Chapter Fourteen Cat
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Cat
Elician and Cat speak of nightmares and daydreams. Of promises given and forgotten.
And at last – of what it had been like in the cold, broken room Elician had stayed in during his time at Alerae.
Of that bed that made his back ache, his bones burn.
Of how Eline de Carsay had come with her knife and her tests and prisoners he never knew, and every word from her mouth had been some derivative of fascinating.
Then they speak of kinder things, softer things, until sleep latches on to Elician once more and he dips off, still slurring words in an attempt to say more.
In the morning, Cat slips from Elician’s side.
He presses his lips to his husband’s brow, a Soleben gesture that he has so often received but has never before had the opportunity to try for himself.
He steals it without Elician knowing, pausing only to ensure his husband continues to sleep soundly before leaving in search of food.
Fen is already loitering by the inn’s bar, hopped up on a stool with her head in her hands.
She has a stack of paper next to her and she’s reading through lines of neatly packed words squeezed in tight to make the most of the space on the page.
‘Fen?’ he calls. She jumps, startled. Whirls towards him. They’re the only ones awake, save the guards watching the floor upstairs.
‘Cat…What are you doing down here? Is Elician all right?’
‘He’s…fine,’ Cat replies. ‘We talked for a long while. He’ll be up later today. What’s all this?’
One of her hands goes to cover what she was writing, but then she seems to think better of it and sighs.
She nudges it towards him as he sits at her side.
‘Something Adalei said after that parliament meeting. That I should be doing something that matters. I’ve been writing letters, sending out pamphlets. ’
Her script is far neater than his, and small though it is, he’s got better at reading the Soleben alphabet.
Fen’s pamphlets are effusive. They celebrate all the lives saved, the respectful management of the city and good work Cat apparently did in calming external tensions.
He doesn’t remember being quite as eloquent as she describes, but it is altogether very congratulatory. ‘You’re singing our praises highly.’
‘People are spreading rumours,’ she starts, already on the defensive.
‘And you’re spreading your own.’
‘It’s not a rumour if it’s true.’ There’s something in her tone, sharp and bitter. But as he slides her papers back to him, he tries to settle the spikes and barbs of her emotions.
‘They’re kind words,’ he says. ‘Thank you for doing it.’
‘It isn’t much. I couldn’t do much of anything. Just writing some things down. It probably won’t make any difference at all.’
‘It’s still kind,’ he offers, but she doesn’t take the praise for what it is. ‘Are you all right?’
‘Fine.’
‘Please don’t lie to me.’ She shakes her head, crosses her arms. He spent the night managing one crisis with Elician; he doesn’t know how much energy he has to confront another. But he will find the strength. One way or another. ‘Fen…tell me.’
‘Anything I tell you is going to sound mean.’ The excuse is as weak as her insistence she is all right.
Cat asks, ‘Since when have you ever cared about that?’ with less patience than she deserves.
Her face flushes in anger and he winces. That was very poorly said. ‘Is that really what you think of me?’ Fen asks.
‘I think you often speak your mind without fear of consequence, and as such you tend to be one of the more truthful members of court. It’s why I liked these…’ He motions to her papers. ‘If it really is what you feel. It’s a gift to be so brazen.’
‘It doesn’t sound like a gift.’
‘Some of us are not used to being so free with our words,’ he excuses. ‘I’m not afraid of what you might say. Tell me.’
Fen opens her mouth to issue another lie, then stops.
She chews her bottom lip. She glances around the empty inn, lowers her voice.
‘Since the battle, all anyone has let me do is sit in my brother’s room.
Look after him. Take care of him. Like that’s all I’m good for.
I started working on these again because there was nothing else to do.
He wasn’t going anywhere or doing anything, and I…
I just wanted to do something. I wanted to make a difference but I haven’t done anything at all. ’
‘I couldn’t have gained control of the army if you hadn’t destroyed those pendants,’ Cat reminds her. She waves it off.
‘A few seconds. I didn’t get to do anything afterwards.’
‘Those few seconds made all the difference, for a lot of people.’
‘You’re not listening to me.’
‘I am, but you’re not giving yourself the credit you do deserve.’
‘I want to help. I want to keep helping. Not do one thing one time and say it’s done. And the one task I did have – watch over Elician – that suddenly stopped mattering the second he woke up. You were the person he wanted to see. Lio too. It’s not me. It’s never going to be me and…’
It’s a hard thing to love someone so much and know deep in your heart…you are not their priority.
Harder still that Cat hadn’t even realized that was the case.
That at some point Elician’s attention had been more focused on him than his own family.
He knew certain things in the abstract: Elician ate with him in their room, or office, rather than with the others.
They spent their days together, their nights.
Lio was there, almost always, as a guard and as a confidant, trading off places when Cat left for other obligations.
But when had Fen ever been given the time?
A few moments in the morning, rushed updates and reports in the halls.
Cat can’t remember when they last spoke of anything aside from work.
‘I’m sorry,’ he tells her. ‘We’ve been busy. ’
‘I know. I’m not a child. I told you it wouldn’t make me sound good. I understand why. I just…I want to be someone people can depend on. I want to be someone you can trust when things go wrong. Not…not always second best.’
‘There is something that only you can do that I do need your help with,’ he says. He has been putting it off, has not known what to say or how to go about it, but if she is willing…he will ask.
Her eyes widen, hopeful and sincere. ‘Really?’
‘Yes. The Reapers—’ Any pleasure at being included in a task fades at the mention of his kind. She scowls, and he presses onwards. ‘I want to ask them if they would like their faces healed, and if so…if you would be willing to remove their scars.’
She shakes her head, tense and uncharitable. ‘If you do that, no one will know what they are.’
‘Yes.’
‘Cat, people should know what they are.’
‘Why?’
‘Because they’re monsters, Cat. They murdered almost forty thousand people!’
‘With the help of the Alelunen army. You cannot tell what the soldiers did by looking at them. Should we brand them too?’
‘They can’t kill anyone just by touching them!’
‘The Reapers at Kreuzfurt don’t have those marks. I don’t. Do you regret healing me?’
She has the wherewithal to catch herself from saying whatever her instinctive response would have been. But she does not manage to hold back a mulish, ‘You’re different. You’re not like them.’
‘Yes,’ he refutes. ‘I am. I am Alelunen. I am a Reaper. I lived in dark and silence. And I came to your country to serve as an agent of Death. I would have killed everyone you loved, and had your brother been anyone else, I would have succeeded. And I would not have regretted it. Not as your country fell to chaos or despair, not as your people panicked and our armies advanced. My mother would still be alive if I had done that. Altas never would have been slaughtered in the first place. But none of that happened because I was given a reason and a chance to do otherwise, because circumstances were what they were, and eventually you gave me the chance to be more than that mark on my face. So, I am asking you to give them the chance to do the same.’
She healed his face. Erased his scar. Wiped away the violent and brutal reminder that he had murdered his father, and that all he had been good for was death.
How can anyone expect more from someone when one of the worst days of their lives is burned onto their face for all the world to see?
When merely existing in public is an act worthy of condemnation, terror and imprisonment?
‘You want to do something that matters to someone? This will matter to them. And it will matter to me. So…please help me,’ he begs. ‘Please help them.’
She does not want to say yes. He knows that. He can feel her fury and disdain in her very life force, can feel it shudder and writhe across his senses. Adrenaline, noradrenaline and cortisol race through her blood, all signs Elena Morsen had taught him to look for. All signs of agitation.
But in the end, grudgingly, she says yes.
It may not make her feel any better, but doing the right thing doesn’t need to feel good at all.
The school building where the prisoners are kept is only a few blocks away. It does not take long to reach it. Elician is still asleep. If they hurry, perhaps they can be done with it all and return before he wakes.
There are many guards watching over the area, but Cat and Fen are let through after only a few moments to confirm who they are.
They need no escort. Cat leads Fen down a long corridor that runs parallel to the main city street.
It takes up almost a full block with three floors above and a basement layer below.
There is a yard in the back of the school complex where children used to gather for physical exercises and games.
Most of the hedges have been burned away and their toys have been reduced to ash.