Lightbringer (Empirium #3) - Claire Legrand Page 0,184

her lip. “That’s true.”

“And I suppose Corien hurt him as well, over and over, to ensure he was not being deceived.”

“For every night of peace Simon enjoyed in Corien’s palace, he endured ten of torment,” Ludivine said simply. “But Corien could never find anything amiss. I ensured it would be so. Until today, he believed Simon to be his entirely.”

Eliana’s eyes stung with tears. She hardly noticed them. Her chest was hot with fury. “You’re a monster. You tortured this boy who had lost his father and his home, and then you sent him off to another monster to be tortured further.”

Ludivine was implacable. “I don’t need to tell you that sometimes we must make difficult choices and commit acts of violence to benefit the greater good. Look at what you did for your family when you lived in Orline. Look at what you’ve done for Red Crown, for Remy, for the people of this world. You are no stranger to sacrifice, Eliana, nor to cruelty.”

An acolyte appeared suddenly at the door, startling Eliana from her rising grief. They were too quiet for her liking, these acolytes, their gazes too direct. Eliana wondered what torment they had endured at Ludivine’s hand. Was it love that kept them loyal, or was it fear?

“They’re here, my lady,” the acolyte said with a bow.

“See that they are fed and their wounds treated,” Ludivine commanded. “We will join you shortly.”

The acolyte nodded once and then was gone.

“We will speak more later,” said Ludivine, rising from her chair. “Until then, I leave you with this thought. The only way to end this—this war that has for millennia gripped everyone in this world and others—is for you to return to Old Celdaria. Convince Rielle to kill Corien and close the Gate. Fight her if you must. Destroy her if it comes to it.”

Eliana stared at her, full of too many warring sadnesses. “You loved her.”

“I did.”

“And yet you speak of her so coldly?”

“I have had centuries to grieve for her,” said Ludivine. She plucked a piece of carrot from her sleeve. Her unfinished stew streaked the floor. “I no longer fear her death as I once did.”

The cool mask of her face unnerved Eliana. “I don’t understand how we would even do this thing. Simon tried traveling many times in the palace. He could not find his power.”

“Because you wouldn’t let him.”

A deafening silence fell between them.

Ludivine smiled gently. “You understand, then, what you must do. You reawakened his power when your love for him was nearing its peak. Once when you healed Remy. Then again during your time at Willow. The world’s magic is dead, Eliana, the empirium wrenched and distant. Only through you does it live again. And with your trust in Simon lost, beneath the iron press of your angry will, his power has become dormant once more, and unreliable, as you have seen. You must truly accept him into your heart once more, allow him to find his power again, if there is to be any hope of doing what we must.”

Eliana shook her head. She found her chair and sank slowly onto it, her knees suddenly unsteady. “How can I? After what he’s done, after what he’s seen and heard…” She closed her eyes, struggling to find her voice. “I could say, ‘I forgive you’ until my throat bled, but it wouldn’t be true, even knowing what you’ve done to him.”

“I didn’t say forgive. I said accept.”

Hearing Ludivine kneel before her, Eliana opened her eyes and stared at her through a simmering field of hate.

“You could choose not to,” said Ludivine kindly, considering her. “You could continue to refuse him his power. We could sit in these rooms waiting for Corien to recover from the blightblade and find us. He’ll kill all of us, including Simon, and me, and you, perhaps, because he has very little sanity left now, and then this will all have been for nothing. Everything you’ve endured. Every moment Simon spent sobbing at my feet as I dissected his mind. I know that’s not what you want to happen.”

Eliana looked away, her shoulders aching under a terrible new weight. Arguing with Ludivine would be futile. She knew what Eliana thought as surely as she herself did.

“And if we do this,” she said quietly, “what will happen to everyone living now? Remy and Navi, everyone I’ve ever known and loved?”

“They will no longer exist. They will never have existed. At least not as they are now. Remy may