“You always bring the pretty boys with you, Tylira. What is it about you that attracts them, I wonder? You certainly never seemed like anything more than a spoiled child to me.”
My blood froze in my veins. No. No. No. It couldn’t be.
Amandera stood in the doorway, holding Kjexx by the collar. His body shook with a spasm in her grip, his face a rictus of pain, but his hand clutched the scintellex tight against his body. I was supposed to be watching his back. I was supposed to be making sure that this didn’t happen.
“Kjexx!”
My hands shook, but she was no match for me. I could still get us out of this.
“That reminds me,” Amandera said. “I’ll be taking that scintellex, barbarian.”
Kjexx handed her the scintellex with a shaking hand. I could unweave Rusk’s cage and then start on Amandera.
“You’re thinking that you can just start unweaving, but have you ever noticed, Tylira, that you are always one step behind us? You were never much of a thinker.”
“Us?” Memories of Amandera torturing me and chasing me across Canderabai flooded my mind, and I froze like a rabbit before a snake.
“Catane and I. He’s been teaching me a new way of thinking since I arrived. We’re going to save Everturn from the cataclysm, Tylira. This whole world is rotting, and the people here need a new home.”
“I know all of that.”
“And let me guess, you think you can fix it? You and two young men? Don’t be a fool. A problem like this needs people with loyalty to more than just the fun they can have. Now that you’re here, we can use your power to save the world, too.”
If she really wanted me to believe her cause was just, then why was Rusk bleeding in a cage?
I reached for Ra’shara. Had she told the truth about An’alepp? Sickening black streaks filled my vision. Was Ra’shara in worse condition near Amandera? I felt for Rusk’s cage. If I was going to try something, then I’d need to start there.
“Free him from the cage, and I will kill your barbarian friend here,” Amandera said easily. It was strange to see her ko above her head. It looked just like a fully-blossoming rose. Kjexx writhed beside her, but he managed a grin and a wink for me anyway. My eyes widened. How had he done that? I remembered what it felt like to be on the receiving end of it.
“Set them both free and I’ll stay with you.”
I picked at the threads that wove Rusk’s golden cage, and a bell sounded somewhere. Whatever it was, it was too late. I would have this thread free in just a moment, and then two more after that.
“That’s not an option, Tylira. We have plans for the Prince of Hawks,” Amandera said. “And while we’re on that subject, did you tell your beloved Rusk that you married his rival? He’s been holding out on us to help you, when all along you were being faithless to him.”
“Just run, Tylira,” Rusk said quietly.
“Oh yes, I know what those rings mean,” Amandera said. “Don’t you think you’ve hurt him enough?”
Lighting danced across the room as I pulled the threads of his cage free. I needed to get him out of there before Amandera destroyed everything with her words. Why did she want Rusk? What did they think they could use him for?
Amandera flung Kjexx to the side. He slumped to the ground, his body shuddering like he was still battling intense pain. She turned her attention to Rusk. He slumped, moaning in pain, and then he shuddered like Kjexx.
“All you cause with your link to the Common is pain, step-mother.” I gritted my teeth as I spoke. I was getting better at not killing people accidentally with the lightning, but there was still a burnt scent in the air as the leafy plants absorbed lightning strikes.
“Same to you, child. Your link pains everyone you know. You tear apart the fabric of every world you inhabit. Your very existence is what unravels reality.”
There! I pulled a last thread, and the side of Rusk’s cage exploded outward, splinters of gold flung into the trees and walls. I squinted, fearing the worst, but I wasn’t hit by any of the shards. Rusk cried out in pain, and I rushed into the cage, pulling him up with one hand. A splinter of the cage, as long as my finger, was buried in his forearm. I pulled him out of the cage, but I needed to turn my attention to Amandera.
“You know you can’t beat me,” I said. “You weren’t able to before.”
I gently eased Rusk to the ground, and then launched my lightning towards her. She deflected it easily, weaving a shield in the air that shed it like water on a turtle shell.
“Oh, I’m not trying to beat you…not yet.”
Then what was she doing? At least with her attention focused on me she had to stop hurting Rusk and Kjexx. Both of them had stopped writhing, although both were slumped on the ground, still breathing heavily. When had she arrived in Axum? Had she been helping Catane this whole time? I remembered, suddenly, the wispy white fabric darting away.
“It’s a trap.”
“Of course,” her smile was cat-like and might have been seductive directed at anyone other than me. I unwove a tree beside her, letting the lightnings fork towards her. She spun deftly away, flicking up her shield again.
“It’s touching that you don’t really want to kill me, Tylira. Or, at least, I assume that’s why you are performing so poorly.”
“How did you get here? When?”
“Through the door. Just like you did. But unlike you, I chose the winning side.”
“What do you want from me?” I began to unweave the threads of her scarf. Maybe so close to her face she wouldn’t be able to deflect them.
“We want to keep you from destroying Everturn. Your very existence is a threat to it.”
The lightning lashed out as I whipped the thread free. One bolt hit her before she could stop it, and she flew backwards landing with a crash. I ran to where she lay, behind me both men were picking themselves up off the ground. The scintellex rolled and skittered across the ground.
“I thought you were loyal to the High Tazmin,” I said. “I’m his daughter and I don’t think he’d like it if you killed me.”
She coughed, pressing up from the ground. Behind her Kjexx pulled himself across the floor towards the fallen scintellex.
“I’ve always been loyal to the same man, Tylira.”
That didn’t make any sense at all. My brows pulled together, and I leaned towards her, wanting to know what she meant.
Something hit me in the chest, as powerful as a tree swung by a giant. I flew through the air towards the balcony, landing hard on my back. My head knocked against the floor. How did she do that? I didn’t think she had it in her!
I stood, wobbly and dizzy. Rusk flew through the air, hitting the railing of the balcony and slumping to the floor with a cry. How much more torture could he take? At least he was no longer a caged bird.
“She’s loyal to me, Tylira.” Catane strode through the doorway, his shirtless muscles gleaming with the golden writing on his body. “And you will be, too.”
“Never.”
Kjexx was sneaking across the side of the room, scintellex in his hands, angling to get behind Amandera and Catane. Like a pair of cats, they stalked towards where I stood on the balcony, Rusk slumped beside me.
Rusk was muttering something about “like birds but not.” He was delirious with pain.
I could have won against Amandera, but against both of them?
Now or never. I tried to grab at the threads that made up Catane, but he laughed, flicked away my unweaving. How did he do that?
I grabbed a tree beside them, plucking a thread loose. It flipped free like a thrashing eel, lighting spraying out from the end, but Amandera smiled and wove it back into the tree.
I swallowed, and threw myself back into unweaving as fast as I could. For every thread I plucked and pulled, Amandera and Catane drew ever closer. What would happen when I had to face them physically as well as magically?
“An’alepp!” I called out in Ra’shara. “An’alepp!”
Ther
e was nothing. My breath came quickly. The small of my back pressed against the stone balcony railing. Rusk pulled himself up beside me, using the rail to support his stumbling weight. He looked down at the ground, and his lips moved as if he were counting.
“You’re going to help me, little sister,” Catane said.
“What do you want from me?” I asked, furiously unweaving everything I could, watching my lightning sizzle and fail at their defenses.
“You’re going to help me take over Everturn,” Catane said. “And then we’ll burn Axum, to the bedrock.”
Rusk straightened, suddenly, his stumbling pain falling from him like a mask. He looked right at Kjexx.
“Now!” Kjexx yelled, throwing the scintellex to Rusk. It spun, white and gleaming, over Amandera’s head, and Rusk caught it deftly with one hand. His other arm snaked around my waist while Kjexx crashed into Amandera from behind.
Kjexx seized Amandera by the waist and the two of them crashed into the railing and tumbled, tangled together over the railing and into the night. Kjexx’s eyes sought me one last time, and he winked.
“No!” I screamed, watching as he plummeted over the side and towards the black of the city at night.
Catane rushed to the railing, peering over the edge. His hands came up as if he were unweaving, but I didn’t get to see what he did. Rusk spun me around, tucked the scintellex into my hand and then climbed over the railing, pulling me with him. He was still counting aloud, though his voice was fuzzy and his movements sloppy.
“One, and… Now,” he said, and we dropped together into the night.
What was he thinking? I wasn’t ready to die! At least I would die with Rusk and brave Kjexx. The ground came up quickly. Below me I saw Kjexx on the cobblestones, bent and broken in death. His ko was missing. I choked on a sob, my last breath.
And then, lighting fast, we swung upwards before we hit the ground, our inertia slowing as we gained height. At the peak of the arc we stopped and then all I could see was Eaglekin as I was lowered onto the back of the great brown Graxx along with Rusk. I peered behind me to see that we had been caught and swung by the long neck and beak of Helixx.
Rusk pushed me into the saddle, wrapping the cords around me while Helixx and Graxx broke out in a twin song of sadness. Their long, high keens sent chills to the base of my spine, but I didn’t have to ask why they cried. My own tears were flowing so fast and thick that I could barely make out the form of my husband where his blood was running redder than the Heart of Veen across the cobblestones.
Of Amandera, there was no sign.
Chapter Twenty-Six: Eaglekin
THE EAGLEKIN DASHED DOWN the streets, leaping over horses, carts, coaches and even the smaller buildings as we fled towards the gate. No one had time to alert the guards before they were hunching low to the ground and then squeezing through the gates, guards scattering everywhere like ants from a hill.
The Eaglekin took off across the snowy plains, eating up ground so quickly that what had taken a day to cross on horseback wouldn’t take more than a few hours. Could they keep ahead of any scouts or messengers Catane sent out? Did I dare to hope that we could escape the Veen Empire?
“Get in the pannier, Tylira. You’re freezing,” Rusk said, sliding into the large basket.
I followed him in. It wasn’t like the Eaglekin needed my direction. They probably understood what was happening better than I did. Rusk pulled a pair of blankets off the floor, handing one to me and wrapping the other around himself. I hadn’t realized how cold I was in the frigid air with nothing on but my slip of a dress.
I ripped the mask off my face, and pulled the deliciously thick blanket around me. My teeth chattered uncontrollably and Rusk pulled me closer as we leaned in towards each other.
“You must be in so much pain,” I said between chattering teeth.
“I’ll be alright.”
“How could you have known the Eaglekin would catch us?”
“The Eaglekin can communicate with me, remember?” Rusk said, putting an arm around me and pulling me close so that our shared body heat and the two shared fur blankets began to still our shivers.
“It was like Kjexx planned it with you. He said ‘Now.’” My voice broke.
I couldn’t bear to think of him shattered on the street. It felt hollow to think of him just gone. If he’d lived, we would have had years of life together. I should have been kinder to him. I should have let him kiss me more. I was going to miss those winks and grins.
“Those are your packs,” Rusk said, nodding at the other end of the pannier. “Once you’re warm you can change and even put your coat and boots back on, but you should stay under the blankets for now. It’s warmer with the body heat.”
I stared at the packs, and realization dawned.
“He could speak to the Eaglekin. You could speak to them. You communicated through Graxx?”
Rusk nodded. In the light of the one, huge moon I saw his face as plain as if it were dawn. Sadness etched itself across his face.
“I was beginning to like him,” he said.
I twisted the silver ring around my finger, back and forth, back and forth. “I liked him, too.”
“Enough to marry him, I note.” Rusk’s voice sounded a little frostier.
“It wasn’t like that, Rusk.”
“Tell me what it was like then, Tylira. The man just fell to his death for you.” He sounded sad, but not bitter. In fact, he pulled me in tighter and tucked his chin over my head, protectively. It was easier to talk like this when he wasn’t searching my features for every hint of emotion.
“He loved me,” I said softly.
“He wanted you to have his army and to be in a position where you had to save his people — where you couldn’t just walk away.”
“How do you know?”
“He told Graxx, sort of. Graxx told me. I’m sure some things were lost in translation.”
“So, you knew. You’ve been in a golden cage all this time, tortured and alone. And you knew?”
“Yes.” The pain in his voice cut me.
I turned in his grasp so that he was pushed against the side of the pannier, laying my body flush against his. My hands slid along his chest and neck and up to his face, cupping it between them.
“You told me to leave you, knowing I would be another man’s wife.”
“Yes.” His eyes burned into mine, loyalty, faithfulness, and sacrifice mixing in them.
“You would have died there with nothing.”
“Yes.”
“And even then, you loved me enough to send me away.”
“I will always love you, Tylira.”
“I thought you had grown tired of me. That you’d realized I was forced on you. That we were a poor fit. That you’d made a mistake.”
“No, no,” and as his head shook, his eyes grew too bright, as if tears brimmed in them, and his hands reached up to cup my face, too.
I kissed him, an embrace of my lips and his, bittersweet and more potent than any poison. I was almost the cause of his death. I was certainly the cause of Kjexx’s death. Kjexx, who I had kissed so passionately only last night. Kjexx who I was married to. The bitterness of it tore at me. In his arms I had felt guilt, in Rusk’s I felt shame.
“Don’t cry, Wild Girl.”
“I don’t deserve you.”
He chuckled. “It doesn’t work like that.”
“I didn’t deserve either of you.”
“It never mattered. Neither of us chose you because you were worthy. Don’t you remember what I told you? I chose you because you are you. That doesn’t go away, no matter how guilty you feel.”
“You shouldn’t love me like that. You should be angry at me. It should have been me on the ground back there, not Kjexx.”
“I’m glad it wasn’t you. And he is too. You were bought with the price of his life. He gave it to you freely, out of love.”
He held me for long moments. Kissing me on the forehead, the cheeks, in my hai
r and on the lids of my closed eyes. How could I ever repay him for what he suffered? I could certainly never repay Kjexx. I had squandered both their love.
“I knew he would do whatever he needed to get you and the scintellex out of the Heart. He knew I would do the same,” Rusk said eventually. “It could have been I who died and he who rode off with you into the night. When we planned to have the Eaglekin come with the supplies at that exact moment, we didn’t know which of us would be riding away with them, but if it had been him I would have hoped that he’d kiss away your pain.”
The way he kissed me after that felt like he was trying to do just that. His hands skimmed over my body, with nothing but the sleek silver dress between them and my skin. I didn’t feel cold anymore. I felt burning hot. Searing tears still dropped down my nose and into his face, but for every tear that fell, he covered it in a kiss. Hot, trailing kisses down my neck and over my shoulder. Warm, soft, painfully sweet kisses that parted my lips and slid into my mouth. Passionate, roaring kisses, that filled my ears with the rush of my blood and drove away my pain and heartbreak.
“I love you.”
His words weren’t needed. His large calloused hands already told me I was wanted, owned, safe in his care. His kisses told me I was forgiven. The expression in his eyes told me that to him, I was whole.
“I love you, too,” I echoed, my hands careful over his injured skin. But my heart, oh my heart wasn’t careful at all. It had broken open with abandon. I didn’t bother to guard it, didn’t stop to hold out a reservation or a what if. Who cared how we had come to be, or where we would go? I didn’t want to miss out on this love ever again, no matter what commitment it took. No matter what life it led to. Freedom? Was there anything more free than this? Anything more whole than I was when we were so tangled that I couldn’t tell where I ended and he began?
I was changed, freed, reborn by two different loves and I finally understood what Rusk had meant about sacrifice being a greater freedom. My future wasn’t my own. It had been bought with Kjexx’s life. I would honor his sacrifice. I would lead his people to freedom and safety. My heart wasn’t my own, either, and it had been won by Rusk’s sacrifice. I would love him well, by healing the things he loved.
Lightning Strikes Twice (Unweaving Chronicles Book 2) Page 16