Bisecter

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Bisecter Page 30

by Stephanie Fazio


  And then time catches up. I get to my feet just in time to see a Dusker running straight at Ekil with his sword aimed at the Halve’s heart.

  “No!” I yell.

  The only thought in my mind is reaching Ekil before the Dusker. I throw the blade in my hands. It strikes true, and the Dusker collapses.

  Another Halve fighting nearby notices Ekil. This one isn’t injured, and he uses his size to plow through the Duskers. I go weak with relief as I watch the Halve swing his stone club at any who come near, blasting a path for Ekil to escape the worst of the fray. I’m so busy watching their retreat to another part of the battle I barely notice what’s going on around me.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I see a Dusker raise his crossbow. I’m still so focused on Ekil’s near miss that I don’t even register the weapon is aimed at me.

  “Hemera!” a familiar voice cries.

  I turn my head just in time to see a black arrow hurtling across the sky, straight for me. I stare at the arrow dazed, almost uncomprehending. I can see the arrow’s tip gleaming in the sunlight right before it pierces my neck.

  Except it never reaches its intended target.

  Something else comes flying through the air. This time, it’s a person. Before I can react, before I can even think about stopping him, Brice throws me out of the arrow’s path.

  He hits the ground on both feet and takes a stumbling step. His beautiful green eyes meet mine for only an instant before he looks down at the arrow sticking out of his chest.

  “Brice!” I scream.

  Brice’s red blood blooms across the front of his cloak as he collapses.

  CHAPTER 53

  Aside from his twitching sword arm, Brice has gone motionless.

  “No!”

  I fall onto the ground beside Brice, cradling his head in my lap.

  “Hemera,” he chokes out, his words thick with blood. “I’m so sorry.” His breaths come fast and shallow. “I’m sorry I failed you.”

  “You didn’t fail me,” I gasp, searching for someone—anyone—to help.

  “Thought if I was Captain, I could avenge my parents.” He coughs. Blood spatters the collar of his cloak. “Didn’t mean to betray you.”

  “None of that matters,” I tell him.

  Brice tries to sit up, but he only manages to raise himself onto his elbows. “I never lied about loving you,” he says.

  “I know.” I blink tears out of my eyes. “I know.”

  “Hemera—”

  “Shh, save your strength.” I blot at his blood with the sleeve of my cloak.

  Brice has survived brawls with the guards, attacks from bandits, and Tanguro. He’ll be fine.

  Brice gives me a tired smile. “’S no use,” he slurs.

  “I’m going to save you,” I cry. I lean over him, as though by my will alone I can keep him from slipping away. “Look at me!”

  A trickle of blood slips between Brice’s parted lips.

  The sounds of the battle fade around us. Everything becomes still, quiet.

  The steady rhythm of Brice’s heart, the warmth as he held me in the darkness of our cave behind the waterfall, all of our promises…it all fades as the light in Brice’s endless green eyes begins to dim.

  “Someone get a healer!” I yell, scanning the battlefield. There must be someone who can help. He’ll be fine. All he needs is a healer….

  My thoughts come in fragments. Hardly aware of what I’m doing, I disentangle myself from Brice. My brother. Dayne can save him.

  “I’ll be right back,” I promise.

  Brice doesn’t reply.

  I try to run, but someone blocks my path.

  “No, let go of me!” I shriek and twist, but my vision has gone blurry. I have to get help—have to save Brice.

  “He’s dead, Hemera, leave him.” Wade’s arms tighten around me, pulling me away.

  I wrench myself free. “He just needs a healer. Let go of me! Someone, help!”

  “You can’t help him.” Wade shoves me out of the way of a sword that comes flying through the air. It thuds into the ground where I had been kneeling moments before. I don’t care.

  Brice is dead, and it’s my fault. It’s all my fault.

  I slump beside Brice’s body, no longer caring about the battle. I barely notice as Wade and Vlaz keep a Dusker from killing me. I lay my head down on Brice’s chest.

  “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

  Any moment now, Brice will blink, and the cloudy, vacant expression in his eyes will clear. He’ll open his arms to fold me into his embrace. His lips will tickle my ear as he whispers “I love you.” Any moment now….

  I stare at the arrow still protruding from his chest…the arrow that should have been in my heart, instead. Brice begged me not to go after Ekil. I didn’t listen. And now, because of me, Brice is dead.

  Tears stream down my cheeks, mixing with the blood that is already congealing on the front of Brice’s cloak.

  A cyclone of dust rises on the other side of the ruined stone wall. When the dust settles, it’s replaced by a blue wave slicing through the Duskers and swarming across the corpse-littered ground. Good. Maybe it will wash all of this blood and death away. I lay my head back down on Brice’s chest.

  “Jadem’s come!” voices all around me shout.

  Jadem. The word is familiar, somehow, but I can’t think of why it matters. With a tremendous effort, I lift my head back up.

  As they slay through the Duskers, I see it’s not water, but rather an army in blue. Their cloaks are the same shade of blue as mine, or at least the way mine was before all of the dirt and blood.

  Aunt Jadem. The Solguards. They’re here.

  I should be cheering like everyone else, but instead, there is only a yawning emptiness inside me.

  A Dusker, retreating from the blue army, spies me.

  I grit my teeth and raise myself to my knees as he points his crossbow at me. There are no weapons within reach. My fists are cracked with blood. I’m so tired….

  There’s a flash of blue as someone leaps in front of the Dusker. The crossbow ricochets backward as the Dusker fires, narrowly missing his target. Unflinching, the soldier drives their sword into the Dusker’s chest.

  When the Dusker has collapsed, the soldier turns to face me. I let out a small gasp.

  “Hemera!” Aunt Jadem stands before me. Her scarred face is twisted in worry. “Are you injured?”

  “What are you doing here?” I manage to croak as Aunt Jadem draws her sword back out of the Dusker’s flesh.

  “Come on!” she pulls me to my feet.

  I want to resist, to stay with Brice, but my body feels too heavy for me to wrench it free from my aunt’s grip. Jadem pulls me away from Brice and the fighting, using her sword to slash at the Duskers who cross our path.

  A wounded Dusker stumbles toward us. Jadem draws her sword, but a small soldier in a blue cloak gets to him first. He throws a well-aimed knife into the Dusker’s chest.

  “I got your back, Hemera!” the boy yells.

  “Wokee?” The sound of his voice clears the fog in my head just a little.

  “I figured you’d be needing me.” He pauses long enough to throw another dagger. “I gotta go help the others, but I’ll be back.”

  He runs off again, and I lose him in the sea of blue cloaks that is swallowing up the last of the Duskers.

  “You let Wokee come here?” I demand, using the last of my energy to give my aunt an accusing look.

  Aunt Jadem shrugs her shoulders. “A thousand Duskers couldn’t have kept that boy behind.” A grin twitches at the corner of her scarred lip. “He said he didn’t trust the rest of us to help you.”

  In what could be either minutes or hours, there is not a single Dusker left standing. But I feel no sense of victory. A heavy numbness weighs me down and slows my thoughts. Brice is dead.

  The words revolve in my mind in an unending loop. The numbness keeps the pain lurking just beneath the surface from drownin
g me.

  My ears ring with cries of victory. Thutmose and Jarosh lift me onto their shoulders, ignoring my weak protests. Jubilant shouts rise from the former prisoners as the men carry me through the crowd. Solguards, all dressed in blue, hold their fists over their hearts and chant my name.

  There’s laughing, hugging, and tears of joy as friends find each other. Reunions long hoped for but never expected surround me on all sides.

  I force the ghost of a smile onto my face in response to the gratitude and vows of friendship that follow in my wake. I don’t see their faces. All I can see is Brice’s still body, pierced with the arrow that was meant for me.

  A glimmer of emotion flickers in me at the sight of Wokee, on the shoulders of a man I don’t recognize, reaching down to slap hands with the other soldiers in blue.

  Dayne, who looks dirty and exhausted, but otherwise unharmed, calls out to me. Hearing my name, Wokee looks over. He lets out a yelp of excitement as he leaps from the men’s shoulders. He makes a show of tumbling into a somersault and then jumping to his feet. He bows to the cheering crowd before running to Dayne. My brother catches him mid-leap and lifts him into the air.

  Vlaz capers around Wokee, whining in excitement and lifting off the ground to bathe Wokee’s face with his enormous tongue. Wokee throws his arms around the cub, and Vlaz nuzzles Wokee with so much force the two of them fall to the ground. Wokee is overcome by a fit of giggles.

  A tap on my shoulder draws me away from their happy reunion.

  “Miss me?” Wade’s mouth is quirked up in a sideways grin. The look in his golden eyes is serious, though. There’s no pity in them, only understanding. I’m grateful.

  “Thank you for—” I make a vague gesture. Believing I was capable of leading this army even when I didn’t. Saving me when I didn’t want to be saved.

  “You’ll be alright, you know,” he says. “You’re strong. The strongest person I’ve ever met.” He touches my cheek with his thumb.

  Before I can think of anything to say in response, a dozen other people are separating us, congratulating me on our victory. When I turn back to Wade, he’s gone.

  CHAPTER 54

  It takes all of us to gather the dead and pile them onto flaming biers. I never stray far from the place where Brice’s body lies.

  Unable to stand the thought of his body being tossed with the reptors and Duskers, I go to where he is stretched out on the ground. I carry him to a tree with golden flowers, out of sight of the bonfires.

  Stupidly, I arrange his blood-stained cloak to make sure his skin is protected from the sun. I snap off the arrow’s shaft and throw it as far as I can. Then, I kneel beside him. My fingers brush over his cheek like they used to when he slept next to me. His skin is hot from the sun, but stiff. His eyes are unseeing. There is no hint of the fearless energy that filled them in life. Brice’s soft hair is matted with dried sweat and blood. I run my fingers through the tangles, the way I used to after we swam together beneath the waterfall.

  Using a piece of a broken shield, I scoop away enough dirt for a shallow grave. I lower Brice’s body into the pit. When I sit back up, some part of me is gone, broken away to nestle itself against Brice in the dirt.

  I look down into the grave.

  “I’m sorry.” I wrap my arms around myself as if to stop the chill that has taken hold of me. “I’m so sorry.”

  ✽✽✽

  “I’m going after the Captain.”

  It’s the first time Jadem, Dayne, Wokee, and I have found a moment alone.

  I expect them to argue, but instead, Dayne says, “I’m coming with you.”

  “Me too!” Wokee brandishes his knife.

  “No!” all three of us say at once.

  “Wokee, you’re needed here,” Aunt Jadem tells him. “Many of the soldiers tore their cloaks during the fighting, and you’re so good at cloak-making. Could you help them?”

  At this, he brightens. “Did you notice all of our cloaks are the same color as yours?” he asks me, puffing out his chest. “I didn’t have time to make new ones, so Jadem helped me dye the old ones. But she only helped a little.” He looks down at his own cloak. “I stitched the sun on every one of them, though.”

  I look more closely at Wokee’s cloak and see the black outline of the spiraling sun above his right shoulder.

  Wokee looks at my stained and filthy cloak and sighs.

  “I’ll put the Solguard sun on yours when I make you a new one.”

  He grins. “I even made something for Vlaz,” he nods at the cub’s blue collar. “See? There’s a sun on it, too.” He twists the collar around to show me, and then looks up, as though he’s just realized something. “Hemera, did you ever notice that you’re the only one who can’t be hurt by the sun? It’s like the Solguard mark was made for you.”

  “Smart boy.” Dayne gives Wokee a pat on his curly-haired head.

  Wokee beams. He tightens his right hand into a fist, watching the way the new black markings ripple across his skin.

  Ry and Thutmose, just returned from scouting for signs of my father or his guards, cut a path through the crowd.

  “All the tunnels are blocked from the cave-in,” Ry reports. Her red hair is plastered to her face, which glistens with sweat. “There’s no sign of the Captain in either of the buildings. Either he’s gone, or there are other tunnels we didn’t find.”

  “And Ekil?” I ask.

  “We found some Halves that escaped,” Thutmose says, “but they all look the same to me. Some of our people are holding them until you decide what should be done with them.”

  “Let them go.” My voice is sharper than I intended. “They’re not our prisoners.”

  An awkward silence follows.

  Dayne clears his throat. “Shall we go, Hemera?”

  “Just a minute,” I tell him.

  I motion to Aunt Jadem, and together, we walk away from the others until we’re far enough that we won’t be overheard.

  “I know how hard it must have been for you when I left without telling you where I was going or why,” I say, “and I’m sorry.” The words I’ve wanted to say since I left the fortress pour out of me. “I don’t want you to hate me or—”

  “Oh, Mer.” Aunt Jadem pulls me to her. For as big as she is, her embrace is gentle. “I could never hate you. Not ever.”

  My chest swells with emotion.

  “Thank you,” I say into her cloak. “Thank you for coming.”

  My aunt pulls away from me and looks at me with her single eye. “When your mother was killed, I lost the most important person in my world. No matter what I did, no matter how many Solguards I saved, I couldn’t bring her back.” She swallows, her eye gleaming with unshed tears. “But the day you stepped into my fortress, I got a piece of her back. You are precious to me, darling niece, and there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you.”

  “I feel the same about you,” I whisper.

  ✽✽✽

  Dayne and I set a path toward the far end of the prison building, away from the battlefield, where the cave-in didn’t reach. Vlaz trots beside us. Wokee suggested we bring the cub with us to sniff out the bad guys. I don’t know whether he’ll be able to help find my father, but Vlaz’s presence is a comfort.

  “I saw what happened with Brice and that Halve,” Dayne says once we’re alone.

  I keep walking without looking at Dayne. My throat burns.

  “You did what you had to do.”

  I shake my head. “I’m the reason Brice is dead.”

  “You’re a leader,” Dayne says. “You made a choice, a choice to defend what’s right.”

  Swallowing, I blink back the tears that swim across my vision.

  Vlaz, who has been flying ahead, lands abruptly. He puts his nose to the ground and lets out a low growl.

  Dayne and I look at each other, and then hurry over to where Vlaz is clawing at the ground. The smell of cammamoss wafts stronger as we come near. Dayne crouches and sweeps his hand across the cammamo
ss covering the ground to reveal a heavy stone. When I roll it aside, a narrow earthen staircase appears.

  Without waiting for us, Vlaz bounds down the stairs into the darkness below. Dayne and I follow behind, holding our weapons out in front of us.

  At the bottom of the stairs is a wide path strewn with broken rocks. Before, the darkness of the tunnel would have stolen my breath away. I would have felt like I was suffocating. I would have cowered against the wall, ready for the ceiling to come crashing down on me at any moment.

  Now, that feeling is gone. I survived a collapse, and I pulled myself from the wreckage. The only feeling this tunnel awakens in me is a burning need for vengeance.

  Harsh voices and tramping boots echo through the tunnel. Dayne and I exchange a look. Shadows grow against the candlelight, and then turn into dozens of the Captain’s guards. Instead of pulling back into the shadows, I step into the lantern light. One of them gives a shout.

  The men rush at us with swords and leather whips. Vlaz bares his teeth and growls in response.

  “Go,” Dayne shouts as he cleaves a man with his sword. “I’ll hold them off.”

  “There are too many,” I argue. I send another one flying into the side of the cave with my elbow.

  “Find the Captain.” Dayne kills another guard. “For our mother.”

  Dayne throws himself at the guards, his blade flashing in the light of the candles. Vlaz lets out a growl that makes the walls tremble. As the guards cower, a path emerges through their ranks. I take a few steps, and then look back, gripped by indecision.

  “Go!” Dayne roars.

  I hurry down the path, punching and kicking my way through the guards. There are dozens of them. Dayne will never be able to kill them all. Even as I’m about to turn back, a Halve emerges in the tunnel. Its head towers over the guards, who shout bloodthirsty cries as they turn their weapons on him.

  Ekil. He’s wielding a blade in one hand and a stone club in the other as he cuts a path through the guards.

  “This way,” Ekil calls in his gravelly voice.

  With a last glance back at Dayne and Vlaz, I follow Ekil as he disappears down a dark passage cut into the side of the main tunnel. The sound of fighting fades as we go deeper underground. At the end of the path, Ekil turns back to face me.

 

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