“The knight! There!”
Their boots rang against the stone streets as they gave chase. Good. Let them follow me.
I ran through the temple district’s winding paths, my sword bouncing against my hip with each stride. The buildings here were older, their surfaces carved with ancient prayers that glowed softly. Canals ran through the district, lined with purple trees. I spotted a stone bridge crossing one and raced toward it.
Behind me, the guards shouted orders and curses. They were gaining ground—too many of them, and they knew these streets better than I did.
An arrow sparked off the bridge’s railing beside me. I heard another and threw myself forward, rolling and coming up in a sprint on the far side. The temple ahead was taller than the others, its spiral architecture offering handholds and ledges.
I jumped, my fingers catching the carved stonework, and hauled myself up. Novi Lunium spread out below me, a glittering web of light and shadow. Somewhere out there, Emmeline was making her escape. The thought should have comforted me. Instead, it felt like someone was carving out my heart with a dull blade.
More arrows whistled past as I climbed. One grazed my shoulder, tearing through fabric and skin. I ignored the burning pain and kept moving, pulling myself onto a narrow ledge that ran around the temple’s circumference.
The next temple was close enough to jump to—barely. I backed up, ran, and launched myself across the gap. For a moment I wasflying, suspended between the moon and the star-filled sky, then my boots hit the opposite roof, and I rolled to absorb the impact.
I ran across the sloped roof, my feet sliding on the smooth tiles. A wall between the temples blocked the guards behind me from following, but more ran down the alleys to either side. They were spreading through the streets like a net drawing closed. They’d done this before, hunted fugitives through these same paths.
Another leap, this one to a bridge connecting two temple towers. My lungs burned as I sprinted across it, the guards’ shouts echoing from all directions now. They were coordinating, communicating. Professional. Despite the circumstances, I felt a grudging respect.
I was halfway across when two guards emerged from the temple at the far end of the bridge, blocking my path. A man and woman, both young, both determined. They’d already drawn their swords.
“End of the line,” the man called, raising his blade.
I didn’t slow down. At the last second, I feinted left, then dove right, sliding across the smooth bridge surface on my knees. The woman’s sword whistled over my head as I swept her legs, sending her tumbling. I rolled to my feet and caught the man’s wrist before his blade could hit me, then twisted and drove my fist into his nose.
He doubled over, clutching his face, but I was already moving.
A courtyard lay on the other side of the building, with no more temples to jump to. I leaped down to a lower ledge and then to the ground, landing hard on the stone. My ankles twinged in complaint, but I had bigger problems.
Footsteps thundered from every entrance to the courtyard. They had me.
I drew my sword as the closest guard charged. I parried, tripping him, and deflected a second guard’s blow as the first went sprawling.
Two grabbed me from behind, and strong hands tried to wrench my sword from my grasp. I threw back my head, feeling a crunch of another nose breaking. The guard released me with a cry, freeing me to twist and drive my foot into the other guard’s knee. She fell, cursing, and I jabbed my elbow into her head as she went down.
More came, backing me up against the wall of the temple behind me. Fifteen guards, maybe twenty, their weapons gleaming in the starlight. Men and women doing their duty, protecting their kingdom from criminals like me.
“Surrender your weapon!”
Captain Teiom was a stocky woman with graying hair and tired eyes. She’d been serving the Crown since before I was born.
“I don’t want to hurt any of you,” I said, raising my blade. The jewel at my hip pulsed once, as if mocking me.
“Then don’t make us kill you.” Her voice was almost gentle. “You’re outnumbered twenty to one. There’s nowhere left to run.”
She was right. Even without my injuries, without the toxin slowing me down, even if I fought with everything I had, I couldn’t win this. And I didn’t want to. These people weren’t my enemies; they were just doing their duty.
I thought of Emmeline, hopefully far away by now, and let my sword point drop toward the ground. The pain in my chest was worse than anything the guards could do to me.
“I surrender,” I said, and let my blade fall from nerveless fingers.
The sound it made hitting the stone floor seemed to echo forever in the sudden silence. Then the guards surged forward,surrounding me, binding my hands with chains that felt cold against my skin.
As they led me away from the temple district, I glimpsed the palace in the distance, its spires bright against the starry sky. Somewhere in those glittering halls, servants were probably cleaning Drudon’s blood from the floor.
My brother was dead by my hand. The woman I loved had looked at me with horror and run. And I’d failed my queen. The Selenian Jewel now rested in Captain Teiom’s careful hands, on its way back to Princess Regula.
But Emmeline was free.
