Chapter 28
Perhaps Leita should’ve been pleased to not only see justice done, but to take it for herself with her own hands and magic. Perhaps she should’ve been relieved to finally get answers.
But Leita felt nothing at all when Ondra was brought before her, bound between two guards.
The execution of a traitor should have been carried out in the citadel, a space which conveyed the gravity of what would come to pass. Instead, Leita, Attalus, her council, Thalia, and a host of guards gathered in the hypostyle hall at the heart of the palace.
Shafts of light cut across the stones, creating a dramatic dichotomy between sunlight and shadow. The afternoon sun caught on the many faces of the friezes carved into the red granite, giving them ghoulish expressions as they watched the drama.
Once Ondra was made to kneel before Leita, the hall fell silent, save for the soft slap of Attalus’s tail on the stones.
Leita had hardly spoken to him in two days, the distance he kept an ache that just kept growing.
She’d tried to explain herself, but he didn’t want her reasons, sound as she thought them.
She doubted he’d even accept her apologies, not that she intended on giving them.
Leita had nothing to apologize for. She’d made clear what she would do to protect her azai, and if he didn’t like her methods, well, that was his own burden to bear.
They’d dressed for this in solemn silence, choosing fabrics and robes of somber gray. The color of judgement. Leita didn’t feel beautiful or queenly in her royal costume and jewels; she felt as though she wanted to itch her very skin off.
When asked if he was ready, Attalus nodded grimly. His bloodlust had cooled, it seemed, although he was adamant he witness Ondra’s sentence. “I won’t be denied that, at least.”
His words stuck like thorns in her heart.
No, she wouldn’t deny him this. Even if she was still sore with him—and at herself for being so relieved having him at her side.
Leita didn’t think it showed on her face, but terror clutched her stomach tight.
Everyone gathered knew what would happen, including Ondra. She glared up from where she knelt, defiance in her eyes. She appeared far braver than Leita felt, despite the roles they were now to play.
The interrogators had weakened Ondra’s mind.
The fae rarely physically tortured traitors; there was no need, when the mind itself could be broken.
There were fae strong enough to resist, yes, but they were rare.
Ondra clung to her beliefs and her silence and resisted ably, although Leita was told the cracks had begun to lengthen.
Almost no one could withstand the onslaught of a Queen. Not just terror but compulsion urged them to reveal innermost secrets they’d sworn never to tell.
It was a messy business, one that Amaranthe had apparently used liberally throughout her tyranny. While reviled as a method, it was nevertheless expedient.
Marcades read out the charges against Ondra, a list of some of the highest offenses in the faelands. Treachery, conspiracy, attempted regicide. By rights, Ondra’s body should be hung from the battlements after this, her brains leaking out her ears.
Leita clung to hope that wouldn’t be necessary.
“Reveal what you know. Earn a clear conscience and clean death,” Leita said once Marcades finished. To Leita, it was less an order and more an imploring. Don’t make me do this.
But Ondra only sneered, her gaze filled with hate.
What have I done? Leita wanted to cry. Why did you do this?
It doesn’t matter, Thalia told her, not unkindly. Whatever her reasons, she made her choice.
Yes. Ondra hadn’t been blackmailed or coerced or enthralled. The choices she made were her own, and so were the consequences.
Leita stepped forward, her breathing shallow. She feared anything deeper would make her vomit. Only at the last moment did she unclench her trembling hands from behind her back. One gathered in a fist at her side, the other reached out for Ondra’s head.
“Don’t make me do this,” she whispered.
“If you want my secrets, you’ll have to take them,” Ondra growled.
What little air remained in Leita’s lungs escaped in a shudder. Leita fought tears, her hand visibly shaking as she laid it upon Ondra’s head.
“You’re just like her,” spat Ondra.
No, she wasn’t. She was nothing like Amaranthe.
Leita’s eyes slid closed, not wanting to see what happened.
Her magic touched Ondra’s mind, hotly burning with anger and terror. An animal backed into a corner, she swiped and hissed at Leita’s invasion, horrid yowls a haunting warning.
Perhaps, with practice, Leita might have been gentler. There was likely a way to finesse secrets and find what was sought without trampling over every memory and synapse. Leita didn’t know how, though. She didn’t want to. She didn’t want to do this.
She tried to be quick, ramming through Ondra’s mind in a horrible battering. Leita’s own consciousness quailed and shrunk at the horror, trying not to feel the threads of sanity snap around her own fingers.
“They number in the hundreds, but there’s seven who lead,” Leita said, her eyes clenched shut. “They meet up the coast, where they keep their storehouse. Where they make—”
“NO!” Ondra thrashed beneath her, and the guards held fast. Ondra screamed and screamed, sounds pulled up from the dregs of her soul that echoed through the hall.
“They make weapons. Magic items, spelled to…” Leita’s throat clenched shut. The group pooled their magic to spell chains, manacles, and daggers, items that when used on fae, mantii, Savrakae, harpies, or orcs would sap their strength, siphon their magic, and prevent their shift.
Leita herself had been a prisoner of such manacles. The horrid memory, of being so weak, her stolen magic echoing around her like a phantom, withered limb, threatened to suffocate her.
A warm tail wrapped round her ankle, and a steady hand rested on the small of her back.
She forced herself to breathe. “They sell the weapons to fund their cause—they’ve found steady clients in Pyrros. But the strongest they keep back for when the time comes to strike.”
“No, no no nononono…” Ondra wailed.
“They’ve sold arms and secrets, whispering to other courts about Fallorian.”
“Noooooo!”
“They would kill the Queen, imprison her court and any who oppose them, and take command of Fallorian. Lycea and Highhome would recognize their rule. They would bring a new age, freedom to all fae who join their righteous—”
“Enough,” Attalus whispered.
Leita gasped, pulling back from the mire of Ondra’s mind. She came back to herself in increments; the sound of Ondra’s pitiful wails, the smell of blood, the burn of tears on her own cheeks. Leita was afraid to open her eyes.
Finish it, Thalia insisted. Dying beasts should be put out of their misery.
Leita opened her eyes, staring in horror as Ondra ripped at her own hair, blood spilling out her nose. She wailed and thrashed, her sclera bright red from all the little vessels bursting. Sanity had fled, and in its wake, there was nothing to do but scream.
Leita wanted to scream, too.
Shall I do it? Thalia offered.
A unicorn horn aimed true was a quick way to die, but Leita could make it faster.
Tears blurring her vision, Leita swept a shaking finger through the air. The bolt of magic pierced Ondra’s temple and obliterated what remained of her mind, ending her life and suffering.
Ondra’s body slumped to the side, and the hall resounded with silence.
The court watched on, shaken but resolute.
It was Charis who nodded and took charge, having the body borne away. She issued orders for the information Leita found to be disseminated and called for her spymaster to join her in her office.
Everyone seemed to move, if slowly. The dribbles of blood on the stone floor were wiped away, and the guards returned to their posts. Soon enough, the hall was practically empty, all evidence of the horrors it’d just seen vanished.
Leita turned stiffly away, her knees hardly bearing her weight, they shook so violently. Her chest clenched too tight to breathe, every heartbeat agony.
She needed to escape, to return to her room or anywhere she could be away. She needed trees and open sky and fresh air and for life to be far less cruel than it was.
Leita staggered up the first few steps, meaning to climb to her room, but her legs just wouldn’t bear her. Catching herself on the wall, she wept, “Attalus…”
“I have you, agae.”
Mighty arms swept her up, holding her to his warm chest. Leita buried her face there, listening to the twin drums of his hearts. She pressed one cheek to his skin and hid the other with her hand, muffling her sobs as Attalus bore them away.
Take care of her, lizard.
I will.
Between his quick pace and occasional bounding steps made greater by his wings, Attalus brought them to their bedchamber in what seemed like no time at all. The cool air of their quarters smelled like them, and Leita shuddered with relief.
“I can stand,” she mumbled, but Attalus wouldn’t hear it.
They dropped to the ground, where he settled against something and nestled her in his lap. The sounds of crashing waves and crying gulls reached her ears, the fresh sea breeze finding them up on their balcony.
Leita hadn’t the strength nor will to lift her head for a long, long time.
She clung to her mate and to their bond, almost greedy for the comfort and reassurance he quietly offered.
For the moment, he wasn’t angry with her, and she was grateful.
Any distance between them might break her after what she did.
Attalus let her soak his scales with her tears. He crooned and murmured to her, lullaby sounds and soothing nonsense that blessedly wrapped her battered heart in wool.