Chapter 27
The chain linking our fates pulled tight with panic. Vaeron’s panic.
Everything in me screamed to turn around, to go to him. But my magic wouldn’t serve me—or anyone—in a physical altercation. They only wanted my Sight for assurance. For the promises Iaoth had made in my name.
“We’re almost out of the city,” Lyriasthe told me.
Fires from the camp beyond sprang up, soldiers rising with the dawn to prepare for our departure.
And I couldn’t wait to leave this place.
We careened into the camp, wings flapping wildly to slow our descent. Perimeter guards rushed forward, their brows furrowed.
“Where is the Issaraeth?” Thalessa, a female who had once been a royal sentinel, asked, looking past us to the lightening sky.
“There’s a mob,” I panted, anxiety still tight in my chest. Through our connection, I felt Vaeron still fighting his way free. “They came after me, and he and Maelsar remained behind to protect our escape.”
She brought her fingers to her lips and gave a sharp whistle. Others sprinted through the wagons toward us. “You two stay here. Find somewhere safe in the center of camp. We’ll go to their aid.”
“Thank you,” I choked out.
She merely nodded, shouting orders at the other soldiers who had raced to her side. White wings unfurled in the dawn, and they took to the skies, racing back toward Vyss.
Lyriasthe and I shared a long, worried look.
“Do you think they’ll be okay?” she asked, teeth raking over her bottom lip.
“They have to be.” Pain ripped down my bond, and I pressed my hand over my magic source.
“What did you feel?” Lyriasthe asked, gripping my shoulders.
“He’s hurt,” I whimpered, a grimace rising even though the agony was not my own.
“Fucking Goddess,” she swore, sky-blue eyes flashing with fury. “How can they possibly believe all of that nonsense?”
“Because they are frightened.”
Both of us spun at the sound of Helene’s voice.
“You,” I hissed, stomping forward, nails digging crescents into my palms. “What were you hoping to accomplish with this? Did Iaoth tell you to ensure we died?”
The priestess had the nerve to look affronted. “You should address Her Radiance with the proper respect.”
I scoffed, white leaking from my palms as my fury rose. “Proper respect? Are you fucking joking?”
“Sylaira,” Lyriasthe said, warning in her tone. But I was too lost to the tempest inside me to heed it.
“Iaoth,” I spat her name for good measure, “has done nothing but torment me since the moment I stepped foot in Thalvireth Palace. She committed one of the gravest sins in front of me—power sharing. In front of at least a dozen others too, and yet no one blinked. So tell me, why do you choose to follow someone who blatantly disregards our Goddess’s directives? ”
“I don’t believe she did anything of the sort,” Helene sniffed, her nose rising high in the air.
And I snapped.
Incandescence exploded out of me, wrapping around her and squeezing. Her coughs and splutters were drowned out by the thunder in my ears. Screams of lightning ripped through my veins with flash after flash of Heraphia’s death.
Tears clawed down my cheeks.
“She killed my best friend. She killed me.”
The world fell away as I stalked toward Helene, more power pouring from the core of my being.
Flooding the area around us with light so blinding, all color stripped away.
Save for the lapis color of her irises, pupils pinpricks from fear.
Her lips moved, but no sound came out. I shoved luminous threads between them because I didn’t want her baseless, false words.
“Dogma shatters logic until no one can see the truth in front of them,” I snarled, fingers tightening. A whirlwind of white wrapped around us, much like at the trial by light. “Dogma breeds fervency until the threat of a different opinion is enough to kill over.”
Helene’s eyes bulged, and she thrashed in my power’s hold.
“You all claim to follow the same divine law, to believe in one truth and only that truth…” I rose to my tiptoes so my face was level with hers. My lips curled back from my teeth. “And you deem anyone who does not hold that same line a traitor to the crown.”
A crack rent the air.
“You’d rather kill Elessarum than concede we have valid principles of our own.”
Helene’s jaw opened in a soundless cry.
“I am no martyr. I am no weapon. No one controls me. Not you, not Iaoth, and certainly not the Goddess.”
I ripped my magic back into me, letting Helene crumple to the ground.
She didn’t move. Didn’t blink.
“Get up and face what you’ve done,” I snapped, kicking her leg.
Still, she was motionless. She didn’t even react to my rough touch.
Horror wrapped around my ribs.
No no no no no no no no
Lyriasthe skidded to a halt beside me, gasping.
“Did I…” I started, but nausea churned in my gut. Gagging, I slapped a hand over my mouth. Tried to breathe through my nose.
But the bile came up anyway.
Lyriasthe rubbed my back as I heaved into the grass. “I didn’t mean to, I didn’t mean to.” It was all I could say between strangled sobs. Like that could absolve me of the greatest Elessarum sin.
I’d killed her.
Lost to panic and rage and grief, my power had taken on a mind of its own.
I’d lost control of myself.
The bond gave a mighty tug, and I tore my blurred vision upward, finding Vaeron sprinting toward me. Ruby stained his skin, and his hair was a wild mess. At his back, the sentinels and Maelsar landed, tucking their wings away. All looked as disheveled as my mate.
None had realized I was a murderer yet.
“What happened?” Vaeron questioned, taking in my distress and the crumpled priestess.
“I–I ki–” Air quaked in my throat. Because if I said the words aloud, they were real. They were true. There was no taking them back. “I killed her. It was an accident.”
“It was! She provoked Sylaira,” Lyriasthe immediately added, her voice strong and steady. “She was the one who caused the mob too.”
Vaeron gathered me in his arms, and I drowned myself in the comforting scent of stormwood. Until I noticed the deep cut on his forearm, still weeping ruby. Because his innate healing magic was locked away behind bronze thread.
“Oh fuck.” Maelsar finally caught up, surveying the scene. “Oi! The rest of you, round up everyone to leave. We don’t have any time to waste.”
“Did anyone else see it happen?” Vaeron asked Lyriasthe.
“No, there was a wall of white around them,” she explained.
At least she had the composure to convey my mistake. A body-wide tremble overtook me until even my breath stuttered. My teeth chattered, ice slicking my skin.
You’re violent. Always have been. Never a true Elessarum. You’re a murderer. Always have been. Ever since you let your parents die instead of accepting your fate. Always will be. No better than the monarchs you hate.
The words screamed through my mind, their truth a dark ink staining my soul.
“You defended yourself, little fugitive. That is not murder. You have not sinned.”
Vaeron’s reassurance only dug the knife of my actions deeper.
“She didn’t provoke me…not in a physical sense.”
In that moment, I wanted him to hate me. To reject me. To confirm what I now believed about myself.
But he didn’t. His arms squeezed tighter, like he alone could anchor me in the downpour.
“You were panicking. I could feel it as I was fighting to get to you. She had you cornered, and more than that, she had it coming. Had I reached her before you, she would have died under my blade for what she did.”
“Truly?”
“Truly. When you are calmer, we will talk about what is next for us. It is time that we snatch back our power.”
“Please.” I clutched his blood-soaked leathers even though my yes was built on a house of lies.
“My sister has gone too far. She does not see the way she jeopardizes her very cause with this story of you being sent by the Goddess to save our realm. Her delusions will get us all killed if we do not act.”
Vaeron gently rocked me as the rest of my panic ebbed away. I focused on his conviction, his devotion, to steel my own will. To not fall into the thoughts that wanted to slice me into ribbons.
“Maelsar, we need to move out. Now. If there’s anyone still alive, they’ll send word to Iaoth immediately. We’re racing against her now to get to Eloi and then to the front.”
If anyone is still alive?
A chill dug into my bones. Had Vaeron wiped out all of Vyss to protect me? There were thousands of people living here. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to know the answer. And he didn’t have access to his Command power…
“If Althirion and Nymirae haven’t already,” Maelsar muttered.
Vaeron tipped his head to the sky and released a violent growl. “Find them immediately.”
“I’ve got it,” Lyriasthe said, her lips pressed into a thin line. “I have a feeling they might have encouraged Helene’s actions.”
“Stay safe. I can’t lose you too,” I croaked, looking up at my friend. “Go in peace.” Yet it was no longer a promise of non-violence to me; the phrase had morphed into the goal of each messy plan.
Her expression softened, like she too had registered the change in meaning for us. “Always in peace.”
The two left, leaving Vaeron and I alone. He captured my face between his large palms, forcing me to look deep into his glacial eyes. To see the acceptance there.
To witness his love.
But there was something different about the left one, bisected by that scar…
“Nothing you do could ever change how I feel about you, Sylaira,” he murmured. “For months, I’ve watched your storm build. We have the power to change the course of this realm.”
His lips slanted over mine for a brief moment before he retreated.
“Take my hand. Walk by my side. Let’s drown them all.”