Author: Victoria Aveyard
Genre: Fantasy, YA
Year: 2017
Series: Red Queen
SUMMARY
This is the highly anticipated new novel from New York Times number one best-selling author of Red Queen.
Mare Barrow is a prisoner, powerless without her lightning, tormented by her mistakes. She lives at the mercy of a boy she once loved, a boy made of lies and betrayal. Now a king, Maven continues weaving his web in an attempt to maintain control over his country – and his prisoner.
As Mare remains trapped in the palace, the remnants of the Red Rebellion continue organizing and expanding. As they prepare for war, no longer able to linger in the shadows, Cal – the exiled prince with his own claim on Mare’s heart – will stop at nothing to bring her back.
In this breathless new novel from the best-selling author of the Red Queen series, blood will turn on blood, and allegiances will be tested on every side. If the Lightning Girl’s spark is gone, who will light the way for the rebellion?
ONE
Mare
I rise to myfeet when he lets me.
The chain jerks me up, pulling on the thorned collar at my throat. Its points dig in, not enough to draw blood—not yet. But I’m already bleeding from the wrists. Slow wounds, worn from days of unconscious captivity in rough, ripping manacles. The color stains my white sleeves dark crimson and bright scarlet, fading from old blood to new in a testament to my ordeal. To show Maven’s court how much I’ve suffered already.
He stands over me, his expression unreadable. The tips of his father’s crown make him seem taller, as if the iron is growing out of his skull. It gleams, each point a curling flame of black metal shot with bronze and silver. I focus on the bitterly familiar thing so I don’t have to look into Maven’s eyes. He draws me in anyway, tugging on another chain I can’t see. Only feel.
One white hand circles my wounded wrist, somehow gentle. In spite of myself, my eyes snap to his face, unable to stay away. His smile is anything but kind. Slim and sharp as a razor, biting at me with every tooth. And his eyes are worst of all. Her eyes, Elara’s eyes. Once I thought them cold, made of living ice. Now I know better. The hottest fires burn blue, and his eyes are no exception.
The shadow of the flame. He is certainly ablaze, but darkness eats at his edges. Bruise-like splotches of black and blue surround eyes bloodshot with silver veins. He has not slept. He’s thinner than I remember, leaner, crueler. His hair, black as a void, has reached his ears, curling at the ends, and his cheeks are still smooth. Sometimes I forget how young he is. How young we both are. Beneath my shift dress, the M brand on my collarbone stings.
Maven turns quickly, my chain tight in his fist, forcing me to move with him. A moon circling a planet.
“Bear witness to this prisoner, this victory,” he says, squaring his shoulders to the vast audience before us. Three hundred Silvers at least, nobles and civilians, guards and officers. I’m painfully aware of the Sentinels on the edge of my vision, their fiery robes a constant reminder of my quickly shrinking cage. My Arven guards are never out of sight either, their white uniforms blinding, their silencing ability suffocating. I might choke on the pressure of their presence.
The king’s voice echoes across the opulent stretches of Caesar’s Square, reverberating through a crowd that responds in kind. There must be microphones and speakers somewhere, to carry the king’s bitter words throughout the city, and no doubt the rest of the kingdom.
“Here is the leader of the Scarlet Guard, Mare Barrow.” In spite of my predicament, I almost snort. Leader. His mother’s death has not stemmed his lies. “A murderer, a terrorist, a great enemy to our kingdom. And now she kneels before us, bare to her blood.”
The chain jerks again, sending me scuttling forward, arms outstretched to catch my balance. I react dully, eyes downcast. So much pageantry. Anger and shame curl through me as I realize the amount of damage this simple act will do to the Scarlet Guard. Reds across Norta will watch me dance on Maven’s strings and think us weak, defeated, unworthy of their attention, effort, or hope. Nothing could be further from the truth. But there isn’t anything I can do, not now, not here, standing on the knife edge of Maven’s mercy. I wonder about Corvium, the military city we saw burning on our way to the Choke. There was rioting after my broadcast message. Was it the first gasp of revolution—or the last? I have no way of knowing. And I doubt anyone will bother to bring me a newspaper.
Cal warned me against the threat of civil war a long time ago, before his father died, before he was left with nothing but a tempestuous lightning girl. Rebellion on both sides, he said. But standing here, leashed before Maven’s court and his Silver kingdom, I see no division. Even though I showed them, told them of Maven’s prison, of their loved ones taken away, of their trust betrayed by a king and his mother—I am still the enemy here. It makes me want to scream, but I know better. Maven’s voice will always be louder than mine.
Are Mom and Dad watching?The thought of it brings a fresh wave of sorrow, and I bite hard against my lip to keep more tears at bay. I know there are video cameras nearby, focused on my face. Even if I can’t feel them anymore, I know. Maven would not miss the opportunity to immortalize my downfall.
Are they about to see me die?
The collar tells me no. Why bother with this spectacle if he’s just going to kill me? Another might feel relieved, but my insides turn cold with fear. He will not kill me. Not Maven. I feel it in his touch. His long, pale fingers still cling to my wrist, while his other hand still holds my leash. Even now, when I am painfully his, he won’t let go. I would prefer death to this cage, to the twisted obsession of a mad boy king.
I remember his notes, each one ending with the same strange lament.
Until we meet again.
He continues speaking, but his voice dulls in my head, the whine of a hornet coming too close, making every nerve stand on edge. I look over my shoulder. My eyes drift through the crowd of courtiers behind us. All of them stand proud and vile in their mourning black. Lord Volo of House Samos and his son, Ptolemus, are splendid in polished, ebony armor with scaled silver sashes from hip to shoulder. At the sight of the latter, I see scarlet, raging red. I fight the urge to lunge and rip the skin from Ptolemus’s face. To stab him through his heart the way he did my brother Shade. The desire shows, and he has the spine to smirk at me. If not for the collar and the silent guards restricting everything I am, I would turn his bones to smoking glass.
Somehow his sister, an enemy of so many months ago, isn’t looking at me. Evangeline, her gown spiked with black crystal, is ever the glittering star of such a violent constellation. I suppose she’ll be queen soon, having suffered her betrothal to Maven long enough. Her gaze is on the king’s back, dark eyes fixed with burning focus on the nape of his neck. A breeze picks up, stirring her glossy curtain of silver hair, blowing it back from her shoulders, but she doesn’t blink. Only after a long moment does she seem to notice me staring. And even then, her eyes barely flick to mine. They are empty of feeling. I am no longer worthy of her attention.
“Mare Barrow is a prisoner of the crown, and she will face the crown and council’s judgment. Her many crimes must be answered for.”
With what?I wonder.
The crowd roars in response, cheering his decree. They are Silvers, but “common,” not of noble descent. While they revel in Maven’s words, his court does not react. In fact, some of them turn gray, angry, stone-faced. None more so than House Merandus, their mourning garb slashed with the dark blue of the dead queen’s wretched colors. While Evangeline did not notice me, they fix on my face with startling intensity. Eyes of burning blue from every direction. I expect to hear their whispers in my head, a dozen voices burrowing like worms through a rotten apple. Instead, there is only silence. Perhaps the Arven officers flanking me are not just jailers, but protectors as well, smothering my ability as well as the abilities of anyone who would use them against me. Maven’s orders, I assume. No one else may hurt me here.
No one but him.
But everything hurts already. It hurts to stand, hurts to move, hurts to think. From the jet crash, from the sounder, from the crushing weight of the silencing guards. And those are only physical wounds. Bruises. Fractures. Pains that will heal if given the time. The same cannot be said of the rest. My brother is dead. I am a prisoner. And I don’t know what really happened to my friends however many days ago when I struck this devil’s bargain. Cal, Kilorn, Cameron, my brothers Bree and Tramy. We left them behind in the clearing, but they were wounded, immobilized, vulnerable. Maven could have sent any number of assassins back to finish what he started. I traded myself for them all, and I don’t even know if it worked.
Maven would tell me if I asked him. I can see it in his face. His eyes dart to mine after every vile sentence, punctuating every lie performed for his adoring subjects. To make sure I’m watching, paying attention, looking at him. Like the child he is.
I will not beg him. Not here. Not like this. I have pride enough for that.
“My mother and father died fighting these animals,” he rails on. “They gave their lives to keep this kingdom whole, to keep you safe.”
Defeated as I am, I can’t help but glare at Maven, meeting his fire with a hiss of my own. We both remember his father’s death. His murder. Queen Elara whispered her way into Cal’s brain, turning the king’s beloved heir into a deadly weapon. Maven and I watched as Cal was forced to become his father’s killer, cutting off the king’s head and any chance Cal had of ruling. I have seen many horrible things since then, and still the memory haunts me.
I don’t remember much of what happened to the queen outside the walls of Corros Prison. The state of her body afterward was testament enough to what unbridled lightning can do to human flesh. I know I killed her without question, without remorse, without regret. My ravaging storm fed by Shade’s sudden death. The last clear image I have of the Corros battle is of him falling, his heart pierced by Ptolemus’s needle of cold, unforgiving steel. Somehow Ptolemus escaped my blind rage, but the queen did not. At least the Colonel and I made sure the world knew what happened to her, displaying her corpse during our broadcast.
I wish Maven had some of her ability, so he could look into my head and see exactly what kind of ending I gave his mother. I want him to feel the pain of loss as terribly as I do.
His eyes are on me as he finishes his memorized speech, one hand outstretched to better display the chain binding me to him. Everything he does is methodical, performed for an image.
“I pledge myself to do the same, to end the Scarlet Guard and the monsters like Mare Barrow, or die in the attempt.”
Die, then,I want to scream.