The Memory of Fire by callie bates

Author:callie bates
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-06-04T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

“Jahan,” she whispers. She’s shaking. The ruffles quiver.

“El.” This is no simulacrum. This is her, fierce, bright-eyed. Alive.

I start to step forward, but before I can cross to her, she runs to me. Her arms close around my neck. I hug her tight against me, not caring that Bardas Triciphes is here, not caring what he sees or what he thinks. She presses against me, whispering my name over and over. I bury my face in her hair, drinking in her warmth, the feel of her. She’s alive. Somehow, she survived.

Here, in the Deos Deorum. With Bardas Triciphes. Who didn’t so much as mention, in the conversation we just had, that he knew anything of her whereabouts. Or that she even lived.

Gently, reluctantly, I release her. She lets go of me at the same moment, as if the same realization has occurred to her. She’s wearing a new necklace, I see, a thick silver choker. It looks heavy against the mauve gown. But she’s here.

Bardas has closed his mouth. He’s fiddling with his coat cuffs. “I suppose I shouldn’t ask how you got in here…”

“ I might ask why you didn’t mention any of this,” I retort. I feel out of breath. I can’t believe she’s standing before me. I want to touch her again, to reassure myself it’s real. That she’s real.

Bardas looks at the ceiling, as if it might offer him some excuse. “Maybe I hoped to avoid this scene,” he mutters. “We had to think things through. Act carefully.”

I can’t believe this nonsense. “You mean you had to lie to me?”

“You claim we’re allies!” Elanna rears up, hands back on her hips. “But you didn’t tell Jahan they never executed me?”

Bardas winces in the face of our mutual anger. “It was an omission, not a lie…”

“We’ve spent days hoping he’s alive!” Elanna gestures at me. “You know how much he matters to me. Didn’t I tell you, if there was one thing you should do, it was to find Jahan and let him know I lived?”

“He didn’t cooperate the first time,” Bardas retorts. “He grabbed the simulacrum and ran off with it—”

“Because I thought you’d all been discovered!” I exclaim. “Pantoleon’s people told me none of them did it! You said midnight. I waited. I wasn’t going to leave El to rot. So I showed the entire world I’m a sorcerer, for the sake of a damned simulacrum. If you had just told me—”

Bardas throws up his hands. “We couldn’t tell you more! What if someone had found the note?”

“They meant to rescue us both at midnight,” El’s saying at the same time. “Me first, then you. But my mind…I couldn’t walk. Couldn’t think, even to obey commands. They had to carry me out, keeping absolutely silent, then go all the way back for you—but it took too long. By the time they returned, with the simulacrum of you, the witch hunters had found you. I didn’t know what had happened—I could hardly talk…” She stops, brushing a hand over the collar at her throat.

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