—The Word of the Prophet
“You don’t look surprised to see me,” said Rahzavel. He approached through the bathing room with a dancer’s grace. “So you’re a fool, but you’re not stupid.”
Every instinct screamed at Eliana to run out of the maidensfold after Simon and Navi, but to where? And then what? Rahzavel would chase her to the ends of the earth. He and Invictus and the Emperor himself would view her defection as a personal insult.
She had time for two fleeting hopes—that Simon and Navi would get out of the palace safely. And that Simon would find a spark of mercy in his heart and protect Remy and Harkan.
Then Rahzavel attacked.
He was fast, through the bathing room and upon her before she had the chance to strategize. He raised his sword, and with that pale face smiling coldly at her, everything Eliana knew abandoned her in an instant.
She turned and ran.
Rahzavel chased her through the scented labyrinth of the maidensfold. He caught up with her, let his sword fly. Eliana swung the adatrox sword, its heavy hilt slick with blood, and parried. Rahzavel advanced; Eliana barely blocked each of his cuts.
Their blades caught. Eliana stepped back and quickly turned her sword, dislodging him. She swiped wildly at his torso, but he was too quick. He advanced again. Eliana stumbled back, found a carving of a scantily clad woman on a tabletop, threw it at him, and ran.
She heard the carving hit the floor. Rahzavel’s quick footsteps followed her through a series of narrow carpeted rooms.
Her strikes became desperate; Rahzavel was too fast, too meticulous. She gasped for breath; he hardly seemed to break a sweat. She ducked his sword, the blade hissing past her neck. She flung aside the adatrox sword, used her free hand to grab whatever she could find—vases, goblets, gilded plates—and fling them back at him.
He laughed at her, dodging it all.
They emerged once more into the bathing room, the tile slick from water and blood.
A lone girl huddled in the corner, whimpering.
Rahzavel’s smile unfolded. “You’re frightening the whores, Eliana.”
She thrust at his belly with Arabeth; he blocked her easily.
They circled each other, Eliana blinking back sweat. Her hair had fallen loose from its knot.
“You should never have turned,” said Rahzavel, every syllable pristine. “You could have been one of the Emperor’s favored. Your family would have wanted for nothing.”
Then, without warning, someone shoved Eliana from behind. She lost her footing on the slick tile, and Rahzavel used his sword to knock Arabeth away.
He lobbed a hard backhand across her face. She fell, her head knocking against a low table.
Dazed, she saw movement and color—one of Lord Arkelion’s concubines, scurrying away. The girl had pushed her.
“It seems the bonds of sisterhood do not extend to traitors.” Rahzavel’s voice floated above her. He straddled her hips, his face inches from her own—clean-shaven jaw, straight nose, gray eyes flat and distant.
She felt a sharp pain below her throat and glanced down, too dazed to fight.
He was cutting her.
A new panic seized her, shocking her awake. She needed to get away from him, now, before he saw the truth.
“Many would kill their dearest loved ones,” Rahzavel murmured, “for the chance to serve the Emperor as we do in Invictus. And yet you have thrown in your lot with the Prophet’s lapdog?”
Another cut, a shallow X between her collarbones.
She twisted in his grip. He cut into the soft flesh of her upper arm.
God, no, he’ll see—
“I suppose I shall have to find the Emperor a more grateful recruit,” he mused softly, “and keep you for myself.”
He swirled one long finger in her fresh blood and dragged it down her arm to her elbow.
He glanced down—and froze.
Eliana followed his gaze. The world slowed and stilled.
Together they watched the cut on her arm close.
An instant later, the skin was as good as new.
Rahzavel’s gaze shot back to hers, and for the first time since she had known him, she saw a spark of something other than bloodlust in his eyes.
Wonder. Confusion.
Fear.
Eliana could hardly breathe. Her blood raced hot beneath her skin.
“What are you?” Rahzavel whispered.
A sudden movement, just beyond Rahzavel’s shoulder. A tall, dark shape; a shift in the air.
Eliana flashed Rahzavel a smile. “I am your doom.”
Rahzavel leapt up, turned, and met Simon’s sword with his own.
Eliana rolled away, retrieved Arabeth, and pushed herself to her feet, ready to jump in after Simon and help, but the sight of them stopped her in her tracks.