“How?” Granddad snapped.
But Steve was deep in that memory. “When I woke up in the cave, it was awful. The feeling in there sat on my chest like a stone. It was a burrowing grief, a despair. Just to want to escape was an effort. The temptation was to do nothing.”
“I felt that energy on the mountain,” Fay whispered. “I couldn’t believe how you fought through it. I could feel it overwhelming me. I almost couldn’t move.”
Steve looked into her haunted eyes. They alone at the table knew the horror of Tarik’s power. What they didn’t know was if that was the extent of it or if it could be worse. He spoke to her. “Sensing you there, through the mate-bond, cut through the drag on my soul and muscles. I didn’t know how you came to be there—I didn’t know then how long I’d been unconscious—but everything in me screamed to get you away to safety.”
“You fought seven weres for me.”
His grin was lopsided. “You tore up a rainforest and blew up a hut for me.”
Her answering smile was wry but real. “We were terrible guests. Do you think Tarik will invite us back?”
Steve’s lips pulled back from his teeth. He couldn’t stop the snarl. His canine teeth maybe even lengthened, as they shouldn’t in human form. “We’re not waiting for an invitation.”
His warrior-princess kissed him. A mangled kiss that wrecked against his snarl, but one that showed he could be his worst and she wouldn’t flinch.
His snarl eased to a growl, a rumble of displeasure.
“I realize you’re going to attack Tarik,” Liz interrupted. “Before we discuss that, Fay, can you describe this energy. Steve could still have been affected by the drug they used on him. Some people react badly to anesthetics. What was this energy you felt? The whole notion of dream essences is new to me.”
“New to me, too.” Fay leaned back in her chair as she looked at Steve’s sister. “I wasn’t exaggerating when I said that Steve was incredible to fight through it. It rolled out like a poisonous gas, but on a psychic level. It seemed to squash positive emotions, suck energy—” Fay broke off. “Energy drain. I was holding the amulet.”
They all looked at the tarnished silver locket.
“Did it steal some of your energy?” Granddad asked. For the first time, his voice warmed with concern for Fay.
A tightness in Steve relaxed, even as Grand-mère glared at her husband.
“No,” Fay said definitely. “It couldn’t steal my energy. I’m well-warded and I’d know if someone attacked my protections. Besides, they functioned in the fight.”
“She turned us invisible and deflected bullets,” Steve elaborated.
“Which is of a different level to psychic attack.” Fay continued to stare at the amulet. “But I wonder if the amulet’s proximity enabled Tarik to draw more power. It was as if the living energy around us dimmed. It was a miasma of hate that rolled through the rainforest.” She looked at Steve. “Do you think Tarik pushed his emotions at us? That he can use the poison in him as a weapon?”
David studied the amulet without touching it. “I can’t answer metaphysical or magical questions, but I’m interested that Steve reckons not all of Tarik’s people are enslaved. I doubt the porter is. So Tarik must have employed them. Who are they?”
“Malcontents,” Granddad answered. “You know them, David. They think they are better than humans and resent the tradition of hiding who we are. They want to rule with terror.”
“Don’t they know the Collegium would fight them?” Fay asked.
“Can you fight them?” Granddad countered. “You sound as if Tarik’s energy overwhelmed you. You fled.” He shook his head. “This isn’t magic as you know it. Maybe you can’t fight it.”
“She fought,” Steve gritted. “Unprepared. How did you even get there so fast? I’ve had time to calculate and—”
“Uncle,” Fay said succinctly.
Everyone straightened a fraction around the table.
“He intervened?” Michelle asked.
“He arrived at Victor’s cabin in Siberia, announced Steve’s kidnapping and translocated Narelle and me to the mountain slope below Tarik’s cave. Uncle definitely knows more than he’s told us. I suspect he could end Tarik’s enslavement of people right now. Instead, he’s playing games.”
Grand-mère hissed her disapproval.
Fay nodded. “But that said, we can’t control a djinn, so we must allow for his idiosyncratic intrusions into our plan.”
“And what is our plan?” Michelle asked. Steve’s mom had been uncharacteristically quiet, watching Fay with close attention.
Fay glanced at Steve. “I need to study the amulet and the spells around it. If we can release the enslaved weres safely, I’d like to do so. However, if Narelle’s spell is as tangled as it appears, then it might have re-created itself, even bound itself to a person—Tarik. In which case, the spell can’t be destroyed without killing either the person who cast it or the person who channels it.”
It was Liz who grasped the inference first. “So, potentially, this amulet is no longer the primary conduit for the stolen dream essences. In effect, Tarik has become the amulet.”
“Perhaps.”
Steve frowned. “Do you need to consult the Collegium? I’d rather you didn’t travel through the portal till Tarik and his tame porter are de-fanged. But if the Collegium sent mages to you…Granddad, would you allow them entry to the fort?”
“You would tell them of a way to control weres?” Grand-Mère asked, enraged.
“I’d rather not give them the details,” Fay said. “And I don’t know if they could help. Dream essences aren’t magic. They’re…they’re like the mate-bond I can feel to Steve. It’s incredibly strong and resilient and I can push energy along it, as I did when I healed him, but it’s not obedient in the way magic is. I can structure how I use magic. Dream essences are all about instinct and emotion.”
“So what can we do to help?” Liz asked.
“Don’t get kidnapped,” Steve said.
His sister pulled a face. “I was thinking of something a bit more dynamic.” She looked at Fay. “I could research dream essences, see what the library has.”
“The library?”
“The fort has a library,” Liz said. “There are even scrolls in it from when the first library of Alexandria burned. Didn’t Granddad tell you?”
They all looked at Tomy, who cleared his throat.
Fay frowned at Steve.
He shrugged. “It didn’t occur to me. I’m not a scholar.”
“I’ve been looking at the library myself, in between other demands on my time,” Granddad defended himself. “I haven’t found anything.”
“Would they have maps of the Mountains of the Moon, particularly its cave system?” Steve asked.
Liz scribbled a note. “I’ll find out.”
John finally launched himself into the discussion. “The first stage of any plan is clarifying its aim. What do you intend to do—capture Tarik, kill him, free the enslaved, retrieve the rogue mage?”
Silence gripped the Court. It was too glib to say “all of the above”. They had to have one over-riding purpose. John was right.
Steve said slowly, thinking aloud. “Uncle never defined what my test was. He presented us with the information that weres were being enslaved. He didn’t say what we should do beyond the implicit need to free them.” He rolled his shoulders. “Besides, this has gone far beyond a test. The evil Tarik has done to people can’t be allowed to continue.”
“He didn’t do it,” Grand-mère said. “That woman did.”
“Narelle.” Fay picked up the locket. “I can see her magic. It is so frayed. She fled from Steve, down the mountain. By now, Tarik will have sent one of his people to retrieve her. She’s not a threat. It was Tarik who found the spell to steal the dream essences. He used her. She’s not blameless, far from it. I saw the dreadful state the enslaved wolf-were was in. Narelle can’t be allowed to exercise her magic without restraint
, but that’s for the future. For now, in terms of threats, I’d say she’s nearly irrelevant.”
Fay looked around the table. “You can contact Victor Gustev. One of his nephews works here as a marshal. He’ll know how to contact Victor, and Victor will tell you what he saw of Narelle. She is pathetic.”
“Perhaps.” Michelle looked steadily at Fay. “But you should never underestimate those of lesser power than yourself.” Her gaze flicked momentarily to Grand-mère. “They have their own ways of surviving and controlling others.”
“All right.” Steve called a halt. Everyone had heard his and Fay’s account. Anything more would be wasted time, rehashing things. “Fay will study the magical element, the amulet in particular. Dad, if you could help Liz with the library research, a map of Tarik’s cave system would be excellent and he must have found it somewhere. Grandfather and I will consider tactics for approaching Tarik’s hideout, especially if we bring in a taskforce of marshals. Lilith will be part of that.”
“And me,” his mom said.
Steve nodded.
“And me?” Tomy asked from the head of the table.
Steve realized he still felt betrayed. And in response, his own feelings betrayed him. He didn’t plan to include Tomy.
Liz jumped into the tiny beat of silence. “Granddad will show me his research so that I can take it from there. People know something is happening, so he’ll be too busy dealing with their questions and speculation to help.”
Tomy put a hand over his eyes, head bowed.
Grand-mère stood and put an arm around his shoulders. “Now look what you have done,” she accused the family around the table.
“Not them.” Granddad’s voice was muffled. “Me. I failed them. They do not expect me to put family first, to help.”
With Grand-mère looking daggers at everyone and Granddad so obviously crushed, emotional guilt sat heavy. Steve fought through it. In a shadowy, lesser way, it was like facing the energy Tarik had broadcast. Steve had to hold onto the truth and not surrender to the negativity. “Granddad, that’s not true. We know you value us, your family. We know how hard you’ve worked as Suzerain and the burden of it. But you have shown that you’re not willing to help Fay, to accept her, so I have to respect your choice.”
Michelle looked pride and approval at him, but Steve ignored his mom to focus on his grandparents. They had to realize that their choices wouldn’t prevent his and Fay’s future together, but would decide if Tomy and Raha were part of it.
Emotional turmoil in the middle of his Uncle-given test was far from ideal.
To his right, Fay pushed back her chair and stood. “I think I’ll study the amulet down by the portal where the magic is stronger.”
“I’ll walk you down,” Steve said.
She glanced at him, startled. A tip of her head suggested he should stay with his family.
He pushed his chair back into the table, hands resting a moment on the top of it. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
“Good idea,” his dad said decidedly.
Fay waited till they were out of the Court and walking down the corridor to the stairs down to the portal. “I’m sorry. This, with your family…”
He pulled her to a stop. “This is what families do. We’re family, but we’re also individuals with individual agendas and loyalties, even different beliefs. We pull apart as much as we pull together. Granddad is facing changes. Stepping down from the Suzerainty, becoming an ordinary person, no matter how balanced he is, that is a huge hit to his identity. He and Grand-mère have put a lot of that onto you, which isn’t fair.” He smiled, lessening his intensity. “Fay, just because someone’s old doesn’t mean they’ll behave well. It helps that Grandfather is here. He’ll talk to them.”
Fay grimaced uncomfortably. “I don’t want to cause trouble.”
“You’re not.” He put an arm around her waist and they started walking again.
The stone walls of the staircase were shadowy in the dim light. A soft murmur of voices echoed up it. Probably the guards Lilith had left. Steve gestured for Fay to precede him. He watched her straight back.
She was a fighter, but she ought not to have to fight his family for him.
The two marshals stood between the portal and the stairs, one watching each, even as they talked.
Faroud sat in his chair near the portal, evidently part of the conversation. “Are you wanting to travel?” he asked Fay and Steve.
“I just wanted to be near the portal’s magic while I studied something.” Fay held the amulet in her left hand, its chain dangling a few inches.
Steve gave the two marshals a commanding look.
They nodded. They’d protect Fay, as well as the entrance to the fort.
“May I see what it is?” Faroud stood and approached.
Steve kissed Fay’s cheek. “You can find us in the Court when you’re ready.”
“Gee. Thanks.”
The marshals grinned, undoubtedly at her dry tone. They’d seen how badly Grand-mère had reacted to Fay. And maybe better than Steve—who’d stayed away from the fort the last few years, intent on his mercenary life—the marshals knew how deeply Granddad would feel the loss of the Suzerainty.
Steve left Fay to her study of the amulet and took the stairs two at a time. He emerged into the corridor and stood a moment. What he really needed…his hands curled into fists. He was so damn angry. It was controlled. He doubted Fay guessed. He’d fought hard to hide it from her. But he was so damn angry that the quiet time she and he needed alone had been stolen, and then, she’d been attacked by Uncle, by his family, and by that hell-damned crazy jackal.
It wouldn’t help if he stirred up more trouble with his grandparents, but he wasn’t going to back down. Fay wasn’t were, so what? She was his mate. She was an amazing, and an amazingly powerful, person in her own right. She deserved respect.
He, and his choices, deserved respect.
His dad met him at the door to the Court and pushed him back out simply by moving forward. It was step back or jostle David. “Let your Mom deal with this.”
“Dad.” Protest and anger, determination.
“I know.” A wry look. “Believe me, I know.” He spoke under his breath, aware that sharp were hearing could pick up their words from inside the Court.
Liz slipped out, sidling around their dad. “Come on, Steve.” She linked her arm with his and tried to pull him away.
But it was John who broke the impasse. The old man shoved them all away from the door. “Kippers and steaks, boy,” he roared. It was the earl’s favorite cuss word. “Focus on the important point. There isn’t anything in this world that’s going to drive your woman from you, so you focus on protecting her in whatever mess this is. And by mess, I mean the fool jackal and his tame mage. Some in the family might take longer to remember that they’d like some great-grandkids, but don’t you worry about their ageing brains.”
Steve didn’t get to hear Grand-mère’s response to this attack. John gripped one arm and Liz the other, and they towed him away.
Fay walked around the portal to sit opposite the stairs with the portal between her and everyone else, and a wall at her back. She could feel the surge of power from the portal.
Whatever Faroud’s evident interest in gossiping—and his gaze tracked her avidly—he was taking guardianship of his portal seriously. No one would be coming through it without his knowledge and permission.
The stone floor was cold. Fay ignored the discomfort, crossing her legs and placing the amulet in front of her. It was harder to ignore her emotional state. She didn’t understand families. Her own family was small, distant and messed up. Steve’s family, both in their support and antagonism, bewildered her. It was as if she couldn’t find secure ground. Did she fight or placate, engage or ignore? His mom, Michelle, seemed to think Fay should let others fight for her.
Fay had never had anyone fight her battles, although Steve had fought beside her.
“Just do your
job.” It was a relief to return to the discipline of the work she’d been trained for.
She centered herself in her magic, withdrawing gradually from awareness of the waves of the portal’s power that lapped over her to a humming focus on the coiled magic within her. Keeping her eyes closed, she activated her mage sight. She concentrated on the rhythm of her breathing with the underlying beat of her heart and the softer, soundless pulse of the portal. She braced herself and opened her eyes.
To her mage sight, magic flared everywhere. The portal blazed with it and she could see patterns Faroud must have traced around it, spells of defense and containment, and other, stranger purposes. Yet that magic was strong and true, clear and distinct. When she looked at the amulet, all of that changed.
Against the backdrop of the portal’s clean power, the fraying spell wrapped around the amulet and the dream essences leaking from it were cloudy, muddled and wrong. Skin-crawlingly wrong. Fay forced aside her repulsion to peer closer.
Her concentration deepened and shifted. She fell into an unfamiliar trance state. She didn’t know if it was caused by the dream essences spilling from the amulet, the power of the portal or her own new, mate-bond inspired awareness, but she chose not to fight it. Checking that her personal warding remained strong, she let the trance state take her, curious as to what it would reveal.
In her mage-sight, the spell strands weaving around and through the amulet acquired a translucence, as if they faded back. The spilling dream essences came forward. Their colors shifted and strengthened, growing out of grayness into hints of green and purple and even orange shades of brown, the raw ochre colors of deserts. The dream essences appeared as cords, twisted around and strangled by the amulet, leaking off color like dye dripping from newly dipped yarn.
Fay touched one and it had a tangible weight for her trance-enhanced senses. She pinched it lightly between thumb and index finger. She could move it fractionally.
The cords of dream essences became visible about half a meter from the amulet, and fed in and out of it before vanishing again. Fay slid her finger along a cord. A drop of dream essence fell and she captured it in the palm of her other hand. It pooled there, collecting a second drip. The color shimmered purple, like poor quality amethyst crystal.
Djinn Justice (The Collegium Book 2) Page 17
