Kai’s mouth went dry.“What did I do?”
“You summoned rain that put out the fires and healed us.All of us, even Lina, Castor, the Moths.”
Lina.Lina, cradling Ione in her arms.“Is she with Ione?”
“No, she…” A muscle worked in his jaw.
“River.”
“She’s alive,” River returned quickly.“I – I presume so, anyway.”He pressed a palm over the rip in his shirt, where Castor had stabbed him.“Castor attacked you, first thing.It was like a hurricane.Blue fire, not even Lina could put it out.”He shivered, haunted.“You stopped it like it was nothing.Froze the water on the floor, made it shoot up like spikes.”
Kai’s breath caught.He remembered Castor’s face then.His too-wide eyes, the curl of his smile contorting with rage, the dawning terror that he had summoned Menon, but could not succeed in killing Her.
“It was instantaneous,” River murmured.“A single ice spear through the heart.”
Kai saw him hanging, lifeless, at the head of the spear.Saw the rest of Castor’s crew, falling back.Saw Lina paralysed; Ione, diving in front of her.
Don’t you dare, Kai, she had screamed.
But it was Menon who replied,
Bastard sons and daughters of fire, She had said, a wave of filthy water rising behind the puppet that was Kai’s body.Live and tell the fools who reared you not to cross Menon a second time.
He – She – swept them into the sea.Left them to swim to shore or drown.Saw Ione swinging at him, begging him to bring Lina back.
He felt himself nod, numb.Right, he muttered.
He must’ve looked bad, because River huffed out a long, weary sigh and slid his hand behind Kai’s head, guiding him to rest his forehead on his shoulder.Kai closed his eyes, listened to their breaths, focused on the weight of River’s hand on his nape, the steady pulse in River’s neck against his temple.
Alive.They were alive.
They sat silently like that for a long moment before, “You must really fucking hate me now.”
“Kai, I never – ” River sighed, gently squeezed the nape of Kai’s neck.“The only person I hate right now is Saros.”
“Yeah?”
“You should have seen him.How happy he was.And how easily he abandoned Ione.”
She waited past the cracked-open shell of the altarhouse, perched at the edge of the dry reflection pool in her courtyard.She stared ahead, expressionless, her hands folded on the lap of her ruined wedding dress.Around her, the incinerated skeletons of her peacocks lay scattered, although Kai thought he could hear the keening cries of one of two, somewhere far off in the emaciated woods behind the shrine.
She didn’t move as they approached, River helping Kai to sit before her.The ash greying her face was streaked through with tears, but she barely blinked when Kai brushed a strand of hair behind her shoulder, exposing her neck, the abalone necklace, stiff and stained with blood.He took her hand and kissed her fingers, his chest aching.
“Ineen,” Kai whispered, and slowly, painfully, she dragged her hand away.
“Leave.”
His eyes stung.He blinked hard and raked his hair back.Was it agonising for her to see him?Was it horrible that he wanted to be here regardless, that he wanted to hear someone tell him everything would be all right?
River stirred beside him.“Saros announced we’ll all be moving to Caelos.We’re not leaving you here alone.”
“Saros.”She emitted a harsh, biting laugh.“As always, he gets what he wanted.A better Menon, a reason to declare war.”Finally she faced him.“And you,” she whispered through gritted teeth.“Was this part of our deal?Steal Menon, leave Lina to drown, take everything I had?”Her voice deadened, brittle as ice.“Was this the glory you sought?”
Shame spiked through him.“No,” he breathed, his chest caving at the way she looked at him.“Ione, I don’t – Ineverwanted this.”
Her colourless eyes bored into him.“Did you hear what they said?”She smiled, hateful.“Menon regretted choosing me.She shed and discarded me like an old skin.You were perfect, they said.The perfect replacement.”
Kai grabbed her hands again, held them tight.“I don’twantto be – ” Why had this happened, to either of them?To Ione, who loved Menon; to Kai, who hadn’t prayed to any god since his father died?Ione recoiled, but he reached for her shoulders and shook her, ignoring River’s protests, his hand on Kai’s wrist.“Take Her back.I don’t want Her.”
