Crown of Cinders (Imdalind Series Book 7) (24 page)

“He forgave me,” was all Wyn said as she splashed a large amount of wine onto the cloth, the brilliant crimson seeping so fast I knew it wouldn’t hold it all. It dripped from the edges onto the ice-coated grass like tears falling to the ground.

Without a word, Wyn handed the bottle to me, and my hand shook as I wrapped it around the neck. Thankfully, I didn’t drop it as she let go. It was heavier than I expected it to be and slippery underneath my fingers.

“He reminded me I had a family,” I said.

My nose tickled, the tears kept coming, and I could barely get the words out. I let them flow while staring at the white of the handkerchief before I poured the wine onto it. Watching the blood red absorb into it, I gasped, feeling the warmth against my hand, pooling in my palm hidden beneath the surface.

I stared at it for a moment too long before Ryland reached for the bottle, reminding me of what my job was.

He grabbed the bottle without hesitation, splashing some onto his own, his lips a tight line as he said, “He was the man his father pretended to be.”

The words struck home, and I gasped, my tears flowing more freely as Ilyan walked around Dramin’s body, grabbing the bottle from Ryland and continuing the process all over.

“He showed me how to laugh.”

“He never gave up on me.”

“He saved me in more ways than he knew.”

On and on, they went until each of our handkerchiefs were soaked with wine and our palms were full of the deep red fluid. Then the bottle was empty and set beside Ilyan’s feet, rattling against dying grass and stone as it rocked in the wind that blew past everything. My emotions by now were so raw and open that I was amazed the wind didn’t pick me up and carry me away.

Ilyan took a step forward and knelt in the dirt beside where my brother lay. Carefully, he placed the handkerchief over his face exactly as he had in the sight. The wine-soaked cloth covered the gray skin, the sunken eyes, and the jaw that looked so broken it didn’t even resemble my brother anymore.

“I will take care of her as you asked,” Ilyan said, his wine-soaked hand grasping my brother’s dead one. His stiff fingers were like rocks underneath Ilyan’s strong grip.

Ilyan did not move as Thom limped forward, Wyn helping him to kneel beside his brother. His hand shook as he, too, placed the cloth over Dramin’s face.

“I will never forget what you have done for me,” Thom whispered, his hand replacing Ilyan’s against the stiffness of Dramin’s.

Without a word, Wyn knelt beside Thom near Dramin’s feet and leaned over both of them to place her handkerchief over Dramin’s face, on top of all the others.

“I will be worthy of your forgiveness,” Wyn whispered, her hand clutching Dramin’s before wrapping around Thom’s. Her head fell onto his shoulder as the tears flowed freely.

Kneel across from me, můj kamarád
, Ilyan prompted inside my mind, his voice quiet as he gave me the needed instruction.

Everything felt weak, numb, and broken. Each step opened up a new agonizing pit in my stomach as I moved toward him then kneeled across from him before I placed my handkerchief over Dramin’s face.

“I will always be your sister.”

I squished my face together in an attempt not to let the tears find a way past, in an attempt not to sob and cry like a pitiful little girl. Regardless, the sounds came out. The heartbreak bled from me, anyway. All I could do was sit there and cry.

I didn’t even hear what Ryland said as he placed his handkerchief over my brother’s face. I couldn’t hear beyond the wind that roared around us and tried to carry me away. I couldn’t hear beyond the sobs that racked my body.

They grew inside of me, swelling and growing into a pain I could no longer hold back, a pain I didn’t want to feel anymore. I didn’t want to. I let all of the anger, all of the pain, and all of the loss go in a crippling despondency that escaped from me in a scream so loud and feral everyone around me jumped.

I screamed as I clutched Dramin’s hand. I screamed as I clawed at his arms. I screamed as I tried my hardest to shake him awake, knowing that it wouldn’t work and not caring.

I clutched at his clothes, at his dead, lifeless arms. Everything was cold and stiff and uncomfortable and not him anymore. Not him ever again.

He was gone.

There was nothing left.

I cried so loudly and so hard I could barely move. I held on to Ryland and Wyn as they flanked me, holding me, trying to calm me.

It was no use. The heartbreak grew as I felt Ilyan’s magic surge, the earth reacting to it, and the soil before us shifted and moved as it began to swallow Dramin whole.

The tears kept coming, and I tried to reach him, but he was already being swallowed by the dirt. He was already leaving.

He was going, and I couldn’t go, too.

I couldn’t.

But I wanted to.

I wanted him to come back.

Wyn and Ryland tried to hold me back as I lunged for him, part of me needing to claw him out and part of me needing to follow.

I had done this to him. I needed to make it better.

I could make it better.

It was the only thing that was left, that and tears. I didn’t even know what was going on around me anymore. I could feel hands against my arms. I could hear pleadings in the air around me. But the next thing I knew, there was only dirt, and my magic was angry, and I was angry, and my magic surged to the surface as I screamed and Wyn grabbed me, trying to help me.

Our magic reacted, and everything went white.

But not the white of the sight I had pulled everyone into before. It was the white of the explosion I had seen outside of the cathedral, the blast so bright and so hot that everyone’s shrieks rose to match mine. Everyone’s pain rose to match mine.

Everyone was as trapped in it as I was.

It was then I realized who those two figures I had seen in the explosion of my sight were and why this moment was so cemented within our timeline.

As the explosion began to fade, as the cries of pain began to lessen, as the heat of the blast began to subside, I opened my eyes.

I opened my eyes to a beautiful, blue sky and to snow blowing over us all.

T
he smell
of dirt and blood mixed with the scent of sweat and desperation in a way that was intoxicating. It lingered in the air and dripped against my skin in tiny pricks of energy, each one infecting me… awakening me.

Of course, I was positive it had more to do with what was coming than the two women below me who were currently pulling at each other’s hair, a move that would normally insight cheers of glee in the crowds.

Only a few clapped their hands.

A coup was moments away. I could feel it in the pinpricks of my sight, feel it in the eagerness of the crowd, their attention half-focused on the battling women in the middle of the mud-filled pits. Their eyes constantly darted to me then darted to the large door inset into the floor of the arena.

Even if I hadn’t seen what was coming within sight, I would have been able to guess. They gave themselves away.

Foolish Trpaslíks.

Smiling to myself, I sat back on the many velvet pillows that Edmund had used as a throne, sipping Black Water like wine. Wine for the greatest of shows.

One woman clawed at the other before wrapping her teeth around the soft flesh of her neck and pulling. Red sprayed from her neck in a fountain as a large chunk of flesh was pulled from her like overcooked meat.

The comical reaction was enough to pull the audience’s attention from what was coming. With a roar, they cheered as the bleeding woman fell to the ground in a heap while the victor turned to me, her eyes dangerous as she smiled.

I laughed at the look, the raw danger she tried so hard to show me. Yes, she would be good in battle; I could see that at once. However, it was the warning behind her eyes that forced the laugh from my chest.

The threat was clear. She might as well have said, “You’re next, Sain.”

I laughed harder, the sound echoing around the stadium as her face fell.

Even the Chosen who were being forced to fight for their lives knew what was coming. They were ready to try to overthrow me as much as the Trpaslíks who were now looking at me with varying degrees of fear and confusion.

“I am quite ready for this attempted coup to begin,” I said underneath the laugh quiet enough that Ovailia could hear from where she sat, nestled against my legs, one tier of bleachers down.

Below me where she belonged, where she would die.

Maybe I would end her in the pits just like all of these fools.

Ovailia didn’t turn to look at me. Her hand shifted to rub against my leg, her magic swelling. “Is that why you are laughing?” Her voice was dark molasses, sweet and dangerous. It drifted across the tense anticipation in the air like candy, swirling over everything.

I sighed, pulling long strands of her hair gently before running my fingers over the top of her head.

She shivered, her magic quivering alongside, and my smile grew.

“Among many things.” My voice was even lower now, something Ovailia didn’t seem to mind. Damek, however, stepped closer to us, away from the door he was supposed to be guarding, his fear unabashed as he tried to pick up as much of the conversation as he could.

With one sharp look, I caught him in the act, sending him scuttling back toward the entrance to our little alcove, his shoulders hunched and shivering.

I would have to punish him for that little trick later. Maybe let him and Ovailia battle it out in a pit of their own.

The women in the pits had given me something to chew on.

“Did you see the look on her face?” I whispered into Ovailia’s ear, meeting the glare of the woman below me, the hatred fading a bit due to the look I fixed her with.

“Hers?” Ovailia asked, her voice shaking a bit as I leaned down toward her, pressing my cheek against hers, our conversation hidden from prying ears.

“Yes. Did you see the hatred?”

Ovailia shivered as my magic pressed against her, searching for hers. I let it flow, feeling her unease. The emotion was so strong I could taste it. Delicious.

“I saw the darkness in her eyes,” Ovailia answered, her uncertainty fading as she pushed strength into her voice. The stoicism that I loved bled into me as she lifted her hand, brushing it against my forearm, her magic sparking pleasantly against my skin. With that one touch, my magic reacted, attempting to connect with hers as she attempted to connect with me. It took all my will to keep my magic restrained. “She wanted to kill you. Do you want to kill her?”

“I want to kill them all,” I answered as a roar encompassed the crowd, the sound loud enough that I jerked.

With my cheek still pressed against Ovailia’s, I glanced toward the pit, my heart a thunder of hope that perhaps this would be the start. But no, it was just two scrawny teenage boys dressed in blood-soaked clothes that I knew didn’t originally belong to them.

They looked at me with the same defiance the woman had. Their hands pressed against their hearts in a salute before they bowed, the motion rehearsed as they turned, shaking in preparation for death.

“I
will
kill them all,” I declared, my voice a snake as I smiled. The eagerness for what was to come flourishing.

“Will you?” Ovailia whispered, turning her head toward me as the words grazed across my cheek in hot breath and soft lips.

Heart racing in both need and disgust, I pulled away from her, looking her full in the face as my temper howled under my skin. “Don’t question me,” I snapped. She flinched, the reaction fueling my authority more. “I don’t need bottom feeders, Ovi. You either follow me, or I dispose of you. Don’t you like your spine where it is, inside your pretty little back?” I ran my finger up the appendage in question, tracing over the fine silk of her shirt.

She jerked, attempting to move away from the threat, from the look in my eyes. But I held her against me, letting my magic shoot into the bones of her back in tiny shots of pain.

“I keep telling you not to unleash the hell inside of me, Ovailia. Why must you keep defying me?” I kept my voice low, the deep, sultry notes affecting her the way I knew they would. The woman melted beneath me in fear, in need. “Do you want to see hell?”

“I want to see the end, Sain.” She smiled, the grin long and menacing as it stretched over her face.

An end, I could give her. An end of a blood red blade as it intersected with her neck.

My own smile stretched, fueled by the sight my magic had given me which was playing on repeat.

“I want to give that to you, Ovailia. I can end this once and for all.
We
can end this once and for all,” I continued. The words were a lie, bitter and gross in my mouth. I knew I didn’t mean it, and I was certain she knew it, too.
We
would not do anything.

It didn’t matter, however. She smiled, anyway, drowning in the power I taunted her with. The power she had wanted since the very beginning.

“Then let’s end this,” she said, her voice full of lust and need, her magic pressing against me again in that disgusting desire. I let it twist over me, my own spreading to join hers, my heart betraying me with the contact.

“Let’s.” I was drowning in her proximity, desperate to connect to her, to feel her.

I considered slapping myself back to my senses; I would have if it weren’t for the roar that went up from the crowd, the noise signaling the end of yet another battle.

I didn’t even glance toward the stands to congratulate the winner. I was pretty certain what I would find down there, anyway. I could already smell the blood. And sure enough, the boys were covered in it. But they were both still standing, very much alive. They were both staring at me.

Staring just like everyone else.

“It’s time,” I announced, a sneer twisting over my lips as excitement invaded me.

My sight wasn’t far behind, pushing against me in need, but I thrust it away, letting my deeper magic flare, bringing it to the ready. I had already seen what was about to happen; I didn’t need another recap. I did, however, need to be ready for a fight.

“Go get my creature, Ovailia,” I hissed.

My anger drenched her pretty blue eyes in a luscious syrup. Watching her was like watching a well-practiced Oscar performance. Anger, seduction, lust, frustration—they all played upon her face in perfect harmony, stirring my own hunger from deep inside of me.

“Make Damek do it,” she hissed, her anger growing. “I need to be here. They need to see us sta—”

“They need to see where my power lies. It is not with you!” The snap of my voice smacked her right across the face, and she flinched, cowering away from me.

Ovailia. Cowering. The brief image was beautiful.

I had always been told that the witch couldn’t be controlled, that she could never be a true servant. Yet, here she was, beautifully submissive.

“Go. Get. The. Creature.” I snapped each word like a whip, each one making her recoil, curling up her spine. “
We
need to show them what we are capable of. You are not
we
, not right now.” Pushing a hard edge into my voice, I moved away from her, leaning back against the rich softness of the pillows, the plush red blending perfectly with the bloodstained bathrobe I still wore. “Go,” I spoke without even looking at her, my focus on the boys below me as all of us waited for the next step in the show to start.

I knew it was coming.

Ovailia left without another word, her sheet of hair falling down her back against the red silk of her dress. The crimson matched her shoes that tapped over the distant screeches of the crowd. They were a countdown that ended with the smack of a heavy door somewhere in the distance.

Pushing her out of my mind, I forced my focus back to the pits, back to the men who were now walking onto the field, back to the deathly silence that had suddenly taken over the space.

George and Bronislav walked into the center of the pit, the sound of their steps against the blood-soaked dirt so thunderous I could hear them echo off the metal stands. They ricocheted, the tone of fearful exhilaration so loud now that I could swim in it.

I looked down at the men as they looked up at me. Their faces were filled with gaunt exhilaration. Bronislav’s smile was visible from under his beard, the look so out of character for him that I could laugh.

And I did.

I laughed.

I laughed in the silence with a deep belt of humor. I laughed over the tension, and everyone in the stands turned to face me, their previous countenances of eager bloodlust vanishing into confusion and fear.

I didn’t stop laughing as I rose from my pillows, and the robe caught in the breeze, sending my magic out from me in a powerful, impenetrable shield. Keeping the magic steady and strong, I stepped forward over the metal bleachers, dancing and jumping until I stood atop the lowermost tier, facing the usurpers and all of their minions, all of whom were ready to rip my head from my shoulders, all of them blissfully unaware of what was coming for them.

“Friends,” I yelled, my voice a boom over the nonexistent chatter of the crowd. I lifted my arms in wide vulnerability. “You wonderful friends, I knew I could trust you to put together this wondrous event! You have done it! What an amazing way to celebrate the people we have become! To celebrate the possibilities that are before us.”

Keeping the widest smile I could, I plastered on all the sugar, sharing the feigned gratitude in a slather that they gobbled up. My smile was exuberant.

“You have done such a wonderful job that I would like to give you something,” I began, the sugar that had dripped from my words leeching into acid, rancid tones that weren’t missed. “A gift if you will.”

All signs of the jovial character I had created vanished in a flash. Arms falling, I then lifted a large, red blade from my pocket, the same blade I had used to destroy Edmund, the same one they had all seen protruding from the chest of his corpse.

Visibly, they stiffened. Even Damek jerked from where he stood in the corner. Quick side-glances pulsed between the men below me as Bronislav shifted his feet, debating whether or not to run. I wished he would.

Twisting the blade in my fingers like a parade baton, I took a step down onto the narrow metal rail that separated the stands from the large open pit the two men stood in. It was a sheer drop of at least fifteen feet from where I stood, pacing and dancing on the narrow line. With the shield still tightly pressed against me, I waited for the first attack.

“It’s the best kind of gift. Would you like it?” I asked as I jumped along the railing, the red blade reflecting the color of death over the stands as it spun between my fingers.

I expected the scared men to begin whatever pathetic attempt at a rebellion they had planned, knowing the pride of the Trpaslíks. Instead, Bronislav nodded in agreement. The smile was gone from his lips as he narrowed his eyes at me.

Well, that was unexpected. No matter. Slight changes were meaningless. They were still walking into death, and being close enough to see the look on their faces when death met them face to face was an added bonus.

My heart thundering wildly in my chest, I jumped, the wind and magic catching me as I soared down to the pits, landing lightly before the two men. All signs of their fear were gone as they smiled at me, their eyes glistening as though they already thought they had won, something I was content to let them believe for now.

Bronislav held out his hand the moment I landed. When I stepped toward him, the man smiled, the look in his eyes giving him away so obviously I laughed, the sound cutting into them. As close to them as I was, I could see them wilt. I could see their supposed victory slip between their fingers.

“Oh,” I said, my voice dark as I let it rattle over the stands, hitting all of them. “You thought this was the gift?”

My laugh continued, pressing against them and wilting their souls as I twirled the blade once in my hand before tucking it into my pocket. The men watched the movement, their eyes widening as their jaws began to open and close in panic and fear.

They thought it would be that easy.

Fools.

“No, no, no, no.” I clicked my tongue with each word as I shook my head.

Circling around them, I looked up at the stands, my heart thundering pleasantly due to the mirrored look from all those above me as well as below. Panic, confusion—they all felt them. Now I needed the last piece to fall into place. I needed the fear to come. Then they would be mine. Luckily, that piece was steps away.