father in the palace. Raping her to ease a momentary urge would rob him of his bargaining chip. Stellan had already surprised Jaxyn once with the lengths he was willing to go to when he felt betrayed. Who knew what he'd do if he found Arkady harmed by the lover he was still smarting over?
A loose corner of the inn's shingled roof was banging relentlessly in the wind as he reached the door, accompanied by a swirl of icy sleet. He hammered on the door with his fist, but it remained determinedly closed. That told Jaxyn a great deal. Mortals would not leave a lone traveller out here in this blizzard to die.
Which meant they must know the traveller banging on their door couldn't die.
And that meant there was something or someone inside they wanted to protect from him.
Jaxyn took a deep breath. The Tide surged around him. The wind picked up and the temperature dropped even lower, the sleet falling so hard and sharp now that it scoured the bark from the unfinished logs from which the inn was constructed. A moment later, the loose corner of the roof ripped off, exposing the beams underneath. He thought he heard a scream coming from inside the building, but he might have imagined it. In any case, no matter how desperate, their mortal cries for help would be torn away by the wind before anybody could hear them.
'I know you're in there!' he called, using the Tide to amplify his voice so they would hear him over the screaming wind.
There was no answer, but he was hardly surprised. And in a way, he was glad of it. With the Tide nearing its peak, the exhilaration of allowing the magic to sing through his veins was something he hadn't experienced fully for a thousand years. This is what it was to be a Tide Lord. This was the glory of it, the seduction of omnipotent power.
Without another word, he blew the inn door off its hinges, exposing the interior of the tavern to the storm. He stepped inside and glanced around. There were several wizened old miners cowering in one corner, the one-armed tavern keeper, Clyden Bell, standing in the other, his arm protectively around a lad of about fifteen, who was wearing an apron and a look of abject terror.
There was no sign of Arkady or her father.
'I know you're here, Arkady,' he called, as another piece of the roof let go, allowing the sleet and ice into the taproom. 'Come out now and I won't kill anyone!'
There was no response. Jaxyn wondered if he'd misjudged Arkady. Had she outwitted him again? He was on the verge of believing she might have, when the tavern-boy gave the game away by shouting at him, 'They're not here! We haven't seen them!'
'I didn't ask if you'd seen them,'' Jaxyn said with a smile as another part of the roof let go. Clyden Bell seemed terrified, the young lad even more so. The miners in the other corner were paralysed with fear.
'The boy dies first, Arkady,' he called again. 'But only after I've used him to assuage my need. Are you going to listen to his screaming while I take my pleasure, or come out here and stop it?'
'Lay one hand on the lad ...' Clyden began, stepping forward bravely.
Jaxyn never heard the end of the threat. He picked Clyden Bell up without a thought and slammed him into the stone fireplace so hard he could hear the old man's bones shattering even over the storm. 'Lay one hand — that's quite amusing, coming from you.'
The young lad cried out in horror as Clyden's limp body dropped to the floor. Jaxyn ignored him for now. He held his arms out wide, calling out into the storm that was, bit by bit, un-roofing the inn. 'Look what you've done now, Arkady. All this death, doom and destruction. It's your fault. You made me do it.'
'Liar.'
He turned to find her standing behind him. Arkady and her father must have been hiding beneath one of the tables near the door. He smiled and let the storm go; even a Tide Lord needed their wits about them when dealing with this woman. Her father slowly climbed to his feet beside her as Arkady stepped forward.
Drenched and frozen though she was, she seemed uncowed. Arkady slapped his face with considerable force, her eyes glistening with unshed tears.
'Again,' he said with a leer, as the wind died down now he'd let go the Tide. 'Harder.'
'You make me sick.'
'And you made me ride all the way out here to find you,' he said, glancing at the pale, shivering figure behind her. Bary Morel seemed resigned, the fight drained out of him by the cold. 'Can't have done the old man any good. And now you've gone and killed your old friend, too,' he added, glancing over his shoulder at Clyden's body and his weeping apprentice. 'And after you gave me your word you'd be good.'
Arkady had no answer to that, which disappointed him a little and made him angry. His blood was tingling as the Tide drained away, his skin itching, his flesh crawling with the need to release the tension.
For a long, considering moment, he stared at Arkady, debating the need to keep her whole against his need to relieve himself.
Prudence won. Barely. He needed Arkady whole and unharmed, and despite his threat, he wasn't so far gone that some unwashed tavern-boy offered much of an alternative.
Jaxyn drew the Tide to himself again, wrapping Arkady and her father in bonds of air — a technique that took enough concentration to stave off his carnal needs for the time being. Without another word he forced both of them out of the door and into the storm
which was dissipating almost as quickly as it had gathered.
With these two walking behind his horse, it would take an hour or so to get back to the palace. An hour drawing on the Tide to keep them bound. An hour to relish the Tide and bask in its magical glow.
And when he got back to the palace ... well, it was a good thing Lyna was there.
Perhaps it was time she earned her title as his betrothed.
CHAPTER 17
It took a week to cross the ocean from Stevania to Torlenia. The three Tide Lords took turns riding the Tide, keeping their thatched vessel skimming over the waves. Declan's blood was constantly on fire from the strain of it, but he was growing accustomed to the feeling. As Cayal had said when they first let Declan ride the Tide to keep their magic carpet afloat: It gets predictable. It even gets tolerable. But it never gets better.
Declan had discovered that for himself in the past few days. Although he felt as if raw lava was running through his veins, he'd' also found some point at which it became bearable. Somehow, you just had to step away from it and let it go.
It was that, or lose your mind, he decided. He stared at Kentravyon out of the corner of his eyes, still numb with what the madman had done. Although they hadn't spoken of it again, Declan saw those lines of dead laid out in the ruined temple every time he closed his eyes.
It was a good thing sometimes, he decided, that immortals didn't need to sleep, and with it, face their dreams. Or their nightmares.
Declan was contemplating this interesting phenomenon as he rode the Tide toward the Torlenian coast, the smudge of brown on the horizon growing rapidly larger in the distance as they sped toward it. Both Kentravyon and Cayal were lying on the thatched roof beside him — Cayal on his back with his arms
folded behind his head, apparently asleep, and Kentravyon on his belly, his head hanging over the edge of the thatching, Tide fishing.
Tide fishing was a game Kentravyon appeared to have invented for the sole purpose of entertaining himself on this trip. As if the incident in Blackbourn had never happened, he would hang over the edge of their fragile platform, using Tide magic to keep himself balanced, one hand dragging in the water. His plan, as far as Declan could tell, was to catch fish. This was an almost impossible task, given the speed they were travelling and the fact that for there to be any chance of him even seeing a fish, let alone getting a hand to one they needed to be passing directly over a sizable school. He would occasionally direct Declan this way or that in the hope of finding a school near the surface, but so far he'd done little more than brush a few fish in passing with his fingertips. He didn't seem to mind the impossibility of the task, or even the silliness of it. It gave him something to do, and the more impossible the task the bet
ter. He was immortal, after all. Impossible tasks had the advantage of taking longer, and therefore keeping one amused for longer.
At least, that's how Kentravyon had explained things to Declan. And it was better than murdering wounded innocents.
'A little to the left!' Kentravyon ordered, without looking up from the water. 'I almost had one then.'
Declan shook his head, thinking that highly unlikely, but he did as Kentravyon asked and banked their magic thatched roof-section (a mode of transport Declan decided was not nearly as romantic as a magic- carpet), a little amazed at how easily he could make the roof turn now he'd had a bit of practice.
And then, without warning, the platform shattered, Declan lost his grip on the Tide and hit the water like it was made of cobblestones. He had time to wonder what they'd hit before being swamped by the waves.
Stunned and reeling from his sudden disconnection from the Tide, Declan fought his way to the surface and looked around, spitting out salt water, trying to figure out what had happened. The other two immortals were bobbing in the waves a few feet away. Cayal's expression was thunderous. Kentravyon, on the other hand, was looking delighted. He was clutching a large silver fish over his head, which wriggled and fought in his grasp. 'I caught one! Look! I caught one!'
'Tides, Rodent, what did you do that for?'
'I didn't do anything,' Declan said, ignoring Kentravyon. 'It was as if we slammed into a wall or something.'
Cayal made a noise of disgust, then turned and began to swim toward the distant shore as the last remnants of their thatched roof-section sank below the waves. A few moments later, still clutching his prized fish, Kentravyon did the same. The Tide Lords neither asked for a further explanation nor bothered to reprimand Declan for his carelessness. Puzzled by their odd behaviour, Declan eyed the coastline warily, thinking it was almost too far to swim. But then, what was too far, now he was immortal? In theory, he could survive here forever.
Declan struck out after Cayal. If Kentravyon or the Immortal Prince knew what had caused their accident, they weren't saying. But there was something in the way neither of them questioned Declan's assertion that he'd simply slammed into something, that made him think they knew what was going on.
Perhaps, if one of them was feeling generous, they might eventually tell him what it was.
'What do you think happened?' Declan asked, as he emerged from the water a couple of hours later. The effort of swimming ashore through the breakwater had cooled his blood somewhat, making it easier to
concentrate on their immediate dilemma. He still had no idea what had toppled them, and was hoping the others had some inkling. Kentravyon and Cayal were sitting on the deserted beach waiting for him. He had no idea where in Torlenia they were, other than a rough guess they were somewhere on the northern coast.
The others already had a fire going and had stripped off their wet clothes. Why did they not use the Tide to dry them? Declan wondered. Bedraggled and soaked to the skin, his boots squelching, Declan began peeling off his own shirt as he approached the fire.
Cayal was sitting naked on the sand beside the fire. He looked up, squinting into the sun setting behind Declan. 'You weren't paying attention, is what happened.'
'It felt like we hit a wall.'
'What we hit, Rodent,' Cayal said, 'was a trip wire. Or the magic equivalent of one, at any rate.'
Declan's brows drew together in confusion as he pulled the shirt over his head and wrung it out. 'A magical trip wire? Who would set ...?' He stopped as he realised the answer to his question without having to complete it. 'Brynden?'
Kentravyon nodded. He was also naked, his clothes spread out over the nearby rocks, drying in the remains of the day's sun. He was scaling the fish with a small dagger from his belt. Apparently his prized catch was going to be this evening's dinner. 'Tide's coming in fast this time. Didn't think it'd be up high enough for something like that yet.'
'But how could he know we were coming?'
'He wouldn't know,' Cayal said. 'He'd have set it around the whole continent. It's not that impressive a feat really — just a very thin magical barrier a few feet high, a couple of miles off the coast. The effort it takes to ride the Tide the way we've been doing means you probably wouldn't even feel it — unless you were
paying attention. And clearly, you weren't paying attention.'
'If you thought there was a danger of something like this happening, Cayal, why didn't you warn me?'
Cayal shrugged. 'I should have, but I keep forgetting how stupid you are. Sorry.'
Quashing the desire to even the score with Cayal using his fist, Declan decided to let that one pass. He turned to Kentravyon. 'So if Brynden set a trip wire, then he'll know we're here?'
'Without a doubt,' Kentravyon agreed.
'What will he do?'
'Depends on what else he's got going on here in Torlenia, I suppose,' Cayal said before Kentravyon could respond. 'He won't know who's tripped his alarm, just that somebody has. He might not even come to investigate if he's otherwise engaged.'
'He might send Kinta,' Kentravyon suggested. 'She's a fierce warrior, is our Kinta,' he added with a smile. 'If I ever decide to take a goddess, I could do worse than her.'
'Don't bother,' Cayal said, with an edge of bitterness in his voice. 'She's not worth the trouble. Believe me, I speak from experience.'
Kentravyon looked at him curiously. 'Lukys mentioned Kinta when he was bringing me up to date on everything I've missed these past few eons. You stole her from Brynden, didn't you? Or kidnapped her? Or something like that?'
'I didn't steal her. She was the one who wanted to leave Brynden.'
'That would not have made him happy.'
Declan couldn't help but smile at Kentravyon's mild observation. He sat down and began working off his sodden boots. 'That's something of an understatement, I hear.'
Cayal glared at him. 'You weren't there, Rodent, so why don't you keep your flanking unwanted opinion
to yourself?' The Immortal Prince turned to Kentravyon. 'Whatever way this plays out, we'd be well advised to be gone from Torlenia before he does come looking for us, though. You're right about how fast the Tide is coming in. I don't know that we've got the time to indulge in a pissing contest with Brynden.'
The older man sighed regretfully. 'What a pity, Cayal, that you wish to die right at the point where you appear to have gained some wisdom.'
'How do we keep going?' Declan asked.
Cayal looked at him with a puzzled expression on his face. 'What?'
'We need something to ride, don't we?'
'Yes.'
'Well, the roof-section is gone, the carpet's back in Stevania, and there doesn't seem to be much here,' Declan said, indicating the barren rocky landscape, 'from which to fashion a raft.'
'Kentravyon's got a dagger. We could skin you alive and use your hide stretched over a couple of bits of driftwood. I mean, you're the biggest one here, Rodent, so it makes sense to have you volunteer for it. And it's not like your hide won't grow back in a day or so. Might be a bit painful, though. What do you think, Kentravyon?'
The madman smiled. 'I think you've been anticipating an opportunity to make a suggestion like that ever since we left Stevania.'
Cayal grinned back at him. 'Doesn't mean it's not a good idea.'
'It's a stupid idea,' Declan said, finally getting off his right boot. 'Why don't we just use Kentravyon's cloak?'
Cayal seemed rather disappointed at the suggestion and looked to Kentravyon, hoping, Declan suspected, that he'd refuse. 'You don't have to give it up, you know, old boy. The Rodent's hide is plenty thick enough for our needs.'
'Perhaps,' Kentravyon agreed, 'but the time he'd take to heal is time we don't have.'
Declan found it more than a little disturbing to think the only thing stopping Kentravyon from agreeing to Cayal's ludicrous plan was the idea that the healing process required to recover from being skinned alive might slow them down a bit. He remembered the line
s of dead on the cliff top in Stevania. Tides, but these creatures are callous monsters.
What does that make me?
'Then it's settled,' he said, making sure they had this clear in their minds and it didn't involve him being skinned. 'We move on, using Kentravyon's cloak. When we get to Elvere, we can find something a bit more suitable.'
'We won't be stopping in Elvere,' Cayal said. 'Or anywhere else in Torlenia if we can help it. Next stop after this will be the Chelae Islands.'
'But first we eat!' Kentravyon declared, holding up his gutted prize.
'There's not enough meat on that wretched thing to feed a starving child, Kentravyon,' Cayal pointed out with a frown.
'Then it's a good thing there are no starving children here,' Kentravyon said, tossing the fish into the flames. It hissed and smouldered for a few moments, the stench of burning scales making Declan glad he didn't have to eat if he didn't want to. If his survival had depended on that one small charred fish, he'd be in big trouble.
'If we're so pressed for time,' Declan said, tugging on his left boot, 'do we have time to eat?'
'We have time,' Cayal said. 'Unless Brynden's hiding over the next ridge, he's unlikely to find us before morning.'
'Unlikely?'
'There always a chance, Rodent, however unlikely. I mean ... look at you.'
Declan pulled off his other boot and emptied the water out of it before answering. 'If you're looking to figure the odds, Cayal, you might want to wonder what the chances of me helping you anytime soon are going to be, if you keep trying to piss me off.'
Cayal didn't seem too bothered by Declan's warning. 'Maybe I'm trying to make sure you want me dead.'
'Making you suffer seems like a lot more fun right now, Cayal.'
'You'll change your mind,' Cayal told him confidently. 'Come the crunch you'll look at me and realise everything in your world would be better if I'm dead.'
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