Burning Bright

by Megan Derr

  What would he do without Pechal? Why would anyone want to kill Pechal, who was sweet and earnest and only a thief from necessity-and stubbornness, because Raz knew people had offered to take Pechal in and give him honest work. Pechal stuck with it because of Raz, because if they couldn't be honest citizens together then they would be thieves together.

  Raz could not repay that loyalty, that love, by letting Pechal go to the Fires. "Get some sleep, you. Everything will be better in the morning. We'll come up with a plan."

  Pechal started to reply, but sleep stole him first, and Raz watched him until his own eyes could no longer remain open.

  Chapter Six: Curse

  Ivan reluctantly sat up in bed, mourning the loss of warmth when Ailill rolled over with a grunt and settled back into sleep. Sighing, Ivan climbed out of bed and slowly went around the room retrieving his hastily discarded clothes. When he was dressed, he sat down to pull his boots on, and then buckled his sword belt into place and made certain the blade fell as it should. Once his sword was secured, he strapped another dagger to his right thigh, tucked a smaller one into his boot, and finally swung his cloak over his shoulders and pulled on his leather gloves.

  He glanced toward the bed and felt a sudden impulse to kiss Ailill goodbye. Ignoring it as any stupid impulse deserved to be ignored, Ivan slipped away as quietly as he could in the creaky inn and went downstairs to where his men already waited in the entry hall.

  Isidor's fingers moved, just visible in the light of a street lantern just outside the front window. Ready to go?

  Ivan nodded and led the way outside, keeping a sharp eye out for guards. The entire city had been in an uproar since someone or something had severely damaged the Cathedral of Ashes. Ivan hadn't been able to get close enough to see for himself, but he had heard that none of the windows remained intact and nearly all the internal walls were cracked. Some said it was only a matter of days before one of the damaged spires finally surrendered and collapsed entirely.

  He was more concerned by the fact that he knew Raz and Pechal lived in the cathedral, and Raz had been upset about something that very same day. Just minutes after he'd left them at the teahouse the Heart had gone ablaze with panic. Ivan had a sneaking suspicion he knew what was wrong, but it seemed too surreal to believe.

  But Pechal and Raz were definitely not in the city, and Ferapont had managed to learn that they'd left on horses with the Kundou girls. Ivan had only one real question: was it Raz or Pechal who was the Vessel?

  When the coast seemed clear, he gestured to his men and left the relative safety of the inn to creep across the street to the alleyway there. They had a long way to go to reach the noble district, and the closer they got to that part of the city the worse the guards would get. Nothing was worse than a twitchy guard, but there was no help for it.

  Some jobs he could ignore or refuse and others … Others he had no choice but to leave a warm bed and willing body to attend.

  As they reached the gates that heralded the noble districts, Gleb and Luka moved forward to take the lead, slinking and sliding through the shadows in that way of theirs. Usually the gates between districts remained opened as the districts themselves were a long-outdated practice. But the gate was, for the second time in Ivan's memory, locked. He hated when the Heart got panicky. It made sneaking around more trouble than it was ever really worth.

  Not that a lock had ever stopped Gleb, and Luka and Isidor made quick work of the guards. First obstacle overcome, they pressed on until they finally reached the park where they had been told to meet their new client.

  "Wait here," Ivan murmured when they reached the fountain they had been told to look for. They all made noises of protest, but at a sharp gesture from him, subsided. Ivan looked around the clearing, glanced at his men, but no one saw anything amiss.

  Still, the prickling along the back of his neck told him something was going to burn. Loosing his sword in it sheath, he gave his men a last warning look and finally walked toward the small temple nestled in the cluster of trees just off the walking path.

  The building smelled of disuse, old stone and mildew, and dust. Ivan stepped inside, squinting when a burst of light suddenly flooded the room, and then dimmed down to a more reasonable level. In the far, right-hand corner a man stood, his features obscured by a cloak and the glowing orb of light in the middle of the room.

  Ivan had heard that some of the magic users could call light in such fashion, but he hadn't thought it more than exaggeration. "You had a job?" he asked.

  "Yes," the man said, words clipped and striving to obscure an accent, but Ivan knew a noble when he heard one. No one else would go to so much ridiculous drama just to arrange a simple job. "I need you to find someone for me and bring him to me. I was told you were the best group in the Heart."

  "We're the best in the country, but we don't kidnap or kill. Too messy, too much trouble, too little money for the effort." He also did not approve of either, not without extremely good reason, but there was never any point in telling anyone that. People believed in laziness and monetary motivation long before they believe a merc might have a moral code. "I'll find him for you, but bringing him in is your own problem."

  "I can make it worth your while," the man said, and he threw something at Ivan's feet. Ivan did not bother to glance at it—the metallic chink told him it was money.

  He shook his head. "I don't do kidnappings. I'll find him—"

  "You'll do what I tell you!" the man said, voice taking on a chill that sent a spike of alarm through Ivan. He held his ground, however much he wanted to get the ashes out of the temple. "I want you to find the most recent Vessel and bring him to me. I do not want the High Priest or Lord Krasny to get to him first. That shouldn't be a problem given that he is going to die, anyway. Bring him to me, and he might just live."

  Ivan knew a lie when heard one, no matter how smoothly it was spoken. That aside, what sort of scorching idiot did the man take him to be that Ivan would believe he meant Pechal or Raz no harm after going to all this trouble to get him before he was sacrificed?

  He might not have been a fancy, educated noble, but fire and ash he wasn't stupid. "Interfering with the Vessels is against the law, and that's a law even I won't break, though I have broken almost every other. You want the Vessel, you're on your own. Hearth and light, good sir." Ivan stepped back and started to turn to go—and swore when the door slammed shut and the light flared up to a painfully blinding level. He squinted and shielded his eyes, but even that was not enough.

  Too late, he saw the man draw close, but couldn't react in time when the man punched him. Ivan reeled and tried to recover to reach for his sword, but that scorching light! He grunted, pained, as his head slammed into the stone floor. He fumbled for the hands tugging at his clothes, but could not find the strength to tear them away. Couldn't do anything. Fire and ash, that light.

  A hand as cold as ice pressed against his chest, making him hiss. Incomprehensible words began to fill the room, as cold as that hand and even more disorienting than the light.

  Then came the pain. Ivan screamed in agony, screamed himself hoarse, until abruptly everything stopped. He sat up, feeling weak and shaky, fumbling for his torn clothes but still unable to gather the strength for it. The man kicked him back down and placed a boot on his chest.

  "If you do not do as I say and bring me the Vessel in seven days then that mark on your chest will kill you. Don't think it will be quick, either. If you fail to bring me the Vessel, then you will spend another seven days in unbelievable agony and die choking on your own blood. Once upon a time, the sorcerers called that mark the Basilisk's Kiss. Now get out and find my Vessel. You can keep the coin; take it as a show of my faith in you."

  Ivan tried to say something, but couldn't. A couple of minutes later, he was alone. Slowly, bit by agonizing bit, Ivan managed to sit up—and nearly collapsed again save for the arms that suddenly caught him.

  "Boss! Fire and ash, boss!" Luka exclaimed and together
with Maksim, got Ivan on his feet. "What happened to you? What the scorch is on your chest?"

  "Get—" Ivan broke off, drawing in ragged breaths, every one of them feeling as if someone was force-feeding him glowing embers. "Get me to Ailill. He's the only one I know—"

  Luka nodded. "Maksim, carry him. Isidor, Gleb, Ferapont, go ahead and clear the way. Karp, keep a sharp lookout with me."

  Ivan remembered practically nothing of the journey back to the inn, only brief snatches of conversation and what he thought was a tussle with guards at one point. When they reached the inn and Maksim set him down, Ivan dropped to his knees and heaved on the street, tossing up what little of his dinner remained in his gut.

  He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and drew another ragged breath. "Upstairs," he said hoarsely and groaned as they hauled him to his feet. Maksim picked him up again and carried him inside and up the stairs to the room that Ivan had been sharing with Ailill.

  On the bed, Ailill jerked up, growling in that way of his that sounded so genuinely feline that Ivan had his suspicions as to what form Ailill took when he shifted. But all he could think about right then was how appealing the bed looked. He groaned as Maksim laid him down upon it, whimpered when Ailill touched his face.

  "By the Queen, what happened—that is a killing curse!" Ailill snarled, and if he was aware he was shouting in the dead of night, he gave no indication of caring. "Vanya, who in the gods' names put a killing curse on you?"

  "Don't—know—painful light—" Ivan gave up, drew a breath, and suspected he blacked out for a moment because the next thing he remembered he was alone, most of his clothes were gone, and a hot cloth was laid across his forehead.

  He was also lying with his head in Ailill's lap. Not a bad place to be, by any means, but the circumstances were not what he wished. "What?" he asked, then gave up, throat hurting too much to finish the question.

  "Shh," Ailill said quietly. "Can you sit up? I've a tea here that will help your throat."

  Ivan tried to say yes, but just gave up and did it, though it took more help from Ailill than he liked. When he was settled against the wall, legs stretched out in front of him, he sipped at the tea until he finally managed to ask, "What?"

  Ailill's mouth tightened. "Someone placed a killing curse on you. It's very old, very powerful magic. I would be impressed that someone in Pozhar is so talented except it's exactly the kind of thing that outlawed and restricted magic here in the first place. You don't know who did it?"

  "No," Ivan rasped and gestured weakly. "But only—only so many—" He coughed, splashing tea on his hands and at a reproving look from Ailill, resumed drinking it.

  "Nine people in Pozhar are allowed to use magic, but that doesn't mean there aren't others who can," Ailill said. "Isn't that what those rebels were trying to do?"

  Ivan conceded the point with a grunt. The Sword & Sorcerer had been shut down, it's people hanged, because they had somehow obtained fire feathers and were trying to use magic. "Too strong. Lord."

  Ailill nodded in agreement. "I tend to agree it must be one of the nine, but that still leaves us with nine and no easy way to get to them. Well, it's easy enough for me. Why did he do this?"

  Sighing, Ivan finished his tea and tried to stand up. When Ailill shoved him back down and glared, he rolled his eyes. "Isidor or Luka."

  "All right, I'll get them," Ailill. "Don't move or I'll throttle you right here and now, wolf."

  Ivan smiled faintly and fought a stupid urge to kiss him. He did not know where all these impulses toward affection were coming from, but it needed to stop. Ailill was a casual lover, nothing more, and Ivan certainly wasn't interested in trying for anything more. Even if he was, Ailill was a duke of Verde.

  He leaned back with another sigh as Ailill left to go find Luka or Isidor, wondering how in the flames he was going to get out of this mess.

  When he heard the door open a moment later, he could barely make himself open his eyes. He shouldn't have been so tired; he'd taken worse beatings. Was this really what magic did to people? If so, he was glad that practically no one could use it.

  Luka stood by the side of the bed scowling at him. Ivan lifted one hand and signaled quickly, forcing his fingers to work, annoyed when they fumbled. But Luka seemed to follow well enough because he said, "Definitely a noble. Wants us to find the Vessel, deliver him to the noble."

  "Why?" Ailill asked.

  Ivan shrugged and signaled again. Luka sighed. "Well, of course you refused. We don't do kidnappings, and while we obviously don't have much respect for the law, we wouldn't interfere with a Vessel hunt. I don't even want to think about what they would do to us for kidnapping the Vessel and preventing a sacrifice."

  Grimacing, Ivan signaled the next thing he needed to convey. Luka stared at him, horrified. "Repeat that."

  Ivan glared at him, but obeyed. "Fire and ash," Luka swore.

  Ailill's brows rose. "What?"

  "Ivan says that the Vessel is probably Raz or Pechal. He thinks Pechal. Why?"

  Ivan sighed and let his head fall back to rest against the wall again. "Water." Ailill immediately stood and poured a glass of water from a pitcher on the nearby table and helped him drink it, wiping water from his damp lips when he was done. "Thanks," Ivan rasped. "Raz was upset the other day. They live in the Cathedral. Other stuff, little things. It fits."

  "You may be right," Luka conceded reluctantly. "Raz did seem jumpy. He'd give himself up, but there's no way he would surrender Pechal. So this guy put a killing curse on you so that we have no choice but to bring him Pechal. And then he'll kill all of us anyway. Does he think we're stupid?"

  Grunting, Ivan closed his eyes. After a moment, he dragged them open again and looked at Ailill. "Why so tired?"

  "Curses are draining because it's literally weaving itself into your body, becoming a part of it so it can kill you according to its strictures. Think of it as ivy overtaking a wall."

  "Fire and ash," Luka said again, sighing. "Can't you break it? You're a White Beast, surely you can do something."

  Ailill shook his head, clearly upset. "I wish I could, but magic in Verde doesn't work that way. We all have magic, but it's all in the shifting. My magic means I can shift right now without losing my clothes or anything. It means when I shift back later, I'll still be wearing them. It makes the shift painless. Being a White Beast means I can communicate with only thought to all other citizens of Verde and can control them to a certain extent. But this—" He lightly touched the mark on Ivan's chest. "It's completely beyond my abilities. Even if I knew what to do I wouldn't be able to do it. Breaking this is going to take the man who cast it or someone of his skill or better. I don't even know how he managed to learn such archaic magic."

  "Scorch it," Luka said sourly. "How long do we have until he dies?"

  "Seven days," Ivan said.

  Luka's hands balled into fists at his side. "I'm getting the others. We have to do something."

  "But what?" Ailill asked. "Even I dare not go to the palace and try to find help. We don't know who amongst the nobles cast this curse and taking any overt action will put you all in greater danger—and probably cause him to step up the deadline on the curse."

  "He can do that?" Luka asked.

  Ivan closed his eyes, wondering if perhaps it wasn't better just to die right then. But suicide sounded too much like sacrifice, and that left a bad taste in his mouth. He might not interfere in them, but he didn't have to like them.

  "Is there no one else who might have the resources or knowledge to help?" Ailill asked. "If we were anywhere else, I might be able to provide them, but here in Pozhar all the help I could access will just put us right in the path of whoever cast the curse."

  Luka hesitated, glanced at Ivan. He shook his head and added a glare for good measure.

  "What?" Ailill asked sharply, noticing the silent exchange.

  Ivan continued glaring, but after another moment of hesitation, Luka said, "We could try Sasha."

&n
bsp; "No," Ivan snapped. "He's no better than whoever did this. Fires, maybe it was him. I never did get a look."

  "Sasha isn't a magic user and believe me, as much as everyone gossips about him that would have been noted. Magic doesn't stay secret. But Sasha … he knows things. He's always…" Luka broke off with a huff. "Sasha is strange. He's always there, and he always shows up asking for strange things. He just had Raz steal the Tear of Blood from the Duchess of Ilarion. Rumor has it last month he paid someone else to steal a set of books from the Ashes Library. But he's also been known to help people for the right price. He got the Flicker gang out of jail, at least according to them when you can get them to be honest for two scorching minutes. Rumors say he's been seen in other parts of the country, too. No one knows who or what he is, but if anyone could help—"

  "He's dangerous!" Ivan snapped, and then immediately felt tired. "I feel like a child."

  Ailill smiled sympathetically. "Shifting is tiring the first year or so after we're able to do it. Children can't shift because their bodies simply don't have the energy for it. A powerful magic user in Verde is someone who can shift between forms multiple times a day. Rest all of tomorrow and you'll be fine."

  "Then we'll only have six days left," Luka pointed out. "Scorch you, I'm going to put word out we're looking to speak with Sasha. In the meantime, we need to find Raz and let him know the High Priest isn't the only one looking for them. Fire and ash! How do we get ourselves into these messes?" He did not wait for a reply, simply turned around on one heel and stomped out of the room.

  Ivan sighed and gave up staying conscious.

  When he woke up again, it was to sunlight in his eyes. Ivan lifted a hand to block the worst of it and fumbled with the blankets wrapped tightly around him. Finally shoving them off, he sat up and swung his feet over the edge of the bed.

  His chest ached something fierce, and with that thought, all his memories of the previous night came rushing back. Ivan looked at his chest, finally getting a good look at the mark he had only glimpsed before. He had thought it just some indistinct smudge sort of thing, but in full sunlight it looked like someone had tattooed a bird skeleton on his chest. It reminded him of the skeletons that healers pinned in boxes and displayed in their offices, as though they somehow thought it was inviting to show off bones.