“I made a promise too,” Kadra said darkly.We let the Clan burn.
He tensed in preparation to lunge when his brother drew the knife tip lightly along Sarai’s skin. Rage welled in him along with the drop of blood that ran along the blade.
“Today, we talk.” An icy smile formed on Noceo’s face. “I have no intention of harming her, not when she’s been stubborn enough to survive again. It would be a shame if you force me to, though. Spilling blood isn’t my strength. It’ll be messy.”
A fine lie. Though he seemed to believe it. “Speak.”
Descending from the dais, Cassandane prowled to the other end of the stage along with Harion, fencing Noceo in. His brother eyed them with amusement.
“The lovely Cassandane.” Noceo bowed. “I should warn you that there isn’t much point in this posturing. People are rather pliable in my hands. Petitor Sarai is quite right. They do anything I want.”
“You aren’t the slightest bit subtle about it either,” Sarai noted as though she didn’t have a blade to her neck.
Kadra’s eyes narrowed at the genuine amusement that broke past his brother’s icy mask. “I’ve no use for subtlety. It keeps no one in line. A hammer does. Edessa has fought you for months, and now there they are, united.” He directed a hand toward the remaining stupefied spectators. “It’s why Aelius held the land together without major conflict, and you couldn’t. People prefer fear.” At the immediate insulted yells from the crowd, he sighed. “Quiet.”
The order slammed into Kadra’s eardrums, sealed his lips, and stuck his tongue to the roof of his mouth in the same breath. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Cassandane clutch her throat. Others echoed the motion across the Aequitas, eyes huge.
Twelfth-Tier. Noceo’s power had been nowhere close to this eleven years ago, at the peak of magical maturity. This command had been effortless, lacking the strained compulsion that he’d seen his brother apply during adolescence.
“Forgive me.” Noceo’s smile was unrepentant. “I’m a proponent of free will, of course. But you’re rather loud. And you’ll want to hear me for the next few moments.”
Bulging eyes glared at Noceo from every corner of the Aequitas in silent disagreement.
Kadra quietly funneled power into the air. Slender currents of differing temperatures twisted together and sparked. His hands fisted, waiting. Because this was too simple. A hostage. Two opponents. He could take them easily, and Noceo knew it. There was something here that he had missed that would turn the tides.
The answer crystalized when he spotted the lightning magi arrayed throughout the courthouse. Noceo didn’t have one hostage. He had thousands. One wrong move and he’d obliterate the Aequitas.
Grim resignation settled over Kadra, a mantle of stillness.
Noceo’s silver eyes gleamed. “I’m sure you’ve all noticed the family resemblance.” He pointed between them. “I’ll admit, I’m Noceo bu Kader of Clan Kader. That’s no secret. But that there, is Drenevan bu Kader, Clanson, killer, and now, Magus Supreme.” The barest hint of bitterness laced his voice. “You’ve done well for yourself,brother.”
Eyes bulged wider around them. Kadra glanced at Sarai. His heart twisted at her shuttered features. He angled his head toward some of the magi seated on the tiers in silent warning. She paled but tilted her wrist to show him that she hadbeshazactive on her armilla.
A corner of his mouth tugged upward. He poured power into his clenched larynx until the weight on it vanished. “Is this envy?”
Noceo’s smile slipped before he slid geniality back on. “I asked you forsilence.”
Kadra braced himself as the command struck, drawing from the deep reserve of magic Wrath had given him, and pulled his tongue away from the roof of his mouth when it tried to stick there. “You did.”
Rage howled in his brother’s eyes. “Keep your voice then. It won’t help you. I have your priests. I pay your Praetors. And I have your people.” He glanced at the onlookers. “Thank you for making it so simple. I emphasized the right stories, and you danced without any Coercion. Murder in the most public of arenas. Blood being touted as justice. A poor decision by a grieving girl to Summon a god. And a man on the throne with no purpose unless he has someone to fight. And you people swallowed it all.” He took a step away from the stake, forcing Sarai to do the same or risk being cut. “This, people of the south, is a coup, not the Death-Summoner’s tired attempts at transparency. Differentiate better next time.”
Noceo’s voice was a subtle knife, lulling his transfixed audience even as he mocked them. Kadra took in their blank faces and still figures. A magnetism so powerful that it halted all rational thought or they would have fled the Aequitas by now. He had seen Noceo do this to small rooms, but not to tens of thousands. How had he grown so powerful?
Kadra mirrored Noceo’s motions when he took another step backward. “Did you come here to impart political theory to my constituents?”
“Partially. I’m here to give them a choice.”
Kadra saw the walls of a trap move toward him with slow finality. The high tiers of the Aequitas twisted in the edges of his vision, different scenes playing out at each corner. A flaming battleground scarred with corpses and rubble in one. Screaming faces bleeding from every orifice choking to death on their fluids. And a void so black and deep that it took all life with it. Possibilities and probabilities.
“Being?”
“Life. And death.” Noceo addressed his audience. “Kneel to me, Edessa. Disavow your Tetrarchs and accept my rule. Or I’ll raze you to the ground.”
Cassandane stumbled, eyes huge. Faces boiled red above them. Harion’s jaw hung open.
A humorless smile curved Kadra’s lips. No one would walk away unscathed today. Noceo wanted to raze the city, and its people would give him a reason to. There wasn’t an Urd alive who didn’t know that Edessa had always had too much damned pride.
The fear in Cassandane’s eyes said she understood the same. “If it’s power you want, we’ve an empty seat in the Tetrarchy. Will you not give us a chance to negotiate?”
