“The ’Shael-spawned son of a fucking whore,” Gwenna snarled. “That bastard. That son of a bitch.”
The curses weren’t directed at anyone, they weren’t even coherent, but they kept her from sobbing.
She’d known it was a risk. They all had. She’d known, when she gave the order to attack, that people wouldn’t be coming back, that Balendin would put up some kind of fight and that people would die. She’d known there was a possibility that the leach was just too strong, and she’d made the choice to go after him anyway, before he got even stronger. She’d known all of it, and yet seeing the birds burst into flame, seeing the men and women she’d so hastily trained burning, falling, dying … she hadn’t known how much that would hurt.
The fact that her own Wing had survived only made it worse, and when Quick Jak dropped off Allar’ra’s back, Gwenna went at him with a fury, seizing him by the throat and throwing him to the ground. The fact that she could see the fear in his eyes, that she could smell the stink of panic on him, made her want to kill him right there and be done with it.
“Why did you peel off?” she demanded.
“Gwenna,” Talal said quietly.
“Stay out of this, Talal.” She didn’t take her eyes off the flier. “Why did you peel off?”
Jak managed to shake his head slightly. “He … had us. You saw.…”
“You don’t know that,” Gwenna shouted. “You don’t know that, you worthless piece of shit. The plan, the fucking plan, was to go in hard and keep going. That’s what the other Wings did, or maybe you were too busy shitting your pants to notice.”
Jak’s face was purpling, but he made no move to fight back or try to pull free.
“Other Wings…,” he managed, “died.”
“Sometimes that happens,” Gwenna screamed. “Sometimes when you’re fighting, people fucking die. It doesn’t mean you stop fighting. The only reason you stop fighting is you’re too frightened, because you’re a coward, because something’s fucking broken inside you.”
The flier opened his mouth, then closed it, shut his eyes.
“Gwenna,” Talal said again, taking her by the shoulders this time, pulling her back. “Get off of him. We’re alive because he saved us.”
Gwenna slammed the flier’s head against the ground once, then straightened up to shove a finger in Talal’s face.
“He saved us,” she hissed, “by running away. I ordered those other Wings into the fight. I told them we were all going, that we were making a concerted attack, together, and then I ran away.”
“Would it be better if we were dead?”
“Yes!” she said, shocked at her own conviction. “Yes.”
Talal shook his head slowly. “No.”
Behind them, Quick Jak was getting unsteadily to his feet. Gwenna took a long, shuddering breath, held it for a few heartbeats, then let it out. Then she did it again, and again. When you fight, Hendran wrote, people die. It’s only human to care, but you need to cut out that human thing. If you care too much, you lose.
When she thought she could speak without screaming, she turned to face her Wing.
“Stay with the bird,” she said, then gestured toward the wall and the tower punctuating it. “I’m going to tell the Emperor we failed.”
* * *
Adare had just sent out a dozen runners east and west along the wall. The fight with the Kettral had been pretty hard to miss, but all the same, she wanted to make sure the Sons of Flame understood what was coming.
The leach is going to hit us today, she told the messenger. And we think he’s going to hit us here, at this tower.
That, at least, was what Nira believed, for reasons Adare didn’t fully understand. Maybe the old woman was right, and maybe she was just finally going insane, but after seeing the Kettral scrubbed from the sky, Adare needed to do something, and sending out a warning was something. She was searching for another task when Gwenna stepped up through the trapdoor and onto the tower’s top.
“Your Radiance,” she said, bowing her head. The genuflection was uncharacteristic. “The attack failed.”
Adare bit back the first sharp retort that came to mind. “I saw,” she said instead. “I’m sorry for your soldiers.”
The words sounded stiff, useless, formulaic, but what else was there to say? The leach had just shattered the best weapon that Adare could bring against him, shattered it without even the slightest hint of effort.
“Thank you, Your Radiance. We can mourn the fallen later. We have one bird left. What are your orders?”
Adare was still trying to formulate an answer when a runner stumbled up through the trapdoor, sweating and out of breath.
“The kenarang,” he managed after a moment. “Your Radiance, I’ve come from the palace. Kiel sent me. He says he had eyes on the kenarang.…”
Nira stiffened at Adare’s side. “Where?” she demanded.
“Inside … the Spear,” the man gasped. “He had a hundred soldiers, and he went into the Spear.”
Adare stared. She could feel the warning from il Tornja, the single slip of paper folded inside her pocket.
“That’s where Kaden’s going,” she murmured. “That bastard. He’s always a step ahead.”
Gwenna studied her. “I don’t know why in Hull’s name Kaden would want to get inside the Spear, but he’s not headed that way. We caught a glimpse of him. Valyn was taking him west. Away from the palace. Which is just as well, since the whole ’Kent-kissing Army of the North was in his way if he tried to go east.”
“West,” Adare murmured. “They changed the plan?”
Nira snorted. “Faced with a whole army. Wouldn’t you?”
Adare took a deep breath. She could feel a sudden spark of hope inside her, hot, bright, horrible. Do not interfere, il Tornja had warned her, with anything south of the wall. I have your son.
Adare shuddered, replied silently, But I have you. Now. For the first time. I have you trapped.
“When?” she demanded, rounding on the messenger. “When did he go in?”
“Long time ago,” the man replied. “It took … time to cross the city.” He shook his head wearily. “I’m sorry, Your Radiance.”
“A long time ago,” Adare said, hope’s spark kindling to a fire. “And he hasn’t left?”
The man shook his head. “Not that I know, Your Radiance.”
“Good,” Adare said, nodding slowly. “Good.”
“’Fuck’s good about the kenarang takin’ control of your palace?” Nira demanded.
“He’s not in the palace,” Adare replied, smiling. “He’s in the Spear. It’s time for Intarra to pull her weight.”
“Meanin’ what?”
“It’s time for a miracle.”
Nira studied Adare from beneath hooded lids. “And if the goddess don’t comply?”
“Oh, I’m through waiting for the fucking goddess.”
“Meanin’ what?” Nira asked again, even more quietly this time.
“Meaning I’m going to set her Spear on fire.”
* * *
We’re killing good men, Valyn thought as the palace guardsman crumpled beneath his ax. He’d hit the man with the blunt back of the metal head, trusting to the soldier’s helmet to cushion the blow. He’d probably survive. With any luck, most of them would survive. The Flea was fighting mostly with the flats of his blades, and Sigrid, too, but sometimes the only way past a man was through him, and Valyn would be shipped to ’Shael if he failed in this last, mad dash because he was too delicate to spill the necessary blood.
After Sigrid smashed through the Water Gate, the Dawn Palace had erupted into utter madness. The normal guardsmen, baffled by what seemed an unprovoked attack, were coming at them from every direction, spears waving stupidly in the air. If there had been more time, Kaden might have talked to them-he had the eyes, they would accept him in his own palace-but there was no time. Il Tornja’s soldiers were inside the red walls, too, just behind them, fighting their own way forward, and if that weren’t enough, the Aedolians, drawn to the sound of violence, kept attacking in knots of two or four.