Page 42

41

SCARS

CEDRIC

Cedric sat on the stone bench, elbows on his knees, his hands scrubbing his face. He could feel Elyria at his side, silence stretching between them, a strain in her typically irreverent presence that he knew was only there because of him. She was stretched tighter than a drawn bowstring.

He knew the feeling.

His chest still ached—not from the flames. They were long gone at this point, fizzled out in the time he’d spent sitting here, silent, still, after his...combustion. It ached from the memory, though, of the heat that had consumed him from the inside out, that had burst from him so uncontrollably that he knew he might have very well burned the entire Sanctum down had Elyria not been able to stop him.

He rubbed at his chest, his fingers bunching the black fabric of his tunic, as though he could sense the fire smoldering just underneath. Absently, he thought about what a shame it would be to ruin yet another set of clothing.

A clang echoed across the chamber, drawing Cedric’s focus to the other four champions. Kit and Zephyr had made a hasty retreat to the other side of the room when Elyria, fed up with their hovering after they’d tended to her wounds, issued a reprimand sharp enough to have taken their heads clean off. Now they sat with Thraigg, who appeared to be in the middle of telling some tale—quite animatedly, from the way he was gesticulating with his hammer.

Half-covered in shadows, Nox sat a few paces away, sipping from a bronze goblet. Brow furrowed, their eyes flitted between Cedric and Elyria, as if the two of them were a puzzle they were trying to piece together.

Thraigg’s story must have ended, because suddenly all Cedric could hear was the soft hum of magic layered with Zephyr and Kit’s hushed voices. His ears pricked at the sound of his name, barely loud enough for him to hear.

“Is Cedric all right?” Kit asked.

He felt like he should be the one to answer the question, to tell her that of course he was. And of course he wasn’t. But both responses stayed stuck in his throat, tangled and muddy.

“There are different kinds of injuries,” Zephyr said after a moment, her voice layered with an emotion Cedric couldn’t place. “Not all of them are so easily healed. Some leave scars long after all signs of the wounds themselves have faded.”

They lapsed back into silence.

Pulling his hands from his face, Cedric stared into his open palms. They looked so...ordinary. He flexed his fingers, half-expecting fire to burst from his hands, but nothing happened. There was just that tingle under his skin, the smoldering embers of magic somehow in him, a furnace he had no idea how to extinguish.

What was that?

What was he ?

He clenched and unclenched his fists, willing the answers to appear in the lines of his palms. But there was nothing. No seared flesh, no scars—none that were visible, at least.

He reclined against the wall, tipping his chin up until the back of his head came to rest on the cool stone behind him. His upper arm brushed Elyria’s shoulder as he did, but still, she said nothing. Turning his head, his eyes flicked to the long bandage that started at her hand and wrapped its way up her arm. Guilt spiked in his gut. He hated that she’d gotten hurt—that he’d hurt her, again.

“I’m sorry,” he suddenly blurted, his voice piercing the tense silence between them.

“It’s fine.” The words were clipped, her body tense, as if she were angry. She wouldn’t look at him. But she also hadn’t moved from her spot beside him.

He didn’t understand why. It wasn’t as if she didn’t have the entire open Sanctum to retreat to. Hells, she could take her pick of bedrooms. There were more of them than the remaining six of them could occupy at this point, a fact that had Cedric’s shoulders sagging with heavy sadness.

Fourteen champions had entered the Arcane Crucible—fifteen, if you wanted to get technical. Six remained.

His attention turned back to Elyria and the simmering tension he felt radiating from her at his side. Her uninjured hand was fisted in her lap, her exhalations coming fast and indignant through her nose. Yes, she was definitely angry. Outraged. Livid, even. And she had every right to be.

Once again, she’d had to come to his rescue. Once again, he’d proven himself the weak link amongst them. Once again, they were forced to wait on him.

Although . . . that wasn’t entirely true this time, he supposed.

In the hours that had passed since Cedric awoke back in the Sanctum, there had been nary a sign as to what was to come next. No accolades or congratulations from the Arbiter rang through his mind. No doorways glowed. And Cedric suspected part of Elyria’s obvious frustration was due to the fact that not a single one of the champions knew what they were supposed to do next.

“I understand that you’re angry with me,” he said, coughing to clear the scratchiness in his voice. It still felt like there was smoke in his lungs. “And I know?—”

Her head whipped to him. “Of course I’m fucking angry,” she hissed, not quite meeting his eye. “I’m pissed. ”

“You could have let me burn.” His voice was hoarse, and though he hadn’t intended to sound so pathetic, the words came out as barely more than a whisper.

Elyria stiffened but didn’t answer immediately. She was silent for so long, in fact, that Cedric wondered if she’d even heard him.

Finally, she released a long, shaky breath, tilting her head so that she met his gaze straight on. “And that, right there, is why I’m so pissed.”

He blinked, surprise flickering through him.

“All that shit that you said before you lit up like a fucking bonfire,” she continued.

Flashes of all the fears Cedric had put into words ran through his head.

“I shouldn’t have made it out of the trial.”

“How many times should I have died in here?”

“I wouldn’t have even made it past the first fucking trial without your help.”

“Look how easily my fellow humans were all taken by the Crucible. Did we even have a chance?”

“I should be dead.”

Elyria’s silver-flecked emerald eyes burned into him with a fervor, a rawness, that locked his gaze in with her own. He couldn’t have looked away even if he wanted to.

He didn’t want to.

“You think you’re so expendable, that you’re not worth saving? I disa-fucking-gree. And I really wish you would stop with this self-pitying, self-sacrificing bullshit.” Her words were like acid, but her voice was thick. “Did you ever think that maybe I didn’t want to let you go?”

Cedric swallowed hard. What was he supposed to say to that? “I’m...I’m sorry?—”

“Fucking stars above!” She threw her hands in the air, her bandage slipping slightly as she stood. “Stop apologizing for being alive, Cedric.”

Her words struck him like a slap. Not malicious though. A plea. A demand. Like she was still waiting for him to wake up.

And hadn’t he sworn he would no longer keep anyone else waiting?

With a sigh, Elyria turned away from him and attempted to walk away. Cedric reached out, wrapping his fingers around her unbandaged wrist with a featherlight touch. The instant his skin made contact with hers, he felt that weight in his chest settle, the ache dispersing like steam evaporating into temperate air.

With the gentlest pressure, he pulled her back. She complied, turning to sit on the bench once more, apprehension painted all over her perfect features.

She looked as lost as he felt.

He opened his mouth to say something, but once again, the words were stuck just behind his tongue.

“I need to check your bandage.” Zephyr’s soft voice fell over the pair, and Cedric tore his eyes from Elyria’s face to where the sylvan now stood in front of them, shifting awkwardly on her feet.

“Sure,” Elyria said impassively, holding her injured arm aloft as if it were barely a bother, as if nothing strange and unexpected had occurred in this chamber at all.

Zephyr went to pull something from her belt.

In one swift motion, Elyria yanked her arm back, her eyes narrowing on the small tin Zephyr now held. “How’s the smell of that one?”

The sylvan huffed a quiet laugh. “I’m afraid you already know,” she said. “Same stuff I gave you for your legs.”

Cedric couldn’t stop himself from glancing at Elyria’s legs, from thinking about the checkerboard of burns he knew lay under her leathers.

Elyria groaned melodramatically. “Fine. But only because I also know how well it works.” With her uninjured arm, she pinched her nostrils closed and squeezed her eyes shut, her visage suddenly far closer to that of a spoiled child than a centuries-old fae warrior, and it made that formerly aching spot in Cedric’s chest start to throb.

“Here, allow me,” he said, taking the tin from Zephyr with one hand and tenderly lifting Elyria’s bandaged arm with the other.

Elyria’s eyes flew open, and she seemed to instinctively pull her arm closer to her body. “No, you don’t have to?—”

“Please,” he said, his eyes meeting hers. “Let me.”

She hesitated, her face inscrutable. She leaned toward him. The movement was subtle, small. And were it not for the thick fog of tension suddenly pressing on the two of them, Cedric might have wondered if he’d imagined it entirely. But tense, it was. The kind of tension that made him feel like the two of them were seconds away from clashing...in some manner or another.

Whatever she saw in Cedric’s own expression must have softened her resolve, however, because a long sigh slipped from between her lips moments later, and she allowed him to gently retrieve her arm.

Cedric’s breath caught in his throat as he unwrapped the bandage to reveal the angry red burn beneath. It was worse than he’d imagined—her pristine skin was cracked, raw, and blistered from her palm to her elbow. And this was after Zephyr had already tended to it. He could see a few patches of new skin poking through, shiny and pink, but more of it was still charred, dark, and peeling.

Swallowing hard, he tried to quell the twisting in his stomach as he dipped two fingers into the balm—which did, in fact, smell absolutely foul —and gingerly applied it to the burn. Elyria released the faintest whimper as he touched a particularly heinous-looking spot, and it was all Cedric could do not to crumple at the sound.

He froze, tempted to pull back entirely, but he thought that delaying would only make it worse. “I’m sorry,” he said. “You know I never meant to?—”

“I know,” she interrupted, something that sounded a lot like pity in her voice. “It wasn’t your fault.”

His jaw clenched. “It was.”

“I told you to stop apologizing,” she gritted out. “It’s not the first time, won’t be the last.”

“I know. But it should be,” he said, his voice tight. “And I swear, I will never be the cause of your pain again.”

There was a sad smile on her lips when he looked up. “You can’t promise that,” she said.

“I can. I do.”

He owed her that much. Owed her more than that. He did this to her. The hot sting of shame crawled up Cedric’s spine as he thought of the animosity he’d held for the Revenant—for her. There was much he wanted to make up for.

A clean bandage was suddenly dangling in front of his face, held there by a small green hand. Cedric blinked, having nearly forgotten Zephyr entirely.

“Thank you,” he said, taking the bandage and wrapping it back around Elyria’s arm. Zephyr patted him on the shoulder, and for a second she looked hesitant, torn. Like she might have wanted to say something. It was gone as quickly as it came though, and Zephyr was heading back to her previous position on the other side of the chamber before he could ask her about it. He had enough going on in his head at the moment anyway.

As if she could sense his thoughts, Elyria placed her hand on top of his, warmth radiating from the spot. A different kind of warmth than he was used to feeling. Less like heat. More like...light. And that throbbing in his chest only intensified.

If she felt anything similar, she didn’t let on. She only continued holding Cedric’s hand as she said with a steady voice, “I know something of having a power inside you that you don’t know how to control.”

“I have barely the comprehension to understand that this ‘power’ came from inside me at all, let alone that it’s something that can even be controlled. You should stay away from me,” Cedric replied, though despite being the one to say the words, something in his chest roiled at the suggestion. He couldn’t find the strength of will to enact it, to put any actual distance between them. Everything in him seemed to be screaming to do the opposite, in fact. So instead of pulling away, he flipped their hands so hers was face up, his fingertips dancing across her palm.

She scoffed. “I’m not afraid of you.”

He looked up from where he’d begun tracing the lines on her hand and met her glowing green stare. “Maybe you should be.”

“Maybe you need to stop being afraid of yourself.” Her gaze was unwavering as she wove her fingers between his. Her voice dropped. “You’re not alone in this. We’re so close, I can feel it. So close to the end. Whatever happens next, we can face it...together.”

Together.

The word was a chorus swelling in his ears, loosening the lingering remnants of whatever had constricted around his heart. For the first time since he woke, he felt like he could take a real breath .

“I’m sor?—”

“I swear to Solaris, Lunara, Gaia, and Noctis alike, Cedric, if you say ‘I’m sorry’ one more time... ”

He pressed his lips together. “I shall try to apologize less,” he said after a moment, his mouth tipping up sheepishly as he called upon the words they’d exchanged at the beginning of the second trial, “if you promise to try and loosen up a little when the occasion calls for it.”

Elyria’s lips pursed, her cheeks flexing, and Cedric knew she was fighting a laugh. He was very pleased when she lost that fight, a beaming smile overtaking her face. It was like the first rays of sun breaking through an overcast sky.

“That sounds like a losing proposition for us both,” she said, and the lopsided grin playing at the corners of Cedric’s lips bloomed until he found himself laughing.

A true, full-bodied laugh.

Elyria stared at him, the silver flecks in her eyes winking like stars on a windy night. “He laughs! Consider me utterly aghast.” She flexed her bandaged arm as if testing his handiwork, her voice teasing. “Did the fire burn away your broodiness?”

The question was said in jest, an attempt to stretch the lightness that had just finally broken through between them. Cedric knew this. It hit him like a hammer to the chest, nonetheless. A reminder that he had been changing—that he had changed—since being here. Making him question just how much of that change was due to the Crucible, or simply because whatever was in him had been slowly awakening this whole time.

It had haunted him since the moment the fire surged from his body. No, earlier. Since he crawled out of that lake of flame and smoke like he’d been born from it. Maybe since the first time he’d felt that heat coiled in his chest, waiting all along to break free.

His next words came out as a broken whisper. “What is wrong with me?”

Elyria cracked a grin. “Oh, come now, that’s far too easy.” When Cedric didn’t respond, her expression softened. She shifted, straightening her back even as she left their fingers intertwined, their hands laying on the bench between them. “There’s nothing wrong with you, Cedric.”

“It feels like everything that’s happened is my fault,” he said, voice shaking. “It’s my fault you got hurt. It’s my fault Gael died. It’s my fault that?—”

She lifted her other hand, her first finger raised to halt him. A contemplative look crossed her face, as if she was carefully weighing her next words. “I know what it’s like...to carry that ever-present weight of guilt. Of blame. To feel like something inside you is wrong, to let it eat away at you until nothing of you remains but wisps of smoke and a collection of scars.

“I ran from my power for years. Ran from myself. After Evander died, I blamed myself for not being strong enough. For not controlling it. I thought maybe if I’d been stronger, if I hadn’t been so scared of what I could do, he’d still be here.”

She looked across the chamber and met Kit’s eye, a bemused expression on the other fae’s face. “He only did it to help me, you know. Only entered the last Crucible because he thought that with the power of the crown, he might be able to free me from this.” She opened her free hand, and a wisp of shadow danced over the bandage crossing her palm. “That he might finally be able to give me peace.”

Her voice cracked on the last word. Cedric didn’t have a response to share. He also didn’t think she needed one. That this confession was as much for her as it was for him. So, he simply listened, rubbing his thumb in slow circles on the back of her hand as she spoke.

“For twenty-five years, everywhere I looked, all I saw were the places he wasn’t. Every time I walked into a room, every time I turned the corner, my eyes would go to the places I thought I would find him. The places he should have been. Sitting in his favorite chair. Reading a book on his side of the bed. Filling a water basin for the housekeeper with the snap of his fingers. Even things I used to complain about him wasting his time on...”

With a sigh, Elyria closed her hand, snuffing out that wisp of magic. “Things that, now, I would give anything to be ignored for again. If it meant he was still here.”

“He never would have wanted you to stop living, Ellie.” Kit’s voice was low as she crossed the space between them, coming to kneel at Elyria’s side. “And I wish I’d known this was the burden you carried all these years. ”

A single tear rolled down Elyria’s pale cheek. Cedric resisted the urge to wipe it away.

“If only you’d endangered your life sooner, we might have had more time to enjoy this,” Elyria said with a choked laugh.

Kit reached out and lightly smacked Elyria’s shoulder. “We’ll have plenty of opportunities to make up for lost time after we get out of here,” she said.

Elyria pulled her hand from Cedric’s to take her friend’s instead. “After,” she said, and his heart clenched all over again.

He wanted to speak, to say something, to acknowledge this strange thread between them. To ask if she felt it too.

She must feel it too.

But before Cedric could say anything, Kit stood, pulling Elyria to her feet before they dropped their hands and drew apart.

“First things first, though,” said Kit.

“The whole ‘getting out of here’ thing?” Elyria asked.

Kit nodded, then turned to address Thraigg and Nox in addition to Cedric and Elyria. “Anyone have a clue what we’re supposed to do now?”

Nox hummed as they got up and approached the rest of the group. “It is rather curious that we have not received any additional communication from the Arbiter, is it not?”

“Curious? It’s damned baffling,” said Thraigg.

“Precisely,” said Kit. “Where’s our congratulations for surviving another trial? Our ominous instructions on what is to come in the final one?”

“What makes you think only one remains?” asked Cedric.

“Oh, she hasn’t shared her theory with you yet?” Elyria asked.

Cedric shook his head.

“Kit’s convinced that the Arbiter’s proclamation back in Castle Lumin painted a map through the trials for us.”

“Was I wrong?” Kit looked affronted. “The Arbiter told us that the trials would demand strength and power and test our resolve and spirit. Trial of Strength, check. Trial of Spirit, check.”

“Trial of Magic?”

“Power, magic.” Kit glared at her friend. “As I’ve said before, semantics. ”

Elyria clucked her tongue. “Which would mean that we have, what, a Trial of Resolve remaining? That doesn’t make any sense to me.”

“Is the trial seeing how long we resolve to wait here like bumbling idiots?” Thraigg grumbled.

“Perhaps the Arbiter’s words are not an exact match for what we’ve come to experience, then,” Cedric said. “But the prophecy still is.”

“The prophecy?” repeated Elyria.

Cedric cleared his throat. “ From shadow and fire, champions rise, forged in the Crucible of fate. Strength, spirit, magic, and concord test the trials beyond the Gate. ”

Elyria was smirking at him when he finished his recitation, and embarrassment kept him from repeating the final two lines. Nobody else seemed to notice, though.

“So, not the Trial of Resolve, then, but the Trial of Concord?” Kit asked, her brow furrowing over her mismatched eyes.

A chill fell over the chamber, blanketing the group of champions like a shroud. Cedric didn’t understand why. Didn’t understand why Elyria went suddenly stiff, her breath catching, her gaze pinned on a spot somewhere behind Kit’s moonlight-silver head. Didn’t understand the expression of pure, unbridled disbelief on her face.

Not even as a voice—low and male and gentle and one that Cedric had certainly never heard before—cut through the silence like a knife.

“I always knew you were the smart one.”