The Sharpest Blade

Kyol sees the Taser, too. He fissures away from Cardak’s attack and knocks the device out of the human’s hand.

It skitters across the floor, landing by my foot.

“Behind you, Taltrayn!” Aren shouts at the same time I yell, “Kynlee, run!”

Kyol sidesteps, barely avoiding the false-blood’s attack.

Aren’s back on his feet. He and Kyol close in on the fae. Cardak’s glare shifts between the two of them, then, ever so casually, he raises his sword and slashes through the security guard’s stomach.

Kyol and Aren both lunge forward, but Cardak fissures out of the way. Some instinct tells me he’s going to appear behind me so I sweep up the Taser, turn, and fire.

The cartridge shoots out, striking the false-blood’s cheek. Edarratae explode across his skin like a million blue veins. He drops to the ground, shaking, vomiting.

His legs kick out, striking me so viciously I’m knocked off my feet. A surge of electricity flows into me, but it disperses quickly, and I watch Cardak twitch as froth bubbles out of his mouth. I don’t feel a twinge of remorse. I remember Sosch and Shane and a countless number of others who are dead because of him and when his body gives one last twitch before it disappears into the ether, I know that this is a death that I will never regret.

“Are you hurt?” Kyol kneels in front of me. He searches for an injury.

I grab his hands, hold them still. “I’m okay. Lena?”

“I fissured her to the Realm,” he says.

He fissured her to the Realm. She’s safe. The false-blood’s dead.

My breath whooshes out of me, carrying with it a thousand worries. I squeeze Kyol’s hand as I look past him, searching for Aren. I find Nimael instead. He’s still here, still alive. His eyes are wide, like he’s just witnessed the death of someone he worshipped, and he’s still on his back with the TV and the tools and parts scattered around him. I don’t think he’s a threat, but—

No. He is a threat. The edarratae draw my attention first. They’re leaping and spiraling and crashing over the hand he lifts. The hand that’s holding the Taser I dropped when I fell.

“Kyol!” I scream, but I’m too late. Nimael lunges forward, firing the Taser as he slams it into Kyol’s back. Light explodes all around us, then . . .

THIRTY-ONE

ALL I SEE are shadows upon shadows. In this emptiness, I should feel nothing, but there are sensations. Sensations of falling. Sensations of burning.

Sensations of loss.

I try to catch hold of something, anything that will ground me and make me whole again.

• • •

THERE may be light in the shadows, bolts of blue and white and shades of silver at the edges of my vision, but every time I try to focus on the flashes, they disappear. I think they might be remnants of my soul. It’s missing, and I’m a shell of what I was before. Shells can be crushed. They can be ground into powder and scattered in the wind. I feel scattered. I feel lost. The only way to find a path home is to follow the lights. There’s a certain color I need to hold on to. It can sew my soul back together, so, blindly, I search the shimmering night . . .

• • •

LOW, incoherent murmurs invade the darkness. The shadows fluctuate with the volume of the voices, but I’m still lost. Still cold. Still wandering.

“. . . better when . . . together.”

“. . . loves him.”

“Of course . . . Ten years. Not even you can erase that . . .”

The conversation should make sense. If I listen harder, if I climb my way out of the abyss, I can understand.

“I want her to be happy.”

“So does he.”

He. Kyol. Aren. The names twist through my memory. I have to climb out of this abyss. For them.

• • •

HOW long has it been?

My question is attached to a voice. Not my voice, though. It’s Aren’s.

“Long enough that I’m ordering you to leave.”

That’s Lena. I’m almost there. The fuzziness in my brain is fading, but something’s still not right. I don’t feel . . .

Kyol. He’s lying beside me, his cold arm touching mine. I try to make my hand reach out for him, but I don’t have command of my body yet.

I don’t have command of my voice either, so I reach out with my emotions. There’s no response from him, just emptiness.

“I’m not leaving her,” Aren says. “She could wake.”

“She may not. And if she does, Aren, she may not be well. The tech . . .”

“She’ll pull through this,” he says. “They’ll pull through this.”

“You need to prepare yourself for the possibility . . .”

• • •

I’M in the Realm. That accounts for some of the lightness I feel. The air has a different quality to it, a different viscousness than Earth’s. My head hurts, my mouth is dry, and I feel so weak, like I’ve been lying here for weeks.

I try to open my eyes. I can’t.

Kyol?

“Any change?” Lena asks.

There’s no response. I know Aren’s here, though. I smell cedar and cinnamon, and I can feel his presence.

“She was angry,” he says. “She didn’t understand why I claimed to be the garistyn.”

That’s not true. I told him I didn’t understand why he didn’t leave with me afterward.

“You’re an idiot,” Lena tells him.

A small snort of laughter. “That’s what she told me, but I did what I had to do to protect her, and to secure your seat on the throne. Hison arrested you. If news of that became public . . .”

“We would have found a way to secure the throne despite his interference.”

“Would we have?” Aren asks.

I want so much to open my eyes. I think I might be able to now. I should try. I shouldn’t lie here and let Aren immerse himself in guilt.

Lena sighs. “If Taltrayn had stepped forward instead of you, he wouldn’t have let any harm come to her. He would have fought for his freedom. If he didn’t achieve it on his own, he would have left when she found him in Hison’s offices.”

“She took down half his guard,” Aren says, admiration softening his voice. “She thinks so little of herself, but she’s strong. She’s amazing.”

“She’s okay,” Lena says.

I almost smile.

I really should open my eyes now.

“We finished identifying the documents Taltrayn and Caelar found in Jythkrila,” Lena says.

“You can link him to Thrain?”

“Yes, not that it matters now. There were letters between Cardak and his brother. There were also several old documents. One was a map of the Sidhe Tol. It’s old and faded, but the Sidhe Tol he gave to Caelar was on it. So was one other we hadn’t learned about yet.”

There’s a long pause. This would be the perfect moment to groggily open my eyes, pretending I’m just now waking. The only reason I don’t is that emptiness I’m getting from Kyol. It feels . . . different now. More like a wall than a bottomless chasm. I try chipping away at it.

“She thought I was dead,” Aren says.

“We both did. There was no word from you, and Taltrayn heard rumors of your death.”