Liberating Fight

by Melissa McShane

  Heat battered at Amaya an instant before fire filled the window. She did not have time to shout before it was extinguished. Then every torch in the plaza died and vanished. “You must find him, Amaya,” Elinor said. “I—”

  The torches came to life again. The sound of the crowd, which had grown fearful, rose to an exultant roar, and they pressed forward, thrusting their torches at the battered door.

  Elinor sat shakily in her chair. “He is quite powerful,” she said. “That is a trick I am not sure even I could manage.”

  Amaya crouched beside her. “More powerful than you?”

  Elinor shook her head. “But I am hampered by the need to protect the child, or I would—duck!”

  Fire bloomed again in the window, hotter than before. “I must know where he is,” Elinor continued, “so I may attack him directly.”

  The sound of blows striking the door filtered up to where they sat. “The others will guard the door,” Amaya said. “Sit here.”

  She again took her position at the side of the window and surveyed the plaza. The fire had not been launched at them as before; it had simply ignited the air at the window. Amaya recalled what Elinor had said about range and distance and guessed Valencia was close enough to ignite a fire wherever he chose rather than lighting one near at hand and casting it out into the sky. That would make it harder to find him.

  Heat gathered at the window, and she ducked away from Valencia’s fire. A moment later, it went out, and she peered around the window’s edge again, scanning the crowd. Valencia would not be with the torch-wielding attackers; he would be somewhere—there. A shadowy figure stood between two buildings to the right and across the plaza. No, two figures, one shorter than the other.

  “I see him. I believe it is him,” she said, beckoning to Elinor.

  Elinor looked where she pointed. “I fear I can see very little despite the torches,” she said. “Let us hope you are right.”

  Fire exploded, hot and bright like a second sun, in the alley across the plaza. A shrill scream rang out before the fire disappeared. The two figures moved deeper into the alley, out of sight. “Ah, that is he,” Elinor said in tones of deep satisfaction. “Now, sir, we shall see what you are capable of.”

  A rumble filled the air, deep and thunderous like the earth shaking, though nothing moved. Then fire filled the alley from one end to the other, blazing as high as the rooftops. It did not go out immediately as the other fires had. Amaya looked at Elinor, who wore an expression of profound concentration. “Yes, I am not so weak a foe as you believed,” she murmured. “I refuse to be defeated by the likes of you.”

  Two figures staggered out of the alley and ran for the western end of the plaza. “They moved,” Amaya said.

  Elinor let the fire die and lit another in the direction Valencia and Jennet ran. The two changed direction and hurtled into another alley. “Another trap,” Elinor said, and set that alley on fire as well. They waited. No one emerged. Elinor extinguished all her fires and, after a moment’s hesitation, the torches as well. “They escaped out the rear. And now I do not know where they have gone.”

  Suddenly, the room filled with fire. Amaya dropped to the floor, waiting, but the fire did not go out immediately. Scorching hot air filled her lungs, and she crawled to the window, desperate for air not on fire. Then the fire was gone, and Amaya faced Elinor, whose expression was wide-eyed and terrified. “The child,” she whispered.

  Amaya grabbed Elinor’s hand and towed her out of the room, slamming the door shut on another blaze. She fell into her awareness of Elinor’s body and focused on the place where the babe rested in the womb. “I cannot touch,” she said, hearing her voice coming from very far away, “but it moves yet, and your body is cool to the touch. It is well.”

  Elinor breathed a long sigh of relief. “I was too confident, and I nearly paid a very dear price.” Smoke curled from beneath the closed door, and Elinor glanced that way and the sound of the fire licking at the wood ceased. “I dare not put myself in harm’s way again.”

  “And yet he has no such restriction,” Amaya said.

  Elinor nodded. “I can keep him from burning this place, but that is all. Amaya, I do not know what else to do.”

  “I do,” Amaya said.

  She and Elinor hurried down the dark stairs to where the noise was loudest. The mob beat on the doors, which were held fast not by a barricade but, Amaya suspected, a Mover’s talent. Lord Enderleigh left the defenders to take his wife’s hand. “You are well?” he asked.

  “I am, but there is nothing I can do save prevent El Encendedor’s fire from engulfing this place.” Elinor gripped his hand tightly.

  “I will go,” Amaya said.

  “Go? Go where?” Elinor asked, her expression confused.

  “Out. I will find Señor Valencia and stop him.” Saying the words filled her with fierce joy.

  “You cannot. He will kill you, or that Coercer will enthrall you—”

  “I do not burn as others do. And Jennet will not see me.” It was not true that Jennet would not see her, but Amaya did not wish to explain her certainty that Jennet would not turn her Coercion upon Amaya.

  “This is insanity. Miles, we cannot permit this.” Elinor turned an imploring look on Lord Enderleigh.

  “Lady Enderleigh is correct,” Lord Enderleigh said. “We have only to wait El Encendedor out. He will exhaust himself soon, and then we can attack.”

  Amaya glanced at Elinor to see what she thought of this statement and saw uncertainty there. “You do not know this,” she said. “It is that Señor Valencia has much endurance, and he may burn this place before he is exhausted. I must go.”

  “Go where?” Edmund said from behind her, startling her.

  “Amaya wishes to kill herself fighting El Encendedor,” Elinor said.

  Edmund came forward to stand beside Amaya. “I have been thinking it is time to take the fight to him,” he said. “And as we cannot open the doors to face the mob without being overwhelmed, that means someone must approach stealthily. Amaya and I are experts at doing so.”

  Elinor flung up her hands in exasperation. “And now you both have gone mad.”

  “Elinor, it is what I am made to do,” Amaya said. “I will—”

  “We will,” Edmund interrupted her.

  She glanced at him. He looked as determined as he ever had fighting for Valencia, and it comforted her to know this time his skills would be put to the right cause. “Very well. We will leave by the back door and make our way around to where Señor Valencia is. And then we will see how well he starts fires with my claws in his belly.”

  Lord Enderleigh smiled. “A vivid image. Elinor—”

  “I know,” Elinor said irritably. “But I do not wish to lose either of you. So you must swear to return.”

  “I swear it,” Amaya said. Edmund nodded.

  “Speak to the priest,” Lord Enderleigh said. “We will hold fast here. And—good luck to you both.”

  Amaya clasped Elinor’s hand. “I will return because I wish to see who the child will become.”

  “I will hold you to that promise,” Elinor said.

  The priest, and a handful of men and women dressed in long black robes, huddled together near the table by the strange carvings, muttering in a language Amaya did not understand. When she laid her hand on the priest’s shoulder, he startled, but did not react in fear. “What manner of men are these that attack a house of God?” he said.

  “They are not in control of their faculties, Father,” Edmund said. “They have been Coerced. We intend to put a stop to it, if you will show us the back way out.”

  The priest nodded and rose to his feet.

  Amaya wondered why, if there was a back door, no one had tried to assault it. When she saw it, her question was answered. The back door was a narrow, black slab of age-hardened oak, barely large enough for one person to enter. The priest unlocked it and opened it cautiously, but no one waited outside to attack them. The door opened on an e
qually narrow alley that ran the length of the church. It smelled of rotting waste and animal feces, and Amaya had to turn sideways and sidle along it to make her way out. No attacking force could make use of it.

  She stopped outside the alley, breathing deeply and wishing the air did not stink. Edmund, for whom the alley was an even tighter fit, joined her after a moment in which she feared he might be stuck. The noise from the mob was duller, but torchlight flickered off the walls and Amaya knew Valencia must be nearby.

  “He was in that alley before,” she said in Spanish, pointing, “but I believe he has moved on. We must search quickly.”

  “This way, then,” Edmund said.

  They made their way around the plaza, staying out of the light and using the alleys between the buildings as much as possible. There were few of those; the buildings were two or three stories tall and many rikras long, though Amaya guessed, if they were like English buildings, they were divided internally into several houses. The streets stretched out at random, making odd, sharp turns or curving in places, and without the guidance of the stars to keep her oriented, Amaya would have become hopelessly lost.

  Slowly, they worked their way west and south, around the plaza in a drunken path that nevertheless brought them ever closer to their goal. The sounds of battle rose up in all directions now, not just the mob in the plaza but more distant shouts and screams and gunfire. Amaya could hear at least one group centered on the Palacio Real, and despite her anger with King Ferdinand’s stupidity, she hoped no one there would be killed.

  They crossed a street, temporarily empty, the packed earth of which showed signs of many people having passed that way recently. Amaya circled around the west side of the nearest building, a tall structure with walls darker than its neighbors, and ducked into the alley that ran behind it. The alley’s scorched walls caught Amaya’s attention. This was the second alley Elinor had burned, the one from which Valencia and Jennet had not emerged.

  She held up a hand to signal Edmund to stop and pressed herself against the wall to peer down the alley’s length to where it ended at the plaza.

  “They were here?” Edmund whispered. He took a position opposite her, his back to the wall.

  Amaya nodded. “But they would have exited at this end, where we stand, and we have not seen them. They might be anywhere by now.”

  “Except they are not, because the church is still under fire.” Edmund peered down the alley as if hoping to see Valencia trotting toward them. “We must search this area.”

  The roar of shouting rose like a windstorm, and torchlight flickered from the west. Edmund swore under his breath. “They should not be this far west yet,” he told Amaya. “We must move quickly or be caught up in the mob.”

  Amaya took a few steps to look down the western street. The mob was a dark, moving mass gilded by the light of a dozen torches. She swiftly assessed their weaponry. “Some guns,” she said. “Knives, mostly. They are no threat to us.”

  “No, but we are on a different mission, remember?” Edmund took Amaya’s arm and drew her away from the street. “This street runs between the houses parallel to the plaza. If Mr. Valencia is not at its end, he is surely in one of the alleys that run like wheel-spokes between here and there. Hurry.”

  They ran eastward now, slowing every time they came to an alley cutting across theirs. The shouting and clamor rose up on all sides, and the glow of firelight was stronger than before. Amaya refused to let herself dwell on what Valencia might have done, whether the church was on fire and it was already too late. She would not permit him to defeat her by giving up before she knew her cause was hopeless.

  Creeping up on the second alley to her left, she pressed against the wall and peeked around the corner. Two figures, one smaller than the other, waited at the far end, backlit by an enormous blaze. Amaya’s fear that this was the church door burning passed as the mass of flame sped away to splash against the church’s shattered window. Then the end of the alley lay in darkness once more, the two figures darker shadows in the gloom.

  Amaya glanced at Edmund, who crouched against the opposite wall. “I go, and you follow,” she whispered.

  Edmund scowled and shook his head. “As if I would permit you to take the first blow.”

  “This is no time for you to become chivalrous, Edmund. If Mr. Valencia sees us coming, he will try to burn us, and I can survive that more readily than you. I will draw his attention, and you will attack.”

  Edmund did not look happy at this proposal, but he nodded. Amaya took a deep breath, assessed her sunqu as she let the air out of her lungs, and sprang for the taller figure.

  She was as quiet as possible, given the speed of her attack, but she was not quiet enough. The sound of her feet hitting the ground made Valencia and Jennet turn around. In the timeless drawn-out period between launching herself into action and reaching her target, Amaya had time to observe that Valencia looked tense, as if things were not going his way, and Jennet was as impassive as if she had Coerced her own emotions away. But Valencia had not reacted with fire, and Amaya pushed herself harder, not looking to see if Edmund had followed, hoping only to reach the Extraordinary Scorcher before he could attack.

  Then the world erupted into flame.

  Chapter 26

  In which there is fire and blood

  For the briefest moment, Amaya’s accelerated senses perceived nothing out of the ordinary. Then pain greater than any she had ever experienced enveloped her. Her skin and hair curled in from the heat, all the moisture in her mouth and the insides of her nose evaporated, and her eyes threatened to boil from the fire’s proximity. Amaya shot a command to Sense that tempered her nerves’ reactions, and the pain dulled but did not vanish. She needed some pain to stay aware of the fire’s progress.

  She was running nearly blind now, her eyes unable to focus past the fire. Valencia and Jennet were blurry shapes, Edmund was not within sight. She flung herself, not at Valencia, but at the shorter figure, bowling Jennet over and taking them both to the ground. Jennet screamed as the fire engulfing Amaya seared her flesh.

  Then the fire died as abruptly as it had started. Jennet’s eyes were squeezed shut, and she breathed rapidly, her heart pounding. Amaya rolled off her and sprang to her feet. She lunged at Valencia, her claws extended, snarling.

  Valencia was locked in combat with Edmund, the two men grappling for dominance. Fists gripped fists, and they shoved one another back and forth like wrestlers with deadly intent. Amaya, searching for an opening, shouted, “Give up, Mr. Valencia! You cannot win!”

  Valencia ignored her. Fire blossomed over his fists and spread over Edmund’s hands and up his arms. Edmund cried out and released his enemy, swatting at the fires to extinguish them, but they spread until his whole upper body was consumed by them.

  Valencia stepped back and regarded Edmund’s struggles dispassionately. Amaya again lunged at him, and he held up a hand and said, “Kill me, and he will burn until he dies.”

  Amaya instead flung herself at Edmund, tearing the shirt from his body so he could stomp out the fire. Red streaky burns covered his torso, and he was breathing as heavily as Jennet, but he turned on Valencia with a furious, fearless expression. “Coward,” he spat. “You know you cannot defeat me in a fair fight.”

  “Why should I not use all the weapons I have? Is that not a fair fight?” Valencia shrugged. He turned his gaze on Amaya, and smiled. “I did not believe in a Shaper’s power over fire until now,” he said. “You should be burned to death, and yet you stand here as lovely as ever. My admiration for you grows stronger with every moment.”

  “I believed I admired you, but that was a lie,” Amaya said. “You forced us to follow you, you made us believe—”

  “I did nothing of the sort,” Valencia said. He gestured at Jennet. “Ned chooses to serve me, and his talent is remarkable, yes. But let us not lay blame where it is not deserved.”

  Amaya had turned to look at Jennet when Valencia gestured. Jennet had stood and mo
ved some distance from both Amaya and Valencia, almost to the plaza. Her clothes were scorched and her hair was in disarray, but she no longer looked terrified. At Valencia’s words, though, the swiftest expression of anger swept across her face, her brows drawing down in the center, her lips thinning to a pale line. Then it was gone almost before Amaya could register it.

  Impulsively, Amaya said, “We know she is Jennet, not Ned. And you are wicked to claim no culpability in the things she does. She acts on your behalf.”

  Valencia raised an eyebrow. He, unlike the rest of them, was untouched by fire and looked as fresh as if he had just stepped from his dressing chamber. “She told you the truth? That astonishes me. Jennet’s secret has been her protection for years, is that not so, my dear?”

  Jennet nodded once, sharply. Her eyes were fixed on Amaya. Almost Amaya felt Jennet was waiting for her to do something, but she had no idea what.

  “But that is irrelevant,” Valencia continued. “I do ask Jennet’s assistance, but it is her choice whether to obey. It has always been her choice, and the consequences are hers alone. True, she owes me her life, but even so—”

  “Then it is you who have manipulated her,” Amaya said. “She believes she must help you because of what she owes you, but it is not true. No one should give over what they know to be right simply because they feel a duty to serve someone evil.”

  “Evil?” Valencia sounded utterly astonished. “I, evil? When I do nothing that is not in the service of Spain?” He stepped closer to Amaya. “You saw the rightness of my cause once, before Jennet made it more appealing than even my rhetoric could manage. Can you not feel so again? This is the new world, Miss Salazar. A world swept free of nobles and kings, where ordinary people have the charge of their own fates. You cannot tell me you do not believe this is the best choice for Spain?”

  “Do not attempt manipulation again, Mr. Valencia,” Edmund snarled. “We are not fools.”

  Valencia ignored him. He took another step, then another, until he was within touching distance of Amaya. “You are a magnificent woman,” he whispered, “beautiful and terrifying. What might not the two of us accomplish together? Please, Miss Salazar. Join me. Take up your rightful place in history.”