Truthwitch (The Witchlands, #1)(117)

With an arm thrust up to protect her face, Iseult frantically searched for signs of Evrane. A flash of white in the storm or a flicker of the monk’s Threads. But Iseult saw nothing. The storm devoured everything. Iseult could barely sense the Cleaved anymore—in fact, they seemed to be fleeing the city and racing north.

Lightning exploded. Iseult’s eyes shuttered against the light, the heat. Magic crashed over her, shivered on her skin and in her lungs. She tumbled against the nearest wall and shrank within the cloak.

For half of a seemingly endless breath, Iseult was crippled by her guilt. By how much she hated herself and her magic and the Puppeteer.

But then the storm withdrew. The noise and the pressure and the mauling rain pulled back …

And Threads scissored into Iseult’s awareness. Living Threads nearby. She lurched upright, tossing back the cloak to find the cyclone leaving. It spiraled over the sea like a writhing black snake.

Iseult limped into a demolished alley, searching for the living Threads. Her feet crunched through glass until at last she found the Prince of Nubrevna, bruised, bleeding, and trapped beneath a fallen building.

Yet he was still alive, and Iseult was still alive to save him.

*

A laugh writhed in Safi’s throat as she stared blearily at Vaness. Of course, it would be the Empress of Marstok. Who else would have the balls to fight with a flail? Or be insane enough to come after Safi herself?

Rain fell. Wind charged—strong as an ox and growing stronger—and waves threatened to cover the entire street. A hurricane roared at the other end of the city, but Safi never looked away from Empress Vaness. If the woman cleaved …

But gods below, could she kill an Empress?

Safi’s eyes flicked to the flail, an arm’s length from Vaness and all but forgotten. If the Empress was cleaving, that weapon was Safi’s only option …

Vaness stilled. She stopped scratching her arms, stopped moving at all. Her gaze was pinned behind Safi.

“Twelve protect me,” she said.

If she’s speaking, then she isn’t cleaving, Safi thought. Whatever corrupt magic had surged through Vaness, the Empress hadn’t succumbed.

But then Safi made the mistake of following Vaness’s gaze. The storm was leaving, a single figure at its center. Lightning sizzled down its black form as it curved and twisted and charged out to sea.

Kullen.

Oh gods. Safi swayed, but forced her head to stay up so she could search the street. She saw no sign of Merik. Surely he had not been killed. Yet before Safi could propel herself that way, Vaness shouted, “Give up, Truthwitch.”

Shit. Ever so slowly, Safi turned back to Vaness, who stood with her flail ready.

Safi wet her lips. They tasted like blood and salt. Maybe if she could distract Vaness, she could bolt away. “Why you?” she asked. “Why not send your soldiers to kill me? Why risk yourself?”

“Because, I am a servant to my people. If I must dirty someone’s hands, then I will always dirty my own.”

Safi blinked. Then she laughed—a broken, shocked sound. It would seem Vaness was just like Merik in that regard. Still … “This is much more than just … dirtying your hands, Empress. You were almost killed by a hurricane—and you almost cleaved too.”

“If my enemies had claimed you first, then you could topple me. Yet in my hands, you will save a kingdom. My kingdom. To me, that is worth dying for.”

Ah. Safi sighed at those words, and something deep and ancient flickered awake at the base of her spine. One for the sake of many. She understood that now.

“Surrender.” Vaness flicked her hand, and the spiked flail pendulumed. “There is nothing you can do.”

False, Safi’s magic breathed, and with that prickle of power, everything from the past few days washed over her. A deluge of words and lies that people believed about her.

… live out the same unambitious existence you’ve always enjoyed … This isn’t about you anymore … Only you would be so reckless … There is nothing you can do …

Then a single bright thought rose to the surface: If you wanted to, Safiya, you could bend and shape the world.

Uncle Eron had said that, and Safi realized—almost laughing as she did—that he was right. She wasn’t trapped inside her skin or her mistakes, and she didn’t need to change who she was. Everything she needed was inside of her: the tools from Mathew and Habim—even Uncle Eron—and the solid, unwavering love of her Threadsister.

Safi could bend and shape the world.

And it was time to do so.

In a single, fluid burst, Safi hooked a heel behind Vaness’s ankle and punched the Empress in the nose. Vaness fell backward to the street.

And Safi ran—flat out for the third pier. No looking back, no thinking. This was who Safi was and who she wanted to be. She thought with the soles of her feet, sensed with the palms of her hands. A bundle of muscles and power honed to fight for the people she loved and the causes she believed in. Her life hadn’t been leading up to Ve?aza City or the flight from the ball. It had been leading up to this race to the final pier.

It wasn’t freedom she wanted. It was belief in something—a prize big enough to run for and to fight for and to keep on reaching toward no matter what.

She had a prize now. She ran for Nubrevna. She ran for Merik. She ran for Iseult. She ran for Kullen and Ryber and Mathew and Habim, and above all, she ran for herself.