Chapter Twenty-Six
Annora
A breeze driftsthrough my open window the next morning, rustling the parchment scattered across my desk. My pulse thrums in my throat as I grab the half-finished sketch of Jasce and blow away the excess charcoal dust, then trace my fingertips along the curve of his lips.
If only he were here. If only he could kiss me.
I sigh when my sleeve snags on the edge of the parchment, smearing part of his jawline. The imperfection somehow makes the drawing more real, more honest—like the way his hair falls over his forehead after training, or how his formal clothes never sit right because he can’t stop fidgeting with the collar.
A knock against my door jolts me from my sketching, and I glance up, wondering if it’s Tahira and Emerin. They usually join me in the morning.
Three more knocks quickly follow, each one harder than the last.
“I’m coming,” I call out as I move to the door and open it.
Instead of my sisters, Aleksander fills the doorway. The usual playful glint in his eyes is gone, replaced by something fiercer.
I turn away and hurry to the table, where my veil lies draped across a stack of books. My fingers tremble as I snatch it up and secure it over my face. When I turn back, ready to face his revulsion, his expression hasn’t shifted. No disgust twists his features. No pity softens his gaze.
“Come with me,” he commands, his voice devoid of the warmth it held these past weeks.
Apprehension prickles against my skin, fear that something has changed. “What’s wrong?”
“Now, Annora,” he snaps in a voice as cold as the northern winds.
This isn’t the same man who helped me distribute grain to the hungry, the one who defended me in the tavern. No. This is the Aleksander who bound my magic to his. The one who locked Emerin away.
I swallow through the dryness in my throat and step into the corridor as Aleksander turns and walks ahead of me.
Just yesterday, he helped Tahira arrange flowers in the great hall, teasing her about her choice of colors. Now his shoulders are rigid, his spine straight.
He glances over his shoulder. “Keep up, Annora.”
I grit my teeth and quicken my pace. “Where are we going?”
“You’ll see.”
What could have happened to make him behave this way? Is it something I’ve done? Something Asha said?
As we turn down another corridor, it takes everything in me to keep walking, to keep following him.
We descend a flight of stairs and head toward one of the side doors, where he pauses for a beat, then shoves it open. Sunlight floods the stairwell, and I blink against the sudden brightness as I follow him into the courtyard.
My heart seizes the moment I recognize the courtyard as the same one my grandfather used to execute his prisoners. So many people died here. So many families were fractured here.
Today, there is no crowd—only three men standing on the gallows, each one chained to an iron bracket. All three have gaunt faces and empty eyes, as if they died a long time ago.
My heart clenches as I stumble back a step, wanting to be anywhere but here.
Aleksander fixes me with a piercing stare as he speaks in the coldest voice I have ever heard. “Use your magic to kill them, Annora.”
No. No. N—
Horror slices through me as I obey, chanting those ancient Hematite words. Flames curl around my hands, then tear from my fingertips, engulfing the first man. His screams rip through the courtyard as my magic surges again, hurtling toward the second man.
My heart sinks as I unleash the final volley toward the last man, and he falls to the ground, his body crumbling into ash and dust.
I blink, unable to look away, unable to unsee what I have done. What I have destroyed. Horror claws at my insides, my chest, my lungs, but I still cannot look away.
