Chapter 22 #2
“You’re here.” She couldn’t manage anything but a whisper. “It’s you.”
“Of course I am,” he said. “Not even a border skirmish could keep me from you today. Tyr wanted to have my head on a stake, but I don’t think even he could stand up to Mother and Father’s wrath.”
A border skirmish?
Tyr?
Mother and Father?
The confusion lasted for only a moment, and then she understood.
Dreams came with their own logic, and this was nothing but a beautiful dream.
In this world, Speer had never been destroyed.
Tearza had not died and abandoned her people to slavery, and her kin had not been slaughtered overnight on the Dead Island.
She almost laughed out loud. In this illusion, their biggest concern was a fucking border skirmish.
“Are you nervous?” Altan asked.
“Nervous?” she echoed.
“I’d be surprised if you weren’t,” he said. His voice dropped to a conspiring whisper. “Unless you’re having second thoughts. And—I mean, if you are, it’s fine by me. If we’re being honest, I’ve never been too fond of him, either.”
“ ‘Him’?” Rin echoed.
“He’s just jealous that you’re getting married first while nobody wants him.” Ramsa shouldered his way between them, chewing on a red bean bun. He dipped his head toward Altan. “Hello, Commander.”
Altan rolled his eyes. “Don’t you have fireworks to light?”
“That’s not until later,” said Ramsa. “Your parents said they’ll castrate me if I go near them now. Something about safety hazards.”
“That sounds about right.” Altan ruffled Ramsa’s hair. “Why don’t you scurry along and enjoy the feast?”
“Because this conversation is much more interesting.” Ramsa took a large bite of the bun and spoke with his mouth full. “So what’s it going to be, Rin? Will we have a runaway bride? Because I’d like to finish eating first.”
Rin’s mouth hung open. Her eyes darted between Ramsa and Altan, trying to detect proof that they were illusions—some imperfection, some lack of substance.
But they were so solid, detailed and full of life. And they were so, so happy. How could they be this happy?
“Rin?” Altan nudged her shoulder. “Are you all right?”
She shook her head. “I don’t—This isn’t . . .”
Concern crossed his face. “Do you need to lie down for a moment?”
“No, I just . . .”
He took her arm. “I’m sorry I was making fun of you. Come on, we’ll go find you a bench.”
“No, that’s not what I . . .” She shrugged him off and backed away. She was walking backward, she knew she was, but somehow every time she took a step she ended up no farther from Altan than she had been to begin with.
“Come with me,” Altan repeated, and his voice resonated around the room. The colors of the banquet hall dimmed. The guests’ faces blurred. He was the only defined figure in sight.
He extended his hand toward her. “Quickly now.”
She knew what would happen to her if she obeyed.
Everything would be over. The illusion might last another few minutes, or an hour, or a week. Time worked differently in illusions. She might enjoy this one for a lifetime. But in reality, she would have succumbed to Daji’s poison. Her life would be over. She would never wake up from this spell.
But would that be so wrong?
She wanted to go with him. She wanted to go so badly.
“No one has to die,” Altan said, voicing her own thoughts out loud. “The wars never happened in the first place. You can have everything back. Everyone. No one has to go.”
“But they are gone,” she whispered, and the instant she said it, its truth became apparent.
The faces in the banquet hall were lies.
Her friends were dead. Tutor Feyrik was gone.
Master Irjah was gone. Golyn Niis was gone.
Speer was gone. Nothing could bring them back. “You can’t tempt me with this.”
“Then you can join them,” Altan said. “Would that be so bad?”
The lights and streamers dimmed. The tables faded to nothing; the guests disappeared. She and Altan were alone, two spots of flame in a dark passage.
“Is this what you want?” His mouth closed over hers before she could speak. Scorching hands moved on her body and trailed downward.
Everything was so terribly hot. She was burning. She’d forgotten how it felt to truly burn—she was immune to her own flame, and she’d never been caught in Altan’s fire, but this . . . this was an old, familiar pain, terrible and delicious all at once.
“No.” She fought to find her voice. “No, I don’t want this—”
Altan’s hands tightened on her waist.
“You did,” he said, pressing closer. “It was written all over your face. Every time.”
“Don’t touch me.” She pressed her hands against his chest and tried to push him away, to no avail.
“Don’t pretend you don’t want this,” said Altan. “You need me.”
She couldn’t breathe. “No, I don’t . . .”
“Don’t you?”
He brought his hand to her cheek. She cringed back, but his burning fingers rested firm on her skin. His hands moved down to her neck. His thumbs stopped where her collarbones met, a familiar resting place. He squeezed. Fire lanced through her throat.
“Come back.” The Sorqan Sira’s voice cut through her mind like a knife, granting her several delicious, cool seconds of lucidity. “Remember yourself. Submit to him and you lose.”
Rin convulsed on the ground.
“I don’t want this,” she moaned. “I don’t want to see this—I want to get out—”
“It’s the poison,” said the Sorqan Sira. “The sweat amplifies it, brings it to a boil. You must purge yourself, or the Seal will kill you.”
Rin whimpered. “Just make it stop.”
“I can’t. It must get worse before it gets better.” The Sorqan Sira seized her hand and squeezed it. “Remember, he exists only in your mind. He only has as much power as you give him. Can you do this?”
Rin nodded and gripped the Sorqan Sira’s arm. She couldn’t find the breath to say the words send me back, but the Sorqan Sira nodded. She threw another ladleful of water onto the rocks.
The heat in the yurt redoubled. Rin choked; her back arched, the material world faded away, and the pain returned. Altan’s fingers were around her neck again, squeezing, choking her.
He leaned down. His lips brushed against hers. “Do you know what I want you to do?”
She shook her head, gasping.
“Kill yourself,” he ordered.
“What?”
“I want you to kill yourself,” he repeated. “Make things right. You should have died on that pier. And I should have lived.”
Was that true?
It must have been true, if it had lingered so long in her subconscious.
And she couldn’t lie to herself; she knew, had always known that if Altan had lived and if she had died then things would have gone much differently.
Aratsha would still be alive, the Cike would not have disbanded, they would not have lost to Feylen, and the Republican Fleet might not be in fragments at the bottom of Lake Boyang.
Jinzha had said it first. We should have tried to save the other one.
“You are the reason why I died,” Altan continued, relentless. “Make this right. Kill yourself.”
She swallowed. “No.”
“Why not?” His fingers tightened around her neck. “You’re not particularly useful to anyone alive.”
She reached up for his hands. “Because I’m done taking orders from you.”
He was a product of her own mind. He had only as much power as she gave him.
She pried his fingers off her neck. One by one, they came away. She was nearly free. He squeezed harder but she kicked out, nailed him in the shin, and the moment he let go she scrambled backward away from him and sank into a low crouch, poised to strike.
“Really?” he scoffed. “You’re going to fight me?”
“I won’t surrender to you anymore.”
“ ‘Surrender’?” he repeated, like it was such a ludicrous word. “Is that how you’ve thought of it? Oh, Rin, it was never about that. I didn’t want surrender from you. I had to manage you. Control you. You’re so fucking stupid, you had to be told what to do.”
“I’m not stupid,” she said.
“Yes, you are.” He smiled, patronizing and handsome and hateful all at once. “You’re nothing. You’re useless. Compared to me you’re—”
“I’m nothing at all,” she interrupted. “I was a terrible commander. I couldn’t function without opium. I still can’t call the fire. You can tell me everything I hate about myself, but I already know. You can’t say anything to hurt me more.”
“Oh, I doubt that.” Suddenly his trident was in his hand, spinning as he advanced. “How’s this, then? You wanted me dead.”
She flinched. “No. I never.”
“You hated me. You were afraid of me, you couldn’t wait to be rid of me. Admit it, when I died you laughed.”
“No, I wept,” she said. “I wept for days, until I couldn’t breathe anymore, and then I tried to stop breathing, but every time, Enki brought me back to life, and then I hated myself because you said that I had to keep living, and I hated living because you’re the one who said I had to—”
“Why would you mourn me?” he asked quietly. “You barely even knew me.”
“You’re right,” she said. “I loved an idea of you. I was infatuated with you. I wanted to be you. But I didn’t know you then, and I’ll never really know what you were. I’m finished wondering now, Altan. I’m ready to kill you.”
The trident materialized in her hands.
She had a weapon now. She wasn’t defenseless against him. She’d never been defenseless. She had just never thought to look.
Altan’s eyes flickered to the prongs. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“You are not real,” she said calmly. “He’s dead, and I can’t hurt him anymore.”
“Look at me,” he said. “Look at my eyes. Tell me I’m not real.”
She lunged. He parried. She disentangled their prongs and advanced again.
He raised his voice. “Look at me.”
“I am,” she said softly. “I see everything.”
He faltered.
She stabbed him through the chest.
His eyes bulged open, but otherwise he didn’t move. A slow trickle of blood spilled out the side of his mouth. A red circle blossomed on his chest.