by Elly Blake
Something entered his expression, something I’d never seen in his eyes before. I tilted my head to the side, trying to identify it.
“What have you become?” Kai whispered.
“Let him up, Ruby.” The voice came from behind me. Hard. Cold. Implacable.
I snarled, “The prince is learning a valuable lesson.”
Arcus’s hand came out and grasped Kai’s wrist.
With a rapid jab, I punched Arcus’s forearm hard, making him gasp in pain. His other hand grabbed my braid, the sharp jerk on my scalp making me suck in a surprised breath. With his hand wrapped around my hair, he turned my face to his, and I stared into enraged blue eyes.
“Come to your senses!” he shouted.
The Minax shied from him, as if from an unnamed something that was repugnant to it, a light inside him that nothing could extinguish.
He let go of my hair, reached out, and lifted Kai to safety, depositing him on the deck in a heap.
My hands fisted, fury tearing at my mind like jagged claws. “You had no right!”
“Get below,” Arcus told the onlookers, eyes trained on me as he half turned to speak to the prince. “Everyone but essential crew, Kai.”
Kai rose to his feet, fury, pride, and betrayal flashing in his eyes that never left me. He shouted the order. The Minax, distracted by this new threat, let them go. Footsteps clattered over the deck and everyone nearby disappeared from view.
“You too, Kai,” said Arcus. “Go.”
“I’m not sure it’s a good idea to leave you alone with her,” Kai warned with a distrustful, measuring look. He stretched out his fingers, which I saw were reddened and swollen.
“I’ll be fine. Go.”
With a searing backward glance, the prince left.
My gaze locked onto Arcus’s. We stood facing each other.
“I don’t like you,” I said, softly but edged with fury and a blend of fear and excitement. My blood was up, and I craved a new victim, but he would not provide as much satisfaction as the last one. I sensed his determination, his steady, unswerving regard. He would not bend to my will so easily. The game must be played more carefully, the seeds of darkness sown more deliberately, the harvest reaped with speed and skill.
“I don’t like you, either,” he replied.
“You love me,” I sneered, grinning maliciously.
His eyes flared, his face briefly suffused with agonized emotion. “I do love Ruby.”
Something leaped inside my heart.
“And that’s why I will destroy you, creature,” he promised. “I won’t rest until you leave her and I will make sure you can never return.”
“I’ll kill you,” I swore. “I’ll kill you and her grief will be so great that we will devour her mind and she will never come back. She will cease to be.”
All expression closed off behind hooded lids. “I won’t play your game. Threats and anger merely feed you.”
“I’ll kill you,” I goaded again, lifting my chin, lips curled.
He leaned against the railing in a relaxed pose, but remained tense and watchful.
“There are many ways to appease us.” I stepped close to him, ignoring the inner repugnance of his nearness, the feeling of how incompatible my dark heart was with his light essence. “You want her. You can have her.”
He shook his head. “No.”
“But you do want her.”
His lips flattened. His hand tightened on the railing.
I looked up at him, making my eyes soft and inviting, sensually aware of the tilt of my head, the position of my shoulders, the thrust of my breasts against the jacket I wore over a thin shirt. “She thinks about you at night. She longs for you.”
His eyes narrowed. “Stop this, Ruby. Stop this, now.”
“Her skin wants your skin,” I continued, touching a finger to his sleeve.
“Stop.” His voice broke lower, raspy and emphatic. Revealing his agitation. Good. Push him further. I slid my fingertips to his neck. He shivered. He couldn’t hide his response: an indrawn breath, a flare of his nostrils, the dilation of his pupils.
Still, he resisted.
“No.” Implacable. Final.
New tactic. “If you don’t give her what she needs, there are others who will.”
“You’ve tried that threat on me before. I see through it now. You keep trying to make her hurt me so you can feed on her regret and guilt, and on my jealousy. But I am not your plaything nor your servant. I won’t do what you want.”
I lifted a shoulder and let it drop carelessly. “Someone else, then.” I skimmed the deck with my eyes, pointing at a Frostblood sailor. “Him. He won’t resist us.”
The king took my wrists in his hands, squeezing lightly, making me shudder in revulsion at the searing light under his skin. “No one on this crew will serve your needs. They will all refuse you, or else they will find themselves in a cold sea.”
My smile widened, my eyelids heavy. “Your jealousy is delicious.”
I put my chest to his and rubbed back and forth. His light prickled unpleasantly in my senses, but the bliss of his chaotic emotions was greater than my distaste.
He sucked in a shortened breath and shoved me away. “I. Won’t. Feed. You.”
“Pity,” I breathed, enjoying the hatred in his stare. “You hardly know what to do with everything you feel. You just lock it away under ice. Don’t you wonder what it would feel like to let your emotions out to play?”
He returned my look but said nothing.
I watched him hungrily. “She likes that about you, all those banked emotions waiting for a spark to ignite them.”
“But you won’t. You’re wasting your time.”
“If only you weren’t so full of light. The light repels us.”
“Good,” he said emphatically.
So difficult to break. I needed a reaction, a loss of control, a spiraling descent into stimulus and response that had nothing to do with reason.
“Your face is scarred. You were handsome once, but no more.”
The muscles around his eyes tightened, a subtle tell of surprise. “She doesn’t mind, and I don’t care what anyone else thinks.”
I leaned forward, aiming my lips at his ear. He tightened his grip to keep me back. I laughed and whispered, “She wishes you had never been burned.”
“Of course she does,” he replied stonily. “She has compassion.”
“She doesn’t like to look at you.”
“I know you’re lying.”
“You disgust her.”
“No.” The light inside him dimmed, then brightened. “She loves me. I know she does.”
Where his hands gripped me, the light under his skin burned.
“She hates you,” I rasped, furiously trying to wrench away.
“Try harder. You’re only losing ground.”
I swept in for the kill. “She loves the face of the Fireblood prince so much more than yours.” I peered up at him, watching for a reaction. “Oh, if only you looked like him, so handsome and golden and perfect. He has what you will never have: her yearning.”
Something flickered in his expression, but then closed off.
“You told me she wants only me,” he said. “You contradict yourself, Minax.”
“I am Ruby.”
“You are not. You occupy her body. You poison her mind. But you are not and will never be her.”
“She is tired of fighting. She has been alone too long with shadows inside her head. She pushes you away, and you have retreated. She has been losing this battle since the moment we joined with her. Soon she will be lost forever.”
He shook his head, breathing deeply through his nose. His light dimmed.
“You know that part is true,” I said with deep satisfaction. “I do not lie.”
“You lie as easily as you breathe,” he said, his voice rough with emotion.
“Oh, what is that you’re feeling? Despair?” I sucked in a lungful of stingingly cold air and sighed
with pleasure. “The most beautiful of all emotions.”
“Ruby, I know you’re in there.” His voice sharpened. “Fight your way out!”
“But, Arcus,” I replied silkily, “it is me. I am Ruby.”
“Give her back to me,” he said, shaking me. “Let her go.”
I laughed, overflowing with joy, then leaned in and whispered, “Never.”
“Ruby, listen to me. This thing will take you over if you let it. Believe that you’re stronger! Focus on the love that I know is in your heart. Know you can do this!”
Something unpleasant tightened my chest, but I shoved it away. “This is who we are.”
His shoulders sagged.
Then his eyes shifted up, away from me to something—someone—behind. A blast of pain split the back of my head. The faint embers of setting sun flickered out.
TWENTY-SEVEN
“SO, I HEAR YOU HAD AN EPISODE.”
I set down the book I was reading. Not The Creation of the Thrones since Brother Thistle wouldn’t let me anywhere near it in my current state, but a book of Sudesian philosophy borrowed from one of the masters.
“Marella!” I sat up in bed—slowly, so as not to jar my aching head. “You’re awake.”
She swanned into my cabin with her usual grace. She looked almost like her old self, though thinner, paler, and more serious than before. Her hair was pulled back and tied with a piece of ribbon. She wore a brown fur jacket over a blue skirt, the color bringing out the pansy violet of her eyes.
“Nice clothes,” I said drily.
“This old thing?” She smoothed a hand over the fur.
I cleared my throat. “It’s mine.”
“Noticed that, did you? I don’t have access to my wardrobe at the moment. I didn’t think you’d mind if I raided your trunks.”
“I don’t mind at all.” I gave her a welcoming smile. “It’s good to see you up. Would you like to sit?”
She sat gingerly on a wooden stool, the only movable piece of furniture in the room, looking around awkwardly, as if searching for something to focus on. The cabin didn’t offer much to inspire conversation, only the necessities of bed, trunk, table, and washstand, all bolted to the floor.
I thought of at least a dozen things to say and discarded all of them, settling on, “I’m really glad you’re feeling better.”
She took a deep breath, meeting my eyes. “Thanks to you.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
She lifted a finely arched brow. “Oh, no, nothing. Merely scaled a monstrous cliff, broke into a heavily guarded keep, fought off a score of armed fanatics, and risked your life to rescue me from a slow death.” She rolled her eyes. “Do you have to be so heroic all the time? Don’t you get tired?”
“I’m not heroic,” I said a little defensively. “Cirrus sent me a vision of you, and we thought you’d know directions to the Gate. Turns out, she was showing me Sage and you just happened to be there.”
Her brows drew together. She looked down. I saw that her hands were clenched in her lap.
I swallowed. “I didn’t mean that like it sounded. We wanted to find you, too. I worried from the moment Eurus took you. I know Arcus was worried, too.”
She waved me away. “You don’t have to say that.”
“It’s true.”
Her voice softened. “I thanked him, too. He was cordial. I tried to apologize, but I could tell he didn’t want to hear it. He won’t forgive me for what I did.”
“When you brought the frost Minax to Sudesia, you were under its influence already. You couldn’t have fought that. I know what it’s like. Now more than ever.”
She relaxed a fraction. “That’s why I came in here, actually. I heard what happened and thought you might want to talk to someone who understands. Did you really try to throw the Fireblood prince overboard?”
Her haughty tone when she said Fireblood prince didn’t escape me. “His name is Kai, and yes, I did. I remember enough. Unfortunately.”
I’d done nothing but agonize about it since. The things I’d done to Kai, the things I’d said to Arcus. The memory ate at me like a thousand biting ants.
“So is that why you’re hiding in bed?” she asked. “Doing penance? Being tragic?”
I sat up straighter. “I’m here because I have a raging headache. Someone—they wouldn’t tell me who—conked me over the head, which was apparently the only way to disable the Minax once I’d gone full Nightblood, or whatever you want to call it.” I saw concern in her eyes, and found myself adding, “I was completely lost to it, Marella. I was trapped inside myself, and I couldn’t get out.”
I didn’t know if I was looking for condemnation or absolution.
“You don’t have to explain it to me.” Her eyes were sympathetic, her voice serious. “You hear your own voice talking, you feel your body moving… and the things you say even sound like you, but it’s not you. It’s that thing. And it’s wearing you like a coat.”
We both shuddered.
“Is it… awake?” she asked.
I put a hand to my chest. “Oh, I wasn’t thinking. Can you sense it? Does it bother you?”
She’d hosted the other Minax for weeks. I figured she would be sensitized to the presence of another.
She shook her head. “I’m all right. I sense it on some level, but it helps that it’s not the same creature. The frost Minax felt different.”
That was true. From my experience with the two Minax, I knew they each had a different signature, a distinctive essence.
“No, it’s not awake right now. Lucina filled me with sunlight or something while I was knocked out. But I still feel its anticipation, like there’s something on the island and it can’t wait. Probably thrilled to be reunited with its creator.”
“No doubt,” she said bitterly. “The vile god and its vile creation. They’re welcome to each other.”
The ship rocked with a creaking groan. Perhaps the east wind warning us not to speak that way about a deity.
My hands curled into fists. He wasn’t worthy of the name.
“What did he… Did Eurus mistreat you?” I asked. “Aside from the obvious, of course.” Those small matters of abduction and imprisonment. “The vision showed me the moment you were brought into the cell.” I hesitated. “I saw a… mark on your shoulder.”
She inhaled sharply, her lips pressed tight, hands clenched. “He branded me, that foul dog. No, he’s worse than a dog. A… a rodent. A beetle. A centipede! All his Servants wear the brand, so he made me get one, too. I fought like mad, harder than I’ve ever fought in my life, but I couldn’t get away.”
Her voice broke and she covered her face. Broken sounds and jagged breaths escaped her cupped hands. I stared in shock for a second, hardly comprehending. Marella was sobbing.
Then I threw off the quilt and moved to the edge of the bed, reaching out to comfort her.
“Don’t touch me!” She jumped to her feet. Her face was streaked with tears, her eyes red. “I can’t bear it. Not… not when that thing is inside you!”
I backed up, feeling sick at the clear revulsion in her expression. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think.”
She wiped her tears with trembling fingers. “It’s not your fault. I just can’t bear it right now.”
“I understand.” I moved to the farthest corner of the bed and wrapped my arms around my bent legs, making myself as small as possible.
After a minute, she sighed. “I came here to offer you comfort, but it looks like I’m the one who needs it.”
“It’ll take time, maybe a long time, but someday you’ll heal. We’ll send Eurus packing and then we’ll fight until we get our lives back.”
“Do you really believe that?”
I nodded, meeting her eyes. “I really do.”
I believed it—for her. But when it came to myself, I wasn’t so sure anymore.
“Then I’ll believe it, too,” she said.
My heart twisted. She looked so uncertain, like my word
s were a lifeline she clung to. But who was I to throw her a rope?
I was already drowning.
The next day, the wind all but died. Fog descended, muffling sound. Sunlight couldn’t penetrate the soupy mist.
We ghosted through the water, tacking into a feeble headwind. The word becalmed was repeated in hushed tones with looks of dread. If the wind died completely, we’d be dead in the water. A sailor’s worst nightmare.
After breakfast, I came on deck for the first time since my “episode” as Marella had called it. Tiny fog droplets hissed as they hit my skin.
Jaro joined me at the starboard rail. I was touched to see that he didn’t seem afraid of me. “I don’t like it. It should be too cold for fog this far north.”
“It’s ice crystals.” I turned my hand, watching them melt. “The fog is frozen.”
“A bad omen,” he muttered, shaking his head as he walked away.
The tension wound tighter as the day went on; partly because the visibility was so poor, we had lost track of our scout ship the previous night. As an effective and useful distraction, Brother Thistle and Seva—Frostblood and Fireblood masters—drilled the crew on how to make frostfire. They didn’t actually use their gifts, since it would have been far too dangerous, instead practicing the level of intense concentration that would be needed. It was funny to see them scrunch up their brows, eyes closed, while lifting their arms and directing their hands at invisible targets.
As the day went on, I started to feel invisible. I stayed on deck for hours waiting for Arcus to appear, but he never did. Kai didn’t look at me once, and I couldn’t bring myself to approach him.
Just before the first dogwatch, a sudden breeze cleared tendrils of fog away, revealing a black sail, nearly on top of us.
Kai shouted, “Beat to quarters! Clear for action!”
There was a flurry of activity as sailors secured barrels, coiled ropes, and scrambled into the rigging adjusting sails. Seva rushed past, taking her place at the rail with the other Fireblood masters. Frostbloods positioned themselves at intervals, ready to douse any fires. In the confusion, I couldn’t see Arcus.