I feel the telltale twinge up ahead. The empty ache that plagues all Silvers and newbloods. One more door to push open. One last chance to survive where so many others would die.
I will not fail, Mother.
Grinning, I turn around, letting her watch me as I back farther into the dark chamber. The single window is small, and a weak light fills the space. Illuminating the dark walls, patterned like a checkerboard of gray and black. The gray bits gleam dully, showing ribbons of liquid silver. Arven blood, Silence blood.
She hesitates at the threshold, feeling the press of Silent Stone. I watch it ruin her.
The color drains from her face, and she almost looks Silver in the cold, gray light. I keep walking, back and back. To the next door. The next passage. My chance.
She doesn’t stop me.
Her throat bobs as she swallows around the fear clawing at her. I gave her this wound. I locked her away in chains, drained her ability, made her live like a wasting ghost. If she steps forward, she’ll have no weapons at all. No shield. No guarantee.
The letter opener in my hand feels suddenly heavy.
I could drop it. Leave the blade and run.
I could let her live.
Or I could kill her.
The choice is easy. And so very difficult.
I hold my ground.
My grip tightens on the iron.
THIRTY-SEVEN
Mare
The room is a coffin. A maw of stone that will swallow me whole. I feel dead, even on the threshold, hesitating to fully succumb to this place and the person who built it.
My heart pounds so loudly I know Maven can hear it.
His eyes trace over me in a way that is too familiar and too close, despite the yards between us. He focuses on my throat, on the vein pulsing with all my fear. I expect him to lick his lips. My hand flexes in vain, attempting to call up a bolt of lightning. All I get are weak sparks, darkly purple, dying quickly against the might of so much Silent Stone.
Something gleams in his hand, flashing in the dim light. A knife, I think, thin and small but sharp enough.
My hand strays to my hip, for the pistol Tyton harangued me into wearing. But the holster is gone entirely, probably lost in the Bridge collapse. I gulp again. I have no weapons at all.
And Maven knows it.
He grins, teeth white and wicked. “Aren’t you going to try to stop me?” he says, tipping his head like some curious puppy.
My mouth feels dry when I speak. “Don’t make me do this, Maven.” It comes out raspy.
Maven just shrugs. Somehow he manages to make his simple gray clothing look like silk and fur and steel. He isn’t a king anymore, but no one seems to have told him.
“I’m not making you do anything,” he says imperiously. “You don’t have to suffer this. You can stand right there, or even turn around. It makes no difference to me.”
I force another breath, stronger than before. The too-familiar memory of Silent Stone claws up my spine. “Don’t make me kill you like this,” I growl, sounding dangerous and lethal.
“What are you going to do, stare at me?” he shoots back dryly. “I’m terrified.”
It’s a brash show, his forced nonchalance. I know Maven well enough to see the truth in his words, the real fear weaving through his practiced arrogance. His eyes dart, quicker than before, not over my face, but my feet. So he can move when I move. Run when I lunge.
In spite of the dagger, he’s without his weapons too.
I don’t tremble when I take the first, slow step, sliding into the prison of Silent Stone.
“You should be.”
Maven stumbles back, surprised, almost tripping over himself. But he recovers quickly, the dagger tight in his hand as I continue forward. He mirrors my movements, stepping backward. The lethal dance is achingly slow, and we never break our stare. We don’t even blink. I feel as if I’m walking a tightrope over a pit of wolves, barely keeping balance. One wrong move and I’ll fall to their fangs.
Or maybe I’m the wolf.
I see myself in his eyes. And his mother. And Cal. All we did to get here, in the middle of the end of his world. I lied and was lied to. Betrayed and was betrayed. I hurt people, and so many people hurt me. I wonder what Maven sees in my eyes.
“It won’t end here,” he murmurs, his voice low and smooth. I’m reminded of Julian and his melodic ability. “You can drag my corpse across the world, and it won’t end any of this.”
“Likewise,” I reply, showing my teeth. The inches close between us, in spite of his best efforts. I’m more agile than he is. “The Red dawn won’t stop with me.”
He offers a twisting smirk. “Then it seems we’re both dispensable. We don’t matter anymore.”
I bark out a laugh. I’ve never mattered the way he still does. “I’m used to it.”
“I like the hair,” Maven murmurs, filling the empty space. His eyes run over the tangle of brown and purple spilling over one shoulder. I don’t reply.
The last card he plays is obvious, but it still stings. Not because I want what he offers, but because I remember a girl who would have accepted it. She knows better now.
“We can still run.” His voice deepens, letting the offer hang in the air. “Together.”
I should laugh at him. Twist the knife. Make him suffer as much as I can in these last moments we have. Instead I feel some piece of my heart break for someone so irrevocably lost. And I feel true sorrow for the other brother in the midst of all this, who tried and failed. Who never deserved what’s happening now.
“Maven,” I sigh, shaking my head at his blindness. “The last person who loves you isn’t standing in this room. He’s out there. And you burned that bridge to ashes.”
He goes deathly still, face white as bone. Not even his icy eyes move. When I take another step, coming within arm’s length, he doesn’t seem to notice. I ball a fist at my side, bracing myself.
Slowly, he blinks. And I see nothing in him.
Maven Calore is empty.
“Very well.”
The dagger cuts at my throat, swiping with vicious and blistering speed. I lean backward, dodging the blow without thought. He keeps coming, keeps slicing, saying nothing. My body reacts before my brain, all instinct as I deflect his strikes. I’m faster than he is, and my arms swing in time with his movements, catching his wrists before he can do any damage with the tiny, wicked gleam of sharp iron.
I have nothing except my own fists and feet. My focus is on keeping the dagger away from my skin, and I barely land any blows of my own. I twist, trying to trip him with a hooked ankle, but he steps neatly over the attempt. My first mistake, leaving my back exposed. I move as he does, and a stab for my lungs becomes a long but shallow gash across my side. Hot, red blood wells up, filling the air with a copper tang.
I almost expect him to apologize. Maven has never truly delighted in my pain. But he gives no quarter. And neither do I.
Ignoring the spreading pain, I jab at his throat with a closed fist, hitting hard. He wheezes and stumbles, dropping to a knee. I strike again, kicking him across the jaw. The momentum sends him sideways, his eyes wide and dazed as he spits silver blood in all directions. If not for the dagger, I would use the opportunity to get my arms around his throat and squeeze until his body is cold.
Instead I leap, using my weight to keep him pinned as I fight the fingers still clawed around the dagger hilt. He growls beneath me, in spite of the jaw, trying to force me off.
I have to use my teeth.
The taste of silver blood poisons my mouth when I clamp down on his fingers, cutting through flesh straight to the bone. His growls turn to wailing screams. The sound rips into me, made worse by the effect of Silent Stone. Everything hurts more than it should.