Chapter 33 Elena
ELENA
Never trust the happy hero. They are a myth.
—a Sesharian proverb
Samson was staring at her, his face haggard, his mouth slightly agape as if he had come up for air and sucked in water. Inwardly, Elena smiled. She relished his displeasure, though something chafed within her ribs. It hurt to see his surprise.
I would never abandon my people to you, she thought. Had he underestimated her so poorly?
“Syla.” She turned away from Samson with more force than she intended. “Could you tell me why we’re discussing bargains with Farin?”
“Farin wants to call the council,” Syla said.
Elena stilled. Her heart, which had already begun to double its pace at the sight of Samson, now thundered. “It’s a trick.”
“I assure you, Elena, it is not,” Syla said with a bitter smile. “Your men succeeded in destroying the mines, and we’ve forced Farin to come to the table—in a way. Farin comes with his own… terms.”
“What are they?” When no one answered, Elena found her gaze returning to Samson. He avoided her eyes. “What did you do?”
He said nothing for a long moment. She could sense his Agni fidgeting, as if it was crumbling within itself.
Elena saw now the deep shadows that carved hollows beneath his eyes and cheekbones.
The sallowness of his skin. There was almost something insubstantial about him—like a great oak withered down to a stalk, shaking in the wind.
She almost reached out to touch him, but then Samson met her gaze, and she stopped.
“We couldn’t save the miners,” Samson said. His voice was barren. “We had to escape ourselves, so we left them. Four hundred of them. They died from either the fire or the quakes. Now Farin’s rounding up Sesharian children into camps as punishment.”
Elena stared at him, horror, black and thick, pressing her voice into a whisper. “Why couldn’t you stop the fires?”
Samson flinched. His lower lip trembled, whether in anger or sorrow, she could not tell.
“You don’t think I tried?” he said, and she heard the familiar sting of his words, the sharp edge of his ire that she had come to know intimately. She rose to it. At least this she knew, not the broken, haunted man he pretended to be. Violence and pain fed his Agni, as much as grief fed hers.
“You can control the Eternal Fire, but you can’t stop infernos of your own making?
Mother’s Gold, Sam! What were you thinking?
They were people, your people! And you buried them.
” She had hoped that the tragedy would happen only once, that they would learn—amend—but her failure in Magar had only been doubled.
Warped into something more sinister, more treacherous.
She whipped around to Chandi, who stood with a stiff chin, her eyes narrowed.
“Where is Visha? What happened to having the most cunning strategist in the world?”
“It is a tragedy all around, Elena, and we are all sorry for it,” Syla cut in.
“But Farin is on the move, and it would be a disservice to those men and women if we stand around bickering and pointing out each other’s faults.
However deep they run.” He cast a glance at Samson.
Elena found her gaze wandering past Samson, to the man and woman who stood like shadowed wings.
“And who are you?”
The bearded man smiled. “Well, we’re the Arohassin, darling.”
Instantly, she dropped her hand to her waist, her palm warming, heat razoring up her spine as she called for the guards, for Syla to step back, but the old king shouted and Chandi yelled at her to stop.
Samson stood, watching her. And then he laughed.
High and thin, like a madman.
His laughter cut through the courtyard with the force of an arrow splitting through the unexpecting throat of a hare.
Elena froze. They all did, save for the bearded man and the woman. The man smiled with a degree of self-pleasure that made her skin crawl. The woman watched Samson with a crude fascination as if he were a specimen to be analyzed. She did not know who to fear more.
“Gods, Elena, you have missed so much.” Samson grinned, his eyes dead like stagnant pools of festering waters.
“Thanks to your little rendezvous with the Yumi, I had to seek help from them. Speaking of. Where are your feared warriors?” He turned, calling.
“Oh great madams, where are you? Come quick! Our queen is afraid of our visitors.”
Elena straightened, hands curling into fists. “That’s enough.”
“Come, come! We need your help. Apparently, we’re shit at protecting our own.”
“I said that’s enough!” she snarled.
Samson whipped around, lightning quick, and she flinched at the sudden movement, hands rising in defense. His eyes fell to her palms. Guilt flickered across his face before he killed it like an ember smothered. “So you failed too.”
She bristled at his tone. “Not quite.”
“Did the Yumi agree to show for the council? Did they pledge help?” Syla asked. The Arohassin woman perked up at this, though she remained quiet.
Elena hesitated. Samson was watching her with a new alertness, and she wondered if he felt it too. The feather warming in her pocket. She withdrew it and held it up.
“Their high priestess gave me this.”
“What is that?” Syla drew closer. “A feather?”
“I believe it’s a powerful token,” she said and remembered the high sister’s instructions.
Give it to the one they call Prophet, and his Agni can be yours for the taking.
Slowly, she held it out to Samson. The feather grew warmer as he approached, and at the same time, she felt her Agni snap alert.
A sudden hum thrilled through her bones, as if her blood had awakened, heightened.
And with it, an irritational fear. It spidered down her spine, hooking its long legs into her ribs, and pulled slowly. She ignored it.
“Take a look,” she said.
Samson reached for the feather.