Touraine was such a bloody mess. Her eyelids fluttered as she wavered, somehow holding herself upright.
“Where… the sky-falling fu—” She didn’t finish the sentence, choking on her own blood.
Luca swallowed and pushed the pistol wide before scooping Touraine to her chest.
“You have no say in military justice, Your Highness,” Cantic hissed. As if she could not wait for it to be over. Are you as ashamed as I am? Cantic nodded at Rogan. “Finish this.”
“I said, stop.” Luca stared down the barrel of the gun and into Rogan’s eyes. That this horse-faced bastard should be the one to end Touraine was beyond cruel. And anylight: “All she has done, she has done for me.”
Cantic hesitated. Her mouth half-open to form what words? A flicker of sorrow broke through the mask of stony command.
Touraine’s blood leaked warm against Luca’s pale linen shirt, blending in with the black embroidery. So warm. Too warm. Like the glow of a fire in a winter hearth.
“Sacrifices,” Touraine choked out. “Must be… made.”
“Touraine?”
Before the flash and the sound of a skull shattering, Touraine’s eyes glowed golden.
Luca thought her heart had stopped as everything froze around her, but it hadn’t. Everyone, including her, had forgotten how to breathe. The air was still; the audience was silent. Touraine, too, lay still in her arms. Utterly still.
She did not believe her eyes, which told her that Rogan’s head had broken open, not Touraine’s.
Then, like a wave crashing from its zenith, the entire crowd recoiled in revulsion and panic, and Luca flinched with them, spattered in gore. The firing squad held their spent weapons, blinking in surprise. Only Cantic pulled her pistol, but there was no place to aim.
Fast, faster than anyone could reckon in their confusion, Aranen the priestess, somehow unbound from the ropes that held her, crossed the few paces separating her and the general. Aranen’s eyes glowed golden, her hands and mouth were smeared with blood, and she reached to brush a palm over Cantic’s cheek.
Luca didn’t have time to cry out, but the general’s reflexes were well honed.
Cantic pulled the trigger with the barrel of her gun against Aranen’s belly. The priestess barely flinched, a slight recoil of force. She never lost contact with Cantic’s skin.
Bile rose in Luca’s stomach. The general’s skin turned grayish and drained, while her eyes rolled into the back of her head. Blood pooled in her eyes until her eyelids overflowed; it leaked from her mouth, nose, and ears.
The brief panic halted in the face of pure shock.
In that interval of horror, Luca laid Touraine down, resting the woman’s head in the dirt as gently as she could. Touraine stared at the sky, but Luca saw her eyelids flutter. Golden irises in bloodshot eyes. The relief in her heart didn’t last. If Touraine died right now, Luca would hate herself forever. On the other hand, if Aranen wiped out the compound—or worse, the remaining Balladairans in the city—there would be no living with that.
She stood, good and bad leg weak and trembling, and walked to Aranen. The priestess stared at Cantic’s corpse, then at her own hands. Luca held herself as straight as she could. She looked nothing like royalty, in a blood-soaked shirt and plain trousers. She probably smelled like sick, like everything else in this sky-falling compound. The broadside artists would have fun with this moment if she survived it.
“Please don’t hurt anyone.” She lowered her head. She didn’t deserve to ask it of Aranen, of any Qazāli, but she would try.
Aranen turned to her. Her eyes had turned the dull gold of an antique. Then she made to pass Luca, and Luca flinched. Another musket fired and hit Aranen in the shoulder. Blood blossomed and spread through the dirty cloth, but as Luca watched, the wound slowly closed.
Sky above and earth below. Luca’s mouth worked soundlessly until she found her voice.
“Stop!” She threw her arm out to stave off another attack.
Aranen brushed past her, but she only walked to Touraine.
Half of the audience had already fled, to barracks or for the Quartier or the city proper—wherever they could convince themselves was safe. Nowhere. Nowhere is safe, Luca thought.
Many of those remaining were blackcoats. She met their grim or frightened gazes with her own, whatever good the solidarity would do. “Lay down your weapons. No matter what happens, the Qazāli go free today. Rebels. Conscripts. They are not to be harmed today or any day after. We’re leaving.
“Have mercy on us, Aranen.” Luca spoke to Aranen’s back, in Shālan. The priestess was consumed with Touraine’s body, running her hands along the woman’s torso and legs.
“You have cost me everything,” Aranen finally said.
Luca wanted to say that it wasn’t her, but Aranen didn’t deserve such weakness. “I know. I’m sorry.”
Aranen stood and fixed her eyes on Luca again, and Luca knew without doubt that the priestess was not the one appraising her. Every petty thought, every insecurity, every moment of cruelty was exposed. She wanted to throw herself to the ground.
The priestess stepped toward her, hand outstretched, and Luca shrank back. Cantic’s dead body was barely two paces away.
Where does a queen’s life weigh in the balance of her kingdom?
Aranen pressed a hand against her cheek. Luca leaned into it, eyes closed. She yielded.
Heat, or maybe light, or maybe none of that but something rolled through Luca’s body. It coiled inside her chest, sliding between her lungs, slipping into the gaps of her intestines. It itched, a fierce tingling that made her want to rip herself apart. It shot up and down her legs, bouncing, heedless of the pain it caused her. At her heart, it felt like a caress, like a fist wrapped around her life, thinking to squeeze.
Balladaire has lost. I’ve lost us.
And then Aranen broke
