Chapter 32 Knight of Swords #2
The box spins out across the floor as Kasper’s fingertips are sliced from his hand, cauterized by Draven’s sword, and I lunge forward, catching Draven as he collapses.
Kasper screeches in pain, clutching his hand.
He dives for the wand, scooping it up along with his fingertips, shoving it all back into the box.
HELP! The scream rents from my mind like a beacon and the door flies open.
“Rune, what’s going on—” Felix stumbles in, Ember and Scorpius behind him.
“Get the guards!” I shout at Ember who freezes up, terrified.
No sooner does Scorpius glance between Draven and the blood running along Kasper’s arm than he rushes forward, tackling him, the cards forgotten.
Felix summons the Fool, for fearlessness, and his spine straightens as he joins Scorpius in trying to detain Kasper.
Everything’s a blur. All I see is Draven’s blood. Too much blood.
I drag Draven toward my tarot cards as he clutches his neck, gasping.
“It’s going to be okay, Draven.” Raw panic coats my voice and I force it back, needing for him to stay as calm as possible. “You’re not leaving me right after a proposal, right?”
His eyes finally focus, brows lifting ever so slightly, and I can hear his voice in my mind, though it sounds quiet, exhausted. You’re not … making jokes right now … are you?
Whatever keeps you with me.
With shaking hands, I summon the World and then the Empress. Fuck. I’ve never healed more than a split lip, and his throat’s open nearly ear to ear.
Breathe, Rune. He needs you. It’s not my voice that comes to me in this dark hour, but my father’s.
My heart rate slows enough to think and I flick the Four of Swords to the forefront, remembering that it aids healing.
I’ve never used three at once before, but I’d rather drain every ounce of energy I have than let him die.
The cards begin to work to heal him, but it’s slow, and I don’t know if it’ll save him.
Across the room, Kasper punches Felix hard enough to lay him out on the ground, finally snapping Ember out of her frozen trance and she crouches over him, protecting him, tears running down her face. Kasper uses his High Priestess card, always dodging Scorpius’s blows, one step constantly ahead.
I keep channeling into my cards, desperate as Draven’s skin slowly begins to stitch back together. His eyes blink heavily, and I growl at him, “Draven, don’t you dare die on me.”
Rune … I … I love …
“Then stay.” I don’t care if he doesn’t think he has a choice, if the magic isn’t enough. I’ve seen what a strong will can do, and I demand all of it in this moment. His eyes water, his air scarce, but he fights to hold on.
Kasper strikes Scorpius with his knife, leaving a jagged slash across his face, nearly taking out an eye. A hidden blade shoots out of Scorpius’s cuff, but Kasper deflects it, headbutting him, the two slamming into a bookshelf and toppling it over the door. Kasper raises the knife …
And Ember leaps forward from where she was helping Felix get to his feet, grabbing Kasper’s arm to stop the killing blow. He shoves back, not even looking at who has him, and throws her up against the wall with visceral strength. His knife comes arching down.
Felix shoves her out of harm’s way. The knife plunges into his sternum instead of hers. A gasp bursts out of me. Felix chokes, grasping the blade handle as Kasper takes a step back, hands shaking.
Ember screams, and it rends through the space, vibrating the walls, trembling the very floor.
“Ember …” Kasper breathes as she clutches Felix. He didn’t realize it was her, but I don’t fucking care. His hands shake, so much blood coating them. Skittishly he takes in all of us, eyes landing on me.
My glare is a promise. I will fucking kill him for this.
Kasper swallows, eyes fluttering, and he rushes to a window, forcing his way out, and flees into the night. Scorpius looks half-conscious, splayed on the floor, Felix is bleeding out, Ember trying to save him.
I keep channeling, Draven’s suffocated breaths piercing me, his head on my knees, his hands on his throat. Felix staggers, colliding to the ground, Ember wrapped around him.
I can’t save them both.
We need help.
Draven’s eyes flutter. I feel the flicker of his presence within my mind, guiding me, showing me where to mend as I push that magic into pressing the skin back together, forcing it to fuse, to stitch. You even heal angry. Draven’s voice is a wisp in my mind.
It reminds me of what he said, all those weeks ago with Kenzo’s training. It requires something softer.
Show me, I beg him. His presence grows stronger within me, a guiding light to lead me where to go, how to heal him. My desperation to save him, my desire to be with him every day of my cursed life, all flood into him, and the bleeding slows.
And I realize it needed deep, compassionate love.
His skin’s pale under all that red, but he takes a reedy gasp as I finish.
“I’m … going … to … parcel … that … fucker …
out,” Draven pants. There’s a crimson scar across his throat now, as if it happened ten years ago, the skin not sewn perfectly.
His side is still pumping blood and I shove my palm against it, letting that love pour through channeling the Empress, darning skin like two pieces of stubborn cloth, sewing my name into his.
No sooner has the first, deepest layer of skin healed over when he places a hand on mine. “Help … Felix.”
I scramble across the floor to Felix’s side, his breaths violent, hacking, body convulsing. The dagger sticks straight into his sternum. If I try to remove it, he’ll die. If I don’t, he’ll die. I turn to Ember. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to help him.”
“Please, please.” Ember sobs, holding his shoulders.
There’s so much blood all over me. Draven’s. Felix’s.
“I’m so cold. Why am I … so cold?” Felix grips my hand, but I try anyway, summoning the same Arcana cards I used on Draven.
“If I pull the knife slowly, maybe I can try to heal right behind it.” I sound frantic, but I’ll do whatever it takes. I clench the knife, but he cries out so hard I release it. I turn to Ember, who looks stricken. “Be ready to cauterize it. Maybe it’ll stop the bleeding.”
I force the healing toward him, sinking into his chest, but I’m exhausted from healing Draven, and it’s not as strong. I’m so fucking livid, hopeless, lost.
I choke on a sob. Feeling down deep within Felix, my magic can tell that the knife has bent on bone, pierced his heart.
I don’t know how to mend a vital organ. It’s not just skin or a vein, it’s too complex.
He’s too far gone. Blood keeps pouring out of new places despite the Empress’s magic.
I don’t know if I’m saving him or killing him faster.
Felix reaches out, a finger tracing Ember’s cheek.
The Four of Swords burns, collapsing to the floor, the imagery burning out like it’s been pulled from a forge.
Felix chokes. I push more of myself into the World and the Empress, but the latter card begins to burn along its foil, too.
It’s not working. Blood dribbles against his lips, and his round eyes shimmer with tears.
He tries to grab the knife, but his grip is too weak.
His eyes flick to mine, blinking off-kilter.
“I’m not ready to go … please … I’m not ready … ”
“Stay with me,” Ember begs, squeezing him tighter.
All at once his eyes fade, pupils dilating, the life draining so quickly, like a waterskin with the bottom slashed out. It’s all just gone. The Empress flashes, burning, and drops to the ground, leaving me shaking.
The door blasts open. Cleona, Amaya, and Wynter stand in the fiery entry. Cleona must have used her Sun card to blow open the door. Books burn in piles around her as the rest of our group finally burst through.
“We were all just chatting outside and saw Kasper run by covered in blood—” She breaks off when she sees Felix.
“Is he …?” Amaya can’t seem to say it.
“Kasper,” I answer.
Wynter’s face curls into rage. “Why would he do this?!”
“He stole something dangerous and plans to give it to the seraph king. He’s his bastard son,” I explain.
Cleona and Amaya comfort Ember, who is sobbing so hard I don’t know what to do for her. Fable runs to her brother, and Zara and Malik check in with Draven, the blood still wet on his torn shirt and jacket, staining his skin.
“He tried to take me, too, to use me as a hostage, but Draven stopped him, nearly dying in the process.” I rise shakily. “Draven’s cards have been handled, but we can still stop Kasper.”
“I’m on it.” I’ve never seen Wynter so angry before. He rushes out and I hear the front door nearly fly off the hinges.
The others look to me. Ember still clutches Felix’s limp body, whispering to him as though he will wake up, but his eyes are so hauntingly blank.
I tell them all, “The rest of you go after him, but be careul—Kasper’s dangerous. I’ll be right behind you.”
The others run after Kasper and Wynter, though Ember stays with Felix.
Draven’s hand braces against his throat, the other one rubbing his freshly healed side. I scoop my cards, calling them to me until I have them all.
Draven staggers toward the door. “You can’t seriously be considering going after him.”
I snap, “You need to see a real healer.”
Draven shakes in anger.
I’m strung between staying here with him and comforting Ember, or chasing down Kasper, but the seraph prince is going after my mom.
I have to try to stop him, stop Altair. I whisper to Draven, “Make sure Ember’s okay, explain what’s going on, it’s the best you can do with that much blood loss and no magic. ”
“Don’t let him get away.” Draven’s voice is horribly hoarse but improving.
I nod. My legs aren’t long, but I sprint after the others, flying out of our Hearth, running harder than I’ve ever managed before, a gazelle bounding through the plains as if chased by a lion. Yet right now, I’m the one that’s hunting.
Summoning the Chariot, I increase my speed. Before I know it, I’m catching up to the others and then surpassing them as we race toward the center of the Oval. Kasper’s light hair catches the moonlight with two others—someone I don’t recognize, and Magda.
Scorpius, Wynter, and Malik scream profanities and threats at them.
A black void opens ahead at the dead center of campus—whoever else is with them must be a Death Arcana.
He must be there to transport them to the Sedah Royal Palace.
Kasper turns and sees us gaining on him.
He grabs Magda and throws her, screaming, into Wynter, buying himself enough time to slip through the wobbling portal.
Scorpius tackles the Death Arcana to the ground a second after, and the portal shuts.
The yelp the stranger gives is nothing next to the cracking sound of his body hitting the stones.
I release the Chariot, wildly out of breath, a stitch firmly pressing against my side.
I look down at Magda, but she’s bleeding, Wynter holding on to her so she can’t run.
“Where did you send them?! Where?!” Scorpius slams the man’s head back into the stone and he’s whimpering, begging.
“The palace! I’m sorry! He paid me to meet him here at this time with her, that’s all I know!” the young man cries, and it seems clear to me that’s the truth of it. Scorpius flings his arm straight out, parallel above the stranger’s body, and that blade shoots out some hidden spot in his sleeve.
“No!” Malik wrestles him off. “We need someone to send us through too!”
“Like we’re going to trust him?!” Scorpius spits.
I turn to Magda, who watches the scene unfold with a coldness I’ve not witnessed. “Why were you helping him?” I can’t understand it but she just sneers.
“Torn from my life to serve the immortals for eternity? Gods only know why they chose me at my age. I have to spend the rest of my days scrubbing my tormentors’ floors?
Doing their laundry?” Her lips peel back over her snarl.
“That stupid boy said he’d let me go home, got me in contact with the Ascension. I thought …”
Ember has caught up to us, and my heart pounds as I spot Draven trailing behind her, staggering, still horribly pale. My prince couldn’t sit this one out. Typical.
“They get away?” he croaks.
“Yes.” I want him to rest but the determination boiling in his gaze is undeniable.
“We’re going, now. I need to warn the king. Get your mother out of there.” Draven rubs at his throat. He turns to the others, taking stock. “Zara, go tell Commander Soto what happened. We’re under attack. Take her and that Death Arcana with you.”
“Be a man. Kill me now,” Magda growls at him.
“I stopped being just a man a long time ago.” His expression holds an immortal’s cold fury. Draven announces, “Amaya can open the portal.”
“Uh … I can?” Amaya glances uncertainly my way.
“Can you do it?” I ask.
“I’ll try.” She sighs, determination setting her shoulders.
“Be careful,” Zara insists, taking one last look at us. She binds the stranger’s wrists, keeping Magda close as she moves them both farther into the Forge.
Amaya channels Death. The portal is wobbly, but after a moment it rights itself. She shoots me a proud grin.
Draven’s hand lifts, the tattoo on the back glowing as he checks it. He nods to Scorpius, Malik, and Fable. “Ready?”
“What’s waiting for us?” Malik asks.
“He said the seraphs would be invading the palace. Prepare yourselves for a fight,” Draven tells them, and everyone exchanges a dark look.
Draven’s eyes snag on mine briefly before he rushes through with his friends.
I turn to mine. Wynter looks lost to his grief, furious tears drawing paths through the blood down his face.
Amaya is being held by Cleona, but she looks to me with determination in her gaze, holding that portal strong.
Ember stands like a shade of her former self, no light limned in her at all as she stares into that dark portal.
“You don’t have to—” I start.
“I’m with you,” Wynter insists. “He killed Felix.” He says it simply, like there is no other option. And I realize he’s right.
“For Felix,” Cleona and Amaya say.
I nod at them and turn to Ember last.
“Not all changelings are traitors.” Her eyes spark with fire.
We turn and march through the darkness, and I pray to the gods and stars to keep us all breathing until morning.