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No matter how much time I stole, everything had caught up to me. I let my magic burn away, keeping enough time for later, with everything that happened, with everything I was sure was about to come for me; I would need it. There was no more time for excuses. It was time to go to Turin.
It was time to end the queen.
I just had some loose ends to tie up first.
Chapter 11
Caspyn
Crouching behind one of the scrub brushes that grew near the lapping waves of the ocean, I watched the ferries pull in and out until the sun was kissing the end of the world and everything had turned gold and plum, the colors so close to that of a caspyn lily you would think you were looking into the center of one.
I had watched for hours as Tayln and his son pulled and heaved the heavy ropes in the heat of the day, switching back and forth from bank to Qit as they fought against the breaking of the waves, playing the same role I was sure their fathers and grandfathers had, that I was sure I had seen their sons and grandsons do before everything had gone to shit.
I wanted to be home. I needed to speak to Jayse, gather my supplies and make my way to the queen. I was trapped behind a bush seeing as I was covered in so much blood there would be no way I would not attract too many questions.
If I was going to Turin, if I was going to end the queen, now was the time I needed to become the invisible assassin I had spent all of those years training to be.
It was more important now that all of my lives were converging. I was running out of time, which made this wait even more excruciating.
Only when the sun was dipping behind the distant blue of the ocean, the Qits that lined the bay little more than black specks against nothing, did I emerge from the brush. I walked as quickly as I could, yet not so fast I would attract attention. I trusted Tayln, but after our last interaction I knew that was lying on one frayed thread. Thankfully, the man said nothing as I boarded the ferry and he flashed one bright light from his lantern in the distance to signal his son before we moved.
Ropes creaked, wood groaning as we hit the break, the heavy wakes crashing against us and covering everything in spray, sending us rocking back and forth. The motion was heavy, rough, but it was nothing compared to The Sway, compared to the rough water that had gone everywhere and coated me in blood.
Blood that no matter how hard I had scrubbed the vile stuff in the ocean, had remained.
“Someone came looking for you t’day,” Tayln said as soon as we cleared the breaks, the waves a gentle lull as he continued to pull us toward the Qit, the floating village a growing black mass against the expanse of stars that stretched through the sky, each spot reflected in the dark waves like an eternal mirror.
I barely moved, but neither did he. His focus remained forward as he heaved again and again, ropes creaking louder the closer we came to the Qit.
“Who?” I finally asked, suddenly aware my voice was still smothered with the sound of death that usually followed me everywhere but my home.
Tayln didn’t even shift, as though he knew the darkness I carried all along.
“Not good ‘uns by the look of' em,” he sighed, the steady gate of his pulling slowing. “I take it they found you already?”
Still, he did not turn, he stared forward, both of us watching as the low glow of the lanterns that lined the windows and streets of our home popped into the pitch like stars as we neared the dock.
“Perhaps some of them.” I stood as the ferry gave one last rock as we arrived at the Qit. “There might be more.”
I could barely make out the tight lines of his face as he finally faced me, those eyes full of sorrow and fear.
“Caspyn–” he began, but I put my hand up, my palm flat as I willed my magic to stay settled and calm inside of me. This man was not the enemy, even if he was looking as though he might be.
I had known I was out of time, now it was just more obvious. I would kill the queen, I would be done, perhaps I could have a life after all of that. But to make any of that possible I needed to protect what I had.
“I was thinking about what you said.” That darkness still hadn’t left my voice. “About Jayse. About being done. I think you might be right.”
I didn’t give him a chance to answer before I jumped from the ferry, everything swaying as I walked away from him and down the winding wooden path toward home. The sound of my boots against the damp wood was the only sound as I moved over swaying boardwalks. Through the winding narrow alleyways where my sister and I used to run, and then later where Jayse and I would hide and steal scraps of food, find anything we could to sell to survive.
There was sadness everywhere; sadness in the armies that haunted the world I had come from, and sadness in the hunger and cold of this one. But in both worlds, there had always been joy. Joy in Lily and a family who gave up everything to protect me. Joy in a friend who stayed by my side, even when she knew so much about what I had become.
What I was.
Every step I took further from The Sway I had thought of those moments, of Jayse, and why exactly I had kept her far away from the walls I had placed around me.
Walls I wasn’t quite sure I was ready to topple.
But perhaps Tayln was right. Perhaps it was worth it.
