parents’ faces. A bloodied knife. Then firelight glinting along the oncoming blade in her hand.
She gasped, her thoughts shying from his presence in her mind. Her aim moved an inch.
The dagger plunged into his chest. Light exploded behind his eyelids, and his magic shattered out of his grasp.
Agony coursed through his veins. He couldn’t see or hear. Couldn’t breathe.
Goddess, let the pain end.
No. No, I am not ready to die.
He didn’t know how long it was before his vision cleared. He could still see the canopy of Nora’s bed over him. Her heart beat nearby. And in his chest, his own heart labored on.
He stared at the dagger protruding from his chest. He recognized the gold hilt encrusted with topaz.
He had seen it in his brother’s memories as Rahim’s life had slipped away.
This weapon had sent Rahim retreating to Orthros, unable to heal himself, barely able to step.
By the time he had made it home, it had been too late.
Dav was on borrowed time. If only he had managed to heal Nora’s mind before now. He had been trying all night, struggling to remaster his power. Why had his mind healing chosen the hour of his death to come to her aid?
Dav would not survive this night. But there was still time to make his and Rahim’s deaths mean something. Dav could still save Nora.
She huddled on the foot of the bed, her face hidden by the curtain of her hair. A streak of blood soaked through her sleeve. “The dagger was supposed to protect me from your magic.”
He coaxed some air into his lungs. “It would, if I were a mind mage. But I’m a mind healer.”
As he spoke, he eased his magic deeper. She clutched her head. She didn’t even know she had been harmed. Her tormentor had robbed her of the power to choose healing. Dav would restore her Will to her.
“Nora, look at me.”
She raised her head, her eyes wide. “What are you doing to me?”
“I’ll heal the injury inside your mind that has warped your memories, so you’ll understand what really happened the night your parents died.”
“Why should I believe anything you say?”
Her reality was altering before her eyes.
What evidence could he possibly give her when she didn’t know who to believe?
Through his pain, the words of a greater Hesperine than he came to mind, and he gave Nora the wisdom of Queen Soteira.
“‘Questioning is not a betrayal of the truth. It is the only way to prove your truth to yourself. To be a heretic is to question everything.’”
“I’m not a heretic!”
“Look into your memories and tell me if you are not.”
The scars in her mind twisted Dav’s magic into unnatural shapes. Her anguish became his own. There was too much for him to heal before he died. He could not undo a lifetime of abuse in one night. But he could set her on the path toward healing.
“Does it hurt?” he asked her.
“N-no,” she gasped.
A smile came to his face. “How does it feel to have me this close?”
She wrapped her arms around herself. “Safe.”
He traced farther along the scars. All their pathways led to the crisis in the center of her mind. As he neared her misshapen memories, tears slipped down her cheeks.
He flexed his hand. “Come here, Nora.”
She shook her head.
He touched the deep wound with the first delicate thread of theramancy. She moaned.
“You’re going to be all right,” he reassured her.
His magic came to hand, precise and masterful. In his dying moments, he performed the most challenging healing of his career. As he reordered disjointed pieces of her life into complete experiences, he became lost in her, and nothing else seemed to matter.
He rebuilt her mind’s Sanctuary, a bastion against her other scars. Her memories of that night flared to life again, and they relived them together.
Nora knelt before the shrine of Andragathos. She heard the dagger case open.
“You let him kiss you,” came Sir Virtus’s voice. “Of all your transgressions, this is the most shocking. I thought better of you, especially after the many times I have purified you.”
“He kissed me first.”
“What did you do to tempt him? Did you smile at him? Perhaps you let some of your hair escape your veil?”
“No! It wasn’t my fault.”
“It is always your fault. It amazes me that you can get a kiss out of a man, but not a marriage proposal.”
His footsteps approached. Nora covered her scarred arms with her hands.
His tone of reassurance sent a shiver down her spine. “For the sake of the Order’s reputation, I will silence the gossip. And I will never abandon you, no matter how much you shame yourself. I will keep helping you become your better self.”
Sir Virtus loomed over her, Sancti in his hand. But this time, he held Arceo, too.
All she could do now was take her punishment with grace. He drew Sancti’s edge along one of her scars to reopen it. Hot, bright magic sliced into her. He gave her other arm the same treatment, and blood trickled down to her elbow, burning her skin.
“This will be your deepest purification of all,” he said.
Pain tore through her shoulder, and sunfire burst behind her eyelids. Through the glare, she stared in shock at Sancti embedded in her flesh.
The door of the shrine swung open. Her mother sailed in, all righteous fury. Her father charged forward with his hand on his sword. “What in our god’s name are you doing?”
Sir Virtus and her parents shouted at each other over Nora’s head, their words swimming together in her roaring ears. Then Sir Virtus raised his arm. With a flick of his fingers, he threw the Blade of Protection.
Nora could do nothing but watch it fly and land in her father’s heart. He crumpled, his sword clattering on the floor. Her mother screamed and went down on her knees, throwing herself over his body.
Nora yanked Sancti out of her shoulder and made a wild swing at Sir Virtus. His grip crushed her wrist. He wrested the dagger from her hand and threw again. The Blade of Purification cut through the air and plunged into her mother’s back. Her weeping fell silent.
Nora found her feet and backed away from Sir Virtus. “What have you done?”
His rage drained away, and his face went slack with shock. He came toward her, his hands out. “I can still save you. Come here, and Sancti will erase this terrible memory from your mind. I will be your father now that your parents are gone.”
She raced for the door and fled down the corridor, clutching her injured shoulder.
“No!” His heavy footfalls chased her. “I cannot lose you. I will not fail you.”
She lost him in the fortress’s twisting passageways and found her way out through a postern.
With no thought of where she was headed, she tripped and scrambled through the dark woods.
When she came out into the clearing, she hid behind the boulder to heave air into her burning lungs.
But her head swam, and blood kept dripping onto the ground in front of her. Her vision began to darken.
She came to with her head resting on someone’s lap, his hand pressed to her wound. Gentle magic washed through her, a buffer between her and the pain. She looked up into the kind face of her rescuer.
“I’m Rahim,” he said. “What’s your name?”
“Nora.”
“Don’t be afraid, Nora.” He smiled, and she saw his fangs.
But she wasn’t afraid of the Hesperine. His fangs were far less threatening than the daggers in Sir Virtus’s hands.
“I’m a healer,” Rahim explained. “This wound was dealt by an artifact, so it will take me some time to mend.”
“He’s coming for me! Please…we must escape.”
“Your body can’t withstand magical transport until I heal you.”
“We’ll have to run. He’s a holy knight. He wants me alive—but he’ll kill you.”
“You won’t get far while losing this much blood. I’ll stop the bleeding as quickly as I can and hope my veil spells hold against him.”
As she fought for consciousness, he kept talking to her, his voice so steady and reassuring. He told her of where he could take her for safety, spinning visions of the Hesperine homeland in her mind.
“We can give you Sanctuary,” Rahim promised.
“He’ll keep me with him at any cost. He can find me anywhere in Tenebra.”
“But not in Orthros. We can give you a new life.”
“Why?” she rasped. “My family has killed so many of your kind. Why would you do this for me?”
“None of this is your fault.”
In all her life, no one had ever said that to her before.
She looked down at Rahim’s fingers, covered in her blood. He held her life in his hands. And he was trying to give it back to her, although a Knight of Andragathos could attack at any moment.
“Please,” Nora wept, “give me Sanctuary.”
“That is a sacred request. I will get you to safety behind the Queens’ ward, or die trying.” Suddenly, he cocked his head. “I hear the knight. He’s combing the woods for you. Come on. We can make it to the nearest Hesperine refuge.”
Rahim lifted her in his arms. Now she too could hear Sir Virtus’s heavy boots crashing through the woods.
“Don’t try to hide from me, Nora!” he shouted. “Sancti calls to your wounds. I can sense where you are.”
The ground fell away as Rahim levitated. The clearing swept past at breathtaking speed.
“Nothing can hide from the Blade of Purification.” Sir Virtus called. “It cuts through lies—and Hesperine veil spells.”
Something whistled past them. Rahim jerked against her. The magic buoying them disappeared, and they crashed to the ground, tumbling down the hillside. Nora crawled toward Rahim, spotting the Blade of Purification out of reach in the grass. His arm bled where Sancti had clipped him.
Sir Virtus burst from the trees. Nora threw herself toward Rahim, but her wounded body was too slow. Arceo grazed her cheek and plunged into his heart.
“No!” She closed her fingers around the hilt.
Rahim wrapped his hand around hers. “I must—return to Orthros. For healing from the Queen. No use to you dead. In Hespera’s name, I swear I will come back for you and free you from him.”
“I believe you.”
Together, they pulled the dagger out of his chest. Rahim disappeared before her eyes.
Nora rounded on Sir Virtus, Arceo in her hand. Dodging her attack, he lunged past her and snatched up Sancti. He blocked her next swing with his blade.
She had no hope of besting a knight in single combat. Within moments, he had disarmed her and forced her to the ground. “We’ll make this awful night disappear, my dear. I will take good care of you.”
He drove Sancti into the wound Rahim had tried to heal.
Nora surfaced from her memories with a gasp. She lay against Dav, her face pressed to his chest. Eye to eye with the topaz in Arceo’s hilt.
“No.” She sat up, her hands hovering uselessly over the dagger. “What have I done?”
“Listen to me. You can still escape Virtus. I’ll tell you how to find the tower. Make a libation…ask for Sanctuary…the magic will open to you.”
“I’m not leaving you! Help me understand what you need.” She drew a deep breath, gathering her calm. “If I remove the dagger, you’ll bleed. Which is worse—Arceo’s magic, or the blood loss?”
“Save yourself. That’s enough for me.”
“No. There must be a way to heal you. If you drink pure human blood, will it purge Arceo’s magic from you?”
Dav moved very carefully, covering her hand with his. “That didn’t save Rahim. Not even our Queen’s magic could heal him.”
“Even if all my blood can give you is comfort, I will shed it for you.”
She scrambled off the bed and went to the wall, where she pressed the stone that opened a hidden niche. She rifled through the secrets she kept from Sir Virtus and seized the two vials she had stolen from the shrine chamber.
The white bottle of poison was chained to the gold bottle that held the antidote, in case a knight needed to revive a Hesperine prisoner. Nora uncapped the cure and tossed back its contents. She counted to fourteen, time slipping through her fingers while she waited for the potion to work.
When warmth shot through her body, she raced back to Dav’s side. She tore out of her festival gown and climbed onto the bed. “I’ll remove the dagger now, and then I want you to drink from me.”
“Please, Nora. Go.”
“I will not abandon you,” she swore. “Just like you and Rahim never gave up on me.”
Dav swallowed. “If your blood…is the last thing I taste…then I’ll keep fighting, too.”
“On the count of three. One.” She took hold of the dagger. “Two.” She held her gown ready to staunch the blood. “Three.”
She pulled the blade out, his shout of pain ringing in her ears. Hurling the dagger away, she pressed her gown to the wound. His blood soaked the gold and white fabric.
She pressed her throat to his mouth. “Drink!”
His fangs shot out, and he sank them into her neck with feral force. She pressed her fist to his wound, breathing hard as he tore her blood out of her. He groaned against her skin, and she felt his magic reaching for her mind again.
“Yes,” she said. “I’m here. You’re not alone.”
His power wove into her, hers into him. In that moment, she felt closer to him than she ever had to a living soul. And she was losing him.
His blood soaked through the gown onto her hand. Her tears splashed onto his chest. She would do anything to go back and change even one of her choices.
She held his head, fearing the moment when his bite would weaken and he would slip away.
She would hold on to him for as long as she could.