"Donât you dare tell me to go!â Anna roars. âYou think Iâm going to let you die here? After you shot my boyfriend? After you did this shit to my mom? Fuck you! You owe me! You donât get to die!â
âSerendura,â Ssrin says, heads looking at one another, laughing in her own khai way, âIâll go to hell.â
âHell canât have you until Iâm through!â
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âYou paid me because I worked for you,â I say, matching Giseleâs chill. âAnd you worked me to the bone for pennies, so I couldnât afford to leave.â
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âI think I get it now,â I announce with an air of discovery. âYouâre what happens when an encyclopedia wishes on a star to be a real boy, if that encyclopedia was also an absolute prick.â
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"The dagger flashed its light, illuminating the landscape to the heavens. The darkness vanished. And so did the dragon.
You switched it off, hesitating to place it back in its sheath. Good thing. The dragon was instantly back again, larger and fiercer than before.
Backing off, you attempted the same move again. Foolishly. The result was no different. As long as the dagger emitted its photons, the dragon was gone. As soon as it switched off, the dragon was immediately back.
âThey found light sitting in a room,â you heard the voice of your Coach echoing in your mind. âLight, would you like to meet darkness?â
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"Until the dragon reaches Eden, it is still a dragon.â
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âEveryone dies, little Prince. Everyone. But if we die to make tomorrow better, itâs worth it! Thatâs what I say to the ruins of Kutulbha. Thatâs what I say to Abduâs dead mother. Thatâs what I tell myself, when my guilt runs up my throat and fills my nose.â
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"That aside, out of curiosity,â the Red Mage smirked, âhas that speech ever actually worked?â
The Black Queen breathed out, and in a moment she went from tired girl only a few years older than them to razor-sharp killer. It was in the eyes, in the way she held herself. She had the poise of someone used to taking lives.
âNo,â she said. âBut Iâll try with the next batch anyway. Sixth timeâs the charm, right?â
"Youâve seen Iâm prepared,â Catherine Foundling said. âYouâve seen I have the muscle to put you down. But I didnât put on the fancy hat to kill kids. So please, I beg you â donât make me.â
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Find someone who loves you the way my girlfriend pushes me off a cliff. Without hesitation. With full confidence in your abilities, with the rocksteady belief that your relationship can handle it, and with complete faith that when you come out of the water, assuming you survive, you will totally forgive them for the push. Almost certainly forgive them. Probably.
Bonus points if you find someone with enough chutzpah to say Bon voyage while they do it.
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"Why?â
She turned, met pale brown eyes with golden ones. Because you are my past made man, she thought. There is no pit in Creation deep enough I could bury you in it. Because I loved a girl as a sister, once. I murdered her, and a thousand other sisters since. Where does it end? If no one kills me, where does it end?
âWhy not?â the Doom of Liesse replied.
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"Last year,â I said, âI crushed the skull of a man who thought he was a visionary. He wanted to save Callow, he insisted. Thing is, I donât really believe you can save people anymore. I tried that and it doesnât ever quite seem to work right. I think itâs because it doesnât matter, if they worship at the House of Light or sacrifice at some dark altar â most days theyâre just people, and those are the same everywhere. They till the same fields, pay the same taxes, marry their neighbours and die fat if theyâre lucky enough."
âNamed are more,â Archer said. âWeâre the brighter flame: the people who can actually change things.â
âAre we?â I smiled. âThe part of the Conquest you pay attention to is the Calamities sweeping all opposition aside. You think thatâs because they were mighty, but thatâs not the part that matters. They were figureheads, enablers. Praes won because it had grown as a nation while Callow had not.â
âThe Empire grew because villains made it grow,â she replied flatly.
âAnd donât you think itâs telling the most successful villains since Triumphant put their efforts into reforming institutions rather than building a bunch of flying fortresses?â I asked. âPeople won that war, not Named. Malicia and Black, theyâre brilliant â but thereâs been a lot of brilliant Named over the centuries, on both sides. What makes those two different is that they know change comes from the bottom, not the top.â
âThatâsâŚâ she hesitated.
Heresy, she wanted to say. That it went against everything we knew. History was forged by the hands of those that stood out and crowned themselves with power, those precious few even the Gods recognized as apart from the masses. Except thatâs a lie. A thousand Dread Emperors and a thousand Kings, but nothing ever changed â until what lay behind them did. Itâs not the tip of the blade that kills, itâs the force that drove it into your belly. That was, I was beginning to grasp, what Iâd done wrong in Callow. Iâd fought to put all the authority in my hands with the vague notion that I could fix it all afterwards, but how was that any different from what the Lone Swordsman had been doing? There were people all over the Empire who could make things better, if they were allowed to. And if there were forces trying to stand in the way? Well, I was a villain. The parts of Creation I did not like, I would break.
âRight now I have an enemy in Liesse who thinks by sheer will and ruthlessness sheâll drag Praes back to a golden age that never existed,â I said. âIâm not worried about her, deep down, because even if she claims Iâm the one going against the grain sheâs the one fighting the tide.â
I broke off a piece of turnover and popped it into my mouth.
âLast spring, a little boy gave an orc a crown of flowers. Thereâs something beyond any of us happening in the Empire, right now,â I said. âMalicia and Black think they control it, but I donât think they do. Theyâre watching the story when whatâs important is the people telling it. They want me to part of the machine theyâre built, but I donât think thatâs my role.â
âThen what is?â Archer asked quietly.
âWhen heroes and villains come knocking in the name of fate,â I spoke, tone calm and measured. âWhen they try to drag us back to where we were by force with a Choir behind them or the host of some howling Hell â Iâll kill them all. Every last one of them.â
Softly, Archer laughed.
âAh, Foundling,â she murmured. âI was wrong about you â youâre not boring at all. Youâre just as mad as the rest of us.â
I looked up at the sky. Night was dying.
âDrink up, Archer,â I said. âDawnâs coming and we have a god to rob blind.â
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âA man like Musser, left with no good way to get what he wants, will not give up what he wanted,â Rook intoned. âHe will give up âgoodâ.â
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âSo I did,â Akua murmured. âI made a decision. A nudge, righting a wrong left to fester.â
She paused, meeting my gaze.
âWhat now, Catherine?â
Am I a prisoner on a longer leash, those golden eyes for the second time, or am I what you say I am? I breathed out shallowly. Iâd made the decision already, I realized. Iâd made it years ago.
âThen I trust your judgement,â I said.
Was it grief I saw in there, or love? Or perhaps what I was most afraid of â that, when it came to the two of us, there might not be much of a difference between the two. I looked away. The question burned, but this was not the hour for it.
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âOther Firstborn seem to be avoiding the area,â Masego noted. âWe should continue down this street, it will quicken our pace and lessen the risks.â
Throat tight, I nodded. Grim as the logic was, it wasnât untrue. But before we could move, there was an interruption.
âWe need,â Akua Sahelian quietly said, âto free them.â
I felt the weight of those golden eyes on me without needing to turn. My heart clenched. The calculus was plain to see, as it so often was at times like this. If we freed them, the enemy would know weâd been here. Maybe not immediately, but sooner than otherwise. And if we got caught, were forced to retreat or fight our way out before getting to the tower, it might be a lot more than three hundred drow that died for it. And on the other side of the balance was a hard truth: if we did not save these people, they were dead. And we would condemn them to that fate simply because of a risk, a potential danger. Not a certain consequence.
I knew the choice I would have made if Iâd come alone. Knew it deeply, instantly. And some part of me recoiled at the thought of how very comfortable with sacrifices I had become.
âMasego?â I asked.
âSo long as the spell is not too powerful, I can maintain the Mirrors through it,â Hierophant said.
He did not seem particularly concerned with the moral question to wrestle with, I thought. Indifference, or was he simply trusting me to wrestle with it for him? Sometimes it was hard to tell.
âI have had enough of shackles, Catherine,â Akua murmured. âEspecially those made of iron.â
I studied her face. She had already made her decision, I realized. She would free the dzulu whatever I said. And so I shivered, knowing in that moment that I had both succeeded beyond my wildest hopes and entirely lost control of the situation. So I said the only thing I could say.
âWe must be quick,â I replied, âand then cut through the Rozhan territory in a straight line.â
It wasnât even that difficult, when it came down to it. The shackles had been made to resist Night, not sorcery, and so Akua sent a spell shivering down the nine chains one after another that simply popped the shackles open. The dzulu milled about uncertainly, some even fearfully. Thinking it might be a trap. But when one of them hesitantly tried to leave and nothing struck it down, there were excited shouts and within moments they were scattering in every direction. We waited until our path was clear, then ran for the Rozhan grounds to the east.
I could not see Akuaâs face, but somehow I knew she was smiling.
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"The first time I met you two,â I said, âI killed you both."
âGood times,â Evil twin grinned.
âThe second time,â I continued, âI left you behind.â
âAnd the demon broke you,â the other spirit replied.
Mistakes, I thought. Both times itâd been mistakes. And Iâd never seen them with the Beast.
âItâs the end of the road, you know,â I quietly said. âThere wonât be another one after this.â
Neither of them answered. Their gazes were on me.
âItâs the third time,â I said. âLetâs make it count.â
I breathed out, looking up at the moon through the parted clouds, and let myself loosen. Stopped trying to trick my way out of this, to win it, to use it as a tool. It was a journey, nothing more and nothing less. A hand gripped my right shoulder.
âDo better,â she whispered into my ear. âRemember the girl who wanted to save her home. She was always the best of you.â
A hand gripped my left shoulder.
âDonât flinch,â she whispered into my ear. âRemember the girl who wanted to be the storm. Sheâs the one who got you here.â
We stood the three of us under the moon, in the heart of broken Hainaut, as below us the corpses began moved. Not as a horde but as one, a behemoth of a creature rising from the cradle of death made of a hundred thousand corpses. It stood tall and terrible, blotting out the sky, watching me through a sea of dead faces.
âHello, old friend,â I softly greeted the Beast.
It opened a gaping maw, baring fangs made of broken swords and spears and banners. It was a beast, I thought, fit to swallow the world whole. West and East, what did it matter? It would devour it all.
âI once told you I wasnât afraid of you,â I smiled. âBut it was a lie. Did you know?â
It laughed, the sound a thing of horror.
âLet me tell you again, then,â I said. âIâm not afraid of you.â
The behemoth of corpses climbed out of the pit, standing over me. An entire world of death enveloped me on all sides. I cocked my head to the side.
âIs it a lie now?â I asked it.
Its massive head lowered and it watched me, suddenly snapping out. I did not flinch.
âYou know what we are now,â I told it. âWho we are.â
I looked up into its eyes.
âThe Warden,â I claimed, and the world shivered with the truth of it.
The Beast roared in approval. Time to wake up, I thought, and the great maw of death opened wide.
I never felt it close around me.
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For, most of all, he was a bored sergeant on a warm Wasteland night, catching his first glimpse in the eyes of a stranger of the girl whoâd topple empires and feeling his blood burn.
He was the Adjutant, and Catherine Foundling was returning.
If any stood between them they would be broken, sure as dawn and dusk and the death of men.
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Tariqâs mouth opened to a ragged gasp, and within the depths of Liesse death was cheated for the third time at my hand.
"Time to rise, pilgrim of grey,â I murmured. âThereâs still work to be done.â
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"These are the lives we live, Catherine,â he gently said. âWe kill and we win until we lose and we die. We are the children of the knife."
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