Chapter 25
One thing rang clear through our platoon as we cleared brush and hefted the first of two heavy gates barring our path into the bowels of the keep: Adoel Nicosia could not escape.
If we found him, if we stopped him, this would be the turning point of the war. This could be the beginning of the end.
The archers had been told to watch for him.
Being a soulbinder, Nicosia could escape on a warbird or even a starling—the weight of souls overrode the weight of flesh.
I feared that the spy was wrong, that Nicosia wasn’t in Rove, or that he’d left before we could attack.
I feared, perhaps more, that he was here, and he lay in wait for us, slinking through the shadows of the bailey like those diseased rats, ready to destroy us all.
I could still feel that unnatural tug on my soul, as though I were still bound to the Egroran. Trapped with invisible chains, as he took out his frustrations, his jealousies, and his rage on me.
I shivered, and not for the coolness of the tunnel.
This was my third time below the castle, but the pathway felt longer this time.
Darker, despite the three torches spread between soldiers.
As the stairs made my calves and thighs ache, as we neared that nondescript door that led into the keep, I dared whisper a reminder into the darkness: “Do not let him touch you.”
The quiet thickened around us. I knew the soldiers felt my words as much as they heard them. One touch, and Nicosia would have it all—soul, mind, and body. One touch was all he needed.
The Allmaster of legend.
I could not see Renn in the narrow stairwell; he led at the front of the platoon, while I took up the rear.
Yet I felt I watched him. Saw the shimmering outline of his body behind my eyelids.
Gods-touched. And yet I could not understand why the gods had created an Allmaster.
Why Nicosia existed in a world where Renn had been chosen.
Balance, perhaps? Or was it some phenomenon of breeding?
Perhaps, were craftlock not banned in these lands for so long, we’d have enough knowledge to pinpoint the answer. But we did not, so we’d do the best we could.
We waited on the stairs. I thought, at first, that those at the front heard footsteps in the connecting corridor and waited for them to pass.
Then I heard the subtlest clearing of a throat, a trickle of embarrassment, and I knew the scars on Renn’s lumis bothered him.
He waited for the symptoms to pass before acting.
The door opened with the faintest creak, like the complaint of a mouse.
We were in.
The nostalgia, the strangeness, of being in Rove Castle again might have overwhelmed me if not for my own fear and alertness shrieking like a blue jay in the back of my mind, my own need to keep every sense open for possible enemies.
Renn’s presence—for I had not erected the basalt wall, in case I were to be injured in or near my heart and needed quick healing—further kept me focused.
This narrow hall appeared unoccupied. The platoon split, half the soldiers following previous direction to head to the donjon—the inner keep—to see if Nicosia hid there while our army assailed the castle walls.
The other half—including me and Renn—would make our way to the war room.
They were the two places we’d most likely find the Sestan king. And if we didn’t, we’d keep searching until we did.
We’d burrowed too deeply into the keep to hear much of the assault outside, though an occasional distant scream or bludgeoning sound pricked my ears.
Before moving on, Renn approached me. “Do not follow until the way is clear.” His blue gaze radiated stoic focus, while the link pulsed with fear and apology. “For both our sakes.”
I nodded, and he again took the lead.
I glanced over my shoulder constantly as our group of ten pushed through the corridors, trailing behind the last soldier by several paces.
I waited at every corner, hugging the inside wall as instructed, ready to spring to action if I felt injury to Renn’s person.
It seemed Rove Castle had grown dozens of new corners in my absence—a veritable maze that made my body antsy and my fingertips numb.
Death curled around my neck.
Before I turned the third corner, slaughter broke out.
Wincing, I pressed back into the wall, pulling out a short sword Renn had strapped to my hip, my grip slick on the hilt. The battle went far quieter than I expected. Not like the wails and shouts of the assault at Derren. This was quick breaths and grunts, curses and gurgling.
The cool touch of death dried out my nostrils and made my eyes water.
I realized, uselessly squeezing that hilt, that I didn’t know who prevailed.
If the slump of bodies and wheezing of last breaths were from dragons or phoenixes.
All I felt was the sharp alert and frenzy of Renn through the bond. Stay alive, stay alive, stay alive.
The softest, sharpest whistle from another soldier’s lips darted through the now eerily silent hall. Swallowing, I peered around the corner to our platoon and the handful of dragons bleeding on the floor. One of our men had a gash in his thigh; I hurried to him and healed him, sword still in hand.
We moved on without conversation. One of the dragons, an older man who looked a little like my father, still breathed.
It would take only a moment for me to heal him.
To right him. And yet I knew I could not, for he would only come at us again.
He might feel mercy toward me for the kindness.
Or he could run a blade through my heart, ending the war all on his own.
So I gritted my teeth and moved on, following the soldiers, every sense attuned to the spaces between stones.
We didn’t get far before another surge of enemy soldiers came upon us.
Again, I held back, but hearing thundering footsteps coming down the opposite end of the corridor, I panicked.
Grabbed the closest door and wrenched it open.
There was little space within, but I pushed through and pulled the door shut behind me just before the runners passed—
It took me a moment to recognize the scratch of linens. Stacks and stacks on shelves. This wasn’t a room, but a closet.
Was this where Lonnie had hidden for three days when Sesta first fell upon Rove?
The panic of war, the fierce determination of a leader, pounded into my heart. I focused on it, letting Renn’s focus become my own. Faced the door and readied my short sword, the tip of its blade pointed at the handle—
A slice on my elbow. Renn’s elbow. Shallow, but it stung.
Fear rose, but I held on to that link. Held on to Renn. Focus.
It ended so quickly. I knew more from Renn’s reactions and emotions than from my own senses. Hugging the sword to myself, I pushed open the closet door and stepped around the corner. We’d lost three men. Some of the dragons had been slaughtered so gruesomely I had to look away.
Cool relief trickled when Renn’s gaze found me. I lifted a hand, gesturing to heal him, but he shook his head. Instead I healed two of our soldiers with larger wounds, and we started down the corridor. I let them get several paces ahead of me before following—
Death sang in my ears before a dragon seized me by my braid. He yanked me back without fanfare—
My half-heart arrested as he drew a dagger across my throat.
The way he’d grabbed my hair, the angle of my head, and Renn’s earlier admonition to keep my chin down made the slice uneven, half of it on and under my chin. But the blade bit deep into my neck, spilling warm blood over my flesh.
He released me and surged ahead as I dropped. Ahead, someone cried out, “The king!”
Stay calm, I imagined Ursa admonishing me.
Coppery bubbles filled my breath as I dowsed, shock keeping the pain at bay.
Deeper shadows ringed my lumis as death neared. I had moments. Hurriedly I replaced and repaired stones, so focused I barely noticed the lack of my sister’s power. The shadows lightened, pulled away, and then disappeared entirely.
Back in the corridor, I sucked a great, tangy breath into my lungs and sat upright, spitting blood onto the stones. Wiped the back of my hand over my throat, smearing blood onto my knuckles.
Grabbing my sword, I hurried ahead. The platoon hadn’t gotten far, and the dragon who’d attacked me lay dead across an old rug, run through the middle.
Renn was assuring the others he was fine, but mortification spiked.
He looked at me, gaze dipping to the blood on my skin. Blood seeped into my dress.
I nodded to him, promising I was hale, but the worry lingered there, his fear glimmering in his eyes.
There was no time to waste. No opportunity for either of us to change our minds.
Jaw clenched, he nodded to one of the soldiers before tilting his head toward me. When we moved deeper into the castle, that soldier did not move on without sight of me.
A loud fracturing like thunder echoed deep in the castle, somewhere below my feet.
My heart surged into my throat—I was sure the floor would crumble beneath me.
A catapult from the assault, perhaps? A great door busting in?
But the stone here held, and I had no time for conjecture.
The army outside had drawn away many of Nicosia’s dragons to the outer walls, but we were hardly alone.
As we surged up a narrow set of stairs, we came across two more dragons. To my surprise, they immediately surrendered, one knee to the floor, hands up.
“Highness,” one of the soldiers warned, and in that moment I saw it—the flash of silver on their necks. Pips denoting not the ranking of normal soldiers, but of crafters.
I knew instantly they could not be permitted to live. Not with power that could hurt us if we spared their lives. These weren’t like the warbirds, who bowed to whichever hand fed them. These would be loyal to the Sestan king.