Page 40 of Embrace the Serpent

The huntsman had stepped closer, and the light caught his bronze hair and familiar face. Vanon’s cheeks were hollow; there

were dark circles under his eyes. “You’re needed upstairs. They said you had to come. Something’s happened...” He hesitated.

“They said I shouldn’t spring it on you. But it’s your mother.”

The nervousness in his eyes set off the embers that had been smoldering in my gut since dawn.

I flew across the bridge, into the tunnels, and up, up through the door and up the stairs—and as I climbed the stairs, it struck me what I would find—carnage everywhere; rubble from where the palace had been breached; the air thick with stone dust; and my mother, my mother whom I had gotten a second chance to know, whom I would never know, if I reached the top of the stairs and she was gone, her body in a pool of blood, just like back then—

I burst out into the entrance hall.

Three startled townsfolk shrieked, and one dropped his basket of laundry. I pushed through to the center of the hall, picking

my way through the crowd of palace servants and townsfolk, seeing no rubble, no blood, no bodies.

My heartbeat echoed through my head.

A gust of wind carried voices from the courtyard. The Serpent King’s long silver hair glinted in the sunlight. At the edge

where the flagstones of the courtyard met the lapping waves of the lake, he stood with several of his huntsmen, leaning over

a table laid with a map. A winged runner landed—she had birdlike features that were less eagle and more pigeon—and brought

him a scroll, breathlessly delivering a report.

She pointed at the watchtower across the lake. The Imperial Army seemed like ants, swarming down the forested slope in neat

dark lines. They had surrounded the watchtower, but it seemed they could not get in through the stone or up the smooth walls.

On the forest side, Imperial soldiers toppled trees, making flat barges to cross the lake. On the town side, smoke rose into

the sky over the pearly bridges and canals.

“They’re torching the town,” one of the huntsmen was saying. “My father’s shop—”

The Serpent King shook his head, a note of warning in his voice. “They want us to meet them in battle. We won’t be tempted.

We can rebuild, if we survive.”

I had too little breath to speak. “I—”

He noticed me. “What are you doing here?”

“My mother—where is she?”

“She’s there.” He gestured back the way I had come. Past the entrance hall, into the ballroom.

The ballroom was still strewn with wedding decorations, but the townspeople had arranged foodstuffs into organized piles,

and it looked almost like a small town square. A group of children were playing with Grimney, and their laughter sounded strange

and distorted to my ears.

My mother rose to her feet, wiping her forehead with the back of her hand.

She... looked fine.

“Saphira, what is it?” The Serpent King said from beside my ear.

I jumped, not having felt him come near. I didn’t understand. “Vanon said—”

“Vanon?” A strange look came over him, thoughts flickering in his eyes. His posture grew tense as a drawn bow as he pieced

together something I could not yet see. He beckoned to a huntsman. “Vanon was stationed—where?”

The huntsman stammered. “H-he offered to guard the Imperial messenger.”

The bowstring snapped, and the Serpent King flew into action. “Seal the exits. We must find them. Send huntsmen to the shrine.”

The huntsman objected. “But—he wouldn’t help her, not after what she did to him—”

“We don’t know that,” the Serpent King said. “All we know is that he told Saphira a lie, and she left the heartstones alone.”

I flinched at that, as the implication dawned on me. Horror sank through my bones.

Several of the huntsmen set off at a run down the stairs. I took a step after them, but an arm blocked my way.

The Serpent King’s eyes were cold as he said, “Stay here.”

There was a hiss under his voice.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I shouldn’t have left, no matter what he said.” Guilt squeezed my throat.

“We are lucky they didn’t try to take you.”

My body was a coil of tension. How many minutes had it been since I left the shrine?

The Serpent King didn’t meet my eyes. How could he not blame me?

A horn blew in the distance, from the direction of the watchtower on the other side of the lake. Beyond it, the sky seemed

to tremble, like a desert mirage, and a hot wind blew, sending ripples across the water.

Bile filled my mouth. No.

The horn blew again, and a tiny dot leapt out of the top of the watchtower and streaked toward us. They flew erratically,

dodging arrows from below.

I glanced back. The stairs leading to the submerged levels showed no signs of the huntsmen.

The tiny dot had grown into a winged runner, now streaking low and fast across the lake, racing their rippling shadow.

The stairs were quiet, empty.

The winged runner touched down, shouting, “The army—they’ve broken through!”

A strange shiver seemed to go through the Serpent King, as if he had fought back an illusion. His hands were fists at his side. “The border has fallen.”

The sound of breaking glass interrupted my thoughts. Someone screamed, “Stop them!”

I ran to the edge of the courtyard.

Two figures dove out of a balcony, into the lake. They rose up on water horses, breaking into a gallop across the surface

of the lake.

One rider had a stream of black hair like silk, the other a head of bronze. Mirandel and Vanon.

Eagle folk streaked after them, their wings catching a current, bows in their hands. They shot at both of them. Mirandel was

faster, evading the arrows, but Vanon’s horse balked, rearing on its hind legs, and he fell behind.

The eagle folk chased after her, but she crossed onto the lakeshore, and the ranks of Imperial soldiers surrounded her.

The eagle folk were forced to fall back, though they picked up Vanon on the way.

The report came to us minutes later. The old heartstone was shattered. And Rane’s heart was gone.

Mirandel had stolen it.

Vanon gave no explanation, said nothing at all, as the eagle folk brought him before the Serpent King. He only stared at the

ground, shaking his head like he was trying to clear it. Huntsmen led him away to be imprisoned.

A healer murmured to the Serpent King, saying the prolonged exposure to the tourmaline collar had made him susceptible to Mirandel’s voice, to her commands, even after she no longer had access to the jewel.

Nothing could be done. There was no restoring the border enchantments. The entire reason Rane had brought me here had come

to nothing. And worse, by bringing me here, it felt like I had inflicted my ghosts upon them.

My thumb sought out my mother’s ring, before I remembered that the Serpent King had it.

He stood alone, a dark look on his face, his thoughts turned inward. My gaze fell to his hands, to his unadorned fingers,

and my heart twinged.

The Serpent King exhaled and straightened. “The plan has changed. We will do everything in our power to retrieve the heartstone.”

His words sent a ripple through the huntsmen.

Within a quarter of an hour, the huntsmen were helmed and armed to the teeth. Their mounts rose from the lake, more water

than horse, their manes flowing in the air like froth on a wave. Behind them the lake was dark as a bruise, reflecting the

gloomy clouds shrouding the sky.

Standing alone was the Serpent King. His silver hair whipped in the wind. He seemed immense, like his shoulders could blot

out the sky. Silver-armored, covered in scales, his pupils slitted.

A stranger.

He strode to me, dangerous, purposeful.

“I think this is the end,” he said quietly.

“It might not be,” I said.

He did not smile. “I will do what I must.”

“Rane—” I touched his hand, and he turned. I rose to the tips of my toes and pressed a kiss to the corner of his mouth. He stood still as stone, and I realized I had already lost him.

He said, “Goodbye.”

The huntsmen took off, their horses racing across the lake’s surface.

The Serpent King lingered on the lake’s edge. He tilted his head up to the sky, and like a flower unfolding, he grew.

Scales rippled across his skin, shimmering in the dim light, and his form twisted and grew, transforming into the massive,

sinuous shape of a giant silver serpent.

He grew larger and larger, and he slid out the balcony, down into the lake, so immense that he almost looked like a bridge

crossing the water, a serpent large enough to devour the world.

My mother sat with me on the balcony, Grimney in her lap.

The lake was dark and scattered with debris, the remains of the barges. The Imperial Army was at the lakeshore. Behind them,

the forest rose, and atop the rise was a line of grand tents. Their flags flapped in the wind, too far to make out anything

but the color, but I knew Incarnadine’s was among them.

The town was aflame. Imperial soldiers fought the huntsmen and the divine peoples.

The air smelled of copper and ash.

The reports had come in promising, at first. They were close to breaking through the ranks. They had stopped the advance on

the town. They were hopeful they could fight to the heartstone.

And then something changed. The tone grew nervous. There’s something wrong with the king.

My fingers traced the edges of the silver scale, over and over again.

I knew my husband was capable of wearing a thousand faces. Perhaps he would always have new faces, new sides that I could never know.

I understood him. He didn’t value himself. He valued his responsibility. His people. He was willing to become a monster to

protect us.

He had become a monster.

The trees in the woods were falling.

The army was focused entirely on the Serpent King. He rose from the tree line like a knife, silver scales glinting, and cut

down.

He rose again, higher, and I leaned over the railing, straining to see across the distance—his scales seemed mottled and marred,

and it almost looked like he had grown thin spines—

They weren’t spines. They were spears, stuck in his body from where he’d been stabbed.

Let it be dust and dirt that mottled his scales, not blood.

He would kill everyone, or they would kill him.

I gripped the balcony railing. I knew how to deal with horrors. I only had to run away, take my mother and Grimney with me.

That was what I had always done. What I was good at.

Rane had given me all the means to do so. We had said our goodbyes, and part of me thought he wanted me to run.

Everything faded.

And in that empty space, that sun-bleached whiteness, I came to the end of myself.

The old Saphira was dead.