Chapter 67
Amryn
Amryn’s heart thudded a vicious rhythm as she stared at the knights and the high cleric standing in front of her. She wanted to slam the door. Lock it. But that wouldn’t protect her from the knights and their damning accusation.
“You’ve been a very difficult empath to find.”
Despite the ringing in her ears, she forced surprise into her expression. “What are you talking about? I’m not an empath.”
“I should have known,” Lisbeth said quietly. “Your resemblance to your mother is uncanny, after all.”
Amryn stared at the female cleric, shock freezing her blood. Lisbeth had known her mother was an empath?
“The fault is mine,” Renault said grimly. “I interviewed her myself.”
“Still, I should have said something,” Lisbeth said, her tone contrite. Her eyebrows pulled together as she stared at Amryn. “I think I wanted to see Ferrin in you. And when you passed your interview, I thought . . .” Her eyes darkened. “But no. You’re as much a witch as your mother was.”
Rhone’s jaw ticked, his face more remote than Amryn had ever seen it. “Her trickery fooled us all.”
Behind her, Felinus pushed to his feet. “There has been some mistake. Lady Vincetti is not—”
“You were not as careful as you thought, Cleric,” Renault interrupted.
“I knew you were scurrying about Esperance researching bloodstones. I also know from my investigation at the temple that you befriended Lady Vincetti while she was there.” He arched a dark brow.
“I don’t believe in coincidences, Felinus.
My suspicions were already strong, but when I made my report to Lisbeth tonight and she told me Amryn’s mother was an empath, well .
. . the pieces fell into place. Rhone can even attest that when he sensed an empath in the city, Amryn was there.
Just as you were with Princess Sadia when she was healed. ”
A tremble shook through her. When Renault stepped into the room, she took a hurried step back. They mirrored each other, Rhone and Lisbeth advancing behind him.
“Bloodstones are rarely discussed, even among the knights,” Rhone’s father said, his tone disturbingly conversational.
“But among the leaders of the Order, an interesting fact is known: a bloodstone has the ability to shield an empath from our detection. Bloodstones are so rare, however, it was never deemed necessary to share that information.”
The senior knight drew to a stop before them. Amryn was now standing beside Felinus, and his hand flashed out to catch her arm. He tugged her behind him.
Renault’s upper lip curled, derision sharpening his gaze. “I expected better from a former knight.”
Felinus’s fingers bit deeper into Amryn’s arm, then suddenly his grip loosened. “And I would expect nothing less from a monster like you, Renault.” Without warning, Felinus drew a knife and leapt at the senior knight. “Run!” he barked at Amryn.
She fell back a step, but there was nowhere to go. Rhone had shifted to block her from the main door, and the balcony would only trap her further.
Lisbeth cried out as Felinus swung his blade, but Renault easily dodged the older man’s attack.
In a motion so fluid it must have been practiced for years, Renault drew his own blade as he spun, and he buried it in Felinus’s back.
The old cleric stumbled, gasping from the blow.
“No!” Amryn cried. She dropped to her knees beside Felinus’s crumpled form, her chest filled with agony as she watched him struggle to breathe. Oh, Saints, had a lung been punctured?
It didn’t matter. She had the bloodstone. She could heal—
An arm snagged around her waist, dragging her harshly from the floor. Her back slammed into Rhone’s chest as he caught her in a fierce hold, drawing her back from Felinus.
“No!” she shouted. “Let me help him!”
Rhone’s grip only tightened.
Panic ripped through her, hazing her vision.
She bucked wildly against Rhone’s hold, but she couldn’t break it.
She couldn’t even calm herself enough to use the training Carver had drilled into her.
Desperation made her wild. Felinus was dying and they wouldn’t let her help him—even though they knew she had the power to heal him.
Because they knew she was an empath. A chill wracked her.
“You never said you were going to kill him,” Lisbeth’s voice rose from somewhere behind her.
“Sinners deserve to be punished. It is the only way they can be forgiven.” Her voice changed slightly as she intoned, “Those with the higher knowledge suffer the higher wrath—salvation will only be possible if they pay the higher price. Felinus deserved a chance to atone.”
“Clearly, he didn’t want a chance at penance,” Renault said calmly. “He knew what he was doing by attacking a knight.”
Felinus’s breaths were so strained now, every inhale and exhale was labored. His hand twitched, reaching toward her. His eyes were wide. Pained. Afraid.
Afraid for her. That only created new fissures in her breaking heart.
She strained against Rhone’s hold, but he subdued her with too little effort. A new wave of dizziness hit her. This time, it was coated with a growing fogginess.
“You won’t be able to fight much longer,” Rhone said. His solid arms were wrapped around her torso, pinning her arms uselessly to her sides.
Her heart drummed madly as she continued to buck against his restraining grip. But her movements . . . they were growing sluggish. Just like her thoughts.
And then she realized something horrifying.
She was in pain because she was watching Felinus suffer, but she wasn’t actually feeling his agony. She couldn’t feel any of the emotions in the room. How long had that been true?
And the bloodstone . . . the thrumming pulse was quieting with every rapid breath she sucked in. What was happening to her?
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the food spread on the table along with the two tall glasses, still holding wine.
Her stomach dropped. The dizziness they’d both felt . . .
They’d been poisoned.
“Yes,” Renault said, as if reading her thoughts. Or had she spoken aloud? “It was in the wine,” he explained. “It will render anyone unconscious, but it also subdues an empath’s abilities.” He gave her a slight smile. “An unconscious empath is much easier to transport.”
Amryn was shaking in Rhone’s hold now. “Wh-Why . . .?” She couldn’t even find the words to ask her question. Her thoughts were slowing—stuttering.
Renault moved to stand in front of her, his dark eyes locking on hers. “There is no point in fighting. It’s better for us all if you realize you’ve already lost. We don’t want you to damage yourself in a pointless fight. What good would you be to us then?”
Her panic was near blinding. Her fate was in the hands of monsters, and that was utterly terrifying—her worst nightmare—but Felinus was bleeding out on the floor.
He didn’t have long. She was still trying to fight against Rhone, though her movements were weakening at an alarming rate.
“Please,” she gasped. “I can still save him.” She honestly didn’t know if that was true.
Her empathic sense was gone. Her connection to the bloodstone was waning, barely there—
The bloodstone.
With the bloodstone, she didn’t need to touch Felinus to heal him. If she could access its power, she could heal him from across the room. Just like she’d healed everyone in Esperance.
Her arms were pinned, but her hand fumbled to enter her pocket. Her fingertips brushed against the stone, even as she closed her eyes and reached desperately toward the bloodstone’s faint pulse.
It was like trying to hold onto a fistful of water. Impossible. Her connection with the bloodstone had been muted by the drug they’d given her.
Felinus exhaled one last reedy breath, then went still.
Through the fog in her mind, Amryn barely felt the empathic backlash of his death. But her heart? It shattered. Tears poured down her cheeks, a sob caught in her throat. Felinus was dead. Killed because he’d tried to defend her.
Renault didn’t even seem aware that the man he’d stabbed had stopped breathing. His focus was aimed at Rhone. “I want you to remain in the capital and handle things here. Dispose of his body quietly. No need for anyone to know about this mess. I’ll take her and the bloodstone to the Tower.”
Even through her heart-wrenching grief and the spreading numbness, Amryn reacted to that revelation.
The Tower. The headquarters of the knights.
Felinus’s words from long ago about empaths in the Tower floated through her hazing mind.
“They break them. Completely. And still they hurt them, even when the empath is no longer sane and can only give them screams.”
Tremors wracked Amryn’s body. No. That couldn’t be her fate. And yet, the fullness of Felinus’s fear for her suddenly made sense.
Terror and resolve merged. She wasn’t going to let Renault take her. She would fight, just as she’d promised Carver she always would.
But her body and mind were failing. She couldn’t break free like he’d taught her.
She couldn’t fight . . . The ring. Why hadn’t she thought of it before?
She used her thumb to rotate the emerald ring on her finger, then tried to find the disguised latch with her thumbnail.
She just needed to free the needle. Then she could pierce Rhone’s flesh and run.
A distant voice in her mind yelled for her to wait, to use the ring later when she had more strength to run. But she didn’t know what poison swam in her veins, or how long she would be unconscious. She didn’t know what would happen to her once she was dragged from this room. She had to act now.
The corner of her nail caught the latch. She felt the gemstone spring back. She twisted in Rhone’s arms, using all her strength to loosen his hold just enough so she could grab for his hand—