A Sorrow Fierce and Falling (Kingdom on Fire, Book Three)

by Jessica Cluess

  “I saw several of you at a meeting for the army of the burning rose.” I looked pointedly at Peg and patted the stool. Yes, I remembered Alfred. “We all want a way out of this darkness. Will you join me?”

  Silence. “I went to that meetin’ ’cause there was free ale,” one of the magicians muttered.

  “Well, I’ll join you.” Alice shook my hand and glared at the others. “If they’ve any sense, they’ll do the same.”

  Apparently, Alice’s was the voice they’d been waiting for. Soon after, we were able to deliver the magicians.

  Witches and magicians had united…but what of the sorcerers? Blackwood crossed his arms in defiance.

  “The Order is run by the votes of its seal bearers.” Bloody hell. Seal bearers were the heads of sorcerer families. I was still one, as I was unmarried, but I knew which way Blackwood would vote. Scanning the group, I realized that the majority of seal bearers were on his side. The younger men were with me, but they weren’t family heads.

  Blackwood could destroy this consortium before it even started.

  I wanted to give him a strong piece of my mind, but Mickelmas touched my arm. “Don’t lose your temper. These fellows seek any reason to vote no,” he whispered. He was right.

  “Then I call that we hold the vote in one hour’s time,” I replied.

  Blackwood narrowed his eyes. He understood that I wanted time to see if I couldn’t persuade more men to give up centuries of tradition and join a harebrained scheme doomed to almost certain failure.

  I needed to stop listening to my own thoughts.

  Dee and Wolff were with me at once—Lambe, bless him, was asleep in a corner. Together with Magnus, we spoke with every seal bearer at the meeting. I did my best, but I wasn’t certain it would be enough. Swearing inwardly, I had some of the older men meet with Maria or the magicians. I wanted to show how reasonable they were.

  Magnus pulled me aside. “I’ll be back in a minute,” he said.

  “You’re leaving?” I needed him here! I needed every man I could get.

  “Do you trust me?” he whispered.

  “Yes.” The word came out as naturally as a breath. I was shocked how easy it felt to speak. “But the vote’s about to start.”

  “Stall if you must. You’re good at distractions.” He kissed my cheek and was off.

  I grinned, until I discovered Blackwood watching me. He looked as if someone had struck him in the face. I wanted to speak with him, but the hour was up.

  Time to vote.

  I went forward first and voted for the consortium.

  Blackwood went next. In a rigid voice that suggested he was barely keeping his anger in check, he voted to remain in the Order.

  To my surprise, we had a few more seal bearers join our side. The older men had listened to me, thankfully, but a cursory glance told me that a few would not be enough. Dee, who had lost his father in the Battle of London, voted to leave. God, we were close, but it was going to come down to…

  No. I realized, with a sinking heart, that we would be evenly split. If that happened, the Imperator got to cast a double vote, one as a seal bearer and one as Imperator himself. If he did that…the whole thing would be finished.

  And so it was, a perfect tie. Blackwood smiled. “With an even split, I cast a vote as Imperator.” I locked eyes with him, silently begging him to relent. I had always believed he would do what was best for this country. But in his eyes, I found only anger. “I vote that—”

  “There’s one more vote to be cast.” Magnus broke through the crowd, a small velvet pouch in his hand. “The Magnus vote has not been counted.”

  Maria punched my shoulder, crowing with glee. I was so shocked I hardly felt the blow.

  “The Magnus vote?” Blackwood sounded as if Maria had punched him as well.

  “My cousin, Percival, has died. He left no children, making me his heir.”

  “You.” Blackwood’s voice cracked; he got it back under control. “You have no proof.” He did not sound confident, though. With a flourish, Magnus opened the pouch and removed a piece of paper, along with a small metal disc.

  The metal disc displayed a hawk winging its way above an ash tree. That was the Magnus crest, only gifted to the seal bearer of the house.

  “My cousin perished during the march north,” Magnus said. “I received word two weeks ago, just after we marched into Scotland. It took months to track me down, but here it is: death certificate and the seal.” He handed the paper to Blackwood, who looked like he wanted to tear it to pieces.

  “If I’d known…” Blackwood stopped there, but I could guess what he meant to say: if he’d known Magnus was now a seal bearer, he’d have known my side could win. He might have suggested an alternative plan.

  Magnus had waited until it was too late for Blackwood to change his mind. Excellent strategy.

  “As I’ve said, there is one more vote to cast.” Magnus placed his seal back in its satchel. “The Magnus line votes to dissolve the Order.”

  I’d thought there’d be an eruption, but no one spoke. We had destroyed a six-hundred-year-old institution in the span of an afternoon. The sorcerer Order was done, and so was Blackwood’s power. He looked ill.

  The queen said, “As the head of the newly formed consortium, I choose to appoint the leaders of each branch until such time as we form a better system. For the witches, this…what was your name?” she asked Maria.

  “Maria Templeton,” she said.

  “Yes. Miss Templeton shall lead. For the magicians.” Her eyes scanned to Mickelmas, and her lips seemed to struggle to form the words. “Howard Mickelmas.”

  He bowed deeply in reply.

  Finally, the queen looked at me. “Henrietta Howel shall have the sorcerers.”

  Head of the sorcerers and answerable only to the queen? I stammered my thanks. Blackwood put a hand over his chest, as though an invisible shaft had been plunged into his heart. He began pushing toward the exit, but on the queen’s command was blocked.

  “Lord Blackwood, you have violated your position most grievously,” the queen said. “For that, punishment must be meted out.”

  Blackwood did not beg for mercy. I couldn’t let this happen.

  “Your Majesty, I beg you to spare him,” I said. “We will need every possible soldier in the war to come.”

  “As the head of the sorcerer branch, you recommend this?” she asked warily.

  “I do.”

  “Then it shall be done, though he must have eyes upon him at all times,” the queen ordered. Blackwood looked like a ghost of a man as he fled the gathering.

  I would have to speak with him, and right away.

  But once I’d exited the tent, I found Mickelmas waiting. The magician was looking up to the oncoming night. Stars had scattered themselves across the deep blue of the sky.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Should we survive this final battle, in the centuries to come, some will speak your name with loathing. Some will speak it with praise.” He gave me a strange grin. “But they will all speak your name, Henrietta Howel. The girl who changed the face of English magic. They will speak your name as long as there are tongues to utter it and ears to hear.”

  I had never yearned for nor dreaded any meeting this much. I trailed Blackwood as he made his way to the edge of camp. What I had to do was right, but I had not expected it to hurt so badly. When I called out to him, Blackwood regarded me with a bitter smile.

  “You couldn’t bear to be the second most powerful.” He paced like a caged beast. “You had to wrench the crown from my head.”

  “I never wanted this.” How different he seemed to me as I joined him on equal ground. He looked bruised and half wild. This near to him, I could feel tenderness creeping in. I couldn’t allow that, not now. My feelings for him, real though they wer
e, were also a product of some irresistible destiny. I would not be ruled by it. “Our goal was to save England. That’s what we both wanted.”

  “What I wanted,” he growled, turning his face away, “was to be the one to save it.”

  Yes, that was the dream to which he’d clung—a country’s adoration to make up for a lifetime of warmth denied him. His mother had forsaken him because he was of his father’s blood. His father had ignored him. Blackwood had done what so many other neglected children did. He had sought love from the world, and when he did not find it, he’d hated that world. I’d seen enough children like that at Brimthorn. Perhaps, if I were honest, I had been one of them.

  But I had had Rook, at least. Blackwood had had no one. Even Eliza, much as he loved her, had been shut out from his secrets. And now I was taking away from him one more piece of love. If only I…

  No. I could not give in. Sliding off my glove, I removed his engagement ring and held it out. He froze.

  “Put that back on.”

  “Please don’t make this hard,” I murmured.

  “One mistake.” Pain tightened his features. “I made one hideous mistake. I should never have said those words to you in the library.” He came closer. “I wasn’t in my right mind.”

  “I know,” I whispered. He pressed the ring into my palm.

  “You could forgive Magnus for what he did. Forgive me, then, and marry me.”

  He saw my confusion.

  “Our souls were wedded long before we were born. The ivy on our staves; the way that I feel when I’m near you.” He put a hand to my waist, and despite everything my body burned with that touch. “Let the world collapse around us, let the Order fall and a new monument be raised in its place. I want you.”

  My last remnants of anger fell away. A horrible, aching sadness remained. “I do forgive you. Truly. But I can see now that we wouldn’t work. We’re too similar.”

  He didn’t seem to grasp what I was saying. Boots crunched behind me as Magnus appeared by my side.

  “Is everything all right?” he asked. I could see Blackwood remember what had passed between us in the tent. Black fury flashed over his face. He managed to tuck it away behind a stoic mask, but I had seen.

  Blackwood gritted his teeth. “Haven’t you snatched enough of my women?”

  “Eliza and I weren’t yours,” I said, but he wasn’t listening.

  “Don’t speak of your sister that way,” Magnus said. They were going to come to blows if I didn’t stop this. Already, Blackwood was backing up, and Magnus looked as if he’d rather welcome the challenge.

  “Blackwood, these men want your head. Don’t give them an excuse to think you unstable!” I cried.

  He calmed, tugging at his coat to neaten it, buttoning and unbuttoning it as though to give himself something to do. Then he extended a hand to me. Despite Magnus’s grunt of disapproval, I held out the ring once more. Blackwood snatched my wrist instead and pulled me near.

  “Does he make you feel this way?” Blackwood’s lips moved against my cheek. “Do you know this with him?”

  No. You could never love two people in precisely the same way. Even now, part of me still yearned to give in to him. But I knew my answer before I spoke.

  “We were marked for one another in darkness.” Gently, I put the ring into his hand. “I want a different life.”

  I wanted air, and light, and peace. Whatever thrill power gave to him did not prove as intoxicating for me. He stared at the ring.

  Then Blackwood glowered at Magnus. “You should know she’s spoiled for anyone but me.”

  It didn’t feel as much of a slap as it had in the library. Before, he’d wanted me to feel worthless in his rage. Now he only wanted to cordon me off from Magnus or any other man. Shoving out of his arms, I looked him in the eye.

  “I am not for anyone but myself,” I replied.

  Magnus strode forward, looking ready to do battle again. Blackwood dropped the ring in the snow. He wanted this, too.

  Magnus stopped when I grabbed his arm, though I felt the strain in his body.

  “I know what happened,” he snapped. “It doesn’t matter.”

  I thought Blackwood would attack, but instead he kept his hands by his side. Snow glistened in his hair, and his eyes were raw. Without another word, he walked off toward the trees. The ring lay glinting on the ground, and I picked it up.

  “It’s yours,” he called over his shoulder before I could offer. “It will always be yours.”

  The way he said it, and the fact that it still felt as if my soul were being pulled after him, made it impossible to stay still. I turned and strode off in the opposite direction, my lungs burning with the freezing winter air. Magnus came up alongside and walked with me until I slowed and then stopped. No one could see us as he held me. He didn’t try to kiss me or to coax assurances of what I felt for him. He only let me weep, the ring cold in my hand.

  * * *

  —

  WE RETURNED TO CAMP, AND I found that Lambe was awake by the campfire, gazing into the crackling flames. Beside him, Wolff plucked at the strings of a cello. He coaxed “Greensleeves” out of it, and did rather well.

  “How the devil did you manage to keep an instrument with you from London?” I sat opposite him.

  “I didn’t. A man sold it to me for two bags of potatoes.” He began a piece by Mozart and got lost in the music. A smile stretched over his face.

  “You didn’t think the food had greater value?” I asked.

  “What’s the point of fighting without something beautiful to live for?”

  “You want to ask a question,” Lambe said to me. “Ask it.” Of course he knew my mind without me saying a word.

  “I was curious,” I said as I watched everyone preparing for the night ahead. “Do you have any thoughts? Er, about prophecy, that is.”

  “You mean the prophecy tapestry that marked Maria as our chosen one?” He nodded. “There is a feeling you have, a fear that Maria is the one to destroy the Blackwood family. Indeed, I’ve wondered that myself. Sorrow-Fell is in the hands of the bloody king. Our chosen ones tend not to be so successful.”

  “Well, that’s rather it,” I said, my gut cramping. “Do you believe that destiny is unavoidable? Or can we make our own path?”

  “You were our false chosen one, and you still destroyed Korozoth. Maria is our true chosen one, and she burned down Sorrow-Fell. The Speakers’ tapestry hinted at both outcomes. Yet why did we seek a chosen one to begin with? Because the tapestry told us she existed. Without that prophecy, Master Agrippa would not have looked for you in Yorkshire. He would not have brought you to London. You, in turn, would not have found Maria. We hunted for our destiny because we were told it was our destiny.”

  “And it all came true,” I said, puzzled.

  “Because we told ourselves it would.” He looked to the stars above. “Fate is inevitable, but there are many different ways to approach it. After all, the prophecy said poison would drown beneath dark waters of the cliffs.” He blinked at me. “Were there any cliffs when you battled Nemneris?”

  “I’m not even certain she drowned,” I said.

  Lambe coughed thickly, and Wolff stopped his playing.

  “Clarence is sick. Let’s not overexcite him,” he whispered to me.

  “Lady Blackwood may do as she likes,” Lambe murmured.

  I scoffed. “I am not, and never will be, Lady Blackwood.”

  “Oh” was his only reply. He slumped over as he fell asleep. While Wolff tucked a blanket around his shoulders, I felt a prickling on the back of my neck.

  “Everyone. Be very still,” I breathed. Taking Porridge, I walked away from the fire. I could feel the shadows beyond us. They seemed to be…watching me.

  I felt the invisible tug that a mother might feel for her children, one
that guides her to them no matter how far they are from her. Putting out a hand, I waited.

  And the shadow Familiars of Korozoth came slipping over the snow to touch my outstretched fingers.

  One of the creatures rose up, the bony tips of its fingers meeting mine. It felt like the touch of death, and yet I welcomed it.

  “Hello.” The voice was not mine, but it came from me. The black shadows skirted around, nudging at my ankles. They wanted to play. They wanted me to love them.

  And now they were in danger.

  “Don’t move,” I called to the men who were tramping forward to crush the threat. I focused on my strange shadow children. The Familiar in front of me bobbed. Its pathetic robes were a thin trail of smoke over the ground. Whimpering like a dog, it pressed its clay-cold palm to mine. A spark of recognition fanned into love. I wanted to keep this terrifying thing safe.

  “Mistress,” the creature hissed.

  I’d got the feeling that the less I lost my temper, the more control I’d maintain.

  “All of you come here. Assemble,” I said, pointing a finger at the area around me. They fled in from across the snowy glen, out of the shadows of trees, and stationed themselves about me. They turned their faces up, rolling their smoke hoods away. Their faces were gaunt and pale, lips chapped and ice blue from the cold.

  One of them I recognized, a young woman with ragged white hair and eyes sewn shut with a needle and thread. Gwendolyn Agrippa, no longer threatening me or attacking. Now she rubbed her forehead against my knee like a devoted pet.

  “Save us, mistress.” She rubbed her arms as though she were freezing.

  “The queen wants to talk strategy,” Magnus said as he approached. He kept his voice careful. “Is all well?” He drew out his stave when my monsters hissed.

  “It’s all right. They’re mine now.” One of the beasts snuffled at my hand, as if I’d a treat to share. The perverse urge to cradle it returned.

  No. I must be firm with these and keep them loyal, but I could not afford to love them. With a click of my tongue, I led them up farther into the camp. They trotted after me, some of them on all fours. Magnus and Wolff walked alongside, making certain that people did not attack. Despite their wariness, I believed they understood. And though many of the sorcerers in particular had horrified words to say about this, they did not argue.