Healer's Choice g-3

by Jory Strong

  A servant appeared in the doorway as if on cue. “Two of the brothel prostitutes are at the gate, my lord. One of them has her hands bound behind her and is gagged. The other says she has important business with you.”

  “Interesting,” Allende said, idly picking up a knife at the corner of his desk and touching the hilt to his lips, half closing his eyes as he inhaled the scent of woman. “Do you recognize either of them?”

  “No, my lord.”

  Allende stood. “I’m in the mood for exercise, perhaps even a little sport. Have them brought to the courtyard.”

  The servant hurried off to do the vice lord’s bidding. Unseen, Addai followed Allende.

  Moments later, escorted by bodyguards, Kala and Feliss were positioned in front of the Were who owned their lives. Allende’s eyebrows rose in silent query then abruptly lowered.

  He tilted his head, studying Feliss intently as if comparing her to a mental picture. His eyes narrowed and his mouth firmed, the good humor that had brought him to the courtyard disappearing.

  “Turn her around,” he told Kala.

  The Lioness obeyed, and though Feliss shook with terror, she didn’t resist or try to pull away from Kala’s grip.

  Allende lashed out with the knife, a swift, sure strike slicing through the back of Feliss’s dress and bisecting the smooth flow of human skin between delicate shoulder blades, scoring just deeply enough so blood slowly welled to fill the cut.

  Allende said nothing. Only when the blood gathered and began to slide downward did he take his eyes off his handiwork and look at Kala.

  “This is hardly a matter to warrant coming to my home and interrupting me, even if Rebekka unwisely helped a prostitute who intended to flee and cheat me out of what’s due on a contract.”

  “Feliss is not the only one Rebekka has helped. There are probably dozens by now.”

  “And you’ve come to me hoping I’ll decide Dorrit or one of the others needs to be replaced as madam?”

  Kala had enough sense to be frightened by the silky threat in his voice. But whatever conflicting emotions she might have wrestled with after witnessing what Rebekka was capable of, what Rebekka’s gift might mean for her, in the end ambition had dominated.

  “The scent doesn’t lie. Rebekka did more than make Feliss look human. She healed her completely. I saw Feliss shift form.”

  Something passed through Allende’s eyes. Not disbelief. Not surprise. It made Addai wonder. Speculate. Increased his interest in proceedings with a foregone conclusion.

  Allende reached out and cut away the gag, then the leather ties around Feliss’s wrists, before ordering her to face him. “Does Kala speak the truth?”

  Feliss didn’t answer. For all her terror and hopelessness, she refused to betray Rebekka.

  Allende stroked her cheek with the back of his hand. “It would be a shame to destroy something so beautiful when it’s not necessary.” To Kala he said, “Do you know where Rebekka is?”

  “Yes. I can take you to her.”

  Feliss whimpered and looked up, eyes filling with tears. Allende’s smile was very nearly gentle as he stroked her cheek again. “There, see what I mean? Violence can be avoided. Capturing Rebekka will be an easy thing. Do you know what they say about healers like Rebekka?”

  He didn’t wait for an answer. “To hurt another, even in self-defense, ruins their gift. It taints it so instead of diminishing pain, their touch increases it. Rather than strengthening and restoring a body they try to heal, they turn it against itself, weakening the immune system, allowing infection and disease to spread throughout it.”

  Allende cut the material of Feliss’s dress. It fell away, leaving her naked.

  He placed the blade tip on a breast, lightly circled the nipple. “How long do you think Rebekka will keep her secrets when faced with the damage a knife can do? Or with the prospect of being taken to one of the brothel dungeons and paying for her silence and her betrayal there?”

  He cupped Feliss’s chin and forced her to meet his eyes. “So beautiful. So naturally submissive. There’s no reason for you to suffer. Nothing you can do will change her fate, only your own.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “Show me your other form.”

  Crying, Feliss shifted. She stood, a trembling Doe not looking behind her to the open archway or trying to make an escape.

  Allende turned toward Kala. “Perhaps you should be made a madam after all. Let’s see what you make of the choice everyone in that position faces.”

  He opened his hand, and the knife lay across his palm. “What do you think should be done with this one? Make an example out of her with a punishment that allows her to keep working, paying off her debt? Or kill her, so others will know death is the only way they’ll escape before their obligation is met?”

  The choice was offered without inflection. Addai thought that had it been any other at Kala’s mercy, she might have chosen differently. But where ambition dominated when it came to capturing and bringing Feliss to the vice lord, jealousy ruled now.

  The Lioness snatched the knife. And for the first time since arriving, Feliss’s fear did something more than hinder her.

  She tried to bound away, but it was too late. Kala’s arm was around her neck, long talons digging in, causing the Deer to struggle and rear, providing a perfect target.

  With the expertise of an experienced hunter, Kala unerringly slid the blade between Feliss’s ribs and into her heart.

  “Not the choice I would have made,” Allende said, as the carcass landed on tiles painted in shades of blue and gold. “But not a waste either.”

  He turned to the servant who hovered behind him. “Deliver the Deer to the cook employed by Dorrit. Tell him I want the head and the hide for the brothel wall. He can do whatever he wishes with the rest.”

  “Should he be told who—”

  “Not until I’ve seen to Rebekka. Take a few men with you and make sure word reaches all the madams and bouncers. Clients may enter and leave but those whose contracts I own may not. I’ll be along shortly and I’ll expect a head count as well as the names of any who are missing.”

  The servant stepped forward, picking up and shouldering the carcass. Allende turned his attention to Kala, then to the two bodyguards standing on either side of her. “Take her. Contact me when you’ve collected Rebekka. I’ve got arrangements to make regarding the healer’s fate.”

  Addai didn’t bother remaining with them. He returned to the harbor and found Rebekka had maneuvered the Constellation out to a buoy as a safety precaution.

  Addai felt the presence of a Djinn nearby. Rebekka’s father no doubt.

  It didn’t take long for a heavily armored car to arrive. It glided to a smooth halt several hundred yards away, hidden from the docks by the jungle of wrecked cranes and cargo containers left from the days of The Last War.

  Darkly tinted windows shielded its occupants from view. The back doors opened and Kala emerged, accompanied by two armed men.

  They made their way toward the harbor, careful not to be seen. The two men halted behind the last piece of rusting metal while Kala alone stepped from behind it and crossed the open space to the water’s edge.

  Addai had to admire her show of courage and confidence. She barely looked at Rimmon’s men nearby, one standing with an automatic weapon while the other did maintenance work on the engine of a speedboat.

  Kala waved at Rebekka, yelled, “I saw Feliss in her fur when I was in the woods.”

  A laugh followed, amused, believable. “Good thing she changed before she ended up on the dinner table! Help me too, Rebekka. I want more than to spend my life as a whore to humans.”

  Addai could read the briefest hesitation in Rebekka before she started the boat’s motor and carefully guided the Constellation to the dock.

  Kala leapt on board, pausing only long enough to look into the cabin to be sure Rebekka was alone before pulling a knife and holding it to Rebekka’s throat.

  “Turn off the engine,” she sai
d, her attention on Rimmon’s men, waiting to see what they would do.

  Neither made a move toward the boat until Kala had forced Rebekka off it.

  The Lioness backed away, using Rebekka as a shield. She didn’t turn from the dock until it was no longer in view and by then it was obvious that beyond securing the boat, Rimmon’s men didn’t intend to get involved.

  One of Allende’s guards stepped forward, locking his fingers around Rebekka’s upper arm. “We’ll take her from here,” he said to Kala. “You’re to return to the brothel.”

  Kala’s knife left Rebekka’s throat.

  Rebekka’s eyes were wide with fear and the pain of betrayal. “Why?” she asked.

  The Lioness gave no answer.

  “Where’s Feliss?”

  Kala’s smile held vicious satisfaction. “Dead.”

  The men led Rebekka away.

  As soon as she was out of sight, the Djinn materialized behind Kala. The Lioness had only enough time to register the arm around her chest and a hand across her face before he broke her neck.

  Addai manifested in human form, clothed in flesh and dark material, his thumbs tucked into the front pockets of his pants instead of pressed to the hilt of a sword. “You are quick to destroy your tools, my friend.”

  Torquel let the body fall to the ground. “This one has served its use. If my daughter survives, I’ll not risk her life and all we’ve worked for by leaving this enemy in place.”

  “So I see. I will tell Tir to be ready to finish his part in this.”

  Thirty-four

  THE arrival of the tusked madam cut Aryck’s penance short. She stopped in front of him and spoke as if discussing business with a brothel visitor but her words were directed at Levi. “I smell Jaguar. He’s the one?”

  An upward flick of Levi’s eyes answered her question. She said, “Allende knows. His men are here. As soon as one of them finds me, I’ll be ordered to lock down the brothel.”

  A brief hesitation and she added, “They brought the body of a Doe with them. Feliss is dead.”

  “Come with us, Dorrit,” Levi murmured, lips barely moving.

  “It’s too late. Do what you can for those of us trapped here but don’t put Rebekka at risk.”

  She moved on, stopping to talk to others, customers and prostitutes alike, as if merely making her rounds.

  Regret slammed into Aryck. Shame, for a lifetime of judging those he knew nothing about.

  “Let’s go,” Levi said, escorting Aryck along public and hidden walkways until finally reaching an exit doorway guarded by hard-eyed Jackals who let them pass to freedom.

  Away from the brothel the scent of grief and fear poured off Levi. Breaking into a run he said, “We may already be too late. The moment Allende learned Rebekka can stand before the ancestors and return an outcast’s eternal soul to the shadowlands, he would have sent his men to capture her.”

  Aryck stumbled. Shocked despite having guessed Rebekka was responsible for the change in Levi.

  “This is why she left,” he said, feeling the sting of failure as he remembered eyes wet with pain, silently pleading as she asked him to come back to Oakland with her.

  “She couldn’t tell you. She shouldn’t have had to.”

  Hostility was back in Levi’s voice.

  “I won’t fail her again,” Aryck said. “I’ll give up my life before I do.”

  The Lion didn’t respond, only continued running. The salt-laden scent and the sound of water lapping against metal and wood and rocky shore intensified as they neared the bay. They entered the metal ruin of what had long ago been a port for container ships from around the world, and soon came upon a body.

  Levi glanced down at it, his steps faltering, though he didn’t stop. Aryck followed, dread arrowing straight through him at the sight of the outcast female Lion.

  They cleared the last of the metal jungle. A boat bobbed gently where it was tied to the dock. The cabin door stood open. Even at a distance the only feeling emanating from the Constellation was one of emptiness.

  Agony clawed up Aryck’s throat, making it impossible to call Rebekka’s name. He reached the boat and climbed aboard. The healer’s journal lay on a seat, as if she’d been reading it but laid it aside before she was taken.

  Seeing it abandoned nearly drove Aryck to his knees. Hopelessness and failure tried to crush him. He shook them off, refusing to acknowledge the possibility it was already too late.

  He’d found her in the encampment and saved her before she could be raped. Against all odds they’d not only left it alive, but because of her, the threat posed to the Weres was over and the slaughter of innocent humans avoided.

  This wasn’t a world he could navigate. For a second time Aryck swallowed his pride where the Lion he’d once thought less was concerned. “She must have allies who can help us find her. Who do you suggest we approach?”

  “There are only two choices. The Wainwright witches, who drew her into their games and dangled the lure of being able to heal the outcast in front of her. Or the Iberás, one of the Founding Families. They’re rich and powerful, with allies in the Guard and no doubt spies in the red zone.”

  “The witches first,” Aryck said, spitting the words.

  “There’ll be a price to pay,” Levi warned. Adding a challenge. “Are you willing to pay it to get her back? I am.”

  Aryck’s lips pulled back, baring his teeth. The Jaguar rose in his eyes, staring down the Lion. “She’ll never belong to you. She’s my mate.”

  “If she’ll have you,” Levi said, satisfaction in his voice at having baited Aryck.

  Aryck reverently picked up the journal, the movement loosening Rebekka’s scent and making him wish the warmth trapped in its cover came from her holding it and not from the sun.

  REBEKKA sat between the two Weres who were Allende’s personal guards. On either side of the car, there was nothing but the forest that began where the red zone ended to the north.

  She thought they must be going to Allende’s estate but it barely mattered to her. She felt overwhelmed with grief at Feliss’s death, with the shock and hurt of Kala’s betrayal, and the sense of failure at having so quickly been discovered and captured.

  The events at the dock played over and over in her mind. Silently she berated herself for ignoring the tiny, hesitant internal voice urging her not to take the Constellation in until Levi returned.

  The thought of Levi jarred Rebekka out of failure and pain-induced apathy, bringing with it fear, not just over her own fate, but his. Had Kala told Allende about his involvement? Was he already dead?

  Sweat trickled down her back and sides at the prospect of being at Allende’s mercy. He wasn’t known for his compassion.

  She took a deep breath, fisting her hands in her lap so tightly her short nails dug into her palms. The physical pain helped. It reminded her of all she’d endured.

  Since Levi, she’d healed many, many others, not all of them brothel workers. Most were like Feliss, victims instead of victimizers. Those who’d been born with a part of their soul wandering in the ghostlands instead of cast there by the ancestors. But some had deserved their fates.

  What she’d felt as she held their metaphysical hearts had been an agony more excruciating than what she’d endured on Levi’s behalf. Though in the end, after she’d witnessed the events of their lives, she’d felt their redemption was equally deserved.

  A shudder went through her. There was a difference between pain borne psychically and that endured physically. If Allende intended to kill her, she’d already be dead.

  Death was too quick a punishment. And she was still a valuable tool even if she couldn’t be trusted.

  Bile rose in her throat as she imagined what he’d do in order to make an example of her. He had only to say the word and she’d become a prisoner in the brothel, forced into serving as healer as well as prostitute.

  Rebekka looked out the window, wishing desperately her father would appear. Surely he hadn’t aband
oned her now even if she hadn’t seen the cardinal since making her choice to return to Oakland.

  If only she could summon him. He’d saved her twice already. He’d touched his mouth to hers and given a part of himself.

  My spirit to yours. Surely that meant they were somehow linked.

  Could she find him? Signal her need for him in a way similar to how she’d been led to the infected goats?

  Rebekka gathered her will and closed her eyes. Focused on him only to have nothing happen.

  There was no tingling, no surge of power, no icy emptiness in her chest. She realized then why he’d refused to give her his name when she’d asked for it, guessed that with it, she did have the power to call him to her.

  Her mouth went dry as another possibility came to her. Each visit to the Were ancestors had started the same way, with the ritual question, “You ask us to render a judgment?”

  What if she were to touch the guards and enter the shadowlands with their spirits? What if she were to stand before the ancestors and answer yes instead of saying she was there to heal?

  Would it destroy her gift if the ancestors chose punishment? If, rather than healing, her touch led to the making of an outcast?

  Rebekka trembled at the prospect of risking it. Healers who killed or willfully harmed another corrupted their gift. Everyone knew it.

  She was as frightened of turning her gift into a thing that destroyed others as she was of whatever Allende had in store for her.

  Rebekka wavered, hands clenching and unclenching in uncertainty. If she attempted it, she’d have to be quick and accurate. Even then there was no guarantee it would work without the touch of her palms to the bare skin over the guards’ hearts.

  Every choice seemed ultimately to lead to death—either spiritual or physical.

  To taint her gift was to taint her soul. How could it be otherwise? Gift and spirit for a healer were the same.

  To taint her soul was to never be able to stand before the Were ancestors, to never again be welcomed in Were lands. She’d been warned about both.