Queen of Fire

“So that’s why Revek hung on to his shell for so long.” The Ally gave a grating cackle. “Taking another would have left him susceptible to my touch once more. So he gave you his blood to free you as he had freed himself.” His mirth evaporated and he hissed at Frentis, eyes bright with baleful promise. “You shouldn’t have revealed this little secret, boy. All you have done is ensure the death of any formerly bound by my will. Though it may take me years. Do you imagine time is any barrier to me? The centuries I endured in the Beyond . . .”

Frentis cuffed him on the side of the head, the force of the blow enough to leave the Ally stunned and barely conscious. “You seem overly fearful, for a god.”

“Beloved.”

She stood next to the ape’s body, red from head to toe but whole again, the rents torn into her chest sealed and smooth. Her face was a stranger’s but the gaze was the same: unselfish affection, naked love. “Did you bring the healer?” she asked.

He looked back at the doorway, seeing the Lonak girl enter, leading Lekran and the Politai into the arena. Vaelin had told her to wait until her song told her it was safe. Weaver walked at the head of the Politai, his gaze fixed on the Ally.

“I see you did,” the woman observed. “I don’t suppose it matters now. It seems your brother found a better vessel.”

He turned back to her, noting she had reclaimed a short sword from the sand and was moving purposefully towards the queen.

“Don’t!” he told her, moving to block her path.

She stopped and issued a sigh of frustration. “She took you from me,” she explained in her impatient tutor’s voice. “There must be a reckoning.”

“Yes.” He raised his own sword. “Yes there must.”

“Don’t you see?” she railed at him in sudden anger, pointing at the Ally. “He is broken now. I will drink from him, take his gifts. The world can be ours.”

“And what would you do with it? I fought my way through a city of horrors today, all of your design. How can you dream I would allow you to do that to the world?”

“Because you love me!” Her new eyes were beautiful, he saw. Dark, limpid pools in a pale mask, free of any cruelty, but utterly mad.

“You are sick,” he told her. “And I brought the healer . . .”

She gave a shout of frustration and attempted to dodge past him, sword reaching for the queen’s exposed back. He forced the blade aside with his own and tried to grab her wrist, hoping to disarm her. She was too fast, spinning away and slashing a cut into his shoulder.

“You talk of sickness,” she spat. “We live in a world of sickness. You mourn for those I killed today. Did any ever mourn for me? I killed for decades to build this empire of filth and greed. It was mine to bring down.”

Frentis felt his left arm growing numb as warm blood coursed down his back. “Please!” he begged her. “If he can heal a body, perhaps he can heal a mind.”

She paused for a second, a confused frown appearing on her brow. “The night I killed my father he wasn’t afraid. He sneered at me, he spat in contempt. He said, ‘I should have drunk your blood the night I drank from your whore mother.’ Can he heal that?”

“I don’t know.” Frentis reached out to her, chilled arm trembling. “But we can . . .”

The arrow took her in the chest, quickly followed by two more. She staggered, her confusion fading as she looked down to regard the fletchings, her expression one of complete and sane understanding.

The Lonak girl stepped to Frentis’s side, bow drawn, and sent another arrow into the woman’s neck, folding her body onto the sand. Frentis watched the girl move closer and deliver a hard kick to the corpse, eyes narrowed as she scanned her for the slightest sign of life. She glanced at Frentis, frowning at what she saw on his face. “The song was clear,” she said.

He heard a faint moan behind him and turned, seeing Weaver gently taking hold of the man lying slumped in the sand and guiding him into a seating position. The Politai stood around them, spears levelled at the Ally. “There is a great sickness in you,” Weaver said. “Let me help.”

The Ally’s senses seemed to return as Weaver drew him into a tight embrace, struggling feebly then throwing his head back to issue a scream.

PART V

Any found to have promulgated the falsehood that human life may be extended by the foul practice of drinking the blood of the Gifted are liable to summary arrest, their punishment to be determined under the Queen’s Word. Any writings containing this falsehood are subject to immediate seizure and destruction.

—THE QUEEN’S TENTH EDICT, SIGNED INTO REALM LAW BY HER GRACIOUS CONSENT IN THE SIXTH YEAR OF HER REIGN

VERNIERS’ ACCOUNT