Twenty-Seven: Checkmate

“ARIS.”

His name tasted like ash in my mouth. Blood rushed from my head to my feet. Raeyn’s grip on my arm was the only thing that kept me standing and I was painfully aware how pathetic we looked, one leaning on the other, cornered with no way out.

“You sound shocked.” Aris’s mouth twitched, one corner lifting in a parody of a not-quite smile. It sent a shudder of goose bumps down my spine. “Voyants are hard to kill. Thought you of all people would remember that.”

He moved like a broken stick figure, one stiff step toward me, his palm a light touch against my chest where Valyr’d shot me months ago. Underneath Aris’s fingers, I felt the cold burn of the bullets as they’d ripped me open. Nothing but a phantom echo, a memory of bleeding into the dirt while the world grew dim. It still tore a soft, strangled sound out of me. Cold concrete pressed against my back before I’d even noticed I’d backed away.

“Leave him alone.” Raeyn pushed forward, but Taerien held him back.

Aris’s smile didn’t touch his eyes. “Oh, I’m not the one who nearly killed him, brother.”

Raeyn didn’t reply, but I watched a muscle jump in his cheek as he gritted his teeth. Aris wouldn’t even look at him. His eyes were fixed on me.

“I told you not to get involved.” Aris let out a sigh that caught on a wince. His hand went halfway to his chest before he stopped himself. Sweat shone on his forehead. “We need to get you out of here,” he said. “And by the Gods, let’s hope you didn’t just fuck up everything.”

Aris cast a quick glance to Taerien. “If either of them tries to run, you shoot them.”

What the fuck? Since when was Taerien in cahoots with Aris? Fucking spider. He—

Aris kicked my legs out from underneath me. I heard the cold snap of handcuffs closing around my wrists before I even registered he’d slipped behind me.

“Trust me,” Aris whispered against my neck.

Trust him. Right. Like we’d done so well with that so far.

“Fuck you.”

“Thanks, but it looks like you picked my brother.”

Something tightened in my throat. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught Raeyn glaring.

Taerien yanked Raeyn’s hands back and whispered something to him that made him quit struggling fast. Aris shoved me out into the hallway, and I nearly lost track of Raeyn in the chaos.

A gaggle of Reds swarmed us, prodding us up the stairs. Laras’s hand fell on my shoulder, her thin, bony frame pressing against my side.

“I always wondered if you were a screamer, Nettoyer,” she said dreamily. Her gloved hand was a vise around the back of my neck. “Looks like we’re about to find out.”

Lightsquare’d turned into a caricature of itself. Sunlight had bleached away the fake brightness of the Election Day celebrations. Crumpled flyers and trampled garlands littered the waterfront. Clumps of spilled coal crunched under boots trailing soot across the white marble covering Lightsquare like a tomb.

The square was lined with Reds. The Empire must’ve pulled all its reserves for this one. Reds in riot gear formed a solid ring around the Finger of Light and the palace, walled in the crowds pressing along the sidelines and the riverside, spilling over into surrounding streets.

They might as well’ve soundproofed the place. Everyone stood with their heads down, voices low. Scattered laughter echoed across the hushed square, nervous, high-pitched sounds.

The Core’d gone into duck and cover mode, listening for the roaring of incoming bombers. No one’d forgotten how last time Nymeron’d leveled most of Low Side to make a statement. The Gods only knew what he’d do after I’d all but offed his son.

At first, I thought I was having flashbacks, the panicky kind that filled my nose with smoke and scraped at the back of my throat whenever I thought of the day the Empire’d burned Kovacz. They’d walked me across the square and halfway to the pyre before it finally hit me.

This one was for me. Nymeron was going to burn me.

I locked up. Started to panic. They were going to burn me. They’d make me get up that pyre, tie me down, and watch me roast like a fucking feast day lamb.

Aris would throw the torch.

I squeezed my eyes shut so tight stars sparked. My knee trembled, this side of giving out. If I fell now, Laras would only drag me the rest of the way. I’d make her day.

No one’d dragged Kovacz to the pyre.

I kept walking before Laras had to nudge me.

Next to me, Raeyn didn’t blink. He’d slammed the shutters tight, his face locked behind his usual blank mask, so nobody saw how fucking terrified he was. I would’ve done anything to be able to touch him then, would’ve let them burn me three times over if it’d spare him.

But this’d stopped being a world with room for wishful thinking a long damn time ago.

The president stood at the same spot where he’d been about to announce his perfectly faked victory the day before. Valyr hovered in the background. Off to his side, I could still make out the huge dark stain where Aris’s blood had leaked through the slats.

Aris’s hand closed around my shoulder, the grip possessive, a dog pissing up a tree, marking his territory before another bigger, scarier dog got the chance.

“Father.” Aris’s head tipped just shy of a bow.

Nymeron nodded. Aris steered me onto the pyre. My stomach dropped. I wanted to dig my heels in, lose my shit, anything, if it meant staying alive for another minute or two longer.

I climbed the pyre without stumbling.

Aris stepped in front of me, gently pushed me back so he could tie me to the stake before he stopped. His cool fingers cupped my cheek, the touch old and familiar. I flinched when his lips brushed against mine.

Nymeron cleared his throat. “This really isn’t the place, Aris.”

“You’re right, Father. It isn’t. I should never have let it come this far.” A fierce grin lurked behind Aris’s eyes. “You know, you completely ruined my timing,” he murmured against the side of my throat. At a flick of his wrist, my handcuffs clattered to the ground. “Sorry about this. I would have spared you the drama if there’d been a quicker way to get you out of the Finger. Anyway.” He slipped my Colt into my hands. “Run.”

His eyes lit up white.

A rustle went through the crowds, everyone close to the stage suddenly very busy getting the hells out of Lightsquare. Only the ones too curious to book it kept lingering by the river.

“And that’s our signal,” Raeyn said next to me, his hands uncuffed and pulling me with him. “Time to get out of here. Mael’s driving the getaway hover.”

I didn’t move. Just stared at Aris and Nymeron, a Voyant shitstorm ready to hit the fan.

Raeyn sighed. “Well then. He better keep it running.”

“Aris. What do you think you are doing?” Behind his pasted-on smile, there was a razor edge to Nymeron’s words.

“What I should have done for months.” Around Aris, the Voyance became a second pulse. The air hummed with it, a coil of power wound tight enough to snap.

It hit Nymeron square in the chest. He stumbled. Caught himself on the podium. The Voyance burned white in his eyes. The hum of power grew to a vibrating roar.

Nymeron smiled. “‘Et tu, Brute?’ Is that how it’s going to be? I’m afraid you’re harboring delusions of grandeur, son.”

“I’m not your son,” Aris said. “And I’m not alone.”

Valyr met her son’s eyes. Aris nodded. The Reds in riot gear put their shields up. Around them, the air blistered with power. Shit, guess the rumors about some Reds being low-key Voyants were true. And Aris had made an army of them.

The Finger of Light exploded in a shower of glass. Windows blew out. Concrete walls caved. The shockwave was deafening. I hit the ground before I even noticed I was falling. Raeyn’s knee smacked into the small of my back, his weight keeping me pinned. The Finger’s steel frame groaned but held. Fires flickered behind gaping windows. A hailstorm of metal and glass hammered down on the square.

Aris stood in the middle of it as if it was nothing but a mild spring rain.

He towered over Nymeron. “I’m not the only one tired of your lies.”

My ears were ringing so badly I could barely pick out the words. Nymeron’s face was gray, staring at the dust settling over the ruins of what used to be the hallmark of his Empire.

Aris didn’t hesitate.

The Voyance curled around Nymeron’s throat like a noose made of live wire. Nymeron’s eyes widened. He tried to claw it loose, but Aris didn’t budge. “To you, I never was anything but a windup toy. Something to show off and point at people when it was convenient.” Aris pulled the noose tighter, trembling with the effort.

“Two can play a game, Father. See, I thought if I played my part, become the prodigal son you made me out to be, your poster child, the perfect successor, it would all be worth it.” Aris’s nose had started to bleed, a steady red drip down his upper lip. “I did everything you asked me to. I switched sides, became your puppet, killed without looking twice at the bodies.”

His voice cracked, and he couldn’t even look at me. “I turned on everyone around me. All for the off chance you’d let me in enough to turn your back on me just once, so I could—” Aris shook his head. I saw him draw the knife, the gleam of the blade a searing afterimage in front of my eyes. “I’m done playing, Father.”

“Are you now? Well, that’s a relief.”

Nymeron struck without warning.

A brief flicker in the Voyance was all he needed to smash Aris’s offensive. Aris’s Voyance shattered into a thousand pieces. The blast kicked up a whirl of dust and fallen glass. I could smell fried wiring. Downed cables were striking sparks.

Aris staggered. He couldn’t catch himself before Nymeron lashed out again. The strike hit him like an oncoming train. Sucked him under and ground him into the dirt before he even got the chance to scream. The knife slipped from his fingers, and Aris fell half a second behind, a bundle of rags collapsing at Nymeron’s feet.

He didn’t get up again.

“Aris.” Valyr moved toward Nymeron, piece pointed at his chest. “He’s your son.” Her voice shook, but her hands were steady. “He’s your son.”

Nymeron’s hands clamped down around her throat. “We’ll talk about this later.”

The Voyance snapped. Valyr made a small sound in the back of her throat and went limp. Nymeron tossed her aside like a broken doll.

“It’s a shame.” He shook his head. “So much potential. Wasted.” Nymeron crouched, glass crunching underfoot. Long fingers brushed Aris’s hair out of his face. Nymeron picked up the fallen knife and weighed it in his hands.

“Don’t touch him.” I got to my feet, ears ringing with a surge of Voyance boiling to the surface. I dragged my Colt up. “Don’t you fucking touch him.”

“Damian, don’t.”

I didn’t notice I was shaking until Raeyn tried to tear me away, the Colt an impossible weight dragging on my arms. My eyes were glued on Aris lying on the ground in a crumpled heap. He’d played me. He’d told me he wasn’t going to leave the palace when I’d tried to get him out, he’d thrown me down four flights of stairs into a subway tunnel. Gods, he’d launched a fucking air raid, killed dozens of people, people who’d been his friends, just to keep me far enough away from him and this batshit plan of his.

He once said he’d set the world on fire for me if it came down to it.

“You godsdamned bastard.” I had to fight the urge to kick him. “Fuck you.”

“Yes, all that.” Raeyn’s hand clenched around mine. “Anyway. Do you think we could save the wallowing in sudden but inevitable betrayal for later?”

I put two right between Nymeron’s eyes.

“Or you could shoot people. If it makes you happy.”

Might as well have poked Nymeron with a toothpick. He moved so fast, the slugs didn’t as much as scrape him. His fingers burned white-hot, curling in my collar, pulling me close.

“Hm.” Nymeron checked me over. “So, you are the new one.”

“What the fuck do you mean, the new—”

Nymeron kicked me through the floor. Something creaked and gave where his boot hit my chest. The ground opened beneath me. Raeyn shouted something, but the words ripped away. My back slammed into concrete so hard, it dented, cracks spiderwebbing outward. My skull exploded into bursts of light. Dust and splinters rained down the hole my body’d punched through the stage.

Nymeron towered over me, tall and still as a statue, blotting out the light.

His lips twisted. “Disappointing.”

“What?” I croaked. “Sad I don’t do tricks for you? Want me to roll over and let you pet my belly?” I tried to pick myself off the floor. My stomach lurched. Pain sank its claws into my abdomen and yanked.

Nymeron put his boot on the small of my back and leaned. “Down.”

I choked on the dust, dragging in breaths through bruised lungs. Glass shards dug into my palms, into the side of my face. Spots of color flittered in front of my vision. The Voyance tingled in my fingers and toes. Nymeron stomped it out like the guttering embers of a dying fire.

Nymeron clucked his tongue. “He almost drained you dry. Pity. And wasteful. Given he can’t use it for anything other than to heal himself. Like a cockroach. Always coming back.”

“What—” I fought for air, harsh gasps catching on kicked-in ribs. “—are you talking about?”

“Let him go.” Raeyn was a silver streak in the corner of my eye, staring down at his father, my Colt glinting in his grip. “Leave him out of this.”

“You didn’t tell him.” I could hear the shark-smile behind Nymeron’s words. “Well, full disclosure never was your thing.”

Raeyn’s voice dropped to a growl. “I said leave him.”

Nymeron’s left hand fisted in my hair. He hauled me up fast enough I felt something tear. I hissed, the knife dug into my throat, the blade already warm and sticky with my blood.

“Yes, it’s all talk with you, isn’t it?” Nymeron pulled me close, effectively turning me into his meatshield. “I thought you had learned from last time. You were so broken up about Gren. Gren was his name, right? You go through them so fast, it’s hard to keep up.”

“Don’t.” Raeyn almost choked on the word. His finger tightened on the trigger. He’d shoot me. Anything to get to his father. This close, the bullet would go right through me before it’d take down Nymeron. I should probably be worried about that, but all I could do was stare at Raeyn because I’d finally drudged up the reference.

“Gren. That guy in L’Oubliette. You,” I fumbled for the words. “You did this to him?”

I remembered Gren’s ruined face, the bloody bandage wrapped around his eyes, his fingers digging into Raeyn’s wrist, desperate to hold on. The images overlapped with Raeyn clutching at me after Laras shot him, the rushing of the waves dragging me under. Afterward, Raeyn’d been better. A lot better.

“So that’s what happened.” I was cold. Would’ve shivered, if I’d had room between Nymeron and the knife against my throat. “You said he saved your life. Guess he did.”

“I never meant to hurt you.” Raeyn’s eyes bore into me, pleading. But he didn’t deny anything his father said.

“That’s why you didn’t want me to touch you,” I said. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

The desperation in his eyes was all the answer I needed. Looked like I wasn’t the only one with issues admitting things to himself.

“I’m not like him,” Raeyn said. “Damian, please.”

“Really, son.” Nymeron shook his head. “Hypocrisy doesn’t suit you. It played right into your cards that Aris ended up at the palace to keep me preoccupied while you could go about planning riots. Assassinations.”

Raeyn recoiled like he was going to be sick.

Nymeron patted my shoulder. “You even got your very own Voyant to leech off. Impressive.”

I froze over. Stared at Raeyn. “I led you right to Aris. To him and everyone else.”

The thoughts came so easy, falling into place like puzzle pieces.

“No.” Raeyn’s face turned gray. “I didn’t. Damian, I swear to you, I had nothing to do with the raid on the Shadow.”

The cold carved into me. I couldn’t think. My head was pounding. Even the Voyance burned like ice. Hollowed me out and lined me with cracks. If Nymeron as much as flicked a finger at me, I’d shatter.

Instead, he lowered the knife and handed it to me.

Nymeron’s white Voyant-eyes sliced into me. “Kill him.”

“What?” My broken fingers closed around the handle and I’d taken two steps toward Raeyn before the word was even out. “No. No, wait!” I took another step.

“I’m sorry, Damian. I should have told you.” Raeyn didn’t move. My mark. The presidents’ son-turned-revolutionary. Aris’s brother. My partner long before I’d woken up in his bed. Just stood there, pointing my own Colt at me.

“No.” This wasn’t how this was supposed to go. “He’s in my head. Fuck, Raeyn, move.”

I tried to stop. Dig my heels in. My Voyance flared, but it was like holding a candle to a wildfire. Nymeron swallowed it all up. I tasted blood. Felt it running down my upper lip, dripping off my chin. I trembled, fighting him every inch. Nymeron kept pushing me forward. To him, I was nothing but a piece on his chessboard.

Two steps. One.

You were a tracker, Nettoyer. Nothing more. Valyr’s words echoing past the pressure building between my ears. I tried to drown them out, tried to remember it wasn’t actually me thinking them. That they weren’t true. I knew Raeyn.

As much as anyone could know him. Which wasn’t much at all.

I closed the gap, knife angled at Raeyn’s ribs. No. No.

“Tell me you didn’t just use me.”

He’d slipped his hand into mine the day they burned Kovacz. I remembered Raeyn’s lips hot on mine, the soft sounds he’d made when I kissed his scars. Remembered pancakes in bed, how he’d taken a bullet for me even after I let him down.

“Raeyn, please.” Move. Don’t let him make me do this.

“I didn’t lie to you.” Raeyn’s pale eyes were fixed on me.

He dropped the Colt.

“What are you doing?”

“I never lied to you,” he said again. The tip of the knife sliced into the fabric of his shirt. It nicked his skin. Raeyn didn’t flinch. “I want you to know that.”

He leaned in. The blade dug in further. His breath hitched. “For once, I told the truth.” Raeyn’s palm was warm against my cheek, melting some of the ice. A crooked grin ghosted across his face. “And now I need you to do what you’ve come here for.” Raeyn held my eyes. “I know I have no right to ask this of you, but do you trust me?”

“What?” Blood spattered my fingers where the blade slid between his ribs.

Raeyn didn’t seem to notice. “Do you trust me?”

“Yes.” I shouldn’t, but I did. Fuck me, I did.

“Thank you.” Raeyn closed his eyes in relief. It lasted for half a second. Then his hand clamped down on the side of my head. It was scorching hot. “And I really hope this works. Because it would be a horrible plan B if it didn’t.”

“What—” I tried to jerk away, but Raeyn didn’t let go. His eyes were white and filmy, the Voyance crackling at his fingertips.

“You see, the Voyance works two ways. If I can take it from you, I can give it back.”

The current hit me. It flushed Nymeron right out of my head. The knife slipped from my fingers. My knees gave out under me, my body jerked, trapped in a high-voltage circuit that wouldn’t let me fall. Raeyn’s Voyance poured into me; everything he’d stored up and that’d gone unused building up, rushing through, filling me up until I was sure I’d run over. Pressure pounded between my ears, behind my eyes. My heart fluttered, shocked into overdrive. Even my fingers and toes were throbbing with raw energy.

“There.” Raeyn was breathing hard, wavering on his feet. His hand fell away.

“What.” I gasped. Stumbled. “What did you do to me?”

“I may not be able to do anything with all the Voyance in the world. But you can.” Raeyn swayed. His eyes were dull, his hair stringy with sweat, but he grinned through clenched teeth. “Fry him, darling.”

I nearly tripped over Aris, his body a sudden, solid warmth at my back. “Damian?” Aris took a groggy step forward, reached, but didn’t touch me, as if he was worried I’d shock him.

“Are you okay?” He squinted. Blinked. “Thought I told you to run.”

“Yeah.” I fought down a hysterical laugh. It was either that or scream. I could barely see him against all the white bleaching out everything around us. “Bit late for that, don’t you think?”

Nymeron’s eyes brushed over me, weighed and measured me before settling back on Raeyn.

“Honestly, son. Look at him. Trembling like a leaf.” His mouth quirked at the corner. “You have got to stop betting all you have on one horse. It makes you look desperate.”

Raeyn’s face was an exact mirror of his father’s when he said, “Someone once told me not to worry so much about how I look. You may want to give it a try.” He sauntered forward. “Also, I never made a very good bystander.”

Raeyn caught his father’s hand.

Nymeron’s eyes widened. Tried to shake him off, but Raeyn latched on tight.

“I’m not like you.” Raeyn’s lips pulled back into a fierce grin. “In all ways but one.” He squeezed. The Voyance danced behind his eyes as he drained his father like a juice box. “Damian, now!”

Raeyn’s voice was my signal shot. I turned to Aris. “Are you with me?”

“Always.”

“Good.” I swallowed the crack in my voice. “You heard him. Let’s fry the fucker.”

I took Aris’s hand.

The Voyance screamed.

The world turned white.

Everything tilted. I would’ve fallen if not for Aris’s fingers laced through mine, holding tight. I thought I saw him smile. The Voyance tore through conscious thought, a firestorm of burning energy racing through my veins.

It burst outward like the mushroom cloud of a nuclear explosion. Raeyn’s hand tore from his father’s and he flung himself to the side. The blast knocked him down hard. Wood splintered. Fallen glass turned to shrapnel cutting through the air. Raeyn lay unmoving.

Nymeron never had time to get his shield up before the Voyance hit him head-on. He staggered and dropped to his knees, mouth opening in a scream ripped away by the roar of the Voyance. It wrapped around him in a shroud of living flame. He tried to fight it, but whatever Raeyn’d done, on top of the load we threw at him, it was as if we’d popped a breaker. Nymeron’s Voyance clicked on empty, nothing but sparks sizzling against the gale sweeping him up, burning him from the inside.

Aris and I burned with him, the Voyance around us flaring bright like a dying star. It fused us together, our skeletons melting. I felt my fingernails peeling back, curling away from the heat. The smell of scorched hair and charred skin stung my nose. Even my lashes felt singed.

Between us, the air burned. We sucked down liquid fire with every breath. I couldn’t keep this going much longer. The Voyance’d hollowed me out, a pillar of ash about to crumble and blow away with the wind.

Just a little while longer.

Finish winning first. Then I could fall.

The backlash hit with a teeth-grating jolt. The Voyance shorted out, kicked back a half second later. Through the haze, I felt Aris slip away, his fingers slide out of mine, the Voyance around him spider-webbing before it broke and fell away.

“Oh no, you’re not.”

Aris’s eyes fluttered shut when I caught him, yanked him back from wherever he’d been about to go. Bits of glass dug into my arms, slashing lines of fire through skin and tendons. My hands were raw and slick with blood, too slippery to hold on.

“Damian, let go.”

“Forget it.” I tightened my grip. The Voyance flickered, a light bulb before it burned out.

Nymeron took his chance. His strike nearly swept me off my feet, his Voyance crashing against mine.

I hit him with all I had left. The Voyance cracked down in a bolt of lightning.

Hairline cracks lined my skin. The pressure in my skull skyrocketed. Something wet trickled down my cheeks, from my lips, too warm to be tears.

The ground dragged me down, Aris’s body radiating heat against my chest.

I barely made out the blurry figure moving toward Nymeron, the knife he’d picked up a glimmer in a bone-white hand. Raeyn moved through the flames like a ghost, as if they couldn’t touch him.

He didn’t hesitate. Just brought the knife down at the center of his father’s chest. It cut right through Nymeron’s Voyance. Silence fell; the only sounds the crackling flames and the soft sigh that escaped Nymeron when Raeyn pulled the knife out. He let go of the hilt, the blood on the blade sizzling, Raeyn’s hand blistered with burns.

“You.” Nymeron choked, blood bubbling at the corners of his mouth, running down his chin. He slumped forward, pale fingers snatching at Raeyn’s shirt.

“Me.” Raeyn lowered him to the ground. “May the Gods forgive us both, Father.”

Nymeron made a wheezing sound that sounded like a laugh. “Proud of you,” he whispered past the blood. “In the end. Exactly like your old man.”

Raeyn froze. Shook himself loose. “I don’t want your pride. Or your Empire. I just want you gone.”

Nymeron cracked a red grin. “You think it’s that easy? Kill me and that’s it?”

“It’s a start,” Valyr said behind Raeyn. The side of her head was caked in blood, her hair wild, uniform in tatters.

Nymeron’s face lit up at the sight of her, suddenly hopeful.

Raeyn’s grin turned fierce. “Hello, Mother.”

Valyr smiled at him. She picked up the knife. I tried to shout a warning at Raeyn.

Too late.

She kept smiling as she stabbed the knife into the base of Nymeron’s throat. Nymeron’s eyes bulged. He tried to scream, but all that came out was a mangled gurgle drowned in a gush of blood.

Valyr laid a finger against Nymeron’s bloody lips. “All those years you thought I’d never turn on you.”

She leaned in and pushed the knife down, sawing through bone and cartilage in a soggy crunch. Stilettos were made for stabbing, not hacking people’s heads off.

Valyr managed.

A final spasm shuddered through Nymeron, then he lay still.

“You were wrong,” Valyr said to his severed head. Her fingers left a red smear where they brushed against a slack cheek. “Bon passage, mon amour.”

She put the head down. Drew herself up straight and nodded at Raeyn, who stood frozen, staring at Nymeron’s headless body. No one made a move to stop Valyr when she turned and disappeared in the smoking ruins of Lightsquare.

At the edge of the stage, Nymeron’s head rolled over, empty eyes staring at the palace, watching it burn.

I must’ve made some sort of noise rolling Aris off me because Raeyn snapped out of his stupor and staggered toward me. “Damian? Are you—”

“Gods,” I croaked. “If you’re about to ask me if I’m okay, I might have to punch you.”

I wanted to take back the words as soon as they came out.

Raeyn stopped in his tracks. Reaching out for me, his hand fell before he got even close. I couldn’t bring myself to look at him, the rawness in his face harsher than the spatters of his father’s blood clinging to his jaw, soaking the collar of his shirt. The wound in his side’d torn open again, a growing red stain to match the rest of him. Didn’t think he noticed.

Raeyn knelt in front of Aris, a puppet with his strings cut. “Just.” He licked his lips. “Let me help. Please?”

I tightened my arm around Aris, his breathing ragged, but steady. “Think you helped enough.”

Raeyn flinched as if I’d slapped him. I trusted him, but I hadn’t forgiven him.

Either way, not much he could do. I’d felt Aris’s Voyance burn out like an old fuse, leaving nothing but soot and rattling pieces on the inside.

He’d survived. Barely. Now it was on me to keep it that way, never mind I hadn’t the slightest idea how.

I shook him. Aris made a weak protesting sound. “C’mon, gotta get up.” I pulled his arm over my shoulder. “Time to get out of here before the Reds get their shit together and send in the cleaning crews.”

I dragged Aris off the floor and almost keeled over, my whole body feeling as if someone’d torn my spine out and ground the rest of me to mush. I sucked in a sharp breath and ignored the twinge in my knee, pretending I didn’t see Raeyn fidgeting, looking like he was torn between wanting to reach out and not daring to.

“I better do the same,” he said. “I have a feeling people aren’t the biggest fans of Nymerons right now.” The corner of Raeyn’s mouth twitched into a hollow almost-smile. “Can’t blame them, really.”

“You don’t have to go.” The words were out before I could stop myself.

Raeyn met my gaze and it was like watching a tower crumble and fall behind his eyes. “Best I disappear for a while. Divert attention. Let the dust settle.”

My nod felt hollow. This wasn’t how things were supposed to end, Gods damn it.

Pretty sure we were both running a mental recap of the same things: bodies strung up by the river. Reds raiding bars, torching houses. Iltis’s charred hand curled against the floor of her study. Jay’s body growing cold and heavy in my arms. All overlaid with the sting of smoke and Nymeron’s body a mangled shadow off to the side.

“I’m sorry, Damian.”

“I know,” I said because it was the only thing to say. “Me, too.”

I left him standing in the middle of the rubble. With Aris leaning on me, I limped out of Lightsquare. Around us, the fires guttered out and the world turned gray.

We’d won.

Fuck me if I had any clue how we’d even start picking up the pieces.