Page 24 of Swords of Soul and Shadow
At that moment, Hallie couldn’t recall what he’d worn at Achilles. A sneaking suspicion told her he’d stolen the clothes from somewhere. Stoneset, more than likely. The horror might have struck her harder had she not been trapped between two Cerls, Niels bleeding out on the cratered ground, Correa still battling the flames on the other side of the lane.
“Hate us forwhat?” Hallie choked.
King Filip snapped his fingers. A light bloomed above them as if the air had caught fire. It solidified into a ball and floated just beside his head. “A question I won’t dignify with an answer. We want you alive, but your guide is not necessary. We can take you drugged and bound and leave him to die, or you can come willingly, and your reward will be his life. It’s your choice.”
Choice. That was nochoice.
Niels had stopped moving now except for the shallow rise and fall of his chest. Unconscious. If she didn’t decide soon, blood loss would decide for her.
Even if they kept their word, it would only be to use Niels against her later. Was that worse or better than dying here, from a woundHalliehad dealt him?
She didn’t know that answer…but she knew hers. She’d lost too many people. She refused to lose one more.
If she agreed to work with them, she could help Niels. Maybe they would unwittingly teach her how to use her power, or maybe she could trick them into it somehow. It was the only reason she was valuable in the first place; they would need her capable of using it if they wanted to do anything with her.
But Correa.
She couldn’t become his prisoner again. She could still feel the lightning pain as it coursed through her body.
She chewed on her lip so hard she drew blood.
But shehaddone something to him at Achilles. She could do so again. If she could convince them to let her go to Myrrai, they might even help her find what she needed. They might even help her with the Passage.
She just needed a story good enough to convince them.
“We’re trying to get to Myrrai.” The words were thick, but she said them with as much confidence as she could. “If you heal my guide and get us there, I will help you.”
Better to stick with calling Niels her guide, not her friend. The less he mattered to her, the less they would try to use him against her…she hoped.
The memory of Kase’s screams as she tried over and over to convince the Lord Elder to pass on his power would live with her forever. She’d made the mistake of letting Correa see how much he meant to her. She wouldn’t make that mistake with Niels.
Filip smiled, banal, oddly plain for a man so beautiful, so hateful. “Is that all?”
She had to word this precisely right. Wetting her chapped lips, she answered, “You have the Essence power?”
“In the moments before my mother died, she passed her Essence down to me.” King Filip cracked his neck as if the conversation strained it in some way. “A feat the assassins were only able to pull off at all because she was without her vessel. She only had the strength left to pass her power onto me. Fate knows how long the Essence power would have been lost if she hadn’t.” He looked back at the flames. “My uncle would not approve, but alas, Fate has chosen this moment for me.”
The calm way he spoke about his mother’s death unnerved her. But then, being the king of Cerulene meant he couldn’t show weakness. And to many men, emotion was weakness. What could be hiding underneath the icy yet beautiful façade?
Hallie had lost greatly, and it had sent her halfway across the world to avoid her past. But she’d been on the cusp of adulthood when Jack died. Still horrible, but not the same as a child watching assassins murder her mother.
Not to mention taking on the power of a god in the same moment.
No wonder rumors swirled through the realms about his cruelty and iron fist. Hallie wasn’t sure if she would’ve faredbetter. Not that it excused his actions, but she could understand how he’d turned into this, if only a little.
“You claim we’re working toward the same goal. If that’s true, prove it. I’ll work with you…if you teach me how to use my power.”
King Filip’s smile had yet to leave his lips. “Excellent.” He gestured to Niels. “Heal him.”
Hallie didn’t understand at first. “What?”
The king repeated his command. “Heal him.” He crouched beside Niels. “Or we could build him a pyre, if you prefer. Your first test could be lighting it.”
Hallie’s heart lurched. She tugged against the woman’s grip, but she held Hallie fast. “I don’t know how. I can’t control it. I could kill him!”
“He’s already dying,” King Filip pointed out. “Whether you stop it or send him off, you’ll still learn something, won’t you?”
The woman pushed her forward. Hallie was prepared for the rush of power that time. She gritted her teeth against the inferno waiting on the other side of the dam. It raged within her, begging to be released, angry at being restrained. Her hold was tenuous, like a stray thread. One tug, and the entire thing might unravel.
