Forgive me.
I failed you.
Forgive me.
I failed you.
I was moving, my hand finding metal. I rose from the blood, turned around. I saw Lord Mazeen standing there, barely a speck of blood on him, hardly a strand of hair out of place.
He looked at me.
Forgive me.
He smirked.
I failed you.
“I won’t be forgetting that anytime soon,” he said, nodding at Vikter.
Forgive me.
The sound that tore from me was a volcano of fury and pain that cut so deep, it irrevocably fissured something inside of me.
I was quick, just like Vikter had taught me to be. I swung the sword around. Lord Mazeen was unprepared for the attack, but he moved as fast as any Ascended could, his hand snapping out as if he planned to catch my arm, and I bet he thought he could. The smirk was still there, but rage was faster, stronger, deadlier.
Fury was pure power, and not even the gods could escape it, let alone an Ascended.
I cut through his arm, through tissue, muscle, and then bone. The appendage fell to the floor, useless like the rest of him. The surge of satisfaction was bliss as he howled like a pitiful, wounded animal. He stared at the blood geysering from the stump just above his elbow. His dark eyes went wide. There was shouting and screaming, so much yelling, but I didn’t stop there. I brought the sword down over his left wrist, severing the hand that had held mine down on the Duke’s desk, ripping away the last shred of modesty I had as the Duke brought the cane down on my back.
I failed you.
The Lord stumbled back against the chair, his lips peeling back as a different sound came from them, one that sounded like the wind when the mist came in. Spinning the sword, I swept it in a wide arc. This sword—Vikter’s sword—found its target.
Forgive me.
I sliced Lord Brandole Mazeen’s head from his shoulders.
His body slid to the floor as I raised the sword and brought it down, hacking into his shoulder, his chest. I didn’t stop. I wouldn’t until he was nothing but pieces. Not even when the screams and shouts became all I knew.
An arm came around me from behind, hauling me back as the sword was wrestled from my hands. I caught the scent of pine and woods, and I knew who held me, knew who pulled me back from what was left of the Lord. But I fought—clawing, swinging to be free. The hold was unbreakable.
“Stop,” Hawke said, pressing his cheek to mine. “Gods, stop. Stop.”
Kicking back, I caught him in the shin and then the thigh. I reared, causing him to stumble.
Forgive me.
Hawke crossed his arms around me, lifting me up and then bringing me down so that my legs were trapped under me.
“Stop. Please,” he said. “Poppy—”
I failed you.
The screaming was so loud it hurt my ears, my head, my skin. In a distant, still-functioning part of my brain, I knew I was the one screaming like that, but I couldn’t make myself stop.
A flash of light exploded behind my eyes, and oblivion reached for me.
I fell into nothingness.
Chapter 27
Half resting on the inner ledge, I stared out the window at the torches beyond the Rise, eyes aching and weary with the pressure of tears that wouldn’t fall.
I wished I could cry, but it was like the cord that had connected me to my emotions had been severed. It wasn’t that Vikter’s death didn’t hurt. Gods, it ached and throbbed every time I even thought his name, but that was almost all I’d felt in the week and a half since his death. A sharp slice of pain that cut through my chest. No sorrow. No dread. Just pain and anger…so much anger.
Maybe it was because I hadn’t gone to his funeral. I hadn’t made it to any of the funerals, and there had been so many dead that ten or more were held at a time—or so I had heard from Tawny.
It hadn’t been my choice not to attend the services. I’d been asleep. I’d been sleeping a lot this week. Entire days just gone in a blur of sleep and drugged consciousness. I didn’t even remember Tawny helping me bathe away the blood and gore or how I got back to bed. I knew she’d talked to me then, but I couldn’t recall a single thing she’d said. I had this weird impression that I hadn’t been alone while I slept. There was a sensation of callused palms against my cheek, fingers brushing hair back from my face. I had the faintest memory of Hawke talking to me, whispering when the room was filled with sunlight and when it had been taken over by night. Even now, I could feel the touch against my face, my hair. It had been the only grounding connection I’d had while I slept.
I squeezed my lids shut until the phantom sensations vanished, and then I reopened my eyes.