Page 94 of The Cruel Dawn
This place is evil.
No one complains any time I stop at a cell. No one hurries me as I say the doomed one’s name—Scorsca, Thilos, Nenji, Igal—and end their pain.
At one point, Elyn stands behind me and touches my shoulder. That healing sensation crawls from where Elyn touches me, across my shoulders, arms, and back. “You grow weaker each time you do this,” she whispers. “Remember what’s happening to you. My help is less effective each time…”
My eyes fill with tears, but not from the stench. “I know. And thank you.”
She squeezes my shoulder one last time before she lets go.
We reach the last cell, and the iron door is still locked. It’s occupied by a young woman with a gaunt, dirty face and big blue eyes. A once-beautiful dress, now tattered, clings to her thin, amber-glowing frame. The fabric used to be a deep, shimmering sapphire, but none of that color remains, stained as it is with grime and streaks of dried blood. It hangs limply from her shoulders and hips. The skirt is shredded, the hem caked with mud.
I imagine that, once upon a time back in Maford, she’d danced around her sitting room, her voice proud and playful as she named this dress DECADENT or OCEANSIDE.
Now, this young woman gapes at me from the floor. Her expression slips from surprise and joy to fear as she remembers all that she did to me.
With only a thought, Elyn opens the door.
Jadon rushes past the Adjudicator and into the cell. “Livvy.” He pulls his adopted sister into his arms.
Olivia’s glow slips into a shade of brown.
“Jadon, no,” Elyn says.
He releases her and scrambles to the other side of the cell. But knowing that he’s Miasma, that he’s just lessened the length of her days, does not temper Jadon’s joy at finding Olivia.
Philia enters the cell, her eyes bright with tears. “Livvy?” She kneels in front of her beloved and touches her cheek. Bursts of purple light flash from both young women.
Olivia croaks, “Phily?”
Philia and Olivia crash into each other like the softest waves against a lakeshore.
Phily swipes tears from Olivia’s grimy face. “I love you so much.”
“I must look frightful,” Olivia says.
Philia giggles. “You may not see them, but…” Her smile dims. “I have so many scars now. Big, ugly ones. I’ve been fighting to get to you, and… I fought a burnu!” She shakes her head, unable to speak, embarrassment now coloring her cheeks.
Olivia tries to smile but looks to Jadon. “What about Gileon?”
Jadon shakes his head and looks away.
“What have you decided?” Elyn whispers to me. “Mercy or…?”
I grind my teeth as my heart rises up against my anger. The Adjudicator waits in silence as I agonize over what to do about Olivia Corby.
“Life,” I whisper, finally.
Elyn nods and places her hand on the small of my back, since my decision means extending more of me for her to live. Then she says, “Olivia, we need to go.”
Olivia shuffles over to me, her cheeks red, her head bowed. After I touch the top of her head, after her glow shifts from brown to blue, she whispers, “I’m so sorry, Kai. I never thought… I’d hoped…” She manages to look up at me and offers an earnest smile.
I don’t return it. I want to break her neck, or at least her hand. Sure, I’ve healed her, but I can still take a little of that gift back. I’m still angry, and the ground rumbles beneath us. The bones of the dead rattle like pebbles in an empty cup.
“Lady,” Separi whispers.
“Kai,” Elyn warns.
But I’m not the first one to spit angry words.
