Page 115 of The Bones of Benevolence

“Not yet. I have one more thing I have to do.” I turned toward the hunched figure that sat bound to a tree trunk.

? ? ?

“You’re going to tell me everything,” I demanded, staring down at Ludovicus’ hunched form. “From the beginning.”

He opened his mouth to speak but hesitated. “I’m not even sure where to start.” It was hard to look at him. He looked so different than when I’d seen him knocked unconscious by Kauvras’ men and hauled away from the Eserenian throne room. One cheek was still swollen from Cal’s unleashing. His lips were split and bruises shadowed the creases beneath his eyes. He looked fucking awful. “I suppose I’ll start with Castemont. It all seems to start and end with Castemont, doesn’t it?”

His voice was strangely melodic. It may have even been pleasant had it not been coming from a man who’d almost murdered me. I tried to reconcile that the man in front of me was not that man, not technically.Somehow.

“My family was a prominent family back in Nesan. The capital city of Araqina, the Holy City, to be exact. That’s where I hail from originally, though I haven’t returned since I was just twenty years of age. That’s when I traveled to Taitha to further my studies in the art of weaponry. My father accompanied me on the journey.” He ran his tongue across his lips, measuring his words. “Castemont’s father was the official spice merchant of King Divos of Cabillia. That was not a position of much honor, but he used his father’s proximity to the King to make sure he was always in the right place at the right time. Even though he was young, Castemont always knew the right people. He ended up in my family’s employ, tending to the horses, mostly, and stitching my wounds when my training got the better of me. But he and I were close in age and quickly became friends. I didn’t have many as a foreigner in Taitha, so his friendship was most welcome.” I saw familiar regret flash across his face as his eyes scanned the trees. He leaned back, the picture of defeat. I let myself revel in it, just for a moment. “He came to me one day with a plan to ensure the survival of the realm.”

Ludovicus told a story almost identical to Cal’s. Castemont had popped up, seemingly by chance, here and there, and that’s how he’d earned a spot working for Ludovicus’ family. He brought him to see the Bloodsinger all the way in Blindbarrow and convinced him that it was in his power to save the realm from thetyrannicalDaughter of Katia.

“You hadn’t even been born yet,” he murmured, the pain in his eyes so pronounced that it almost made me hurt, too. But I caught myself, reminded by those ink-black eyes what he’d done to me.

“Go on.”

“Castemont convinced me to move to Eserene, where the prophecy stated the Daughter of Katia would be born. He’d thought up the idea of Initiation, and he was going to propose it to King Umfray in order to rid the castle of its past follies. Then he’d find a way to get the Daughter of Katia to the castle to test her healing powers.”

“I thought he wanted me dead.”

“He did. He said he had multiple plans in place to ensure you’d bedealt with. I told him I’d only go to Eserene on the condition that I could finish my studies first. I had just two years left. But he didn’t want to wait.” He drummed his fingers across his knee, the dirt like crescent moons beneath his fingernails. “We had a bit of a falling out, one that resulted in Castemont leaving for Eserene on his own. And then the changes started.”

His eyes met mine, and I couldn’t do anything to break the stare. It was almost as if he saw through to my soul, to the very essence of what made me who I was. “It was my hands first. I noticed that they seemed to be bony where they hadn’t been before. One day, one of my fingers snapped as I was pulling back a bowstring. I was doing nothing violent, nothing forceful, and it just snapped.” His hands laced together in his lap, his arms shifting uncomfortably beneath their restraints. “And then the fingernails. I’d cut them short only for them to grow back within days, sharp as the blade I’d cut them with. I didn’t know what was happening. But I truly didn’t think much of it at the time.

“Eventually my skin began to lighten and pale, and it was then that my father took notice. I walked into our home one morning after retrieving a repaired sword from the blacksmith, and my father grabbed me by the throat and demanded I stop seeking favors with blood magic.” His stare broke away then, falling on the campsite, his gaze lost in the flames that licked toward the sky. “I told him I wasn’t, of course. But he didn’t believe me. He told me if he found out I’d seen a Bloodsinger again, I’d be exiled from the family.

“But the changes kept coming. I was able to hide the thinning limbs under tunics and trousers, and my hair was already dark enough that when it went jet black, he didn’t notice. But when my voice began to change…”

His expression was mournful when his eyes met mine, and this time I had to look away. Feelings of empathy were beginning to form in my chest, and I wasn’t ready to face them yet.

“He made good on his promise and threw me out. For the time he remained in Taitha, he kept our home guarded, and the guards were instructed to keep me out by whatever means necessary. It was always force. I’d tried to come talk to my father and explain that I didn’t know what was happening to me. That resulted in a black eye and bloody nose. Then, I tried to retrieve some of my belongings, and that resulted in multiple shattered ribs. Within a week, my father returned to Araqina and the house was abandoned. I wrote letters, dozens and dozens of letters to my mother and sisters back home, but they all went unanswered.

“The entire time, I was transforming into the monster you know me as. I didn’t know why at the time, but now I do, but it doesn’t make remembering my actions any less painful. Castemont had secured my blood somehow, most likely one of the times that he was all too eager to stitch me up. And little by little he was sacrificing me to the Darkness Beyond, using my blood, my lifeforce to further his plan.”

My entire body had gone cold, my limbs numb as I stood in place over Ludovicus’ battered form.

“I remember the first time I realized that my soul was under attack. A month after my father left, I was walking through a market square in Taitha, past a textile merchant with fabrics stacked in a cart. And I just…tipped the cart. I walked up to the man, looked him in his eyes, then tipped his cart and let his fabrics fall in the dirt. I had no idea what possessed me to do it at the time. It felt awful, like something evil was growing inside me alongside my actual self.”

He swallowed hard, closing his eyes and letting his head fall back against the tree trunk. “It only got worse from there. He not only sacrificed my blood, but he used those sacrifices to make me do things… Horrible, wretched, unforgivable things. Even before he concocted the idea of the Board of Blood and appointed me as its head, he made me do things that no man would ever be able to atone for, not just to strangers, but to people I’d grown to love. I’ve stolen, I’ve maimed, and I’ve killed.” Hands trembling, he wrung his fingers together, the muscles in his jaw working under olive skin. “But do you want to know the worst part?”

I couldn’t answer, couldn’t find an affirming word in the agony of my thoughts. I only managed to blink beneath furrowed brows.

He inhaled, the air shaky as it left his lungs. “I was there the whole time. Through every wrong, every wound I caused, every murder I committed, I was there, stuck in my body behind the darkness that had possessed me. I had no way to control what I was doing, and no way out.” Those now-human eyes stared up at me, his gaze intense. “I was there. And I was powerless to stop it. I’m sorry.”

All I could do was breathe in and out, frozen in this moment in time. How many people could wrong me against their will? How was I supposed to accept the fact that I was surrounded by people who’d hurt me even though it hadn’t been by their own will?

It was maddening, this convoluted, hair-thin line between wanting so desperately the revenge I deserved, but being forced to accept that I may not get it. Those who’d wronged me… They didn’t deserve to face their consequences any more than I did.

My teeth gnashed together as tears began to prickle the back of my eyes. I blinked furiously, a question burning a hole in my tongue. “How are you…yourself again?”

“Your blood, Petra. It healed me.” His lips upturned into a smile, an actual smile, not a wicked or sinister grin. His eyes crinkled, his cheeks rose. “When you saved the Vacants, I’d been among them. I’d managed to avoid being given leechthorn by acting like I was already addicted. It wasn’t hard considering a Bloodsinger’s affinity for violence. When the rain fell and I stumbled out of a cobbler’s shop, I was me again.” His shoulders rose and fell with a silent laugh. “I was back in control of my body and my thoughts. I wanted to approach you in Taitha, but I was afraid, so I followed you through the Pass.”

He was lying. He was telling a lie and I’d caught him in it. Here was my evidence that though he may not look the same, evil still lurked within him. “You came into contact with my blood in the Eserenian throne room. Youdrankmy blood. Now you’re going to tell me that it suddenly healed you in Taitha when it hadn’t before?”

“You hadn’t yet come into your power in Eserene.”

Shit. Hewasn’tlying.

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