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Aric’s muscles tensed. “That can never happen.”
I sat up with a frown. “Have you forgotten that I swore revenge on him? He might not have murdered Jack, but he did murder Selena and all those people.” The Emperor’s laughter had haunted me. “And don’t forget that he tortured me for months two games ago.” Mercifully, I hadn’t recovered those memories.
“You told me you feared destroying the world if you battled him. Or dying. I believe you called yourself the nuclear option. Tell me you feel differently, and we can talk.”
Matthew had said that power was my burden. What if I began something that I couldn’t pull back from? Still, if my choices were either to have Aric burned alive inside Richter’s vile body or risk the earth . . . “The Emperor’s kill is mine—not yours. And certainly not yours because of a one-way ticket.”
In a teasing tone, Aric asked, “In the calculus between my life and the fate of humankind, should we not be rational?”
I raised my chin, fists clenched. “What if I refuse reason?”
He fell silent. Then he leaned up to cup my face in his warm hands. “You love me.”
I gazed at him, letting him see how much. “Of course I do.”
His brows drew together. “It’s more than love. You feel for me what I feel for you.”
I could only nod.
Yet this seemed to sadden him. “I think a part of me believed you were immune to fully loving me because half of your heart is taken. I’d forgotten the most important thing about the Empress. Your wrath is boundless—but so is your love.”
“Then you can understand why I can’t ever lose you. You told me you wanted a life for me and Tee. We want you.”
“But our wants must come second to the needs of our son. Everything we do must be for him. Everything for Tee.”
Even your death? “I need him to know you and love you.”
“Sieva, he already does. I have been unsure about many things in my long life, but I feel his love as strong as a battle-tested shield.” Such a knight. He drew me back down against him. “We don’t have to figure this out tonight. I’m open to ideas.”
“If you believed we could thwart the game, you’d be more reluctant to throw yourself away.”
I expected him to say that Jack might find a clue about the game in the Swords’ library, or that we’d keep searching for an answer.
Instead he said, “You’ve read and reread all the chronicles with me. You know what I know about the game. And based on the information we have, I don’t believe it can be ended—and neither do you, my love.”
Hadn’t I begun to suspect that we were spinning to our bloody end? Yes. But to hear him say it out loud, to accept it . . .
Kentarch had spoken about the whisper of one’s hope. I feared mine would lie to me about thwarting the game right up until the end.
“One must win. And one must live as an immortal. You must.”
“I can’t.” The red witch purred, I can. “I won’t get over you. Don’t force me into that situation.”
“It will be out of my hands. As all war ultimately is.”
“You wrote something similar in your chronicles.” The only way to control the outcome of war is not to fight it.
“The end must come for us all. My hope is that I meet it well.”
“What does that mean?”
“Many warriors fight well; they practice to achieve greatness. But there’s no practice that can make one die well. You’re either born with that stern stuff or you’re not.”
Would I be? Whenever my life had been in jeopardy in the past—such as when I’d been mind-controlled by the Hierophant or battling the Alchemist—I’d never had much time to think about what happens if I lose.
Now I did, and I wasn’t convinced I would survive the upcoming clash against Richter, even with Sol’s help. How long did we have? “When do you think Matthew will restore the Arcana calls?” Each player’s signature phrase alerted us to their proximity. Richter’s—Quake before me!—had sounded just before he’d struck Jack’s army.
Aric said, “Whenever the Gamekeeper is ready for the end, when all his plots and machinations have fallen into place. Crazy like a fox is apropos, no?” Matthew’s own call.
“You make him sound sinister.”
“I hope the Fool isn’t. But don’t ever forget that he won the first game. There’s a reason Tarot cards are about his journey—because he was the first immortal.”
I pictured his card: under the bright sun, a blithe young man strolled down the road with a bundle of belongings over his shoulder, a white rose—one of my symbols—in his free hand, and a dog at his heels. He had his head tilted back, was about to walk blindly off a cliff.
