She just had to do something else first. The knives and daggers didn’t really need sharpening. They were just a distraction, a way to keep her hands occupied while she…
Someone knocked at the door.
Caina straightened from the table, smoothing the front of her dress.
“Come in,” she called.
###
Kylon stepped into the small guest room.
Caina stood by a table, wearing the dress and cloak of a Kaltari woman, the bronze brooch glinting in the dim light from the hearth. He still could not sense her presence, not at all, but he didn’t care. She was conscious, standing and awake.
That was more than he would have expected. More than he would have hoped.
“You’re awake,” he said.
She smiled. “This morning. I think I just missed you.”
“Strabane has me hunting for Teskilati spies in the hills,” said Kylon. “They’re good at hiding, but they can’t hide from a man with the sorcery of water.” He hesitated, looking at her for any sign of illness, of pain. “Though you’re doing a good job of it.”
Caina shrugged. “Annarah says that what…happened to me was similar to the trials the valikarion of Iramis underwent. So apparently I can claim to be a valikarion now. No divinatory spells will work on me, and I can…see sorcerous auras. It is a damned strange sensation.”
“You can see mine, then?” said Kylon.
“Yes,” said Caina in a quiet voice. “It’s…silvery and blue, but those aren’t the right words. It’s so hard to describe.” She met his eyes. “It’s a…a compelling sight. I never thought I would say that about anything of sorcery.”
Kylon nodded. “That is what I wanted to discuss with you.”
“Oh?”
Kylon took a deep breath. “I’m sorry.”
###
Caina blinked several times before she spoke.
“What?” she said. “Why are you sorry? What are you sorry for? You…haven’t done anything.”
“I did,” said Kylon. His face was grim. “I…should not have poured that Elixir down your throat.”
“Why not?” said Caina. “It saved my life. It saved all of our lives. Cassander would have killed us all, and a lot more people if he got his hands on the regalia. You…”
He kept speaking.
“I know how much you hate sorcery,” said Kylon. “And I should have been more vigilant. I should have realized that if the Huntress wore a shadow-cloak, I couldn’t sense her or her nagataaru. I…”
“Kylon,” said Caina. “If there is any blame, it is mine. All those damned curved knives. I should have realized that it was Kalgri months ago.” She sighed. “She was playing with my head, trying to make me isolate myself so I would be easier to kill. It almost worked, too. It would have worked, if not for you.”
She crossed the room and stood before him, looking up at him.
“Kylon,” she said. “You saved my life. You saved us all. Thank you.”
Kylon stared down at her, and at last nodded.
“How could I not?” he said. “After you risked everything for me?”
“What do you mean?” said Caina.
“In the Craven’s Tower, after you defeated the Sifter and used the Elixir to heal me,” said Kylon. “You couldn’t have carried me out on your own. Morgant told me what you did, how you threatened to kill him if he didn’t help you get me out.”
Caina felt her face warm. “I…was in a bit of a mood at the time.”
“You had been seeking him for months,” said Kylon. “He was your only link to finding the Staff and the Seal, your only clue to stopping the Apotheosis. And you were willing to kill him to save my life.”
Caina couldn’t meet his eyes for a moment. “Like I said. I was in a bit of a mood.”
“I was wrong about you,” said Kylon. “When we first met. I thought you were a…a cold spy, a manipulator.”
“Now what do you think of me?” said Caina. Her voice was a little hoarse.
“I think you’re the bravest woman I’ve ever met,” said Kylon.
“Because you saw into my mind?” said Caina.
“No,” said Kylon. “I came to that conclusion long before that.”
Caina took a deep breath. “About that. I…also need to discuss something with you.”
###
Kylon looked down at Caina, his pulse drumming in his temples. She was close enough that he could feel the heat of her breath against his face when she spoke and see the faint tremor near her right eye.
She was nervous. He couldn’t sense her emotions, but he could tell she was nervous.
“When I was…dying,” said Caina. “I don’t remember most of what happened.”
“That’s probably for the best,” said Kylon. He remembered every detail of what had happened in the Corsair’s Rest. “It wasn’t pleasant.”
She nodded and reached up, pushing her hair back from her face. “I…remember when I was lying on the floor, bleeding to death. You were sitting next to me while Nasser was shouting at Cassander. You said…you said…”
She stopped, pulling her composure together.
“Go on,” said Kylon.
Caina looked up at him. “You said that it was your fate to see the women you loved die in front of you, that you could do nothing to save them.”
He nodded, not willing to trust his voice.
“Does,” she said, swallowing, “does that include me?”
Kylon took both of her hands in his, and her blue eyes grew wide. The contact of her skin brought her emotions against his senses, and he felt her fear and pain, backed by a strong and growing love for him.
A love that matched what he felt for her.
“Yes,” he said.
“I love you, too,” she whispered. The pulse in her wrists raced against her fingers. “So. Good. Good. That’s good.” She was talking so fast that the words were tumbling together. “You love me, that’s good. It is in fact the best news I’ve heard in years. So what are you going…”
“Stop talking,” said Kylon, and he pulled her close and kissed her.
For an instant she went rigid with surprise, but only for an instant. She pressed herself against him, wrapping her arms around his back and pulling him closer. The nervousness vanished, replaced by a swelling heat. Her hands slid under his tunic, climbing up his back.
That seemed like a marvelous idea, so he began tugging at her cloak, pulling it off her shoulders.
###
Caina tossed aside the last of her clothing, standing before Kylon.
The last time she had seen him undressed had been in the aftermath of the Craven’s Tower. This was a more pleasant circumstance by far. The dying fire threw shadows over the hard planes of his chest and arms, and his eyes flicked up and down over her, taking her in.
Over the scar on her belly.
A wave of self-consciousness went over her, and her hands jerked to cover the garish scar.
“No, no, no,” murmured Kylon, reaching down to pull her hands away. “No. Don’t hide. I want all of you.”
She stared up at him. He looked back, more intense than she had ever seen him. He looked…
He looked like a man dying of thirst who had just walked into an oasis.
Come to think of it, Caina was pretty thirsty herself.
She seized his head with both hands, pulled his face to hers, and kissed him. His arms wrapped around her and pulled her close. She coiled her left leg around him and gave the back of his right knee a tap with her heel. Kylon overbalanced and fell forward, his weight driving her down to the bed beneath him.
They didn’t stand up again for a while.
Much later, Caina lay against him, her head resting on Kylon’s chest, his right hand stroking her hair and back.
She felt better than she had in a long, long time.
“What will we do next?” whispered Kylon.
A dozen different playful suggestions came to the tip of Caina’
s tongue, but his tone was serious. She levered up on her elbow and looked at him.
“Whatever happens,” said Caina, “whatever fate awaits us, we’ll face it side-by-side. Together.”
“Together,” said Kylon.
Epilogue
The woman who now called herself Kalgri strolled through the southern edge of the Desert of Candles, tossing Caina’s ghostsilver dagger to herself. The Voice brooded and hissed and snarled in her thoughts. Kalgri listened with part of her mind, the rest of her will considering her next course of action.
Step by step she left Rumarah behind.
That had been something of a mess.
Kalgri was not entirely sure how Caina had survived. The Voice was baffled. Kalgri had seen Elixir Restorata used before, knew that it produced an explosive discharge, but nothing like that. The firestorm that had engulfed the Corsair’s Rest and the Adamant Guards had been like the wrath of a furious god.
And then when Caina had stumbled out of the wreckage, impossibly alive but invisible to the Voice’s senses, when Kylon and the loremaster had driven that necromantic shadow from her…
For an instant, Kalgri had known a flicker of profound terror.
She had killed Caina. Kalgri was absolutely, unquestionably certain of that. The wound had been mortal, and Caina’s damaged aura would not let her use Elixir Restorata. The long-forgotten religious lessons of Kalgri’s childhood had floated to the forefront of her thoughts, and for a wild moment she had wondered if the Living Flame had descended in wrath to raise Caina to life once more.
She wondered if the Living Flame had descended in wrath to bring retribution for all of Kalgri’s many, many, many victims.
Utterly absurd.
Yet Kalgri had not survived for so long by attacking unknown threats. The Voice had counseled retreat, and for once Kalgri was in full agreement with the nagataaru inside her skull.
She fled.
Now she walked alone through the Desert of Candles, tossing Caina’s ghostsilver dagger to herself, the Ghost’s shadow-cloak wrapped in a bundle and tucked under her arm.
Well. Maybe not quite alone. She sensed a flicker of life ahead.
Just as she had expected.
Kalgri stopped, caught the dagger by the handle, and tapped the flat of the blade against her lips, thinking.
Perhaps the time had come to tell Callatas of the Staff and Seal. Nasser Glasshand had them, and Nasser Glasshand would follow Caina’s counsel and take them to Catekharon. If the Staff and Seal fell into the hands of the Scholae, Callatas would never claim them, and the Apotheosis would never come to pass.
The Voice screamed in rage at the thought.
Yet Nasser would first go to Istarinmul to charter a ship. Overland travel while bearing such precious artifacts was too great of a risk. Nasser would go to Istarinmul…and when he did, Kalgri could arrange for the deaths of countless thousands.
Callatas could have the Staff and the Seal once Istarinmul burned to ashes. Perhaps Caina would even die in the firestorm.
Kalgri giggled a little at the thought, and the Voice hissed its approval of her plan. Of course, the nagataaru approved of anything that would kill a lot of people.
She started walking again, strolling through the corpses.
Once the dead men had been a tribe of Istarish nomads, wiry little men in brown robes and turbans. Now they were dead. Most of them had been burned alive. A few of them had broken necks from blasts of psychokinetic force. And some of them had bled to death, their bodies missing various parts.
As if someone had harvested their organs.
Kalgri stopped when she found Cassander Nilas.
Or, at least, what was left of him.
He wore only his trousers and boots, and his left arm was missing. His torso was now a mismatched patchwork of scars from the stolen skin and flesh he had grafted to repair his grievous wounds. The right side of his face was still handsome. The left was a hideous maze of scars, and looked as if it had been stitched together out of old leather.
Or as if it had been rebuilt with pieces from the dead tribesmen.
Kalgri waited as Cassander finished grafting his new arm to the charred stump of his shoulder, assembling it piece by piece from dead flesh, casting spell after necromantic spell. When he finished, it was a mismatched horror, but it was functional. Cassander let out a rasping sigh, rotating his new left arm.
His eyes fell upon Kalgri and narrowed. His right one was still blue, but the left had turned a venomous shade of orange.
“I thought,” said Kalgri, “that you might have a trick up your sleeve. Or, more precisely, a bloodcrystal. One to snatch you away from the explosion. Clever of you. Excellent foresight, really. ”
“You useless bitch,” snarled Cassander, his deep voice transformed to a snarling rasp. “You ran! See if you can run from this!”
Fire snarled into existence around his armored right hand, the bloodcrystal flashing in the back of his black gauntlet.
“Now, now,” said Kalgri, a sword of black shadow and purple flame springing to life in her hand. The sight of it made Cassander hesitate. “Why so angry? You were successful.”
“I was almost killed,” snarled Cassander.
“But Caina Amalas is dead,” lied Kalgri.
Cassander stared at her, his scarred face caught between rage and curiosity.
“The explosion wiped out your Guards and nearly killed you,” said Kalgri, “but it killed her as well. Behold.” She lifted the ghostsilver dagger. “Her blade and shadow-cloak. Trophies that you can lay before the feet of the Grand Master.”
Some of the rage faded from Cassander’s face. His spells had let him repair his injuries, stealing flesh from others to rebuild himself, but that kind of necromancy had some side effects of which Cassander was likely ignorant. At best, it induced a furious sadism, a twisting of the intellect. At worst, it caused homicidal madness.
Either outcome promised to be enjoyable.
“You should have warned me of the trap,” said Cassander.
Kalgri shrugged. “I ran for my life. What more warning did you require?” She dismissed her blade of force, walked closer, and held out the dagger and shadow-cloak. “If you were too busy gloating to notice the obvious, that is upon your head, not mine.”
She saw him consider killing her, saw pragmatism win out over his newfound bloodlust.
“Very well,” said Cassander, taking the cloak and the dagger. She located his spell-armored greatcoat, which had survived the blast, picked it up, and held it open as Cassander shrugged into it. “We will present these to the Grand Master, and see if he keeps his word.”
“And if he doesn’t?” said Kalgri, the Voice hissing with anticipation.
“And if he doesn’t,” said Cassander, his mismatched eyes mad and gleeful, “you and I are going to kill a lot of people.”
He laughed, furious and wild, and Kalgri laughed with him.
Oh, but she was looking forward to it.
###
In the darkness of his Tomb, Kharnaces and the Harbinger, the nagataaru within him, gazed upon the floating sphere of the Conjurant Bloodcrystal.
He was the Harbinger. The Harbinger was him, and the furious chorus of the lords of the nagataaru thundered through Kharnaces’s mind, the titanic voice of Kotuluk Iblis rising over them all.
The Conjurant Bloodcrystal was nearly complete. It needed only a single drop of Callatas’s blood to activate.
And soon, very soon, Callatas would come to Pyramid Isle. The Harbinger had foreseen it, and Kharnaces was the Harbinger and the Harbinger was him.
For once Callatas returned, Kotuluk Iblis would devour this diseased world at last.
Kharnaces waited for the glorious end.
THE END
Thank you for reading GHOST IN THE SEAL. Look for Caina's next adventure, GHOST IN THE THRONE, to appear in late 2015. If you liked the book, please consider leaving a review at your ebook site of choice. To receive immediate notificatio
n of new releases, sign up for my newsletter, or watch for news on my Facebook page.
Other books by the author
The Demonsouled Saga
MAZAEL CRAVENLOCK is a wandering knight, fearless in battle and masterful with a sword.
Yet he has a dark secret. He is Demonsouled, the son of the ancient and cruel Old Demon, and his tainted blood grants him superhuman strength and speed. Yet with the power comes terrible, inhuman rage, and Mazael must struggle to keep the fury from devouring him.
But he dare not turn aside from the strength of his blood, for he will need it to face terrible foes.
The priests of the San-keth plot and scheme in the shadows, pulling lords and kingdoms upon their strings. The serpent priests desire to overthrow the realms of men and enslave humanity. Unless Mazael stops them, they shall force all nations to bow before the serpent god.
The Malrag hordes are coming, vast armies of terrible, inhuman beasts, filled with a lust for cruelty and torment. The Malrags care nothing for conquest or treasure, only slaughter. And the human realms are ripe for the harvest. Only a warrior of Mazael’s power can hope to defeat them.
The Dominiar Order and the Justiciar Order were once noble and respected, dedicated to fighting the powers of dark magic. Now they are corrupt and cynical, and scheme only for power and glory. They will kill anyone who stands in their way.
To defeat these foes, Mazael will need all the strength of his Demonsouled blood.
Yet he faces a far more terrible foe.
For centuries the Old Demon has manipulated kings and lords. Now he shall seize the power of the Demonsouled for himself, and become the a god of torment and tyranny.
Unless Mazael can stop him.
Read Demonsouled for free. Mazael's adventures continue in Soul of Tyrants, Soul of Serpents, Soul of Dragons, Soul of Sorcery, Soul of Skulls, and Soul of Swords, along with the short stories The Wandering Knight, The Tournament Knight, and The Dragon's Shadow. Get the first three books bundled together in Demonsouled Omnibus One.
Ghost in the Seal (Ghost Exile #6) Page 33