BYZANTIUM LAY beneath a charcoal night sky, a sprawling city unaware that the fate of the world hung in unforgiving balance, final judgment to be rendered in a mere matter of hours.
Jordin sat atop her stallion between Roland and Michael, staring down at the capital from the rise. Forty of Roland’s most skilled Rippers were mounted abreast, silent and unmoving, hooded and clad in black. Anyone peering out from the city might have thought them a cadre of reapers come to drag the unwitting to Hades.
And they might be right.
Behind the closed doors of a hundred thousand houses and as many apartments, Corpses prepared an evening meal consisting mostly of simple starches, canned meats, and aged vegetables. They would not venture out, far too aware of the bloodshed that visited their streets after dark. And so they remained imprisoned by fear as much as by the city’s evening curfew, praying over their supper for the Maker to grant Feyn favor against the plague of white-faced Immortals whom they feared more even than her Dark Bloods.
Eighty thousand of Feyn’s guards patrolled the city in an ever-broadening perimeter around the Citadel, roaming the vacant streets in packs, eager for a kill. Bringing the head of an Immortal to Feyn would catapult even the lowest-ranking Dark Blood to a high position within the ranks.
At least, that was the assumption. The feat had yet to be accomplished.
Roland’s Rippers had never come into the city in such numbers as they would tonight. Theirs was a guerilla campaign, dependent on the stealth and sharpened perceptions that made them prized targets for the stronger and faster Bloods.
Jordin had agreed to lead Roland in; she needed him, end of story. He was unyielding in his conditions, knowing she had no choice but to agree. He’d even made a reasonable case for his ability to stop Mattius from releasing the virus. They still had two full days, did they not? With his Immortal skills, he might stop the older Sovereign before he could trigger the release. Wasn’t it better to cut the alchemist off at the knees before going after Feyn and confronting her formidable Dark Bloods?
They’d ridden hard and arrived an hour before dusk. But now that the time had come, Jordin couldn’t settle her nerves. She’d run through all possible approaches to the Sanctuary a hundred times. With his far superior eyes and sense of smell, Roland might be the better choice for initial penetration, but she had the advantage of delivering Roland if he agreed to go in as a captive. She would be fulfilling part of her bargain, which might at least cause Mattius to pause and buy her more time.
She hadn’t suggested the approach to Roland yet.
Roland flipped his hood from his head. His hair fell down over his shoulders. “Tell us the way now,” he said, not bothering to turn to Jordin. His attention was fixed on the distant barriers along the entrance she’d led them to on the city’s eastern border. She stared, barely seeing them in the dark, feeling practically blind compared to the creature she had been mere hours before, unable to keep from wondering if she might have been better served in this mission as an Immortal herself.
The call of those intoxicating senses, so rich and full of the sensual life all but renounced by the Sovereigns, was hard to ignore. She could hardly blame Kaya for refusing to give them up in exchange for an uncertain and less vibrant future spent toiling under the wretchedness of Sovereignty.
Wretched? Less? She shoved the insane thoughts aside and set her mind on the task at hand.
“What guarantee do I have that you won’t kill me the moment I tell you?”
He turned toward her, his expression set. “The virus is our common enemy. Return my belief in your warning with trust in me.”
“Mattius is no fool. If he manages to release the virus, it’ll go airborne. Once that happens, we have no reason to believe it can be stopped. I have a better way.”
“Tell me.”
“I take you in as my hostage. Bound and gagged.”
The prince arched a brow. One of the horses gave a quiet snort.
“I can understand how you might prefer me bound and gagged. And if I were anyone else I might agree,” he said dryly. “Tell me, have you ever heard of an Immortal being killed in battle over this past year?”
“No.”
“No.” His affirmation was low and utterly sure. “There’s a reason for that. And you will be better served trusting my abilities over any crafty plan. Believe me when I say I will be in and out of your Sanctuary before this Mattius realizes he’s not dreaming.”
Perhaps she was underestimating him. Jonathan had simply said, Lead him.
“Have it your way. But I lead.”
He gave a curt nod.
Turning to Michael, he said, “Ride hard down the streets. Pound Hades from the cobblestones. I want every Dark Blood within ten miles to hear. To rush to the fight. Don’t engage them, just draw their attention away from us.”
To Jordin: “I need to know the direction.”
He studied the dark city then spoke to Michael again. “Send them northeast with Marten leading. No more than an hour in the city. Then exit north, into the western waste. We will rejoin in the Bethelim Valley.”
Jordin knew of the valley by hearsay only, so named by the old Nomads who had their own names for any landmark on the map. It was the barest valley in the land, once lush but now unmade because in truth there was no Maker, as the saying went by those who had defied Order. There, godlike weapons had turned the earth to dust during the Zealot War five centuries ago. No life had returned. Not a soul traveled there. Ever.
None but Immortals, evidently.
Roland looked to his left. “Cain.”
“My prince,” the Ripper answered. The man who’d approached her with such wanton affection only two nights earlier was now fixed on nothing but dealing death. Of the four War Lords among Roland’s wraiths, only Michael had come, but Cain would surely one day be one himself—if he lived long enough.
“Your men with me and Michael.”
He dipped his head. “As you say.”
“Now, Michael.”
She nudged her stallion with her heels and trotted toward the far right where Marten waited.
“Lead us,” Roland said to Jordin, “but I will take point. I won’t allow anyone to put us in danger for lack of sight. Direct me from behind.”
“Fair enough.”
Without a word, twenty horses to her right broke from the line and plunged down the steep slope, riders leaned back in the saddle, singularly focused on their mission. Hooves pounded, but the black-cloaked Rippers seemed to float like phantoms down the hill.
Jordin felt her pulse surge as the warriors blended into the night. How many times had the Immortals entered the city in this way? How often had they cursed Feyn’s new Order of death by dealing their own? She was witnessing a wonder—nothing short of magic, however dark.
Could a race so deathly beautiful—birthed to life by Jonathan himself—be so wrong?
The sound of thundering hooves grew distant, leaving the night to silence once again. Not another word was spoken as they awaited Roland’s command. A hundred thoughts began to race through Jordin’s mind.
None of them good.
Roland’s command came by silent action. He stepped his stallion forward five paces and stopped. He turned, locked gazes with Jordin, and then he was off, spurring his mount down the slope at a full run.
As one, Michael, Cain, and the Rippers under his command broke on his heels, leaving Jordin alone for a moment. And then she dug her heels into her mount and gave the horse its head.
The stallion knew its place among the others well and took her after them at a full gallop. The still night came to life—dust in her nostrils, wind in her face—carrying away thoughts of what awaited.
Roland didn’t seem to care that she’d fallen behind, his mission was set and his focus was clear. Sovereign or not, she would catch him—hadn’t she always? And so she did, thundering through the pack to ride just behind and to his right.
She expected him to slow before reaching the barriers, but he didn’t. He leaned low in the saddle and sped—directly toward the concrete wall the height of a horse’s shoulders.
His stallion left the ground gracefully, as if to mock its crushing weight. Needing no guidance from her, Jordin’s mount followed, lifting her to the sky in a powerful leap that took her breath away.
They landed with a bone-crushing jar and galloped on without breaking stride.
Only when Roland reached the middle of the empty street did he slow to a trot, head forward, attention fixed.
They were in Dark Blood territory. She pulled up beside him, comforted by his strong presence on such dangerous ground. There was no breeze—if any Dark Blood came within half a mile, he would know by their scent alone.
“Direction is yours,” he said as the others fell in directly behind.
“Left at the next intersection,” she said.
“And then?”
She hesitated. “And then I will tell you.”
Roland glanced at her. He alone was hoodless, as if to make plain that his place as leader was meant to be seen by all.
“Then you’d better keep up, my little Sovereign. We take to these streets like the wind.”
“We’ll be heard.”
He didn’t bother responding but kicked his mount to a full gallop, leaning into the night.
Jordin followed hard, twenty Rippers behind her. The thunder of hooves echoed off the buildings, announced the coming storm.
She pushed her horse to catch him. Taking the turn, the prince made no move to slow for direction but took them straight down the middle of the road.
Lead him, Jordin.
“Left at the end!” she cried.
Instead he veered into an alleyway and cut behind the street she’d indicated. Naturally, the Immortals knew their hunting grounds as well as the ones who’d built the city. Likely better than Feyn herself.
He followed the alley the length of two blocks before cutting right and rejoining the street Jordin had first indicated. She assumed he’d simply avoided possible contact, alerted by his senses. Tonight he wasn’t hunting Feyn’s minions.
Though countless Corpses had surely heard the approaching ruckus and peered out of their windows to see dark Rippers flying by, they encountered only one Corpse in the half hour it took them to reach the edge of the ruins. They’d left the older man gawking beneath a streetlamp. On they rushed, loudly enough to summon the dead.
And then they were only a hundred meters from the edge of the ruins.
Roland knew before she told him—how, she had no idea. He suddenly jerked back on his reins and lifted a hand. Her horse pulled up hard, nearly pitching her off its back.
“What is it?”
He stared down the vacant street. The fence surrounding the abandoned ruins was in sight… she’d told him nothing of the place. Could he smell the Sovereign scent beneath the ruins?
His face was drawn tight; eyes wide with unmistakable concern.
“What is it?”
He gestured, and half of the Immortals swept to his right flank as he urged his horse into a swift trot. Jordin kept pace, her mind spinning with questions. Dark Bloods?
They reached the edge of the compound, and Roland studied the ruins, riding parallel to the fence. No sign of movement or Dark Bloods. A quick glance—every Immortal was keenly fixed on the compound.
Only when she saw that a ten-foot section of the perimeter fence had been cut away did Jordin know something was wrong. She rode on, heart lodged in her throat, hoping that her fears were misguided. There could be many reasons for the breach in the fence. It meant nothing.
But Roland seemed to know more.
He guided his mount through the opening, followed by the others who fanned out wide once past it, angling for the hedge that hid the Sanctuary entrance.
But there too was a problem, one far more telling: the hedge before the entrance had been torn away.
Jordin kicked her horse into a run, bounding over heaps of rubble and large stone blocks.
The entrance was gone. Stone had been piled up in its stead. Perhaps Mattius had ordered the opening closed for protection. But that didn’t explain the trampled hedge.
She slid from her horse and ran ten paces to the stone pile, frantic. Most of them were the size of a human head, none larger than a horse’s, and they came away easily in her panic.
“Help me!”
Roland sat upright in his saddle, scanning the perimeter warily. “Do it,” he ordered.
Three of Cain’s men dropped to the ground and quickly cleared enough of the rocks to reveal the darkness beyond. Jordin stood back, panting, fear lodged in her throat.
Roland dropped to the ground and walked to her, eyes on the gap in the wall. “Michael and Cain, with me.” He stepped past her. “The rest stay here. You know what to do.”
“No, you can’t go in,” Jordin whispered harshly. “If Mattius—”
“We’re beyond that, my dear.”
He ducked into the tunnel, followed by Michael and Cain, neither of whom gave her more than a passing glance.
She looked over her shoulder and saw that the others were forming into a wide arc, horses facing away from the entrance, sentries of the prince.
Jordin edged into the unlit opening, aware of the deep darkness beyond. Roland had already vanished below with Michael and Cain. She took the flight of stone steps by memory.
She reached the bottom landing and was about to call out in the darkness when dim light flooded the cavern. Roland stood at a wall-torch he’d apparently lit for her benefit, and was looking back to see that she’d made it.
“Where’s the virus?” he asked.
Unable to form words, she rushed to the torch, snatched it from him, and ran past Roland, her mind lost. Down the tunnel that fed into the main chamber.
The moment she spun into the massive cavern where they normally congregated, she saw that they were gone. They would have put up a fight here. Both Dark Bloods and Sovereigns would have fallen here. But there was no one and no sign of blood that she could see.
Taken captive then?
She hurried through, searching the corners for any missed sign in the dim light.
“Check every door!” Roland’s order echoed through the cavern.
Jordin pushed herself into a run again, thinking now only of one room: the council chamber. She reached the large door, twisted the handle, and shoved the door open.
Coils of smoke wafted past her, flooding her nostrils with an odor as offensive and putrid as any she could remember. Two oil lamps were burning, one on each wall. But the smoke didn’t come from them…
But from the charred bodies on the floor.
She staggered back. Her heart refused to pump blood; her lungs ceased drawing breath.
More than ten bodies. More than twenty.
All of them!
“Here, Roland!” Michael called. “The laboratory!”
She blinked at the sight, fighting to understand, knowing that there was nothing to comprehend beyond what her eyes told her already. She didn’t know what to do—her mind was no longer processing thought properly.
“Jordin!”
Roland. His voice urgent.
She reeled back out of the chamber, staggered. Roland was standing in the doorway to the laboratory thirty paces down the hall.
“Come.”
Her feet refused to move.
“Come!” he thundered.
Jordin stumbled over something on the floor, caught herself with one hand, and lurched toward him, hardly aware of her feet.
And then he was there, grabbing her arm to steady her, pulling her down and into the lab.
A thin veil of smoke partially obscured the instruments and broken vials of alchemy strewn across the work benches. But Jordin’s eyes were immediately drawn to what she saw on the ground.
She could not mistake Mattius’s partially burned body, dead eyes staring wide at the ceiling, his blistered mouth twisted in its final cry of horror.
His bloody fingers clung to a single vial sealed by a cork and resin.
The virus, surely. Mattius would go for no other vial in such dire straits. The thing for which they had gone to such desperate measures. For which all the others had lost their lives.
Roland strode past her, crouched by the burned body, and pried the stiff fingers from the vial stuck against the palm. The Immortals had what they’d come for. If Rom was Dark Blood, she was now the only living Sovereign. And then Roland would make her Immortal, leaving no trace of Sovereign blood on the earth.
Jonathan’s legacy had met a gruesome end.
He slowly stood and stepped back, eyes fixed on the vial stuck in Mattius’s hand. Bloodied. The alchemist’s palm was cut. Not by a Dark Blood’s sword, but by glass.
The vial lay in two pieces, snapped at its center. He’d broken it in his own hand. There was an “R” marked on the upper half of the broken vial. Reaper.
Jordin looked up at Roland. His eyes bore a hole through her very soul. He knew as well as she: the Prince of Immortals, glowing with life now as he stood tall, was already a dead man. Along with all of those under his rule who boasted Immortality.
Mattius had released the virus.