Chapter 25 - Cinders of a Wise Soul
July
The passage before us narrows as we approach the bottom of the tower, engulfed by water, flames, and smoke. Despite being slippery with blood and sweat, I hold onto Galen’s hand as if my life depended on it—which it probably does.
Above us, the mouth of the Wise thunders, its stones chatter, and its head swings like that of a man about to fall under a flurry of shots.
I exhale with relief when the last steps finally come in sight, and I spot the main gate wide open, waiting for us to run to safety.
I speed towards it, expecting to see people running towards us, alerted by the ominous noises and the flames, but my gaze stretches over the empty darkness of the Wise’s external garden.
Galen comes to a halt beside me. “Not that way. We’re going out through the back gate,” he pants, pausing to approach the smaller, almost hidden wooden door on the right side of the tower's base.
“You mean crossing through the training square? If any of those who attacked us are still there or in the building, there will be nowhere for us to hide. We’ll be in the open for a while.”
Galen draws a big breath and closes his eyes.
Something is off, but I guess the violence of the recent events has cracked his tough armour as well as mine.
There are shadows under his eyes when he puts himself between me and the main gate, taking my hands in his.
“Some of us are still fighting on the towers, buying us time.”
Us?
He doesn’t let me overthink it and, having shouldered the door open, jerks his chin, inviting me to follow. I rush outside, where cleaner air makes my lungs sing with joy, but where we also look like desperate ants scrambling for safety.
The wound in my shoulder shoots pain down to my fingertips every time I move my arm as I run behind Galen.
As I fight for my breath, I blurt, “Has this got to do with the Chapter?”
There is no accusation in my voice. No expectation. But we both stop at the same time. Galen’s back is a trembling wall.
He slowly turns, but lowers his eyes to avoid mine. “Will you follow me if I say no?”
Right in front of me, the courtyard gleams as if ablaze. The reflection of the flames, that is, which have now reached the lower levels of the Wise and are dancing behind its windows, showering the round bushes of periwinkles and lilies adorning the perimeter in yellow and orange sparks.
The rain wasn’t that powerful, after all.
I shake my head, searching for Galen’s face, but he keeps his eyes on the ground. He’s panting so heavily that air comes out of his mouth in dense, dark purple puffs.
I sigh. “It is true, then. Not just an uncomfortable feeling in my stomach.”
“How?” he finally looks at me, wincing like the slightest movement is costing him all his strength.
“When I met the Chapter, Popplewish confessed Roden is not new to using the power of your Deleteri on Harvesters. I believe he did something to me. To make me forget the details of our dinner and our car ride. But—I don’t know how; my subconscious retained something.
And this morning, you looked so…Forcefully unaware.
I thought my mind was playing tricks on me… ”
His brows furrow. “I thought you were passed out at that point. I suggested there was no need to wipe your mind clean. That it was too dangerous…” His hand, covered in dirt and scratches, reaches for mine.
His curls, damp with sweat and water, are stuck to his forehead.
He seems older—stronger. Someone I’ve never really known.
I take a step back. “You…You’re one of them,” I deflate. At once, the raging fire seems friendlier than the face before me.
He drops his hand. “Evelyn asked Roden to reset only bits of that night to avoid long-term damage to your memory. We thought we did enough already—”
I clench my jaw to prevent my heart from leaping out of my mouth. Instead, it drops into such a dark place that I fear it is gone forever.
“How thoughtful…Then explain why, at breakfast this morning, you pretended you didn’t know my next destination. I’d already told you where they’re sending me before our dinner.” I struggle to believe that the voice I’m hearing is mine.
I don’t intend to waste more time walking in the dark, putting together scraps of truth. I pretend the whole fucking thing.
I charge towards him and raise my hand, ready to slap him, but my fingers curl into a fist, nails digging into my palm.
“For days, I’ve lived in fear, believing the fucking Chapter had completely messed up your brain as well, but you were probably just confused by all the lies you had piled up to keep me in check. ”
Whatever the reason for the pain on his face, either his wound or my poisonous words, I enjoy it.
Galen puts some distance between us. His boots skid on the muddy path, and he nearly loses balance. Wincing, he hunches to avoid falling on his back, a hand firmly pressed to his side.
I don’t care. He deserves it. “While I was gambling with my life, making deals to keep you safe and away from this shitshow, you were enjoying it from the first row, pretending to be my friend—”
I stare at him; tears and raindrops run down my face while the Wise roars in despair before the atmosphere in the courtyard turns sticky and heavy as if the Blind is holding in a big breath—its very last one.
We exchange a knowing look and duck just before the castle exhales violently, showering us with a mixture of stone fragments and colourful glass shards.
The rain has lost its battle against the fire.
“That wasn’t an act—” Galen struggles to speak.
We’ve both fallen flat on our stomachs, with our hands on our heads for protection.
“What?” I snap, slowly pushing back on my feet. I’m still wearing Galen’s jumper, which is now covered in mud and falling to pieces. A dark stain is also spreading beneath my jeans on my left knee.
Galen slowly peels himself off the floor, his legs shaking under his weight. “I wasn’t lying about Sector 43—I did not remember. That’s why I wanted to see you tonight—” he flinches again, hissing through his teeth.
This time, I can’t ignore the pain on his face, the silver specks in his eye losing their natural light, and I lunge forward to catch him should he fall.
But another ominous sound and the ground shaking under our feet make us freeze.
I look down at the thin cracks forming along the stone floor, one running right between my feet.
“As much as I want to kill you right now, with my own hands, I think we need to set your fucking betrayal aside and run.” I glare at him sideways, but my eyes fall on the red stain on his shirt that spreads quickly, soaking the fabric.
I point a finger at his face, craning my neck to look him in the eyes, “Do not bleed out until we get away from here. I will not allow it. You owe me answers. Lots of them.”
His voice is feeble; I hardly hear it when he says, with a grimace more than a smile, “Fine, lead the way, but I want you to have this.”
He searches for something on his back, and when I hold up a hand, flexing my fingers to hurry him, Galen produces a gun—the same he used to kill the Herionos.
“Don’t wait to see someone else pointing a gun at you. If you feel threatened—use it.”
“Don’t give me ideas you may regret,” I snatch the gun from his hand and lower it at my side. “Thanks,” I add, hating the tone of my voice, which is still used to sound friendly when speaking with him.
The rain has stopped completely, and the smell of burning is nearly unbearable. Tongues of flames erupt from the Wise’s head, the tops of its towers swallowed by columns of dark smoke.
We both look up.
We managed to stop them…
“I’m not waiting for the others,” I snap.
“I understand.”
“And you’re not either.”
Galen sighs and drops his shoulders. “They can take care of themselves.”
I bite my lip; my feet refuse to move. “Was Popplewish there—You know what? I don’t want to know.”
“Sof, what do you want me to do?” Galen sounds exhausted, and the air from his mouth has turned dangerously pale.
I grunt in distress. “Just shut up, and let’s get away from this place before it buries us. I hope you appreciate the fact I still have a speck of morality, unlike you, and I’m not leaving you here to die.”
Conscious of his wound, I grab his hand and pull him towards the small black gate at the back of the castle.
As if to end our discussion, a couple of bricks fall a few inches from us, exploding in a cloud of dark red powder.
For once, I have to slow down to let him keep up. My run changes to a brisk walk, then weakens to a sudden stop. We’ve left the main building behind, its five towers only an intricate mass of black smoke and orange sparks. But we’re still inside the perimeter of the Wise.
A tall enclosure of black metal bars surrounds us, topped by spiky ends in the shape of miniature towers.
The main gate seems so far away, but I keep going because I know that the path running up the hill, beyond that gate, is a longer way to the shore, but it is also isolated and has a few good hiding spots.
I ask, between laboured breaths, “Why the shore?” I don’t know where all my energy is coming from, but it’s liberating to speak freely with Galen once again, even if not for the right reason— even if I want to stop and slap his face hard enough to leave a mark.
But he doesn’t reply and only gives me a look that makes me wonder if I should knock him out and take the opposite direction.
“It is not a trap,” Galen mutters as if reading my mind.
We both pant loudly, studying each other like wolves who used to belong to the same pack. I can’t help but throw quick looks at his wound. It hasn’t spread, but Galen’s face is worryingly pale.
I nod, bracing my hands on my knees. “Right. You’re lucky my only alternative is to go back to that nightmare of flames and smoke. Can you walk or—”
“Don’t worry about me.”
“Oh, I’m not. I don’t want you to slow me down,” I sound so bitter, I surprise myself.
But Galen looks at me through his dark lashes with a smirk.
I keep my expression flat but hurry to loop an arm around his, trying my best to hold him up as I start again for the gate, and to ignore the pain in my shoulder.
“I can see the path of trees that run down the hill towards the shore. We’re nearly there.” A pep talk for us both.
The gate swings slightly with the wind. The sea will soon appear beyond it like a dark purple line to the horizon. I can almost hear its voice—
“Stop.” Galen’s hand lands on my wounded shoulder like a claw as he unexpectedly steps in front of me and grabs my wrists.
“What the f—”
He pulls me into his arms, pushing my head against his chest, and turns us around so his back is to the castle.
The imaginary voice of the sea turns into a whistle, growing closer by the second, until I spot a massive boulder flying towards us.
I shut my eyes and bury my face against Galen moments before the stone lands inches from us and disintegrates as soon as it hits the ground.
For a moment, everything stops except for the ringing in my ears and Galen’s laboured breath.
He presses his cheek against my head. “You’re okay,” he whispers. “You’re safe…”
I push away and flinch at the state of his face. Scratches and grazes on his cheeks are barely visible under the layer of soil and dirt. Blood drips down from a cut on his forehead.
“What the hell happened on that tower?” I ask, tasting chalk on my lips.
This can’t be a trap if he’s just risked being flattened by a boulder to save me.
As if reading the doubt in my eyes, and perhaps the feeble hope that maybe he isn’t lying and this whole freaking situation caught him by surprise as much as me, he takes my face in his hands and kisses my forehead, as I mumble, “You owe me—if we make it, you owe me big time.”
His attempt at a smile puts a painful mask on his battered face.
I try to keep a straight face, “If we make it out alive, we are leaving this fucking place together,” I offer him my hand. “Then I’ll probably kill you.”
There are no night birds in Libera. When the sun disappears behind the sea, gulls retreat inside caves by the shore, and little birds hide amongst the fat branches. Nights in Libera are utterly quiet and silent.
The day I met the Chapter, Roden spoke as if his words had no implication, “You bring me the rebel’s soul, and you will be free to go as far as you want from the island. Anywhere, with whomever you want.”
“And Galen won’t remember?” That was my only clause in our agreement. I wanted him to forget everything about me, had he chosen to stay in Libera. Forget about my name and face—that I ever existed.
“Should he wish, Galen will be given a whole new life and purpose.”
“How can I be sure?”
“Because I’ll be watching over him as my personal responsibility,” Popplewish had stepped in.
That day, I felt darkness; not because the birds had gone to sleep but because I had traded the life of a stranger for Galen’s future.