The Fiend Queen (42 page)

And Starbride was in her arms. They stood together.

Katya heard a crunch at her feet. Four tiny pyramids littered the ground, leaving Starbride’s body unmarked. Katya kissed her forehead over where the smallest pyramid used to be. “I’m so sorry, Star, if you ever felt anything less than loved.”

Starbride put her arms around Katya’s neck. “Deepest fears from my most inner self,” she said. “Nothing I ever truly thought. Katya, I’m so sorry. I can’t, I can’t even tell you…” She sagged as if her legs wouldn’t hold her.

Katya squeezed her hard and held her up. “I love you, Star. I always will. Just breathe for now and think on that.” She cleared her throat. “It’s done,” she said loudly, making the others turn toward them.

Leafclever and his adsnazi stood arrayed before them, pyramids out. “Then, at last, can you stand out of the way so that we can deal with the monster that still lives inside that pyramid?”

Brutal didn’t move. “Redtrue said you can’t cleanse it yet, not without knowing what it might do to those still connected with Yanchasa.”

Leafclever frowned. “We will not harm someone through magic, you know this. But we can take possession of that artifact in order to insure no one else
is
harmed.”

Brutal looked back to Katya. “Let them through,” she said. She worried that Starbride remained silent, but she knew that shame and guilt had to be hard at work in Starbride’s mind. Katya bit her lip, unsure of the right course. She’d never had to tend to someone who’d just regained their humanity. As if reading her mind, Maia appeared at her side and helped her guide Starbride out of the way.

“Can you still hear its voice?” Katya muttered in Starbride’s ear.

She shook her head. “Katya, how will I ever apologize?”

“They know it wasn’t you. I know. All we need is…” She’d been about to say time, the thing that Starbride had asked for with Yanchasa sharing her head. “All we need is rest.”

Maia pressed in close, and Katya heard her whisper, “Welcome back.” Dawnmother pressed to Starbride’s side and wouldn’t let go. Two of the adsnazi lifted Yanchasa’s pyramid carefully and walked it from the room.

They all tread carefully, nursing wounds. Katya sent Vincent ahead to have his arm seen to. Brutal and the rest of the adsnazi stopped to help their unconscious comrades and to check on the sleeping men and women they’d passed on their way to the fight. At the sight of a charred corpse, Starbride turned her face into Katya’s shoulder.

“Wait,” Starbride said. “What happened to Bea?”

“You mean me,” Roland said.

Katya paused. She couldn’t see him as wholly man or monster, but she couldn’t say that aloud, not with Starbride so near and vulnerable. An inner voice asked how she could forgive one of them and not the other. Katya frowned so hard it threatened to become a snarl. Starbride hadn’t killed Ma.

When Katya turned to Roland, his face shifted through several expressions, and she worried he might have another fit of madness.

He breathed deep. “When you offered me the Aspect again, I knew what I had to do. There was nothing left of that girl. When I saw her, I remembered. I had to stop me.”

Starbride sobbed a laugh. “You’re a very good actor.”

“As leader of the Order, you have to be.”

Katya had said that a few times. She clenched her jaw and fought the urge to identify with him. He held his pyramid out, and Katya plucked it from his palm.

Hugo put an arm around his shoulders and led him away.

“Bea told me a story about eating too many berries with her brother,” Starbride said.

Katya had to swallow bile. “That’s one of my father’s stories, when he and Roland were children.” Before Maia could follow Hugo, Katya caught her arm. “Roland has to go back in his cell.” Maia’s face hardened, but Katya shook her head. “You can stay with him or bring him something to make him more comfortable, but he cannot go free, Maia. You know that.”

She nodded and followed on her brother’s heels. Freddie replaced her, joining those clustered around Starbride. “You can’t blame them,” he said. “Both Maia and Hugo always hoped their father could be saved.”

“But there are some deeds you can never come back from,” Starbride said. “I should know.” Katya hugged her closer.

As they began the climb up the disorderly steps, Katya noticed Redtrue, Castelle, and Riverwise stayed with her rather than go with the adsnazi. “What did Leafclever mean?” Katya asked. “About you not knowing what it meant to help me?”

Redtrue looked away, but Riverwise sighed. “By choosing forbidden magic, we are no longer adsnazi.”

Katya stopped and half turned. Even Starbride looked at them with wide eyes. “Wait, you’re not…”

“You’re exiled?” Starbride asked.

“No one can bar me from Allusia,” Redtrue said with a sniff. When Katya continued to stare, Redtrue stiffened, a challenging look on her face. “And just because I cannot call myself adsnazi does not mean I will conform to pyradisté ways.”

Katya knew anger covering grief when she saw it, and she sensed that now wasn’t the best time to thank Redtrue for what she’d done. Maybe there would never be a good time for that, not if it meant reminding her of what it cost. Maybe she could have a word with Leafclever later, or maybe Da could.

“I think I might learn Farradain magic,” Riverwise said.

Redtrue stared at him as if he’d just lit himself on fire. “You will remain close to me,” she said slowly. He grinned into her glower, and Katya thought she might have met her match, or at least had someone who might distract her from her current predicament. Either way, Katya put it out of her mind. She had Starbride to take care of first.

Starbride

Starbride tuned out the conversations around her. She kept seeing the burnt corpse in the hallway, kept imagining the hundreds she’d killed outside the city walls. She’d let Yanchasa out. How could she have been so stupid?

She knew what Katya would say: “Place the blame where it belongs.”

Could she ever experience the adsna anymore? She couldn’t bring herself to try. She’d have to practice magic the way she had before, with a different pyramid for each task, as blind and deaf to the flow of the adsna as any other pyradisté, unless the adsnazi could teach her differently. They might refuse. She wouldn’t blame them if they did. Horsestrong preserve her, she’d hurt so many people!

Now she understood what Maia had told her about missing the Fiend’s power. Not the desire to kill or the imperious coldness, but the freedom from consequence.

Starbride felt a tug at her consciousness, and it took her breath away. Yanchasa’s voice was too faint to hear, but she knew what he wanted, what he could give her, the promise of power. She could be free again. All was not lost.

She thought of what Roland had done, his denial of power. The path to redemption began by saying no to the thing that had first led them astray. Starbride brushed Yanchasa’s lingering essence away and tightened her grip on Katya.

Maia and Brutal caught up to them at the door to Starbride’s apartment. He reported that none of the sleeping monks or adsnazi appeared to be seriously injured. He didn’t mention the one she’d killed, but the image wouldn’t leave her mind. Maia wrung her hands, seeming much closer to the young girl she’d been before the troubles started. When Brutal finished speaking, she flung her arms around Katya and Starbride both.

They staggered, and just as Starbride began to put her arms around Maia, Maia kissed both their cheeks and stepped back. “I didn’t want you to think I was angry with you, Katya, because of my father. I just wanted you to know that I love you. That seemed important to say right now.”

Starbride had to smile, and she bet Katya did the same.

“And,” Maia said, “life’s too short to keep secrets. I’m pregnant with Darren’s baby.”

Starbride felt Katya stiffen. She didn’t think she’d heard complete silence before that moment. She knew that particular secret, and she was still surprised.

“Um,” Katya said, and Starbride thought she did rather well to get anything out at all.

“You don’t have to say anything,” Maia said. “We’ll work it out.”

By the sweet smile Brutal gave her, Starbride knew two things: she’d already told him, and she wouldn’t be a parent alone.

“Since we’re all telling secrets,” Freddie said. “I was once convicted of murder and hanged.”

They all breathed out a not-quite laugh, the tension deflating. Starbride tugged on Katya’s arm. “And we’re going to get married.”

Katya slid her thumb across Starbride’s chin. “We haven’t had a year of consortship yet.”

“Darkstrong take propriety. We’ll marry whenever we want.”

Dawnmother hugged her other side. “Horsestrong couldn’t have said it better.” She waved at the rest of them. “Rest. Eat.”

Starbride was stumbling by the time they got inside the sitting room. Once inside the bedroom, Katya had to half-carry her, and she passed out fully dressed on top of the covers, barely aware of Katya undressing her and putting her between the sheets.

*

Starbride’s eyes flew open, and panic gripped her heart until she reached out and found Katya asleep beside her. She’d been dreaming of snow-capped peaks and the screams of dying men, but they didn’t have the clarity of Yanchasa’s memories. Just another nightmare she’d have to live with.

She eased back into the pillows, watching Katya sleep by the light of the moon streaming through the window. Stars sparkled in the clear night sky, the snow done for the time being.

Idyllic really, and she knew she should relax into it, keep the calm while she could, but now that she was awake—her heart still pounding—she itched to be up. Even though she’d gotten no rest with Yanchasa, she felt as if she’d slept for far too long.

She dressed in the dark and tiptoed from the room. Dawnmother had left a bowl of dried figs and nuts on the table next to a lantern, just in case. Starbride smiled, and her stomach growled. She hadn’t needed to eat much with Yanchasa around. She bolted a few pieces of fruit and put more in her pocket before she sneaked from the room, careful not to wake anyone.

Once out, though, she was lost. What were her choices? Walk the halls like a ghost, fully immersed in the wrongs she’d committed? Venture out into the cold, but to do what? She suddenly craved someone who understood, who’d felt this restless energy, the fight between wanting to do something good and wanting to collapse into a puddle and wallow in guilt.

Roland would know. Whether he could offer advice or not, he would know her feelings as well as she did. But how to get through the dungeon door without a Fiend?

She paused in the dark hallway, torn. She supposed Yanchasa might have left enough residue on her soul to get her through, but she’d hate to take the long walk only to have to come back unsatisfied. She kept picturing Roland’s face as he turned on Bea—no,
himself
—in order to help her. He’d resisted the temptation to reclaim power long after it had been stripped from him. It had been easy to do when she’d been exhausted, but later, if it ever happened again? She needed to ask him how he’d managed it.

Starbride hurried to Hugo’s room. He answered the door while clutching a robe around himself. “Miss Starbride?” he asked cautiously.

She breathed a laugh. “It’s me. I need your help. I need to see your father.”

“One second.” He made as if to slip inside but eased back out. “To do magic?”

It hurt, but she couldn’t blame him. “No, I promise. I just need to talk to someone who, um…”

He nodded and threw some clothes on before joining her in the hall. They didn’t speak for most of the trip, but she couldn’t help glancing at him from the corner of her eye.

“I’m sorry, Hugo,” she said softly, just before they reached the dungeon.

He sighed a laugh. “You knew I’d forgiven you before you said that, right? There’s little I wouldn’t forgive you for.”

She was tempted to ask what but squeezed his hand instead. “You are one of my dearest friends, I hope you know that.” Tears threatened to choke her, and her vision swam.

He clutched her fingers and leaned in, planting a quick kiss on her lips. “I hope you will do me the honor of letting me escort you on your wedding day.”

She wiped away the few tears that had managed to make their way out. “Let them try to stop us.” The words sounded too close to something she would have said with Yanchasa sharing her head, and she shuddered.

When they found the dungeon door ajar, Starbride paused. Hugo glanced at her, and they stepped through together. Soft voices led them to Roland’s cell. Einrich stood over his brother, a dagger in one hand, and Starbride wondered if that was revenge or mercy in his rigid shoulders.

Starbride waved Hugo back the way they’d come, but he stared at the dagger. Starbride pushed until he waited by the door.

“Did a part of you want to help Starbride and get your Fiend back?” Einrich asked.

“You should kill me,” Roland said.

“For what you’ve done, or because you might do it again?”

Roland’s face jerked up, and his eyes pinned Starbride to the wall. Einrich didn’t seem to notice the glance. Maybe he thought Roland was staring at shadows.

“You’re awake because you miss your wife,” Roland said.

Einrich let out a slow breath. “Yes.”

“I killed her, my own sweet sister-in-law. I killed a lot of people. But now I’m free.” His eyes seemed to plead. “Free to die. I abandoned my duty for power. Everything I’ve done since doesn’t matter.”

Einrich knelt and brought the dagger close to Roland’s throat. “Did you let it in, Roland? Did you invite it? Do you want it back?”

“It’s not like that,” Starbride said softly.

Einrich stood and whirled, face thunderous with a hint of panic. Starbride had never seen his emotions so naked. He held the dagger up as if to fend her off.

Starbride held her hands up so he could see her empty palms. As she stepped inside, she waved to Hugo to stay where he was. “Yanchasa saw everything I ever wanted or ever felt insecure about. Every slight became a monument to insult. And that was with the
thinking, reasoning
human behind the power. What you have, what Roland had, is the most monstrous side of Yanchasa’s personality. You don’t invite that in so much as it barges in and takes over.” Both Roland and Einrich stared at her now, and they looked so much alike. She’d thought so before, but it was easier to see without Roland carrying Yanchasa’s Aspect. Now Einrich was the more dangerous one.