From Blood and Ash (Blood And Ash Series Book 1)

Half resting on the inner ledge, I stared out the window at the torches beyond the Rise, eyes aching and weary with the pressure of tears that wouldn’t fall.

I wished I could cry, but it was like the cord that had connected me to my emotions had been severed. It wasn’t that Vikter’s death didn’t hurt. Gods, it ached and throbbed every time I even thought his name, but that was almost all I’d felt in the week and a half since his death. A sharp slice of pain that cut through my chest. No sorrow. No dread. Just pain and anger…so much anger.

Maybe it was because I hadn’t gone to his funeral. I hadn’t made it to any of the funerals, and there had been so many dead that ten or more were held at a time—or so I had heard from Tawny.

It hadn’t been my choice not to attend the services. I’d been asleep. I’d been sleeping a lot this week. Entire days just gone in a blur of sleep and drugged consciousness. I didn’t even remember Tawny helping me bathe away the blood and gore or how I got back to bed. I knew she’d talked to me then, but I couldn’t recall a single thing she’d said. I had this weird impression that I hadn’t been alone while I slept. There was a sensation of callused palms against my cheek, fingers brushing hair back from my face. I had the faintest memory of Hawke talking to me, whispering when the room was filled with sunlight and when it had been taken over by night. Even now, I could feel the touch against my face, my hair. It had been the only grounding connection I’d had while I slept.

I squeezed my lids shut until the phantom sensations vanished, and then I reopened my eyes.

It wasn’t until about four days after the attack on the Rite that I’d learned that Hawke had used some kind of pressure point on my neck to render me unconscious. I’d woken up sometime later in my room, unable to use my voice. The screaming…it had torn up my throat. Hawke had been there, so had Tawny, the Duchess, and a Healer.

I was offered a sleeping draught, and for the first time in my life, I took it. I might’ve kept taking it if it hadn’t been for Hawke removing the powder from my room four days ago.

It was then I learned that the attack on the Rise hadn’t been the only one that night. The Descenters had set fire to several of the opulent homes along Radiant Row, drawing guards from the Rise and the castle. That was where Hawke had been after he’d left the garden, which explained the soot on his face.

The fires had been a smart move by the Descenters. I had to give them that. With the guards distracted, the Descenters were able to move through the night, taking out guards stationed around the castle before they even knew they were there. They were able to commence wholesale slaughter before the guards who’d gone to Radiant Row could even be summoned.

No one could be positive what message the attack on the Rite had been meant to send, or even if they had been searching for me. None of the Descenters were taken alive that night, and any of those who had escaped, had slipped back into the shadows.

The Ascended had done what the Duchess said they would do. They got their hands dirty, but their assistance had come too late. Most who’d been left in that room had died. Only a few had survived, most so traumatized that they couldn’t even recall what had happened.

Well over a hundred had died that night.

Gods, I’d rather be asleep than awake.

At least when I slept, I didn’t think about the Duke burning from where he had been hung and impaled. I couldn’t think about Dafina’s one blue eye, or how Loren had tried to go back to her friend, only to be struck down. I wouldn’t remember how it had felt to crawl over people who were dead or dying, unable to do anything to help him. The metal wolf masks didn’t haunt my sleep. Neither did that smile Vikter had given me, or how he’d told me that he was proud. Asleep, I didn’t think about how the last words he’d ever spoken were a plea for forgiveness for him not protecting me. And I couldn’t remember how my gift had failed me when I needed it the most.

I wished I had never said what I did in that garden.

I wished…I wished I’d never gone to the Rite or gone out into the willow. If I’d been in my room where I was expected to be, we wouldn’t have been in the thick of it. The attack still would’ve happened, and people still would’ve died, but maybe Vikter would still be here.

However, a tiny voice in the back of my mind whispered that the moment Vikter learned of what was happening, he would’ve gone down there anyway, and I would’ve followed. Death had come for him, and that voice also whispered that death would’ve found a way.

In the days I spent lost to the deep nothingness, I couldn’t acknowledge what I’d done to Lord Mazeen and how I felt about it now.

Or how I didn’t feel.

There wasn’t an ounce of regret. My nails dug into my palms. I would do it again. Gods, I wished I could, and that disturbed me.

When I was out of it, I didn’t think, and I didn’t care about anything.

But now I was awake, and all I had were my thoughts, the pain, and the anger.

I wanted to find every single Descenter and do to them what I’d done to the Lord.

I’d tried the second night I was awake. I donned my cloak and mask and grabbed the short sword Vikter had given me years before since my dagger was lost to the chaos of that room the night of the Rite. I’d planned to pay Agnes a visit.

She’d known. Nothing could convince me otherwise. She’d known, and her attempts to warn me hadn’t been enough. The blood that had been spilled that night was on her hands—Vikter’s blood tainted her skin. My mentor and friend, who’d drunk her hot cocoa and comforted her. She could’ve stopped all of this.

Hawke had caught up to me halfway through Wisher’s Grove and all but dragged me back to the castle. The chest of weapons had been removed from my room at that point, and the servants’ access barred from the stairwell.

And so, I sat. I waited.

Each evening I’d been awake, I waited for the Duchess to summon me. For punishment to be rendered. Because I’d done something so expressly forbidden that it made everything I’d ever done before an afterthought.

I’d killed an Ascended.

Maiden or not, there had to be some kind of punishment for that. I had to be found unworthy.

A knock drew my gaze from the window. The door opened, and Hawke strode in, closing the door behind him. He was dressed in the uniform of the guards, all black except for the white Royal Guard mantle.

No one had replaced Vikter’s position yet. I didn’t know why. Maybe after seeing what I was capable of, the Duchess realized that I no longer needed as much protection. But protecting myself would be kind of hard to do without access to any weapons. Or maybe it was the fact that I’d already gone through three guards in one year. Or it could be because so many had died during the attack, and they were shorthanded.

My back tensed as Hawke and I stared at one another from across the room.

Things had been weird between us.

I wasn’t sure if it was because of what had happened in the garden and then with Vikter, or if it had been what I’d done in that room after Vikter’s death. It could’ve been all of that. But he was quiet when he was around me, and I had no idea what he was feeling or thinking. My gift was hidden away behind a wall so thick that it couldn’t even crack.

He said nothing as he stood there. Just crossed his arms over his chest and stared at me. He’d done that a time or five hundred since I woke. Probably because when he tried to talk to me, all I did was stare at him.

Which was also probably why things were weird.

My eyes narrowed as the silence stretched between us. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“Then why are you here?” I demanded.

“Do I need a reason?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t.”

“Are you just checking to make sure I haven’t figured a way out of the room?” I challenged.

“I know you can’t get out of this room, Princess.”

“Don’t call me that,” I snapped.

“I’m going to take a second to remind myself that this is progress.”

My brows furrowed. “Progress with what?”

“With you,” he answered. “You’re not being very nice, but at least you’re talking. That’s progress.”

“I’m not being mean,” I shot back. “I just don’t like to be called that.”

“Uh-huh,” he murmured.

“Whatever.” I tore my gaze from his, feeling…I didn’t know what I was feeling. I squirmed, uncomfortable, and it had nothing to do with how hard the stone was beneath me.

I wasn’t mad at Hawke. I was just angry with…everything.

“I get it,” he said quietly.

When I looked at him, I saw that he’d moved closer, and I hadn’t heard him. He was only a few feet from me now. “You do?” I lifted my brows. “You understand?”

Hawke stared at me, and in that moment, I felt something other than anger and pain. Shame burned through me like acid. Of course, Hawke knew, at least to some extent. But still, he probably knew better than a lot of other people.

“I’m sorry.”

“For what?” The hardness had eased from my tone.

“I said this to you before, shortly after everything, but I don’t think you heard me,” he said. I thought about those vague sensations of him being beside me. “I should’ve said it again sooner. I’m sorry for everything that has happened. Vikter was a good man. Despite the last words we exchanged, I respected him, and I’m sorry that I couldn’t do anything.”

Every muscle in my body locked up. “Hawke—”

“I don’t know if me being there—like I should’ve been—would’ve changed the outcome,” he went on, “but I’m sorry that I wasn’t. That there was nothing I could do by the time I did get there. I’m sorry—”

“You have nothing to apologize for.” I rose from the ledge, my joints stiff from sitting for so long. “I don’t blame you for what happened. I’m not mad at you.”

“I know.” He looked above me and out the window to the Rise. “But that doesn’t change that I wish I would’ve done something that could’ve prevented this.”

“There are a lot of things I wish I would’ve done differently,” I admitted, staring at my hands. “If I’d gone to my room—”

“If you’d gone to your room, this still would’ve happened. Don’t put this on yourself.” A heartbeat later, I felt his fingers under my chin. He lifted my gaze to his. “You’re not to blame for this, Poppy. Not at all. If anything, I—” He cut himself off with a low curse. “Don’t take on the blame that belongs to others. You understand?”

I did, but that changed nothing, so I said, “Ten.”

His brows knitted. “What?”

“Ten times, you’ve called me Poppy.”

One side of his lips tipped up. The faintest trace of the dimple appeared. “I like calling you that, but I like calling you Princess more.”

“Shocker,” I replied.

He dipped his chin. “It’s okay, you know?”

“What is?”

“Everything that you’re feeling,” he said. “And everything that you’re not.”

My breath caught as my chest squeezed, and it wasn’t just pain doing that. It was something lighter, something warmer. How he knew was proof that, in some way, he’d been where I was right now. I didn’t know if I moved or if he did, but my arms were suddenly around him, and he was holding me just as tightly as I was him. My cheek was plastered to his chest, below his heart, and when his chin dropped to the top of my head, I shuddered in relief. The tender hug didn’t fix the world. The pain and anger were still there. But Hawke was so warm, and his embrace was…gods, it felt like hope, like a promise that I wouldn’t always feel this way.

We stood there for some time before Hawke pulled back, and as he did, he smoothed the unruly strands of hair back from my face, sending a shiver of recognition through me.

“I did come here with a purpose,” he said. “The Duchess needs to speak with you.”

I blinked. So, it was time. “And you’re just telling me now?”

“Figured what we had to say to each other was far more important.”

“I don’t think the Duchess would agree,” I told him, and the expression on his face said that he didn’t really care. “It’s time for me to find out how I’ll be punished for what I…for what I did to the Lord, isn’t it?”

Hawke frowned at me. “If I thought I was delivering you for punishment, I wouldn’t be taking you there.”

Surprise flickered through me, proving it was yet another emotion I could feel. “Where would you take me?”

“Somewhere far from here,” he said, and I believed him. He’d do what no one else would, not even…not even Vikter. “You’re being summoned because word has come from the capital.”

It felt strange when Tawny arrived to help me with the veil, to be wearing it after everything, and even more weird to realize that the castle looked the same as it had before the attack. All except for the Great Hall. It had been barricaded from what I could gather. One brief glance at the room Vikter had died in told me that the door had been replaced.

That was all I needed to know.

The Duchess wore white, like I did, but while I wore the clothing of the Maiden, she wore the color of mourning. She sat behind what had been the Duke’s desk, looking over a piece of paper. Not the desk that had been in the Duke’s more private office. If we’d been meeting there, I had no idea what I would’ve done.

I still couldn’t believe how the Duke had been killed. Surely, the weapon had been coincidental, but it still pecked away at something in the back of my mind.

The Duchess glanced up as the door closed behind us. She looked…different. It wasn’t the color, or that her hair was pulled back sharply from her face in a simple twist. It was something else, but I couldn’t place it as I walked past the benches. There were two other people in the room, the Commander, and a Royal Guard.

Her gaze flickered over me, and I wondered if she could tell that I had left my hair down beneath the veil. “I hope you’re doing well.” She paused. “Or at least better than the last time I saw you.”

“I am well,” I said, and that felt like neither a lie nor the truth.

“Good. Please. Take a seat.” She gestured at the bench, and I did as she asked.

Tawny sat beside me, but Hawke remained standing to my left. I did everything in my power not to think about how Vikter belonged here.

“A lot has happened while you’ve been…resting,” the Duchess started. “The Queen and King have been notified of recent events.” She tapped one long finger on the parchment.

The message must have been sent through carrier pigeon to the capital, but only a Huntsman would deliver a Royal message here. He had to have ridden night and day, changing horses along the way to have made it back. It generally took several weeks to travel that distance.

“After the abduction attempt and the attack on the Rite, they no longer believe it’s safe for you here,” the Duchess announced. “They have summoned you back to Carsodonia.”

I knew this was coming. Since the abduction attempt, I’d accepted that there was a high chance that the Queen would summon me to the capital, and I knew that could mean an earlier than expected Ascension. That was probably why I wasn’t surprised, but it didn’t explain the lack of dread and fear.

All I felt was…acceptance. Maybe even a little relief because this castle was now the last place I wanted to be, and I wasn’t thinking about what could happen when I got to the capital. I wasn’t even thinking about seeing Ian again. I knew what else I felt, though. And that was confusion.

“I’m sorry,” I blurted out. “How am I not punished?”

Hawke turned to me, and without looking, I knew he probably had the same expression on his face that Vikter would have had.

The Duchess didn’t respond for a long moment until she said, “I assume you’re speaking about Lord Mazeen.”

My stomach tightened as I nodded.

Her head tilted. “Do you think you should be punished?”

I started to respond as I would’ve two weeks ago before the attack, back when I was still trying so damn hard to be what I was beginning to believe I was never meant to be. “I don’t think I can answer that question.”

“Why not?” Curiosity marked her features.

“Because…there was a history there.” I settled on that, aware of how Tawny shifted so her leg pressed against mine. I drew in a deep breath. “I know I should be punished.”

“You should,” she agreed. “He was an Ascended, one of our oldest.”

Tension radiated from Hawke as I felt him move just the slightest bit toward me.

“You cut him up like a butcher would a slab of meat,” she continued. I should’ve felt horror or disgust—anything other than the surge of gratification that swamped me. “But I’m sure you had your reasons.”

My mouth dropped open.

The Duchess leaned back as she picked up a quill. “I’ve known Bran for many, many years, and there is very little about his…personality that I am unaware of. I had hoped that he would’ve known better given what you are. Apparently, I was wrong.”

I tipped forward. “Did you—?”

“I would not ask that question,” she interrupted, her unflinching stare locking on mine. “You would not like my answer, nor would you understand. Neither would I expect you to. Take this as a much-needed lesson, Penellaphe. Some truths do nothing but destroy and decay what they do not obliterate. Truths do not always set one free. Only a fool who has spent their entire life being fed lies believes that.”

Chest rising and falling, I snapped my mouth shut and sat back. She knew. She’d always known about the Lord and the Duke. Maybe not what they’d done exactly, but she knew. My fingers dug into the skirt of my gown.

“You’re the Maiden,” she continued. “That is why you will not be punished. Count your blessings, and do not speak of them ever again.” A muscle twitched under her eye. “And do yourself a favor. Do not waste another moment thinking of either of them. I know I will not.”

I stared at her as her white-knuckled grip on the quill eased. It struck me then. If the Duke had treated me as he did, why had I assumed he would treat his wife any differently? After all, I’d never seen them being loving towards one another, and that went beyond the almost cool nature of the Ascended. I’d never seen them touch. Being an Ascended didn’t mean you were no longer in a position to be abused.

Lowering my gaze, I nodded. “When…when do I leave for the capital?”

“Tomorrow morning,” she answered. “You will leave with the rise of the sun.”