Chapter Forty-Seven
The cruelest theft is not of gold
But all the stories no longer told
The Perils hum quietly around them, The Widow’s Waters resting peacefully like liquid glass. It feels almost still here—deceptively so. Like the world is holding its breath before it breaks.
Rubi is not still. She paces the edge of the cavern, boots grinding against damp stone, fingers stained faintly with residue from the ironsap, the dragon’s blood. The antidote.
“We can make it,” she says, more to herself than to them. “That’s not the problem.”
Vren leans back against one of the stone outcroppings, arms crossed, watching her with the kind of patience that comes from a lifetime of waiting for things to go wrong.
“Comforting,” he mutters, a crease forming between his dark brows.
Rubi ignores him.
“The antidote is viable. It makes sense. I can use the dragon’s blood, dilute it enough to use for all of Virellin, and make sure it actually does what we need it to do.
” She drags a hand through her hair, frustration sharpening her tone.
“But administering it to an entire city? That’s where this falls apart. ”
Saana, seated cross-legged near the water’s edge, looks up from the bundle of dried herbs in her lap. She has been quiet until now, listening, watching, a finger looping through the curls of her hair.
“Could we put it in the water?” she asks gently. “Along with the threvenar. Allow it to cannibalize the threvenar before it gets to the people?”
Rubi shakes her head immediately.
“No. Dosage is too unpredictable that way. Too diluted. It could lose potency before it reached the population. And if Ilyra is already using the water to deliver threvenar, we can’t trust it as a delivery method for the antidote.”
Vren huffs a humorless laugh, dragging his hand down his face. “So poisoning the poison won’t work. Good start.”
Rubi shoots him a look but keeps moving.
“Food?” Saana offers, though it sounds more hopeful than viable.
Rubi exhales sharply. “Inconsistent. Not everyone eats. Not at the same time, not the same amounts. And the moment someone realizes something’s off, it’s over.”
“We force it, then,” Vren says bluntly. “Line them up, dose them.”
Rubi stops pacing.
“And start a riot in a starving city?” she snaps. “You want them fighting us while we’re trying to save them?”
Vren shrugs. “Just offering options.”
“Well they’re bad fucking options, Vren.”
Silence settles, heavy and unhelpful.
Rubi presses her palms to her temples, thinking, calculating, discarding possibilities as quickly as they form.
She is born for this. She needs this. If redemption is possible, this is exactly the form it would take.
For the first time in days, her hands are steady.
Not because the withdrawal has passed, but because her mind finally has something louder than the craving to hold onto.
And she needs to leverage that. Because if she can save them—if she can return an entire city to itself—then maybe her life has been more than a long trail of people she could not save.
“There’s no way to reach everyone at once,” she mutters.
Saana watches her for a long moment, head tilting slightly.
“You’re thinking too narrowly.”
Rubi’s hands drop. “I’m thinking realistically.”
“You’re thinking individually,” Saana corrects, her voice still soft, but steadier now. “One person at a time. One dose at a time.”
“That’s how healing works.”
Saana shakes her head. “Not always.”
Vren straightens slightly, interest flickering.
“Go on,” he says.
Saana gestures vaguely, as if trying to shape the thought in the air between them.
“When Maireth created the testing grounds for Skyfire—her explosive weapons—in the eastern quadrant of the Outside, the people fled. They had to. They moved to the other side of the boundary, we took them in, treated them for exposure to whatever alchemy Maireth uses in those things,” Saana says, ideas forming as she speaks.
Dread pools in Rubi’s gut.
Skyfire.
So that’s what Marin was talking about. The weapons.
Gods. One problem at a fucking time would be nice.
“What exactly are you saying?” Rubi presses, shaking her head as if she can dislodge the thoughts of Skyfire.
“Two things. One: people don’t stay separate when they’re afraid,” she says.
“They gather. They move together. Two: when we treated them for exposure to alchemy, we set up steam rooms—hot water, respiratory-supporting herbs they could breathe in to clear their lungs. We didn’t treat them one by one.
We treated the air they were breathing.”
Rubi frowns. “What does that have to do with—”
Footsteps echo through the cavern, cutting her off.
Elyssara’s voice carries before she even comes into view.
“The people of Virellin will gather, just as you say. We’re clearing the streets. Everyone goes to The Underbelly.
The words land. Rubi stills. Completely.
Vren pushes off the stone. “You’re going to hide the very people that could help us win this fucking war? They can fight!”
Elyssara doesn’t rise to the bait.
“They’re untrained, starving, and terrified, Vren.
They’re not soldiers, they’re victims. It’s the only way to keep them out of the line of fire,” Elyssara continues, stepping into the lanternlight, the rest of her Fallen fanning out behind her.
“Revryn will move them through the tunnels. We’ll keep them there until this is over. ”
Saana’s gaze flicks to Rubi. And something shifts. Rubi’s mind catches up in real time, pieces clicking into place with terrifying clarity.
“Not food,” Rubi murmurs, a finger rising into the air in realization.
Saana nods.
Vren frowns. “What?”
“Not water.” Rubi says, clarity landing. Her eyes lift, sharp now. Focused. “Air.”
Silence.
But Vren’s brows pull together. “You’re saying we gas them?”
Saana doesn’t flinch. “I’m saying we disperse it,” she corrects. “Confined space. Limited exits. Shared airflow. If they’re all in The Underbelly…” Her voice gains momentum, certainty replacing frustration. “We don’t need to dose them individually. We saturate the space.”
Rubi moves slowly, nodding as she follows the logic through. “It would reach everyone. Or at least, very large groups,” she says. “At the same time.”
“But it has to be controlled,” Saana adds quickly, looking back to Rubi. “Too much and you’ll overwhelm them. Too little and it won’t counter the threvenar.”
Rubi’s lips part slightly. Then she smiles. Not relief. Recognition.
“I can control that,” she says. “I can build it to disperse in stages. Slow release. Enough to neutralize without harming.”
Vren drags a hand down his face. “You’re still talking about flooding a tunnel system with something we barely understand.”
Rubi turns to him fully now.
“We understand it enough,” she says evenly. “And unless you’ve got a better idea, this is the only option that doesn’t rely on cooperation from a population that’s been poisoned and starved for decades.”
Vren holds her gaze for a long moment. Then exhales. “…All right,” he mutters. “Then we do it your way.”
Saana steps closer, quieter now. “It has to be done carefully,” she says. “The body will still need time to adjust. Even if the antidote works.”
Rubi nods once. “Then we make sure it does.”
Her gaze flicks between them—Vren, Saana, Elyssara. For the first time since the conversation began, she is completely still. Completely certain.
The kind of stillness that only comes when the answer finally locks into place.
“Bring me the rest of the Melders,” Rubi says. “And I’ll make sure the entire city remembers exactly what was taken from them.”