“Navi, you can barely even walk,” he muttered.

“Listen to me.” She searched his face. The glittering sadness in his eyes seized her heart. “I know what you’re feeling. I feel it myself. But we cannot allow ourselves to fall prey to our own shame.”

Malik shook his head. “Navi, I can’t bear to leave them—”

“I know, but we must.” She cupped the back of his head in her hands, brought his forehead down to touch hers. “This war is not only about the fate of Astavar, and we can’t help Eliana if we are lying dead on a battlefield.”

“Eliana.” Malik spat a curse. “She brought this down upon us.”

Navi frowned. “She saved us all, that night in Karajak Bay. She sank the Empire fleet.”

“Which ended up meaning nothing.” He flung his hand toward the ceiling. “Listen to them, Navi. Listen to our people die. Listen to our kingdom fall. If she hadn’t come here—”

“If she hadn’t come here, we would have fallen weeks ago. And you won’t speak ill of her again, not in my presence. She is on a more difficult path than any of us. I can only pray that, wherever Harkan has taken her, she is able to enjoy a little bit of peace before they find her again.”

Malik gave her a sad, tight smile, but before he could speak further, dull booms thundered overhead, muffled by the dense stretches of rock above them. Malik tried to move away, dragging a hand across his face with a small sob, but Navi held him fast.

“Astavar may fall,” she said quietly, “but its people will live on, and as survivors flee and scatter, you and I will be fighting to save them, and their Venteran brothers, and their Celdarian sisters.” She drew a deep breath, her energy nearly exhausted. “Tell me what we will do.”

After a long moment, Malik managed to speak. “We will flee south, to the Vespers.”

“And then?”

“We will gather allies as we travel.”

“We will collect the lost and the homeless, as many as we can care for, as many as our ship can hold. And we will find more ships, and our numbers will grow, and then none of us will be lost or homeless any longer, for we will have made a new home of our own, a new country.”

“We will have built an army to crush the Empire,” Malik added, his voice stronger now, more assured.

Navi nodded, her heart bursting with love for him. Their fathers’ farewell kisses lingered on her brow. If she inhaled deeply enough, she could still smell Ama’s perfume on her clothes.

To honor their sacrifice, she wrestled her tears into submission. They could rise later. “The Empire’s foothold in the islands is not as strong as it once was. We may be able to unseat them, if not in Tava Koro, then on one of the smaller islands.”

“They’ll be distracted, looking for Eliana.”

“Quite likely.” She gripped Malik’s soft black hair, anchored him to her eyes. “We will rally the Vespers to our cause. We will gather ships, weapons, soldiers. And when Eliana is ready to destroy the Emperor—for she will, she will destroy him, I believe that with my every breath, my every waking hope, dear brother—when she is ready, we will be there, with our army of strays, and we will be at her side, and we will not let her fall.”

Malik closed his eyes, tears slipping down his cheeks. “We are not cowards.”

“No. I was wrong to have said that.” Navi stepped back from him and looked at each of her guards in turn. “We are the light against the darkness, and we must continue to burn brightly, so others may find their way out.”

Last of all, she met Hob’s gaze. He nodded once and then said, “May the Queen’s light guide us.”

Navi said a quick, silent prayer that she would not only live long enough to once again fight at Eliana’s side, but also to see Hob and Patrik reunited. Not once since he had left Patrik weeks ago at Crown’s Hollow had Hob complained about how this fight had separated him from his love, but Navi saw the quiet grief in every line of his face, heard it in every word he uttered.

She touched his arm and offered him a small smile, which he returned with shining eyes.

“May the Queen’s light guide us,” she agreed, and then, unsteady, refusing Ruusa’s silent offer of aid—at least for a little while, at least for a few quiet yards on her own two reborn feet—she turned away from her home for what she knew in her heart would be the last time and sent a silent prayer to whatever ravaged vestiges of the empirium remained in the world.

Find her.

Protect her.

Help her believe.

22

   Eliana

“When the Sun Queen arrives, she may not look like anything you’ve imagined. She may not know who she is, and she may resent the destiny to which she was born. Be patient with her. Nourish and cherish her. And above all, do whatever you must to keep her safe, even if it earns her hatred.”

—The Word of the Prophet

Eliana observed her and Harkan’s progress through an acrid fog, her head throbbing.

She knew the drug he had used—a powerful sedative, commonly known as black lily, that she had, as the Dread, often deployed against her victims. She was so angry with him for using it on her, and with herself for not seeing it coming, that despite her muddled senses, fury lit the soles of her feet afire, grounding her useless body.

She had to lean heavily on Harkan to stay upright. His arm was firm around her waist as they fled through the castle, down the now-familiar route toward Tameryn’s cavern, and then through a different series of tunnels that, thankfully, were not flooded and required no swimming.

At last, they emerged into the city, into the chaotic heart of Vintervok. Explosions tore the streets to pieces, debris clattered down upon the roads from rooftops shattered by cannon fire. Terrified citizens ran screaming through the streets, only as many belongings as they could easily carry haphazardly bundled onto their backs—arms full of children, books, sacks of food. There had been no time to prepare; the invasion had risen suddenly like a monster from beneath the earth, and now there was nowhere to run.

The black lily was sinking slowly into Eliana’s veins, overpowering her sight, her balance. She let herself fall into the support of Harkan’s gait and stumbled alongside him like an animal being led by its master.

Beneath the waves of the drug sloshing through her mind, her rage coiled, waiting.

• • •

They boarded a ship—the Streganna, Harkan murmured against her ear. As they were shuffled into one of the ship’s dark holds, along with so many other wailing, sobbing passengers that even in her current state, Eliana felt her skin begin to crawl, Harkan told her what he had done.