Page 209 of The Eye of the Fifth
Her nails scraped the rock. ‘I saw it, as if it were happening in front of my own eyes.’
‘You saw your brother, yes. But what if therewasanother?’ When she could only frown at him, he continued, ‘There was a woman. Everyone else was dead. Your brother had Rosary. And there was a woman in the doorway. Very much alive.’
The woman in black. Kyra had seen, but hadn’t truly taken any notice of her. The sight of Oslan dragging Rosary through the taproom had stolen all her attention.
Kyra squeezed her eyes shut.
Gloved hands. Night-kissed, tightly wound hair.
A woman in all black, face hidden, lurking like a shadow.
Shadow.
A deadly stillness slithered over Kyra’s bones. ‘Lilion.’
Gedeon stared at her. ‘You know who the woman is?’
There was no tremor to her voice now. ‘Lady Lilion Perdy was my employer in Avaldale’s Arc. She was the one who sponsored me to fight in the pits. She enslaved Oslan as a whore. The blood-bargain I made was to her. To free him.’
‘But that bargain was fulfilled? Oslan could not have been a slave to her anymore. The blood-bargain between you would have taken her life if she hadn’t released him from his enslavement when you upheld your end.’
Oslan’s changing face flashed before her. Lying in bed next to Rosary, features soft and finally free from strife. Then contorting with rancour before his blade had sliced her ear off. As though he were being driven by something outside of himself.
Kyra had seen him look like that before. Only then, his barbarity had been directed ather.Striking to kill his own sister.
But before then, he had pleaded with her.Please, kill me now. Do it now before she makes me-
‘Mother above,’ Kyra breathed softly. ‘She’s imperi. She’s fucking imperi.’
‘Imperi,’ Gedeon repeated. ‘A rare gift. And one my mother would prize.’
Kyra was talking without really thinking then. It was better to talk, the words just falling like cascading water, than to think. ‘Lilion has always followed power and glory to whatever end. The Empress poses both. I’m willing to bet that Lilion offered up her services in exchange for a place of high status in the new world the prophecy speaks of. I bet your mother jumped at the chance to have Lilion on her side. Just as I suspect Lilion fucking soiled herself with excitement at the prospect of being considered important to the mighty Empress.’
‘A private puppeteer pulling the strings at her command,’ Gedeon murmured.
Thoughts began spilling from Kyra’s mouth: ‘Lilion controlled Rosary too. In the cells, Rose kept sayingshe knows.Through Rosary’s eyes, Lilion must have seen that we were there. That’s why there were no sentries. Rose was a sentry for the Empress herself. And that High Wielder-’
‘Hossean.’
‘Lilion must have forced Rosary to obey his every word. She couldn’t disobey him.’ Kyra screwed her face up. ‘But Rose wasstillin there. She was aware of what she was doing. She spoke to me. She looked me in the eye. When Oslan was forced to fight me in the pits, he was completely gone. He didn’t even know who I was.’
Breath was etching higher and higher in her lungs.
‘Even with Oslan’s enslavement broken, Lilion still had him wrapped around her finger,’ she hissed in a rush. ‘Shelethim go. She let me think he had been freed.Shetold him to go to Taru. To follow Rosary. And Oslan… Oslan never knew he was being controlled. He must have thought her hold over him broke when the bargain was fulfilled. He didn’t know what he was doing when… when he-’
She couldn’t say it. Her throat closed up. The trembling began once more.
After a moment of silence, Gedeon said, ‘I think your brother broke free of her, Kyra.’
She croaked, ‘How?’
‘In the Throne Room, the Empress screamed at Hossean tocontinue the search for the boy.She said-’
‘He will be our next ultimatum,’Kyra finished for him. ‘I remember. She was talking about Oslan.’
Gedeon nodded. ‘If Lilion still controlled him, he would have been in Dracyg.’
A small relief, to know that Oslan had somehow broken Lilion’s control of his mind and escaped Zarynth. Though imagining what lengths he had gone to do so was terrifying. Imagining him alone somewhere in the world with wolves prowling after him was even more so.
