Calling On Fire (Book 1) (38 page)

Esset was in extremely low spirits the next day, although he did lend a hand to the Nadra by helping them hunt the remaining Reshkin. There had been a bit of a resurgence in their population, but nothing huge, and the Nadra made a bigger dent in their numbers than usual with Esset’s support. Esset didn’t actually leave the room, however; instead he summoned a wolf and used its body and senses to help the Nadra remotely.

Esset had banished his wolf for the day and was stretching after his body’s long spell of inactivity when Nassata showed up at his room. She reached through the curtain and beckoned for him to come out. Tilting his head to the side, he obeyed. When he emerged, he found another Nadra, a rust-colored male, beside Nassata.

“I thought you’d want to hear this,” Nassata said without preamble. “Terress, please continue.”

Terress dipped his head and spoke.

“I’ve just returned from the human town. There was an uproar when the healer was discovered dead, so I and the other Nadra left there kept our distance. But then…it got quiet. Awfully quiet. We went to investigate, but the first few people either fled before us or were so disoriented that they couldn’t remember their own names. A wider search determined that others had suddenly been struck with maladies. One woman we found dead. I came for reinforcements,” he explained.

“We just came from the council—it was an easy decision for them to send a relief group. We need the good relations with the town, if nothing else,” Nassata added. Esset knew the Nadra were also simply the type to help if they could.

“But what’s wrong with them? What happened?” Esset pressed. He’d come to know and like a good number of the townsfolk.

“We don’t know,” Terress said with a shrug. “There is no sign. One spoke of it being the ‘Hand of Bright Hyrishal,’ repercussions for the healer’s death, but no one looked particularly convinced.”

“Do you think…” Esset looked away, leaving the sentence unfinished.

“What?” Nassata asked. Esset steeled himself, feeling obligated to answer.

“Do you think it was Ateala? She had us fooled, after all. What if she fooled them too? What if she…hurt them too?” he asked. The black guilt he felt for Toman’s condition intensified as the harm inflicted on the villagers was added to it. How could he have been so blind?

“It’s possible,” Nassata said, her voice sympathetic. “Hopefully Toman can tell us more about what happened.”

“Hopefully.” Esset’s voice was still bleak.

Toman opened his eyes again a day and a half after they arrived in Salithsa. Esset was eating lunch when Toman woke, but it was Kessa who saw his eyes open first.

“Toman!” she exclaimed happily, drawing Esset’s attention. Toman immediately tried to move, but Esset had already dropped his food back on his plate and reached out to pin Toman’s shoulders to the bed.

“Easy, brother, don’t try to move,” the summoner warned. Toman had already winced at the pain his attempt had caused, so he didn’t argue.

“What—” Toman’s voice cracked, his throat bone-dry.

“Ssh.” Another late warning. Kessa picked up a mug from the table—it had a long, winding straw poking out the top.

“Here, drink some water. Through the straw now,” she said, placing the straw right next to his lips so he could suck through it. A brief drink worked wonders.

Toman relaxed for a moment, then began looking around the room, taking in his surroundings. His mind was foggy, trying to catch up after being asleep too long; then it all came rushing back. He was in pain, in his side, chest, and arm.

“No!” he suddenly exclaimed—he’d tried to move his left arm. There was sensation, as if there were something there, but there wasn’t actually anything. There was pain, but his limb was gone. He tried to sit up again, frantic.

“Toman! Don’t sit up!” Esset had his hands on Toman’s shoulders again, keeping him down. Toman felt the pain in his chest and side—and in his arm, too—as he struggled briefly.

“It’s gone,” he cried pitifully. It tortured Esset as much to see Toman now as it had to see him in his physical state in the first place.

“I know, brother,” Esset said, bowing his head. “I’m sorry.” He was suddenly overcome with the need to escape the room—his soul felt black with guilt, and he couldn’t stand being in the small room for a moment longer. Toman stopped trying to force himself up into a sitting position, so Esset backed off, removing his hands and standing up. Toman was sweating in the pain he’d caused himself in moving, and Esset couldn’t bear to see him suffering one moment longer.

The summoner suddenly turned away wordlessly and escaped the room.

Toman watched him go, wanting to call out to stop him, but the air seemed to stick in his throat. There were too many emotions to deal with, and the pain—he couldn’t deal with it all himself. Kessa was there, and she was adorable, but she didn’t know him—especially not the way Esset did. Toman’s mind was foggy with pain and painkillers both, so it didn’t even occur to him to wonder why Esset had left—all he knew was that he wanted his brother beside him.

“Kessa,” Toman murmured, even though it was basically unnecessary to say her name to get her attention. “Thank you for being here.”

“Of course,” the little painted Nadra said. “Is there anything you need?”

“Please, could you bring Esset back?” he requested. She nodded right away and headed for the door. She pushed the beaded curtain aside and saw that he was still just right outside the entryway. She let the curtain fall shut on her tail and put a tentative hand on the summoner’s arm.

“Esset? Your brother needs you,” she said softly when he looked at her. “I’ll wait out here.” The rest of her coils slithered out of the room and into the hallway. Esset nodded, but he still didn’t say anything as he turned and went back into the room.

Toman had never been great about opening up about how he was feeling, even to Esset. But he knew he needed to talk to his brother, if only to keep from thinking about his arm and panicking or letting the memories of what Lady Ateala had done to him in that brief time from playing over and over in his mind.

“What happened?” Toman asked. “Y’know, after she…” He averted his eyes. “After.”

“I killed her,” Esset said, looking away too.

Toman relaxed a hairsbreadth and looked back. “But, what
happened
?”

“Well, you must have managed to animate my clothes for just a second—they kind of jumped, so I figured you must be in trouble to do something like that… Anyways, when I opened the door and saw what she’d done, I summoned the Guardian.”

“That’s a new one,” Toman said.

“Yeah…it was pretty powerful, but it sapped a lot of my personal energy, and the conditions I can call it under seem to be pretty limited,” Esset semi-explained.

Toman waited, but Esset had nothing more to say. Toman frowned, recognizing that something must be wrong for Esset not to be all excited about a new summon.

“Come on, Esset. This Guardian sounds pretty cool, what’d it look like?” Toman prompted, feigning energy that he did not have. Esset gave him an unreadable look for a moment, and Toman didn’t know if he was guessing his bluff or if he was surprised or what.

But Esset answered, so at least there was progress. “The Guardian wasn’t like other summons… It was almost like I summoned it inside of myself. I had this huge, flaming sword in my hand, and…” He paused, and for a second, he seemed like his old self. “I think I had
wings
. Y’know, like in pictures of guardian angels? Except fiery. No halo though, that’s for sure, but there was this kind of fiery glow around me. I remember the heat, but I didn’t feel hot at all. It was bizarre.”

“You mean
cool
,” Toman corrected him. He still felt the weight of what he’d been through upon him, but for a moment, he was distracted. “Bright Hyrishal, Esset, you would’ve looked totally scary.”

“I melted a knife right out of her hands,” Esset put in almost as an afterthought.

“As I was saying: scary. Cool,” Toman repeated. He was impressed, and although he didn’t quite manage to force a smile in his state, he thought he’d succeeded in lightening the mood for a moment.

“But I was too late,” Esset said, suddenly pitching forward and running his hands through his short brown hair. He pulled at the permanently messy mass, wracked with guilt. “Toman, I’m so sorry. I should have known, I should have come sooner, I should have never left, I—”

“Jonathan, you send those thoughts straight to the Darkfires where they belong,” Toman said forcefully, lapsing back to using Esset’s given name. Now he could read Esset’s expression—that one was definitely surprise.

“You saved my life, Jonathan. She tricked us both, and an entire town of people, and more beyond that, no doubt. She used magic, too, small stuff that no one noticed, but stuff that got her what she wanted. There was no way we could have known, not either of us. And you saved my life not once, but twice. You saved me from the Reshkin’s venom by bringing me to her, and then you saved me from her.

“Besides, we knew what we were getting into when we decided to go after Moloch,” Toman murmured after a moment of silence. “She may not have had his power, but she was exactly his kind of weapon. We’re just lucky he thought we weren’t worth bothering with… This…time.” With a massive sigh, he lapsed back into slumber the moment after he finished speaking, leaving Esset to wonder if Toman’s words had still been lucid at the end.

When Toman opened his eyes again, he was absolutely ravenous. He looked around but saw Esset in a deep trance, no doubt helping the Nadra. When he rolled his head to look to the other side, he saw Kessa there. She’d found their sewing kit and was apparently taking it upon herself to fix the shirt that Lady Ateala had destroyed. Somehow the stains had been washed out of it, but repairing the cloth was proving more difficult. There was a rather mangled line of stitches along the tears, but she was intent on getting it right. Toman found himself looking at her face, creased in absolute concentration as she deliberately placed one stitch after another…in the wrong place. It was adorable, especially since it wasn’t even his shirt—it had been a borrowed one that he’d worn while sick in bed at the false healer’s.

“You don’t have to fix that, you know,” Toman murmured, his voice still a bit hoarse. She looked up in surprise and poked her finger with the needle.

“Ow! You’re awake!” she exclaimed. She put the shirt aside, having forgotten it already. “How are you feeling?”

He opted not to answer. “That shirt should just be thrown out—it wasn’t mine to begin with, although I do appreciate the effort,” he said instead. Kessa looked over at the shirt.

“Yeah, I guess. I’m not so great at fixing it, either. Your brother made it look so easy,” she said, a bit perplexed.

“Yeah, he does that,” Toman replied, smiling slightly. “If it helps, I’m not so great at mending clothes either. Passable, but not great. I tease Esset about having lady-hands occasionally, but I make sure not to lay it on him too hard or he won’t fix my clothes for me.” Kessa had to smile.

Toman shifted and braced his hands against the bed to push himself into a sitting position, only to find himself moving unevenly. It was a shock to the system.

“Here, let me help you,” Kessa said, but Toman leaned away.

“It was there. It felt like it was there,” he said, disoriented. He looked down, but there was still just a stump where his second arm should have been. Heart racing, Toman let his head fall back into the pillow.

“What?” Kessa asked, withdrawing with a confused look.

“For a second, it felt like my hand was still there. It felt so real,” Toman said. Kessa gave him a hug in lieu of knowing what to say.

“It’s—” Toman abandoned the false start. “I remember talking with an old war veteran. He’d lost a leg. I remember him saying he had a ‘phantom limb.’ His leg wasn’t there anymore, but he could still feel it.” Toman clenched “both” hands again and squeezed his eyes shut.

“Did he ever come to be at peace with it?” Kessa asked.

Toman had to think before answering. “I guess. He learned to live with it, anyways.” Toman tried to push thoughts of his missing appendage from his mind—well, mostly, anyways. Using his right hand, he checked on his other wounds.