Stalking down the hall to her cell, her mind was whirling. She knew she couldn’t allow a rebellion against Leona to happen—her entire plan would be undone if she did. But if she allowed the dona to have her way, if Leona couldn’t be swayed, Sid and ’Singer and Bryn were as good as dead. Nobody survived Pandemonium. Even the greatest warriors lasted a few months there, at best.
A slow quiet settled over the barracks, the gladiatii bedding down for the nevernight. Sidonius returned from the bathhouse, sitting opposite Mia in their cell. She’d not been moved upstairs yet—with all the drama of the last few turns, she supposed Leona had more pressing concerns than finding her new champion’s quarters. And so, Mia was still stuck in her cage. Feeling Sid’s eyes on her as the arkemical lamps were turned down, as the talk of the other gladiatii softened and then stilled, finally replaced by the sounds of sleep.
As always, the man stayed quiet when they were alone. Never pressing.
Simply staring.
Minutes ticking by like days. His blue eyes fixed on her.
Unblinking.
Mute.
“Black Mother, what?” she finally hissed.
“I said nothing,” Sidonius whispered.
“So you plan to sit there and stare at me all nevernight?”
“Would you rather me speak?”
“Yes, damn you, say your piece. You weren’t shy about it in the fucking bathhouse. We’re alone and all of a sudden the cat has your tongue?”
“And what would we speak of? You’ve made feelings clear enough.”
“You’ve been following me like a fucking bloodhawk since you found out who I was. And you’ve never asked me of it, not once. Yet at the first whisper of . . .”—Mia glanced about, lowered of her voice—“ . . . of rebellion, your tongue is all aflutter.”
“The action we take about my impending sale concerns me direct, Crow. But as far as your parentage goes, it’s not my place to speak. And if you were wondering, all you needed do was ask. I follow you out of respect for your father. He’d have wanted me to look after you.”
“And what do you know of what my father would have wanted?”
Sidonius laughed softly. “More than you realize, little Crow.”
“You were a soldier. Branded for cowardice and kicked out of the legion. You weren’t in his counsel. You didn’t know him.”
Sidonius shook his head, hurt shining in his eyes.
“I know he’d be ashamed of what this house has become.”
Mia fell quiet at that. Took a deep, shivering breath and looked to the walls around her. The iron bars and the human misery. She’d scrubbed herself hard in the bath, but she could smell the smoke from Maggot’s funeral pyre in her hair.
“Your name is Mia, aye?”
She looked up sharply, eyes narrowed.
“It took me a while to remember it,” Sid said. “The justicus spoke of you sometimes, but he kept talk of his familia mostly to himself. I think he felt closer to you all that way. Not sharing you with others. Not staining thoughts of you with all the blood and shit we saw on campaign.”
“Aye,” she finally answered. “Mia.”
“Your little brother was Jonnen.”
“ . . . Aye.”
Sid nodded, sucking his lip, saying nothing.
“Daughters, spit it out,” Mia sighed.
“Spit what out?”
“The rebuke so obviously churning behind your fucking teeth. ‘You can leave these walls any time you like, Crow, you’ve no right to stop us trying the same. Even if we fail, the administratii will never catch you. No cell can ever hold you.’”
“Is that what I was thinking?” Sid asked. “Or what you were thinking?”
“Fuck you, Sid.”
“It took me a while,” the big man said. “To ponder it. Why you were here, why you’d want to fight in the magni. And then I remembered who’d be standing on the sand with you when you were declared the victor. The same men who stood in judgment over him, aye? The same men who smiled as he hanged.”
Mia said nothing. Simply stared.
“I wasn’t there when it happened,” Sid said. “I was already in chains by then. But I heard about it, afterward. Heard the Dona Corvere stood on the forum walls, above the howling mob. A little girl in her arms. Must have been you, aye? Quite a thing to make your daughter watch.”
“She wanted me to see,” Mia said. “She wanted me to remember.”
“Your mother.”
“Aye,” Mia spat. “What was it you called her? The stupid fucking whore?”
“Aye, that was unkind of me,” Sid sighed. “But it’s hard for me to find too many kind words for your ma, Mia. Knowing what I know of her.”
“And what is it you think you know?”
“Just that Alinne Corvere had more ambition than Justicus Darius and General Antonius put together. Half your father’s centurions were in love with her. She had a third of the Senate wrapped around her finger.” Sid steepled his hands at his chin. “How do you suppose she did that? She wasn’t quite the swordswoman her daughter grew up to be. She was a politician. You think a woman like that could almost bring a Republic to its knees without dropping once or twice to her own?”
Mia glowered at Sidonius. “Don’t you dare.”
“I know you’re trying to avenge them,” Sidonius said. “I know you think it righteous. I just wonder if you’d think the same if you knew the kind of woman your mother was. Or, the kind of man your father was.”
“I know what kind of man he was. He was a hero.”
“We all think that of our parents,” Sid said. “They give us life, after all. It’s easy to mistake them for gods.”
“You speak one ill word of my father,” Mia whispered, “and I swear by the Black Mother I will fucking end you right here in this cell. He was doing what he thought was best for the Republic and its people. He was a man who followed his heart.”
“I loved your father, Mia. And I served him as well as I could. He had that way about him. The loyalty he inspired in his men . . . I think all of us loved him in our own way.” Sid fixed Mia in his stare. “And aye, he was a man who followed his heart. Just not in the way you think he did.”
“ . . . What are you talking about?”
Sid sighed.
“Your father and General Antonius were lovers, Mia.”
Mia flinched as if she’d been slapped in the face.
Breath trembling.
The whole world shifting under her feet.
“ . . . What?”
“Everyone knew it,” Sid said. “All their men, anyways. Nobody cared. Not even your mother, so long as they kept it quiet. She’d married the position, not the man. Their marriage was one of friendship. Perhaps even a strange kind of love. But first and foremost, it was one of ambition. Your father commanded loyalty among the Luminatii. It didn’t bother us that the would-be king and the Kingmaker occasionally slipped into each other’s beds. Some even found it romantic.” Sidonius leaned closer, his voice heavy and hard. “But don’t tell me the rebellion was about Darius Corvere’s love of liberty or the people, Mia. It was about his love for Antonius. The general wanted to be a king. And your father wanted to be the man who placed that crown upon his head. Plain and simple.”
Mia remembered the nights in Crow’s Nest when the general would visit. She’d always called him “Uncle Antonius.” Her mother and father and he all dining together, the wine flowing, their laughter echoing down halls of long red stone.
And afterward . . .
Perhaps under this very roof . . .
“Lies,” Mia whispered. “You’re speaking lies.”
“No, Mia,” Sid said. “I’m just speaking difficult truths.”
Mia sat still, silent, heart pounding in her chest. Blinking hard.
She couldn’t rightly remember the last time she cried . . .
“Hurts, doesn’t it?” Sid sighed. “When you find out the ones who gave you life are just as mortal and frail as
the rest of us? That the world isn’t what you thought it was?”
Mia wiped at her tears with shaking hands. Remembering the way her father kissed her mother. First on one eyelid, then the other, then finally upon her smooth, olive brow.
But never on the lips.
Could it be true?
. . . Did it matter if it was?
If there was no deceit between them, why did she care who her parents lay with? Though they may not have loved each other, they’d both loved her; she knew that if nothing else. They’d taught her to rely on her wits, to be strong, to never be afraid. And she missed them both, even now, like a hole had been carved in her chest the turn they were taken away.
But if her father hadn’t been the hero of the people she supposed him, if he’d only been trying to overthrow the Senate for his own selfish ends . . .
. . . what was all this murder and blood for, exactly?
No.
No, Scaeva and Duomo still deserved a killing. They’d still imprisoned her mother and brother, left them to die in an oubliette inside the Philosopher’s Stone.
“I will give your brother your regards . . .”
“I know what it will cost you,” Sidonius whispered. “To let rebellion happen under this roof. But think of Bryn. Of Bladesinger. Of Butcher and me. Do we truly deserve to die in some godsless pit because Leona hates her father, and you love yours too much?”
Silence between them, heavy as lead. Mia looked the man over; this man she’d mistaken for a lecherous fool, a thug, perhaps even the coward his brand told the world he was. She saw he was none of those things. But still . . .
“Why weren’t you there when my father and Antonius were captured?” she asked, her voice hollow. “Why aren’t you dead with the rest of their men?”
Sidonius sighed deep, hung his head.
“The Luminatii centurions and their Second Spears were informed of Darius and Antonius’s plan the nevernight after we mustered. Antonius made a grand speech, spoke of corruption, of hubris, of the Republic being under the control of weak and impious men. And when all the shield beating and chest thumping was over . . . I just couldn’t do it. The Republic is rotten, Mia, I’ll brook no argument there. A cancer eats at the bones of this place, and Godsgrave is the heart of it. Julius Scaeva is twice the tyrant Antonius would have been. But we were the Luminatii Legion. Soldiers of God. The war that would’ve come if we marched on our own capital, the suffering that would have ridden in our wake . . .
“Thousands would have died. Tens of thousands, maybe. And for what? So one man could wear a crown, and another could place it on his head? I couldn’t do it. I went to my centurion and told him so. He listened patiently as I tried to tell him the wrong of it. And when I was done, he had me beaten near to death, branded a coward, and sold off to the first bidder on the blocks.”
Sidonius shook his head.
“Six years in chains for one moment of principle. That’s the tithe I paid. But you know what I learned in all the years between then and this, little Crow?”
“ . . . No.”
Sid fixed Mia in his ice-blue stare.
“There’s no softer pillow than a clear conscience.”
Mia sat in the dark, trembling head to foot. Tears spilling down her cheek. And without another word, Sidonius lay down in the straw, rolled over onto his side, and closed his eyes.
“Sleep well, Mia.”
1 Known as reparii, these coins are paid to the Goddess Keph in return for a succor by her Hearth in the hereafter.Since the Earth Goddess has been slumbering for eons and has no use for currency, the wooden coins are thrown into the Hearth to keep it burning. The fire within the Hearth was a gift from Keph’s sister, Tsana, the Lady of Flame, who thought it unfair that their mother, Niah, be given sole dominion over the dead. Thus, she created the fire to give righteous souls a place to gather and warm themselves against the chill of the hereafter’s endless night.Tsana hates her mother, you see. Almost as much as her father does.One is forced to wonder if she was hugged enough as a child.
28: scars
“ . . . this is unwise . . .”
“As you’re so fond of reminding me.”
“ . . . if i don’t, who will? that fool eclipse . . . ?”
“If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were jealous of her and Ashlinn.”
“ . . . it is a good thing you know better, then . . .”
Mia knelt in the alleyway, found the cloak Ash had left for her and wrapped it about her shoulders. Though skulking about Crow’s Rest in this heat while wearing a hood and cloak wasn’t exactly the best way to avert suspicion, it was easier than blundering around blind beneath a mantle of shadows.
“I need to talk to her, Mister Kindly,” Mia said, pulling the hood up over her head. “She’s been back two turns and things are moving quick at the collegium.”
“ . . . once upon a time, you used to talk to me . . .”
“I still talk to you.”
“ . . . mmm . . .”
Mister Kindly hopped up onto her shoulder, curled his tail about her throat. Mia made her way out of the alley, stalking down Fisher’s Row toward the inn. The hour was late, the winds blowing in off the ocean almost pushing her hood off her head. A few scattered folks ran about in their errands, and she could hear bells tolling down in the harbor, but aside from ne’er-do-wells like her, the streets were all but empty.
“All right, then,” she muttered. “What do you want to talk about?”
“ . . . where to begin . . . ,” came the whisper in her ear. “ . . . that thing that saved your life in galante? your theory that the darkin are somehow connected to the fall of the ashkahi empire? the map inked on ashlinn’s back? and let us not forget your match with the silkling, and the second set of blades she so conveniently forgot to weaken . . .”
“Anyone could have made that mistake, Mister Kindly.”
“ . . . you are a fool to trust her . . .”
“If Ash wanted me dead, she could have ended me ten times over by now.”
“ . . . be that as it may, her involvement is clouding your judgment. there are so many questions about what is happening here, and you seem to be looking for answers to none of them . . .”
“There’s only so much I can do behind the walls of the bloody collegium,” she hissed. “The magni comes first. We have one chance at this.”
“ . . . do you remember what that shadowthing in galante told you . . . ?”
“That I should be painting the skies black. Whatever the fuck that means.”
“ . . . it said your vengeance serves only to blind you, mia . . .”
“Are you saying I should forget what Scaeva and Duomo did?”
“ . . . i am saying there may be larger things at play here . . .”
“You think I don’t know that?”
They rounded the corner to the inn’s back alley, the scent of garbage and rot in the air. Mia threw off her hood and Mister Kindly hopped down onto a broken crate, began cleaning his translucent paws as Mia continued.
“Look, I’ve felt like a pawn that can only see half the board for months now. And the questions in my head are near deafening. But all those questions will still need answers when truelight is over, and the chance to end Scaeva and Duomo will be gone. Our plan is one rebellion shy of ruin. Everything hangs on the next few turns.”
“ . . . well, if thought of the gladiatii rebelling is all that troubles you, the answer is obvious . . .”
“O, aye? Pray tell, then.”
“ . . . you cannot allow it to happen . . .”
“It’s not that simple, Mister Kindly.”
“ . . . it is that simple. if you still wish your vengeance, you must win the magni. and you cannot win the magni if you have been executed for rebellion against the republic. you talk constantly of how much you have given up to get this far. you cannot fall now, at the last few feet . . .”
“So I’m just to let Sid and the others perish?”
“ . . . they are not your friends, mia . . .”
“Who are you to tell me that?”
The not-cat tilted his head.
“ . . . i am your friend. your oldest friend. who helped you when scaeva ordered you drowned? who saved you on the streets of godsgrave? who stood beside you through your trials in the church? and in all that time, have i ever steered you wrong . . . ?”
Mia felt a rebuke rising on her lips, but before she could speak it, she sensed her shadow rippling, a familiar chill prickling her skin. A dark shape coalesced at her feet, sleek and lupine, weaving around and in-between her legs.
“ . . . YOU RETURN . . .”
“ . . . Hello, Eclipse.”
“ . . . I MISSED YOU . . .”
“ . . . o, please . . .”
Eclipse snarled, shadow claws digging into the dirt.
Mister Kindly affected a yawn.
“ . . . stop, you’re frightening me . . .”
“ . . . I THINK YOU TOO STUPID TO BE FRIGHTENED OF ME, LITTLE MOGGY. BUT ONE TURN, I SHALL TEACH YOU THERE IS A PRICE FOR OWNING TOO MUCH MOUTH AND NOT ENOUGH TEETH . . .”
“ . . . tell me, dear mongrel, do you practice these blunt little threats when you’re alone, or do you simply improvise . . . ?”
Mia frowned, her tolerance of the not-cat’s sarcasm at an all-time low.
“Mister Kindly, go watch the Nest. Come fetch me if Furian stirs.”
“ . . . you send me away . . . ?”
“ . . . O, MY HEART BLEEDS . . .”
“ . . . we have no hearts, you idiotic mutt . . .”
“ . . . BE SURE TO REMIND ME OF THAT, WHEN I AM EATING YOURS . . .”
The shadowcat hissed, and the shadowwolf growled. But with a ripple in the black about her feet, Mia felt her passenger depart. She knelt and ran her hands through Eclipse, fancying the slightest whisper of cool velvet beneath her fingertips.
“All is well?”
Eclipse’s hackles were still up, but under Mia’s touch, she slowly quietened. Licking her mistress’s hand with a translucent tongue, the shadowwolf spoke softly.
“ . . . IT IS WELL. BETTER NOW, THAT YOU ARE HERE. HOW ARE YOUR WOUNDS . . . ?”