Page 95 of Of Bargains & Betrayal

It started at the hollow of his throat and wrapped around, ending just under his right ear. That same ear was missing a small chunk of its delicately tapered point and adorned with a couple of metal rings.

When he’d first shown up in my cell, I had a hard time looking past the intimidation he’d clearly tried to wear as some kind of shell, and that was aside from taking in his eyes and horns that screamed anything but my norm. Not that I could blame him for any of his natural being; I could just see anything but that now.

The slight bump on the bridge of his nose.

The loop of inky-black hair that had broken free from his half-tied back strands, shuddering in the breeze.

I really had to pace my observations the farther we traveled from the Keep, because there was no way he wouldn’t notice how my casual observations of the surrounding landscape kept turning into me cocking my head at him.

Maybe this sudden appreciation had a little to do with the fact that Maksym clearly spared my life because of his relationship with Kieran.

After all, could a man really be that deplorable if he’d made such a selfless sacrifice for a stranger loosely associated with someone he clearly cared for? Maksym had tethered himself to me, a complete stranger and alleged criminal, for the rest of our worldly existence, all because, what? Kieran told him we’d been friends half our lifetime ago?

It made him seem more than a little out of his mind, sure.

But it also seemed like I’d read him the act about my big, vulnerable heart when he held one with similar values, just buried a little deeper. Maybe that was what Eilir had meant when he said Maksym was different when he was younger, before his mother was executed and things clearly fell apart for him.

Only time would tell.

“We don’t have much farther, I promise,” Maksym said abruptly, and my attention shot up from the crushed stone path beneath us.

I offered him a small smile. “That’s alright.”

Clearly, I’d stopped paying attention to the surrounding structures some time ago, because the pathway had widened significantly, and the imposing central gate lay only a hundred paces away.

“The cliff flats we hold our pyres on are just a little outside the Keep. They’re part of a strait that’s worked its way in from the sea, and the view can be quite breathtaking if the sky cooperates.” He gestured at the clear night sky, already speckled with the first whisper of stars. “I think we’re in luck.”

I appreciated Maksym attempting to sell me on the place where I was about to watch my countrymen’s bodies burn to ash after their senseless deaths, but it was unnecessary.

He observed my silence for a moment before he nodded and did not say another word to me for the rest of our walk. Not as we cleared the rest of the distance down the roadway, or as we waited for the gates to be pulled open.

Just outside the walls, a path sparsely lined with trees branched to the left, and I followed Maksym down it. The crisp, briny scent I’d caught whispers of around the Keep built steadily as the path wound, taking us down a few sets of crudely hewn steps, until the last of the foliage cleared away, and I halted mid-step.

The flats were breathtaking.

Wide open and jagged, the plateaus of dark rock lowered steadily into a narrow strait that echoed up the dulcet sounds of the ocean. It reminded me of a theater in a way, with how the terraces were formed one over another in staggered layers, all built around a straight drop into the sea as their stage.

But instead of spectators, there were ten pyres laid out on the second-to-lowest flat. Simple wooden structures supported the bodies, all draped in white sheets weighted with fronds, and my chest tightened so quickly, I let out a shaky breath.

Maksym had made it down farther than me when he realized I had stopped, and he turned back. Maybe he’d misinterpreted why I was frozen halfway down the last set of crude steps, because he extended his hand out to me. And maybe I wasn’t handling things as well as I’d hoped, because I took his hand and his help down the rest of the way to the pyres.

The tightness in my chest compounded tenfold when I caught a glance across the split in the bluffs. On one of the opposite plateaus, Eilir and Kieran—or Jasper—were sitting together. I supposed he no longer had such pressing need to wear his hood, but it was jarring to see him sitting there, looking every bit and nothing like the boy I’d known.

And the longer I stood there looking at him, as he watched me back with his eye patch and his messy blond hair, the more the ache in my chest turned into something that wanted to scream.

“He will not bother you,” Maksym said from behind me. “Neither will Eilir. You have both their words and mine.”

I could only scoff as Maksym set his hand on my back and turned me away from the view that had set my entire body on edge.

Had I taken out my anger a little unnecessarily on the sprite? Probably. Their slip-up had been one of complete necessity, and an apology would come once I’d had a night’s rest and a modicum of control over my emotions. But Kieran? His words meant nothing to me. If he’d really cared about not bothering me, he wouldn’t be there at all, making sure I had to be aware of his presence.

He hadn’t known my dead comrades outside of Streja, not in anything more than passing fifteen years ago. He didn’t need to be there, pretending as if he had respects to pay to any of them.

“It turns out, mourning vine does not grow here, not abundantly at least.” We’d come to a stop at a series of crates set out before the pyres, filled with unfamiliar white flowers. “But the groundskeepers found these. Hopefully, they are an acceptable substitute for you.”

Anything was better than nothing, given the circumstances.

“They are, thank you. And you were able to get me paint, or…?”