My eyes burned with held-in tears. Ada and Veronique were there, too. They both looked pale. Fresh cuts dripped blood from their arms and legs. Angry bruises covered their faces. Grief weighed down my soul.
No, not Ada and Veronique.
More figures stepped forward. This time, the Fantomes led the Creation Casters. Rowan’s guard. They were bloodied, gagged, and chained in a long row.
Gods-damn it. There’s no way we can survive this.
The Tsar gestured around him. “Now, this if what I call true beauty. A Royal house smashed to rubble. My enemies chained and near death.” He rounded on me. “And my greatest foe about to die.”
I lifted my chin. “If you’re going to do it, do it. I’m right here.”
“Ah, now that’s the tricky part, isn’t it? Didn’t you ever wonder why the Sire and Lady had you put me into exile instead of murder me outright?” The Tsar lifted his dagger and rested it again my cheek. I tried to fight my way free. The Fantome behind me still held me tightly, though.
So this is it. Torture. Just like the Vicomte. I won’t let him see me weep.
I forced my features into a semblance of calm as the Tsar slowly cut a line down my cheek. Pain burned down my skin… Until I saw what was happening to the Tsar. A line of blood appeared on his face as well. Shock rolled through me. I couldn’t focus on anything outside of the red mark on the Tsar’s skin.
“That’s a trick.”
“No, that’s a fact. Our magick is too similar. Whenever I try to hurt you, I hurt myself. Which is why I can’t destroy you, but I could send you into exile.” He tapped his chin as if seriously considering this option. “But I won’t.” He raised his dagger again. “Instead, I’ll ask one of your own to do the honors.” He pointed at Veronique. “Bring her here.”
Veronique barely stood upright in her rags, with her head lolling from side to side. I flashed an angry look at the Tsar. “Leave her be.”
“Oh, I can’t do that. Someone besides myself must be your executioner.”
A pair of Fantomes dragged Veronique over to stand before me. One of them roughly pulled the gag from her mouth. Up close, Veronique looked deathly pale and bleary-eyed, a faint shell of the fierce girl she’d once been.
The Tsar stalked over to her. “Do you understand what I want you to do, girl?”
Her voice was a harsh rasp. “Yes.”
The Tsar cut loose Veronique’s hands and set the dagger onto her palm. “Then slit her throat while the others watch.”
Across the darkened rubble, Ada fell onto her knees, her face streaked with tears.
So much time. All my work. And now, Ada would watch me die, right before the Tsar killed her, too.
I locked gazes with Veronique. If I was about to die with an audience, at least I could do it with dignity. “Go on.”
“I can’t.” Veronique looked to the Tsar, her heads wide and pleading. “You forgot something.”
The Tsar sniffed in disgust. “What could I have possibly have missed?”
Veronique’s gaze turned sly. Her stance straightened despite her battered body. She mouthed six words so I only I could see them.
I still have a bone crawler.
My eyes widened as I realized the truth. Mother Superior had put a bone crawler in all my new Sisters right before they left the Midnight Cloisters, Veronique included. The Tsar was so concerned with his all-powerful Fantomes he must have forgotten.
Voices rose among the Fantomes. I recognized more of the ones I’d possessed starting toward us at a run. They were trying to help by causing a distraction. The Tsar swung around to face them. “What’s all this?”
Acting with a speed I hadn’t thought possible, Veronique lifted the knife to her shoulder, sliced a line in her skin, and tore out the creature. She dropped the wriggling bone crawler into my hands.
Instantly, fresh power slammed into me, stronger than ever before. Hybrid magick lit up my body with more strength and energy than I ever thought possible. I merely shrugged my shoulders, but the motion was so laden with magick the Fantome behind me was thrown across the rubble into the darkness.
The Tsar looked back at me and roared with rage. He raised his arm. The bones there glowed so brightly it was almost blinding. “I hold all the Necromancer power! It is mine! You are nothing.” A great column of purple smoke stretched across the ground. When the haze cleared, the earth was covered in skeleton warriors. Only, they were unlike any fighters I’d ever seen before.
The bones of the Tsar’s army were twisted into odd shapes. Spines bristled with spikes. Bone swords and clubs replaced their hands. Many had overlarge heads filled with jagged teeth. Thick hides of violet alligator skin acted as armor. A chill of fear ran up my neck. These were a mixture of skeleton and animal, bone and skin. Hybrid magick.
The Tsar pointed directly at me. “Kill her!”