by Claire Luana
Sable coughed wetly, the sound cutting through the fog of Hale’s vengeance like a knife.
“Hale!” Wren cried. “Sable needs you!”
Hale turned to see Wren and Olivia kneeling next to Sable, pressing the fabric of their skirts against Sable’s torso. He left Killian and crawled to Sable’s side, some part of him taking in the rest of the scene.
Lucas and the other Spicer’s Guildmen had somehow managed to defeat the Black Guards who had emerged from the carriages. The prisoners had been freed, and now they stood silently in a half-circle, watching the bloody scene. Thom stood, his hand over his mouth in shock.
Pike’s man Rizio had reached him and was staunching the blood flowing from his wound. “We’re going to get you in this rear carriage,” Rizio said to Pike, and Lucas appeared, shouldering Pike’s other side.
But none of that mattered; it was all minutiae. There was only Sable, pale and gasping on the ground. Blood flecked Sable’s lovely lips. Hale caressed her cheek, leaving crimson smears on her copper skin. “It’s going to be all right, my love,” he said, his voice as low and soft as velvet. The words were a promise. He would save her. If it was the last thing he did.
“Should we move her?” Wren asked.
Hale didn’t answer Wren, but he swept Sable into his arms in one smooth motion. Fresh rivulets of blood leaked from her wound, and she moaned, her eyes fluttering closed. He ducked into the carriage, depositing Sable on the cushioned bench across from Pike. He ducked his head out the door and barked, “Everyone, get back in the carriages. Follow us.”
Hale dove back into the carriage, kneeling on the floor between the two seats. He had hardly pulled the door shut before he heard a whip crack and the world lurched beneath him. The carriage took off at a breakneck pace, tossing Hale to the ground. There was no way the other carriages would be able to follow at this pace, but he knew that Wren knew the way and could lead the rest of the released hostages to the relative safety of Pike’s manor.
Sable was limp and pale on one seat, while Pike was cursing Hale, the heavens, and everything else he could think of while clutching his shoulder. Hale crawled to Sable, taking her hand. It was clammy and cold. “Hold on, my love,” he whispered, feeling hot tears spill down his cheek. “Don’t you die on me. This is all my fault. You thought you could protect me…” Hale bowed his head to Sable’s shoulder, guilt and misery overtaking him. When he had seen her stalking the Black Guard, her eyes bright and alive, he had thought he had never seen a more beautiful sight. But somehow, the man had turned on her. His fingers twitched at the thought of the guard, wishing he could stab the man again and again. He never should have let Sable put herself in danger. He should have demanded that she stay far away, where she could be safe. If Sable died, it would be his fault. He couldn’t protect himself. He couldn’t protect her.
They passed over a rut in the road and Hale took flight before crashing back down on angry knees. Sable almost rolled off the bench, but Hale held her on the seat. Her dress was soaked with blood. There was so much blood. Too much blood, a part of Hale’s mind said. He pressed a kiss to her forehead, murmuring against her hair. “You are a daughter of Magnus, strong as the sea. Stay with me. One day we will laugh about this day, with the skies above us, the seas below. Stay with me and we’ll run from this place. You’ll be free. I promise.”
Sable’s lips moved as if she were trying to speak, but Hale couldn’t make out the words.
The carriage lurched to a stop and Pike flew off the seat onto Hale’s back. “Flame it, Rizio, you son of a spicer,” Pike cursed, collapsing back onto the ground.
Hale threw open the door with such an intensity that it practically came off its hinges. Rizio appeared at the door, helping Pike out of the carriage. Hale lifted Sable like the doll she resembled. “Doctor?” he growled at Rizio.
“The housekeeper has medical training,” Rizio said. “He’s patched many of us up before.”
They entered the house, and some small part of Hale noticed the massive half-timbered beauty, its polished floors, its plush carpets that they now tracked blood and dirt on. Rizio led them into a sitting room, where he deposited Pike with a groan onto one couch before jogging out of the room hollering for the housekeeper.
Hale set Sable gently down, putting two bloody fingers to her throat to check for a pulse.
“Does she live?” Pike rasped from the other couch, trying to crane his head.
“Barely,” Hale said without looking away from her. She looked paler. Smaller. As if her body had somehow shrunk in these last few moments, without the pulsing aura of life and vibrancy about her. Images of his brother, Cal, flashed through his mind, the pale hue of his flesh as his lifeblood poured out into the dirt, Hale helpless to stop it. His mother’s body, tiny and still, the red welts of the plague covering her porcelain skin. He hadn’t been able to save either of them. But gods help him, he would save Sable.
The housekeeper appeared, wearing a quilted dressing gown over a bare chest and linen pants. The man was wizened but vigorous, and he hurried to Pike’s side. “Her first,” Pike rasped.
“But, sir…” the man protested.
“Her. First.”
The housekeeper shook his head and crossed the room, attempting to shoo Hale away. Hale circled around by Sable’s head, refusing to break contact.
“Single sword wound?” the housekeeper asked.
“Yes.” Hale’s voice was as rough as gravel.
The housekeeper cut open the bodice of Sable’s dress and inspected the wound, adjusting his spectacles to get a closer look.
Rizio reappeared. Hale hadn’t even known he’d gone. “I’ve sent a messenger for a surgeon. I don’t know how long it will take to get him here at this hour.” He eyed Pike and crossed the room, placing more pressure on Pike’s wound.
The front door opened, and Wren and Lucas entered, followed by Olivia and Thom and half a dozen other men and women Hale had never seen.
“Is Sable going to be all right?” Thom asked, his blue eyes wide with concern.
“I don’t know,” Wren whispered.
Sable stirred as the housekeeper pressed on her wound, her black eyes fluttering open. “Hale?” she said, the word as soft as a butterfly’s wings.
“I’m here,” he said, stroking her hair. “I’m right here. You have to fight, okay? Don’t leave me.”
“I’m sorry,” she said, grimacing in pain.
“Nothing to be sorry for,” Hale said. “Some days you stub your toe, some days you get stabbed. Just part of life.” He tried to smile, blinking through his tears.
“Not. That. I didn’t tell you.”
“Tell me what?” Hale asked, leaning down to hear her ragged words.
“When I saw you… that first time. You were the most beautiful sight I had ever seen.” Hale’s heart twisted painfully as she recited back to him the words he had said to her.
“I am very handsome,” he murmured, stroking her brow, tears falling from his nose into her hair.
“I knew even then I was lost. That I would love you.” She tried to look at him, squinting.
They were the words he had wanted to hear every day for the past five years. And now, he wanted to hear anything but. Because those words, in this moment, sounded like goodbye.
“I love you too, Aiyani Sable. We’re going to have years together,” he said. “Babies. Can you imagine? So many babies.”
She let out a wet laugh, and blood bubbled at the corner of her mouth.
“Don’t make her laugh,” the housekeeper said crossly. Hale had forgotten the man was there. Had forgotten anyone was there but her.
“I’m not afraid,” Sable whispered.
“You’re never afraid,” he said, nodding. “You’re as fierce as a dragon.”
“No. Of death. I’m not afraid. My tribe—we join the sea. Our spirits become something more. The wind, the water. The whales. I think I’d like to be a whale.”
Hale shook his head. “Y
ou’re not going to die.”
“Hale.” She smiled sadly at him, lifting her hand to cup his cheek.
A sob broke from his lips. “I’ll follow you,” he said. “I’d make a good whale.”
Her lashes fluttered and closed, the melancholy smile still on her lips. “You make a good man.”
And then her hand slipped from his face, hanging limp at her side.
“Sable,” he said, shaking her shoulders gently. Then, with more urgency, “Sable.”
“I’m sorry, sir,” the housekeeper said. “She’s gone.”
A roar erupted from Hale. “No!” he bellowed, lunging at the housekeeper, lifting him bodily by his robe. “Save her!” Hale cried, his face heated with rage.
“Hale!” Rizio and Lucas and Thom closed the distance, pulling the housekeeper from Hale’s grip as Lucas put a hand on Hale’s heaving chest. “He’s doing everything he can.” Lucas turned to the man, who was straightening his robe with shaking fingers. “Right? What’s her condition?”
“As I told him,” the man said, clearing his throat. “I’m terribly sorry. But she’s lost too much blood. We’ve lost her.”
Chapter 31
The world seemed to dim in that moment. Sable was so pale, a ghostly corpse version of herself drained of life and vitality. The look on Hale’s face was almost too painful for Wren to gaze upon. It was as if Hale was watching the ruin of his life, everything he’d once held dear burned to the ground before his very eyes. Hale knelt down once again and leaned his forehead against Sable’s, murmuring words into her ear that Wren couldn’t bear to hear. She turned away, and she saw the same look mirrored on Pike’s face. Fresh, hot tears coursed down her cheeks, and tears flowed down Pike’s cheeks as well. He met her eyes with a look of startling intensity, and she knew that the guildmaster’s grief was as bottomless as Hale’s.
Wren felt Lucas wrap his arms around her, pull her close, but she resisted burying her face in his chest. She couldn’t look away. It didn’t seem fair that she had someone warm to comfort her when Hale had lost everything.
Hale’s golden head fell forwards on Sable’s chest and he let out a keening sound, a sob that broke through the room, broke Wren’s heart all over again. She pushed off Lucas and knelt by Hale, wrapping her arms around his huge shoulders, laying her head on his shoulder even as he laid his head on Sable. Together, their tears bathed Sable’s body, a final baptism of love and friendship and sorrow.
Wren didn’t know how much time had passed when Lucas came to kneel by her, to peel her from Hale. “The doctor is here,” he said. “And the coroner. They need to take Sable’s body.”
Hale was up in a flash, his expression wild. “They can’t touch her.”
Wren shrank back from his ferocity, but Lucas stood, strong and sensible and kind. “Hale. Let them take her. They’ll treat her body with dignity. You can’t keep her here forever.”
“I can’t be without her,” he said. The words were raw. “I don’t know how.”
“It’s not her.” Lucas placed a hand on Hale’s shoulder and looked him in the eye. “That body is a vessel. It doesn’t have Sable’s spirit, her fire. She’s with the gods now. She’s probably bossing the Sower around as we speak, telling the Piscator how a real fisherman throws a net.”
A crack of a smile appeared on Hale’s face, and he began to move, one leaden foot in front of the other, until Lucas led him to sit down at the table in the dining room. Wren silently showered Lucas with gratitude—that he had known what to say seemed nothing short of a miracle. Wren wasn’t good in these moments…other people’s emotions were still strange bedfellows to her.
“Let’s get you cleaned up,” Lucas said to Wren. She allowed herself to be led like a small child, let Lucas wipe her face and neck with a warm washcloth, let him lead her downstairs towards the kitchen to find something to eat. She didn’t think she would ever eat again, but Lucas insisted that food would help, and she wasn’t one to argue.
“I saw you…in the middle of everything. You stabbed Brax. It was…savage. What was that?”
Her lip quivered as hot shame flooded her. “I wasn’t thinking. I saw him, and I just had to kill him. So he wouldn’t…” Her voice was hoarse.
“So he wouldn’t what, Wren?” Lucas asked gently. “I thought there weren’t supposed to be any more secrets between us.”
Wren closed her eyes, stumbling to a halt. “So he wouldn’t sell other children like he tried to sell me.” The words tumbled out. “And the other children in the orphanage.”
“Sell you…” Lucas shook his head, his brow furrowing. “I don’t understand.”
“The orphanage was a front for child slavery. And worse.”
Lucas’s face had gone pale, and the muscles in his jaw worked back and forth. “What?”
“It’s where all your father’s favorite nobles would come to get their playthings,” she hissed. “But no more. Sable dashed into the middle of things, and I followed, and I saw him standing there. I saw my chance…to do the thing I couldn’t do when I was ten years old. I killed him. He’s dead.” The sudden fierceness drained out of her. “And so is Sable.” Her voice broke.
Lucas pulled her into his arms and she pressed her face against the soft fabric of his shirt, melting against him.
When he spoke, his voice was hard and low. “I will make him pay, Wren. You have my word. My father will pay for what he did to you.”
Within her, his words kindled fear and satisfaction alike. For however glad she was that Lucas finally saw the truth of who his father was, she was afraid of what it meant. For King Imbris wouldn’t pay for his crimes without more bloodshed. And that, she didn’t think she was ready for.
Wren and Lucas untangled themselves and trudged the rest of the way to the kitchen. In the clean tidy space they found Thom and Trick sidled up against a massive butcher block island, devouring a loaf of hot bread, smearing it with creamy cheese.
“More bottomless pits here to crowd my kitchen?” the sturdy cuisinier complained as they entered, but her eyes were kind, and she put out two more plates and a basket of grapes.
Wren crashed into Thom with a bone-breaking hug while Lucas did the same with Trick. “I’m so glad you’re all right,” she said. Thom was her only Gifted ally in the Guild now…besides Hale…and she didn’t think Hale would be himself for some time. If ever again.
“Sable?” Thom asked, his face twisted in worry.
Wren scrunched her lips together, trying to stop a fresh bout of tears. She shook her head once.
Thom collapsed onto the stool, his head in his hands. “This is all my fault,” he said. “If I hadn’t been captured, none of this would have happened!”
“No,” Wren and Lucas said at the same time, and she looked at him for the hundredth time that night with gratitude. “It’s not your fault,” Wren said, putting an arm around his bony shoulders. “You were kidnapped. None of what happened to you was your fault. We took a calculated risk in rescuing all the hostages. It was the right choice.”
“The only one to blame for Sable’s death is my father,” Lucas said, his voice like iron. “His Black Guard ran her through. His Grand Inquisitor planned to ambush us when we tried to free the prisoners. He bears the blame. At least Killian paid for what he did.”
They had left Killian’s broken body bloody on the cobblestones in their rush to get Sable and Pike to medical treatment. “Is he dead?” she asked.
“I’d never seen someone take a beating like that and live,” Lucas said. “Hale must have crushed his skull in. He’s dead.”
“Good,” Trick said, surprising Wren and Lucas. Thom blew out a sigh of relief.
“What do you have against Killian?” Lucas asked his brother. “I know he’s never been our favorite of father’s attack dogs…”
“We have much to tell you,” Thom said, reaching for another slice of bread. “We learned a lot in our short captivity.”
“Like what?” Wren asked.
“Like we were only the beginning.” Trick looked meaningfully at the cuisinier, who was ignoring them while chopping vegetables. He nodded towards the door.
Thom stood, loading the food onto a plate, and led the way out the kitchen door.
“Thank you for the meal,” Lucas said as he gestured for Wren to proceed. They made their way into the dark hallway before Lucas rounded on Trick.
“The beginning?” Lucas’s brows furrowed. “What do you mean?”
Trick hesitated, looking meaningfully at Wren, from Wren to Lucas.
Wren raised an eyebrow in confusion, before she realized what Trick was getting at. “Oh,” she said. “Lucas knows.”
“It’s about damn time,” Trick said, his shoulders slumping in relief. “Father intends to gain complete control over all Gifted and infused products. He’s been building…a home for us.”
“A home?” Wren asked.
“A prison. Forced labor. We cook, we distill, we sleep. Until we die,” Trick said.
“I overheard Killian saying you were supposed to be the first, Wren,” Thom said. “But Callidus foiled the plan when he came in and saved you. Killian had it in for him ever since.”
“But…they were going to kill me,” Wren said.
“No, they weren’t,” Thom said. “It wasn’t real poison. It was just supposed to look like you were dead. You were intended for this secret prison.”
“That’s why they were executing you by poison,” Lucas said, realization dawning on him. “Death by ingestion. I’ve never even heard of that. They always cut people’s heads off.”
“Everyone would have thought I was dead…but I would have woken up a…slave?” Wren shuddered, suddenly even more grateful that she had foiled the king and Killian’s plan. She would rather be executed than enslaved for the rest of her life.