Chapter 44

Ishould have left hours ago. Thrown my few belongings into a bag, taken a horse, and rode through the night. As if I would be able to pull a few hours of rest before morning with the Black Art's words lingering in my mind, hanging on my heart.

I wrestled with my feelings for Sin—hated myself for growing attached to a man capable of such heinous acts. But never did I mistake him for something he wasn't. The warmth of Sin's touch did not blind me to the coldness of his heart. And I wanted every piece of his frigid black soul anyway, smugness and swords and all.

What a stupid girl.

I was na?ve to think Sin wouldn't hurt me the second he had the opportunity. He even warned me—told me not to trust him. And foolishly, I ignored his cautions, lit my heart on fire and chucked it at him to do with as he pleased.

He is no better than Cathal.

At least Cathal didn't pretend there was anything between us after he learned what I was. He didn't take me to bed, whisper sweet affirmations in my ear, crush my heart with his godsdamned bloody fists.

The Black Art's wickedness runs deeper than Cathal's prejudices.

Sin's very blood is as dark as his heart.

And I wanted to consume it all until my battered lips were swollen with need and my tongue dripping with raven regret.

Stupid, stupid girl.

* * *

The floor quivers with a deep rumbling, the pitcher of water careening off my bedside table, the frames encasing paintings of sweeping landscapes swinging wildly against the wall like a broken pendulum. I'm out of bed, dressed in a tunic and pants, dagger strapped to my thigh in less than a minute.

An explosion.

Another thunderous boom shakes the castle, and my hands break my fall as I tumble sideways on the stairwell. The ceiling creaks as more are roused from their beds, vases topple over on the foyer tables, and flickers of orange lick at the arched windows.

What is happening?

Now flying down the stairs, I barrel through the double doors of the castle's entrance but skid to a screeching stop when I behold the horror before me.

The barracks are on fire.

Blazing curtains of orange and red shroud the quarters as soldiers rush from their beds, clad in nothing but their night wear. Several rush to try to drown the flames with well water, casting bucket after bucket onto the fiery storm. I scan the area—no enemies within the keep, no arrows flying over the wall.

No sign of an attack—perhaps a terrible accident.

The well water does nothing to calm the flames' fury and they climb higher, sneering down at the sweating, frantic men chucking water into their enveloping swells. I'm across the courtyard in a blink, lifting my palms to the rearing wall, willing the fire to bow before me. The flames buckle beneath my magic but don't shrink, refusing to surrender to my will.

I push against them harder. Perspiration beads across my brows, and my lungs cough in protest, but still, I command the inferno to die.

A hand grabs my arm mid-air, and Sin yanks me back a few steps, putting distance between us and the burning buildings.

"It won't go out!" I shout over the barracks now cracking, wood splitting as interior walls begin to fall, smoke filling every open space inside.

He grabs my hand with his, and we channel our magic together, sending our now joined collectives spiraling into the torrid heat.

The flames burn and burn and burn. Unwavering. Unyielding.

Glass shatters at our rear, and I turn in time to see the windows of the castle's western wing blow out as fire now claims that too. We abandon the barracks, running for the castle, and connect our magics again as soon as we halt at the foot of the fire.

"Get everyone out—everyone out now!" Sin bellows to a horde of men now rushing inside, pulling the thin fabric of their nightshirts up over their mouths and noses.

"Why isn't it working?" My body trembles with the force of my power and his, Sin's magic bleeding into my own as we unite against the fire trying to claim our home.

Hishome.

The reminder of Sin's dismissal lashes through me, but I bury it deep. Shoving him into the conflagration won't erase the pain and will only put others still inside at risk. They need his power.

His power that, right now, might as well be nonexistent against the incandescent flames wrecking his stronghold.

Another window shatters outward, this one from the ground level, the fire taking another part of the castle as its own. Dusaro appears at my left and grabs my other hand with his. I try not to recoil as he binds his own inky magic to ours.

"Alchemist fire," he spits as the flames continue to burn and smolder and claim.

Alchemist fire.

Fire birthed from a sacred ritual, and very, very difficult to conjure. Impossible to extinguish with hands other than its creator's. Whoever gave life to these flames didn't do it on a whim—this attack was orchestrated.

We're not putting these flames out. At best, the three of us can hold it here, prevent it from spreading, but our magic has limits. Even Sin, whose collective was blessed by the goddess of the arcane, will falter eventually. I whip towards him to demand a plan and find him tracking the fire's path with his eyes, his mouth silently muttering to himself as he holds his arms out in front of him. He looks over my head at his father, Dusaro's face cast in a hazy red shadow as his lips twist into a smirk at his son's panicked expression.

"Get her out," Sin orders with a slight curl to his lip.

Dusaro chuckles without humor, his eyes creasing in the corners as he shakes his head. "No time, Singard."

"I have to hold it," he snarls, the veins in his forearms bulging as he exerts all his energy into holding the flames steady.

My own arms turn to lead as exhaustion seeps into them, but I hold fast. We can't drop our hold until everyone has been evacuated.

"Get. Her. Out," Sin growls again, his tone rivaling the flames for wrath.

"I told you it would catch up with you," Dusaro drawls. "I'm not going to risk our home crumbling to the ground to take care of your pet. Let her burn," he spits, cold indifference wet on his tongue.

Fury rips across the Black Art's face, his eyes narrowing into slits. Sin's hand clenches around mine as he bares his teeth at his father.

I look between them both, confused and irritated they're choosing now to have a pissing contest while someone is trapped. "Who needs out? Ileana? Where is she?" I demand, panic rising in my voice. If Dusaro won't risk getting her out, I will.

Sin doesn't answer me, no sign he even heard me on his face as he continues to stare down his father, his expression threatening something much worse than alchemist fire.

"SINGARD!" I shout, and his eyes finally drop to mine. "Tell me where she is—I will get her!"

"The gate! Your Grace—the gate has been breached!" Aldred warns from behind us.

From over my shoulder, a small group of about fifteen steps out from a cloud of smoke and ash. Behind them, Sin's guards lay strewn across a now blood-soaked lawn, though no one in the group has their weapons drawn. A woman of small stature stands in front of the rest, clearly their leader, and raises her hand above her head. The air turns rouge as she recalls the fire into her palm, leaving the castle smoking and ruined and bare.

The mother of the flames.

"That's not possible," Dusaro breathes next to me, dropping my hand as we release our joined magics.

"Stand down!" Sin calls to the soldiers now charging the group. None of their hands even flinch towards their weapons, though if they managed to create alchemist fire, I doubt they intend on fighting with steel at all.

Sin and Dusaro rush forward to meet the infiltrators where they stand. The woman in front, the one who commanded the flames, is short in stature with dark wavy hair that falls to her shoulders. A labyrinth of lines and circles drawn in black and white paint is smeared across her rounded face. Behind her, the others all wear similar masks of painted-on geometric shapes slathered across their cheeks and forehead, and again under their eyes. They wear no armor, and the swords and knives hanging from their sides appear well-crafted. This is not Legion.

"Sera," Dusaro murmurs, his voice a mix of awe and disbelief.

"You haven't changed a bit, Dusaro," the woman replies. Her voice is lower than I expected, juxtaposed by the roundness of her cheeks and the feminine slope of her shoulders. Her pine green eyes sweep across Dusaro and rest on Sin who hasn't moved a muscle since calling off his men.

"Singard," she whispers, her deep voice softening around his name. "I've missed you so much."

"Mother," he utters, almost a question, as if he doesn't trust his eyes not to deceive him.

Mother? His mother was murdered, labeled a traitor for marrying Dusaro—a betrayal that was punished with her permanent silence. Judging by the surprise in both Sin's and his father's voices, they believed that to be true.

But now that I study her, I see the resemblance. Her green eyes are a darker shade and rounder than her son's, and her pale skin a stark contrast to the deep umber brown Sin shares with his father. But it's there—in the straightness of her nose and the curve of her lips—she is undeniably Sin's mother.

"How are you here? How… They killed you… they…" Dusaro stammers off, shaking his head as if he could rearrange the thoughts in his mind until they make sense.

"I left, Dusaro. I had a duty to protect my people."

"Protect your people—protect them from what?"

"From you," she drawls, double edged sharpness in her tone.

"I don't understand. We nearly started a war with transcendents because we thought you were dead. We slaughtered an entire army that was formed in response to our actions against them. You allowed us to think that. How could that have helped your people, Sera?"

Never have I heard Dusaro speak with such uncertainty. He stares at—at his wife—as if he hardly recognizes her at all. If it weren't for her apparent disdain towards him, I'd have written her off as being as vile as the rest of them.

"Did you expect I'd be content to stand by and watch as you and Ephraim spread your lies and your hate for my kind? Teaching people to fear us, as if we were the ones inciting violence. Motivating them to kill us before we killed their wives, their children." Sera shakes her head and tsks softly to herself.

"I would have protected you. I always protected you," Dusaro responds, confusion in his tone and his usual sneer replaced with tenderness.

"By hiding me! You stowed me away like some treasure you didn't want to share. That's not protecting me, Dusaro. I was a prisoner." Sera takes a step forward, and every guard around us mirrors her with one of their own.

"And you thought running away, abandoning your son, was better than the life I could have provided you? That's beneath you, Sera, even for one of them," he spits back at her.

She ignores his comment but shifts her attention to Sin. "Son, I wanted to take you with me so badly. Leaving you was the worst part—it's why it took me so long to leave at all. But I knew if I took you, if I let him think they killed both of us, your father would have never stopped coming for them. You had to stay to give your father a reason to use caution. Please understand that, Singard."

"Oh—save your breath, Sera," Dusaro chastises.

I dare another glance to Sin whose face remains expressionless, stoic as he stares at his mother, considering her words and processing this new truth. Legion was birthed in response to the kingdom's prejudices against transcendents. Prejudices that greatly accelerated when it was believed they were responsible for Sera's death. How many people did Sin and his father slay in response to a betrayal that never happened?

"You killed him, didn't you, husband? Did you ever tell our son that?" Sera asks with forced humor in her tone. "That Ephraim wasn't as obsessed with the extinction of my people as you? But you… you were so foolishly blind with rage, you needed to get him out of the way so you could manipulate the crown to do your own bidding? Blaming the assassination on Legion—tsk, tsk, now that's beneath you, Dusaro. My only regret is not seeing your face when Adelphia denied you at the Rite."

Dusaro scoffs and jabs a finger towards her chest, now taking a few steps of his own towards her. "Ephraim was killed by the rebellion," he barks.

"I am the rebellion!" Sera roars back.

Wrath colors Dusaro's face a deep shade of red, while Sin's bronzed face blanches as he makes sense of her words. I fight back the urge to grab his hand, to give him a tiny squeeze to remind him he's not in this alone. But the Black Art made it perfectly clear he needs my comforts no longer when he broke his promise to me, so I pin my hands firmly at my sides.

"What have you done?" Dusaro whispers, rage lowering his voice to a deep, controlled tone.

"What have I done? I spent the last decade and a half building an army. Seeking out those that will fight alongside us, fight for the land we are rightfully owed. We deserve to be free, to run without consequence. Did you really think that little show in the city was a victory? That was a distraction—a necessary sacrifice Cathal and I agreed to long ago, to give us time to slip some of our own inside your keep. And you all were so desperate to lap up Legion blood you ran right at them. They are no longer your concern—I am." Sera is small, but she is a beacon of strength as she addresses the two most powerful men in the realm without an ounce of fear. She is also minutes from having her throat ripped out as her words click in my mind. Legion didn't show up with Cosmina in tow because they never had her.

This bitch did. My eyes zero in on her pulse ticking away in her neck.

"What exactly are you asking of us?" Sin finally speaks, his throat bobbing as he struggles to keep the seal on his emotions in check.

Her face softens again at his voice, and she directs her full attention to her son now. "To release transcendents from your restrictions, your prejudices, your lies. Grant us land to form our own place in Aegidale, to self-govern as we please. We keep to our business and you to yours. We have ideas for treaty lines and trade routes and—"

"That is rich, Sera," Dusaro cuts her off, his light chuckling crescendoing to a deep laughter, and he claps out his amusement.

"If you deny us this, it will mean war. Not the carrying on you've done with Legion over the years—real war. Singard, nothing would cause me greater pain than watching you meet your end early, and certainly not next to him on the battlefield," she says, jerking her chin to motion towards Dusaro. "But I will not protect someone who kills my kind for the sake of running their blood through their hands, even if they are my kin."

My kind.

She doesn't know. His mother doesn't know Sin inherited her transcendence after she left.

"I grew up believing you were murdered in cold blood," Sin says. "I made decisions—I did unspeakable things, Mother—because I believed that." His mask slips as he addresses the woman that left him to be raised by Dusaro. Fled to protect shifters while inadvertently abandoning her own transcendent child to be brought up by the man who hates them most. Every life Sin reaped in her name was a lie. As if he wasn't already struggling to tame that darkness within himself, this truth erases any sense of morality he may have found in his choices.

"I didn't have another option," she responds calmly, but the corners of her eyes fold into creases.

"You could have just left! You chose to manipulate us. To let me think my own mother was brutally killed."

"What choice did I have? You were so young then, Singard, you don't remember. It wasn't safe. Even with your father there to protect me, he was only one person. If Ephraim discovered we were lying beneath his nose, he would have killed both of us for treason. And worse, he wouldn't have taken a chance to see if you inherited the gift. I chose life. Not just for me, but for you. And I'd do it all over again because that's what a mother does—she protects her child!" A tear springs from her eye, and she quickly wipes it away.

"You invade my home, kill my guards, set fire to my castle, and you dare make demands of me?" Sin's hands ball into fists as fury rolls off him in waves thick enough to choke the life from anyone standing too close. And yet, all I want to do is run to him. Throw my arms around his waist and tell him that he is loved.

I dig my feet into the ground.

"We needed the advantage. You wouldn't have listened to us any other way. I did what I had to do," Sera speaks calmly, steeling her spine.

"I ripped people apart in your name. I will do it again," Sin warns, his voice as cold and promising as death itself.

He's taken countless lives in exchange for the loss of his mother's, and now, he vows to reap the souls from their bodies because she lives.

Sera shifts her attention to where I lurk behind them. "I heard rumor there was a bloodwitch in your ranks."

A guttural growl rumbles in Sin's chest.

"Wren, is it? My name is Seraphine. A friend of mine informed me you might be interested in joining us, and I certainly wouldn't refuse someone with your power."

Now it is my throat that releases a warning growl. "Give me my sister, and I'll consider not drinking the blood of your friends from your skull."

A smile stretches across her rounded face. "Now I really wouldn't refuse you an offer," she says with approval. "Legion nor I ever touched your sister. I am surprised actually that someone with your abilities has been manipulated so easily. Perhaps you should have searched a little closer to home while looking for her."

"Leave now," Sin warns, his top lip curling over his teeth.

"Where is she?" I demand, taking a step towards her, magic flowing to my arms instinctually. Sin's mother or not, I will rip the blood from her body, ounce by ounce, until she tells me.

"I wouldn't expect you to believe me. Ask her yourself," she says, waving a hand to the opened gate behind her.

Appearing in the portcullis tunnel, her arm draped over Cornelius's shoulder, Cosmina limps towards us.

Goddess above.

"You traitorous cunt," Dusaro seethes, watching the eldest Langston son help my sister into the keep.

"Give her to me," I snap, rushing towards her.

"We recovered her a few hours ago. After mentioning to Cornelius you believed Legion was hiding your sister, he confirmed with me and what remains of Legion that we didn't have her, nor did we ever. Putting the pieces together was really quite simple if you had just thought about it. But sometimes we don't want to see what's right in front of us."

"This is your final warning. Get. Out. Now." Sin's voice is pure lethal, but Sera doesn't so much as flinch.

"You raise a hand to me and I have enough alchemist fire to burn your entire kingdom to ash," she threatens.

"Try. It," Sin dares between clenched teeth.

"Enough!" I shout. I shove Cornelius out of the way, sling Cosmina's arm over my shoulder, and hoist her weight onto my hip. I bare my teeth at him as I step away, and Cornelius merely gives me a nod as if understanding and expecting my reaction.

"It's okay, sweetie. I have you. You're okay. You're safe—you're safe," I whisper against her head, burying my face in the side of her tangled, black hair that reeks of natural oils and filth. Cosmina's usual fair skin is now a ghastly shade of translucent white, too thin, and pulled tight across her hollowed cheeks. Vibrant shades of plum and garnet strangle her wrists—bracelets I recognize.

She's been shackled in iron, weakening her to the point she can barely walk, just as she found me many years ago in a Legion camp. My sister twists slowly in my arms, turning to look at me, her sky-blue eyes frightened and confused.

"Where have you been?" I ask softly, brushing the hair from her eyes.

She raises a bone white arm and, with a trembling finger, points behind me. "With the Black Art."