Fallen City by Adrienne Young - 37

Vale stared stoically at the fissured wall as each of the Centurions took turns reporting on the losses of their legionnaires.

“And the other watchtowers?” Vale asked, arms crossed over his chest.

Roskia stepped forward. “From what we can tell, the three left standing didn’t sustain much damage. They’re sound.”

That was at least one bit of good news. The towers were the only places that were feasible to operate the larger artillery. Without them, we’d be stuck fighting hand to hand with soldiers coming over the walls.

“What about the Lower City?” Vale continued.

“Many structures sustained damage. Only six structures fell.”

“Only?” Vale’s tone took on an edge. “And the citizens?”

Another Centurion’s eyes cut to me, hesitant. “There’s no way to know just yet. It will take days to search the debris.”

Vale didn’t like that answer. “Then we get every set of hands available to do the job. The bodies will be wrapped and burned. No exceptions.”

The Centurions responded with a collective grunt. With the legionnaires defending the walls, there were those who wouldn’t likely know the fate of their own families for days. Maybe that was best.

In the distance, a line of men, women, and children stretched from the bank of the river, hauling buckets of water toward the remaining flames in the Lower City. The blackened rooftops looked like a barrel fire of smoking coals, and I tried not to think about who may have been inside the homes when the flaming stones and bolts landed.

Valshad’s fire hadn’t reached the river and I now suspected that wasn’t luck. The towers of the Illyrium still stood, only one pillar of smoke rising from its roof in the distance. The attack had missed the temple, and the buildings that surrounded it were also untouched, which meant Valshad had taken care with their aim. I didn’t like what that might mean.

The Citadel was being protected. So was the district. We’d thought the Consul and the Magistrates were mad, but this wasn’t madness. It was desperation. For weeks, months maybe, the Consul had been orchestrating the one strategy no one could ever predict. The city had fallen, the Loyal Legion all but gone, and even the Forum was half emptied of its Magistrates. We’d been hours from crossing the Sophanes to take the Citadel, and the only things he had now were the Priestess Ophelius and the grain. Both of which could be used in a bargain with Valshad.

“Matius.” Vale’s voice broke through the storm of thoughts in my head and I looked up to see him staring at me. “Do you agree?”

I nodded, unsure what he’d even said.

“As soon as you have numbers, I want to hear them.” Vale was talking to the Centurions again.

He dismissed them with a nod and they dispersed, headed to gather their own cohorts. All except Roskia. He waited for the others to get out of earshot before he spoke.

“You know what must be done, Saturian,” he said, his voice level and calm.

Vale waited. I watched his face, trying to read where this conversation was going. But he looked unsure.

“This could have been avoided if you had allowed yourself to part from your own sentimentality. It’s past time to act,” Roskia said.

“Are you saying this is our doing?” I snapped.

Roskia shook his head. “If we’d stormed the Citadel weeks ago like we should have, Valshad wouldn’t be at the gates.”

“You don’t know that,” I said.

“I think I do.” He kept his tone respectful, but I could see in Roskia’s eyes that he was resolved. That coldness within him was crackling just below the surface.

I was losing my patience now. “Murdering the Consul and his Magistrates isn’t a solution, Roskia.”

“Murder and justice are not the same thing. There are plenty of legionnaires behind me who would agree,” he replied.

That single statement was enough to put Vale on guard. With Roskia, we were always dancing on the edge of a threat. He knew that with the right words, the right angle, he could turn this legion into a bloodthirsty mob. He was just waiting for the right moment to do it.

Roskia kept his voice even. “We need to get across the river and deal with the Consul. Now. We never should have waited this long.”

“I agree,” Vale said.

My eyes snapped up.

Roskia’s brows lifted. “What are you saying?”

“We should have pushed into the district weeks ago. We shouldn’t have stopped the line at the river,” Vale continued.

My jaw clenched and I bit back the words I wanted to say. We were close, much too close, to our own desperate measures.

“But right now, we have to secure the gates,” Vale continued.

The three of us fell silent, the false hope in the words making me tense. There wasn’t one among us who couldn’t see how this ended. We didn’t have the men or the weapons to hold off an attack by Valshad.

“And then we decide how to handle the district.” Vale exhaled.

Roskia nodded, a sense of arrogance in the way his chin lifted. I waited for him to look at me with a measure of satisfaction, but he didn’t. He didn’t have to. In this war we’d been waging between us for months, he had finally gained some ground.

Roskia turned to leave us and Vale started toward the gates. I followed him into the smoke as the winding, empty streets took us into the heart of the Lower City.

“You can’t be serious, Vale,” I finally said.

Instantly, he stopped walking, turning to face me. He was only inches away, his dark eyes blackening. “What exactly would you like me to do, Luca?”

“It sounded like you were close to sanctioning the execution of everyone in the district. You know that’s what Roskia wants.”

“Maybe he’s right to want it.” Vale’s voice rose. “Maybe we should have cut their throats a year ago.”

I squared my shoulders to him. “We agreed from the beginning that we wouldn’t be who they are.”

“There is no we, Luca.”

I flinched.

“You tell yourself there is, but it isn’t true. You had your chance to lead, and you didn’t want it. So, now I have to take what’s left and do what I have to. There aren’t any options here. We were fooling ourselves to think there was a clean way to do any of this.”

“Nothing about this has been clean. People have died. The city is in ruin.”

“What did you think was going to happen?” He was shouting now. “You want revolution, but you don’t want to pay the cost. You don’t want to sacrifice.”

“I have sacrificed everything. ”

“Is that true?” His voice lowered.

“What?”

“You watched the Consul and the Magistrates murder Vitrasian right in front of you, but you won’t walk across the bridge and give them your vengeance. But if it were her … if it were her, you’d bathe yourself in the blood of your own brother. If I had my knife to her throat, you’d draw your own blade against me. ”

I could feel the rising tide of rage consuming me inch by inch. What he was saying was the closest he’d ever been to turning against me. I hadn’t thought that was possible.

“Deny it,” he dared me.

When I said nothing, he laughed bitterly.

I leveled my gaze at him, letting the truth of the words bleed into my voice. “Don’t put me in that position, Vale.”

There was nothing lost in my meaning. I’d started a war with him, fought beside him, but none of that would stand against the lengths I would go to in order to be sure that I never saw Maris hanging from the bridge.

“All of this”—he lifted his arms around him, his face falling—“I’ve done for you. For all of us. But everything you do is for Casperia.”

I swallowed down the words I was thinking, as if that would make them untrue. But Vale wasn’t wrong. About any of it.

“Centurion.” Théo’s low voice was suddenly at my back, making both Vale and me look up. Asinia stood behind him.

Théo’s face was still streaked with ash, and when Vale saw him, his expression darkened.

“Where the hell were you?” he growled.

I went to step between them, but I wasn’t fast enough. Vale shoved Théo in the chest with both hands, and Théo took the brunt of its force, feet planted on the ground. But he didn’t say a word.

Behind him, Asinia was visibly restraining himself, grip tight on his javelin.

“You’re a tribune! Your Centurion nearly died today!” Vale roared, shoving him again.

Théo’s gaze met mine for a split second, his jaw tight. “I’m sorry, Commander.”

If he was ever going to betray me, now would be the time. But Théo was unwavering in the set of his mouth, the line of his shoulders. Not for the first time, I had to ask myself why.

Théo lifted a small scroll in Vale’s direction. “A falcon just arrived with this.”

Vale snatched it from him, turning the scroll over in his hands until I could see the seal that was pressed into the wax. It was the seal of Valshad.

He hesitated before he broke the seal with the blade of his knife and unrolled it.

“They want to meet,” Vale said heavily.

The irony of it was palpable in the air between us. Only days ago, we’d sent the same request to the Consul. We’d had the upper hand, in a position to make our own demands. Now we were on the other end of that message.

“What will you do?” I asked.

“I’ll accept.” He folded the message, eyes moving over the city in the distance. “It’s not as if we have much choice.”

I was surprised to hear him use the word we, though whether he’d said it out of intention or habit, I didn’t know. The divide that had opened between us only moments ago was something I didn’t know how to cross with him.

“Send the falcon back and tell them that we accept.” His gaze dropped to my arm. It was still bleeding. “And then get his arm taken care of.”

Théo looked to me, waiting for permission, and I nodded.

Asinia followed him out, and we stood in a knife-edge silence before I finally spoke. “What you said…”

Vale lifted a hand, stopping me. “I’m sorry. It’s not fair to use her against you.”

“But you weren’t wrong.”

The look he gave me told me that he knew it was true. “I know.”

“It’s the reason you’re wearing the mantle of the Commander. Not me.”

For the first time in maybe months, Vale let his gaze lift to the ring of gold that arced in the air over the crown of my head.

“You’ll come with me?” he asked.

“Of course.” My eyes landed on the scroll. “What do you think they want?”

“I think they want what they’ve never been able to get—vengeance. And I think they will have it.”