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Then you know everything.
My plan to escape, my hopes, my hates.
Everything. No one turned me in to the Augur. I turned myself in.
“It’s a good plan, Elias,” the Augur confirms. “Nearly foolproof. If you wish
to carry it out, I will not stop you.”
TRICK!
my mind screams. But I look into the Augur’s eyes and see no lie
there. What game is he playing? How long have the Augurs known that I want to
desert?
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“We’ve known for months. But it wasn’t until you hid your supplies in the
tunnel this morning that we understood you had committed yourself. We knew
then we had to speak with you.” The Augur nods to the path that leads to the
eastern watchtower. “Walk with me.”
I’m too numb to do anything but follow. If the Augur isn’t trying to keep me
from deserting, then what does he want? What did he mean when he said my
future would be punishment enough? Is he telling me I’ll be caught?
We reach the watchtower, and the sentries stationed there turn and walk away,
as if following a silent order. The Augur and I are alone, looking out over
darkened sand dunes that stretch all the way to the Serran Mountain Range.
“When I hear your thoughts, I’m reminded of Taius the First,” the Augur
says. “Like you, soldiering was in his blood. And like you, he struggled with his
destiny.” The Augur smiles at my stare of disbelief. “Oh, yes. I knew Taius. I
knew his forefathers. My kindred and I have walked this land for a thousand
years, Elias. We chose Taius to create the Empire, just as we chose you, five
hundred years later, to serve it.”
Impossible
,
my logical mind insists.
Shut it, logical mind.
If this man can read minds, then immortality seems like
the next reasonable step. Does this mean all that drivel about the Augurs being
possessed by spirits of the dead is true? If only Helene could see me. How she’d
gloat.
I watch the Augur out of the corner of my eye. As I take in his profile, I find
that it’s suddenly, oddly familiar.
“My name is Cain, Elias. I brought you to Blackcliff. I chose you.”
Condemned me, more like.
I try not to think of the dark morning the Empire
claimed me, but it haunts my dreams still. The soldiers surrounding the Saif
caravan, dragging me from my bed. Mamie Rila, my foster mother, shrieking at
them until her brothers pulled her back. My foster brother, Shan, rubbing the
sleep from his eyes, bewildered, asking when I would return. And this man, this
thing, pulling me to a waiting horse with the barest explanation.
You’ve been
chosen. You will come with me.
In my terrified child’s mind, the Augur seemed larger, more menacing. Now,
he comes to my shoulder and looks as if a stiff wind could knock him into the
grave.
“I imagine you’ve chosen thousands of children over the years.” I take care to
keep my tone respectful. “That’s your job, isn’t it?”
“But you are the one I remember best. For the Augurs dream the future: all
52
outcomes, all possibilities. And you are woven through every dream. A thread of
silver in a tapestry of night.”
“And here I thought you drew my name out of a hat.”
“Hear me, Elias Veturius.” The Augur ignores my barb, and though his voice
is no louder than it was a moment ago, his words are wrapped in iron, weighted
down in certainty. “The Foretelling is truth. A truth you will soon face. You seek
to run. You seek to abandon your duty. But you cannot escape your destiny.”
“Destiny?” I laugh, a bitter thing. “What destiny?”
Everything here is blood and violence. After I graduate tomorrow, nothing
will change. The missions, the rote viciousness, will wear me down until there’s
nothing left of the boy the Augurs stole fourteen years ago. Maybe that’s a type
of destiny. But it’s not one I’d choose for myself.
“This life is not always what we think it will be,” Cain says. “You are an
ember in the ashes, Elias Veturius. You will spark and burn, ravage and destroy.
You cannot change it. You cannot stop it.”
“I don’t want—”
“What you want doesn’t matter. Tomorrow you must make a choice. Between
deserting and doing your duty. Between running from your destiny and facing it.
If you desert, the Augurs will not stop you. You will escape. You will leave the
Empire. You will live. But you will find no solace in doing so. Your enemies will
hunt you. Shadows will bloom in your heart, and you will become everything
you hate—evil, merciless, cruel. You will be chained to the darkness within
yourself as surely as if chained to the walls of a prison cell.”
He moves toward me, his black eyes pitiless. “But if you stay, if you do your
duty, you have a chance to break the bonds between you and the Empire forever.
You have a chance at greatness you cannot conceive. You have a chance at true
freedom—of body and of soul.”
“What do you mean, if I stay and do my duty? What duty?”
“You’ll know when the time comes, Elias. You must trust me.”
“How can I trust you when you won’t explain what you mean? What duty?
My first mission? My second? How many Scholars will I have to torment? How
much evil will I commit before I’m free?”
Cain’s eyes are fixed on my face as he takes one step away from me and then
another.
“When can I leave the Empire? In a month? A year? Cain!”
He fades as quickly as a star into the dawn. I reach out to grab him, to force
him to stay and answer me. But my hand finds only air.
53
K
IX: Laia
eenan pulls me to a cavern door, and I hang limp, my breath gone from
my body. His mouth moves, but I can’t hear what he’s saying. All I can
hear are Darin’s screams echoing in my ears.
I’ll never see my brother again. The Martials will sell him if he’s lucky and
kill him if he’s not. Either way, there’s nothing I can do about it.
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