The weight of it choked me.
Wind began to blow around us, driving out the dust, making me blink constantly in an effort to see. Then Sethos’s eyes widened, even as he continued to stare at me. He still pressed inward, but now I was able to press back.
“Majesty …” he ground out, sounding only spiteful.
“Let her go, Sethos!” Keallach cried, reaching his hands out to him. He was using his gift to move Sethos the tiniest amount—every smidgen of which I was grateful for because it granted me that much more oxygen.
“Yes, let her go!” Kapriel echoed, but with his command he sent a burst of air that made Sethos careen two steps to the side, away from me.
I gasped for air, aware for the first time that sweat streamed down my face and neck. Vidar shouted and drove forward, blade high—his bullets likely gone—bringing his sword down on Sethos from behind when Sethos rammed a short sword backward, through my Ailith brother’s belly.
“Vidar!” I screamed, feeling as if his name spread out over minutes, not seconds.
Kapriel sent another burst of air in Sethos’s direction, nearly succeeding in forcing him from his feet.
Sethos gave him a long, steely look, then turned and fled down the alcove passageway. Ronan and our trainer tore past us in pursuit, but my eyes were on Vidar. I grabbed hold of him as he crumpled to his knees. But he was heavy, and he fell partially atop me. Still, I held on to him, easing him to the side and to his back, pressing down on his wound with both hands. I grimaced as blood seeped between my fingers, staining them as red as the Sheolite cloaks. “Go find Tressa!” I urged Kapriel and Keallach, hovering above me.
It was then I saw Chaza’el, his head still, eyes wide. At first I thought he was having another vision, lying there so still. But with a gasp, I knew that he was dead.
“No,” I muttered, tears springing to my eyes. “No, no, no!” I looked to the twins again, already turning. “Hurry! Please hurry!” I sobbed. Perhaps, if she was in time, we could pray—pray all together—and bring Chaza’el back to us. We couldn’t lose both of them. I forced myself to concentrate on Vidar. Even in the dim light, I could see he was fading to a ghastly shade of gray.
“Tell Bell,” he grunted, his voice terrifying with gurgles, “that I always knew she secretly loved me.”
“Shut up,” I said, fury washing through me. “You use your energy to fight this, Vidar. You hear me? Fight this.”
“It’s bad, Dri,” he said, and I felt the terror within him, the giving up.
“Yeah? So was Ronan! So was Killian! Tressa and Niero … they healed them! You just stay still and stay quiet, and pray the Maker doesn’t take you home yet. Do you hear me?”
“Dri? You’re shouting.”
“Oh, Vidar,” I sighed, half laughing, half crying.
Bellona cried out behind me and rushed in our direction, sliding to her knees beside us. “Vidar,” she began. “What happened?”
“Don’t make him talk,” I said, fear rising in me as the blood continued to seep between my fingers and spread out across Vidar’s tunic in a widening pool. “We need a medic. And Tressa. Tressa, most of all.”
“Where is she?” Bellona said, rising.
“No, Bellona—the twins went after Tressa. They’ll be back soon. See if you can find some gauze, or something to help stanch this blood.”
“Two pretty girls, looking … after … me,” Vidar quipped, but his tone had none of the lightness of his words. I looked in alarm to his eyes as they rolled backward.
“Vidar!” I grunted, pressing harder, as if I could will the wound to seal itself.
Ronan, Niero, and our trainer came into view, and my heart leaped, hoping that Niero might again intervene on our behalf. On Vidar’s behalf, I thought, looking upon my brother with every ounce of hope in me.
“We need Tressa!” Bellona cried, fury carefully masking her panic as she placed her fingers over mine.
“Keallach and Kapriel are looking for her,” I explained to the others. “But we don’t have much time.”
Niero moved to the torch on the wall and drew a long, thick dagger from his belt, placing the tip of it directly in the flame.
“What are you doing, Niero?” I asked shakily, well aware of his intent, but hoping he would resort to his … other methods. “Tressa is coming!”
“If she does not reach us in the next moment or two, you know what I must do.”
I can save him with human methods, he willed into my mind, meeting my gaze. He can survive this.
He intended to seal Vidar’s wound shut with a searing blade.
The horror of it sickened me. “Niero …”
“It is the Maker’s way, to show us the means to accomplish his task,” he said, turning back to the flame.
I winced and stared back at Vidar’s terrible wound. “We don’t even know if there’s more damage inside,” I muttered.
“If there is, only Tressa’s prayers can heal him. And those will work regardless of whether the skin is sealed or not. Right now, we must stop the bleeding, or we will lose two Remnants this day instead of one.”
Tears welled in my eyes as I again looked to Chaza’el, so terribly still.
“Lift his tunic,” Niero said a moment later. “Ronan … Dri.”
Ronan took hold of my shoulders and gently eased me back. “No,” I cried, watching as Vidar’s blood continued to spill faster when my pressure lifted. But still Ronan pulled, clearing a space for them to do what they must.
“Try and bring the skin together,” Niero directed Bellona.
She pressed from either side, leaving enough room for his blade to cauterize the skin together. She turned her face, and after looking to the empty doorway, said, “Do it.”
Niero pressed down with the hot blade without pause. My stomach roiled as the peculiar odor of hot blood and seared flesh filled the air, wafting upward in steam. I turned away, pressing my face into Ronan’s chest. He stroked my hair with one hand and held me tight with his other arm.
Vidar came to with a scream, and Bellona shoved his shoulders down. “Look at me! Look at me!” she cried, forcing him to concentrate. “You are not alone. We are with you!” But by then, it was over. Niero lifted the blade and flung it toward the wall, bending to take one of Vidar’s hands in both of his. “Forgive me, brother. It had to be done. You were going to bleed out.”
Vidar nodded, silent, lips parted in desperate pants that were partly tears. Sweat ran down his temples, and his eyes were wide and round. Once Bellona captured his attention, he closed his eyes and clenched his teeth so hard I could see the muscles in his jaw and neck pulse with the effort. Blessedly, he blanched and passed out again a moment later. I think we all breathed a sigh of relief.
Niero laid his broad palm on Vidar’s chest and bent his head, closing his eyes as if in prayer. I knew he was searching my brother to find out just how bad his wounds might be. After a moment, he looked toward us, face grim, which made my heart pound in fear. “Go and see if you can find Tressa—see what keeps her and the others. We will bring Vidar to the meeting room. Gather every elder you see and tell them to go there, along with the Ailith. We must decide on how we shall proceed.”
Ronan and I immediately did as he asked, running out the tunnel and to the stairs. But when we got to the lower levels, horror overtook us. This was why the others hadn’t returned with Tressa and Killian. Everywhere we looked, there were dead or dying people.
Men, women, and children, some infants, lying beside their parents.
Worse were children weeping, clinging to mothers and fathers who were long dead.
There were murdered elders too. I glimpsed one, slumped against a wall, his eyes wide, as if in shock, as if he couldn’t believe that this was how it would end. Another lay twisted on the floor, as if she had been writhing in pain when she died.
The stone floors were covered in blood. We almost slipped several times because of it. The walls were streaked with it, reminding me of my home
after the Sheolites came and took my parents. I had been so afraid …
“My parents,” I said, gripping Ronan’s arm. “Our parents.”
“They should be safe,” he said, not sounding entirely sure. “I doubt our enemies took the time to break through that reinforced door. But we’ll go to them.”
I nodded, my stomach twisting as I saw yet another dead child in the arms of a wailing, wounded mother. There were survivors, and that was a blessing. But their combined emotion—terror, grief, agony—made me turn and vomit.
Ronan’s hand covered my shoulder until my belly was emptied.
“I’m sorry,” I said, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. It was the last thing he needed to deal with.
“It’s understandable, Dri. I know … I know this must be a lot for you. Feeling everything. Everyone.”
An armed guard came trotting through from the direction of the front gate. Ronan stopped him. “Have you repelled them all?”
“For now,” spat the young man, probably only a season younger than Ronan and me. “But we’re trying to re-form in case they return.”
“How many dead outside?”
“Only a few. Most retreated inside before the stones were rolled into place after the helicopters arrived.”
“How’d they get through?” Ronan asked, his tone tight and high, as if he still couldn’t believe it. We thought we were invincible within the castle cut from the cliff.
“They blasted through. They had missiles on those helicopters.” He turned his face and shook his head. “Missiles. Some say that they had dynamite too, at the gates. How are we to fight against such a well-armed enemy?” He shook his head again. “The explosions killed some. And then the cursed Sheolites swept through while we were still trying to regain our feet, killing everyone in their path. If there hadn’t been guards deeper in the Citadel to repel them, they might still be here, murdering all who remain.”
I swallowed hard at the thought. Worse, I knew that they’d been after us—the Ailith. How many had died, standing between our enemy and us?
Ronan reached a hand out to cover the young man’s shoulder in encouragement as we prepared to move on. “The Maker shall sustain us,” he said. “He will show us the way. Do not lose heart. Share that with everyone you see, all right?”
The guard nodded and moved on. I clung to Ronan’s words too.
We turned a corner and at last saw Tressa and Killian. He had an arm around her waist, and she looked beyond weary, her task clearly taxing her strength. I’d been so afraid that the reason they didn’t return to us was because they’d been killed. Blood completely covered both their shirts, and I knew it had to be from a combination of repelling our enemies and tending to the wounded.
“There are so many …” Tressa said, pushing the back of her hand to her brow and meeting my gaze. She knew I felt the collective pain in a way that even she could not. It bonded us.
I reached out and took her other hand. “The Maker will sustain us all,” I said, realizing I’d adopted Ronan’s comforting words. It was what we all needed. To focus on our one, true, eternal hope. Anything else, as today had so vividly shown us, was temporal. “We’re to meet. They’re bringing Vidar. Niero seems to think …” I paused, my voice cracking.
“It’s bad,” Ronan said. “Vidar needs you, Tress.”
Killian nodded, pulling Tressa along, but it wasn’t long before she knelt beside an unconscious man. “We’ll be right there,” she said, looking up at us. “I know we’re to go to Vidar. But the Maker calls me to heal this man first.”
Ronan looked at me in desperation. We were close to the passageway that led to our quarters, where our parents were. While Tressa prayed over the man, we might have just enough time. Wordlessly, we agreed, practically running now. If anything had happened to our parents, if they’d come out to try and help defend the others …
But then, there they were, outside the reinforced door, working together to aid those around them—bandaging, bringing water. Ronan’s mom had a child on one hip, his face covered in tears and snot and misery. Ronan went to them, and I to my parents, hugging them and directing them to the meeting place. “We have to hurry,” I said. Mom and I led the way, with Dad behind and Ronan and his parents following.
We were halfway there, relieved to see that this quadrant of the Citadel seemed to be fairly untouched by the destructive path of the Sheolites, when my arm cuff began to chill. “Mom,” I said, reaching out to grip her wrist, frowning, turning, trying to ascertain where the threat was coming from, even as I saw Ronan press toward us. But by then, they were there—two Sheolite scouts who had been left behind.
Or had remained behind, hoping for just such a moment as this.
They both struck at me at once.
If Mom hadn’t managed to block one’s blow and drive her dagger into his neck, I would’ve surely died. The other was fierce enough—seemingly as strong as Sethos in his manic drive toward me—that he almost cut both my belly and neck by the time Ronan and Dad intervened and made sure he never rose again. Only as my cuff began to warm did I begin to breathe normally again. Then, I looked around at our parents with pride in my heart. All four held both sword and dagger or shield in their hands. Somehow, I thought that if Ronan and I hadn’t had our trainer, these four would’ve done their best to prepare us to survive.
“Why?” Ronan asked, panting. “Why is it always you that they’re after? You that they find?”
“Those two weren’t out to capture me,” I said, my voice trembling a little. “They wanted me dead. Come,” I urged as Tressa and Killian caught up to us, wide-eyed as we wiped our blades of blood. “We need to get to the meeting hall.”
We set out again, this time with Ronan and Dad taking the lead and me paying special attention to any warning the Maker might be sending me through the arm cuff. But I only felt growing warmth.
When we reached the hive-like room, I wanted to weep at the sight of all the bloody and hastily bandaged elders, and at how many of their seats were empty. I stopped when I saw where the oracle had once sat—the ancient woman who was blind and yet could see more clearly than others. Tyree was here without Clennan, grief etched into his face, and when Tressa saw him, she let out a cry, knowing what it meant right away. Her foster father—the only father she’d ever known—was now gone. Tyree took her into his arms, and they cried together. It was as if the Sheolites had come in with a special focus on killing every elder and Ailith possible, but the carnage they left behind told me they’d had instructions to kill anyone in their path.
Mentally, I breathed a sigh of relief as each of my brothers and sisters—Azarel, Cyrus, Asher, Niero, and the others—arrived. But Vidar was still unconscious, and when Azarel and Asher helped Keallach and Kapriel carry in Chaza’el, lifeless, I cried out and went to them. I choked out a sob, looking at his black eyes—eyes that would never see our future again. I closed my own, tears coming fast then, and heard others around me. But Niero put his hand on my shoulder. “Come, sister. Pray with us for a brother we might yet be able to save.”
I tore myself from Chaza’el and entered the circle around Vidar, joining hands with the others. Bellona was on one side of him, Tressa on the other. He was still terribly pale, his skin an odd gray, as if chilled to the bone, but he was sweating at the same time. Tressa had both palms on his chest, head bowed, praying. And quietly, we all echoed her words. “Maker of all, we commit our brothers Chaza’el and Vidar into your care. Chaza’el has gone ahead of us, but we beg you to spare Vidar. Bring him back to us, Maker. Knit together his wound from the inside out.” Gently, she moved her fingers to hover over his wound—fiercely red around the cauterization. “Just as you knit him together in his mother’s womb, Maker, knit him together again. Keep his heart steady, his breathing sure. Bring him back to us in the name of the One who was, and is, and is to come.”
“In the name of the One who was, and is, and is to come,” we repeated, over and over.
; “You are Shammah, ever-present, Maker,” Tressa prayed, and I could hear the tears that threatened to choke her as she invoked strange, ancient names for the One who spoke us into life. Had an elder dared to share them with her? My heart thrilled to the names that I felt I should’ve known all my life. “You are Nissi, our banner. You are Raah, our Shepherd. You are Tisdkenu, our righteousness.” Even with my eyes closed, I could see the room was growing brighter, the torch flames rising. Heat flooded through my arm cuff. The presence of the Maker was so tangible that I could barely breathe.
“Maker, you are Rapha,” Tressa whispered. “Our healer. Holy and mighty, holding all our lives in your very hands. Bring Vidar back to us now. We ask this in your name, above all names.”
And then it was done.
Tressa was silent. We were silent.
But Vidar did not respond.
And still did not respond …
I opened my eyes just as Vidar blinked slowly and then focused on each of us. “Finally …” he mumbled, barely able to form the words, “I’m the center of attention.”
I huffed a laugh, sinking to my knees, and the entire chamber exploded in applause and cheers, even from those who ailed.
On the edge of our circle, I saw Keallach sink to his knees too, mouth slack with wonder.
Bellona closed her eyes and lifted her chin, her face so open in gratitude for a moment that it took me aback. She was beautiful as her usual fierce self, but she was even more so when she allowed herself to be vulnerable. “Thank you, Maker,” she breathed.
“See? You do … love me,” Vidar said, closing his eyes and wincing slightly.
“Does it hurt?” Tressa asked him. Killian had come around Vidar to kneel at Tressa’s side, his arm again around her waist.
“Only a lot,” he said, giving her a rueful grin. “It feels like I’ve been in the worst battle of my life.”
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