Rie pulled the hood down farther over her face. With valuable property out in the open, there would certainly be more guards watching, both private hired arms and military.
Their little group was pushing against the flow of traffic. They would be obvious to anyone looking.
“Isn’t there a better way to go?” Rie asked. This couldn’t be the only way out of the city.
“Not if you want to get to Bjergtopp tonight,” Felman replied.
A herd of goats pressed toward them, directly in their path. Dozens of animals blocked the width of the entire road. Goatherds and frost sidhe shouted at one another, trying to clear the way and straighten out which animal belonged to whom. The goats seemed perfectly comfortable in a mixed crowd.
Daenor squeezed close. Garamaen glanced back at them from ten paces ahead, a half dozen bleating animals separated them. Someone jostled Rie from behind. She turned to find the odd bland eyes of a goat staring at her as the beast tried to nibble at her cloak.
“Leave off,” Rie growled, pushing the beast away.
“Hey! Don’t touch my animals!” A thin-lipped man waded through the white wool. He grabbed Rie’s arm and yanked her away from the goat, as if she were trying to beat on the beast.
The motion of her shoulder shook free her hood, exposing her very un-frost-sidhe short black hair.
“A human?” He peered under Daenor’s hood with a gasp. “And a dark elf? Guards!”
Rie yanked her arm out of the man’s grasp, turning the motion into a quick back-kick to knock the man’s legs out from underneath him. He fell, the goats scattering out of the way. Their movement gave Rie and Daenor just enough room to maneuver out of the herd toward one of the open lean-to’s.
“Not there!” Felman shouted from the group farther ahead. He pointed toward another hut three spaces up the road. A woman motioned for them, her eyes wide.
Meanwhile, the man who’d grabbed her was back on his feet. “Guards!” he called again, “they’re here!”
How could he possibly know who Rie was? How could he have identified them so quickly?
Unless they had only been told to watch out for a human and a dark elf together. That would be a striking combination. Rie shook away the worry. If they were being followed, being chased, the best thing they could do would be to get out of there as quickly as possible.
Rie waded through the goats, most of which were amenable to being moved. She threw her hood back over her hair.
“Ouch!” Niinka complained. “Don’t forget we’re in here!”
“Oof,” Hiinto grunted.
Rie felt the pixies moving around in her hood but said nothing. They were a distraction she didn’t need.
She turned her head, checking over her shoulder to see what was happening. The man was still pointing in their direction and shouting, but the other frost sidhe in the area just looked at him with confused expressions. It didn’t seem any wanted to follow. But then movement in the back. A guard with a tall helm and silver armor was pushing through the crowded street.
Daenor waved her on, pushing her forward. He was right, focus on where they were going, and get there as fast as possible. Just twenty paces to the woman, then they were through the open doorway.
“Quickly.” She kicked aside a pile of dirty straw and pulled open a hatch in the floor. Beneath, a dark room greeted them.
“What about the others,” Rie said, hesitating to enter the shadowed confines of an enclosed box. Felman had pointed them in this direction, but what if it was all a trap? What if he wanted them captured to gain favor with the frost sidhe? It was certainly a possibility.
But then Garamaen would be unlikely to help solve the problem with the wolves.
Unless the frost sidhe had promised their help in exchange for this trap.
“They’ll meet you outside the gates,” the woman replied. “There’s a tunnel in the corner. Emergency escape hatch.”
Rie glanced back at the opening to the hut once more. She didn’t hear any commotion, but Garamaen would have tried to stay hidden.
“Check the possibilities,” Daenor whispered, understanding her hesitation. He too, must have considered that they could be led astray.
“There’s not much time, you have to get down there, now!”
The buzzing of wings caught Rie’s attention. Tiik zipped in and landed in the fur of Rie’s hood with enough force to turn her head.
“Garamaen says to go. He’ll find you outside.” Tiik launched himself back into the air and was gone, faster than the eye could follow.
Rie nodded but took one breath to parse the possible futures of the next few moments. If they hesitated any longer, the guard would come through the doorway and capture them. They’d be taken to some sort of ice prison. If they dropped through the hole now, the girl would cover their tracks and tell the guard they had slipped out through a shuttered window on the back. She’d even make it believable by giving the shutters a bang before the guard arrived and leaving them flapping open in the wind. Rie and Daenor would indeed be able to exit the city through an underground tunnel.
It was not going to be pleasant.
CHAPTER EIGHT
A WEIGHTED WHIP flashed toward Judith’s head. She ducked, narrowly avoiding the bead at the tip.
“You have to be faster than that,” Eliphaz chastised. His arm pulled back, cracking the whip close to Judith’s face.
She flinched, pulling away just in time. If she hadn’t moved, she might have lost an eye.
“When the Moirai assigned you to my physical training, I hadn’t expected I might go blind.”
“You won’t go blind if you move faster.” The blond angel grinned, a glint of bright white teeth between full lips. “If they can’t touch you, they can’t distract you. Don’t take a blow you can avoid.”
Judith’s breath came in ragged gasps as she jumped and dodged, her wings lifting her higher into the air than just her legs could manage. Unfortunately, they also got in her way when she was on the ground. Which was why this training was so important. She couldn’t always simply fly away.
The dust of the training grounds puffed around her feet as she landed.
“The less you move, the faster you’ll be,” Eliphaz continued.
“That makes no sense.” Judith twisted out of the way of a lash aimed at her hip but was too slow to avoid the next strike. The tiny metal bead found skin at her waist. She hissed. Eyes reflexively squeezed shut against the pain.
Another strike on her shoulder. A trickle of blood this time.
Judith lifted a hand, pausing the exercise. Immediately, Eliphaz recoiled the whip, but he frowned as he did it.
“You have to work through the pain,” he said, approaching Judith to look at her injuries. “The souls won’t stop. If you can’t find a way to stay focused on the battle, despite your injuries, despite your fatigue, they’ll easily overcome you.”
“They can’t possess my form. Isn’t that enough?”
Eliphaz shook his head. “You know better than that.”
Judith sighed, hanging her head between her shoulders while she rubbed her side. A welt had already sprung up, the swollen red skin painful to the touch.
“I know.” And she did. She’d experienced first-hand how the souls would do anything to possess a body, and how they could affect even those they couldn’t possess.
Eliphaz straightened up after examining the wounds. The shoulder strike had already stopped bleeding. Judith shouldn’t be complaining so much. But she was tired and angry and resolved to do her best even while fantasizing about throttling Apprentice Sanyare. The woman had gotten her into this mess, taken away her opportunity to finally achieve her goal of becoming a counselor to the souls of traumatized human children. Instead, she would be playing executioner to the irredeemable wicked.
The Moirai would frame it differently, she was sure, but the truth remained the same. She would be forced to hunt and destroy the twisted creatures who’d escaped the Daemon Realm.
Because Sanyare hadn’t just pulled the souls of the dead through the veil, she’d pulled the worst of the worst, the psychopaths and sociopaths without conscience who took pleasure in Chaos. It wouldn’t be long before the innocent began to fall to their wicked desires. Sadly, the lost souls could only be found through the ripples of death and destruction around them.
She loathed the thought of striking the blow that would give a soul its final death, but she hoped she could rescue the innocent before Chaos blackened their souls.
Judith fought to turn her thoughts from the darkness and focus on what Eliphaz was saying. Dwelling on future torments would only handicap her efforts here and now.
“You’re working too hard, thinking too much,” he said. “Use the least amount of energy possible to avoid the blow, and then you’ll last longer in a fight. Think about efficiency.”
Judith shook off her doldrums and lifted her head. “Show me.”
Eliphaz grinned again, approval in his eyes. “On that second to last strike, you twisted out of the way, taking three steps to do so. That’s a lot of energy. It can certainly move you out of the fight, but it also leaves you open. You can’t see where the next blow is coming from when you’re facing the wrong direction. Instead, you could have simply dipped your hip to the side. Less energy used, but still effective at avoiding the strike.” He demonstrated with a shift of his hips and a lift of his arms. “Simply stay out of the way. Sometimes, that only means you have to move a finger-length or two.”
Judith could see what he meant. “But what if you misjudge it. Wouldn’t it be better to move farther to ensure you don’t get hit?”
“Even if you misjudge it, if you’re moving in the right direction, the strike will be less powerful—less damaging—than if you hadn’t moved at all. And it has the benefit of keeping you aware of the next move, and the one after that.”
Judith pursed her lips, nodding her head in understanding. “Okay, let’s try it again.”
The gods only knew when she would be called to fetch the first lost soul. It could be next week, or next bell. She needed to be as prepared as possible.
Eliphaz stepped back, whip held loosely in his hand. He waited for Judith to get set, then launched a series of attacks aimed at her arms and hips. This time, Judith tried to move the least amount possible to avoid the stinging beads. After a few glancing blows that left her wincing but still engaged in the fight, she started to understand the reach and dynamics of the strikes. Soon, she wasn’t being hit at all anymore, and she hardly moved a muscle.
“Don’t take it easy on me,” she said.
“I’m not. But if you’re feeling that confident, I can take it up a notch or two.” The twinkle in his eye gave away his excitement at the prospect.
Judith lifted an eyebrow, still keeping pace with the whip. She blew out a breath but accepted the challenge with a single quick nod.
Eliphaz’s smile widened. The whip continued to lash out at the same pace, but now he was moving. He pushed forward, forcing Judith to step back. A strike at her abdomen had her jumping back with her waist sucked in. The whip came back at her face. She tilted her head to the side, but the bead glanced across her collarbone with a resounding thwack.
Judith yelped. Eliphaz pressed his advantage as her balance shifted out of stance. He lunged forward. His arm flashed out. Eyes wide, Judith watched the bead heading directly for her face. She bent further to the side, but it wasn’t enough. The whip sliced across her cheek even as she overbalanced and landed hard on her hip.
Eliphaz dropped the whip and rushed to her side, his wings outstretched and protective. Judith waved him away, pushing herself to sitting. She touched her cheek, her fingers coming away stained with red.
“I’m so sorry, Judith,” Eliphaz said. “I got carried away.”
Judith shook her head. “I asked for it. Cocky. My own mistake.” Her cheek was entirely numb, but she could feel sticky warm liquid dripping off her chin.
“Here, let me help.” Eliphaz pulled a thick square of cloth from a pocket. Faded red stains marred the fabric, but it looked like it had been washed. Repeatedly. He pressed the cloth to Judith’s cheek.
“You keep a handkerchief in your pocket?” Judith asked.
Eliphaz shrugged, keeping the fabric on her wound. “I’m a combat guardian. Injuries come with the territory.”
“I guess I’m going to have to learn.”
Eliphaz waved away her concern. “You’re not a combat guardian. You’re too nice. But if you’re venturing off-realm, you will need to be prepared.”
“Judith!” Tirzah called from the second-story loft above the training arena. She was Judith’s instructor for the management and counseling of souls. Judith was scheduled to meet with her later in the afternoon but wasn’t entirely surprised to see her now. The loft was Tirzah’s favorite place to rest between classes, or so she’d told Judith.
“Come speak with me for a moment.”
Judith gave a quick nod to the stands before turning back to her sparring partner. “I should go.”
“Same time tomorrow?” Eliphaz asked.
“Yes.” The word came out a disgruntled mumble, but Eliphaz grinned anyway.
“We’ll have you fit for duty in no time.”
“Right.”
Judith thumped her fist to her chest in the traditional greeting of the guardians, then leaped into the air. With a few beats of her wings, she landed in the viewing gallery to find Tirzah seated with another angel.
“Judith, I’d like you to meet Silas. He’s the head of the reaper choir. We were discussing your new role.”
Judith thumped her chest again, this time with a slight bow from the waist. The head of any choir had to be at least a level seven. Judith’s own parents weren’t even that high ranking.
“I’m honored,” Judith murmured, tucking a loose lock of hair behind her ear. If only this meeting didn’t concern the hunt for the lost souls, she might have been more pleased to meet him. Instead, her nerves jangled in anticipation of bad news.
“Your physical training seems to be going well,” Silas said.
His expression was bland and hard to read. Judith couldn’t tell if he was giving her a serious compliment, or just making small talk. Probably the latter.
“Eliphaz is a talented instructor,” Judith replied.
“It was good of him to take you as a student.”
Judith dipped her chin in agreement, unsure what to say. Eliphaz had volunteered for the job, but she didn’t think his skills were in such high demand that it was a hardship.
“Tell me, Judith. What do you know of the dual-souled?”
Judith shook her head, confused. “The dual-souled?”
“Bodies who have been possessed by a non-native soul, without dislodging the original occupant.”
Judith’s eyes widened. She swallowed. “I didn’t know that was possible, sir.”
She’d always assumed only one soul could inhabit a body at any given time. It was why Norgeledil had perished at the Battle of the Arches. The souls had fought over her physical form until her soul could no longer hold on. If that wasn’t true, it changed everything. It meant that two beings could live the same life.
“How could they possibly coexist?” she asked, following her thoughts to their logical conclusion. “The body would deteriorate, naturally be torn apart.”
“Sometimes, that’s true. Usually, one soul is stronger than the other and quickly ejects the weaker. But not always.” The guardian’s cheek twitched. “I once reaped a dual-souled body. The creature had killed itself after being unable to reconcile the two halves of its being. The trauma was too much, and even after arriving in the Daemon Realm, the souls couldn’t be separated. They had twined together. Yet their competing interests had driven them insane.”
“What happened?”
The reaper grimaced. Fully, this time. “They were amongst the first occupants of Hollows South.”
Why did everything seem to com
e back to the Hollows?
“They were truly irrecoverable,” Silas continued. “There was no separating the souls, and their obvious insanity made them a liability if they were to be reincarnated.”
“Do dual-souls always end in insanity?”
“It depends on how quickly the dual nature is discovered.”
“Judith, why don’t you sit,” Tirzah said as she stood and relinquished her stool at the table. She opened her wings and ruffled her feathers a bit. “I have another class to teach.” Eschewing the open balcony, she chose to walk down the stairs.
Strange woman.
Silas pointed an open palm at the now empty seat. “I think we should have a discussion, if you have the time.”
“Of course.” Knowing that a significant number of souls had escaped during the Battle of the Arches, making friends with the head reaper seemed like a good idea. Maybe he would have a way to bring the souls back to the Daemon Realm without destroying them. She would try anything if it meant her sword remained sheathed.
“So, to fully answer your question, if the invading soul can be identified and removed quickly, the original soul should have a strong chance of a normal life. In the case of the humans, who have chosen ignorance regarding the nine realms and the state of their consciousness, the instance of insanity is much higher, and the window of opportunity for recapture is short. The rest of the fae have a better outcome. Usually.”
“But most of the time the invading soul disconnects the original owner and establishes its own connection with the body.” Judith made the statement a question with a lifted brow.
“Yes, usually, but after the battle we performed an inventory of the souls returned to the gates. We couldn’t account for all of them.”
“So there are dual-souled bodies roaming the realms? Isn’t there a way to track them?”
SanyareThe Winter Warrior Page 5
