The Cage King

by Danielle Monsch

  The pale woman spoke first, breaking into a simpering smile. “Dragon Slayer.”

  “A Rainha Flor-Cadaver.”

  The pale woman cocked her head and pushed out her lower lip. “You always break up my funnest games. Why can’t I have the phoenix?”

  “You wanna play?” The redhead twisted the massive sword with a roll of her wrist, the flames in her skin jumping at the movement. “That’s why I’m here.”

  The pale woman’s face lost all artifice, and pure and simple hate shone from her as her eyes rose to the swordswoman’s hair. “I so despise red,” and the words were a curse, spat with deepest loathing. She held up her hand, Nalah’s ring encircling one pale finger. “Tell Reign next time to come himself and not send anything as pathetic as a Skin Dweller to do his dirty work.” And she and the child disappeared, Nalah’s ring and all magic connected to her going with them.

  The fire on the redhead’s skin faded until her arm was bare, her power pulling closer, and once she sheathed her sword, Esh felt nothing further from her. She turned, taking them in. “Ais, what’s the story?” She walked towards them, her gaze falling to the slashes across the elf’s chest. “Immediate care?”

  Aislynn shook her head. “I will be well soon enough, Fallon. There is nothing magic about this. That child would not poison the weapon with magical means or other, not when the purpose is to inflict pain.”

  Fallon nodded, then turned her attention to him. He stepped in front of Nalah in an instinctive move. Yeah, she’d saved them, but that much power – it was impossible to simply trust.

  “Calm down, fighter boy. I’ve known her five years and haven’t done anything more than subject her to Laire’s fashion critiques.” After saying that, though, she motioned to Nalah with her hand, asking permission with the gesture. He moved away in answer, and she crouched down to run her hand over Nalah’s face much as the elf had earlier. Nalah continued to cry, the sound low and piteous.

  “Fucking pale-ass bitch.” Fallon’s voice was low, the volume and tone suggesting she was more talking to herself. The next words were louder and directed at them. “Her shields are smashed and her psychic landscape is fried. I’m amazed she lasted this long, considering she’s been dealing with the Pale Lady the entire Tour.”

  “And how do we fix it?”

  After placing her hand on Nalah’s forehead and sweeping her hair back, Fallon rose, all predatory grace. “We can’t. Shields are too personal, and it’s instinctive to fight against any attempt to mess with them. Only someone she loves could try without getting pulled into the chaos that’s her mind right now. Which means you gotta go in and do it.”

  “I don’t know if she-” Esh stopped the sentence. Fuck if it mattered if Nalah loved him. No one else was a possibility, and it didn’t sound as if she could get worse. He was with her until the end. “What do I need to do?”

  Fallon’s eyes gleamed bright, and a jab of adrenaline lined with unease rode through him. He knew this look – it was what he’d heard snatches of conversation about, opponents talking how he looked through them and with that look, knew how they ticked. Then the look vanished and she was only a concerned friend again, and said, “Let the phoenix lead. Healing and resurrection is what it does.”

  “I don’t know shit about the thing inside me-”

  “It’s been part of you your whole life. It is you, and it’s proven it fights for you, so trust it.” Fallon cut through his protestations with a no-bullshit tone.

  Inside him, a song rose, fierce as the drums of war, but with a peaceful undercurrent, beckoning him to follow.

  This was for Nalah.

  So he did.

  Down the path of fire he walked, and then it wasn’t a fire, it was their old library in the shithole town they grew up in, Nalah’s second home he and Jac had always called it. Same two worn and weathered chairs in the middle, the once-red fabric now a bloody brown and shelves of the most battered books that still managed to hold themselves together.

  “Only good for getting out of the rain.”

  The owner of the voice walked towards one of the chairs, sat in the broken cushion. He was still wiry and compact, the white of his teeth and eyes blinding against his dark skin, his hair close-cropped to his skull. “Jac.” The world spun the way it only had after he’d been jumped and kicked in the head by the group of boys when he was young, not able to right himself because of the dizziness.

  “Sit down, man. You fall over, you’ll embarrass me.”

  “You’re here?”

  Those dark eyes rolled in dramatic fashion. Yeah, Jac always had a larger-than-life edge to him. Strange, that Esh had forgotten. “She’s my sister. You think I’ll ever truly leave? Will you?”

  “Fuck no,” came the immediate reply, and Jac nodded in ready approval.

  Jac was relaxed in the chair, the lines and tenseness that had been constant on the man the last months of his life gone. He looked good, like he did before being Esh’s friend wasn’t enough, before he had to prove he was somehow better than the Cage King.

  “I didn’t think you’d die.” The words released on quick breath, the utterance not planned yet inevitable. “I thought they’d hurt you, and I wanted them to.”

  And maybe that was why he’d let Nalah go, why he didn’t run after her, because how could he love her, make love to her, create a family with her, when deep in his heart, he’d wanted her brother hurt. Hurt bad enough, become scarred enough, that Jac wouldn’t put them through any more shit.

  Forget not interfering. That was why he hadn’t taken Jac’s place, and even as he said the bullshit excuse to Nalah, he’d known.

  Jac laughed, and the sound was clean without any bitter taint. “That sounds like my son-of-a-bitch best friend.”

  Esh gave a half laugh in response, not as unencumbered, but less pain than he was used to. “What the fuck else could I do? I had to get it through your fucking head to not start shit anymore. If I thought for one moment they’d kill you, I’d of been there. I’d of taken the spot.”

  Jac shook his head. “Nah. Wasn’t your place, and I was wrong to put it on you. Everything that happened that night was on me, so don’t live with it anymore.”

  “Kind of hard not to.”

  Jac threw the chair pillow at his head. “My sister knows. She’s just stubborn about shit. Lucky you always could outwait her. How many damn times did I catch you here watching her and waiting for her to finish? Well, you waited until she looked up from her book, and after that you hustled her ass out in seconds flat.” The smile that followed had a hurt edge, the first showing of pain since he arrived. “Always hated that look. Do you know what it told me?”

  “No.”

  “Told me I was going to lose my sister and my best friend and be all alone. And it was right.” Jac rose and went to the astronomy section, the only section he ever looked at. It didn’t surprise Esh the first time Jac did it, not with the hours upon hours Jac spent looking at the stars. He’d read the titles, studied the pictures displayed on the covers that faced outward. Yet in all the years they went to the library, not once did Esh ever see Jac pull a book from the case.

  “You always had us. No way we would have left you.”

  “Wish I’d been strong enough to find something I could have given that look to.” His hand ghosted over a spine, but he didn’t grab the thick textbook. Instead he turned away. “You take care of my sister. That’s all I want now, and if you think you owe me anything, do that and we’re good.”

  The walls rattled, and outside dogs barked. Jac’s voice became urgent. “Do what you came here to. Get her out of this.”

  There was no time to speak the other thoughts that lay uneasy on his tongue. There was now only movement, the library falling apart and a graveyard, dark and dank with a sliver of moon for light and a lone headstone in jagged silhouette.

  Nalah stood over it, her face tear-stained but no active tears. “It’s my fault.”

  He came to stand beside her
, and the fraction she shifted away cooled the fire inside him by several degrees. “It wasn’t.”

  Her body was bent, sagging under imagined weight. “I keep thinking about all the decisions I made that led to this. I should have done so many things different.”

  The inches between them might as well been miles. He was lost now, in a way he hadn’t been since she came back into his life. He didn’t know how to make things right, not with his own decisions mocking him. But that guilt was on him, not her. She’d always been the glue, strong and holding them together. She’d always fought to do things right. She didn’t deserve to take any of this weight. “You always did your best, Nalah. Jac and I, we saw that. It made our lives easy, cause we could trust you. Any decisions you made wrong, they were made by a kid. How the fuck can you blame a kid for not knowing what they were doing?”

  She shook her head, her expression saying You just don’t get it. “Being a kid wasn’t an excuse. I’d have made all those same decisions if I was an adult. I’d probably make them now.”

  “Like what decisions?”

  The movement was subtle, but she shifted toward him now, and her lashes lowered to rest against wet cheeks. “I looked up and saw a boy who fought a whole gang to protect me even though he didn’t know me, and right then I decided I was going to follow him wherever he went. I didn’t know what it meant at the time. I only knew he would be my life, and I never considered where that would leave my brother.”

  Esh hadn’t mourned for Jac when he’d died. Esh had been too pissed, and then too scared with Nalah missing, and after she hadn’t come back all that was left was empty. Now, the back of his throat thickened and his chest went tight.

  They’d all made stupid decisions. He and Nalah had been so wrapped up in each other they’d left Jac behind, and Jac let his hurt turn him bitter, leading him to make stupid, destructive choices that Nalah was always cleaning up after, until the one time Esh said no more, and that one time destroyed everything.

  The dogs howled around them, mad, frantic barking that grew louder, closer, circling. Nalah turned to the sound. “They’re almost here. You should leave.”

  “Without you?” Nalah met his gaze, and the vague mourning for Jac morphed into a cold pit that ate up his heart. She was ready to say goodbye. “Dammit Nalah, you’re not a fucking liar. Don’t say you’re going to follow me and then let me go. I won’t allow it. From here on, we go together.”

  Her unfocused expression pissed him off, like she expected him to accept her words and leave her to her fate. He grabbed her hand, placed it over his heart. “Do you know what happened to me when I saved you? Before you I hated what I was. I knew I had something different in me, and it was from assholes who threw me away to the streets. If I could have gouged it out with a knife, I would have. But you fucking smiled at me like I was a miracle, and that thing inside me sparked and lit. And I knew it was for you. That thing in me was a good thing, because it made me strong enough to protect you. For the first time I didn’t hate what I was. I was grateful.”

  Beneath her palm the fire in him rose to greet her, the phoenix raising its voice in exultation. “This fire is yours, and if it can’t be used to protect you, I don’t want it. I’ll throw it away and walk by your side to meet whatever’s coming. But what I’ll never do is leave you again.”

  Tears fell and her lower lip trembled. “Am I betraying Jac? How can I have loved him if I want to live while he’s dead, when his death is my fault?”

  Take care of my sister, that’s what Jac said. Whether him speaking to Jac was true or an illusion, the rightness of that statement sank into Esh. “If you asked anyone, they would say the same thing. Jac loves his baby sister, and you know that’s true. Now honor him, because do you think the man who raised you would have wanted you in pain for five minutes because of him, let alone five years?”

  Her face collapsed on itself, features stretched out with her sobbing, and she buried herself into him until not a breath of air could have found its way between them. Her tears broke something in him too. He’d never be totally right with Jac’s death, he’d never forget it, but it was time for some forgiveness.

  The black dog came into view, savage intelligence in its dark eyes, teeth sharp and exposed. He wanted to hold her until her decision otherwise, but the timing was out of his control. He bent over her head to speak low into her ear. “Nalah, do we fight, or do we submit?”

  Her fingers curled and nails dug into the skin over his heart. Her head lifted, those dark brown eyes clear of the past, and gods were they beautiful. “We fight, because the Cage King always wins.”

  As if it had been waiting, the phoenix burst forth around them, its beak sharper, its flames burning hotter and higher than they’d been before, the colors more distinct and varied between reds, yellows, and even the hint of blue.

  “So beautiful,” Nalah said, awe in her wide eyes and open-mouthed half-smile.

  The phoenix took flight, its song full of joy and wonder. It swooped low at the dogs, which cowed and crept back into the darkness, before soaring into the heights once more. It twisted and turned, cleansing the air wherever it passed and banishing the night, the graveyard, and now they were at a waterfall, lush foliage and sun sparkling above and about as perfect a place as Esh could ever want to be.

  “Didn’t know you liked waterfalls.”

  After all they’d been through it might not have been the most insightful comment, but Nalah started laughing, full-blown belly laughs that had her doubling over. “You kept sneaking the travel book that had this waterfall like I wouldn’t notice,” she said as she straightened. “I cut the picture out and kept it with me.”

  For him. This was for him. He lowered his head and poured everything he felt into the kiss he wrapped her in, and overhead the phoenix sang in approval.

  Chapter Twenty

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  Esh opened his eyes to see red hair and gold, gleaming eyes, a spark off the hilt of a sword. “Was it real?”

  Fallon didn’t ask for details. She was quiet for a moment, and if she pretended she didn’t know what he was talking about, he might take a swing at her, Guild or not. “The knowledge is real,” were her ultimate words. “So take it and move on.”

  Move on. Yes, that he wanted to do, and he got to his feet, walked to where Nalah was sitting up, protesting her treatment by Rorth and Aislynn. “Honestly, I’m fine. I’m good. My head feels clear for the first time in forever – better than it used to.” His shadow touched her and she looked up, and a luminous, hesitant smile stole over her face.

  Screw hesitation. He bent and lifted her, picking up the kiss as it had been by the waterfall, and her hands tangled in his hair and pulled tight as she kissed him back. It felt like their first kiss all over again, and in a way it was. They were as free of the past as they could be, and it was time to celebrate.

  Whistling. It was whistling that broke them apart, and Fallon gave a close-lipped smile. “If you let us wrap this up, you can do that as much as you want and I won’t bother you again.”

  “Fallon,” was Nalah’s small protestation, but she patted Esh in an unspoken plea to be put down, which he complied with. She looked among the three of them. “My mother’s ring.”

  “I’m sorry, but it has been taken,” said Aislynn, her expression pure empathy for Nalah.

  “That…woman.” Nalah shuddered and huddled closer, and Esh held her to combat the chill. She looked to Fallon. “Who was she?”

  “A Rainha Flor-Cadaver – the Corpse Bloom Queen. Pray you don’t meet her again.”

  Esh never prayed – never a reason to – but if he ever started, that would be his first.

  Fallon turned the conversation away from the ring and their recent enemy. “The Phoenix Clan will want to know about you. Do you want to meet your people?”

  “If I have a people, why the hell was I running the streets?” Old hurt rode him even after the earlier cleansing, and bitterness still seeped through his tone.
<
br />   “You don’t need me to tell you the Great Collision destroyed a lot of lives, so don’t expect me to coo over you because yours was one of them.”

  Before he could open his mouth to respond, Aislynn put her hand on Fallon’s shoulder and said, “Perhaps at this point I should speak?” Fallon motioned her forward, and Aislynn took focal point of the group. “I do not know what happened to your family or why you were alone. What I can assure you of is the Phoenix Clan is small, and it values all of its blood. If the Clan knew of you, they would never have let you live out your life on the streets. And while in one way that would have been a great joy, it would have meant you would never have found Nalah or your calling in the fights.”

  “You think the fights are a calling?”

  Esh’s question was full of attitude, but Aislynn’s response was not. “Some of us have the skill to fight, but we are not fighters. While I accept my place in battle, it is hard for me to exist there.” The elf’s blue eyes went flat in a way Esh knew from older fighters, those who were at the end of their time in the cage and ready to escape it – in any way necessary. His gaze flicked to Fallon, but she was speaking in low tones to Rorth and not watching the elf. “You, however, thrive there, and you enter and leave the same way, as a good man who upholds his honor. So yes, the fights are your calling. Whether they are in front of a crowd, or should our battle come to your door, beside us in combat.”

  They were Guild. Their existence was fighting. Kind of surprising, Nalah ending up with them instead of him. And if Nalah stayed with them? Then fucking positive the battle would land at his door, because she wasn’t going without him.

  “One day,” Esh answered. “Soon, I’ll meet with the Clan. Got questions I want answered anyway. Right now I want space.”

  Fallon had finished her discussion with Rorth and again took point. “Sounds reasonable. I’ll let them know of your existence so they’ll be ready when you contact them.” She softened a fraction then, her eyes flicking to Nalah, who was still in the circle of his arms. “You did well. Not many could take on the Corpse Bloom Queen for even a moment. What are your plans now?”