Dancer's Flame (Grace Bloods Book 2)

by Jasmine Silvera

  She focused on the body under her hands. Dory was here too, but he had already gone solid, cold as marble. She searched around, the wind battering stray bits of her hair and sending them into her face. She swore, batting them away as she narrowed her eyes, extending her sight as far as it could go.

  There. Gold sharpened her vision.

  A bright pearl glow, almost unrecognizable for the sickly green binding that covered it from head to toe. Dory. It dragged him as he writhed against it. Isela sprang to her feet. Running. She needed a knife. What had Tariq said? When she reached for it, the hilt of the Damascus steel found her hand. The weight of it grounded her. It was real. She was real. This was real.

  She caught Dory in a flying leap, not enough to stop the momentum of whatever had him, but now she had him too. She swung around him, ignoring the burn of the ropes where she touched them, searching for the source of the binding. Six or eight long tentacles closed around him. She sliced down. The first two fell away. She slashed and sawed until the last whipped away into the darkness.

  Dory tumbled to the ground and she flipped, landing on her toes away from him. He writhed, weaker now. Working more carefully, she sliced the binding around his head. It fell away like smoke. Dory beneath was a luminescent glow, like the skin of a pearl.

  Hurry. We won’t be alone for long.

  Isela glanced up. Around the edges of her vision, figures shuffled in the shadows, curious and wary. And hungry. She set to work on the binding. Demons?

  They’re called blights. Lost things. Untethered souls, malformed demons, summoning spells gone wrong. They don’t have enough power to move on, so they’re drawn to power that appears in the In Between. It feeds them.

  Freed, Dory’s soul lay still and glowing for a long moment. Then it began to fade. Isela grabbed at it, but her hands passed through.

  What do I do?

  You freed it from the spell, but the blade caught him in the heart. I’m not a necromancer, Isela. I don’t know.

  You brought me back.

  Your body was intact.

  Isela thrust her body backward, rolling to her feet and picking up speed.

  What are you doing?

  She leaped, legs kicking out in a grand jetè, and landed back in her body. The world spun until she forced herself to focus. The Aegis battled demons around her in slow motion, the growls and snarls and cries of combat an incoherent din. She turned to Dory. Crimson seeped between her fingertips to the cobblestones. She slid her fingers into the gaping wound, feeling for his heart. Bone scraped her knuckles until the tough muscle pushed back. I’ve always been shit with a needle. Even when I danced en pointe, I traded favors to avoid having to stitch my own ribbons.

  Do your best. It’s not real.

  In her mind’s eye, she placed a needle and thread and her own hands, stitching the ragged tear in a bright cloth patterned with luminous birds of paradise. She drove the needle, pulling diligently, with all the patience in the world. When it was done, she sat back, hands on Dory’s closed chest. His eyes remained open, the flat black stare of his pupils empty.

  “Come on, Dory,” she murmured. “You’re tougher than this.”

  Now call him back.

  She thought of the shimmering soul on the ground in the In Between. She pushed herself there. This time it took effort to stagger to her feet.

  What did one say to call a soul back into a body? She opened her mouth, closed it again.

  Blights had begun to circle the fallen warrior, their hunger evident. What had Dante said? Do not underestimate the power a word spoken on instinct with intention. All spells begin as such, and all beings of power understand that.

  Of course, he had ended with a warning. Great things can be accomplished on impulse, but foolish, dangerous ones are more likely.

  Isela closed her eyes. She would have to take her chances. She thought of Dory’s laugh and his bright smile, the small ways he made her feel welcome and at home in Azrael’s world.

  “I call you back to the life you’ve left behind you. To the brother who loves you. To the necromancer who trusts you beyond others. To me.” Her hands stretched out of their own accord. “I call you to me. Come back. Please.”

  The sensation of power moving through her came from a great distance. She bowed into the strain of it, letting it flow through her. She closed her eyes and felt her balance give. Her senses shifted, vertigo hitting her as she fell too far from where she stood.

  “I got you, Issy.”

  The scent of blood flooded her nostrils, stuck to her cheek. But where her ear pressed to his hastily stitched chest, a heartbeat pounded. It was the sweetest sound she’d ever heard.

  Dory was on his feet, carrying her easily in one arm. Pain ricocheted through her skull and out to her extremities. She vomited.

  Dory chuckled. “Well, we can’t smell much worse.”

  The sound of fighting was a distant cacophony. Dory ran, his machete in one hand, her curled in the crook of his arm. He fought his way free and flung her into the back of the Range Rover. Her last sight was his face, beaming. She lunged at the door and he slammed it in her face. He hammered the roof of the car. In the driver’s seat, Tyler hit the gas and swung the wheel, leaving the others behind.

  Isela curled up on the back seat and surrendered to darkness.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Pain dragged her flailing back to consciousness.

  I’m sorry, Issy, Gold whispered. You pushed yourself too far. It’s going to hurt for a while.

  Tenderness framed her joints in halos of ache. Icy fire raced through her as her extremities sent pain shooting into her spine and up to her skull. It roared through her, rendering her thoughtless. She clenched her teeth on a moan.

  A hand closed over hers. “Welcome back, Issy.”

  Dory. She remembered his heart in her hands and sobbed. His voice came again, softly at first and then growing more steady. It was joined by its twin, even richer and more beautiful, if that was possible. What they carried between them was more chant than a song, but an unmistakable melody framed the words. It surrounded her, the origin of the voices lost in the darkness. She clung to the sound, dragging her awareness onto it like a raft on rough seas.

  It’s about a village, small but plentiful. Gold translated when she began to slide back into waves of pain. With a gentle breeze and beautiful children, a long sea journey to find new land. A victorious return. Here… I think this won’t be too hard on you, it’s temporary.

  Isela felt something turn over in her mind, a slight sideways shift, and the words became clear. Not translated, but as though she had always known the language.

  A little trick, that’s all. Rest now. And listen.

  She drowsed in the sound and the steady repeat of rhythm and melody. When she woke again, a sliver of light poked through the heavy curtains. She winced. She lay on the couch in the bedroom, a blanket thrown over her. The room was empty.

  In the bathroom she squinted in the dim light until she was able to open the window shade. The clothes from the night before had stiffened. The stink of blood and sweat mixed with dried river water. Pain had been dialed down to a steady low-grade ache.

  She knew pain. She had been twenty-four when her hip first began to ache after dances. Gradually the pain became her constant companion. She hid it well, but Divya saw her limp once and sent her to the Academy physician. Looking at the X-rays and going over MRI results, she’d compartmentalized the diagnosis. She told Divya the doctor was content with a short rest. Only Kyle knew the doctor advised her that surgery would be the only way to ensure she was able to walk, never mind dance, past her thirties. She’d set herself to learning her pain as fully as she had learned the moves required to make physical requests for gods. She learned its shape, its weight. Understood where it rooted in her brain and how to build a wall around it that barred it from most everything. She learned to hide the signs; to move slowly with controlled grace as a godsdancer of great renown. Let them believe s
he had bought her own hype, that she considered herself something better than the rest of them. As long as they didn’t know the truth. She had a core group of friends she trusted and a family she supported with the money from the patrons she danced for. That was all that mattered.

  But if sometimes, deep in the night, the wall came down and she lay hand in hand with pain, that was between her and the pillow soaked with tears by morning. That was the way of walls. They had a way of coming down at the most inconvenient times. And they all came down eventually.

  She couldn’t lie in bed all morning. Yana was in danger. Another necromancer had violated Azrael’s territory. A phoenix lay dying in the aedis. And there had been no word from Azrael. She hadn’t viscerally understood of what kind of danger he might be going into, other than in the abstract sense she always had when Vanka was part of the conversation. But last night had brought it home in a tangible way.

  She shuddered. She peeled everything off and ran the hottest bath she could stand, sinking into the tub. She combed the worst of the tangles out of her hair, arms shaking with even that small effort. In the closet she found one of Azrael’s T-shirts, pressing it to her nose for a long moment. She froze at the sight of the row of button-down shirts, the slacks on hangers, and tried to breathe. Fear dropped her to her knees. She hadn’t even said goodbye.

  Azrael, where are you? Please just be too busy to answer me.

  She remembered how Gregor’s words had guided her as she fought. She had no doubt that if she had acquitted herself well at all the night before it was because of his teaching. He had Azrael’s back. And Lysippe, descended from Amazons, was Azrael’s daughter in all but blood. They would protect him, and as she had seen firsthand, they would die for him. She had to hope that would be enough.

  Come back to me. I don’t care how long it takes or in what condition. Just come back.

  She dressed slowly in baggy leggings and a butter-soft sweater. Even the cloth rubbed her skin raw. Hunger sawed into her stomach, and it took her a moment to realize it’d been triggered by the scent of food. As she came down the stairs, she heard movement in the kitchen.

  She rounded the corner and paused. “Rory?”

  The more solemn of the brothers moved around Azrael’s immaculate, underutilized chef’s kitchen. Saliva pooled in her mouth as the scent of bacon frying flooded her nostrils. His face did not lighten, not exactly, but he looked less… thunderous. The big red apron emblazoned with a palm leaf and a stylized island over the words da Rock helped.

  “Please sit.”

  Her place had been set. She took a long drink of orange juice, wondering at the pulp that clung to her teeth. How long had it been since she’d had fresh-squeezed orange juice? She nibbled at some fruit, wildly out of season and all the more delicious for that. He came by with a pan, scraping a pile of eggs beaten into a fluffy yellow scramble onto her plate and setting down a paper bag that sent out the amazing aroma of freshly baked croissant.

  “For me?” she said dumbly.

  “Eat,” he ordered. “I’ve seen stronger-looking sticks.”

  “Thanks,” she said wryly but reached for the jam and a knife. “I think.”

  Her stomach grumbled. Between hastily chewed bites, she asked, “How’s Dory?”

  “I sent him home to rest.” Rory returned with pan-fried slices of ham and a bowl of oatmeal. “He’s alive.”

  Isela wondered where she would put it all, but the thought didn’t stop her from trying. When he returned with his own plate and a cup of coffee, he grunted, pleased at the sight of the decimation of her eggs and bread.

  “More eggs?”

  “No way,” she said. “I’m saving that spot for pig. Is everyone else okay after last night?”

  He grunted again and took a few bites from his own plate. They ate in companionable silence, and Isela felt a bit of herself return with every bite. Along with a sense of wonder at what had happened the night before. She’d brought a man back from death. Stolen him back from a spell intended to rip his soul from his body.

  That was very brave of you, Isela, Gold said. And foolish. So many things could have happened.

  But they hadn’t.

  You’re learning how to use my presence, Gold said, satisfied. That’s good.

  “I was seventeen when I met Azrael,” Rory said. “My parents wanted me to follow in my father’s footsteps, to lead. But I hungered for more, the desire to go further. And here comes this strange man who looked young but was so much older. We fought together, he and I. And when he asked me to join him, to become… what I am, I had only one condition.”

  Isela’s attention on her plate drifted. She set down her fork.

  “Dory and I shared our mother’s womb.” His voice cracked slightly. “He was born first, but in every way I was the elder. He was my shadow, but he also lit my way. Our names mean the moon that follows the sun and the sun that trails the moon. I would not leave him behind. For four hundred years, I have looked after him, and he after me. And together we protect Azrael. Last night…” His voice fell away, overcome with emotion.

  Tears sprang to her eyes and she blinked furiously. “You think I don’t know…” She shook her head as she struggled for words. “How little I deserve either of you and the sacrifice you are willing to make? How could I not do everything to save him?”

  “Please.” He palmed away the wetness on his cheeks and met her eyes. “I have not been kind to you. I have not trusted you or your influence on Azrael. But last night… what you did… for my brother. I have never seen courage like that. I am ashamed. I can never repay you.”

  Isela broke, her face in her hands. When Rory touched her shoulder, she folded into him. It wasn’t so much an embrace as being swallowed whole by a mountain. He smelled of bacon and eggs, and beneath that the clean ocean and white sand and driftwood.

  “Thought I was going to miss you guys hugging it out, eh?”

  Rory jumped up and managed to carefully deposit Isela in her own chair before barking something in Samoan as his brother closed the door in his wake, strolling to the table.

  “Sit down, man.” Dory grinned, and to Isela muttered, “He takes this older-brother thing way too seriously.”

  Isela gaped. He looked as though the night before had been nothing more than business as usual. If she hadn’t known better… If she hadn’t felt— Wait, what was it she was feeling? She explored the thread that tugged gently on her as he grew closer. His smile softened and he tugged a chair into place before her.

  “Hey, Issy. Can’t thank you enough. For what you did.”

  He winced as he sat, and sensation tugged her again, as if a thread connected directly to the heartbeat in her chest.

  Oh no.

  Oh no what? Isela snapped, trying not to panic.

  She could feel him breathing. She touched the slight, distant pain on her pectoral. It felt like a thin line, tight and itching faintly as it healed. He tried to catch her hands, but she shook him off. His fingers fell away as she split the fabric over his left pectoral, revealing a long ragged line of healing flesh that bore the marks of hasty, skill-less stitching.

  She hesitated, but he covered her hand with his own, pressing down. She felt the pressure on the ache of her own chest.

  “It will take a bit longer to heal than the rest of me.” Dory shrugged casually. “Because the blade was spelled.”

  Shit. Isela jerked her hand away. What did you do?

  Me? Gold laughed. You insisted on going after him. I didn’t do anything. You spoke the words to bring him back. To Azrael, and to his brother too. And to you… at the very end. You said “to me.”

  The door opened, Tariq shrugging guiltily at Rory’s glare as if to say I tried. Gus stalked in behind him before she ascended, catlike, into the chair at the head of the table. Dante detoured to the coffee machine and returned with two cups, sliding one to Gus before making himself comfortable and opening his notebook.

  Rory rose to his feet and stormed into th
e kitchen after Tariq. “I told you to keep him—”

  “Short of chopping off his legs, how did you think I was going to stop him?” Tariq muttered. “He’s avowed. You don’t keep them apart now unless she commands it.”

  Isela stared, touching the spot on her chest that ached dully.

  Dory looked chagrined. “I’m sorry to cause you pain, Issy.”

  “Oh shit.”

  Dante cleared his throat. “That’s not the traditional response.”

  “It’s not the end of the world,” Tariq said. “How about a plate of eggs for me?”

  Rory slammed a pan down on the stove. “Eggs are gone; shame you don’t eat ham.”

  Tariq grimaced. “Unclean beasts, pigs.”

  Rory grunted. “More for me. Isela?”

  “Please.” Isela cleared her throat with juice as Tariq made himself comfortable at the table. “You look like normal.”

  “Is that a compliment?” Tariq plucked half a croissant off her plate. “Are you finishing that?”

  “Well, last night you had a flap of skin hanging off your skull.” Isela gestured at her eyebrow. “Your shoulder looked broken. And yes, I was going to eat that. But you should help yourself.”

  He had the grace to look surprised when Rory set a plate of eggs and fruit down in front of him.

  “Dislocated,” he said, digging in. “I’m tough to kill. Though I do miss the days when it was just horses and carriages. I think I ruptured my spleen. Again.”

  “Azrael’s going to freak out.” Isela buried her face in her hands.

  Tariq paused between mouthfuls to shrug. “Azrael has what… nine now? A bit excessive if you ask me.”

  Isela didn’t have words. She could feel Dory’s heartbeat, a counterpoint to her own and aching as it healed. “What if I say no?”

  They all looked at her.

  Gus sighed. “Apparently she turned Azrael down at first too. What is it with these mortals? Back in the old days, they begged for our favor.”

  “Issy, you began the bond when you brought him back,” Dante said, patting her arm for silence. “That may have been the mechanism by which you were successful. Though it’s traditional for the contract to be declared before the binding.”