Turesobei settled onto the cushions between Kurine and Iniru. Enashoma and Zaiporo snuggled together on the opposite side, with Turesobei’s amber hounds, Rig and Ohma, nestling at their feet.
Awasa hesitated as Motekeru stared into the fire. The flickering flames animated his terrible features, making him appear more nightmarish than normal. After a few moments, he shook his head, as if he had suddenly come to his senses.
“I will go meditate now,” he announced.
As he turned to leave, Awasa grabbed his arm. “Stay. Please…for me.”
He met her eyes…paused…then looked over her shoulder at the fire. He shook his head. “I’m sorry.”
“I’ll come with you,” she said.
“Remain here with your friends and enjoy the evening.”
She frowned, started to say something, then nodded silently. Turesobei wished he could help her feel more welcome, but he could hardly abandon Kurine and Iniru to sit with Awasa. Even he understood what a disaster that would be.
“Lady Awasa, come sit by me!” Lu Bei said.
She spun around, a surprised expression creasing her face. “What? Me?”
Lu Bei patted a cushion beside him. “Yes—” he hiccuped “—you.” He laughed, sloshing tea from his bowl. “Silly demon girl.”
Eyes narrowed in suspicion, Awasa approached slowly, then knelt carefully beside him. “If you’re going to play a trick on me then—” She recoiled. “Ugh! What’s that smell?”
“Karion whiskey.”
“You spiked your tea?”
“Of course!” He cast bluish sparks from his hands into the air. “It’s a party, don’t you know?”
“Oh…great,” Awasa groaned, though a faint grin tugged at her face.
Turesobei would have to remember to thank the fetch for including Awasa. Assuming Lu Bei didn’t overdo it and cause problems. Which, now that he thought of it, was likely, since he and Awasa had never gotten along with one another.
Bathed in the warmth of the crackling fire and cooled by a breeze, both girls—leanly-muscled Iniru and curvy Kurine—snuggled up with Turesobei. The servant played a bright love song on the zither. The full moon shined down from above. The scent of woodsmoke merged with that of the night-blooming jasmine and honeysuckle hanging from the nearby trellis. Bowls of tea, sweet cakes, and wine were crammed onto the tables beside them. Everyone was happy, laughing and chatting with one another.
Iniru leaned in. He looked intently into her golden eyes, surrounded by downy, red-brown fur. She kissed him deeply. Warmth spread throughout his chest into his gut and along his neck and face. By his side, Kurine tensed up, but she didn’t release his arm. Iniru drew away, traced a finger along his cheek, then shoved him—gently—toward Kurine.
Scared, excited, and mystified, he half-turned. Kurine’s emerald eyes and a nervous smile met him. She brushed her golden mane back, exposing the white fur of her neckline. Iniru squished her fingers tightly in-between his. She trembled, ever so slightly. So did he.
Kurine blushed. Was she waiting for him to make a move? He inched his face toward her, then hesitated. She surged in and kissed him just as deeply as Iniru had. The warmth within Turesobei tripled.
This moment…surrounded by friends and beauty…with both girls he loved sharing him…it was perfect.
Too perfect.
I’m so going to die tomorrow.
Chapter Eleven
“Master!” Lu Bei patted him on the arm. “Master, it’s an emergency!”
He swatted at the fetch. “Go away.”
“It’s important, Master. I swear.”
The girl in the bed with him rubbed her eyes and yawned. “Lu, what’s wrong?”
Groaning, he shoved her away. “Leave us…” he couldn’t remember her name “…girl. Go now.”
Naked and frightened, she scurried out of his room. She didn’t even look familiar. Oh well.
“What is it this time?”
“A thief,” Lu Bei said.
“Again? You don’t need me to deal with a thief. Summon Motekeru.”
“A thief broke into your vault, Master.”
He was on his feet instantly. “What did they take?”
“All I saw missing were…” Lu Bei frowned in worry “…were the kavaru of the Council of Nine.”
He threw on a robe and grabbed his sword Yomifano. “How long?”
“An hour at most. When the second guard patrol showed for duty, they found the first shift neutralized.”
He raced out into the hallway. “Why didn’t my alarm wards sound? How did they make it past my defenses? And what about my demon guardians?”
“Master, I don’t know how, but they didn’t set off any of the alarms, and they opened the vault with ease. As for your demon guardians, they have been banished back to the nether reaches. Motekeru is in pursuit of the thief, along with a dozen of your finest.”
“Did he get a look at him?”
Lu Bei shook his head. “Motekeru is doing a wide sweep looking for…anything. Before I came to alert you, I did a quick flyover, but I couldn’t detect a kenja trail of any type.”
He paused and let out a deep breath. “You might as well recall the search. Only one person could break in here and exit without leaving a trace. And they will never find her.”
“Nalsyrra, Master? But why would she ask you to stop the Council and then steal the stones? She could have done it all herself.”
“Why does she do anything?”
“That’s true, Master,” Lu Bei said, nodding. “She is inscrutable.”
“We can only hope she won’t do something equally terrible with those kavaru.”
“I think she was sincere when she said the Kaiaru race should not be restarted,” the fetch said.
“She always seems sincere.”
He walked back into his room, put Yomifano on its stand, and took off his robe. “Lu Bei, inventory the vault. Make certain nothing else was stolen, and check that everything in there is genuine. Send that girl back in first, though. And while you’re at it, find out her name for me.”
* * *
Turesobei awoke with Lu Bei sitting on his chest. Iniru and Kurine lay on either side of him, where they had fallen asleep at some point during Enashoma’s good luck party. The fetch briefly put a finger across his lips and motioned for him to follow. He carefully extracted himself from between the sleeping girls and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. Awasa must have gone in to bed at some point, because her spot around the still smoldering fire pit was empty. Enashoma and Zaiporo lay curled up together on the other side.
The fetch beckoned to him from the doorway. Turesobei tiptoed around his friends’ sleeping forms and followed the nervous fetch back to his room. Once he slid the door shut, Lu Bei finally settled on the edge of his desk.
Turesobei knelt on the reed mat in front of him. “What's wrong?”
“You were talking in your sleep.”
"Oh." The dream, Chonda Lu's memories, came rushing back. “What did I say?”
“You muttered a few names is all,” Lu Bei said. “Was it a bad dream?”
He rubbed his temples. “I don’t really remember.”
Lu Bei nodded decisively. “Probably just as well, master.”
He could tell that Lu Bei understood he was lying, in case Lord Gyoroe was listening in. These dreams always left him with more questions than answers. It would help if he and Lu Bei were able talk freely but, even if they could, the fetch obviously didn't know everything.
Turesobei stared at the fetch.
In the dream, Lu Bei had been able to fly around without a distance restriction, and he’d been able to track kenja trails. The fetch often claimed he used to have a lot of other powers, including the ability to turn invisible. Maybe he was telling the truth about that. It was always hard to tell.
At the beginning, Lu Bei had claimed he could only stay in fetch form if Turesobei focused on him. That had turned out to be a lie, though it was true he wa
s the source of Lu Bei’s power. That’s why the storm energy had caused the fetch to grow and gain the ability to cast sparks. It had doubled his range, too. Lu Bei had not, however, regained any of his old abilities, despite the massive storm energy they had both absorbed. So either the fetch was hiding those abilities, or different power sources led to different types of abilities.
Lu Bei’s face creased with worry. “Something wrong, master?”
“Just worrying about the mission tomorrow. I could use a cup of tea.”
“Right-o, master! Tea ahead!”
Turesobei gave up on getting any more sleep and fixed himself a bath instead. He slipped into the hot water with a sigh and pondered what the dream had meant. Nine stones…ten personalities…a powerful Kaiaru named Nalsyrra who told Chonda Lu about the threat posed by the Council of Nine, and then apparently stole the kavaru which were now bound to Gyoroe. There were big pieces missing from the puzzle and knowing them might give him the edge he needed to defeat the Blood King.
Solving this would be so much easier if Turesobei had direct access to Chonda Lu’s memories instead of receiving random dreams. But that thought made him shiver, despite the hot bath. He'd almost rather just go up to the Blood King and ask how he had gotten the stones.
Chapter Twelve
With a sizzle like water tossed on hot iron, the flickering portal within the stone arch of the Spring Gate closed and disappeared. Her friends gone, Enashoma collapsed to her knees, raking in shallow breaths. The blissful feelings from the night of companionship around the campfire vanished.
She was all alone with the Blood King now.
As the Nexus seemed to close in on her, Enashoma’s muscles trembled. Her heart thundered in her chest, and her breath caught.
The Blood King knelt beside her. “Breathe, girl, and all will be well.”
She tried to take a few deep breaths, but only ended up gasping.
“You are worried about being forever stuck here with me, yes?”
She nodded.
“Your brother will not abandon you. If I thought he might, I would have also kept Kurine here as additional collateral.”
“I know he...won’t abandon…me….” she panted. “He should...but he won’t. It’s just that...he...he might...”
“Perish? Well, that is a risk, of course.” He gently touched her shoulder. “Calm your mind. Focus on your kavaru.”
Enashoma considered the deep amethyst channeling stone on her forehead, held there by an iron circlet covered with silver filigree. After only half a day of wearing it, the stone and the circlet still felt alien.
“I don’t have…a clue how to…use it.”
That statement wasn’t entirely true. Once, when Turesobei was unconscious after absorbing the energy of the Storm Dragon's Heart, she had called power from his stone. But she thought it dangerous to let the Blood King know she had connected with a kavaru before.
“I want you to focus on it anyway. And take deep breaths. Calm your spirit as Hannya taught you during your mudra training sessions.”
She gave him a worried look.
“You do not have to open your mind to the stone,” he said, “if you are not yet ready.”
Enashoma relaxed enough to manage a few shallow breaths. She didn’t care how kind Nāa seemed in her visions, or how much Lu Bei praised him. The idea of intimately connecting with another soul, especially one so foreign and alien, frightened her. Ever since she had seen him during her test, Enashoma had felt him there at the edges of her mind. And now that everyone was gone and there were no more feasts or friends to distract her, no more Zaiporo to cuddle with, she feared she wouldn’t be able to keep blocking him out.
She curled the fingers of each hand into a relatively simple mudra and focused her mind on the image of a breeze dancing across a field of lavender. Slowly, her breaths deepened, and her muscles relaxed.
Then she felt it—the faint rhythmic pulse of the amethyst kavaru, the beat of a long-dead Kaiaru’s heart. An intense serenity came over her, overpowering her desire to rip the circlet off her head and toss it aside.
“Feeling better?” he asked.
She nodded.
“Good. You understand I do not mean you harm, right?”
“You don’t?” she asked incredulously.
“I will not punish you if your companions do not return.”
“You said you would torture me.”
“Only as a threat, to make sure your brother returns.” He smiled. “Worry not. If you get stuck here, I will not harm you.” His smiled faded, and a deeper color flickered in his eyes. “But I must warn you not to tell your brother what I just said. I do not want to weaken my threat.”
“I swear, I won’t. Not that telling him would make a difference. He would never abandon me here.” She chewed at her lip. “To be honest, I’m less worried about Turesobei returning. He always makes it through, somehow. He’s powerful and has his special destiny. But the others...they don’t all have his abilities...they might not all make it back....”
The Blood King’s eyes shifted to gray. Those morose eyes marked a brooding personality they had rarely seen and hardly interacted with.
“I understand.” He took her hand in his, as if comforting a friend. “You may not believe me, but I went through exactly this situation myself. Many times.” His voice fell to a whisper. “My mother set out on many journeys, traveling…on a sailing ship, I think. She would be gone for many months. My sister and I worried so much that we could hardly stand it.”
“But she always returned, right?”
“Until I was sixteen.”
“What happened?”
He frowned deeply. “I…I do not remember.” He shook his head. “It was so very long ago, and I think this is the first time I have thought of it in millennia.”
“My father died on his last adventure—Turesobei’s first. Until then, I had thought my father would always return. He had seemed so invincible to me.”
“My father disappeared when I was very young. I do not remember him.”
They sat in silence for a few moments, both staring at the gate. The Blood King had never before seemed so human to Enashoma.
“I am sorry you must endure this,” he said. “But at least you understand now that I would never make you go through it lightly. I would not wish such torment on another.”
That was odd, because he didn’t mind making them writhe in excruciating agony with his torture spell whenever he was the least bit peeved.
“This is simply how life works,” the Blood King said. “My sister and I took on the same job my mother had held. We ventured out...out onto the starry seas. And eventually we too....” His voice choked, he winced, then he doubled over as if in pain.
She reached out a hand then pulled it back. “Are you okay?”
He righted himself, his eyes turning violet. “Of course.” He stood. “Wait here if you want. I have better things to do.”
“Aren’t you going to start teaching me?”
“Not yet. You need to spend time getting used to the feel of the kavaru. And you need to learn to accept that you are a bonded host.”
“How do I do that?”
“For starters, you should stop blocking your mind and your pathways to keep Nāa from contacting you again.”
“How did you know I was doing that?”
“It was easy enough to see, for someone with my powers, and given your brother's destiny, even easier to guess.” The Blood King eyed her fiercely. “You will report to me every morning at dawn to update me on your progress in communing with Nāa.”
Without waiting for a reply, he swept away, down the steps from the Gate Platform, and out into the courtyard. Then he disappeared.
Enashoma shivered. Turesobei might be used to dealing with the Blood King’s sudden mood shifts, but she wasn’t. And all that about his parents and sister.... He had seemed human, almost too human, and that had made her even more uncomfortable. Something within him
was deeply twisted.
Enashoma’s gaze returned to the gate. She took a deep breath. She couldn’t just sit here waiting on the platform. They would be gone for hours, perhaps days. She should try to distract herself.
The kavaru pulsed eagerly. She really should try bonding with the stone. No, bonding wasn’t the right term. She was already a bonded host, whatever that meant. She only had to open her mind to Nāa.
And she did need to…commune…with him to find out what he wanted, find out why he had awoken and what was so special about her. Procrastinating wouldn't help anyone. She needed to learn as much as she could as quickly as possible. If they ever got a chance to escape, as unlikely as that might seem, she wanted to do her part.
Chapter Thirteen
Though it seemed as if they were speeding through a tunnel of white clouds, Turesobei knew they were simply passing through the Wraithspace at incredible speed.
Not entirely unlike the Shadowland, the Wraithspace was a ghostly realm which lay underneath, or perhaps between, all the other places in the universe. He had been trapped there briefly, though he remembered little of what had happened, except something vague about Chonda Lu and being attacked by demons. Upon escaping, he had teleported back into the Nexus and had nearly died because he arrived in a rose bush, its thorny vines woven through his body.
Turesobei stumbled out of the tunnel onto the other side of the gate and found the others waiting on him: Motekeru and the hounds, Rig and Ohma. Awasa in her new, lightweight armor of azure and black. Zaiporo in heavy armor of burgundy and green. Iniru in her sleek black and smoke garb of partial plates and thick padding, which was as heavy as it could be without diminishing her mobility. And Kurine in the finest armor Lord Gyoroe had given any of them: lacquered plates of scarlet and gold, etched with intricate spiral designs and protective runes. Turesobei’s green armor with burgundy trim paled in comparison to hers.
He breathed a sigh of relief. Everyone had made it through safely. Lu Bei crawled out from his pack and spiraled up into the sky.
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