A Sky Beyond the Storm

by Sabaa Tahir

“If we do not all go, the Nightbringer will win.” Laia’s voice is low, and she struggles to temper her frustration. “He will have his vengeance on the Scholars, and Keris will hunt you down like she hunted down my people. You’ll be enslaved. Destroyed. Just like we were.”

  “You have the scythe,” another voice calls out. “You go fight him. Was it not your people whose violence led to the Nightbringer’s ire?”

  “That was a thousand years ago—” Darin speaks, which is when I notice Martials sprinkled through the crowd. The Blood Shrike’s men.

  “There’s no point in staying if we’re just going to be hunted,” Afya says forcefully. “We go. We fight. Laia takes down the Nightbringer. Maybe we win.”

  “That will take weeks—”

  “Months,” Gibran calls out. “Maybe years. But at least we fight instead of hiding like rats.”

  I think of Mauth’s warning, and Khuri’s prophecy. In flowerfall, the orphan will bow to the scythe.

  We do not have months or years. We have weeks, if that. Spring is close.

  It is Laia who sees me first. Laia whose eyes go wide as I step out of the dark.

  Whispers of Banu al-Mauth streak through the crowd gathered around the fire. They could shout at me. Ask me why I left. Instead they shift back, giving me space to pass. Watchful. Defiant.

  “The Nightbringer’s maleficence runs deeper than we thought,” I tell them. “For he is not stealing your ghosts to empower his people. He is stealing them so that he can destroy all life. And if we wish for a future—any future—we have no choice but to stop him.”

  XLVII: The Blood Shrike

  We bury the Empress Regent two days after her murder, as the sun goes to rest in the west. Thousands line Antium’s streets, littering it with winter rose petals as six Masks carry her to the Aquilla Mausoleum on the north end of the city. There, under a rainy, slate-colored sky, she is movingly eulogized by a handful of highborn Paters and Maters who barely knew her.

  Or so I am told, after. I do not attend. I do not leave the palace for days following. Instead, I plot how I will destroy Keris.

  Two weeks after the funeral, I am holed up in a meeting chamber with Livia’s advisory council, listening to a group of recently arrived generals arguing over why their war plan is the only one that will allow us to take back Silas—and eventually Serra and Navium—from Keris.

  “We should wait,” says old General Pontilius, fresh from Tiborum. He paces around the long table where I sit with Mettias, Quin Veturius, Musa, Cassius, and six others.

  “No. We strike now,” Quin says. “While she’s trying to take the Free Lands. Secure Silas, and move south from there.”

  “And what if it’s a trap?” Pontilius asks. “She could have an army lying in wait for us. Reports put her forces in Marinn at nearly forty thousand men. She has another thirty thousand in reserve. That leaves fifty thousand men unaccounted for.”

  “They’re scattered throughout the south—” Musa offers, and Pontilius recoils as if slapped.

  “How would you know, Scholar?”

  Once, Musa might have laughed off such insolence. Now he frowns. Eleiba’s tidings from Marinn have sobered him. All I could send was a token force. Two Masks. Two hundred soldiers. They will not have even reached Marinn yet. They won’t get through in time, Musa had fretted. We have to draw Keris off. We have to take back the Empire so she has no choice but to return.

  He could have gone back with Eleiba. He’d wanted to, even. But his people are here, so he stayed.

  “Do you know where Musa of Adisa was in the fight to take Antium, Pontilius?” I say now. “At my side, bleeding for an Empire he’d never set foot in until a few months ago. Fighting for the Scholars. Tell me, General, where were you during the fighting?”

  Pontilius pales. “You’ve been taken in by a handsome face—”

  My blade is at his throat before he finishes. “Do not make the mistake,” I say, “of thinking I won’t slit your throat for discourteousness, old man. Everyone at this table knows I won’t hesitate.”

  Pontilius swallows and, in what he no doubt thinks of as a more reasonable tone, says, “He is a Scholar—”

  My punch lands with a crack across his jaw, and he topples backward, stunned. I am embarrassed for him. He’s younger than Quin. At the very least he should be able to handle a punch on his feet.

  “You—” he sputters. “How dare you—”

  “She could have killed you.” Pater Mettias, wan and quiet until now, speaks up. “Count yourself lucky.”

  “You should remember, Pontilius”—Quin spits out the Pater’s name—“Empress Regent Livia freed the Scholars. The advisory council supported her.”

  “The Empress Regent is dead.” Pontilius moves as far away from me as he can. “And now this—this woman—”

  “As the people have named her Imperator Invictus, and as she is the Mater of Gens Aquilla, I move for the Blood Shrike to serve as regent,” Quin says. He’d warned me this morning that he’d make such a motion. But I did not expect it to come so soon—and I wish he had not invoked the title of Imperator.

  “Until we have dealt with Keris,” the old man goes on. “Yea or nay?”

  It’s not really a question, and the yea that rumbles through the room is unequivocal.

  “She cannot be both Shrike and regent.” Cassius speaks up, the cretin. He and Pontilius don’t look at each other, but my sources tell me they’ve been plotting. It’s a shame I need their men. “There’s no precedent.”

  “There is no precedent for a Blackcliff commandant to betray her own people to barbarian invaders, leave her capital to burn, and declare herself Empress,” I say. “There is no precedent for her to then enjoy the support of hundreds of Illustrian Paters, including yourself, despite such crimes. There’s no precedent for her to murder the rightful regent with the help of an ancient supernatural evil.” I open my hands. “But here we are. Help us or leave, Paters. It makes no difference to me. I will secure the Empire for my nephew with or without your aid, and with or without your men.”

  After the meeting is over, Dex finds me. My old friend has shadows beneath his eyes. He looks like he slept about as much as I did. But he does not offer me kind words or understanding. He knows I do not want either.

  “The new wet nurse is ready to meet you, Shrike,” he says, and I follow him toward the Black Guard barracks, which we’ve moved to the palace grounds. “Her name is Mariana Farrar,” Dex says. “She was recommended by Coralia Farrar. They’re cousins.”

  “So she’s related to the Emperor too,” I say. “How has he been with her?”

  “Much better than the last wet nurse,” Dex says. “I asked Silvius to observe too, since he’s worked with mothers and children. He had no concerns.”

  “Family?”

  “Husband’s a tanner. They escaped Antium with us after the siege. They’re well-known. Well-liked. They have a sixteen-month-old son. He’ll be weaned soon.”

  When I enter Dex’s quarters, Mariana stands. Her Farrar blood is instantly visible—she has Marcus and Zacharias’s yellow eyes. A young man holding a child stands beside her—her husband, I presume. I can tell they want to curtsy or bow. But my armor is throwing them off.

  “I am the Blood Shrike and Regent of the Emperor.” My title feels strange on my tongue, and I call on the Mask in me that I might deliver the words with no inflection. “My duty is to protect the Empire and the Emperor at all costs. You are a necessary part of a machine designed to protect him. If you harm the Emperor, what do you think I will do?”

  Mariana lifts her chin, but her voice is a whisper, and she has to force herself to meet my gaze. “Kill me. As you should.”

  I nod to the child and the man who holds him. “I will kill your boy, there, first. I will kill your husband. I will find everyone you love or have ever loved and I will kill them too.
I will insist you watch before I throw you in prison forever, that you might live with the horror of your actions. Do you understand?”

  Mariana nods frantically but I hold her gaze. “Tell me in your own words.”

  “I—I understand.”

  Dex and I escort her and her family out, and once they are down the hallway, I turn to him. “Four guards when she nurses, not two.” I say. “Her husband and son remain in the palace and under watch. If she so much as looks at the Emperor wrong, you let me know.”

  I make for Zacharias’s room, which now connects to mine on the second level of the palace. It faces the palace garden, though he cannot see it. His window is boarded up, and despite a number of colorful lamps hanging from the ceiling, it feels less like a nursery and more like a prison cell. Likely because of Silvio Rallius and Deci Veturius, each hulking in a corner. Would that I had stationed them in Zacharias’s room before this.

  In addition to the Masks, Coralia sits in a rocking chair in deepest black, her eyes puffy as she watches Tas and Zacharias playing. She rises when I enter, but I wave her back to her seat.

  Tas is on the floor with my nephew, making a small wooden horse dance along his arm. I watch for a moment before the boy notices me. He stands, but I give him space and bid him sit. I know his history. Harper told me of him and Bee and the other children of Kauf.

  “Shrike,” he says after a few moments, and I can tell he has worked himself up to this. “I—I owe you an apology. If I hadn’t left Zakky that night, if I’d stayed with him—”

  I go to Tas and kneel down. In a corner, Coralia sniffs quietly, attempting to muffle her sobs.

  “Then you’d be dead too,” I say. “Don’t you take the blame, Tas. That belongs to me, and me alone. I do have a request for you, though.”

  I’ve been considering this for days—since before Livia was assassinated.

  “The Emperor needs a companion. Not a regent like me, or guards like Rallius.” I nod to the big man, who observes Tas soberly. “But a friend. A brother. Someone to laugh with him and play with him and read to him, but who will also guide him and keep him safe. Someone he trusts. Someone who understands him. But that person, Tas, must be trained in battle and combat. He must be educated. Will you undertake this task?”

  Tas shifts uncomfortably. “I—I cannot read, Blood Shrike.”

  “You’re a smart lad—you’ll pick it up quick. If you want it, of course—” I realize suddenly that the child might be afraid to say no. “Think on it,” I tell him. “When we see Laia again, maybe you can ask her. She’s wise about these sorts of things.”

  Zacharias takes the horse from Tas and throws it a few feet away. He rolls onto his stomach, rocking toward the horse, perplexed that he does not appear to be getting closer to it.

  I cannot help but smile. My first since Keris murdered Livvy. “He’s never done that before.”

  Zacharias loses interest, rolls onto his back, and puts a foot in his mouth.

  “He’ll be running before long,” Tas says. “For now, feet. Quite tasty, apparently.”

  “Very tasty.” I pick up my nephew and tickle his toes. He flashes two teeth at me and giggles.

  “Ah, little one.” I narrowly evade his fist as he lunges for my braid. “Determined to ruin Auntie Shrike’s hair, I see. Tas, why don’t you go get lunch and some air. You shouldn’t be cooped up in here all day, little one.”

  The boy leaves and I walk Zacharias into my quarters, dismissing the Masks within. My nephew flops toward the window, toward the light. But I keep him well away and in the darkness, where it is safer. Where no errant assassin’s blade can touch him.

  This is no way to live, Livia said. But it is all we have. I hear footsteps behind me, a familiar gait. I do not turn.

  “Soon you’ll walk in the light again, nephew,” I tell Zacharias. “Auntie Shrike will make you safe. You’ll ride and run away from your tutors and have great adventures with good friends. Auntie Shrike will destroy all of your foes. I pro—”

  The words die on my lips. Because I promised my sister I would keep her safe. I promised myself I would not let anything happen to her, not after what happened to my parents and Hannah.

  “Make that promise, Shrike.”

  Harper stands beside me, greeting the Emperor with a rare quirk of the lips and a kiss to his head. Zacharias offers him a tentative smile.

  “Look your nephew in the eyes,” Harper says, “and make a vow.”

  I shake my head. “What if I can’t keep it?” I whisper because the alternative is to scream, and if I kept silent as my sister died, then I can keep silent now.

  “You will keep it,” Harper says.

  I shake my head and call out to Coralia, who takes Zacharias from me. Harper follows me as I leave. It has been easy enough to avoid him this past fortnight—I’ve had months of practice. Before he says something that makes me come apart, I speak.

  “Bring Quin Veturius to the small chambers off the throne room,” I say. “I want his thoughts on what to do about Pontilius—what are you—”

  Harper takes my hand and brushes a finger across my lips—sh. He pulls me in the opposite direction of the throne room and down a set of stone stairs. Near the bottom, beside a pile of rubble and just before an enormous, recently restored tapestry, he touches part of the wall and the stone moves away.

  I know this passageway, and it leads to a dead end, with a few storage closets in between. Rallius has the palace guard check it twice a day.

  But of course, Harper would know that. I understand why he’s brought me here, and I am so grateful I want to grab him and kiss him right here with the hallway door hanging open.

  Oblivion is what I need right now. A way to escape this feeling in my chest, like if I say Livia’s name aloud, my heart will wither and die. Harper is a distraction. One I am desperate for.

  He releases my hand once we’re in the hallway and lights a torch. When it flares, we are moving again, past a storage room filled with rubble and wood and into another, which is larger than I realized. It is big enough for a rope pallet and a small table with a lamp. In one corner sits a club and a pile of large stones.

  “Is this where you sleep?” I ask him, eyeing the cot, but he shakes his head.

  “Only ghosts down here, Shrike.”

  The room is cold, though I hardly feel it. I unhook my cloak, but Harper shakes his head and hands me the club.

  “Ah.” I glance down at it uneasily. “What am I doing with this?”

  “I found this place when we first came to Antium, after you told me how my father died.” He looks me level in the eye.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I came here to shout into the darkness,” he says. “To scream and break things.”

  “But you’re always so calm.”

  “Always, Shrike?” He arches a silver brow, and a flush creeps up my face. He is not always calm—that was clear enough in the baths.

  “I don’t need to—to shout or cry or . . . break stones.” I drop the club. “I need to—I need—”

  “To scream,” he says quietly, and hands me the club again. “And break things.”

  It is as if his words have breathed life into something twisted and aching that has lived within, unacknowledged, for too long. Lurking ever since I watched Marcus slit my father’s throat. Since I heard Hannah cry out, Helly! Since I watched Antium burn. Since Cook and Faris and Livvy all died.

  I only know I hit the floor when my knees slam into it. The scream breaks out of me like a prisoner who hasn’t seen light in a century. My body feels alive, but in the worst way, a betrayal of all those who are gone. All those who I didn’t save. I scream over and over. And the scream dissolves into something primal, so I howl then, and weep. I snatch the club from Harper and break every stone in the room.

  When there are no stones left,
I drop the club and curl into a ball on the cot. Choked sobs leak out of me, and I have not wailed like this since I was a child safe in the arms of my parents. Then even the sobs fade away.

  “I am unmade.” I whisper to Harper the words the Augur uttered to me so long ago. “I am b-broken.”

  Harper kneels and wipes my tears away with his thumbs. Then he lifts my face to his, his own eyes wet, his gaze fierce in a way I’ve rarely seen.

  “You are broken. But it is the broken things that are the sharpest. The deadliest. It is the broken things that are the most unexpected, and the most underestimated.”

  I sniff and wipe my face. “Thank you,” I say. “For—” For being here. For telling me to scream. For loving me. For knowing me.

  I say none of it. I am glad now that we did not make love here, in this place. I am glad I pushed him away for so long, for it will make doing it again easier.

  I return the club to its corner and stand. Then I walk away. He says nothing. But I hope he understands.

  I have seen what happens to those I love.

  * * *

  «««

  At dawn the next morning, I leave my room and go next door, to Zacharias. He sleeps, Tas on the cot beside him and Rallius standing near the door.

  “Shrike,” Rallius murmurs, before stepping outside to give me a private moment.

  I stand over my nephew’s crib and stare down at him. His brown curls are fuzzy and soft beneath my hand, just like Livia’s used to be when she was a child.

  “I promise I will keep you safe.” I fight back the tears that threaten. I have done my screaming, my weeping. No more. “Whatever the price. I will protect you as I didn’t protect them. This I vow, by blood and by bone.”

  And with that I leave, and go to secure my nephew’s empire.

  XLVIII: Laia

  The moon is high and fat when Elias finds Darin and me sitting atop a boulder on the rim of the canyon. I sense the Soul Catcher before I see him, the way you feel the air quiver when a falcon stoops for prey.