44. Kiera
T o know yourself well is to know your worst enemy because only you can decide what will make you suffer the most.
And I know. I know it all.
The board we’ve been playing upon has been uneven and murky thus far, but now I see it in crystal clarity. Jagged sharpness has opened my eyes.
The Darkhavens hover around me, ushering me this way and then that. I don’t pay attention to the movements of my body as my mind transcends the physical. Somehow, beyond the reins of my consciousness, I find that I trust them implicitly. With my body, with my soul, and my life. I close my eyes and just breathe for several long seconds. Those seconds turn into minutes, into hours, into eternity, but when I reopen them, I know that only a small amount of time has passed.
Panting. Sweating. My skin feels as if it’s crawling. I’m out of breath. We’re out of time.
Ara? I reach out with my mind, seeking something familiar. Ara, are you there? Answer me.
Nothing comes back. I try again and still … nothing.
When panic seizes my chest, I reach out and latch on to Ophelia’s training, but it all … just … slips … away.
“—iera? Did you hear me?” Hands cup the sides of my face. I don’t recognize where we are, but we’re no longer in the arena, no longer outside. It’s too dark here. Too closed in.
The face before me is familiar. So, too, is the voice those words are spoken with. Sunburnt eyes the color of liquid gold bore into me. “Kiera?” His hands are cool upon my skin. I have to warn him. I have to warn them all. We need to get out of here. We have to leave. The Gods … oh dear fucking Divinity. We’re in so much danger.
The pieces have clicked into place. The missing Mortal Gods. The book with the names crossed out. Caedmon … I understand now why he wouldn’t—couldn’t—tell me the truth. I shut my eyes and wish I could shut out the whole world.
Be careful what you wish for, isn’t that what people say? I pushed and I hunted and now, I know the truth. It’s as if I had a shroud over my head for so long, fighting my way through the world, squinting to recognize faces distorted by fabric. Tears burn at the back of my eyes.
I was a fucking fool. I thought I was so strong simply because I knew how to use a blade. I assumed that because I’d suffered that there wasn’t anything worse. There always is.
“Do you understand what we’re telling you, Dea ?” Theos’ voice is back and I open my eyes, fixing my attention on him for a beat and then glancing over his shoulder to the two shadow-like men hovering behind him.
“What?” The word is a croak and it sounds nothing like me.
Theos’ brow furrows. “We have to get ready,” he tells me. “The Gods are sending us all to Ortus—Ortus Academy.” No. Reaching up, my nails sink into the backs of his hands on my face. “Fuck!” He releases me and when he yanks himself back I see that there are streaks of blood on his skin.
Stumbling back, away from him, I bump into something. It slams into the back of my legs and sends me careening to the floor. Ha. Some assassin I am. Pathetic. I don’t even bother to get up off the floor. I just lie back and let the tears trail from the corners of my eyes to my temples and into my hair. We’re all fucked. Every single one of us. Not just the Darkhavens and me, but the entire race of Mortal Gods.
“What’s wrong with her?” Kalix demands, hard anger in his tone.
Warm hands touch my face and hands, feeling for … what? A physical wound to explain this breakdown? Nothing physical could ever have ripped me apart this badly. The moment we’d walked into that damned arena, I’d felt the pressure of Tryphone’s abilities. At first, it had hovered at the fringes and then it had burrowed, deeper and deeper still, until it had reached the darkest parts of my mind.
His power had wrapped me in chains, in claw-like tendrils that had refused to let go even when I’d fought against their hold. He’d trapped me in my own fucking head, held me in place just so I could feel him penetrate my innermost core. My lips curve, though, as I remember what I’d done next.
Block after block had been thrown in his way. Barriers made of shadows and webs. Walls of brimstone and darkness. Maeryn—oh, how I wondered if she could help me. She’s a healer, after all. Just the thought of her had given me all that I needed though. Healers took what was before them and used it to their advantage. They aren’t fighters, so their best offense is defense. Instead of blocking Tryphone, I’d taken down each boundary, each wall. Then I went after him. The link had been opened and just as he was able to get into me, I was able to get into him.
Sickness churns in my gut at the cold recollection. So many years and pain and despair, but above all was the constant desire, the yearning for dominance. For power. He’d deflected, of course, but not before I’d taken the last clue I needed to find the truth.
Dark midnight eyes appear over me. “Kiera?”
Parting my lips, I stare back into Ruen’s face even as more wetness runs down my temples and I just breathe. I’m not crying because of the ache still lingering in my head. I don’t even know why the tears won’t stop. Flashes of Tryphone’s memories—dark, horrid places full of the putrid stench of death and decay, pale faces with sunken eyes, glistening blood shining off ribcages that had been ripped open and bared. Skeletal frames leached of all life. Young ones shriveled into ancient husks.
“Kiera, what happened in the arena?” Ruen’s calm demeanor helps me to get my racing thoughts under control.
“Tryphone,” I say, voice cracking. “He tried … to get into my mind.” I have to command my body to do things that I would normally do on instinct. Swallow. Salivate. Lick lips. Talk. “I took his … instead.”
Kalix’s grinning features appear just over Ruen’s shoulder. “Next time, kill him, little Thief,” he says.
I shake my head as I feel the coolness of the floor on my cheek. I can’t kill him. Caedmon was wrong. I cannot kill the unkillable, but now … if I don’t … we’re all doomed.
“You took his mind?” Ruen’s face is the focus once more. “What did you find? Do you know where the others went? Are they going to Ortus?”
I close my eyes and swallow back the bile that threatens to storm up my throat from the images of those faces. Malachi and Enid. “They’re dead,” I hear myself say.
“ What? ” Theos. Poor Theos. He recommended Enid for advancement and though he’d never admit it, if he knew … that the Gods only choose the most powerful of their offspring, he’d blame himself. Enid was powerful. So was Malachi. Now … they’re dust and bones.
The swallowing is compulsive now, more and more rioting happening in my stomach even with the cool floor pressing into me. Ruen tries to sit me up and I struggle against him. He doesn’t stop, and finally, I just let him do what he will—lifting my body and carrying me to a lounge. I’m sapped of strength, all of my energy having been taken up by Tryphone’s underhanded attempt at slipping past my defenses.
“The taboo the Gods have broken is … filicide,” I say.
Ruen jerks against me as if his body recoils at the last word. “The Gods are killing their own children?”
An almost hysterical laugh bubbles up out of me. “Killing them? No.” I shake my head. If only they were merely killing their own children. Try as I might, the memories from Tryphone’s mind creep past my defenses. It’s like trying to cover my eyes with my hands to hide his thoughts. Useless. They’re already inside me.
I reach out and find Ruen’s hand with mine. He feels like fire against the ice of my skin, but I clutch on to him anyway. I need the physical touch to ground me, remind me that I’m not in my head anymore and neither is Tryphone. “They’re consuming them.”
The Gods are dying and they’re using the Divinity of their children to replenish their life sources. Draining every last drop of power from the strongest and brightest students of the Academies to keep them young and powerful forever. Disgust is a pitted weight in my soul. In a flash, I recall the night that Ruen helped me to leave the Academy to meet up with Regis—the very night that he’d discovered my secret. The image of the tarp covered wagon ambling out of the gate we’d used to get past the walls and the shriveled branches comes to the forefront of my mind. Staring at Ruen’s hand, so strong beneath mine does the trick.
That branch had looked like a hand … no, it had been a hand with leathery gray skin sucked dry of life and blood and muscle, only left to cling to decaying bones.
“They’re … consuming us?” Shock is a rippling wave through the room as Ruen chokes out his question almost as if he can’t understand my words.
I bite down hard on my lower lip until all I taste is blood. It fills my mouth with its deep rusty flavor. Old metalwork and ash on my tongue.
“There’s more,” I say even though I don’t want to.
“ Fuck, ” Theos breathes.
I force my eyes to leave the tanned knuckles of Ruen’s fist to meet Theos’ horrified gaze. Then Kalix’s. Then … back to Ruen. If only my heart were as cold and distant as I once pretended it was. Then maybe the tragedy of my next words wouldn’t be such a dagger in my chest.
“Caedmon is dead.”