It was a flame demon skull.
That’s how she’s powering the wards, Leesha realized, wondering why she hadn’t thought of it herself months ago. Alagai hora. Demon bones.
The realization brought endless possibilities, but none that mattered if she could not live through the night. She couldn’t draw wards to counter the fire before Inevera incinerated her.
“Is that how you power the doorframe?” Leesha asked, turning to glance at the door. “Are there alagai hora hidden in the wood?”
Inevera glanced toward the door, and in that instant Leesha’s hand darted to a pocket of her apron, coming out with a handful of toss bangs she threw Inevera’s way.
The little twists of paper exploded with cracks and flashes, perfectly harmless, but Inevera shrieked and threw her arms in front of her face. Leesha wasted no time, crossing the space between them in an instant and grabbing the wrist that held the demon skull. She pressed her thumb hard into a nerve cluster, and the skull fell to the floor. Leesha’s other hand was not idle, curling into a fist. The weak cartilage of the Damajah’s nose crumpled most satisfyingly.
Leesha drew back for a second blow, but Inevera rolled onto the floor and twisted, grabbing Leesha’s shoulders and driving a knee between her legs with force that would have done a camel proud.
“Whore!” Inevera shrieked as pain exploded through Leesha. “Did my husband thrust well?” she shouted, kneeing Leesha’s crotch again. “Did my husband thrust hard?” She struck a third time.
Leesha had never felt such pain. She grabbed blindly for the Damajah’s hair, but Inevera caught her sleeve cuffs in tight fists, guiding Leesha’s arms away as a Jongleur might guide a puppet’s. In her heavy skirts, Leesha was helpless to resist as Inevera slithered behind her and dropped the sleeves in favor of a choke hold.
“Thank you,” Inevera whispered in her ear. “I would have killed you with clean fire and spared the paint on my nails, but this is much more satisfying.”
Leesha rolled and thrashed, but it did little good. Inevera locked her legs around Leesha’s waist and kept her face covered by her arms. Leesha could reach no vulnerable point with hand or powder, and the world began to blur as the air in her lungs depleted. She reached for the demon skull on the floor, but Inevera kicked it away. Leesha was beginning to black out when she pulled the warded knife from her belt and drove it into Inevera’s thigh.
A hot jet of blood struck Leesha’s hand, sickening her, but Inevera screamed and lost her grip. Leesha was able to kick away, sucking in a lifegiving breath as she rolled to her knees with the knife held out before her. Inevera rolled the other way, reaching into a pouch at her waist and throwing something Leesha’s way.
Leesha dove to the side as what seemed and sounded like a swarm of hornets shot past. She cried out as one of the projectiles passed clear through her thigh, and another lodged in her shoulder. She pulled it free and found she held a demon tooth. It was covered in her blood, but she could feel with her thumb the wards etched into its surface. She shoved it into a pocket for later study.
Inevera was back on her feet by then, charging at Leesha, but Leesha put her knife up as she got back to her feet. Inevera checked herself and began to circle. She pulled a curved knife of her own from her belt, the warded blade sharp as any of Leesha’s scalpels.
Leesha put a hand into another of her apron’s pouches, and Inevera made a similar reach into the black velvet bag at her waist.
The coreling prince watched in amusement as the females postured like high princes when the queen was preparing to mate. It had intended to consume the Northern female’s mind and replace her with its mimic to get close and kill the heir, but their own politics were so much more delicious. They could break both the heir’s spirit and his dream of unity at once.
All they needed was a nudge.
CHAPTER 32
DEMON’S CHOICE
333 AR SUMMER
IT WAS THE DARKEST part of the night when Jardir finally returned to his palace. He was not tired; he had not truly felt tired of body since he had first used the Spear of Kaji, but he longed for his bed nevertheless, if only for a chance to close his eyes and dream of her to while away some of the hours before he could visit again.
Leesha Paper truly was a gift from Everam. Her acceptance of his proposal seemed assured, and with it his foothold in the Northland. But he found that mattered less to him now than the thought of having her at his side. Brilliant, beautiful, and young enough to bear him many sons, she also contained a boundless passion that came out in her anger, and in her loving. A worthy bride for even the Deliverer, and a valuable check against the Damajah’s rising power. Inevera would try to stop the marriage, of course, but that was a worry for another day.
Jardir saw the light on in his chambers and frowned. Everam’s Bounty had no Undercity for women and children, even on Waning. His wives instead took turns waiting in his private chambers with a bath and a willing body, but Jardir wanted neither water nor woman. His lust could only be sated by one, and beneath his robes, her scent was still on his skin. He wanted to keep it there a little longer.
“I require nothing,” he said as he entered. “Leave me.”
But the women in his room were not lesser wives, and they made no effort to leave.
“We need to talk,” Leesha said, and at her side Inevera nodded.
“For once, I agree with the Northern whore,” Inevera said.
There was a moment of silence that seemed to Jardir to last for many minutes, as he struggled to embrace this new development and return to his center.
He looked more closely at the women. Their clothes were ragged and torn. Inevera had a blood-soaked scarf tied around her leg, and Leesha’s shoulder was similarly bound. Inevera’s nose was twisted and swollen three times its normal size, and Leesha’s throat was purple and bruised. She favored one leg.
“What has happened?” Jardir demanded.
“Your First Wife and I have been talking,” Leesha said.
“And we have decided we will not share you,” Inevera said.
Jardir made to go to them, but Leesha held up a finger that checked him like a child. “You keep your distance. No touching either of us again until you make a choice.”
“Choice?” Jardir asked.
“Her or me,” Leesha said. “You can’t have us both.”
“The one you choose can be your Jiwah Ka,” Inevera said, “and the other shall have a quick death at your hand in the town circle.”
Leesha gave Inevera a look of disgust, but did not argue.
“You agree to this?” Jardir asked, surprised. “Even with your Gatherer’s vow?”
Leesha smiled. “Strip her naked and cast her into the street for all to see, if you prefer.”
“Weak, like all Northerners,” Inevera sneered, “leaving enemies to strike another day.”
Leesha shrugged. “What you call weakness, I call strength.”
Jardir looked from one woman to the other, unable to believe matters had come to this, but their eyes were hard and he knew they meant every word.
The choice was impossible. Kill Leesha? Unthinkable. Even if it wouldn’t destroy any potential alliances in the North, Jardir would sooner cut out his own heart than harm her.
But the alternative was equally impossible. The dama’ting would not follow Leesha, and if he stripped Inevera of power—and in favor of a Northern woman—they might choose to follow Inevera still, causing a schism through his empire that might never heal.
And she was his First Wife, the mother of his children, who had orchestrated his rise to power and given him the tools to win Sharak Ka. Despite the pain she regularly caused him, he looked at her and found he loved her still.
“I cannot make such a choice,” Jardir said.
“You must,” Inevera said, pulling her warded knife. “Now, or I will cut the whore’s throat myself.”
Leesha drew her own knife. “Not if I cut yours first.”
“No!
” Jardir cried, throwing the Spear of Kaji. It struck the wall and embedded deeply, quivering between the two women. He pounced on them, cat-quick, grabbing their wrists and pulling them away from each other.
But as he did, the wards on his crown flared to life, illuminating the women, and both shook their heads as if waking from a dream.
Leesha was the first to come to her senses. “Behind you!” she shouted, pointing.
“Alagai Ka!” Inevera cried.
Alagai Ka. The name Jardir and his men had laughingly given to the rock demon that followed the Par’chin, but it was an ancient name, one that carried an aura of immense power. Alagai Ka was consort to the Mother of Demons, and he and his sons were said to be the most powerful of the demon lords, generals of Nie’s forces.
He spun to meet the demon, but there was nothing to see at first. Then, as he concentrated, the Crown of Kaji warmed once more and he could see that part of the room was clouded by magic. There was a ripple in the cloud, and suddenly a demon more fearsome than any he had ever seen leapt at him.
He reached for the spear, but it held fast in the wall for the split second it took the demon to cross the floor and tackle Jardir. He was knocked over the bed and the two of them landed hard on the far side, the demon clawing madly at him. He felt the ceramic armor plates in his robes shattering under its claws, but they blunted the initial attack. The demon seemed to sense this, and its mouth widened impossibly, growing rows of new teeth right before his eyes as it became a maw large enough to swallow his entire head.
Jardir rolled and pushed out with his arms, gaining enough space to work his leg up between them. He kicked out, knocking the demon away long enough for him to tear off his robes and reveal the scars Inevera had cut into his skin. They flared brightly as he met the demon’s next attack head-on.
Leesha hadn’t known the demon was in her mind until Jardir touched her and the wards on his crown flared. She heard the demon’s whispers then and knew them for what they were. The demon was in the room with them.
Inevera knew it, too. They had just enough time to shout a warning before the demon bodyguard struck Jardir, knocking him across the room and taking the aura of power around his crown with it. She felt the mind demon attempt to reenter her mind.
Leesha resisted, as did Inevera, thrashing wildly against its control, but the outcome was never in doubt. The demon would have them in a moment. Already she felt an enormous weight in her limbs, as the mind demon commanded her to lie down, helpless and weak, while it watched its bodyguard kill Jardir.
Leesha looked around frantically, spotting an incense tray on the nightstand that had not yet been cleaned. She flung herself toward it as she went down, pretending it was an accident as she stuck her hand in the greasy ashes and knocked the tray to the floor in a cloud.
Inevera hit the floor as well, limbs flopping weakly, and Leesha rolled toward her, using the last of her energy to draw a ward on Inevera’s forehead. The same ward at the center of Jardir’s crown.
Immediately the symbol flared, and even as Leesha fell, her limbs useless, Inevera sat up. The demon seemed not to notice, its attention on Jardir, fighting for his life.
Inevera scowled and grabbed Leesha’s hair. “You are still a whore,” she growled, and spit in Leesha’s face. There were long veils that went from her sleeveless bodice to the golden bracelets at her wrists. She gathered one and used her spit to wipe the soot from Leesha’s brow, then dipped her finger in the ashes, drawing a mind ward on Leesha’s forehead as well.
Leesha sat up, reaching for her warded knife. Inevera took what looked like a warded lump of coal from the black felt pouch at her waist and held it toward the mind demon. She whispered a word, and lightning arced from the stone to strike the demon. It shrieked as it was thrown across the room, hitting the wall with a crunch before dropping lifeless to the ground.
The demon changed shape continually, but Jardir pressed his attack, wards sizzling as he struck it with elbows and knees, fists and feet. He matched the demon’s raw aggression with the fury of a warrior bred for the Maze. His crown flared brightly, and he felt so suffused with power that the wounds the demon inflicted began healing before the full damage was done.
I am fighting Alagai Ka, he thought, and I am winning.
That thought carried him forward for a moment, but then the demon picked up a heavy table in one giant claw and smashed it down on him as a hammer strikes a nail.
The wards on his skin offered no protection against the wood, and it was only the magic coursing through him that kept him from being killed. Still, bones splintered on the impact, jutting from his leg and stabbing into his innards. He felt the magic speeding his body’s natural healing along at an incredible rate, but it could not set the broken bones, and he felt them healing at odd angles.
It mattered little, though, as the demon lifted the table again to finish the job. Jardir, weaponless, could do nothing but watch.
But before the demon could bring the table down, it shrieked and grabbed its head, dropping the table. Jardir kicked out with his good leg to deflect it as the demon’s flesh seemed to melt like wax, and it stumbled about, thrashing madly.
Jardir looked up then and saw why. He hadn’t been fighting Alagai Ka at all. Leesha and Inevera stood over the smoking body of a slender demon with a gigantic head. Even from across the room, Jardir could sense the power and evil the creature radiated. The demon he had fought was its Hasik: brainless muscle to clear paths and break skulls that were beneath its master to shatter personally.
The slender demon lifted its head. Inevera shrieked and sent another bolt of lightning at it, but the demon drew a ward in the air, dispersing the energy. It reached out, and the demon bone flew from her hand. The slender demon caught it, and the bone glowed briefly in the demon’s grasp before the magic was absorbed and the bone crumbled to dust.
The demon reached out again, and Inevera’s horapouch flew to its hands. She shrieked as it upended the bag, dropping her precious dice into its clawed hand.
Leesha and Inevera charged the demon with their warded knives, but it drew another ward in the air that flared to throw them across the room as if picked up by a great wind.
The alagai hora glowed as the demon absorbed their power. Jardir felt a strange mix of fear and relief as the dice that had controlled his life for more than twenty years crumbled to dust. Inevera wailed as if the sight caused her physical pain.
The mimic demon regained its senses as soon as its master recovered, but Jardir was already moving, springing across the broken bed on his good leg. He caught the Spear of Kaji in his hands as he rolled off the far side, letting his weight pull it from the wall.
Pain screamed through Jardir’s mangled leg as he came to his feet, but he embraced it effortlessly, his movements sharp and decisive as he drew back and threw.
And before either demon could react, the fight was over. The spear blasted through the mind demon’s skull, leaving a gaping, blasted hole and continuing on to stick quivering in the far wall. The mind demon fell dead, and without it, the mimic fell to the ground shrieking and thrashing about as if on fire. Finally it lay still, a melted pile of scale and claw.
Leesha came awake at the sound of a sharp crack, opening her eyes to see Jardir, his eyes closed and his face serene as Inevera pulled hard on his foot to give herself play to reinsert the bone jutting from his leg.
Shaking off her own pains, Leesha fumbled to her side, taking the bone in her hand and guiding it back into the incision Inevera had cut. As with Arlen, the wound began to close almost instantly, but Leesha still reached for needle and thread to stitch it evenly.
“There is no need,” Inevera said, rising to her feet and going to the mind demon’s body. She drew her warded knife and cut off one of its vestigial horns. She returned with the foul, ichorous thing, then removed a thin brush and bottle from her pouch. She drew neat wards along the edges of Jardir’s wound, and as she passed the horn over them, the wards flared, closing
the incision seamlessly.
She did the same for her own wound, and then wordlessly tended to Leesha, not meeting her eyes. Leesha watched in silence, memorizing the wards Inevera used and the fashion in which she knit them together.
She looked at the horn when she was finished. It was still intact, and Inevera grunted. “I’ll make better dice from this one’s bones, anyway.” Leesha went to the mind demon’s body herself, cutting off the other horn and one of its arms. These she rolled in a heavy tapestry for later study. Inevera’s eyes narrowed at her, but she said nothing.
“Why has no one come to investigate the sounds of battle?” Jardir asked.
“I expect it was simple for Alagai Ka to draw wards of silence around your chambers,” Inevera said. “They will likely remain in power until the sunlight strikes the walls.”
Jardir looked at them. “It controlled everything you said and did?”
Inevera nodded. “It…ah, even made us fight each other, for its amusement.” She touched her swollen nose gingerly.
Leesha felt her face color, and she coughed. “Yes,” she agreed, “it made us do that.”
“Why play such cruel games?” Jardir asked. “Why not just have one of you cut my throat as we lay in the pillows?”
“Because it didn’t want to kill you,” Inevera said. “It’s more afraid of your power to inspire than to fight, and none inspires more than a martyr.”
“Better to discredit you and splinter the unity of your forces,” Leesha put in.
“But you are the Shar’Dama Ka,” Inevera said. “There can be no further question, with Alagai Ka dead at your hand.”
Jardir shook his head. “That was not Alagai Ka. It was too easy. More likely, this was the least of his princelings. There will be more, and greater.”
“I think so, too,” Leesha said, looking at Jardir. “Which is why I’m holding you to your promise, Ahmann. I have seen Everam’s Bounty, and now I wish to return home. I must prepare my people.”
The Desert Spear Page 70