Chapter 13
thirteen
“Shit,” Aelen said.
While Abcin raised her own dagger, Aelen matched, whipping one and shoving it into the man’s eye socket. I wanted to scream, but there was nothing left inside, so I merely whimpered as the knife dug into his orbit with a squelching sound that would no doubt haunt me in my dreams.
Aelen retracted the dagger, greeted with a gush of blood.
A bloodied orb remained on his blade, and my knuckles went white.
I reached for my knife. But before I unsheathed it, Aelen swiped his dagger again, splitting the man’s neck before he toppled to one side.
The crowd moved over, but they said nothing and kept their heads bowed.
I revealed the small blade, but Aelen forced my wrist beneath my cloak.
“It knows you’re here. Say nothing. Do not fear.
Control your heart and breathing.” I fought against his grip, but he forced his whisper into my ear, and then into my soul.
“You cannot kill this being with a blade, or even a thousand broadswords. This isn’t something any mortal weapon could cull.
If you care about your life, trust me. Just this once. ”
My hackles raised, and I bit my cheek until I tasted foul copper.
I balled my fists and wouldn’t put away the knife, but I didn’t raise it again, either.
Every part of me that could screamed at me to run.
To stand up and flee the square, fighting.
But I inhaled, shoved that deep inside, and said nothing as Aelen replaced his hand around my lips and added another over my eyes.
I didn’t protest. In fact, it was almost welcome—almost.
Time passed over us like the trickle of a breaking dam, but I tried to focus on his ragged breaths instead of the wet sounds and groans that emanated from the square.
The feelings were almost worse, like when the mist condensed and lapped at my flesh.
It raked like a thousand thorns and hundreds of knives, yet somehow never drew blood, only pain.
However long we sat there, it felt like many agonizing years.
Eventually, I wrenched his fingers from my eyes and watched as the ice sprites attacked with abandon. Now their violence centered not only on the dying I’phri, but anyone too close to the square. They lashed with ice and coated the snow in crimson.
Dimeidas was the last standing, with the other three unmoving in a pool of their collective blood.
He continued to sing, his melodies scraping against my ears, and each note frenzying the sprites and their hateful attacks.
I felt his song as it cut through the air, like the buoyant, ghastly mist. His song wasn’t only music, the notes radiating with tangible magic that nipped against us like the wintry chill.
My heart thundered, but beside it, his elegy inspired something there.
Something I knew but couldn’t touch, just out of reach.
With every word, the sprites tried to stop him, yet refused to kill him.
Every time he raised the blade, they darted out with excited violence, trying to yank his arm down and force him to his knees.
He’d falter, but each time he would raise it again, and resume his elegy, despite the brutal wounds to his face.
My feet beckoned me to bolt. But I wouldn’t allow them as much. I only needed to get through this. Another minute. Another second. Another death.
Dimedas’s song finally climaxed, his treble sinking into my bones.
It twisted the thing inside my chest. With his last attempt, the blade sliced across his neck, and out poured his life.
Dimeidas collapsed to his knees and when the geyser slowed, he fell onto the pile of sacrificial I’phri.
Only then did the spectators release their held breath. Mine never loosed.
With his death, the wintry sprites trilled, their shrill cries piercing my ears as they exploded into ice shards.
The speaker rose to his wary feet, and when he did, the braziers across the city erupted with flames red as the spilled blood.
With the fire came a sudden onset of warmth that engulfed the square.
The heat trickled across my skin and whipped away any remnants of the vicious smog.
Icicles melted, drip, drip, dripping away onto the now sloshy gutters and glistening masonry.
The frozen sculptures dissolved into broken statues, revealing wilted, blackened bushes in the stone planters.
The very bed of snow I sat on turned to nothing but a watery grave of brown, wilted grass and ice-chipped pavers.
The aged I’phri raised his hands over his head, his palms coated in crimson. “The magic in their blood has returned life to Eltidian. Let us never forget their sacrifice, as above or down below.”
My skin prickled and my brow beaded from the sudden sweltering air.
And like nothing had happened, the crowd began to rise and disperse.
But now they wore with a hollow, haunted expression.
Aelen wrenched me to my feet and I trailed listlessly.
As we exited the square and headed toward the paths, I couldn’t help but steal glances of the lifeless bodies.
Of the warmth they’d given themselves for.
Of everyone who gave them a wide berth, but didn’t bother with a second look.
As if acknowledging the dead would put them in the pile too.
Brutal, callous work, and they’d given themselves willingly.
But his chorale and the words he sang clung to me like the sudden sauna.
Of his gods, their sacrifice and love. Of the fallen star, who’d forsaken their eternal home in the sky to explore the world, and of the unfathomable pain and slaughter he’d caused.
A haunting melody of death, decay, pain, and hope.
And it was encased and delivered on a bed of magic.
Only once we were deep in the wood, with the bending branches scraping across our waists, did I dare speak. “Why did they do that?”
“To save us. All of us. Magic runs through the blood of all I’phri, a final departing gift from the Starsingers—but for most I’phri you must wrench away their life to find it. A hidden spring, always flowing.”
“For heat, you have to sacrifice your people?”
His fingers found mine and entwined. I should have pulled away, but it filled me with the same comfort when he covered my eyes. So I didn’t. “Indeed, but there aren’t many of us remaining. We can only keep this going so long, and for every passing season, our time is running out.”
The passing seasons. That reminded me—I didn’t see a single child. Even the Underquarter had children running underfoot.
“I didn’t see any little ones in Eltidian—what happened to the children?”
His hand released mine. “Your father.”
The rest of me lost feeling, and I held back the tears, instead forcing my soul to anger. But for the rest of the journey, silence encased us. I swore with the slightest touch, I would have shattered.