Текст книги "Cruel Beauty"

Автор книги: Rosamund Hodge

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Текущая страница: 13 (всего у книги 17 страниц)

“This is the ring that seals my bargains,” said Ignifex. “The Kindly Ones gave it to me as a mark of my service. When you wear it, you will command a measure of my power.”

I wiggled my fingers, watching the gold glitter. “Then I can rule the world through wicked bargains?”

He flashed me a smile. “Not quite. But you can open any door, and it will lead to wherever you want to go.” I opened my mouth. “In this world—even I can’t bridge the Sundering. But you see why you must be careful.”

The Resurgandi would kill to possess this ring. A few months ago, I would have used it to kill him. And he had placed it on my hand.

“I have no desire to be eaten by demons,” I said. “You can trust me.”

“I do,” he breathed, so softly that I barely heard it. Then he kissed me as if he would never see me again, and I kissed him back just as hungrily.

“Stay with me until tomorrow,” he whispered finally.

My heart was racing and I wanted to say yes, but I thought of Astraia sitting up every night, trying to die for me.

“No. I’ve waited far too long already.”

“An hour?”

“Well . . . if you make it worth my while.”

He laughed and drew me back toward the gate out of the graveyard. Just before we left, I thought I heard a noise again. I looked back, but the graveyard was as still and empty as before.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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20

Two hours later, standing beside the caryatid bed in my room, I was ready to go home. I had changed into a plain red dress; my hair was neatly braided and pinned around my head. I looked one more time out the great bay window at the village, tiny and toy-like with distance.

Then I turned to the door—Ignifex’s ring heavy on my finger—and laid my hand on the knob.

“Take me home,” I whispered, and opened the door.

Through the doorway, I saw the foyer of my father’s house. The late-afternoon sky glowed warmly through the windows onto the red-brown floor tiles. In the distance, I heard the chiming of the great grandfather clock.

I didn’t want to face Astraia, didn’t want to face what I’d done to her. But she needed me. So I squared my shoulders and marched through.

The door slammed behind me. The clock ticked on imperturbably; people shouted outside in the yard; the air smelled of dust and wood and Aunt Telomache’s perfume.

My old maid Ivy walked out of a doorway, carrying a pile of towels. She saw me, squeaked, and fled, dropping towels in her haste. It was as if she’d seen a ghost.

I was a ghost, for to these people, I was dead.

I strode out of the entryway and down the hall to Father’s study, where I banged on the door once before flinging it open.

“Good afternoon, Father,” I said. “Aunt Telomache, how nice to see you too.”

They stood on either side of the room, pins coming out of her hair and his eyes fixed on the ceiling. It was not the nearest I had ever caught them to embracing, but it was close.

Now, of course, they were both staring at me and turning pale. I had never in my life unnerved them so, and the realization made me giddy.

“I’m looking for Astraia,” I said brightly. “Is she in her room?”

Then they both strode toward me, Aunt Telomache to seize and kiss my hands, Father to slam the door behind me.

“Child, what happened?” Aunt Telomache demanded. “Did you—is he—”

“No,” I said, “he isn’t dead or imprisoned. But your advice was most useful, Aunt.” I took a vicious pleasure in the deep flush that spread across her face.

Father gently pulled her back from me. “Then make your report. Why have you returned?”

I crossed my arms. “I want to see Astraia.”

He let out an impatient sigh. “Have you located the hearts of the house yet?”

“All four of them. It won’t do us any good.” I pulled open the door. “Is Astraia up in her room?”

“Why won’t it work?” Father demanded.

“Because all Arcadia is inside the Gentle Lord’s house. Collapsing the house would just collapse the world.”

They both stared at me. The words skittered out between my teeth, faster and faster. “It’s a cozy little thought, isn’t it? All of us under one roof, even the Gentle Lord. You sent me to die in just the next room.”

Father’s jaw clenched. “I sent you to save our world,” he ground out.

“I’m your daughter,” I spat. “Didn’t it ever, for a single moment, occur to you that you should try to save me?”

“Of course I wanted to save you,” Father said patiently, “but for the sake of Arcadia—”

“You weren’t thinking of Arcadia when you bargained with the Gentle Lord. And I’m not sure you were thinking much of Mother, either, because if you really loved her, you would have found a way to save both the daughters she wanted so much.” I bared my teeth. “Or at least you wouldn’t have spent the last five years bedding her sister.”

As they were still choking on my words, I whirled and strode out of the room. In a moment I heard Father coming after me; I didn’t feel like trying to outrun him, so I turned to the nearest door, thought of the library, and stepped through just as he started to yell, “Nyx Tris—”

Then his voice cut off as if muffled by blankets. The library door swung shut behind me, and I was surrounded by rows of polished cherrywood shelves. The library was the largest room in the house, but it had been turned into a honeycomb of bookcases. I wandered down a row, trailing a fingertip across gold-stamped leather spines. I had spent so much of my life in this room; the scent of leather, dust, and old paper was like a friend.

From behind, I heard a gasp that was almost a sob. I turned and saw a girl sitting on the floor in a pool of dark skirts.

It was Astraia.

Had the mirror’s blurred image lied to me, or had I simply not noticed her changing? The fat had gone from her face; her jawbone was sharp and angular now, and though her lips were still plump, they were pressed into a flat line. She was dressed all in black, as she never had been since Father gave us leave to pick our own clothes, and her face was set in a hard, stoic expression that I had never seen on her before.

Her mouth opened, but no sound came out, as if she were still behind the glass.

“Astraia.” I dropped to my knees before her, then flung my arms around her shoulders. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

Her arms moved slowly to return the embrace. “Nyx? How—what happened?”

“I came back,” I said. I didn’t want to look her in the eyes again, so I made myself sit up and do it. “I couldn’t let you go on thinking that I was dead and hated you.”

“I knew you weren’t dead,” she said distantly. “I saw you at Mother’s tomb today. You and the Gentle Lord.” My heart jolted, but she didn’t accuse me, just went on, “If I’d only brought my knife, I could have—could have—” Her mouth worked silently a moment; then she swallowed. “I call to him every day, but he never listens.”

“I know,” I whispered. “He told me.”

Her mouth scrunched a moment, then smoothed. “Of course.” Then she sat very still, like an abandoned doll.

I took her hands. They felt small and cold. “Listen. I never should have lied to you about the Rhyme, I know that now, but I couldn’t bear to take your hope away. And what I said that morning—I was angry and scared and I didn’t really mean it. I have never hated you, and I’m sure Mother never did either.” The words, spoken so many times to the mirror, were now stiff and awkward in my mouth. “And I—if I could only take it back—”

“Hush.” She pulled me into her arms again, then eased me down to lay my head in her lap. Just as I had sometimes imagined she would. “I know he did terrible things to you.”

I choked out a laugh that was maybe a sob. She was so right and so wrong, she had no idea.

“I wanted to go with you,” she said, with the same empty calm. “If you’d ever asked, I would have crawled to help you. But you never wanted my help. You only wanted me to be your sweet and smiling sister. So I smiled and smiled, until I thought I would break.”

“I’m sorry,” I whispered helplessly, remembering all the times in our childhood when she had babbled about learning the Hermetic arts or knife fighting and I had rolled my eyes at her. I had always assumed that she didn’t mean it, because she was sweet and happy little Astraia.

She’d had the comfort of believing the Rhyme. But her happiness had still been almost as false as mine. And I’d ignored her pain, just as Father and Aunt Telomache had ignored mine.

“You’re really sorry?” She stroked my hair. “You want me to forgive you?”

“Yes.” I had said it a hundred times to the mirror, thought it a thousand more: Forgive me. Forgive me. Forgive me.

Her hand stilled. “Then kill your husband.”

“What?” I bolted up.

“He killed Mother. He defiled you. He’s enslaved Arcadia and ravaged our people with demons for nine hundred years.” Astraia looked me steadily in the eyes. “If you have any love for me, sister, you will kill him and free us all.”

“But—but—” I nearly said, I love him, but I knew she would never understand.

She smiled, the same sunny expression that for years I had assumed was simple and guileless. “I know. You think you love him. I saw you kissing in the graveyard. Or are you going to pretend you don’t enjoy bedding our enemy?”

“It’s not . . .” But I couldn’t go on; I remembered his kisses, his fingers running through my hair, his skin against mine, and it felt like my whole body was blushing.

Astraia’s smile vanished. “You like it.” Her voice was low and shaky. “All these years you were miserable. All these years I tried and tried to comfort you but nothing ever worked until at last I thought you were broken. I felt so useless that I couldn’t heal you. But really, all you ever needed was to kiss our mother’s murderer and become a demon’s whore—”

I slapped her face. “He is my husband.”

Then I realized what I had done and twisted my hands together, feeling sick. But Astraia didn’t seem to notice she’d been slapped.

“And a great honor that is.” She stood. “But I am still a virgin. I can kill him. If you have no stomach for saving Arcadia, get me into his house and I will do it for you.”

I surged to my feet. “You can’t.”

“You still don’t believe in the Sibyl’s Rhyme? Because I’ve done a lot of research since your wedding, and I am more convinced than ever. I’m willing to risk my life on it.”

I remembered how Ignifex had always taken the knife instantly away from me, how still he had been when I held it to his throat. How he had agreed to my bargain.

“No,” I said heavily. “I believe it now.”

“Then why not? Because it’s more important for you to have a man in your bed than for all Arcadia to be free?”

“No, because I love him.” The words ripped out of my throat and hung in the air between us. I couldn’t look Astraia in the eyes; I stared at the floor, my cheeks hot. “And because he isn’t the one who sundered Arcadia,” I went on quietly, desperately. “The Kindly Ones did that. He’s just their slave. He doesn’t even know his name. I told him– He said if he finds his name, he’ll be free. I promised I would help him.”

I dared to look up then. Astraia had tilted her head thoughtfully to one side.

“The Kindly Ones are real?” she said.

I nodded. “Yes. In the days before the Sundering, they struck bargains with men like the Gentle Lord does now. And I think the last prince must have made some bargain with them, because they sundered Arcadia, created the Gentle Lord to administer their bargains, and made the last prince his slave.”

“So you know how the Sundering happened.” Astraia’s voice was quiet, thoughtful. “You know that the last prince is alive and kept in slavery. With what you’ve learnt and the knowledge of the Resurgandi, you could probably save us all. And your concern is for a servant of the Kindly Ones?”

“No—but—” A new thought suddenly struck me, and I drew a breath. “The Rhyme doesn’t promise that it will end the Sundering or destroy the demons, it just promises that it will destroy him.”

“So?” said Astraia. “It would avenge our mother. It would stop him sending his demons against us. We can solve the Sundering at our leisure once he’s dead.”

“You don’t understand,” I said. “He doesn’t send the demons against us. He’s the only one holding them back. When they hurt people, it’s because they escaped against his will, and he hunts them down. If he were gone, they would tear us all to pieces.”

I felt a sudden surge of hope. I didn’t understand this new Astraia—no, I had never understood who my sister was all along. But surely she had to see the logic of my argument. Surely she had to accept it.

Her forehead creased thoughtfully. “The chief servant of the Kindly Ones can’t always control his demons? Why would they leave him so little power?”

I shrugged. “They thought it amusing, I suppose.”

“Or he thought it amusing to lie to you.”

“He wouldn’t—” I started, then caught myself as her face started to twist in scornful disbelief. “Do you want to risk it?” I asked instead.

“No,” said Astraia. She seemed to consider it a moment. “Then before we kill him, we must find a way to end the Sundering and banish the demons.”

She spoke so confidently and matter-of-factly that it took me a moment to find my voice. “No, we need to find his name.”

“And if it’s possible to find his name, and if it’s true that it would free him, do you have any reason to believe that it would end the Sundering and free us from the demons?”

I didn’t, I realized with a cold, sinking horror. He’d only said that I would be free and he wouldn’t have masters anymore. Everything else was just my own foolish hopes.

“But we can’t kill him,” I protested. “I told you—”

“You have told me good reasons to be careful,” she said. “You have told me that so long as he lives, demons will ravage our people. You have told me that so long as he lives, he will still lure people into twisted bargains.” She stepped closer, until our faces were only a breath away. “You have told me that you want him alive, though it means our mother will lie unavenged, and his bargains will punish both guilty and innocent, and demons will crawl out of the shadows and torment people until they die screaming every day.”

There was no anger in her voice now, only perfect, unbending conviction. I couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t look away from her relentless gaze.

“Is that not so, sister?”

I wanted to shout, You don’t understand!—but every word she had said was true. People were dying every day, and I hadn’t minded if they kept on dying, so long as the one person I wanted stayed alive. Even though he was the one person who least deserved it.

In the end, all I could do was stare at her and whisper, “Yes.”

“You know he’s a monster,” she said gently. “However much you think you love him, you still know. Maybe he is enslaved, but if he really hated what he was doing, he could have killed himself any time.”

I shook my head, remembering how he had healed from the darkness. “I’m not sure they would let him die—”

“Am I telling the truth?”

“Yes,” I said helplessly.

She laid a hand on my cheek. “I’ve heard the stories about him. I don’t blame you for being beguiled. But if you do not help me, I will never forgive you.” Her lips curved in a sunny, vicious smile. “And I know that Mother will never forgive you either.”

My nails bit into my palms. She had every right to fling my own words back in my face, and she was probably telling the truth, as I had not.

“He trusts me,” I said. “You know how the gods judge traitors.”

“You must betray one of us. I suppose which one you pick depends on whom you love the most.”

I looked at her. She wanted me to break my promise with Ignifex, to betray him after he had given me absolute trust, to kill the only person who had ever loved me and asked nothing in return.

She was my only sister, the living image of my mother, and the person I had hurt the most when of all the people in the world she deserved it least. She wanted me to avenge ten thousand murdered souls and save all Arcadia from the terror of demons.

I remembered the screams echoing from Father’s study. I remembered huddling next to Astraia when she couldn’t sleep for fear the shadows would look at her. I remembered silently swearing, I will end this.

That oath, too, surely must be kept.

“Nyx.” Astraia cradled my face in her hands. “Please.”

I should have known, I thought dully. Why did I think that I would ever get to keep what I loved?

Why should I think that my love was more important than all Arcadia?

I gripped her hands and whispered, “Yes.”

Our fingers wove together. I felt like there was ice jammed into my chest.

“Swear to me,” she said, “by the love you bear me and our mother, by the gods above and the river Styx below, that you will destroy the Gentle Lord, rescue the last prince, and save us all.”

My heart thumped. I tried to speak, but my throat tightened. Memories of Ignifex flooded over me: His lips against mine. His hands as he slid the ring onto my finger. His voice in the darkness as he said, Please.

But he didn’t matter any more than I mattered. We were both wicked people, and we were both the ones who had to be sacrificed.

“I swear.” The words came out in a whisper. Then I swallowed and ground them out. “I swear by my love for you and our mother, by the gods above and the river Styx below, that I will destroy the Gentle Lord, rescue the last prince, and save us all.”

“And?” Astraia promptly gently.

“And . . . and by the creek in back of the house.”

She flung her arms around me. “Thank you.”

I pressed my face into her shoulder. My eyes stung with tears, and I expected that any moment the cold hate for her would wash over me. But all I felt was emptiness, until I realized that I had finally gotten my wish: I had learnt to love my sister without bitterness. All it had cost me was everything.

It occurred to me that Ignifex would find this fate both amusing and appropriate. Then I cried, my whole body shaking with sobs, and Astraia held me and stroked my back until I quieted.

It didn’t take Father and Aunt Telomache long to find us, but we bolted the door and refused to come out. Father pounded on the door and commanded Astraia—he must have known I was a lost cause—to open it.

“We’re plotting the death of the Gentle Lord!” Astraia called back. “Go away!”

I laughed weakly. “You grew a sharp tongue rather quickly.”

“Twins are always alike, don’t you know?” Her voice sounded almost affectionate, and I laughed again; then her next words caught me like a blow across the face. “Why did you go to the graveyard?”

I remembered my cheek leaned against Ignifex’s shoulder, his arm around my waist, and his lips as he kissed me, fiercely tender. It felt like worms crawling over my skin to remember that Astraia had watched it all, hating both of us.

But I owed her an answer.

“Because I was always a terrible daughter. And . . . in that house, I became a worse one.”

Astraia glanced at me sharply, and I could see the words Because he made you in her eyes, but she was mercifully silent.

I went on, “I wanted, just once in my life, to do something right for her.”

Astraia puckered her lips. “Why did he go with you?” she asked, apparently missing—or accepting—the implication that I had never, in all my life, loved our mother properly.

“I asked him.”

Her nostrils flared. “So he could laugh at her tomb?”

My hands clenched. “He drank the funeral libation with me,” I growled, then couldn’t help adding, “You must have seen; you were spying long enough.”

Astraia stood. “He could pour out all his blood in libation and it wouldn’t pay what he owes us.”

“I didn’t say it did.” I stared at the floor, remembering his dead brides lying in the darkness and the dead sorrow on Astraia’s face when I left her. Neither of us could pay for our sins.

“I suppose by now he trusts you?” She looked down and I felt compelled to meet her eyes.

You can trust me, I had said, and he had whispered, I do.

I nodded wordlessly.

“That’s a good thing. Because after everything, he deserves to know what it feels like to be betrayed.” Her smile was like broken glass. “Someday you’ll be free of him, and then you will agree.”

The next instant I was on my feet, my heart pounding in my ears.

“Of course he’s evil and unforgivable.” My voice felt like it was coming from the far end of a long tunnel. “But he is the only reason I ever honored Mother with a clean heart. And if I hadn’t learnt to be kind with him, I would never have come back to beg your forgiveness and pick you over him. So gloat all you want—you deserve to watch us both suffer—but don’t you dare say I will ever be free of him. Every kindness I ever show you, all the rest of your life, that’s because of him. And no matter how many times I betray him, I will love him still.”

I clamped my mouth shut. My skin crawled with shame at having revealed what I dared to want. But as I stared at Astraia, hands trembling, the cold wave of hatred still did not find me, did not turn me into a monster who would say or do anything.

Astraia’s face was unreadable. She reached out slowly; I tensed, but she only stroked my hair, and I closed my eyes. Without my hate, I felt bereft.

“He’s going to die,” she said in my ear. “So I’m not discontent.”

“Then can we get on with the planning?” My voice wavered only a little.

“Of course. Tell me what you learnt. Besides kindness.”

So I told her my story. Some of it.

I told her how the darkness tried to eat Ignifex alive, how he needed rows of candles or at least my arms to survive the night. But I didn’t tell her how I had left him helpless in the hallway or how he had said, “Please,” because I knew she would smile at the thought of his suffering and I couldn’t bear that. I told her how I found all the hearts—including the Heart of Air—but though I blushed enough for her to guess, I didn’t tell her what we’d done there.

Most of all, I was careful not to tell her how long I had dallied between finding the Heart of Air and coming to see her. She knew I loved the enemy of our house, but she didn’t need to know how much I had wanted to forget her. Or how easy it had been.

After I had finished, Astraia sat quietly for a while. Then she said, “You have to free Shade. He’s the prince, isn’t he?”

He killed five women, I thought, but Ignifex had killed more, and in the end neither of them mattered at all. Avenging my mother and saving Arcadia from the demons were the only things that I should care about.

“Yes,” I said.

“During my research, I found a variant of the Rhyme—only recorded in two manuscripts—but it adds another couplet:

“A pure heart and a pure kiss,

Will free the prince and give him bliss.

”

I snorted. “Even if it’s true, I think that’s as impossible now as the virgin hands.” She opened her mouth. “For you as well. There’s far too much poison in your heart now.” I frowned. “Besides, I’d have to find Shade first. Ignifex wouldn’t say where . . .” My voice trailed off as I realized there was only one place that Ignifex would be satisfied to imprison Shade.

“He’s behind the door,” I whispered. “With the Children of Typhon.” I felt a twist of horror that Ignifex would do that to anyone, but I knew it had to be true.

“Well, that’s easy then, isn’t it?” said Astraia. “You have the ring.”

“So?”

She rolled her eyes. “He can command the demons. The ring lets you stand in his place. I’d wager anything you can command them as well.”

“Would you bet your life?” I muttered, but I looked down at the ring. How much of his nature had the ring given me? It let me share his powers; what if it let me share his weakness as well? I noticed the deepening shadows in the library, and my skin prickled.

“Yes, and more,” said Astraia, grim again.

“I wasn’t wavering,” I said. “I was thinking. Remember how I told you that darkness burns him? I think it might do the same to me since the ring lets me share his power. Shade said that monsters are afraid of the dark because it reminds them of what they are. Ignifex said that he hears a voice in the darkness and he only survives because he forgets.” I met her eyes. “I want to know what truth it is that tries to eat him alive every night.”