Chapter Thirty – Scarlett #2
It was suddenly difficult to breathe, and I knew it wasn’t the smoke that clogged my throat and made my eyes water.
There would never be enough atonement for this. Never .
‘You have my word,’ I told Aella. Before I could reconsider, I sliced my palm with my dagger. Making my word true, and ensuring I couldn’t go back on this promise later, even if I wanted to. ‘I’ll do everything within my power to keep Aurelius safe.’
Aella released the boy, and Odessa quickly grabbed him. But despite the increasing smoke, and the distant line of fire torches I could see through the windows – no doubt belonging to Roran’s reinforcements – I couldn’t make myself move.
I glanced at my former attendant. ‘You’re not coming with us, are you?’
‘No,’ Aella said with a soft smile. ‘I’m not.’
‘You don’t have to do this. I can find your blood ruby–’
Aella shook her head. ‘I won’t live my life under someone else’s control. Not Zandri’s, not Roran’s – and not yours.’
Odessa tugged on my arm, and I allowed her to lead me out of the room and into the hallway, which had turned into a smoking furnace. The curtains lining the windows went up in a blaze of flame and the glass shattered.
If Aella didn’t leave now, she never would.
I looked back at her one last time – sitting on the edge of Aurelius’s bed. Tracing his name embroidered onto a pillow.
Her brown eyes locked with mine. And I knew the conviction in her eyes would haunt me forever.
The certainty that she would rather die than be controlled. That she would rather die free.
Like Severin.
For a day and a half, we travelled through lush countryside in a stolen horse and cart. Only my illusions had saved us as we escaped from the burning manor, a few minutes ahead of Roran’s Warriors.
His fury would be volcanic. Not only had he lost me, Aric and Lillian – but he had lost his son.
And Aella.
I didn’t know why her death bothered me so much. I hadn’t known her – not really – and she had made her own choices. But what she had revealed about Severin had shaken me to my core.
Severin had believed that I would hate Zandri for what she had done to him, and he was right. But I hadn’t turned against her. Whether out of love or dependence or fear . . . I had allowed Zandri to manipulate me. Had allowed her to comfort me–
A warm hand brushed mine, and I quickly clamped down on my death magic as I noticed Aurelius staring up at me. He was relatively calm now; there were no more heart-wrenching questions about where we were going or why we had left his mother behind.
When I opened my palm, I saw that Aurelius had placed two objects inside it. Toy soldiers. No – toy Warriors, I realised as I saw the black armour. Roran must have had them especially commissioned for his son.
A foreign emotion squeezed my chest. I looked pleadingly to Aric for assistance.
Aric took the toy soldiers and set them up on his knee, arranging them in battle formation. Then he matched his Warriors against Aurelius’s, until the boy was completely absorbed in the game.
His childlike laughter was painful. There was nothing of Roran’s cruelty in him, and it felt wrong to contemplate using Aurelius like this. What would Severin think of me now, kidnapping a child and making an alliance with Mira that I intended to break?
I wondered what he had Seen, to make him so surprised that I would betray her. In the days leading up to Cassius and Mira’s wedding, I had been certain that it was a choice between her or me. That if I let her leave for Kalure, she would be in the perfect position to threaten my rule.
But was any of that really true – or was it a result of my own paranoia? The fear and distrust that had hung over me ever since I realised how precarious my life in the Ravalian Court really was?
‘Careful,’ Aric said, and I turned to see him unsheathing his sword. Apparently, Aurelius had grown bored with the figurines.
He wasn’t bored now. His eyes lit up with interest as his fingers brushed the steel and enclosed around the hilt. Aric kept a firm grip on the sword, so Aurelius couldn’t hurt himself.
‘Father promised to give me a real sword one day,’ Aurelius said, and though he was speaking to Aric, his eyes were on the blade. ‘I don’t see him much.’ This held a hint of sadness.
Personally, I thought he was fortunate.
I gazed at Aurelius, but it was Aella I saw in that moment: her eyes burning with conviction as she prepared to die. A choice she had made to escape Zandri’s control as much as Roran’s.
But this wasn’t the time to evaluate the morals of the Orders. Reformation could come later, if I survived to see it through. Right now, I needed to focus on escaping to the Wilds alive – which would be much easier if I hadn’t already strained my illusion magic to its limit.
‘I don’t know if I can do this,’ I warned as the cart slowed to a stop. We disembarked, Aric helping Aurelius down.
‘If you can’t,’ Odessa responded tersely, ‘then we’re all dead.’
We were on the edge of the countryside now, far from Taiga.
To the north-east, I could make out the smaller settlement of Fr?r – the last point of civilisation before the Frozen Wastes.
If there had been a mountain pass in Fr?r, this would have been much easier.
Then again, the Kalurians who lived there weren’t exactly welcoming to outsiders.
Even my father had given them a surprising amount of freedom.
I turned my attention to the palisade of tall, sharpened posts in front of me.
There was an iron gate in the middle – the only way into the no-man’s-land that separated Kalure from the Wilds, allowing passage between the Archasian mountains.
The checkpoint was lit with fire torches, intensely bright in the darkness, and manned by black-garbed Warriors.
Aric left to scout up ahead, Lillian taking over his position at Aurelius’s side. She had been quiet during the coach ride, shooting wary glances at Odessa and watching Aurelius with fierce protectiveness.
‘I want to go with him,’ Aurelius said, tugging on Lillian’s arm. ‘I want to meet the Warriors.’
I crouched at Lillian’s side – so that I was level with Aurelius’s pale green eyes. A similar shade to Roran’s, but with none of his coldness.
‘When Aric returns,’ I told him, ‘we’re going to play a new game.
It’s Roran’s idea; a test of your suitability to become a Warrior one day.
All you need to do is keep your eyes straight ahead and cross through that checkpoint without making eye contact with anyone.
No acknowledging the Warriors, no speaking to them – nothing. Can you do that for your father?’
Aurelius nodded seriously. ‘I won’t let the emperor down.’
‘I know you won’t.’ My answering smile was genuine. If he could stay quiet, maybe we could actually survive this.
‘They aren’t letting civilians through,’ Aric told us quietly when he returned. ‘Only Ravalian Warriors are allowed to pass.’
His words confirmed what I had already suspected.
I closed my eyes and concentrated, recalling the mental images I had spent the past two days perfecting.
When I reopened my eyes, I was staring at three Ravalian Warriors – and I knew that I was cloaked in the same dark armour, a sword gleaming at my side. But–
‘I’ve never tried to work an illusion on a child before,’ I said, eyeing Aurelius. ‘The slightest slip could give us all away.’
Aric met my gaze steadily. ‘It’s still our best chance. And you only have to hold the illusion until they let us through.’
‘I’ll make it happen,’ I assured him.
Aric took point at the head of our small group, followed by Odessa who adopted a convincingly bored expression. Lillian would usually be our weakest link, but I had disguised her delicate features and increased her height. It was Aurelius I was most worried about.
Lillian murmured soft instructions to the boy, reminding him to be quiet and follow her.
‘Like a mission?’ he whispered back.
‘ Exactly like a mission.’
I couldn’t hear what Aric said to the Warriors at the checkpoint, but they let him and Lillian through easily enough.
I followed just behind Aurelius, focusing my illusions on keeping him invisible.
Warriors pressed in against us on either side but I walked past them with my head held high, my gaze fixed ahead – on the desolate mountain plateau beyond the border.
We were almost across the threshold when–
I was a second too late to shift my illusion as Aurelius tripped, and there was nothing I could do to conceal his faint cry of pain. Acting on impulse, I grabbed his arm and sprinted the remaining distance.
Behind me, the Warriors shouted. They had only seen Aurelius for an instant – but the whole of Kalure was on the lookout for a boy of his description.
Arrows whizzed past my head as we ran – aiming high, so as not to hit Aurelius. I picked up my pace, my legs straining at the effort.
I let my illusions scatter as we reached a narrow barrier of snow drifts, disappearing into a powdery haze. The alpine tree line was close now, and I knew we would be safe from the Warriors, who were reluctant to follow into the Wilds.
But as we ran, I noticed that Aric’s face was curiously pale. His left hand pressed against his back, as if he was in pain.
‘You’re hurt,’ I said, studying the wound with worried eyes. ‘How bad is it?’
‘It’s nothing.’ Aric’s voice was sharp. ‘One of the Warriors landed a lucky shot, that’s all.’
An arrow wound – and he must have pulled it out to keep running. An icy tendril of fear darted down my spine.
I slowed to match Aric’s pace, letting him lean on my shoulder. The fact that he accepted my help told me it was much worse than he had made it seem.
‘There are healers at the Temple,’ Odessa promised, but her expression was pinched.
Neither of us mentioned the distance we still had to cover – or the blood staining Aric’s tunic.
Neither of us had to.