The Labyrinth of Flame

by Courtney Schafer

  Kiran spoke again to Mikail’s mother. It’s as I warned you. He’s been much hurt in mind and spirit. Recovery will be long and not easy. He needs compassion. Can you give it to him?

  Her eyes, gray as Mikail’s, flashed like sun glinting off a glacier. “We are the people of the ice, but our hearts are not frozen. I have twenty years’ worth of compassion that could not be given because my sons were gone from me. Now I will thaw his pain.”

  “Minuq,” she said again, the tone both commanding and gentle.

  Mikail turned. He stammered out a halting set of words, stumbling over the consonants. Kiran caught the meaning from his mother’s mind: I know you, but I do not. Too long…I am a stranger.

  “You are no stranger.” Mikail’s mother took his hands. “To you we are a dream, forgotten and strange. But we are your kin, and you are in need of healing. Come, and we will show you who you were, so you may decide who you are.”

  Mikail pulled free and said bitterly to Kiran, “Do you choose for me the fate you wish you had? This is foolishness, Kiran. The child I was…I barely remember. I can’t—can’t live with these people.”

  “Better them than the Alathians, surely?” Kiran said. “Try, Mikail. If you can’t, I set no bindings on you. You can leave if you wish.”

  “As if I’d get anywhere in all this snow and ice without magic to warm me or speed my travel. Why not be honest? This is nothing but another prison.” Yet a flush darkened Mikail’s cheeks and he wouldn’t meet Kiran’s eyes.

  Kiran sighed. “Think of it how you wish, brother.” He turned to Mikail’s mother.

  You are certain you wish to take him into your care?

  She gave him another fierce look. “Do you think us so incapable? No. He is hurt, I see it, his heart is hard…but he is my son. If you had children of your own, you would understand.”

  Kiran bent his head. That had never been a path open to him. He took a last look at Mikail, who met his gaze, his gray eyes still mutinous.

  Severing this final tie to his mage-family felt like slicing off a piece of his soul. Yet the storm that had raged in his heart for so long had finally broken. Grief still ran hot through his ikilhia, but the pain felt…clean. As if a festering wound had been lanced and might one day heal.

  “Farewell, brother,” Kiran said, lifting a hand. Mikail’s jaw clenched; he made no sign in return.

  Kiran crossed into the demon realm, feeling as if he took the first step onto a wholly unfamiliar trail. He’d never been so grateful for his bond to Dev. The very existence of the link was a silent promise that he didn’t have to travel his new path alone.

  With a cold jolt, he remembered that he had promised Cara he would sever the bond once Ruslan was defeated. The very idea made the currents roil wild around him.

  Kiran forced himself into calm. He would talk to Cara. Maybe she would agree to let him keep the bond a little longer. He knew Dev had no desire to break it. He didn’t want to cause another argument between Dev and Cara, but this was too important a matter to dodge or dismiss.

  But neither did he want to rush into a discussion. First, he would bring Lena news of Marten, and take Dev and Cara home. Kiran stepped into the silent, starry darkness of the cave beneath the Khalat, and reached for Dev’s mind.

  Have you recovered enough to go to Ninavel?

  A sunburst of relief and welcome exploded along the bond. Thought you would never come back and ask.

  * * *

  Some hours later, Kiran took Dev and Cara from the demon realm into a bedroom with a spectacular view of Ninavel’s moonlit towers backed by the familiar serrated skyline of the Whitefires. The city’s soaring spires appeared as beautiful and deceptively serene as ever, with colored magelights sparkling in their windows like a rainbow of jewels. Magelights were such simple charms they didn’t require the aid of a confluence to make, though Kiran had to wonder if they’d be used so profligately in the future. He rather suspected the reality of the change hadn’t yet sunk in for many of the merchant houses. Or even for the city’s mages.

  Cara eyed the wardlines surrounding the unshuttered window. “I hope this isn’t Ruslan’s house.”

  “Hell no,” Dev assured her. “I plan to never walk those halls again. I rented this place back when we were planning your rescue. You wouldn’t believe how much coin and charms Ruslan had stashed away in his vaults.” He squinted at the books piled against the walls. “I don’t remember the house being buried in books, though. Kiran, what…?”

  “I moved Ruslan’s library here. Better for us to have his books than for Sechaveh’s mages to take them.” During the time Kiran had spent waiting for the Alathian ambassador to leave Marten alone in the embassy, he’d seen mages wearing Sechaveh’s scorpion crest come to Ruslan’s house, hunting answers. They hadn’t yet been able to break through the remnants of Ruslan’s wards to get inside, but he didn’t want to count on that continuing. “I’m sorry I didn’t have the chance to put away the books properly.”

  Dev slanted him a glance. “Thank Khalmet you didn’t bother. You took long enough to come back as it was.”

  He hadn’t been pleased to hear that Kiran had freed Mikail. Yet he hadn’t voiced his blaze of outrage and incredulity, and Kiran had pretended not to sense it. They’d both learned that such pretenses were occasionally necessary to keep the intimacy of the bond from rubbing too raw.

  Cara swatted Dev’s shoulder. “Quit grumbling. Lena and Teo wouldn’t have let you leave the healers’ tower any earlier than they did.”

  “Healers are all alike,” Dev said. “Way too cautious. I just wish we hadn’t left Melly. I know it’s only a few days, but you should’ve seen how fast I could get into trouble at her age.”

  “Fewer chances for trouble in Prosul Akheba than here,” Cara said. “You know she’d never agree to sit safely behind wards while you run around bargaining with handlers and ganglords. Better for her to enjoy a few extra days with Janek while we sort out your Tainters.”

  “Melly’s not going to change her mind about staying with you,” Kiran said, answering the true fear plain in Dev’s mind. “And Cara’s right; she’s safer in Prosul Akheba.” Ninavel remained in a kind of muted chaos, as the more adaptable of its residents scrambled to carve out new positions of advantage, while others tried desperately to cling to their old ways of life.

  Kiran wished it had been possible to bring Lena through the demon realm. Even casting to speed her travel, she’d need a week or more to cover the long miles between Prosul Akheba and Ninavel.

  Now who’s fretting over nothing? Dev said, amused. Have you forgotten you can zip through the demon realm to see her whenever you like?

  Only if she’s near an earth-current. Once, that would’ve been true for almost the entire trade route between Ninavel and Prosul Akheba. But the confluence’s transmutation had affected far more than just Ninavel’s environs. Currents remained, but their flows were shifted, altered. Kiran would have to make new maps of earth-forces to replace the ones Ruslan had long ago drawn.

  Cara surveyed the room’s single furnishing: a broad, sturdily built bed with a feather-stuffed mattress and sheets of dark silk. “There’s a welcome sight after sleeping on hard Varkevian cots.”

  “I’ll admit the delights of a proper bed.” Dev slumped face-down onto the sheets. “I should go talk to handlers. But gods, if I could just have an hour’s rest…”

  “You should rest,” Kiran agreed. Lena had warned him that Dev in particular still needed sleep. He’s much improved, but he was too busy worrying over your absence and making plans for Ninavel to rest properly in the Khalat, she’d said. Travel through the demon realm will only exacerbate his exhaustion. “Any negotiations you make would be better served with a sharp mind, not one blurred by tiredness.”

  “Says the mage who used to happily run himself straight into the ground,” Dev said, muffled by a pillow. “Do you even need to sleep now? If not, that must be nice.”

  Kiran was surprised. Usuall
y Dev avoided any mention of Kiran’s transformation except as it applied to matters like their planned rescue. As if by pretending Kiran was still human, he could make it true.

  Maybe at first Kiran had wanted that pretense. But now, what he wanted was truth between them. He was no longer human. Both he and Dev must stop cringing from that.

  Quietly, Kiran said, “I don’t sleep anymore. But there are times when I clear my thoughts and rest.” The scarred demon had showed him how to drift in the currents and open himself to their fire until time dissolved and all was pure sensation. It was strangely peaceful.

  “But you don’t dream.” Dev had followed some of Kiran’s thought.

  “No,” Kiran said.

  Cara settled on the bed beside Dev. She looked up at Kiran, and her mouth quirked. “From what I saw of your nightmares in the Whitefires, I’m thinking that’s a good thing.”

  “Definitely.” Kiran didn’t miss his dreams at all.

  Cara nodded. Kiran knew she’d been dismayed by his change; she hadn’t been able to hide her stricken sorrow when she greeted him upon his return to the Khalat. But all she’d said to him was, I don’t care what you are. I’m just glad you came back to us. Now she touched Dev’s shoulder and said, “Kiran has the right of it. Rest first, make deals later. You deserve a good sleep.” She began rubbing Dev’s back in long, slow strokes. He groaned, tension easing from his splayed limbs.

  Kiran turned aside. He might not miss dreams, but the simple comfort of touch—that, he still missed terribly. “I should go. If I’m to learn how to cast again, I’ll need practice.” He had not forgotten the scarred demon’s warning that the madrek-zal would soon descend upon him, eager to examine the new addition to their realm. He did not want to meet them defenseless.

  “Wait.” Cara halted her massage. “Kiran. You don’t have to run off. Even if you can’t sleep, can you rest with us for a while?”

  It wasn’t at all restful to stay in Ninavel, where threads thin as spidersilk were all that remained of the confluence. Kiran was constantly fighting the pull of the demon realm.

  Dev turned his head. One green eye peered at Kiran through a thatch of dark hair, and wistful entreaty crept down the bond. Stay. Please? For once, I’d like to go to sleep knowing exactly where you and Cara are, and that you’re all right.

  He couldn’t feel warmth from touch, but the warmth that spread through him from Dev’s words was so deep it was akin to pain.

  “I’ll stay a little longer.” Careful to move human-slowly, he sat on the bed’s edge.

  “Good.” Dev relaxed. Cara gave Kiran a grateful glance and curled beside Dev, her head propped up on one hand. She traced gentle fingers down Dev’s back.

  Tentatively, Kiran laid a hand on Dev’s shoulder. His fingers might be illusion, unable to feel as his real flesh once had, but contact did still enhance the bond between them. Dev was more than half asleep already, exhaustion a thick blanket pressing him down. Yet he was reveling in Kiran’s and Cara’s presence, and the knowledge that for one blessed interval he need not fear for them. The weight he’d carried for so long lifted at last, leaving him so light he might fly higher than he ever had when Tainted…

  Dev’s breathing deepened into snores.

  Cara said softly to Kiran, “He loves you, you know. No matter what you’ve become.”

  “I do know.” Impossible to miss, thanks to the bond, and Dev must know his own depth of feeling. Yet beyond love, he’d seen Dev’s fear for him, mirrored by his own. He’d once dreamed of freedom. Now it felt both dizzying and perilous. So many paths he might take…and how could he trust his instincts, changed as he was?

  One instinct he did trust. He said to Cara, “I may have changed, but one thing hasn’t and never will. I would give anything to keep Dev safe, and you with him.”

  Cara’s smile was bright. “Maybe I don’t yet know you as well as Dev does, but that I do know, and I love you for it. You saved him from Ruslan—and that’s not all I’m grateful for. I thank Khalmet every day that he took that job to guide you.”

  Kiran couldn’t see why. “If Dev hadn’t taken the job, he’d never have come to Ruslan’s attention in the first place. You and Melly would never have been in danger, and—”

  “Oh, stop it.” Cara sat up, her pale eyes gaining a tinge of exasperation. “Sure, it wasn’t all sweets and roses, not by half. But you didn’t know Dev before. Even with Sethan, he always kept a certain distance, like he was afraid Sethan would turn his back on him if he found out too much. The rest of us, he wouldn’t let within arm’s length. Oh, he’d laugh, and joke, and boast, but get the least bit personal, and he’d use that sharp tongue of his to make you regret it. Jylla was the only one he trusted. When she destroyed that trust, believe me, it could’ve gone a whole other way. He could’ve shut everyone out, for good—I think that’s what he wanted to do. But then, there was you, and he couldn’t. You got inside that barrier of his. Enough for him to let me in too, and now I’ve hope he’ll see that he doesn’t have to keep friends forever at a distance for fear they’ll hurt him—”

  She broke off with a snort. “Gods, listen to me babble. But I mean it, Kiran. It’s been one hell of a season, and I don’t say I’ve no regrets, but in this, I swear to the marrow of my bones: Dev’s better off for having met you.”

  Maybe; though the debt ran far deeper the other way around. But if Cara really thought so…Kiran summoned his courage. “In the temple, I promised you that once we defeated Ruslan, I’d sever my bond to Dev. I’ll be honest—I don’t want to sever it, and neither does he.” Kiran hesitated, trying to find words to explain the depth of his need; his certainty that the bond would keep him from sliding into the arrogance of which Mikail had accused him.

  Cara spoke before he could marshal a proper plea. “I’ll be honest, too. When I asked you for that promise, I was afraid. Of what the Taint might do to Dev, and…well, of you. But I’m not afraid anymore.” She gave him a rueful grin. “Maybe a little jealous. Many’s the time I wished I knew what Dev was thinking. Although plenty of other times I’ve been glad he didn’t know my thoughts.”

  Looking at her body nestled against Dev’s, Kiran was more than a little jealous; but that pain was small compared to the force of his relief. He smoothed his hand over Dev’s back. Dev was dreaming now. Something about an icy, overhanging cliff Kiran would’ve shuddered to attempt, but in the dream, Dev was happy. Deeply, joyously so.

  Answering joy leaped in Kiran. He smiled at Cara. “Ever since Dev woke in the Cave of Stars to find you and Melly at his side, he’s been the happiest I’ve ever felt him.” He stood. “I really should go.” On impulse, he bowed to Cara as he might have to Lizaveta, his arms crossed and extended at the wrist. “Thank you. For everything. If you should ever want anything that I could give…”

  “I do want something,” Cara said. “Dev says you don’t think you can ever leave the demon realm and really be here again. I ask that you don’t give up on the idea. Maybe it feels impossible to you, but every outrider knows that ‘impossible’ is just another word for ‘not yet climbed.’”

  Kiran couldn’t help a chuckle. “Nothing daunts you and Dev, does it? Don’t worry. You’ve certainly given me new motivation.” If all he could have was the bond, that was enough. But if he could have more…

  All the more reason he should practice casting.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  (Dev)

  It felt like centuries since I last dropped through the window of Red Dal’s den, not a mere handful of months. The weight of all I’d seen and done in that time made my last visit seem some faint, misty dream; a glimpse of a life that I hardly remembered. Yet everything within the den was achingly familiar: the brightly painted walls, the toys scattered over the floor, the gaggle of kids shrieking in excited welcome. It wasn’t me they ran to greet but Melly, as she swung through the window to land at my side.

  “Melly, you’re alive!”

  “How’d you get away from the
blood mage?”

  “Red Dal said you weren’t coming back!”

  As they piled on Melly like kitfox cubs, I ran through the habitual tally: Jeran, Alsa, Tamin, Porry, Jek, Kuril, Ness…thank Khalmet, none were missing, killed on jobs gone wrong.

  Melly had her arms around as many of her denmates as she could reach. “Missed you brats. Yeah, even you, Porry. And I’ve got the best tale to tell.”

  Ness, slim and dark and oldest after Melly, pulled out of the hug. “None of us can lift anymore. Can you?”

  Oh gods, the desperate undertone to that question. Ness wasn’t the only child whose face was strained and hollow-cheeked beneath the flush of excitement. Even the youngest, sturdy little Tamin, froze into stillness waiting for Melly’s answer.

  Melly shut her eyes, and the regret and sorrow printed sharp on her features made her look suddenly, terribly adult. “Nobody can lift anymore. It’s awful, I know, but Dev’s got some good news.”

  “I’d certainly like to hear something good.” Liana, the den minder, stood up from a cushioned chair in the far corner of the room. She’d been rocking a little boy I didn’t know, a chubby brown toddler who clutched Liana’s neck and stared at me with wide, nervous eyes. After losing Melly to Ruslan, and the boss Tainter before her to a Change, Red Dal must’ve been eager to secure new Tainters to train.

  Liana looked like she hadn’t slept in days. Her reddened eyes were glassy with exhaustion, her curls lank, and her round face scored with deep lines of worry. She knew far better than the kids what the loss of the Taint could mean for them. She must be scared for herself, too; she’d never known life outside the den. She and I had been Tainters here together, but Red Dal had kept Liana when she Changed. The canny bastard had wanted a minder who was certain to be loyal to him.

  Every child had turned to me like hopeful flowers seeking sun. I spoke directly to them. “It’s true you can’t work jobs anymore, but you don’t have to leave the den. You can stay together as long as you want. Red Dal’s given the den over to me, and I’ll be hiring scholars to teach you, and making sure you have everything you need while you grow up.”