The Fates Divide (Carve the Mark #2)(76)

“Hey,” one of the technicians says. “Let go of her, or I’ll have to call security.”

Ast releases me, and I stumble out of the room and into the hallway, shaken. I half walk, half run back to Isae’s room, which is right next to mine. I am about to knock when I see that her light is already off—she’s asleep.

I want to get to her before Ast does. Find a way to explain what I did that makes Ast seem irrational and paranoid. If I talk to her first, maybe I can destabilize whatever argument he has, maybe—

I need to think this through. I go to my room instead, so I can splash water on my face, careful to lock my door behind me.

I go to the little bathroom attached to my room and stick my head in the sink. I drink straight from the faucet, and water runs into my ear. When my throat is soothed, I reach blindly for the towel and press it to my face. I think I hear something. Clicking.

When I drag the towel down, Ast is standing behind me.

“Do you know what the children of mechanics learn to do?” he says in a low voice. “Pick locks.”

My currentgift stifles me. It doesn’t care that I’m in danger; it doesn’t care for my survival. It just strangles me, keeping me from screaming. I grab for the glass near the sink so I can break it, make a noise. While I lunge for it, he lunges for me. Something glints silver in his fist.

He’s strong. His hand is big enough to hold both of my wrists. His hands fumble over me, then find my shoulders. I drop the glass and it doesn’t break. He lifts me to my toes, and I bite, finding the flesh of his arm. I bite down as hard as I can, so hard he groans and his skin tears.

A hot pain spreads through my side. My shirt clings, wet, to my rib cage. In the mirror I see fierce red spreading down my body the same way it spread around my father’s head. It’s the color of hushflowers, the color of Blooming gowns and the glass dome of Hessa Temple. Red, the color of Thuvhe.

He stabbed me.

This is it. The first child of the family Kereseth will succumb to the blade.

This is my fate, at last.

He drops me, moaning over his arm, which bleeds in a half circle from where I bit him. I fall heavy on the floor. I haven’t made a sound. No one will come get me if I don’t make a sound. I reach for the fallen glass as Ast tries to stanch the flow of blood from his arm.

I’m going to pass out. But not yet. I raise the glass, and using all the strength I have left, I slam it against the stone floor as hard as I can. It shatters.





CHAPTER 41: AKOS


NO ONE BROUGHT HIM food.

The cell was lavish, as far as cells went. A soft bed with a heavy blanket. A tub in the bathroom as well as a shower. A thick rug on the hardwood floor. It was essentially just a bedroom with a sophisticated lock, one that Akos was sure he could dismantle if he had enough time, but then he would have an entire household of soldiers to contend with.

He drank water from the faucet, when he had to, but no food came his way, and he wasn’t stupid enough to think it wasn’t on purpose. If Lazmet had wanted him fed, he would have been fed. They were starving away his currentgift.

In the morning, after he woke, the door finally opened. Akos was standing by the window, thinking about how bad it would hurt if he jumped out and made a run for it. Not a smart decision, he knew—he’d break both legs and get caught by a dozen guards even if he did manage to run away.

A tall man with a scarred face, and a short, white-haired woman walked into the room. The man was Vakrez Noavek, the commander of the Shotet military, who had seen to Akos’s education as a soldier. The woman looked familiar to Akos, but he didn’t remember her name.

“I don’t understand,” Vakrez said, squinting at Akos.

“Oh, do catch on, Vakrez,” the woman said, with humor in her voice. “Only Noaveks are that tall and yet that thin. Like drawn hot glass. He’s Lazmet’s son, obviously.”

“Hello, Commander,” Akos said to Vakrez, his head bobbing.

“I’m going to tell him your name and where you came from, you know,” Vakrez said to him. “So what was the point of the evasion in the first place?”

“It bought me time,” Akos said.

“So you two know each other,” the woman said, sitting in a chair by the fireplace. Akos had thought about climbing out the chimney, but after investigating, ruled out the possibility. It was too narrow for him to fit.

“He was a soldier. Not a very good one,” Vakrez said with a grunt.

The woman raised an eyebrow. “My name is Yma Zetsyvis, boy. I don’t think we’ve been formally introduced.”

Akos frowned at her. He knew her. Her husband, and her daughter, had both been subject to Cyra’s currentgift before they died, and she had been glued to Ryzek’s side after that.

“What are you doing here?” he asked. “I thought you were both loyal to Ryzek. And now, what, you just . . . switch to his father before his body is even cold?”

“I am loyal to my family,” Vakrez said.

“Why?” Akos said. “Didn’t Lazmet’s mother kill your mother?” He paused. “Why are you even still alive? I thought she killed everyone, including his cousins.”

“He’s useful,” Yma said, brushing a lock of white hair over one shoulder. “So he lives. That’s the Noavek way. It is why I am alive as surely as it is why you are alive, boy.”