House of Earth and Blood

Justinian still groaned every now and then, his toes or fingers twitching as he slowly asphyxiated, his body trying and failing to heal his taxed lungs. His wings had already been cut off. Left on the marble floor beneath him.

Viktoria, her essence invisible within that glass box, was forced to watch. To endure Justinian’s blood dripping on the lid of her container.

Hunt had sat on the small cot and watched every second of what had been done to them. How Viktoria had screamed while Micah ripped her from that body she’d been trapped in for so long. How Justinian had fought, even as they held down his brutalized body on the crucifix, even as the iron spikes went into him. Even as they raised the crucifix, and he’d begun screaming at the pain.

A door clanged open down the hallway. Hunt didn’t rise from the cot to see who approached. The wound on his temple had healed, but he hadn’t bothered to wash away the blood streaking down his cheek and jaw.

The footsteps down the hall were steady, unhurried. Isaiah.

Hunt remained seated as his old companion paused before the bars.

“Why.” There was nothing charming, nothing warm on the handsome face. Just anger, exhaustion, and fear.

Hunt said, aware of every camera and not caring, “Because it has to stop at some point.”

“It stops when you’re dead. When everyone we love is dead.” Isaiah pointed to the screen behind him, to Justinian’s ravaged body and Viktoria’s blood-soaked box. “Does this make you feel like you’re on the right path, Hunt? Was this worth it?”

When he’d gotten Justinian’s message that the deal was going down, as he climbed into bed, he’d realized it wasn’t worth it. Not even with the medwitch’s antidote. Not after these weeks with Bryce. Not after what they’d done on that couch. But Hunt said, because it was still true, “Nothing’s changed since Mount Hermon, Isaiah. Nothing has gotten better.”

“How long have you three been planning this shit?”

“Since I killed those three drug lords. Since they told me about the synth and what it could do. Since they told me what kind of power it gave Danika Fendyr when she took it in the right doses. We decided it was time. No more fucking bargains with Micah. No more deaths for deaths. Just the ones we choose.”

The three of them had known there was one place, one person, who might get the synth. He’d paid the Viper Queen a private visit a few days ago. Had found her in her den of poisons and told her what he wanted. Vik had the gold, thanks to the paychecks she’d saved up for centuries.

It hadn’t occurred to him that the snake would be in the Archangel’s pocket. Or looking for a way into it.

Isaiah shook his head. “And you thought that you, you and Vik and Justinian and whatever idiots would follow you, could take the synth and do what? Kill Micah? Sandriel? All of them?”

“That was the idea.” They’d planned to do it at the Summit. And afterward, they’d make their way to Pangera. To the Eternal City. And finish what was started so long ago.

“What if it turned on you—what if you took too much and ripped yourself to shreds instead?”

“I was working on getting my hands on an antidote.” Hunt shrugged. “But I’ve already confessed to everything, so spare me the interrogation.”

Isaiah banged a hand on the cell bars. Wind howled in the corridor around him. “You couldn’t have let it go, couldn’t serve and prove yourself and—”

“I tried to stop it, for fuck’s sake. I was on that barge because I realized …” He shook his head. “It makes no difference at this point. But I did try. I saw that footage of what it really did to someone who took it, and even with an antidote, it was too fucking dangerous. But Justinian and Vik refused to quit. By the time Vik gave the Viper Queen the gold, I just wanted us to go our separate ways.”

Isaiah shook his head in disgust.

Hunt spat, “You might be able to accept the bit in your mouth, but I never will.”

“I don’t,” Isaiah hissed. “But I have a reason to work for my freedom, Hunt.” A flash of his eyes. “I thought you did, too.”

Hunt’s stomach twisted. “Bryce had nothing to do with this.”

“Of course she didn’t. You shattered her fucking heart in front of everyone. It was obvious she had no idea.”

Hunt flinched, his chest aching. “Micah won’t go after her to—”

“No. You’re lucky as fuck, but no. He won’t crucify her to punish you. Though don’t be naïve enough to believe the thought didn’t cross his mind.”

Hunt couldn’t stop his shudder of relief.

Isaiah said, “Micah knows that you tried to stop the deal. Saw the messages between you and Justinian about it. That’s why they’re in the lobby right now and you’re here.”

“What’s he going to do with me?”

“He hasn’t declared it yet.” His face softened slightly. “I came down to say goodbye. Just in case we can’t later on.”

Hunt nodded. He’d accepted his fate. He’d tried, and failed, and would pay the price. Again.

It was a better end than the slow death of his soul as he took one life after another for Micah. “Tell her I’m sorry,” Hunt said. “Please.”

At the end of the day, despite Vik and Justinian, despite the brutal end that would come his way, it was the sight of Bryce’s face that haunted him. The sight of the tears he’d caused.

He’d promised her a future and then brought that pain and despair and sorrow to her face. He’d never hated himself more.

Isaiah’s fingers lifted toward the bars, as if he’d reach for Hunt’s hand, but then lowered back to his side. “I will.”

“It’s been three days,” Lehabah said. “And the Governor hasn’t announced what he’s doing with Athie.”

Bryce looked up from the book she was reading in the library. “Turn off that television.”

Lehabah did no such thing, her glowing face fixed on the tablet’s screen. The news footage of the Comitium lobby and the now-rotting corpse of the triarii soldier crucified there. The blood-crusted glass box beneath it. Despite the endless bullshitting by the news anchors and analysts, no information had leaked regarding why two of Micah’s top soldiers had been so brutally executed. A failed coup was all that had been suggested. No mention of Hunt. Whether he lived.

“He’s alive,” Lehabah whispered. “I know he is. I can feel it.”

Bryce ran a finger over a line of text. It was the tenth time she’d attempted to read it in the twenty minutes since the messenger had left, dropping off a vial of the antidote from the medwitch who’d taken the kristallos venom from her leg. Apparently, she’d found the way to make the antidote work without her being present. But Bryce didn’t marvel. Not when the vial was just a silent reminder of what she and Hunt had shared that day.

She’d debated throwing it out, but had opted to lock the antidote in the safe in Jesiba’s office, right next to that six-inch golden bullet for the Godslayer Rifle. Life and death, salvation and destruction, now entombed there together.

“Violet Kappel said on the morning news that there might be more would-be rebels—”