Chapter 49 #2
Kiyan’s eyes flickered to me, his gaze homed on my throat, where Reza’s hands had just been. His mouth flattened, and a muscle ticked in his jaw when he looked back at the Viceroy.
“It was a mistake to leave me with my power. You should have drained me the first chance you got. Instead, you housed me, had me doing your dirty work—a Prince of River in your palace. I was never your dog, Reza. I was always a wolf. And now I have no limits on my life magic.”
The Viceroy’s eyes went wide as he stared at Kiyan. “A Prince?”
He pressed a hand to his chest, his fingers finding the empty cavity, as if he simply were not used to the vacantness there. For the first time, fear was painted on the Viceroy’s face.
The silence, the unmoving bodies; every peri from either River or Salt was petrified—forced into stillness by Kiyan.
This was Kiyan’s true power.
He held every single thread of life on the battlefield in his hand like it was nothing.
No, not nothing. I could see the strain in Kiyan’s eyes, the sweat beading on his upper lip, the tightness of his mouth. It was costing him to do this, to show the Viceroy just how much he had lost.
But despite the drain on his strength, his power was stunning. I held my breath, looking around in disbelief at the soldiers unable to even lift their blades due to Kiyan’s power.
The Viceroy’s face was bloodless, his eyes blown wide. He opened and closed his mouth several times, his fingers scratching at the concave space where the King’s crown once sat as if he could claw it back.
“You can’t kill me, they’ll come. If you kill me the rest of Salt will come.”
“You think we’d rather stay as we are, because we are afraid of someone else coming for us? We will fight if the Court of Salt returns. And you’re a fool if you think I am going to kill you.”
Kiyan smiled, but it was a slow, deadly grin.
He hadn’t been looking at me, but I still felt uneasy just from watching his expression. This was the peri Reza had kept caged for so long, finally unleashing his retribution.
“You’re going to stay alive for a very, very long time.”
The Viceroy walked backward, his eyes huge.
“You’ll never see your family again. You won’t be able to free them.
” He launched himself at me suddenly, his hands pressing to my skin, and I felt the tug of his draining magic.
Despite not having Rusul’s crown, he still had his own magic from Salt to pull the power from others.
We fell to the ground and Kiyan shouted, his hold on all the soldiers loosening. Fighting resumed around us, but was stilted and jerky, as if the soldiers knew they had been held by Kiyan’s power and were coming out of a dream.
But I saw something dangling from Reza’s waist that I recognized.
It was the pouch that he had put my mother’s bangles in.
I snatched it from him at the same time Kiyan reached us, ripping the Viceroy off me and pressing his hands to his face, the same thing I’d seen the Viceroy do to countless rebels and members of the Court of River.
What he’d done to Mishah, who still lay on the ground, crying and clutching her face.
But instead of draining magic, it was his own life draining away from him. His hair turned white, and Queen Azari’s crown slipped as his head began to shrivel, his skin growing papery and old.
“The thing you taught me, Reza, is that I can take life as much as give it. And when you destroyed my magic, I found another way to bring it back. I was going to keep you alive, to send a message to the Court of Salt, but I think I can get my vengeance this way too.”
Reza started to laugh, even as Kiyan drained the life from him.
“You fool. You think you can use the crown to open the Mountain? Not with the King’s crown destroyed. That type of magic demands blood.” He spat at him, his face crumpled like the rotting leaves of Kiyan’s creation. “There is always a price.”
Kiyan roared, pressing his fingers into the Viceroy’s eyes, and draining the remainder of his life away.
Until the gold crown that sat on his head clattered to the ground, Reza’s body fading to dust, not even the decay left in him.
I opened the pouch with my mother’s bangles, pulling them out, threading them over my wrist.
Zaye had told me she hadn’t been able to find a cure, but she didn’t have these.
I walked over to Mishah and put my hands on her.
She looked up at me, the wrinkles on her brow and around her eyes, which used to be a sparking fire, were dull and faded, her hair white.
She opened her mouth to speak, but her tongue was tangled, and she couldn’t use any language.
It was the same as the woman by the River, as all the rebels turned by Reza.
I pressed my hand to her chest, feeling the magic within the bangles, calling it to me. The threads of my magic pulled through the bangles, filling my veins with that strange light and pouring from my hands to Mishah.
At first, nothing happened. It seemed like my power just melted away into her chest. But then, the threads gathered, spreading up her neck, the golden magic webbing across her face, shoulders, spreading through her hair and hands.
She opened and closed her mouth, testing her jaw. Her feet untwisted themselves, hair returning to its deep black color.
I had brought her back. It worked.
Which meant I could do it for them all.
“Holy shit, scholar. What the fuck did you do?”
I released a sob, launching myself forward and wrapping my arms around Mishah.
“You’re smothering me a little,” Mishah said into my chest.
“Sorry, I didn’t think it would work.”
“We thought it was uncurable.” Kiyan stood staring at us, shock and devastation on his face as he looked at Mishah.
“Hey, Kiyan.”
“Hey, Mish. Just when I thought I’d gotten rid of you.”
She laughed and stuck her tongue out at him.
All around us, rebels from River were using their magic against the Salt soldiers, rounding them up, arresting them, and restoring their land to what it once was.
But there was still something left for Kiyan to do.
I held Queen Azari’s crown in my hands, meeting his eyes. “Shall we try to open the door?”