Furyborn (19 page)

“Are you mad?” Rielle cried.

“They are orphans from the Low Streets,” the Archon explained. “No one will miss them when they’re gone. Except, well…” He glanced up at the furious crowd. “
They
might, I suppose.”

Understanding sank into Rielle like a slowly twisting blade. The maze
was deadly enough as it was. She would have to fight hard to survive it—and to save three children on top of that seemed impossible.

But if she didn’t…

She glanced up at the bellowing crowd.

The Archon’s smile grew. “Your move, Lady Rielle,” he said.

Rielle did not hesitate. She turned, flung off her stiff coat, raced to the waiting door of the cage, and jumped inside.

Eliana

“The Emperor is a hunter that never tires. A storm that never sleeps. How do we best such a creature? The answer is simple: we cannot. If the entire world turned as one to destroy him, again he would rise—and again and again.”

—
The Word of the Prophet

“Who are you?”

Eliana startled to hear the Emperor’s voice. She’d imagined it before, entertained wild fantasies
of storming his palace in Celdaria and slitting his throat before he had the chance to talk her out of it.

Whispered conversations in Lord Arkelion’s palace had told her the Emperor’s voice could worm its way inside your mind and heart, make you helpless to resist doing whatever he suggested. Which Eliana had long ago decided was nonsense. A voice couldn’t control you; anyone who said otherwise
was a fool.

But never, in all her blood-soaked daydreams, had Eliana imagined the Emperor’s voice to sound quite like this. A purpose lived there, beneath the rich tones—resolute and unmovable, ancient and sly.

She stepped back, stumbled over an imperfection in the terrace stone. “I didn’t mean to intrude.”

“And yet you did.” The Emperor approached, hands behind his back. “I can’t
see you very well. Can you see me?”

“A little.” Her vision swirled and shifted. She felt tempted to rub at the air, as though to clear a fogged window.

“How curious.”

“I’ll just…” She wanted to turn away and run, but the inexorable blackness of his eyes held her in place. “I’ll be going now.”

“Oh, I don’t think so. No, I think—”

He froze. Expressions she couldn’t altogether
decipher cascaded across his face: horror, joy, astonishment.

Rage.

“
You
,” he whispered hoarsely, all the loveliness gone from his voice. In its place was a terrible, ragged longing. “It’s you.”

Eliana met the terrace railing at her back. “What?”

Swiftly he moved closer, reaching for her. “Stay there. Where
are
you?”

A great shudder shook the terrace, throwing Eliana to the
side. She pressed her hands against the palace wall to keep herself from falling…

And suddenly, the palace, the city below, the Emperor, were all gone.

The red walls of Lord Morbrae’s dining room stood fast and close around her. His slack face stared up at her, eyes clouded and gray.

Like the eyes of an adatrox.

She pushed back from him, fell hard to the floor, scrambled away.

“Who are you?” Lord Morbrae asked, rising jerkily from his chair. Reaching for her, just as the Emperor had done. His voice had been cut in two—part his own, part the Emperor’s. “Come here. Come to me.”

A blast sounded from outside. Eliana recognized it as the detonation of a bombardier.

Simon.

Remy had told them everything, and now Red Crown was going to destroy this outpost, with
her inside it.

Despite herself, she smiled. What a budding rebel her little traitor brother had turned out to be!

The room shook; the dishes on the table rattled, and Lord Morbrae stumbled. Three of the four adatrox stationed around the room hurried out the door, unsheathing their swords. A wineglass fell to the floor and shattered.

Eliana grabbed the biggest shard of glass she could
find, leapt to her feet, and lunged for Lord Morbrae. He saw her too late, dodged clumsily. She wondered if the gray clouding his eyes was confusing his sight, then drew the shard’s sharp edge across his throat. Blood gushed hot over her hand and onto her clothes. Lord Morbrae made a terrible choking sound, then fell hard to his knees before collapsing.

The remaining adatrox rushed at Eliana.
She grabbed a carving knife from the table and met him beside Lord Morbrae’s corpse, kneed him in the groin, then plunged the knife into his belly. She ran past him, flew out into the hallway, and ran right into the muzzle of Simon’s revolver.

He wore the Wolf’s metal mask, but even with his features hidden, she could feel his fury in the air like the charge of lightning.

Another bombardier
exploded, this one closer. Simon grabbed her by the arms as something in the ceiling gave way with a creaking groan, pulled her tight against his chest and shielded her between his body and the wall. One of the rafters fell, bringing down stone.

“This way,” he muttered, shaking dust from his hood.

She pulled against his grip. “Where’s Remy?”

“With Navi. And so help me, I will throw
you over my shoulder and carry you out of here if necessary.”

“Why not kill me?” She wiped grit from her eyes. “I’m a traitor, aren’t I? I thought you’d blow the place to the skies—and me with it.”

He laughed bitterly. “If only it were that easy.”

Shouts and gunfire sounded from beyond the outpost’s walls, and Remy, Eliana assumed, was somewhere in the thick of it. If she didn’t cooperate,
she might never find him. She shot Simon a glare and swallowed her anger before following him down the hallway.

From behind them came a distant scream, followed by another.

Eliana whirled. Inhaling, she tasted smoke.

The prison.

She ran for it, but only made it a few paces before Simon grabbed her arm.

“Unhand me,” she growled.

He did, roughly. “Then don’t run away again.”

“There are people back there,” she said. “Refugees. Prisoners.
Children.
We have to free them.”

“We can’t.”

“
Why?
”

“Because my soldiers have set bombardier charges around the building. When the fire reaches them, they’ll detonate. In less than five minutes, this building will no longer be standing.”

Eliana felt as though the floor had dropped out from under her. “You’re lying.”

“I’m not.”

“Well, I’m going.” She started again for the prison, and this time, when Simon stopped her, she elbowed him in the gut and stomped on his foot, but he didn’t release her.

“Let me go!” She struggled, twisting violently. “What do you care if I die trying to save them?”

“As touched as I am by your sudden heroic streak,” Simon bit out, “I don’t have to explain myself to you.
Now,
move
.”

Another bombardier detonated, the closest one yet. A chunk of plaster fell from the ceiling and hit Eliana’s head. Pain spiked down her skull; she swayed, tried to move forward, stumbled.

With a curse, Simon caught her, thrust his gun into her hands, and scooped her easily into his arms.

“If someone comes at us,” he ordered, “shoot them.”

He ran, keeping his head tucked
over hers. Clouds of dust, smoke, and grit fogged their way. Eliana coughed against Simon’s chest, considered shooting him in the gut right then and there.

But then two adatrox ran out of the shadows. Eliana turned in Simon’s arms and fired five times. She was a bad shot even without having been hit in the head, but luck helped at least two of her bullets hit true. The adatrox jerked and fell.

They turned a corner and another, passed a room crackling with flames and another where a glassy-eyed adatrox lay on the threshold, his arm outstretched. Papers marked with muddy boot prints littered the floor.

Then, a shot from behind them—a near-hit. Eliana looked past Simon’s shoulder, and her stomach lurched with fear.

Lord Morbrae.

He was
alive
.

He chased them down the
corridor, rifle in hand, and though his face, neck, and jacket gleamed with blood, Eliana could see no wound on his throat.

Impossible.

She pointed the revolver past Simon and fired, but nothing happened.

“You used all the goddamned bullets.” Simon kicked open a door in their path three times before it gave. Once through, he kicked it back shut. Lord Morbrae fired again; the door’s
wood splintered at Simon’s heels.

He lowered Eliana to the ground. They were out. It had to have been near midday, but clouds and smoke darkened the sky. The outpost’s perimeter wall was aflame. Eliana heard screams, shouted commands. Simon pulled her along awkwardly, his arm around her waist as they ran.

Oh, right
, Eliana thought, giddy, the pain in her head now completely gone, her limbs
strong and steady once more.
I’m supposed to be hurt.
She leaned into Simon’s body, let him help her along.

A chorus of high-pitched whines began behind them. The door through which they’d exited burst open. Eliana saw Lord Morbrae search through the smoke, spot them, raise his gun. The whines escalated, shrill and dissonant.

Simon shoved Eliana ahead of him. “Get down!”

She obeyed,
skidding down a wet slope into a narrow, swampy ravine. Simon threw himself down after her and covered her body with his own.

The world exploded.

• • •

Someone slapped her.

Eliana surged awake with a gasp. “How long?”

“Three seconds,” came Simon’s impatient reply. “Get up.”

She obeyed, then froze. A terrible sound floated down to her from the blackened sky.

Screams.

She climbed the ravine, slipping on the slick wall of mud, and peeked over the rim into chaos. The outpost’s main building lay mostly in ruins, debris scattered as far as she could see. And from the ruins came those screams—agonized, beastly.

“The prisoners,” Eliana whispered. She looked over at Simon. “Some could still be alive.”

“Yes,” Simon agreed, “or it could be adatrox or my own
soldiers who didn’t get out in time.”

Eliana lifted herself up by the roots of a watchtower tree. “We should try to help them.”

Simon pulled her back down. He began reloading his revolver. “No. We ride north.”

“Did you not hear me?” She flung out her arm in the direction of the outpost. “There were children in that prison. They had them in cages—”

“Yes, and if Red Crown had carried
out their raid tomorrow as planned, they would have gotten them out. But you ruined that when you ran away. We couldn’t risk letting anyone who’d seen you, or heard whatever intelligence you delivered, leave here alive.”

Eliana stared at him in horror. “What?”

A shot rang out near the outpost, followed by another. Simon pointed one gloved finger. “Hear that? My soldiers, disposing of the
survivors. Listen.”

Eliana did, hearing a third shot, then a fourth, a fifth. She reached for the tree roots once more, but Simon pulled her back down and held her close, arms pinned at her sides.

“Listen to them die,” he hissed, his mouth hot at her ear behind the cold, hard mesh of his mask. “Their blood is on your hands.”

Eliana half-heartedly fought to free herself, but as the
shots continued, and the horrible screams abruptly stopped one by one, she subsided.

It will consume you
, her mother had warned her.

She breathed past the foul knot of shame burning the back of her tongue.

“We’ll add them to your tally, hmm?” Simon’s voice was furious. “Do you even remember how many people you’ve killed, Eliana?”

Eliana nodded, her eyes and mouth dry. She felt
shriveled, undone. She closed her eyes. Yes. Yes, she remembered. Including Harkan? He’d be alive now, were it not for trying to protect her.

What had she told Remy?

We can’t know for certain.

He could still be alive.

She closed her eyes, clung to the foolish hope to keep from screaming.

“Eighty-seven,” she whispered as the gunshots continued. “Eighty-eight. Eighty-nine.”

“What did you ask him for?” Simon lowered his hood and pushed back his mask so that it rested in a mess of dirty-blond hair. “Safe passage home for you and Remy? Amnesty? Your mother returned to you, safe and sound?”

Eliana nodded. She felt as though, slowly, all the life inside her were being funneled out.

“And was it worth it? Were their lives worth it?” He jerked his head up at the
outpost. “Did you get what you asked for?”

Eliana didn’t have the chance to answer, interrupted by galloping hoofbeats. She glanced up, and the sight of a mud-spattered brown horse emerging from the nearby woodlands, Remy sitting on its back behind Navi, knocked the breath out of her.

She met his worried blue gaze and gave him half a smile.

“Simon!” Navi called down to them, a terrible
fear on her face. “Crown’s Hollow is under attack!”

Simon pushed Eliana ahead of him. “Climb,” he snapped. She did, Simon following nimbly. Remy was already dismounting, Navi right after him. Remy stumbled across the mucky ground to bury his face in Eliana’s bloodstained shirt. She held on to him automatically, half her mind still back at the outpost with the gunshots.

They’d stopped.
So had the screams.

Remy whispered, “Did they hurt you?”

She shook her head, made herself look at him. “No. I’m all right.”

Simon grabbed the horse’s reins. “What’s happened?”

“A squadron of adatrox attacked,” Navi explained, “shortly after you’d gone. Patrik got me and Remy out, but just in time. We were the only ones. Simon, they’ve taken all the exits.” Her hood fell back, her
eyes haunted. “No one can get out.”

Eliana stepped away, detaching herself from Remy. The refugees. Patrik. Hob and his notebook. And tiny Linnet…

Three hundred and sixty-seven, give or take, if no one else had made it out. Plus the ninety-three she’d reached before the guns stopped.

Four hundred and sixty bodies’ worth of blood coating her hands a bright, blazing red.

A numb feeling
spread out from her chest down her limbs, scouring her veins clean of all reason.

“El, what is it?” Remy asked. “Are you sick?”

But she ignored him. A movement at the corner of her eye grabbed her attention: two Red Crown soldiers, thirty yards away, near the smoking perimeter fence. They were picking through the uniforms of fallen adatrox, pulling out flasks, papers, weapons.

Nearby,
grazing among the debris, were two horses. Bridled and saddled, patiently waiting.

Eliana squeezed Remy’s shoulders, murmured, “Stay here, quietly,” and backed slowly away as Simon and Navi continued their hushed, urgent conversation. Then she turned and ran, ignoring first Navi’s cry and then Simon’s roar of fury. Mounted the nearest horse, snapped the reins, and bolted.