A ​Sky Beyond the Storm (An Ember in the Ashes, #4)

by Sabaa Tahir

I want sand and stories and a clear night sky. I want to stare up into pale gray eyes filled with love and that edge of wickedness I ache for. I want to know what he said to me in Sadhese, a year and a half ago, when we danced at the Moon Festival in Serra. I want Elias Veturius back.

But once, I was someone else. Who? I wish I knew. I wish—

:( elias come back.

and grab the carved wooden armlet I always find myself working on—though I don’t recall where it came from.

“Elias Veturius yet lives. And it is imperative that he live, for the Great War approaches, and it is not the Soul Catcher who will win it, it is Elias Veturius. It is not the Soul Catcher who is an ember in the ashes, it is Elias Veturius. It is not the Soul Catcher who will spark and burn, ravage and destroy. It is Elias Veturius.”

And I’d have been free of Harper and the maddening desire that muddles my mind and tangles my words whenever he’s near.

What is it you always tell me when I’m too tired to pull a bowstring? Defeat in your mind—” “Is defeat on the battlefield.”

Scholar rebel and a Martial Blood Shrike are friends and the sky didn’t fall in. Whatever shall we do?”

“Don’t let me fall, you idiot.” She lists forward. “Unless you want to carry my carcass the next hundred miles.” “Wouldn’t be the first bleeding time.” It’s not until she grins at me that I realize my voice wasn’t that of the Soul Catcher but of someone else. The person I once was. Elias Veturius.

Awwwwww. Come back.

“The troubles of the human world are not my concern,” the Soul Catcher says, and the finality of his words is chilling. “The Augur asked that I relay the message. He was dying, and I didn’t wish to deny his last request.”

Elias come back!!!!

Beside me, Laia plucks at the knots on her bedroll, then dashes her hand against her eyes. What can I say to her? It is torment to love someone hopelessly, with no chance of requital. There is no salve for it, no cure, no comfort.

POOR LAIA!

so she can mourn in peace.

To mourne somebody you love and they are stil living :(

“Be safe, little sister,” he says, and there is no laughter in his voice anymore. “It’s just us now.”

“Do not invoke his name.” The steel in Darin’s voice reminds me of his mother. “Spiro Teluman was ten times the man you are. As for silence—we are done being silent. Without us, you can’t hope to ever take the Empire back from Keris. You need the Scholars, Pater. Keep that in mind.”

Justice for the Scholars!!!

“Have you forgotten that the Shrike is a woman, Mettias?”

Girl power

“It was an honor to serve by your side, Helene Aquilla,” he says. “Give my best to Elias, if you see him. And for skies’ sake, put Harper out of his misery. Poor bastard deserves a roll in the hay after all you’ve put him through.”

The skeleton is not large. A child, a wooden horse clutched in his shriveled hands. Injured in the attack and left here, perhaps. Or maybe separated from family and abandoned to fend for himself.

<\3

I thought I served a great cause: protecting the Empire. But all I did was protect people who were never in any danger.

“I’m Spiro Teluman. I have been waiting for you.”

Ahhhh!!!!!!

“I’ve known him all my life, Harper. We survived Blackcliff together. Skies, he tried to kill me once or twice when we were Fivers. But when I was crawling through that tunnel, when I knew he was fighting and dying for me, all I could think was that I was so thankful it wasn’t you up there. Because if it had been, we’d have died together.”

“I do not love my family any less than he loved his.” I turn on her, and if she had a body, it would currently sport a black eye. “I lost my mother,” I say. “My father. My sister. My friends. My grandmother. My grandfather. I was betrayed by the Resistance. Betrayed by the first boy I ever loved. Abandoned by Elias. You think I don’t want to sink a dagger into the Commandant’s heart? You think I don’t want to see the Martials suffer for what they have done to my people? I understand loss. But you do not fix loss with mass murder.”

“The river that did this to you,” I say. “I don’t like it.”

Her smile is a lightning flash in the dark. “Are you going to find the bad river, Elias? Make it pay?” “It’s Soul Catcher. And yes.”

“Instead,” she says, “we won Antium with the aid of the Scholars, who conducted themselves with far more bravery than you. Do not mistake me, Kinnius. We are not so desperate for allies that we will tolerate the insults of a man too weak to fight for his people. If you wish to discuss your support for Zacharias, the rightful emperor, then remain. If your fear of Keris is so great that you’d rather spout horse dung, my Blood Shrike will escort you to the city gates.”

yasssssss

“I wish you luck, Laia,” he says. “But I have my own mission. If you’re in trouble, I can’t help.” “I am not expecting you to,” I say. “But if something happens to me—” “Defeat in the mind is defeat on the—” “You Blackcliff types and all your sayings.” I kick his boot. “Listen, for skies’ sake. If something happens, be a brother to Darin for me. Swear you will.” “I don’t—” He takes in my scowl and nods. “I promise,” he says. “Thank you, Soul Catcher.” “Elias,” he says after a moment, the slightest bit of warmth entering those cold gray eyes. “From you I prefer Elias.”

“It’s going to be difficult to act like nothing’s happened if you blush every time you see me, Shrike.”

“By the skies, Soul Catcher,” she says as Musa moves away. “Is that jealousy?” “Do you want it to be?”

“There is no one I’d rather have at my back, Blood Shrike,” he says, and there is a fierceness to his voice that makes my heart ache, that reminds me of all we have survived. “No one.”

“To ignore you, he first has to be aware of you. And he is. He’s aware of every move you make.

“Love can be more powerful in a battle than planning or strategy. Love keeps us fighting. Love drives us to survive.” “Skies, stop meddling—” “I meddle because I hope, aapan.” The humor bleeds from his voice, and I’m certain he’s remembering his beloved, doomed Nikla. “Life is too short not to hope.”

If I seem different, remember that I love you. No matter what happens to me. Say you’ll remember, please. “I remember,” I whisper, and make my way across the jinn grove. “I remember.”

“There’s a question I have been meaning to ask you,” I blurt out, for if I do not ask now, I never will. “But it is from before you took your vow to Mauth. I don’t know if you will remember—” “When it comes to you, I remember everything,”

“That night in the desert, when I was leaving,” he says, his lips so close to my ear that I tremble, a thrill running down my body. “I did say something to you.” He removes another pin. My shirt slides off one shoulder, and the hard muscles of his arm brush against it slowly. “I said: You are my temple.”

His scent intoxicates me, and I inhale so that I might remember it always.

“Laia—” But she shakes her head, gold eyes fiery, and puts a finger against my lips. “You love me,” she says. “And I love you. And that is all that matters this night.”

“Harper,” I say hesitantly. “Avitas . . .” “Mmm?” I love you. Such simple words. But they are not enough. They don’t convey what I mean. “Emifal Firdaant,” I say to him. “You’ve said that before.” He runs his fingers through my hair. “What does it mean?” I cannot quite look at him when I say it. “May death claim me first.” “Ah, no, my love.” He gathers me close. “You cannot go first. I could not make sense of the world if you did.”

I put my hand on Harper’s heart, and lift his to mine. “You got there first, my love,” I whisper. “I envy you so. For how will I endure without you?”

“Gird your loins, Shrike.” Musa gives me a sidelong glance. “You’re about to get quite the promotion.”

“Tell Helene I got my wish, please. Tell her she must live.”

“You’ll go to her?” he asks. At my nod, he tilts his head. “I’m happy,” he says. “If anyone can love her enough for everyone she’s lost, it’s you. I wish you joy, Elias.” Then he too steps into the river.

“Well, boy, what are you waiting for?” She smiles her crooked smile and gives me a shove. “Go to her.”

LXXI: Helene

“How is your heart, Hel?”

“Empress?” He waits for an answer to his question, and I shake myself. “I don’t want to keep you in the Empire”—I can’t quite look at him—“if you don’t want to stay.” “Do you want me to stay?” Despite the arrogance that he wears like armor, I hear a thread of vulnerability in his voice that makes me look up into his dark eyes. “Yes,” I say to his uncertainty. “I want you to stay, Musa.” He lets out a breath. “Thank the skies,” he says. “I don’t actually like bees very much. Little bastards always sting me. And anyway, you need me around.”

“It should have been him dancing with you,” Musa says,

“I wish I could live a thousand lives so I could fall in love with you a thousand times,” he says. “But if all we get is this one, and I share it with you, then I will never want for anything, if—if you—would—if you—” He stops, hands gripped so tight around the armlet that I fear he’ll break it. “Yes. Yes.” I take it from him and put it on. “Yes!”