“And what is that?” Torchay entered the conversation, already sounding as if he disapproved.
“We must travel to Tibre and rid their king of the demon that rides him.”
“What?
No
.” Stone slammed his eating knife down on the table. He wouldn’t go back to Tibre. He couldn’t. His life as a Tibran warrior was no more, but his heart was still Tibran. How could they expect him to fight and kill his own people?
“Stone, we must.”
“I will not take part in any plot to kill my king.”
“He’s no’ your king any longer.” Torchay watched him, obviously ready for any threatening move.
“With any luck, we won’t have to kill him.” Kallista laid a hand on his arm and Stone resisted the urge to throw it off. “There is a demon riding his shoulders.
That
is our enemy. I’ve seen it in visions. It whispers in his ear. ‘What does it matter how many warriors you lose? Breed more. Who will mourn them when they die? Their mothers forgot them. Their fathers don’t know them. Take the land. Take the cities. Take their wealth for your own.’ I’ve heard it, Stone.”
Her words turned his blood to ice. “Do you tell me this…
demon
is the cause of the wars?”
“I believe it, yes. I have seen it. Who knows how long it has ridden Tibre’s kings?”
Stone opened his mouth to deny the existence of demons and found that he could not. He had seen, had felt too many impossible things since he woke up in that breach in the walls of Ukiny. How could he not accept the possibility of a demon? If this demon were stripped from the king…might not some of the warriors have a chance to know those things Fox had longed for on the night before he died? Perhaps they would be able to go home and soak in the baths, sleep in a bed and dally with a woman who had all her teeth.
He cut his eyes toward Aisse as if she could hear what he was thinking. He’d learned to be wary of her sharp tongue cutting up his peace. Not warrior’s behavior, but she had him thinking things that weren’t warrior’s thoughts. Like—what if the woman didn’t
want
to be dallied with?
“When do we go?” Obed’s question called Stone back from his errant thoughts.
“As soon as we can be ready.” Kallista pushed back her plate, half the food still remaining on it. “We’ll need supplies, horses, that sort of thing. Aisse, you go through all of this—” She waved her hand at the goods half filling the long parlor. “See if any of it might be useful, then find somewhere to store the rest of it. Or send it to my sisters and let them take care of it. Torchay, help her. You’ll know what we need.”
“What about us?” Obed asked.
“We will be practicing magic, you and I and Stone.” She sighed. “If we are to face a demon, I had better know what I am doing with what you two carry.”
Joh stalked through palace halls seething with emotion. Anger, disgust and loathing roiled in his stomach, made worse by generous dollops of guilt and shame, though he had done nothing worthy of either one. If he could just leave this place, get out of this damn poisonous atmosphere. He hated sneaking about. He wasn’t a spy, he was a soldier.
He pushed his fist hard against the pain in his gut, shooting a glance over his shoulder. Goddess, he hated it all. He hated the way the captain looked at him at the times when she would have once offered her hand but didn’t any longer, as if he had disappointed her somehow. He hated the fear that crawled through him then, wondering just what dark magics she held in her ungloved hands, whether she could read his thoughts, his fear. He wanted out.
Joh pressed his lips together, quelling the need to vent his frustrations in a more physical way. He could go to the training yard later and take them out on some hapless sparring partner. His request for transfer to a forward unit had been turned down. Again. Maybe they were hoping after four requests, he would give up and resign himself to his useless post. He wouldn’t. But he’d wait a bit before presenting the next request. Just now, he’d been summoned back to the little Briar Chapel in the bowels of Winterhold Palace.
Joh strode down the aisle, finding the expected hooded figure in the shadows.
The Master Barb glided forward. “The Barinirab Order requires your service.”
The jab of pain through Joh’s burning gut was scarcely noticeable past the dread. “What is it?” He dipped his head slightly, Renunciate to Rejuvenate, unable to keep all the resentment from his voice.
“West magic is an abomination before the One.” The master’s voice deepened, crackled with fervor. “It is death and destruction, permeated with darkness. It is a perversion of everything that is good.”
Joh listened, though he’d heard it before. No one was comfortable with West magic or its dark connections. He least of all.
“This naitan has disrupted the government. She has set the court on end with her wild magic and her evil intent.”
“Well—” Joh wouldn’t go so far as to call her evil, exactly. She made him uneasy—truthfully, she frightened him. Because he didn’t know what she could do. Or would do. But evil?
“West magic is insidious,” the rasping voice went on. “It steals away a person’s will, tempting them with knowledge, with dark powers never meant for mere humanity. It twists the one it possesses, changing them, leading them deep into its dark web.”
That made sense. “What service does the order ask of its Renunciate?”
“We must stop them.”
Joh recoiled. “How?” He wanted to stop the magic, but certain things he would not do. Murder was one of them. He killed, yes, but the enemy in the battlefield, face-to-face, not his soldier sedili with a knife in the back.
“You reported that the naitan goes daily to practice her magic.”
“Yes, that’s right. With her ilian. They all go together. What do you plan to do?”
The Master Barb moved out of his corner, revealing a small keg in the deeper dark. “We have a naitan, an East magic healer, who can block the West magic with the help of this medicinal powder.”
“You want me to mix it in their drinks? Sprinkle it in their food?” There was a tremendous amount of powder in the keg for that, but Joh couldn’t think how else it could be used.
The master’s laugh sounded like stone scraping on stone. “It must be burned, so it becomes a vapor to be breathed. But not in their suite. In the yard where they practice, so the vapors can dissipate when the healer’s spell is finished. You must burn it without the captain naitan knowing it. The West magic grips her hard, it will not want to let her go.”
“There may be a drain where I can pour it.”
“No. It must remain inside the cask. Will the whole of it fit inside the drain?”
Joh frowned, taking a visual measurement of the container. “I don’t know. I’ll have to look. How am I to start it burning without the naitan seeing me?”
“Simply pour a small trail from where you hide the cask to where you hide yourself. The spark will travel along the line of powder.”
“Won’t the naitan see the spark burning?”
“You will have to ensure that she doesn’t.” The master’s voice crackled with anger. “And if you take the cask directly to this practice yard when you leave here, no one will see you transport it.”
It was late, the ilian closed tight in their suite, and Winterhold Palace abandoned for the summer months. “This spell will free the naitan from the West magic?” Joh asked for verification.
The Master Barb inclined his head. “It is the only way.”
Joh lifted the keg to his shoulder. “I hope this works.”
“As do I, Renunciate.” The cowled figure bowed again and disappeared into the shadows. “The healer will be at the courtyard at ten strikes of the clock tomorrow morning.”
By the light of a silver moon, Joh scoured the practice yard for a place to hide the keg. It had to be close by, so the vapors would permeate the entire courtyard as well as the windowless chamber adjoining. He contemplated sinking it into the central drain. It was large enough to hold it, but he feared a powder trail leading to it would be both too noticeable and too easily scuffed away, whether by accident or purpose.
He finally settled for concealing the keg partially inside the broken-off gargoyle lying in a corner near the adjoining chamber. He wrestled the keg back out and poured a generous trail of powder along the edge of the wall, into the empty chamber, down a corridor and around a corner. He studied the harmless-looking stuff. Would a spark truly burn along all that distance?
Joh set the keg down and pulled out his flint and steel. The powder caught at the first spark, flashing into a spitting flame that sped back along the trail so fast he had to run to keep up with it. The acrid black smoke it gave off smelled foul enough to work some sort of magic. He only hoped the naitan or one of her iliasti did not notice the scorch marks on the parquet floor. They would likely notice the spark, but as swiftly as it flashed down the powder line, they would not have time to act before it reached its goal.
He went back to where he’d left the little keg and poured out another trail of gritty black powder, making a pool of it beneath the gargoyle. He tucked the keg in on top of it, upside down so that the spark could ignite the powder through the bunghole opening. In the morning, he would follow when they came to practice. When the tower clocks struck ten and they were focused on their activities, he would light his powder trail and with luck, the captain naitan would notice nothing until the healer naitan had her spell under way. It would work. It had to.
“How, exactly does this practice of magic work?” Obed asked the next morning as he, Kallista and Stone wound their way through the palace complex.
Kallista answered something, hardly thinking about what she said. Torchay hadn’t even blinked when she left him behind with Aisse to organize their new riches. They’d explored them all day yesterday, draping each other with silks and velvets, trying on dancing slippers and riding boots, necklaces and coronets. Today was for business. She just wished she knew whether Torchay’s easy acquiescence meant he trusted the other two men, or he didn’t particularly care anymore.
Trust. Had to be that. Because even if he didn’t care, he would never, ever shirk his duty.
“And here we are in our charming work space.” Stone bowed them into the barren courtyard. “Mind the glass. Kallista’s powdered most of it to dust by now, but there’s still the odd shard or two.”
“And now, how do we proceed?” Obed walked into the courtyard ahead of Kallista, looking curiously about him. He wore Adaran tunic and trousers today, black like Torchay’s uniform, but without the blue trim or military cut. He looked even more exotic in ordinary dress, with his black hair curling over his shoulders and the tattoos marking his face and hands.
“Naitan.” Stone’s voice cut through Kallista’s distraction. “I accept your gloves.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
T
he tower clocks began to chime as she drew the gloves off, finger by finger. She had called magic from each of them yesterday to keep it from building too high, but she’d done it one at a time. She hadn’t touched both of them at once since the ceremony that had bound Obed to them. She still couldn’t control the magic Stone carried. Would Obed’s make it easier? Or worse? The only way to know was to try.
The chiming stopped and she held a bare hand out to each man. Stone closed his hand around her left one. “You’ve always used your right hand to cast the magic,” he said. “How will you do it if you’re holding his with it?”
“That’s what we’re here to find out.” Kallista held her hand out to the dark man, challenge in her gaze.
Obed smiled. He took her hand in his and as the magic stirred, responding to her touch, he raised her hand to his mouth and kissed it. “All I am is yours.”
Shaking her head—did he have no sense of self-preservation?—Kallista called magic, pulling it from both men, stirring it together inside her. It bubbled up, escaping her faster than it ever had. She grabbed for it, but it eluded her grasp, twirling away to do Goddess knew what mischief.
“That’s new,” she said, utterly disgusted.
She could feel Obed’s heart pounding, his eyes watching her. “You worked magic?” he whispered.
“I didn’t work anything. It got away from me before I could do anything at all with it.”
“She
called
magic.” Stone grinned. “Told you it felt good.”
Obed rubbed a hand down his face. “Saints and all the sinners, I will be laid low before the morning is out.”
“Be glad it doesn’t hurt.” Kallista glared at Stone.
“Believe me, I am.” His grin widened. “I’m very glad.”
“We’re here to work, not play.” Her scowl made no impression whatsoever on Stone, so she snatched magic, making him gasp. “Work.”
“As you will, my ilias.” His words came rough, through gasping breath. “I—”
“Work,”
she repeated in an attempt to cut him off. May as well have tried to stop the wind.
“A man could grow to like your discipline.”
It wasn’t so much the last word Stone had to have, as the chance to tease he could never resist. Kallista had found nothing yet that would stop him.
So she ignored him and went to work. She tried calling the magic with Obed holding Stone’s hand, which made Stone scream as both magics poured through him. When Stone held Obed’s hand, the magic drove their new ilias to his knees. She tried it while holding Obed’s hand with neither of them touching Stone and that worked a bit better, but she still could not wrestle the magic into anything resembling a spell.
The clocks were chiming again when Kallista released Obed’s hand and took a step back.
“It’s not going well, is it?”
She tensed when Obed set his hand on her shoulder, then relaxed as he began to knead her muscles, thumbs pressing in hard in a way that hurt and felt wonderful at the same instant. “No,” she said. “Not well at all. There is twice as much power, and I have less than half as much control over it.”
Stone drifted closer, eyes intent on Obed’s activity. “What is that you’re doing?”
“It’s a technique I learned in my land called massage. For relaxing tight muscles, easing the pain. I’ll teach you if you like.”