Page 125 of Mother of Death and Dawn

The man who stood before me now looked exactly as I remembered him, and yet, so very different. His face was not so still, his eyes not so bright. When his gaze fell to Caduan, it was not emotionless detachment that lingered in it, but genuine pain.

He remained far away, beyond the reach of hands or weapons. Meajqa’s aim held.

“Are you pleased with yourself?” Ishqa said, voice stretching across the rubble. “Does all this death bring you the satisfaction of a job well done?”

“It was stupid of you to come here,” Caduan replied.

Meajqa’s only response was to let forth another arrow, which Ishqa dodged easily.

Meajqa had said he was no warrior, but he truly was a terrible marksman.

Ishqa’s lips thinned. “Iajqa. Where is she? I know she was a general here. I have not seen her.”

“You lost the right to ask after your family.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Caduan. You forgot that we were friends for four hundred years.” Ishqa’s gaze fell to Meajqa, who still aimed at his father. “I will never stop asking after my family. You know it as well as I. And I hope they know it, too.”

Meajqa’s jaw tightened. He let another arrow fly. This one didn’t even come close to hitting, burying itself uselessly in the ground several feet to Ishqa’s left.

No, this wasn’t right. I didn’t like any of this.

Ishqa was pretending to be someone kind, someone who looked at his son with such open affection, someone who chided Caduan—Caduan!—about the morality of this battle.

I did not like to be lied to. And this version of Ishqa was a lie. I knew it because the real version, the true version, had destroyed me without a second thought. I wanted to peel all the skin off his beautiful face until it exposed the rotting darkness underneath.

Without intending to, I took several steps closer, just enough to reveal myself from behind the line of Caduan’s soldiers.

Ishqa’s eyes met mine and went wide.

I was not expecting his stare to strike me as it did, yanking me back to a terrible day five hundred years ago without even a touch.

His lips fell open, as if words escaped him.

“What is this?” he choked out, after a moment. He whirled to Caduan. “What did you do?”

Caduan stepped in front of me.

“How did you do this?” Ishqa staggered closer, and I tensed—and that was enough to break the thread of Caduan’s restraint.

“Leave before we kill you,” Caduan said, calmly. “Now.”

Meajqa let an arrow fly just as Ishqa launched himself into the air. He hit his mark this time, though only enough to make Ishqa stagger as he arced gracefully through the sky. He flew fast. Seconds, and he was gone beneath the cloud cover.

But my pounding heart and shaking hands lingered long after he left.

* * *

The executions lasted lateinto the night. There were many humans to kill. Caduan told us that the battle had been lengthy and hard-fought, and that he hadn’t been able to send word back to Ela’Dar because there simply hadn’t been time—we had arrived only hours after the tides had turned, leading to Threllian victory. Even he had underestimated the strength of sheer numbers the rebels commanded.

We piled bodies over bodies. The pyres burned so high and hot that often they threatened to spiral out of control, requiring groups of frantic Threllians to rush in with pails of water and Fey magic users to force flames back with whispered spells. I was certain my clothes and hair would never stop smelling of burning human flesh.

The piles of burning bodies were reserved only for the rebels and those killed within their territory. The Threllians burned their dead separately, in neat, individual pyres by the shore presided over by priestesses. Their dead slave warriors were burned separate from the rebels, too—the Threllians believed that even their loyal slaves deserved to be separated from the rebel traitors.

As for the Fey—by Caduan’s order, the dead were treated with the utmost care and respect. We collected all the Fey bodies, painstakingly combing through rubble to make sure we recovered all of them, even those that were in such terrible condition that they were unrecognizable. We wrapped the corpses in ivory silk shrouds and laid them side by side, far away from the burning humans. Soon, rows and rows of pristine white punctuated the charred remains of the city.

Caduan barely spoke to me—barely spoke to anyone—the entire time. Days passed of this. Eating, sleeping. Collecting the dead.

On the third day, Caduan at last sank down beside me. The hours were between midnight and dawn. I had not seen him rest once.

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