We Leave Together, стр. 70
“I don’t know who I am, Rachel. I don’t know what I am. I don’t know anything, but I’m so tired, Rachel. Elishta, but I’m so tired.”
“Good-bye, king’s man,” said Djoss.
Jona stumbled forward after her, crawling on his hands and knees. The violence had ended behind him. The raiders had run off into the night. The prisoners were free. The signal fires burned over the hills calling like bells in the city streets for hard men to come. Jona turned to look back at the mess he had made of his life.
His only thought was to leave. He had lived in Dogsland and suffered for it every day of his life. He wanted a new life. He wanted to go somewhere no one knew him, and he could start over brand new, a nobody with nothing to mark him.
He wanted to be born brand new, an infant with no past.
Calipari filled the stars with the darkness of his shadow. He grabbed Jona’s throat. The ice that clutched at Jona’s hands made it hard to fight back. Calipari punched Jona hard in the face, and held Jona’s throat closed.
Jona couldn’t bear to fight back.
He tried to tell Nicola that he was leaving, to just let him go, but the fist descended and darkness came. He wasn’t dead, yet. He was resting for the first time in his life.
CHAPTER 22
I watched him a long time like that.
Did you pray for him.
I don’t think so. I wasn’t praying. I was cursing him, a little. I was wishing he was already dead. I was wishing I didn’t have to kill him. Mostly, I was watching him unconscious, and telling myself that if he just stopped breathing and didn’t wake up that would be for the best. I didn’t want him to wake up again, because I didn’t want to spill my friend’s blood.
Then you were praying, and you didn’t know it.
I don’t know what prayer is.
A curse is a prayer of hate. A wish is a prayer of hope.
He was my boy. I spent years with him, down in the worst of the Pens. I spent years with him, and he does that. I had so many dead boys. I wish I could kill him again. I wish he was still alive, but not so I can kill him again. I want him to be alive. I wish he hadn’t done what he did, and I wish he was alive. Also, I’m glad it was me that killed him, and I wish it wasn’t me.
It’s all right. You did the right thing. They’re hard things to do, but you were right. He betrayed the king, the city, and killed so many good men. Do you know when he started killing for the Night King what he was doing?
No.
She didn’t want anyone else to throw a party to compete with hers. She had her loyal demon child wipe out anyone that accepted another nobleman’s money until the merchants and the nobleman figured it out.
He killed a lot of people?
Innocent people. He died, Nicola, and it was right that he died.
Every one of my boys was a little dirty, though. The Pens is dirty. You know, I can’t imagine what it’s like to wake up and not think about all the terrible things I’ve seen down there. When I was dying, before you came, I had nightmares.
They’re gone now.
***
“What did you see when you were asleep, wicked fiend?” said the sergeant, holding a rusty sword to Jona’s chest.
“I think…” said Jona, squinting into the black night above his head. “I think I had my first dream.”
“Your first dream?” asked the sergeant.
Jona closed his eyes. “I don’t sleep. I never sleep. My blood doesn’t let me. My dad was a demon child. My granddad was, too. I am. I don’t sleep. I never sleep. I was born with wings my ma cut off. But, I think I was sleeping, just now. I was lying in water. It was so cool. I looked up at the sun and it was hot, but the water was cool. I was just a boy, like I was just a boy again. I was floating in the water. I looked over to the beach and Rachel was waving at me. She was so beautiful there, and she was waving at me. Then she was my mother. Then, she was someone else. I thought… For a little while, I thought it was real. I started to swim to her. Then…”
“Then you woke up?”
“No. Then, there were horses. Thousands of them. Every time the waves broke upon the shore, the white foam was horses. It was so beautiful. I was swimming to shore, and I ended up on a horse’s back. We charged up, past Rachel, past the forest, and into the darkness. Into the… Then…. Um… Then…”
“Already, the dream fades.”
“I can’t… I don’t remember. Rachel always remembered her dreams.”
“May the Gods absolve me, Lord Joni. You killed innocent men. You caused so much death out here.”
“Please don’t, Nicola. I’m just going to leave. I’ll leave Dogsland, and I’ll walk away and I’ll never come back.”
“No,” said Nicola.
The sword pushed through Jona’s chest. The blade was cold and hot at once. Jona felt the strange sucking of blood-loss—but painless at first—and also he heard the sucking sounds in his ears, echoing up his bones, like two separate things. Was his body really making these sounds? Was that him? Is that his blood? He looked down on his skin, and saw his hands twisted in pain and shock. He saw the blood pouring all over his chest. He felt his eyes fade to nothing. His eyes fell back into his head, and rolled out of his own wounded neck. His eyes saw a puddle of blood, and red and red and red. Then, a strong wind came and picked up his eyes, lifting them up.
And then Jona saw the whole forest, and the whole city, and everything in the whole world. He