An Ember in the Ashes
Page 52

“Even my mother?”
Cain pauses for a telling moment. “Even her.”
“You’ve read her mind?” Grandfather speaks up from beside me. “You’re absolutely certain she didn’t know where Elias was?”
“Reading thoughts isn’t like reading a book, General. It requires study—”
“Can you read her or not?”
“Keris Veturia walks dark paths. The darkness cloaks her, hiding her from our sight.”
“That’s a no, then,” Grandfather says dryly.
“If you can’t read her,” I say, “how do you know she didn’t help Marcus and Zak cheat? Did you read them?”
“We do not feel the need—”
“Reconsider.” My temper surges. “My best friend is dying because those sons of a whore pulled the wool over your eyes.”
“Cyrena,” Cain says to one of the other Augurs, “stabilize Aquilla and isolate the Farrars. No one is to see them.” The Augur turns back to me. “If what you say is true, then the balance is upset, and we must restore it. We will heal her. But if we cannot prove that Marcus and Zacharias cheated, then we must leave Aspirant Aquilla to her fate.”
I nod tersely, but in my head, I’m screaming at Cain. You idiot. You stupid, repulsive demon. You’re letting those cretins win. You’re letting them get away with murder.
Grandfather, unusually silent, walks with me to the infirmary. When we reach the infirmary doors, they open, and the Commandant emerges.
“Giving your lackeys warning, Keris?” Grandfather towers over his daughter, his lip curling.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“You’re a traitor to your Gens, girl,” Grandfather says, the only man in the Empire brave enough to refer to my mother as a girl. “Don’t think I’ll forget it.”
“You picked your favorite, General.” Mother’s eyes slide to me, and I spot a flash of unhinged rage. “And I’ve picked mine.”
She leaves us at the infirmary door. Grandfather watches her go, and I wish I knew what he was thinking. What does he see when he looks at her?
The little girl she was? The soulless creature she is now? Does he know why she became like this? Did he watch it happen?
“Don’t underestimate her, Elias,” he says. “She’s not used to losing.”
XIX: Laia
When I open my eyes, the low roof of my quarters looms over me. I don’t remember losing consciousness. Perhaps I’ve been out for minutes, perhaps hours. Through the curtain strung across my doorway, I catch a glimpse of a sky that looks as if it’s still undecided as to whether it’s night or morning. I push myself to my elbows, stifling a moan. The pain is all consuming, so pervasive it feels as if I’ve never been without it.
I don’t look at the wound. I don’t need to. I watched the Commandant as she carved it into me, a thick-lined, precise K stretching from my collarbone to the skin over my heart. She’s branded me. Marked me as her property. It’s a scar I’ll carry to the grave.
Clean it. Bandage it. Get back to work. Don’t give her an excuse to hurt you again.
The curtain shifts. Izzi slips in and sits at the end of my pallet, small enough that she doesn’t need to stoop to avoid hitting her head.
“It’s nearly dawn.” Her hand drifts to her eye patch, but, catching herself, she knots her fingers into her shirt. “The legionnaires brought you down last night.”
“It’s so ugly.” I hate myself for saying it. Weak, Laia. You’re so weak. Mother had a six-inch scar on her hip from a legionnaire who nearly got the best of her. Father had lash marks on his back—he never said how he got them. They both wore their scars proudly—proof of their ability to survive. Be strong like them, Laia. Be brave.
But I’m not strong. I’m weak, and I’m sick of pretending I’m not.
“Could be worse.” Izzi raises a hand to her missing eye. “This was my first punishment.”
“How—when—” Skies, there’s no delicate way to ask about this. I fall silent.
“A month after we arrived here, Cook tried to poison the Commandant.”
Izzi toys with her eye patch. “I was five, I think. It was more than ten years ago now. The Commandant smelled the poison—Masks are trained in such things. She didn’t lay a finger on Cook—just came at me with a hot poker and made Cook watch. Right before, I remember wishing for someone. My mother? My father? Someone to stop her. Someone to take me away. After, I remember wanting to die.”
Five years old. For the first time, it sinks in that Izzi has been a slave nearly her whole life. What I’ve gone through for eleven days she has suffered for years.
“Cook kept me alive, after. She’s good at remedies. She wanted to bandage you up last night, but...well, you wouldn’t let either of us near you.”
I remember, then, the legionnaires throwing my numb body into the kitchen. Gentle hands, soft voices. I fought them with whatever I had left, thinking they meant me harm.
Our silence is broken by the echo of the dawn drums. A moment later, Cook’s raspy voice echoes down the corridor, asking Izzi if I’m up yet.
“The Commandant wants you to bring her sand from the dunes for a scrub,” Izzi says. “Then she wants you to take a file to Spiro Teluman. But you should let Cook tend to you first.”
“No.” My vehemence startles Izzi to her feet. I lower my voice. So many years around the Commandant would make me jumpy too. “The Commandant will want the scrub for her morning bath. I don’t want to be punished for being late.”