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Authors: Claire Legrand

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BOOK: Furyborn
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“No.” Rielle set her jaw. “I insist we talk about it, this very night. It’s unfair to all of us until we do.”

Into the silence that followed, Ludivine spoke gently. “She’s right, Audric.”

Audric leaned heavily against his desk.

“If I could give up my crown and my duty,” he said,
“and leave this place behind, with only you at my side…” He glanced at Rielle. The quiet anguish on his face seized her heart. “I would do it in an instant, with Lu’s blessing.”

“Abandon your birthright? Leave your country without an heir?” Rielle scoffed, tears standing hot in her eyes. “You’d never dare.”

“You’re wrong!” He stormed away from them to face the starlit windows, his shoulders
high and tense. “I’d do it for you. Sometimes I think I’d betray everything I hold dear for the chance to—”

His voice broke; he fell silent. Rielle turned away, arms tightly crossed over her front. Audric’s servants had prepared his fire for the night. The crackling flames and popping wood were the only sounds in the room for several long minutes.

Then Ludivine cleared her throat. “There’s
no need to give up anything, you know. Not the crown, and not each other. You would just need to be…discreet.” She smoothed her skirts. “I could help you, as needed.”

Rielle stared at her. Ludivine had taken her to Garver Randell for a contraceptive tonic, yes, but to hear her suggest such a thing so plainly, as if they were all merely discussing the weather, left Rielle without words.

Audric laughed in astonishment. “Lu, are you suggesting what I think you’re suggesting?”

“That you be together?” Ludivine raised an eyebrow. “Yes. In secret, of course, but soon. And as often as possible, so I’m spared the agony of your tortured pining.” She leaned back in her chair, closed her eyes. “It’s exhausting to witness. I’ve reached my limit.”

Heart racing, not daring to look at
Audric, Rielle breathed, “I can’t believe you’re actually saying this.”

“Why not? I’ve told you both how I feel about the situation.” Ludivine smiled, eyes still closed. “Or do you doubt my word?”

“No, it’s not that, it’s just—” The images crowding Rielle’s mind made a delighted heat climb up her cheeks. “Wouldn’t you be embarrassed?”

“That my dearest friends could be happier than
they’ve ever been? Why would that embarrass me?”

“Maybe ‘embarrass’ isn’t the right word.” Rielle did look at Audric, then. Half in shadow, he frowned at the floor.

“If we’re discovered,” he said at last, “even if we explained that you knew and approved, it could be humiliating for all of us, but especially for you.”

“Oh, is that what could happen?” said Ludivine blandly. “I hadn’t
realized.”

Rielle let out a rush of nervous laughter. “We would just have to…not be discovered.”

Audric scrubbed a hand over his face. “It’s not as simple as that.”

“Of course it is.” Ludivine watched him fondly. “We’ll be careful, and you’ll… Well, Audric, you’ll have to get good at lying somehow.”

“And your family? What about them? If my mother finds out? Or your father? He’ll
be studying us closely now.”

“I can handle my family.”

For a long time, Audric stared at the crackling flames.

“We can’t,” he said at last, his voice heavy. “Something is happening in Borsvall. The attacks on the border, that report I read… House Sauvillier is our strongest defense against whatever might come south. While we sort out what’s happening, we need your father and his soldiers
to remain loyal to the crown. And they surely will not if they discover that Rielle and I are having an affair.”

Rielle struggled to speak past a rising despair. “But, Audric—”

“What did you tell my father, weeks ago? Enough lies have been told, enough secrets kept?” He glanced at her. “This is not how I want us to begin.”

“And I don’t care how we begin,” she protested, stepping toward
him, “as long as we
do
.”

In the blazing silence, Audric’s gaze dropped to her lips and then away.

“Perhaps,” Ludivine said after a moment, “you can simply wait a while. Until the danger at the border has passed and my father’s temper has cooled.”

Rielle threw up her hands. “And then what? He’ll suddenly be happy when we tell him what will happen next? Sorry, Lord Dervin, but your daughter
won’t be queen after all?”

“No, he won’t be happy,” replied Ludivine evenly, “but he won’t be as angry.”

“And the kingdom will hopefully be stable, then, and safe,” finished Audric. “Whatever attacked our border will have been found out and vanquished.” He took a deep breath, dragged a hand through his curls.

Rielle moved to stand before him. She refused to touch him, though her body
ached to.

“Is this really what you want?” she whispered.

“What I want?” He smiled sadly, moved as if to touch her, then drew back. “Of course not. But it’s what we must do, Rielle.”

He has the eyes of a cow
, Corien sneered.
Soft and unthinking.

Rielle’s wrath rose swift and hot.
And you have the tongue of a serpent
.
Cruel and repellent.

Corien retreated, a sulky bend to his
presence.

“Rielle, I’m sorry,” Ludivine murmured, rising from her chair. “But I think Audric’s right. This is the wisest—”

“Lu, I’m thankful for your selflessness and for your friendship,” Rielle said tightly, a terrible pain lodged in her throat, “but I think I need to be alone.”

Then she tore herself away from Audric and left the room.

34

Eliana

“Because of your generosity and teaching, my lord, it will take more than a fall from a tower to kill me. One more day, and I will have them.”

—Message written by the Invictus assassin Rahzavel to His Holy Majesty, the Emperor of the Undying

Eliana staggered back to avoid Rahzavel’s flying sword, stumbled over a chair, and fell hard into Navi’s arms.

Simon lunged
in front of them, his own sword raised to strike. The two blades crashed together and caught.

“Navi, get her out of here!” Simon bellowed over his shoulder, just before Rahzavel let out a harsh scream and swung his sword around to free himself. Simon stumbled against a pillar, kicked a chair into Rahzavel’s path.

Navi grabbed Eliana’s wrist, and together they raced into the crowd. Bystanders
had noticed the fight and hovered nearby. Navi wove through them, shoving at bodies twice her size when they didn’t move fast enough.

“Eliana!” Rahzavel called after them, his words punctuated by grunts and the clashes of blades. “You can’t run from me! I’m like you, don’t you see? I can’t be killed!”

Fear was a fantastic energizer; Eliana’s head cleared with every step. Soon she was the
one dragging Navi after her.

“In here,” she gasped, turning Navi into the maze of the fighting pits. Narrow paths separated each cage from the next; a turn past one cage, then another, and they were in the thick of the brawls. A bare-chested fighter threw his opponent against the wire wall to Eliana’s right. The noise was tremendous, the crowd a seething mass on all sides.

“Back to the
apartments,” Navi cried. “We’ll be safe there!”

“If a fall wouldn’t kill him,” Eliana replied, “then we’ll never be safe from him again, not until he’s dead.”

I’m like you! I can’t be killed!

But he was wrong, wasn’t he? She could be killed. She wasn’t completely invincible. If he stuck her through the heart with a sword, she would die just like any beast that bleeds.

And him…
His fall off the maidensfold tower in Orline must have been a lucky one. He’d hit the water at just the right angle, avoided the rocks scattering the river. The Emperor had fed him a regimen of drugs, conditioned his mind and body over the years to withstand impossible abuse.

“Could he be an angel?” Navi shouted over the din.

Eliana grimaced. “Knowing our luck?”

They emerged from the
pits onto the open floor. Eliana ran for a set of twisting iron stairs nearby. As she reached for the railing, a body flew out of the crowd and slammed into her side, knocking both her and Navi to the floor.

Eliana pushed herself up, head spinning. “Navi?”

She lay unconscious two feet away, beside the inert body that had hit them. She must have hit her head against the bottom stair. Eliana
crawled toward her.

A sword struck her across her back once, then twice. Blazing pain ripped through her body. She screamed, tightened her grip on Arabeth, turned, caught Rahzavel’s sword with her dagger.

He leered down at her, pressing hard against their joined blades until she was nearly flat on the floor. Her bleeding back was a twisting plane of fire.

“Hello again.” His voice rattled;
his ravaged face stretched into a madman’s grin. He stomped down hard on her thigh, then on her ribs. As she screamed, blinking away starbursts of pain, he raised his sword with wild eyes. She plunged Arabeth into the top of his foot, then rolled out from under him right as his sword slammed into the ground.

Navi shook herself awake, then looked in horror at something past Eliana’s shoulder.
“Watch out!”

Eliana turned, ducked in time to avoid Rahzavel’s sword. The tip of the blade caught her cheek. Blood spurted hot across her face and arms. She thrust out with Arabeth; he bashed it out of her hand with his sword. She spun out a hard kick at his chest; he grabbed her leg, twisted, slammed her to the ground.

Before his fall, he would have fought her in silence, every movement
swift and calculated.

Now he laughed, yelped playfully when one of her daggers caught his skin, clucked his tongue when she missed. A tight crowd had gathered around them, boxing them in with pumping fists and wordless, rhythmic cries hungry for violence.

Eliana grabbed a carving knife from a nearby table, whirled to throw it at him. He knocked it easily aside. She found another one, turned.

She dropped the knife. It clattered useless to the ground. Swaying on her feet, she reached out for support, found nothing, fell to her hands and knees.

Fidelia.

Fog blackened her vision. The nausea returned, sweeping through her with startling violence.

“Look at her!” Rahzavel cried, dancing gleefully around her prone form. “The famous Dread of Orline!”

The crowd responded
with a chorus of jeers.

“Eliana, get up!” Navi frantically tugged on her arms. Eliana tried to stand; her limbs gave out, and she crashed to the floor.

“They’re here.” Her stomach wrung itself into a knot. The world spun, tilting right then left. Whoever or whatever was pinning her down, it was wrong. It didn’t fit; it didn’t belong here.

“Run,” she gasped out, groping for Navi’s hand.
“They’ll find you.”

“Who will?” Navi’s voice was full of panicked tears.

A furious cry behind them made Eliana blearily turn.

Simon dropped down from the stairs above, crashing feet first into Rahzavel. The assassin dropped hard, then rolled away with a feral peal of laughter and sprang back to his feet. Simon advanced ruthlessly on him, his scarred face ferocious with anger.

Then, turning to block one of Rahzavel’s thrusts, Simon glanced over and found Eliana on the floor. Their gazes locked.

The world seemed to stop. Eliana’s breath caught in her aching chest.

They had been here before—not in the fighting pits of Sanctuary, but in a similar moment of danger and flight.

Of separation.

The certainty of that—like suddenly recalling a lyric long forgotten—opened
an unfamiliar chasm in her heart.

A flicker of some unnameable sadness shook Simon’s face. Did he feel it too?

“Run!” he roared at her.

Reality returned. Time spun forward, blistering and unkind.

Eliana shoved her way into the crowd. She heard Navi yell her name, heard a harsh cry, hoped it wasn’t Simon. She searched for another set of stairs that would take her back to the third
floor. She would get Remy and leave. They would run as fast as they could, for as far as they could. She would shave their heads; they would get new clothes. They could make it to Astavar like that, disguised and unrecognizable.

She made it to the second floor before Navi caught up with her. The girl grabbed her arm, yanked her back hard. Eliana spun around, pressed Whistler to Navi’s throat.

“I’m getting my brother and leaving,” she spat, “and if you try to stop me, Navi, I swear I will gut you.”

The world spun and wouldn’t stop. Eliana dropped Whistler, sagged against Navi’s body.

“Eliana?” Navi sank to the floor with her. “Get up, please!”

Eliana gasped for breath, her voice choking in her throat. She tried to dislodge herself from Navi’s arms, crawl away, but she
couldn’t move.

Then Navi disappeared.

A gloved hand came over Eliana’s mouth, pressing a reeking cloth to her face. She struggled, her scream muffled. Another hand caught the back of her skull, forcing her harder against the cloth.

As her vision dimmed, she saw a black-clothed figure—hood drawn, mask on—gathering an unconscious Navi into his arms.

The wrongness in the air swallowed
Eliana whole. She wanted to be sick again, but the pressure bearing down on her throat prevented it.

A voice at her ear whispered, “And when the Gate fell, He found me in the chaos, pointed to my thirsting heart, and said, ‘You I shall deliver into the glory of the new world,’ and I wept at his feet and was remade.”

Then Eliana slipped into a narrow pit, where the fading world around her
jolted sharply before folding her away into nothingness.

35

Rielle

“The mountain falls under my fists

The sea dries at my touch

The flame dies on my tongue

The night howls with my anger

The light darkens in my shadow

The earth fades beneath my feet

I do not break or bend

I cannot be silenced

I am everywhere”

—The Wind Rite
As first uttered by Saint Ghovan the Fearless, patron saint of Ventera and windsingers

Rielle sat on a throne in the center of a dark room.

A narrow light illuminated her from above. Beyond lay a vastness of shifting shadows. She sensed that pieces of a world just beyond her reach were rearranging themselves, whispering to one another how best to play tricks on the foolish lit-up queen who thought she was something.

The throne beneath her was made of knobs and ridges
that bit into her thighs. A voice whispered to her,
Look.

“At what?” Rielle peered through the darkness. Doing so made her dizzy. “I see nothing.”

Look closer.

Rielle obeyed. Days passed. Her eyes burned; she did not sleep. Voices whispered from a distant realm.

She rose from her throne. Desperate unseen hands grasped at the hem of her cloak. She tasted a sour ancient rot on her
tongue.

“There is nothing here,” she insisted. Time had shredded her voice.

Keep going.

She walked for centuries. The whispering voices grew bold. They became a conversation, then a din. They spoke in an unfamiliar language, but still she understood what every word meant and that all were spoken for her:

Maker.

Queen.

Liberty.

Rielle.

At last, she saw a spot of
light in the distance and cried out. Was this finally the end? She had tired of walking alone. She wanted no more of these voices calling for her, of sensing the nearness of others, but not being able to find them.

When the light came into full view, she saw it was one she already knew—the illuminated throne.

And now she understood why it had hurt her to sit upon it.

It was made of
bones.

Exhausted, elated, she sank down onto it. She clutched the throne’s smooth white arms and knew them for the bones of those who had once tried to cage her.

“What is this place?” Rielle demanded. “I deserve an answer.”

Shadows slithered around the bright solid wall of her throne, then coldly across her cheeks, her breasts, the curve of her scalp. She closed her eyes; her mouth
fell open to receive a kiss.

The shadows became a man.

“This is where we have lived for an age,” he whispered. He pressed his lips to the curve of her ear. “And where we will soon no longer be if you have the nerve for it.”

“Corien,” she breathed. “I don’t understand what you mean.”

He inhaled deeply. His mouth moved against her cheek. “Don’t make me beg.”

Rielle brushed her
lips along the line of his jaw. “What if I want to make you beg?” she whispered. “What if I want you at my mercy?”

“Then I shall happily obey.” He moved one white palm down her body, across the flat of her stomach. His knuckles grazed the tops of her thighs, and she leaned back to make room for him—

Rielle awoke with a choked gasp, her fingers already working between her legs. Three quick
strokes, and she came apart, quietly pulsing around her hand. She turned her face into her pillow, seeking relief for her flaming cheeks, but the pillow was drenched in her sweat.

She sat up, her body trembling. Eyes squeezed shut, stomach in knots, chest tight around her heart. Fear chasing pleasure, pleasure chasing shame.

Then she realized how strange it was that she would have woken
up in such a state, and Evyline would have said nothing.

“Evyline?” Her voice sounded like it had been run through with razors. “Evyline, are you—”

Something hard struck the back of her head.

She crashed to the floor. Pain throbbed through her skull and coursed through her body in waves. Cheek pressed against the plush carpet, she found the prone form of Evyline across the room.

Hands yanked her up from the floor. A dark heavy cloth came around her eyes. Someone tied it behind her head, too tightly, then fisted a hand in her hair, pried open her mouth, and forced a bitter liquid inside. She choked, tried to spit it up. Her attacker clamped her mouth shut. She was forced to swallow, coughing up as much as she could. Her nose burned; her eyes watered behind the blindfold.

People were talking above her head. Whispered instructions, distorted and monstrous. Bizarrely, she was upside down. She could feel her head lolling and large arms cruel around her body.

Wake up!

How strange that anyone would tell her to wake up. She
was
awake; she had simply been poisoned. She tried to speak, made a terrible inarticulate noise. A gloved hand struck her hard on the
temple. She hardly felt it. She was a girl made of fog.

“Don’t kill her,” came a voice. Rielle thought it sounded familiar, but the poison was clogging her ears and her brain and every pore of her skin. “I want her to feel it when she dies.”

• • •

It was very cold, wherever they had gone. Cold and howling.

Strong hands pinned Rielle’s arms behind her back. Her teeth were chattering;
her nightgown was nothing against the wind. Under her bare feet was frigid, rocky ground.

For God’s sake, Rielle, wake up!

“I am awake,” she managed to mumble.

“Not for long.” A thin, nearby voice whispered, “I’m sorry to say you won’t be able to save yourself this time.”

The blindfold was ripped from her eyes, and her mind exploded with fear. She blinked into sheer brilliant white:
snowcapped mountains. Sky and a fine mist of clouds. A cliff’s edge.

Oh, God.

“All hail the Sun Queen,” whispered that mocking voice, and then the hands holding her arms flung her off the mountain to her death.

• • •

The wind punched her helpless body through the air as she fell.

She had no chance to scream—and no breath for it. Freezing wind slammed up her nose and mouth.

Save yourself!
Corien’s voice was frantic.

She was in the world, falling through the mountains, and she was also on the ground before her throne in that hollow dream realm. Corien scooped her limp body into his arms and tried to breathe life back into her.

Fight this! Fight it!

She knew he was right. She could fight this.

She forced open her eyes; the cold pulled thick streams
of tears down her face.

I do not bend or break
, she prayed.
I cannot be silenced.

But the poison had formed an immovable wall between her body and the empirium. She reached for its power and found nothing.

She knew, then, that she was going to die.

No, you’re not!
Corien cried.
God, Rielle, no, please!

Beside the throne, his face raw with grief, Corien cradled her body against
his chest. The endless dark world around him sent up wailing, terrified screams.

A rush of swirling cold gusted up from below Rielle, spraying her with snow. A spinning ocean of gray peaks sped toward her.

When she closed her eyes, she saw Audric and Ludivine, and her heart clenched painfully with despair, and she wished, and she
wished

She slammed to a stop so sudden that it knocked
the wind out of her.

But she felt no pain.

And she was rising.

A creature beneath her let out a piercing cry, part hawk, part horse, part…some unearthly, lonesome thing that sent a pang of longing through Rielle’s heart.

She finally let herself understand the truth:

A chavaile—a
godsbeast
—had caught her midair and was now climbing up through the sky with Rielle nestled safely
on its back between two massive black wings.

Stunned, still gasping for breath, she finished her prayer in the brilliant light of the morning sun:

I do not break or bend.

I cannot be silenced.

I am everywhere.

BOOK: Furyborn
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