Sy-wen’s brow bunched. What was happening?
The dragon’s head swung toward her.
“Kast?” she asked tentatively.
Yes, it’s me, the answer came to her.
She reached toward the steaming snout. “Where’s Ragnar’k? Was he injured by the fall from the sky?”
The dragon shook his head in a very human way. No. I don’t sense him within me at all.
“Are you sure? Maybe he was knocked out.”
Sy-wen. The voice was Kast’s usual stern firmness. I’ve lived with the dragon inside me for over two winters. He is not here. He is gone.
Sy-wen covered her mouth. “How?”
Touch me, he commanded, extending his neck.
She swallowed back her panic and reached her hand again to the opalescent black scales. She closed her eyes, but still she felt the rush of magick, a flushing from crown to toe.
“Sy-wen?”
She opened her eyes. Kast stood before her again, her palm on his cheek. He grabbed her hand before she could take it away. “Hold tight,” he warned. “I think the mer’ai spell has somehow reversed itself. Now your touch calls me out of the dragon rather than sending me in it. Don’t let go.”
She moved to lean against him. She had no problem with this last command. She never wanted to let him go.
“What happened?” he asked.
In his arms, she told the story of their flight, the empty dockworks, and the lurker in the gate. “We were on our way back to the ship.”
“Is that all?”
Sy-wen shook her head. “No. Sheeshon’s flower . . .” She glanced to the beach. In the black sand, the purple-and-crimson blossom lay in the sand where she had fallen. “Rodricko’s flower. Sheeshon had a dream that it had to be bathed in the smoke off the mountain.”
“Why?” Kast frowned.
“I don’t know—something to do with helping Hunt. Master Edyll believed it important, maybe prophecy. And since we were headed here anyway . . .” She covered her face with a hand. “We shouldn’t have attempted it.” She explained about the dragon’s last flight, the burn of the smoke, the tumble from the sky.
Kast walked with her out of the shallows, hand in hand like any two lovers strolling a beach. He plucked the flower from the black sand.
Sy-wen expected to find the flower a singed ruin, but the purple petals had peeled back to its fiery heart. The flower now glowed like a coal from a fresh fire. “It’s bloomed,” she said, surprised.
Kast seemed less shocked. His eyes were on her own, his brow wrinkled.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“You . . . You’re not possessed.”
She blinked, and then his words sank to her heart. In her panic over Ragnar’k, she had failed to notice the end of the simaltra’s possession. She touched her forehead in wonder. She was still herself. She searched inside her mind for the malignant presence of the tentacled beast. Where before it had been a palpable darkness behind her eyes, icy and cold, now she felt nothing. How could that be? She stared up into her lover’s suspicious eyes. “It’s gone. I don’t feel it inside me.”
Her words did little to dismiss the doubt in Kast’s gaze.
“I remember the pain from the smoke. We both tumbled. When I hit, I felt so dreadfully sick.” She crossed to the soiled section of the sand, drawing Kast with her. Amid the blood and bile, an oily skin lay like a wrinkled snake’s shedding. Kast used the end of the branch to fish it out. He plopped it down and teased out the tentacles.
It was the simaltra . . . or what was left of it.
“I truly am free,” she cried. A joyous tide surged in her heart. Free! She stared up at Kast as he rose to his feet. Her relief and happiness must have been plain, too bright to doubt any longer.
He swung her into his arms, hugging the breath from her. “You’re mine again,” he mumbled into her hair. His body shuddered against hers as he allowed himself to believe.
After a moment, Sy-wen pulled away enough to speak. “But what of Ragnar’k?”
Kast stared back at the smoky column. “I’m not sure, but Sheeshon warned me of something—she said I’d have to slay Ragnar’k, that he would eventually pose a risk to the world.”
Sy-wen jolted with his words, almost breaking from his arms. “Why would she say that?”
“I don’t know. She didn’t either.” Kast studied the smoky trail in the sky. “The magick from the mountain’s heart must be able to suck a foreign essence from a body. It drew the simaltra from you, leaving only the skin that you later expelled. It must also have drawn Ragnar’k out of me, leaving only the dragon’s skin behind. But the spell tattooed into my flesh somehow keeps his skin alive, allowing the transformation to continue.”
“But without the dragon inside . . .”
“It’s just an empty skin,” Kast finished, kicking sand over the slimy tentacles.
“Not empty,” she argued, reaching to his cheek. “It still has a heart . . . your heart.”
He sighed and faced the rising curl of smoke. “Ragnar’k rose from the stone heart of A’loa Glen in a smoky cloud. Now smoke draws him away, perhaps to the very heart of Blackhall.”
She heard the worry in his voice. “You fear he’ll be twisted by the magick here?”
“Ragnar’k is a spirit of pure elemental magick, the clay from which the Dark Lord sculpts his ill’guard creations. I fear what the fiend could do with the dragon’s energy.” He circled Sy-wen with his arms again. “Back at A’loa Glen, the whole purpose in seeding the ebon’stone eggs had been to capture Ragnar’k. And now we’ve delivered him to the very doorstep of the Dark Lord.”
Sy-wen mumbled into his chest. “Then we’ve traded my freedom for the dragon’s.”
Kast tightened his arms. “Don’t speak that way. It is the Mother’s blessing that you are free. There was no trade.”
Sy-wen leaned against Kast’s chest, the joy in her heart soured. “Either way,” she finally mumbled, “we must return to the Dragonsheart to let them know of the trap and of what has befallen us here—and to return Rodricko’s flower before he falls ill from its absence.”
He nodded and stepped back. “Then I must fly us home.”
Sy-wen shook her head, catching his hand. “No. I can’t ride back with you.”
Kast’s brows pinched.
“You forget, my touch will pull you back into a man,” she explained. “You have to go without me.”
“And leave you here?”
“I’ll hide,” she promised. “The news you bear is too important. And Rodricko will need his flower. I’ll stay here until you return.”
Kast glanced around, clearly searching for another answer. He found none. His eyes settled back to hers, unsure.
“You must,” she said simply, putting all her courage in her voice.
“But I’ll still be a dragon when I reach the ship.”
“You’ll find a way to pass on the message. Carve the planks with your claw if you must.”
“I only just got you back,” he whispered.
She lifted his hand and kissed it. “Deliver the warning. Let the fleet prepare to battle the beast in the gate. While they do that, you return here with Hunt so we can free him. I’ll be safe. Now that I’m free, I’ll never be enslaved again.”
Kast’s eyes were still narrowed with worry, but he nodded.
“You’d best hurry.” She began to pull away, but he drew her back into an iron embrace.
“I’ll not miss this chance,” he whispered, then bent and kissed her.
Sy-wen sighed between his lips. It had been too long. She melted into his warm lips, tasting the salt and his breath. Her heart ached and in this moment, she could not hide her own fear. In this kiss, she drew what strength she could from the steel in his arms, the firmness of his lips, the coarse stubble of his cheek. She drew all she could from him.
But it could not last forever. With tears in her eyes, she broke their embrace, pushing him away. “Go . . .
” Before I never let you go, she added from her heart.
He stepped back, arms outstretched, only their fingers touching. His face was flushed, balanced between duty and love.
“Go,” she repeated.
“Be safe,” he commanded.
She nodded, not trusting her voice any longer.
His fingers dropped from hers. Magick blasted outward, kicking up a small eddy of sand. A moment later, the dragon reappeared on the strand of beach, silver claws dug deep into the black sand. Sy-wen stepped forward and retrieved Rodricko’s flower. She placed it before the dragon.
“Fly swiftly,” she whispered.
Kast stared at her through a dragon’s eyes as tears flowed down her face. Then he gently collected the flower between his teeth and spread his wings. I’ll return soon. The silent promise filled her heart and mind. Then with a bounding leap, he flung his body into the air. His flight was not as smooth as when Ragnar’k controlled the dragon, but apparently the blending of the two over the past winters had given Kast some ability. After a slight bumbling, he was off, flying over the jagged Crown to the seas beyond the shoals.
She watched him, a fist clutched to her heart.
Under her feet, the ground shook again, this time more violently. The smooth waters of the lagoon rippled. Sy-wen turned from the skies to examine the peak behind her. Gouts of smoke belched from the fissures, and fires spouted from the distant cone with a horrendous roar.
Sy-wen had never felt so alone. She looked to the dwindling form of the dragon, watching until he disappeared, then sank to her knees in the black sand.
She had thought herself free, but now she shrank from the enormity of the black cone and molten fires. She stared toward the misty horizons.
Keep your promise, my love. Return to me soon.
24
Elena clutched the rails of the Windsprite as storm winds buffeted the ship. The deck pitched under her, rolling a wider view of the landscape below. Columns of og’res trudged through the mud and deadfall of the blasted orchards, advancing in a solid line toward the pit. Steam rose, drifting up from the deep coal fires buried in the debris. Neither the fierceness of the past night’s storm nor the morning’s steady downpour could drown these last reminders of the orchard’s fiery destruction.
“They’re making good progress,” Er’ril said at her side.
“So far,” Elena agreed. “But the day has just begun.” She huddled within her eelskin cloak, rain slicking off her. One hand settled to the rose-carved pommel of her blood sword, seeking the reassurance of its elemental steel. Since the battle at the Spirit Gate, she kept the sword belted at her side—a dull ache, a constant reminder of her responsibilities.
Below, birds of every shape swept through the rain, keeping pace with the giants on the ground. Only a few scouts of the si’luran army delved deeper toward the pit.
Elena studied their goal.
The excavation had gone strangely quiet during the night. The continual column of smoke had been extinguished or been swamped by the rain. Only a deep mist hung over the pit, like steam on a mug of hot kaffee. It lay thick, obscuring all, stirring in a slow eddy. The sight was more ominous than the furious smoking of yesterday.
The ship rolled again, pulling her vision back toward the skies. The clouds remained low, heavy with rain. Day was upon them, but it was impossible to say exactly where true night ended and morning began. The world had become a continual twilight.
“We should keep belowdecks,” Er’ril urged her. “We’ve sentinels in the crow’s nest. At the first sign of trouble, the horns will sound.”
Then they should be sounding already, she thought. The very air reeks of trouble. But she allowed herself to be guided back toward the deck hatch.
When it opened, she found Joach standing there. She startled back for half a heartbeat before recognizing him. He waved them out of the rain with his staff. “We’ve assembled all the gear in the ship’s stern hold,” he said. “Packs with extra ropes, climbing tackle, torches, oil pots. Everyone’s seen to their personal weapons and needs. We’re ready for the descent into the pit.”
Er’ril nodded, shaking out his cloak. “I’d like to inspect it myself.” He turned to Elena. “Why don’t you and your brother warm yourselves in the galley? I’ll be right back.”
Joach backed out of the way for Er’ril to pass, then stared strangely at Elena. “El . . . you and Er’ril . . .”
Elena turned her back on her brother, a flush rising to her cheeks. Did he know about last night? Was it so obvious? Did it show on her face? She and Er’ril had made love again just before dawn, one last moment alone to touch, and to heal any last wounds between them.
Joach continued. “You love him, don’t you, El?
She kept her back to her brother. “Of course I do.”
He touched her shoulder. “Then you can understand how I feel—how I felt—about Kesla.” He sighed loudly.
Elena swung back to her brother, realizing his line of inquiry was heading in a different direction than she had thought. She fought back her blush. “I know how much you loved her.”
He frowned at her words. “There was something I wanted to talk to you about.” He glanced to his toes, a boyish gesture coming from the middle-aged figure.
Elena reached to his hand. “What is it?” She was glad that Joach was finally willing to talk about the pain in his heart. Maybe his rejuvenation after the death of Greshym had healed more than just his aged body.
Still, Joach hesitated.
“Would you rather talk about this in my cabin? We’d have more privacy.”
He nodded, clearly relieved.
She led him down the crisscross of corridors to her room. Once at her door, she slipped off her glove and pricked her finger on a sliver of wood. She cast a tendril of wit’ch fire into the lock to melt the frozen metal. Er’ril had suggested the added precaution to protect the talisman locked inside: the Blood Diary. Now she deftly melted the tumblers free and pushed the door wide for Joach to enter.
Elena cast a glance around the room. The furs and blankets were spread evenly. No evidence of the past night’s lovemaking was apparent, but to Elena’s senses, the room remained heady with the musky scent of their spent passions. She glanced to Joach, but he seemed oblivious.
Her brother crossed to the small hearth and jostled the coals brighter. As he warmed the room, she slipped out of her wet cloak and hung it on a wall peg. She reached to the oil lamp that swung from a rafter and twisted its wick brighter.
She turned to find her brother standing before the small oaken desk. Atop it lay the Blood Diary, its gilt rose showing the barest glimmer, heralding the coming midsummer moon.
Joach studied the book, hard lines marking his forehead. “According to the elv’in captain, the moon will rise early. It’ll be in the skies even before the sun has fully set.”
Elena hadn’t needed to be told this. With the magick ripe in her, she was tuned to the swelling moon. She knew its movements as well as the beat of her own heart.
“The moon and sun together,” Joach mumbled. “Do you remember what Father used to call that?”
Elena smiled. “A fool’s moon.” She sighed. “A moon too foolish to know the sun hasn’t set.”
Joach turned from the desk, leaning on his staff. “And look where we head now under a rising fool’s moon.” A tired grin shadowed his lips. “Who are the true fools?”
Elena unhooked her sword and settled to the bed. She rested the sheathed blade across her knees. Joach took a small stool, sitting with his staff across his own knees. She stared at him, searching back through their lives. How had they come to this room, burdened with the magick each bore?
A silence followed, the only sound the constant patter of rain on the deck above their heads. Finally Elena spoke. “You mentioned Kesla.”
Joach’s eyes flicked to the Blood Diary. He nodded. “I think I’ve discovered a way to bring her back.”
Elena could not hide th
e shock in her voice. “Back from the dead?”
Joach visibly swallowed. “She was dream made flesh. Could such truly die?” He lifted his eyes to hers. Pain shone brightly. “My abilities have grown. I think I can sculpt her back into this world. But . . .”
“But should you?” Elena asked softly. “To draw a spirit back to a body, that smacks of the darkest magick. Remember Rockingham, even Vira’ni. The dead should be allowed to die. It is the Mother’s final kindness.”
“What of Nee’lahn? She died and came back.”
Elena shook her head. “She is nyphai. She didn’t truly die, only the husk of a body she wore. Her spirit remained here, wrapped in the magick of her woodsong.”
“But is Kesla any different? She was born out of the Land’s magick. Who’s to say her spirit has passed on to the Mother?”
Elena frowned. Joach could be right, but in her heart, Elena feared so dark a path. “What you ask . . . ,” she mumbled, shaking her head.
Fire entered his voice. “I never said I was asking.”
Elena met his eyes. His pain had flamed into something bitter: His fingers had tightened on his staff. “Joach—”
“What if it was Er’ril?” he blurted angrily.
Elena opened her mouth. Her first impulse was to deny she’d follow his path. But sitting on this bed, where a short time ago they had shared themselves—heart, spirit, and body—she could not say for sure what her own decision would be. “How . . . why do you even think you could accomplish this?”
Joach held out both hands. “I’ve already done it. I showed you how I could create a solid illusion of my missing hand, but it was a dead, unfeeling creation.” He squeezed a fist. “But look! Now it lives. It’s fully a part of me again.”
“You said that the hand returned with your youth . . . after Greshym died.”
He waved her question away with his new hand. “It was more complicated, hard to explain. All that matters is that with Greshym gone, I could do what I couldn’t before.”
Elena sensed hidden meaning behind her brother’s words. “A hand is not a person,” she simply said. “A hand does not possess a unique spirit.”
Wit'ch Star (v5) Page 49
