Chapter 56 Valerie
Val had fantasized about kissing Caruso more times than she’d care to admit, but in all her steamy imaginings, she’d never pictured it quite like this: in the heart of a warring city, within spitting distance of a dead Strix.
‘Fuck.’ He growled against her lips, sliding his hands into her hair. Hands that had just killed people. In front of her. Why did she find that so attractive?
Caruso was a good kisser. So good Val curled her fists in his collar and nipped impatiently at his bottom lip.
He chuckled as he deepened their kiss, his tongue meeting hers in a rush of hot aching need.
Saints help her, she groaned. Part of her wanted to devour him right there on the street but it was impossible to ignore the screams of a city in revolt.
Her duty as a saint was to try and save it.
She broke away with a gasp. Raked her curls back. ‘Right. That was… well.’
Caruso stared at her, panting.
Why was he looking at her like that?
Those lethal blue eyes were scrambling her thoughts.
She frowned. ‘We need to… There are things we have to do.’
‘I found the thing I want to do.’
She gave him a flat look. ‘I meant saving the city.’
‘Fuck the city, let’s go home.’
She snorted as she pushed past him, enjoying the heat of his gaze as he trailed after her.
A fresh chorus of screams made her jerk her chin up. The townsfolk were fleeing south towards the harbour as Andreas’s soldiers spilled onto Merchant’s Way. There were thousands of them, and all wearing the same glazed expression. Enthralled.
Val broke into a run but Caruso lunged, pulling her back. ‘Where the hell do you think you’re off to?’
‘They’re going to kill everyone!’ she said, fighting his hold.
‘And what? You’re going to get yourself killed, out of solidarity?’
‘I’m going to yell some sense into them!’
He measured a sigh. ‘Can you not be reckless right now?’
‘You’re always reckless.’
‘I pull it off.’
‘Let me go!’ she shouted.
‘No.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I fucking care about you, that’s why!’
Her eyes went wide. ‘You can’t just say shit like that.’
He cocked a brow. ‘What are you going to do about it?’
The fight went out of her. She stilled in his arms, clutching him a little tighter. ‘I care about you too,’ she hissed. ‘But if you tell anyone, I’ll kill you.’
She’d never seen him smile so wide.
‘I have to get to Sera.’ She spoke with mounting urgency. ‘The sooner Andreas is unmade, the sooner this hell-storm goes away.’
They went north together, Caruso swinging at anyone who dared glance her way, while Val screamed above the rising chaos. Magic poured from her like a song.
‘Think for yourself, soldiers of Valterre!
Rip the Silver-tongue’s veil from your eyes and protect this city, as you once swore!
Your people are frightened!
Your people are in danger!
They need your protection!’
For every soldier Val lassoed back to their senses, ten more charged at her. Caruso beat them back with ruthless efficiency, but the Saint of Warriors was no match for the numbers that swarmed Merchant’s Way.
They were soon surrounded.
Anouk ran after them, ripping up the cobbles in a fury.
The others flanked her with whatever weapons they’d gathered from the cobbles, fighting their way through the fray.
Chunks exploded all around them. Buildings trembled as the Stone Maiden tore through the earth, making a ditch so deep the charging soldiers toppled into it.
And still they came. Compelled to march and kill at any cost, they filled the hole with their bodies, while their fellow soldiers used them like a bridge.
It bought them precious minutes, enough time for the townsfolk to flee to the harbour or lose themselves in the winding laneways along Merchant’s Way.
It gave Caruso time to recover, but the reckless brute didn’t take it.
He fought on, sustaining hit after hit, shoving ever closer to Traveller’s Arch, until, with the suddenness of a lightning strike, the Rose-bearers stilled.
Thousands of swords hit the cobbles as they came undone, stalling in the streets like blank-eyed mannequins.
The townsfolk kept running, but there was no one to chase them now.
‘What’s happening?’ Val’s voice echoed in the sudden quiet.
The beginning of the end, whispered the old voice, and she knew, without quite knowing how, that Andreas was being unmade.
‘All saints,’ said Anouk, turning slowly on her heel. ‘It must be working.’
Val smiled.
Then the world went black.
Death came from the north, swallowing the arch. The wind turned to ice and brought with it the scent of ash. Decay.
Val’s stomach turned. ‘Shade.’
It yawned across the sky.
Death rides on the north wind, warned the old voice.
Well, no shit.
Her magic squirmed. Within the encroaching dark, Val sensed a group of figures, sauntering onto Merchant’s Way. The last of Andreas’s defected Daggers.
Together, they had ingested and built a wall of Shade that would kill every soul on Merchant’s Way.
‘There,’ she said, marking them in the moving dark.
‘Stay behind me, kitten.’ Caruso palmed his sword, vaulting ahead. ‘I’m about to introduce Fatebringer to some old friends.’
‘If you’re stabbing, then I’m stabbing,’ said Nadia, twin daggers in hand. ‘Let’s put this damn Order to bed, once and for all.’
As the clamour of swordfight died out across the city, the saints of Fantome went into the maw of death itself.