Chapter 36
Cyra
The next morning, I stepped inside the room next to the training yard to find Praya and Ariel already waiting there.
The Citadel guards often used the room if they needed to change before training or store any of their gear, but we’d made sure it was empty earlier, and Bressen had used his mind power to clear everyone out of the area until we were done.
“Are you ready?” I asked Praya. “Do you have everything you need?”
“The only thing I need is the bone,” she said.
“How close do you have to be?”
“Not close,” Praya said. “Probably thirty feet. You can put up an obfuscation glamour so no one will see us?”
“Bressen will do it,” I told her. “He’s better at them than I am.”
“Then I’m ready whenever you are,” she said.
I nodded then paused. “I…have something to ask you,” I said.
Praya sighed deeply, as if she already knew what I was going to ask. I went on anyway.
“My father,” I started, but she cut me off.
“Cyra, I can’t bring your father back,” she said.
I’d spoken with Praya a lot on the trip back from the island. She was a good listener, and I’d told her most of my story by the time we got close enough to land to portal, so she knew I’d recently lost Aramis. What she didn’t know was that I still had a piece of him.
“But you can,” I insisted.
I fished quickly in the pocket of my pants for the paper butterfly I always kept with me now. I’d had a small leather wallet made for it, only a couple inches with a pocket inside to keep the butterfly from slipping out, and I carefully removed the paper to hold it in my palm.
“This is a piece of my father,” I said. “I transfigured his body when we had the funeral. If you need me to, I can change it back into…”
I trailed off. Into what? It had never occurred to me to think what piece of my father this had been. If I tried to change it back, would the thing change into a fingernail? A piece of his liver? An eyeball? Some skin?
Thinking about it suddenly made me a little sick, but I took a deep breath to quell the nausea and looked at Praya.
“Please,” I said softly. “It’s my fault he’s dead.”
She gave me an empathetic look.
“Cyra, even if I could recreate your father’s body, there’s no mind or soul to put into it. Your father’s spirit has passed on.”
My stomach turned to lead, and tears sprung to my eyes, but I blinked them away.
“But maybe-”
“Cyra,” she cut in gently, “even if there was a way to fully restore your father, I wouldn’t do it.
Once the Nemesis has taken a soul, that soul can’t return.
There would be grave consequences for bringing back a soul the Nemesis has already taken.
The Nemesis wouldn’t react kindly to us meddling in this. ”
“I’m bonded to the Nemesis,” I said. “I’m sure I could-”
“No, you couldn’t,” she said, exasperated now. “I understand you’re in pain and you think bringing your father back will fix what happened, but it won’t. There are rules to the natural order, and I won’t break them.”
“Aren’t we breaking them to bring back Morland?” I asked.
“No, we’re actually setting things right,” she insisted.
“Morland was the one who broke the rules when he refused to fully die. The Nemesis tried to claim him over twenty-five years ago, but Morland defied that claim. His continued existence is an afront to the gods. The only reason I agreed to help you is because bringing Morland back now to kill him fixes a mistake that was made a quarter century ago.”
A feeling of stone crept up my throat, much like Samhail’s gargoyle form crawled over his skin when he shifted. I tried to swallow down my grief, but I couldn’t.
“I brought Bressen back from the dead,” I told her. Tears broke free from my eyes and trickled down my face. “Sandrian struck him with lightning, and he died. He wasn’t breathing. His heart wasn’t beating, but I revived him. He came back.”
My voice was drenched in desperation. Praya closed her eyes, and I knew she was losing patience with me, but I had to try one last time. If what she’d said was true, I wouldn’t have been able to bring Bressen back.
“I don’t profess to be a healer or to know everything about the line between life and death,” Praya said, “but as I understand it, the soul doesn’t leave the body immediately upon death.
In most cases, there’s a short period where the body, mind, and soul all still live, even if the heart no longer beats or the person no longer breathes.
It’s possible Bressen wasn’t fully dead when you revived him. ”
She gave me a firm look, and the resolution in her eyes shattered me. I let out a sob, but Praya was no longer in the mood to be merciful.
“Your father is dead, Cyra. Fully dead,” she said. “He belongs to the Nemesis now, and I won’t take what the Nemesis has claimed. Nor should you try. You especially. If you attempt to go against the Nemesis, you risk severing your bond with it, and the consequences could be severe.”
I pursed my mouth and tried to get control of myself, but my lips quivered with grief. That had been my last hope.
Praya clasped her hands on my shoulders, and I looked at her through bleary, tear-filled eyes. Her face had finally softened.
“Please, Cyra,” she said, a modicum of compassion returning to her voice.
“I know you’re in pain, but take it from someone much older and more experienced than you.
Being a syphon doesn’t mean unlimited power or the latitude to do whatever we want.
Our positions come with a heavy responsibility, and there are penalties for not heeding that. ”
I nodded, not because I understood or agreed, but because I couldn’t bear to discuss it anymore. I closed the butterfly back in its wallet and slipped it into my pocket again. I wiped my eyes to dispel the last of my tears and blew my nose into a handkerchief Praya handed me.
Bressen appeared in the doorway of the room.
“Are we ready?” he asked. “Everyone is…”
His words fell away when he saw my face.
“Cyra, what’s wrong?” he asked, striding toward me. He looked sharply at Praya. “What did you do?” he snapped at her.
“Nothing,” I cut in quickly. “She didn’t do anything.”
Or more specifically, she wouldn’t do anything, and that was part of the problem. My breath stuttered in my chest as I exhaled deeply.
“I just…” I broke off and threw myself against Bressen’s chest. He wrapped me in his arms, and I gave in to silent sobs.
I felt the anger roiling inside Bressen and knew he was likely still glaring at Praya, but I spoke into his mind.
I wanted to bring Aramis back, but it’s not possible, I said to him.
The tension in his body eased as understanding sunk in, and his arms tightened around me.
When I pulled away a minute or so later, Praya and Ariel were gone, having left to find a place to wait while I pulled myself together. Again.
Gods, I was so tired of crying.
“You don’t have to be here when we do this if you don’t want,” Bressen said quietly to me.
“Yes, I do,” I said. “Samhail and Talyn need to believe I’m the one working the magic that restores Morland’s body. I doubt they’ll believe you can do it.”
Bressen canted his head to concede the point.
“Besides, I need to see this through,” I said. “I need to be sure Morland is gone once and for all.”
He sighed. “Very well. Praya and Ariel should be in place now. I put the obfuscation glamour on them the second they left the room.”
I nodded. “Let’s go then.”
Bressen turned, and I followed him out of the room, down the hall, and out into the training yard. Surgeon and Serise had been stationed just outside the entrance to the yard, and they fell into step behind us now.
I took in the scene that awaited us. Morland stood silently in the yard, while Samhail and Talyn stood a few steps away from him, both of them looking rigid and anxious.
I took note of how closely they stood to each other and how Samhail had positioned himself between Talyn and Morland as if to shield her from him.
Not that Morland would be able to do anything. Bressen had taken control of his mind again, and he stood placidly in his borrowed body as if he were waiting for a play or sporting match to start.
Across from him, Jasper was anything but placid. He looked as though he was about to jump out of his skin, and beside him, Maziren stood so coiled with tension I was sure she’d snap any second now and kill us all.
I flinched when Samhail’s voice cut the silence.
“Cyra? Are you alright?”
I looked up at him and tried to work a smile onto my face. He could clearly see I’d been crying. “I’m fine. Let’s get started.”
I stepped forward and placed the bone we’d retrieved on the ground in front of Morland.
In a few minutes we’d either be rid of Morland for good, or Aidan would be lost to us forever.
Tandem Read: Go to Clash of Stone and Steel (Bk 3), Chapters 44-47