Chapter 49 Aiden
Aiden
All I heard was Kiera screaming. Endless and agonized, like her heart was being ripped from her chest.
I let go of the man I’d been helping into the hatch and whipped around.
Kiera held Maz in her lap, screaming and sobbing. He was so pale. So still. Blood covered his chest and side. An arrow.
Yarina and Sigrid stood frozen in shock, their weapons limp at their sides.
I stumbled toward my friend. My brother.
“No,” I rasped, cupping my hands around his wound. “No. We made it. We fucking made it, Mazkull. Everyone did. Just like you said. Don’t do this to me. Please.”
Kiera shook as she clutched him. As if she could keep his soul in his body if she just held on hard enough.
I continued to mumble to him. Trying to staunch the blood. Too much blood.
Another crash rocked the ship, and Skelly shouted something. But I couldn’t look away from Maz’s closed eyes and still face. I pressed my trembling fingers to his neck.
A faint pulse fluttered against my touch. He moaned something.
“Wake up, Mazkull,” I commanded him. “Open your eyes.”
His eyes slowly opened. “Brother . . . I’m sorry.”
“Don’t you fucking dare,” I snarled. “This isn’t goodbye, remember?”
“And it . . . never will be.” His eyes slid shut.
“No. No!” I threw my head back and roared in agony, shredding my throat.
Fucking Four, the pain. I’d never felt such pain. So deep no one could heal it, even if they tore me open.
His sisters dropped to their knees, sobbing. Kiera stared at him, glassy-eyed, like her horror had carried her away from her body entirely.
Another gods-damned barrel hit the railing near us, showering fire over the deck. I threw my body over Kiera’s and Maz’s. I barely felt the sizzle of my skin.
I rose to my feet, staring at our ship, frantically rowing toward the canyon. And then theirs. We would never make it out of here with that warship on our heels.
Limbs shaking with grief and rage, I stalked toward Nikella, whose spear dangled in her limp grasp. Tears laced her scar as she stared at Maz.
“Give me the last bomb,” I growled.
One of the bombs in the cavern had lost its fuse, so Nikella had grabbed it in case we needed it.
She looked at my bloody hand, then at the warship chasing us. “You can’t blow it up, Aiden.”
“I can and I will. Give it to me.”
“You’ll die.”
“I don’t care, gods damn it!” I shouted. “I will not stand by while we all die!”
Emotions warred in her eyes until nothing but resignation remained. She cupped my cheek in her hand. “A leader must always make sacrifices. A good leader knows which sacrifice to make.”
I frowned, her words not making sense. Grief and fear clouded my thoughts. “I am making the right sacrifice.”
For Kiera. For Maz. For his family that I’d sworn to protect. For the prisoners we’d saved and the warriors who’d fought for them.
I would do this for them all.
Another barrel crashed into the ship, which groaned and pitched. Cries sounded from below.
“Give it to me,” I said through clenched teeth.
Nikella straightened, her eyes sadder than I’d ever seen them.
“Aiden Falcryn, may you be a man like your father and as strong as your mother. May you be a king, the greatest among your ancestors. May you have love, as they did. Love that no knife, no arrow, not even a gods-damned war can break.” She glanced at Kiera, who stared at us with eyes swimming in pain.
I shook my head in confusion. “What are you . . . Why are you saying this?”
Nikella squeezed my hand once, the closest she ever came to a hug. “It’s what your mother told you as she lay dying,” she said, her voice strong. “I’ve fulfilled my promise to your mother. You were never alone. You were always loved. And you always will be.”
The reason finally dawned on my mind. “Nikella, don’t—”
Tears fell over her scars once more, flooding her eyes with light. “Tell Jek I love him, too.”
I grabbed at her arm, but she wrenched away and jumped over the railing. Her spear clanged to the deck.
“Nikella!” I shouted, rushing over to peer into the water.
She bobbed to the surface and immediately struck out for the warship.
I clung to the railing, tempted to jump after her.
Fucking Four, Nikella, why? Why?
A wave slammed her up against the warship, and she latched on. She pressed the last canister to the ship’s hull.
“I have to shoot it,” Sigrid said in a dull voice, coming to stand next to me. She’d lost her eye patch, her eye socket scratched and bloody.
She didn’t wait for my agreement. She simply loaded a burning arrow into her bow.
Don’t, please. There must be something else . . . She can’t die. I need to save her, too. I can’t lose someone else.
But the words wouldn’t rise to my mouth. This was Nikella’s choice. To protect me one last time. To save Rellmira.
Sigrid’s arms shook as she aimed at Nikella’s hand holding the canister in place. I could barely see Nikella’s eyes across the water, but I stared hard at her face. The only face I’d known my whole life.
Sigrid fired. The arrow landed next to Nikella’s hand.
Nikella yanked it out and shoved it into the canister.
My heart stilled. The explosion followed a moment later. A ball of heat and white flames ripped through the warship’s hull and bellowed against the walls of the trembling canyon.
The warship burned and sank, soldiers leaping off.
I swayed on my feet, unable to look away from the spot Nikella had been a moment ago.
My heart twisted and slowed. Too wounded. Too much loss.
“May the gods find your soul,” I whispered. “Please, Mynastra, carry her home.”
As soon as the words left my lips, a strange wind rose. A whispered song. It rushed through our ship and eased my pain for just a moment.
Skelly shouted in alarm as the ship hurtled through the water, twisting through the canyon as if guided by the cool, sweet, strong wind.
A wave swelled beneath us and tossed us out of the canyon, into the sea. Then it pulled away, rushing toward the cliffs. The stormy gray water rose higher and higher. The wind billowed and howled, and the cliffs trembled.
More people shouted in dismay, but I simply watched. I felt no danger.
Vicious waves crested like a thousand spears and stabbed at the cliffs. Their harsh faces shattered, spilling out black stone like blood. It tumbled into the roiling sea with a great sigh.
Violet clouds darkened to obsidian between one breath and the next. Bolts of lightning darted out like Nikella’s spear, impaling the cliffs. They shrieked and crumbled.
The army encampment—a smudge on the cliffs—fell into the furious sea.
The battle between sea and sky raged until the waves swallowed every trace of Calimber.
Mynastra had reclaimed her night sky.
The sun parted the black clouds, lighting upon a glittering sea—and a rough cliff face bisected by a jagged scar. Just like Nikella’s.
Perhaps it wasn’t. Perhaps I’d imagined it all. Perhaps it was simply a strange storm.
But I chose to believe it was a goddess honoring the sacrifice of a Teacher who spent her life defeating monsters.
I staggered away from the railing, ignoring the open-mouthed expressions of everyone on deck.
I collapsed next to Kiera, who still held Maz.
Tears poured down her cheeks. “He’s still breathing.”
And Maz continued to breathe. All the way to Yargoth.