Chapter 31 #2
“You’re here, aren’t you?” I counter harshly. “Seems to me like you fell for it.” The light in his eye flickers with malevolent ice as he stalks forwards. Tahira grabs my arm, pulling me closer to her side, her sword drawn and pointed at the descending brute. Nouis smirks at her.
“I’ve been wanting to kill you for a long time.” He’s practically salivating at the sentence. “Fate is rewarding me tonight.”
“Or perhaps he just wants you to shut up!” Idris shouts from the flat roof of an old building stretching above the viewing platform.
Beside him is a handful of Halician soldiers, in their grasp the missing two cardinals with swords to their throats.
Idris has a bow in his hand, ready to fire and trained on Nouis. Nouis doesn’t seem bothered.
“We both know you can’t shoot, Patricelli,” Nouis says, smirking.
“Maybe that’s changed,” Idris fires back hotly. “Step away from my Fated.”
Nouis practically roars, his entire body twitching at Idris’s claim.
“You’d never harm her, never even risk it,” Nouis sneers back, gesturing to me with his sword. “While she is within my grasp, I own her. Meaning I own you!”
“Step back! Now!” Idris’s voice betrays his panic as he bellows into the dark. Nouis laughs, his repugnant glee cracking against shadows and spectres.
“Or what? You’ll kill them?” he says, swiping his hands viciously through the night air towards the captured cardinals.
“Do it! Do it and let’s get the bloodshed started!
Down here it’s still two against thirty.
Your silly little bow and arrow don’t change a thing!
I’ll kill them both before you can find your mark.
I’ll start with your war bitch, and you can watch! ”
I look to Lysa, who’s tensely watching me like a hawk. She’s on tenterhooks, waiting for me to meet her eye. To give our signal. To expose the biggest gamble I have ever taken.
Is Lysa with him, seduced by his arguments and letters? Or did she stick to the plan? Is she still with us?
I nod sharply.
“Now,” I shout, grabbing hold of Tahira and pulling her back several steps. Not a second is wasted.
Thunder cracks open the night in a flurry of violence.
The war screams as the Coari soldiers erupt with the lethal slashing of their blades.
Before the Church Militia can react, blood spills across the old stonework.
Swords coated fresh crimson seek new victims. Surprised shouts break and die on the frozen air.
Nouis’s face falls as he staggers back a step and brings his sword to face the violence before him.
“No!” he roars, lifting his sword and making to swipe for the closest Coari soldier. Bash charges forwards and in a display of lethal brilliance, breaks Nouis’s nose before knocking the sword from Nouis’s hand. It spins and scutters across the stone floor.
The remaining cardinal is subdued – a Coari mercenary I can’t name presses a blade against his neck as they kneel in the dead grass and old stone. Nouis is shaking, hands empty as a cold sweat shines across his skin.
“You vicious little traitor!” screams Nouis, his shrill rage cracking at my nerves as he hurls his anger upon Lysa who is grinning with wicked triumph.
“Are you truly shocked, Rizaro?” mocks Lysa with thick derision, entirely unruffled by the turn of events she’s been expecting for months. With a pretty smirk, she saunters to my side. “You of all people should know better. A Di Maineri can never be trusted.”
“You—” Nouis spits his venom as Bash leaps forwards, grabbing hold of him and forcing the monster onto his knees on the cold stone.
“You … you’re with us…?” Tahira’s mouth falls open in shock, like she can barely believe it.
“Always have been. This was the plan from the start,” Lysa answers warmly, and at that Tahira turns her gaze to me. It brims with betrayal and hurt. The silent accusations spilling from her eyes as my guilt clogs up my throat.
“I left a letter,” says Bashran with a confused frown. “Explaining—”
“I burned it,” Lysa says as Bash scowls. “The smaller the circle of trust, the harder it is to break.”
“I’m sorry, Tahira. But we know there are spies everywhere in Halice.” I speak quietly. “If you weren’t properly angry, word would’ve got back to Nouis. I couldn’t risk that.”
Bash swears, but a crooked smile filters over his face as he regards his leader.
“You didn’t actually think I’d betray you, Tahira?” Bash almost laughs, as he winks at her. “I’m actually offended.”
At that moment, Idris races onto the platform. I’m swallowed by the fire of his presence as he sprints to my side, taking me in his biting embrace. He clutches the side of my face with blistering fingers, scanning me up and down like a river of searing flames.
“Are you alright?” he demands, acid ripping through his throat.
“Of course she is,” answers Lysa brightly. “She’s a Di Maineri.”
Idris looks like he can’t decide if he should gut my cousin or hug her.
“Did you know? About this false betrayal plan?” demands Tahira, and Idris sighs, dropping his head before turning to face her.
“Yes,” Idris admits.
“Only after,” I tack on quickly, it’s not fair for him to take this heat. “This was my plan, my execution. I only filled him in after they’d left.”
Idris hadn’t been happy about it at all.
In fact, he’d stormed off in a seething fury for several hours, but at that point it was far too late.
Everything was underway. Idris was right from the start, I did take the power in Halice with a plan in mind.
Sending Fiora to invite Lysa here to be the front.
But it was all set in motion when I thought Idris would die.
When it was just my relationship with his friends that would be damaged by the fallout.
I was willing to make that sacrifice for Halice. Idris shouldn’t have to.
“You could’ve told me!” Tahira shouts angrily at one of her oldest friends. Idris looks pained.
“I’m his Maestrus and I told him not to,” I say finally, stepping between the furious mercenary and my Soulhate.
“We vetted each man we took with us. You inspire so much loyalty, Tahira, and we had to take only the most devoted,” Lysa explains victoriously. “Those we knew wouldn’t give us away, those who would obey the order when we told them to set the whole camp on fire. Speaking of…”
Lysa looks over her shoulder and I follow her gaze.
Across the rippling ford, against the backdrop of navy and violet night, the black and white encampment is in complete chaos. Fires, slaughter, screaming. An explosion erupts from its centre, followed by three more.
“There goes food and medical,” Lysa muses, the fires glowing like memories in her eyes.
“That’s why you took the explosives,” I say. The relief in my heart that she hadn’t truly turned to the enemy is palpable. I should’ve known better; Fiora would never have recommended her if she didn’t think Lysa was up for the challenge.
“I thought it would make the job a little easier if we had some secret explosives,” says Lysa. “After all, the Red Bannerhood are very skilled but still outnumbered.”
It’s been the biggest gamble of this war, but it has paid off.
Losing those men, making our armies appear smaller …
it could’ve ended in disaster far, far worse than this.
Not only that, but the pain in Tahira’s face.
The outrage, the hurt… I’ve damaged a treasured friendship beyond repair.
But I couldn’t risk the exposure. Or her meddling in the outcome.
“You conniving, deceitful little—!” Nouis spits, thrashing forwards as Bash forces him back, harshly back to his knees. I level a hateful glare at him, barely containing my absolute loathing as I see the monster that tried to destroy my entire world.
On his knees before me, the stain on humanity that he is looks so pathetic. Cornered, declawed, he’s a snivelling shell of the demon that had stalked my nightmares both day and night.
“Say a word against my cousin and I’ll take your tongue, before taking your life,” I snap, realising we’ve done it. Somehow this foolhardy plan has actually worked.