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CHAPTER SIX

Cat

L io volunteers to escort the adopted Princess of Soleb back to bed. He wraps an arm around her shoulders and steers her towards the door, flagging down one of the House’s staff members to let them know about the mess. There is a rush of movement in response. Voices calling this way and that. Cat watches the fuss with a detached bemusement. After meeting Elician, it should not surprise him that another member of the royal family is a Giver. While it’s true that Princess Fenlia had not been on his list of targets to begin with, he is starting to think his entire mission has been a farce from the outset.

Closing his eyes, his heart lurches at another possibility altogether. My queen wanted me gone, he thinks, and knew I would never return.

Freedom, in the form of exile.

He tries to remember what his queen had looked like when she gave him the order. She had offered him a boon. An exchange, one that he had taken at face value without asking any additional questions. He had agreed to the terms, knowing the only reason it had been offered was because they were not in public. She never played her hand in public. There were too many eyes, too many people who would later hold those moments against his queen in any way they could. She had been trying to tell him something in that office, and he had not understood until now. He should have. He truly should have.

‘You could have handled that more delicately,’ Marina suggests, distracting him from the downward spiral. Lio and Fen are long gone. The others are still here. ‘Today has not been easy for her.’

Zinnitzia shrugs, says, ‘She cannot keep avoiding responsibilities that are unpleasant.’ She steps away from the mess on the floor, nose curling at the smell.

‘Has Fen been very difficult?’ Elician asks. His hand still rests at the back of Cat’s spine, thumb shifting in a comforting and absentminded stroke. A pleasant and warm feeling that Cat has become far too familiar with in the three weeks it took to arrive here.

‘Fenlia has undeniable talent,’ Zinnitzia informs Elician with the gravitas of a beleaguered parent forced to admit to the good qualities of a child they despise. ‘But,’ she continues, ‘Fenlia has no desire to do anything with that talent. She avoids the House of the Wanting at every opportunity, and I believe tonight was the first time she even bothered to cross the threshold of this House.’

‘That doesn’t surprise me,’ he murmurs. ‘Death has taken much from her already.’

‘She’s ignorant and oftentimes hateful .’

‘And you have had three years to help her be better,’ Elician points out. His hand leaves the small of Cat’s back. Cat misses it on instinct. He leans back into the empty space where the feeling once lay. ‘You truly believe that she and Cat would do well together?’

‘I suppose that depends on the nature of your Cat,’ Zinnitzia says. Cat hates the look she sends him, assessing and prodding. Like his brother’s most terrifying toady, Eline de Carsay, whose sole purpose in life had been to ask questions and find out how everything truly worked. Cat knows this game well. Stay still, stay quiet, keep his head down and maintain a posture as unthreatening as possible.

Nothing to see here, no need to look.

‘He’s a good man,’ Elician says. It should sound like a lie, but somehow it doesn’t. The prince is, disconcertingly enough, being honest. ‘He doesn’t enjoy killing and was quite terrified of killing our horse. The whole journey here, he did not fight or argue. Not really. He didn’t complain. He never tried to run or wander off. He would even help us set up camp in the evenings.’

‘My, my, you almost sound smitten, Your Highness,’ Zinnitzia says.

Head down, Cat thinks, cheeks burning, do nothing.

‘Just because I want him to be treated with respect does not mean I’m smitten with him,’ Elician replies.

‘Perhaps, but you sound like you’re trying to sell him for adoption or marriage.’

‘I want him to be treated well. He has done no irreparable harm since we met.’

‘Yes,’ Zinnitzia bites out. ‘Besides killing Lio. Tell me, Your Highness, how many times have you wrested him from Death’s grip? Six? Seven?’ From under his lashes, Cat sees Elician flinch. His crossed arms tighten, jaw setting in open defiance. But the venerable Giver matron is not finished. She stalks closer, voice dripping with condemnation. ‘Your pathetic attachment to Wilion d’Altas is what really will be your undoing, Your Highness . You cannot keep bringing him back. There are consequences!’

‘I am very aware of what those consequences are, thank you.’ In three weeks of travel, Cat has never heard Elician speak like this. Sharp and pointed, his tone stinging like ice on an open wound.

‘Are you? Because you—’

‘That’s enough.’ Marina. She had been quiet during the rising argument, loitering on the outside of their group and fading into the background as Cat himself had tried to do. He had almost forgotten she was even there.

Zinnitzia, though, is not prepared to stop. Even with Marina’s interjection. She glowers at the aged Reaper. ‘You coddle him too much. You know where this kind of thinking leads.’ She thrusts a finger towards Elician, turning back to him with fire on her tongue. ‘How am I meant to teach your sister not to raise the dead when you seem perfectly content to do it on a whim?’

‘On a whim?’ Elician asks, temper rising ever more. ‘A whim ? I’ve been fighting that war for three years, watching dozens – hundreds of people die every week, smelling the pits burning their bodies, tasting their ashes in the air, and I have not saved a single one of them. I have not brought a single one of them back from the dead, healed a single shattered bone or mended one avulsion. I have watched men and women throw themselves into that melee and not make it to the other side, and I have done nothing . Don’t talk to me about whims when every day of that war is a constant struggle. When all I want is to put an end to a symphony of agony.’ He runs out of air, chest heaving. ‘If the gods don’t want me to save Wilion’s life each time he dies, then they can damn well remove their fucking blessing from me at any time. Until then, he stays.’

Zinnitzia looks away. She glares at the puddle of sick on the ground. Her fingers flex as far as they can at her sides, then curl back into fists. ‘You shouldn’t even be there,’ she says eventually. ‘War is no place for our kind.’

‘You are welcome to try to change my father’s mind. But the last time she tried’ – he waves a hand at Marina – ‘she was removed from my household and sent here where she could stop being in the way . So, tell me, exactly, how do you plan to fix things?’

Zinnitzia says nothing. Perhaps there is nothing to say.

He’s exhausted, Cat thinks. A sound builds at the back of his throat. A hiss that would carry an emotion. An urge born from his time in the Reaper cells he’d called his home, where language was stifled but sound was almost permitted if they could be subtle about it. Elician would not understand the noise. Few do. But the hiss stutters past his lips anyway, carrying with it all there is to feel. Worry. Concern. Weariness, and a deep need to rest.

Elician glances at him. His frown deepens for a moment. He does not know how this language works. He cannot repeat the sound back in empathetic unison. But his shoulders do lose some of their tension. His crossed arms fall straight at his sides. ‘None of this matters now. I won’t change my mind regarding Lio. As for Cat . . . my only intention here is for him to have the option of a life beyond the bars of a cage. Once I’m king we can discuss what the future holds from there.’

‘You are too kind to be a king,’ Marina murmurs when it seems like Zinnitzia has run out of things to say. ‘Your reign will not last long.’

‘Perhaps it won’t. But it will last long enough for me to make that decision, and I will worry about its length after I wear the crown. I’m not a king yet.’

‘You will be,’ she swears. ‘Come, little brother.’ She holds her hand towards Cat. He glances at it, then back to the prince. ‘You will see him later, I am sure.’

‘Go,’ Elician encourages.

‘Get some sleep,’ Cat says in turn, forcing his thoughts into words the prince will understand. Elician huffs. Smiles in a way that is too forced and unnatural to be beautiful.

‘You too.’

Cat won’t. He takes a step after Marina. Then another. He glances back at the prince and realizes for the first time: he will miss Elician when he leaves Kreuzfurt to go back to the war. His company had not been bad to have at all.

Marina is exactly as Ranio had described. Her hair is straight, brown and cut sharply at her ears. Her face is long and narrow, her lips thin. She reminds Cat, almost, of his mother. But her skin is not so pale as that. Marina spends time in the sun, her cheeks red from its oppressive glare. But, more importantly, though her face is youthful, it is an illusion. Cat knows it like he knows how to breathe. She is old. Very old. And for all she looks nearly the same age as his queen, he knows she is far older than that.

Marina moves gracefully, her heel and toe perfectly in line with each step. The bell at her wrist chimes as she moves, and she sways with it, each step a dance. There is a sword at her waist. As she walks, her hand on his shoulder, his eyes continue to fall to its hilt. Is it sharp? It must be. What would be the point in carrying a weapon that is dull? Then again, she has no need for such a weapon. She can kill easily with a flick of her hand.

Marina opens a door. She guides him inside. It is dark, he cannot see well, but soon she strikes a match and lights a candle. She illuminates the room, one lantern at a time. He stands there, watching, waiting. There is a bed pressed to one wall. Great windows with long curtains pulled back. A table. Some wooden furniture, dresser drawers and a mirror. He ducks his head to keep his eyes far from the mirror. The floor offers nothing nearly so interesting, thick and carpeted as it is, but he prefers it to his reflection. She says something to someone in the hall, then closes the door.

When she faces him, her expression is stern and unyielding. ‘There are things I must know before I give you unfettered access to this place,’ Marina says in Lunae so perfect it sounds antiquated. It is different from Elician’s delivery, where his accent still shortens the closing vowels, or from Lio, who regularly fumbles both pronunciation and conjugation.

As far as Cat has been able to tell, the people of Soleb do not take kindly to the implicatory nature of his mother tongue. They prefer their static consonants and sharp distinctions. Theirs is a language that demands no questions of its listener. There are twenty different ways to say the word love , for instance, and each is used for a specific time or place or purpose. The expected and pro forma love of a parent is different from the devotional love of a child or the budding love of friendship. The love of an inanimate object is different from the love of a living thing. These are a literal people who choose their words carefully and have no need for critical thinking or analysis. They wish for the easy comfort of confirmation, so there can be no doubt.

Marina speaks to him in Lunae, but she does so from the viewpoint of a Soleben. She wants distinction in her understanding, and clarification of the unknown. She asks him about his orders. He explains them without pause. To end the royal family. Elician, Lord Anslian, King Aliamon, Queen Calissia.

‘Not Lady Adalei?’

He frowns, trying to remember the name beyond the brief mentions he had overheard from Lio and Elician on the ride to Kreuzfurt. But like Fenlia, she had not been included on the list he had been given. He shrugs. Maybe she’s a Giver too. The royal family seems full of them.

‘Have you killed people on your queen’s orders before?’ There is no point in telling her the answer to that. He presses his lips tight, and she waits, patient and unyielding. ‘Have you killed any Soleben subjects on your queen’s orders before?’ He shakes his head. No. Not on orders. Ranio had died, broken and shattered, but his death had not been purposeful. His death had not been at Queen Alenée’s word. Cat’s hands still clench at the memory. He stares down at the floor, waiting for her judgement.

Marina’s posture is tense and dissatisfied. Her hands rest on her hips, her left very near her sword. ‘I will have someone watch you at all times,’ she decides at long last. ‘If you prove yourself to not be a threat to the people here, that may change. But you should know, Cat, this place is not like Alelune. You may not find peace here.’

He nods.

He doubts peace is something that he would find anywhere. But for the foreseeable future, here is well enough. ‘Well then.’ Her head dips like she is confirming some imaginary contract, sealing his fate therein. A knock sounds at the door. ‘Yes?’ she calls out in Soleben. An elderly man, skin drooping and loose, peers in around its edge. ‘Fransen, yes, come in.’ He does, pushing the door open even further to reveal a tall stack of black clothing neatly folded in his arms. A silver ball-bell rests on top, tiny enough to hide in a closed fist.

The man walks slowly, feet sliding across the floor rather than lifting. His back is bent forward, and his breaths come in loud inhales that seem to press his lungs right up against his ribs. ‘Two uniforms for a new Reaper,’ the man says, reedy voice breaking as he leans down to deposit his load on the bed.

‘Thank you, Fransen. Fransen, this is Cat. He’s just arrived.’

‘Good to meet you, then, lad. We estimated your size, but if it does not fit well, let me know, yes? Yes?’

‘Yes,’ Cat responds dutifully.

‘Tomorrow, Fransen will give you a tour of the grounds. The outer gate is open during the day, closed at nightfall. It does not matter if the gate is open or closed, you will not cross it, understood?’ Marina presses onwards.

‘Yes.’

‘You’ll have access to all the grounds, though do take note that there are more than just Givers and Reapers here. We have about thirty to forty guests at all times, some for healing at the House of the Wanting and others who are seeking end-of-life care. You will not approach them. Is that understood?’

‘Yes.’

‘If Fenlia does join us tomorrow, there are some things I’d like to test you both on; I’ll see how well you’ve grasped certain concepts. But when you are not with me, Fransen will be your . . . let’s say, your chaperone.’

Cat frowns. It seems like entirely the wrong word. Though calling him a guard would be somehow worse. The elderly man standing between them does not seem capable of such things. Fransen straightens his back, vertebrae popping and cracking into place. He lets out a quiet oomph , and rests one hand against his lower spine. ‘You think me incapable?’ Fransen asks. Cat glances between him and Marina. He shakes his head. If this is how they want it, he will not argue.

Still, he knows as well as Marina does, as well as Fransen must know, that Cat could outrun him. He could knock him over and disappear down the hall before Fransen could manage to scream. He could do any manner of things and Fransen could do nothing to stop him. So why Fransen? Lio and Elician had been terrible captors for a myriad of reasons, but to expect Fransen to keep him confined? That is almost insulting. Is all Soleben security this lax?

‘Unclench your jaw, you’re too young to be breaking your teeth over silly things like this,’ Fransen says. ‘It’s a test. Tell him, Marina, before he works himself into a frenzy.’

‘It’s a test,’ she repeats. ‘One based on your personality more than anything else.’

Oh. Cat closes his eyes. He breathes in, then out again. I see. Invisible bars on invisible cages. Elician had been right. The point of Kreuzfurt is not to be forced into place by someone with more power, it is to lock himself inside and wilfully stay put. He has to choose to let this man be his chaperone, and he has to choose to accept what that means.

‘You can try to leave, of course,’ Fransen says. ‘But how you treat those around you will dictate how you are treated in turn. And if you try to breach the outer gates, you will be stopped. They are constantly under watch.’ The old man points towards the windows. Beyond the glass, all of Kreuzfurt is laid bare. Its towering external wall, made of thick stone and smeared with smooth plaster, offers no opportunity for climbing. Torches flicker as people walk along its length – guards monitoring all those inside. Cat’s fingers twitch, threatening to curl into fists. He lets it go. Elician had provided an accurate description after all. More than he knew. It’s a far too familiar sight. ‘The only entrance or exit is that front gate. The wall itself has been dug deep into the ground, you cannot tunnel your way under it – and you would be spotted if you tried. You have to use the gate. And if you try to leave without permission, you will be shot by any one of the trained archers that patrol that wall.’

‘We do not die,’ Cat murmurs in the foreign tongue.

‘Not for good, no, but an arrow through the heart will still stop you in your tracks. Your heart can’t heal with a shaft through it. And even if the arrow should miss or go clean through – the tips have been laced with enough poison to kill you a hundred times over. You’d be dead before you hit the ground, and you wouldn’t regenerate until your body had managed to do away with the poison. It is an entirely unpleasant situation.’

That sounded personal. Cat twists to look back at the old man and asks, ‘You tried to leave once?’

‘Only once,’ he agreed. ‘My first year here, in fact. I had a damn fool idea that I would go to the art festival in Himmelsheim. I’d gone every year before my first death and, well, I was determined to go and listen to the music. I donned a perfectly clever disguise, no black cloak or Reaper’s bell to be seen – or heard!’ He laughs at his own joke before miming a bow and arrow with his old, weathered hands. ‘I was shot before I made it one foot past the gate. Believe an old man, yes? It is not worth it. Three weeks in bed trying to fight that poison, dying and waking up again in cycles. I’m too old for that now.’ He waves his hand to the side, shaking his head.

‘You are not old,’ Cat states. Both Fransen and Marina laugh.

‘Well spotted,’ Marina praises lightly. ‘How old do you think Fransen is?’

It is difficult to say. Cat looks at him and can see what is obvious. He is frail, his bones are weak, his skin is so thin as to be translucent. Fransen’s veins are visible along his neck, and there is discoloration from spending too much time in the Soleben sun. His hair is white and thin, balding in patches along his scalp. But what he looks like and what he feels like are entirely different. There is an energy radiating off the man that Cat has long since grown accustomed to feeling. Death has placed her hands on Fransen, but she has only done so in the past few years. Compared to Marina, Fransen feels like a child.

‘I’ve been a Reaper longer than you,’ Cat murmurs.

‘Quite possibly, yes.’ Fransen shrugs. ‘My clock didn’t have the courtesy of freezing me at peak physical perfection like the majority of you lot. I had the great honour of dying of old age about five years ago. I’m the youngest Reaper here as far as that maths is considered, but I look old enough to be this one’s great-grandfather. Regardless of that, though, I’m still your elder, which means I’m due a certain amount of respect. Understood?

‘Yes.’

‘Good then, I’ll leave you to it. I’ll wake you in the morning for the Summer Rituals. You’ll want to take part, even if it seems strange.’ Fransen dips his head and sees himself out.

Marina waits until he is gone before asking, ‘Will Alelune send someone else to kill Elician?’

‘I don’t know,’ Cat replies.

She looks at him, lips tugging down into a deep frown, then nods. ‘Get some rest. Have a good waking in the morning.’

Then she is gone, the door closing quietly behind her. There is no sound of a lock securing him into place. Thirteen minutes later, he checks just to see. The door opens seamlessly. There is no one in the hall. Lock yourself into your own cage, he thinks bitterly. Throw away the key. Slowly, he shuts the door.

Walking back to the bed, he eyes it speculatively for several moments before sitting down on the floor next to it. It will be too soft to sleep on. He knows better than to torment himself with that possibility. Closing his eyes, he swallows down a laugh. It is the first time in months he has been left alone more or less unsupervised. He almost wishes Elician was still near. At least then he would have someone to listen to. The prince did seem to love to chatter aimlessly about anything that crossed his mind. And that had been pleasant, at least. For a while. But this room is quiet and still, and that is fine too. Cat is adaptable. He does not have a choice. It’s not like he can die.