Chapter 16

Chapter 16

She had expected him to mock her with his usual smirk.

For a long moment he simply watched. Then, with a careful, almost cautious movement, he cupped her cheek and slowly ran his thumb over Sian’s wet lashes, wiping away the moisture. He followed by taking a handkerchief and cleaning the vomit surrounding her mouth and jaw.

Why this sickening show of concern? He’d goaded her into brutal trials and then, after all that, moved tenderly as if nothing had happened. The gesture irritated her.

Sian opened her eyes a sliver and met his face. His handsome features sat there, composed and expressionless.

Even in this moment he wore the look of someone perfectly calm. So assured that it seemed she alone had been toyed with. He was perfectly composed without a single shred of emotion.

The fear that had made her shrink into herself flared into anger. The mind that had teetered under the succession of extremes from earlier collapsed into furious heat.

Sian lost her composure. She swung her hand up, but before she could strike him, she was caught.

Actarachion simply took her wrist in a light grip, a pitying look in his eyes.

Sian ground her teeth, swallowed the first surge of rage, and forced the words out. “Just one hit.”

She couldn’t hold in her anger any longer.

He paused for a moment, then released her wrist without a word.

Crack!

A sharp sound of impact sliced the air. Blood, bright and wet, smeared his previously smooth cheek.

Sian’s expression turned icy. Her palm shook from the slap, but her breathing remained steady.

“I’ve been struck,” he said, tilting his head back into place as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. His tone was flat. He embodied indifference.

She felt drained by his detachment. He could shrug off a slapped cheek as if it meant nothing; the small power she had over him felt utterly negligible. There was no point in showing more.

One blow was enough.

She closed her eyes, feeling the stickiness of dried blood on her palm, and wished, with all her might, to wake up.

* * *

The weak Princess fell asleep quickly.

Actarachion sent her body back from the otherworld, even wiping away the traces of blood. When she opened her eyes she would think she’d simply woken from a nightmare in her lodging.

He’d given what he considered sufficient courtesy. He admitted privately that he’d gone too far, though she was the one who’d agreed to endure this penance. He even let her strike him, so that should have eased his mood.

So why did he feel so uneasy?

Alone in the empty dimension, he stared at the place she’d occupied.

His neat brows crumpled; a frown cut across his forehead. Without the need to feign composure for others, his face showed his emotions..

He had wanted the brazen Princess to be reduced to fear, to hang on his leg in abasement, to have that proud face plead and cling. The thought of her clinging to him, determined to fight even in the face of death, delighted him.

And for a while she’d given him exactly that, which satisfied him until she seized the spear.

Her crying and retching made him uneasy; instead of pleasure it irritated him. Why that irritated him, he couldn’t at first explain. He’d always enjoyed watching people break; it had been one of his amusements. So why hadn’t her tears pleased him?

He clicked his tongue and moved his head. Beside the shattered door lay the copy of the Princess he had fashioned. The mock corpse with its chest pierced. He’d made it look so much like the real thing it chilled him to see it.

His face grew harder.

He’d been unsettled by her fainting. He wondered what would happen if she actually died. Would it matter? He had staged the scene to find out.

It was a foolish thought.

He was overcome with a deep discomfort as he gazed upon the corpse of the woman. He knew it wasn’t her. This wasn’t Sian Heartperion. Why was it that he felt not “regret,” but something closer to “disappointment”?

Why?

After staring for a long moment, he muttered a curse and summoned sacred power.

A pure, distant energy that was fit for gods was used to revive the counterfeit. He pulled the spear free, mended the flesh, and restored mobility.

The replica sat still, wide open eyes staring up at him.

He grabbed the imitation by the hair and tilted its head back. The puppet, though roughly handled, sat obedient like a doll.

When it had been dead it had been frighteningly similar to Sian. Now that it moved, the sickness of likeness faded and the thing looked fake again.

The lingering irritation drifted away.

Then the dimension itself began to crack.

Actarachion crushed the otherworld and pulled himself out.

It wasn’t tenderness. Not that far. But it was intriguing. It was a shame to kill it. He would have regretted losing it completely. That alone explained his actions.

* * *

A sharp spear pierced skin, sliced through flesh, scraped along the back and came free.

Her breath hitched in irregular gasps. Her hands were slick with a warm, sticky feel. Her vision kept blurring and clearing and she felt faint; in it she saw a woman with silver hair.

Staring at that corpse felt like looking into a mirror. In the hazy dead red eyes she could see herself.

A quick, stunned intake of breath brought the metallic scent of blood and every time she felt that retching sensation, her eyes shot open.

Sian felt her fingers tremble and exhaled. Cold sweat soaked her brow.

This was the fourth night already. It was still dark; the clock on the bedside table had barely reached two o’clock.

She had gone four nights with little sleep; dark circles carved themselves under her eyes. Actarachion Jerdin. He was the cause of everything.

“This is infuriating.” She rolled from the bed, hating the insomnia that she feared could become a habit.

The nightmare had been violent and she could not eat on the day she woke up. The vividness of the sensations had lingered and tormented her: the creak of aged hinges or a wooden door made her flinch; looking into reflections felt cruel. The only consolation was that Actarachion hadn’t found her to inflict another dream.

It was such a relief that the penance wasn’t meant to run the full forty-five days.

Sian checked the clock again: 2:05 a.m. Even if she forced herself to sleep now, she’d only get a few tens of minutes; she’d surely wake before three.

It was better to go out for a walk. She pulled the thin blanket around her shoulders like a shawl and stepped into the corridor.

The quiet, moonlit hall welcomed her.

Normally she ought not to be out at this hour, but what did it matter? Midnight taboos had already been broken twice by him; she no longer had to worry about impressing the temple. She even skipped morning prayers now.

All that mattered was enduring Actarachion’s penance for the remaining forty days.

She walked down the corridor wrapped in the blanket until she reached the door leading to the rear garden. No one crossed her path as she slipped outdoors.

Leaves brushed with a soft rustle, like pencil on paper. The moon hung white and the night meadow glimmered silver.

She moved into that clear scene. A cool wind ruffled her silver hair. The chill in the air felt good on her skin after the day’s heat.

A pleasant chill traced her cheek; she pulled her blanket tighter and felt less cold. The tightness in her chest loosened a little.

Sian stood and listened to the scene for a moment before drifting forward in a straight line.

She had no intention of going far. Just a short walk to ease frustration and insomnia. She walked for a few minutes, a quick look toward the woods where the ominous lake hid, and then back.

Near the far back gate, a familiar silhouette on the wall made her scowl. At this hour there was only one person in the temple who might be outside.

A dark suit, ash-colored hair faint in the moonlight, long fingers with a cigarette between them.

It had to be that bastard.

The closer she approached, the angrier she became. 

Of all times and places, why run into him here? Was he going to impose another penance? It hardly seemed a coincidence; her head throbbed with the thought.

Maybe she should just ignore him and pass him by.

She drew the blanket more tightly, passed him leaning against the wall, and reached for the back gate’s latch, completely ignoring him.

“Act like you know me,” he said.

She felt the words but kept going to open the door. The blanket slipped from her shoulders with a soft rustle. There was only one blanket per guest, and she reflexively clutched it, turning back.

There he stood, cigarette in the corner of his mouth. She hadn’t seen him in four days, and seeing him was no comfort.

His dark eyes looked like a nightmare. A gold tie-pin glinted where it fastened his black tie. It felt too bright.

She fixed her gaze on the tie-pin and asked, “Why?”

He held the lit cigarette between two fingers. It was the same brand Dion, who didn’t prefer cigars, sometimes smoked. An oddly precise memory. Sian bit her lip.

“You don’t like cigarettes?” he asked.

“I don’t.”

He ground the butt out against the wall and extinguished it. The sacred wall left no scorch mark thanks to the temple’s protection, so no visible harm remained.

He no doubt did it carefully. Even so, he looked like a delinquent.

He looked like a thug, not a High Priest. She cursed him inwardly, watching only his hand. Then she felt a presence approach; something about it made her recoil. She stumbled a step back.

He didn’t stop. He followed her eyes.

He wasn’t usually this persistent.

Sian was unsettled, but she refused to meet his gaze. She stubbornly clutched the blanket between her fingers.

Before, in the old days, she would have bowed, constrained by propriety. Not now. Once she’d taken the pledge, the only thing left to endure was the penance. She had no intention of tolerating his ill-tempered nature.

A pointless tug-of-war hovered between them, blanket in hand.

Oddly, Actarachion was the first to speak.

“Aren’t you curious where I was just now?”