The Sharpest Blade

by Sandy Williams

  If Caelar’s here, and they’ve already discussed a plan, I’ve slept a hell of a lot longer than I thought.

  Careful not to disturb Aren, I get out of bed and follow Kynlee into the main part of the house. Lord Hison and Caelar are sitting at the kitchen table across from Lena and Kyol. Nick is here, too. I slide into a chair beside him. My map, messily drawn in dirt on the pouch that held Lena’s anchor-stones, is spread out on the table, along with other maps and a few notebooks, which I’m guessing Nick loaned to the fae.

  “Jythkrila,” I say, watching Caelar’s and Hison’s expressions. Recognition flashes in both of their eyes. They’ve never been there before, but seeing my map and hearing the location is as good as if they fissured there on their own.

  “Do you know what we will find there?” Caelar asks.

  “I’m hoping you’ll find evidence that Cardak is not Tar Sidhe as he claims to be,” Lena answers. “If we can link him to Thrain, it will give people a reason to doubt him.”

  “They need reason to doubt him?” My voice is unexpectedly tight, and I’m surprised by the anger that’s pumping through my veins. I’m mad at the fae, I realize. I’m mad at every single one of them who has so much as entertained the idea that the false-blood could actually be Tar Sidhe. Wanting to rid the Realm of human influences is one thing; torturing humans and using the fae’s hatred of them to further your cause is something else entirely.

  “He has an extremely rare and powerful magic,” Lord Hison says. “And he’s presenting himself as a savior. Many fae want that. That’s why the elari are growing in number.” His expression sours, and he glances at Lena. “That’s why we need you. We may have ignored certain parts of the population for too long.”

  May have. Well, that’s certainly an improvement in his attitude. Hison hasn’t mentioned his wish to see the kingkiller brought to justice again. I don’t know if that’s because of the position he’s found himself in, or if it’s because he’s honoring the pledge he made to Aren at the palace. If Aren and I hadn’t stayed behind to face the elari, they would have captured or killed the high noble and his people.

  “Taltrayn and Caelar are fissuring to the Jythkrila camp tonight,” Lena says. “Tomorrow, Caelar will agree to meet with the false-blood.”

  Caelar raises an eyebrow. “I will?”

  “When the false-blood allows you in the palace,” Lena says, “you’ll have access to the surviving high nobles. You will make our case to those you believe will be amenable to ousting Cardak.”

  It’s a risky mission, as risky as any she’s ever asked Kyol to accomplish, and Caelar stiffens at the command in her voice. His jaw clenches and unclenches, but after a handful of seconds, he nods exactly the same way Kyol would.

  “Taltrayn,” Lena says.

  Kyol stands. When Caelar does as well, I rise, too, assuming they’re going to fissure to the false-blood’s camp now.

  “You’ll stay here, McKenzie,” Lena says.

  “If Nimael is there, they’ll need a set of reliable eyes.” The words are out of my mouth before I remember that’s not necessarily true. Kyol can see through fae illusions now. Or, he can at least see shadows of invisible fae. We haven’t tested his vision out to see how well it is.

  “We don’t know if there will be a gate nearby,” Lena says. “Taltrayn and Caelar will make do. If they’re seen and outnumbered, they’ll fissure out immediately.” She looks at the two men and emphasizes, “Immediately.”

  “Of course,” Kyol says. Lena looks appeased by his words, but I’m not. His definition of “outnumbered” isn’t the same as hers or mine.

  THIRTY

  “IS HE OKAY?” Lena asks for the umpteenth time. She’s not pacing back and forth in Nick’s living room, but I’m sure she would be if she wasn’t still recovering from her injuries. After Caelar’s so-called fight with Aren, she fissured back to Nick’s. It was a mistake. It drained her magic and has made her impatient and short-tempered.

  “I’m still breathing,” I tell her, trying to hold on to my patience. “So, obviously he is.”

  “But he’s still there?” she asks.

  I sigh. “Yes, he’s still there.”

  Kyol and, I assume, Caelar are both in the Realm. I think they’re both still in the false-blood’s camp in the Jythkrila Mountains, but I can’t be sure. His heart isn’t pumping adrenaline through his veins, though, and he’s not injured. Both are good signs.

  “They’re not fighting anyone,” I tell Lena, hoping that will calm her.

  “They’re not supposed to be,” she bites back.

  Kynlee looks up from her homework, wide-eyed. Yeah, Lena is touchy. But she’s worried, hurt, and generally exhausted and stressed out, so I’m trying to be understanding.

  I just give Kynlee a shrug as Nick walks into the living room. He’s carrying a glass filled to the top with a white liquid that I’m guessing isn’t milk. He holds it out to Lena.

  “What is it?” she asks without taking the glass.

  “It’s something I mix up for Kynlee when she’s not feeling well,” he says.

  “I call it a Happy Colada,” Kynlee speaks up from the couch. “It has coconut in it.”

  “And some other things,” Nick says with a nod.

  “Lorn drank it,” I tell Lena when she still doesn’t accept the drink. Slowly, she reaches up to wrap her hands around the glass. Then she takes the tiniest sip.

  And makes a face that’s a lot like mine whenever I drink cabus.

  “It’s good,” Kynlee insists, her brow furrowing.

  Lena glares at her, then takes another sip. When she makes another sour face, I almost laugh.

  “Thanks,” I say to Nick, hoping the drink will help her. I haven’t been able to convince Lena to rest. Her magic won’t completely recover until her body does.

  Nick just nods, then stands there with his hands at his sides, looking like he has something to say. It’s probably something along the lines of “get the hell out of my house.” I’m surprised he hasn’t insisted on it yet, especially since we brought two new fae—Caelar and Lord Hison—here. But maybe he misses the Realm and the action more than he thought he would. He’s asked me several questions about what’s going on. He’s also asked about a few fae he used to know, and a few cities he frequented. And more than once, when a fae has fissured out, I’ve seen his gaze go to the shadows, his fingers twitching as if he wanted to trace their peaks and valleys.

  “Another day or two,” I say, “and she and Aren can probably fissure to Naito’s house.” That’s well over five hundred miles away, but I think they’ll be able to make it. If not, Kyol can fissure them there, taking the drain of passing through the In-Between on himself.

  “Good,” Nick says.

  “You should be resting.” Lena sets her glass aside.

  I frown until she slowly turns her head toward the hallway behind me. Looking over my shoulder, I see Aren.

  “I did rest,” he says. His gaze is locked on me, and my heart does a somersault in my chest. He’s hurting, but his silver eyes are still intense, still mesmerizing.

  “Can we talk?” he asks.

  Something in his tone makes my breath catch, and not in a good way. But I want to talk to him. I want to hear his voice, his laugh, and I want to touch him and taste his lips, so I just nod, then follow him out the back door, hoping I shouldn’t be bracing myself for bad news.

  Nick’s porch is covered. Aren steps off it and onto the lawn. When I do the same, he turns toward me. He’s holding his side. He starts to lift his hand away, but then winces, returning it to his ribs. I hate seeing him this badly hurt. Caelar beat the hell out of him. The cut on his forehead needs stitches, and his right eye is so swollen, I’m certain he can’t see out of it. I’m not so certain he doesn’t have serious internal injuries. His breaths sound wet and raspy, like he has blood in his lungs, and there’s blood at the left corner of his mouth that looks fresh.

  Lena promised not to heal him until three da
ys pass. He hasn’t even made it through one yet.

  He takes a step toward me. He tries to hide how much that hurts him, but the corner of his nonswollen eye crinkles, and the way he winces makes that cut on his forehead reopen. Blood begins to trickle down his temple. Oddly, that’s when the tension whooshes out of me.

  “You’re such an idiot,” I tell him. What is the deal with fae attempting to ignore their injuries?

  He goes still. “Those aren’t exactly the words I’d hoped to hear.”

  “Just sit down,” I tell him. I ignore his sharp intake of breath when I grab his arm and maneuver him back onto the porch, where there are table and chairs. I pull one of the latter out and all but shove him into it. His body tightens up when he lands, and he closes his eyes, waiting for what has to be a wave of pain to subside.

  I feel a little guilty about that.

  “I’m not an idiot,” he says when he can talk again. “I’m determined.”

  “Is that what you call this?” I ask. “Is that what you call your insistence on suicide?”

  “I told you why I stepped forward as the garistyn,” he says. “Hison arrested Lena. He was about to do the same to Taltrayn. I had to—”

  “I gave you a way out, Aren.” That’s the part of the whole thing that I don’t get. I understand why he stepped forward even though I don’t completely agree with it, but he’d already taken the blame for killing Atroth. He could have escaped with me. Lena had an alibi. We would have faked his death, then lived happily ever after. “You should have taken the way out.”

  His forehead creases again. “I did take it.”

  “No, you didn’t.” I glare at the renewed trickle of blood from that head wound. It’s driving me crazy. “You threw my backpack out the window and all but launched me out after it.”

  “I told you I was going with you.”

  My eyebrows go up. “No, you didn’t.”

  “I did,” he insists. Then he says, “I think I did. Or I was going to before the door flew open.”

  “Really?” I ask, letting doubt creep into my voice.

  He gives me a small smile. “I swear it.”

  Damn, I’ve missed him. Even with his lip busted and swollen, I want to wrap my arms around him and kiss him until he feels nothing but chaos lusters on his skin.

  “You should have told me why you were keeping your distance from me,” I say. “I’m still pissed at you for that.”

  “I told you it was the life-bond.”

  “But neither of you told me our lives were linked.”

  “Would it have changed anything?” he asks. Before I can answer, he says, “It wouldn’t have. It would have only made you worry more. And I was trying to find a way to end it without killing either of you.”

  “I could have helped—”

  “That’s another reason I didn’t tell you,” he says. “If you had started asking questions about life-bonds, you would have raised suspicions.”

  I sink back in my chair. “You still should have told me,” I say, this time halfheartedly.

  “I also wanted to be sure you couldn’t work things out with Taltrayn.” There’s a question in his voice, and a note of foreboding, as well.

  My attention turns inward, toward Kyol. He’s still in the Realm and still okay. There’s an occasional blip in the life-bond, a tiny leak of emotion that I equate with surprise, but I’m not worried about him. He’s okay, and I’m hoping those blips are a result of finding incriminating information on the false-blood.

  Kyol feels my attention, though, so I do my best to block him out and refocus on Aren. The small smile I give him is sad, regretful even, because I still hate hurting Kyol.

  “Kyol and I worked things out,” I tell him. “We—”

  A slash of light splits through the air in the center of the backyard. A fae steps out of it. A fae I don’t recognize.

  Aren and I both leap to our feet. The fae’s gaze locks on us the instant mine locks on the name-cord in his hair: red and black. He’s elari.

  He fissures out before my next breath, and Aren curses.

  “Lena!” he yells, grabbing my arm as he reaches for the back door.

  “I can map his shadows,” I say.

  “Did he go to the Realm?” Aren demands.

  I look over my shoulder, see the shadows shift and twist. “Yes.”

  “Then I can’t fissure after him yet.” He slams open the door. “Come on.”

  Lena’s on her feet.

  “A scout,” Aren says, cutting of her question. “Can you fissure?”

  “Not far,” she answers. “How did he find us?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “What’s going on?” Nick asks.

  “The elari know we’re here,” Aren says. He reaches down behind the back of the couch where his and Lena’s weapons belts are lying. He tosses Lena’s to her and fastens his around his waist, all without a grimace of pain.

  Nick curses under his breath then, “Kynlee! Kynlee, in the truck. Now!”

  “What?” she yells. She’s not in the living room. Her voice comes from down the hall.

  “Hison?” Lena asks, buckling her belt.

  Aren shakes his head. “If Hison betrayed us, the elari would know we were here. They’re guessing, testing out anchor-stone locations and rumors. McKenzie, you have a car?”

  Anchor-stones.

  “Shit,” I say out loud. Lena meets my eyes. A second later, she gets it. I dumped her anchor-stones out so I could draw Nimael’s shadows on the pouch that held them. The elari must have found them.

  “Keys are in my room,” I say, heading that way and running into Kynlee.

  “What’s happening?” she asks, as I steady her.

  “Go with your father,” Aren says. “The elari will follow us, not you, but you can’t come back—”

  The backyard erupts with light. It’s like a flash bomb going off, there are so many elari. One, maybe two dozen.

  “If we’re separated, we meet at Naito’s,” Aren says, drawing his weapon as the elari burst inside.

  They break through the windows and kick open the door.

  “Kynlee!” Nick shouts.

  “Oh, crap,” his daughter says.

  I grab her arm, pulling her out of the hall. The only reason we’re not already dead is the silver Nick’s hidden in the insulation. The elari can’t fissure behind us.

  But they can rush in and divide us: me, Kynlee, and Aren on one side, Nick and Lena on the other.

  “Taltrayn?” Aren demands, standing between us and the approaching fae.

  “On his way,” I say. I’ve let him feel every ounce of my fear.

  Aren nods. “Run. Get Kynlee out of here.”

  The first fae attacks him, then the second. I don’t know how he’s able to block their blows, but he does, his blade ringing off theirs and countering.

  I chuck a lamp—the nearest object I can find—at a third elari, keeping him away from Aren. I don’t want to leave Aren and Lena, but I can’t put Kynlee’s life at risk either.

  The third fae sneers at me, bypasses Aren, and hefts his sword.

  Shit!

  I shove Kynlee behind me as I back toward the front door. The fae doesn’t charge forward—I think the silver and the tech is making him cautious—but even at his stalking pace, he’s quicker than me.

  I turn to reach for the doorknob. When I do, I see Nick’s shotgun propped in the corner.

  The elari attacks. I block his swing with the shotgun’s barrel, cock it, then pull the trigger.

  And it slams hard into my shoulder, knocking me into the wall.

  “That’s not how you hold it,” Kynlee says, grabbing the weapon from my hand. She turns, presses it against her shoulder, aims, and fires.

  Then she fires again.

  And again.

  Other shots ring out from the living room—Nick has a gun—and a surge of emotion tells me Kyol just entered this world. Better odds, but not great.

  “I�
�m out,” Kynlee says, lowering the shotgun.

  I ignore the throb of pain in my shoulder, grab her arm. “Let’s go.”

  We run out the front door. It’s the middle of the day, but the street is empty save for my car parked on the curb. I don’t have my keys. Nick’s garage door is still down. We’re going to have to—

  An elari steps out of the house.

  “Just run!” I yell. “Run!”

  I shove Kynlee toward the side of the house, where we’ll be out of the fae’s line of sight, but we’re only clear for half a second. He reappears before we reach the gate to the neighbor’s backyard. When he opens a fissure again, I reach down, grab a shovel lying against the base of the house, and swing it as hard as I can as I turn.

  The elari appears exactly where I thought he would, and the metal shovel slams into his head.

  I swing again before he reorients himself. His head cracks. His face is bloody and cut.

  A third swing, and he drops his sword. I grab it as he’s scrambling toward his fissure. He disappears before I can drive the blade through his heart.

  Kynlee’s staring at me, wide-eyed.

  “Come on.” I run to the neighbor’s fence and open the gate. The yard is an exact replica of Nick’s. I can hear the fight continuing on the other side of the fence, but I don’t hear a gun firing anymore. I hope that’s not a bad sign.

  “Now what?” Kynlee asks quietly.

  I came this way to get out of sight, but we’re far from safe. If someone sees us—

  The gate creaks as it reopens. A shout of “They’re here!” rings through the air.

  I’m already shoving Kynlee toward the back fence. “Over it!”

  Whether it’s fear and adrenaline or just the fact that she’s fae, Kynlee sprints to the wooden fence, leaps high enough to grab the top, then vaults herself over it.

  My trip over it is a hell of a lot less graceful. I toss my sword over first, barely manage to hoist myself on top of it, then I fall to the other side, the wood raking across my skin before I hit the cement sidewalk.

  I force myself to my feet, grab the sword, and sprint across the street. Kynlee runs with me, entering the shopping center’s parking lot. It’s filled with cars and witnesses, though I don’t know if the fae will give a damn about the latter.