"Come for....” Jacin's thumb slid over the stone of Malick's ring.
Malick... help.
Asai settled his hand over Jacin's torn palm with a gentleness that made Jacin quiver and made mortifying tears burn behind the bridge of his nose. That same look as in his father's dooryard all those years ago, but Jacin had thought the dark gaze kind then, full of promise.
"You don't remember any of it, do you?” Asai asked softly. “You don't even remember this morning."
Jacin shut his eyes.
Ghosts, too damned many of them, and Beishin and no Malick to chase him away, and fuck, Asai had been right there, mocking and leaving invisible welts on Jacin's skin beneath his scornful, demanding not-love, touching and promising, hands like chains, weighing Jacin down, choking him, and barriers between him and away, and deep topaz eyes that saw but didn't see at all, and, “Now, Jacin-rei."
Guiding him. Giving him direction in his directionless existence.
Because Jacin needed. And Malick wasn't here, damn him.
"I... I want...."
"I know,” Asai soothed. “I know, Jacin-rei. I've always known."
Soft fingertips swept over Jacin's temple. Jacin couldn't help the flinch.
"Love the unlovable,” Asai whispered. “I can give that to you, little Ghost. You have had your Temshiel, but we both know what you really wanted, no? And now your Temshiel is gone, just like you knew he would be. Just like they'll all leave you, in the end. Your kind were not meant for the love of another. Only I can give you what you need. Only I want to. You're mine, little Ghost. I've come back—for you."
Jacin's mind was screaming, refusing, digging in its heels. His body was leaning toward Asai, and he couldn't stop it.
So fucked, so fucked, so fucked.
There was anger in Jacin's chest, in his gut, roiling, seething, but Jacin didn't know where to point it. It muddled into itself, congealed, strung through with confusion and fear and resentment, and something that tasted like hope, bitter and biting, but he didn't know where to put that, either.
Asai had killed Caidi. Malick had left.
Jacin had allowed every moment of it all.
Weak.
Failed.
Except... Asai had failed too. From the moment he'd stolen a gutless Untouchable from a prison camp, he'd stepped into Jacin's trajectory of failure.
Malick was strong. Malick didn't fail. Except Malick wasn't here, and even if he was, he wouldn't tell Jacin what to do, never, just, I want you to live, but I'm not going to tell you how, and I love you, but you used to love him and I'll never let you forget it.
"I want to forget it.” A thin skirl of breath that gained absolutely no power in the speaking. “Why can't I...? I... I want...."
I don't want to love you, I don't want to have ever loved you, I hate you, I don't want you here, I want Malick, but Malick left, and all I have is you or nothing, and I can't have nothing, I can't, I've tried, but I can't stand the emptiness, and I'm afraid and I don't know what to do.
"You don't know what you want, Jacin-rei,” Asai crooned. “You need me to show you. Come with me, lad. There is nothing for you with them anymore. You're a killer, Jacin-rei, a murdering Ghost—how long, do you think, before your beloved twin stops making excuses for what you've become? How long before he sees?"
It... hurt. Which was strange, because Jacin knew Joori didn't really see him, but he hadn't necessarily thought before about what Joori seeing him would actually mean.
Jacin gripped the knife in his hand more firmly.
"The gods have nothing for you but more betrayal. I am your maker, little Ghost. By my breath do you live, by my love do you go on. You do not exist but in my eyes."
Love.
Love the unlovable.
I fucking love you. Deal with it.
A sob leaked out from Jacin's throat.
I can't. I don't know how. Damn it, how could you leave me here like this?
Beishin could eat him up, swallow him, breathe him in and smother him in his own delusions. Hadn't he done it before?
The idea was... not as horrifying as it probably should have been.
You don't want choices? You don't know what to do with them?
Blatant challenge in Malick's remembered voice, but Jacin couldn't answer to it like any man with a backbone should.
"No,” he whispered instead, “I really don't."
Blindly, Jacin leaned forward, eyes still shut tight. He held out the knife in an open palm. Testing, maybe, he didn't know, but waiting, wanting, mind and heart and soul all flailing and reaching for something—sanity, the ability to tell right from wrong, good from bad, an answer—while his body stood still and just... waited.
An offer—retribution. Or maybe it was a request—execution. Finally.
It would be fitting irony to have Beishin dig out Jacin's heart as Jacin had dug out Beishin's, and with the knife Malick had handed Jacin as a present in that room at the Girou, trying to woo him. Maybe this was Jacin's way of wooing. Knives had always been foreplay to him; no reason why they couldn't be completion too. No reason Jacin should escape the fate he'd handed Asai. Wasn't he doomed already anyway?
The scent of rain overwhelmed the cocktail of pine and sage, the smell of moist earth and ashes sitting heavy in Jacin's nostrils, tightening his chest.
Why didn't Beishin smell of jasmine?
Jacin didn't know if the warm mouth that settled over his own was what he'd expected. He didn't know if the firm hands that pulled him close were the ones he should be allowing the liberty—if any of this even existed outside his own head. He didn't know if the gentle kiss from the man he used to love—the man he'd killed—was right or sane or maybe even somehow erotically profane.
He knew it was warm. He knew he felt it, and he wasn't sure if he cared if it wasn't real.
He knew it was an answer. Even if it wasn't the right one.
"You're mine, Jacin-rei.” Breathed right into his mouth, tendriling down his throat, into his lungs, stoppering any deteriorating reason he might have had left.
It pulled mind and soul loose from unsound moorings, mangled and twisted them, then crammed them back down his throat ‘til he almost choked.
Jacin sucked in a shaky breath and pulled away, took his hand from Asai's and clenched his fist but not enough to break the skin that had reknit itself while he'd been passed out in the rain. The heat of his own blood called to him with the promise of clarity and control, but he couldn't listen. He opened his eyes and looked at Asai. He resheathed his knife.
"Where am I supposed to go?"
Fuck, he needed a smoke.
* * * *
"You... lost the Incendiary.” Dakimo watched Imara's mouth pinch down, watched the anger flare in her gaze, and shook his head. “And...?” he asked calmly.
Because by the reluctant purpose all over Imara's face, Dakimo could tell there was more.
Imara sucked in a breath. “And he was wearing Kamen's ring when he fled."
Dakimo's teabowl almost flew out of his hands. He managed to hang onto it. “I'm sorry, what?"
"I don't think it's as bad as it sounds,” Imara hastened to add. “He was bleeding. I smelled it. And then it was just gone. I think he used Kamen's ring to hide.” She held up her hand when Dakimo rubbed at his brow. “I don't think he knows all of what he could do with it. And I have to believe Kamen would not be so stupid as to give all of its power over to....” She trailed off with an uncomfortable shrug.
Dakimo's heart sank. “The Incendiary is as unstable as all that?” He kept his tone mild, even though his gut had dropped all the way down to the floor. The power of the Incendiary running about loose was bad enough, but to add Kamen's powers to it, undirected.... It didn't bear thinking about. And yet Dakimo had no choice.
How was he going to explain all of this to Emika? To Wolf?
Imara paced the small receiving room before sighing and allowing herself to fall elegantly onto a plump cushion in the c
orner. “Yes,” she said simply. “But it's more than that. He thinks he's being haunted by Asai's spirit. His sister's, as well."
Dakimo paused to take that in.
"That cannot be.” He narrowed his eyes. “Can it?"
This Fen Jacin-rei was Incendiary—impossible to find through magic, and impossible for the spirits to see, let alone haunt. Even the gods couldn't always see him.
Imara looked like she wanted to cry. “I don't know."
"You looked?"
"Well, of course I looked. I found nothing.” She paused. “Although... not nothing. Something, but...."
Dakimo set his teabowl down on the nearest table so he wouldn't end up throwing it at Imara's head. “But what?"
"Nothing. I don't know.” Imara ground out a sigh of annoyance. “It should not be possible to haunt Incendiary, but he was hidden inside the bondage of Untouchable for years, and that should not have been possible, either. And what were the voices of the Ancestors but haunting?” She shook her head. “For that matter, what do we know about the laws of Incendiary but that they are changeable? Isn't that the point of Incendiary in the first place?"
"Answerable to none but Fate and their chosen god,” Dakimo conceded. The conflict of which being the very thing that had doomed Hitsuke. This was getting out of control far too quickly. Dakimo waved a hand, impatient. “Find Asai's spirit and you'll have your answer. At least to that.” He pondered for a moment. “Set Xari to it."
"Xari should not have to undertake such a thing. I thought I would—"
"You will have other matters to attend. And perhaps look for the Incendiary's sister while you're at it.” Best to make sure.
Imara looked up, gaze narrowed. “Did you foresee what would happen to Kamen?"
Dakimo almost growled. “How would I have seen it?” he snapped, irritated at the sudden turn, because he hadn't seen a bloody thing, and he should have. It was his job, after all. “He was veiled down so tight I could scarcely squeeze a conversation through his shields, and he has attached himself to the Incendiary. I can barely even see the ripples of change the Incendiary initiates a moment before he initiates them.” And that was with intense meditation and hours of concentration—hours Dakimo just didn't have right now.
"Xari saw it,” Imara said quietly. Too quietly.
Dakimo rubbed at his brow. “And she told you this when?"
"It....” Imara's gaze skittered away. “Yesterday morning."
"I... see.” Dakimo had to put his hands behind his back, because they'd fisted up tight and he didn't think he could uncurl them just now. “And you did nothing."
"I did nothing. And I insisted Xari do nothing.” Imara lifted her chin. “I didn't know you were going to send him out after the banpair, and I didn't know he'd actually let them ambush him. Kamen needed a lesson. He wasn't doing his job. And he was doing the Incendiary no good; in fact, perhaps doing further damage by allowing—"
"And you thought it wise to teach Kamen this lesson while he had an unstable Incendiary in his care, and Tambalon was under siege by banpair immune to the gods?"
"I thought I could help them both by not helping Kamen,” Imara defended. “I wanted to see Kamen... chastened, perhaps, not actually sent to spirit. How could I know he'd let banpair fell him? How could I know how unbalanced Fen Jacin was until—?"
"Until Kamen and all his magic was already gone!” Dakimo's teeth had clenched; he forcibly relaxed his jaw. “Centuries old, and this is how you interpret Wolf's command?"
Imara bridled. “Wolf's command was to see that Kamen facilitated the Incendiary in his choice, Dakimo. To prevent Kamen from disobeying his own orders. That was all. Your orders were the same as mine.” She tilted her head. “And they had nothing to do with trying to use the Incendiary to solve Tambalon's problems."
"Not the decisive parry I'm sure you intended,” Dakimo countered, sharp and pointed. “I merely hoped to take advantage of an opportunity. I did not interfere with Kamen's choices by not giving them to him, nor did I prevent another from doing so. You have erred, Wolf's-own. You have misjudged. And you have, once again, done so because of Kamen.” He watched as Imara's mouth tightened and she looked away. “What is it between the two of you?” Dakimo asked, and not for the first time. “Why is it that Kamen can take all your years of knowledge and skill and make you seem nothing more than a mortal girl of seventeen?” He paused with a wince he couldn't help as a possibility struck him. “Tell me you're not in love with him."
"No!” The grimace and abrupt anger was a relief, and more of a confirmation of the denial than the actual denial. “In love with Kamen,” Imara said with a roll of her eyes and a scowl. “All the gods spare me from a fate such as that.” She shook her head. “He is still new, Dakimo, and powerful. Too powerful. He was not ready for what was handed to him."
Dakimo's eyebrows went up. He couldn't argue with it, he thought the same himself, but it was rather beside the point right now. “It is not ours to question our god, Imara. Nor to hear our god's voice and interpret it as we see fit."
Imara was silent for several long moments, before she ventured quietly, “I owe him, Dakimo. I was trying to repay him."
By getting him sent to spirit and endangering the Incendiary he risked his soul to save?
Dakimo didn't say it. It would not be productive, and he wouldn't be telling Imara anything she didn't already know.
"You're going to have to explain that one to me,” Dakimo said when Imara didn't go on. “I fail to see how allowing Kamen to be—"
"He's never failed!” Imara cut in. “Never, not even in his mortal life. Skel was the closest he came, and that failure wasn't his. How can he know the danger of his power if he has never seen the consequences of it? How can he understand the risks he takes? Not just with the affairs of mortals and those he protects, but with himself. He risked his soul for the Incendiary, Dakimo, before he even knew what the Incendiary was. He would do it again, I saw it in his eyes, and yet he won't see that the kindest thing he could have done for Fen Jacin would have been to let him die when he begged for it."
Dakimo couldn't tell Imara how wrong she was, and he couldn't tell her why she was wrong, so he said nothing.
"And now,” Imara went on, “Fen Jacin would spurn the gods and what Fate has made him, and Kamen would help him do it. He won't even glance at the fact that he would fail Wolf in the doing. He risks his soul again, and I couldn't—"
"Now was not the time to make your point!” Dakimo snapped. “Your actions have turned the Incendiary from a potential asset into a potential threat. You have set him loose in the birthplace of the servants of the gods and all the world's magic, and with Kamen's ring in his fist.” Imara opened her mouth, but Dakimo cut her off with a sharp gesture of his hand. “No. The best interests of Kamen and your god notwithstanding, you have erred. You will now set yourself to fixing it. Where are the rest of those Kamen claimed? The brothers have been marked, as well. We cannot—"
"I know, Dakimo.” Imara glared, but kept her tone civil. “They are protected. I left them in the care of Naro-yi."
"Naro-yi.” One of Owl's. “He will do.” Dakimo hardened his gaze so there would be no misunderstandings or room for misinterpretation. “You will keep them safe. Swear them oath, don't swear them oath, I care not, but you will keep them safe. And you will find the Incendiary and do the same."
"And how do you propose I do that?” Imara asked. “He can't be found with magic, and I'm not—"
"I care not,” Dakimo said again then waved a hand. “Set Xari to the stone, since she seems better able to discern him through Fate's mists than I. Or find the damned banpair and follow after them, since they apparently seek him, as well, and managed to find him where all of the gods’ servants failed.” The admission stung and made Dakimo's teeth clench again. “How you do it matters little, but find him you must, before someone else does. If it becomes known that he is as unstable as you say, the rest of the gods will put him down, and we will al
l have failed Wolf."
Dakimo paused, took the few paces over to Imara, and crouched in front of her to lay a hand to her shoulder. He softened his tone. “You have erred, Wolf's-own, but I have every faith that you will fix your mistake. You have no choice. If you would do Wolf's work, you will find and help the Incendiary.” He patted Imara's cheek. “And I will do what I can to help you."
Right after he got done telling Governor Emika that they were right back where they'd started with the banpair problem, and that she had an unhinged Incendiary running around loose in Mitsu—an unhinged Incendiary who thought he was being haunted by the ghost of Asai, and had all the magic of Wolf's Null at his disposal. Dakimo wondered if telling her the Incendiary probably didn't know how to use it would be any consolation.
He thought probably not.
* * * *
Goyo wasn't necessarily surprised to run into Imara on his way into the Statehouse. He was surprised that she'd been paying so little attention to where she was going that she nearly plowed him into a marble pillar on her way by. The pinch of the mouth didn't come until after she realized who'd just saved her from a very inelegant and public tumble down the steps.
"Goyo,” she said flatly as she extracted her arm from his grip.
Goyo grinned, as brightly as he could manage. Mostly because he knew it would annoy her. “You're so very welcome.” His bow was pure theatrical irony. “And what has you ramming through innocent pedestrians like Wolf himself has come to swallow you?"
Imara smiled in that way she had that always made Goyo wonder if she wasn't thinking about dragging him back to her web, lopping off his head, and laying her eggs down his neck. She opened her mouth like she meant to retort, then pinched it down tight again. “You know what, Goyo?” she finally said. “Fuck off."
Goyo stepped hastily out of her way before she could... well, he wasn't sure, but by the set of her jaw and the glitter in her eye, he thought perhaps she wouldn't be entirely opposed to an actual brawl. If the Statehouse and its perimeter hadn't been warded up so tightly, she might well have just set him on fire with her glance. Though, with the feral bit of a snarl she gave him as she stalked down the steps, Goyo rather thought biting would've been the way of it.
Wolf's-own: Koan Page 21