Chapter 33

CHAPTER 33

ELODIE

Pain coursed through Elodie's body.

Each time she thought she had managed to gain some sort of equilibrium, had managed to reach a place where she was balanced precariously on the edge and might be able to reclaim some sense of herself, or perhaps even grab a scrap of her power, the darkness surrounding her resurged, swallowing her down again.

It was far more than the power of shadow-wrought steel. More than anything she had encountered before.

Someone had made this, created this – a spell which riddled the black manacles and collar, twisting the old magic's light and dark, blending the two and switching them back and forth in a whirlwind of pure chaos – just for her. Someone who could turn the magic she thought she knew so well inside out.

Sassone couldn't have done this. Not on his own. This was witchkind magic, but Elodie had never encountered anything so vicious. Not even the rebel witchkind or the College of Winter would willingly do this, not even the Sisterhood of the Nox. This was magic twisted and corrupted. And there was nothing Elodie could do to counter it.

Agony blinded her, smothered her voice and deadened her senses. All was pain.

The cold black power eating away at her wouldn't relent. It sucked all the light from her, chilled her to the core and there was nothing she could do. It had been made to do this, designed with her power in mind, targeting her alone. She was helpless in the face of it and the Nox's laughter echoed through her head.

Finally , it seemed to say, finally you're mine. And the girl will be next.

Wren…her face, pale and frightened but still determined, still so perfectly stubborn, swam up out of the shadows and pleaded with Elodie to fight, tried to help her, even when Elodie told her to run. But Elodie was nothing now. Once a queen, once a witch, she was barely clinging onto herself.

There was only one way she could still protect Wren.

Give Sassone what he wanted. A confession.

Whatever he wanted her to confess. She didn't know. She just needed it to stop.

If she could just catch her breath for even a second. Even a breath. If she could just…

They had erected a pyre in the top of the walls, a great stack of kindling and firewood. In the middle a single wooden post rose like a finger pointing at the sky. As they dragged her up the steps she could smell oil and tar.

Given to the flames…this was what it meant. Burned alive, choking, blistering, dying, consumed by the one thing that ought to give her strength. She was lost.

The light overhead was dim and night was already falling. Even if she could reach her magic, the dawn was hours away. The moon wasn't due to rise tonight.

Panic raced along her veins like acid, careening through her. The wind cut at her skin like knives and she saw the lower city spreading out beneath her. The palace was so far away, a white shining thing on the hill, out of reach. There was a noise outside the gates of Castel Sassone, the sound of war. She knew it too well to forget it. Looking down, she could see them now. The Knights of the Aurum, still faithful to her…Horses and men circling, siege weapons being readied.

She hadn't dared to hope they would come. But it was still too late.

Elodie knew this place. It had always been here, the stronghold of the Tarryns. And it was impenetrable.

A fortress as strong as the palace complex above it, and Sassone had made sure to keep it in perfect order, all his line had. They were no fools. The walls were tall and thick, not overlooked from the nearby buildings, offering no position to attack easily. All her knights could try to do was break through the gates and scale those walls, so securely defended. They would have to fight their way to her.

They would never be in time. That must be Sassone's intention. Her knights would watch her die long before they reached her.

And they wouldn't be the only ones. The whole city was watching. She could feel them, her people, some terrified, some angry, some curious and some delighted…those whose hearts were filled with hate, who blamed her for everything.

Rightly perhaps. She had taken the crown. Oh she had been young and na?ve, but she had sworn vows and promised to protect them. And all she had done was plunge them into war.

They might have won it, but that was no victory of hers. She had been long gone.

No wonder they hate you , said the voice inside her which might have been the Nox, or the Aurum, or her own conscience. You are a traitor. You always were.

The Ilanthian embassy was in sight, all gleaming walls and gold-topped towers, pennants flying to show that royalty was in residence. Were they watching too? Was Leander even now looking on in triumph? He had everything he wanted now. She was going to die.

And Finn? Was he there? Poor Finn, so hopelessly lost between his heart and his duty and his blood…

But he'd protect Wren, surely. He had to.

The wooden pole, as thick as a tree trunk, struck her back as she was pushed against it, and her arms, still chained, were dragged up and secured above her head. The guards fell back, releasing her as if reluctant to touch her rather than eager for her death.

One of them muttered something. It sounded like a prayer, a plea to the Aurum to help them all. And well he might pray, she thought. He might not like what he was doing but that didn't stop him doing it.

Roland was coming. He would be too late for her. But not too late to exact his vengeance.

His retribution would fall on each and every one of them and it would never be satiated. Roland de Silvius, her Roland, her love…he'd break the world apart with grief to have found her and lost her again.

Below her, the city fell to an eerie silence. Faces looked up at her, so small and lost in the encroaching darkness. Waiting. They were waiting. They were as helpless as she was.

She had to protect Wren. That was all that mattered. Whatever the outcome here, she had to protect Wren.

Once more, she struggled to free herself, fighting through the agony crawling along her limbs, through every spasming muscle. Her vision blurred, the edges eaten away with night.

And then she saw him, far below her, Roland, still dressed in the ceremonial armour from the trial, gilded and etched with patterns of flames, and not even the slightest bit practical. It made him beautiful. More than beautiful. Great light, he was everything she might have hoped to see as her last vision. Her Roland. He was older than in her dreams, harder than ever, but he was still the one thing she wanted. The one thing she missed about life here. The only thing…

She still ached for him.

Tears scalded Elodie's face as she stared at him, as she studied the expression on his face, the traces of fear, the anger, the wrath…

‘Aeryn of Asteroth has a confession to make,' Sassone roared through the horrified silence encircling Pelias. ‘Hear her and witness her execution.'

‘Tarryn,' Roland shouted back. No title anymore, no honorifics. He wouldn't sully his lips with them. ‘Don't do this. Let her go and?—'

‘Hear her confession,' the earl shouted over him and turned to her. His face had turned florid, spit flecking at the corners of his mouth. Was he deranged? Enchanted? Or simply driven by lust for power and other delusions? ‘Speak, woman.'

Elodie drew in a shaking breath but as she opened her mouth another spear of pain lanced through the whole length of her body. Laughter echoed in her ears, distant and invisible, but still there.

They'll burn you, and scatter your ashes as you burned and scattered me. You will be nothing but a hated memory.

The metal was an icy fire on her skin, as if the Nox threaded itself through it. No, she thought. She couldn't give it the satisfaction. Wren would be safe by now, surely? The boy would have got her clear, taken her back out the way she came in. Elodie hadn't meant a word she'd said. Wren was hers and would always be hers. She'd needed to make sure she left.

From somewhere she found her voice. It was thin and agonised but it was hers. That was all she had left now. Her voice.

Elodie locked eyes with Roland, down below her, staring up helplessly. He was saying something to the men around him, still issuing orders, but he never tore his gaze away from her. He held his horse in check, the beast straining beneath him. Nightbreaker, strapped to his back, sang out to her, the Aurum's light in it trying to give her strength. And perhaps it did.

‘I am Aeryn,' Elodie shouted, her voice rising on the wind. ‘I am the trueborn queen of Asteroth, the Chosen of the Aurum. Everything I have done, everything they accuse me of, was done in defence of my people, my kingdom and in service of the great light.'

She glanced at the Earl of Sassone, who was opening and closing his mouth in disbelief. ‘Your confession?—'

Elodie shook her head. ‘That's all I have to say. Were you…' The pain surged back, clawing inside her, tearing her apart, but she didn't care. She smiled through it. ‘Were you expecting something more?'

He snarled a curse at her, violent and final. ‘Very well, perhaps your child will be more cooperative. I'll soon bend her to my will.'

Elodie bit her lip until she tasted blood and scowled at him. She made sure her voice carried again. Let them all hear. Let them know the truth at last. If she couldn't protect Wren it was all for nothing anyway. ‘What…child? I have no child.'

Sassone grabbed the torch from the guard beside him. The flames turned his face scarlet and black, sweat gleaming. ‘This is your last chance, witch.'

Elodie lifted her face to the sky, feeling the faint touch of the last rays of light lingering on her skin like a lover's caress. Roland was there, but he was too far away. She had no magic left to her.

A dreadful boom filled the air and the wall below her shook. A battering ram? He had a battering ram. Elodie almost laughed. Roland was going to tear this place apart, bring down the gates and the walls and anything in his path to reach her. Because he was Roland, her Roland.

And he would always try to save her.

Too late , the voice that taunted her seemed to say. Far too late.

Sassone thrust the flaming torch into the pyre, which caught in an instant. He knew what he was doing. Perhaps she wasn't the first woman he had burned.

The boom of the battering ram again, shouts of rage, the crackle of flames, and the pain, the endless waves of pain coming one after the other. They swirled to a crescendo and then one sound cut through them all.

A scream, high and desperate, so scared…a voice which had brought Elodie running no matter what was happening to her for twenty years now. A sound she would always put first. Wren's voice, Wren's scream, and all around the darkness howled in triumph. Wind whipped around Elodie, lashing her hair across her face, but all it did was fan the flames underneath her. Smoke rose, black and choking, and even as she reached for the light the flames ought to embody, the metal turned cold as ice and the smoke closed on her, smothering her.

Wren was down there somewhere and all the light left in Elodie's world rushed to the girl's command. And all the darkness too.

They would all know what Wren was. They would all see.

Everything Elodie had done, all she had given up, had been in vain. She screamed, her voice breaking as she threw back her head, trying to warn Wren, trying to stop her and failing.

A terrible crash told her the gates had shattered, either the ram itself or helped by Wren's power, Elodie no longer knew. There was no magic left to reach for, no light, nothing.

Hooves thundered on stone, and Elodie saw the flash of a sword, a line of pure white light arcing through the night. The heat beneath her was unbearable and she was locked in the cold embrace of shadow-wrought steel. Fire caught on her skirts, rising around her, and she tried to take its light, tried to use it to protect herself, but the enchanted metal sucked that away in a moment and turned it back on her in agony. It was voracious and unstoppable, this spell. It would devour her.

She was lost. Darkness surged up around her and Elodie felt the last glimmer of light in her heart flicker out.

And Roland… her Roland…

The sword crashed against the post above her head, severing the chains holding her there. She slumped, falling towards the flames, helpless to stop herself. Her meagre strength was gone, the fight in her all but done. But strong arms seized her and pulled her clear. Someone hauled her over the withers of a horse and they were moving again, riding through the night. Hooves struck stone and the stone walls of the fortress fell away.

A body clothed in metal held her against him like she was something precious. And his voice…she knew his voice…

‘Elodie?' he panted, adrenaline and exertion making him breathless. Or maybe that was fear. But he had never been afraid. Not her Roland. Never. ‘Elodie, can you hear me?'

She tried to answer, tried to find words, but there were no words and there was no more air in her lungs. Only smoke and shadows, only darkness. She had failed to protect Wren and now they all knew.

There was nothing else she could do. She had lost and the Nox had won. That was all she knew.

Elodie finally let the pain take her into unconsciousness.