He’d screamed, then, until Haspar had silenced him with one raised hand. He’d scrabbled helplessly at his forearm with his fingertips, trying to tear open the skin to remove the object he could still feel pulsing in there next to his bone, impossibly wrong… and then Haspar had spoken a word, and he’d felt his whole body jerk as some other force took control of his movements.
After that, they’d talked. But there hadn’t really been much to talk about at the end of the day, had there? The gemstone was bonded to Cato’s body. Haspar’s will was bonded to the gemstone, by means of its magical twin, embedded somewhere in his own flesh. At any time he liked, he could exert that horrific control of Cato’s limbs he’d demonstrated. And, he’d added lazily, as if reading the plan as it coalesced in Cato’s panicking mind, if Haspar died, so would Cato. Their fates were inextricably bound.
But he was alive, Haspar reminded him whenever he seemed about to sink into despair. Instead of dying a horrible, ignoble death in a gutter, he was alive. Didn’t he want his life to mean something?
Cato gritted his teeth against the old itch, deep under his skin. He’d never gotten used to that feeling, never felt completely at home with the invasive lump that rested up against his bones like that. He’d only grown better at channeling the stone’s power, choosing if and when he made use of its healing abilities… sometimes it was better that strangers didn’t witness his wounds closing over by themselves. And, of course, he could control when it reached out to contact Haspar… though he had no control over when Haspar reached out in kind. He’d learned to proceed as though Haspar was always listening, always watching.
Though he hoped like hell his boss hadn’t thought to check in during the nights he’d been spending with Acantha.
“Cato. You’ve finally bothered to call.” Haspar’s voice was soft and sibilant, hissing against his ears as though he was standing right behind him… he shot a glance over his shoulder at the sleeping form of Acantha, hoping fiercely that nothing would draw her attention.
“Under guard,” he said as quietly as he could. “Dangerous.”
“So they don’t trust you, hm? Not quite the puppet master you fancied yourself. That’s a shame.”
“Getting there.” He’d been rehearsing this over and over—but he hadn’t accounted for the fact that he’d be whispering as quietly as he could in a corner. “Listen, I want to suggest a change of plans. I have a better way.”
“Cato, we’re attacking in less than twenty-four hours. We’ve been preparing for weeks. Might I remind you that all of this was your idea?”
“Won’t work,” he said through gritted teeth. “Too many dragons, too strong—but let me suggest an alternative. We form an alliance.”
Only silence from Haspar, though the uncomfortable heat of the gemstone under his skin told him the mage was still listening. He pressed on, hoping his desperation didn’t show too clearly in his voice.
“These dragons are smart, resourceful… the leaps and bounds in understanding they’d made in just a few weeks are incredible. They’re figuring out things about the Fog that even we don’t know. And their Queen is from an insula I’ve never even heard of. We could help them. We could learn from them.” He could feel his voice shaking. “And we could be safe with them. We could live here, Haspar. Permanently, not constantly moving from safehouse to safehouse in the blasted Fog, always fending off madness with one hand and scrabbling for our next meal with the other… I know I could talk them into it. If you’d just agree to try…”
“Are you finished?” Cato’s heart sank. “Good. That’s all nonsense, obviously, and we’ll be having words about this later. But for now, we’ll see you tomorrow evening at sundown for the attack you planned. Understood?”
“Haspar—”
“I don’t care.”
Cato clapped his hand over his mouth to stifle the scream of pain that almost slipped loose as the gem in his arm lit up, white-hot and searing him with unbelievable pain. He closed his eyes and willed his way through it, breath shuddering as he waited for Haspar to get bored, trying not to imagine he could smell his own skin cooking… and then, slowly, the heat began to subside. Tears prickling at the backs of his eyelids, he pulled on the magic in the stone to heal the damage it had done… but relieving that pain did little for the terror in his chest. He’d failed. His one shot, and he’d failed.
But there was worse to come. When he rose to his feet and turned to head back to bed, the silhouette of Acantha’s sleeping body had changed. She was sitting bolt upright, her green eyes wide open… and the look on her face made the question of how much she’d heard completely unnecessary. She’d heard enough—she’d heard more than enough.
“You lied,” she said faintly, and though he’d expected her voice to be harsh and flat, the reality was a much harder punch to his gut. Her voice was quiet, small—vulnerable in a way he’d rarely heard it. And far from the stone wall that was her default expression, her face was wreathed with dawning betrayal, those exquisite green eyes shining with tears.
“Acantha,” he breathed, hearing his voice crack. “Please, let me explain.”
“I thought I was paranoid,” she said slowly, not moving. “I thought I was being a harsh old fool, clinging to my gut instinct that you were up to something. You made me…” She shook her head, and he saw a tear roll down her cheek. “Alright, Cato. I concede. You win.”
“Acantha, listen. He’s—it’s more complicated than I can explain now, it’s—he controls me, he’s got control of me—” He was gesturing at her with his wrist as if that would explain it somehow, losing control of his words as he panicked. But Acantha wasn’t listening to him. She was putting on the last few pieces of her armor—she must have been putting it on during his entire conversation with Haspar. How could he have been so stupid as to think she wouldn’t wake up the moment he left the bed?
“Come with me,” she said, her hand on the hilt of her sword. She seemed to draw strength from it, her expression smoothing and calming as she squeezed the grip of the weapon in her palm… and when she looked up at him again, it was with nothing but menace. “And if you try to say another word to me as long as you live, Cato, I’ll cut off your worthless head.”
Chapter 17 - Acantha
Yet again, they were walking through the Palace in the middle of the night. The sense of déjà vu was ameliorated somewhat by the fact that she was holding Cato at the point of her sword, not carrying his unconscious body on her back… nor had she felt this completely emptied out back then. As they passed the door to the prison, she saw his feet slowing automatically and jabbed him in the lower back with the tip of her sword, probably harder than she’d needed to. But the cloth of his robes was enough to stop the blade from breaking his skin, and he hurried forward, unscathed. That was a shame.
When they reached the Archives and she steered him through the front door, he seemed to put the pieces together … but she ignored him as he turned to her with his mouth half-open, turning her attention instead to one of the worried-looking guards standing watch.
“Wake the Queen, wake the Court,” she said, her voice sounding very far away to her ears. “I’m calling an emergency war room meeting.”
“We’re not at war,” the guard said blankly. Acantha didn’t break her gaze … the guard’s eyes widened a little, and she snapped a salute before hurrying away. That done, Acantha turned back to Cato.
“One word,” she reminded him. “One word, and it’s your head.”
He squeezed his eyes shut… and for a moment, she genuinely hoped he’d cave in to his clear desire to ignore her and speak anyway. In that moment, she knew that if he gave her half an excuse, she’d use every ounce of her power to strike him dead where he stood. It was a comforting thought, a familiar one. To use her sword to protect the Palace… that was why she was alive, at the end of the day. All the rest of this had simply been a test she’d been failing.