by Sara Raasch
Cansu’s raider shoved Vex aside to glare at Pilkvist’s raider. “You better shut yer mouth! The Mecht syndicate don’t know when to quit!”
The greasy prisoner gaped. “I didn’t say nothing!”
But Cansu’s raider threw a fist. Chaos caught—legs kicked, knuckles broke open lips.
Vex dropped back onto his bench. Would this be enough of a distraction to make the guards forget the prisoners’ claims? He doubted it.
The cell door flew open and a half dozen guards rushed after the rowdiest prisoners. One made for Vex, looming over him with crossed arms.
“Devereux Bell?” he asked.
Vex looked up, smiled, and batted his eyelashes. “Who?”
The soldier clamped his hand around Vex’s throat. Vex choked, and before he could remember any of the defenses Edda had taught him—something about bending the attacker’s wrist, or his own wrist, or maybe a thumb?—the soldier ripped off Vex’s eye patch.
A sheet of cold swept over Vex’s body, pinning him to the bench like a shackle. He knew what the soldier was looking at: two scars in the shape of an X through the socket where his right eye had once been. His own memento of the war.
The soldier grinned. He released Vex but kept the eye patch in one beefy fist.
You are weak came voices that Vex could never get out of his memory. You are evil.
He saw the men who had thrown him into the custody of the Church during the war. He saw the smirks on the Argridian soldiers’ faces as they delighted in purging Grace Loray’s shores of scum and impurities. He saw the monxes in the holding cells where he’d spent four months, and his throat thickened with the memory of plants, poison, forced into his body. When he finally did pray, it wasn’t for redemption—he prayed that if there was a Pious God, it would show mercy and let him die.
The eye patch dropped onto the stones at his feet. Vex snatched it up and yanked it on, and the world settled enough that he heard the soldier’s order.
“Put him in solitary till we can figure this out. Don’t need no more fights.”
Vex kept his hand over the patch as if he could weld it to his skin.
This was not an ideal situation.
2
BEN LEANED AGAINST a pavilion in Argrid’s capital, Deza, willing himself not to vomit.
He was on land, but the slosh and sway of the water lapping at ships in the wharf in front of him made his stomach spasm. Though the actual cause of his current state was the drink last night, the spicy one the barkeep had called o Golpe de Veludo do Inferno—the Velvet Punch of Hell. It was living up to its name now, in both its aftereffects and the fact that stumbling back to the palace last night, drunk off too many of those damn things, had landed Ben a shift on the Inquisitor patrols this morning.
Overseeing defensors, Church soldiers, as they patrolled inbound ships had once been one of the esteemed responsibilities of the Inquisitors. Now it was a cushy “punishment” for sinful youth.
Ben pinched the bridge of his nose and took a long draw of the salty bay air.
“My patrol stopped a diseased ship from coming into port last week,” a voice carried. A duque’s son, one of the half dozen royals in the tent behind Ben—though, for the life of him, Ben couldn’t remember the boy’s name. “Not quite as exciting as finding illegal magic, but it is useful work.”
A goblet clinked. The scent of floral wine perfumed the unventilated tent.
Another boy groaned. Ben recognized that particular grumble—it came from a conde, a count, named Claudio, a year younger than Ben, who’d been in a few of Ben’s classes on Church etiquette and history growing up.
“I swear,” Claudio groaned, “most of these searches are so boring.”
“They aren’t meant to be entertaining,” said the duque’s son. “They are reparation for our sins.”
“We didn’t do anything wrong, Sal,” Claudio countered. Salvador—that was the other boy’s name. “So your parents caught us kissing. We’re betrothed, for the Pious God’s sake. It shouldn’t matter.”
The rest of the group gasped.
“Calm down,” Claudio moaned. “We didn’t do anything that bad. We aren’t real sinners, like the rest of you heathens.”
Someone cleared their throat, reminding Claudio that the Crown Prince was one of the aristocrats serving on the Inquisitor patrol. One of the heathens.
Silence fell.
Ben massaged his temples and looked back. Velvet chaises and overstuffed settees created a circle for the handful of nobles, all fancied up in silken breeches, polished gold buttons and beads, lace neckerchiefs and jeweled hair nets—styles befitting a Church service, not a dockside search for magic.
Ben shook his head. He swore he saw at least two of each of these people. Damn that drink.
He tugged on his collar, wanting to rip down the pavilion walls and let in a breeze. But it would show the world around and remind the aristocrats here of true problems. With the walls up, the elite could sit in ignorance as too many guards had to stand watch to keep the desperate at bay—the sick who lined up outside of hospitals, the poor who begged along the streets.
“This duty used to mean something,” Ben mumbled to no one in particular.
Salvador squinted. “Are you all right, my prince?”
The rest of the Inquisitors leaned forward, some concerned, others intrigued.
Ben met their eyes, fighting a hiccup. But his reputation was no secret.
Even our prince falls for the Devil’s temptations, Argridians said. Poor Prince Benat—he overindulges, he is promiscuous! He serves Inquisitor patrols to cleanse himself. If our divine prince can be so seduced by evil, yet be redeemed, then there is hope for our own brittle souls!
Ben imagined it all as a clumsy waltz. How many missteps could he take in one direction, back, forward, before people stopped crying poor Prince Benat and started crying heretic?
Caught drinking—he served a week of Inquisitor patrols, and the Church forgave him, like any other aristocrat. Sex—if rumors spread, another week of patrols, and all was atoned for.
But being caught with Grace Loray’s magic? Speaking favorably of certain plants? Unforgivable.
Ben brushed off their concern. “I’m fine,” he snapped.
Claudio sat up straighter, his dark eyes flashing. “My parents pray for you at each Church service. They pray that our country is strong enough to undertake the Pious God’s most difficult tasks.”
Ben lifted an eyebrow. “Are you saying I’m not already strong, Conde?”
Claudio’s face went red. He hadn’t thought Ben would call him on it. He’d thought he’d sulk off, simpering and shamed that he was as prone to sinning as the rest of them.
“Of course not, my prince,” Salvador jumped in, putting his hand on Claudio’s knee. “What he means is you’re an example to us. Your resilience against evil gives us hope that we, too, can overcome any sin.”
“Even being dumb enough to kiss your betrothed in your father’s study,” a girl next to Salvador whispered.
Claudio whipped a frilly pillow at her.
Ben faced outside again, enough of a dismissal to get another conversation going. Claudio and Salvador threw themselves into it, doing their best not to look at Ben, still at the door.
In another time, Ben might have joined their conversation, something frivolous about the next Church holiday. He might have joked about what had landed him on this patrol, or given Claudio and Salvador tips on how not to get caught.
But Ben couldn’t get Salvador’s words out of his head.
Argrid wanted him to be strong, to inspire them; but they wanted him to fall as well, because the Pious God rewarded those who sacrificed—and what bigger sacrifice than to give up an ordained leader?
The Argridian people had cheered for Rodrigu’s and Paxben’s deaths. They had begged for them.
Pious God above, his head hurt.
“Prince Inquisitor? Your presence is needed.”
Ben tu
rned. Jakes Rayen stood at attention on the dock, his defensor uniform billowing in the wind, showing the ivory crest of Argrid: the curved V, cupped hands for a willingness to lead a life of purity; the X, representing crossed swords, to protect that life. Jakes yanked the uniform straight, tugging the collar down, showing the flushed bronze skin along the top of his chest, a few bristly hairs that Ben knew ran all the way down to the soft skin below his stomach.
Ben’s body sang with heat that had nothing to do with the warmth of the day. Part of the reason he was glad to have Jakes in his guard was because he looked so good in that uniform.
“Is it a diseased ship, Defensor?” Ben asked, but he knew Jakes wouldn’t have come if it were that simple.
Jakes frowned. “No,” he said. “Raiders.”
A few of the Inquisitors groaned, jealous that Ben’s patrol had found what would release him from duty for the rest of the day. He ignored them and followed Jakes out into the sun.
The raider ship was a steam-driven frigate moored at a dock that embodied Argrid’s despondency now. The planks were brittle and ill patched, with barnacles and grime sticking to the posts and along the edges. Ben walked behind Jakes up the dock, stepping where he did so as not to fall through the weak wood.
Ben paused at the base of the gangplank. More of his defensors swarmed the deck, some hauling a chest overboard, taking such care that he immediately knew its contents. He almost asked them to lift the lid so he could see the vials of magic inside. Could he still name the plants, as Rodrigu had taught him?
A different memory came, though—vicious monxes, and his own father, smacking him across the mouth when he dared say something positive about magic after Rodrigu’s burning. The only thing important to know about magic now was that it was a sin, all of it—and his sins would be wiped away as soon as he gave the necessary speech to the raiders.
“Are you all right?” Jakes asked, falling in step as Ben started up the gangplank. Then, realizing they were within earshot of others, added, “My prince?” Then repeated, louder, “Are you all right, my prince?”
Ben cut him a smile. “Nice recovery, Defensor Rayen. But I’m fine.”
“Fine here meaning both drunk and hungover?” Jakes whispered.
“Oh, Defensor, your flirtation doth take my breath away.”
Jakes’s eyes flashed wide. “Shh—” But he cut off his shushing and ducked his head. “I don’t want to give those vultures”—he motioned back toward the Inquisitors tent—“a reason to cause trouble for you. Even if the nobles of court look down on a royal and a guard, I have to believe the Pious God, at least, can forgive us.”
A year as one of Ben’s defensors, yet Jakes was still the earnest orphan who had come to Deza desperate to serve the Pious God.
Ben exhaled, almost a growl. “I have enough experience dealing with the gossip and macabre interest of the court. Let them try to spot another heretic in the Gallego family—they will find nothing irredeemable in me. Sex before marriage is a sin, but not a condemnable one.”
Jakes bowed his head, and Ben hated the formality of it, though it was necessary. There were some things in Ben’s life that crossed political lines more than religious—and the fact that the heir to Argrid had maintained a relationship with a commoner for ten months now was borderline reprehensible.
Argrid allowed a measure of freedom among nobles to choose their own partners—so long as those partners were also of nobility, to not be unequally yoked. Elazar hadn’t forced Ben to find a partner yet, but if he knew that Ben had given his heart, his soul, and most of his waking thoughts to one of his guards, who until his post as a defensor had been the orphaned son of a merchant, well . . .
Ben did his best not to think about what his father would do. His relationship with Jakes was just one more thing he had to keep staunch control over.
Ben made his voice lighter, but it sounded pained to his ears. “You know I don’t think of you as a sin. . . . I mean, I’m not ashamed of us.”
Jakes cocked his eyebrows. “You should be. I’m not even a captain, for the Pious God’s sake.” He smiled.
Ben winked at him and pressed forward to keep from taking Jakes’s hand.
The morning heat was slightly more bearable on the ship’s deck. Ben tugged at the thick velvet of his sleeves as he neared the line of raiders kneeling amid a circle of defensors. He didn’t know how anyone managed to survive the conditions of Grace Loray to leave in the first place. The island was a week’s sail away, and supposed to be hotter and more humid than Argrid’s sweltering capital.
The salt-seasoned wind did its best to steal Ben’s hat, thrashing the feather against his face. Four of the raiders looked Argridian: varying shades of russet and brown skin, black hair, angular features, and dark eyes—not uncommon, since any raider who dared sell magic here tended to blend in. But the last raider, a Mecht, drew Ben in. Blond, pale, and brutish, he embodied everything Ben had heard about that country’s clans and their endless, bloody wars.
The Mecht looked up, his glare biting with an intensity that Ben recognized.
The Eye of the Sun flower gave the temporary ability to control fire. Only the Mechts had figured out how to harness its power—and, more, how to make Eye of the Sun permanent. Eye of the Sun warriors became infernos in human skin, living proof that botanical magic was the Devil’s work.
Before Ben could ask if this Mecht had undergone the ritual to absorb the flower’s abilities, the raider exhaled, smoke streaming from his nostrils.
“Bárbaro diaño,” a defensor spat. Barbarian devil.
A few others muttered prayers. But Ben smiled.
An Eye of the Sun warrior. Fascinating. The only ones he’d seen before had found themselves dragged back to Argrid as examples by Church missionaries for refusing to accept the Pious God. Their executions had been through pistols, not flames.
“How is it that an Eye of the Sun warrior has come to be in Argrid?” Ben asked.
“He ain’t our regular crew,” said one raider, most likely the captain, his voice thick with the Grace Loray accent that trilled his r’s. “Picked him up as a hired hand in the Mechtlands, not a month ago. If he’s the reason for all this, take ’im.”
The Mecht snarled to the deck.
It wasn’t that simple. The captain knew it. The Mecht knew it. And Ben did, too, his stomach squeezing as the boat rocked.
Jakes walked past him, discreetly brushing his hand along Ben’s hip as he joined the other defensors to circle the raiders.
Ben pressed his hands to his chest, wrists together, fingers cupped upward in the stance of prayer. The defensors on deck did the same.
“Our Pious God, show us the ways of purity, honesty, chastity, penance, and charity,” Ben prayed. “We thank you for opening heaven to those created of the Devil’s hellfire and evil. May you purge our lives of temptations so we may reflect your pillars. Praise the Pious God.”
“Praise the Pious God,” echoed everyone on deck, save for the raiders.
“You have been detained by the Inquisitors of His Majesty’s Church of Argrid,” Ben continued, addressing the raiders now. “Unholy items have been found in your possession. If you do not repent, the Church will purify Argrid of your irredeemable soul.”
The Church had written this speech so detainees would have fair opportunities to repent. Everyone caught with plants was guilty, and admitting it was the only thing that could save their souls. They would still be rehabilitated for a time, but they wouldn’t burn.
Fair had had a different meaning under Ben’s uncle—back then, the accused were assumed innocent until the Inquisitors passed a sentence based on careful analysis of Church doctrine. Were their sins rooted in magic? If so, did they have evil plants that had been proven dangerous, or did they have pure magic used for healing or growth?
But Rodrigu’s betrayal had destroyed the luxury of assuming people were innocent. After his death, the Church had disbanded the remaining Inquisitors, and those who res
isted had been burned as well. The only duty of the Inquisitors that the Church hadn’t eliminated was searching inbound ships, but they had bastardized even that duty by giving it to careless aristocrats.
“I won’t repent for made-up sins.” The captain spoke again. “My crew ’n’ I are as innocent as you are, especially with that group from Argrid in Grace Loray right now. You wanna condemn us for stuff yer own men are negotiatin’—”
“Quiet!” a defensor snapped. “You’re speaking to the Crown Prince!”
Ben bit his tongue. You’re right, he wanted to tell the captain. The Church still ordered the arrest of anyone carrying Grace Loray’s botanical magic, even when a contingent of Argridian diplomats was negotiating a peace treaty with the island’s ruling Council.
When Ben’s uncle and cousin had tried to change the Church’s stance on magic, Ben had watched them die. Anyone who supported the war had been exterminated as well.
Ben didn’t have much hope that a new treaty would change Argrid.
Another of the raiders dared to chuckle. “The Prince. You ain’t as good-looking as they say, but maybe if you were the one kneeling . . .”
Jakes punched the man so hard he flipped into the raider beside him. The movement caused a distraction, and just as Ben registered that, the Mecht raider did, too.
The Mecht flew up and slammed his body into Ben. Though his wrists were lashed to his back, that didn’t affect the strength of the man’s muscles—or his Eye of the Sun.
Ben careened toward the ship’s railing, the Mecht shoving with every bit of anger he had repressed as he knelt. The Mecht’s face was so close that when he breathed, heat brushed Ben’s forehead, his senses flaring with ash and flame.
Memories ruptured in Ben’s mind. His uncle and cousin writhing on pyres. Screams.
Panic overtook him. His spine connected with the railing, and the Mecht exhaled a stream of fire that Ben dodged instinctively. He jerked to the left, the flames biting over his shoulder, and the Mecht stepped back in surprise. Ben regained enough control to plant his feet and jam his elbow into the Mecht’s stomach. The fire cut off as the man let out a strangled cough.