02 - The Barbed Rose (23 page)

Fox cradled her face between his hands. “I know you this way, the silk of your skin, the wine of your mouth. Now I know the blue of your eyes and the pale blush in your cheeks, and I am grateful for this gift.”

Kallista shivered, held powerless by the poetry in his words. She accepted his kiss, drank him down, yearning for more even as it dissolved into the nothingness of ordinary dreaming. She whimpered, feeling the loss, and a hand stroked along her arm, offering comfort. She followed, needing more, nestling in to the bare male flesh in front of her.

The hesitation in his response told her who it was before his scent and the isolated fluff of hair on his chest—more than Torchay, less than Obed—identified him as Joh. She didn’t want to push him beyond his willingness, but allowing him to hold back as Obed had done obviously wasn’t the right way to go either. Would he object if she spent desire roused by another on him? She didn’t know him well enough to guess.

They hadn’t been bound together for two weeks yet, and only since Sixthday last had they persuaded him from his isolated cot—when the other half of their ilian was attacked. Time enough to learn, to bind him closer. Kallista brushed her nose against his collarbone and let her breath out as she relaxed into him. Time enough—if it didn’t take too long.

Kallista told the others of her dream, all of them grateful for the good news and that no demons had awakened them all with her screams. She wondered if that meant the demon had left Arikon, especially since a pair of days passed with no sign of it or its handiwork, save for a tattered, fading null-spell in the Great Hall.

On Graceday, Arikon farspeakers received word that the troop sent to find Kallista’s mates and children had reached Sumald. They found the battered inhabitants full of tales of invasion and terror, but no sign of any travelers. Kallista urged the Reinine to send the troop on to Korbin prinsipality. Once the children were safe, Fox could be located and rescued.

Two days later on Peaceday, the city was at rest, beginning to gather energy again for the bustle of Firstday. Kallista lounged on the long yellow sofa propped against Torchay sitting in the corner with her feet in Obed’s lap. Joh sat on the floor on one side of the low serving table trying to teach Gweric to play queens-and-castles, while Viyelle hung over the boy’s shoulder and watched.

“If you’d keep your hands off the pieces, he might be able to catch on to the rules of the game.” Joh’s voice penetrated Kallista’s lethargy.

“I haven’t touched his queens,” Viyelle protested. “
Or
his castles.”

“I don’t think those were the pieces our Joh was referring to,” Torchay said, a sly grin winking in his half-open eyes.

“Oh, you mean
that
game…” Viyelle bent closer over Gweric until her cheek nearly brushed his. “I think he already knows the rules.”

“I hope so.” Kallista didn’t want the boy hurt. It had to be good for him to know a woman found him attractive despite his scars or…missing pieces. She just hoped he wouldn’t read more into it than there was.

Thunder rumbled through the open window. Kallista pillowed her head on Torchay’s shoulder and let her eyes drift shut. Cuddling inside while it rained was one of her favorite activities. “Someone ought to close the window so the rain doesn’t get the Reinine’s furniture wet, Viyelle.”

“It’s not raining.”

“It will be soon.” Kallista turned her face into Torchay’s neck. She heard people moving around—Viyelle walking to the window, Joh standing.

“No, Major,” Viyelle said. “The sky’s perfectly clear. Not a cloud in it.”

Kallista flicked her eyes open. “Then why do I hear thunder?”

Obed and Torchay were on their feet with her, striding to the window together. She leaned on the windowsill, stretched over it as far as she dared, listening, looking for any sign of what she might have heard.

“You heard it, didn’t you?” She checked with the others. Most nodded. Viyelle shrugged.

A sharp crack sounded, loud and close by followed by a receding rumble. Kallista’s head jerked around and someone caught her belt to keep her from tumbling through the window as she leaned farther out. Smoke, or dust, rose from a palace tower not two hundred paces to her right, spilling out through a gaping hole in the stone wall, and a faint, familiar scent drifted to her on the breeze.

“Sweet Goddess, it’s
gunpowder!
”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

S
o many hands pulled her back through the window, she flew, skidding when she hit the polished floor. “Boots. We need boots. And weapons. Joh, to me.”

Riding the fine edge of panic, Kallista caught his forearm beneath his pushed-up sleeve and called magic, pulling more of it through links with her other mates. She knotted it clumsily together and threw it out, hunting the Reinine. Hunting demons. Pray the One she did not find them together.

Viyelle tossed Kallista her rapier, belting on her own sword. All the men were already armed. They always were, since the assassination attempt. Obed knelt, holding her soft-topped boots open and she stomped her feet into them. Torchay tucked her gloves into his belt. Kallista shifted her grip on Joh to hold his hand.

“Our tower is clear,” she said, diverting a stream of magic to check. “No people, no magic.”

With a nod, Torchay led the way out of the room as another distant rumble sounded in the city. Kallista shoved down her fears and tugged at the tail of her magic. They needed to find the Reinine.

The palace corridors and antechambers were as crowded as ever, filled with courtiers who seemed more puzzled or curious than frightened. A few attempted to stop Kallista with questions, but a growl from one of the men backed them off. The magic thrummed, finding its goal.

The Reinine was not in the ruined tower, thank the One, but moving rapidly down and east, perhaps to some safe room Kallista didn’t know of. She left the Reinine to the care of her bodyguards and ilian, and spread the magic wider, hunting the stink of demons.

“Get down!” Torchay bellowed, spinning to throw himself at Kallista. She smelled it, too.

The explosion followed so quickly it drowned out his warning, sent them all flying. It blasted a hole through the palace wall. Gentle spring sunshine slanted in through the floating dust, lighting the dazed faces of those crawling back to their feet. A woman screamed and sound bloomed again.

“Are you all right?” Kallista touched Obed, got his nod, lifted Torchay’s head. He winced as she touched a swelling knot on the back of his skull but claimed no other hurts. Joh was already checking Viyelle and Gweric.

“Courier, get help.” Kallista rolled to her feet, favoring the hip where she’d landed.

“Already coming.” Viyelle pointed out the broken wall at the soldiers and healers swarming up over the rubble.

“All right then.” Kallista tried to think past the ringing in her head to what she should do next.

Others could handle this chaos better. The Reinine was safe, or as safe as a double quarto of bodyguards could make her, so what was left to do was…demons. She needed to hunt demons.

She grabbed Joh’s hand and scooped out more magic, binding it with that she called from Obed and Torchay. She needed what each of them had to give—Torchay to provide an immovable foundation, Joh to see what was there, and Obed to know the truth of what she saw. She took the time to build the necessary spell, wrestling the reluctant magic into exactly the shape she wanted.

“Gweric, can you see the magic?”

“I—yes. I see it.” The boy limped up beside her.

“Help me watch. Help me find what we seek.” Kallista adjusted her grip on Joh, wrapping her arm in his for support while maintaining the skin-to-skin contact. She drew Gweric close to her other side.

“We should get out of the way.” Torchay eyed the rescue workers bustling past.

Kallista took a deep breath, coughing a little on the dust. When she let it out, she let the magic go, giving it a shove when it didn’t go fast enough. It floated motionless a moment, then began to drift down the corridor, past the blast center, beyond the moaning wounded and silent dead, in the direction the Reinine had gone. Kallista tipped her head after it. “That way.”

Periodic rumbles, the thunder of explosions, continued to echo through the city. Where had the rebels acquired so much gunpowder? How had they hidden it? How had they smuggled it in? Or had it been in Arikon all along? Urgency drove Kallista, but the magic wouldn’t be driven.

It sauntered through the palace corridors as if it had all the time in the world. As if it wanted to challenge her, like a child that knew it had to obey, but would sulk and delay as long as possible before finally obeying. Or perhaps the demon was simply too good at hiding its tracks.

The magic led them down into the bowels of the palace, into places Kallista had never known existed and wouldn’t have guessed at without being shown. They came to a narrow corridor with a heavy iron door, barred, locked and bolted, tucked just inside its branching.

Ferenday Reinas blocked access to the door, blocked their way when they neared it. “What are you doing here? Who told you the way?”

“No one. I’m following magic. Tracking demons.” Kallista wished she didn’t have time to talk, but she did. The magic moved that slowly.

Ferenday paled but hid any other reaction. “Demons came this way? This close?”

“So the magic says.”

“I can see its tracks,” Gweric said, pointing. “A smear in the air.”

“Can you? Good.” Kallista patted his hand. “A demon hound is much better than a witch hound. Or a spell. What do you see?”

“It’s faint.” Gweric’s nostrils widened as he sniffed. “I don’t think it was here recently. Or maybe it’s—”

“We should go.” Kallista bowed to the Reinine’s ilias. “Before the magic gets too far ahead of us. May we pass?”

“The Reinine may trust you.” Ferenday gave her a hard look. “But I do not.”

“Of course you don’t. You’re a bodyguard. You’re not supposed to trust anyone.” She wanted her smile to be reassuring but feared it held too much cynicism. “She is my Reinine, too. My commander. I am sworn to protect her just as you are. Which means finding and destroying demons.”

With a last suspicious glare, Ferenday stepped back into the shallow recess before the heavy door and let them pass. They had to hurry to catch up with the spell. It seemed to be picking up speed.

“Do you still see the demon’s tracks?” Kallista asked.

“Yes.”

“Still faint?”

Gweric nodded, his empty eyes focused on things only he could see.

So, if the spell was moving faster, it apparently wasn’t because they were closing in on the demon. Kallista tightened her grip on the spell and the men to either side of her and kept going.

The magic led them through a twisting maze of hallways until they reached a door that blocked their way. The magic slithered through the cracks and beyond reach. The door was locked and they had no key, so Obed and Torchay put feet and shoulders to it, bursting it open.

They fell into a tangled ivy that had grown up, apparently for decades, over the opening. It took a few more moments to fight their way through to the kitchen garden beyond. Leaving the kitchen help, gardeners and refugees from the explosions staring openmouthed after them, Kallista and her party hurried to catch up with the demon-hunting magic.

It bustled along at a brisk pace now, requiring its followers to break into the occasional trot to keep up. They left the palace grounds through the south gate, plunging into the terrified chaos of the city. Kallista could see smoke rising from fires in every quadrant of Arikon. As they scurried after the tracking spell, another explosion rumbled to the west, leaving screams and weeping behind.

“We have to help them,” Viyelle shouted. Kallista had almost forgotten she was with them.

“We are.” Kallista kept moving, grim determination joined with urgent need. “Others can dig the victims out and heal them. No one else can stop it.”

The magic led them south, faster and faster until they were racing down Arikon’s steepening streets. Kallista let go of Gweric to run easier, but she clung tight to Joh’s hand. She didn’t dare lose that grip. She might lose the magic.

Sudden screams burst from a small square ahead of them. The magic danced with excitement, bubbling in a multitude of colors. They were right on top of the thing. They had to be.

“I see it!” Gweric slapped both hands over his nose. “Oh, saints, I
smell
it.”

Kallista sniffed cautiously. Nothing. People scattered, running from the square, crashing into them in panic, breaking her hold on Joh. But it didn’t matter now. She could see it, too.

The dark malevolence that was the demon glared hate at her from red glowing eyes as it crouched on the shoulders of a well-dressed woman. Then it leaped to perch atop a burly carter.

“Joh!” Kallista couldn’t take her eyes from the demon, wasn’t sure she dared, but she needed all her magic. All her iliasti.

“Here.” He shoved through the crowd, bodily picking a man up and setting him aside when he didn’t move fast enough. Joh stretched across the gap swarming with frightened people and caught her arm, using it to drag himself through the human river until he was braced against her back. He wrapped an arm around her waist to lock them together and slid his other hand onto the bare nape of her neck, leaving her arms free.

“Now,” he said into her ear, “where do you need to go?”

“There.” Kallista pointed at the demon, still glaring at her from atop the carter’s head. It seemed smaller than the one she’d encountered before. No less dark, but somehow…thinner. Not quite as solid.

Torchay led the way, forcing a path into the square, though the crowd’s panic seemed to be lessening. Then screams and shouts erupted again and the crowd surged. The demon laughed, seeming to dance on its perch. It skipped across the crowd, bouncing twice, three times before coming to rest on one of the fleeing people.

“Look!” Viyelle pointed up.

Kallista fought back her shout of horror. Like some diabolical vulture pulled from its home element and twisted to serve unnatural purposes, a small boat floated in midair.