The Offering (26 page)

All I knew was the ringing.

I tried to sit up, but the world tipped crazily. Up felt like down, and the other way around. I was so disoriented, I barely noticed the way my elbow was bent at a strange angle beneath me.

I blinked, and blinked again, but my eyes stung. The sulfur that filled my nose seemed to be burning them as well. Breathing was hard too, although not in the same way it had been immediately after Eden had died. This was more tangible, and I found myself panting just to ease the throbbing in my ribs.

White smoke and tears clouded my vision. Between the columns of burning debris, I could see people rushing here and there, and from behind the ringing, I could make out the muffled, faraway shouts of voices, which were probably not so muffled or faraway at all. But I couldn't distinguish a single face among the throng, or make out a single word amid the buzz.

It was like being both blind and deaf, and entirely helpless.

I shook my head, trying to clear my senses, and then I tried to stand.

The world swayed, tipping first this way and then that. But my legs, by the grace of all that was good, held me in place. I kept my arms outstretched. If I stumbled, I wanted to at least attempt to cushion my fall.

But I didn't. Fall, that is.

I stood. Wobbly and unsure, but somehow I stood.

Slowly, ever so slowly, my hearing returned. The ringing remained, continuous and annoying—much in the way Sabara was—but eventually I could make out other sounds too. More gunfire. More cannon blasts. More voices—shouts and commands.

And, along with my hearing, my vision returned. The smoke eventually subsided as well, until I found myself standing near the edge of a crater so massive, I could hardly imagine what could have done so much damage.

Inside the crater, and all around it, were bodies. Bodies of the raven-faced warriors who belonged to Elena's army. Bodies of Caspar's followers, the mud stripped and peeled from their youthful faces. And bodies that could be identified as neither because they were too mutilated from the blast.

I saw the body of the black-haired girl. I knew even without going closer to inspect her that she was dead, because her sapphire eyes remained wide and unblinking, and her neck was distorted gruesomely.

I felt fortunate that I'd been thrown so far from the blast. That I hadn't been standing in the place where the bomb had struck. And at the same time, my heart ached for all those who had been.

The smell of sulfur made me gag, as did a thousand thoughts of children who no longer needed homes, and children who were newly orphaned, and brothers who'd just lost sisters, and lovers whose beds would now be empty.

War benefited no one. We were all losers on this day.

I vomited until my stomach was emptied, and when I was done, I wiped my mouth on the back of my hand. My chest and my elbow continued to throb, and I wondered if my ribs might have been cracked.

I tried to think, to decide what I should do next. I didn't see Caspar, but that didn't mean he wasn't among the bodies that had been flung about the cavernous basin in the earth. It just meant I couldn't identify his remains.

And it meant I was on my own now.

I still needed to escape, to find a way out, so I started back in the direction I'd been headed when Caspar had saved me.

It was the voice that stopped me, cutting through my regret, and the ringing in my ears.

“Not so fast, Your Majesty.”

I would have spun to face him, willing my reflexes to match the beating of my heart. But I was too injured to react so hastily, and I likely would have fallen if I'd tried. Instead I turned sluggishly, deliberately.

Inside, Sabara gloated,
I knew he'd stop you. I knew he wouldn't let you get away, you insolent brat
.

“Niko,” was all I said, keeping my bad arm braced to my stomach as I glanced suspiciously at the gun he held, and the three masked soldiers at his back.

He grinned then, and I suddenly wished I still had my gun,
that I hadn't lost it in the chaos of the blast. “You might want to come with me. We have a surprise for you.”

I'd barely made it two steps into the tent when I saw her.

“Brooklynn!” I rasped, and struggled to break free from Niko's grip on my bad arm. But he wasn't letting me get away that easily. Apparently, one escape attempt made me a high-risk prisoner.

The jostling aggravated the pain, but I refused to give Niko the satisfaction of seeing me wince, so I bit it back, hiding my discomfort.

Brook was in the same situation I was, except that, even though she looked like she'd been through the wringer—her clothes ripped and covered in ash, her face swollen and bruised and cut—she was being held back by guards on either side of her and iron restraints that shackled both her wrists and her feet.

“I killed twelve of 'em before they got me,” she crowed, her chest puffing boastfully. Of course, she said that right before she caught an elbow to the side of her head from one of the masked warriors beside her.

She staggered slightly, looking as off balance as I'd felt right after the blast, but she came up quickly, prepared to fight all over again. She threw her body at the soldier, but he cuffed her, this time with the back of his metal-studded glove. The blow sent her reeling into the waiting arms of the soldier on her other side.

“Stop them. No more!” I shouted, my voice sounding
hoarse as it ripped from my sulfur-scorched throat. And still Niko held me back.

Brook refused to stay down. She was in no condition to keep fighting, and she was in no position to wield any real power over these warriors. She was their prisoner, and they could batter and abuse her all day long if they wished.

Because she had no other recourse, she spat a mouthful of blood at her captors before turning to me. “I'm glad you're alive. We were worried about you,” she told me, her voice matter-of-fact, as if we'd just bumped into each other in a park or at the market and were chatting amiably.

I gave her a curious look. “I'm . . . glad you're alive too,” I said, sounding like it was a question and not a statement, and feeling nothing short of ridiculous for making small talk with her here. I didn't bother pointing out the truth of our predicament, that we were standing in the queen's tactical command tent. “How did you find me?”

“We,” she corrected. “How did
we
find you?” She grinned then, revealing blood-tinged teeth that made me want to frown back at her. “We have an army out there.” She fixed her pointed gaze on each of the soldiers at her sides, and then on Niko, before looking to me once more. “We've got this, Charlie.”

“No. You don't, actually.” It was Elena now, entering the tent with a dramatic flourish.

It was immediate, the hatred I felt for the other queen, resurfacing as quickly as if it had never faded, practically choking me as I glared at her.

Brook's gaze narrowed, and her lips curled upward. She
looked the way she used to, when we were in the clubs and she'd set her sights on a guy she planned to toy with. “You have no idea what you're up against,” she practically purred.

Elena looked equally confident as she approached Brooklynn, appraising her in a way that she hadn't Eden. “I heard you caused quite the brouhaha. Killed a lot of good soldiers.” She reached a manicured finger out to Brook, and then pressed it beneath her chin, lifting Brook's face to inspect every bruise, cut, and abrasion. “You're arrogant. I like that.”

Brook jerked away from Elena's touch. Her voice when she responded was so deadly low, I could barely hear it above the ringing that continued to resonate in my ears. “You're gonna die today.”

Elena leaned closer and seized Brook's chin in her hand, squeezing it hard. Her voice was equally ominous when she answered, “Funny. I was going to say the same thing to you.”

I gasped at Elena's words, and Niko's hold on my arm tightened, causing a stab of pain to explode up from my injured elbow.

Elena whirled to face us then, still clutching Brook's face. Her cinnamon-colored eyes sparkled when they fell on Niko. “This is going to work, isn't it, my love?” she begged, and I realized how mad she looked. Utterly insane. “I think this time our little queen here won't have any qualms about what needs to be done.”

I felt Sabara's confidence swell into something I could no longer dispute, and it made me hate Elena all the more.

This queen was the reason Eden was dead.

She was the reason I was here, while my best friend was being used to force me to make the toughest decision of my life.

Could I really sacrifice anyone else? I'd already watched Eden die. Could I do it again? Was keeping Sabara inside me worth losing someone else I cared about?

But what choice did I have? Nothing had changed, had it? I couldn't set Sabara free just because it was Brook's life at stake instead of Eden's. One life wasn't more valuable than the others, was it?

Suddenly I wanted to tell Brook everything. I wanted to tell her about Elena and what she'd done to Eden. I wanted to tell her about Caspar and his followers, and the blast that had killed so many of them. I wanted to tell her about what I'd done to the soldier, the one who'd come into my tent to collect me when the fighting had started. How I'd shot him and stolen his weapons.

His weapons.

I'd lost his gun in the blast, but that wasn't the only weapon I'd taken from him.

I squirmed, trying to make it seem as if I were shifting on my feet. But it was enough to confirm what I'd hoped. I still had his knife. Tucked in the back of my waistband.

Sabara read my thoughts just as quickly as I'd formulated them, and I knew hers at the same moment.

Sure,
I decided,
I'd let them have Sabara.

And then she and I were going to try to kill each other.

“Stop stalling,” Elena complained, her impatience reaching a crescendo.

What did I care if she squirmed a little? I needed a few moments to gather myself, to collect my strength and assess the situation. My plan, if it was going to work, depended entirely on timing.

There were four soldiers inside the tent with us, more outside should Elena or Niko or any one of the masked warriors call for them. Brook could occupy at least the two who were holding her. The other two were stationed on either side of the tent's entrance.

Elena and I were standing in the center of the oversize enclosure, Niko at my side. All I needed was one moment. One tiny, insignificant moment, and it would all be over.

Just enough time to put my blade through Elena's heart once the transfer was complete.

The problem was, that was all the time Sabara needed too. And she would be trying to use her powers to stop me—to close my airway—before I could follow through with my intentions.

I had to reach
her
before she had that chance.

Four soldiers against one good arm.
I like my odds
, I thought, grinning inwardly as Sabara tried to quash my confidence with her own.

She felt much the way I did. That her chances were good.

“Charlie, you don't need to do this. You shouldn't do this!” Brook fought and fought, trying to break free, trying to get through to me, trying to stop this from happening. But I wasn't listening at all. I barely noticed her.

I reminded myself of everything Elena had done—to Xander,
executing Eden, the attempts on my life, declaring war on Ludania. And all the people Sabara would kill if she had the chance—Brooklynn, Aron, my parents, Angelina, me. Even her own grandson, Max.

Maybe I'd been too long locked in Sabara's dark grip, maybe I'd been poisoned by her venom, but I could see no viable alternative.

I nodded at Elena, ready.

I
was
ready. I could do this.

Niko released my arm, and I stepped forward, meeting Elena face-to-face, letting my anger toward her seethe. I needed those feelings. I needed to revile her as much as I reviled the soul inside me.