by Ted Dekker
Feyn for Avra. Send her out and Feyn will be yours.
That was it.
What was he to do, hand her over with no guarantee that he would get Feyn at all? What did they take him for?
And yet what choice did he have?
He had thrown out the messenger and raged the length of the office, called for Corban and then made him wait outside. Corban’s presence only exacerbated Saric’s own frustration and his awareness, sharper than ever, that he was alone in feeling it.
He sent for Rom’s whore, but once the servant who fetched her left them alone as he demanded, he found he could barely look at her.
Her hair was mussed and her cloak was gone. Her eyes were red and swollen. There were chafe marks above and below the ties that still held her wrists. They had bound her to his bedpost, no doubt. The vile scars against her collarbone were visible in the pale light through the window, but worse yet, they seemed to dance in the serpentine light of the lanterns in their tall stands. What was he thinking, having sent her to his chamber? He could never have wanted her.
“Well. Your man fought for you.”
“Of course he did,” she whispered.
He could not abide the absolute conviction in her voice. He crossed to her and hauled her up by her hair.
“Really? And is it also love that if I don’t receive my sister, he’ll have condemned you to your death? That you’ll die because of him?” Spittle flew in her face, but her eyes were fixed brazenly on him. That there was no fear in them was the gravest insult of all.
Hades, she believed in this Rom. She would defend him at the expense of her life.
A single backhand sent her flying into the desk and onto the floor.
“Dog! Is that the great secret of the keepers, this enslavement to your master?” He strode to his desk and snatched the knife kept there for opening the wax seals on documents. He grabbed her by the wrists, sliced through her ties, and let her fall back onto the floor.
“You disgust me. You spent the night alone because I couldn’t bring myself to take you. But if I don’t get back my sister, the next time I see you, I’ll take my pleasure with you. I’ll do what should have been done the day you incurred that defect. I’ll cut off that twisted skin and put you down like an animal.”
He shouted for the guards, who came and lifted her to her feet. She struggled to pull her arms free of them, her hair wild, an angry welt already darkening her cheek.
“Take her to the gate. Set her free. Leave me, all of you.”
When they had gone he threw the knife into the corner. He could do nothing but wait. Nothing.
Feyn waited in hiding, obscure in her torn dress, until she saw a dark-haired girl released at the gate. She waited until the messenger she’d sent caught up to Avra and handed her the note with the cryptic words that read only: Rom is alive and well. Wait for him.
Avra was a pretty girl, beautiful in her own way. Rom would do well to keep her.
Satisfied, Feyn entered the Citadel and headed toward the Residence of the Office. She pushed wide the great bronze doors and strode into her father’s quarters.
But the figure that turned from the window wasn’t her father, as she’d expected. It was Saric. And the man near the desk wasn’t Rowan, but the alchemist Corban.
Saric’s eyes widened. “Sister!”
His hair was in disarray. Dark shadows nested like bruises under his eyes even as they took in her disheveled state.
“What’s this? What are these rags? Have you been mistreated?”
“I’m fine. A disguise to smuggle me out of the Citadel.”
Her brother crossed to her quickly. “Thank the Maker. I assure you, the guards who were on duty have been punished and released from their positions. You have no idea the sleepless night I’ve had, how I feared for your life!”
Indeed, she had never seen him in such a state.
“Put aside your fear, brother. I’m alive and well.”
His fingers were trembling. “When I think what this could have cost us…Did you know that I had one of the outlaws here? I released her on your account. I had no choice.”
“What matters is that I am safe. Thank you.”
“Come. You must let me send for some food. Corban?”
The alchemist opened the door and called for a servant.
Feyn wanted to ask where Father was—she needed his counsel now more than she ever had. But Saric cut her thoughts short.
“I’m most curious to know what sort of madman, what kind of dangerous lunatic, captures the Sovereign-to-be.”
Feyn glanced away.
Rom.
His name should have incited a flush within her. The memory of kisses, of all that was beautiful beyond the concrete structure of this world. Sadness, at the least.
She felt nothing except a quick stab of fear for his safety. But she would not betray even this.
“As you say, brother, he’s a lunatic, doing what seemed right to his mad mind. Where is—”
“Where did he take you?”
“He’s fled beyond the city.” She dropped into the chair he held for her, only then realizing how weary she was.
“Did he tell you about this blood that he carries from the keepers?”
“Blood?” She glanced at him.
“The blood he took from the keepers. Did you see it?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said.
“Did you see something like a document? Something very old. It might not have been with the blood.”
The vellum. How was it possible that Saric knew about it?
“Brother, I was in fear for my life, kidnapped by a madman. Besides, do you really think he’d share his secrets with me?”
“Of course. You’re right.” He regarded her for a moment longer, then strode toward her father’s desk. “I’ll have them hunted down and killed. It will become my only concern in these few remaining days as Sovereign, even if it means I forgo sleep as I did last night.”
“Sovereign? What are you talking about?”
Saric didn’t respond. He didn’t even turn.
Feyn pushed herself up from the chair. “Where’s Father?”
“Father is dead,” he said, flatly.
Fear filled her like water rushing into a cistern after a storm.
“What?”
Saric turned, slowly, to face her. “He died yesterday, very suddenly. It was a terrible shock. You can’t imagine. There I was, eating with him…” His gaze drifted away, as though his attention had wandered back into his own thoughts.
“Father is dead? And you are Sovereign?”
“As the law requires. Only until you can take the throne, naturally.”
“You have no training! You’re unqualified! A person can’t become Sovereign without years of preparation. This is insanity!”
“Yes, well, that’s what I said…” He paused. “Is that how you think of me? As nothing but an unqualified little brother?”
“Don’t be ridiculous! What have you ever done other than please yourself? What was the senate thinking?”
A chill iced his voice. “They were thinking of adhering to the law, to the Order that you yourself are sworn to uphold.” Something about his eyes—they flashed.
He was seething.
Anger. Rage. A day earlier she wouldn’t have recognized it. How could he feel this jealousy and anger? Was it possible he, too, had taken the blood?
“Given the circumstances, they should have amended the law to allow someone with experience, like Miran, to step in.”
“Trust me, I tried,” he bit off. “But the senate will do as they see fit. Perhaps if Father had made me head of the senate, we wouldn’t be in this mess. What are we but figureheads, to do their bidding? Even you.”
From the corner of her eye, she saw the alchemist Corban’s nervous glance. The way he stood there, watching, saying nothing. Did nothing seem amiss to him? And where was Rowan?
“Don’t look for
Rowan. He was the first to usher me to the Sovereign’s chair.”
“The law is made to support Order, Saric, not one man’s ambition for power.”
“Ambition? And what would you know of ambition, sister?”
“That it is forbidden. And yet, somehow, it lives in your eyes.”
He was regarding her strangely. “Something is different about you.”
“I’ve just learned news of my father’s death!” She paced out into the middle of the room, turning to face the alchemist. “And who is this, your senate leader now? You. Will you say nothing to him, Corban?” A dread unease bit at her, a growing gnawing in her stomach.
“It is the law, lady.”
“The law isn’t everything. The senate has grown shortsighted. Of all people. Rom was right, even their boy would do better to replace me than any of you! Destiny isn’t something to be tinkered with!”
“Boy?” Saric said. He had gone rigid. “What boy?”
She’d said too much. Whatever her fears, she did not want her brother, now Sovereign with far too much power, to broaden his hunt for Rom.
She dismissed the notion with a flick of her wrist and turned away. “Nothing but a rumor. I was only making a point.”
“What rumor?” Saric stepped toward her. “The next seventh is a girl your own age.”
She looked over at him. His curiosity in the matter was striking. Unnerving. Two thoughts clashed in her mind. The first was that she was right. He was full of ambition. In fact, he had been reaching for this power for days, weeks—longer perhaps.
The second was that such an ambition could only come with that same poison that had set her off her feet.
Saric’s face darkened. “As your Sovereign, I order you to tell me about this boy.”
“There is no boy!”
“Tell me!” he shouted.
She stared him down. “You’ve taken the blood, haven’t you?”
He blinked.
“Blood, sister?” he said into the sudden silence.
“The blood you spoke of to me, just days ago in my chamber. But how?”
His features turned to ice. “You know what I think? I think you’re lying to me. I think you went with that artisan willingly and now conspire to undo what’s been done by law.” He pressed in closer. “My own sister, who will be my successor to the throne, stands in defiance of me?”
There was blackness in his eyes she had never seen in him before.
She took a quick, backward step. “I’m only concerned for you.”
“You will tell me everything,” he snarled. “Everything or I swear I’ll rip it out of you!”
Another step back, driven by the fear that Saric would not stop with words.
“Saric, please. What has gotten—”
His hand flashed and struck her face. Feyn stumbled into the secretary. Her pocket caught on the desk’s corner and ripped open. She lost her footing and fell to the floor.
There would be no more pretense. No more pandering. He had already quenched the fire Feyn once ignited in him. He had been a schoolboy, looking up to her as the rest of the world.
Now Saric knew better.
Feyn brought a trembling hand to her cheek, eyes wide. “How dare you strike me?”
“How dare you mock your Sovereign?”
“I’m your sister!”
She clambered to her feet, hand pressed to her face. A tattered piece of cloth fell from her torn pocket and settled softly to the floor. It was covered in ink.
Her eyes darted down, and by that single look of fright, Saric knew that she hadn’t intended on him seeing that cloth.
Her gaze lifted to meet his. She slowly lowered her hand.
“You’re hiding something from me, sister.”
“And you are acting like a child, brother.”
Her voice was strong again. Here was the woman who so easily quickened his pulse. It was a pity she had to die. She would have made such a perfect companion.
Saric stepped forward and lifted the cloth with its scribbled lines in Feyn’s own handwriting.
“It’s only the legend of these keepers,” Feyn said. “Their fantasies of overthrowing Order in opposition to me.”
The vellum! This had to be from the vellum itself. And yet she’d denied the existence of any such vellum.
“I didn’t want to bother you with quibbles over my right to power, but now you have it,” she said. “You see how foolish you are? You strike me to the floor when you should be ushering me into authority!”
Saric barely heard her. His eyes were on the writing in his hand.
Sometime at or near the new year 471…Bloodlines should converge to produce a child. A male…
In this child is our hope. It is he who will remember his humanity, and he who must abolish the Order, the very structures of which go up like a prison around the human heart. It is he who must be brought to power to save the world.
He quickly scanned the translation. A notation had been scribbled in the bottom corner:
Boy. Royal. Nine years old.
His pulse spiked. Another line, at the end of the account:
Find the boy. Bring him to power.
A sharp ring resonated through his skull. So then, there was a boy. He lifted his eyes. Saw that Feyn was staring at him disapprovingly. But then she would—he’d just lost control of himself. And right when it was crucial that Feyn not see him as a threat to her power.
“You see no challenge to your office in this?” he demanded.
“If I did, I would have shown it to you immediately. But I was with this deranged artisan. If he intended me any harm, would I be standing here alive? He raved about this impossible legend, but when it became clear to him that I had nothing to offer, he released me and fled, likely to the nomads.”
“So you see no basis for the existence of this boy, even though this notation”—he indicated the words at the bottom—“is in your own hand.”
“Please. He forced me to transcribe the words from another document. I did what was required to placate him. But now your behavior has me fearing for my life. In my own office!”
Saric drew a calming breath and gathered his thoughts. He had to recover any ground he’d lost with her.
“Forgive me. You can’t imagine what it’s been like since your abduction. Please…I lost myself. You are the rightful Sovereign, of course. I would never suggest otherwise. But Father rejected my request to head the senate, and now you treat me like a child. I can’t bear the thought of your dismissal.”
She watched him for a few moments, then offered him a thin smile of consolation. “You surprise me, brother. I honestly didn’t think you had the backbone for leadership. Perhaps I’ve underestimated you.”
Her words surrounded him like a tender embrace. It was the most beautiful thing she’d ever said to him, even though he wasn’t sure she fully believed the words herself. What he wouldn’t give to rule with Feyn! And for her affection, he might give up any hope of power.
But that was impossible. Without the serum, Feyn wasn’t capable of such ambition, no matter how alluring the fantasy.
The account she’d transcribed, on the other hand, was not a fantasy. Without the benefit of the blood, Feyn might not understand the threat presented by the vellum’s translation, but he had no doubt that the keeper’s secret could destroy them all.
Saric cleared his throat. “Perhaps we’ve underestimated each other. To be clear, you see no threat from this artisan or the keeper’s legend whatsoever?”
“No. As I said, his mind was lost. Driven by fear and forbidden sentiment. The poison they take drives them mad. The same blood that I suspect you of taking, brother.”
There it was. To deny it would only erode her trust in him.
“Yes. You are too astute. I took it as a way to understand the threat they pose to the Order.”
“And your conclusion?”
He frowned. “As you say. Poison. It lingers in my mind still. But you’ve see
n that.”
“Yes.”
His mind spun with a sudden thought: And I would give it to you as well. I will kill you after you take your throne, but not before your blood rages with the same passions as mine.
If he could not have her love, he would at least have her desire, even her rage.
He set the cloth on the desk with an unsteady hand. “You’re probably right about these keepers, but we can’t allow even the smallest threat to go unnoticed.”
“I’m sure you’re right. I should have shown you, forgive me.”
“We’re days from the inauguration,” he said. “We can’t risk another attempt on your life. You must remain in your quarters under full guard until we usher you out for the world to greet their new Sovereign.”
“You’re putting me under house arrest?”
“No. I’m assuring your safety. As acting Sovereign, it is my duty. It’s customary for the incoming ruler to be sequestered before the ceremony. What is a country estate compared with the Citadel palace? Anything less would be beneath you.”
She stepped up to him, fully recovered now, her gaze lingering on his eyes before dropping down to his chest. She reached out and brushed a bit of lint off his shoulder.
“I have, haven’t I?” she said.
“Have what?”
“Underestimated you.”
Saric felt himself flush. He both relished and despised this power she held over his heart.
“Perhaps Father was wrong as well,” she said. “The senate might do well with new leadership. It will be my first decree, brother. You will assume leadership of the senate on the first day of my rule.”
Saric wasn’t sure what to make of her offer. On the one hand it was a moot point. Ironic in the least. On the other, it would give him more time to facilitate his own desire. In either case, the fact that Feyn was reaching out to him flooded him with a surprising satisfaction.
“I…I don’t know what to say.”
“Say nothing.” She lifted her hand for him.
He took it gently in his own, dipped his head, and touched his lips to her knuckles. And then on whim, he turned her hand over and laid a kiss against her palm. “It is my honor to serve you, my sister…my Sovereign.”