Geder nodded, acknowledging him without answering. He couldn’t answer.
“Prince Geder?” another priest said. “You look unwell. Are you leaving us?”
“I—” Geder said, and stopped.
The room was silent now. All the priests—there were hundreds of them—had shifted to face him. There were too many. He couldn’t fight his way free. He had to say something. He had to tell them everything was all right, but it wasn’t, and they’d know. He had to tell them he wasn’t leaving, but he was leaving, and they’d know. He had to lie, because if they knew the truth, they’d rip him to shreds with their hands and spill out into the world again, and Cithrin would know he’d failed. And Aster. Only he couldn’t lie.
There had to be a way. A turn of phrase and intention that would get him free, but he couldn’t think of anything. The seconds stretched, and fear with them.
He looked up into the Tralgu’s warm, dark eyes. We’re going to die here, Geder thought. I’ve done all this, come all this way, and I’m going to die here because someone asked me a question I couldn’t answer. The monstrous unfairness of it was like a torch in his belly. It hurt and it filled his nose with the scent of smoke. The anger flowed into him, an old ally come in his hour of need.
He had to say something.
It had to be true.
Fine.
“No,” Geder said. “I’m not leaving.”
The Tralgu blinked, but if there was any surprise in his expression, Geder couldn’t see it.
“I’m not leaving,” Geder said, his voice ringing out. “Hear my voice? I’m not… I’m not leaving.”
Because if I were, you bastards would know it. And if you knew, it would all be over. And I’m not losing to you again.
Yardem nodded. “I’ll let her know.”
The sense of loss was less terrible than he’d thought it would be. It wasn’t even grief, precisely. Only a profound disappointment. There were going to be days and nights in Cithrin’s company. He was going to read poetry to her, and watch Aster become king. He was going to go out to Rivenhalm with his father and spend a long day fishing at his side, the way he’d always meant to. He’d see Sabiha and tell her himself how Cithrin bel Sarcour had come and saved the empire with him, and everything was going to be all right. Only no. He wouldn’t. He was going to do this instead.
“Yes. Please tell her,” Geder said. “Tell them all.”
Then he stood silently and watched while the Tralgu walked out the doors and closed them solidly behind him. Briefly, something in Geder’s mind shrieked. This is the moment. Change your mind again. Run! But then the low growl of the iron bars came, and all hope died.
He looked around at the men staring at him. Dozens of different faces. Some were confused, some sullen and angry, some lit with hope. He smiled. It felt real this time. It was as if everything he’d ever seen had been through a dirty window, and now the glass was clean.
He was done. Nothing mattered.
“Well,” he said, rubbing his hands together. “All right. Why don’t we get started? Can all of you come here, please? Everyone from the back rooms too? Yes, good. Everybody. Come out here where you can get a good look out at the city.”
Like a nurse with too many children to care for, Geder made a show of putting them all in lines and rows. They shuffled and pushed under his guidance, jockeying for position without knowing it was their own pyre. Geder found a bleak and terrible joy in it all. Here, you’re taller, so stand at the back. Make sure everyone’s got a good view. This is important. This will be amazing. You’ve been looking forward to this, haven’t you? I can tell.
They stood in ranks, facing the open sky, and Geder took his place behind them. Their heads blocked the blue. It was fine. There, almost too small to see, but high in the open air, something was gliding. A hawk above the city walls, perhaps. Or something larger and farther away, but coming close.
“All right,” Geder said, his voice a cheerful singsong. “I want everyone to close their eyes. Everybody, now. You’ve come all this way to hear what I have learned about the goddess. So close your eyes, and relax. I want you all to feel her power within you. I want you to feel the comfort she gives you all. Can you do that for me?”
A murmur of gentle assent rose all around him.
“Think about all that you have sacrificed for her,” Geder said. The wings were larger than a hawk’s now, but not yet, he guessed, within the city. With every heartbeat, they seemed to grow just a bit wider, just a bit thicker. Like someone had drawn a pen across the clouds, and the ink was still seeping in. “Think about the trust you have put in her. The faith. You have all given your lives for her. Died out of the life you had before in order to carry her voice into the world. Without your dedication to her, you might have had wives. Children. You might have written songs or brewed beer or any of a thousand different things, but you are the servants of the Servant because you knew in your heart that this was better. Am I right? Do you deny it?”
Another wave of voices, now in negation. No, they did not deny. No one could deny the power of her voice. Some of them were swaying now. Someone was weeping, and it sounded like joy. The wings were no longer like a hawk’s. They took a shape more like a vast and ragged bat. Not quite that, but more like. It was a beautiful creature. He could make out the dragon’s head now, and it might have been only his imagination, but he thought he heard a roar rising in the city. A thousand throats shouting in a chorus of fear.
“Think of the promises she made you,” Geder said. “The golden glow of truth. The knowledge that you were better and purer and more right than everyone else. Take a moment, and feel all the love in that promise. Take comfort in it.”
Someone in the group moaned in something like religious ecstasy. Geder bounced on the balls of his feet. His grin was so wide, it ached.
“My voice doesn’t have that power. But it can carry truth. And the truth I have for you—the one you have been waiting for and searching for, the one that will end all dispute between you, has come. Take a breath, open your eyes, and hear my truth. You don’t get to fucking laugh at me.”
One opened his eyes, then a handful, and then all of them together. They looked around in confusion, reared back, cried out. They surged for the doors, but to no effect. The iron held. The dragon’s approach shrugged off the illusion of floating gentleness. It drove toward them all like a falling stone. The great mouth opened, and Geder could see its teeth.
Inys slammed into the tower, his vast head blotting out the city, the sky, the future.
For the first few seconds, the flames felt cold.
Cithrin
Inys hit the Kingspire with a sound louder than thunder. Cithrin felt it in her chest like a blow. Massive claws dung deep into the tower’s flanks, leaving marks so wide she could see them from the gardens where she stood. His body filled like a bellows, and the roar of the fire was an assault in itself. Flames blew out, bathing the dragon’s head. They lit the windows of the Kingspire. Black smoke billowed up, rising into the sky. An announcement of tragedy. The violence of it staggered her.
Aster, unthinking, pushed himself in front of her as if his body would offer any protection. She put her hand on his shoulder. All around the grounds, the others were gaping up at the spectacle. Other voices raised in alarm came from behind her. Geder’s guards. The city watch. All the men and soldiers that Geder was supposed to have summoned making their own approach, alarmed and unsought. She didn’t know if this was a blessing, and she didn’t turn to see. The banner of the goddess fell toward them, but slowly. It burned as it fell, and seemed borne up by the heat of its own unmaking. It rained ashes below it and belched smoke above.