Chapter 66
That morning, shortly before the first bell rang, one of Faran's soldiers knocked on the door for the last time.
“The prince sends his regards,” he said before pushing a small piece of paper beneath the door.
I rose slowly from the chair, the very same seat I had dragged across the room that night after returning from the dark depths of Lysande’s dungeon, and stepped away from the wooden stand where his armor hung.
I dragged my weary body toward the door, my legs trembling violently from days of starvation, my head spinning from absolute lack of sleep.
Crouching beside the threshold, my fingers closed around the small, stained piece of paper, slick and soaked in half-dried blood
I clenched my jaw and let my head rest against the door when I realized it was the little piece of paper on which Lysande had written my name many times over. Now stained with his blood, taken after they had tortured him, there wasn't a single readable letter left on it.
“I will kill you for this. I hope you know it,” I said quietly to the soldier, and he laughed.
I saw his shadow move beneath the door, as though he had crouched down as well. “And that still wouldn't change the fact that your knight's head will end up on a spike,” he said before his shadow disappeared from beneath the door.
I crumpled the paper again and threw it somewhere across the floor before returning to the chair.
I had no tears left to cry and no words left to beg with. I had nothing.
Mindlessly, I began picking at my fingers, already scraped raw down to the flesh, and then my heart stopped.
The first bell rang.
I heard the soldier laughing outside, but instead of sadness, something else awakened inside me.
Anger.
With all the strength I could gather, I threw myself against the door and began begging. I promised things I could give and things I couldn't, but the soldier would only answer, “My prince is already offering me all of that.”
When I finally lost my strength, after nearly twenty minutes of beating against the door, his shadow approached again.
“You know, Princess, your savage was silent for the first few days, but my Prince possesses very exquisite ways of extracting what he desires,” he chuckled, and a violent knot tightened in my stomach.
“The little bird began to sing rather beautifully after the Prince brought out his favorite toys.”
I closed my eyes fiercely, trying to force the horrific images and phantom screams from my mind.
“Your knight told us the entire tale of how the two of you met. A truly sweet story. My heart nearly melted listening to his confession.”
“Stop,” I said, but he only continued.
“And he begged us to stop too. You truly should have heard him, Princess. Though perhaps Your Highness would have been thoroughly disgusted by the pathetic way he wept for mercy.” I clamped my hands tightly over my ears, trying to block out the venom of his tongue.
The bell seemed to be ringing inside my head. I felt trembling spread through every part of my skin, and my vision darkened. I lifted one hand in front of me and couldn't control my fingers.
Then, when the second bell rang, something inside me snapped. The soldier chuckled again like a hyena, but now my movements no longer felt like my own. My face turned by itself, as though someone were pulling it, toward Lys's chest plate hanging from the wooden stand.
The little shell gleamed in the morning light, while the one hanging around my neck seemed to begin burning against my chest. I pulled the necklace from my neck and, as though someone were dragging me toward the stand, walked over to it.
I stood there for a minute, staring at it, before my eyes fell to its lower edge.
Even though it was blunt, the bottom of the chest plate formed a point that extended downward.
My eye began twitching, and the ringing in my ears became unbearable.
I ripped the chest plate from the stand and charged at the door with all strength left in me.
It felt as though someone were there, someone pushing me to strike harder and harder, using his chest plate against the metal lock of the door.
“Princess, what are you doing?” a frantic voice asked from somewhere, but it seemed to be both inside the room and outside it. As though he were standing beyond the window and on the ceiling at the same time.
I screamed and struck for so long that another bell rang somewhere in the background.
Or perhaps it didn't. I don't know.
I couldn't see what I was doing anymore. Everything in front of me was black, and the only thing I could hear was metal striking metal.
My hands didn't hurt. I didn't feel tired.
There was absolutely nothing.
I didn't even feel the lock break away or the door opening. I didn't see when I threw myself onto the shocked soldier or when I ripped the helm from his face. I didn't know when I began striking his face in the same way until he stopped screaming beneath me.
Only then, when I tasted his hot blood in my own mouth and Lysande’s chestplate clattered against the stone floor, did the ringing finally cease. The darkness disappeared from my vision, and finally I could see my hands, bloody and battered from the blows.
The bell rang again, but I no longer knew whether it was the third or the fourth time.
I didn't even turn to look at the body behind me. I only ran toward the stables.
Dozens of people saw me; some began running toward my blood-soaked form while others fled in terror, but I did not stop until I reached the armory shed where my training bows were secured.
I snatched my bow, slung it over my shoulder, and shoved a full quiver of arrows onto my back.
Then, driven by a strength that felt entirely infinite, I ran toward the royal stables.
In front of the stable where my mare was kept, if they hadn't executed her as well, the stablemaster was grooming one of the royal horses. He stopped what he was doing when he saw me and tried to say something, but the ringing in my ears returned.
I jumped onto the horse's back, thankfully one accustomed to both the sounds of war and sudden movements, grabbed its mane, and kicked its sides.
I used its mane as reins and held on with my legs as tightly as I could to keep from falling.
We passed through the castle gates and onto the old road, the same road where, a hundred years ago, Sando, Lys, and I had once happily walked back from the city.
Now I rode it alone, bloodied and crazed.
Somewhere halfway there, when I could already see the open city gates and people entering and leaving, the final bell rang.
I yanked back on the horse's mane, forcing him to a sudden halt.
The stallion stepped backward, rearing slightly as he whinnied loudly into the morning air, but I barely felt the movement beneath me.
It felt as though one of my own arrows had pierced straight through my chest, freezing the blood in my veins.
I looked at the sky, then at the brilliant sea shimmering to my right.
I looked at the golden autumn leaves falling from the trees and the commoners harvesting wheat in the distant fields.
I looked at my hands bloodied from the violent promise I had just fulfilled, and then at the bow resting against my chest.
I tore it from my shoulder, gripped the wood tightly in my right hand, and drew a single arrow from the quiver.
Something cold passed through my soul, like a winter wind entering directly into my lungs. I struck the horse's flank once more.
Screams filled the narrow streets around me.
City guards lunged forward to intercept my path, only to recoil in terror when they recognized the royal breed of the stallion I rode.
Commoners fell beneath us, throwing their bodies into the dirt to avoid being trampled by the hooves, but I did not slow down.
The horse was panting heavily beneath me, forcing its way through a city that seemed to be overflowing with people.
As though everyone had come to watch my soul being torn in two at my harbor, on my promenade, beside my sea.
The crowds grew thicker as we neared the docks, making it nearly impossible for them to escape our path; but when the entrance to the harbor finally opened before us, I could see nothing ahead but a solid wall of thousands of people.
I couldn't see the execution stage, nor the water, only the towering masts of the ships and the sea of spectators.I wrenched the poor animal down a narrow alleyway I knew would lead to a secondary, smaller entrance to the promenade, and for a fleeting second, I slowed.
I found myself directly in front of the Tavern Under the Stairs.
The place where I had danced with him, where I had laughed, and where I had irrevocably fallen in love.
Anne stood outside her doors, staring blankly at my blood-spattered form, but her eyes held no recognition.
I simply pressed onward.
The cold gnawed at my skin, my cracked lips beginning to bleed from the wind, and from time to time a tear would fall from my eyes, but I simply continued.
I guided the stallion up the stone steps and then leapt down the short ledge with the beast.
Finally, I saw the glistening sea.
I saw the people.
I saw Sando standing on the wooden stage with his head lowered and Father speaking to the crowd.
I saw Faran, his head tilted back slightly, looking forward with a smirk, and the executioner holding his sword at his side.
And I saw Lys, his head resting against the stone railing of the stage.
My heart skipped.
I imagined one bell.
I still had time.
“...the knight who dishonored...”
I heard the words ahead of me as I turned the horse toward the stage and struck its side hard.
I drew the bowstring back until it cut into my jaw, placed my finger firmly against the feather of the shaft, and released the arrow directly toward the stage.