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CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

TAKE OFF MY ARMOR

W e put the Faithful Forester’s chime in Benji’s room with the other stone objects and shuttered Petula Hall. Not even the knighthood, dispatched to the village two miles away, was allowed in. And not just because their fellow knight Maude Bauer was bruised and broken and unconscious.

It was to spare them the sight of their king.

Benji was… I didn’t know what to call it. His grief that Maude, whom I expected he held as both mother and sister, was so injured, put a misery in him no ale or wine or idleweed could ease.

“No,” he said, spilling his wine when Rory tried to drag him from her bedside for a proper sleep. “I want to stay.”

It was two days after the ceremony in the sacred glen. Maude lay on a finely woven quilt atop her bed, covered in bandages. The birke had fallen on her, shattering the bones on the left side of her abdomen and putting a swollen knot along her temple. Her ribs, her shoulder, her arm and fingers—all broken. The village physician came and went, setting her bones, but she’d said it was the bump to Maude’s head that concerned her most. That Maude might never wake.

That did not stop us from sitting at her bedside, waiting for her to do so.

“Come on, Castor.” Rory reached for Benji’s arm. “I’ll take you to your room. Sleep off some of that wine—”

Benji pulled away. “Fucking hell, Rory, leave me alone. No one believes this white knight charade.”

Rory flinched.

I flew to my feet, but it was the gargoyle who spoke. “That is unkind and unworthy, Bartholomew.” He’d been quietly crying in the corner of the room, and now appeared the spirit of righteous anger. “If you value your friend when he fights your battles for you—when he is rogue and ruthless—you must value him when he is gentle, too. Otherwise you do not value him at all.”

Benji leaned his back against the bed. Put his hands over his face. “I’m sorry, Rory.”

Rory was looking at Maude’s unmoving form, his dark eyes glassy. “It’s fine.”

Hours later, in the quiet of the hall, I was thinking of Maude. Of the Diviners. Of sleep that brooked no awakening.

Next to me, the gargoyle was looking out the window at the Chiming Wood. “The whole world is a wood, Bartholomew, and everyone in it is fashioned of birch bark. Frail as paper.”

He began to cry, and I did, too. “Oh, gargoyle.”

I used to think his sadness, his heavy emotion, such a futile thing. An irreconcilable flaw. But as I kept to Maude’s room, watching Benji drink and Rory go silent and feeling my own tongue struggle to put to words the defeat I felt, I began to think I’d been telling myself the wrong story about my peculiar batlike gargoyle.

Sadness, like birch bark, had all the appearance of frailty. And yet…

The tree prevailed.

A day later, I was running down the stairs, bare feet slapping against stone. When I found the gargoyle, polishing armor in the great hall, I was breathless. “She’s awake.”

Maude was sitting up in bed, drinking water, pale and shaky and covered in bandages, but awake. I stepped into the room, and she looked at me with those kind green eyes, and I learned that, for all my heartbreak over death—over false stories and lying gods and lifeless Diviners—my heart could break for happiness, too. “Hey, Maude.”

“Heard you two snagged that chime,” she said, winking at the gargoyle. “That’s four Omens down—two more to go.” Her voice grew solemn. “I know things have not been anything like you thought they’d be when you left Aisling, Diviner. But I hope you know how special you are to us. We wouldn’t have gotten this far without you.”

“Oh.” I scrubbed a hand over my cheek. “Thank you. I’m very glad you’re not, um, you know—”

“Dead as a doorhanger?” the gargoyle offered.

Maude turned to Benji, who stood near the window. “We should do something to commemorate her. She’s been fearless.”

Benji’s skin was brighter. His eyes less glassy. Maude’s awakening had brought him back to himself. “Whatever sounds good to you, Maude.”

“I was thinking a knighthood. We’ll have a proper ceremony. Today.”

I didn’t know what to say. “Don’t knights swear to the Omens in their vows?”

“We can skip that part.” Maude beamed. “You don’t have to do it, of course. But just in case you’ve grown tired of Aisling’s creed and everything that’s come with it, you might like to say ours for a while.”

My armor may dent, my sword may break, but I will never diminish.

I knew what she was doing. Offering me a permanent place, now that the Diviners were gone. Telling me that I need not remain adrift—that I had a home with them if I wanted one.

Tears prickled behind my eyes. “I’m not noble born.”

“Exceptions can be made,” Rory and Maude said at the same time, sharing a smile, then sending it my way.

Benji’s gaze shifted between Rory and me. He was quiet. Then—“Six has proven helpful as a Diviner. I wouldn’t want to change her title. The influence she wields, the way the nobles look at me when I’m with her—”

“Don’t be a prat,” Rory said. “This isn’t about you.”

“Of course it’s not.” Benji’s cheeks reddened, his voice hardening. “I’m the king, and it’s never about me. I’m not respected like a craftsman or a knight or a Diviner. My first public act is to go into the hamlets and be utterly humiliated by the nobility in the names of the Omens. I know that I’m young, and that my grandfather was a heretic, but the treatment of sovereigns goes far beyond that. It’s as if my position has only ever existed to be a foil to Aisling. I am made a prostrate fool to prove how much weaker a king is to a god.”

The silence in the room was heavy.

Rory went to stand in front of Benji. When he slouched as he often did, Rory and the king stood exactly equal, eye to eye. “Perhaps that’s the system’s fatal flaw. If Aisling and the Omens have only ever painted a king as inconsequential, what does it say about them if a king is the one who brings them all down?”

Benji’s face twisted as he held back tears.

“Your grandfather would be proud of you, Benji.” Maude, despite her bandages, tried to sit up straighter. “We’re proud, too.”

I nodded in agreement, and the gargoyle leaned close to whisper in my ear. “If the boy wants to make me cry, he’ll need a sadder story than that.”

I shushed him, and the king’s gaze turned. Benji looked at me. Really looked at me. I couldn’t see the world behind his eyes, but I was certain it was vast, and that he was desperate to map it. “If you wish it, Six, of course I’ll knight you. Your loyalty is a treasure I would never deny.”

He stepped around Rory, placing himself between us. “But please understand. Our work is not yet done. Every Omen that dies, every stone object I claim, I grow closer to reclaiming the kingdom from its dreams and portents and false stories. But if I succeed in taking up the mantle, if the Omens are vanquished—if Aisling falls—I must give people something to believe in in their stead. All that power has to go somewhere .”

He took my hand, then turned to Maude, then Rory. “Do you all promise to be there with me, that I might bear it?”

“Of course, Benji,” Maude said. “We’re with you.”

Rory nodded, his gaze flickering to me.

“My business has ever been with the Omens,” I murmured. “Next, it will be with the Heartsore Weaver. And after—” My voice hardened. “With the moth. When I face the abbess again, it will be in armor, not gossamer.” I reached out. Took Benji’s hand. “With King Benedict Castor the Third at my side.”

He smiled. Boyish, brave. “Then let’s get you knighted.”

The gargoyle and I stood outside Petula Hall’s library door at sunset. Maude had chosen it for the knighting, because that was where the best western light shone, and she said she liked the feel of it on her cheek. The rest of the knights were not there, and I was glad for it. I didn’t want a display. It was only me, the gargoyle, Maude, Benji, Rory, and the blacksmith, Victor, who’d brought me my finished suit of armor that morning.

It was so… beautiful. I didn’t even remember the names of all the pieces, but the gargoyle, who had not shirked his duty as squire, had chattered in my ear about them as he dressed me. When the chainmail, then armor, was fastened, I felt like a great stone edifice. Sturdy and impenetrable, but with a beating, swelling heart within.

“You know, Bartholomew,” the gargoyle said, just before we joined the others in the library. “It would be all right if you did not want to become a knight.”

I turned. “What makes you say that?”

“I don’t know why I say the things I do.” I’d given him my hammer and chisel to hold. He weighed them in his palms, his brows lowering in contemplation. “Only, you did not ask to become a Diviner, yet you swore all your worth to Aisling. It would be a sad story, were you to do that again.” His stone eyes rose to my face. “But if you wanted to—I would not blame you. It is easier, swearing ourselves to someone else’s cause than to sit with who we are without one.”

With that he stepped forward, humming to himself, and pushed open the library doors.

Benji and Maude and Rory stood by the west windows of the library, lit by a sunset sky. Maude was not wearing armor on account of her bandages, but Rory and Benji had donned full suits, the metal bright, reflecting the day’s final light.

They watched me as I came into the library, offering the moment the stillness it was due. Rory’s gaze warmed my face, and I met it, wishing with a sudden intensity that he knew I was looking back at him.

That my shroud was not there, between us.

When I stood before them, next to the gargoyle, light fell upon our faces in a way it never had in the spring upon Aisling’s chancel. The king drew an arming sword from his belt. Cleared his throat. “I am Benedict Castor the Third.” His voice was quiet at first, but then I smiled at him, and he spoke louder, projecting over the library like we were in a vast hall filled with witnesses. “It is my honor, for deeds done in bravery, in shrewdness, and in generosity of heart, to bestow the title of knight upon—”

“Sybil,” I said. “My name is Sybil Delling.”

Benji’s gaze widened, and Maude’s smile lit the room. Rory watched me with soft eyes, and the gargoyle began to clap, then sob. “Bravo, Bartholomew. Bravo.”

The king took a moment to speak. “Very well. Sybil Delling—do you accept the accolade of knighthood?”

“Yes.”

“Bend a knee.”

I did.

“A knight’s craft is love. Faith. War. Now, because the knights are not here, I will not swear you to the same vows of faith we three took. There will be no talk of the Omens. No self-effacement. Rather, I will put upon you the weight of responsibility due to the valorous of the Stonewater Kingdom, and you will tell me if you agree to its burden.” He did not seem like such a boy anymore, his spine straighter, his words surer. “Does that suit you?”

“It does.”

Next to him, Maude was grinning ear to ear. I wondered how many ceremonies she’d been to. How many times, since girlhood, she’d watched a knighting. Yet I knew, by the happy lines in her face, it meant something to her, being here for mine.

“Do you vow to protect the weak and defenseless and all those who beckon for your aid?” Benji asked.

“I do.”

“Do you vow to be a witness, pupil, and visitor to the kingdom’s peoples and keep peace within the hamlets?”

“I do.”

“Do you swear to reject pecuniary reward and all mercenary endeavors, acting only upon charity and what best suits the kingdom?”

“Yes.”

“Do you swear loyalty to the crown? To be my serving knight—and also my Diviner?”

I paused. My shroud was so much lighter than my armor. But I felt its weight upon me. “What is a Diviner, really, when nothing is divine?”

“You needn’t wear the title if it no longer fits you,” Rory murmured. “You needn’t do anything you do not wish to.”

The king’s gaze shot to him. “Yes, she does. That’s the whole point. To swear to me is to swear to my wishes, my aspirations—my kingship. If she vows to be my knight, she vows devotion. To do as I ask, just as you and Maude have.” His eyes darted to me, then back to Rory. “Yes?”

“Yes,” Rory snapped. “We swore loyalty—but not mindlessness. She’s not here to give up more of her liberty, Benedict. The abbess did not own her Diviners, the Omens do not own Traum, and you do not own the Stonewater Kingdom, nor your knights, just for some words said in a ceremony.”

“That’s not—” Benji flushed. “You’ve never seen the importance, the virtue, of noble vows.”

A deathly calm came over Rory. “Because I’m neither noble nor virtuous?”

Maude rubbed her brow as if she were watching two siblings squabble over a toy. “Wrong time, wrong place.”

“This armor fits me better than my Divining robe ever did,” I said abruptly. “It’s an honor to wear it.” I reached up. Grazed the rim of my shroud. “But I’ve sworn to Aisling, and I’ve sworn to the Omens, and I’ve sworn to my friends, who are now forever gone.” I drew in a long breath. “I think I would like to stop promising myself away, or else there will be nothing left of me to give, King Castor.”

“A fine answer, Bartholomew,” the gargoyle commended.

Benji’s cheeks were still red. He turned away from Rory. “Fine.” The king lowered the arming sword to my left shoulder, then my right. “Sybil Delling. Your armor may dent, your sword may break, but may you never diminish.” He looked upon my shroud, searching for my eyes.

But he could not find me.

“Welcome to my knighthood.”

Hours later, when the moon was high, the gargoyle snoring and Maude lost to sleeping drafts, rest was a stranger. I wandered Petula Hall, still in my armor. I thought maybe I’d check in on Benji, but when I ambled past his door, my feet kept moving.

Taking me where I needed to go.

The door I stopped at had no light dancing under its threshold to invite me. Still, I knocked three times against the wood.

No one answered.

I pressed my brow upon the aged grain. “Myndacious?”

Again, no answer.

Maybe he was asleep. But just as I was about to go—

“Sybil.”

I breathed against the door. Clasped the cold iron knob. Turned it.

Rory was seated upon a long bed, a weary candle lit upon an adjacent table. He wasn’t in his armor anymore—just a pale shirt and trousers. His elbows rested on his knees, his hands dropped between his legs, fingers flexing as I stepped into the room. “Are you all right?”

I closed the door behind me. “I just wanted…”

He waited.

“I just wanted to see you.”

His throat hitched. Then—“Come here.”

The candle caught my visage, casting a long shadow upon the floor. I stepped into the room, walking until there were no more steps to take—until my armored toes were pointed at Rory’s bare ones. Slowly, my hand dropped into his black hair, my fingers tangling in the silken mess.

He looked up, gravel in his voice. “You’re still in your armor.”

“I didn’t let the gargoyle take it off.”

“Why?”

“I feel stronger with it on.”

Rory held me in his gaze. I thought he might lecture me on martyrdom or strength—on the impossible weight of living.

He rose to his feet instead. Put his hands to my face—held my cheeks with an imploring pressure. “What happens at Aisling Cathedral is not your fault. The Omens and the terrible things they’ve done are not your fault. Lost Diviners, past and present, are not your fault. You have no failures or falsehoods to amend for, no vows to tether you, no strength to prove.” He soothed my hair, as if to comb away the knots of my despair. “Especially to me.”

My body had always been strong—and ever just enough. But whatever my soul was made of was frail. Like birch bark, like gossamer, like the wings of a moth. When Rory brought his lips to my forehead, kissing it with unbearable softness, speaking the language of pain and reprieve into me, that frail little soul began to fortify.

“It’s heavy,” I murmured. “My armor.”

“I know.” He took a step back, eyes dropping to my mouth. “Let me help you.”

He began with my pauldrons.

Clasps were undone—armored plates removed first from my shoulders, then arms. Rory released my hands from their gauntlets. Next came my breastplate. When that had joined the pile of armor upon the floor, Rory dropped to his knees and began to work the clasps at my thighs—the cuisses, the poleyns. The greaves upon my shins fell with a clang, and then it was just the intricate web of plates—the sabbaton—over my boots.

Rory discarded them all, then removed my boots, too. When he looked up at me from his knees, it was the same way I’d looked up while being knighted. There wasn’t a sword between us, but he was just as vulnerable as I’d been.

When the armor was off, Rory rose to his feet. “Sit on the bed.”

The backs of my legs hit the mattress. I sat, and Rory’s eyelids grew heavy. “Arms up.”

He grasped my chainmail at my ribs, the web of iron hissing as he pulled it. By slow measures, it shifted. When it finally surrendered and fell to the floor, Rory and I were both breathing hard.

My armor lay like a vanquished enemy at our feet. Just like in the Fervent Peaks when I’d moved through the hot spring’s feverish water, I felt weightless.

I rose to my feet. “All of it.”

Rory’s gaze trailed up the buttons of my under armor, his brow knitting as he searched for more armor that wasn’t there. I took his hand and brought it up my body. Over my stomach, my ribs, up my throat and onto my cheek until his fingers, rough and calloused, caught on my shroud.

“This too,” I whispered.

His muscles tensed, Rory’s entire body suddenly called to attention. “Sybil.”

“I’ll wear it publicly, like Benji wants. Prove that I’m influential. Mythical. Fearsome. Only—”

He kept still. Waiting for me to finish.

“Only I don’t think those things matter to me anymore.” I stepped closer, our faces inches apart. “Please, Rory. Take it off. I want someone to see me.” I whispered against his lips. “I want it to be you.”

Rory’s touch was slow. Gentle. He slid his pointer finger under my shroud, grazing my cheekbone—the delicate line of my lower lashes.

We both let out a shaking breath.

I guided his hand over my cheek, behind my ear, to the knot at the back of my head. Rory worked it, keeping his eyes on my face the entire time. The candle’s meager light cast shadows over him, his dark eyes two pools of ink. They trailed over my cheeks, my nose. Over my lips once—twice—

The knot loosened. I reached out of instinct, pinning my shroud to my cheek before it could fall.

Rory’s hand went still. “You can change your mind.”

I let go. “I haven’t.”

Rory’s lips parted, but he didn’t say anything. His fingers got back to work on the knot. It loosened, loosened—

And then my shroud was falling, silent, onto the pile of armor.

I didn’t watch it drop. My eyes remained lifted, fixed in the darkness of Rory’s.

His inhale was sharp. For an excruciating moment, I couldn’t read his face—couldn’t decipher his eyes. “What?”

“I just…” His breaths came faster. “I don’t think I have the words.”

“Am I that unsightly?”

His thumb found my chin—lifted it. He looked so exquisite to me. My shroud had never hidden any of his beauty, nor was I surprised to see it so close. Rodrick Myndacious was exquisite—

But it wasn’t that. It was the newness of his expression. There was wonder in his gaze I’d never glimpsed before, as if seeing my eyes for the first time had profoundly altered his.

He said it intently. Like he was imploring every part of me to take heed. “You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, Sybil Delling.”

The air tasted of him. Of musk and idleweed and the distinct smell of his sweat. I breathed it in too fast—filled my mouth and lungs with it—but it wasn’t enough.

The darkness in Rory’s gaze blew wide. There was no kneeling, no wearing armor. We stood nigh eye to eye, perfectly balanced, he naked in his wonder, me in my defenselessness—and both of us in our desire.

“Don’t tell me what they look like.” I pressed onto my toes. Swallowed his shaking breath with my own. “Don’t say anything at all.”

Rory’s smeared his thumb across my lips. “I’ll do anything you ask of me.”

And then his mouth was on mine.