by K. A. Linde
34
The Martyr
ISA
Everything had gone to plan.
Isa smiled through her red mask as the world turned to utter chaos. Humans and half-Fae ran for their lives. Bodies littered the ground. Buildings were toppled. The Red Masks were on top of the world. They had won.
They’d waited it out until the protests got big enough that even the Society took notice. Attacking the small ones would have given them more notice than was necessary. But if they were going to actually become a threat, that was a different story.
And now, they were nothing.
This was Father’s great undoing. He had been misguided to ever let Basem Nix do as he pleased. It had set back their cause. But then Kerrigan had been named to the Society, the protests had started along with petitions to the government for humans to be treated as Fae were. It had turned the tide.
The Red Masks were innumerable. They would wash this city in blood before allowing the humans and half-Fae to take a place beside them. And it was all Father’s doing.
She’d seen Basem as a way out of the Red Masks. Away from her fanatical father, who had raised her but did not see her as anything but the assassin he had created. She’d wanted more. And now, standing on the battleground in the wake of their victory, she understood his vision. Why he had always treated her so. A part of her still wanted to escape, but how could she be anything but this? The only thing she knew how to do was be an assassin.
And tonight, she wanted to finish it.
She’d seen Kerrigan’s red hair in the crowd. Watched her now struggle with the prince who should have hated her. He should have been on their side. Not siding with some half-Fae.
She could complete her mission.
She could kill the girl.
Father had told her to abandon the task. It had been given to her by Basem, not Father. He didn’t approve of it.
The last thing he wanted was for Kerrigan to go from being a symbol to a martyr. There would be no turning back the wave of support then. Her death could mean the end of the Red Masks.
But still, she hated her. Hated the life she had and the prince and the role in the government. How could a half-Fae have it when she didn’t?
Isa defied orders and strode across the barricade line. She would end this here, today. Then, something happened. The prince grabbed her. His black magic swept around them, and they popped out of existence.
“No!” she screamed into the crowd.
Isa whipped around, looking for them. His magic wasn’t that strong. She’d gathered from her spying that he couldn’t travel much distance at once. Which meant they might still be within reach. She could still end this if she found them. And even better, he would be depleted of his reserves.
She turned back the way she’d come and watched the smoke reappear. They’d made it across the line and into safety. Or so they thought.
She pushed past the remaining Red Masks on the line and ignored them as they tried to focus her elsewhere.
“Father’s orders,” she snapped.
Kerrigan looked around herself in terror, as she must have realized that she wasn’t completely out of danger. The prince had fallen to his knees next to her. He didn’t look like much as he was now. Not like the last time she’d gone up against him. She’d been practicing too. Maybe she’d forfeit both of their lives. Two less half-Fae sympathizers was all the better.
Kerrigan scrambled to her feet. She saw Isa coming toward her and put her hand on Fordham’s shoulder. He shook his head. He couldn’t get up to help her.
Good.
“Miss me?” Isa called to Kerrigan.
Kerrigan stiffened. She didn’t have to see Isa’s face. It was clear she recognized the voice. “Isa,” she snarled.
“I do love that I made such an impression.”
“Why are you doing this?”
“It’s fun, darling,” she trilled.
“Who are you working for?”
“Father, of course.”
Kerrigan’s eyes narrowed. She brought her fists up, as if that would save her. “What do you want?”
“You dead,” Isa told her flatly.
And then she stopped walking as she heard the flapping of wings.
Kerrigan looked up at the same moment as a giant black beast landed in the space behind them. Dragons were in the skies. Dozens of them heading in their direction, answering the call of their city.
Isa wiggled her fingers at Kerrigan in a mock wave. Maybe next time, she’d kill her but not when Father could see her misbehaving.
35
The Arrest
“Isa!” Kerrigan screamed into the night as the girl got away. As she always did. “Gods!”
Fordham groaned next to her, but his head was tipped up in fear. “Kerrigan, look.”
She’d only half-recognized the dragon who landed behind them. But now, she turned fully away from the assassin and to the man striding toward her in black Society robes—Lorian.
“No,” she whispered.
“Look what we have here,” Lorian said with a smile that practically glowed. Here was his excuse to have her kicked out. Here was his excuse to get rid of the half-Fae while his Red Masks terrorized the city.
“Fordham, you have to go for help,” she told him.
“I can’t. I’m drained.”
“You’re not,” she insisted. She didn’t know if it was true, but it had to be. “Go get Helly. Or Bastian. Just go to the mountain. You can do it. I know you can.”
“I won’t leave you.”
She looked down at him with determination in her eyes. “You can’t carry us both that far. Now, go!”
He squeezed her hand. The only confirmation she needed. Then, his black magic enveloped him one more time, and he vanished into thin air. She released a breath of relief. Lorian might have seen Fordham, but he couldn’t prove it. So, even if he couldn’t get help, he wouldn’t be in the thick of it. It would only be Kerrigan facing down the head of the Red Masks.
“I always knew that you were more trouble than you were worth,” Lorian taunted.
“Funny, I could say the same thing about you.”
Lorian bristled. “You dare talk to your superior like this!” His hand went to the pommel of his sword.
“Yes, I dare!” Kerrigan threw her hand to the carnage behind her. “Look at what is happening on the streets of Kinkadia. And you’re here, talking about how much trouble I am. People are lying dead, and you care more about me than that.”
“That is being taken care of,” he snarled.
That was when she saw the Society Guard rushing into the bottlenecked streets. A strange vapor emanated from their water magic. People were coughing and falling over.
“What are they doing to them?” Kerrigan gasped. “They’re innocent.”
“No one is innocent in a riot.”
“The Red Masks started this! Not the protestors.”
“A convenient answer. I don’t see any Red Masks, do you?”
Kerrigan rubbed her still-burning eyes and looked around at the destruction before her, but he was right. She didn’t see any Red Masks. He’d let them get away. By the time the Guard had returned, all of the masks had been safely hidden. No one the wiser. She wanted to scream.
Just then dragons rained water down on the burning buildings. Society members were in the skies, taking care of what the Guard hadn’t cleaned up in the streets. Kerrigan could already see shackles coming out. Arrests were being made all over the place. It was wrong. So wrong. This wasn’t even their fault.
“You can’t do this!”
Lorian scoffed. “What? My job? You’ll find that I can.”
Then, with her senses still addled from the smoke and his superior footwork, he whirled her in place, kicking her knees out from behind. Kerrigan gasped as she fell forward—hard. Gravel and bits of building dug into her knees. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she watched the devastation.
Lorian wrenched her
arms behind her back. “By authority of the Society, I am placing you under arrest.”
Shackles circled her wrists, closing so tight that they nearly cut off circulation. She gasped, doubling over as she realized they were magic-dampening manacles. It felt like a punch to the gut when she reached for her power and found only a yawning emptiness. And not just that, but they were also iron. Her half-Fae heritage kept them from making her completely recoil. Iron wasn’t exactly poisonous to Fae, but it was a deterrent, and many refused to go near it. The fact that Lorian had on protective gloves proved that he’d known what he was walking into.
Without another word, Lorian dragged her back to his dragon. Getting onto the beast with her hands behind her back was a feat, but Lorian shoved her into position, and without a backward glance, they were in the air. She leaned forward and gripped the dragon tight with her thighs.
She didn’t want to do this. She couldn’t believe that Lorian had the audacity. Why hadn’t she had a vision of this? What was her magic even good for if it didn’t warn her about impending doom any longer? She reached for it then, searching for that connection to the spirit plane. Demanding its release. Her head buzzed and buzzed and buzzed. Only getting louder and more persistent as she attempted to force it to do her business. Her vision swam and then went black at the edges. Still, she pushed.
The last thing she remembered was her magic leaching from her core and everything falling into darkness.
She woke again inside the mountain. Two Society Guards hauled her by either elbow. She got her feet under her and blinked. There hadn’t been a vision. Not a single thing. She’d just expended her magic and passed out. Thanks, universe!
“Oh, good. You’re awake,” Lorian said at the bottom of the flight of stairs. “Here will do.”
The guards deposited her in an iron-lined cell. The Fae guards hastened back out as quickly as possible. The walls felt as if they were leaning. So much iron that it was nearly oppressive to Kerrigan, whose Fae blood was so diluted. They hadn’t even put Basem Nix in a cell with this much iron. How telling that they’d shove a half-Fae in one who had done nothing, but not a murderer.
Lorian stood before her, seemingly unperturbed by the iron. He looked smug as he watched her take in her surroundings—a smelly straw pallet, a metal bucket, and cold, hard stone.
“This is where you’ve always belonged.”
“You’re not going to get away with this,” she told him.
“Arresting a rioter that I caught in the act?” He shook his head at her as if she were so naive. He was the sole witness. She wished more than anything that she had an ounce of her magic to wipe that look off of his face.
Lorian turned then, as if that was all he was going to say on the matter. Just leave her down here to rot. A commotion on the steps stilled him. And in that moment, Helly burst through the doorway.
“What is the meaning of this, Lorian?” Helly demanded.
“Hellina,” he said mildly. “What a pleasant surprise.”
“You have overstepped.” Her eyes were wild. She looked half-ready to throttle him. “You have no authority to arrest a Society trainee when she has done nothing wrong. This is outrageous. I will request an inquest from the council.”
“I must agree with her, Master Lorian,” another voice said, following in Helly’s wake.
Kerrigan craned her neck to see Mistress Anahi step into the prison. She was nearly as short as Kerrigan with long, perfectly glossy box braids and deep black skin. Anahi barely suppressed a shudder at the iron all around them. Kerrigan was surprised to see Anahi here with Helly, as they didn’t always see eye to eye. They must have been meeting at the time or else Helly wouldn’t have brought her along.
“I do not approve of the protests outside, but they are legal. Arresting a Society trainee is outside of the bounds of your jurisdiction,” she said with a flat northern accent, indicating her Sayair tribe high in the Vert Mountains.
Lorian glared at both of them. “It was not a protest. It was a riot. I have every right to arrest someone inciting violence in Kinkadia. That is our express purpose—to govern and protect the people. And I must protect our people from her.”
“He’s lying!” Kerrigan cried. “I was at a protest, but we weren’t rioting. We were marching through the streets. We were herded away, and the exits were closed off. Red Masks destroyed buildings, threw smoke bombs, and were killing people.”
“I saw nothing of the sort,” Lorian said.
“You came too late. You let the Red Masks escape.”
Lorian actually had the audacity to roll his eyes. “There were no Red Masks. Their leader was murdered months ago, and they have dissolved, if they were ever what you claimed in the first place.”
“Lorian,” Anahi admonished. “We know of the Red Masks’ existence.”
“And their threat,” Helly added.
“Five years ago maybe,” he said lightly.
More footsteps announced another person’s entrance. Bastian appeared then with a huff. “I don’t move quite as fast as I used to,” he said with a small smile. “Now, what is this I’m hearing about what is going on? You are discrediting the existence of the Red Masks? Even after Basem’s blatant use of them after the tournament?”
“I believe in their existence, but I saw no threat, except what you see before you. She is turning the city against us, initiating riots in the streets and infiltrating our sacred halls. Can none of you see what she is doing to us? How she is trying to turn us against one another?”
“I wouldn’t have to do any of that if you weren’t leading the very people you allowed to escape,” Kerrigan snarled.
She shouldn’t have said it. She had no proof. Not yet at least. Just Dozan’s word, how Lorian had treated her these months, and what he’d done today. But she knew he was the leader. He was the one who had been trying to kill her. Why else would Isa have run away like that at the sight of his dragon? She’d known.
But the looks of disbelief, coupled with Lorian’s stark laughter, hurt.
“Kerrigan,” Helly said softly, “we cannot accuse people of such things.”
“Aye,” Anahi said with displeasure in her expression. She had gone from helpful to neutral to disapproving. “Master Lorian still deserves your respect. Whether or not you should be behind those bars.”
“Of course, Mistress Anahi,” she said in haste. “I only meant—”
But Lorian cut in with another laugh. “You believe I am the leader of these Red Masks?” He turned back to his colleagues. “Do you not see now? She is trying to place the blame on me. It’s absurd. You can take this to the council if you wish, Hellina, but I am going to move to have her expelled.”
“Expelled?” Kerrigan gasped.
Helly looked dismayed for one second before straightening and giving him an imperious look down her nose. “If you do this, it will end your career. The council election is next year, Lorian.”
His nostrils flared. “Are you proposing that you will oppose me?”
“It is not the time to make enemies,” she said pointedly.
He balked at the blatant threat. A part of Kerrigan cheered for her. That she’d go up against Lorian for her.
“This is not about you two,” Anahi said. “It is about the girl.”
“Agreed,” Bastian said, coming between them. “None of that. What we need is a compromise. Lorian wishes to see the girl expelled. Helly believes that she should be let go. Surely, there is a middle ground.”
Anahi nodded. “I concur with the honorable Master Bastian.”
Lorian and Helly huffed at the same time and looked away from one another.
“Kerrigan was in the wrong place at the wrong time. She likely shouldn’t have been at the protest in the first place.” Bastian looked to Kerrigan, as if to say I told you so. “But unless you can prove that she started all of this, Lorian, I believe that her infraction is more a problem with political action during her training and less to do with inciting vio
lence. For that, I would offer a third choice—probation. Kerrigan would be monitored for the duration of her training and grounded from flying for a month.”
“What?” Kerrigan gasped. “But we start flying tomorrow!”
“It seems fair to me,” Anahi agreed. “A compromise.”
Lorian’s lips tipped up at her objection to the punishment. It wasn’t getting her kicked out, but it was something she clearly cared about.
Helly sighed and shot Kerrigan a pained expression. “I agree with Bastian if you do, Lorian.”
“Helly,” Kerrigan breathed. “But…”
“No, Kerrigan, you were warned about the protests already. This is a fair alternative.”
She shut her mouth. Because if Helly was saying it was fair, that likely meant she thought that Lorian had a chance with convincing the council to kick her out of the program.
“Fine,” Lorian ground out. “Probation it is. But I’ll be the one watching.”
Then, he whipped his black robes around him as he vanished. Anahi shot them a pained look before following in his wake. Helly produced a key and opened the iron gate. She bristled as the iron touched her skin as she removed the manacles. The rush of magic returning to Kerrigan sent tears to her eyes.
“Thank you.” Kerrigan threw her arms around Helly. “Fordham found you?”
“He did,” Helly said. “And he’s fully depleted. Nearly killed himself doing it. We were lucky that Bastian was already with me at the time. I gave Fordham a tonic, and he should be out for the rest of the day.”
“Gods,” Kerrigan whispered.
Helly patted her back comfortingly until the tears dammed up. Kerrigan brushed the back of her hand under her eyes and looked to Bastian. “Thank you for your help. I can see that Lorian could have come out ahead.”
Bastian bowed his head to Kerrigan. “Indeed.”
“I still think he’s behind the Red Masks,” she told them both.
“Even if it’s true,” Helly said, “you cannot go around saying so. We’d need definitive proof before we could bring it to the council, and you’re already on thin ice.”