The Epilogue
Cosmer
Cosmer is locked in the infirmary.
The medic – her name is Meena – is helping him. She’s overly helpful. Exasperating with her helpfulness. But he’s trying his best to be kind to her. It’s what Ara wanted, after all.
And actually, Meena can be rather endearing. She reminds him of Riss.
Riss, who’s gone. Early this morning, when the withdrawal symptoms were starting to kick in and his temperature was rising, and he was wheezing, as if he could no longer breathe without the gas, he’d even seen her.
She was standing over him. There was no accusation or judgement in her eyes. Only friendship.
It’s a crime to live in a world without her.
Or Ara.
But here he is.
Here. He. Is.
The ship has landed in Rhavna. He knows that. He’s not allowed to leave this room, though.
He’d rather not see this enemy country anyway. The quicker he can get out of here, the better.
But he needs to get clean. The magic on him won’t end until he is. And it’s what he wants, most of all. Ara’s words had moved him, even without the magic. He will chase sobriety the way some people chase dreams.
The withdrawal symptoms are not easy. He goes from sweating to freezing. His breaths are shallow. He’s bone-deep miserable. He knows the two things that would help him immediately, if he could only breathe them. They would remove it all.
But neither are his to have anymore.
The knock at the door he’s been waiting for comes at noon.
Meena lets Drake in. He’s pristine, dressed every bit the Rhavnan prince he is. Before, Cosmer would have been strongly considering garrotting him with that ridiculous silk scarf knotted at his neck.
Now, the thought almost doesn’t even cross his mind.
Almost.
Cosmer sits up in the bed.
“Well?” he asks, brusquely.
“She is happy,” Drake states. “Her brother is alive, and has been here, in Rhavna, all week.”
“Eric’s alive?” Cosmer grins crookedly. “That’s amazing.” He tilts his head, smile fading. “There’s a ‘but’ coming, isn’t there?”
Drake looks at him, hard. “She is wearing a ribbon in her hair,” he starts, in a remorseful tone. “A ribbon she only began wearing when—”
Cosmer’s face drains of any remaining colour. His mouth parts.
But, slowly, he shakes his head.
“Could just be coincidence.”
Drake flinches. “She is picking you flowers as we speak.”
Cosmer blinks, twice. “Picking me flowers?”
“She knows you are here. She knows you are unwell. She is picking you flowers.”
Fingers faintly trembling, Cosmer rakes a hand through his hair.
“That doesn’t mean anything,” he says, after a beat.
“She’s being kind.” He nods then, firmly, colour returning to his cheeks and freckles.
“We know she has feelings for you – in some way or another. You can make her happy. Give her the life she deserves. Save your country, or the world, or whatever.” He leans back against the wall.
“What’s the matter? You look more sick than I do right now. ”
“You knew exactly how she would react when you broke things off.”
“Of course.”
“You suspected what she might ask of me.” He signifies the bed with a wave of his hand. “What she might do to you.”
“Of course,” Cosmer says again, softer. “I know her. I love her.”
He squints, fighting off the threat of tears. He can’t keep crying over what is lost.
“You even knew she would reject the proposal—”
Cosmer snorts. “Obviously.”
Drake’s chin angles. “You were unnecessarily unkind to her.”
The accusation isn’t overt, but it’s there. Why did you hurt her?
“I would be,” Cosmer retorts. “If I was that angry at her. She had to believe it.”
Drake edges back a step. “Did you mean all of the things you said?”
Cosmer shrugs. “I don’t really like yes or no questions, on principle. So, I hope you won’t mind me not answering that.”
Silence.
Really, the break-up – the final sacrifice, he liked to think of it – had worked out as he’d hoped. Apart from becoming unconscious in the Chamber. He hadn’t intended to inhale that much.
But it really had broken something in him, hearing Drake’s name out of her mouth just as she was falling asleep – and was why he’d had no choice but to wake up Drake and talk it all through with him.
And after he’d heard what Drake had to say, about prophecies and domes breaking and magic and Ara’s own happiness, Cosmer’s choice was made. What Ara did with it was hers.
Drake strides over to the bed, pulling at the key on the cord that had been tucked under his shirt. He takes it off his neck and hands it over.
“Pod 57. When the time is right.”
“Rike’s ship?”
“The only one left. He won’t be needing it now.”
“Thank you.”
Cosmer places the key around his own neck. Fidgets with it distractedly.
“Where will you go?” Drake asks, voice level.
“To bury my mother. And then to Belemy, to return Riss’ belongings to her family, and tell them of her death.
After that, I don’t know. I’d like to see Lartos – the Home of Tech, after all.
But the world just goes on, and on, doesn’t it?
” Cosmer shrugs again. “Maybe I’ll go everywhere. Leave me plenty of osimidite.”
He doesn’t mind, really, wherever he ends up.
He’s already seen the most beautiful – so beautiful as to be heart-breaking – of sights. He’d seen it at fourteen, in his own house, while washing a pot in drawn-up water, looking out of the slatted hole in the wall that was his kitchen window.
The prettiest girl he’d ever seen, in a neat white dress with a black ribbon in her hair, was helping an elderly woman and a younger boy into the house next door to his. It had belonged to his State Craftsman but had been empty for as long as he’d known it.
She was deeply tanned, like the sun had spent its life choosing her. Her back and shoulders were perfectly straight, and her footsteps seemed perfectly timed. Her black hair was glinting in the afternoon light.
Maybe sensing someone was looking at her, she turned around.
Seeing her face was like witnessing magic. Her eyes were the bluest of blue.
The metal pot fell right out of Cosmer’s hands – hit the basin of water on the stand with a splash, like a wrecked ship.
Even now, he knew he would never see a sight like that again.
And he wouldn’t change that.
Not for the sky.