The Burning White (Lightbringer #5) - Brent Weeks Page 0,346

Kip felt a jolt of admiration for his bride’s cool calm. “Do you need medical attention?”

He knew how Tisis had felt about Teia in months past, but now she was choosing to see Teia as a young woman who was not in a good way, but also maybe not quite responsible for it. She saw Teia’s suffering, not her behavior.

It made him love her even more.

Teia covered her face with her hands, contorting with such shame and self-loathing it made Kip ache for her. She gestured toward Tisis. “Guess I don’t need to ask what you see in her, huh? All this and kind, too? Her hair even looks good. She’s been sleeping and her hair looks good. How does she do that? I bet she’s not even a murderer!”

“Teia?” Kip asked. This was not like her. He’d expected that she would change in the time they’d been apart, but even given that, this wasn’t her.

“The poppy’s wearing off,” Teia said. “I wanted it to, but . . .” Teia repeated curses under her breath for a few moments, then she looked up plaintively. “I just really wanted to see you, Kip. I’m sorry to be like this. I can’t even remember all I wanted to say to you, but I just really wanted to see you one last time.”

One last time? “Teia? What’s going on?”

She looked up at him, and her eyes filled with regret. “Kip, I’m dying.”

Chapter 104

Quentin had only two types of clothing now: the disgustingly rich and the obscenely wealthy. Either one would have nauseated the old him. Over the last year, he’d warred with himself every day as he’d slowly grown accustomed to the weight and wear of this garb.

As part of his punishment—being the example of a luxiat led astray by the world’s riches—he was forbidden to wear anything less expensive than his second-best set in public. In his rooms, he’d worn literal sackcloth for several months. Then, realizing that he was taking pride in mortifying his own flesh—O Pride, thou insidious beast!—he’d taken to wearing a fine but simple robe in private.

But today, long before the sun rose, after Kip had awakened him and told him what was required, Quentin put on his finest robes with something akin to a healthy pride: today these robes would help him do what needed to be done. He actually had to ask a servant to help him dress: there were layers to these things! Pearls in their hundreds, real gold twisted in the brocade, a mink collar dyed murex purple. Fawn-skin boots, silk laces, and jeweled rings for every finger.

He looked like everything he had always hated, but today it would all be for Orholam’s glory. That which had been a scourge unto his back was now the armor for his battle. A great and glorious gamble. He would be tested to his limits.

He might not survive it.

From his apartments in the blue tower, he made his way across the Lily’s Stem, greeting a few luxiats on their way to matins prayers. One offered him a coin, and he took it humbly. If the Order came to suspect what Quentin was doing, he’d not get a chance to put it into the hands of the poor who needed it, but this, too, was his personal spiritual discipline: trusting that Orholam would cover his flaws and failures and still get His work done on this world, even if Quentin weren’t here to do it, even if Quentin misused some moiety of the bounty with which Orholam had trusted him.

He arrived at the west docks an hour before sunrise. The docks were crowded with the faithful, still hoping for a parade. But not only the faithful thronged here. Last-minute reinforcements to the fortifications above the docks and to the surrounding walls were being shored up by dozens of workmen. Nearby buildings had been cannibalized for lumber and bricks, beams torn from centuries-old homes while their owners wept.

On the opposite side of that wall, crouched in the bay like a panther outside the door, the Wight King’s navy waited.

Quentin hated being the center of attention, and as he looked at the stairs up to the wall, he felt faint. Several soldiers were looking askance at him. The bored crowd, some huddled with their sleeping children, others simply looking for some entertainment to fill the next hour until sunrise—all stared at him and openly speculated as to why he was here rather than in richer quarters.

Men and women will die