by Gail Dayton
“Just let him go,” the demon whispered. “You have four others. Are you willing to destroy all of them—destroy everything—to save him?”
“Leave him alone!” she shrieked, desperate to hush the awful whispers. “He’s mine.”
Is he? The quiet voice spoke inside Kallista from the center of her tears. Time seemed to slow, stop as understanding exploded.
Torchay was vulnerable to the demon because he was the only one of her iliasti not marked by the One. And he was unmarked not because he himself wasn’t willing to surrender to the purposes of the One, but because Kallista wasn’t willing to give him up.
She had been afraid that Torchay would love the One more than he loved her—even while she’d been busy denying that she loved him in return. She had been afraid the One would demand his life. And while she was perfectly willing to give up her own life, Torchay’s life was another matter entirely. She had taken the choice from him, and now the price he would pay was not only his life, but his very mind and soul.
She had other responsibilities as well. Her other iliasti were only four of them. The fate of all Adara, perhaps all of Tibre, of hundreds of thousands of people, lay in her hands. She had risked them all with her selfishness. Her lack of faith.
Who was she to think she knew better than the One God? What right did she have to make demands? How could she think she knew what sacrifices would be called for? All that was required of her was faith, for if she truly believed that the One was God and held all things in just and loving hands, then how could Kallista hold back? After faith came surrender. A willingness to place everything, even her most precious treasure, in the hands of the One and to become the tool that was needed for Her work.
“Oh, Goddess.” The groan went soul deep as she gave up her beloved to the One who loved them most. “Forgive.”
Torchay cried out again as time restarted. Kallista looked, terrified of seeing the demon swallow him up. But the black threads were being driven out through the faint cuts on his skin. His injuries had been more to the soul than to the flesh, healing as Torchay seemed to fill with light, the same light—the same magic that filled the others.
The link snapped into place, fully formed. A raging torrent of magic crashed into Kallista, replenishing everything she’d lost in battle and offering yet more. She braided Torchay’s stubborn strength into the whole of the magic and reached for the king. The demon had taken back all of him.
The veil, whispered the West. You cannot save him. He’s been too long in the demon’s grip.
Acquiescing to the inevitable, Kallista gathered the power. It filled her as it had that day on the city walls above the breach, pouring into every crevice, every part of her. But somehow, she’d grown larger since then. She could hold the magic, from five now rather than two, even with Torchay’s booming power added to the others.
She shaped it, named the enemy with a whisper, “Tchyrizel,” and threw her arms wide to fling the magic on its way.
It roared out of her, faster than the eye could follow, farther than any walls could contain. The demon screamed, shredding into tatters that disintegrated as the magic onslaught continued. “Zughralithiss!”
And it was gone.
The king lay dead, slumped on his throne, his face peaceful, untouched save for a burn mark on his forehead. It was over.
They had won.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Kallista’s knees buckled. Obed and Torchay caught her as she fell. They exchanged a glance, then Obed sheathed his sabre and swung her up into his arms.
“What happened?” Stone asked Torchay.
“Let’s get out of this place, and I’ll tell you.” He pointed at the door. “Back the way we came—or however will get us out of here quickest. Fox and Stone lead.”
Kallista tried to pull up a shadow veil around them, but she hadn’t the strength. They relied on speed instead, and the confusion that gripped the palace when suddenly all of the Rulers and a good many warriors died where they stood. Corridor by corridor, room by room, they ran. Until Kallista shouted for them to stop, for Obed to put her down. The young Witch Hound, the naitan huddled terrified in the same corridor where they’d first seen him, surrounded by corpses.
She laid hands on the tarnished gold of his hair and kissed his forehead, wanting to weep at his flinch when she did. “Blessings of the One on you, precious child,” she murmured. “Come to Adara. To Turysh. They can heal some of your pain there.” She wished she could do more for him, help him now, but the magic wouldn’t answer.
“Kallista, let’s go. Not everyone in the city is dead.” Torchay lifted her back to wobbly feet and Obed picked her up again to hurry on.
“He’s following,” Aisse said, a few paces on.
“We can’t leave him.” Kallista struggled to get down.
“He betrayed us.” This time, Obed held her tight.
“He didn’t know any better.” Kallista pinched his ear with her fingernails. “Wait.”
“He can’t run on those feet.” Fox turned back, threw the boy over his shoulder and trotted on.
“You’re insane, you know.” Torchay shook his head at her, gesturing at Stone to keep going.
“But you love me anyway.” She said it, though she wasn’t quite sure it was true.
Until he grinned at her. “Fool that I am.”
The palace gates were pure chaos, warriors shouting at each other, giving contradictory orders, brawling, some walking away. The ilian was through the gate before anyone noticed, and the pursuit fell apart before two blocks of barracks passed. Obed and Fox showed no sign that their burdens slowed them, but Kallista could sense their strength leaching away.
“It’s not far to the river,” she said. “Let me down. I can walk.”
“Not as fast as I can.” Obed held her closer. “We should take one of the western rivers. They’ll be looking for us on the Silixus.”
“The Athril’s big enough for boat traffic,” Stone said. “We just have to be sure to take the center fork. Current’s tricky there, they say.”
“Can we find a ship? Is there a port at the river’s mouth?” Torchay turned in circles as he walked, watching behind as much as ahead.
“There’s a port,” Stone said. “Djoff. Whether we can find a ship there is another question.”
“There will be a ship.” Obed descended carefully down the steps to the walkway at the river’s edge.
“How do you know?” Stone followed him down.
“I know.” Obed would say nothing more, but looked up- and downstream for attackers.
Aisse found a boat. Tied up at a pier, it had been abandoned by everyone aboard save its dead Ruler owner. Stone threw the body overboard while Fox and Obed set their burdens on the benches in the stern. It was a big boat, made for river journeys, long and narrow with a pointed prow. A low, flat-roofed cabin was built into the prow, and a canopy shaded the stern of the boat. The center was open, with oarlocks set on either side for the rowers. The boat was ornately carved, luxuriously appointed, and available.
“Anyone know anything about boats?” Stone asked, standing with the others on the open deck.
They looked expectantly at each other, no one admitting to anything, until Kallista sighed. She slid down the bench to take her place at the tiller. “I grew up in Turysh with the Taolind at my back door. It’s been too many years since I manned a boat, but I think I can remember how to steer. Someone look for oars. We’ll need them, especially if the currents are as tricky as Stone says.”
Aisse calmed the boy—Gweric, his name was—while Stone and Obed located the oars and Torchay cast off the lines. By the time they reached the triple fork in the river, the men had learned the rhythm of rowing, and Kallista was able to steer the boat into the central channel without much struggle. As they left the higher-caste sections of the city, the chaos lessened. Even the lost-looking warriors were no longer in evidence.
“Called them all in to deal with us, likely,” Torchay said
when Kallista commented on it.
“What happened?” Stone asked, pulling on his oar in pace with the others. “I know you used the same magic as at Ukiny, but how could it kill two men and leave the one between alive? And what happened to Torchay?”
“Later,” Torchay said. “When we’re safe away.”
“That could be weeks,” Stone protested.
“The Athril’s shorter than the Silixus.” Fox splashed water at Stone with his oar. “The coast is closer in the west. And we’re in a boat. Won’t be weeks.”
It didn’t take quite a full nine days to reach Djoff on the coast. The city was in almost as much chaos as the capital, everyone terrified. All the city’s Rulers had dropped dead along with most of the high-ranking warriors at the same moment on the same black night eight days previously. Kallista and her ilian heard the story from frightened merchants where they sold the boat. Those left were trying to cope but defiance was everywhere. The castes were crumbling. A laborer had dared to strike back when a merchant beat him for his clumsiness. The world was falling apart.
Kallista hid her satisfaction as she followed Obed and Fox down the steep hills to the harbor. Torchay held her arm, steadying her unbalanced gait while Stone and Aisse helped the young naitan Gweric, dressed now in tunic and trousers like the rest of them, down the path.
At the harbor, Obed paused, scanning the scattered masts of those ships that hadn’t run before the wind when the Rulers died. Kallista moved up next to him, leaned against his arm, struggling not to pant. It was a long way down from the river docks and she didn’t have the stamina lately that she’d had a few months before. “What are you looking for?”
“That flag.” He pointed to a bright blue pennon blazoned with a stooping hawk. “Come. We sail with the tide.”
Kallista looped her arm through his. “Whose flag is that?”
“Mine. As is the ship.” He paused, sought her gaze. “Now yours. I thought to change the flag. A compass rose, perhaps?”
“Whatever you like.” She urged him on. “How did you know the ship would be here?”
“I sent orders for it to wait for us.”
“No, I mean, how did the ship know to be here, in Djoff? Why didn’t you send it to Haav?”
“There is another ship waiting in Haav.” Obed escorted her up the gangway, moving ahead of her so he could lift her to the deck. “I sent a ship to wait in every port on this continent. When we reach Adara, I will send word releasing them.”
Kallista stared at him, mouth open. “You sent…How many ships? All yours?”
Obed signaled to the captain as Torchay, the rear guard, leaped aboard. The crew sprang into motion. “Seventeen ships.” He offered his arm again and Kallista took it. “But they are yours, not mine.”
Finally he met her eye, his cheeks a dusky rose beneath the tattoos and the natural tan of his skin. “I told you, I am not a poor man.”
“Well, yes, but there’s quite a gap between ‘not poor’ and ‘stinking rich.’” She blinked as the size of Obed’s wealth began to sink in. “Saints and all the sinners.”
“Is this safe away?” Stone asked. “Because the minute we leave the harbor here, it’s going to be just like crossing the Jeroan, and I want to know what in stars happened back there before I start heaving my guts over the rail.”
“Don’t be so impatient.” Aisse smacked his arm.
“Just explain it, all right? Why didn’t the veil magic kill everybody like in Ukiny? And how did it kill people all the way to Djoff?”
Kallista sat on the bench provided for passengers outside the door leading to the cabins in the stern and gestured for everyone to gather. Torchay took the seat beside her, Obed kneeling at her feet. Stone sat on the deck on her other side and leaned his head on her knee, grinning up at her, daring her to order him away. Fox and Aisse sat just beyond, holding hands.
“Now that I’ve had time to consider,” Kallista said, “I believe the magic struck differently because it was shaped differently. Before, at Ukiny, I asked for something to save the people of Ukiny and of Adara. Because we were in the middle of a battle, it struck down everyone who fought against us.”
“Except me and Stone,” Fox said.
“You were marked. You became part of the magic.”
“What about this time?” Stone rubbed his cheek against her knee. “How did you shape it this time?”
Kallista set her hand on his head a brief moment. “I named it. Before I released it, I spoke the demon’s name.”
“So it destroyed the demon—” Stone began.
“And everyone who worshipped it,” Fox ended. “Including a lot of high-ranking warriors.”
“All the way to Djoff,” Aisse said, “because this time it wasn’t only two linked with you, but five. Do you think it killed Rulers in Haav too?”
“Maybe.” Kallista shrugged a shoulder. “Torchay’s magic holds so much sheer stubborn strength, it wouldn’t surprise me if it killed Rulers all the way to Adara.”
“Torchay’s magic.” Obed looked so decidedly unhappy, Kallista held her hand out to him. Why? What was he thinking? He took her hand, kissed it, then let it go.
“What happened then?” Stone asked. “When Torchay was marked? It wasn’t much like what happened with the rest of us.”
“The demon sank its claws into me.” Torchay spoke before Kallista could. “I was unmarked. It left me vulnerable to the demon. The mark requires surrender. There was one thing I would not give up.”
“No, Torchay,” Kallista spoke up. “It wasn’t your fault. I kept you from it. I wouldn’t give you up to the One.”
He smiled at her, bringing her hand to his mouth for a kiss that made her shiver. “Then why were you marked and I not? You can’t think for me, love. You can’t dictate my emotions or my decisions. It was my refusal. My own…stupidity. I did no’ understand that letting you go was the only way I could protect you.”
“But…” Kallista paused to think. She was sure she had kept Torchay from being marked. Maybe they both had a part in it. “It doesn’t matter now. You’re marked like the rest of us.”
“What happens now?” Stone leaned back on a braced hand, looking up at her. “We’ve destroyed the demon. Does that mean the marks go away? Are we still ilian?”
The sails snapped in the wind, drawing Kallista’s attention as she struggled for words. “Ilian is family,” she said finally. “Bound together to love and support each other and raise any children that may come. It is possible to dissolve these bonds, if the marks leave us.” She took Torchay’s hand, squeezed it tight. “But, even if that happens, I hope you all stay. I wasn’t exaggerating when I said I love you all.”
“And there is a child to raise,” Aisse added. “I stay.”
“I too,” Fox said quickly. “This is my—my family. There are no castes in Tibre any longer, I think, even if I had one.”
“I’m staying.” Stone made a face. “Though I don’t know how much use I’ll be raising a child.”
“Actually…” Kallista glanced at Torchay who grinned at her. “There will be two babies to raise. After we left Tsekrish, on the riverboat, when Torchay did his medical check, he listened to be sure the baby was all right. And he says there are two heartbeats. Twins.”
“Two babies.” Aisse bounced to her knees in excitement.
Torchay cleared his throat. “Not exactly.”
All eyes turned to him. Alarmed, Kallista’s hands flew protectively to her stomach. “Is something wrong with one of—”
“No.” He caught her close in a hug, chuckling. “No, love. Nothing like that. It’s just that we’ll only have two babies for a short while before Aisse gives us a third.”
“Third…” Aisse stared at him, eyes wide with shock. “Third baby?” She shook her head, clutching Fox’s arm. “No, that is impossible. I am barren. I—”
“Perhaps when the One marked you, She also granted you healing.” Kallista stretched a hand toward Aisse who took it and
held on tight. “Joy to you, ilias.”
“I—are you certain?” Aisse looked as if she’d been struck with one of Kallista’s lightning bolts.
“Aye. Your babe should arrive near the end of Mielle, about six weeks after Kallista’s two.” Torchay grinned. “Joy to you, ilias. Joy to us all.” He gripped Fox’s hand, then slapped Obed on the shoulder.
Obed knelt on the deck before Kallista without reacting, silent, his face remote. He worried her sometimes.
Kallista leaned forward, touched his cheek. “Will you stay? You never did say.”
His expression shut down even more. “Do you cast me off?”
“No, of course not. But I won’t keep you against your will.”
“Your will is mine, Cho—Kallista.”
She gave him a skeptical look, remembering a certain morning in the forest when that had not been true. Obed must have remembered it as well, for he flushed that dark red again, shifting position. “I will never willingly leave you.”
Her fingers trailed along his cheek as she drew back. “Good.” Kallista took a deep breath. “So. I suppose when we get back to Adara, if the Reinine has no duties for us, we’ll need to find a place to live. With our so-wealthy ilias here, we won’t even have to worry about finding a way to support ourselves. We can spend our days in idleness.”
Torchay’s stifled laugh sounded too much like a snort. “I’ll believe that when I see it.”
“I’m very good at idling.” Kallista poked his arm. “You’ve seen me do it.”
“Aye, for a week or two. Then you’re jumping out of your skin for something to do.”
The sails snapped again and the ship heeled over as the wind broke free of the rocky headland. The three Tibrans promptly turned a bilious shade of green.
“Oh, Goddess.” Fox lurched to his feet, stumbling for the rail, Aisse and Stone on his heels.
Kallista’s stomach felt none too steady either, but with the breeze on her face and her eyes on the horizon, she didn’t need to find the ship’s rail yet.
“What of me?” Gweric turned his eyeless face toward her from his post near the ship’s mast and guilt dug its talons into her. She had forgotten his presence. “What will you do with me?”