Chapter 40
Felix had never used a gun before, so it wasn’t surprising that the bullet missed terribly. He tossed the rifle aside as August disappeared around a building.
For a moment, curiosity held him still, his mind working to make sense of what he’d seen. The cut on August’s hand had been jagged and ugly, deep enough to need sutures. And yet, somewhere between one side of the Hollow Dark and the other, the cut had not only sealed; it had vanished entirely.
August wasn’t a healer. And even if he was, to heal a cut like that, it should’ve taken time and focus. Even Marlow, who had been teaching herself anatomy and medicine for years, would’ve needed a minute to manage what he’d done.
“Should we go after him?” Marlow asked.
Felix dragged his focus back to the matter at hand. The aeslings were meeting in the market square. August wouldn’t leave without his sister.
“I know where he’s going. We’ll meet him there.”
It didn’t matter how August had healed his hand. All that mattered was that August had just kicked out the columns of the life Felix had worked so hard to build, and now everything was cracking and crumbling around him. A knife in the back would’ve been a kinder betrayal.
City Watch officers had learned Felix’s secret, and two had lived to call for his arrest. His execution.
Life as he knew it was over. There was no way forward from here.
After Elise’s death and the loss of his leg, it had taken years of anger and picking fights for Felix to understand that none of it would make a difference.
He’d changed tactics then. Though he detested having to appease those responsible for every one of his problems, he adapted and endured.
It was a necessary step. A means to an end.
He drew in the night air, thick with smoke, and closed his eyes. The memories he had forced down all broke loose.
A lavish home. The cold wall pressed into his back. The old woman’s husband’s breath at his ear, voice low and lethal, reminding Felix he was not family, vowing to end him if he ever returned.
A plush bedroom with sweeping curtains. The noble boy’s cruel smile as Felix assured himself it wouldn’t be as bad as last time. But it always was.
A crowded hall. His cheeks burning as the girl who’d played a friend in private turned on him in public, spitting insults for all to hear.
Felix could feel the burning sting of every artificial smile, the brutal weight of each begrudging bow, and the bitter aftertaste of every strained compliment.
He’d worked so damned hard, and now none of it mattered.
If there’s not a path, make one. His da’s words, recounted through his ma’s many stories. If there’s a wall in your way, tear it down.
There were walls everywhere now. August had ruined everything. It was almost funny, though. As angry as Felix was, he wasn’t surprised. In fact, it was a relief.
For a while there, his worldview had been completely upended. A member of the ruling class who deserved his trust? It went against everything he’d previously believed.
But August had just set the world back in place. He wasn’t a good person. Only a good actor. That made what came next significantly easier. No blurred lines, no sentimental complications.
It was time to change tactics again. To adapt to the hand he’d been dealt.
The country must rid itself of its corruption, from the crown and the nobility to the criminals paid to do their dirty work.
He would make them all pay, and he would not be merciful.
“We’ll deal with the aesling,” he told Marlow as he opened his eyes. “Then we’re going to burn the noble houses to the ground. But we need numbers.”
Destabilize the power.
Nobility. Ministry. City Watch.
If there’s a wall in your way, tear it down.
Then, finally, the aesran.
Felix crouched to search the other bodies. The rifles were too heavy, too difficult to use. So, he plucked two flintlock pistols and a dagger from their belts.
“Here now, take this.” He handed Marlow a pistol.
“I don’t want a gun, Felix.”
A twist of apprehension in his gut. “You’re not coming with me?” He couldn’t do this without her. He needed her.
“Don’t be puttin’ words in my mouth,” she said dryly. “Just don’t want a damned gun.” Her rings glowed red, and she gave him a sharp smile.
The corner of his mouth lifted. He could always count on Marlow.
The night market was in full swing, the city unaware of the change that was coming. Felix tucked the pistols away, then stepped up onto the edge of the fountain. His gaze slid slowly over the small groups of City Watch scattered across the market square, and he hesitated.
If there’s a wall in your way, tear it down.
Felix had never met his father, but he’d heard the stories. A lieutenant who’d fought in the war against Vastrad, his team had turned the tide when the war was all but lost. Atheran was still Atheran because of him.
What would he think if he saw it now—saw how it treated his only son? Felix was certain he’d be standing right here with him. He’d understand what needed to be done. His father had died to protect his home, and Felix would fight to fix it.
He could be fearless, too. But he sure as hell wasn’t dying tonight. He had no interest in being a martyr.
“Wielders!” he shouted. “Atheran’s in dire need of change!
” A few heads turned his way, but the restless murmur of the crowd persisted.
He flexed his fingers, drew a steady breath, then conjured a dark cloud.
It roiled above them, swirling like an impending storm.
Using his magic in public felt like breaking free from invisible chains. He stood taller, chin held high.
Faces turned to him now, the crowd quieting. When he spoke again, his voice was steady.
“In nature, it’s the strongest who endure and survive while the weak and the cowardly get left behind. That’s the law, etched in the bones of history. But the aesran? She’s out to rewrite it. Stealing our power and handing it to those who’ve no right to it.”
The accusation was a lure, drawing them in. They were truly listening now. He spoke with growing conviction as the City Watch closed in, his voice carrying loudly through the square.
“There’s an elixir used by the nobility, funded by the crown and pushed by the ministry.
Wielders are being dragged from the streets, murdered, just to make the stuff.
They punish us for our magic, but now they think they can take it for themselves!
Our power’s not theirs to take. We are not prey to be butchered for their gain.
Our lives, our choices—they belong to us, not to tyrants! ”
A ripple ran through the crowd, voices rising, shouts breaking loose. The prim faces of the aristocrats shifted quickly to fear.
Felix called out above the noise. “Why should we live on our knees? They don’t hold the power. We do! And I’ll be damned if I’m bowing to those who are beneath me!”
His eyes lit gold, a display of what he was, what he could do, and the dark cloud vanished as his focus shifted.
“It’s time to set things right. To rip down the opulent, the dishonorable, the corrupt. To remind them why they fear us!”
Chaos broke out in one fell swoop. Stalls ignited with pink flames, and the handful of Watch were swiftly overwhelmed. Felix stepped down from the fountain, steadied by Marlow’s hand.
Now, to find the aesling.
Screams erupted from all around as he made his way across the square. A body lay sprawled on the ground, limbs spread unnaturally. He stepped over the corpse, eyes scanning.
Where are you?
A man ran past, dressed in a fine tailcoat and carrying a dueling cane. He stumbled and fell, his cane flying from his grip as he landed on his hands and knees.
Felix’s gaze followed the object as it skittered across the cobblestones. When it came to a stop, he looked back at the man. He wasn’t familiar, not a face from Felix’s past, but he may as well have been.
It was easy to spot the nobility among the laborers, merchants, and beggars who made up most of Fallowmoor’s population. They stood out, not only in their clothing choices and their cleanliness, but in their spinelessness.
The man looked back at the chaos, eyes like saucers, then scrambled forward, seeking shelter behind a stall. He hadn’t noticed Felix. Didn’t see him aim his gun.
Felix pulled the trigger, and the sound blended with the rest of the clamour. This time, he didn’t miss.
August’s words rang in his head. You did this. But he was wrong. They did this. All of them. Decades of hatred. Decades of oppression. There was a time when wielders were respected. Atheran would get there again.
If there’s not a path, make one.
He would. Even if it was paved with corpses.
Gunshots cracked across the square, and Felix spun to see a City Watch squad firing into the crowd.
A group of wielders surged in from behind, most of them familiar faces from the pub. Moving with startling precision, they tore through the squad in seconds.
Felix stared. Had they been training? He’d always taken them for drunks, not fighters.
He spotted the black curls then, led by a Watch officer around the edge of the square.
Coward.
Felix holstered the spent gun, then rounded a group of stalls to cut him off.
The surprise on August’s face was magnificent.
As Felix gave the command for the officer to shoot himself, he grabbed the aesling by the throat and had him pinned against the wall before the shot rang out. The officer fell, and he conjured the cloud again, wrapping it around them, shielding them from view within its heavy darkness.
He wanted to take his time. Wanted to make this hurt.
“A lifetime of hiding my magic,” he said, the steadiness in his voice a stark contrast to the fire burning through him.
“A lifetime of pretending. I loathed it, y’know.
But I knew it would all be worth it someday.
There was hope for something better. I was going to be a legend, my name stitched into the history of a better Atheran. And then I met you.”
His grip tightened as August struggled, fingers digging into Felix’s arm.
“You destroyed everything and guaranteed my execution with a single sentence.”
“I can . . . ” The words barely made it out as August gasped for air.
Felix loosened his grip to let him speak.
“I can get you a pardon. But you have to let me go.”
Felix leaned in, his eyes narrowing as they locked on August’s. “My existence isn’t a crime, despite what they think. I don’t need their permission, or yours. And I don’t need a pardon.” His lip curled in scorn. “Because I have done nothing wrong!”
Searing white-hot pain lanced through his thigh.
Felix released August as he jerked back. The cloud dispersed, and the chaos of the market square snapped back into view around them.
He glanced down at Lottie’s dagger buried in the side of his good leg.
That August had actually used it was unexpected. Admirable, even. But his failure to bury it somewhere fatal was a mistake the aesling would quickly regret.
With a grunt, Felix yanked the blade free and let it clatter to the ground.
“This isn’t the way to fix things,” August said, pleading, still flat against the wall. “You think killing these people will make it better? Make you a hero? It won’t. You’re only making them more afraid of your kind.”
Your kind.
Felix scoffed. “They’re right to be afraid.” He drew his second gun as he took a step back. “And I don’t need to be a hero to be a legend.”
August’s gaze flicked over Felix’s shoulder—an unintentional warning, and Felix whirled just in time, narrowly dodging the sweeping arc of the dueling cane.
Lottie was already winding up for another try when a violent gust of wind sent her forward, slamming her against the wall.
Her head hit the unforgiving stone with a sickening crack.
She crumpled, unmoving.
“Lottie!” August fell to his knees beside her.
Felix’s eyes widened, and a sour taste crept into his mouth as he stared at the windwielder. Sean was a regular at the pub and one of Marlow’s friends from Hatha House.
He just saved Felix’s life.
The boy gave him a small nod and a sharp grin, then turned and headed back into the fray.
Felix looked down at the growing puddle of blood beneath the youngest aesling. Guilt climbed his throat, and for a second, he was sure he’d be sick.
No, she was one of them. She attacked him.
He forced his gaze away.
A wall of City Watch stormed into the market square, clad in sleek black instead of the usual grey.
Not City Watch, he realized. Ministry. It made sense they’d be sent in. He should have expected it. But even with their training in subduing wielders, the ministry didn’t stand a chance. They were outnumbered and vastly out-powered.
A large man barreled toward the line, and an officer sent a blade out with a flick of his hand. He didn’t even aim. It wouldn’t hit.
But the blade redirected its course at the last moment, curving to bury itself in the man’s temple. He tripped over his own feet and fell lifeless to the ground.
Impossible.
Another officer put his hands together, and as he drew them apart, pink fire appeared between them. He launched the fireball into the crowd.
Screams and the smell of charred flesh.
A third pressed out with his hands and blasted a group off their feet with a powerful gust.
Felix’s stomach sank. It was magic. They were using the elixir. This was why the aesran wanted it. To fight magic with magic. And it was working.
People scattered as the ministry attempted to quell the riot, taking out wielders and nonwielders all at once.
“Felix!” Marlow called. He couldn’t see her, but she was close.
He gritted his teeth and turned back to August, his grip tightening on his pistol.
He wasn’t done.