Page 78 of While the Dark Remains
“You go first, Saga,” I tell her. “Shout when you’re finished.”
She nods her assent, and Ballast and I pace back into the central square. We sit on the edge of the fountain, the water here also clear and flowing.
I study Ballast as I have never seen him before: in dazzling light. He’s shed his coat, and his sleeves are rolled up to the elbow; his brown arms are a map of scars where his swirls of Iljaria tattoos used to be. Kallias cut them out with a knife when Ballast was thirteen or so, to make him more Daerosian, but a few overlooked specks of blue remain.
There are scars on Ballast’s jawline, too, and a nick in his right ear along the upper rim. I remember when Kallias did that—he was in a rage because the dogs had gotten loose in the palace, torn his private chambers all to pieces. He thought Ballast had done it, but it wasn’t his fault. It was mine.Ihad let the dogs out of their cages and sent them hurtling toward the king’s rooms in an act of righteous defiance. And I hid in my cage while Kallias carved a piece out of Ballast because of it.
Ballast turns toward me, catching me in my scrutiny, and I am struck anew by his eyelashes, which, like his hair, are a mix of black and white. He reaches out one tentative hand, his fingers brushing the edge of my headscarf. I tremble, and he mistakes the meaning of it. He lets his hand fall and sags where he sits.
I don’t know how to tell him that I want him to touch me, that I long for it, a sharp ache beneath my ribs.
“You’re right,” says Ballast, to the ancient flagstones. “I always had a choice, and I shouldn’t havelethim ... hurt you. Hurt all of you. I should have stopped him. I could have. But I was too afraid of how he might hurt me. Of how he might hurt my mother, even more than he already had.”
“I was unfair before,” I tell him, the music of the fountain echoing in the wide arch of the cavern. “He did hurt you. Over and over. And your ear. The dogs ...” I speak around the lump in my throat, racked with guilt. “That was me.”
He glances over again, a strange expression on his face. “Don’t be sorry about my ear. If not for the dogs, he would have found another reason. He cut off one of my toes because I couldn’t make a snake play a violin.” Ballast gives a bitter, awful laugh.
I feel utterly sick.
But then he shrugs, like it’s no big matter. “Whatever else I was to him, I am my father’s son. I don’t think he would have killed me, if it came down to it. Not like you. Not like all of you. You were expendable. Toys to amuse him and throw away when he got bored.”
He’s right, and I have no reply to that.
“I could have helped you. I could have stopped him, put an end to his damned Collection and saved dozens of lives. But I didn’t because I’m a coward.” He slams his fist into the edge of the fountain, cursing as his knuckles split and blood beads bright. He lifts his face to mine, tears gleaming on his cheeks, and runs his uninjured hand through his snow-and-earth hair before turning away again.
My throat hurts, my heart pulsing too fast, too hard. I want to wipe his tears away; I want to comfort him, to pull him into me and banish his tormented thoughts into the darkness where they belong. But I don’t know how, or I am not brave enough. And if Ballast is a coward, I am one, too. I could have saved him. I could have saved everyone. But I didn’t.
“You are one of the most powerful Iljaria I’ve ever seen,” I tell him quietly. “You can do whatever you want: Free your mother. Remove your father from his throne.” I study Ballast, his form lanky and taut in unnatural light. I am struck suddenly by his beauty, enough to steal my breath. “Itisn’tyour fault, what happened to me and Saga and all the rest of us. That was your father’s doing. It wasn’t yours.”
“I killed a man.” His voice is raw and ragged. “Just because my father told me to.”
My heart tears. “You did it quickly,” I counter, “as mercifully as you could. Your father meant to be cruel, and you denied him that.”
“But he’s still dead.”
I try not to hear Hilf’s cry in my mind, try not to see his blood pooling over the marble.
“Ballast.” His name sticks in my throat, and he looks at me again, his eyes wet and bright. “Hilf would be dead, with or without you.”
He takes a shuddering breath, and I reach out to touch his arm, his scars rough under my skin. He turns his wrist and grips my fingers like he’s dangling from the edge of a cliff and I’m the only one who can pull him to safety. I grip him back, so tightly I can feel his heart beating with mine, ragged and wild. His heat sears me, like I’ve caught hold of an open flame.
I want to pull him closer, but I’m terrified I will be burned.
“I don’t want you to be afraid of me,” he says frankly, gaze locked hard on mine. “I don’t want you to look at me and see my father.”
“I’m not,” I say. “I don’t.”
His eyes go wet and he lifts his free hand, tracing it ever so lightly over my cheek. I shiver and lean into him. His hand is rough and warm.
“Brynja,” he says quietly, “I—”
“Get away from her!”
I jump nearly through the roof at Saga’s voice, jerking apart from Ballast. Saga stands there, dripping from her bath, eyes blazing with hurt and fury.
My heart is beating too fast, too hard. I can’t seem to catch my breath.
“Don’t touch her,” Saga says to Ballast, low and cold. “Don’t you dare touch her.”
