Slip Song (Devany Miller Series)

by Jen Ponce

  He cursed again. “We need to find where she keeps her souls. Set them free. That would keep her busy.”

  I pictured a bunch of beautiful innocents being hunted and killed by savage Skriven and had to press my hand to my stomach and breathe to keep from puking again. “No. We can’t.”

  “Devany, she plans to do the same to you.”

  “It’s wrong. I know I’ve done bad things but I’ve tried to cause the least harm. A bloodbath of my own making would be wrong, no matter how advantageous it would be right now. No.”

  He looked away from me, the muscles under his jaw jumping.

  “Tytan. I want to kill her and I’ve been wracking my brain to figure out how. Because she hurt you and she will do it again given the chance. But I don’t want to become her. I don’t want to be someone who can condemn souls to die because it suits my purposes.” I touched his arm and waited until he could look at me again. “We can grab Vasili too. He’s in danger, especially if Amara knows I was shot back in time. Then we can work a fade spell around my house. It’ll keep them from finding any of you. Combined with protection spells and your offensive strength, you all ought to be able to withstand an army.”

  “One determined Originator can do a lot of damage.”

  “Yes I can.” I smiled at him and after a moment, he returned it. God those dimples.

  We grabbed Vasili and convened at my house. Arsinua wasn’t happy to have two Skriven in the same place as she but agreed they would help power any spells she wove, especially if I allowed them to pull as much Source through me as they needed to defend the place. I also asked her to work the fade spell on the house and every person/thing in the house. Together we fueled Arsinua’s working and the spell settled into place with a resonant boom that sounded bigger than the world.

  With everyone as protected and hidden as I could make them, Jasper, Nex, and I hooked to Banishwinds to put destiny into motion. A strange elation filled me as we got closer to the Carnicus and the Wilds. Elation and anticipation. I tried to tell myself it was because I could fix the things I fucked up last time. I tried to tell myself it was just because this time I might be able to save Sharps from her asshole brother. I tried to tell myself that I couldn’t be so shallow that I was excited to meet Kroshtuka all over again and maybe, just maybe, take him up on his offer of making love without the need for a contest.

  Then we got to the place where, last time, the Carnicus of Nightflowers had camped, to find a big empty lot with trampled grass and garbage. “They’re gone,” I said, staring in disbelief at the trash pile at the far end of the camp. “What the hell?”

  “She had a hand in this, the Originator,” Nex said. He was disappointed too, I heard it in his voice. Would he have taken Quorra up on her offer to cuddle the first time she asked? I thought he would have. If the damn fucking wagon train had been where it was supposed to be.

  “I guess we follow them,” I said, disappointment riding me.

  “We’ll be lost in the Anwar,” Jasper said. “Magic doesn’t work the same there as it does near the witch towns.”

  “I know.” Jasper and I hadn’t shared a kiss, as far as this Jasper knew, anyway. I felt sad that I would miss that too and then castigated myself for being a selfish person. “Still, we have to find Cyres before the bitch does. Can you imagine what Amara would do to your sister?” Tytan’s soul deserved safety and peace. Not torture at the hands of a monster. “Maybe we can find a guide at the tavern.” We hadn’t stopped this time because I knew the answers, or thought I did.

  The tavern was fuller than last time we’d visited, though it was also later in the day. The bartender was busy filling drinks and arguing with a hairy guy about that day’s sales. Right. The slave market. I glanced at Jasper and he looked pale. I put my arm around him and gave him a squeeze. “Never again.”

  I was tempting fate, saying never so many times but damn it, what was the point of having lots of power if I couldn’t use any of it for good?

  “I hope not.”

  Hope was a good thing. We sat at the crazy bar again where the little things inside were flying around like crazy. Or were they swimming? My stomach lurched at the thought. I decided I wasn’t swimming again for a long time. I hadn’t been that turned off by water since watching Jaws as a kid when my Girl Scout troop had a movie night.

  Nex’s presence gained us some attention, though it wasn’t as quiet or reverential this time. One guy stumbled up and leaned on the bar, turning his bad breath our way. “You missed the sales. That thing coulda fetched a pretty price.” He leered at Jasper. “For that matter, you woulda made a mint on him. Wings are good for more than healing.”

  Jasper rose, anger vibrating through his body. I sat back, willing to let him take care of the jerk if he wanted to. He’d managed to give Tytan a shiner before, so I doubted one drunk guy would give him any trouble.

  “We don’t want no fighting here,” the bartender said.

  “Rhodri will say yes,” I told him. His face went pale then flushed pink. That taken care of I turned back to Jasper and drunk guy and rooted for my favorite.

  I’d been thinking of Jasper as a pacifist. I don’t know why. Probably all the talk of Wings being like angels or something. He circled drunk guy like a pacing cat, easy on his legs and looking the complete opposite of innocuous.

  Drunk guy didn’t seem to understand Jasper wasn’t going to just sit back and let him spew his assholery. “You ain’t going to hit me,” the guy said as Jasper let a left hook fly. The drunk guy staggered back and fell into a table with a crash, then struggled like a turtle to get to his feet.

  No one else offered any insults or help to the man who was spouting obscenities.

  Jasper’s cool grey eyes swept the room. A slight smile touched his lips. “Anyone else?”

  “Ah, boy, you made your point. Ole Char’s just full of drink and full of stupid. We’ll make sure he stops his shit.”

  Jasper nodded and returned to us at the bar, surreptitiously rubbing his hand. “How did I do?” He whispered the question and I fought back a grin.

  “Um, hello? One punch.”

  The look on his face was priceless.

  The bartender took that time to lean in to us. “How did you know about Rhodri?”

  “Psychic,” I said. “I don’t suppose you know of a guide who will take us through to Galleia, do you?” And will oh-so-accidentally lose me in the Wilds so I can find a certain hyena man?

  He straightened, his lip curling. “I’m sure the duallies will be here after moon rise. They come around ever’ two weeks or so on market days. Try to break up the slaver caravans and steal the merchandise.”

  A warm feeling stole over me. “Really?”

  “Yup. They takes them that they steal out to the Anwar and gets them tainted with magic. Despicable.”

  “And being a slave is all that better?”

  He looked at me as if I were a crazy person. “Yeah. Who wants to be a duallie?”

  I rolled my eyes. “When’s moon rise?”

  “‘Bout twenty minutes or so. You’ll hear them before you see them. They ain’t quiet about coming in. Making this town practically uninhabitable what with their visits and all.”

  Ah prejudice, how is it you can find your way into every place there’s people? Would it be too much to ask to find a new world where they’d worked all that shit out?

  Thirty-five minutes later, a far-off howl made me sit up in my seat. The other patrons shifted and more than a few threw money onto the bar and began an exodus until only our group and one man in the corner remained.

  “Where do they usually go first?” I asked the bartender.

  “The market. Catch any stragglers. Don’t matter how often the merchants changed the dates or time, them animals always manage to be here to make trouble. Now the merchants stick to a schedule and arm themselves.”

  Fear shot through me. I hoped Kroshtuka and the Meat Clan would stay safe. They had to be safe, right?

&nb
sp; “If they know what’s good for them, they’ll stay away. Ole Dodger got him some heavy help this time.” The bartender lowered his voice. “Some Skriven. His wife up and left him when she found out he was making bargains with that kind. Ain’t going to end good, but nobody going to tell Dodger that.”

  Shit. Amara. She knew. Somehow she knew. “They’re going to kill Kroshtuka. If he dies—” I thought hard, forcing my way past the fear as I ran out the door, not waiting to see if Jasper and Nex were following. Jasper easily caught up to me. “Where’s the market? Show me.”

  He steered me to the right and we ran. As we did, I gave him my theory in shortened breaths. “He’s the one who helped me rescue Cyres. If he dies, I might not find her. Amara’s fucking with things this time to make the outcome different. She’ll be the one there waiting for the Theleoni when they finally emerge from the Wilds, not Kroshtuka. Not if he dies here.”

  The market was a long run from the tavern and I was blowing air hard by the time Jasper slowed us and pushed me down behind a low wall. I tried breathing as quietly as I could, which was difficult when my lungs were trying to explode through my ribs.

  He said, “There are two guards over by the holding cells. Do you see them?”

  I peeked, saw nothing, and opened my Magic Eye. The two guards lit up like candles and a few others showed up further afield, one even hanging out in a tree. I ignored the ones that read as witch-folk and concentrated on locating the Skriven I knew was lurking somewhere in the mix.

  I finally spotted the bastard, standing with cool self-assurance in the middle of the arena. I recognized him. Cambion, the one who’d been helping the Theleoni grab humans. Amara’s involvement and animosity for me started to make sense. It wouldn’t surprise me to learn that she started the Theleoni down the road of human killing so that she would have some entertainment. Originators seemed to get bored way too easy.

  I knew how to kill Cambion but it would involve taking someone’s life and I wasn’t sure I could just snatch some random person’s soul and use it for that purpose. Even the guards here, though working for a reprehensible man who thought selling people was a great money maker, didn’t deserve to die because I needed a soul to kill a monster.

  Now, if one of the guards happened to get himself killed in the process of ambushing Kroshtuka, that was another matter all together. I sank down into my control room, wanting to put up some sort of barrier around us to keep us from being seen by anyone looking. For some reason, the movie Predator popped into my head, so I used the idea of camouflaged armor and modified it with my imagination. I had no idea if it would work, but if it did, we’d have that much more of an advantage.

  Nex floated up a few minutes after I’d constructed the barrier, his intestines grubby from dragging in the dirt. “Devany?” he whispered.

  He couldn’t see us. I pumped my arm. “Yes.” I eased the barrier and he nodded in appreciation.

  “The mark of a good hunter. Camouflage is something the fleshcrawlers are adept at.”

  “Thank you.” He bobbed beside me, assessing the scene.

  “Tough odds.”

  “Yes.” I nibbled my lip, then asked him, “Do you have any way to defend yourself?”

  He looked affronted. “I have my teeth.”

  “Any defensive or offensive magic?”

  Sighing, he shook his head.

  “No worries. Stay here, be a look out. Holler if there’s something we need to know.”

  He nodded. I turned to Jasper. “You don’t have to fight.”

  “I know. But I will and gladly.”

  I still hadn’t asked him what had happened to him at the slave market. We just hadn’t had time and I’d hesitated bringing it up. Now I wished I’d made room for him to share what had happened to him.

  “If things get rough, get inside a protection circle. I can hook away, you can’t. Okay?”

  Jasper nodded, then laid a hand on my shoulder. “Be careful. I don’t want to think what life would be like without you.”

  “It might be safer.”

  “You don’t understand the difference you’ve made. But I do. Be careful.”

  “I will.” I touched his face and then jumped when we heard the howls again. They weren’t subtle. I supposed though, that it would be in their best interests to be loud. People were frightened of them and the howls would get them off the streets. Tonight, though, they were running into an ambush and the howls were serving to help the Meat Clan’s enemies kill them.

  I thought of the mind link I’d established with Kroshtuka once before and wondered if I could renew it, even though this time around I hadn’t made the connection yet. Nephele had known about me the second time around. Tytan remembered. Would Kroshtuka?

  In my head I thought of him, of the way he looked last I saw him in the cavern of Dreams. ‘Kroshtuka?’

  There was a burst of mental static, that white noise that your brain makes as you’re trying to sleep and then, “Devany?”

  -TWENTY-FIVE-

  I grabbed Jasper’s arm so I didn’t spill over onto my ass in surprise. ‘You remember me?’

  “I. Yes. And no. I had a Dream about you last night. In it, we’d met after you wandered into my village and I challenged you to a hunt to get you into my bed.’

  “Are you okay?” Jasper asked as I covered my mouth to contain my shock and excitement.

  At Krosh, I thought, ‘It wasn’t a dream to me. But we can talk about that later. Right now I need you to know your people are moving into a trap. Dodger is consorting with a Skriven and they’ve set up an ambush in the arena.’

  I felt the rush of his anger as well as his masculine self-confidence. “Good. I’ve been wanting an excuse to take that old man down.”

  ‘I want to help, as do my friends. There are only three of us,’ and one’s only a head, ‘but we can fight.’

  A slight lifting of my thoughts. He was remembering my change into Neutria. “You will be the spider?”

  The admiration made me smile and Neutria pushed forward long enough to declare, Our mate.

  When I didn’t disagree, her laughter tickled through my head.

  ‘If I need her strength, yes. We are on the side of the market closest to the tavern, fetched up against a low rock wall.’ I described the locations of the witches and where the Skriven stood. ‘I’m going to have to take him.’

  “They are dangerous.” His smile came through his thoughts. “I think he won’t know what hits him.”

  Yeah. And that, right there, was why I couldn’t stop thinking about the guy, even in the midst of all this crap. He liked my power. Admired it. That kind of confidence in my prowess was lovely.

  “I’m going to send a few of the clan to howl and whoop it up near the tavern and the rest of my warriors will find you.”

  ‘Okay. Thank you, Kroshtuka.”

  “You saved my people from being slaughtered. I think it is I who should say thank you.” I could just imagine the heavy-lidded look he would have if I could see him. “Perhaps there’s a way I could thank you later.”

  I made the mistake of looking up at Jasper at that moment and almost strangled on my tongue. ‘Yes. Yes, there may be.’

  I cut off the connection, feeling guilty and not knowing why. I didn’t have commitments with anyone so there wasn’t any reason to feel guilty. And despite our kiss, my feelings for Jasper weren’t of relationship quality. I worried for him, I hurt for him, and I wanted him to be happy. That didn’t translate into the kind of attraction I felt for Kroshtuka. Or Tytan, damn him, but much of that I attributed to his talents―since I didn’t want to think that I might be attracted on my own to someone who could be as evil as he’d been in the past.

  God, hormones. They weren’t convenient at the best of times and they certainly muddled shit up.

  The Meat Clan didn’t make much sound as they crept up on our position. I wouldn’t have noticed them at all if I hadn’t had my Magic Eye up. I eased the barrier enough to allow them
to see us.

  Kroshtuka was already in hyena form. His shoulders came to my head as I sat, back against the wall, and his sharp face grinned as he looked at me. Without thinking, I reached out and scratched him behind his ears. His lolled tongue and half-closed eyes made me smile.

  “What’s the plan?” I whispered aloud and in my head so that everyone could hear. Kroshtuka set down his plan which I relayed to Nex and Jasper.

  “They’ll try to take us alive, but won’t be gentle about it,” Jasper said. “We may have to kill them.”

  “I know. And if it’s a choice between keeping one of us alive and one of them, we win.” My hand was still on Kroshtuka’s ruff and though I figured I should move it, I didn’t. His warmth and strength comforted me. “If you kill someone, or you know one of them is dying, call out to me if it’s safe.” I couldn’t bring myself to say I needed the soul, so I just shut up. Let them wonder.

  The Meat Clan warriors scattered as I extended the barrier around the outside of the arena to attempt to keep their approach a secret until the last minute. I’d warned them I didn’t know what kinds of traps the Skriven had set up.

  “I’ll go in first. He’ll know who I am and it may just distract him enough that he doesn’t get around to attacking the rest of you.”

  ‘You are risking your life for us,’ Kroshtuka said in my mind.

  ‘Maybe.’ I was strangely calm about the whole thing and I hoped this sudden confidence didn’t get me killed. I said a silent ‘I love you’ to my kids then stepped out from behind the barrier. “Cambion! A little birdie told me you would be here. Not very many humans to exploit at this time of the night, are there?”

  He spun and launched an attack. Luckily I’d already been preparing my bubble for just this occasion and I got it slammed in place as his volley exploded around me. Despite the magical barrier, I still felt the heat of the explosion as it blew past me. It even took me back a step before I could right myself. “Well, that wasn’t very nice at all,” I said. “I just came here to talk.”

  “There is nothing I have to say to you, usurper.”