Ninthborn (The Ninthborn Chronicle Book 1)

by J. E. Holmes

  “If Wien dies, I am next,” he said simply. “I do not want to bleed and cause her to die.”

  “Bleed? Why—?” She turned. All the spilled blood from the assassin was gone. Ashwin had been stopped before he could get to the king’s body. Wien didn’t strike, didn’t draw blood. “Because the sword uses the blood.”

  “Steady, Princess,” Wulfgar said. “You have plan? We have plan, too.”

  “This was your plan? Javras! You were planning to assassinate your own father?”

  “He’s a monster,” Javras said. He kept his eyes on Ashwin and Wien.

  “You could have said something to me, in all that time we spent together!” She stomped toward him. “You could have said something.”

  “And you could have told me you’re just the ninthborn,” he said.

  It was like a slap across her face. ”You said . . . .”

  “I despise the way he treated you,” he said, “so I won’t mourn your father.”

  There was something different about him, something cold. He’d never been this way with her before. She pulled together her courage and stalked the rest of the way to him. He still wouldn’t look at her.

  “Did Jinnrey know?” she said.

  “Yes, everything.”

  “Did you . . . did any of our time together mean anything to you?”

  “Of course,” he said. He looked at her now. He looked pained, anguished, frightened. “I told my father I was in love with you, under the effects of the torturer’s vine. I couldn’t lie.”

  “I . . . .” She spun and looked at Wien, intently dodging swing after careful swing from Ashwin. Could he just draw his own blood and kill her? Maybe it didn’t work like that.

  “Lords,” Ediline said. “This is insane, Javras. The king of Tithelk is dead, and you’re still in his manor. You’ll either be arrested or torn to pieces before you can set foot outside.”

  “It was a better plan when you were heir,” he said, ignoring her.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “When we get out of this, I will explain everything to you.” He swallowed. “I swear.”

  “Your promises don’t mean as much to me as they used to,” she bit off.

  Wien ducked under a sidearm swing and shifted in closer. There was a flutter of movement, and then she danced backward. Her hands were empty. Ediline glanced back and forth between Wien and Ashwin, not sure what had happened. Then—

  The taibuo was lodged in Ashwin’s throat, through his neck. He grabbed at it with one hand, his fingers flailing around it weakly. He opened his mouth, blood running down his hand, but he couldn’t speak.

  The bloodsword fell from Ashwin’s hand. It hit the ground without a sound. Not quietly, not softly. It made no sound. He stumbled, fell, and didn’t move.

  Javras broke the moment of stillness. He sprinted toward Wien and the body of his father. Ediline lost a few steps to surprise and a rotten urge to turn her stomach inside out. But when she ran, she burned some windsurge moss in her pocket, and the air split away from her, a gust caught her and shoved her, and she picked up speed on Javras. She was on his heels, almost there.

  He reached down and gripped the sword. “By the blood of my father,” he said, “I will never come to harm by this weapon.”

  Ediline hit him with her shoulder. It hurt from the impact, but more importantly it threw Javras off balance. She went with him, slinging her elbow back into his jaw, extending her arm full out and slipping her hand under his, scooping the hilt of the blood sword from his grasp. With the momentum of being struck, he went down and hit the wood floor. She rolled over his back, tucking in midair and landing and sliding on the other side on her feet, Lords bless her Grace. And she came down with the Ender in her hand, weightless.

  She leveled it at Javras. “I won’t have you taking your father’s place,” she said. “I know you don’t want that.”

  “Ediline,” Javras spat. He struggled to his feet, breathing heavily and rubbing at his jaw. A trickle of blood rolled down his chin. “Give me the sword.”

  Blood. She had no idea how this worked, but she didn’t want Javras to have the sword. Lords, she didn’t want anyone to have the sword. She was shaking just holding it. It felt so light, like holding nothing.

  “I won’t take his place,” Javras said. Wulfgar stood still in the background. Wien slid her taibuo from Ashwin’s throat. “This is a weapon of war, of Ruin. I do not want it.”

  “You . . . don’t?”

  “I was going to give it to you, but you aren’t the heir, so I’ll have to give it to your brother. The bloodsword has a purpose, Princess,” he said, biting off the last word savagely. “Don’t you think it should fulfill that purpose?”

  “You’re a liar. A damned good one. But I don’t believe you.”

  He stepped toward her.

  “Javras, don’t.” She pointed the sword at him.

  “Give it to me,” he said.

  “Javras . . . .” Her eyes were hot and wet. She looked frantically from him to each of the bodies, to Wien and Wulfgar. If she gave it to him, she could live. Probably. But in what state? Ancil as king of Tithelk, leading a bloody war to conquer the world? Bloodsword or not, there was a very real chance that Javras, Wien, and Wulfgar would all be killed or imprisoned before they could leave Sladt.

  He drew closer, and she swung. He didn’t try to dodge, but he did flinch. The sword passed straight through him. She gasped and tasted bile on the back of her tongue, thinking she’d cut him down. With her breath held, she waited for blood. But nothing happened.

  “I made a pact with the sword,” he said. “It won’t harm me.”

  “I . . . .”

  He touched the blade, ran his finger along it.

  “You will never have this sword,” she snarled. She drew the sword back and in the same motion lashed out with her leg and straight-kicked his kneecaps. He went down swiftly.

  Before he was down, Wien was moving, taibuo drawn. Ediline screamed and ran for the back wall, clawing at her memory for the location of the switch for the secret exit.

  There was a torrent of stomping footsteps. At the other end of the hall, Wulfgar, a dagger in each hand, fended off a swarm of Tithelk soldiers. Wulfgar dropped a half dozen of them with brutal efficiency, daggers tearing into and out of each one, then broke away and dashed after Javras.

  Amidst the soldiers, Ancil stepped through. Then Deffren, who bellowed in rage, and Straad, commanding the soldiers. All of Ediline’s favorite people, all in one place.

  Meanwhile, Ediline was at the wall, running a trembling frantic hand over the smooth wood. There was a secret panel here somewhere, a latch that opened the door. She heard footsteps behind her, and dodged just in time. Wien’s taibuo was clean of blood, despite having been lodged in Ashwin’s neck. The bloodsword had consumed all the blood of its target. She was learning quickly, but also far too slowly.

  “Ancil, help!” she cried.

  “Edi, you dirty ninth,” Deffren roared, “give us the sword!”

  “Do I still count as the ninth child if my father is dead? Sounds like it’s all nullified to me.” She ducked and ran, and she burned through another cluster of moss to push her along and shove Wien back with a powerful gust. Now she was doubling back, toward Javras and toward Ashwin’s body. Javras was back on his feet. She had nowhere to run.

  “Ediline,” Ancil called across the hall. “Do as your brother commands. Give us the sword, and I will protect you.”

  “A little difficult right now!” Not that she would. She couldn’t. No one could have it. But then, what could she do with it? How was she better than anyone else holding it? She could take it away. From everyone. Find a way to destroy it. Make sure it could never be used again.

  Wien’s taibuo snagged on Ediline’s blouse, a neat hole through it. She scrambled away. The fabric tore. She didn’t feel any pain, but she felt wet, hot blood. Blood she could use. She pressed the flat of the blade to her shoulder. It felt
like nothing. She could still see it falling from Ashwin’s hand, see it hitting the wood, and hearing nothing. It felt vile to have it in her hands.

  “By my own blood,” she shouted, “this sword will not leave me until I am dead!”

  “I object slightly,” Wulfgar said. He straightened beside Javras, whose own sword was still drawn. “You are fun person. It is would be shame to kill you.”

  Holding the bloodsword out seemed to keep everyone from advancing. Wulfgar and Javras, but now even Wien had broken off her pursuit. Straad and his soldiers removed the bodies of the fallen, and Ancil and Deffren held back among the soldiers. The entrance to the Hall was not her exit. Her only option was the secret passage. And once she turned her back on them, turned her attention away from keeping them back, they would close in. She had to find that secret latch. She glanced back, hoping to dislodge a memory of where she could find it. Beyond the throne behind her, there were so many details carved into the wall, there was no way she could find it.

  But on the throne was her father’s body, and it was wet with blood. Best to see what this mystical ancient weapon could do. She turned on her heel and burned the rest of her moss to give her a push toward the throne. Wien would reach her first. This had to work.

  The sword pierced King Maxen’s dead body with ease. Ediline had to squeeze her eyes shut and swallow a bubbling lump coming up her throat. “Father,” she whispered. “Let your death mean something. By your blood, guide me from here.”

  When she opened her eyes, she had to pivot and duck out of the way of another attack from Wien. The taibuo struck her across the forearm. Again it felt like nothing. She shot a look at the wall. Nothing had changed. Except now a memory surged back to her. Back when she and Ancil had shared a bedroom in the manor proper, the two of them had snuck down here, fiddled with a latch made into a spear in the depiction of the battle, and unveiled the lit passage beyond, which connected this hall to their father’s bedroom, and to the back of the manor, the emergency escape for the King. Ediline hadn’t wanted to go anywhere near her father’s bedroom, but she had slipped through and found her way outside, onto the back walkways of Sladt.

  Ediline lunged and swung the sword wide. Wien backed far away to avoid the blow. That gave Ediline enough room to rush forward, to slam the sword into the wall where she now knew the latch to be. It was like there was no resistance. It didn’t slice clean through, but there was almost no impact. She grabbed the latch, exposed, and pulled.

  “Don’t let her escape! Capture Princess Ediline at any cost. Retrieve the Ender.” The voice giving the commands was Ancil’s. Her heart felt like a moldy stone, even as the rest of her felt ready to burst into flames from adrenaline.

  The wall split open, and she squeezed through the gap. The passage beyond was dimly lit by narrow strips of glowing oak along the floor. She stumbled her way through. Her memory of the passage wasn’t clear enough. Turns came from nowhere, walls and shadows mixing. The passage cut back and forth, but she knew where it would take her. So did Ancil. He would be waiting for her when she got to the other side. Hopefully she would be faster—

  A hand grabbed at her arm from behind. She shrieked and pulled away. She spun and held the sword out. “Stop there,” she said.

  “I do not think you are in the mood for killing, Princess.” Wien, her weapon stowed.

  “You can’t stop me here.”

  “Hand me the sword, and I will let you escape.”

  “There’s no—I can’t, Wien!”

  “And why is that?”

  “Because . . . because I saw Ashwin. I saw what this thing made him. I don’t want that to happen to Ancil, or to Javras, and I don’t want to be killed or locked in a prison. So I’m running, and I’m taking this terrible thing with me.”

  “Is that truly the wisest decision?”

  “I don’t care! Everyone is . . . Lords, you all think I’m the one who’s bad, who’s evil, unlucky, unwanted . . . but none of you bother to look at yourselves. I don’t care if this is wise, Wien. It’s the decision I’m making. Try to stop me and I’ll kill you.”

  She ran as fast as she could from Wien, until there was no more passage, only a wall. But it wasn’t really a wall. She didn’t slow. The wall burst open onto the back walkway of Sladt.

  The icestorm was growing stronger. Wind whipped her hair over her face, splattered her with rain and flecks of ice. Below Sladt, the Rodiv roared, the river swollen from the rain. To her left, she saw the gate to the ladder, to the secret escape. The gate was open and swung madly in the wind. Why? It was meant to be locked, and her key had been taken. Had Ancil opened it for her? He and her mother had both told her she knew where to run, hinted at this escape.

  She sprinted down the slick walkway, and she thanked the Lords for blessing her with Inherent Grace. The water and ice on the ground did not make her trip, they did not send her into a wall or tumbling over a rail.

  But before she reached the gate, it was swarmed by Ancil’s soldiers. He had the capacity to be so much more than their father, but he seemed intent on being exactly the same. He moved to the front of the soldiers, who leveled their spears.

  “Ediline!” he shouted over the storm. “Stop this now.”

  She had to look down to make sure she still had the bloodsword. Yes, still there. They all just wanted it so badly. How many assassination attempts had Ashwin survived, before today? How could he live his life, wielding this? He had stopped living a normal life, being a normal person, having a normal family, or doing normal things like raising a son.

  “Ediline!” Behind her, Javras and his keepers emerged from the secret passage. Javras aimed his beautiful sword at her. He had no reason to fear her. The bloodsword wouldn’t hurt him. She had Wulfgar’s knife, but she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t cut him down, even after this. He came at her steadily. She needed to act before he reached her.

  The way to the gate was blocked. She closed her eyes and listened to the rush of the rain, the whistle of ice through the air, the clatter of ice on rooftops, the endless roar of the river.

  “I do love you,” Javras shouted. “Just give over the sword, and I will protect you.”

  Ancil came from one side, Javras from the other. She could do it. She could relinquish the sword. She could choose who should have it—which of the people she had loved and trusted would be less likely to betray her again—and hand it over. She would be subject to whatever punishment they saw fit. But she could end the chase and just give it over.

  She couldn’t.

  She wouldn’t.

  She didn’t. This sword was vile, and it needed to be out of hands of power. It needed to be in the hands of someone small, someone insignificant, someone who wouldn’t use it to kill fields of people, to level nations, to broker deals, to force people to submit. This sword was vile, an ancient power. Cursed.

  It was hers.

  She turned and lunged over the rail. Out through the air she soared, the water and ice hitting her and cutting her and chilling her right through. With her eyes closed, it barely even felt like falling. A moment, another, and she hit the water of the river. It was like falling onto wood that cracked and broke under her impact. It disoriented her and sent shards of pain through her body. The river pulled her deep under and shoved her.

  Her lungs begged for air, but the river held her. It pressed her to the bottom, along the small rocks and the mud and the mangrove roots. She hit objects she couldn’t see and spun in directions she couldn’t guess. Something snagged her cloak and tried to tear it away. Her leg hit a surface so hard she lost feeling in it.

  Her lungs screamed. She burned one of the four deadfish reeds, and the air in her lungs was new. At the same time, she breathed out into the water, pushing out the old air. It would buy her moments. If she didn’t resurface after her four reeds were burned through, she would drown.

  Since speaking with Ancil outside the café, she’d known she might need to jump into the river. Her mother had only confi
rmed it. This had been her escape plan—if things went poorly, she would know where to go—but the reeds would only keep her alive a little longer.

  Her head struck something hard, and she coughed and sucked in a mouthful of water. She couldn’t see, couldn’t hear. Which way was up? Why had Javras . . . ? Why had Ancil . . . ?

  Her father was dead. Ashwin the Endbearer was dead. Soon, maybe, she would be too.

  This thought occurred to her calmly. It was simply a thing that might happen. She coughed and wretched in the water, and then she burst up into the air, harsh and cold on her face.

  When she tried to inhale, nothing came. She coughed and spat up water and couldn’t breathe. Her neck tightened and her eyes hurt. Her lips were numb. She hit an embankment, and she clawed onto the ice-slicked mud. Her fingertips bled.

  Frantically, she burned through her last three reeds all at once. Air gushed out from her lungs. She bent over and opened her mouth as if to retch, and the water was compressed up and out of her lungs by fresh air. It came out her nose and her mouth, burning, but it was out, and she sucked down a tiny wet breath.

  She coughed for minutes, and she collapsed on the muddy embankment. A short distance from her face, she saw the cut of darkness, the bloodsword, dry of blood, dry of water. Up above her, she saw Korv. It wasn’t that far off. The river was fierce now, but she hadn’t been under long. It had carried her to the bounds of the city. Somewhere above her was the tangletree, where she’d told Javras the truth.

  It made her ill.

  One things was obvious and true: she couldn’t go back. She let her head slip to the icy mud, and she pulled the hood of her soaked-through cloak over her.

  Part Two

  — The Princess —

  — Chapter 15 —

  “If I am to live, I live by my own strength; if I am to die, I die in my own body.”

  —a Ruiner axiom

  Southeast from Tithelk was a steady slip downhill into sodden marshland. Between shallow streams and thick mangroves, dense mist hung at all hours in the unmoving air. There were other bridgetowns, on higher ground, but Ediline avoided these. She avoided the Rodiv, the river that had twice deigned not to kill her. Birds and incessant insects were the only wildlife she encountered, and she stayed far from any sign of people. Her pursuers had yet to appear.