Eithan and Nicce saw them off hours before dawn.
And then they did crawl into one of the narrow beds together. He could have sworn he was too exhausted to do anything but sleep, but there was something about her close, something that made him insatiable, and they made love after all. It was soft and slow and sweet.
When he fell asleep with her in his arms, his heart felt stretched out in a wonderful way, but it almost hurt, because it frightened him too. None of this between them had ever made any sense. With every moment, he fell more hopelessly in love with her.
And they were taunting gods.
Everything they did was dangerous, and Nicce seemed to have no sense of that.
Maybe it was because she was young.
Gods, was it obscene that he was with her, considering the differences in their ages? Maybe so. He didn’t care. He didn’t feel like an old man. In some ways, he felt like that time with Ciaska had been like being encased in one of her crystals, like the way Lian had been. Trapped and stuck for decades, and he’d been unable to grow or change. He’d been at a complete standstill until the moment he’d crossed swords with Nicce, and she’d…
It was for her.
It was all for her.
He slept and dreamed of her. He dreamed of her laughing and running through a sunny meadow, carefree and happy. When he woke up, he wasn’t certain if he’d ever seen her that way.
It was dawn, and he relished the feeling of the sunlight on his face. It was still new to him, after so much time in darkness. Nicce was still sleeping. He propped himself up on one arm and just gazed at her there, the sunlight spilling over her. Her eyes were closed. Her skin was smooth. Her hair glinted in the light, which brought out strands of red and gold against her dark locks.
His heart hurt again.
She stirred next to him, blinking up at him, a smile stealing over her face. “Were you watching me sleep?”
He smirked. “Maybe.”
“That’s not creepy at all,” she said.
“I thought you told me you were attracted to me specifically because I was creepy,” he said.
She snorted. “Because you were dangerous and thrilling, which is not the same thing.”
He shrugged. “Pretty close.”
She pressed her face into his chest, burrowing close.
Gods, she was warm and soft and perfect. He let out a small, low groan. “So, we need to get up and get moving, because there’s no way Sullo doesn’t find King Timon here. It’s a question of when, not if.”
She made a muffled groan, too, but it was a different sort of groan. “This is what you want to talk about?”
“I don’t want to talk at all,” he said. “I can think of at least ten other things I’d rather be doing.”
“Ten?” She was laughing.
“Give me time, I can think of more.”
She pulled away, running a hand through her hair and grinning at him. “You’re… I love you.”
He kissed her. Longer than he should have. He pulled away and his voice was hoarse. “But regardless of what I want, we need to get up and get dressed.”
She flopped back on the bed. “We barely even slept.”
He glanced at her. “Are you all right?” He didn’t really need to sleep. He could, and he did, but when he didn’t, it made little difference. “Maybe you should go back to sleep, and I’ll—”
“No, I couldn’t,” she said, pushing aside the covers. “It’s too bright. And I’ll be fine. I trained without sleep a lot. Once they made me go nearly five days without it, and I had to fight… six men? One every day and two the last day. It only ended because the last one beat me, I think. They would have kept pushing me until I broke.”
He grimaced. “I’m really less and less sorry about killing so many members of the Guild the more of these stories you tell me.”
“It wasn’t their fault,” she said, sitting up and putting her feet on the floor. “It was Diakos’s doing. It was all his grand design.”
“Well, I’m glad you killed him, then,” said Eithan, sitting up too. He kissed her shoulder. “You know, whatever I said last night, you really aren’t weak. Not even a little bit.”
She looked at him over her shoulder. “And you’re not destroyed. You’re whole, Eithan.”
Their lips met again.
It took them longer than he would have liked for them to get dressed.
But soon enough they were striding through the hallways of the keep, weapons strapped on, not even touching each other. The sun poured over the courtyard, making long shadows that stretched over the dewy grass.
They found Jennix in her study, which had once belonged to Diakos, Eithan understood. There were a set of crossed swords hanging over the fireplace. Jennix’s hair was wet. She must have washed that morning.
“When does the jewel gatherer arrive?” said Eithan, hoping it was soon.
“He doesn’t,” said Jennix.
“What?” said Nicce. “You said—”
“He doesn’t come to the keep,” said Jennix. “He’s set up across the ridge.” She pointed in the direction of the coast. “We go to meet him.”
“Fine,” said Eithan. “When do we leave?”
“Right away,” said Jennix. “If you two are planning to kill Sullo, I’d rather you did it before he arrives here and kills us trying to get to the king. That’s your doing, isn’t it?”
“Should I apologize for that?” said Eithan.
She narrowed her eyes at him. “I don’t get the impression you’re very good at apologizing.”
“He’s not,” said Nicce.
“Let’s just go,” said Jennix, glowering at them both.
They set out on horseback, along with a few other members of the Guild. Eithan insisted they bring a carriage for the jewels. Jennix was surprised, which made Eithan worried. Would the jewel gatherer not have many jewels? They needed a lot to fight Sullo. But Jennix assured him he’d have enough to fill a carriage, and they brought it along.
The carriage slowed them down a bit, but the sun still wasn’t very high in the sky when they met with the jewel gatherer.
He was camped in a valley in a caravan drawn by oxen. He had a lean-to tent set up with chairs, which was apparently where he did business with Jennix usually. Jennix said that he was fond of haggling over price.
This was the first time Jennix seemed to realize that Eithan didn’t have any gold. They had already dismounted from the horses. They were only fifty feet from the jewel gatherer’s encampment. But Jennix turned on them, furious, and blocked either Eithan or Nicce from going past her.
“You’re going to kill him,” she whispered harshly. “Aren’t you?”
“That’ll depend on him,” said Eithan. “Once Sullo is out of the way, we can arrange for some kind of payment, but we didn’t have time to seek anything out.”
“You think he’ll take that news well?” said Jennix, glaring at them. “He’s going to take it out on me, because I brought you both here.” She shook her head. “Listen, this is it. This is the last time I do a damned thing for either of you. After everything you’ve done to me and to the Guild, I don’t really owe you anything. Any favors you’ve done me are payment for services already rendered.”
“What services would those be?” said Nicce, nostrils flaring.
Eithan touched her shoulder, shaking his head. There was no point in picking a fight with Jennix. “Understood. We’re even, then.”
“We’re never even,” she said. “I think you’re in my debt.”
“If we kill the gods,” said Nicce, “then everyone in the Four Kingdoms will be in our debt.”
“All of the gods?” Jennix’s eyes widened.
“No debt,” said Eithan. “But if you’d like, I can hit you and tie you all up so that he doesn’t blame you for what we’re about to do.”
Jennix scoffed. “Only you would offer such a thing as a favor.”
He shrugged. “I guess that’s a no?”
Eithan shot a glance at Nicce. All the gods? Her words floated back to him from a few days ago. I’m not finished. I’m not even close to finished. Nice of her to share her plans with him, especially since he seemed to be included in them. But then, maybe he deserved that. He wasn’t much for sharing plans either. Well, gods take him to the pit. At least odds were she’d be close enough when he died that she could be the last thing he saw. Hadn’t he lived several lifetimes, anyway?
For some reason, he thought of that dream of her, carefree and laughing.
It made something twist painfully inside him.
No time to think of any of that now, though. He started for the jewel gatherer and his tent.
The man was on his feet.
Jennix hurried to overtake them. She reached the jewel gatherer first and did some introductions.
“Cassiel, this is Sir Eithan Draig.”
“Of the Knights of Midian?” said Cassiel. He was a stocky man, a head shorter than Eithan. His hair was greasy and it curled around his neck. He looked Eithan over. “They said you were tall.”
Well, the man seemed impressed, if not frightened. Frightened would have been better.
“We need your jewels,” said Eithan.
“Well, that’s why I’m here,” said Cassiel. “To sell jewels.”
“We’re going to need, um… credit,” said Eithan.
Cassiel’s eyes darkened. “So, you’re here to steal my jewels.”
“That’s an ugly word,” said Nicce.
“It implies violence,” said Eithan. “We’d like to avoid that.”
“But if you force our hand...” Nicce shrugged, putting her hand on the hilt of her sword.
Cassiel shook his head slowly. “How am I supposed to hold my own against the leader of the knights of Midian and all these trained assassins, hmm? I guess I don’t have a lot of choice here.”
“You don’t,” said Eithan. “And this isn’t theft. Write down what we owe you, and once we’re able, we will pay.”
Cassiel laughed, and it was bitter. “Owe you for what? How many are you taking?”
“We’re taking whatever is there,” said Eithan.
“We only hope it’s enough,” said Nicce.
Cassiel’s face twisted. “Do you know what it takes to find that many jewels? Do you know how many days I’ve scoured the hills and valleys of Kemulia only to find nothing? This is what I’ve found in nine months of searching. I search and then I sell, and while I search again, the money I’ve made selling feeds my sick mother. How am I supposed to feed her now? You take this from me, and I starve. My family starves. I have a sister who lost her husband. She has a little boy. I—”
“We will pay,” said Eithan. “And I’m sorry. But everyone has their struggles, don’t they?”
Cassiel looked around, and his fingers were twitching toward a sword on his belt.
“They’ll kill you,” Jennix spoke up. “Don’t, Cassiel.”
“Who cares for your mother if you’re gone?” said Eithan.
“You…” Cassiel was so disgusted, he couldn’t seem to articulate an insult.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Nicce felt for Cassiel, who she could see wasn’t pleased about losing his jewels. Eithan wanted to simply take his caravan, but Nicce intervened, because the man obviously was living out of the caravan. It was cruel to take that.
But it did cost them time, transferring the jewels from the caravan to the carriage. They were in crates and there were ten crates of them, all full. She hoped it would be enough, but she felt that there had been more in Ciaska’s hidden room than this.
There was also the fact that it had never been easy for her to retrieve the magic from the topazes. She didn’t know why that was, but she felt that the spells she’d used on Ciaska’s crystals had worked more easily for her.
Her ineptitude with magic had caused her first tutor at the Guild to give up on her, but then Rhodes had taken over, and he’d been patient and kind, and with his help, she’d mastered tapping into the jewels for their magic.
But she wondered if maybe the similarity between her magic and Sullo’s was what created problems. She truly didn’t know much about her own power, and she didn’t really understand the crystals either. Why did the gods make them?
These were the thoughts that went through her mind as they loaded up the carriage with jewels. She also thought about how she would need to have all the jewels touching, that they couldn’t be in the crates. What she had done with Ciaska’s magic was to funnel each crystal’s power into the next, and by the time it came out of the last one, it was concentrated and strong.
Could she even do that with all of these loose jewels?
She felt frustrated. Eithan had put all this into motion without even consulting her.
But there was no point in those sorts of thoughts.
It had to work, and so it would. She would make sure that it worked.
She and Eithan took the carriage and the jewels, and they kept going when Jennix and the other members of the Guild stopped at the keep.
Eithan figured that Sullo would be coming for King Timon, and that he’d be tracking him from the palace, so all they needed to do was to head for the castle and they would find him.
But they reached the dark forest and there was no sign of Sullo.
They decided that he must have gone back through the portal to the Nightmare Court, and they were debating about bringing the carriage through, which might be difficult, because the bottom of the portal was at least two feet off the ground, when they saw a burst of light from Castle Brinne, and they realized Sullo was still there.
He’d never left.
Nicce went into the back of the carriage and dumped the crystals out of the crates. They filled the floor and spilled up to the seats.
That done, they headed up the mountain toward the castle.
The closer they got, the more dead guards they saw.
Their wounds were blackened, as if they’d been burned, and Nicce thought this was because they’d been hit by Sullo’s power. She thought of the way he’d punched a beam of light through Eithan’s neck, and she felt sick with fear.
Sun and bones, what were they doing?
But they had to do it.
The alternative was to scrape and bow to Sullo, to submit to his horrid ideas about her, to become his daughter and to be controlled by him.
She wouldn’t.
They had no choice.
The gate to Castle Brinne stood open, and it was surrounded by dead guards. They entered the courtyard, and there were more dead. Everyone was dead. Not just guards now, but servants and noblemen and women too.
Bodies littered the ground. Bodies littered the steps. Bodies littered the entryway.
They didn’t go inside the castle, but they could see through the open door.
They got out of the carriage and surveyed the place.
If they left the carriage, they left the jewels, and the jewels were their best weapon.
So, they waited, just outside the castle, and time passed.
“Maybe he’s not in there,” Nicce said finally. By the position of the sun, it was past noon.
“We saw that he was here,” Eithan countered.
“Maybe he left while we were coming up the mountain,” said Nicce.
“He didn’t,” said Eithan. “We would have seen him.”
“There’s a temple to him on the top of the mountain,” said Nicce. “Maybe he went there.”
They both turned to look at the carriage. The path beyond the castle wasn’t passable for carriages. They knew this because they’d been up there, taking refuge in the king’s hunting “cabin.”
“We should search the castle,” said Eithan.
So, they did.
The castle was empty except for a great number of dead bodies. They went from room to room, and the stench of death was all they found.
But when they
emerged back into the courtyard, Sullo was there, standing next to the carriage, peering in the windows at the jewels there.
They both stopped short.
And then Nicce took off running.
“What are you up to?” said Sullo, still staring at the jewels, seemingly uninterested in Nicce’s movement.
Nicce sprinted to the other side of the carriage and tugged open the door. Jewels spilled everywhere.
Sullo shook his head. “Where did you get these, anyway?”
Nicce buried her hands into the jewels and began murmuring the spell she’d been taught by Rhodes to get the power out of the jewels. At once, all the jewels touching her body lit up with bright yellow light.
Sullo made a careless gesture with one hand, and light poured out of his palm.
It hit her in the chest, and it felt like a boulder had dropped on her.
Her voice faltered.
The spell stopped.
And she was propelled backwards, onto the ground, more jewels coming out of the carriage, rolling around, scattering in the grass of the courtyard.
Eithan was there, sword drawn.
But Sullo gave him an annoyed look and send out another beam of light, which punched a smoking hole in Eithan’s chest.
Eithan let out a funny gasping noise and collapsed into a heap on the ground.
Nicce shrieked. She got up on all fours and crawled back into the jewels, whispering the spell. This time, she managed to get a real beam going, pushing it into the jewels surrounding the ones she was touching. It was hot, fiery light, and it hurt—it burned. She gritted her teeth and focused the beam on Sullo.
Sullo looked stunned when the beam hit him in the stomach and pushed him backwards.
He collided with the wall of the castle, and he was pinned there, legs dangling off the ground.
Just like Ciaska, she thought, getting to her feet. She stood with her back to the carriage, facing the castle wall and Sullo, gritting her teeth as she kept the beam alight.
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