Beastly (14 page)

Lia sat cross-legged on the damp planks of the cell’s floor. With delicate grace she gently wove slivers of warm light into a luminous fabric. The bundle floated above her lap, slowly spinning as she worked her hands back and forth on an invisible loom. Her button nose scrunched, further tightening her concentration. Through pursed lips she puffed a lock of hair from her squinting eyes. She beamed at her latest attempt.
“Almost finished.”

“How dare you,” Malachai droned.

He swung his wicked sword high
overhead. The sword flashed like an obsidian lightning strike, slicing within an inch of Lia’s face, close enough that she felt the malice of its hateful hunger. The vicious slash cut through Lia’s handicraft, banishing the light back to shadow. Malachai twisted the muscles of his pale face into a grin.
Look at her
, he thought,
sitting there alone on the floor. Pathetic. Defeated.
He sheathed his sword, certain that the little abomination’s rebellious spirit was crushed once and for all.

Lia regarded the fading remnants of spell craft in her lap. She plucked a strand of light like it was yarn, watching it waver in the drafty room. The light dimmed and then died into nothingness. She
sighed a child’s sigh. Malachai turned for the demolished entrance, savoring his victory.

“Oh well. Looks like I’ll have to start over.”

Malachai froze dead in his tracks, snared by Lia’s gleeful defiance. He pivoted on a heel to face the challenging taunt. Searching for bluster, Malachai found his tongue felled. All he could do was
stare. Lia was already fast at work, mending and shaping new fibers of light. The colors were brighter than before, fuller.
Alive
. The dark of the empty room was aglow in shifting pigments as she worked, crafting the strands into ribbons. Then ribbons into patches...

Malachai’s sword instantly flashed back to life, tearing at the fabric, cutting the deviant heresy to pieces. Lia only smiled and began again. Another fabric of light formed, this time bearing shape: A flower, petals blossoming in a violet that had only before existed in Lia’s imagination. Malachai’s drone burned at his throat and lifted to a roar. He slashed at the flower with sword and dagger alike in a flurry of wild strikes. Unfamiliar fatigue burned at the Wakeful Captain’s shoulders as he hacked away. What was the strange power this girl had to defy him?

Lia climbed from the dank floor, hands weaving wildly. Her fingers, too stubby to learn
Cedrik’s lute had found an instrument all her own. She hummed Polaris’s tune,
Cedrik’s tune
. She threw her shoulders back and chin up, increasing her pace to match Malachai’s slashing. A dozen swathes of luminous fabric appeared, each larger, more magnificent than the previous. Sweat trickled from Lia’s brow as she directed the pieces into fusion. The patches stitched together in shades of Lia’s violet. A pattern emerged; a wondrous design born of the child’s dreams.

The patchwork unicorn reared majestically, filling the room with the intense blast of dawn’s light. It scraped at the floor, lowering its
spiraled horn. Malachai’s pale head tilted to one side. He could not believe the sight. Would not believe. It could not be...

Malachai lunged into a twin strike of sword and dagger shaped like an X at the illusion’s throat. The majestic beast parried the strikes and Malachai’s blades clanged harmlessly away. It neighed and reared, nearly connecting a pair of trampling hooves to Malachai’s skull. He dodged swiftly aside,
then retreated for the safety of the doorway. He snatched a halberd from a wall rack and leveled it at the gaping door, hoping to impale the charging beast. A tense moment passed. The Wakeful captain approached cautiously, halberd raised. Malachai leaned around the doorway, finding darkness had reclaimed ownership of the small room. Slowly he peered inside.

The unicorn had vanished. All that remained was a sleeping girl, curled into a ball, murmuring a lullaby.

Malachai stared through the bars of emerald flame cast onto the empty door. His shoulders ached and his head pounded. That he fatigued at all was cause for concern. Did the little abomination’s blasphemy know no limit? How could this have happened? Doubt started seeping into his mind through a tiny crack threatening to burst.
I should feel nothing at all. Not soreness, not fatigue. Certainly not fear
. Yet the child’s blasphemy chipped away at the Wakeful Curse, robbing him of strength.

Malachai felt a sudden charge of rage. He regarded the green flame once more,
then conjured additional cross bars for good measure. The wooden frame hissed wisps of grey smoke. He stepped back, armored boots clunking, pleased with his work.

The City Watchmen pressed against the jailhouse wall, watching Malachai’s every move. Castiel was more than slightly unnerved. His thick fingers cramped around his sword’s hilt: they had been wrapped around it the moment Malachai had splintered the door. In all honestly, he knew little could be done if Malachai turned the wrath of his crimson eyes onto him. Nothing in Castiel’s meager experience with the City Watch had prepared him for such dealings. He snuck a look to his sergeant for reassurance, but found no aid.

Dacian joined Malachai with a lingering sneer of his own. His
rat like face, pockmarked and picked at, was devoid of compassion. He knew Malachai’s Queen would honor the arrangement as brokered. He gestured to the newly resettled chairs.

“Captain, forgive me but there is much to discuss, preparations to make. The dauntless men of our City Watch stand at the ready to apprehend your fugitive,” Dacian continued with a sardonic grin. He hated the City Watch, thought his comrades less than rubes. If not for the opportunities wearing the uniform provided, he would have abandoned the post long ago.

Castiel levied a disgusted look. When he had joined the Watch a summer ago he could have never have imagined such corruption.
Paid to detain a child?

Malachai gave no reply. He twisted in the chair, drawn again to the
darkness behind the emerald blaze.
How had she made the tree blossom?
Dacian boldly tapped Malachai’s forearm. “Captain...”

Malachai’s dagger sang out, slicing through the tip of Dacian’s index finger. He howled and jumped from his chair, cradling the wounded digit to his chest. Castiel quickly wrapped the shortened finger, tying the bandage tight. Both men knew Wakeful swords were often enchanted to cleave wounds unable to cease hemorrhaging. Dacian hope their daggers were neglected in that regard.

Malachai finally regarded the frightened pair. His dagger dripped a pitter patter of Dacian’s warm blood. He wiped the blade at the flimsy, yellowed table cloth and sheathed it. He gestured to the chairs, commanding more than requesting. “Come, we have much to discuss and many preparations to make.” The watchmen nervously lowered themselves into chairs at the table’s far end.

“And you, you diseased
pizzle,” Malachai said to Dacian, “If you touch me again, more than a fingertip will roll.”

Neither watchman dared to move, let alone speak. Or breathe. Dacian clutched at his bandaged wound grateful that the bleeding had stopped. Both men stared at the table’s center. Malachai drummed his fingers. The clawed gauntlet gouged away flecks of wood with each impatient strike. Soon, the table looked like a savage pet’s used play thing.

“I do not know what manner of fool pursues me. I presume they mean to claim the abomination for their own,” Malachai said, gesturing to the
cell. “Someone on a fool’s quest destined for a fool’s painful end.”

The last of Malachai’s cold words froze the room like winter’s frost. The watchmen knew of the Liche Queen’s proclamation and ban of magical practice. Few in Meridian were foolish enough to dabble in even the smallest of magical feats. Indeed there was little desire to do so. Meridian was well served by the technocratic alliance fostered by the grand twin cities of Neverdawn and
Dayscape. Simply put, Meridian had no need for magic.

“Your men are stationed?
Well-armed?” Malachai asked.

“As you’ve ordered, captain,” Dacian blurted. The
weasley watchman’s gaze bored a hole through the battered table top. “They are quite capable, equipped to handle any opposition.”

The hollowness of Malachai’s voice returned. “We shall see about that.”

“It would be the City Watch’s great honor if the Captain would allow us the pleasure of apprehending this criminal antagonist on her Majesty’s behalf,” Dacian said, flourishing a wide bow.

The watchman’s shameless ploy at currying favor went unnoticed. Malachai neither wanted nor required his ego stroked. He needed an end to this fool’s errand, an end to the heresy. His Queen would see to it. And if she did not...

      
      
      
***

Lia stirred from her slumber, chilled by a sudden draft. She sat up in a panic, forgetting where she had fallen asleep. It was a small room, even for her. The glow of night time trickled in from a single barred window. Her stomach soured at the sight of Malachai’s ugly barricade.
Its roiling emerald flames offered no warmth and familiarity with the terrible blaze encouraged her distance.

Nightmares had plagued her short nap, leaving her restless. Houses obliterated by malachite stars crashing from the skies and people crying out. She shook the images free and began exploring her meager accommodations. A small stained cot occupied a corner. Next to it sat a foul looking bucket. She stretched to the tips of her toes and just barely managed to peek between the window’s rusty bars.

The glow of lamp posts dazzled the thoroughfares and water front of Meridian. Lia had never seen such a spectacle. The ‘city’ below was as foreign a place as the Gloom.
It was like having stars close enough to reach out and catch like fireflies,
she thought. She suddenly longed to be sitting in Polaris’s lap underneath their tree.

“Get down from there, before you fall out,” Castiel called.

Lia hopped down, searching through the fiery door for the voice’s owner.

“Cripes, imagine that.
You fallin’ out the window and Malachai tossin’ me out on after you. Would be just my lot.”

Lia knelt by the door, careful to avoid the bars, finding a spot to peer through. Castiel sat at the table, feet up, rocking back. He toyed with a dagger, spinning its tip on the pad of his thumb. Castiel stared back, contorting his face into a twisted
mockup of Malachai’s stare.

“
It’s bad manners to put your feet on the table, you know,” Lia said candidly. “My
pafaa
said so.”

Castiel’s dagger took an errant spin. He bobbled it twice and let it clang to the floor. He stretched to retrieve it and slipped, breaking his fall with a bulbous chin.

Lia stifled a giggle with a swift hand. And then couldn’t help
herself. She laughed at the heap of Castiel still collecting himself, straightening his tunic and rubbing his scraped chin. Castiel heard the laughter and followed Lia’s eyes to the stain on his stomach. He laughed, grateful for the break in tension Malachai had provided.

“Are you alright?” Lia asked through a cupped hand.

Castiel carefully extended his hand through the fiery barrier. “I’m fine. Clumsy as an ox, I am.
Name’s Castiel.”

Lia shook Castiel’s hand and introduced herself. He withdrew, frantically rubbing at his hand. She chanted, summoning the Breath, pleased to find it came easier now. Her hands gathered up the misty white light. It pulsed in the air around her fingers, rippling like a disturbed pond. She brandished the light at the bars. “I can help.”

“I’m sure you can little one, but I am fine,” Castiel said, presenting the
unharmed hand for inspection. “I needed see for myself if you burned with the unholy blasphemy and heresy, blah, blah, blah.” Castiel’s sarcastic smile broadened as he delivered his best Malachai parody.

Lia giggled at the impression and let the Breath’s power fade. She shrugged free of her thick over coat, rolled it into a cushiony ball and plunked down in front of the bars. “When we left it was winter, but when I looked outside there wasn’t any snow,” Lia stated flatly, hoping Castiel would elaborate.

Castiel remembered vividly his amazement with Meridian’s marvels when he had first arrived.

“The Dreamers of Neverdawn have given Meridian many gifts in the name of friendship. Our very streets capture the sun’s warmth and use it to resist the snow. Some of Meridian’s buildings are lined with the same type of stone. That’s why
you’re sweating through your clothes.”

With grave concern she sidled tight to the burning gate. “But if there’s no snow, how can there be a Winter Festival?”

Castiel chuckled. “Not to worry. Our Elders disable the warmth when it suits our needs. We have no need for warm buildings in the summer do
we?” Castiel sliced a few pieces of crusty bread and mashed a bitter smelling cheese between them. He half-offered the morsel and then quickly pulled away, with a curious eye brow arched high.

“Promise not to tell anyone?”

Lia’s stomach lurched and grumbled. She couldn’t remember the last
time she had eaten. She nodded enthusiastically. “Promise!” Castiel passed the offering through the green flame, making sure Lia did not come close enough to be burned. Lia warbled through a mouthful. “Thank you.”

Small acts
, she recalled Polaris saying.
Small acts of kindness and courage.

Chapter 17

The Liche Queen was unaccompanied on this particular visit to her favorite chamber. She could not recall the last time she wandered the drab pathway, filling the last decaying remnants of her mortal lungs with the stale odor of her labors beyond. Perhaps it had been when she had called upon Malachai to serve. The Garrison awaited its queen from behind a veil of black satin. It was the only guard needed.