Chapter 56
Early in the morning, following a quiet breakfast, the inquisitors guide us across the upper bridges of the Undercrust to our final test. Cold rage has settled between my ribs.
If concealing my power was what led to my friends being tortured more, then I am not today.
I will do whatever it takes to get through this alive and keep them safe.
I’m done holding back.
We will survive this, and then we’ll finally be free of the Tribunal. I can eat a good meal, sleep without keeping one eye open, and maybe…maybe pursue whatever is going on between Lucan and me.
If he still wants to.
Rather than focus on where we’re going, I peer over the railings and into the city built into the stalactites as I daydream about everything I’m going to do. That’s why I see the procession before I hear it. I’ve already stopped as the rest of the group slows at a low, somber sound.
A curate stands on a balcony with a strange-looking instrument.
I’ve never seen one outside of a display case.
The horn is shaped like a funnel—like the Undercrust itself.
I know that inside the instrument, near the mouthpiece, is a tiny bone broken from the base of a dragon’s skull that, when blown through, emits an almost ominous hum.
In Vinguard, we use it for one thing: to honor the dead.
Lucan stops by my right side, peering over. “Who do you think it is?”
The procession is coming into view, emerging across one of the bridges beneath us that connects the stalactites. The haze of the Font deep below shifts around them.
Down on the same level as the terraced farms is where bodies are consigned to the soil.
Composted, churned, and tilled, so their nutrients can be returned to the earth and their essence to the Font—to help sustain all of Vinguard for years to come.
We are all part of one earth, one flow of Etherlight, a flow we take from and ultimately give back to.
“Someone important.” They don’t have singing bones for just anyone. That, combined with the length of the procession that marches deeper into the Undercrust, assures me of that much. I lean farther to get a better look.
The Font’s haze parts, and I can see the fine embroidery on their ceremonial robes in the vibrant colors that are from rare dyes said to have once come from distant lands. The deep dragon-blood maroon of the curates is interspersed with other finery.
My breath catches, and I grip the railing tighter and lean even farther, nearly doubled over, as if I can somehow get a better view. It couldn’t be…
I catch every detail of the pennons the people marching behind the curates carry: a crossbow framed by a fan of dragon claws that belongs to the Artificers Guild.
The pallbearers wear robes I’ve only ever seen worn by the high curates.
Draped over the shroud-covered body laid on a stretcher are the sashes that are only ever worn by someone high up in the Creed.
Sashes I last saw hanging in my father’s closet.
“It can’t be.” I’m amazed I can speak at all. That shock hasn’t utterly silenced me.
“What?” Saipha stops at my left side. She squints and sees what I see. “No. It can’t… No.”
My hands tremble on the railing, my knuckles completely white. All I see is the body. The sashes.
There was only one high curate that belonged to the Artificers Guild. My eyes don’t deceive me.
“Keep it moving,” one of the inquisitors commands, crossing over with almost violent intent. We’re not the only supplicants who stopped, but I’m certain that we would be the harshest punished.
Yet I don’t move. I don’t even look when I demand of him, “Who died?”
He ignores me. “Keep. It. Moving.”
“Who died?” I repeat, dangerously calm. That wrenching, churning, gut-hardening feeling that I had upon leaving the basement returns in full force.
“I said—”
Something in me snaps. I move faster than the inquisitor can react, as fast as the vicar has spent years training me to be, and the inquisitor clearly wasn’t expecting it.
I close the distance between us, unlatching the holster for his silver dagger with one hand and drawing it in a fluid movement.
With my other hand, I grab his chin and thrust his face upward.
Just as his muscles tense and he’s about to retaliate, I press the razor-sharp blade more solidly at his throat, and he freezes.
“By this blade I swear, from this breath till my last, all deserving shall know the grace of Mercy, even if it be upon me,” I whisper, reciting what I know to be the oath of a Mercy Knight—what the Creed ingrained in me.
Just saying the words when you are not a knight is akin to treason.
But let him challenge me on being worthy of this vow. Let them all challenge me.
The man’s wide eyes are focused only on the knife as the ominous hum of the dragon skull horns resonate in the background.
“Tell. Me. Who. Died.” In my periphery, I can see the other inquisitors moving toward us, but my grip doesn’t falter. My attention doesn’t waver.
“High Curate Kassin Thaz.”
Everything stops. My heart, my breathing, the world around me, and for a moment, I think I’m imagining all of this.
It’s the result of green dragon vapor, or maybe the effects of being hit in the head one too many times in that cage.
But then the horn hums its low sound again from the funeral procession below—my father’s funeral procession—and reality hits me with a force greater than an inquisitor could inflict.
An inquisitor like the one whose life is in my hands.
Kill him. Do it. End it all.
I’ve never had a murderous bone in my body. I’ve never delighted in death or destruction. I have only ever wanted to help—whatever that meant. I did not even delight in the murder of the dragons that ravage my city. But now? I am all bloodlust.
They tore apart my family.
They took my childhood and made me their savior.
They shamed, blamed, and ostracized my mother.
They have assaulted me and my friends.
And now they’ve killed my father. I know it as surely as I know my own mind.
What is left for me? What remains if not hate and loathing? I could reduce the world to ash and historians would call it “justice.”
The knife is perfectly still. My stance sure.
Lucan’s fingertips land lightly on the back of my hand, and I drag my attention to him. He just shakes his head. Saipha stands two steps back, hands covering her lips in horror. She doesn’t even dare approach me.
Slowly, I lower the blade. With purposeful movements, I return it to the sheath on the man’s hip, even fastening the clip once more. All the while, our eyes stay locked, and he warily regards me as though I’m still holding the knife to his neck.
You should be afraid.
“The other inquisitors are coming,” I say under my breath. “Tell them all is well, and I’ll say nothing about how you let a supplicant take your dagger.”
The man holds my gaze with a scowl. Hate simmers in his eyes. I meet it, welcome it. Challenge me, I say without words.
He turns, mumbling something to the other inquisitors as they run up about all being well. The rest of the supplicants regard me with wary looks, staying a few steps away.
Rather than assuaging their fears, I stiffen my spine and keep walking like nothing happened.
Once more, my body doesn’t feel like my own. It moves, but the motions are mindless. I stare down at the haze of the city below the entire time we walk, but Father’s procession is gone.
Father is gone.
I want to scream, but I can’t find sound. Want to weep, but there are no tears. There’s just the task ahead and—for the first time in my life—a true hatred for what this city is. What it has made me.
“Isola…” Saipha starts to say something.
“I’m fine.” I give her a sharp look. “Let’s focus on surviving today.”
“You don’t have to be—”
I grab her wrist and pull her close. What I say next is harsh, but I can’t find it in me to soften the words.
“Tonight, in Mercy Spire, you can hold my hair back while I sob until I retch. But I’m not going to give any of them the satisfaction of my pain for a second longer.
They want their great slayer, Valor? I’ll show them Valor. ”
Lucan looks at me sideways as I pull away. I expect him to say something about how harshly I spoke to her, but he doesn’t. Saipha gives a slight nod and looks forward. I don’t miss the shiver that runs down her spine.
I should apologize, but I can’t. Right now, I can’t allow myself to be tender. Not even to her. If I do, I’ll shatter, and I don’t have that luxury. I must succeed in this next challenge. Not just for me but for Father.