Wicked Saints

by Emily A Duncan

  “Admirable, as your father is currently involved in planning filicide.”

  He laughed. It was strained.

  “What about the war?”

  He cast her a sidelong glance that made a jolt of fear run through her. She wondered if he suspected, though she didn’t know how he possibly could.

  “We don’t know anything else,” he said. “And that needs to change. And we’re out of time. The Kalyazi are moving on Tranavia and I don’t know if we’re in a position to properly defend ourselves.”

  Nadya’s breath caught. “Anna,” she whispered.

  “What?”

  She shook her head, hoping he didn’t press further. “And Tranavia’s irreconcilable differences with Kalyazin?”

  “What about them?”

  “Would you let priests back into Tranavia? Rebuild the churches?”

  His jaw tensed. Alarms rang in her head; she had stepped too far, but it was too late to backtrack.

  “I’m not sure Kalyazin’s gods have any place in Tranavia,” he said.

  She nodded as if it was a perfectly reasonable answer. Inside she was left fumbling. Serefin would be better than his father and the war did need to end. Was she willing to compromise? She was here to give Tranavia back to the gods, but she was here to stop the war as well. Was one more important than the other? She was only one girl; she didn’t want the fate of nations resting on her decisions.

  They were nearing Nadya’s chambers. She wasn’t entirely certain how to reach the cathedral from here and she asked Serefin for directions.

  He frowned.

  “Be … careful, Józefina,” he said. “He is not one to trifle with.”

  Nadya almost laughed. It was touching that he seemed so concerned with her welfare. “Could you do me another favor, Serefin?”

  “You’re aiding me in patricide, I figure I owe you a lifetime of favors.”

  “Oh, I’ll remember that.”

  He grinned. She couldn’t help but smile back.

  “Someone has surely noticed that I’m not languishing in a dungeon by now. I would like to be confident in my knowledge that no one is going to come looking for me because I’m not where I’m supposed to be.”

  Especially as I’ll be with the Vultures.

  Serefin nodded. “I can do that.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I still don’t understand why you’re doing this.”

  Nadya didn’t know how to answer that. Divine command was too much truth, anything else felt trite.

  “The war took someone important to me,” she said, fingering Kostya’s necklace unconsciously. She couldn’t think about how it had been Serefin who had led that attack. “I won’t tolerate it any longer.”

  He leaned against the wall beside the door to her chambers. “And who are you that you can do what countless others have failed at over a century?”

  No one. Just a girl. Some small scrap of divinity.

  She shrugged. “I’m the first person who refuses to fail.”

  * * *

  The Vultures kept residence in what once was the grand cathedral of Grazyk. Now that the gods were no longer worshipped, it was where the Carrion Throne resided. Malachiasz’s throne.

  The cathedral was an imposing structure. Massive and bleak, with grand spires and huge stained glass windows.

  Nadya stopped before the entrance, staring up. She couldn’t force her feet closer and after a few minutes she was dimly aware of Malachiasz’s presence beside her, looking up at the cathedral as well.

  Silence filled the space between them before he spoke: “War has made us all used to living in desecrated spaces once considered holy.”

  It had been painted black. Nadya knew there was no way it had looked like this when it was an actual church. There were ironwork vines and shattered statues worked into the bricks. All the statues had lost their heads but one.

  “Cholyok dagol,” she swore under her breath.

  Malachiasz followed her gaze. He paled. “You know, I’m honestly not sure how that one in particular has survived.”

  “I can’t tell if you’re lying to me or not,” Nadya said wearily.

  Svoyatova Madgalina. A saint who was supposedly the first of the clerics. Nadya didn’t like the irony.

  It started to rain. A freezing rain that fell in heavy, painful droplets. Malachiasz squinted up at the sky. He reached down and took her hand, twining their fingers together.

  “You’re not forgiven,” she whispered.

  “I know.”

  She bit her lip, blinking back tears. He tugged at her hand.

  “Parijahan and Rashid are fine, come on, let’s get out of the rain.”

  She followed him into the cathedral and tried to not feel as though it was swallowing her alive.

  The foyer was tiled with cool, black marble. The door to the sanctuary black with gilded edges. Malachiasz pushed the door open. It was like he was leading her farther down into hell, a new level with every door he opened.

  Yet still she followed him.

  Her breath caught in her throat when she stepped into the sanctuary. Malachiasz glanced back at her, a half smile at his lips. He was wearing different clothes, a long tunic over breeches, all in black with a rich golden brocade belt tied around his waist. He looked more like nobility now, like he could reasonably be a young king.

  The sanctuary was vast, with high, vaulted ceilings and pillars carved with figures that betrayed the room’s religious origins. The Carrion Throne rested atop gilded skulls. Bones lined the long, open hall, inlaid into the black marble floor. There was a brutal, primal beauty to it, this combination of the profane and the divine.

  Light filtered down through the high windows, flooding the room, softening its harsh lines. She was aware of Malachiasz watching her as she took in the sanctuary. She walked around the bones inlaid in the floor, while Malachiasz stepped from one to the next, like a young boy playing a game.

  “Tell me what you wouldn’t say in front of the witch,” she said.

  “The king is trying to become a god,” Malachiasz said, without looking up, as he hopped from one bone to another.

  Nadya drew in a sharp breath at the frank way he said it. As if it was nothing.

  “My concept of a god, not yours, I think,” he said. His shoulders lifted in a shrug. “But who knows? And, yes, the theory was one I discovered.” He sighed, rubbing his forehead with his elegant, tattooed fingers. She wondered—not for the first time—what the tattoos meant; she wondered if it was too late to find out. “It was just a theory; the sheer amount of magic involved to make anything like it remotely a reality was so astronomical that I thought it was impossible. I shouldn’t have told anyone, I know, but I did and here we are.”

  “Why were you researching it to begin with?”

  “Curiosity, for one.” He waved a hand at the sanctuary. “Because I saw the fault line in Tranavia and thought maybe—maybe I could fix it. Maybe I could be the one to save this crumbling kingdom. What’s the point of all this power if I don’t do anything with it…”

  He’d never struck her as the power-hungry type. She wondered if that was just another facet of him he was hiding, if he had so perfected the image he wanted her to see that she didn’t actually know him at all. Or if the idealism—the desire to save a dying kingdom—if that was the truth of him.

  Except … He was picking at his cuticles, the rim around the nail on his index finger filling with blood as he tore too far. He winced and stuck his finger in his mouth to stop the bleeding. She didn’t think a power-hungry monster king would have anxiety and play childhood games on the floor of his own grim palace.

  “So, you abdicated? Fled the Vultures?”

  “I fled Tranavia,” he clarified. “Abdication is impossible. I have the throne until I die, until I’m killed for it, most likely.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “When the Vultures attacked…”

  “I thought they were there for me, yes. Rozá is one of the ones w
ho want me off the throne.”

  “But you sent them away?”

  “It was a gamble. Like I said, the magic is imperfect, obviously, as they attempted to kill me there. They could have kept after us; they could have killed the others. We got lucky. I shook the order when I fled; I have created more chaos by returning. I … I don’t know if I can command them like I did. No one has ever done what I did.”

  She frowned.

  “You are searching for an apology for what I am; I will not provide one. I thought I had found something to end this war and save Tranavia. Instead I gave the idea of unlimited power to the one person who should never have considered it. I ran because refusing would have meant my execution. I can admit to being a coward in that respect.”

  Something cracked in her chest and she jolted. “All of it has been a lie? Everything?”

  He closed his eyes, knuckled the bridge of his nose. “No. Nadya, that’s not what I meant. I have grown so used to lies that I don’t know what’s true anymore.” His voice trembled. “What you’ve given me is a truth I don’t know what to do with because I’ve never had anything like it before. I can’t bear to think I’ve ruined it.”

  They stood in silence, the light shifting outside, fading within the sanctuary, and lengthening the shadows around them. Here in this profaned place, Nadya found herself reaching for a monster.

  She cradled his hand, lightly pressing her fingertips against his. She let the silence drag out, stretch between them, become something almost tangible. When she was certain he felt it, she reached up and took his face between her hands. His eyes closed, long eyelashes splayed like shadows against his pale skin. He rested his hands on her wrists, thumbs pressed lightly against her palms in a way that made her heart pound traitorously.

  “Tell me the truth, Malachiasz, why are you here?”

  He exhaled deeply, his breath feathering her face. “I’m tired, Nadya. I want to put an end to what I’ve started. I want this war to end without leaving Tranavia in ashes.”

  “I want to believe you,” she whispered. “But…”

  He opened his mouth, at a loss for words. Finally, he asked, “Will it always be like this?”

  Would it? She couldn’t say. Would she ever be comfortable with what he was? Or would it always be this constant hot and cold, friends one second and enemies the next?

  “I don’t know.”

  He nodded and there was such a deep well of sadness in his pale eyes that Nadya felt her heart splinter to a shattering point. It wasn’t something she had ever felt before, this crack in her chest, this void splitting her ribs open. His sleeve fell back, revealing the ridged mess of scars covering his forearm.

  Frowning, she trailed her hand over the scars. “You said the razors to cast magic don’t scar.” She had cut open her arms in the arena and the wounds were already healing—not as quickly as if she were a blood mage herself, but they were healing clean.

  “They don’t,” he said. “It was a reminder.” Like the reminders he whispered to himself of his name, always his name.

  “Do you still?”

  He shook his head. “Not for a long time.”

  She let her thumb brush over his, fingers toying with his, before she dropped his hand, taking a step back. She turned away, taking in the sanctuary again. Would he lose all of this if he helped them? Did he even want it in the first place?

  “How long have you been … this?”

  “Two years,” he said. “I was sixteen when I took the throne.”

  “You killed the last Black Vulture?”

  She turned in time to see him nod.

  “Why?”

  “I wanted to know if I could,” he said softly. “If anything would become better if I succeeded.”

  “Did it?”

  “No.”

  They were quiet again. Nadya wandered through the sanctuary and the voice in the back of her head that was still loudly struggling against Malachiasz began to fall silent.

  Eventually, Nadya heard his footsteps behind her. Felt his lips press against her neck in a way that made her knees weak.

  “I want to talk to the others,” she said, flushing at the way her voice hitched. Her face flushed even hotter when she heard his soft laugh.

  When he stepped past her, a smile flickered at the edges of his lips. There was darkness at the corners, something evil just underneath the surface, sinister. He turned and grinned at her, monstrous but beatific, holding out his hand, darkness gone. Maybe she’d just imagined it. She took his hand.

  Malachiasz led her out of the sanctuary, up a flight of stairs and down a long hallway. They were stopped midway down the hall by a Vulture clearing her throat.

  “I honestly didn’t think you were ever going to come back.”

  Malachiasz tensed. He hastily dropped Nadya’s hand and she ducked her head. She had to fight the instinct to flee.

  “Rozá,” Malachiasz said flatly. “I would apologize for leaving you in the dark, but it occurs to me that I don’t care and you are not required to know my business. Żywia knew I was back and last I checked she was my second, not you.”

  Rozá wasn’t wearing a mask and her bare face was softer than Nadya expected. She was pretty in a luxurious sort of way.

  “Any longer and I would have been named Black Vulture,” she sneered.

  Malachiasz’s smile had a knife’s blade edge. “We both know that is impossible.”

  Her claws snapped out of her hands, but Malachiasz already had one long iron claw tipped underneath her chin.

  “Don’t, Rozá,” he said softly.

  “I should tell the king what you’re doing,” she said, but she swallowed hard and her voice trembled.

  “Well, then, it’s good for all of us that you cannot.” Malachiasz’s voice struck chords of fear in some primal depth of Nadya.

  Rozá’s eyes flashed but she nodded. Malachiasz retracted his claw, letting her take a step back.

  “But you can tell him that I’ve been watching and I have thoughts about how he has chosen to handle matters,” Malachiasz said. He glanced back at Nadya. “My chambers are at the end of the hall. I’ll be with you soon.”

  Nadya frowned. She didn’t want to leave him alone with this Vulture where she couldn’t keep on eye on him. She shot him a warning look as she passed. He smiled faintly at her. It did nothing to make her feel better as she hurried down the hall, overly aware she could be stopped by a Vulture and no longer have Malachiasz’s protection shielding her.

  Not that she couldn’t protect herself, but she was in a precarious position as it was. Stirring up suspicion was the last thing she needed.

  Rashid was on edge when she entered Malachiasz’s chambers. He jumped to his feet, wincing at the motion, but he relaxed when he saw it was her. She walked in slowly, taking in the lavish quarters. They didn’t appear like they had been lived in for some time.

  Paintings covered every open wall space and were stacked in the corners of the room. Mostly landscapes, strangely dark, as if the artist was rendering a grim future. A few portraits that didn’t appear to be of anyone in particular that Nadya could tell. There was a bookcase that was overfull, books beginning to gather in piles around it.

  “Oh,” she said. She shot Parijahan and Rashid a reluctant smile before stepping toward a door and opening it. She wanted to know everything about this strange, secretive boy. He was a liar and she wanted his truths.

  Inside the room was a study befitting someone with Malachiasz’s title. More books were stacked in the corners. The desk was a mess of papers and razors and sharp tools that Nadya didn’t even want to consider. The room felt wrong, off, and Nadya shut the door quickly, feeling ill. The corridor off to the back led to his bedroom. Nadya hadn’t expected the rooms to all be so cluttered and messy. She moved back into the main sitting room.

  “You lied to me,” she said flatly.

  Parijahan pursed her lips. Rashid, at least, looked ashamed.

  “What did you expect
? It was enough that you knew he was one of them—”

  “You don’t get to make that decision for me,” Nadya snapped.

  Rashid touched Parijahan’s arm. “She’s allowed to be upset,” he said, voice soft.

  “How did you find out?” Nadya asked.

  “It’s Malachiasz. He hedges. He hedged too far one day and I put the pieces together,” Parijahan said.

  “You trust him?”

  “I trust him. He has questionable methods, he’s desperate, but he’s trying and that’s more than can be said for most people.”

  It didn’t feel like enough to Nadya, but she didn’t know what would ever make it enough. But it didn’t seem to matter. She could wander in mental circles about how she shouldn’t trust him because he lied to her, but she would still follow him.

  This was a battle she had lost. No amount of flipping back and forth was going to change how she needed him for this plan to work, that she cared about the anxious boy trying to correct a mistake, the boy she believed was not a lie. Even if he happened to be a monster.

  “Where were you two?”

  “Languishing in dungeons, trying to convince a rather keen guard that ‘No, Parijahan doesn’t look familiar, you just think all Akolans look the same.’”

  Nadya’s eyes widened. “What?”

  Parijahan waved a dismissive hand. “Could you see to his broken ribs?”

  “Your what?”

  Rashid smiled sheepishly, stretching out on the chaise with a pained groan.

  “I think I’m dying.”

  “He’s not dying,” Parijahan said.

  Nadya drew her magic forth, hating every second she used it without contact from the gods. She whispered holy speech she didn’t understand under her breath as her fingertips heated. She carefully worked out which of Rashid’s ribs were broken and set to mending them.

  Rashid squirmed underneath her hands like a child who refused to sit for the healer. Nadya had to restrain from smacking him. “Sit still.”

  “Your hands are freezing.”

  The door opened and closed with a slam. Malachiasz flopped face-first onto the remaining chaise. He let out a long, dramatic sigh and sat up.

  “Rashid got his chest knocked in for trying to charm the guards?” he asked.