Paladin

by Sally Slater

  His master pulled it out with a grimace. “Thanks for the extra weapon.” As soon as the blade was free of his flesh, he chucked it at Braeden’s head.

  Braeden snatched the katar out of the air, the tip grazing his forehead. The edges of the blade cut deep into his palm, but he disregarded it. “You’re getting slow in your old age,” he said, “or perhaps I’m getting faster.” Braeden threw the katar, and ran forward, following the blades’ trajectory. Another pair of katar slid into his hands as he ran.

  Braeden’s katar were inches from his master’s neck when something barreled into him, knocking him to the ground. Massive jaws snapped near his throat. Braeden stabbed upwards, through scale and skin, and shoved the demon’s dead weight off his body. “No fair,” he growled, scrambling to his feet.

  His master laughed. “If I’ve taught you anything, it’s that there’s no such thing as fair fighting, only winning and losing. Anything goes.” The High Commander crooked his finger, and two of his demon entourage launched themselves at Braeden.

  Braeden avoided the swipe of a clawed paw and cut off the offending claw at its furry wrist. The demon stumbled awkwardly on its three legs and stump, and Braeden put the creature out of its misery with a quick slash.

  Jagged teeth took a small chunk out of his shoulder, and Braeden’s vision blurred. He flexed his bicep to stymie the pain. The demon attacked him again, teeth first, but this time Braeden rammed his knife into its maw. The next stab of his dagger was into his own heart.

  It hadn’t been long since Braeden last invoked his demon, and the change came over him quickly. Blood surged through his veins in waves and his muscles pulsed and swelled. A red haze settled over his eyes, while his pupils elongated and twisted. His senses sharpened. He could feel the restlessness of the demons that surrounded his master as if it were his own restless energy.

  “Attack!” his master ordered. Lips peeled back and haunches coiled, ready to spring.

  No, Braeden thought at the demons. He closed his eyes and concentrated. Behind his lids were malleable blobs of darkness connected by thread to a central point—his master. Mentally, he pulled at the thread. Obey me. The demons halted mid-spring, frozen in their tracks. Braeden bared his teeth in a parody of a smile. They were his to command.

  The High Commander flinched. “I see you’ve learned a thing or two,” he said. “But can you hold them?” Braeden felt a tug as his master tried to wrest away control. The demons snorted and stomped, caught between the two men as they each vied for dominance.

  “It seems we are at a stalemate,” his master said through clenched teeth, sweat coating his brow.

  “So it would seem,” Braeden said, aching under the mental strain. It would be so easy to let go—it hurt.

  The High Commander held out his hand to him. “Come with me, Braeden,” he said. “There’s nothing for you in their world. You belong with me, not with those who would reject you for what you are. There’s so much more that I can teach you. We can ride the world of dreams together and fashion our own reality. A better reality. One without man’s stupidity and prejudice—”

  “Without demons?”

  His master laughed lightly, like a flute on the wind. “Oh, Braeden.” He scratched a hellhound behind its ears. “You are a demon. My greatest experiment—the best of man and imagination. You’re meant to be their king.” His voice softened. “Even if your Sam were to survive, she’s not for you.”

  Braeden met the High Commander’s gaze and held it. “I know that,” he said. “It’s enough if she lives.”

  His master’s face turned ugly, lit by unrestrained glee. “You really don’t know, do you? Whether she dies by my blade or by demon, you’ve doomed her.”

  Braeden’s upper lip curled. “What do you mean?”

  “This poison you feel for her,” the High Commander spat, “is a contagion. You’re the king among beasts, Braeden, and your desires are theirs. Every time you look at her, every demon within range turns into a lovesick puppy.”

  Braeden shook his head. “I don’t understand. Demons are incapable of love.”

  His master sneered. “Aye, that they are. But they are capable of want and lust.” He took a step closer to Braeden, his small eyes glittering. “You want Sam, Braeden. Well, so do they. And they won’t stop wanting her till you either give up this foolish infatuation or she’s dead.”

  Bile rose in his throat. “No,” Braeden whispered. “You’re wrong.”

  “Am I?” the High Commander asked. “Ask yourself this—what do you want more than anything?”

  Sam. Her name came unbidden to his lips.

  “Concentrate, Braeden,” his master said in soothing tones. “What do the demons want?”

  Braeden closed his eyes again and felt the pulsating storm of the demons’ savagery. There, at the center of the maelstrom, was Sam. Their violence warped his desire, and the outcome was a singular, focused bloodlust. He’d felt their pull towards her before, but never had he made the connection.

  “You see?” the High Commander said. “Leave her with that idiot Tristan. Come with me.”

  Braeden’s resolve hardened. “Tristan’s no idiot,” he said. “And neither am I. Whether I choose to leave Sam or not, you’ll try to kill her either way. Tristan, too.” His voice deepened with menace. “I won’t let that happen.”

  “Don’t be a fool, Braeden,” his master said. A line of demons separated him from Braeden—he was too close and yet not close enough. Their stalemate would last the night if they both refused to bend. That suited Braeden just fine—it would buy Tristan time to leave the Diamond Coast with Sam. His master continued, “Women are pathetic, as bad as the male of their species.”

  This piqued Braeden’s curiosity. He’d never heard his master speak of such things. “You don’t count yourself among them?” Braeden asked.

  His master snorted indelicately. “Humans are ruled by their fear. Me, I rule fear.” His neck stretched forward, the muscles straining. “I can show you how to take fear and shape it into living nightmare. Love, Braeden, is a fickle thing, but fear will never desert you.”

  “I have already had a lifetime of fear,” Braeden said. “I have no interest in a lifetime more.”

  For a moment, his master’s composure slipped. “Fool!” he hissed, then reigned himself back in. “You will only ever know fear, Braeden, never love. Your own mother couldn’t stand the sight of you.”

  Shock ran through him at the mention of his mother. “You knew her?”

  “Knew her? Your mother was mine to play with: a lesson in the power of fear. Do you know what she was afraid of?” His master let out a singsong laugh. “Me. And so I fashioned a demon in my likeness, or at least the relevant parts. I watched it rut with her till she grew round with you.” His laughter turned discordant. “Your loving mother tried to kill you as soon as you left her womb. And when that failed, she killed herself.”

  Rage coursed through Braeden, and he felt himself teetering over the edge. “You killed her as surely as if you held the knife yourself.”

  “Aye,” his master said. “And you, Braeden, were the knife.”

  The rage and the blackness that came with it consumed Braeden. This time he welcomed it.

  CHAPTER 40

  Sam floated in darkness, swept along by the currents of an ocean so black that no light could reach her. Black ocean melded seamlessly into black sky. Sam saw nothing, heard nothing, felt nothing—not even the weight of her own body. She drifted.

  Then she heard it—the beat of a drum—soft at first, and then louder and louder till it thundered in her ears, vibrating in her skull. The waters became choppy and rough. Lightning zigzagged through the stark black of the sky. It struck again and again, and each time, the world flashed brilliantly white. Sam saw glimpses of faces in the white, faces she recognized and faces she did not. Shorn blond hair and a rugged jaw, colorless eyes that held more sadness than any one person had a right to, worry lines across the forehead of a beautif
ul young woman.

  And then there was pain—unbearable, excruciating pain, worse than a hundred broken bones or a thousand seeping cuts. Her body screamed out in agony and her back arched, sharp needlepoints pricking her everywhere.

  “Shhh,” came a soft, feminine voice. “Shhh, you’re all right now.” A gentle touch swept Sam’s hair behind her ears and something cool and damp was draped across her brow. Then darkness claimed her again and all was silent but for the beat of the drum.

  CHAPTER 41

  Tristan ran his fingers through his hair. He caught himself and made an effort to keep his hands to his sides. After the past week, it was a wonder he hadn’t gone bald. “Has there been any change?” he asked the doctor, Addie.

  She fixed him with a scathing glare. Tristan winced. He had asked the same question twenty times a day since the Uriel had taken over Sam’s care, and apparently the good doctor was tired of hearing it. “As I’ve told you before, you will be the first to know if her condition changes, Master Lyons.”

  Master Lyons. Tristan still wasn’t used to his new station. He was a nobody now, a man like any other. “Thank you, Addie.”

  She nodded distractedly. “Now get out of my sickroom. You’re in the way.”

  It shouldn’t have surprised Tristan that the Uriel’s doctor was a woman—and Sander Branimir’s daughter, no less—not when his trainee was his own betrothed. Gods, what a shock that had been. He hadn’t believe Braeden at first, and Sam’s face had been so bruised and bloody that it was impossible to reconcile it with the girl he remembered from his one encounter with the Lady Samantha. But Braeden had no reason to lie to him, and as Sam began to heal, Tristan slowly started to put the puzzle pieces together.

  As for Addie, she could scowl at Tristan for his constant pestering all she wanted, but he would be damned if he lost his betrothed for a second time.

  Before exiting the infirmary, he took one last lingering look at Sam’s pale face. The bruises had faded to yellow and the cuts had healed to thin pink lines, some of which would scar. But it was the wound below her neck that scared him—one hairsbreadth closer and the High Commander’s blade would have pierced her heart. Regardless, a deep chest wound was a grave injury, and though her breathing and heart rate were steady, Sam had yet to regain consciousness. Addie changed the dressing twice a day but refused to let Tristan see what lay underneath the bandages. “A woman has to have some privacy,” she had said.

  “I’m her betrothed,” Tristan had insisted, peeling back the thin sheet that covered Sam from neck to feet. Having none of it, Addie had slapped his wrist with the dull end of her lancet. “My sickroom, my rules. Get out.”

  If she weren’t so hell-bent on keeping him out of her sickroom, Tristan would have liked Addie Branimir. She had a no-nonsense attitude and a compassionate bedside manner befitting a doctor. As tall as most men but built with the lush curves of a woman, she was, he had to admit, breathtakingly beautiful—the kind of beauty that caused men to lose their heads and women to hate her on sight. Addie had inherited her father’s hazel eyes and dark red hair, though it was impossible to tell its length or texture since she wore it in a sensible bun. Her full lips and straight nose, however, must have been gifts from her mother. But she didn’t act like most beautiful women that Tristan knew—Addie was far more interested in mending broken bones than in fluttering her eyelashes.

  Tristan sighed. “Goodbye, Addie. I’ll check in on Sam again in an hour.”

  “Please don’t,” came Addie’s muffled reply. She had disappeared into the storerooms, likely to mix some foul-tasting concoction for the next poor sap who fell under her care. “I’ll send for you if you’re needed.”

  Tristan left the sickbay and climbed up the winding stairs to his temporary chamber in the Beyaz Kale. The chamber was in an unused, musty corner of the castle and the accommodations were sparse—little more than a bed and an extra pallet. Sander had apologized, explaining the room was the best he could do on short notice. But Tristan was grateful to have anywhere to stay; he’d been unsure of the reception he would receive in Luca, considering the circumstances under which he’d left.

  Braeden sat on the edge of the extra pallet, pricking his fingers with a dagger. “I just came from visiting Sam,” Tristan told him.

  Braeden’s eyes lifted and then returned to his fingers. “How is she?”

  “The same,” Tristan said. He took a deep breath and sighed. “You haven’t visited her since you got to Luca.”

  “I know.”

  Braeden had always been self-contained and a little aloof, but he’d been even more taciturn since he’d shown up in Luca, two days after Tristan had arrived with Sam. When Tristan had asked him what had transpired with the High Commander, Braeden said simply, in a voice colder than the grave, “He lives.” And then he clammed up, tight-lipped and somber.

  “You should visit her,” Tristan said. “I think she’d like that.”

  “She’s unconscious. She wouldn’t even know,” Braeden said callously. He resumed pricking his fingers. “Besides, she has you.”

  Tristan shook his head. He couldn’t understand Braeden’s reluctance to see Sam; the two of them had been thick as thieves before the events at the Diamond Coast. “You should go,” he urged. “You’ll regret it if you don’t. If she dies—”

  The tip of Braeden’s knife drove deep into his finger. “Don’t even say that,” he hissed.

  A knock came at the door, breaking the sudden tension between them. Tristan opened it to a young castle servant. “Excuse me, Master Lyons,” the servant said. “Doc says you should come. Lady Samantha is waking.”

  A tidal wave of relief washed over him. “Thank the Gods,” he breathed. “Braeden, are you coming?”

  Braeden averted his gaze. “I’ll stay for now.”

  “Suit yourself,” Tristan said. He grasped the servant’s shoulder. “Take me to her ladyship.”

  Sam opened her eyes to a face so beautiful it could only belong to a goddess. Funny, Sam had never thought her death would warrant a personal greeting from the Gods. There were so many souls to be ferried over to the Afterlight, after all.

  “Emese?” Sam croaked. Why was her voice so rusty?

  The goddess rolled her eyes. “Not the first time I’ve heard that one, I’m afraid,” she said in a brisk, businesslike tone. “I’m Addie Branimir, the local doctor. You gave us all quite a scare.”

  So she wasn’t dead, then? She should have realized; she was in far too much pain to be dead. Sam blinked as the room came into focus. Stained glass windows let in soft light and color. The walls were lined by neat rows of beds, half of which were empty. The others were occupied by men and women in varying states of illness and injury. “Where am I?” she asked. The last thing she remembered was the High Commander’s leer as he plunged his blade into her chest. She shuddered at the memory.

  “You’re in Luca, in the infirmary of the Beyaz Kale,” Addie said. “Your betrothed brought you here.”

  Her betrothed? Sam glanced down at herself; she wore a woman’s chemise and her breasts were unbound. She blanched. Tristan must have figured out her true identity.

  “You’re hyperventilating,” Addie said. “You need to stay calm.”

  As though the thought of his name had summoned him, Tristan burst into the infirmary. “Sam!” He ran and skidded to a stop a few feet shy of Sam’s bed. “Lady Samantha.” He bowed at the waist.

  Addie rapped his knuckles. “Stop exciting my patient,” she said. “It isn’t good for her.”

  Tristan put on a contrite expression. “My sincerest apologies to both of you.” He cleared his throat nervously. “Could I talk to Sam—Lady Samantha—for a few minutes?” he asked. “Alone?”

  Addie narrowed her eyes at him, placing her hands on her hips. To Sam, she said, “If he bothers you, just yell and I’ll get rid of him.”

  Briefly, Sam considered pretending to fall back unconscious, but somehow she just knew that Addie would see right
through the ploy. “It will be fine,” Sam said weakly. Except it wouldn’t be—after months of deceit, she finally had to pay for her lies. Gods, Tristan must hate her. How could he not?

  “Okay, then,” Addie said. She tugged on tasseled drawstrings, enclosing Sam’s bed in a maroon velvet curtain. “If you feel faint or the pain worsens, call for me.” Addie ducked out through a gap in the curtain, leaving Sam alone with Tristan.

  Sam squeezed her eyes shut, bracing for a diatribe of accusations and insults. When none came, Sam cracked open a lid.

  Tristan bent down on one knee and clasped her hands in his. “Lady Samantha,” he said. “Would you do me the honor of becoming my wife?”

  Sam’s mouth fell open. After a few false starts, she sputtered, “Is this some sort of joke?” It would be a cruel jest, but it wasn’t as though she hadn’t earned it.

  Tristan’s cheeks reddened. “A joke?” he snapped. He gave a slight shake of his head. “I’m completely sincere.”

  “But Tristan,” Sam said helplessly, “you don’t even like me.”

  His blush deepened. “That’s not true.”

  “Tristan, be serious. I annoy the hell out of you,” she said. “You think I’m selfish and spoiled and disobedient. A day hasn’t passed where we haven’t squabbled.”

  Tristan tightened his grasp on her hands. “It will be different now,” he said earnestly. “That was when you were my trainee. If I had known—”

  Sam pulled her hands from his. “If you had known that I was Lady Samantha Haywood, you would never have allowed me to be your trainee. You would have returned me to my father with a scolding and a swat on the behind.”

  Tristan flinched, and opened his mouth. She put her finger to his lips. “Don’t deny it,” she said. “You want a wife that you can come home to, who wrings her fingers while you’re gone. I’ll never be that woman, Tristan. It doesn’t matter if you put me in skirts, fix up my hair, and call me Lady Samantha; I’m the same Sam of Haywood you knew as your trainee. I’m willful and stubborn and I’m damned near as good as you with a sword. I’m not going to sit home and mind the babes while you wage my war.”