by Morgan Rice
She would kill before she let that happen.
“What have you done, you arrogant idiot?” Felene demanded.
Stephania’s smile tightened, tempered only by the knowledge that the thief was dying. As she should have back on Felldust. If she’d had the grace to do that, Stephania would already have been away from there.
“She’s done what she always does,” Ceres said. “Acted with as much bile as she can because she isn’t getting her own way.”
She made it sound as though Stephania was a child, rather than a newly crowned queen.
Even Thanos seemed shocked by the move. That was Ceres’s fault, no doubt. If he’d been there alone, Stephania would have been able to persuade him. They’d have been killing the First Stone even then.
“Stephania, how could you do this?” Thanos asked.
Stephania had done it for the same reason she did everything else: because it was necessary. Now there was no way out but through this.
“They’ll be coming,” Stephania said to him. “Stay here. Fight them. Help me to kill their leader. We can do this, Thanos. We can save Delos. We can rule it.”
She could rule it. Stephania had felt what it meant to be a ruler. She wasn’t going to give that up, and if it meant that she got Thanos too—
Felene cut her off with a slap that rocked her. “We need to get out of here,” she said to the others, as if Stephania were just a distraction. When she turned to Stephania, Stephania could see the hatred there. “Run if you want to live. Just don’t pick the same direction as us, or I’ll cut your throat, child or no child.”
“No,” Thanos said. “We take her with us. I’ll bind and drag her if I have to. Just until the child is born. Please.”
Stephania saw Ceres nod, although she could see that the peasant wasn’t happy about it.
“All right,” Ceres said. “You get her arms, I’ll—”
Stephania reacted on instinct, her hand diving into the folds of her dress for one of the daggers she kept there. She didn’t have many weapons left, but she would use every one she had to keep them from taking her child. She would not be treated as no more than the vessel to bear Thanos’s baby. The sorcerer had tried to do that, and now her husband was… no, she wouldn’t allow it!
She leapt forward, springing past Felene, a blade in her hand as she sprang for Thanos and Ceres.
She hadn’t reckoned how fast Felene was, even injured.
Felene sprang in the way as quick as a snake, and Stephania felt her blade, meant for Thanos, sink deep into the other woman’s chest. Of course, this time it would be that easy. If she’d managed it so cleanly back on the boat, maybe they wouldn’t be standing there now.
Felene’s face was set with determination as she punched Stephania back, knocking her sprawling.
Ceres went one better, kicking the knife out of Stephania’s hand.
Stephania ran for the edge of the circle of statues, but Ceres was faster. So was Thanos. Stephania felt their hands close on her arms, pulling her back even though she fought.
“If you don’t kill her now—” Ceres began.
“What?” Stephania demanded. “What will you do? Leave him? You care so little for him, don’t you?”
She did it because she could. Because even driving that small wedge between Ceres and Thanos was something. Stephania saw the look that passed between Ceres and Thanos. She saw the look of confusion and hurt on Thanos’s face as he fought to work out what to do next. She enjoyed that. She couldn’t have him, but at least she could make sure that Ceres didn’t get him.
“I… I still can’t kill her,” Thanos said.
“I can,” Ceres replied.
Stephania saw Thanos pull at her arm. She smiled at that.
“Oh, how sweet,” Stephania said. “The noble prince, protecting his wife. His wife, Ceres.”
She didn’t care how angry she made Ceres then. Angry was good. Angry meant that she wouldn’t be thinking. Stephania might get another chance to strike.
“What do you want, Thanos?” Ceres asked. “We can’t take her with us. She’d kill us at the first opportunity she got.”
“Yes, Thanos,” Stephania asked, as sweetly as she could, “what do you want? What do you really want?”
Sometimes, the only weapons she had were words, but Stephania was an expert when it came to using them.
“I can’t kill her,” Thanos said. “And I can’t let you kill her, Ceres, because I wouldn’t be able to look at you the same way again.”
“Thanos—” Ceres began, and Stephania smiled in victory.
“But I can leave her behind,” Thanos suddenly said. His hands tightened on Stephania’s arms, catching her as she realized what he’d just said. “I can leave her to the fate of Felldust’s army.”
Stephania felt a wave of terror overcome her.
“No,” Stephania begged. “They’ll kill me. They’ll do worse than kill me. Please, Thanos.”
He didn’t answer, though, but instead dragged her in the direction of one of the nearest statues.
“You can’t leave me here to die!” she shrieked. “To be raped! To be tortured! To be made a mockery of!”
Yet she saw Thanos’s expression and her terror increased as she knew her pleas were falling on deaf ears.
“I’ll kill you,” Stephania shrieked, filled with rage, desperate. “I’ll kill you both!”
Thanos wrenched her arms behind her back, while Ceres cut away Stephania’s belt and then tied her arms in place. Stephania wrenched at the bonds, trying to pull her arms free, but nothing happened.
Worse, she saw Felene struggling to her feet, drawing a sword and long knife.
“Go…” the sailor managed. “I’ll hold them off.”
“Felene,” Ceres began.
“Go!”
Stephania could not believe it as she watched Thanos and Ceres run off, leaving her like this. She vowed her hatred with every step they took.
“Looks like it’s just you and me, princess,” Felene said. “Don’t worry… I’m not… going to kill you. You deserve… far worse than that.”
Stephania ignored her and kept working at her bonds, trying to break free, trying to get away before…
They came in a rush, the first men of Felldust bursting into the circle of grass while Felene moved forward to face them. Stephania saw her thrust a blade through one warrior’s chest, parry a blow from a second, and cut across the throat of a third.
She wasn’t moving well, though. Stephania had seen how fast she could be when she’d fought Elethe, but now she staggered from blow to blow.
Good.
Stephania watched as a warrior thrust a spear into the thief. Felene cut back, bringing the warrior down, but another cut across her leg. She collapsed, and the warriors stepped back the way they might have from a wounded omnicat.
Stephania recognized First Stone Irrien as he stepped into the circle formed by the trees. He was everything her spies had said: tall, imposing, cruelly handsome and deadly looking. Felene fell to her side as he approached, hefting an axe with one hand.
“You’re the First Stone?” she demanded.
He nodded to her. “I am.”
She forced a smile. “Good, I’ve… been waiting for someone… worthy of killing me.”
“Then I’m sorry I didn’t get here earlier,” he said. “Rest now. Your part in this is done.”
Felene lay there, coughing up blood, as he walked past her as if she weren’t there.
And then, to Stephania’s horror, she spoke her final words:
“And that is Stephania,” Felene said. “Don’t let her…tell you otherwise.”
Felene then collapsed, dead.
Stephania felt a rush of fear as the ruler of Felldust grinned in surprise and delight. Felene had ruined her one chance to pretend she was someone else. In her dying breath, Felene had somehow managed to kill her.
He stalked toward her and lifted his axe. For a moment, Stephania thought that he mi
ght cut her down, and she flinched back against the statue, unable to stop her fear.
He buried the axe in the ground, then reached out a hand to touch her face. Stephania wanted to pull away, but she wouldn’t show that weakness. She wouldn’t.
“Lady Stephania,” he said. “Tales of your beauty do not do you justice.”
There was still a chance. The First Stone was still a man, still a ruler, still a warrior. All three of those were things Stephania could work with. She could come out of this more powerful than she’d gone into it.
“First Stone Irrien,” she said. “Welcome to Delos. I hope you’re enjoying your time here.”
She tried to make it sound as if they were meeting in the middle of some noble masque, not the aftermath of an invasion. Pretend a thing enough, she’d always found, and the reality would follow.
“Someone certainly seems to have left me the most interesting things.”
He reached out to touch her throat this time. Stephania tried not to think about how easily he could crush that throat.
“I hope I will prove more interesting than you think,” Stephania said. “If you know who I am, you know what I can do for you.”
“You sound as if you are proposing an alliance,” Irrien said. He sounded amused by it, but also interested.
Stephania knew that she had him then. She might be the one tied in place, but soon enough, Irrien would be the one with her strings around him. She would have to be careful at first, have to suggest and persuade rather than demand, but she could do this.
“I am currently the most important noble of the Empire,” Stephania said. “I took its throne by force and cunning.” The two things that they admired most in Felldust. “While you are a man without a wife.”
“You’re proposing marriage?” Irrien asked, moving behind Stephania, slicing through her bonds with a knife. “You’re bold indeed.”
She resisted the urge to rub her wrists. That would have looked weak. Instead, she stood before him the way a ruler should.
“The strong are bold,” Stephania said. “And we could do great things together. I know the Empire, all its secrets, all its webs of connections. More than that, I bring a sense of legitimacy. We could join our lands together formally, ruling both, above my nobles and your fellow stones.”
“It is a tempting offer,” Irrien admitted.
She could tempt him more than that. She moved close, pressing against him.
“And if your walls had held,” Irrien went on, “I might have considered it. Now, though, you have nothing to give I cannot take.”
“What?”
Stephania moved to step back, but Irrien caught her by the throat, sudden and tight. She grabbed for his hand, but couldn’t move it. His other hand moved to her dress, and Stephania cried out as he ripped the outer layers from her.
He threw her to the ground, and Stephania lay there, staring up at him in terror. When he reached to his belt and drew out a whip, she shrank back.
“Do not worry though. I won’t be killing you. You will make far too fine a slave for that.”
Stephania wanted to stand, to argue, to fight, but there was no time to do any of it. The first blow struck her, and all she could do was scream.
CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT
Ceres leaned on Thanos as much as he leaned on her as they made their way down toward the docks. Thanks to everything she’d suffered, she felt as though she barely had the strength to stand, while he seemed to be unwilling to risk letting go of her, even for a moment.
“That way,” Thanos managed, pointing. “There are small boats.”
Ceres nodded, trying to steer the two of them in the direction he’d pointed. She tried to keep to the shadows to keep them from being spotted, but the truth was that they needed to move quickly more than they needed to keep out of sight.
Somewhere behind them, Ceres heard Stephania scream, and she felt Thanos tense. For a moment, she found herself wondering if he would run back for her. He’d done it before, hadn’t he? He’d returned to Delos to save her.
He pressed forward, though, and Ceres dared to breathe a sigh of relief. Maybe they could do this. Maybe they could get through it.
Ceres saw a group of Felldust warriors ahead, looting their way along one of the streets. There couldn’t be much in the way of pickings for them by now, but they seemed to be going through the houses anyway, determined to collect every scrap they could.
Ceres pulled Thanos down a side street, looking to dodge past them. She hurried with him, making her way past a water butt, then over a low fence. They paused for a moment, waiting for more soldiers to pass. In that moment, Thanos said the words that Ceres both wanted to hear and dreaded.
“I love you,” he said.
“I love you too, Thanos,” Ceres said. “But can’t this wait until we’re clear?”
She wanted to put this off if she could. Thanos had gone with her. He’d rejected Stephania, but even so, there were so many things they needed to talk about.
“No,” Thanos said. “I mean it. I mean… I love you, not Stephania. I chose you. I choose you.”
That was good to hear, but it was something Thanos had said before. He’d still gone back for Stephania, hadn’t he? He’d still kept Ceres from killing her. Ceres understood that was about Stephania being the mother of his child, but that didn’t make it better. It meant that there would always be something connecting Thanos and Stephania together.
On the other hand, he had left her. He’d tied her there for Felldust’s warriors. Maybe that was as clear a choice as Ceres was going to get.
That was a question for later, though. For now, the only thing they could do was try to get out of the city alive.
Ceres kept picking twists and turns through the city, trying to dodge the soldiers there. She knew the streets, thanks to all the times she’d delivered weapons for her father or picked up food from the markets. She wove her way through the small streets and alleyways, trying to find a route that Felldust’s soldiers wouldn’t block.
She didn’t succeed.
Three soldiers came out of a house just as they passed, and Ceres’s breath caught. They stood there for a moment, staring at the two of them as though not able to understand who they were.
Ceres was tired, but she still had enough energy left to react first. She drew a sword with her off hand, thrusting it up under the breastplate of one of the invaders as she drew her second.
Thanos stepped past her, parrying a strike aimed at her head. The attacker pushed him back into Ceres, but Ceres saw him thrust around the attacker’s guard, deep under his collarbone. Ceres rode the motion, striking for the last enemy. Off balance as she was, though, the blow fell short.
The man yelled something in the language of Felldust, and Ceres guessed that he was calling out their presence to anyone who was listening. She thrust her blade into him at the second attempt, and Thanos thrust with her, but by then, the damage was done.
“Can you go faster?” Ceres asked.
Thanos nodded. “As fast as you need to go.”
Ceres didn’t reply, but instead tried to rush into motion. She was bone tired, almost staggering, but she still forced herself across a flat roof, then down across the cobbles beyond.
Ceres heard someone call out behind them and risked a glance back. She saw figures in the mish-mash of different uniforms the invaders favored, rushing after them while some pointed.
“Run!” she yelled to Thanos.
He ran with her, keeping going in her wake, following her lead. They skimmed over the cobbles, heading down in the direction of the docks, moving as quickly as they could. Ceres wasn’t sure that they were moving quick enough. She heard footsteps behind her, spun, and saw a spear heading for her face. She swept it aside and sent the attacker sprawling, kicking him as she went past. She saw Thanos shove aside a second attacker, throwing him into the nearest wall with sheer momentum.
Ceres kept moving, not daring to stop and fight. Every moment the
y spent fighting was a moment when more enemies might arrive. Soon, they would find themselves overwhelmed. It was better to run.
But running might not be enough. Even if there were boats down on the waterfront, it would still take time to get one of them into the water, to cast off, to break free. How could they do all that if there were soldiers coming after them?
They were going to die, but Ceres wasn’t going to give up. She and Thanos kept going, continuing to hope.
She saw the beach ahead and pressed on as fast as she could. What she saw there lent her strength, and quickly she felt the shingle of it under her feet. There was a boat out there in the shallows and on it, Ceres could see her brother, her father, Leyana, and the combatlords Ceres had helped. They pointed as they saw her, then waved as if to make certain that she knew which way to go.
“Not far now,” Ceres said. “That—”
Sand caught under her feet, and she stumbled.
She rolled back to her feet, but Thanos was already there, standing ready to meet their foes. The first to reach them died, Thanos’s blade finding a home in his chest and then springing free again.
Ceres jumped past, parrying a blow from a longsword, then ducked under the sweep of a curved knife. She didn’t give ground, couldn’t give ground, because to do so would have been to leave Thanos alone to their blades. They could survive this only as long as they stood together.
She stood there and fought, chopping and parrying, feeling a sword slice a line across her abdomen because she couldn’t spring aside. She heard Thanos grunt as a blade cut him, then saw him take an enemy’s head from his shoulders.
Figures burst past her. The three combatlords slammed into the chasing troops, cutting down those closest and pushing back the others. Ceres glanced round to see her father standing side by side with Thanos.
“To the boat!” he yelled, and Ceres nodded.
She ran with the others into the shallows, feeling the water lap around her ankles. She thought she saw a body there, washed up from the battle, a sword still stuck through it. She was about to run past when his eyes opened, and Ceres recognized him almost in the same instant.
“Akila?”