Dean touched her shoulder. “I will talk to her.”
“Thank you,” she said. “I’m…I’m going to go help where I can.”
Cyrene wandered the camp, doing all that she could. Saying kind words and thank-yous to the soldiers. Eyeing the rounded-up soldiers who had surrendered and determining who should be pardoned. She helped calculate death tolls, which was the most depressing of the lot. And the most painful, cleansing blood magic.
There were still a dozen blood-magic users who had survived. After weeks of regularly feeding off of blood magic, all of them were fiending for another hit. One of them had even attacked one of her soldiers to try to kill him and steal his energy. They had been confined and were being watched day and night since no one knew what to do with them.
Cyrene went to Vera, and they spent the next several hours working together to save the ones they could. Two of them died in the cleansing. And one went mad, babbling incoherently. The rest looked dazed and uncertain about anything that had happened to them. She had to leave them with guards and put Gwynora in charge of determining what to do with the lot.
Then she and Vera wandered back up the cobbled stone steps toward the castle. It was still burning. A full day later, and whatever explosions that had brought the Nit Decus castle down still burned just as hot.
They sent water seekers to the castle to use the Keylani River to douse the flames, but it was slow-moving.
“I have an idea,” Cyrene said. “If you’ll help me.”
Vera saw the glimmer in her eyes and laughed. “I wasn’t sure I’d ever see that rash look cross your face again. You’ve been walking around all day like your head was in the clouds.”
“It’ll take some time to recover. I don’t expect it to happen overnight.”
“You’ll never recover,” Vera said. “Not really. You will just reach a new normal without them.”
Cyrene could see that. And Vera of all people should know. “How are you holding up? I know we’re all celebrating Malysa’s death, but…she was still your sister.”
“I mourned her so long ago,” Vera said. “But killing her was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. And I don’t know if I’ll ever recover either.”
“Let’s help them finish the job,” Cyrene said. “Together.”
Vera took her hand, and a moment later, they were linked. Cyrene was amazed by the vastness of Vera’s magic. She could feel it because of the diamond, but it was something altogether different to link with a god. Even a demigod, as Vera had confided in her. Cyrene had no idea what the difference was. But, if there were some that were stronger than Vera, Cyrene was terrified and hoped they never, ever found Emporia.
As one, they called the clouds to them. Big, heavy rain clouds, like the ones that she had created for Malysa. But this was different. These had a purpose.
They both breathed in deeply at the connection with the weather. A rare talent they had both been given. That in fact Vera had passed down to Cyrene through many generations.
And then the rain clouds emptied onto Byern. The castle sizzled, and steam rose from its shattered facade as the water droplets finished off the work the Tyghan water seekers had been doing. The water seekers all ran for cover at their first sight of rain. Cyrene hadn’t realized how terrified they would be when water came out of the sky, and she had to rush up to reassure them that it was natural. Well, sort of.
Then out of the rubble of the castle, a lone figure emerged.
Cyrene gasped. Kael had reassured her that no one else was left inside. They’d all been evacuated. He’d wanted to make sure that no one who hadn’t volunteered for the army got hurt. Malysa had thought it was a useless effort since she was certain they would win, but Cyrene was glad that he’d done it.
She rushed up to the figure, who was hunched forward and covered in debris. “Hello there,” she called. “Are you well? Do you need a healer?”
The man brushed his hand at her. “I need a good meal. I had to dig myself out of there, and I’m just an old man.”
Cyrene’s eyes widened. “Master Barca?”
He glanced up at her. “Cyrene?”
“Yes, it’s me.”
She glanced behind him, expecting to see Rhea rushing up after him. But he was alone. And his face fell.
“She tricked me. I was going to light the fuse,” Barca said.
“I don’t understand what you’re talking about,” Cyrene said as Vera came up to her side.
“Rhea…my darling Rhea, she said that you needed my genius, and she lit the fuse.”
Cyrene shook her head. “I don’t…”
“She’s gone,” Barca said. “Stayed behind and locked me out.”
“Gone,” Cyrene intoned. A dull ringing filled her ears.
Barca nodded. “She lit the bombs.”
Cyrene understood then. Understood fully. Rhea had stood at her side the morning of the battle. She had told Cyrene that she loved her, knowing what she was going to do. Then she had used her last brilliant creation to bring down the castle. To end the war and all her suffering.
A hole opened up in the ground before her and swallowed her up.
She dropped hard to her knees.
Saw a flash of black.
Felt her hands scrape against the hard ground.
Her oldest friend. The one who had always believed in her. Who had always been there. The person she would have gone to the ends of the earth and back for.
She was gone.
And somehow, Cyrene had to still go on.
75
The Doma Court
Cyrene slowly rose to her feet again. Vera and Barca had tried to steady her, but she had pushed them off. Everyone had lost someone. Everyone. But she knew what Rhea would want her to do. She knew because she’d had nineteen years with Rhea to learn her every thought. Her every beautiful, brilliant idea in her brain.
And Cyrene knew then how to build anew.
She hadn’t let herself think beyond the war. Beyond that, she wanted to have a place where magical users and humans lived together in harmony. A Fen for the entire world. To right the wrongs that had been done in Byern for so long.
It had been Rhea though, years and years before this moment, who put the idea in Cyrene’s head. Rhea had wanted a place for everyone to be able to get the training that Affiliates were afforded. That there shouldn’t be a system to put you into classes to learn. That just the thirst for knowledge should be enough.
And that was how you created a new world. A better world.
You fed the hungry.
Those hungry for knowledge.
Like Cyrene had been. Like Rhea had been.
No matter where that knowledge took them. It was better to feed the flame than let it go out. And she had the means to do it now.
In Rhea’s honor.
Cyrene took a deep breath. “I need to convene a meeting.”
Vera looked at her curiously. “For what?”
“I’ll need you and Barca there. Everyone to be there. Anyone who felt called to lead.”
Then she stepped away from the pair and the crumpled building and toward a new tomorrow.
It took hours to separate all the generals and leaders from the aftermath of the battle. There was still so much to do. Cyrene felt selfish, extricating them their duties, but this had to be done. The only place big enough to hold them all was before the portal door, which Cyrene now stood before.