Nethereal (Soul Cycle Book 1) (31 page)

Teg swept in from the galley balancing a steaming cup on a saucer, which he set before Elena. The warm, minty aroma wafted across the table. “I made you some tea,” he said. “Sorry about the texture. Gibeah dumped the water tanks. Utility gel's all that's left.”

“Let's get to business,” Jaren said after Teg took his seat across from Nakvin and Deim.

Elena scrutinized her teacup as he spoke.

“Getting home is now our top priority,” Jaren said.

Elena selected a spoon from her place setting and slowly lowered it into her cup.

“That means facing the Guild,” Jaren went on, “but the
Exodus
gives us a fighting chance.”

Elena released the spoon, which remained standing, held perfectly vertical by the cup’s contents. She pushed the fine Temilian service away and folded her arms on the table, burying her face in the crook of one elbow and glaring resentfully at the upright spoon.

“According to Sulaiman,” Jaren said, “there might be a shortcut out of here.”

“You don't sound convinced,” said Teg.

Jaren was loath to appear uncertain, but he needed time to choose his next words carefully. “We're less than halfway through the Nine Circles,” he said at last. “We've already tangled with the locals. According to Sulaiman, the deeper we go, the stronger the baals get. If there's a way to avoid further conflict, I'm for it.”

“I don't know,” said Teg. “Gibeah wasn’t too much trouble.”

Jaren sighed. He would've preferred to keep the information secret, but his swordarm left him no choice. “We got lucky with Gibeah.”

Teg raised an eyebrow. “How so?”

“We didn't kill him.”

“What did,” Nakvin asked, “another baal?”

Jaren shook his head. “I don't know. To hear Sulaiman tell it, there were older and more dangerous things down here than demons. Vaun says they left, but who knows?”

A hush descended on the room. Nakvin glanced over her shoulder.

Teg leaned forward. His dark eyes gleamed. “Alright, what's your pitch?”

“The lords of the Nine Circles are caught up in a power struggle,” said Jaren. “I don't know all the details, but there are two main factions.”

“That explains the battle we ran into,” Nakvin said.

Jaren nodded. “Gibeah and the Lord of the Third were rivals. The baal on the next Circle is a power broker called Despenser. He keeps free of commitments to either side.”

“Makes sense,” said Teg. “I always thought double-dealers ended up down here.”

Speaking of which,
Jaren thought. He turned to Elena and said, “Please excuse us.”

The young woman rose and left without a word. Deim hurried after her. Jaren considered stopping him but let him pass unchallenged.

Nakvin’s face went almost as rigid as Vaun’s mask. “You want to make a deal with him.”

“If you can't get us out, I think it's our only chance,” Jaren said.

“I’ll try again,” said Nakvin.

Jaren held up three fingers. “There are three baals between us and the ether,” he said.

“The ether might touch this level,” Nakvin said. “I can’t know for sure if I don’t try.”

“And the baals might overwhelm us while you’re trying,” said Jaren. “Dealing with one of them is better than fighting three—or more.”

“What will you offer in return?” Nakvin asked.

“Whatever it was that Gibeah wanted,” Jaren said.

Silver fire burned in Nakvin’s eyes. “You think it’s
her
.”

Jaren wasn’t above lying for the sake of a job, but maintaining trust was vital to success. “It's possible,” he said, “but I think those stones are our main bargaining chips.”

Nakvin's gaze didn't waver. “And Elena’s a bonus?”

“If it came down to trading a girl you met yesterday or staying here with her, which would you honestly choose?”

“I don't think I'll have to,” Nakvin said. “We never knew how a ship this big could fly. I think she’s the answer.”

Jaren’s jaw dropped. “You think
she's
pulling the tonnage that the engines can't?”

“I think she's pulling
all
of it.”

Jaren shook his head. “That answer takes more explaining than the problem. Why are you so attached to her, anyway?”

Nakvin's expression softened. “When I was examining her earlier, I sensed a…
connection
between us—a feeling I've never had before.”

“You might have to fight Deim for her,” Teg interrupted.

The glare that Nakvin shot at Teg was fire and ice at once.

Jaren quickly intervened. “Are the rest of the boys aboard?” he asked Nakvin.

Nakvin’s scowl vanished. “Bringing them up was easy with Gibeah gone.”

“And the sailors?” asked Teg.

“Still on the mountain,” Jaren said. “You can see their camp from the hangar.”

“What about Sulaiman?” Nakvin asked. “He did side with Stochman.”

“Who cares?” asked Teg. “If he doesn't like it, he can stay here.”

“No,” said Jaren, “we need his experience with the baal. It's best if I just tell him how things are.”

Jaren found the priest keeping vigil over the valley where his men lay buried. The cold air smelled of death. “I've informed my senior crew about the Lord of the Fifth,” he said without waiting to be acknowledged. “They've agreed that bargaining is our best way out of here.”

Keeping his back turned, Sulaiman brooded over the ice-clogged pass below.

“My offer still stands,” Jaren assured him. “You’ve earned your passage.”

Sulaiman broke his silence. “What of the Mithgarders?”

“I already found a place for them.”

The priest rose from his seat on the snow and turned. His sapphire eyes blazed not two inches from Jaren’s face. “You think yourself a cunning liar,” he hissed. “But your deeds betray your deceit!”

Jaren dismissed the thought of lying outright. Instead, he held his ground. “Your law doesn’t apply out here. We need each other to make it out alive, and I will not let Stochman get in the way.”

“Lies are your meat, and betrayal your drink,” Sulaiman said. “You cannot but deal falsely, even with those you call friends. You will destroy them as surely as you did mine.”

Jaren clenched his jaw. “Lay the guilt on Gibeah if you can't carry it yourself,” he said.

“My ruling was just. If you refuse the Mithgarders passage, then you’ll not leave at all.”

Jaren took a step back. He saw Sulaiman's anger threatening to burst into violence and contemplated drawing his zephyr. He opted for the rodcaster instead.

“You're in no position to dictate the passenger list,” Jaren said, aiming the oversized barrel at the priest's armored chest. “Let's calm down and continue this discussion like adults.”

A blood red fire kindled in Sulaiman's right palm. Before Jaren could press the rodcaster's trigger, the spark flared into a blade of solid flame arcing from the priest's hand. With a deft motion of his wrist, the flaming sword sent the bulky gun skidding across the ice.

Jaren jumped back as the blade's fiery point stabbed at his heart, singing a hole in his shirt but sparing his skin. In an instant, Jaren’s own sword was humming in his hand. He drove straight at Sulaiman, his eyes fixed on a point several feet behind the priest as though he intended to pass straight through him. He probably would have, had his slash hit home.

Contrary to Teg’s frequent chiding, Jaren found that carrying a sword in the age of zephyrs and firearms gave him an advantage in close quarters. Most people had no answer for three feet of sharp steel.

Sulaiman Iason was not one of them.

The priest stood and watched as Jaren charged across the snowy ridge. Just before he struck, Sulaiman pivoted left and held his fiery blade perpendicular to Jaren’s horizontal slash, deflecting the attack with a simple motion of his wrist and the bitter tang of burnt metal.

Jaren’s confidence burst like a paper sack. He hadn't expected Sulaiman to panic like most opponents, but he hadn't thought the man would parry his stroke. Jaren prided himself on his mastery of swordsmanship, but he tempered his pride by training as though he faced equal foes. Yet despite Jaren’s rigorous practice, long life, and superb reflexes, Sulaiman was proving a bit
too
equal.

Jaren's momentum, combined with the slickness of the snow-covered rock, had carried him several paces past Sulaiman. He glanced over his shoulder while turning at the waist to intercept the priest’s counter. The flaming blade flashed in his peripheral vision. Its searing point would have punctured Jaren’s eye, but he deflected the blow an instant before impact.

Jaren used the second that Sulaiman spent regaining his balance to pivot around and face him, but he wasted too much motion and couldn’t evade the priest's lightning-fast thrust at his neck. Jaren reeled backward, but the flaming sword claimed a swath of his scarlet mane. The reek of singed hair stung his nose.

Jaren lashed out in a rising diagonal cut from Sulaiman's left hip to his right shoulder; his sword humming like a shaken beehive. The unconventional attack angle caught the priest off guard, but it was guided by fury; not skill. Sulaiman sprang back, finishing in a controlled uphill slide that opened some distance between them.

Sulaiman brought the palm of his steel hand down on the point of his sword, and for an instant Jaren imagined that his foe would skewer himself on the burning blade. Instead, both hands came together, compressing the length of solid fire between them. The priest ended the motion with both hands cupped at his left side. Then he swept his right hand outward in a wide half-circle across his chest. As his hand blurred along its arc, it loosed three lemon-sized orbs of crimson fire.

Fortunately, Jaren had already seen Sulaiman launch the same weapon at Gibeah. He anticipated the fireballs' pattern and swiveled his shoulders sideways. The outer missiles passed him by, drilling twin holes through a snow cornice. He batted the middle projectile away with the flat of his blade, leaving its Worked steel blackened and ringing.

Jaren’s foe studied him as if reading his soul. The priest's sapphire eyes, which had gleamed with calm determination, seemed suddenly weary. “You have skill,” Sulaiman said. “Even wisdom of a sort. My god and my men are gone. Perhaps I’d do well to join my remnant with yours and quit this Circle while I can.”

“You could do worse,” Jaren said with a tilted grin.

In a narrow gully high on the Ogre Fang’s west shoulder, Mithgar Navy Commander Enric Stochman huddled in a tent made from the coats of the dead. The donors still complained about the cold, but the needs of the living took precedence.

Besides melting ice when he could no longer ignore his thirst, Stochman had done little for the past two days but brood over the long string of humiliations he'd suffered at Jaren Peregrine’s hands. The voyage had strayed far from the mission he'd signed on for: to explore Strata unclaimed by the Guild and get rich in the process. In Stochman’s view, the Gen’s selfish pride had foiled his efforts to get back on course and had caused every disaster that followed.

Some of the officers doubted that Peregrine had regained the
Exodus
, but Stochman thought otherwise. The ship had moved, for one thing; just enough to make it inaccessible from the cliff. Then there’d been the avalanche the day before—sweeping down the south face with such force as to be heard and felt on the western slopes. Stochman saw Peregrine's witch at work in every ill omen.

The huge black hull filled the sky above camp, looking as though one could reach up and touch it. Stochman laughed ruefully at the cruel reminder of his exile. The Gen was probably raising a glass in triumph while the rightful master of the
Exodus
cowered under clothes that dead men didn't need anymore.

Betrayal begat betrayal, of course. A few of Stochman’s men had taken him aside to urge a descent from the high camp, and he’d been an officer long enough to know that a sentiment voiced by one was shared by ten others. Still, he refused.

Did lust for the ship prevent his retreat? Stochman admitted that pride played a role, but it wasn't the only reason. After all, even if his people survived an unguided descent, where could they go?

Stochman became aware of the cold. It was always cold, but the icy mountain air mainly assaulted his skin. This new and sudden chill started at his core and flowed outward.

The stranger in black appeared. The tent flaps hadn’t parted. One moment Stochman was alone; in the next the sharply dressed man was simply standing there. The commander would’ve blamed altitude sickness but for their prior meeting in a lonely hallway.

“Hail, winter hare!” The strange visitor said in an icy voice that more aptly belonged to someone—or some
thing
—much larger.

“What do you want?” Stochman asked through chattering teeth.

The stranger’s laugh resembled the roar of an avalanche. “I beg pardon, sirrah. The pangs of living flesh oft escape me.” He held out his hand. A yellow flame danced in his upturned palm.

Stochman stared.
That was no Working!
But amazement soon gave way to relief as heat radiated out to him. “So you're another dead man,” he said. “Are you one of Sulaiman's?”