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Chapter 29

Leon

R elief roars through me the moment I have Ana in my arms again, pulling her deeper into the shadows, away from any prying eyes.

“Leon, get off me,” she whispers furiously. I release her only once my soldiers have surrounded her.

“What is this, an ambush?” she demands.

I ignore her question. Now that she’s in my sight again, the relief is quickly morphing into anger.

“Do you have any idea how much you’ve risked, coming here?” I snap. Of course, she can’t know exactly how much rests on her staying safe, but I expected her to value her own life a little more than this.

“Nothing I’m not willing to sacrifice for my family,” she throws back.

I pinch the bridge of my nose, praying to the gods for patience. I damn near tore the boat apart when I realized she was gone—of course I’d instantly worked out where she’d have headed, even if I still don’t know how she managed it. But now is not the time to let my feelings run away from me.

“We’re leaving,” I say, as calmly as I can.

“Er…captain…” Alastor is trying to draw my attention to what I’ve already noticed: the golden glow starting to emanate from Ana’s palms.

“Is that really how this is going to go, Ana? You’re going to attack us?”

“If that’s what I have to do. If you’re seriously telling me you came here just to drag me away again.”

I sigh. “What would you have us do?”

“Help me save them!” she looks at me like she can’t believe we’d do anything else. “Right now, there’s probably a dozen people in that sanctuary, young men and women, about to be slaughtered in a matter of hours. Because of me.”

“So you agree that this is a trap,” Phaia says, a curious note in her voice.

“I agree that it’s really fucking strange for a purge to come to a tiny, unknown place like Otscold. But I don’t care why—as long as no one dies come dawn.”

“You can’t save everyone, Ana,” I say.

“Then what’s the point of having all this magic?” she says, holding up her still-glowing hand. I can feel the heat of it from here. “What’s the point of all your strength and speed and sensic power, if you’re not willing to use it to help those less powerful than you? I’d rather have them execute me for being a solari alongside Tira and the others than know I turned my back on them when I could’ve made a difference.”

I don’t immediately respond, considering our options. She obviously isn’t going to be persuaded. And while we could knock her unconscious and bring her with us whether she wants to go or not, she wouldn’t go down without a fight. There’s no way we’d escape notice from the cleavers.

Ana takes my silence as an opportunity to keep pushing, looking around at the rest of the unit.

“What if it were one of you lined up for execution? Would you leave them behind?” I can hear the pain in her voice, and it stings at me. “That’s what you’re asking me to do.”

“We are already here, captain.”

The words come from Eryx, of all people. I stare at him, and he shrugs. He may be a grumpy bastard, but he’s practical, and to him it’s common sense to throw in a little heroism with our retrieval of wayward princesses.

It’s dangerous and risky—for Ana, for our mission—yet looking into her face now, my resolve falters. It was easier to think with my head on the boat, when we were far removed from the situation. But now we’re back in this village, I’m reminded of the last time we were here.

Back then, Ana asked for my help, and I turned my back on her.

True, I didn’t have all the facts. I didn’t even know her. But everything we’ve shared since, all the ways I’ve saved her and taught her to protect herself mean nothing if I make the same mistake now. You can’t undo the past by repeating it, and I’ve already spent too much time thinking about how I would take that decision back if I could.

I can’t do that to her again.

“Fine,” I say. “We’ll free them. Give them a chance to make a run for it before the execution tomorrow. But that’s all.”

Triumph shines on Ana’s face.

“Good. I was going to try that myself anyway. But with you guys helping, everyone’s much more likely to survive.”

This woman is going to make me lose my mind.

“There’s one problem,” Damia says, flicking her dark hair over her shoulder. “Reaching the border is going to be a lot more complicated if we have a big run-in with these clerics, letting the whole country know we’re here with the princess.”

“We’ve killed some of the cleavers before,” Ana points out.

“Yes, but they were hunting smugglers. Which means when they didn’t return, the Temple would’ve blamed their disappearance on common criminals. This is different. There’ll be witnesses this time.”

“So what are you saying?” Alastor asks.

“I’m saying we shouldn’t go in all blades swinging, like the captain here tends to do,” Damia huffs.

I bristle at her suggestion. “I don’t do that.”

“You absolutely do, captain,” Alastor says. “Remember Scletera? Or those lesser lords in Oudis? Fairon spent months smoothing things over with their families?—”

“Alright,” I cut him off, not bothering to point out that those lords definitely got the message they were meant to. “I may favor a direct approach, but I get results. And I was going to suggest a stealth attack here anyway. It makes more sense.”

“So how are we going to do it?” Ana asks excitedly.

“ You aren’t going to do anything. We don’t want the Temple seeing your magic in action if we can avoid it.”

Her eyes burn. “I’m going to be there.”

I know there’s no point arguing. Besides, while I can get her friends out, I can’t make them run to safety. They’d have no reason to trust me. But they’d trust her.

“Fine, but you’re going to stand back and watch while we use our sensic powers to distract the cleavers, and then we’ll sneak the villagers out of the building. If we’re careful, your friends can escape without anyone knowing we helped them,” I say.

My soldiers nod, agreeing to my proposed plan.

“And then we can also be on our way without you causing us any more problems,” I conclude.

Ana narrows her eyes at my words but stays quiet.

“We’ll wait until midnight,” Eryx says, examining the few windows still glowing with lamplight in the street beyond. “When everyone is asleep.”

“Good idea.” The last thing we need is some upstanding citizen spotting us around the sanctuary and alerting the Temple. You’d think people would protect their own, but I’ve seen neighbor turn on neighbor too many times. Fear does that to people.

“Let’s find somewhere to lay low in the meantime,” I direct my unit.

Ana smiles. “I know just the place.”

* * *

I’m glad to be creeping through the streets again after our few hours in the tavern. Despite Ana’s insistence that her friends would offer us sanctuary, it took a lot of persuading on her part for them to even let us inside.

Then we were subjected to a lot of begrudging hospitality, with the serving boy Kit glaring daggers at Eryx the whole time. He hadn’t wanted Ana to go with us and talked about a plan to help his sister with some kind of distraction. I don’t know what she said to get him to stand down, but it was obvious to me his parents were grateful that with us there, they’d be able to keep at least one of their children safely at home tonight.

Now, as we approach the sanctuary, Phaia disappears up a wall, searching for a decent lookout spot, and I stretch my dream magic across the building, searching for minds that feel like they could belong to the cleavers. A few well-placed nightmares are always a good place to start to sow chaos.

People are usually very vulnerable to the power of suggestion when they’re asleep. I learned that the hard way.

I brush past the unconscious thoughts of the villagers, catching flashes of images, waiting to land on something cold and dark and rigid, like the cleavers I saw in the tunnels. They should be easy to locate, like beacons in a sea of normal thought, but…

Nothing. Not a hint of an unusual mind.

“I don’t think any of them are asleep,” I say to the others as we edge along a wall to get a view of the building.

“But they’ve been working all day,” Ana whispers. “They must be resting.”

“I wouldn’t count on that. I don’t know what the Temple does to make them that way,” Alastor says with a shudder. “But there’s nothing godly about it.”

Phaia drops down from the roof corner, quiet as a cat.

“There’s four on duty, two at each entrance. I think the others are inside. Hyllus?”

Hyllus goes still, listening.

“I hear the civilians, some are asleep, but others are talking.” He waits a few moments, and we let him eavesdrop on the whispered conversation happening behind thick stone walls several yards away.

“They’re saying ‘Don’t wake them.’ I think the rest of the cleavers are in there with them.” He pauses and pulls a face.

“What is it?” I ask.

“The prisoners are commenting on the fact that the cleavers sleep with their eyes open .”

“Well that’s really fucking creepy,” Damia breathes.

I frown, trying to understand why I can’t sense them if they’re asleep. I reach out again, slipping between the frightened minds of the few villagers who’ve managed to fall asleep inside the sanctuary, searching for what I missed before.

There . In between the minds, in the places I’d mistaken for empty ether, there’s a slight change in the texture of the dream realm—something where there should be nothing. It’s hard and dark, like polished marble, and totally impassable.

“You’re right, Hyllus. They’re in there. I feel them, I just can’t get to them.”

“Let me try,” Damia says, closing her eyes. I’ve seen Damia use her sensic power in fights with scary effectiveness. Being able to give people fits of uncontrollable laughter might seem like a benign power, but it incapacitates people quicker than almost anything else. I’ve lost count of the times I’ve watched someone doubled over, cackling, as they bleed out from her blade.

Her brow furrows, and she opens her eyes with a frustrated sigh.

“No, I can’t get through. Their minds are too protected.”

“Is that normal?” Ana asks. “Can people do that?”

“Some Trovians have managed to train up their mental defenses in the past,” I explain. “We saw it during the war. There are ways to guard yourself against sensic magic. But those protections can still be broken. In a group of this size, there’s usually a weak link, or a moment when even a vigilant soldier gets complacent. These cleavers…” I shake my head. “The Temple must’ve sent their strongest soldiers. Their minds are nearly impenetrable.”

“Which means this is no ordinary purge,” Stratton points out. “This specific brand of freak must’ve been chosen on purpose, right?”

My eyes fall on Ana. Her face is pale with worry. I know she’s thinking about her friends and not about herself, but all the concern I feel in that moment is for her. She’s not safe here—I don’t know if she’s safe in any part of Trova, not if the Temple is going to such lengths to hunt her down before they even know she’s a solari.

“So what do we do?” Ana asks.

“We try something else,” Damia says. “Maybe subtlety isn’t the way to go after all.”

Hyllus stiffens, signaling us to stop talking.

“Humans heading toward the sanctuary,” he says. “Eight of them, approaching from the other side.”

“Let’s get a better view,” I say to my soldiers.

Ana is right at my back as I reach up to scale the wall Phaia used as a vantage point before.

“I’m coming too,” she says.

I don’t waste my breath trying to argue. Once I’m on the wall, I reach down to pull her up.

“Stay close,” I say as we crawl up onto the connecting roof, giving us a view of the square and the sanctuary on the east side of it.

“There,” I point at the group of people moving toward the rear entrance of the sanctuary.

She squints. “I think that’s Freya’s dad,” she says. “And there’s her older sister.” Her eyes widen with realization. “Oh no. What are they going to do?”

I can see what she’s spotted, that each member of the little group is wielding some kind of makeshift weapon—a mixture of shovels, iron bars, and lit torches.

“They’re demanding that their kin be released,” Hyllus says as the group come to a halt in front of the sanctuary doors.

“They’re going to get themselves killed,” Ana says, scrambling back toward the wall.

“Ana, don’t.” I reach over and pull her against me just as the air fills with the crackle of a violent wave of magic. One of the villagers immediately goes up in flame, the fire from their torch engulfing them. They scream, trying to use their own incendi magic to pull the flames away, but the fire keeps flaring up, overcoming their magic.

Two more figures hit the ground, both pierced through by the wooden handle of a shovel one of them was carrying a moment before, as the pair of cleavers on the rear entrance are joined by the other two guards from the front door.

Ana bucks and writhes against me as she watches the scene, but I don’t let go. The remains of the little group of villagers is fleeing now, trying to outrun the cleavers’ power. But as the maroon-uniformed soldiers advance across the square, they easily mow the civilians down. They don’t even need to draw their blades.

In the end, only two escape, darting beyond the square and down a side street. The cleavers don’t follow them. Instead, they watch them from the edge of the square, still as statues. I suspect they’ve been told not to leave the sanctuary unprotected under any circumstances.

Two figures emerge from the sanctuary. The villager’s body is still burning on the ground, though it’s long stopped moving. By the flickering light of the flames, I can make out that one of the newcomers is wearing robes of bright scarlet and the other robes of deep purple, a red sash cutting through the color like an open wound.

“We know him,” Alastor says. At this angle, he sees the face of the scarlet-robed man before I do, but as they turn toward the cleavers, I see Alastor is right.

“That’s the cleric from the palace,” I say to Ana, who has finally stopped fighting me. I loosen my grip around her, letting her lean forward for a better view.

“Nunias?” she asks. In this light, I doubt she can make out his features.

“Yes. If you wanted confirmation that this is a trap, there it is.” I watch her expression, but it doesn’t change, still stuck on the horror of what she’s just seen.

The two men watch the cleavers return to their posts at the sanctuary doors.

“What does the purple mean?” Stratton asks. “Is he some kind of head cleric?”

“He’s a bearer,” Ana says flatly. “A cleric who only answers to the Grand Bearer himself. The smugglers said Sophos is his name.”

“Should we be worried?” Phaia asks.

“No,” I say. “If stealth won’t work for us, we’ll just do this the straightforward way.”

“Besides,” says Stratton. “We’ve never met a bearer before. Could be fun.”

“He might be worse than those maroon puppets,” Eryx says, a note of warning in his voice.

My gaze meets Ana’s, and I suddenly want to say something to lessen the awful sadness in her eyes.

“Maybe he is, but no matter. Ethira himself couldn’t stop us freeing those prisoners come sunrise.”