Page 89 of A Frozen Pyre
Instead, Dwyn fell asleep.
When she awoke, the blush had returned to her cheeks. Her hair curled near her temples where salt had dampened it with her sweat, but her heart and breathing were normal. The others clapped and hooted and celebrated as if her survival were a miraculous breakthrough, and she bit down on what she knew to be true. She held a piece that the others did not.
When she was strong enough to sit up, Anwir grabbed her head as if she were a beloved child with a fretting parent and pressed a rough kiss into her head. He pumped a rough fist into the air as he said, “No one’s survived an ordeal like that without greenstrike blood!” He was unable to keep the grinning joy from his bits of vital knowledge.
While she knew she was supposed to be ill and on a miraculous return from the brink of death, she couldn’t let go of his innocuous words. It was a piece of information that he hadn’t known he was giving her. The greenstrike—a tropical, leaf-colored creature that looked remarkably like a stick—lunged toward would-be prey, burrowed beneath their flesh, and engorged itself on its new host’s blood. Anwir had never mentioned it before and never spoke the words again. Entirely separate blood could intercede on behalf of that which had been poisoned.
Six months later, Dwyn was brave enough to test her idea.
And when she did, she succeeded.
Thirty-One
“How do you choose someone?” Ophir whispered. Shetrusted Dwyn, but she couldn’t articulate why. The woman was funny, and beautiful, and spectacular in bed. She’d been loyal, supportive, and had helped her through her darkest times. But even as she led Ophir through the streets of Gwydir, Ophir knew she was following a killer.
Ophir swallowed the thought, remembering the blood on her hands. Her first intended kill had been Guryon, the merchant, but she’d slaughtered three farmers in cold blood in the days before his righteous execution. She’d killed intentionally, and she’d killed on accident. Whether she wanted to admit it or not, she was responsible for the deaths of hundreds in Tarkhany from the morning of Berinth’s death. Her ag’druraths had killed before and would kill again. As she watched Dwyn bob between streets, she idly wondered who had the higher body count.
“At this point?” Dwyn stopped between buildings. She wasn’t being overly sneaky, but given that neither of them was a resident of Raascot, they did their best to keep to side streets. “I’ve lost my goodwill for people—humans and fae alike.”
“What do you mean?” Ophir whispered, hurried andanxious.
Dwyn didn’t look at her as she answered. Her exhalation was a short huff as she continued scanning the streets. “I mean,” she began, eyes still screwed to the distance, “think of the last time you saw a sweet old man drinking tea alone and assumed he was probably mourning his late wife. Did you feel sad for him?” Dwyn stopped to look over her shoulder.
Ophir’s brows furrowed.
Dwyn remained nonchalant. “I don’t. No one is without sin. If I see an elderly man alone, I assume he beat his wife to death or hurts children, and I carry on with what needs to be done.”
The air left Ophir’s lungs. She felt like she’d been punched in the gut as she stared at the back of Dwyn’s head. Her speechlessness drew the siren’s attention.
“What?” Dwyn demanded. She straightened her posture and abandoned her search to face Ophir. “Look me in the eye and name all of the truly good people you know. Name every person who hasn’t done something terrible.”
Ophir stammered. Her mind went right to her family, then flitted away from her father, knowing he deserved whatever fate came to him, and from her mother for her complacency in everything she enabled by perpetuating his reign. She thought of Harland, but her nose curled against his judgment, his cruelty, his failure to understand her when she needed him most. She thought of Tyr, and pain pierced her.
“My sister is good,” she said. “Was good,” she corrected, hating herself for it.
“Yes, and your sister died for her goodness.” And though Dwyn was typically cavalier, she softened her words and face alike as she spoke. She rested her hand on Ophir’s shoulder. “Anyone else?”
Ophir chewed on her lip. “I believe Ceneth is genuinely good.”
“Excellent,” she said. “Then they were a match made in heaven. You’ve met hundreds, perhaps thousands in your life?And you’ve named two. I’m not good, nor will I pretend to be. I would bet that anyone you spot has lied or stolen or betrayed or stepped on a puppy’s tail.”
“On accident.”
“On purpose!”
And though the intent had been to joke, and while they smiled in the alley’s shadow, Dwyn’s point rang true. Perhaps no one was truly good. And while it was immeasurably disturbing to see every sweet elderly gentleman and imagine that he’d done unspeakable things to a child, Ophir understood that Dwyn had recontextualized empathy for the sake of practicality.
Caris had been good.
She’d been perfect, and kind, and empathetic, and had devoted her life to others. She would have made change for the continent, not just for her people, but for everyone. She’d been loving to those who deserved it, and even to those who didn’t. And she’d still died.
Ophir would never be the selfless humanitarian who united the continent.
She would never be her sister.
She’d wrestled with the thought for ages, suffocated by the perfect shadow Caris casted.
But Dwyn’s reaction following the events of the summit had been correct. Ophir shouldn’t run into the forest and disappear into oblivion. She had no business living among the rabbits and deer and pines when she could still make a profound and lasting impact.
