52. Kye
Kye
Pheolix snatched at Selena’s arm, but she’d already flown beyond his reach. Her dress ripped as he fisted the skirt instead, a handful of silk that he tossed behind him as he ran after her. The time for hesitation collapsed, and the rest of us ran, too.
Pressure squeezed against my body. Invisible weight, like the air had grown dense, or like I lay somewhere miles below the surface of the ocean. A compress that wrapped around me and squeezed so tight I waited for my head to explode.
So tight, I didn’t feel my feet leave the floor. Not until cold stone slammed across my back. My lungs collapsed on impact, my feet dangling somewhere below me, something warm oozing from the base of my skull, the taste of copper sharp on my tongue. I pried my eyes open.
Thaan stood alone below. At least, a blurry man stood below who looked like the taller version of Cain, the quiet little scribe I once believed to be Pheolix’s assistant.
His gaze passed over us as sharp and unbothered as a dairy farmer counting cattle, salt-and-pepper head tilting softly to one side. “Where is she?”
My eyes opened and closed, but I couldn’t bring him fully into focus. The room below sat so still it felt like it was spinning, my stomach along with it.
“Diara,” moaned a voice next to my waist. I turned my head, wet and sticky against the ceiling, to find Hadrian’s face at my hip. Beside him, Diara hung as if her clothes had been spiked to the stone, head flopped forward and eyes closed.
Thaan paced slowly below. He stopped. peering over the ceiling again. “Where, Selena?”
“Not here.”
My head swung to find the voice. It was somewhere just beyond sight, low to the floor.
Nails bit into the palms of my hands. Arms. Legs. Neck. Somewhere across the ceiling came the soft gargle of someone choking.
“Well, then,” Thaan said softly, “let’s go find her.”
The nails loosened, and in the snap of a moment I realized I was about to fall.
Hadrian grabbed Diara’s stays, jerking her to him as he twisted to land first. My hands and knees braced for collision with the stone below, and the world turned upside-down, the ceiling and the floor trading places.
White pain shot through the point of my elbow, dirt and dust coating my tongue in a soft plume.
Hail fell around us like glass. It bounced off my arms as I covered my skull, splitting flesh where it landed.
I sat up after they all fell, welts over the backs of my hands, taking Diara from a panicked Hadrian, turning her over and swiping my fingers through a thick forest of strawberry hair to find her face.
The floor jolted, and she was ripped out of my hands with a languid tug.
Rough stone scraped and bumped down my spine, the ceiling of the hallway reappearing overhead as I was dragged back toward the servant stairs.
My heels dug fruitlessly into the floor, fingernails clawing at anything they might find. Thaan’s steps echoed ahead.
We followed him like we’d been attached to strings. Seven bodies thrashing for footholds, fighting for the ability to stand. One unmoving.
Selena walked behind Thaan, her words sharp and distant. Angry.
Leihani, I called as I slithered over the first stair. Are you there?
Yes.
Are you safe? I felt stupid asking such a thing as the corner of a step raked down my spine.
Yes. Did you make it to the palace?
“Let us walk!” Aren burst out below me. “Let us walk, you sadistic fucking asshole.”
Thaan halted. Turned. Stalked down to Aren over our bodies one step at a time, his two hands joined together at the fingertips. “You want to walk?” the siren asked in barely a whisper.
The invisible strings broke away. Aren pushed to his feet, his arms shaking with pain, a split in the side of his mouth that painted his teeth red.
Kye.
Stay, I started—
“Go ahead,” Thaan breathed. “Walk.”
Glaring at Thaan, one hand locked onto the rail, Aren lifted his boot.
His leg snapped backwards at the knee. Bone crunched as Aren fell into the railing, his face paler than the moon. His other leg bent wrong the next moment, folding sideways. He screamed as he plummeted down the stairs.
At the very bottom, Leal reached to catch him—but the strings jerked us again.
The stairs erupted with shouts loud enough to shatter my eardrums, so layered and distorted with anger I couldn’t make out which voice belonged to who.
“Fucking coward!” I roared along with them, watching Aren crumple at the bottom.
Kye!
Stay where you are, I shoved at her as calmly as I could, rolling to my knees to try and climb upright.
Beside me, Hadrian wrapped his arms around Diara’s head, taking the brunt of the stairs.
I managed to align myself on all fours, scrambling to stand, and the stairs gave out.
Even floor replaced them, cold marble polished to a glassy shine.
Ahead, Thaan doubled in pace, and my feet slid out from under me.
It felt like fighting a current in the river, one that pushed and smashed, ignoring the strokes of my limbs.
With an open hand, Thaan waved at the glass doors ahead.
Instead of swinging open, they shattered.
Shards crunched and grated under my weight, jagged like knives.
Tiny fragments embedded in my hair and flesh.
And then Thaan stopped. We rolled behind him, gathering our limbs and bearings, pushing ourselves to our feet.
Thaan stood facing out over the cliffs, the horizon that hid a distant Leihani.
I reached for Diara again, and relief flooded when Hadrian’s arms unfurled her, eyes open and aware and she held onto him.
Everyone else seemed all right as well. Battered and bleeding, but alert. Even Cebrinne and Ano were with us, the Leihaniian man helping her rise shakily to her feet. I glanced back at the broken doors, where Aren lay underground.
“You will all stay here,” Thaan said without looking at us.
The only one not standing, Pheolix sat over his heels, pinching an open gash along his arm closed. “She isn’t in Leihani.”
Thaan turned. “No?”
The drone shook his head. “She’s in Venusia.”
I bared my teeth at Pheolix—then realized the clouds in his eyes had vanished, icy daggers in their place, staring directly at me, gauging my reaction. He slumped forward as Thaan snapped back out of his thoughts, striking for me across the cold grass.
“Venusia,” Thaan mused, lifting my chin, forcing me to meet his eyes. “Well, you’re more foolish than I thought.”
I spat at him, a globby red spray that peppered his face. His mouth curled in a silent snarl, and he shoved me away.
“These games, Selena,” Thaan said, rocking his head with a faint laugh.
“After thirty-five years, you are learning, aren’t you?
Full of tricks and surprises. A twin, a prince—back from the dead.
A Marequus? I haven’t seen one of those in…
” He trailed off, sweeping back to Selena, who had pulled a limp Pheolix into her lap. “Where are my stones, Selena?”
Jaw clenched, she glared up at him. “You almost sound worried.”
He thrust his fist above his head, and Pheolix followed, hanging in midair.
Selena leapt to her feet. “No!”
“Where are my stones?”
“Let him go.”
His voice dropped, laced with loosely tied rage. “Where are they?”
“Let him go,” she screamed, shoving him hard enough to force him back a step.
“Let him go,” Thaan echoed quietly, a dark playfulness to the words. “Let him go.” He edged toward the cliffside, a quickly sobering Pheolix floating beyond his fingers.
Selena surged after them. I tried to follow, but my feet had locked to the ground, heavy as lead.
“I should let him go,” Thaan said, watching Pheolix squirm in midair like a beetle flipped onto its back. “I think I’ve used everything he has to offer. I always thought you’d swear yourself to me before you let me kill him. But I suppose a cordae is the one thing you truly did long for.”
Rain splattered over my lashes. Sunlight crawled behind clouds. Thunder broke over the sea, waves clashing angrily against the rocks below. Thaan gazed numbly at the climbing water, a knowing smile fanning from the corners of his mouth.
“Put him down,” Selena ground out.
The drone dropped, his hair flying out over his head as gravity yanked. Selena screamed, and he lurched to halt a few inches below.
The tide smashed across the cliff face, spray flecking up over the sides. Night chased the remaining strands of sun away, not a star in sight. The hair at the back of my neck lifted.
“One drone not enough?” Thaan asked. “Perhaps your sister will do instead?”
Cebrinne collapsed over the compact grass, her body spilling head over heels all the way to Thaan. She hissed and spat, landing at Selena’s feet, blood streaming from a cut over her brow, her fingers deep in the mud as she fought to stand.
Thaan watched calmly, canting his head back at Selena. “And if her, then why not all of them?”
He threw Cebrinne and Pheolix amongst the rest of us, and a gust of wind pierced the sky, shredding the dark clouds above.
Diara’s hair whipped over her head. Leather and cloth snapped and thrashed against my back.
Air howled in my ears, leaves and dust and loose blades of grass swallowed into a choking squall.
Hadrian coughed, tucking his head into his arm to breathe, and Diara pulled him in close, eyes watering as she gazed up at the blaring sun.
A roar cracked over the distant sea, hooves clattering in the sky.
“What do you think, daughter?” Thaan shouted over the din. “Are they worth a lifetime without me? All of them? Why do you think I returned to Cypria, if not for you?”
Worried I’d lose my balance, I leaned into the wind, into its scream, but the words cut through the torturous air. Daughter.
Thaan’s shouts broke over the gale, flaming the tendons in his neck.
“Why else would I find some unturned Prizivac to bear my children? Half a century to find one, and it only took a few faces to understand how she’d let me into her bed.
And then when I came back, I knew you were everything I’d dreamed when you stood over that water and defied me.
You were always clever enough to say no. ”
I crashed forward, rolling, tearing at the grass as my feet lifted behind me. Dimas slammed onto the earth nearby, and we curled in together, huddling over the ground.
“You are mine!” Thaan raged. “Am I not enough? What game shall we play next?”
Cebrinne shrieked as she thrashed up and away, Leal and Ano snatching the folds of her dress.
Light flickered under the blanket of the clouds.
“You have seconds to decide,” Thaan bellowed.
“You’re enough!” Selena yelled.
I hadn’t been able to look her way until then.
The wind died enough for gravity to claim us, and we clasped each other close, ready in case it began again.
My throat ached, ragged with use, and I realized I’d been screaming.
Rain poured over us, coating our skin like thick mortar, stinging at the back of my head where blood pounded against my skull.
Trembling, Pheolix pushed to his feet. “No.”
Selena’s attention cut to him. To the rest of us. She forced out a gasping breath; agony laced in her eyes. “I have let you carry the torch for too long. I’ve let all of you carry it.”
“No!” Pheolix said again, legs wobbly as he aimed for her. The vortex grabbed at his clothes and hair, pushing him from one side to the other. He fell into my shins, and I reached to pull him up.
She watched the drone struggle for her, chin raised high as tears spilled down her cheeks. “Release him fully. Never touch him again, and I’ll swear myself to you.”
“No,” Pheolix and Cebrinne both shouted. Selena ignored them, acted as if she were looking straight through their bodies. Wind tugged softly at her hair, lifting the ends.
Thaan watched them as well, cold triumph in his eyes. “I knew you loved me, daughter.” He pulled a small blade from the detritus amongst the grass—Leal’s boot knife. Thaan nicked the pad of his thumb with the tip, smearing crimson between his fingers. “Pheolix is free. I swear it on my blood.”
A spark flashed, illuminating his ugly fucking face. He held the knife out to her.
My stomach roiled as her slender fingers wrapped around it. As I imagined what I might say to Maren, how I might explain Selena had left us for him.
“Please,” Pheolix sobbed. His hand latched onto my arm like a hinge, an anchor as he reached for her. “Please.”
The wind lashed over our backs and under our clothes, flaying at our skin.
But it didn’t seem to touch her as she wove through the center of it.
Like she was already a ghost, her life sworn to something that called her beyond the living.
She drew into Pheolix, taking him from me and letting her temple graze his jaw, and in an instant, he wound himself around her.
“Please,” he begged. “You can’t join him.”
She pressed her lips into his ear. “In the office, hidden from view—don’t stop looking until it’s in your hands.”
He went very still. Then his mouth twisted with anger. “No, heiress. I won't do that without you. Thaan doesn't love you. He doesn't know what love is.”
She tried to pull away, and he clung tighter. “Find him,” she whispered, stroking her fingers down his cheek. “Find him. And don’t forget me.”
Over the water, close enough to see the tiny veins of light, a spool of chaos unraveled in a jagged line. Clouds shredded apart, the resounding boom rattling inside my head.
Maren.
“Heiress—”
“Selena,” Thaan called, impatient.
“Tell her—tell her I’m sorry,” she said to me. Then cast her gaze across us to Cebrinne. “Until the ocean dries up.”
Pheolix’s hands curled into her dress, into her hair, his breath guttering.
“Are you stalling on purpose?” Thaan eyed the water as if it might strike him where he stood, a hand raised and ready to command our blood over the edge. “Now, Selena.”
Pheolix burrowed his head into Selena's neck, arms wrapped right around her, bounding her to the grass and cliffs. “He can kill me,” I heard him whisper, “before I give you to him.”
“I love you,” she murmured into Pheolix’s ear, sliding her fingers against his heart. He flinched, muscles locking in a deep spasm, and then he fell to her feet.
The blade slid across Selena’s hand. “I’m yours, Thaan of Safiro. I swear on my blood.”
Light effervesced over Selena’s slashed palm just as Maren rose from the water.
Water dripped from her body, silk clinging like a second skin, hair a rushing river. The symbols etched into her skin crackled like someone had poured magma into her veins, her eyes entirely black.
For a moment, the world slowed, time grinding to a screaming, unearthly halt as she looked over all of us.
Through the haze, Thaan’s voice shook. “I should have killed you first,” he seethed at me.
Grass, dirt, rock—shredding my side. Night cut through my hair, the ground shrinking sideways, spiraling away. My stomach shot into my throat as Thaan threw me over the cliff edge.