The Complete Marked Series Box Set

by March McCarron

  His perfect face, disfigured. Their perfect plan, all in ruins. Tae-Young dead. And Quade—Quade must be in the city.

  Hopelessness swallowed Bray whole, and she let her shoulders fall.

  “He must have taken Accord,” Ko-Jin said, finally articulating what they all knew. He stumbled to Tae-Young’s body, fell to his knees, and then tenderly closed the young man’s eyes.

  “May his spirit fly fast and find joy,” Peer said, and Bray echoed him in a dull voice. She was tired of those words. She was tired of people dying.

  “What do we do now?” Whythe asked.

  No one answered, because what answer could they give? If Quade had the city, he had all the Chisanta save for themselves. He had the palace and the capital. He had two armies.

  He has Yarrow, she realized, and that was worse than all the rest. Her heart cracked open at the thought.

  They could not even teleport without Tae-Young, at least not until Kelarre and the others were freed from Quade’s thrall

  “We’ll have to gag and bind these three for now, and travel the slow way,” Bray said. It was an exhausting prospect.

  “Travel where?” Whythe asked.

  “Back to Accord,” Ko-Jin said, nodding. Blood seeped between his fingers and dripped to the road.

  “Back to Accord,” Bray echoed.

  None of them sprang into action. Perhaps her companions were as heart-weary as she.

  “Won’t Yarrow give us away?” Peer asked in a whisper.

  Bray shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe not. The gift answers the need, and Yarrow needed to thwart Quade. Perhaps he’ll be on our side, even now.”

  She recalled the sound of his words in her mind. Think, Bray, he’d said. Likely her subconscious had summoned his voice, a trick to inspire self-preservation. She couldn’t imagine how he could speak to her, no matter where his spirit might be. He was too far beyond reach.

  It didn’t matter. She would not abandon Yarrow to Quade, no matter how little of him was left. No matter how exhausted she was in body and spirit. No matter how long the odds or how steep the cost. She would never abandon Yarrow Lamhart.

  Bray pushed to her feet. “Let’s get moving,” she said. “It’s going to be a long journey.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Ecstasy.

  Quade Asher was in ecstasy.

  In his life, things came easily. Most of his desires were attained without difficulty. He asked—he received. He wanted—he got. But these months of struggle had taught him the bitter taste of failure.

  And now he was learning a second truth: success was far more delicious when it didn’t fall in his lap. His adversaries had been worthy; his task had, at times, seemed impossible. And yet he had triumphed.

  Oh, how sweet a word. Triumph.

  Quade gazed down at the queen and her consort where they knelt on the library floor. A cat’s smile curled at the corners of his lips. The baby mewled, and Quade wondered whether its father would return.

  He wished he could see that fight; it was bound to be interesting. A bloodbath, if he had his guess. Perhaps they would all kill each other and save him some effort. Oddly, he hoped not. He liked the idea of one more confrontation, one more victory.

  If he could choose, he would have Bray Marron be the last man standing. Her gift made her a likely survivor, after all.

  He could just picture her, surrounded by the broken bodies of her friends, friends who’d been forced to murder each other under his orders. She’d be consumed with rage, and so she would come for him—hot-headed people were always predictable.

  If she lived, she would come. Perhaps Quade would stab her in the heart and watch the life leave her eyes. Or perhaps he would keep her.

  So many wonderful options. That was the glory of his new situation. With the city his, the palace his, the military his, he could do anything he liked.

  And he wanted to do it all—everything, all at once. He wanted to eat and drink and kill and dance and fuck and wound and sleep. Dismantle and build. Reward and punish. He wanted it all.

  It was difficult to decide which of his desires he would slake second or fifth or tenth. But he knew without doubt which he would fulfill first.

  “Chae-Na, my dear,” Quade said. “I would like you to take me to Yarrow Lamhart.”

  The queen rose, and when her husband followed, Quade decided not to protest. Best to keep them together, really. If he chose to kill one, he might as well have the other close by for convenience. Quade always preferred to be thorough.

  With that notion in mind, he added, “Mrs. Bowlerham, you may come also.”

  Arlow’s wife stood. The baby fussed, which was irritating. Quade knew he could silence the whelp himself, so he snatched him from his mother’s arms. Immediately, the babe purred and fell back to sleep.

  Quade enjoyed holding the small child more than he would have expected. Perhaps it was all of his potential, wrapped up in such a small package. Or perhaps something more fundamental: there was a satisfaction to the little man’s weight, warmth, and smell.

  Pity the boy looked so much like Arlow Bowlerham, or Quade might take him for a son. Chances were good this boy would turn out as unbearable as his father. In which case, Quade might be wisest to put him down. Do the world a favor.

  Chae-Na led him along the hallway, and as they progressed Quade grew increasingly agitated. Excitement ran through him like electricity.

  Yarrow was his. Finally. As Ellsie Ollas, the previous Fifth, had been his. He’d found her himself, plucked her from her home and raised her to meet that particular purpose. He’d led her down the path to her final sacrifice, hand-in-hand.

  Quade had made her—and he had made Yarrow Lamhart, too, after a fashion. Certainly, the young man would not have achieved transcendence without Quade.

  The queen took them up a winding staircase to the top of a tower. The door swung wide, and Quade stepped within the round chamber. There were a great number of servants in attendance, and he did not desire an audience.

  “Leave,” he said, “all of you.”

  He did not watch them depart. His eyes were locked upon the slim man slumped in a cushioned chair. The sun was setting, and so a warm glow filled the room. It lit Yarrow up like a spirit.

  Quade crossed the chamber. He nearly forgot he was holding a living thing in his arms, and dumped the babe onto a sofa, his eyes never leaving the face of his precious Fifth.

  Yarrow Lamhart had always been a beautiful man; he had elegant bones and intelligent eyes. Now, he was a vision. His skin draped his skeleton, laying bare his strong cheekbones, and though his grey eyes were sightless and distant, that was all the better. He was magnificent.

  “Hello, Yarrow.”

  “Four chambers. Love has four chambers,” he said in a flat yet beatific voice.

  Quade slipped on a glove. He used to wish that he could touch Ellsie, and his longing to touch Yarrow was far greater. But he would not be ungrateful. He would be glad for whatever small pleasures the Spirits afforded him.

  With his hand covered in thin and supple leather, he stroked Yarrow’s face.

  “Everything gets colder. Always colder and farther apart and dying slowly.”

  Quade ran his fingers into Lamhart’s hair, took hold of his braid, and tugged—exposing an exquisite throat.

  “The Confluence blooms green. And beyond the stair, beneath the sand, water gathers. Life will come anew.”

  Quade unbuttoned the top of the man’s robes and then traced the lines of his clavicles. Yes, such elegant bones. Quade would like to peel back his skin and lick them.

  “I have thought of you often,” Quade whispered. “Have you thought of me?” His mouth stretched into a true smile. “Of course you have. You have spoken of little else, I’d imagine. How else was I held at bay for so long?”

  “A storm gathers in the south of Daland.”

  Quade leaned as close as he could without brushing skin, so that his lips were a breath from Yarrow’s ear. “And n
ow you are mine.”

  Yarrow Lamhart had little experience with public speaking, having always preferred the written word to oration. And now, with the entire Company of Spirits waiting upon him to speak, he had the sense of wandering into a nightmare—the kind in which one is wearing no clothes before an audience.

  More than that, he was vexed that he’d been afforded no opportunity to prepare. Surely, if the fate of the Chisanta hung in the balance, he should at least have note cards to read from. A chart to point to. Something. It was Arlow who took a ‘let’s just wing it’ approach to life; Yarrow preferred a plan.

  He gazed up into the infinite hive of faces above him—the dead, present in impossible multitudes. Somehow, Adearre became visible to him, one face sharpening amongst the many. He smiled, tapped two fingers to his own forehead, and mouthed the words, “It’s here.”

  A memory hit Yarrow with a clarity his mortal mind couldn’t summon: himself and Adearre practicing swords upon a beach outside Easterly Point. The sea air had been cold, and Yarrow’s thoughts had been a swirl of self-doubt. Adearre had rapped him on the brow and said, “Here is where your strength derives.”

  Yarrow’s lips twitched in an answering smile. He thought of Bray, who would never be cowed by so small a thing as stage fright. And then he cleared his throat and began to speak.

  “I realize I risk appearing ungrateful, standing before you today as a boy who was marked, as a man who has been gifted again and again, who has saved himself and those he loves by merit of being Chisanta; I understand how thankless I must seem, to have been given all of this, and yet to make so bald a plea.” His voice, which had begun weak and uncertain, grew stronger by the word. He paused for effect, then forged on. “But I have ever been a student of truth, and so I must speak it now—there is only one true remedy to the ills of this moment in time: the age of the Chisanta must come to an end.”

  As he spoke, the floor beneath him came alive again, painting a story from his words. He saw himself at the age of fourteen, staring wide-eyed into a mirror, poking at the mark newly branded on his neck. He saw each of his sacrifices in quick sequence: the first on a boat, as he clutched a grievous wound in his abdomen; the second on the shore of the Painted Mere, with Bray’s blood on his hands; the third in the dungeons of Accord, bound naked to a chair; and the last—a calm conversation in a library.

  With an effort, he tore his eyes away and continued, “The Chisanta, I know, began with all the best intentions. At that time, the Company sought to right a wrong. They wished to keep the channels open between man and spirits; they wished to honor those Chi’santae who gave their lives to protect the Confluence, and they wished to send a clear message to those lost men who sought to silence them—to declare that the spirits would not be so easily set aside.”

  The glass beneath his feet showed an event he’d never seen before: the last forty-nine Chi’santae, fighting and dying in the Confluence. Yarrow knew what came after—Charlem Bowtar would arrive late and last, to find his wife’s cold body.

  “But the Confluence has grown anew, and that sacrifice, while still deserving of honor, is now so far removed that it has long been forgotten. Man does not remember the Chi’santae, and after the life of Quade Asher, they will not remember the modern Chisanta either. They will see only an enemy. And they won’t be wrong: look what suffering we have wrought.”

  The mirror told the story so that Yarrow did not have to. It flitted through horrifying images at speed: Quade Asher murdering, burning houses, kidnapping children, torturing them and using his gift to steal their free will. Rinny Samble, tormented to the point of madness, and forced to strap dynamite to her chest and kill dozens. An orphanage in the Narrows turned to rubble in a single blast. Thousands of men slaughtered as they rushed the walls of Accord.

  “The marked are chosen due to their potential to affect change. They are gifted according to need. Within these parameters, Quade Asher is not an anomaly—he fits squarely into the criteria. Not all change is good; not all men should have what they desire. If Quade is a monster, then the Company made him, however unintentionally. If he is the product of our framework, our framework is wrong. And it is our duty, not only to remove this threat which was unnaturally created, but to ensure that no menace such as him plagues the future. This era of the Chisanta must come to a close. Let a new era begin, as has happened before.”

  Yarrow couldn’t guess how his words were received. The mass of Spirits seemed merely patient, attentive. He saw neither agreement nor dissent.

  He stood in silence, wondering what he should do next—whether he should choose a seat. Then, quite suddenly, he found himself flying through the air. It was a disorienting sensation, not at all like the teleportation he had grown accustomed to.

  When he landed, he was sitting beside Adearre, perched on a bench high above the floor where he’d stood moments before. He sighed, grateful for this return to anonymity.

  “How was I?” he asked.

  “Quite eloquent.”

  “I didn’t say anything they don’t already know.”

  “Of course not,” Adearre said. “But your perception of events will carry more weight, as you are the one living spirit amongst the dead.”

  “What happens now?” Yarrow asked.

  “There will be more speakers, infinitely, until a majority has come to a firm decision.”

  “How long might that take?”

  Adearre shrugged. “You know the answer, Yarrow. You know all that I know.”

  Yarrow frowned, feeling his hope and purpose wilt. This was not the first time the Company had deliberated on this matter. The last Chisanta to seed chaos had not been stopped, though his actions killed many.

  Below, a new spirit took the floor. Yarrow recognized his face from a vision he’d received at the Confluence. He was one of the pair of Chi’santae who had first found a young Charlem Bowtar in a Nerran tea shop, thousands of years ago. His name was Godderd.

  “The Speaker for the Living has made some excellent points. I would like to add to his argument, in favor of dismantling the system of the Chisanta. My issue is a simple one: the first sacrifice, propagation, was devised as a barrier one was not meant to leap thoughtlessly. It is a sound notion. The most fundamental human desire is to live on, through history or art, but more often through progeny. However, I will argue that this sacrifice is one more marker of a broken framework. For there are those who are willing to make such a sacrifice, but are unable to do so. It is fundamentally unjust.”

  Here, a new story danced across the floor. Yarrow was better able to see these moving pictures, now that he was looking down from on high. This story was one he had never personally considered: it showed men and women, attempting to make the first sacrifice and failing. He watched a series of Chisanta throw themselves against that sheer cliff, with unfulfilled desperation.

  There were men and women who were infertile, and therefore could not sacrifice something that had never been theirs in the first place. But most of all, there were men and women who did not feel attraction to the opposite gender.

  The last of these was of Peer Gelson. Yarrow sensed Adearre lean forward, his attention sharpening. The dead watched, as Peer tried desperately to make the first sacrifice so he might save his bevolder, and failed. They watched as he broke his hand against the floor, tears in his eyes, and cursed the Spirits for barring him from their gifts.

  “We have never thought of these people as lesser, so why do we perpetuate a system which treats them as such?” Godderd declared. There was an anger in his gaze that looked all too personal, as he glared up into the endless balconies. And then he flew from the floor, to sit beside his bevolder once again.

  “A blighting good point,” Adearre said.

  Yarrow raised his brows in mild surprise. He had never heard Adearre curse before.

  The next spirit to take the stage was a young woman with dark hair and milky skin. After a moment, Yarrow identified her as the previous Fifth, the o
ne that Quade had kept hidden and used to locate his Elevated. Her life had been stolen from her, and she looked spitting mad about it.

  “Most of you know me as the former Speaker of the Living,” she said. “But it is unfair to call me such. I never had a chance to live. I was made a puppet by the gift of another. My life was taken from me. It is not right. And it will not stop. Look! Look what he is doing, even now.”

  Quade had unleashed his soldiers upon the capital. He had sent Arlow to kill his own friends. He had made automatons of every single citizen of Accord. And now, in this very moment…

  Yarrow shuddered, watching Quade caress his own face. He could no longer feel his physical body, but he did not want Quade touching it. His mouth twisted in disgust. He felt violated and repulsed and, somehow, more defeated than ever before.

  Because he had sacrificed everything, he had given up his very life—a life that was full of love, and had only just begun—and this was his reward?

  “Do not lose hope,” Adearre said.

  “What hope is there if the Company refuses to act?” To his surprise, his voice boomed—echoing throughout the spire, heard by every spirit in attendance.

  Good, he thought, a bitter taste in his mouth. Let them hear my thoughts.

  That’s why I’m here.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Peer despised himself for it, but he shook Whythe once again, rousing him before he could nod off.

  “Forgive me,” he said.

  His bevolder glanced at him with weary, blackened eyes. The bruise had spread from his temple to his left eye, now a vibrant shade of maroon. Peer knew the black-and-blue gouge on his own forehead looked far worse, but he hated the sight of Whythe wounded.

  The other man blinked, lightly slapping his own cheeks. “Right. Sorry. No sleeping.”

  The coach lurched over a rock, and Peer snaked an arm around Whythe’s waist to steady him. They sat on the roof bench, which was pleasant given the warm day and the view—sweeps of green hills and a clear blue sky—but it would make for a painful fall.