The northern wall had been this. But a wall has two sides. There are always two sides.
Oh, the arrogance of man.
I glanced back down at the note in my hands.
Your Royal Highness,
The gate at the ninth watchtower has fallen. Alioth stands, but the shadowguard are ten thousand strong, led by Lord Tiernan. Pykans fight alongside them. I've received no word from Orindor.
Your loyal servant,
Sir Armand de Basco
I made a fist and slammed it on my desk.
"Your grace?"
The messenger stood in the doorway, fingering his hat in his hands, looking a little startled.
"When was this written?" I asked.
"Last night, your grace," the messenger continued. "I rode as fast as I could. Sir Armand de Basco insisted that I deliver it straight into your hands."
I inhaled slowly, fighting for calm. I had always thought making decisions would be the hard part, but I had been wrong. The hard part about leadership was upholding a visage of strength, even when all seemed lost.
"Thank you," I said. "You may leave."
The messenger bowed once more. "Your grace." He replaced his hat on top of his head where it belonged, and then he left.
Aegis Sonya Del Conte stood like an assassin in the shadows near the door. She had escorted the messenger to my chambers herself, since he had arrived in the middle of the night. Ever since Alexander and Daria had left, and even against her husband's wishes, Aegis Sonya had assigned herself to night watch. The other Aegises took this as one of the many signs of impending threat on the castle, but although they were right to be worried, I knew it had been about more than that. Sonya worried for her son and my sister, and the only way to quell her restless sleep was to put her mind and body to work. Though she did look a little worse for wear. There were dark circles beneath her eyes and her coppery skin had assumed more of a sallow quality.
This is my fault.
She waited, silent as the shadow. As my Aegis, she should have dismissed herself, but as a mother, she couldn't bring herself to leave. Her anxiety held her firmly in her place.
"The shadowguard are through the wall," I said.
Sonya's face was as blank as an Aegis', though her hand twitched at her side.
"Here—" I thrust the paper at her. "Read it. I don't care."
Sonya approached slowly, her lean and muscular frame moving with a familiar and deadly grace. It was uncanny how much Alexander resembled his mother—even more so as he had gotten older. Alexander had inherited his father's green eyes, but the rest was just a male version of Sonya.
She took the paper from my hands with deft fingers and looked it over, frowning. Once she was through, she handed it back to me and asked, "Any word?"
I shook my head. "Nothing." I hadn't told her that my bindingbook with Daria had suddenly caught fire a few days prior. I'd never mentioned we'd shared a bindingbook in the first place, so I didn't see how speaking of its sudden incendiary properties would be of any benefit, and it would only cause her further worry. Either way, I'd hoped Daria or Alex would have sent a letter by now, but I'd heard nothing, and it haunted me like a bad omen from a pixie.
I knew Daria was alive, though. I could feel it deep in my bones.
"Stefan, please…" Sonya hesitated. She was not standing before me as my Aegis; she was standing before me as a mother. Not a privilege she took often. "This is beyond opinions of betrothals." Her dark eyes pleaded with mine. "I must know where she and Alexander are headed. They must know what is happening. If they return and we are under siege, they'll never make it through alive."
Sonya was right, of course. I'd made certain Alex would be informed on the state of things before he had left with my sister, but I'd also planned on having the bindingbook available to keep him up to date. The last thing I'd wanted was for them to come back to Valdon in the thick of things, and through the bindingbook, I would have been able to warn them.
I sighed and turned away from her.
Daria, please forgive me, but I can't bear it anymore. If anything happens to you, I'll never be able to live with myself.
"They're headed for Pendel," I said.
"What?" Sonya's voice was a whisper.
I inhaled slowly and looked back at her. "She and Alexander left for Pendel so that she can find the box of the Pandors. She believes she can find it, and that it will have the answer to stopping Eris from using the shield of power."
Sonya went deathly still for a moment, as though she hadn't heard clearly, and then her face blanched.
"Sonya, I didn't know what else to do!" I threw my hands at my sides. "I couldn't force her into marriage, and if she'd stayed here, she wouldn't have had a choice. And without a marriage to Danton, our only other hope of surviving my uncle would be to somehow undermine his power. And even more than that, Pendel should be safe for her since it is so far from all of this—"
"Sweet Mother of Draconi…" Sonya put her face in her hands. "This is all my fault."
I blinked. "I'm not sure how you are to blame in this. If anyone should be blamed, it should be me."
She pulled her hands away and looked at me, her dark eyes filled with so many emotions. "I should have told her. I meant to, but…" She bent her head and shut her eyes again as if she could look away and erase the thoughts pummeling her mind. And then with resolve, her eyes opened and she looked back at me. "Pendel is not safe for her, Stefan. If she does this, they will die."
"But the games? Surely my grandfather wouldn't have rewarded the winner with Pendel if it weren't a safe place?"
Sonya shook her head, her shoulders sagging. "I did not say that Pendel was not safe. I said that it was not safe for her."
"I don't understand why it would be more dangerous for Daria than anyone else. And furthermore, if this is true, you knew this when she'd entered the games and you never said a word about it. Why?"
She threaded her fingers together and started pacing. "I didn't think she'd actually win the games, Stefan, but if she had, I would have told her so that I could prevent her going there."
I was losing my patience to an overwhelming amount of anxiety. "Prevent what, Aegis Del Conte?"
She took no offense to my tone. In fact, she seemed to expect it. "You remember that your mother and I came from Pendel."
"Yes," I said sharply.
She stared at nothing while she paced, strands of hair slipping from her usually tight braid. "Do you know why we left?"
I'd heard the stories—memorized them since I was a boy. "Because you were at war with local clans over boundaries, and my grandfather came in and saved you."
She stopped pacing and stared at me, her face harder than I'd ever seen it. "There was infighting on Pendel, yes, but it was over the Pandors. Many of the locals felt the Pandor family held too much power. They ruled Karth and they were also extremely gifted—in particular, your mother. I was in her household at the time, the daughter of her mother's chambermaid. Some of the local clans rebelled, hoping to overthrow the Pandors."
"And my grandfather rescued them. Yes, I know," I said. "I've been told this story since I was a child—"
"No." Sonya hit the top of a small end table, and the sconce rattled in its holder. She collected herself, though her expression remained hard. "Your grandfather did not rescue us, Stefan. It wasn't until he discovered why we were fighting that he came. He had heard the Pandors were very gifted magically, and so he came in the middle of our civil war under guise of aid when all he really wanted was to take Aurora. She was young enough. He thought to mold her and use her power to strengthen Valdon.
"We let him into the capital thinking they would help us fight against the clans, and that's when they turned on us. My mother and I…" She hesitated in the pain of memory. "When we saw what was happening, and right after they'd murdered Aurora's mother, we hurried to make Aurora unrecognizable. It worked; Darius was unable to find her. He decided to take many of us prisoner inste
ad, hoping, perhaps, she would surface. We were brought back to Valdon as a sign of his greatness. To prove to mainland that he saved Karth from usurpers, and then he instated a steward of his choosing to govern."
She clenched her jaw, her eyes leveled on mine. "He never said that he murdered our fathers and sons because he was afraid of rebellion. Afraid they would come out and speak of what he had done. He never said that he crammed women and children on ships with men who did terrible things. Many of us died on the Black Sea. It wasn't until we returned and your mother was in the healing ward that Darius discovered who she truly was."
For a long moment I simply stood there, feeling like a lame mute.
"Why do you serve the very crown that did this to you?" I whispered after a long pause.
"What choice did I have? I had no family and no connections—only Aurora. I met and fell in love with Cicero, and then…" She hesitated, swallowing down her memories."Being an Aegis has been a way for me to stay close to Aurora, and her children."
I inhaled slowly. "Did my father know of this?"
"Pieces," she replied. "I imagine over time Prince Alaric deduced a bit more than he let on, but he never said. Some pains are better left in the past." She paused. "Victors may write history, as your grandfather has done, but there are still those on Pendel who know the truth. That is why I tell you this now, Stefan. There are still those on Pendel who would seek to gain from using your sister's abilities to detach themselves from Darius's rule. It is a very dangerous place for a Pandor. But there is more."
I didn't know how there could possibly be any more.
Sonya took a breath, collecting herself. "The Pandors did have immense power, and they put a curse upon the box. I know this only because, as I said, I lived in their household. They worried that the box would fall into enemy hands, and sometime during the fighting with the clans, they used magic to make sure that wouldn't happen. That the box would be protected."
"Do you know what is in the box?" I asked.
Sonya shook her head. "No, I don't. And the Pandors took every precaution to make sure the wrong people did not find out."
"But Daria is not the enemy," I said.
"She has Regius blood, Stefan. As much as she is a Pandor, she is also a Regius. If she goes searching for the box, the spell will not discriminate."
I swallowed. "What kind of a curse, Sonya?"
Her gaze leveled on mine. "It will raise the dead from the bones of those who perished during the war, and if she disturbs them, they will not rest until she dies."
Chapter 16
An Unceremonious Landing
Falling is a really interesting sensation. Particularly when you aren't expecting to fall, suddenly can't see a thing, and, therefore, have no earthly idea when you're going to land. Something in your mind tells you that you've been falling much too long and that you've probably reached terminal velocity and that there's no way you could survive such a fall without a parachute strapped to your back. And then you remember that you don't have a parachute strapped to your back, so you're probably going to die. There's a brief moment of panic, acute regret (you had so much more life to live!), and you resign yourself to a gruesome impact, hoping the pain will be quick and that there will be some salvageable pieces of your body left for a burial.
You can imagine my surprise when I plunged into a body of water with no more impact than if I'd jumped off a high dive. But then the water almost took me.
It's not that I'm a bad swimmer—I’m actually a pretty decent swimmer. The problem was that I hadn't expected to land in water and hadn't taken a preemptive breath. I'd barely had time to shut my mouth before my head went under, so my lungs were bursting within seconds. And the water was freezing. My toes turned to lead inside of my boots, and my fingers felt so numb it was like swimming with stumps for hands. Not to mention my cloak suddenly weighed a ton. With a gasp I surfaced, lips trembling and teeth chattering, and then I dove right back down again. I had to find Alex.
He couldn't have landed far from me; I'd jumped right after him. Desperate, I reached out with my senses, but everywhere, in everything, was cold. It was like searching through a block of ice.
Alex, you have to give me something.
My cloak dragged me down, fighting against me as I swam. Somehow I managed to twist out of it and then let the ocean take it away. I thought I might regret it later, but right then I didn't care. Right then I needed all my strength to find Alex, and there it was, the faintest pulse of warmth in the infinite cold. It had to be him.
Please, don't be a fish.
I swam down, much faster without my cloak, and the pressure squeezed my lungs, my head, my ears. I forced my hands to move and my feet to kick, my adrenaline pushing warmth and feeling into my limbs. Down and down and down, deeper in the dark water, following the thin thread of warmth.
I reached out into the darkness and my hand grazed something. My hope surged; it wasn't a fish. I kicked forward and grabbed hold of soggy leather—was it a belt? A sheath?—and then I kicked up as hard as I could, pulling and straining against the pressure. My lungs were full, pushing against my chest cavity while my heart drummed in my ears. He was so heavy and I needed to breathe and the water was so cold. Just a little more. I needed to hang on just a little more.
With a final burst of energy we surfaced. I coughed and choked on icy water, realizing I'd grabbed hold of Alex's belt. He was limp, though the water kept him somewhat buoyant, and I struggled to pull his head above the surface. His lips were blue.
Was there a shore nearby? Please let there be a shore! I glanced around frantically while gulping mouthfuls of saltwater. I spotted rocks in the moonlight. They were a fairly good swim from here, but at least there was land. I had no idea where Vera was, but right then, Alex's health was more important.
I shoved both arms beneath his armpits and used my legs to propel us forward. It was difficult, trying to breathe and swim and keep him afloat, and I was sure that I'd swallowed my weight in seawater. My right calf started cramping, followed quickly by my right foot. I shifted the thrust of my kicking to my left leg, but we still had about one hundred yards to go. Then my left quad started cramping, too. I could feel my body slowly sinking, fighting against me. My head went under and I kicked us up again. And again. And then my head went under and no amount of kicking brought us back to the surface. We were going to drown out here. Wherever here was.
A pair of strong hands grabbed hold of me. They pulled Alex and me through the water and dumped us right on sand. I rolled over, coughing and spitting up water while Vera heaved and coughed beside me. And then I crawled to Alex and rolled him on his back.
He looked phantasmal in the moonlight, and he wasn't breathing.
"No, Alex…" I wedged open his mouth and breathed in, watching his chest rise to make sure there wasn't any blockage. Then compressions. And more compressions. Two more breaths. Compressions. "Alex, don't you dare die on me!" I tasted salt on my tongue. More breaths. I shoved his chest, over and over. And over and over and over. I forced down the memory of my father.
Vera's hand touched my shoulder, but I kept pushing—furious now. A voice whispered in the back of my mind that Alex should have responded by now, but I ignored it. I kept pushing.
"Daria," Vera squeezed my shoulder.
"Get back!" I shoved her off and breathed into his mouth again. This couldn't be happening. Not now. Not ever. He couldn't just…I wouldn't let him…
No, no, no.
Please, God…
Water bubbled out of Alex's mouth and his chest spasmed. Vera crouched at my side, helping me lift him into a seated position while he continued coughing up seawater. There was so much water; had he swallowed the entire ocean?
"Give him some space to breathe," Vera said.
I realized my hands were all over his face and neck. I forced myself to scoot back a little, though I kept one hand on his back. Once the coughing subsided, he fell back in the sand, one of his arms lying limply ov
er his chest. His breath was faint and his lips were still blue from the cold, but he was alive—barely. "Vera, the poison…" I scooted aside a little to let her see him. "You have to try."
She replaced my hand with hers and shut her eyes.
I felt the power surge from her, pouring into Alex. She was strong—very strong—and then I sensed the taint in his blood. It was slippery, feeding off him like a parasite, and when Vera's magic touched it, it pulled back with sudden shock, but it didn't go away. Instead, it condensed upon itself, coagulating in Alex's heart, and his pulse skyrocketed. It was going to kill him.
Vera immediately pulled her hand away and sagged back on her heels, panting. "I can't…"
I crouched over Alex. His heart was beating so fast. After a few long and painstaking moments, his heartbeat slowed and I exhaled. I hadn't even realized I'd been holding my breath.
"Orelius," Vera continued. She was still out of breath from what she'd tried. "He was Mosaque's most talented alchemist—I can't…dragon's bane is resistant to magic. The only known antidote is the skin of a frostberry."
I stared vacantly at Alex while she spoke. The poison was going to take his life. There was nothing else she could do.
But there is something you can do.
But I didn't know the first thing about healing.
You must try.
The ocean breeze slipped over my skin like a spirit—a comforting spirit. It seeped into my pores as though it was possessing my body, another presence that guided my hands over Alex's heart. I shut my eyes and breathed in slowly, giving in despite my better judgment, letting this presence move and guide me. Feeling each and every one of Alex's heartbeats beneath my palms.
I let my spirit seep inside of him slowly, guided by this strange, invisible consciousness. My spirit sifted through his, prodded and grasped as light and as swift as a summer breeze. It moved through Alex's veins until it reached his heart. The dragon's bane threatened, squeezing Alex's heart so tightly that Alex arched his back, and my spirit slipped back, cautious.
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