Beside her, D’Ash’s hem smoked and caught fire, crawling up her dress.
A scream of emotional torment ripped from Shade as he flung another and another of the explosives. “Flametree’s firebombspell. Once it touches you, it will burn you to flinders! There’s no stopping the propel spell—” Holm’s knife stuck in the boy’s chest. His eyes widened and glazed as he stared at the blood painting his shirt. He died.
Screams and shrieks rose throughout the room as clothing and furniture caught fire. As their shields faltered, Ailim heard the awful torment of thoughts. Overwhelming fear and pain buckled her knees. She clamped her hands against her head and reeled against a wall.
“Lord and Lady, no!” cried T’Ash. “Danith, rip your robe off! Don’t let a micron of the firebombspell touch you. It killed my Family. One cinder will kill you.”
Ailim saw T’Ash tear the heavy formalrobe from his wife, saw an untouched D’Ash, saw her garments consumed.
“Healers!” cried D’Ash.
“Can’t. Healers can’t stop this. It’s a propel firebombspell. Nothing can stop the burning,” T’Ash said.
As Ailim stumbled to the door, she saw T’Birch staring at the fiery sleeve of her gown, T’Reed beating at flames on the chairs with his sword. T’Rowan screaming and staring at a blackened hand. Others rolling on the floor in agony. Half the people in the room were afire. Slowly burning to death.
Ruis flung himself through the doors, chains dangling, followed by Winterberry. “We heard screams! Are you hurt, Ailim? What’s wrong?”
“Shields down. Not hurt,” she gasped. “Flametree’s firebombspell. Can’t be stopped.”
Ruis grabbed a box from his pocket, thrust it at her. “My gift to you.”
She fumbled the box open. Her fingers clenched around an emerald heart. The emotions ravaging her from others dimmed.
Ruis glanced around. “Firebombspell is pure Flair. Flair dies near me. I can smother it.” He gazed at the closest burning person and fell upon her. They both screamed, Ruis low, she high. Then she only sobbed and whimpered. Ruis rolled off her and to another.
Healers ran through the doors. “Something’s wrong. We can’t port here,” one panted, taking in the scene with a glance. Horror crossed his face. “What—”
Ailim jumped to a Healer. “A propel firebombspell. You can’t Heal the ones on fire.” She shoved the Healer to Ruis’s first rescue. “Go to her, her flames are out!”
She snagged another Healer, Lark Collinson, and pulled her into a corner. “Have one of your people leave the NobleCouncil Hall, out of the Null’s range—”
“Null?” The smaller woman blinked.
“Yes. He’s stopping the firestorm. Stopping it. You can only Heal those whose fire is out.”
Lark nodded. “Right.” She sped from the corner and took charge. Healers and nobles rushed to do her bidding.
Ailim scanned the crowd for Ruis. The fire on the furniture had been extinguished.
A cindered man placed a woman gently on the floor. Brown eyes looked from a blackened face. Ruis.
He shouted, stumbled toward her, his stare sliding past her.
She whirled to see Bucus Elder, lips peeled back from his teeth in a mad grin, swinging a long curtain sparking at the end. Focused on her. Crazy laughter rolled from his belly.
“So you’ve been snooping, gathering evidence against me, using Menzie. Can’t allow that. I’m the most powerful man on Celta. No one crosses me.” He spit a stream of filthy curses. Ailim froze. It seemed like a nightmare.
He approached, eyes glittering. “If I go down, so do you. I’ll get you.” Another amulet dangled from between his fingers.
Ailim clutched her new necklace, wondering if it could protect her. Even if she flung the necklace away, she was too weak to teleport. Walls of the corner crowded her.
Ruis dived between them, ignoring the bulk of his uncle, the flaming fabric.
Bucus stumbled back, shoved Ruis to the floor, kicked him.
“No!” screamed Ailim. She threw the little box with all her might, hitting Bucus between the eyes. His head jerked back, he hesitated.
Ruis swept Bucus’s feet from under him. The fiery curtain wrapped around them both. They all screamed, Ailim in horror, the two men in pain.
Ruis rolled aside, pushed himself to his knees with blackened hands. Ailim grabbed him and helped him rise. He moaned.
A ululating shriek tore from Bucus. His entire body flamed. His face was a rictus of agony. Ruis put out a hand, but flames reached the amulet and Bucus torched.
Ailim and Ruis swayed together.
“Justice,” Ailim whispered.
Lark Collinson strode over with a burning man. Ruis grasped him.
Other nobles followed, pushing the worst cases toward Ruis.
Ruis had been her man, her love, her hero.
Now, he was Celta’s hero.
He looked at her through eyes that were mere glimmers between the swollen, blistered skin of his cheeks. The front of his clothes hung in tattered, black shreds. Or perhaps it was his skin. He smiled at her and his lips cracked open and bled.
“Restitution for my crimes,” he said.
“Too much!” She faced a terrified stream of burning nobles.
“Who else can do it?” He reached for the next victim, hesitated an instant before encircling D’Birch, who’d lied about him and her necklace. Then he embraced the woman.
Finally it was done, the last of the flesh-eating, Flaired, inextinguishable flames halted. Ruis had to be lifted and his patient removed from under him and taken away to be Healed.
He lay on his back, a cinder of a man, barely breathing. A circle of nobles surrounded him. D’Ash and T’Ash. T’Holly, D’Holly, Holm, and Tinne. T’Blackthorn.
“T’Heather! Where’s T’Heather?” Ailim demanded frantically.
“Healing,” T’Ash said.
“Get him or Lark!” cried Ailim. She’d long stopped noticing the tears streaming down her cheeks, only brushing them aside when they became troublesome.
“Let’s move him to the pentacle,” T’Holly said. “That’s where the most ancient and powerful spells are. It might help.”
He was placed reverently in the pentacle. The nobles parted for Lark. She only shook her head. “We can’t Heal him.” Tears welled in her eyes. “He’s a Null.”
“He will die,” Ailim said dully. After all they’d been through, all they’d overcome with arguments and problems still unresolved between them, they had still not altered any fate. He would die.
Metal clanged against metal as Samba’s saucer hit the doorjamb. “Waaahh. Rrrrowww, hhrrrr ruffff,” Listen to Me, I know what to do, Samba said. Take him to the Ship. Where He belongs. Ship will fix him. Fast horses outside. She sounded falsely hopeful.
The nobles glanced at each other. “She’s his Fam, Zanth’s daughter,” T’Ash said. “I’ll do it.”
Samba tilted back through the doors. T’Ash and Holm lifted Ruis and started out. Everyone followed. Samba glanced over her shoulder and sneered. T’Ash rides with FamMan. FamWoman Ailim rides, too. Everyone else stays.
The Fam slitted her eyes. Contempt at the nobles showed in the twitch of her ears, the twirl of her tail, and every muscle in her body. Stupid nobles sit and think how they owe FamMan. How they need him. How they need Ship.
T’Reed came forward, a hole where his left ear had been, streaks of blisters down the side of his face. He nodded. “He saved my life, many of our lives. We’ll consider everything. Later.” His face paled and he weaved on the spot. He looked at Ailim and blinked rapidly with lashless eyes. “You—”
She drew herself up, and sent a cold glance around the nobles, gesturing for T’Ash and Holly to hurry ahead with their burden.
“Ruis Elder’s been misjudged since his birth,” Ailim said. “He was betrayed and abused by Bucus T’Elder, falsely tried by this Council.” She allowed disgust to thread her voice. “Charges will be brought.” It was the last w
ord she could squeeze from her throat, the last coherent thought she had. She could only run at a shambling pace to catch up with T’Ash and Holm and Ruis. Still, behind her, she heard the whoosh of Samba’s saucer and her hissing, you, greatlords and ladies. you, pray.
Ruis awoke feeling awful. The dimness in his vision that he recalled from other times he’d surfaced still plagued him. The pain was better. Memories descended in colorful chunks. He moved his lips. They felt rubbery. He hadn’t been capable of asking questions before.
A warm, solid presence lay along his side vibrating with a purr that barely reached his ears. “Samba?”
I am here.
“Ailim?”
She left when Ship told her you were waking up and that I could care for you by Myself.
He wasn’t surprised. He’d cost her everything: her title, her career, her Family, her home. Her very honor. More, he hadn’t trusted or believed in her enough to save a future together.
He groaned. He tested his muscles, flailed spasmodically. “How long have I been in sick bay?”
Two days. First you in a heal tube. Ship says it gets you well fast. Samba snorted. You supposed to be able to get up tomorrow, all better in three days.
Physically he seemed whole. His eyes, half-open, closed in deep emotional hurt. Ailim had stayed long enough to ensure he would heal—perhaps that was her sense of duty to an ex-lover.
He moaned.
A little snick sounded by his left ear. Ship gives you more pain meds. You on bed not in tube, good for both of Us.
His mind seemed to float, all his aches, mental and physical, separated themselves from him.
“What happened?”
Evil uncle caught you.
“I remember that.” It still didn’t seem possible, but then, he should have been dead.
You were hurt bad. Uncle got Ailim, too.
“Yes.” He knew he should feel anguish, the anguish that had pummeled him when he realized that she’d lost everything due to him.
Took you to Guildhall and FirstFamilies Council.
Those memories unreeled in brilliant color and clarity. He licked his lips. Something brushed his mouth.
Straw. Drink.
The tang of citrus juice exploded with exquisite sweetness in his mouth. He drank until sated. He opened his eyes to the arched metallic silver ceiling of sick bay.
“Lady and Lord, Shade! The firebombspell! The FirstFamilies Council!” He tried to jackknife up, but his muscles only twitched.
Shade is dead. Boy went mad. Used your Nullness to get into CouncilChamber. Set off nasty spell. Holm Holly killed Shade.
Ruis remembered his shock and grief at seeing Shade dead on the CouncilChamber floor, lips peeled back from his teeth in a mad grimace. “The FirstFamily nobles?” His lips stiffened as emotions filtered back. He didn’t want to remember the hideous pain of stopping the firebombspell with his body.
Many burned. Five die. One HeartMate died, T’Rowan, D’Rowan not burned bad, but she’s HeartMate, will die soon.
“Six,” his stomach roiled. “Six of fifty. More than ten percent. D’Vine, the old prophetess?” Though he had visions of her body flaming and crisping before him, a tendril of hope—
Gone to cycle in Wheel of Stars.
Hurt was coming back. Ruis shook his head on the pillow.
You Hero. You saved them all.
“They must think Shade conspired with me.”
Samba snorted. They know Shade used you. Used your Nullness. Followed you. Who could know when you get caught?
“T’Blackthorn usually finds the trail of whatever he hunts.”
Straif Blackthorn wanted to talk about Hollys. Bucus’s men get you.
“Yes.”
Shade nowhere around you. You couldn’t call him. He comes by himself for himself.
Shade. A tickle behind his eyes became an ache and his throat closed. “He wouldn’t have done it if they hadn’t caught me. He was reforming,” Ruis whispered.
Who knows? Samba said. Big FirstFamilies Council meeting tomorrow. Ship will show Us.
Ruis blinked. Shade was gone. And Ailim. Ailim. He needed her more than ever now. But he had cost her everything. He had committed the crime of his life. He had driven her away.
His mind swirled with color, he tried to roll onto his side. Sharp pain vanquished him.
Ailim ’ported from Landing Park to the D’SilverFir gates. Her eyes filled as she trudged up the gravel path and her breath caught at the first sight of what had been her home.
Gone. All gone. Her title. Her estate. Her career. Her lover.
She could barely look at the proud Residence she cherished. Only her work on Ruis’s case and her own self-discipline had stopped her from falling into despair in the last few days.
She had broken laws and her oath as a Celtan Judge. Ailim stiffened her back. She didn’t regret her choice, even when she realized she’d played the fool for love—loving a man who had no faith in a future together. And then he proved himself a hero with such self-sacrifice that he humbled everyone in the chamber that day.
He was a good man. When the time for action came, he had risen above his childhood abuse and his flaws to reveal a man of truly noble character. He just hadn’t been capable of taking the last step of trusting her against all the evils of his past.
As soon as Ailim stepped through the door, Cona am-bushed her.
“How could you do this to us? How could you ruin the Family? I always knew those self-righteous manners of yours hid a sordid streak.” Cona waved newsheets at Ailim.
Ailim stared at her. “Cona, shut up.”
For a moment Cona’s mouth hung open at Ailim’s rudeness, then Cona continued her rant. “We are ruined! The scandal is dreadful. We have lost the estate!”
“Cona, shut up.” Ailim saw Donax in the shadows. She rubbed her eyes, her shoulders slumped. “Ah, Donax, I’ve lost the Residence and its estate. You should have played it safe.”
Donax dipped his head, an odd expression on his face. “Even if you did lose this Residence and the lands that go with it, we still have several holdings, all of which are prospering. So are our investments. We’ll see this through.”
“How could you, Ailim?” Cona screamed.
Ailim winced, then rounded on her. “Cona, I’m tired of you. Of your whining and your airs. You’re a pain in the ass.”
Cona sputtered. “You can’t talk that way to me!”
“Of course I can. I’m not a GrandLady anymore, I’m not a Judge anymore, either. That means I can act as I please. I’ve already disgraced myself.”
“Yes, you have!” Cona shrilled.
Ailim rolled right over her. “Everyone already believes the worst of me. I’ve had some very bad days and I don’t have to stand here and endure any more snottiness from you.” Her hands itched and she eyed Cona. “Lady and Lord, I’ve always wanted to tear your perfect braids out.”
Cona squawked, clapped her hands to her braids and ran up the stairs. Donax’s mouth twitched as he followed.
“Well done, lass,” said Caltha, walking into the great hall from the den. “Go upstairs and rest. The special FirstFamilies Council meeting tomorrow will be a challenge for you.” She put her sturdy hands on Ailim’s shoulders and squeezed. “I’m proud of you, as is most of the Family. Don’t you worry about your own future. We’ll take care of you, just like you took care of us.”
Ailim shook her head and bolted to her rooms. When she got there, Primrose yipped in pleasure and radiated joy. Love You!
“I love you, too,” Ailim muttered, falling onto the bed.
Primrose hopped up and licked the tears from Ailim’s face.
An urgent bonging woke Ruis. He stretched, winced, and sleep cleared from his head at the Ship’s announcement. “Transmission of FirstFamilies Council Meeting on holoscreen.”
Ruis blinked as images formed.
A tall, older, ascetic man strode into the CouncilChamber and faced the FirstFamilies. He was
accompanied by an ancient man with wrinkled face and hands who walked with a cane reminding Ruis of old D’Vine. Ruis gulped as a burst of grief swept through him. Three others strode through the CouncilChamber doors, two women and a man, all in Judges’s purple robes. Excitement and anticipation made Ruis’s pulse beat faster.
Then his gaze fixed on Ailim as she and her Heir entered. His mouth tightened when he saw she was dressed as a commoner. Longing and despair inundated him. It wasn’t his Nullness or his past that had separated them. It was only his own sheer stupidity and lack of faith.
Finally a fat calico tail waved in the holo. Samba strutted in and sat beside Ailim. Ruis shook his head.
“As acting SupremeJudge, I, GrandLord Goldenseal, can convene a FirstFamilies Council, as I have done. And as SupremeJudge, with the consent and knowledge of my predecessor, former SupremeJudge Orris, and the current other Judges of Celta”—he indicated those in purple robes—“I can rule on any action of this council.”
“This has never happened before. I object to this hasty meeting. I object to this so-called investigation of the FirstFamilies Council’s action in banishing the thief Ruis Elder,” T’Hawthorn said.
Goldenseal swept the table of FirstFamilies with a gaze that made many shrink. “Is Celta ruled by law or by whim?” he asked softly. “Does this council want to compound its illegal acts?”
Twenty
T’Oak rose. Ruis’s throat closed. T’Oak was his maternal uncle, an uncle Ruis had never known, a man who had helped him. “I stand with the SupremeJudge. All the acts of any council must be ruled by the laws set by our ancestors.”
“Laws are what separate men from feral beasts,” T’Ash rumbled, standing.
“Justice must be done,” agreed D’Grove as she joined the men.
“This is an unpleasant duty that must nevertheless be endured,” T’Holly said. Hand in hand with his HeartMate, they both stood. Ruis winced. They looked older than they had a few eightdays ago at his trial—before their sons had been lost. Ruis knew who and what was the reason for their aging.
Each member of the council came to their feet, a pinch-faced T’Reed the last.
Heart Thief Page 35
