Chapter 96
Andrian didn’t move for hours.
The sun slowly set, crawling across the sky. The moons rose, bathing the clearing in pale silver-gold light. Melancholy birdsong returned before tucking away for the night.
Andrian hated all of it.
He hated the moons most of all.
The summer air stayed warm even when darkness fell. But the girl in his arms was too cold, too still. If he kept his gaze on her face, he might’ve been able to convince himself she was sleeping. She only ever looked this relaxed, this content, this youthful when she was asleep.
She was still too cold. He’d stroke her skin, desperate for that spark of fire, and the ruse would shatter like glass, oblivion claiming him again.
The stars were fully out, twinkling overhead, when a hand gripped his shoulder.
“Andrian.” Sebastian’s voice was soft and hoarse. “We need to move.” A pause. “We need to move them.”
Again, if Andrian tried hard enough, he could almost convince himself it was because they couldn’t all sleep out here. Summer storms weren’t uncommon; the smart thing to do was find shelter.
Almost.
He didn’t answer Sebastian with words. Everything was too numb and frozen in his chest. He’d been reduced to his baser self, surviving because his instincts wouldn’t let him die, but feeling none of what made a person alive.
Andrian simply stood, holding Mariah’s body to his chest, and started off down the worn path to Andburgh. He was aware of Sebastian following, carrying his brother, but offered no other acknowledgement.
There wasn’t anything to say, anyway.
They reached Andburgh’s ruined square, lit by the mocking light of those hateful moons. Andrian tilted his face skyward, reveling in the self-torment.
Those goddesses had saddled Mariah with a burden too great to bear. They’d passed their sins to a twenty-one-year-old woman who deserved a longer life than the one she’d been given, knowing all along that she would fail.
He hated them. He hated all of them, all those immortal fuckers who played with their lives like inconsequential ants.
He didn’t care if it was impossible. He would destroy them, even if it meant the end of himself.
His life mattered little now, anyway.
Though most of the buildings were burned or demolished, one still stood. Its simple wood door seemed to beckon in the moonlight, the last quiet refuge they would find.
They’d just found it too late.
The door was already ajar. Andrian pushed it open with his shoulder, taking care to pull Mariah tighter to his chest, sidestepping through the entryway so her feet weren’t caught on the frame.
The room beyond was furnished with several tables and chairs—likely some sort of tavern, before evil came to this place.
Andrian padded quietly to a long table near the back of the room. He gingerly laid Mariah down, her dark hair fanning behind her head, haloing her too-pale face.
He couldn’t tear his gaze from that face. He still found himself begging that her eyes would flutter open, that he’d get to see that incredible forest green again, flickering with silver-gold magic.
Sebastian similarly laid Matheo on a nearby table and collapsed heavily into a chair. He hung his head in his hands, fingers gripping tightly to his hair, his shoulders heavy and drooping.
Andrian knew he was overcome by grief. Knew he’d lost too much today, too.
But his heart was hardened, and he couldn’t find it in himself to be a friend. Not without her.
“We should bury them.”
Andrian hadn’t even realized he’d turned away from Sebastian until the other man spoke. Sebastian’s eyes were bloodshot and harrowed. He swallowed thickly, throat bobbing. “I’m sure you know of a good place nearby. A place she might’ve told you about. A peaceful place.”
He did know. He knew all the stories from Mariah’s childhood—all the places she used to venture with her brother, all the babbling streams where they’d swam in the summers, all the open glades where she’d galloped Kodie through the snow in winter.
But those stories, those places, belonged to him now. He was not particularly inclined to share.
Andrian turned his back on Sebastian, ignoring his exhale of frustration. “Andrian—”
Something thumped at the back of the room.
Sebastian shot to his feet, dagger already in hand. Andrian’s shadows had been quiet and still, but they finally stirred, reaching out like tentative fingers.
In the dim moonlight, he caught a glimpse of tattered white robes and dark, unbound hair.
“Anniliese Hareth.” His voice sounded dead and foreign to his ears. There was no life left.
The girl sobbed, curling herself tighter into a ball.
“You,” Sebastian snarled, charging past Andrian. Andrian halted him with an outstretched hand.
Dried blood stained her hairline. Her eyes were wild and crazed, tears heavy in her lashes.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, clutching her legs tighter to her chest. “They took her, and I couldn’t stop them. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” Her voice broke with another sob, as if the talking had set something free.
Slowly, Sebastian relaxed. Understanding spread across his face.
This girl was as much a victim of this terrible, gods-cursed day as they were.
“Do you know where—”
“It doesn’t matter.” Andrian’s interruption was biting. “None of it matters anymore.” He grabbed the back of a chair, pulling it across the floor. He set it with a thump beside Mariah’s head, dropping into it heavily.
This weariness of loss, this exhaustion of suffering…he just wanted it to end. But he also couldn’t leave.
To leave would admit that it was over, that she was gone. He wasn’t ready to do that yet.
Sebastian released a frustrated, strangled sound, before stomping into the back of the building.
There was a soft shuffling, then the quiet sound of slippered footsteps. Anniliese halted beside Andrian. She gasped softly.
“Is… Is she—”
“Don’t,” he choked out. “Don’t say it. Don’t ask it. Please.”
She fell silent, but her hands tremored at her sides.
Sebastian returned, carrying a simple shovel. He halted beside the table, pinning Andrian with a hard stare.
“I am going to bury my brother. You should do the same for—”
Andrian shoved up from his chair, Anniliese jumping back with a startled yelp. “You aren’t going to fucking touch her,” he snarled. “No one is.”
Sebastian’s expression softened, and gods, it made Andrian want to connect his fist with his face. “She’s gone, Andrian,” he murmured, like talking to a wild beast. “You can feel it. I know you can. There’s nothing else we can do.”
Andrian felt like a horse was standing on his chest, cracking open his ribs. He was sinking, buckling, swaying, dying—
“What are these?”
Anniliese’s question snagged something in him, pulling him from the caverns of his descent. He and Sebastian followed Anniliese’s pointed finger.
To the Marks on Mariah’s hands and forearms. They still faintly glowed and pulsed, opalescent rainbow light drifting off her skin.
Andrian answered on instinct.
“They’re from beings beyond gods. Creators of the gods, if what they said is true. They call themselves the Crieré…”
Realization struck him like the hard edge of a hammer. Wild, desperate hope bloomed with it, snaking through his ruined self like a winding, corrupted vine.
“Don’t, Andrian.” Sebastian’s stare was hard, as if he could read the pathways of Andrian’s thoughts. “Don’t do that to yourself. She is gone.”
Andrian’s fingers gingerly touched Mariah’s skin. He traced the glowing patterns, the way they pulsed beneath her skin. “Then why are the Marks still here? Magic can’t thrive without a host.”
He didn’t know if the Marks were even magic. Yet it was something. And something was all he had, the only raft he had in the dark abyss of his grief.
Sebastian shook his head. “You said it yourself. They were placed there by something greater than gods. We can’t possibly understand how things like that work.”
“We can’t?” Andrian was tired of this. Tired of trying to tell the one man who should be as desperate for this hope as he was. He walked around the table, halting in front of Sebastian. His hands flashed, ripping open the front of Sebastian’s shirt.
“Hey, what the fuck—”
“Look.” His finger drove into Sebastian’s chest, right over his heart. Sebastian’s gaze dropped, his eyes going wide.
“If it means nothing, then why is your Mark gone? Why is there nothing there but a scar?” He tugged down the collar of his own shirt.
His chest was the same as Sebastian’s—no more roaring dragon over his heart.
Only the raised, ragged scar, the only sign it hadn’t all been some crazed, delusional dream.
“Mine is gone, too. And I would bet every Armature—every Marked man back in Verith—is noticing the same loss.” He pointed back at Mariah’s prone form, at her still-glowing Marks. The words were tumbling from his mouth now, a dam set free.
“But why are hers still there? And not just on her skin, but glowing?”
Sebastian’s mouth opened and closed. His gaze darted between his chest, Andrian, and Mariah. His shoulders sagged, entire body drooping. “I don’t know,” he said quietly. Defeatedly.
Andrian was too manic to care.
He turned, padding back to Mariah. “Bury your brother.” He seated himself again in the chair beside Mariah’s head. “Do whatever you must. But you’re not touching her. No one touches her but me.”
Sebastian sighed. He leaned heavily on the shovel, using it almost like a cane.
“I have food,” Anniliese said quietly. “And water. I…” She paused, words catching on a sob. “This place was provisioned. Prepared. I know where they kept supplies.”
Sebastian nodded. “Thank you.” He rubbed at his face before glancing at his brother, grief etching grooves into his eyes. “I can wait until morning. Food and water for now is probably for the best.”
Anniliese disappeared into the back, reemerging a few moments later with salted meats, dried fruits, and a few skins of water. Sebastian sat again beside his brother, his stare glazed and unseeing.
Anniliese offered Andrian food and water. He refused.
He wasn’t hungry. He wasn’t thirsty.
He just needed to think.
Andrian settled into his vigil, searching desperately for a sign that his world wasn’t as over as it looked.