In the Wake of the Wicked (Veridian Empire #1)

38. Rose

38

Rose

T he scent of blood, copper, and sweat spun around me as I ran through a village blanketed in red and steel, cries of the slaughtered and helpless ringing in my ears, fading away with each breath. Each blink. Each heartbeat.

For a moment, all sound ceased entirely.

I watched the violence unfold but was unable to hear it, like there was some sort of veil between myself and my surroundings. In the next second, it all rushed back, and I shook the strange sensation off.

The carriage was heading west. There was no way I’d ever be able to keep up on foot. Spotting a saddled, dapple-gray horse tied to its post off the side of a stable, I sped to it and pocketed my dagger, hastily untying the reins and trying in vain to calm the frightened creature. He pawed at the ground, his muscles shaking as he snorted at me with flared nostrils.

“I know, boy—I know it’s scary,” I murmured, my voice a tremor, my trembling hand reaching out to stroke his nose. Wide, brown eyes locked on mine. “But I need you to help me save my family, okay?”

When I was certain he wouldn’t buck me off the second I tried to mount, I stuck my foot in the stirrup and swung my leg over his back. Steering him in the direction of the carriage, we fled past torn bodies and shrieking children, past growling Shifters and blood-thirsty men.

Wind whistled through my hair, and soon, the sound of rushing water grew increasingly louder over the cacophony behind us. The Scarre River, I remembered from my trek here during the first trial. I urged the horse faster until the dark wood and metal of the back of a carriage came into view.

Beau .

“I’m coming,” I whispered, clenching my thighs and snapping the reins. Within minutes, the rocky path gave way to a grassy riverbank, and roaring water filled the air with a crisp dampness. Glancing behind me, I could still see the tips of the tallest buildings of the central sector, the top of a bell tower and spires of the palace like a beacon against the rising smoke and haze.

The carriage suddenly stopped. Five Mysthelm soldiers jumped from the box and strode to the back, unlocking the bars of the prison. With a cruelty that had my blood boiling, a man yanked them out, each stumbling as they tried to land on their feet while their hands were cuffed with some sort of black metal. Beau collapsed to his knees, his lanky legs sprawled behind him. One of the soldiers kicked his side with a shout to “Get up!”

That was it. He would die first.

I slid from the horse and reached into my pocket for hellebore and amaranth.

A blade appeared at my throat.

“Not so fast,” came a hiss from behind me, a hand snaking around to grab my wrist. With the knife digging into the flesh at my neck, my captor shoved me forward with the rest of them. My mind raced, trying to devise a plan, a way out of here. The protection charm had worn off by now—I needed to get to my herbs. Or back to the horse. Maybe I could gather reinforcements and return to save? —

I glanced at the brown horse behind me. Brown? Wasn’t the one I rode here gray and dappled?

“Caught another one,” the man behind me drawled. “Might be one of the witches. Saw her reaching for her pockets.” His fingers strayed low on my waist, and I stiffened.

“Rosie?” Beau croaked, staring at me in slack-jawed horror from the ground.

My heart jolted. “It’ll be okay, Beau. We’re going to be fine,” I assured him, fighting the urge to whip away from my captor and run for my cousin. But I didn’t know what these soldiers would do. I couldn’t risk them attacking.

Even from a distance, I could see the pain in Beau’s eyes. The terror and heartbreak reflecting in his silver pools made my blood turn to ice. “Rosie…my ma…they—” He choked on his words, and that ice within me shattered.

Morgana.

She couldn’t be…

“Take her weapons,” one of the men instructed.

This time, I did fight. The man behind me jerked the satchel from my belt loop and with his slackened hold on my throat, I pivoted and slammed the heel of my palm into his nose. It snapped with a satisfying crack , and he wheeled backward, clutching his face and shouting obscenities.

Two more soldiers converged. Before I could reach for my charms, they had my arms behind my back. Cool, metallic cuffs clamped over my wrists, and it was like something clenched deep inside of me at the same time. I struggled against its hold but couldn’t move an inch. My shoulders and neck strained wildly as they tugged me to the water’s edge with the rest of the hostages. If I couldn’t get to my charms, if I couldn’t cast, I?—

“Line them up. Kill them. Go get the next group,” the soldier in charge barked to his subordinates.

Wails of protest and pleas for mercy rose at the command. My gaze met that of my cousin, his wide, frantic eyes staring back at me. Looking to me for answers. For safety.

Numbness blanketed me. I didn’t know how to get out of this one. I didn’t know how to protect him, how to get either of us away from danger.

“Don’t touch him,” I snarled as one of the men pulled Beau roughly toward the river. He turned and laughed at me.

“She’s feisty,” he said, licking his lower lip. “I call that one.”

“Why don’t you come and get me now, then?” I glared at him and he tilted his head, assessing me. Examining me.

To my relief, he released Beau. Sauntering forward, ignoring the hysterical hands from the Veridians reaching out to him for pity, he pointed his sword at me. “And mouthy, too. I think you want to go first.”

“Why are you doing any of this?” I hurled at him. “What have we ever done to you?”

“We’ve been biding our time for decades, little witch. Your magic is a curse ,” he spat. “Your people are a poison. This entire empire is unnatural—it should have never gotten such power in the first place. So we’re cleansing it.”

“You’re just going to kill thousands of people?” a hostage cried out.

“Silence!” the Mysthelm soldier roared. “This isn’t a negotiation. We have our orders. Get them in a line,” he said to his companions, who rushed to obey.

How was any of this happening? How had we been so ignorant to their attack? To their blatant hatred of us?

None of this even made any sense.

“Why isn’t anyone fighting back?” I hissed to the woman next to me as we were both shoved forward.

“The sh-shackles.” She motioned down to the black cuffs. “They take away our magic. We can’t fight.”

They could take away magic ? That must have been the strange effect I felt when the cuffs circled my wrist. Was that what Mysthelm had been doing all these years? Developing ways to stifle our powers so they could make a move?

The sight of a dozen men, women, and children being led to the water’s edge with knives at their backs had panic flooding me. Blood roared through my ears, my vision growing cloudy as I tried to think ?—

I glanced up, squinting at the sun hanging over the bell tower in the central sector, and I swear the sky turned… pink . When I blinked, it was back to a clear blue, but my thoughts began churning…

A rough hand clamped down on my shoulder, forcing me to my knees. Distantly, I heard my cousin scream for me, but above that, I heard…

Ding. Dong. Ding. Dong.

I froze.

My eyes searched the treeline and landed on the bell tower, three gray bells swinging at its tip.

Believe the gray bells .

The Oracle.

This was it. This was what the Oracle had warned me about. The gray bells had been my clue for the second trial. But did that mean?—?

The strange mirages I’d seen in the village, where everything seemed to sway and flicker. The gray horse changing to brown. The sky just now, appearing pink instead of blue. A ridiculous, inexplicable attack from a silent kingdom.

This…this was the second trial.

Believe the gray bells .

“None of this is real,” I whispered to myself, realization barreling into me. Slowly, I twisted my neck to face my cousin, his face red and eyes swollen. Was I willing to risk his life on it? On a wild, half-hatched theory?

Before me, the Mysthelm soldier smirked and raised his sword. “Any last words, freak?”

I swallowed hard. There was no more time to think, to deliberate, to fight back. This had to be the trial—to test my heart and see what choices I’d make under duress. To see if I could figure it out and beat their little challenge.

I had to be right.

And if I wasn’t…I prayed death would come swiftly.

“Tell the emperor,” I rasped, knees digging into the grass and soil, “I’ll see him soon.”

Then he plunged his blade into my heart.