Burning Bright (16 page)

Krasny blew out an irritated breath when he was gone. "I cannot imagine why you think marrying him is even remotely bearable."

"I do what I must for Pozhar," Sonya said, sighing. "Though, I suppose now it little matters, since you are likely only days away from being Tsar and Zholty is bound for a noose. Assuming we can find suitable evidence, of course."

"A matter for another day," Krasny said. "Are you all right, Dym?"

Dym nodded. "I will be fine, thank you. I think we have all had a very long day, and it is well past the time we should find our beds. Sleep well, fire warm and guide."

Sonya kissed his cheek and gave Krasny a nod, and then they both left him alone in the cathedral. Dym slowly dragged himself back to his chambers where he hastily discarded his clothes.

He snuffed all the candles in his chambers with a mere thought, pausing only to retrieve the keys he had carelessly discarded with his clothes, and then strode through his rooms to his bed. Climbing into it, he pulled up the covers and tried to sleep, praying fervently that he would not dream.

Raz had just reached the Incoming Tide when the bells began to toll.

There was no mistaking that special set of bells, that pattern of ringing. Raz froze in place, whipped around, and started running back across the harbor toward the main road. He had to get to the palace, he had to save Pechal. How in the fires had Ivan and Shio and Shinju failed!

"Pechal!" he screamed as the bells stopped ringing, stumbling to a halt. He tried to make himself move again, but couldn't because he knew deep down that he was too late.

He did not know if the sensation was real or in his head, but he felt it when Pechal died. He screamed again, tears streaming down his face, and only when someone shoved him did Raz realize that other people were screaming too.

The rough stones of the street scraped his palms where he landed, but he barely noticed, more caught up in not being trampled as people fled the harbor in a panic. Raz stood gawking as he stared at the disaster the shipyard had become—there were boats sinking, already sunk, barely still afloat, and nearly all of them were or had been on fire.

What in the fires ...

He'd done it, he realized. Just as he'd practically destroyed the Ashes. Raz stood there, feeling lost. Scared. Oh, fires. Pechal was dead. He tried not to think about it, scared of what would happen if he lost control of himself again. Reaching up, he wiped away his tears, tried to focus—

—and yelped when someone grabbed him and jerked back—

"Calm down!" Ailill said and shook him. "Raz, you have to calm down."

Raz nodded. "I know. I didn't mean—Pechal is dead, even though they promised—"

Ailill let him go, but then took one arm again and half-led, half-dragged him away from the harbors and back into the heart of the city. "We need somewhere we can talk, somewhere no one will pay us any mind or ask questions. We may need to be there for some time."

"Um." Raz tried to think. "The Two Roses. East side of town. Go to the cellar, not the front door. Left here." He haltingly gave further directions to Ailill as they walked through the city and was shaking hard by the time they finally slipped into the cellar room of the Two Roses.

Dried roses hung from the ceiling, their scent beating back the otherwise musty smell. There was a small bed in one corner, and a table with two chairs against the opposite wall. A small stove was in the middle of the room, and it took Raz only a few minutes to get the coals going.

Then he simply dropped to sit on the floor. "Pechal is dead," he said. "They promised they would take care of him for me, and I left even though I had a bad feeling and now he is dead."

"And you're next," Ailill said quietly. "Once they throw you into that fire, Holy Zhar Ptitsa will be gone forever. You can't let that happen. We lost the gods once; if we destroy them forever then there is no hope left that all can be set to rights."

Raz looked up at him, a bit startled by the vehemence in his tone. "You saw what I did out there. What good would it do to bring back a god who can and will do that? Everyone knows Holy Zhar Ptitsa died after destroying half the country and thousands of people. I probably killed people tonight. If I am only a piece of a god, one piece out of a thousand ... how much worse would it be if I became a thousand times stronger?"

Ailill sneered at him, the expression an awful thing on his handsome face. It made Raz sad, somehow, to see a White Beast look so cold and dismissive. "No one knows what happened almost a thousand years ago. Stories change over time, no matter how hard anyone tries to keep the truth recorded. The same way no one recalls what happened at the Great Oak. We only know they die—every one hundred years they die! We try and we try to right our wrongs, but every century the Great Tragedy repeats. Here you have a chance to bring back the Holy Firebird, yet you sound as if you would rather throw yourself into the fire without a fight!"

"I—" Raz stopped, not certain what to say. "Is that why you need the comb? To bring back your gods?"

"They're part of the ceremony, yes," Ailill said tersely. "By 'they' I mean the comb and four other pieces of jewelry. They were stolen a long time ago, and we are hoping that in getting them back, perhaps something will turn in our favor. Do you have the comb?"

Raz wanted to be angry that all he could think about was the comb when Pechal was dead and he had just destroyed countless ships and the lost gods alone knew what else—but Ailill looked so sad and hopeful all at once, Raz could only reach into his jacket and extract the comb wound up in a silk scarf. "Here."

Ailill unwound the scarf and dropped it to the floor, turning the comb over and over in his hands. It really was a beautiful piece, and Raz did not think he was entirely imagining the power radiating from it. "Thank you," Ailill said, retrieving the scarf and carefully rewrapping the comb in it. "This was the last piece I needed to collect, and I—I know what it cost you to get it and that is not a price you should have paid. I am sorry, however little that is worth."

Raz said nothing, just turned away with a rough noise and started crying again. Pechal was gone, because he'd been unlucky enough to be born with a piece of a god's soul. Pechal, who had never hurt anyone without cause, who had been too sweet and kind to be a thief. Who deserved a house and a garden and a happy life. Not to be sacrificed, his name lost among hundreds of others who had shared his cruel fate.

And Raz was next. What was he supposed to do? Surrender? Run? Was it better to kill a god once and for all, or run away and run the risk of his returning? Was it possible that Verde had it right and the gods should be restored?

But for all that he had a piece of a god within him, Raz didn't think he was up to answering that question. He was nothing but a thief. What did he know about gods? All he'd ever wanted was a house and a garden, to see Pechal become something more than a thief. "I don't know what to do," he whispered.

Ailill did not reply, simply stood and fussed around with the stove and the kettle hanging on a hook above it. Raz vaguely noted that he seemed familiar with the process of making tea and was surprised that a noble would know how.

"Here," Ailill said, leaving the water to boil and bending to help Raz to his feet. He pushed Raz down to sit on the bed Ailill had just vacated. "What you need to do right now is get yourself under control and learn how to stay that way because otherwise you will do a great deal worse than you did at the harbor—and that was bad enough."

Raz flinched and stared at his hands. "I don't want to hurt people."

"It never occurred to me you did," Ailill said quietly. "But you have magic and you need to be careful with it." He returned to the stove and poured the boiling water out into two cups he'd already prepared with concentrated tea. Returning to the bed, he sat down beside Raz and handed one of the cups over. "What is this place?"

Raz sipped his tea, surprised he didn't burn his tongue. "I helped the old lady who owns this place out once. She always keeps this room for me and a few others should we need it. Too conspicuous to come here often, but it has its uses. I'm guessing Ivan and the others weren't at the Incoming Tide?"

"No," Ailill said. "But if the hunters were able to capture Pechal, then the others have probably been arrested."

Or they were dead, Raz thought with increasing misery. Fire and ash, he hoped they were not dead. "So what are you going to do now?" Raz asked.

"I need to return home, but there's no rush yet. You helped me get the comb, despite everything it has cost you. The very least I can do is help you in whatever way you desire."

Raz nodded. "We need to see if the others are alive then, and get them out of jail if they are."

"Very well," Ailill said. "If they were arrested, would they be here in the city or up in the palace?"

"Probably the palace since they would have been arrested by the Vessel hunters, and it's considered treason to interfere with the hunts. If they're still alive, they'll be executed soon."

Ailill nodded and stood up. "Come on, then. If it comes to it, I will simply use my position as a White Beast, but I would prefer to keep a low profile for various reasons. No doubt they will also be able to tell that I have been around you; the power radiating from you is no small thing."

Raz made a face, quickly finished his tea, and then stood up. "Let's get going. The sooner they are safe, the sooner I can figure out what I am doing." He refused to think about it, he just refused.

"Do you know how to sneak into the palace?" Ailill asked. "I cannot imagine that is easily done."

"Of course it's easily done," Raz said, unable not to smirk. "Pechal—" He broke off, his momentary levity dying, throat suddenly tight, eyes stinging. Wiping the tears away, he continued, "Um. Pechal did it once on a dare. It was how he and I met, actually. He would never tell anyone else how he did it, but he told me."

He put the stove out and rinsed their cups in a bucket, and then led the way back out of the cellar and down the street. "Curfew is soon," he murmured to Ailill when they paused at an intersection. "We need to stay away from the main streets now, and when we reached the city wall we'll have to scale it."

Ailill nodded and motioned for him to lead the way. Raz did so, slipping quietly and quickly through the streets, narrowly avoiding patrolling guards at one point, tense and afraid the entire time. Nearly everyone was probably still focused on the harbor, but it meant those who weren't would be on alert for anything out of place elsewhere.

Going to the palace was the epitome of foolish, but it was his fault Ivan and the others had been involved at all. He hoped they were all alive and well. Were Shio and Shinju all right? He knew they did not like to be away from the ocean for too long.

When they reached the main city gates, Raz avoided them and worked his way well down the wall, right into the middle of the main gates and the first guard tower where the watch was weakest. The wall loomed up well above his head, a little over twice his height.  "Can you climb?" he asked Ailill.

"I can manage," Ailill said, smirking.

Raz shrugged and left him to it, eyeing what he could of the wall in the torchlight, surprised at how well he could actually see—but the same thing had happened in the forest, and probably all along, and he really preferred not to think about it.  Stepping closer to the wall, he got his handholds and began to climb.

At the top of the wall, he sat on the ledge—and nearly yelped and fell off the wall when there was suddenly a gigantic white cat beside him. It licked one paw, seemed to wink at him, and then jumped smoothly down to the grass on the other side of the wall.

Raz rolled his eyes and jumped down himself, rolling as he hit the ground and rising smoothly to his feet. He wiped grass and dirt from his clothes, staring in fascination as Ailill shifted back to his normal form in a misty shimmer of light. "That's amazing."

Ailill smiled. "I do admit that I don't know what I'd do with myself if I could not shift. It seems very boring to me only having one shape."

"I'm sure only the faerie children are able to whine about it. I can't miss what I've never had," Raz replied. "Come on, we need to go before the watch comes by. Most of them don't care about anyone on this side of the wall, but some do. After what I did to the harbor, they'll probably all care." Ailill nodded and fell into step alongside him, moving quickly through the dark up the slight hill to the royal palace.

When they were close to it, he stopped moving toward it and began to circle around it, creeping along the edge of the hill upon which it rested until they came to a section of wall that jutted out of the back.

"I suppose all these gates I keep seeing are a bad idea for a not so obvious reason?" Ailill asked softly when they paused.

Raz nodded. "If you got close enough, you could probably feel the magic that keeps them shut. Only certain people can open them."

"Does not surprise me."

Turning to look at him, Raz said, "You're a duke or something, aren't you? Haven't you been to the royal palace?"

Ailill laughed. "No, not me. I have met many of the nobles of Pozhar since Pozhar and Kundou are the only nations whose citizens travel frequently, but by the time I was travelling to other countries myself it was to fulfill the duty placed upon me. I have found it is easier not to be nobility when stealing back rare artifacts."

Raz conceded that point with a slight nod.  "This way, then. Pechal—uh. He said he watched the palace for days and spoke to various maids, footmen, other service people. They know the palace better than anyone else; even the Tsar and the Princess do not know the palace as well."

"That does not surprise me, really," Ailill said. "I imagine our way in is that section of wall there."

Nodding again, Raz said, "That's the execution yard, and it extends out from the prison cells in the palace basement. Well, part of the basement. The rest is the wine cellars and all of that. Are you going to shift again?"