Close Quarter

by Anna Zabo

  The vampire shrugged, a movement that was eerily close to Silas’s own. Rhys felt ice flow down his spine.

  “It was only ever you and I, Quintus.”

  “Perhaps. But no longer.”

  Those words drew Rhys’s attention away from the vampire for a moment. Silas moved his left arm and winced, and the angle of Silas’s wrist made Rhys’s innards twist. Silas couldn’t fight the vampire, not like this. The moment he stepped into the shade, Anaxandros would be on him. Rhys turned back.

  “No, you went and found yourself a Quarter.” He twirled the sword. “How’s the shoulder?”

  Silas said nothing.

  Rhys looked at his own hand. The wound had spread. Shit. He looked up. “I found him.”

  Anaxandros frowned.

  “I’m not his Quarter. He’s my fae.” He put his arm around Silas’s good side. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.” Retreat seemed the best plan. Heal, regroup. Rhys steered Silas toward a set of stairs that led down to the outside deck below.

  “Rhys Alexander Matherton.”

  His name—his full name—on the vampire’s lips caused him to stumble.

  “Rhys,” Silas said, “don’t look back.”

  He didn’t. This time he listened to Silas. But the words from Anaxandros lashed out anyway.

  “The sun will set, Quarter. Soon. Then you’ll both belong to me.”

  Rhys helped Silas down two flights of stairs and into the garden, oblivious to the people around them, heedless of the fact that both he and Silas carried swords. Maybe they were glamoured, maybe not. It didn’t matter.

  All that mattered was healing Silas as best he could in the time they had left. He would not lose Silas to that thing.

  Chapter Thirteen

  The sunlight that streamed in the greenhouse windows was tinged orange, a color Silas had grown to hate over the long years of his life. It brought death and blood and fire and pain. He closed his eyes and let Rhys walk him through the garden. What he could still feel of his arm burned as if it had been dipped in acid.

  Only when Rhys sat him down on a bench did he open his eyes and speak. “You should leave me.”

  “No. Never. So shut the fuck up.”

  The words that poured from Rhys’s mouth were perhaps the most violently loving and curse-laden statements anyone had ever said to Silas.

  “You beautiful shit-head, why would you even say that? After all we’ve been through?” Rhys balled his hands into fists.

  It hurt to laugh. The daemon-forged knife had cut deep, spreading its venom into his blood. What was left of that, anyway.

  He’d truly been blessed to find Rhys. “I don’t want you to die,” Silas said.

  “Yeah, well, I don’t want you dying either. And I’m not having that thing take you.” Rhys laid his sword on the ground.

  Element pushed into Silas, almost painfully. He didn’t bother to ask Rhys to be gentle.

  Rhys has a sword.

  Silas lifted his own blade and stared at it for a moment before handing it to Rhys. “Put both of them back into the Aether. If we lose them here, we can’t get them back.”

  Rhys’s rage ticked down a notch. “Why are there two swords?”

  “I don’t know.” Truth, but Rhys looked dubious. “I truly don’t. The Messengers must have known.” They always knew.

  “But you got your sword years ago.”

  “Two thousand years ago. Yes.”

  Rhys exhaled. Inhaled. Croaked.

  Silas knew that expression well. He’d worn it several times because of the Messengers. “It’s not important right now. You needed it. You have it.”

  Rhys swallowed and nodded, then shoved the blade back in the Aether. Silas’s sword followed. “Now, what can I do to help you?”

  The amount of element Rhys poured into Silas’s body was extraordinary. Had he not taken so much of a beating in the past thirty-six or so hours, he’d have had no trouble healing himself. But now? “Give me your hand. The one that touched the daemon knife.”

  Rhys extended his right hand, palm up. “It burned. But not like fire.”

  “Onyx, edged in black diamond, forged in daemon-fire.” Silas examined his palm. No nicks. Good. “I’m going to heal you. See if you can sense what I’m doing with the element.”

  It was a long shot, but Rhys had become more sensitive to the energy around them. And everything else he knew about Quarters had proved wrong—perhaps Rhys could consciously manipulate the element after all.

  He’d done enough of that without thought.

  Though a simple healing, it took more of him than he’d expected to lay the element out and bind it to Rhys’s flesh, coax skin to grow and heal. By the time he’d finished, his unbroken arm trembled.

  Rhys laid his now-healed hand on Silas’s forehead. “You’re going into shock.”

  “Probably. Did you feel what I did?”

  For a moment Rhys looked as if he might slap Silas. Then he nodded. “Yeah. I think so.”

  “Good. Do it to me, where the knife entered.” He leaned back against the bench and closed his eyes. “It’ll be harder. There’s poison. Blood is tricky because it moves.”

  “I have no idea what the hell I’m supposed to do.” Panic tinged Rhys’s voice higher.

  “I’ll help as best I can.” Which wouldn’t be much at all. “You’ve done this before. From across the ship.” He opened his eyes and looked at Rhys. “I trust you.”

  Rhys furrowed his brow and placed his hand over the knife wound. “Fine.” A distant, internal gaze followed.

  Then the pain came, burning his veins. Not the sting of death or poison, but of every cell cleansing itself all at once. Silas bit his tongue to keep from vocalizing. Like everything else about Rhys, his healing was brash and bold. He probably sculpted in a fury too.

  It was a very good thing he’d been unconscious when Rhys had healed him the first time. With his good hand, he gripped Rhys’s arm. “Enough.”

  Rhys lifted his palm and blinked. “Shit. I hurt you.” He brushed a hand against Silas’s cheek.

  Only then did Silas feel the trail of wetness left behind on his own skin. Tears. His own. “What you lack in finesse, you make up in power. It only stung a bit.”

  “Liar,” Rhys murmured.

  “No.” He shifted on the bench. “Now, you’re going to hurt me. We need to set my arm.”

  All color drained from Rhys’s face. Still, he studied the bones. “I think I know what to do. All those anatomy classes.”

  “Good. Give me a moment.” Silas braced himself, drew up a glamour to cover sound, then nodded.

  Rhys yanked. Twice.

  Silas screamed at the glass ceiling. Twice.

  The fire of Rhys’s subsequent healing left him racked with sobs, and he curled up on the bench.

  Not one of his most glorious moments. The worst bit was the horror writ on Rhys’s face and the litany of “I’m sorry, I’m sorry” over and over again, like some damn priest of an apology god.

  Still quite a bit of young human in Rhys. What power would he possess in ten years? In one hundred?

  Silas grabbed him by the hair and kissed him, tasting his own tears—and Rhys’s—in the process. “It’s your turn to shut the fuck up,” he said. “Sometimes pain is good.”

  Rhys’s green eyes were rimmed with red. “Not this kind of pain.”

  “I’m alive. I wouldn’t be without you.”

  Rhys wiped a hand over his mouth before answering. “Yet you keep asking me to leave.”

  Silas stilled. Orange and red clouds glowed in the sky. “Anaxandros is coming for me. I’m in no condition to fight him. I can’t win.”

  “I can.” Rhys’s bravado both warmed and chilled Silas, because Rhys believed what he said.

  “No, you can’t.” He shifted to sitting and held up a hand to stifle Rhys’s retort. “You can wound him, yes. But in a long, drawn-out battle?”

  That belief wavered. Rhys set his jaw, but fear lingered in
his eyes, in his shuddering breaths. “They wouldn’t have sent you if there was no hope.”

  The Messengers. The truth of Rhys’s words dislodged the ghost of an idea. Silas exhaled. Then he pulled in a lungful of air that smelled of earth, leaves, and Rhys and said a single word. “Bait.”

  The retort he expected didn’t come.

  From the tight pull of muscles in his face, across his shoulders, Rhys didn’t like the idea. He stretched out one long leg. “So, what? I chop off its head when it comes to take you?”

  “Something like that.”

  Rhys let out a strangled laugh. “That’s the shittiest idea I’ve ever heard.”

  As plans went, it was the most pathetic he’d ever concocted. “Have you a better idea?” He said it without sarcasm.

  Rhys rubbed his face. “No.” He dropped his hands into his lap. “Do we wait here?”

  There was a certain advantage to the garden. “This seems as good a place as any. Better, perhaps.”

  “Anaxandros will know. I mean, he’ll see the trap. Every other time I hit him, he hadn’t been expecting it.”

  “Not true.”

  That caused Rhys to turn.

  “You managed to catch him with your sword. He knew you had it, should’ve expected you’d use it.”

  “I don’t even know how to use the thing. I just swung.”

  So Rhys had. And with a speed even Silas couldn’t manage. “You’re fast.”

  After a derisive snort, Rhys reached into the air and drew out his sword with an ease that sent prickles across Silas’s skin. Everything about Rhys was quick, including his ability to learn.

  Rhys looked down the length of the blade. “The pattern’s different.” He offered the blade to Silas.

  He took it and examined the fine etching down the center. The impossible thought that there could even be a second sword had blinded him to the differences. It felt nearly like his, but not quite. Rhys was correct. The weave that ran up the center was tighter than the pattern that ornamented his.

  “I should’ve noticed.”

  “Didn’t you? I saw you look at one point.”

  He handed the blade back to Rhys. “I’d thought there was something odd, but put it down to my light-headedness and your handling of the blade.”

  Rhys laid the sword flat across his legs. “I’m not fast.”

  “You move like wind and water. Like a blade of grass in a stiff breeze.” Silas paused. Sea grass and pine. “Where were you born?”

  Rhys’s skin took on a ruddy hue. “Nowhere special. Nowhere like Italy.”

  “There was no Italy when I was born, and I was rather provincial.” He swallowed a laugh. “Still am, in many ways.”

  “Provincial.” Rhys imitated his accent again. “You should see the way you look. The way you dress. Hear how you speak. There’s nothing provincial about you.”

  “Rhys—”

  “New Jersey. I was born in New Jersey.”

  Silas chewed on his tongue for a moment. “Near ocean and pine.”

  “Close to the Pine Barrens. Why?”

  “Curiosity.” He took one of Rhys’s hands in his own. “You’re of the forest and the field but smell of the sea. And pine. I didn’t understand.”

  “And do you now?”

  “Shifting sand.”

  “Oh.” Rhys twined his fingers between Silas’s. “You mean I’m unstable.”

  Silas couldn’t help the chuckle. “You’re adaptive and quick. Whereas I’m old and set in my ways.”

  “Grounded.”

  Opposites. Complementary. Gods below, if only there were land beneath their feet. Silas stood. “Come. Let’s get a drink and watch the sun set.”

  Rhys rose and sheathed his sword back into the Aether. “Love to.”

  They had single malt scotch, the best on the bar list, poured by Vasil. The waiter looked grim. “People are starting to notice odd things,” he said, his voice low.

  Silas took a sip, and the drink seemed to evaporate on the back of his throat. Peat and smoke. “It’ll be over tonight, one way or another.”

  Vasil paled and looked at Rhys.

  “Everything will go back to normal,” Rhys said.

  Vasil nodded and headed down the bar. Silas strode to a table by the window, Rhys close behind. The fiery ball of the sun hung low and red in the sky, its reflection in the water churned by the passing of their ship.

  “What will happen to him if we fail?” Rhys drank, then he peered into his glass. “I always thought scotch took the skin off your throat.”

  “Cheap scotch does.”

  Rhys glanced at the receipt in his hand and looked up. “Provincial, my ass.”

  Silas shrugged. “Wait until you meet other fae before you make that judgment.”

  “Other fae.” Rhys examined his glass again. “What will happen if we fail?”

  “If” they failed. If.

  He wanted to carve that word out of the English language. Slice the concept out of every tongue he knew.

  “If we fail, and if the passengers and crew are lucky, Anaxandros will be too busy with us to bother with anyone on the ship.”

  A shudder ran through Rhys, and he took another longer pull of scotch. “I thought we’d die.”

  There were worse, far worse things than dying. Hanging in the dark, throat raw from screaming, smelling blood and piss and excrement for endless days of pain. That voice, that deep, haunting voice, laughing.

  Needles pricked the insides of Silas’s bones. He set down his glass and looked out at the sunset. “If we fail, we won’t die. Not for a very long time.”

  Rhys swirled his glass, his color draining away. “I guess we better not fail.”

  “No.” Silas finished his drink. “We best not.”

  But hope had stretched so thin, he felt it fray and split as the sun sank into the ocean.

  Rhys’s muscles itched. Every time anyone walked down the path through the garden, he tensed, thinking it was Anaxandros. But the number of people in the garden had dwindled to nothing. The last person to walk down that path had been Vasil. The waiter had nodded to Silas and then hurried into the main part of the ship.

  Vasil hadn’t seen Rhys at all, which was good. Sort of.

  He should’ve been the one sitting as bait.

  But Silas had insisted, and so Silas sat. Well, he paced now. An hour after Vasil left, Silas had risen from the wooden bench and started walking up and down the path they’d chosen as their battleground.

  Rhys lurked behind a stand of rhododendron, his back against a lemon tree, sword leaning next to him. At first he’d clutched it like a talisman, but after his arm cramped he had set it down.

  He didn’t even know how to use the damn thing. Swing it like a bat? Right. He resisted the urge to sigh.

  All he had was the knowledge that he was quicker and, at the moment, stronger than Silas. And they knew Anaxandros wanted them. Would stop at nothing to have them.

  Rhys glanced at his watch and stretched his back. Four in the morning. The vampire should’ve come by now. Standing here was pointless, and his legs hurt. He sheathed his sword into the Aether and slipped out onto the path.

  Silas turned on the ball of his foot, unsheathing his sword from the air. His expression slid from wary to annoyed. “What are you doing?”

  “Sitting down.” He made his way toward the bench. Or would’ve, had Silas’s look not morphed into fear.

  Shit.

  Rhys dived for the floor as stinging fire raked across the back of his neck. The blow hurt more than bouncing off the pavers. He rolled away.

  From where he’d been came an unnatural screech of metal sliding against metal—swords colliding—then silence. That was broken by Anaxandros’s soft, dark laugh. Something warm and wet ran down Rhys’s neck. As he scrambled to his feet, he rubbed at the liquid. The stinging bloomed into a throb of stabbing heat. His hand came away sticky and red.

  Blood. His. So not good. Neither was the scene before him.


  Silas stood, one hand clutching the back of the bench, the other holding his sword in front of his body.

  The vampire lingered just out of Silas’s reach, his black blade pointing down. Anaxandros bared his teeth. “So you can use that thing after all.”

  Silas straightened and let go of the bench but said nothing.

  “Pity you’re spent. I would have liked to test you in your prime.”

  The laugh Silas gave was nearly as dark as the vampire’s. “No, you wouldn’t have. But you were never one for fair and equal.”

  “Fair?” Anaxandros raised his sword. “Equal? From the lips of a fae?” He leaped forward.

  Rhys didn’t see the series of blows that came crashing down on Silas, or Silas parrying, only the blur of black and silver and that same horrible scrape as before. He reached into the Aether, ran into the fray, and swung his sword at the vampire’s head like a batter after a fastball.

  His sword whiffed air. He never was very good at hitting the fast ones either. The swing took him too close and set him off balance. But it stopped Anaxandros from attacking Silas.

  The vampire’s claws ripped through Rhys’s shirt and raked bloody lines down his chest. Ice stung his veins and chilled his lungs. A flash of silver slid through Anaxandros’s wrist, and the air around Rhys filled with the smell of burned flesh. The clawed hand convulsed before it fell and burst into flame.

  Rhys sucked in air through his teeth and tried not to scream as he fell backward, away from the vampire. It felt like bees had replaced his blood. A spasm racked his arm, and his sword slipped from his hand. The clatter of the blade on the stone path was drowned out by a howl of fury so powerful Rhys felt the hate deep in his bones. He scrambled to his feet.

  Anaxandros rained blow after blow down on Silas, his dark blade ringing against Silas’s sword like a blacksmith’s hammer. Silas fell to his knees under the onslaught.

  And then the silver sword in Silas’s hand shattered into countless pieces.

  No! He threw himself at Anaxandros. It was all he could do, all he had left. The next blow would kill Silas.

  Finally some use for those years of football. A well-placed shoulder into the vampire’s hip kept the thing from cleaving Silas in two. It should’ve knocked the vampire over.