Fire Kin

by M. J. Scott

  They knew we were here now and might just have other weapons with them. I could think of several options that could turn this room into a death trap.

  “How about you?” I asked as I calculated odds rapidly in my head and evaluated our options. We were in some sort of small store, shelves holding dry goods and cans lining the walls. It had evidently been closed or else the owner had had the good sense to flee at the first sounds of gunfire, because I couldn’t sense anyone else in the building.

  “Bastards ruined my ink,” she snarled.

  I snapped my head round to her. “You’re hit?”

  “Grazed my upper arm. I’ll be fine.” She sounded enraged, which was good. Adrenaline and anger would carry her through the pain of the wound until we could get to safety.

  “Did you call for help?”

  She touched the charm on her collar and nodded. “Raised the alarm. There will be a patrol on the way.”

  “Good.” I sucked in a breath, then flinched as another series of shots rang out and more bullets thumped into the room.

  There was no return fire from the street, just the noises of shouts and screams as the humans made for shelter. Gods. I hoped nobody was hurt out there.

  “Do you know what’s behind this building?” I asked.

  She nodded. “There’s an alley that runs back out to the street a block or so down.”

  Which would mean a block or two closer to the barracks but would also mean emerging back onto the street where the snipers were. If they were sensible they would have picked a vantage point that would give them a good range of fire, and the shallowly sloped roofs of the cheaply built buildings would be easy enough to run along and follow us.

  “And across the alley?”

  “More shops, a few little houses, and then another block of warehouses that hold . . . mostly cloth, I think.” She frowned, and closed her eyes for a moment, as though calling up a mental map of our surroundings. Her breathing was quick and light and I could hear the beat of her heart, seemingly strong, but I could also smell blood and that made me think that her wound was slightly more than a graze.

  From my current position, I couldn’t see her arm, though, so I was going to have to take her word for it for now and worry about it once we were somewhere safer.

  “All right,” I said. “We go through that door and make for the alley. If it’s clear we’ll keep going across to the next street and head to the barracks from there. I don’t think we should wait for help here. This place will come down around our ears at the first hint of an explosion.”

  She looked at me and nodded. “On three, then?”

  We were both up and sprinting for the door before I’d even finished saying, “Three.”

  “Right,” Rhian yelled, and I went where she said, agreeing with her sense of direction. We pelted down the narrow corridor and then starting flinging open the doors to the left of us as we came to them, seeking the back entrance to the store. The first door revealed a storeroom of sorts, rows more of shelves with no exits that we could see.

  The supplies included an unfortunate number of cans of oils of various kinds. One spark in the wrong spot and the whole place would blow. Not a good place to hide. As though our assailants could read my mind, there was a roar from behind us and something exploded.

  The force of it flung us forward, but I managed to keep to my feet and dragged Rhian with me.

  I opened another door and—thank the Lady—spotted another door beyond it. We raced through the door and stumbled across the floor, the sound of flames and the all-too-familiar smell of smoke trailing us.

  I sent a blast of power toward the fire and felt it die down a little, but I was too busy running to pay it full attention. The door sprang open to my desperate twist of the handle and we found ourselves in a small courtyard.

  “Gate, boss.” Rhian pointed with her good arm. The rear yard was thankfully small and it took only ten strides or so to reach the gate. It was locked, so I boosted her over and then clambered over myself. There was another roaring whoosh from behind us and the middle of the store burst into flames.

  “Keep going,” I ordered Rhian, and shoved her forward toward an almost identical gate across the alleyway. If luck was with us, our attackers would assume that we were still in the store behind us, but I didn’t want to wait to find out if they would come investigating. This second gate was open and we pushed our way into the small building beyond it. A storehouse full of shelves stacked floor to ceiling with sacks of grain.

  “Don’t these people sell anything nonflammable?” I muttered.

  Rhian shot me a quick desperate grin but saved her breath as we made our way rapidly through the warehouse. But when we came to the end of the building, there wasn’t a door.

  “Fuck.”

  “Make a hole, boss,” Rhian suggested.

  “The whole place might go up,” I protested. The stocks of grain were valuable in a time of war. Who knew? They might end up feeding our horses in the end.

  “Better that it does so with us outside. Do it.” She grimaced, her right hand clamped over the upper part of her left arm.

  I cursed again and sent a blast of power at the wall. It was brick but old brick and fortunately it yielded, a neat section crumpling outward. I pulled Rhian through and then spent a minute making sure any sparks of heat from the force I’d exerted had died down. We were standing in another alley, and from the far end I heard the sound of running feet. In front of us was a massive brick wall forming part of yet another warehouse.

  I drew my sword, hoping like hell that it was some of our men doing a sweep of the area rather than friends of whoever the hell had just tried to kill me. The other end of the alley would lead us back toward the attackers, and I was loath to blast my way into another warehouse without knowing what it contained and who might be in range of the explosion. We had little choice—toward the unseen runners it was.

  “Keep moving,” I said to Rhian, who now had her pistol in her good hand.

  Good idea. I drew mine as well. I’d practiced long and hard to be able to shoot equally well with both hands, and right now the more weapons the better.

  We didn’t get very far before the sound of the feet grew very loud and a group of my men hurtled around a corner.

  “Captain Pellar,” the patrol leader exclaimed. “Thank God. We thought you’d gone up with that store back there.”

  “No such luck,” I managed, fighting to rein my heaving breath back. “We’re fine. Rhian needs a medic. Is the way back to the barracks clear?”

  He nodded. “Yes, sir. There’s a back way. And there’re two other squads in the main street now.”

  “Did they get the snipers?”

  He made an apologetic face. “Not sure, sir. We were sent this way.”

  I muttered under my breath. Sometimes I sorely wished for a better form of communication. Our charms were basic. They could alert people to danger or action, but they couldn’t yet convey a voice across distances. Which meant I would have to wait to find out if the snipers had been captured.

  I didn’t like waiting.

  I was fairly certain that the snipers would be gone by the time the squads made their way up to the roof. There’d been that flash of magic before the first shot, so they—if they weren’t Fae—had some glamour or something at least. Which meant they would, if they were smart, be able to avoid detection. They only had to melt a block or two back from where they’d been and they’d be back across the Night World border anyway.

  “Send someone to tell the men that no one crosses the border,” I ordered. This could be a feint, meant to draw us somewhere that it was smarter not to go. I squinted up at the sky, where the sun could just be seen over the two tall buildings that formed both sides of the small space. “It’s getting late and we don’t want another ambush. They can search the immediate area, but they’re to report back before nightfall.”

  “Yes, sir.” The patrol leader turned and jerked his head at two of the
men, who nodded and took off at a run back the way they’d come. Another of the men came up to Rhian, pulling a bandage and one of the cleansing potions we used out of a pouch at his waist. He cut the remains of her sleeve away with a knife, causing Rhian to say some choice things as she saw the ragged gash across her arm, poured the potion over her wound, and then wrapped the padded bandage in place with quick movements. Rhian thanked him by swearing at him again as he pulled the bandage tight.

  I clucked at her. “Be nice to the medic. How does it feel?”

  “I’m fine, boss,” she said, still scowling at the medic. “Wasn’t me they were trying to kill, after all.”

  “You sure about that?”

  “Yep. I’m too pretty for them to want to take me out.”

  “Well, then. I guess we’d better go find out who I’ve pissed off today.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  BRYONY

  Ash looked up as we entered the room, and my heart bumped a little. Safe, a silly voice said in my head. He’s safe. That voice was closely followed by the more sensible part of me declaring the voice to be an idiot.

  I couldn’t disagree.

  But that didn’t stop me drinking in the sight of Ash—somewhat soot-smeared and rumpled—sitting on a table with all limbs intact and still breathing.

  He met my gaze steadily as I completed my inspection, then shrugged the tiniest of shrugs, as though saying, “I’m fine. Don’t worry,” and then jerked his head toward Rhian, who was sitting on a stool about five feet away from him. One sleeve of her shirt was missing and one of Ash’s men was bent over her, inspecting her arm.

  I nodded and pushed my way through the crowd of soldiers, ignoring the selfish urge to check Ash first.

  “Out of the way please,” I ordered, and the medic looked up from his work with an annoyed expression that froze when he saw me. He stepped back with a half bow.

  Behind me, I heard Guy say something to Ash and Ash murmur a low response.

  I wanted to know what they were saying, but I had a job to do. I turned my attention to my patient. A nasty wound scored across her upper arm, half an inch wide and angry looking. Not deep but painful enough.

  “What happened?” I asked, more to distract Rhian than anything. I knew a bullet wound when I saw one.

  “Someone tried to kill the boss,” she said.

  My eyes jerked up from her arm to her face. “Pardon?”

  Brown eyes studied me. Her free hand reached up to push an errant braid out of her face. “Got your attention, did I?”

  “You always had my attention,” I replied, feeling the ice creep into my voice. There was no time for games. “All my patients do.” Besides which, I’d come rushing here across the City like a lunatic with Guy, who had turned up at St. Giles with a jumbled story of gunshots and buildings on fire and Ash’s patrol that had made my stomach plummet like a stone dropped off a cliff. “What do you mean someone tried to kill Captain Pellar?”

  “Shot at him. At us,” she amended. “But they were gunning for him.”

  “How do you know?”

  “No one in this City knows me well enough yet to want to kill me,” she said with a grin. “And the first bullet hit near him. They wanted him.”

  For what exactly? Damn.

  “Did you see anyone?” I focused back on the wound on her arm. Healing would give me a chance to calm the racing pulse that had galloped into life when she said that someone had tried to kill Ash.

  “They were up on the roof but out of sight.”

  Or glamoured. “They?”

  “Too many bullets for just one.”

  “I see.” I resisted the urge to turn around and go and give Ash a piece of my mind. I didn’t know what earthly good that could do, but it might make me feel better. But first I had to heal Rhian’s arm.

  I pressed the flesh above the wound gently and she hissed a little. “How sore?”

  She grimaced. “I’ve had worse. Olson—that’s our medic—put the yarrow potion he uses on it, but that stuff burns. I think it’s half alcohol.”

  “I see.” I knew the potion she meant. The Templars carried the same thing. It was basic but it did a good job at getting the worst dirt out of a wound in the field.

  “Well, let’s take care of the pain while I figure out the best way to deal with the rest.” I took a breath and then let my power sink into her skin, setting a block around the raw flesh.

  Rhian smiled suddenly and blew out a breath. “Not bad.” She squinted down at her arm. “Can you fix the ink?”

  I blinked. “Excuse me?”

  She gestured at her arm and the tattoos that decorated the skin that surrounded the wound. I’d registered them before but hadn’t been paying much attention other than to notice black swirls across her skin. The bullet had scored at a neat forty-five-degree angle across the dip where her triceps muscle curved, leaving the half-inch-wide strip of raw flesh. Which would heal into a neat scar. And spoil the design.

  I frowned. “Can you tattoo scar tissue?”

  She winced. “Hurts like a son of a bitch. And it doesn’t always take the ink the same. Can’t you put the skin back the way it was?”

  I’d never actually tried. Once, Guy had come to me, wanting me to do something to hide the Templar crosses on his hands, and I’d refused, not wanting to do anything that would damage his skin. But his inks were old and deep in his flesh.

  “How long have you had the tattoo?” I asked.

  Rhian tilted her head, thinking. “That one? Ten years or so, I think.”

  She didn’t look old enough to have been getting sigiling done ten years ago, but that wasn’t my problem.

  “Let me think. Are you hurt anywhere else?”

  Braids bounced as she shook her head. “A few bumps and bruises. Nothing that needs a healer.”

  Well, that was one less thing to worry about. I extended my power again and closed my eyes, following the path into Rhian’s flesh, focusing closer and closer into the damage. I could feel the difference between the unmarked skin and the tattoos, feel the taint of the ink in the cells. Could I heal the skin and make it change to match—extending the ink? I didn’t know. But I could try.

  I opened my eyes. “All right,” I said. “I’m going to try something. If it doesn’t work, I’ll just see how close I can get the skin to normal and your sigiler will have to do the repair job on their own.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “Hold on,” I said. “This may feel . . . odd.”

  I extended my power again, narrowing its scope and focus. Normally knitting skin and flesh back together for such a shallow wound would be relatively simple, but the added tangle of attempting to convince it to change color in the process was far more complex. I coaxed it across, practically cell by cell, not entirely sure it was going to work until I opened my eyes and saw the clean expanse of tattoo across her arm.

  Rhian looked pale but impressed. “Huh,” she said, looking down at her arm. She took a few deep breaths. “Not sure that’s going to catch on instead of sigiling, though.”

  “Did it hurt?”

  “Not exactly. The sigiling hurts, but that felt . . . very weird,” she said. “Give me a needle any day.” She shook her head and lifted her arm gingerly, easing it through a slow range of motion. “Thank you, Lady Bryony,” she said, her voice sincere. “I can see why the boss likes you.” Her eyes twinkled at me. “You’d better go check him out too.”

  “Is he hurt?”

  “Not shot, not that I saw. But who knows what else might have happened to him?”

  “Who indeed,” I muttered. The girl was obviously enjoying herself and trying to do something nice for Ash. Which meant that people close to him had noticed how he felt about me.

  “Rest that arm for a few hours,” I said as I glanced over my shoulder toward Ash and Guy, wondering if Guy had gotten a more detailed account of what exactly had happened than me.

  Probably.

  ASH

  Guy broke
off his grilling as Bryony joined us.

  “Is Rhian healed?” I asked before Bryony could start her own series of questions. Curiosity and frustration burned clear in her eyes. Better to head her off at the pass so to speak.

  “Of course. The wound wasn’t serious.”

  “She was more worried about her tattoo,” I said with a smile.

  “I fixed that too,” Bryony said, which made Guy turn his head to stare at her.

  She rolled her eyes at him. “Don’t look at me like that. It was nothing like the queen changing yours.”

  Guy made a humphing noise, but he didn’t ask any further questions, more’s the pity. It sounded like an interesting story.

  Bryony’s dark eyes made a quick inventory of me. “Anything you should be telling me about?”

  I didn’t think she was just asking me whether I was hurt. But I chose to take it that way for now. “No. I’m fine.”

  “There’s blood on your hand.”

  “A piece of glass sliced me. Just a scratch. It’s already healing. As I said, I’m fine.”

  “Used to people trying to kill you, are you?” she snapped.

  “I’ve had a little experience,” I shot back, then regretted it when a glimmer of remembered pain swam across those eyes. “I’m a soldier, after all,” I added to soften the words.

  “I know,” she said. “But that doesn’t mean you have to be a foo—”

  “Captain Pellar, sir?”

  Sergeant Brooks, one of the patrol leaders, interrupted, appearing next to Guy as though by magic. In reality I just hadn’t noticed him. Which meant that I was more tired than I ought to be. Inattentive soldiers turn into dead soldiers.

  “Yes, Sergeant?” I asked, trying to keep the fatigue out of my voice. I just wanted five or six hours of sleep. Then I’d be as good as new and ready to worry about who had tried to shoot me. I bit down against the yawn that tugged at my jawbone, eyes creasing with the effort.

  “Sir, there’re some people at the barracks gate. They’re asking for you.”