Skirmish: The House War: Book Four

by Michelle West

  She turned almost wildly and Angel caught her shoulder, releasing her as she stiffened, but standing by her side. His signing was curt and minimal; hers was frenetic. She sucked in wet air as the rain that had breached the barrier meant to slough it carefully to one side of the manse or the other joined the water that waited beyond the protections Sigurne had set.

  They would not hold. Jewel knew it.

  “Send the Kings away,” she told Duvari, voice low.

  Duvari nodded. “If,” he added darkly, “it is possible, ATerafin. I will find Lord Sarcen—”

  “You’ll find his corpse, but not today,” she snapped back. As the words left her mouth, she realized they were also true. “What we could do, we did. I saw Sarcen briefly and he didn’t look like a demon, not to me. Go to the Kings.”

  “And what will you do?”

  “We’ll—we’ll deal with the water.”

  * * *

  There was no doubt at all in her voice; Angel knew all the variations of Jay’s voice; he knew her anger when it was buried deep; he knew her fear; he knew her joy, which she hid so completely it seemed to outsiders she had no experience of it at all. She spoke with certainty; she spoke as if every word was the truth.

  Duvari heard what Angel heard, and he hesitated for only a moment longer before he turned on heel and ran. It was the only time that Angel had ever seen Duvari move. He might have continued to watch, but the water was undulating in a way that suggested it was about to fall.

  “It’s just water—” he began, but one look at Jay’s face made clear that water could—and had—killed in her presence. She lowered her trembling arms, and the sleeves of the dress itself fell with them, trailing down her sides as if they were a white, white liquid that had captured some essence of the sunlight that storm clouds obscured.

  Tines grazed the space between Angel’s shoulder blades. He turned. The Winter King’s large, dark eyes gazed unblinking into his.

  “You cannot stand there, stupid boy,” Snow screeched from above.

  “I stand,” he declared, “where she stands.”

  “Then you will die, and she will be very angry.”

  The Winter King did not speak a word; nor did he look away. Angel understood what was being asked—or perhaps offered—but he hesitated anyway. “Find the others, Snow,” was his compromise.

  “Snow is stupid,” another voice said. “But I can find them.”

  “You’re supposed to be with Gabriel!” Angel shouted at Night. Wind tossed the words where the cat failed to hear them. Still air would probably have done the same. He hesitated and then cupped hands to either side of his mouth. “Find them. Keep them safe. Is Shadow—”

  “Shadow stays where she left him. He is trying to be obedient.”

  “Go!”

  “Yes, yes, yesssss.”

  Angel watched their wings cut sky as they wheeled and turned. Not even distance could make them look like birds. He turned to the Winter King and nodded. “Arann!”

  Arann sheathed sword. “It won’t cut water,” he said. The Winter King knelt, and both Angel and Arann mounted his ivory back.

  4th of Henden, 427 A.A.

  Avantari, Averalaan Aramarelas

  Devon had never cared to fight. Fighting was the last resort of the Astari; it generally implied a failure of planning, a failure of caution, or a failure of forethought. Watching the Lord, he knew that Celleriant lived for—existed for—battle itself. He was no son of Cartanis; Cartanis was a god of War—but of Just War; the war that must be fought. There was no battle that Celleriant would not fight if he deemed the opponent worthy; no further cause was required.

  Avandar was not Celleriant, but in some ways, it was worse; when the floor shattered, Devon knew whose power had broken it. He had seen mages for most of his adult life, often covertly, and while he knew mages hoarded their power, he knew as well that they took pride in it. The magi of the First Circle would easily be capable of this limited and this deliberate an act of destruction—but only one of those magi could travel as Avandar had done—and Avandar had carried three.

  It was not the first time Devon wondered who Avandar was, or had been, before his service to Jewel ATerafin; it would not be the last. Duvari did not—and would never—completely trust the domicis, and the scant trust he had grudgingly developed was likely to be greatly diminished if Avandar succeeded on Jewel’s behalf.

  The stranger laughed. “You have grown addled, Warlord, if you seek to face me without a weapon.”

  “I do not seek to face you at all. I am not Arianni; nor am I Allasiani; I have nothing to prove.” He gestured, a sharp twist of wrist, and the fractured floor broke as if it were a shell, and something was pushing pieces aside in order that it might emerge. “ATerafin,” he said, “order your men to withdraw.”

  They were not Devon’s men, but he didn’t argue. He gave the order quickly. The Kings’ Swords hesitated; those who could still stand had a duty to the Princes who lay in safety—such as it was—beyond the closed doors. Devon called them again. “Your deaths here will serve no purpose, and it is death you face—not in battle and not in defense of the future Kings, but as afterthought. Come, gather your fallen; retreat to the Halls of the Wise.”

  “The Princes—”

  “They are as safe as they can be; I will remain.”

  They stood their ground. Devon grimaced. He lifted his hand, gestured, and a sigil appeared in the air, directly in front of his chest. It was the symbol of the Lord of the Compact, the leader of the Astari. What common sense could not do, the sigil did; the men moved.

  So, too, Celleriant. The broken floor beneath his feet didn’t hinder him at all; he leaped to the height of the halls and remained there, his hair flowing on currents of wind that Devon couldn’t see. He could feel it and hear it, though. Amaerelle leaped as well; he failed to land. But where his sword struck Celleriant’s, lightning flashed, red and blue, and it spoke with the voice of resonant thunder, like a note struck against the shell of the world.

  Devon stumbled as the floor beneath his feet tilted. Leaping, he found flat ground, marble with sheared edges. The earth rumbled beneath his feet as he turned. Rising and shedding shards of marble and long splinters of the beams beneath it was a moving mountain.

  The earth itself had risen at Avandar’s behest.

  4th of Henden, 427 A.A.

  Terafin Manse, Averalaan Aramarelas

  House Guards emerged from the manse and headed toward the terrace, their plated feet striking the stone in a way that implied large numbers.

  “Head them off,” Arann told the Winter King. When the stag failed to move, he added, “Please.”

  The Winter King’s tines shifted slightly, as if he were nodding; he sprang and landed a few yards from the frontrunners. Arann shouted, “Halt!” and to Angel’s surprise, they obeyed.

  “The magi and the House Council ask that you remain by the manse; prevent anyone in it from leaving—it is not yet safe. Wait upon the word of the regent or the captain.”

  No one questioned him. Behind his back, they could see the rearing of the water, and not a single man present felt their swords would do it any harm. They withdrew. “We won’t lose anyone here,” Arann told Angel quietly. “Unless the water can shatter the walls.”

  Angel gestured, den-sign, and Arann nodded. He slid off the back of the Winter King. “I’ll join them. Will you stay?”

  “I’ll stay.” The Winter King had already turned away; Angel could see Jay’s stiff back, and at her side, the gray, plain robes of Sigurne Mellifas. The water now towered above them, its shape changing as he watched. When it fell, it crashed to the ground; water rose in a spray. But neither Jay nor Sigurne was so much as dampened, although the mage stumbled. Jay caught her arm, righting her; Angel wasn’t certain he’d’ve dared.

  She heard the voice of the water. Not in the crash and the thunder of its fall—that much, she’d witnessed before, and at the time, people had fallen to its moving rage. Her
grip on Sigurne’s arm tightened as she said, “the water—it’s angry.”

  Sigurne said nothing, but the slender line separating the two women from the wall of water that was once again regrouping—as if each drop, each splash of liquid was a single man in an army of tens of thousands—grew brighter and sharper. “I cannot hear the water,” Sigurne replied, through clenched teeth. “Nor should you be able to, if my understanding is correct. But if you can, ATerafin, bespeak it. Calm its anger.”

  Jewel turned to stare at the lined—and tired—visage of the older woman. “I can hear Duvari when he speaks,” she murmured, “but nothing I can say—or do—influences him at all.”

  The water was not Duvari. Not the Lord of the Compact. Not a man. It was bound, Jewel thought; bound, compelled, and angry to be either. She felt the earth rumble at its movements; the ground shook. “We need to get off of the terrace,” she told the mage.

  “I cannot move and maintain these protections,” Sigurne replied.

  “The terrace won’t last,” was Jewel’s grim response. “We need to move.” She turned to the Winter King as the water struck again.

  4th of Henden, 427 A.A.

  Avantari, Averalaan Aramarelas

  The creature that rose from the remains of the floor was not so much dirt as stone. It was almost the shape of a man, although its fists were fingerless, its head featureless; it wore no armor, wielded no weapon that was not part of itself, but it moved inexorably toward the stranger with the red, red sword. His laughter was wild now, higher in pitch but no less delighted. If demons could be judged by the standards of men, he was insane.

  Fists of dirt and stone drove new cracks into the floors as the living earth struck home; the demon was not beneath them, although it was close. His sword struck earth, bit, and lodged in what might have been wrists. It did not sever hands, and the demon’s brows rose. “Viandaran, you have grown!”

  “It is not I who have grown,” was the cool reply. “But you who have become diminished. You speak of the gray and empty present, Kincallenne; how much of that now resides in your perception? You are not, you will never again be, part of this world; you are given the flesh you can force from the plane for your brief, brief sojourn.”

  There was no laughter in response.

  “Prove that I am wrong,” Avandar continued. “Bespeak the wild earth; tame it, ask for its favor. You were a Lord of the wild earth, in your youth; a Lord of the wild water in your prime.” He smiled. It was a perfect, cold expression in a face that had lost color. Devon thought, watching the domicis, that he was pressing his power to its upper limits. The earth struck again, and this time the demon rose.

  He rose toward the ceiling, borne aloft by wind that now howled. It was winter wind, the edge of its chill enough to kill the unprepared, and it was far, far louder than it had been.

  “What we cannot cajole, Warlord, we command.”

  “There is no other choice left you. Have you now discovered the bitterness of things that must be taken because they will never again be willingly offered?”

  “You speak as if we were ever mortal. That curse, that long curse, belongs to you, Warlord, and only you. What care have we for the affections of the wild? What loss are their voices to us? We will remake the plane, Viandaran, and if rumors are true, you alone might witness it—whatever remains of you.”

  “ATerafin,” Avandar said, raising his voice. “You must depart; attend to the Swords, or Avantari’s magical defenses. The earth and the air have now noticed each other; I cannot concentrate on anything but the earth’s voice in this place.”

  The earth, Devon thought, and the Kialli. Lightning flashed beyond the domicis’ shoulder, and the sound of unintelligible war cries blended with the sounds of nature’s fury; of the two, it was not the former that was suddenly awe-inspiring and terrifying. If the earthen pillar could not be contained, the hall would be destroyed, and with it, the long room in which the Princes now resided, if they had indeed remained there.

  They would have Duvari to contend with if they had, and they somehow survived. Not even the Princes were immune to the ice of Duvari’s wrath.

  * * *

  The earth rumbled; the wind howled. It was the wind that was safer for the Kialli, but Celleriant knew that their mastery of it was forced, enforced; they could not cajole it now. He could, and did, dancing between its thermals, rising and falling at both its whim and his own, plunging past the expert swing and thrust of a Lord’s blade as its tip grazed the side of his shield. He sliced at shins and feet; felt some resistance in the arc of the swing. Red light and blue twined in the moving air, like a twisted frame around them.

  He heard the wind’s voice as his own, and spoke with its breath, challenging the Kialli. But he avoided the ground and its moving column of earth, for he knew what Viandaran had done. He could hear the earth and its rumbling anger—was surprised that the anger was directed not toward its ancient enemy, the wild wind, but toward the Kialli Lord Viandaran now faced. More than that, he could not discern; even that was a risk. The red blade’s edge passed an inch beyond his nose.

  The roof shook above them; the support pillars that bracketed the hall cracked.

  A thought occurred to Lord Celleriant of the Green Deepings as he asked the wind to shunt aside small falling shards of rock and tile: Jewel ATerafin was not going to be pleased.

  4th of Henden, 427 A.A.

  Terafin Manse, Averalaan Aramarelas

  For years, Sigurne Mellifas had adopted the appearance of the absentminded fragility assumed to be the natural progression of age; it suited her purposes. But here, now, holding a spell of protection that she knew was far too delicate to provide defense for long, she felt that age as deeply as she ever had; the rain was chill, carried by a Henden wind that knew no mercy. It was as remote as gods, as demons, as far from the human condition as any being that had ever claimed people as cattle or fodder.

  “ATerafin,” she said, wanting—missing—the fractious and difficult Meralonne APhaniel, “step back, step slowly and evenly. I will cover your retreat.” She did not look at the girl; the whole of her gaze was focused on the roiling, rising wall of water. She had lived the majority of her life in Averalaan; she knew how easily water could kill. The rain fell harder, as if to drive the point home.

  “AMellifas. Sigurne.”

  The girl—ah, no, she was hardly a girl now, except in comparison—had not obeyed the guildmaster, a woman who, in crisis, depended upon obedience. Even from the Lord of the Compact, deny it as he might. “ATerafin,” she said again, through clenched teeth, “there is very little time. Retreat. Take your men with you.”

  “You aren’t moving.”

  “I told you, I cannot move and maintain the shield.”

  “And I told you the terrace won’t last. If you’re here—”

  “My shields will hold; they will be small enough to contain and preserve a single person.”

  “You’re lying.”

  At this, Sigurne did glance at Jewel as the water continued its rise. She forced herself to focus again, but she had seen the expression on Jewel’s face. “It was not a lie, ATerafin; it was a hope.”

  Jewel knew no mercy; she was like the howling wind, the driven rain. “It would be hope if you believed it. It’s not. If you can’t retreat, I won’t leave you here to perish. The magi—”

  “The magi have their hands full; they are not, now, with me—not even Matteos. The shields that protected—that were meant to protect—the funeral rites from something as unfortunate as weather, have clearly fallen; whether it is by their deaths or their sudden incompetence, I do not know, but I do not suspect the latter. Leave me; go. Finish what you have started here, if you even begin to understand it.”

  “What have I started, Sigurne?” the question was low, intent; the older woman heard the fear in it and flinched. If she was not by nature a gentle woman, and not by nature a kind one—how could she be, raised to ice and snow?—years of aping either had taken t
heir toll, and the impulse to offer comfort was strong. It surprised Sigurne. It annoyed her, as well.

  “Go,” she said.

  She felt a hand on her arm; it made the whole of her body ache; her skin felt taut, stretched, and so terribly thin, the slightest of touches might tear it. The water hammered at the shields and she felt the force of its blows; water splayed across it, as if thrown.

  But Jewel said, “You are a guest in my lands; I have invited you into my home, and I have offered you my hospitality.” The words were formal, severe, as if they were issued from the mouth of a much older woman. Sigurne knew, then, which older woman came to mind: she was dead now and waited only the dignity of burial. “Guest or no, Guildmaster, you do not have the right of command here; you are not the Kings, and the Kings are not present. If you cannot retreat while maintaining your defenses, the defenses will have to fold.”

  “You cannot—”

  “I can. Angel.”

  Her companion was there in an instant. He lifted his hands, fingers flying in the rain in deliberate gestures.

  “Yes,” Jewel replied. “Help the guildmaster mount the back of the Winter King; he has agreed to carry her to safety. Snow!”

  The winged cat now landed, hissing. It was convenient to think of him as a cat; it diminished his glory, diluting the awe that Sigurne might otherwise feel in his presence. And very like a cat, he was swatting at the heavy drops of falling rain, as if by so doing he could kill them or scare them away.

  “What are you doing?” he asked, and Sigurne now risked a second glance at Jewel ATerafin. The rain that had soaked and flattened the hair of all but Angel ran in rivers through hers; hers had been heated and combed out of its habitual nest. But her dress seemed to take no damage, to allow no water to soak or touch it; it was pale and white, and it glowed, in the darkness of stormy sky, like moonlight.

  “What does it look like I’m doing?” she snapped back. “I’m riding you.”

  Wet fur didn’t rise in hackles; if it could, Sigurne thought the cat would appear twice his normal size in his bristling outrage. Jewel, however, seemed immune to the threat of his extended claws, the appearance of his long, glinting fangs.