by Anna Steffl
But his eyes locked on hers and told her not to think such things. Drawing her closer, his broad shoulders engulfed her. His eyelids drifted closed, his lips parted and daubed hers in a small kiss, barely a kiss, but it resonated a thousand times stronger through her.
She had to feel it again. She grazed her nose against his and met his lips with hers. Lingering on them, she mapped in her mind their warmth, taste, how their softness gave way to the rough, hard curve of his chin. He opened his mouth slightly, and she kissed him harder, pressing her lips to his teeth.
He pressed back and then took his mouth from hers to kiss her chin and neck.
Her hand, poised on his chest, rose and fell with his heavy breaths.
“Can you endure the worry? Can you forgive me for thinking I could?” he whispered and brushed his lips to her ear. “I can’t forsake you.” He drew her veil back and laid his face against her hair. His voice, sounding from his jaw into hers, seemed to come from within her. “Don’t go with your brother. I’ll send someone. Will you wait?”
Her body was turning into a million particles of shimmering white bliss. That was her answer. She was going to evaporate into pure joy. But she had to stay real, had to hold onto him. She reached around his back, nestled her chest to his, and drew herself tight against his beautiful hardness. Between her legs, the hollow space of her body ached. She kissed him to quell that pain.
Suddenly, Nan’s lips jerked away. What was wrong?
She opened her eyes.
“I’ll kill you, you bastard,” Chane seethed. He had his arm crooked around Nan’s neck.
Nan’s hands dropped away from her. He swung them backward and spun to his right. It was happening so fast.
A bloody knife flashed in Chane’s hand.
Nan’s arm hooked around Chane’s above the elbow.
The knife now pointed to Lerouge’s chest.
Nan’s left hand, clenched over Lerouge’s and pushed in the blade.
Chane shoved Nan away, buckled, and gasped for a moment before righting. The knife was still in his chest. Grimacing, he pulled the knife out, probed the wound, glanced to his two glistening fingers, and then laughed raggedly. Though he panted, he brandished the knife in threatening strokes. But it lagged lower and moved slower until it stopped entirely and dangled at his side. His laugh turned into rasps. He staggered toward Nan and dropped the knife.
Nan caught and eased Chane to the ground. Crouching over him, Nan unbuttoned the prince’s coat. A large, dark stain covered the white shirt.
Arvana fell to her knees beside Chane. She whipped off her headband and swiped the veil from her hair. She was wadding the gauze to press into the wound when Nan caught her hand. He drew his handkerchief from his pocket and pressured it into Chane’s abdomen. The edges went dark with blood. Nan lifted it. He shook his head that it was hopeless.
As if aware that if he closed his eyes he wouldn’t open them again, Chane set an unblinking gaze on her and began to pick at the knot of his neck cloth. “Undo it.”
She dropped her veil and untied Chane’s neck cloth.
He raised his head just enough to remove the relic. The hand clasping it fell to his side. He raised his other hand, touched his knuckles to her lips, and then stroked them once. Exhausted with the effort, Chane let his hand drop to her thigh. He grasped the end of the long sash and caressed the fabric absently, as a child fingers a blanket, then looped it twice around his fist as if it were a lifeline. His lips moved as if he wished to say something.
She lowered her head to hear.
“Come.” The locket sprang open with a metallic twang.
She tried to rear away, but he had tangled her sash around his hand. The unmistakable stench, like burning hair, wafted over her and icy claws seemed to shred through her chest.
Chane was taking her into Hell with him!
She flung across him, snatched the locket, and snapped it closed.
“What are you doing?” Nan asked.
Just as she was sinking back onto her heels and taking a relieved breath that The Scyon couldn’t have seen them so quickly—and she hadn’t been wearing her Solacian things if he had—brightness, like a newly lit torch, flashed to life. Had a soldier with a lantern come upon them? How were they to explain? She clutched the locket to her aching chest and peered into the light. There was no Acadian soldier, only Nan, glowing with life threads. The bright light was his sword Assaea. It was a strange light. For how bright it was, it didn’t illuminate the path or the tangle of tree branches overhead.
Chane stirred the hand grasping her sash. He opened his eyes and eased onto one elbow. Thank the Maker! He was alive. But wait, his body was still there before her—flat on the ground. He was dead and his spirit had left his body. Why was she seeing his ghost? Why was it looking to her, half in wonder, half in terror? Why was she still seeing Nan as if from Hell? With the locket closed, she should be back in the world.
Should be.
She glanced to herself. She glowed with life, but not as brightly as Nan.
Chane’s book said that a spirit taken into Hell couldn’t leave by its accord. Was she dead? The hand holding the locket trembled against her chest. “Nan,” she said faintly.
“Damn it, he’s dead.” Nan shook his head, then reached and unwound her sash from Chane’s limp hand.
Suddenly, out of the light of Nan’s sword came a spirit arraigned in a flowing white dress belted with a gold sash fringed with beaded jewels. Darkly sparkling sapphire beads were braided into her long blond hair. Her blue eyes, the color of cornflowers, were as haughty and imperial as a queen’s. The beautiful spirit stood superimposed over Nan, but he didn’t notice. Arvana tried to scuttle backward on her knees, but Chane threw his ghostly arms around her. She flailed against him, but he clung all the tighter.
“Take me back,” Chane cried.
Nan rose and stepped over Chane’s body in one swift move. “Ari?”
The woman spirit pointed to Chane’s ghost and a fierce scowl twisted her mouth. In heavily accented Anglish, she fired, “Find your own Hell. This is mine.”
Chane’s grasp slipped from around Arvana. Nan, from behind, was lifting her from under her arms, raising her to her feet. No, she wasn’t dead. Chane made a desperate clutch to her waist and she kicked at him.
“Ari, be calm,” Nan said.
Chane’s hands slid down her thighs. It was as if he were being pulled downward through water by a stone tied to him. His ghost gave an agonized cry as it let go of the hem of her dress. Though he clawed furiously, an unseen force sucked him beneath the ground. His horror-struck face stared up at her through the pathway and then disappeared into the deep gray of Hell.
Arvana felt pressure on her shoulders. Nan was turning her to face him. Though he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close, the sensation of him was oddly distant, like the recalled dream of a sensation rather than the real feeling. Her knees began to give under the realization that she wasn’t dead—not yet. With a sob, Arvana said into Nan’s chest, “Something’s gone wrong.”
“Shh. Calm down. Everything’s gone wrong,” he replied. “You know I had no choice.”
The heavily accented woman’s voice spoke into Arvana’s ear. “Who carries Assaea? Is it my grandson, Myronan Degarius? My Nani?”
Degarius clapped his hand over Ari’s mouth. “Shh.” Damn it, she couldn’t go mad. The prince had died before her, and she wasn’t a soldier used to seeing such things, but now wasn’t the time to be shocked, muttering nonsense and staring wide-eyed into the dark. They had to leave. The sooner the better. Sticky wetness was trickling down his back into his breeches. Damn, his shoulder was bleeding, and it hurt like all hell. He’d have to get it attended soon. Which of his servants could be trusted to stitch it up and not say anything? But first, he had to do something about the prince and then manage to return to Sarapost House without drawing attention. His one stroke of luck was that he had brought his cape and she’d been wearing it during
the attack. It would cover the gouge in his jacket.
But first things first. She seemed calmer, so he lifted his hand from her mouth and laid it on her cheek. “Listen, they’ll hang me for it though you know it was self-defense. I’m going to hide the body. They’ll think it was an Orlandian plot. I have an army to lead, a war to fight. You know how important it is. Will you not tell anyone?”
She nodded.
He glanced about. Her veil and headpiece were on the ground. “Collect your things and put them on while I move the body.”
Knowing she had at least to get the Blue Eye to Musette, Arvana looped the relic’s chain over her head, and then bent to collect her headband, veil, and the flower.
The woman’s spirit reached for the relic, but it was beyond the grasp of her ghostly hand and her fist tightened in frustration. “No, you must give it to my Nani. It was he who killed the draeden, wasn’t it? There are no hands, no heart, more able. I made it his destiny.” Her eyes flashed with the same unswerving command as Nan’s. She was his grandmother.
Nan was grabbing Chane’s body by the boots.
“It was he,” Arvana said to the spirit. Arvana’s voice sounded strange, as if she was hearing it spoken by another’s mouth. Was it only her spirit speaking? Nan hadn’t seemed to hear, but the spirit had.
“Then give Nani the Blue Eye.”
“I would, but he can’t use it. Few can.”
“Who can?” his grandmother asked.
“The superior, but she is old. And...I can.”
“Then go back to life and help him.”
“That isn’t my charge.”
“Make it your charge. Everything is at stake. Everything. Go back.”
Was there any hope of going back? Only someone with the relic could bring her from Hell. “I can’t go back without the superior,” she whispered half in hope, half in dejection, and uncertain if it came out aloud. How long could one exist in both worlds? Long enough to get to Solace? It was an eight-hour ride. Concentrating on speaking aloud, she said, “I must go to Solace.”
“I know,” Nan replied and began to drag the body from the path. His grandmother’s spirit drifted away with him, though she kept an entreating gaze on Arvana.
As Arvana draped the veil over her head, her hands tingled, as if they had fallen asleep. By the time she fixed the headband and went to insert the flower, they were nearly numb. She brought them down and examined them. They barely glowed with life. The dimness was spreading up her arms, up from her feet. She was a windowpane frosting from the edges in.
Nan’s grandmother left him and flew toward Arvana. Nearing, her color and beauty faded. She became a gray wraith of dead, tangled life threads. “You mustn’t die. Stay in the blessed blade’s light. It stops the change. Stay by Nani. He must take you to your superior.” With that, the spirit sailed away, her dress and body taking on more and more color as she neared the sword’s light.
Nan was in the woods with Chane’s body. The brush rustled and a faint curse escaped Nan. She wanted to step toward him, but her feet wouldn’t move. Her tongue touched to the top of her mouth to call his name, but she couldn’t summon the breath. The world started graying around the edges; the circle of what she could see in the real world was growing smaller and smaller. A voice from inside Arvana told her to offer her last living words to the Maker. Maker, forgive me. You know I love you.
A faint light crossed the gray field of Arvana’s vision. It grew larger. Warmth, like sunshine, vaguely tickled her skin.
Did she need to be getting all damn religious on him now? Was she already regretting she’d promised to lie about the prince? “Forgive you, for what?” Degarius asked somewhat sharply as he came to take his cloak to hide the gash in his back, but when he got to her, there was something disturbing about her expression that made him forget his irritation. Her eyes lolling upward and her jaw hanging loose, she looked like she was on a suspended verge of fainting. “Ari?”
Her eyes came to a focus, to his relief. With the knife wound in his back, he couldn’t carry her far if she fainted.
Nan’s dear face filled the small circle of Arvana’s vision.
“Speak,” his grandmother’s spirit urged.
“You must take me to Musette, to Solace.” Arvana’s words came only with effort. Her tongue was a weight in her mouth. “Tonight.”
“I wish I could,” he said. “But I have to get to Sarapost. You understand.”
No? Arvana’s eyes burned to cry, but there they were too dry for tears.
He put his arm around her back and propelled her to stumble forward. “Come on, I have to get you to Lady Martise’s. You must leave in the morning, just as you planned. I’ll send someone to Solace for you.”
His grandmother’s spirit swept along at Arvana’s side. “What did he say?”
Arvana shook her head no.
“Speak for me!” the spirit cried. “Speak!”
“Lina says...” Arvana’s tongue stumbled over the guttural Gherian words. When she finished, she sensed that Nan had stopped walking. She strained to see his face. She didn’t understand what she’d said in Gherian except that sometimes the tone was endearing, sometimes scolding.
But Nan looked like he understood.
He looked like he’d seen a ghost.
PINNED BY THE STAG’S ANTLERS
En route to Solace
Ari’s head, cradled in the crook of Degarius’s arm, jerked and jostled with the bumps and sways of Lady Martise’s open one-seater, but she didn’t wake, hadn’t stirred in hours. One of her hands, which he kept in his, never grew warmer. He released her hand, nudged up his glasses, and pinched the bridge of his nose. Damn, this couldn’t be happening. She must be in shock. But, what in creation could account for the strange Gherian words she had uttered. Nani, only his grandmother had called him that, she will die if you leave her. The blessed light of Assaea is her life. Take her to the superior, and you will be rewarded a thousand times over. Before I died I told you to look in Stellan’s chest in the attic for my journals. Remember what you read. It will show you the way, and you will avenge me! Perhaps Degarius had mentioned once that his grandmother called him Nani, but Ari didn’t know Gherian or about the chest in the attic. What struck him, though, convinced him to take her to Hera Musette, were the words about reading the journals. His grandmother had asked him to do it on her deathbed, and he never thought to mention it to anyone or to read the journals. She was crazy at the end, mistaking him for his grandfather, so Degarius thought the request not really made to him. As for the words Ari said about dying and Assaea, they made no sense. One didn’t die from shock, though she was so cold. “Is there a blanket in the back?” he asked Hera Musette.
“There’s no blanket, soldier. Only our bags.” In preparation for their planned early departure, the Solacians had already packed their meager belongings. Even Ari’s kithara had been waiting in the upstairs hall.
Feeling he had to do something, he wrapped his cloak around her.
The horses slowed to a trot. “Why are you slowing?” he grumbled. The moon was on the verge of setting. Then, they’d have to go slower until sunrise, which was still must be an hour away.
“Don’t tell me how to drive, soldier,” Hera Musette said. “There’s an inn ahead, and we need to water the horses.”
Despite telling himself that no one had reason to suspect, he peered backward into the night and listened hard for pursuing horses. Nothing. He’d entrusted a note to one of Lady Martise’s servants to deliver to Fassal at the Coming of Age party, which surely had gone on long into the night. It was the perfect alibi—far better, in fact, than waiting until morning to leave as he originally planned. It gave word of his intention of taking Ari with him to Sarapost after escorting her to Solace to properly renounce her vows. An elopement would cause no suspicion. Fassal could vouch for his longstanding sentiments. Degarius would lose a day or two by going to Solace, but still would be reporting to Sarapost, as the letter from Ki
ng Fassal commanded, at his earliest convenience. Ari would see him made general in the grand ceremony. Then, until combat began, she would stay with him. The rigors of camp life would be nothing for a woman accustomed to austerity.
He scanned ahead. The dark, angular shadows farther on must be the inn. Hera Musette drove around back to the well and water trough. She handed him the reins and descended. No lights came on at the inn. Even if they did, their being here only supported the note he’d left Fassal.
When the horses finished drinking, the Solacian took one of the carriage’s lanterns, climbed in and said, “Let me see the dressing.”
He hunched forward. He could have told her that the dressing she’d applied was fine, but he didn’t want to agitate a woman who already knew too much. When they’d reached Lady Martise’s home, Ari had spoken a few disjointed words to her fellow Solacian—the prince was dead and she and Nan must reach the superior tonight. He wished that Ari hadn’t mentioned Prince Lerouge, but there was no undoing the revelation. She hadn’t said how the prince died, but Hera Musette had noted his back and hastily cleaned and dressed it. At least having the wound tended was for the best.
Hera Musette plucked his blouse open at the neck. “It looks well enough. You were lucky your shoulder blade kept it from being worse.” Next, taking Ari’s wrist, she palpitated for a pulse. “Thready and shallow.” Hera Musette grimaced. “Solace is another hour.” She slumped into her seat, grabbed the reins, and snapped them against the horses’ rumps. “You should pray, soldier. Or do you think she doesn’t need your prayers? A Solacian, a good Maker’s woman. I warned her, I did, and I thought she heeded me. After he went away to Orlandia, I thought it ended. But no, I was wrong. And with so much at stake!”
“What do you mean?” Degarius asked. “What was at stake? What ended?”
The Solacian pursed her lips and shook her head. “You’re a grand fool if you can’t guess jealousy is why the Prince of Acadia put a knife in your back. She was his miss.”
