And so my muscles relaxed.
I watched as a bit of tension fell from Mira’s shoulders, her casting wavering just enough. She thought I wasn’t going to put up a fight, and she had unconsciously allowed herself to mirror her opponent’s stance.
You never were as good as your brother. Marius would never make that mistake.
My right hand shot up to grasp the hilt of her dagger, and then I jerked it away. The cords of my muscles bunched under the strain, my arm was shaking just to keep the blade at a distance, but it was enough. My casting had strengthened my grip.
I overcame her hold. Her eyes flared in panic.
I’m second only to Darren. You never stood a chance.
My second casting took off. The projection struck against the core of my magic like flint against steel.
There was an explosion of light, so bright the entire square was nothing but white, and then a bolt of lightning shot out of the cloudless sky, striking the woman in the center of her chest.
The same casting she had used on my brother.
I watched the woman fall.
Mira’s blade disintegrated into the air like ash. I ripped yet another scrap of cloth to serve as a bandage around my neck.
I should feel something.
The woman was just lying there, sputtering on her last shaky breath, coughing up blood.
Her ribs were rising and falling, but she couldn’t even speak. She was dying.
She had killed Derrick. She had been Blayne’s right hand. She was responsible for the deaths of hundreds, and thousands to come. I had dreamt about this moment for months, watching her in the palace, suffering in the dungeons, wanting to be the one to lock hands around her neck.
I wanted to feel elation or justice, something to make this moment different, something to make the act momentous.
Her eyelids fluttered shut as her chest stopped moving.
My brother’s murderer was dead. I had killed for the first time with intention, and what did I have to show for it?
Shards like a vine of thorns closed in around my throat. It made no sense. I didn’t understand why I was so numb, why I felt nothing when someone so vile was dead.
I wondered if I had lost too much to care, or if the glory of revenge belied the truth that nothing could take back what we had lost. This was but a small stitch in a wound that wouldn’t heal.
And then my boot caught on one of the villagers’ outstretched arms.
I had forgotten. Mira had stolen from them, too.
I knelt down, swallowing past bile and guilt as I pushed the limb to the side.
Heat rose in my chest and there was a roaring in my ears.
So you do feel something.
I could have stopped her. They had only been following the Crown’s orders.
But you thought she was him.
I had been so overwhelmed with the possibility of Darren, that I had been too afraid to lift a finger in my defense. I had let the woman slaughter a small village because I thought Darren had come after me.
Thirty lives gone in the blink of an eye.
Thirty more to my conscience. A number I could never amend.
You can’t hesitate again.
I bit down on the inside of my cheek, tasting warm, coppery blood. My fear had caught up to me, two weeks on the run. I needed to acknowledge the truth before it cost more unnecessary lives.
This wasn’t my story anymore; it was theirs.
I made my way, limping past the bodies, using a fallen polearm to nudge their limbs aside. A part of me wanted to light a funeral pyre, but I didn’t have the time, and it would draw attention I couldn’t afford.
I’m sorry. I took a long breath and exhaled slowly, taking in their faces one last time. It wasn’t the apology they deserved, but it was the only one I had.
I wouldn’t make the same mistake twice.
*
The next two days were worse than before. My wrist wasn’t fractured—just severely bruised, thank the gods—but between it, the festering wound on my leg without proper treatment, and the hunger pangs, I was making slower progress than I should.
The fifth morning, a raging fever broke out and I couldn’t even make it astride my horse. That same day, I reached the bandit camp from my year before serving the Ferren’s Keep regiment. For a moment, there was hope—supplies, food, people.
But the place was deserted. Not so much as a crumb remained behind. A part of me had hoped Nyx would deploy her men to the settlement. It was remote, and if the king had dispersed patrols and the Crown’s Army to the borders, it would make sense.
But no one was there.
I tried not to think what that meant for the rebels.
I had been so sure they would be here. In our talks, Nyx had promised to keep my brother and Ella safe at all costs. I’d thought for sure she would have sent them away the moment their spy sent word of what had gone down in the capital. Or at least when they heard the news that Blayne was dead and the Crown’s Army was still marching on Caltoth and hunting the rebels.
I would have taken the main road had I not been so sure I would find them here.