“This is what you wanted, isn’t it?” Dahlen extended his right hand toward Seotra as if he were commanding him to stop, and Rhee watched in horror and fascination as electricity gathered in the base of his palm. It was the ring, Fontisian technology at work. Tiny surges flared outward like the veins in a leaf, seemingly grabbing energy in the air and burning it, converting the air to forks of blue and white flame.
“Stop,” Rhee said. The stream of smokeless fire wrapped Seotra up and lifted him off the ground, folding him nearly in two, as he moaned in pain. “STOP!” She sprang to tackle Dahlen. But she crashed into a wall of air, clear but firm—and it wouldn’t let her get to him.
“He is a war criminal,” Dahlen said. “He deserves what he gets.”
“Stop! Stop! Stop!” Rhee was screaming so hard her voice was raw. She ran again and again for Seotra, trying to break the invisible barrier, but it was impossible. She was bruised, thrown backward off her feet as if she were running into a solid wall. And finally, mercifully, Dahlen did stop. The Regent collapsed backward, his mouth dark with blood, his clothing smoking.
“Why?” Rhee couldn’t help it. She was crying now. “Why?”
“He does not deserve your tears,” Dahlen said coldly. “He betrayed the order, and he betrayed you.”
Seotra struggled to sit up. “I’ve made peace with your Elder, boy!”
“And what of all the souls you took?” Dahlen asked. “You can’t make peace with the dead.”
Seotra shook his head and looked at Rhee. “I never betrayed you.”
“You betrayed my family,” she said, but as the words came out she felt uncertainty gripping her. Her skin felt tight. That smile she’d seen . . . the words she’d overheard . . . fragments, really. What did they mean?
“That’s what you think?” He was consumed by a hacking cough that brought up more black blood. “I swear on my life, Rhiannon. I loved your family like my own. I’ve wanted to speak with you for so long. So many memories I wanted you to see. I’ve been trying to protect you. I’ve been—”
The words died in his throat. Dahlen held up a hand again, and the Regent began to seize. Sparks danced from his body. Fire flowed like a ribbon tying Dahlen and Seotra together. Then Seotra’s body burst into sudden flame. He mumbled, but Rhee couldn’t hear, couldn’t understand. Only one phrase reached her:
“Ma’tan sarili!” he yelled.
In a single second, Seotra’s body began to crumble, the fire eating away at his edges until his face and eyes and shock-white hair disappeared into black. He dropped like sands of an hourglass, into a tiny mountain of ash on the gray floor.
He hadn’t even screamed.
Rhee looked at Dahlen. “How dare you.” She tasted ash on her tongue.
“He was not a good man,” Dahlen said, his tone flat and expressionless as always. He opened his palm, and the ring gave off blue sparks before it turned black again. Dahlen’s hand was badly burned. “He held my Elder hostage for years, but not before he commanded the slaughter of one monastery in the order. The very home of my family . . .”
“You know this boy?” Tai Reyanna’s voice was practically a whisper, but it still startled Rhee. She turned and saw her adviser limping toward them through the wreckage. “This fanatic?”
Rhee felt as if she were the one who’d been incinerated. All of her beliefs were smoke. They’d all blown apart. For the last nine years she knew Seotra had been responsible for her family’s deaths. And now she couldn’t even trust herself to tell left from right or up from down. “Dahlen saved my life.”
“He killed the Regent. An ally to your family. The one man trying to keep peace—”
“This man did not believe in peace,” Dahlen said. His eyes were dark and unreadable. “He’s a murderer who has never atoned for his sins. But Vodhan will be his judge.”
“Your precious Vodhan,” Tai Reyanna said with so much hatred that it transformed her features to someone Rhee didn’t recognize. “There is no god that could help a soul as rotten as yours.”
A crash sounded above them. Footsteps rattled the lights in their glass casing.
“Tasinn.” Dahlen turned to Tai Reyanna. “You called them.”
“You called them yourself,” Tai Reyanna snapped. “Or did you imagine that you could burn half the library without anyone remarking on it?” Rhee’s heart felt as if it might jump straight out of her chest—the footsteps were closer now, and if they were caught here, with the remains of Seotra . . . “If your god exists, I hope your punishment is slow and vengeful.”
Rhee took a step backward. Panic welled inside of her. “I can’t be caught,” she said.
“No, Rhee, you’re safe now.” Tai Reyanna’s voice was gentler this time. “Your guard is coming.”
“Veyron was part of my guard, and he betrayed me,” Rhee said. “I must go.”
Tai Reyanna caught her arm. “Go? With this murderer?”
“She has no other choice,” Dahlen said. “I can better serve her than you can.”
Both were true: He was a murderer, and she had no choice.
If Seotra hadn’t been responsible for her family’s deaths, her would-be assassin was still out in the universe, roaming free.
Tai Reyanna pulled Rhee into a fierce hug, whispering an old blessing into her hair. “May the ancestors be with you.”