Chapter 69
DIEM
Because of our late departure, we were forced to move at a grueling pace.
As the blood sun neared its crest, the heat grew unbearably thick, so we moved off the Ring Road and into the forest. Though the shade was a cooling relief, the infinite stretch of trees made our trek seem to stretch on forever.
I’d spoken little since we left. Luther and Alixe rode on my right with Lonard, the mortal I’d promoted to Commander, debating what we might find in Fortos.
The rider we’d sent ahead had not returned, and I’d ordered Sorae to stay above the clouds and out of sight, so it was anyone’s guess whether we’d be greeted by friend or foe.
Ophiucae’s aura was growing faster than we were moving, leaving one question answered: wherever we were headed, so was he.
Teller rode on my left, equally quiet. Our mother was leading the mortal contingent, and Lily had chosen to ride in a wagon with the healers.
I’d gladly accepted both offers to keep them away from the vulnerable front of our pack.
I would have preferred to do the same for my brother, but Alixe was keeping the Royal Guard’s newest recruits under close watch.
I glanced at Teller. “Stay away from Ophiucae today, okay? I don’t want him taking revenge on you and Luther for what happened in Sophos.”
Teller’s eyes darted to Luther, then back to me. “Does that mean you’re going to try to face Ophiucae alone?”
“It’s safer that way. I can’t do what I plan to do if I’m trying to keep one of you alive.”
“And what is it you plan to do, D?”
I turned my gaze back to the path, saying nothing. Mercifully, Teller’s attention was stolen by a whispered argument growing louder behind us.
“I need to tell her.”
“Stay out of it, love.”
“But knowledge is important. The most important.”
“Staying alive is most important.”
“What if the Blessed Kindred spared me to do this?”
“If the Blessed Kindred wanted us to get involved, they would have left us our Crowns.”
“If you really believed that, you wouldn’t be here. I have to tell her. What if I don’t and she—”
“Tell me what?” I called out loudly. I glanced back to see Doriel riding with their mate behind a pack of guards. Obaneryn pinched the bridge of his nose.
I motioned for the guards to let them through, and Doriel excitedly prodded their horse into a trot, wedging themself between me and Teller. “There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you about your sword.”
“You mean Sorrow’s Edge?”
Doriel gaped. “It has a name?” They grabbed my arm. “What does it mean? Who named it?”
“Please don’t kill them,” Obaneryn begged. “They go a little mad when someone knows something they don’t.” Doriel’s feverish look did nothing to dispute that claim.
“The Kindred’s mother named it, I suppose,” I said. “She’s the one who made it.”
Doriel nearly squealed. I suspected it wasn’t often they discovered some historical fact they didn’t already know, especially about the Kindred.
“When we were in Sophos, you asked me about the poem on its blade,” they said. “I couldn’t remember it then because of the flameroot. I can read it to you now.”
I drew Sorrow’s Edge from its sheath and held it out, broad side facing me. Doriel reached eagerly to touch the blade, then froze when they caught my glare.
Teller craned his neck to see. “What does it say?”
Doriel leaned in, their finger hovering above each word as they spoke.
“‘Balance is needed, balance is offered, balance is owed. In sacred soil, three hearts entwined must be shattered and sowed. One life taken, one life given, one life a burden bestowed.’ I suspect it’s a riddle of some kind.
” They pointed to the glowing heartstone fragment.
“I assume you know what this is?” They gave me a meaningful stare, and I nodded.
“It doesn’t work like the other. Past Crowns tried to wake it with their blood. It doesn’t seem to respond.”
“Maybe it needs mortal blood,” Teller suggested.
Doriel lit up at the prospect of an experiment. They grabbed a dagger from their hip and reached for Teller, then found the tip of Sorrow’s Edge at the hollow of their throat.
“Touch my brother,” I warned, “and your inexplicable ability to survive will finally come to an end.”
“But it’s research,” Doriel whined. I hardened my glare, and they sheathed their dagger with a longing look at the heartstone.
Teller leaned across Doriel’s horse and sliced his thumb across the blade of Sorrow’s Edge. “Tel, stop,” I cried, yanking the sword away.
He shrugged. “What? I’m curious, too.” He held out his bleeding thumb. “Let me try.”
I wrestled with how much to admit. I already knew mortal blood would have no effect. I’d used the sword in countless battles. The only blood that ever provoked a response had been Ophiucae’s and mine.
But the words on the blade said three hearts entwined. And it was Ophiucae’s sister who’d completed the spell. What if the magic required something from Teller, too?
I started to sheathe the sword, stubbornly insisting to myself that I wouldn’t drag him into the Kindred’s mess no matter what the spell demanded, then I ground my teeth and stopped. I’d dug my heels in denial about so many things, and how much had it cost me? How much had it cost him?
I carefully wrapped my hand around the godstone blade, wincing as its whispered voices flooded my mind, and held the handle out to Teller. He took the sword and let his eyes roam over the golden etchings, then slowly, gingerly, swiped his blood across the heartstone disc.
My breath caught—as did Doriel’s, whose hand shot out and clutched my arm again.
The smoky crystal disc flared with light . . . then died back down to a dim, hazy grey.
Teller frowned. “Should something be happening?”
Doriel’s shoulders sank. “I suppose not.” They looked in surprise at their hand, still clutching my arm, and quickly snatched it back. “Well, at least we know.”
My stomach felt like a hard-wrung towel. If Teller wasn’t what the spell required . . . was someone else?
“Can you speak the Kindred’s language, as well?” I asked Doriel. “Do you know what the whispers are saying?”
“Whispers?” they asked.
“The voice you hear when you touch the sword.” Doriel cocked their head. I glanced at Teller, who raised his brows, looking lost. “Wait . . . neither of you hear the voice?”
Teller set his palm on the flat of the blade and shook his head, then offered it out to Doriel, who did the same.
“What is it exactly you hear?” Doriel asked, shrewdly looking me over.
They handed me back Sorrow’s Edge. The moment my hand closed around it, the whispers struck up again in my mind. The wailing cries of the Kindred’s imprisoned mother replayed in my memories, the depth of her grief unbearable now that I fully understood the horrible choice she’d made.
I shoved Sorrow’s Edge into its sheath. “It’s silent now.
I must have heard something else before.
” My lie was painfully obvious, even to me.
I turned my eyes to the sky. “The sun’s dropping.
We need to move faster.” I prodded my horse and left them both behind as I rode ahead, forcing my army to push their already tired horses into a gallop.
My punishing pace put an end to my advisors’ strategizing, as well, and Luther broke off to join me at the head of our procession.
“We should stop for a while,” he yelled over the thunder of hoofbeats.
I shook my head and kept my focus on the trees ahead.
“Your soldiers need a rest,” he insisted.
“No time,” I yelled back.
“We’re not bound by the blood sun, Diem. The battle can wait until tomorrow.”
“The godstone won’t last until tomorrow. I can’t waste that advantage.”
That, he couldn’t argue. Without Teller’s godstone mixture to protect our army’s minds, our chances would go from a coin flip to grim.
“At least let the horses drink,” he said. “If you don’t, we might not get there at all.”
Unfortunately, I couldn’t argue that. My own mare was licking at her gums, her eyes dull and tired.
I sighed my grudging agreement and pulled on the reins to slow her back to a trot.
With the help of a Faunos soldier and some magic-compelled birds, we found a nearby stream and led our horses to the water.
As the others mingled and stretched their legs, I couldn’t help myself from wandering away, pacing nervously through the trees with my eyes on the sun.
Luther’s stare, as always, stayed on me. I wondered if he could sense my growing dread as I thought on Doriel’s words and fixated on all the terrible things they could mean.
Even the Kindred hadn’t fully understood the heartstone’s magic.
They’d used it to craft the Forging spell, and conflict had plagued our continent ever since.
Was the slow erasure of the mortals and the genocide of the Descended the natural evolution of our history, or was it the heartstone taking its enormous due?
My gaze turned east—toward the Sacred Sea, toward the island, toward the place that had started this all.
That same warm, inexplicable feeling sparked inside my ribs and began to tug.
It felt as if a hook had caught inside my chest, luring me forward.
Without thinking, I began to walk through the trees, the sound of the bubbling stream fading behind me as a quiet, steady rumble took its place.
Movement flickered in the distance. A bright splash of blue rippled through the leaves and the dappled sunlight. We were miles from the coast, too far to see the water even without thousands of trees blocking the view, and yet, it almost looked as if . . .
I picked up speed, ignoring Luther’s voice calling me back. The feeling in my chest grew hotter and brighter, and I started scratching at the phantom shackle on my wrist. There was something in the trees—something that didn’t belong.
I froze as the ripple of blue turned orange. Moments later, I caught scattered hints of pink, then gold. I crept forward again, slower, and bit down on a gasp as a pair of yellow eyes appeared at the tree line.
Luther’s arm flew around my waist and yanked me behind a trunk. “There are people on the Ring Road,” he hissed. “Don’t let them see you.”
I blinked and looked around, realizing that in my daze, I’d walked all the way back to the main thoroughfare.
“This must be who Sorae saw at the border,” Luther said. “We’ll send a scout once they’ve passed. If they’re friendly, we’ll call them back.”
“And if they’re not?” I asked. “Luther, if Ophiucae’s army gets between us and Lumnos . . .”
He turned a grave stare toward the Ring Road. We’d emptied our home realm of nearly everyone who could fight, leaving it critically vulnerable. If Vance realized what we’d done, it would trigger a race to Lumnos—and they would have a head start.
Luther’s fingers twitched, and his magic glittered over us, using an illusion to erase us from sight. His hand found mine, and we crept out from behind the trunk. The curious eyes I’d seen were still there, peering into the woods. We gave them a wide berth as we edged closer to the road.
“Those are Emarion Army uniforms,” I whispered. “Did Ophiucae get to Fortos before we did?”
Though Luther tried to keep the alarm from his features, I felt it in his heart. A victory for Ophiucae in Fortos meant victories in Arboros and Faunos, too, and thousands more soldier-slaves in his ranks. With the Meros Descended not yet here, we’d be wildly outnumbered.
We’d be as good as dead.
We reached the forest’s edge to find a line of soldiers stretching as far north as I could see, all wearing the recognizable multicolored tunics of the Emarion Army. They were moving fast—faster than a group of this size should safely go.
My stomach plummeted as I stepped beyond the trees to peer the other way. A menagerie of animals ran alongside the gravel path, the largest carrying yellow-eyed Faunos Descended on their backs.
A twig snapped to our left. A figure emerged in the trees, though Luther shoved me behind him before I could get a clear look.
“Who’s there?” a woman’s voice called out, accompanied by the deep, throaty growl of a feline beast.
A man on horseback wearing the insignia of an Emarion Army officer pulled off the Ring Road and galloped toward us. “What are you doing?” he bellowed. “No wandering off.”
“Fucking Fortosians,” the woman muttered. “Sheep who think they’re tigers.” The creature with her snarled, seemingly in agreement. “If they didn’t breed like rabbits and dilute their power just to make their army larger, maybe they’d be able to sense this aura, too.”
I stilled. That didn’t sound like the voice of a person whose mind had been wiped. I tried to peer out from behind Luther, but he pressed back against me as the voice grew dangerously near.
“I know someone’s there,” she yelled into the trees. “Come out, or I’ll send my wasps to find you.”
“Get back to your people,” the man shouted.
“Don’t bark at me, you little whelp,” the woman snapped. “If I still had my Crown, I’d—”
“Ailani?” I called out. I pushed off Luther’s grip and stepped around him to see the former Faunos Queen sitting atop a massive white tiger.
The beast growled, and Ailani’s head snapped toward me. She balked as Luther’s magic glittered away. “Diem?”
“Her Majesty to you,” Luther grumbled.
“Thank the gods you’re still you,” I said. “Why are you here?”
“A few days ago, all the animals in Arboros fled to Faunos. They didn’t know why they’d left, they just felt something in the earth that told them to leave.
I sent a hawk to Mireille, but it never returned.
Then yesterday . . .” Her expression went uncharacteristically somber.
“The animals started leaving Faunos, too. I listen to my beasts. When they say to go, we go. We got to Fortos just as your rider arrived.”
The male soldier from the Ring Road dismounted his horse and stalked into the forest, then jerked back in surprise when he saw me. “Your Majesty,” he said with a stiff salute. “What are you doing here? Your orders said to come to Lumnos.”
“Change of plans,” I said. “We’re going back to Fortos.”
“No,” they both said in unison.
“Yes,” I insisted. “Ophiucae’s army is on the way. We’re marching south to confront him.”
Ailani and the soldier exchanged a dark look.
“Well, you won’t have to wait long,” she said. “His army’s right behind us.”