Kiran cried out, despairing, as Ruslan gathered his will. Linked as closely as this, Kiran knew his intent: to burn out Kiran’s mind entirely in a spate of grief and fury.
She tried to kill me!
Ruslan’s rage did not abate. Yet you made no attempt to remove your amulet and seek my aid. If you had, she would have relented. Instead, you turned to this creature, knowing how it would savage her. I should have heeded her warnings. I should have done this long since.
He was raising an annihilating tide of power that once released would destroy every last shred of Kiran’s self and leave his body a mindless shell. Kiran couldn’t even raise a defense. Ruslan’s will held his mind open, helpless, a beetle pinned by a boulder.
“The amulet,” Kiran gasped at the demon. He strained to snatch for the charm, but his body was as paralyzed as his magic. “We had a bargain—help me!”
The demon’s aura brightened. Cold hands tightened on Kiran, lifting him.
“I could not touch you before, bound as you were to the ssarez-kai,” the demon said. “But now…ah, now! Let us see if you are cousin enough to us to find refuge in our fire.”
Beyond the archway, sharp voices and pounding feet. Dev charged into the chamber, shouting Kiran’s name and reaching for him, even as a deadly wave of power exploded down the mark-bond.
But in the last instant before Ruslan’s tide reached Kiran’s unprotected mind, a knife of dissonant magic cut the aether asunder, and the world changed.
Chapter Seventeen
(Dev)
“Kiran!” I lunged for him. Lena was right on my heels, singing something frantic and wild. Light speared past me toward the demon—too late, gods, too late. Both demon and Kiran vanished from the cave as thoroughly as if they’d never existed.
I stumbled to a halt, choking on curses. Kiran had been covered in blood, his face a mask of terror and despair. Ruslan must’ve sent the demon to grab him. Black certainty crushed me: I’d lost all chance of saving him. If I ever saw him again, he’d be an empty-eyed puppet. Or worse: a monster I’d have to kill along with Ruslan.
The very thought drove me to my knees. My mind, my heart, my soul felt about to crack and shatter. Terrible enough if I’d lost Kiran to death, but this—
I lurched up and snatched at Lena, whose face was harrowed with a horror that nearly matched mine. “Promise me you’ll help me make Ruslan pay. Promise me that black-souled viper will burn!”
“Both of you, look!” Teo forcibly turned us around. The light still spilling off Lena’s rings revealed a charred body lying against the cave wall. “Is that Lizaveta?”
One of the corpse’s arms was a blackened stick of bone. The hair was singed away and the eyes were burned sockets, but enough of the face remained to show Teo was right.
I backed away in a hurry. “It’s Lizaveta, all right. Lena—is she dead?” She sure looked dead. But after what I’d seen Kiran survive, I knew better than to trust my eyes.
“I feel no trace of soulfire.” Yet Lena sounded wary.
“Burn her all the way to ash.” I didn’t want to take any chances.
Lena didn’t protest. She raised her hands, and silver magefire crackled over Lizaveta’s body. I watched with unblinking intensity, poised to run at the least sign of magic or movement or…anything.
Lena’s magefire devoured the corpse, leaving only a pitted black scorchmark behind.
Teo spoke. “If the demon killed Lizaveta, I doubt it’s taking Kiran to Ruslan.”
How I wished he were right. “You don’t understand. Lizaveta meant to go against Ruslan somehow. He must’ve figured it out and sent the demon to stop her and snatch Kiran.” It was so hard to stand still and speak calmly when I wanted to scream curses and hit something—no, someone. Kiran’s capture wasn’t Teo’s fault, but Teo had told me whose fault it was. If I ever saw Zadikah again, I’d strangle her bare-handed.
“I’m not so sure,” Teo said. “Before the demon vanished, I saw a mark on its brow. Kiran was trying to summon that very demon. He thought it might help him as it did before.” In quick, spare sentences, he sketched a tale of hunters and demons and Kiran that planted a dagger of hope in me, bright and barbed.
“You think Kiran’s summoning worked and the demon killed Lizaveta for him.” Khalmet’s hand, if that were true—what if the demon could kill Ruslan as well? Yet Kiran had looked terrified, not in the least relieved.
“A demon taking Kiran is no good thing.” Lena’s ringed hands clenched tight on each other. “This is exactly what I came to prevent.”
“Discuss it later.” Teo pointed at the cave floor. Wisps of mist that glimmered an eerie blue were rising off darkened lines of crystal.
“We saw fog like this when the red-horned hunters came.” Teo pulled me toward the archway. “We have to run.”
Fear flashed through me. Teo had said the hunters scoured an entire valley clean of life. “Lena—Cara and the kids are still out there.” Cara would’ve had Melly and Janek on the move all this time, but the terrain was difficult enough she couldn’t have covered that much distance.
Lena was already heading for the tunnel. “I’ll cast to warn her, but we need to get into open air. I haven’t enough strength left to send a spell through all this inert rock.”
I had the horrible feeling that in leaving the cave, I’d miss some vital clue. Something that would tell me why the demon wanted Kiran, or let me find him again. Blood was everywhere on the rock. Some of it might be Kiran’s. If we could just grab a sample, maybe Lena could key a seeking spell.
Wouldn’t do a damn bit of good if Kiran was wearing his amulet. Neither would it do him any good if I died like Veddis.
I sprinted into the tunnel after Teo, our path lit by the wavering glow of Lena’s rings.
Gods, gods, if only we’d come sooner! My last glimpse of Kiran was seared into my memory with brutal, perfect detail. He’d been arched and rigid in the demon’s arms as if his muscles were spell-locked.
His neck was bare. The amulet had been dangling from the demon’s hand.
No wonder Kiran had looked so scared. Ruslan must’ve been right there in his head. Ruslan knew Kiran wasn’t in Alathia. He knew Lizaveta was dead. If that death hadn’t been his will…
He’d be furious to a depth I shuddered to imagine. My mind raced even faster than my feet. A man blinded by fury was one ripe to make mistakes. The tiniest spell cast in retribution against me or an Alathian, and Ruslan would be ash on the wind.
So would Kiran, unless he was protected by wards as immensely strong as Alathia’s border. If Ruslan came hunting, I couldn’t try and provoke him. Not without knowing where the demon had taken Kiran.
We burst out of the tunnel onto a broad, gently sloping ledge. Wind spat sand into my face. The stars were streaked by black fingers of cloud. Thunder muttered from an inky blotch right over the thicket of fins and spires that hid the black-daggers’ sacred pools. Streamers of glowing fog crept toward us through the darkened rocks, accompanied by the distant, yipping cries of clanfolk. The black-daggers didn’t sound afraid. The yells were excited, celebratory.
I hoped the demons turned on their worshippers and murdered every one of them. My stomach sank to new depths when I remembered the mindburned scholar-boy. What did the demons want with him? I should’ve asked Lena to kill him. It would’ve been a mercy. But I’d been so desperate to reach Kiran—yet there too I’d missed my chance. Fuck!
Lena might not have agreed to kill the scholar-boy anyway. Alathians were so uptight about so-called moral uses of magic. So stupid, since the Council and plenty of the Watch—like Marten, her commanding officer—were perfectly happy to coerce and backstab as ruthlessly as any ganglord.
“Hold,” Lena said, breathless. “I can’t watch my step and concentrate on warning Cara at the same time.”
Teo and I stopped our scramble along the ledge. Lena clung to the rock and pulled out a bracelet. The light of her rings showed the silver was etched with runes
and wound about with tawny gold strands that had to be Cara’s hair.
“We shouldn’t delay.” Teo fidgeted, glancing at encroaching fingers of fog. The closest glowing wisp was several hundred yards off, but clearly he felt that wasn’t far enough.
“I’ll be quick.” Lena shut her eyes, and her fingers locked tight on the bracelet.
I hesitated, thinking of the apt-Scholar. Suliyya grant she’d been able to run. “Can you also look for anyone alone among the rocks?” Even if the scholar escaped demons and clanfolk, she wouldn’t have any water or food.
Lena said, eyes still shut, “The aether’s in a terrible state. There’s no way I can pick out the soulfire of anyone untalented without a sample of blood or body to key the spell.”
I sent a prayer to the Khalmet for the apt-Scholar. She’d seemed tough and smart enough she might have a chance at survival. Or maybe I was telling myself what I wanted to hear.
Teo looked back again, pain etched so deeply on his face I couldn’t help a pang of sympathy. His lips shaped a name: Zadikah.
During our desperate rush to the cave, he’d said she meant to kill Gavila before the demons came. From the sound of the black-daggers’ yells, I didn’t think she’d succeeded. Maybe Gavila had killed her instead. Serves her right, my anger insisted. Yet I felt uncomfortable, thinking of how she’d come back for me at the Khalat, of her determination to create a better life for everyone in Prosul Akheba. I’d once betrayed Kiran, too, for reasons I had thought every bit as compelling as Zadikah must think hers.
“She made her choice,” I said to Teo. “You can’t spare her from the consequences.”
“I know that. It doesn’t help.”
I knew something that might. “Bayyan got word that the elders of his clan agreed to help Raishal reach the collegium. She should be safely there by now.”
Teo pressed clenched fists to his mouth. “Goddess below, how I hope you’re right.”
Lena lowered the charm. “Cara’s near a ridge about a mile south of us. She’ll climb it with the children and wait for us on top. Melly can’t lift even a pebble, so they know they’re not near any currents.”
Thank Khalmet for that. I hustled Lena along the ledge. The fingers of fog were creeping ever closer. I didn’t know if the demons were looking for us or just Kiran, but I sure didn’t want to stay and find out.
“How far until we’re on ground where demons can’t follow?”
“Not far,” Lena said. “I’ll keep casting to veil us as long as I can. Otherwise the clanfolk may pursue us where the demons can’t.”
I wanted to demand a lot more answers. What did she know about demons and their plans? And what in Khalmet’s name had she been thinking, dragging Cara and the kids into such danger?
But she was leaning heavily on my arm, and the light from her rings was barely enough to touch her dragging feet. She wasn’t like Kiran, who could’ve sucked scraps of life from the desert scrub to replenish his reserves. Alathians were trained to use only their own energies in casting, and may the gods help you if you ever suggested they try otherwise.
I choked down my questions. Time enough for those once we got the fuck away from demons and found Cara.
Despite Kiran, despite everything, a bright, sweet pang shot through me at the thought of rejoining Cara. I should be horrified she and Melly had come anywhere near me. I’d wanted them safe, not racing to escape murderous demons. But after lying trapped in those manacles, knowing I’d never touch Cara again, never see the flash of her smile, I couldn’t greet this second chance with anything but eagerness.
That anticipation gave me much-needed strength, hauling Lena over endless rocks, feeling my way along ledges in the dying light of her rings. My muscles were leaden, and worry was a lingering, sour taste in my mouth. Teo jumped at every skirl of wind, peering wall-eyed into the darkness, though Lena had wearily assured me we’d reached ground barren of magic.
At last I struggled up a long, sloping ridge of sandstone, Lena’s arm heavy over my shoulders, and spotted Cara’s familiar silhouette on the summit. My heart gave such a leap that I nearly lost my footing.
Lena pulled her arm free. “Go to her. Teo and I will catch up.”
I bounded up the rock as fast as a bolt shot from a crossbow, exhaustion forgotten.
“Dev!” Cara pulled me straight into a welcoming hug. Relief drowned me so deep I couldn’t get a word out. All I could do was cling to her, my breath shuddering in my chest.
Her breath was none too steady either. She kissed me—a long, fierce kiss that set my blood afire—and then rested her forehead against mine. I cradled her face in my hands, my thumbs stroking her cheekbones, still half afraid that I’d blink and find myself back in those manacles.
She gave a shaky laugh. “Do you know the real reason I refused all those years to take outriders to my bed?”
I’d thought it was so her head stayed clear on convoy jobs; she’d only taken me as a lover after I got banned from convoy work. I’d no idea what she was getting at now, but I’d happily listen to whatever she wanted to tell me. Her voice was by far the best thing I’d heard on this long, terrible night.
She said, “So many of us die young. Hard enough to lose good friends, but I’ve seen what death does to lovers left behind. I was terrified of that, and rightfully so. Every time I think you might be dead, it rips the heart right out of me.”
A cold hollow spread in my stomach. “You—are you saying you regret that we…?”
“No! I meant—oh, hell. I’m awful at this. I’m trying to say that I love you. Even knowing what pain it might cause me.”
We hadn’t ever spoken aloud of love. I’d felt mine growing, but had said nothing, too afraid Cara would change her mind about wanting more than friendship. Jylla had warned me in Ninavel that my partnership with Cara wouldn’t last. When she realizes that dead spot in your soul can’t ever heal, she’ll tire of trying. In the end, she’ll seek someone whole.
Some part of me had believed that. Bought right into the idea that Cara would cast me aside just like Jylla had.
I was such an idiot. “When the black-daggers were about to mindburn me, it was you I fixed my thoughts on. You I wished I could hold again; you I prayed for the gods to favor.”
“Don’t even talk about mindburning. Are you hurt? Did they—”
“Just some cuts and bruises.” The skin of my wrists and ankles was torn from the manacles, but I hadn’t anything worse. Except the wound that had nothing to do with my flesh. I swallowed, grief welling up again. “Cara, Kiran’s gone. A demon killed Lizaveta and took him. I don’t know where he is, or if…” I couldn’t go on.
Cara’s arms tightened around me. “If Lizaveta’s dead, that’s one victory. For the rest…we’ll get Kiran back. Just like we saved Melly from Vidai.”
My eyes burned. She always made me believe that together, we could pull off any miracle.
I said thickly, “Are the kids all right? Where—”
“They’re sleeping. Melly was determined to wait up for you, but she was so exhausted after all her lifting and flying that she keeled over as soon as we stopped.” Cara’s tone took on a tinge of exasperation. “She was supposed to stay safely hidden on the damn spire with Janek, not spy on your captors and launch herself headlong into danger. I ought to rip into her for disobeying orders, but how can I? If she hadn’t told Lena what was happening and stopped those clanfolk from dosing you, I wouldn’t be holding you now. Whenever I think about that—” She buried her face in my hair and took a steadying breath. “Still, I know you must be upset to see Melly here.”
She probably thought I was going to start yelling at her the way I had in Ninavel when I found out she’d made a decision involving Melly I didn’t in the least agree with. But now I’d gotten over the first shock of Melly’s presence, I wasn’t angry, and not just because she’d saved me from mindburning.
“If you brought her and Janek south, I figure you must’ve had good reason.”
I’d been an asshole in Ninavel. “I trust you,” I said simply. “Though I would like to hear the whole story. But first, Lena needs rest and food. She’s in a bad way after casting so much. And you haven’t met Teo—he’s a healer who’s helping Kiran.”
I sketched in a few more details for her as we went to help Teo guide a stumbling Lena up the last stretch of stone. Cara wrapped a supportive arm around Lena, murmuring something heartfelt, and steered her to a blanket where Melly and Janek lay curled together like forlorn kittens.
Lena sank down with a sigh. She took a long drink from the waterskin Cara offered her, but waved off the strips of dried meat Cara tried to press into her hands.
“I know you have questions,” Lena said to me.
About a thousand of them, but she sounded on the ragged edge of collapse. “If you’re too tired, I can wait.” Even if I didn’t want to wait.
“I failed to keep Kiran from being taken.” Anguish colored her words. “If there is any hope remaining, we must find it together. I can’t rest until you know what I came all this way to share.”
Quietly, Teo said, “I’ll keep watch while you talk.” He shuffled off a short distance—not far enough he couldn’t still hear us.
Cara muttered in my ear, “You trust him?”
I wouldn’t go that far, but…“He’s seen Kiran’s memories. He already knows all our secrets. I can’t think the risk’s any greater if he hears more.”
Cara subsided. I knelt and put a gentle hand on Melly’s shoulder so I could reassure myself yet again this wasn’t a dream. She was alive, and so was I.
I could only pray Kiran was too, and that Lena held information that’d let me get him back and send Ruslan straight to Shaikar’s hells.
I settled in front of Lena. Cara sat beside me and slid an arm around my back. I leaned into her, wordlessly grateful for her touch.
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