“Come.”
She charged ahead, blasting a passage through the warriors in her way with the lightning at her command. Her ilian dashed after her, caught almost as unprepared as the warriors she attacked.
Across a central courtyard to the other side, up the broad stairs, through two stark, ugly chambers, Kallista ran. She hauled open a heavy, ornately carved door, stepped inside, and nearly went to her knees under the hate that blasted her.
She groped for the links to her marked ones and called magic, drawing fast and hard, wrapping it around them all, tucking Torchay deep in the center. “My turn,” she murmured. “Stay behind me, please.”
The six of them together lit up the dark chamber with a pale blue-white glow. Kallista used it to see her way, borrowing a bit of Fox’s
knowing
to help. The king was
there
. On his throne in the room’s center. And
there
, the demon crouched, slowly taking on a semblance of shape and form.
Its eyes glowed a malevolent, molten black, and it spit hate at her again. Secure in the warmth of her ilian, Kallista let it spill over them without harm and kept moving closer.
“Tchyrizel.” Her voice echoed eerily in the gloom. “Release him.”
The demon snarled, metaphysical claws ripping at her, at her links. Kallista caught hold. Ignoring the demon’s violent struggle, she clung to it, enduring the pain it inflicted as she
reached
into the king. The demon had dug itself deep into the king’s soul, burrowed into every part of him.
Kallista called more magic and it came,
through
her iliasti rather than from them. She rooted the demon out of its hiding places, shaking off the pieces that were not demon. Gradually, bit by bit, she pried the demon loose.
It attacked her, biting, snapping, tearing, but the magic somehow held. She would not let it escape. Sweat drenched Kallista’s tunic, bruises and scratches made without physical blows marked her body, but her iliasti remained untouched. She managed to protect them from the demon’s fury. But she was tiring. The demon was strong. Fighting it took all her ability and concentration. It tore at the shield, rending away bits she couldn’t replace.
The demon reached through the gaps it made. Fox screamed, staggered, and the demon’s scream echoed Fox’s. The magic drove the demonspike from his body. Desperate, Kallista shored up the shield, cutting off the bit of demonstuff, destroying it. Surely she could endure until this was done. She had no other choice.
A few lone strands of the demon still clung to the Tibran king when Torchay cried out. Kallista whirled, saw him convulse, swords clattering to the marble floor with his collapse. The demon had somehow separated him from the others and now hovered over him as if savoring a tasty treat.
“No!”
Kallista
drew
. The magic came, but she was almost too exhausted to fling it around Torchay, squeeze it between him and the demon. Almost. “You shall not have him.”
“Why not?” The demon spoke its first comprehensible words since the battle began. “You do not care about this one. He is not protected. Give him to me and I will let the others live.”
“He’s
mine
.” Kallista tried to increase his protection, but didn’t have the magic to do it.
The demon sank a claw deep. Torchay clamped a howl between his teeth, arcing up onto heels and shoulders in obvious pain.
“No,”
he gasped. “I won’t.”
“Or,” the thing said, “give me the others and I will let you have this one back. They’re of no use to me, but killing them will afford me a little fun. I would like some fun.”
Kallista swiped away tears with a sweaty forearm, unwilling to waste breath on an answer as she struggled to free Torchay.
“Do it,” Torchay rasped as he struggled. “Let me go.”
“No!” Other voices echoed Kallista’s cry.
“I won’t let you have him.” She yanked the demon’s claw free and it sent three more back in. Torchay twisted, heels drumming on the floor, and the shield shattered. The links shuddered but held. For how much longer?
Her iliasti were weakening. Human bodies were not made to be used as vessels for so much power for so long a time. Aisse’s whimper echoed down the link, resonating with the other three. Fox held her up, despite the phantom pain from his phantom wounds. Stone supported them both, though Kallista
knew
his reserves were no greater than theirs. Obed stood in front of them, sword held ready for attack. Tiny droplets of blood trickled down his face, forced out by everything he gave. He held nothing back. None of them did.
Kallista yanked futilely at the demon’s grip, at the end of her strength. She could feel it gloating. If she couldn’t stop this, they were lost. All of them. Uselessly. She didn’t mind so much dying if she could take the demon with her, but could she?
If she didn’t, she and her marked ones would only die, but Torchay—the demon would own him. It would send its vile
wrongness
through his mind and heart, destroying whatever it touched. It would take all the honor and loyalty and love that was Torchay and twist it into something dark and ugly while what was left of his soul screamed in silence. Whatever the cost, she would not lose him. Not any of them.
She drew more magic, trembling as she fought to shape it. The darkness of sheer exhaustion hovered at the edge of her vision. Tears blinded her, caught in her throat. Torchay’s half-stifled scream tore at her heart.
“Just let him go,” the demon whispered. “You have four others. Are you willing to destroy all of them—destroy everything—to save him?”
“Leave him alone!” she shrieked, desperate to hush the awful whispers. “He’s
mine
.”
Is he?
The quiet voice spoke inside Kallista from the center of her tears. Time seemed to slow, stop as understanding exploded.
Torchay was vulnerable to the demon because he was the only one of her iliasti not marked by the One. And he was unmarked not because he himself wasn’t willing to surrender to the purposes of the One, but because
Kallista
wasn’t willing to give him up.
She had been afraid that Torchay would love the One more than he loved her—even while she’d been busy denying that she loved him in return. She had been afraid the One would demand his life. And while she was perfectly willing to give up her own life, Torchay’s life was another matter entirely. She had taken the choice from him, and now the price he would pay was not only his life, but his very mind and soul.
She had other responsibilities as well. Her other iliasti were only four of them. The fate of all Adara, perhaps all of Tibre, of hundreds of thousands of people, lay in her hands. She had risked them all with her selfishness. Her lack of faith.
Who was she to think she knew better than the One God? What right did she have to make demands? How could she think she knew what sacrifices would be called for? All that was required of her was faith, for if she truly believed that the One was God and held all things in just and loving hands, then how could Kallista hold back? After faith came surrender. A willingness to place
everything
, even her most precious treasure, in the hands of the One and to become the tool that was needed for Her work.
“Oh, Goddess.” The groan went soul deep as she gave up her beloved to the One who loved them most. “Forgive.”
Torchay cried out again as time restarted. Kallista looked, terrified of seeing the demon swallow him up. But the black threads were being driven out through the faint cuts on his skin. His injuries had been more to the soul than to the flesh, healing as Torchay seemed to fill with light, the same light—the same
magic
that filled the others.
The link snapped into place, fully formed. A raging torrent of magic crashed into Kallista, replenishing everything she’d lost in battle and offering yet more. She braided Torchay’s stubborn strength into the whole of the magic and
reached
for the king. The demon had taken back all of him.
The veil
, whispered the West.
You cannot save him. He’s been too long in the demon’s grip
.
Acquiescing to the inevitable, Kallista gathered the power. It filled her as it had that day on the city walls above the breach, pouring into every crevice, every part of her. But somehow, she’d grown larger since then. She could hold the magic, from five now rather than two, even with Torchay’s booming power added to the others.
She shaped it, named the enemy with a whisper,
“Tchyrizel,”
and threw her arms wide to fling the magic on its way.
It roared out of her, faster than the eye could follow, farther than any walls could contain. The demon screamed, shredding into tatters that disintegrated as the magic onslaught continued. “Zughralithiss!”
And it was gone.
The king lay dead, slumped on his throne, his face peaceful, untouched save for a burn mark on his forehead. It was over.
They had won.
CHAPTER THIRTY
K
allista’s knees buckled. Obed and Torchay caught her as she fell. They exchanged a glance, then Obed sheathed his sabre and swung her up into his arms.
“What happened?” Stone asked Torchay.
“Let’s get out of this place, and I’ll tell you.” He pointed at the door. “Back the way we came—or however will get us out of here quickest. Fox and Stone lead.”
Kallista tried to pull up a shadow veil around them, but she hadn’t the strength. They relied on speed instead, and the confusion that gripped the palace when suddenly all of the Rulers and a good many warriors died where they stood. Corridor by corridor, room by room, they ran. Until Kallista shouted for them to stop, for Obed to put her down. The young Witch Hound, the naitan huddled terrified in the same corridor where they’d first seen him, surrounded by corpses.
She laid hands on the tarnished gold of his hair and kissed his forehead, wanting to weep at his flinch when she did. “Blessings of the One on you, precious child,” she murmured. “Come to Adara. To Turysh. They can heal some of your pain there.” She wished she could do more for him, help him now, but the magic wouldn’t answer.
“Kallista, let’s go. Not everyone in the city is dead.” Torchay lifted her back to wobbly feet and Obed picked her up again to hurry on.
“He’s following,” Aisse said, a few paces on.
“We can’t leave him.” Kallista struggled to get down.
“He betrayed us.” This time, Obed held her tight.
“He didn’t know any better.” Kallista pinched his ear with her fingernails.
“Wait.”
“He can’t run on those feet.” Fox turned back, threw the boy over his shoulder and trotted on.
“You’re insane, you know.” Torchay shook his head at her, gesturing at Stone to keep going.
“But you love me anyway.” She said it, though she wasn’t quite sure it was true.
Until he grinned at her. “Fool that I am.”
The palace gates were pure chaos, warriors shouting at each other, giving contradictory orders, brawling, some walking away. The ilian was through the gate before anyone noticed, and the pursuit fell apart before two blocks of barracks passed. Obed and Fox showed no sign that their burdens slowed them, but Kallista could sense their strength leaching away.
“It’s not far to the river,” she said. “Let me down. I can walk.”
“Not as fast as I can.” Obed held her closer. “We should take one of the western rivers. They’ll be looking for us on the Silixus.”
“The Athril’s big enough for boat traffic,” Stone said. “We just have to be sure to take the center fork. Current’s tricky there, they say.”
“Can we find a ship? Is there a port at the river’s mouth?” Torchay turned in circles as he walked, watching behind as much as ahead.
“There’s a port,” Stone said. “Djoff. Whether we can find a ship there is another question.”
“There will be a ship.” Obed descended carefully down the steps to the walkway at the river’s edge.
“How do you know?” Stone followed him down.
“I know.” Obed would say nothing more, but looked up- and downstream for attackers.
Aisse found a boat. Tied up at a pier, it had been abandoned by everyone aboard save its dead Ruler owner. Stone threw the body overboard while Fox and Obed set their burdens on the benches in the stern. It was a big boat, made for river journeys, long and narrow with a pointed prow. A low, flat-roofed cabin was built into the prow, and a canopy shaded the stern of the boat. The center was open, with oarlocks set on either side for the rowers. The boat was ornately carved, luxuriously appointed, and available.
“Anyone know anything about boats?” Stone asked, standing with the others on the open deck.
They looked expectantly at each other, no one admitting to anything, until Kallista sighed. She slid down the bench to take her place at the tiller. “I grew up in Turysh with the Taolind at my back door. It’s been too many years since I manned a boat, but I think I can remember how to steer. Someone look for oars. We’ll need them, especially if the currents are as tricky as Stone says.”
Aisse calmed the boy—Gweric, his name was—while Stone and Obed located the oars and Torchay cast off the lines. By the time they reached the triple fork in the river, the men had learned the rhythm of rowing, and Kallista was able to steer the boat into the central channel without much struggle. As they left the higher-caste sections of the city, the chaos lessened. Even the lost-looking warriors were no longer in evidence.
“Called them all in to deal with us, likely,” Torchay said when Kallista commented on it.
“What happened?” Stone asked, pulling on his oar in pace with the others. “I know you used the same magic as at Ukiny, but how could it kill two men and leave the one between alive? And what happened to Torchay?”
“Later,” Torchay said. “When we’re safe away.”
“That could be weeks,” Stone protested.
“The Athril’s shorter than the Silixus.” Fox splashed water at Stone with his oar. “The coast is closer in the west. And we’re in a boat. Won’t be weeks.”