Chapter Nine I Think I’ll Call You Rory #4
It went too fast after that. I don’t know the exact moment I stopped existing and started living or when I began to have faith in the world and the people in it. Killing Omens hadn’t opened my eyes to the goodness of the Stonewater Kingdom.
But she did. That woman on the wall who traveled with us—who put her hammer and chisel into Omens as surely as she did into my pride and disdain and godlessness.
Sybil Delling.
Yes, time went too fast. I no longer carried myself like I was the king’s sword—whoever I was, whatever I was capable of, was shifting, metamorphosis striking me like a rushing, torrid fever.
Every time I’d look at Sybil, a torturous ecstasy, like seeing a table full of food after weeks of hunger, would find me.
Still, it took me longer than it should have to touch that ecstasy.
By then I knew better than to gorge myself, even on things I was desperate for.
But I couldn’t help it. I wanted her so badly I’d let her hurt me. I’d let her do anything to me.
But then, a blighting pain. I was on the tor, and the Omens were dead. Aisling Cathedral had fallen, and Sybil was with me—everything was as it should be, save the sword Benji had slid into my body.
My last memory of Sybil was blurry. She was so close I could almost reach her, and yet she was as the moon, the distance between us impassable. I knew I would not survive the wound I’d been dealt.
Maude carried me away and laid me down on grass.
I’d never seen her weep before, but she was weeping now, long, anguished wails, and so was Bartholomew.
In those moments before my death, I thought of my old mentor.
How Benedict Castor the First had died here, and the grass I lay in now was the same stretch of the tor I’d carried Benji through, shielding him against the pain of the world.
My last moments were covered in blood, my vision slowly waning. “Bring me back.” I was crying out to Maude, clawing at the flask of spring water on her belt. “Please. Bring me back. He needs to know. She needs to know.”
My final words were a portent, a promise. “Death is not my surrender.”
My vision snapped into focus, chaos erupting around me.
I was still on my hands and knees on the floor of the king’s box, panting in the confines of my helmet, tangled with other guards.
It was too much, all that memory at once, rage and wonder and that sick hunger that couldn’t be anything other than love… I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t speak.
Sybil. Sybil. Sybil.
I put a hand to my chest. Weasel Face—no, Tory Bassett—was still in front of me, the loom stone resting in her hand. She was peering down at it, relief easing the lines between her brows—
Silk brushed against the side of my face, and then Tory was falling—someone had knocked into her shoulder and sent her tumbling onto her back. The loom stone fell once more, clattering onto the floor of the king’s box and landing beneath my bent head.
A bare heel slammed down, rattling my teeth.
When I looked up, Sybil Delling stood above me, her foot planted over the loom stone.
Her crown caught the light and her veil rippled with the effort of her breathing.
When she lifted her heel, pieces of bloody limestone were embedded in the skin of the foot, the Heartsore Weaver’s magical object reduced to a dozen jagged pieces.
When they came, my breaths were ragged in the iron cage of my helmet.
Sybil turned. I couldn’t see her eyes, but I knew them, knew her. My chest tightened and my mouth went dry. I understood full well the seismic shift my body underwent when Sybil Delling’s gaze took hold of mine.
But she did not know me.
Sybil’s gaze turned. Before I could catch my breath, she was pushing away, moving through the crowd, trailing pieces of bloody stone behind her.
Benji flickered out of nothingness, appearing in the heart of the bedlam. When he saw Tory, fumbling to get to her feet, then the broken loom stone in front of her, his mouth fell open.
“I don’t know what happened, sire.” Tory’s cheeks were wan. “I—It fell and—”
Samuel Eichel pushed guards aside that he might wring his hands in full view of the king. “A terrible portent, sire,” he said, nodding at the pieces of the loom stone. “A terrible portent indeed.”
Dedrick Lange stepped in. “There’s been a disturbance, Benedict. You and the Diviner should come at once.”
Benji went a brilliant shade of red. “I’d bloody say there’s been a disturbance! What foul, ignoble cur knocks their own king off a horse? And you. Fucking gods, Tory.” He was screaming now. “The loom stone—”
“It’s not the joust or the loom stone, King Castor.” Dedrick’s voice boomed over the din. “I’ve just heard the reports. Aisling Cathedral’s ruins have been desecrated.” He whistled loudly. “Knights—guards. Collect your weapons and retrieve your horses. We ride for the tor.”
Benji froze. “Desecrated? How?”
“It’s the sprites, sire. Those wretched vermin. They’re digging among the ruins.” His voice lowered. “They’re trying to get to the spring.”