“Why didn’t you tell me this on any of my visits to the temple? You couldn’t have told Odessa, or Simeon, oranyone?” Valoria asks, her voice thick with a mixture of pain and shock. “I trusted you, Karston. My friends and I, we accepted you as one of us. Welcomed you into the pack, as you said. And still, you lied to us about your gift. You’re no better than Ha—”
“You think I don’t know that?” he bursts out, cutting her off. “But you needed anarmy, Majesty, and you’d forbidden raising the dead. I wanted to be invaluable to you, so I could stay in Grenwyr for good—the one place where I finally fit in. The only way I knew how to give you what you needed was by lying about my gift. I didn’t think it could do any harm. Hadrien promised me he’d be one of the first into the soldiers, and that the other spirits would listen to him. I...” He raises his chin a fraction, but he struggles to meet Valoria’s piercing gaze. “I was going to tell you, once I was sure it worked. But every time I tried, every time the soldiers did something strange,hetook over. I guess he doesn’t mind me telling you now—now that he’s shown himself. I started losing hours here and there. Anything he didn’t want me to know, he’d try to wipe from my mind.” He bows his head, clearly ashamed.
“Spirits being able to take over your body—that must be the cost of your magic,” Valoria says shrilly. I think she’s in shock. “After pulling a spirit from the Deadlands, your body is open to other spirits asa vessel they can occupy—just like the ones you put them in. I could have helped you figure that out, if you’d just come to me and been honest! I also could have told you that my brother never cared for you. He’s never cared for anyone but himself.”
“Why would I have come to you, Majesty?” Karston’s voice breaks in his anguish. “I didn’t know what was happening! I thought something was off after the soldiers attacked you at the demonstration, but I wasn’t entirely sure. Hadrien kept messing with my memory, leaving me in the dark with fragments to piece together. But I finally figured it out after he used me to kill Noranna and everyone else at the wedding.” He shakes his head, his shoulders quaking under waves of grief. “I was on my way to put a stop to this—to end things for good—when he took over and used me to strangle Odessa and free his army. I don’t want to hurt anyone ever again. I don’t—I can’t take the pain. Mine, theirs—it’s too much.”
I wish there was something I could say to ease his suffering. But I don’t have words for my friend crouching on the stairs, looking like he’s about to be sick. Because I failed him. Maybe Valoria did, too. From the sound of things, a lot of us did. I should have spent more time with him. I should have—
“Hadrien,” Karston says sharply, interrupting my thoughts. I wonder if he’s yelling at the other voice in his head. But as his eyes begin to shift from violet to brown, I realize it’s a warning and raise my blade.
XXX
Holding his short sword carefully, Karston staggers to his feet.
I hesitate. What if there’s some other way to get Hadrien’s spirit out of him, one that won’t kill him?
Karston blinks, pressing his mouth into a grimace, and when he refocuses his gaze on me, his eyes are violet again. “He’s too strong,” he murmurs as sweat drips from his forehead. “He has too much control now. I can’t fight him anymore, but I have one last thing to try.” He gives me a shaky smile. “Odessa, if this doesn’t work, promise me you’ll save the kingdom. Again.”
“Karston, what—? No!” I shout as he quickly turns the blade on himself and shoves it through his chest. Other shouts join mine, almost drowning out the sound of Karston gasping at the impact, at the pain. He sinks to his knees. “His... hatred has no place here,” he grits out, the last words soft as a breath.
The most striking eyes I’ve ever seen quickly close.
I rush up the few stairs between us, kneeling at his side as hishead falls forward and blood gushes from around the wound. I call for a healer, for Danial. He hurries to join us on the narrow staircase.
Right behind him comes Jax, somehow making room for himself between me and Danial. “Don’t do this. Don’t go. I’m sorry I was such a jerk,” he says, gripping Karston’s shoulders as if trying to shake him awake. “I just... you’re a fighter.” He swallows, gazing into Karston’s now-peaceful face. “You’re me.” He shakes his head, his eyes shining, unable to say more. But I know what he means. The person Jax is hardest on is himself.
“Hang on, Karston,” I choke out, grabbing his broad, warm hand. “We can fix this. We’ll find a way to send Hadrien back to the Deadlands without hurting you.”
Danial gently nudges me in the ribs, shaking his head. “There’s nothing I can do.”
Karston is gone.
For a moment, I can’t hear anything but the sound of my heart beating, cruelly reminding me that Karston’sisn’tanymore. I sink against Jax, who crumples against me at almost the same time. Howling with grief, we cling to each other.
Even knowing that Karston must have taken Hadrien with him doesn’t make me feel any better. Another friend is missing from our world now, and there’s an army mere hours away that will take full advantage of our weakness. Worse, we’re standing in a room full of powerful figures with spirits inside them, spirits who seem to still be awaiting orders—for now.
All the time and effort we put into the metal soldiers, and we were creating a weapon for the enemy all along.
All Karston’s efforts to help his kingdom were turned against him, thanks to Hadrien.
“It’s my fault,” Valoria says darkly. “I should have been paying closer attention to the students. Besides, I banned raising the dead, and—”
Karston’s head snaps up. His hands grip the sword hilt and begin to slowly draw it from his chest as his rich brown eyes survey the dungeon.
Hadrien casually drops the sword. He smiles as Danial, Jax, and I stagger back, nearly falling down the remaining stairs in our haste to retreat. Karston’s body dying should have meant Hadrien’s spirit leaving, too, just like when we would run a blade through a person’s body to send their spirit back to the Deadlands.
But this is unfamiliar magic. Dangerous magic.
Already, the blood is drying on Karston’s necromancer’s uniform. And though the wound in his chest still gapes, it doesn’t seem to be slowing his body down in the slightest with Hadrien pulling the strings from inside.
He leaps over the stairs, soaring past us as Danial, Jax, and I try to stop him with our blades. He bumps into a stunned Valoria, knocking the crown from her head, and hurries into the embrace of his metal soldiers—those spirits from the Deadlands apparently loyal to him. They close ranks around him, shielding him from view.
“Go,” he booms out from behind his wall of iron. “Flee. I’m not stopping you. In fact, you’ve all become so boring and pathetic, I’ll give you a head start before my army gets to work. Sound like fun?”
Already, Danial and Jax are ushering Valoria up the stairs still slick with Karston’s blood. Her crown rests on the floor near one of the metal soldiers’ feet, apparently forgotten.
We can’t fight Hadrien’s iron army. Not with our hands. Not with our weapons. Not with fire. I’ve experienced what it’s like to fight the metal soldiers firsthand, back when I thought Karston was in controlof their every move, and even that would have proven fatal had he really wanted to hurt me. They’re too strong.
