Chapter Three
Darkness.
That was all Kiva knew — all Kiva was.
Curled up in the corner of a pitch-black cell inside the Abyss, she tried to find the will to survive, her inner demons whispering that she should give up, that everyone hated her and no one would ever forgive her. That there was no reason to keep on living.
Such thoughts had plagued her ever since the angeldust had faded from her blood weeks earlier, but the unnatural darkness of the Abyss amplified them, leaving her slumped over herself and covering her ears, as if doing so might keep the damning voices at bay.
She was in her own personal hell — and it was a hell of her own making.
Kiva had felt the despair of being locked in an isolation cell only once before, right after Jaren had saved her from the Trial by Water. The sensory deprivation had nearly destroyed her, but thanks to Naari’s warning, Kiva had known she would be released for her final Ordeal.
This time, she had no guarantees. All she knew was that the Butcher’s ruddy face had lit with anticipation upon Rooke’s guards delivering her to the punishment block earlier that afternoon, his delight enough that, for one stomach-dropping moment, Kiva had feared he would drag her straight to the flogging post. She still had nightmares about his bloodied whip tearing Jaren’s flesh open. But the Butcher had spared her that cruelty, having other plans for her, other torments.
“Pain fades, but darkness lingers,” he’d said gleefully, dragging her to the Abyss and throwing her in, leaving her with no distractions from her own merciless thoughts.
Guilt, sorrow, shame — they were her constant companions as the seconds crawled by, then the minutes, then the hours. All the while, she saw the same faces over and over again: Jaren, Naari, Tipp, Caldon, Torell.
She heard Jaren’s final words to her: How . . . could . . . you?
She heard Caldon’s dead-sounding warning: You need to run.
She heard Tipp’s wobbling, tear-filled accusation: You’re a C- Corentine?
And then she saw her sister’s smug face, her moon-pale skin and honey- gold eyes laughing as her damning words repeated endlessly in Kiva’s mind: Well done, sister. I couldn’t have done this without you.
If Rooke had wanted to torture Kiva, he couldn’t have picked a better punishment than to lock her in with her own demons. The darkness only made them grow.
“I can’t do this,” Kiva whispered, trembling and rocking in place. “I can’t survive this.”
She didn’t want to survive it. What was the point, when she’d lost so much? There was nothing left for her — nothing, and no one.
She wanted the darkness to take her.
Wanted it to be over.
Wanted it to end.
But then there was a crack of light, momentary and blinding, followed by the groan of another human as they were thrown into the cell with Kiva, their body crashing onto the hard stone as the door slammed shut behind them.
“Sonofabitch,” hissed a familiar voice, weak with pain, near Kiva’s feet.
Kiva wondered if she was dreaming. Or if she was already dead.
“Cresta?”
A grunt of confirmation. “Who the hell else?”
For a moment, Kiva’s mind blanked, but then another pained groan prompted her to feel through the darkness until she found the other girl, the lightest of touches causing Cresta to gasp and flinch away.
“What did they do to you?” Kiva asked, reaching more carefully.
“Where does it hurt?”
A bark of strained laughter left Cresta. “The better questions are, what didn’t they do, and where doesn’t it hurt.”
Kiva halted her searching hands, not wanting to cause more damage.
Hesitantly, she asked, “Is this because of what happened in the tunnels?”
“This may come as a shock,” Cresta said dryly, “but guards like Bones don’t take kindly to prisoners who talk back to them.” There was a rustling sound, followed by a string of muted oaths. When she spoke again, she was panting lightly, her voice now coming from beside Kiva, indicating that
she’d managed to pull herself upright. “It was worth it, just to see his surprise.”
“It’s my fault,” Kiva whispered. “You’re here because of me.”
“I’m here because of me,” Cresta said sharply. “No man should be able to lord his power over those weaker than him. If you hadn’t stopped me, I would have taken great pleasure in turning things physical. Trust me on that.”
Her words triggered one of Kiva’s hazy memories from the early days of her withdrawal, when Cresta had shared about her own family, mentioning that her mother had sought to “survive” her father. Kiva hadn’t needed her to fill in the blanks — by the sounds of it, Cresta had endured a lifetime of abusive men, with today being no different.
“What can I do?” Kiva asked, hovering uselessly. She could see nothing — if not for Cresta’s labored breathing, she wouldn’t have even known the other girl was there.
“You can quit fussing,” Cresta said. “The only reason the Butcher tossed me in here is because he knew you’d be cut up about what he did to me, and the sadistic bastard wanted to add to your torture. But I’ve had worse — and I’ll heal soon enough.” There was a loaded pause, before she added, almost too casually, “Unless you feel like speeding it along with that magic of yours.”
Kiva pushed past her shock and said, almost accusingly, “So you do know who I am.”
Cresta was silent for long enough that Kiva wondered if she’d passed out. But then she replied, her words chosen with care, “When the riot started, I ran straight to the infirmary. I’d been told to keep Tilda alive — she was my ticket out of here. The rebels were going to take me with them when they came for her. Or so I was told.” The last was grumbled under her breath, but then her volume returned to normal. “I didn’t make it in time.
The boy — Tipp — was already on the ground, barely conscious, and Tilda was —” She stopped, as if suddenly remembering who she was talking to, then went on more cautiously, “She heard me approach and reached out, using the last of her strength to pull me close. And then she said your name.”
Through numb lips, Kiva asked, “Did she — did she say anything else?”
“I told her I wasn’t you, but she just tugged me closer and said, Tell her I love her. Tell her I’m sorry. Tell her I tried to . . .”
Tears welled in Kiva’s eyes. “Tried to what?”
Cresta’s voice was uncharacteristically soft when she said, “She wasn’t able to finish.” Quickly, she continued, “I figured the boy was a goner, so I left him and returned to the fighting, furious that the Rebel Queen’s death meant I’d lost my chance to escape — and furious that I’d never figured out who you were. Not until that moment.”
“No one knew,” Kiva said quietly. “No one was meant to know.”
Another pause, and then Cresta said, “You healed the boy.”
Kiva nodded, even if she knew Cresta couldn’t see her.
“But your mother died before you could heal her, too.”
Kiva said nothing, her silence telling.
Cresta blew out a breath. “That’s rough.”
A startled — if pained — laugh left Kiva. “You could say that.” A tear fell down her cheek as she admitted in a whisper, “And that’s not even the worst of it.”
In the darkness of the Abyss, Kiva threw aside caution, realizing it hardly mattered anymore, and told Cresta the rest. Everything she’d kept bottled up for too long came pouring out, starting with how she and her father had been sent to Zalindov and the ten years she’d spent waiting for vengeance, before moving on to how she’d ended up at the River Palace living with her blood enemies — only to discover that they weren’t her enemies at all. She then shared everything that had happened at the masquerade, before finishing with how she’d been drugged and delivered back to Zalindov.
It was only then that Cresta whistled through her teeth and said, “No wonder you’re so messed up.”
Kiva saw no point in responding. It was true — she was messed up.
Beyond repair.
Cresta scoffed, making Kiva realize she’d said the last part out loud.
“There’s no such thing as beyond repair,” the ex-quarrier stated firmly.
“You’re breathing, aren’t you? You’re still alive — that means you can fix what you’ve broken.”
Kiva shook her head in the dark. “There’s no fixing this.”
“Gods, I forgot how stubborn you are,” Cresta muttered. “That assclown tunneler, the one I punched in the face for protecting your virtue or
whatever — he turned out to be your blood-sworn nemesis, didn’t he?”
“‘Nemesis’ is a strong word,” Kiva argued weakly. Under her breath, she added, “So is ‘assclown.’”
“He lied about who he was, and it wasn’t a small lie — it was a life- changing lie, right?” Cresta pushed.
“I lied to him, too,” Kiva defended Jaren. “And my lies continued for longer — and caused much more damage.”
Cresta made a frustrated noise. “Work with me here. He lied to you, but you still forgave him. He represented everything you’d avowed to hate —”
“Avowed?” Kiva pulled a face. “Who says that?”
“— and yet,” Cresta went on, sounding like she was grinding her teeth, “you still managed to fall in love with him.”
Kiva snapped her mouth shut, pain lancing her heart.
“Don’t you think it’s possible that, if he cares for you as deeply as you do him — and from what you said, all evidence is in your favor — then maybe, just maybe, there’s still a chance for you?”
“He won’t forgive me,” Kiva said, her voice raspy now. “And it hardly matters, because I’ll never see —”
“Maybe he won’t,” Cresta agreed, cutting her off. “But after what you did to him, doesn’t he deserve to have you at least try to earn his
forgiveness?”
“There’s nothing I can —”
“And Naari,” Cresta went on, speaking over Kiva’s objections. “I liked her. For a guard, she was half decent.”
She was more than half decent, but Kiva didn’t correct Cresta, certain the redhead would only interrupt her again.
“Something tells me she’ll hold a mean grudge, but even when she was here, it was obvious she cared for you,” Cresta said. “Do you really think she’d want you to roll over and give up? That she’d want you leaving them to the mess you created without even attempting to make things better?”
Kiva’s throat tightened.
“And I can’t speak for the other prince, what’s-his-face —”
“Caldon,” Kiva offered quietly.
“Yeah, him,” Cresta said. “But by the sounds of it, he’s the only one who knew the truth about you, and he still stood by you, even after your sister stabbed his cousin and stole their kingdom. My guess is, it won’t take much to regain his trust, if you ever lost it in the first place.”
Kiva pressed her lips together to keep them from wobbling.
“As for your brother, I have no idea why you think you failed him — he’s the gods-damned general of the rebel forces. If anything, he failed you, by not getting you out of here.”
“He tried,” Kiva croaked, remembering how Torell had attempted to rescue her and Tilda, only to be called off by Zuleeka.
“He should have tried harder — and sooner,” Cresta said firmly, reminding Kiva that she, too, had been awaiting rebel intervention. “And beyond that, he should have figured out what that psychotic sister of yours was up to and stopped her before it was too late. Death magic? Are you kidding me with that?” Cresta made a disbelieving sound. “They say love is
blind, but it’s not that blind.”
“He had no way to know she —”
“And then there’s the boy,” Cresta cut her off — again. “If no one else, you should at least fight for him. You’re all he has.”
The words cut Kiva deep. “He’s better off without me.”
“Do you really believe that?” Cresta asked.
“I lied to him.”
“You lied to everyone.” Cresta’s tone was indifferent. “We’ve already covered this. And so what? Everyone lies. I lie to you all the time, but you’re still sitting beside me.”
Kiva’s forehead scrunched. “What do you lie about?” She then added, “And it’s not like I have a choice. We’re locked in here.”
“That we can’t do anything about,” Cresta said, ignoring Kiva’s first question. “It’s out of our control. But do you know what’s not?”
“What?” Kiva asked, unsure if she wanted to hear the answer.
“We might be stuck in the Abyss — for now — but it’s up to us how we see it. We can look at the darkness and let it consume us, or we can recognize that it’s only temporary, trusting that once it passes, the light will return,” Cresta said. “It’s all about our attitude.” She paused for a beat, then said, quieter, “You used to be a fighter, Kiva. Don’t you think your friends would want you to fight — not just for yourself, but for them? After everything, don’t you owe them that?”
There was a lump in Kiva’s throat that refused to budge. She could hear it in her voice when she forced out the words, “What does it matter? I’ll never see them again.”
“You’ve escaped Zalindov once. Nothing seems to be impossible for you.”
“I had help, though,” Kiva said. “This time, no one knows I’m in here — no one but Zuleeka and Mirryn and the transfer guards I traveled with.”
Cresta made a thoughtful sound. “I’ll admit, that does complicate things. But still, never say never.” Her clothes rustled as she moved again, then a pained moan slipped out, reminding Kiva that she was injured.
Casting her tumultuous thoughts aside, Kiva said, “Before you list all the reasons why I should prepare for a prison break, stay still for a moment and let me heal you.”
She shifted until her palms connected with Cresta’s torso, then closed her eyes, calling forth the magic in her blood. She had no training — no idea what she was doing — but for years her power had lingered just beneath the surface, always waiting for her, ready for her command. Even when she’d buried it as deep as it would go, she’d still felt it whispering to her. It was only after she’d escaped Zalindov that it had started bursting out of her uncontrollably, demanding her attention.
When she tried to summon it now, Kiva was startled to realize that she hadn’t felt the touch of her power in weeks — not since the night of the masquerade.
Opening her eyes again, she saw nothing but the blackness of the Abyss, and her body froze as her mind conjured images of Zuleeka’s shadowy magic. That same evil was inside Kiva. With a single thought, instead of healing Cresta, she could kill her.
“Is something meant to be happening?” Cresta asked impatiently.
“I —” Kiva swallowed. “I just need a second.”
Biting her cheek, she ignored the anxious sweat dotting her skin even in the chilled cell, and banished all thoughts of dark, shadowy magic tendrils.
Her magic was good — it helped others, healed others. She would never use it for evil.
With a steadying inhale, Kiva summoned it again, this time feeling it stir within her. But just as a tinge of golden light began to glow from her hands, panic swept over her, and the light vanished again, leaving them in darkness once more.
In a wry voice, Cresta said, “You’ve picked a hell of a time to have performance issues.”
Shaken, Kiva replied, “I’m sorry. I think — I’m just tired. Magic takes energy, and I don’t have a lot of that these days.”
Surely that was it, Kiva told herself. She was exhausted, underfed, and soul-weary. There was nothing left to fuel her power. That had to be why it had been so quiet for weeks. If she’d had magical training, she might have known how to summon it regardless, but everything she knew about her power had been self-taught. And mostly trial and error — with a lot of luck
thrown in.
That luck had, apparently, run out.
“Don’t worry about it,” Cresta said. “I already told you I’m not that bad — a few days, and I’ll be all better.”
Kiva felt the guilt of her failure wash over her — another failure. Cresta had helped her through so much since her return to Zalindov, and she couldn’t even repay the ex-quarrier by easing her pain.
“It’s almost like I can hear you thinking,” Cresta murmured. “Stop it.
I’m fine.”
“You’re hurt,” Kiva returned. “And I —”
“This is nothing,” Cresta said. “You should have seen what they did to me after the riot. That was unpleasant.”
Kiva winced. She might not have liked Cresta then — it was debatable whether she liked Cresta now — but she’d never enjoyed knowing others were suffering.
“If I’d been smarter, I would have stayed in the infirmary after I realized who you were, since I should have figured out that if you made it through the Trial, you’d go directly to your mother and the boy,” Cresta mused.
“Then I could have escaped with you.”
Kiva tried to picture it — Cresta leaving Zalindov alongside her, Naari, Jaren, and Tipp — but the image was too strange for her mind to conjure. It did, however, prompt her to ask, “All along, you expected the rebels to break you out?”
“Fat lot of good that came to be,” Cresta muttered.
“How did you — I mean — I’ve always wondered —” Kiva tried again.
“How did you become a rebel?”
“Get up.”
Kiva jerked. “What?”
“If you want the answer, you need to earn it,” Cresta said. “So get your ass up.”
Kiva’s brows bunched together. “I don’t —”
“My mother always said movement is the best thing for when you’re feeling down. Stay still for too long, and your troubles only catch up with you,” Cresta said. “You have a lot of troubles, and they’ve been weighing too heavily on you. I told you earlier that you need to get your fighting
spirit back, and that starts now.”
“But, I —”
“Ass up, healer.”
“And do what?” Kiva asked, exasperated. “It’s not like I can go anywhere. This cell is barely large enough for the two of us.”
“Remember what I said about attitude?” Cresta asked. “There’s plenty you can do in a small space. You told me about your training with that
prince — the cousin —”
“Caldon,” Kiva said again.
“Aside from the running, most of what you did focused on strength, balance, and endurance, all using contained movements and repetition.”
Kiva frowned. “Yeah, but —”
“So you’ll do that here. For as long as we’re locked away, you’ll move, you’ll train. It’ll get your blood flowing and cleanse your thoughts,” Cresta said. “And just maybe it’ll stop you from hating yourself long enough for you to see that you do have a reason to live — and that there are people who, despite you believing otherwise, need you to live, too.”
Tears prickled Kiva’s eyes. “Why are you doing this?” she whispered into the darkness. “Why do you care?”
“I didn’t, when you first arrived,” Cresta answered bluntly. “But you’re like an annoying rash — you’ve grown on me.”
Unbidden, a snort left Kiva.
Cresta turned serious then, her voice quieting as she said, “Everyone deserves to have someone fight for them, even — and especially — when they’re unable to fight for themselves. You did that for me, once. You fought for me, you saved my life, and I’ve hated you every day since because it meant that I then had to make the same choice: to fight, and to keep fighting, day after day. And that’s hard. It’s exhausting and it’s painful and it hurts. But I eventually realized that it’s also a part of life, and it will all be worth it one day. I have to believe that — for me, and for you.”
Louder, firmer, she finished, “So get your ass up, healer. It’s time to train.”
A storm of emotion swept through Kiva, frustration, anger, and resentment, but there was also a flicker of something that she hadn’t felt for so long: hope.
Cresta was right — Kiva owed it to those she loved to get up, to keep going, to fight. She had no idea how to make things better, nor did she know if she’d ever get the opportunity, locked away as she was, but if there was the slightest chance that she could earn their forgiveness, then she had to
try. For their sakes — and for hers.
So she stood up.
And then, at Cresta’s urging, Kiva began to go through the exercises Caldon had drilled into her every morning at the River Palace. She didn’t have a wooden box to step onto, so she modified by squatting until her thighs burned. She couldn’t run around the barracks, so she jogged on the spot until her lungs screamed. She didn’t have a practice blade, but she still went through all the lunges and parries she could remember until sweat dripped down her face.
All the while, Cresta fulfilled her promise and shared her tale.
“I already told you that I was ten when my sister overdosed,” she said as Kiva balanced on one foot with her arms stretched high in the air. “A year later, my father lost his temper, worse than ever before, and he started taking that out on me. But my sister jumped in to stop him, defending me with a fury he never expected. He — she — they —” Cresta broke off.
When she started again, her voice was hard and emotionless. “In one night, I lost everyone but my mother. I was barely eleven years old. We were alone and terrified, owning nothing but the clothes on our backs. I still don’t know how we survived those first few weeks.”
Kiva was scarcely breathing, hearing the heartache in every word.
Feeling the heartache. Her right leg began to tremble, so she lowered it back to the ground and swapped to the other foot, raised her hands again, and waited.
“For a long time after that we lived by the mercy of strangers as we traveled from village to village, making our way south out of Mirraven, until we finally managed to sneak illegally into Evalon.”
Kiva was surprised enough to say, “You’re from Mirraven?”
“I was, once,” Cresta said.
“You don’t have an accent.”
“We wanted to blend in after we crossed the border,” Cresta said. “It’s easy to hide what you don’t want others knowing. You of all people should know that.”
Kiva acknowledged her point, and switched legs again.
“For a few years we moved aimlessly, never staying in one place for too long. Mother didn’t have a plan — she was just in survival mode, trying to keep us both alive. But then, when I was sixteen, she got sick. Lungrot. It spread quickly, and soon she was coughing up blood and having trouble breathing.”
Kiva winced. Lungrot was a terrible disease, with very few viable treatments. Patients usually died in a matter of weeks, sometimes days.
“Ever since we’d arrived in Evalon, we’d heard whispers that a Corentine heir had taken over leadership of the rebels,” Cresta went on.
“We didn’t care about the ancient feud between Sarana and Torvin — nor did we care who sat on the Evalonian throne. We wanted nothing to do with a foreign royal dispute, so we stayed far away from any Vallentis or Corentine loyalists, keeping to ourselves and avoiding any personal connections. But when Mother’s sickness left her bedridden, the village healer made a passing comment about Tilda Corentine’s magic, saying it was a pity the rebels weren’t recruiting in the area.”
Kiva thought back to what Torell had shared about the early years of Tilda’s leadership, how she’d used her magic to heal anyone in need. It was only later that she’d begun to make them earn their healing, requiring that they prove themselves loyal to the rebel movement before receiving the reward of her power. If Cresta had been sixteen at the time, then that was around five years ago — Tilda would have still been healing people then.
“I knew it was a slim chance, but Mother was all I had left in the world, and I was willing to do whatever I could to save her,” Cresta said. “So I left her in the care of the healer and took off in search of the Rebel Queen.”
Nearly losing her balance, Kiva wobbled for a moment before steadying again. “Did you find her?”
“No,” Cresta answered in a flat voice. “I followed enough leads to get close to the rebel camp, but then I made the mistake of asking the wrong person for directions. He turned out to be an undercover Royal Guard and arrested me on charges of conspiracy to commit treason.” Her tone turned hoarse as she said, “I received a missive from my mother’s healer right
before I was loaded into the prison wagon, telling me she’d passed. I didn’t even get to say goodbye.”
Kiva set her foot back down, her hands lowering to her sides.
“Cresta . . .” She trailed off, having no idea what to say.
“Didn’t you ever wonder why I tried to kill myself when I first arrived here?” Cresta asked.
Of course Kiva had wondered. But she’d never realized — “You’re not the only person to have felt like you’ve lost everything,”
Cresta said, her voice quiet. It regained strength as she went on, “I meant what I said earlier — I hated you for saving me. Every time I saw you, I remembered that you’d taken that choice from me. In return, I went out of my way to make your life unpleasant.”
Unpleasant was a generous description, Kiva thought.
“But in hindsight, I’m grateful for what you did. So grateful,” Cresta said. “Life is worth living, even the parts that make us feel like we want to die. That’s something I’ve learned in the last five years.” She hesitated, then added, “I know I’ve never said it before, but thank you. I wouldn’t be alive today without you.”
Kiva tried to rein in her emotions as she replied, “You’re welcome. But we both know the same can be said for me. I never would have made it through my withdrawal without your help. Or survived any of the days since then.”
“I thought you didn’t want to survive them?” Cresta asked, her tone pointed.
Kiva huffed out a sound that was part amused, part annoyed. “Turns out, I’ve grown close with this self-righteous ex-quarrier who seems to think I should hang around for a while. Something about making amends and earning forgiveness.”
“She sounds wise,” Cresta noted. “You should listen to her.”
This time, Kiva’s amusement won. Stretching out her tight muscles, she commented, “I still don’t understand how you ended up being a rebel.”
“Despite the impression I gave, I was never one of them — I was just working for them. Sort of,” Cresta answered. “One of the guards here was secretly a rebel, and he recruited me, telling me he’d ignore some of my more problematic indiscretions in return for me reporting back about —”
Cresta broke off suddenly. “Gods, I can’t believe I never realized.”
“What?” Kiva asked.
“Part of my role was to convert prisoners and stir up trouble, but I was also meant to spy on the other inmates, especially you,” Cresta said. “I thought it was just because you were the Warden’s bosom buddy and they wanted someone on the inside watching you both closely. Now I can see that those orders must have come from your family, with them wanting to keep tabs on you.”
Kiva thought back to her decade locked away, with only sporadic coded messages revealing anything about how her mother, brother, and sister were doing, and similarly, only the briefest of details from her own life being sent outside the walls. She didn’t know how she felt, hearing that they’d been keeping an eye on her through other people. But she let it go to say, “You said before that you wanted nothing to do with the feud between my family and — and Jaren’s.” Kiva stumbled a little over his name. “I guess I’m just confused about why you agreed to work with them. Especially after — well, they’re the reason you ended up here, in a roundabout way. Weren’t you angry with them?”
“I was angry with everyone. You know that.”
“Then why —”
“They offered me a deal,” Cresta said. “If I turned enough prisoners to the rebel movement, then they’d come and break us out. I never believed in their cause — I meant what I said about wanting to avoid any royal complications. Corentine, Vallentis, I don’t care who rules Evalon. But I saw an opportunity to earn my freedom, and I took it.”
Kiva mulled over her words, realizing that most people would have done the same thing in Cresta’s position. No wonder she’d been so desperate for Kiva to keep Tilda alive — she’d seen it as her chance, finally, for the rebels to come and free her, free them.
The wheels started turning in Kiva’s head, and she asked, “What happened to the guard? Might he help us get word out to —”
“He’s dead,” Cresta said without feeling. “He was patrolling on the watchtower when it exploded.”
Kiva grimaced. “Who do you report to now?”
“No one,” Cresta said, yawning. “As far as I’m concerned, my rebel days are over. Especially after everything you shared about your sister. Do you really think I’m crazy enough to stay involved in that? No, thank you.”
“She’ll be disappointed,” Kiva murmured, recalling what Zuleeka had said about Cresta: She’s doing great things for our cause, even behind those
walls.
Kiva felt a smug satisfaction in knowing that Cresta had never worked with the rebels out of loyalty, but had cooperated only for pragmatic, self- serving reasons.
“Life is full of disappointments,” Cresta said, yawning again, louder this time. “And besides, I have no desire to be anywhere near someone who can stop my heart with a thought.”
An awkward, strained silence fell, before the redhead coughed and amended, “Present company excluded.”
Instead of allowing dread to grip her, a choked laugh bubbled out of Kiva, the lightness of it surprising her after so long without any joy. And then Cresta was laughing with her, the two of them delirious from a combination of pain and fatigue, and merely from being once-enemies who were now locked in a tight, dark space together after having candidly shared their traumatic pasts.
Only when they finally sobered did Kiva hear Cresta yawn again, prompting her to say, “It’s late. You’ll heal faster if you sleep.”
“And you need to rest so you can continue your exercises tomorrow,”
Cresta returned, her tone daring Kiva to argue.
But Kiva only said, “I know.”
Because something had changed in her — a spark, reignited. After weeks plagued by internal darkness, she was finally able to see a glimpse of light, even if it was just a speck in the distance. She would have to reach for it, to fight for it. But as she was beginning to realize, half the battle was finding the will to try.
And so, as Kiva curled up on the cold ground and closed her eyes, instead of dwelling on everything she’d lost, everyone she’d lost, she summoned their faces again — Jaren, Naari, Caldon, Tipp, Torell — and
thought about how much she loved them.
For them, she would fight.
For them, she would live.
And even if she had no idea how, she would find a way to earn their forgiveness.
Because they deserved that — and so did she.
