“It has to be the crown. Its magic has always been good at taking my subconscious thoughts and turning them into spells I didn’t ask for.”
Malaq’s stare snapped back to mine. “The crown? You repaired it?”
“I—”
“Give it to me,” he cut in. His eyes were dark and ravenous.
Grasping why, I backed away. “Malaq…wait.”
He closed the distance. “Do you have the crown or not?”
“No. Not anymore.”
“Channel it. I want to see it.”
Inching away, I put the table and chairs between us. “I don’t have it.”
“Liar!” Malaq drew his weapon. He swung so fast, I barely had time to jump back. “Surrender it or die.”
I sidestepped as he swiped again. “Malaq—stop!”
“The power is his, not yours.” Hurling a chair, Malaq kicked the table over. He tossed the other chair out of the way and aimed his weapon at me. Wrath gleamed in his lone gray eye. “Last chance, Shinree.”
“Damn it, Malaq.” I pulled the sword off my back. “Don’t make me do this.”
He came at me. I froze for a second, sad and torn, and wishing there was another way. Then he swung; high for my head. I ducked under his blade. He drew his arm back to strike again, and with a mournful cry of rage that stripped my throat raw, I shoved my sword through Malaq’s chest.
It was a fatal blow. He was dead before I even lowered his body to the floor. Letting him go, I ripped my sword out and threw it across the room. I walked away and came back. I didn’t know what to do. There was too much pain, too much sorrow—too much blood on my hands.
There always will be.
I’d come to understand that, to accept it. But this was too much.
I stared down at Malaq. Red soaked the front of him. It ran down off his sides, seeping across the stones of the floor; dark fingers reaching for me.
He was the last one. He was the last one, and I killed him.
“No,” I said, backing away from the body. “No. This isn’t going to happen. Do you hear me? Do you fucking hear me?” I shouted at the air, willing the promise to reach my father’s ears. “I swear by the gods, I won’t let any of this happen!”
FIFTY THREE
“I didn’t think you were coming back.”
I looked up into Jarryd’s blurry face and groaned. “Me neither.”
He helped me sit up. Our connection soared to life, and I was on my back again, snowed under by the sheer weight of his memories. Months upon months of images, sensations, and emotions transferred between us. They demanded my attention. They wanted me to acknowledge and know them. All I wanted was to bury them.
After the misery I’d endured in the future, I couldn’t bring myself to experience the torment Jarryd suffered in prison. I had to push it all into the background. To focus on the serenity that came with being aware of him, the sense of wholeness I had so terribly missed.
Jarryd was doing the opposite. I could tell by his vague, stunned expression. He was struggling to assess all that had happened to me since the Kayn’l tore us apart. It was a massive amount of information. Considering the content, it would take him a lot longer to come to grips with my memories than to receive them. He’ll have them in moments, I thought. In moments he’ll be aware of what I’m harboring inside me.
Once he sensed the crown, I knew what would come next.
Sitting up again, I put a hand on Jarryd’s head and tapped into the nine auras. I wasn’t sure when accessing them had gotten so easy; it just had. That probably isn’t a good thing, I thought, since I hadn’t been able to draw the auras out at all when I first brought them back. Neither was it good the way I kept throwing them around. I’d been turning to the crown’s magic way too often. But it was in me, and it was fast, and keeping Jarryd from trying to kill me was somewhat of an emergency.
Finding the persuasion spell my father used to manipulate him, I shredded it.
Jarryd flinched and drew back. “What the hell did you do?”
“Saved your life.” Woozy, I let the magic go. “How long was I gone?”
He blinked at me. Breaking the spell had rudely disturbed his digestion of my memories. “About a week.” Getting up, he came back with a skin of water. He didn’t have to ask. With our bond active again, Jarryd felt my thirst. “I can get more,” he said as I drank. Then abruptly, “I have a son.”
I nearly spit out the water. “I’m sorry,” I said, wiping the spill from my chin. “I should have told you.”
“It doesn’t matter. He was a good boy?”
“He was incredible. The way he stood up to Malaq. It was priceless.”
Pain tightened Jarryd’s vague expression. “In your vision I was dead. He didn’t know me.”
“I promise, Nef’taali. He’ll know you.” Finishing the water, I looked around. As expected, my father wasn’t in sight. There were, however, quite a few scattered piles of bone and ash. I didn’t need to count them. I was pretty sure there were twenty.
The hairs rising on the back of my neck, I said, “Where’s Lirih?” but Jarryd wasn’t listening. His blue eyes were big and glazed as more of my past tumbled in. I reached over and shook him. “Hey.”
Jarryd’s focus returned as he pulled out of the flow. “The things that happened—the things you’ve done.” Wincing, he swallowed. “Guidon? Sienn? Liel? Gods, Ian…”
I didn’t know what to say. Jarryd wasn’t judging me, but the stunned horror on his gaunt face wasn’t exactly praise.
Jarryd cursed under his breath. “I can’t believe Elayna married Malaq. He—”
“Didn’t mean for this to happen. He doesn’t love her.”
“I don’t even know if I love her,” Jarryd snapped. “It was circumstance that put us together. Terrible, insufferable circumstance that no child should ever be conceived in.” His face pale with distress, Jarryd’s anxiety rolled over me in heavy waves. The breath moved fast through his lungs. His twisted fingers scratched at the fresh scabs on his arm. As the inflamed skin broke, pain extended across the link. Jarryd didn’t even seem to notice. “I can’t do this,” he muttered. “I can’t do this. I can’t.”
“Then don’t.” Carefully, I put my hand on his. I squeezed until he stopped hurting himself. “Put it away, Nef’taali. Put it all away until we get back to camp. Then we can talk it through. We can face it together. Okay?”
Nodding, Jarryd took a couple of slow, deep breaths. He closed his eyes. I felt him working, straining to shove everything down, to stockpile the events of my life so he could sift through them later at a slower, more manageable pace. The process was harder for him than it was me. His Rellan mind wasn’t built for operating the link and neither our long separation nor his current mental state was helping. Still, I sensed a calm building in him. Relief, too; mixed with a noticeable measure of nostalgia at regaining something he’d feared was forever lost.
When Jarryd opened his eyes a few minutes later, I noticed a balance in him that hadn’t been there before. He knew exactly what I wanted. “Lirih and I were over there.” Jarryd gestured at the back of the room. “This is an amazing place. I felt bad she couldn’t see it. So I offered to walk her around. She ran her hands over the statues and the carvings, and I described them to her. I didn’t think exploring would harm anything. We had no idea your father was even awake until his spell went off.”
“What happened then?”
“Malaq’s men bore the brunt of it, but the blast spread across the cavern. I must have passed out. When I woke, the soldiers were dead. Lirih and your father were gone.” Shifting, Jarryd reached for the dusty pack on the ground behind him. He dragged it around in front and pulled out the stone necklace Lirih was wearing when I last saw her. Handing it to me, he winced; feeling the dread settle cold in my stomach. “I’m sorry. I lost your daughter.”
“It’s not your fault. She shouldn’t have been here in the first place.”
“She’s stubborn, like you.
”
“I’ve noticed.”
Jarryd put a comforting hand on my shoulder. “Give me a second to pack.”
He got up and walked away. Shoving the necklace in my pocket, I stood and brushed off the dust. My nerves were jittery. My muscles were as stiff as the swords I strapped on. Oracle workings and doors left me the same way every time: famished, weak, and hungry for more magic.
Aware of my discomfort, Jarryd glanced over his shoulder. “There’s not much left to eat. Mostly some Langorian crap I’m not touching. But you’re welcome to it.”
“Thanks. I can wait. Let’s just get out of here.” The charm of the ruins had long since worn off. Yet, I was worried about making another door. I had a bad feeling the consequences were adding up more than I knew.
Jarryd was thirty paces off with his back to me. Still, I turned away before lifting the front of my shirt. I’d thought it a good place to start after the painful incident in my tent, so I wasn’t at all surprised by the mass of thin, swirling magic-scars spider-webbing across my chest and stomach. At one end, the tendrils reached up to join the marks on my neck. Most were dark from obsidian. In places, other familiar colors seeped into the black—deep purplish red, ice blue, and slate gray. They didn’t hurt when I touched them. My skin felt normal. Not hard and thick like my father’s. The colors of the crown hadn’t blended yet into a single, ugly hue. That was yet to come.
Hearing Jarryd approaching, I fixed my shirt. Sensations and emotions transferred almost instantly between us. Actual memories only came through after sleep, or when the link was reestablished after a block. That gave me a day at best to keep my new scars to myself. It wasn’t much. But until Jarryd was back on track, the less he had to worry about, the better.
Jarryd brought my weapons over. “You sure you’re okay to cast?” he said, watching me strap them on. “You haven’t eaten in a week.”
“I just went five years, Nef’taali. A week is nothing.” I froze. But it isn’t.
Looking back at the piles of ash, my pulse spiked. I knew exactly what could happen in such a short period of time. Malaq had given me all the bloody details.
Detecting the change in me, Jarryd recoiled. “Whoa. What was that?”
Shrugging, I took my bag from him. “Paranoia.”
“Right...” His crooked grin made an appearance. “Thought I recognized it.”
FIFTY FOUR
We stepped out into chaos. Fire and blood laced the air. The slapping of hooves shook the ground. Flames roared from all sides, interspersed with the repeated clangs of metal and a discordant marriage of pain-filled screams and boisterous cries of victory.
Just once, I’d wanted my suspicions to be wrong.
The door shrunk closed behind us and I yanked Jarryd over into the bushes. Rousing the obsidian, it rushed warm and hard through my veins. I refused to think on how I was refueling the drain magic put on me with more magic, and gave myself a much-needed jolt of stamina. A hand still on Jarryd’s arm, I cast a shield spell on us both.
“Find Kit and Sienn. Their tents are that way.” I gestured left. “Take them into the bog and hide. Take whoever you can find.”
“I can feel how that vision rattled you, Ian, but just because there’s an attack on the camp, doesn’t mean it will evolve the same way.”
“I know.” But it was still too fresh. “Neela’s on the other side of the camp. I’ll head that way and we’ll meet you in the swamp.”
“No, I’ll evacuate as many as I can. You need to get out there and stop this. Kill them. Neela would be the first to tell you that defending these people has to come first.”
I couldn’t argue. “You’ll need a weapon. Can you hold one?”
I sensed his lack of confidence. Then his embarrassment as he admitted, “I don’t think I can stand the weight of a sword for long.”
I slid the dagger from my boot. “My spell will shield you so you can get in close. But after too many blows it’ll weaken and buckle like the real thing. So avoid contact when you can, and when you can’t, make your hits count.” I handed him the weapon.
“Thanks.” Jarryd lingered. A new uncertainty flowed between us. “I know we just got this back. I don’t want to lose it so soon, but it may take some getting used to again and right now I don’t think…”
I let him off the hook. “You don’t want me distracting you?”
Jarryd gave into a quick, guilty smile. “I think it’s the other way around.”
“Do it.” I’d been without our link for so long. I didn’t think it would bother me as Jarryd built up a mental wall to shut me out. I was wrong. My reaction to his renewed absence was a prompt, unpleasant sense of aimlessness. Like someone had swiped my spiritual legs right out from under me.
I was still working to reclaim my balance when Jarryd took off. I dropped my pack, pulled my swords, and went the other way.
Rounding the first corner, I found myself in the path of a mounted Langorian soldier. Jumping aside, I watched him thunder by, dragging a woman from a rope tied to his saddle. Zigzagging his great warhorse, he laughed as his captive swung back and forth, dangerously close to the burning wreckage.
As she passed in a cloud of screams and dust, I ran up alongside and brought a blade down; severing the line. Quickly sliding my sword away, I caught the woman as she rolled to a stop. I helped her up and cut the rope from her torn wrists.
The second they were free, she grabbed me. “My daughter…”
“Where?”
Lifting a bloody hand, she pointed to a hut about fifty paces away. Flames were creeping up one wall; outlining the imposing figure of the Langorian horseman as he halted in front of them. He jumped down from his saddle; club in hand. Recognition set in, and he lost a step. Noticing the black markings on my face, he lost another. Then arrogance won out over fear.
“The King declared we keep what we find.” Eagerly biting his lip, the soldier glanced at his prize cowering beside me. “So I’ll be having that back now, witch.”
I stepped in front of the woman. “If you know who I am, you know that isn’t going to happen.”
“Course I know who you are.” He smirked. “You’re Rella’s bitch.” He swung.
As his weapon neared my face, I grabbed the shaft with my free hand. “And you’re dead.” Holding the club at bay, pulling in the aura of the blue calcite on my left brace, I pointed my sword at the burning hut behind him. With fierce determination, I directed my magic-price at the soldier, and cast.
At the last second, the crown stirred. I couldn’t stop. The spell was already taking its due. The man was jerking and shuddering. A massive gust of wind was building inside me. It fled my hand, traveled down the length of my sword, and burst blue from the tip of the blade. My conjured wind crackled and surged across the camp; smacking into the flames and suffocating them with a whoosh so loud and strong it nearly knocked me over as it rushed past.
Blanched, drained, and desiccated, the soldier fell dead at my feet. The sight of him wasn’t even close to dousing the pleasure. The weakness that followed was far less enjoyable. Even less; the stinging pain on the top of my left hand as a new design formed. Black, curving streaks swept up my wrist beneath the brace to bleed into the scars on my arm.
Gasping, I waved at the hysterical woman. She looked faint. My spell had taken from her, after all. At least she’s alive, I thought as she limped off to get her daughter.
I scooped up the club and moved on. Ducking the flames, trying to elude the rabid, mounted soldiers working to run us all down, I pulled a few refugees to safety. Most were already dead. I stepped over the bodies, broken and burned, splayed open with their insides pouring out over the ground, and struggled not to notice how many were ours. I pretended not to count the crushed skulls and cleaved open faces, the lopped off heads and limbs. I told myself it was Fate’s will. I couldn’t do a damn thing about it. Even if I managed to string together a healing spell that didn’t involve me trading souls with half the camp, they
were beyond help.
My limitations, however, were no consolation. I detested being inadequate. I hated the helplessness that came over me as their stench burned in my nose and throat.
Krillos was right. Even with the Crown of Stones, there were some things I couldn’t fix. So I did the next best thing. I took my deficiencies out on the enemy.
Slicing open the man bearing down on me, I shoved him aside and spun to fell the one sneaking up from behind. I ran a sword through the soldier to my right, stepped and smashed the club into his companion’s forehead. Another rushed up, then another, then three more. Like fools, they kept coming. Obliging their idiocy, I kept killing them. Some fought back more competently than others. But anger concealed the pain. It made up for my fading strength as I chopped into one fat, fleshy body after another, gutting them like the pigs they were. Mercy didn’t enter my mind. These men were not Malaq’s followers. They weren’t spelled. They were simply cruel and brutal, and staunchly loyal to Draken. They fed off violence and blood. I gave them both. Shattering bones with my borrowed club, tossing one wrecked body after another into the flames; I roasted their merciless souls with the heat of their own fires.
It still wasn’t enough. Even standing amid a pile of Langorian carcasses, I couldn’t overlook the ones beneath. I couldn’t forget I was doing battle on top of the fallen; trampling on the ruined bodies of the men, women, and children that had come here to escape the fight. The people that had given me a glimpse of a kind of peace I never thought possible had become twisted, ruptured casings, sinking into the mud like yesterday’s garbage. Their senseless deaths drove my thoughts to the future, to Malaq’s scarred face, the deserted, ravaged camp with the rows of graves, to the bodies hanging from my father’s wall.
I knew damn well not to trust an oracle spell. It was one possible event in a future that was always changing. But doubt was a nagging bitch. It whispered in my ear. What if Fate has already decreed it so? What if he’s chosen the future I saw as the only one?
What if nothing I do matters?
The Crown of Stones: Magic-Scars Page 45
