Ruthless Vows (Letters of Enchantment, Book 2)

Dear Kitt,

I’m becoming a girl made of regrets.

Every morning, I wake from my gray, dreamless sleep and I think of you. I wonder where you are. If you are hurt or hungry or afraid. I wonder if you are above or below ground, if Dacre has chained you to the heart of the earth, so far down in his domain that I have no chance of ever finding you.

I wish that I had never let go of your hand that day. I should have stayed at your side when we were trying to help the soldiers on the hill. I should have refused to let the gas come between us. I should have known my brother wasn’t you. If I had done even one of these things, then you and I would still be together.

The front door opened.

Iris stopped typing, holding her breath. But she recognized the sound of Forest’s steps, and she quickly rose from her place on the floor, emerging from her bedroom to greet him.

He was knocking rain from his coat and boots. It was nearly evening, and Iris hadn’t known where he was. She hated how it tore the scab off a half-healed wound within her—all those hours her mother had come home late, and all the moments Iris had been worried about her but had done nothing about it.

Yet another thing Iris regretted.

Forest sniffed and froze. He glanced up, rain shining on his face, to meet Iris’s gaze from across the room.

“Were you smoking a cigar?” he asked, unable to hide his shock.

Iris winced. She should have done a better job of airing out the flat. “No.”

“Someone was here, then. Who? Did they hurt you?”

“No. I mean, yes,” she said, rubbing her brow. How much to say to Forest? “My father-in-law dropped in for a visit. He was asking me about Roman. Asking me where he is.”

Forest heaved a sigh. He bolted the door behind him and walked to the kitchen table to set down a paper bag. Dinner, by the smell of it.

“And what did you tell him?” he asked in a careful tone.

“That Roman isn’t in Oath. I didn’t say anything about Dacre.”

Forest set out two sandwiches, wrapped in newspaper. But Iris could see his jaw working, as if he were debating what he should say.

“Here, sit and eat,” he finally said, drawing out one of the kitchen chairs. “I got your favorite.”

Iris sat across the table from her brother, unwrapping her sandwich. It was indeed her favorite—turkey on rye with an extra slice of red onion—and her heart warmed until she saw there was a pickle resting on the bread. She had to swallow the lump in her throat. Swallow down the vivid memories of Roman again, that day she had sat beside him on a park bench, seeing who he truly was for the first time.

They ate in silence. Iris was coming to learn that Forest was very quiet these days. They both were, often finding themselves drawn inward. She was surprised when her brother gruffly broke the awkwardness.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t here when you got home from work today.” He paused, wiping the crumbs from his shirt. “I’ve been interviewing, trying to find a job.”

Iris’s brows rose. “Oh? That’s great news, Forest. Are you thinking to return to the horologist’s shop?”

Forest shook his head. “No. Too many questions if I go back there. They knew I enlisted and I don’t want to have to explain what happened.”

Iris understood. But she also didn’t want her brother to feel like he had to keep to the shadows and completely restart his life, all because Dacre had set his claws in him, manipulating him like a puppet.

She opened her mouth to say this, but then caught the words.

Forest glanced up. “What is it?”

“Nothing. It’s just … I’m proud of you.”

Her brother’s face creased. He suddenly looked like he was battling tears, and Iris rushed to add, in a lighter voice, “And it would be nice if you left a note for me, so I know you’re out but will be back. So I don’t worry. I actually got off work early today. Helena gave me and Attie the day off, and—”

“Why did she give you the day off?” Forest interjected, like he sensed the brewing storm.

Iris curled her tongue behind her teeth. Well, she thought, there’s no sense in delaying the inevitable.

“Iris?”

“Helena has asked me and Attie to return to the front.”

“Of course she has.” Forest tossed down the remainder of his sandwich. “You’ve only been back two weeks and she’s ready to send you off again!”

“It’s my job, Forest.”

“And you’re my sister! My little sister who I should have been protecting.” He dragged his hand through his damp hair, his lips pressing into a thin line. “I should have never left you and Mum. I should have stayed here, and none of this would have happened.”

This.

Forest being wounded and healed by Dacre, fighting for the enemy. Their mum succumbing to the bottle, being struck by a tram on a drunken walk home. Iris going to the front lines to report on the war, nearly blown to pieces by a grenade during the barrage.

It all felt hopelessly tangled, one thread entwined with the next.

“Why did you go?” Iris asked, so softly she wondered if Forest would ignore it.

She already knew part of the answer: her brother had enlisted because he had heard Enva playing her harp one evening on his walk home from work. And that song had pierced his heart with the truth about the war. For a complete stanza, Forest had seen the trenches as if he had been there. The wake of devastation Dacre’s forces left behind in small rural towns. Smoke and blood and ash that fell like snow.

“Do you mean what was I fighting for?” he countered.

Iris nodded.

Forest was quiet, picking a hangnail, but then he said, “I was fighting for us. I was fighting for your future. For mine. For the people in the west who needed aid. It wasn’t for Enva. Not really. She never once appeared at the front. She never once guided our forces after getting us to enlist.”

“And I write for the same reasons,” Iris said. “Knowing that … will you still keep me from going?”

Forest sighed, but he looked haggard. He placed a hand over his waist, and Iris knew he was touching one of his scars.

She wondered if the old wounds were hurting him. Three bullet holes had torn through his body, two hitting vital organs. He should be dead, Iris thought with an icy shiver. He should be dead, and I don’t know if I should be thankful to Dacre for saving him, or furious that my brother now lives with such painful scars.

“Your wounds, Forest,” she said, making to rise from the table. She wanted to ease the anguish he still felt but was at an utter loss when it came to helping him. Honestly, Forest didn’t like her to acknowledge his injuries at all.

“I’m fine,” he said, picking up his sandwich. He took a bite, but his face was pallid. “Sit down and eat, Iris.”

“Have you thought about visiting the doctor?” she asked. “I think it would be good to go.”

“I don’t need a doctor.”

She lowered herself back to the chair. The past fortnight, she had respected Forest’s desire for privacy, and she had held most of her questions captive. But now she was about to leave, whether Forest gave his blessing or not. She was about to move toward Dacre again—toward Roman—and she needed to know more.

“Do your scars hurt you all the time?” she said.

“No. Don’t worry about me.”

She didn’t believe him. She could tell he didn’t feel well on most days, and the thought was painful to her. “What if I went with you to the doctor, Forest?”

“And what are we going to tell them? How am I to explain how I lived with such mortal wounds? How I was healed when I should be dead?”

Iris glanced away, to hide the sheen in her eyes.

Forest fell silent, his face flushing as if he felt guilty for his short temper. Softly, he whispered, “Look at me, Little Flower.”

She did, biting the inside of her cheek.

“I know you’re thinking about Roman,” he said, changing the topic so abruptly that it startled her. “I know you’re worried about him. But chances are that Dacre has him very close right now. Healing his wounds, stripping away all connections he once had. Connections like Roman’s family, his life in Oath, the things he once dreamt of. You, even. Anything that would interfere with his service and entice him to escape like I did.”

Iris blinked. A tear trickled down her cheek, and she quickly wiped it away, looking at Forest’s neck. He still wore their mother’s golden locket. The tangible thing that had given him the strength to slip from Dacre’s clutches.

“Are you saying that Kitt won’t remember me?”

“Yes.”

Iris felt her stomach wind into a knot. It hurt to breathe, and she rubbed her collarbone. “I don’t think he would forget.”

“Listen to me,” Forest said, leaning across the table. “I know more than you about this. I know—”

“So you like to remind me!” she cried, unable to stop herself. “You tell me you know more, and yet you hardly tell me a thing. You give me bits and pieces, and if you would just be forthright with me—if you would tell me the entire story—then maybe I could understand!”

Her brother was silent, but he held her gaze. Iris’s anger was like a flare, short-lived and bright for only a second. She hated this; she hated being at odds with him. She sank back into her chair as if the wind had been knocked from her.

“I don’t want you to return to the front,” Forest finally said. “It’s too dangerous. And there’s nothing you can do for Roman but remain safe yourself, as he would want. He won’t remember you, at least not for a good long while.” He crumpled the newspaper around the scraps of his sandwich. The conversation was over, and he rose to toss his dinner in the dustbin.

Iris watched as he retreated to their mother’s old room, which he had taken for his own since they had returned home. He didn’t slam the door, but the sound of it closing jarred her.

She wrapped up the remainder of her sandwich and set it in the icebox before returning to her room. She looked at the typewriter sitting on the floor, just as she had left it, with paper curling from the platen. A half-inked letter addressed to Roman in its clutches.

Iris didn’t know why she was writing to him. This typewriter was ordinary; the magical link between her and Roman was broken. But she pulled the paper free and folded it. She slipped it under her wardrobe door and waited a few breaths.

When she opened the closet, it was just as she expected. Her letter was still there, sitting on the shadowed floor.

Sometime deep into the night, Iris was woken by the sound of music.

She sat up in bed with a shiver, listening. The song was faint but incandescent, a crescendo of notes played on a lone violin. Light flickered beneath her bedroom door, eating at the darkness, and there was the faint scent of smoke. It all felt strangely familiar, like she had lived this moment before, and she slipped from her bed, coaxed from her room by the music and that hint of comfort.

To her shock, she found her mother in the living room.

Aster sat on the couch wrapped in her favorite purple coat, her bare feet propped on the coffee table. A cigarette burned between her fingers and her head was angled back, eyes closed. Her lashes were dark against her pale face, but she looked at peace as she listened.

Iris swallowed hard. Her voice was ragged when she spoke.

“Mum?”

Aster’s eyes fluttered open. Through the curl of smoke, she met Iris’s gaze and smiled.

“Hi, sweetheart. Do you want to join me?”

Iris nodded and sat beside her mother on the couch, her mind full of fog and confusion. There was something she needed to remember, but she couldn’t quite grasp it. She must have been frowning, because Aster took her hand.

“Don’t think too hard, Iris,” she said. “Just listen to the instrument.”

The tension clinging to Iris’s shoulders eased; she let the music trickle through her, and she didn’t realize how parched she was for the notes, how daily life had become a drought without the sound of strings to refresh the hours.

“Isn’t this against the chancellor’s law?” she asked her mother. “To listen to music like this?”

Aster took a long draw on her cigarette, but her eyes gleamed like embers in the dim light. “Do you think something so lovely could ever be illegal, Iris?”

“No, Mum. But I thought…”

“Just listen,” Aster whispered again. “Listen to the notes, darling.”

Iris glanced across the room and noticed Nan’s radio on the sideboard. The music poured from the small speaker, clear as if the violinist stood in their presence, and Iris was so pleased to see the radio that she rose and crossed the room.

“I thought it was lost,” she said, reaching out to trace its dial.

Her fingers passed through the radio. She watched, astounded, as it melted into a puddle of silver and brown and gold. The music suddenly became dissonant, a screech of a bow on too-tight strings, and Iris whirled, eyes widening as Aster began to fade.

“Mum, wait!” Iris lunged across the room. “Mum!”

Aster was nothing more than a smudge of violet paint, woven with smoke and smeared with ash, and Iris screamed again as she tried to hold her mother.

“Don’t go! Don’t leave me like this!”

A sob cracked her voice. It felt like she held the ocean in her chest, her lungs drowning in salty water, and she gasped as a warm hand on her shoulder became a sudden anchor, pulling her up to the surface.

“Iris, wake up,” said a deep voice. “It’s only a dream.”

Iris startled awake. She blinked against a wash of gray light to see Forest sitting on the edge of her bed.

“It was just a dream,” he repeated, although he looked just as shaken as her. “It’s all right.”

Iris made a strangled noise. Her heartbeat was rapid, but she nodded, gradually returning to her body. The vision of Aster clung to her, though, as if burned behind her eyes. She realized it was the first time she had dreamt in weeks.

“Forest? What time is it?”

“Half past eight.”

“Shit!” Iris lurched upright. “I’m late to work.”

“Take it easy,” Forest said, his hand falling from her shoulder. “And since when do you curse?”

Since you left, Iris thought but didn’t say, because while part of that was true, part of it wasn’t. She couldn’t blame her brother for the words that came out of her mouth these days.

“Dress for rain.” Forest rose from the bed but gave her a pointed look. “It’s storming.”

Iris glanced at the window. She could see the rain streaking down the glass and realized the dour light of the storm had made her oversleep. Quickly, she drew on a linen dress with buttons down the front and laced up her wartime boots. She had no time to fix her hair, and she combed her fingers through the long tangles as she flew out of the bedroom, gathering her small purse, her trench coat, and her typewriter, locked firmly in its black case.

Forest was standing by the front door, a cup of tea in one hand and a treacle biscuit in the other.

“Should I walk with you?” he asked.

“No need. I’ll take the tram today,” she said, surprised when he extended both the tea and the biscuit to her.

“Something to hold you over, then.”

His way of apologizing for last night.

She smiled. It almost felt like old times, and she accepted the lukewarm tea, draining it in one long gulp. She gave the cup back to him in exchange for the biscuit, and he opened the door for her.

“I should be home by five thirty,” she said, stepping into the damp morning air.

Forest nodded, but he stayed in the doorway wearing a concerned expression. Iris could feel him watching her as she descended the slick stairs.

She ate the biscuit before the rain could ruin it, dashing to the tram stop. It was a crowded, jostling ride, most people seeking shelter from the storm on their commutes. Iris stood toward the back, and she slowly became aware of how quiet it was. No one was conversing or laughing, as they normally did on the tram. The mood felt strange, off-balance. She thought it must be the weather, but the feeling followed her all the way to the Inkridden Tribune’s building.

She stopped on the pavement when she saw the words painted over the lobby doors. Bright as fresh blood and dripping down the bricks.

Where are you, Enva?

Iris shuddered as she entered the building, but she felt the weight of that phrase as she ducked beneath the lintel. Someone must have painted it hours ago during the night, because it hadn’t been there yesterday. She wondered who they were, and if they truly wanted to put Enva back into a grave, dead or sleeping. Were they someone who had lost a loved one in the war? Someone who was weary of fighting for the gods?

Iris couldn’t blame them; she was conflicted daily when she thought about what had happened to her brother, all because Dacre had woken and Enva had strummed the truth of the war. It made her angry, sad, proud. Devastated.

Despite it all, she also wondered where the Skyward goddess was. Why was Enva hiding? Was she truly intimidated by the mortals who were eager to see her gone?

Where are you, Enva?

While Iris was disquieted by the blood-red taunt, she still expected the Tribune to be humming like a hive. She expected to see the editors typing and the phone ringing and assistants hustling around desks with messages. She expected to see Attie, already three cups deep in tea, typing out her next article.

Iris was greeted by a solemn, still office.

No one was moving, as if they had been charmed into statues. Smoke was the only thing that cut through the shadows, rising from cigarettes and ashtrays. Iris stepped into the quiet, her breath skipping in alarm. She could see Helena standing in the center of the room, reading a newspaper. Attie was beside her, hand covering her mouth.

“What is it?” Iris asked. “Has something happened?”

She felt countless eyes turn to her, gleaming in the lamplight. Some with pity, compassion. Others with wariness. But she kept her gaze on Helena, who lowered the paper to meet her stare.

“I’m sorry, kid,” Helena said.

Sorry for what? Iris wanted to ask, but the words stuck in her throat when Helena extended the newspaper to her.

Iris set down her typewriter. She reached for the paper. Helena had been reading something on the front page.

It was the Oath Gazette. Iris’s old place of employment. How strange to hold this paper now, in the basement of the Inkridden Tribune. It almost felt like Iris was dreaming again until she finally saw what Helena had been transfixed by.

A headline raced across the page in bold, black ink. A headline that Iris never expected to see.

DACRE SAVES HUNDREDS OF WOUNDED IN AVALON BLUFF by ROMAN C. KITT

Iris stared at his name, printed on the paper. His name, which she had never thought to see bound to a headline again.

Kitt is alive.

The relief ebbed, leaving her cold and shaky as she began to read Roman’s words. Iris could feel her skin prickling, her face heating. She had to read the same string of sentences multiple times, trying to make sense of them.

There are two sides to every story. You may be familiar with one, told through the lens of a goddess who has drawn many of your innocent children into a bloody war. But perhaps you would like to hear the other? One that would see your children not wounded but healed. One that would see this land mended. A story not just confined to a museum or a history tome that many of us will never touch, but a story that is in the process of being written. Written now as you hold this paper, reading my words.

For I am here at the front, safe among Dacre’s forces. And I can tell you what you long to know from the other side.

“No,” Iris whispered. She could feel bile rising, burning through her chest like fire.

“I’m sorry, Iris,” Helena said again, the light vanishing from her eyes. “Roman has turned on us.”