Well, no one quite knew what to believe with regardsto her. After what was found in the throne room, even the High Priestess couldn’t quell the whispers that were winding through Dunmeaden like the tendrils of smoke Iliana couldn’t seem to escape.
A dark saint.
A pawn of Kakos.
A murderer.
Our destruction.
It hurt to hear them. Iliana had been in the crowd when the saint was sanctified. She had watched that storm of light eradicate the dark of night. She had felt that hope swell in her chest with each bolt of lightning the saint had sent into the sky. Shewantedto believe Hyacinth—had found herself nodding along to the High Priestess’s fervent rejection of these rumors, the crown of granite heavy on her head as she shook her fist and yelled, “Let us be wary of the true enemy! It is Kakos who destroyed your homes! Kakos who has your saint!”
“Let us be wary of the true enemy! It is Kakos who destroyed your homes! Kakos who has your saint!”
Kakos, Hyacinth had declared, aided by the queen’s treasonous Enforcer.
No one had seen Will Castell since the attack, but it didn’t stop people from repeating the accusations Hyacinth had flung with red-flushed cheeks.
Treason. Manipulation. Murder.
It was rumored his own father didn’t argue in his favor. Apparently, he found his son entirely capable of committing such acts.
Iliana wasn’t sure what to believe. Neither possibility boded well for Tala. Either the saint was no saint at all, or she was, and she had fallen into the hands of those who could—and would—only cause her harm.
Perhaps the Enforcer had partnered with the Heretic King from Trahir.
There were claims he wielded Incend fire in the battle.
A Visya king is an affront to the gods. Another pawn of Kakos, people swore. But it made no sense. He and his soldiers had been fighting on the front lines for Dunmeaden. He hadsavedtheir city. Theybothhad.
“Where’s your head, Iliana?” Suja asked, thrusting Iliana back into the present.
She swallowed, her thumb smoothing over the gauze in her hand. “Do you believe what people are saying? About the Enforcer aiding in the saint’s capture?”
Suja’s brown eyes narrowed, her lips parting in response, but a shout rang out from down the hallway.
“Sir, calm yourself! Sir!”
Suja spun on her heel and took off, Iliana just behind her. They reached the room at the far end of the hall, where a healer was hunched over the bed, his hands planted firmly on the chest of an older man who was thrashing in the sheets.
“Sir, please!” the healer begged. “It’s okay; you’re okay!”
The man’s brown eyes were wide, his olive skin wan as he jerked his head from side to side. Suja surged forward, pushing the attending healer out of the way as she gripped the man’s hands.
“Callias,” she urged, her voice soft yet demanding. “Callias, you are safe. You are safe. No one is here to harm you, Callias.”
It took Iliana a moment to realize whose room they had raced into—to stop focusing on readying her power, on intervening—and instead see not a faceless patient, but a man who she had been sure would never wake again.
But he had.
Iliana’s heart stuttered in her chest as Callias Veliri blinked, the fog in his eyes clearing as he fixed his gaze on Suja.
“Where is my daughter?” he croaked, his eyes darting across the room. “Where is Aya?”
Aya
Perhaps unconsciousness was a blessing. The thought followed Aya as she rose to the surface of her mind, just barely able to make out the blinding light of the horizon, only to be forced into darkness again.
Perhaps unconsciousness was a blessing.
