A Kiss of Fire

by Jacquelyn Frank

  Ariana then singed through Mariah’s bonds, grabbed Mariah’s hand and bolted down the hall with her. She didn’t know if there were other Jadoc shamans in the group, and she wasn't going to stick around and find out. She began to scream, determined to alert every guard within shouting distance. Unfortunately, they were in the raj’s wing of the temple and odds were the entire wing was full of men devoted to Vich by then. Her only hope was to alert the guards who were loyal to Sin and to get the troops somehow mobilized to take down Vich’s entourage.

  Screaming, she realized, was too ineffective a response. It didn’t alert anyone to anything except that there was a woman somewhere screaming her bloody head off. So she began to scream words.

  “Traitor! The traitor Vich is in the temple! Traitor! The traitor Vich is in the temple!”

  A man came out of nowhere and grabbed for her. She didn’t know whom he was with until he tried to slap a hand over her mouth. The minute he did that she generated a pulse of pure heat and drove it into the core of him. It literally cooked the man from the inside out. He had no chance to even scream.

  She continued yelling as she tore into the main body of the temple. To her credit, Mariah kept up with her. Ariana paused in one of the cross halls and tried to think of what would be the next best course of action. She could go to the stables, get a horse…ride hard away.

  Vich would only chase her down. There really was only one thing she could do. She had to find Vich and take him out herself. It was the only way. Once their leader was gone his men would have no direction. No one to lead them. That meant she had to find him. And if she had guessed right then he would be with Fatima.

  “Mariah, go find a place to hide. Somewhere dark and small. Quickly!”

  Mariah nodded and, bless her, didn’t hesitate. She ran off and left Ariana to her own devices. Ariana turned toward Fatima’s quarters and came around the corner just in time to see Vich yanking his mother out into the hallway by her arm. He looked up and saw her.

  “You! I’m going to kill you, you little—“

  Ariana did not wait for him to finish the statement. She knew Vich was a Death Singer shaman. If he wanted someone to enter the afterlife all he had to do was focus long enough and hard enough. She didn’t give him the opportunity. She ran forward, barreling into him, wrenching him apart from Fatima and sending him sprawling back into his contingent of guards. She generated fire and heat from her hands and flung it all out toward Vich and his guards. They all caught fire, including herself. Her nightgown went up in flames, but she ignored it. The fire wouldn’t burn her. She was impervious to it.

  She felt Vich’s hand close around her arm. He was screaming in pain, dragging her down as if he could make her burn with him.

  He could not.

  She wrenched free of him then shucked off her nightgown. She quickly turned to Fatima. Fatima was reaching out toward her dying son, her expression horrified and grief-stricken.

  “You must come away. The temple is burning,” she said to her as firmly as possible without yelling at her. Flame was climbing up the hallway walls. The temple was probably on fire in the other wing she had just come from as well. She realized then that she had told Mariah to hide. To hide in a burning building.

  The screaming of the men she had set on fire had come to a halt. Their bodies were burning like cordwood, lying in a jumbled stack of melting flesh. Vich, she realized, was dead. But the threat was not over. Not as long as some of his men were still threaded throughout the temple. And there was no way of knowing who was Vich’s men and who were Sin’s. Vich’s men would not know Vich was dead. Not unless she told them…and why would they believe her? Plus, she didn’t plan on sticking around long enough to exchange words with them.

  “We need to get to the troop barracks and alert them to the invasion of Vich’s men into the temple and try to arrange fire brigades before the temple burns to the ground with everyone inside! Fatima, please you must come!”

  This last finally got through to the older woman. She had fallen to the floor in the scuffle, but now she got to her feet, her chin raised high as though she were walking into a grand ballroom and not standing in a hall with the smell of her burned son thick in her nostrils. She followed Ariana out of the building and into the cold, stark night. It did not matter to her that she was naked for everyone to see. What mattered to her was Mariah and all of the other innocent people in danger of burning to death because of the fires she had set. She could not bear any deaths on her conscience. Once Fatima was safe with the watch commander, Ariana ran back into the burning building. The antithesis of her power was to take flame away from where it burned, so if she could act quickly enough she could literally snatch the flame away from its fuel. But it took a lot of energy to take flame into herself like that and there was an element of danger to it too. It heated her core body temperature like a fever, burning her up from the inside. It could be deadly to her if she did not use the ability with moderation and there was no telling what it would do to her unborn child.

  She started in the hall to Fatima’s rooms. She ignored the men pushing her around to get water back and forth to the fire. Some even throwing sand on the fire to smother it, others beating at it with their jackets. She began to focus on the flame, on drawing it back into herself, and then slowly a line of fire leading from the burning building to the center of her body formed. She began to devour the flames, the fire dousing, no longer growing. Her body began to heat up, making her break a sweat. She panted hard for breath. There was so much of it…so much flame. It had spread to the new timbers with alarming ease. The flames subsided though, until all that was left were little patches of cinder and ash.

  Men stood still suddenly, the pandemonium of their shouts and actions coming to a halt. They all turned to look at her. One of them leapt to her side, shrugging out of his coat and wrapping her naked body up in it.

  “Come my lady…come away.”

  “No. I must go to the other wing,” Ariana said, sliding her arms through the sleeves of the jacket. She gave his hands a brief squeeze. “Thank you.”

  She hurried away from him, toward the second point of fire. As she came around the bend in the hallway leading to the raj’s wing she was greeted with a raging wall of fire. Here too was the riot of men shouting and water flying and jackets and blankets beating. This fire was far worse than the other and she could hear screams from beyond the wall of flame.

  Vich’s wives and concubines. She had unwittingly trapped them in the hall between two points of ignition. There was no escape for them. They and their children would burn to death if she didn’t take the flame back. But to do so on a massive scale would surely kill her, she fretted. She could risk her life willingly, but to risk her child?

  No. She had to do what she could. She couldn’t leave them there to burn to death. She raised a hand against the burning light of the fire and began to focus on drawing it back into her. She was still hot inside from dousing the previous fire and this only made it worse. She began to pant from the heat, persevering as one inch of flame came away from its tinder, the another and another. She could just see beyond the flames to where Vich’s women were huddled against the floor, sobbing and wailing helplessly, clinging to their children. Ariana redoubled her efforts, her knees giving way beneath her. She fell to them, gasping for breath.

  “Ariana!”

  She barely heard whoever shouted her name. But then cold hands were shaking her, breaking her concentration. The man’s hands were like ice.

  “Stop!”

  “I can’t they’ll die!” she said numbly. Then it registered to whom she was speaking. “Sin!”

  “Yes, love. Let me do it. You need to rest.” He cradled her to his chest and she felt the cold of his body like a soothing breeze. Her superheated skin was wet with perspiration and she clung to those deliciously cold clothes and hands as if she were drowning and they were her only means of staying afloat.

  Then she was aware of the orange glow
of fire dying down and the coolness of his body was gone, replaced by warming flesh and then he too was perspiring. Finally, the flames were gone and men were crossing the burnt hallway to retrieve Vich’s women and children. They were soot blackened, their noses beneath streaked with the smoke they had inhaled. They were coughing and crying.

  “Lindo, take the women to clean quarters. See them bathed and put to bed. See that they are all well-guarded. I will figure out what to do with them later.”

  He stood up and dragged Ariana up high into his arms. He turned and strode down the hall until they were entering the master’s quarters. He took her to the bathing chamber and ran cold water into the tub. He stripped her of the bedraggled jacket she was in and settled her into the icy cold water. Her body was so superheated that even a tepid bath would have felt icy cold to her. He knelt beside her on the floor, carefully keeping her head above water. Her teeth began to chatter and she automatically went to warm the water.

  “No,” he said, realizing what she was doing. “Leave it cold. You need to cool down.”

  “And what of you? You are warm too.”

  He smiled at that and the way she tugged on him as if to get him into the bath with her.

  “No,” he said on a soft laugh. “We’re taking care of you, not me.” He caressed her smoke-streaked face. “Where is that girl of yours? Scared out of her wits no doubt.”

  “I told her to hide. She was scared. We both were. Oh Sin, I’ve never been so frightened. I thought he was going to use me to get to you. I thought you might give up your life for mine and I could not have it. He was going to kill me anyway once he learned I was pregnant with your child. He wouldn’t risk it being a son that could take it all away from him.”

  “It was never his to begin with…and never would be. I know he would have killed you anyway. He would have killed us both. Giving in to his demands was never an option. But he could have made me feel it. Every minute of it. He could have used you to hurt me in…” His voice was throttled in his throat. “When my spies told me he was no longer in his camp I knew where he was. I knew he would come here. I played right into his hands. It was a clever ruse…almost a perfect one. But some of my spies are not so easy to fool, thank god.”

  “Thank god,” she echoed through chattering teeth.

  “I rode as if the hells were opening up behind me. I couldn’t get here fast enough. Kiltian dapples are strong and built for endurance, but they are not known for their speed. Oh how I wished for a Saren thoroughbred. But then I was here and I could see the fire. I knew it could not hurt you, but my mother…and so many others. And I didn’t know if he set the fire out of spite after taking you and going. Until I saw you in the hallways I thought the worst—“ Here his voice broke again. She saw him blink his eyes rapidly and she knew he was on the borderline of tears. It touched her to know she was so deep in his heart.

  “Your mother is safe,” she said.

  “I know. I saw her with the watch commander. Then he told me that you had told him Vich was dead and that you were inside.”

  He reached for a sponge and a bar of soap. He lathered up the sponge and started to wash down her body in soothing, cool strokes. He washed the soot from her body and the smell of smoke from her hair. He did this tenderly and unhurriedly. He was gentle and thorough.

  When he was done he had all the soap rinsed from her body and lifted her out of the tub. When she put her arms around him she realized he still had his heavy coat on from out of doors. He hadn’t even stopped to take it off before caring for her.

  He wrapped her up in a thick, dry towel and then carried her to their room. Here he laid her on their bed and tucked her beneath the covers.

  “Cooler now?” he asked.

  “Yes. Much better.”

  “You took a big risk,” he scolded her.

  “I couldn’t let them die. Whatever their loyalties, they didn’t deserve that. They didn’t deserve to be punished for the acts of a selfish man.”

  “I agree.”

  “And now they have no one.”

  “Untrue. They have me. I will care for my brother’s women and children just as I would have had he died by any other means. His firstborn son is now my heir. They, the women and the children, are still my family. They will be treated as such.”

  “That is very kind of you.”

  “That is the Kiltian way. Had my brother been a decent man, he would have cared for my wife and child if something were to happen to me. But he wasn't a different man. I forbore him too long. I always thought it was only political maneuvering, all his nay saying and his negativity toward all of my choices and decisions, his way of making himself feel powerful or useful or…I don’t know. I had been tolerating it so long for the sake of my mother. I didn’t want her to see her sons at each other’s throats. Yet all the while…it was not an example of my brightest moment.”

  “You didn’t want to believe your brother could be so treacherous. You couldn’t have lived in a world of constant suspicion. It wouldn’t have been wise or healthy.”

  “It will take me a long while before I can trust in those around me again. Lindo will help me weed out the bad eggs…but it will take a lot of time and a lot of caution. Thank God for Lindo. Were it not for him…I would be dead by now no doubt.”

  She shivered at the thought.

  “Cold?” he asked, mistaking the reaction.

  She shook her head. “But come and warm me all the same.” She pulled back a corner of the bedclothes and patted the bed.

  He sighed. “As much as I would like to, there is much to be done. I have to make certain all are accounted for…and that all of Vich’s men have been routed out. Lindo is doing that as we speak no doubt, but I should help him. You rest. Get some sleep. I will be in when I can. When I find Mariah I will send her to you.” He hesitated and looked at her curiously. “How did you get away from my brother?”

  She blushed and looked away, murmuring her reply. “I threw up.”

  “You…what?”

  She explained what had happened and slapped him lightly when he started laughing. But she smiled. “It was just the distraction I needed. You can thank your child for it. He has saved both of our lives.”

  “You said ‘he’,” he pointed out, a smile in his dark eyes.

  “A figure of speech. It could be this was all the cunning of a promising young woman.”

  He laughed. “I wouldn’t put it past her. She would be just like her mother.” He bent and kissed her warmly. “Now sleep. I will be in shortly.”

  She nodded and hunkered down into the covers. She suddenly realized just how exhausted she was. It had been a long, traumatic night. She was ready for sleep.

  She closed her drowsy eyes and was asleep before he even made it out of the room.

  Probably because he lingered to make certain she was completely at rest.

  And safe.

  Epilogue

  Sin paced outside of his bedroom.

  It was taking too long. Too damn long by far.

  Since the night of the fire, the night when he had almost lost everything, he had not let Ariana out of his sight. In fact, they had been inside each other’s pockets so much that this was the first time he had spent any extended period of time away from her since then.

  Kiltian tradition demanded that the father not see his child until he was cleaned and dressed in the formal wraps of an heir of the Kiltian in question. Whether it be a son or a daughter. In Kiltian tradition, if he had a daughter and no sons were born, then that daughter could give birth to a son who would then inherit the royal title…provided the raja lived that long. However, if he died before his daughter had issue, then it would go to his next heir…who at this point was Vich’s son, a mere five-year-old boy. So, until a male child was born, a daughter could conceivably be the mother of the next stage of his legacy. As such, it was only proper she be given all the same ceremony as a male child.

  And ceremony said he was to wait outside of his wif
e’s birthing room, listening to her screams and grunts of pain, unable to do a damn thing about it. Being in the room wouldn’t make much difference, he told himself. He would just be able to watch her struggle instead of just hearing it. And he didn’t want any bad luck marking his son’s birth.

  Or his daughter’s.

  He would be happy either way, he told himself for the hundredth time. As long as both mother and child came through in perfect health, he would be happy. He feared for them both. His mother had lost two children in childbirth…and he had discovered that Ariana’s mother had died while giving birth to her sister Gretha. These were bad portents on both sides.

  He grabbed for the handle of the door, determined to go inside the bedroom…but again he let go, as he had over a dozen times already. He was not a superstitious man by nature, but in this case it was better to be safe than sorry. In Saren they were not so mired down in such traditions. Men chose whether or not they wanted to attend the birth in close quarters. And yet hundreds of healthy births occurred yearly.

  This was nonsense. Superstitious nonsense.

  But if he were to go in and something were to happen…he would never forgive himself.

  But if something were to happen and he was not there for his wife, he would never forgive himself.

  Lindo stood up from the chair he had been sitting in, walked over to the small sideboard where a glass decanter of hussa sat gleaming its amethyst color in the firelight. It was only just turning cold enough to have a fire these early days of fall. It had been a scorching summer, unheard of heat, and Ariana had been incredibly uncomfortable in her last heavy months of pregnancy. Lindo poured two fingers of hussa into two glasses and walked to hand one to Sin. Sin stared at the offering blankly for a long moment.