Chapter 40 Csilla
Csilla
The pressure of Erzsébet on her chest only exacerbated the ache in Csilla’s back as she lay in the cramped room.
She’d heard the whispers of those who’d come in to check on her, ones who prayed and ones who cursed, none of whom had dared touch her while she squeezed her eyes and pretended her heart was light enough to rest. The feel of Mihály’s soul on her palm lingered like smears of altar oil, staining and sacred.
One thing had been clear in all the voices. The Incarnate had sentenced her to death. That’s what this banishment was.
The low angle of the sun told her she’d been out for hours, lying in hot-skinned wait. Strength was coming back to her limbs, her parched throat cracking. Soon it would be dark enough to move. She had to, whether or not she was ready.
She shifted the cat and sat up enough to look out across the cathedral’s steep slanted roofs, wondering what parts of the wood were still good, what could have been damaged.
How she could get out without plunging through and ending up a broken body speared on a blessed statue.
She wished she could call it a mercy that they put her here where she could look over her dear city, not in the bowels, but it was only because there were fewer ways to escape with a guarded door and a sure fall outside.
A sharp knock rattled the door, and Erzsébet stopped her kneading to raise her head.
Ilan entered, face grave. He wore white and gold, and there was a line of gold across his brow.
The signs of a saint.
It might have been her imagination, but she would have sworn his cheeks coloured as he caught her noticing.
Of course he would be the one to carry out the sentence.
She’d claimed to speak for Asten, taken power that wasn’t hers.
The best she could have hoped for would have been to have her tongue cut out and another whipping, but now no one was inclined to mercy.
She’d saved the Church, and he was the Church.
It was too much to hope he’d choose her. She didn’t have the right to want it.
If I was right to act, tell me. Better yet, tell them.
The silence ate at her bones.
Ilan turned the lock, then sat on the end of the bed. Csilla winced as Erzsébet stood to greet him, each paw a dig into her bruised flesh as she walked down Csilla’s body to sniff his hand and say her hellos. As if this were a social visit.
Oh, for the innocent self-assurance of a cat.
‘How are you feeling?’
She shrugged, trying uselessly to smooth her tangled hair. ‘As well as anyone sentenced to die.’
She’d never been so aware of the fragility of flesh and bone, the thinness that separated every soul from the ether. She didn’t know how it was to be done; a blade, a noose, being dragged to the end of the world and boiling in the dark, but she knew the order had been given.
Mihály had looked peaceful at the end, even with his life draining out. She would take comfort in that. Now she knew death wasn’t the worst thing in the world.
‘Do you think I’m going to let that happen?’
A small smile ghosted her face, bringing with it an ache as newly healed skin stretched. He thought he had a plan. Maybe he did.
‘What kind of servant would I be if I let the Incarnate die?’
The worship in his voice made her shiver even as she wanted to laugh. The Incarnate sat on a throne of marble and passed judgements sung to him from above, didn’t lie on sweat and blood-stained sheets, waiting to run in the dark.
But she’d saved the city, in a stumbling, terrified way. She’d taken two lives, given one back, and saved the faith of thousands.
A timid calm lapped through her, gentle waves on a softly worn shore.
On the day she’d willingly gone to bleed for the Church, the Prelate said that Asten didn’t ask how she wanted to serve, but how she would serve. She closed her eyes so tightly tears squeezed out, clinging to the fading echoes of holy strength.
I don’t understand what You want me to do.
The answer didn’t come from the ether but from herself. It was the same calling she’d always felt, a fierce love threatening to pull her apart. Perhaps she’d never hear Them in the way that she wanted.
Perhaps it didn’t matter. She’d done good work before, and she would continue, even if she had to do it alone.
‘Csilla?’
Ilan’s urgency drew her back to her present misery. She may have found a calling, but it was as an enemy of the Church.
‘You offered to help me leave once.’ She pressed her hands together. He reached out and covered her clasped hands with his own, warm and sure. Her breath deepened with the steady anchor.
‘I never rescinded it.’
She nodded, spreading her hands slightly to let their fingers lace together, her throat full of acceptance and gratitude and other things she couldn’t voice.
The relief on his face hurt all the more knowing he wasn’t going to like what was coming.
Saika would be wild and beautiful, and safe for a time.
But if word got out that she was there, the false Incarnate would see it burned and call the blaze redemption.
She could rest there, plan and pray, but not stay.
And she couldn’t tell him that.
‘Are you ready?’ His voice cracked like he wasn’t.
This wasn’t a thing one could be ready for.
If she had time, there was still so much she would do.
Ask, one last time, if anyone knew anything about her family or who she was.
Who it was who had known she needed to be hidden.
Pray over ágnes’s ashes, sit longer with Mihály while all his beauty turned grey and cold deep below them. Someone should.
For a moment, her ears echoed with the Izir’s laughter, warming and drowning her at once, and she pressed her hand to her heart. For all the bitter things he’d taught her, there would always be a small crack there that was his.
Csilla bent down and rubbed Erzsébet’s head, and the cat stretched into the touch with an appreciative purr. Maybe Ilan would let her share his pillow while he was there.
‘I hope you’ve gotten better at mousing,’ she told her sternly, and the rough tongue lapping the ends of her fingers in answer brought a smile to her sore face.
It was as much of a goodbye as she was going to get from the only one in the Church who would care. She offered Ilan her wrists.
?
They rode for a week, Csilla on Vihar, who seemed more put out at the work by the mile and relied on stolen nibbles of greenery to brighten his mood, and Ilan on the spitfire mare the Church had conscripted for Csilla to ride, likely hoping she’d break her neck on the trip and save everyone trouble.
Csilla wore the hood of someone condemned, and in every settlement they passed through, people bowed to Ilan and offered him the best of their larder, and they hissed at her.
I saved you, but I understand, she thought, keeping her eyes on Vihar beneath her. Whatever rumours had escaped the city had painted the prisoner being escorted as the problem. They no doubt thought cursing her was an act of grace.
They were far enough north that the trees were thick with dark green needles and morning exhalations were frosted.
Ilan paused at a crossroad and dismounted.
He untied Vihar from where Csilla was being ponied, and helped her down, her leather boots landing gently on the ground, though after unpractised days in the saddle, her balance was coltish.
‘Here?’
He’d told her he was leading her away, but the names of where they were passing were meaningless to her.
Ilan nodded as she shivered.
‘My mother will be here soon, by Asten’s grace.
If she got the messages.’ His face was regal in the filtered forest light, his pale hair and white cloak a beacon itself, and the air was suddenly no longer so cold.
‘I haven’t told her much, so you should probably just agree with whatever she . . . assumes.’
He didn’t meet her eyes, and she sighed. Sending a disgraced lover away was at least a heard-of occurrence, and a little embarrassment was worth the convenient excuse.
They didn’t have long to wait. A carriage pulled up beside them, dark-panelled wood with silver inlay, a wolf’s head topping each corner and decorating the breastplates of the pair of horses, each midnight-coloured and Vihar’s twin.
Even after all she’d felt, Csilla had too much of a pauper in her not to stare.
This was the kind of life Ilan had left for sanctity and blood.
Olga emerged, her red travelling cloak embroidered with amber-eyed hares and pale green winter sage; it was the colour of Mercy celebration, though Csilla knew she was the only one thinking of ágnes.
‘Hello, my dears,’ she greeted. Csilla tried to bow, but a fresh bloom of pain in her thighs forced her to sag on Ilan.
Olga rushed forward, an extra pair of hands to steady her. Her blue eyes were kinder than her son’s, but she held herself with the same unquestioned confidence.
‘Is she sick?’ Olga’s voice was equal parts reproach and concern as she pulled Csilla to her. With a spare hand she reached for the clasp of her cloak.
‘I’m just tired,’ Csilla explained, flushing. ‘I’m not used to riding.’ A muscle in her hip spasmed in agreement.
‘She’s well enough to travel.’ Ilan’s hand was warm on her lower back, not quite around her waist. ‘We’ll get some food and more water in her.’
‘We?’ A hope as sharp as any knife sunk into her as she realised he hadn’t intended to send her away alone. Ilan gave a small nod. ‘I’ll be riding beside.’
But she had to smother that, sheathe the blade and be brave.
‘No.’ She turned and ushered him back towards the trees, to privacy and violet shadows seemingly designed to soften terrible news. ‘You need to stay. Find out what you can about the man who sits on that throne. That’s one thing I can’t do.’
He parted his lips to speak, and she shook her head.
‘You’re a saint now. He’ll take you with him when he travels.’
‘But what about you?’ He wasn’t even trying to disguise the raw fear in his voice. ‘My parents can’t know who you are. And the Incarnate will take me to war.’
He was right to be afraid. There were many ways to die between here and Saika, and thousands more across to the border. And even if they were both alive, they’d have the whole of the country between them.
But that didn’t matter now.
‘It’s alright.’ She shook her head and breathed deep, a precious and hollow memory of all creation nestled deep within her ribs. ‘I’ll find you again.’
‘Will you?’ The wind whistled between them, sharp and calling as the horses stamped with impatience.
‘I promise.’ Csilla reached out and put her palm over his mark. The dazzling flare of it was a lightning storm, every crack and hollow place within her flooding with purpose. She saw everything. She was everything.
And then it was gone, and all she was left with was Ilan’s awe and a growing cold and the ache of leaving something dear. Still, she smiled, savouring the pain. It was only there because of tenderness, another thing to be protected.
‘Have faith in me.’
If you enjoyed this book, please leave a review and order book two!