Page 116 of Diamond & Dawn
Sunder’s hands tightened.
“Not forever?”
“No.” I laughed through my tears. “I think not forever.”
His gaze shifted from my face. He ran his thumb along the line of my jaw and down the side of my throat, catching on diamond splinters. He touched them tenderly, like they reminded him not of metal and conflict, but of chips of ice and frozen kisses. He smiled.
“Not forever,” he promised. “And when I return, I will bring a thousand bright stars to join my moonlit dauphine in the dusk.”
He kissed me, one last time, lingering over my lips and tasting my tears.
“I don’t want to say goodbye.” Snow fell across his alpine eyes.
“Then don’t say anything,” I wept.
I lifted my fingers to his mouth. He kissed my fingertips—all ten. Then he raked hair back from his face, and walked away from me.
I watched him recede down the stairs. Then I crept to the edge of the roof and watched until I saw his entourage set off along the Concordat—a line of black smearing like shadows toward the horizon. He rode at the back, Oleander at his side. And beside her—Luca, his laughter audible all the way from here.
“I don’t want to say goodbye,” I whispered through my tears.
He turned, wheeling his horse to face me once last time. I couldn’t see his face, but his hair caught the low sunlight and shone like a blade in the dim.
And I knew—
I knew I would never be free of him. And I knew I didn’t want to be.
I waited until they disappeared into the bowels of the city. I rose to my feet, scrubbed my tears on my sleeve, and climbed.
The main dome of Coeur d’Or was steep, its gilded tiles slick beneath my feet. A high wind ripped my breath from my lungs and flung it away. But still I climbed. The sword hanging clumsy from my waist spoke a metal promise—it would not let me die so soon. I fit my fingers into narrow chinks and kicked at the roof until it bore me up—up toward the pinnacle of the city I’d dreamed of, so long ago in the dusk.
I stood, clinging to my balance like a dancer. The wind whipped at my dress, unfurling shadows against the diamonds scarring my arms and throat. Slowly, my eyes found the eastern horizon. The Midnight Dominion was nothing more than a smear of dusk beneath purpling clouds, yet as moisture prickled my wide eyes, I swore I could reach out and touch it.
Thibo’s words echoed suddenly in my mind. We’d gone strolling together, a few days before he left for the Sousine with Lullaby—he, thin and preoccupied in his velvet suit, and me, racked with an empire’s worth of decisions. After minutes of silence, he’d finally turned to me on the Esplanade.
I’m not superstitious, Sylvie. The brutal crop of his bronze curls made his face harsh.But I saw things in the Dusklands I can’t explain. Would you believe me if I told you the darkness was coming?
I did. Especially now, with the wind whipping strange voices by my ears and teasing nightmares from my fingertips. I ran a finger over the sunburst pommel of my Relic sword, stealing a filament of comfort from its power. I absently touched the chips of diamond embedded along my throat. I unwrapped the diamond Relic. We gazed at each other for a long, aching moment. My reflection flashed upon its surface.
My eyes were sharp with moonlight. My blade pierced the roof of the sky. Deep beneath the city, something began to move. Something with a thousand shining feet.
I tore my gaze free of the diamond. My chest ached with a thrill of something like love.
The moon’s light could unveil the beauty of the dark. But it could also show your soul strange, deceptive, impossible things.
I looked down at the city spilling away below.Mycity.Myempire.It wasn’t perfect, like I once dreamed. But neither was I. I was born in the dusk, where darkness stole sunlight and shadows had teeth. And perhaps that was where I would always live, no matter how brightly I tried to shine. But I could live with that.
Despite our dire history, I believed Severine. This Relic wanted totake.And perhaps that was the burden of power. But I couldn’t let it take anything I wasn’t willing to give.
Not today. Notyet.
Quickly, with a length of wire I took from the armory, I lashed the diamond Relic to the highest spire on the highest dome of Coeur d’Or. It pulsed at me, cold and angry, as I trapped it where it couldn’t touch, couldn’t tempt, couldn’ttake.
I stepped back. For a moment, the world seemed sliced in half. On one horizon, amber sunlight foamed, and the eye of the Scion cascaded over the city in light and color. And far away—so far I could almost believe I imagined it, beyond the line of shadow at the edge of the world—I saw an answering flare of calm, smooth light. Sunlight and moonlight both kissed my face, then faded away.
I smiled into the light, and smiled beyond it. I smiled into the darkness and knew:
I might someday need the lost Relic, the diamond Relic. TheSoul Relic.
But until that day, I had a new world to dream.
