Aware that his thoughts had wandered, he straightened and refocused on the road. Not that there was anything to see. The five of them hunkered in an alley across from the telegraphy office. Peer and Ko-Jin were pressed to a haberdashery on the right, and Bray, Whythe, and Tae-Young hugged the wall of the Greystone library on the left. The two buildings sat so close together that he could reach across the divide and touch Whythe’s shoulder if he wanted to.
And, quite naturally, he did want to. He always wanted to touch Whythe. But he kept his hands to himself, for the time being.
Again, Peer forced himself to refocus. He saw the fight in his mind, as he thought it should go: not an epic battle, but a boring assassination. Quade would appear, Whythe would strip his gifts, and Peer would unload his revolver. It would be over in under a minute. If the blighted man ever showed up…
Perhaps they should consider—
Peer caught a slight sound overhead, fabric rustling in the wind. He glanced up, and his eyes flew wide. A bellow lodged in his throat.
Three figures dropped from the roof of the library, each aiming to land on one of Peer’s companions. A blade flashed in the afternoon light.
Tae-Young went down first, his shriek shifting quickly to a gurgle. Peer bunched his muscles, preparing to spring in Whythe’s direction. But he was far too slow.
Fear and rage and desperation screamed in his head, and the moment crawled before his eyes.
The assassin slashed his blade downwards, Whythe pivoted, knocking the dagger wide, but was driven to the ground. His skull struck the street-top with a sick thunk. An instant later, it was followed by a much louder thud, as the third assailant fell straight through Bray and crashed into the pavement.
“Whythe!” Peer cried, launching forward. His bevolder did not stir.
Peer shouldered Whythe’s attacker, and the man stumbled. His hood slipped from his head, and Peer stared aghast into the face of Arlow Bowlerham.
“Arlow?” Peer asked. “What the blighter are you doing?”
Arlow swiped his dagger at Peer, and had he not stepped back, the blade would have opened his throat. The Cosanta had a determined yet flat look in his dark eyes.
Quade, Peer realized with a swelling sense of horror. If Arlow was under Quade’s spell, did that mean he had gotten into the city?
Once again, Arlow attempted to plunge his blade into Whythe’s back. Terror compelled Peer to act, to fight without mercy. He flew into a vicious kick that sent the other man slamming against the library wall. His dagger clattered to the ground.
Peer liked Arlow Bowlerham—or, at least, he liked him some of the time. But he would not risk Whythe. He would kill anyone who intended him harm, without hesitation.
Arlow’s eyes flicked to Whythe, still slumped on the ground, with deadly intent. Peer’s hands flew to the pistols at his hips. He growled, “You’ll have to go through me.”
“Very well.”
Arlow pushed away from the wall, and they collided. The gap between the two buildings was so narrow that they crashed back and forth between them, neither with enough space to land a proper blow.
“Snap out of it, Arlow,” Peer grunted. “You don’t want to be doin’ this.”
“I am happy to do as Quade bids,” he replied in a dead voice. “Quade is—”
Terror flared in Peer’s mind, and he knew he must silence Arlow at any cost, or lose his free will. He cocked his right arm at the elbow and pulled the trigger. At the same moment Arlow swept his hand up—a motion reminiscent of washing a window—and knocked Peer’s arm wide. The blast was sharp in his ears, and the bullet hit the library wall.
“Quade wants—”
He pivoted his hips and aimed his left revolver. Once again, he fired; once again, Arlow redirected his arm. The air burned hot. Peer backed up, hoping to gain room so he might aim without interference, but Arlow followed him, keeping close. Peer targeted Arlow’s boot and fired. The Cosanta danced away.
Peer pushed forward, and his foot slipped on a loose paver. As he caught his balance, Arlow took his feet out from under him with a sweep of the leg. Peer’s tailbone smacked smartly into the pavement.
He raised his pistol and fired. Arlow shifted his head a fraction, and the bullet flew by his cheek. Peer ground his teeth in frustration. Fighting Arlow Bowlerham felt like playing a rigged game.
He leapt to his feet, increasing the speed of his attack. Bang, bang, bang—but Arlow moved like a fish slipping between grasping hands. Peer pressed the trigger and heard the click of an empty chamber. Arlow smiled.
It was Quade Asher’s smile stealing across Arlow Bowlerham’s face, an expression full of cruel delight. A shiver of fear raced across Peer’s skin.
He tossed his weapons aside and barreled forward, slamming Arlow into the library. From above came the scrape of a tile sliding loose from its mortar. He looked up just in time to see a slab of rooftop come careening toward his face.
The pain was hot and sudden, like an egg thrown to a scalding sidewalk. He wavered, blackness falling over his vision. He did not feel his body strike the road.
Ko-Jin’s heart lurched.
He had always prided himself on his ability to anticipate danger, and yet he hadn’t sensed these assailants until they were upon him. Until death had arrived, dressed all in black.
Three assassins dropped from the library roof, silent save for the whipping of their cloaks in the wind. Each landed upon one of Ko-Jin’s companions, in near-perfect synchronicity. He was not a target himself; he could only take in the scene through horrified eyes.
Tae-Young shrieked—a youthful and terrified sound that soon cut short. Bray must have phased just in time, because her attacker crashed onto the street. Such an impact should have been fatal, and so Ko-Jin was unsettled to see the giant figure pick himself back up, brushing dust from his shirt.
Malc, Ko-Jin realized. A Chiona who was impervious to harm. But then, Bray was impervious too, in her own way.
Peer had acted faster than Ko-Jin, leaping to the aid of his bevolder. He engaged a hooded figure who moved like a Cosanta. There was something familiar about the man, but Ko-Jin had no time to consider it.
Peer, like Bray, could hold his own, so Ko-Jin dashed towards Tae-Young and the assassin standing over him. The man held a dagger loosely, the blade scarlet to the hilt.
He pulled back his hood, revealing a smirking face. Ko-Jin stumbled. “Kelarre?”
Like Malc, he was meant to be on their side. Which drove a painful question through Ko-Jin’s adrenaline-fogged mind: were these two betrayers, like Britt, or had Quade gotten into the city?
“’Lo, General,” the teleporter slurred, and then he disappeared with a hollow pop.
Ko-Jin slid to his knees beside Tae-Young. The fabric of his robes was soon soaked in warm blood. The young man’s eyes—dark Chaskuan eyes, rather like Ko-Jin’s own—were open and unseeing. He was already gone.
Ko-Jin’s back curved and his head hung heavy, as he choked on his own remorse. He had led this boy to his slaughter.
I am death and the killing is not yet done.
The general stood, his hands tingling at his sides, knuckles aching to hit something. But he remained still. He listened and waited.
The sharp sound of teleportation came from just behind, and he rounded on his attacker. Kelarre had arrived a little too high off the ground; he hit the street with a pained grunt. When he stumbled towards Ko-Jin, the scent of liquor drifted on the air.
Kelarre swiped his dagger, missed, and staggered from the force of his own sloppy attack.
Ko-Jin took a swing, but the lad was so sotted that, before the blow could land, he succumbed to gravity on his own. His bottom thumped to the street, and then he vanished.
Spinning in a slow circle, Ko-Jin waited for this gnat of an assailant to materialize again. Above, he spotted the young man reappear on the library roof. Once more, he teleported too high. When his boots struck the tile, he knocked one loose. Ko-Jin watched it
fall and strike Peer squarely in the brow, the whole sequence appearing surreal to his eyes, dreamlike.
Kelarre caught his balance, then disappeared. Ko-Jin stilled, listening. He felt the slight shift of the air, heard the pop, and swung his elbow. Kelarre’s nose broke with a crunch, and he slumped to the ground.
Ko-Jin darted forward a second later, saving an unconscious Peer from meeting his death. He faltered when he recognized the identity of their third attacker.
Arlow?
There was no denying the truth of the picture before him: Arlow Bowlerham meant to murder Peer Gelson.
Ko-Jin barreled into his old friend, and they both went sprawling. Arlow’s knife skittered away—he never could keep ahold of his own weapons, despite Ko-Jin’s tutelage, and was always irritatingly blithe about it.
“Ar,” Ko-Jin gritted out. “I don’t want to hurt you. You’ve got an infant son waiting back in Accord.”
His friend’s eyes were black and dark as a starless sky. He sneered, a cruel smile that looked all wrong on his face. “You think that you can? Hurt me?” He rocked his hips and squirmed out from underneath Ko-Jin in a single deft movement. “I recall you once saying I was the one person you couldn’t stand to fight.”
Ko-Jin caught hold of Arlow’s robes near the knee and pinned his legs to the street. “That was more a commentary on your personality than your gift.”
Admittedly, Ko-Jin hadn’t known Arlow’s gift until recently. It had explained a lot—like how Arlow could win at just about anything, even while doing nothing correctly.
Ko-Jin wasn’t sure what was more irritating, the fact that he had withheld the truth for over a decade, or his reason for doing so. “No one plays cards with a superhumanly lucky man, Ko-Jin. Do you have any idea how much money I’ve taken off you over the years?”
Ko-Jin pressed his weight into Arlow, pinioning him to the ground, and his friend thrashed. He reached for the lapel of Arlow’s robes, intending to choke him—it was the kindest option—but at that moment Malc and Bray came barreling through the alley, and Ko-Jin was forced to roll out of the way. Malc somehow managed to step right over Arlow, when it seemed he should have been trampled.
Arlow popped to his feet, his dagger back in hand. Ko-Jin finally drew his sword, though he intended to use it only for deflection.
“Here’s a question for you, General. What’s more important in a fight: skill or luck?”
“Skill,” Ko-Jin answered immediately.
“Wrong,” Arlow said. He closed his eyes and threw his weapon. Ko-Jin blocked it with his sword, but the dagger rebounded at a seemingly impossible angle, careening straight up. Ko-Jin jerked back in time to save his eye, but the blade sliced open his cheek. The sharp sting of the cut shocked him. Blood rushed hot and fast over his jaw and down his neck, soaking into his collar.
“Arlow…” he said, his hand flying to his shredded face. He understood that his friend wasn’t currently running the show, but it still baffled him. Could he not resist? Was he in there at all?
“Sorry, old friend,” Arlow said in a flat voice. “Quade’s orders.”
Ko-Jin gripped his sword in a blood-slick hand and braced himself for a fight. If he was not careful, Arlow might actually kill him.
Sweat dampened Bray’s skin, and her muscles burned; the hilt of her sword had grown slippery in her trembling grip. Malc’s attack slowed, his breathing too labored for speech.
This fight—Oh Spirits, it was the fight that would never end. An indestructible man against an untouchable woman: neither could hurt the other, they were only wearing each other down, like a stone obelisk eroded by the wind.
But even storms die eventually, and Bray feared she would soon falter. Her gift was used consciously; his was not. It was time to discover his limitations, while she could still lift her weapon.
Her Chiona brother threw a punch, and she let it fly harmlessly through. In a flash of speed, she rematerialized, swinging her blade at his head. Bray called upon all the strength that remained to her. She knew she couldn’t break his skin, but perhaps he could be knocked unconscious—
The sword shattered, as if she had slammed it against a wall of metal. A painful shock raced up her arm and into her shoulder joint. She was left holding a hilt with a jagged edge—a vicious cutting tool, if only she were fighting a foe who could be cut.
Malc’s hand shot out with more speed than she’d thought possible, grabbing hold of her wrist—skin to skin.
No!
Panic blared in her mind. She phased, even knowing he would phase right along with her. He could now deal damage no matter her state, and given his strength, he could cave her skull with a single blow.
No, no, no…
He bared his teeth as she tried to wrench her arm loose. It was such a strange look upon his affable face. She’d known Malc for years. He had never stopped calling her ‘little Bray Marron.’
But none of that mattered in this moment. He would kill her, now, without hesitation.
Knowing she could not pull away from him, she collided into him instead, denying him the space to throw a proper punch. He grunted, his fingers bruising around her wrist. With his free hand, he struck her in the side. She heard the crack of her ribs splintering, and lightning shot up her torso.
Fear dug its claws into her mind. She wrenched wildly against the vise of his arm. He twisted, and her wrist snapped. The pain was so bright it blinded her.
I’m going to die. The knowledge came like sea-water gasped into hungry lungs—searing and undeniable.
No, you are not! came a second voice in her mind. Not hers. No, this was a voice far dearer than her own. It was Yarrow’s. Think, Bray, he whispered.
Think.
When intangible, it was a conscious decision to remain level with the ground. If she willed it, she could rise into the air or sink into the earth.
She shot straight up into the sky, towing Malc with her, and then, without pause, she let them drop. In free-fall, her stomach soared inside her abdomen. They didn’t hit the street but slid into it, and Malc’s eyes flew wide. This was her moment—likely, her only moment. She struck up at his forearm, while she twisted and jerked her trapped hand. Her broken wrist screamed, but then slipped free.
The moment she and Malc were no longer touching, he rematerialized—hip-deep in the ground. He gnashed his teeth and struggled, but it would seem this was the limit of his strength. Malc could not wrest himself through solid earth and stone. He wailed a full-throated plea, his eyes shining with the desperate need to reach her, to kill her, to fulfill Quade’s orders.
Her brother was fortunate for his gift. She was fairly certain anyone else would have lost their lower half.
Bray rose and settled solidly upon the ground. She turned to see how her companions were faring. It was not a bolstering sight.
Ko-Jin and Arlow shuffled back and forth in a furious exchange, their swords flashing. She’d assumed that Ko-Jin could dispatch Arlow with ease, but it was the general whose face was streaming blood. Arlow appeared uninjured, and smug about it.
Peer, Whythe, and Tae-Young were all sprawled on the street-top. There was blood everywhere. Fear bloomed in her chest, and she cried out, flying in their direction.
Bray scrambled to her fallen friend. “Peer?”
He moaned, and tears of love and joy slipped from her lashes. She saw that he was bleeding from a wound above his left eye, but it did not look deep. He blinked at the sky sluggishly. “Bray?”
She took his hand in her uninjured one. “I’m here.”
His brow puckered. “Whythe?”
At first, she thought Peer’s bevolder dead. His golden-brown hair was soaked in blood, and his skin was ghostly pale. But she soon traced the pool of crimson to Tae-Young, whose throat had been opened wide.
It was a ghastly sight, and yet her first reaction was relief—relief that it was Tae-Young who’d been slain, and not Peer or the boy who held Peer’s heart. Her second feeling was self-loathing
, that she should look upon a dead seventeen-year-old boy, and feel anything other than horror. A sob caught in her throat.
Bray shuffled to Whythe’s side, her broken wrist clutched to her chest. She pressed a hand to the younger man’s sternum and felt the steady beating of his heart. “He’s alive,” she said.
Peer groaned and rolled onto his knees. He probed at his injured brow, his blue eyes pinched and unfocused. Behind them, Ko-Jin hissed in pain, and Arlow laughed.
This needed to end. And Whythe was the one who could end it.
Bray shook him. “Whythe?”
His eyelids fluttered but then fell closed again. “Whythe!” she shouted. His brow creased. She shook him again, and when he still did not rouse, she slapped him across the face.
That did the trick. “Ow,” he said in an irritated voice.
“We need your gift,” Bray said. “Wake up.”
“I’m awake,” he grumbled. “Peer?”
“I’m here.”
Whythe hoisted himself to a seated position. He blinked into the sunlight, and eventually his eyes focused on Ko-Jin and Arlow.
She could not see the change, but a moment later Arlow tripped over the hem of his own robes. Ko-Jin flipped him onto his stomach, pressed a knee into his back, and set about binding his friend’s wrists with his own belt.
“Kelarre, too,” Bray whispered.
The Adourran teleporter appeared to be out cold, but they couldn’t let him rouse with the use of his gift. He could teleport back to Accord and warn Quade of their survival.
“Done,” Whythe said in a small voice. His kind brown eyes were locked on their fallen ally. His throat bobbed as he swallowed.
After so much fear and commotion, the silence that followed hung heavy. They all heaved for breath, and no one spoke. Bray’s entire body began to tremble. She scuttled away from the blood and collapsed, pulling her knees to her chest.
Now that the excitement was over, her cracked ribs made themselves known. Every inhale sent fire up her side, and yet it still wasn’t half so painful as her wrist.
Ko-Jin wandered over to them, his hand pressed to his bleeding cheek. The cut was deeper than Bray had expected. It needed to be stitched, and would certainly scar.
The Complete Marked Series Box Set Page 130
