Oracle (15 page)

CHAPTER
TWENTY THREE

    
Mark
stood in a little clearing in the woods with the night fading. A gentle breeze
swayed the trees until they seemed to be whispering to one another. He
shivered, though the night was not cold. It was beyond him to understand why
Daniella
had left a note saying she wanted to meet him here
of all places.

    
He wasn’t
the sort to be easily spooked, but something in the air had him feeling uneasy.
It was nothing he could put a name to, but rather something he could feel deep
in his guts. “Get a hold of your wits man,” he muttered.

    
“Talking
to yourself?”

    
Mark spun
around as
Daniella
entered the clearing. In her hands
she carried an unlit candle. He smiled. “I was feeling a little lonely, but now
you’re here....” He slid his arms around her slender waist.

    
Daniella
tipped her head back for a kiss he was more than
happy to give. The touch of her lips filled him with pleasant heat. But after
too brief a moment, she pulled away and stepped past him to set the candle down
in the center of the clearing.

    
Mark
watched her, wondering what she was up to. An early morning tryst in the woods
was fine with him, but it was so unlike
Daniella
. It
was unlikely anyone would be about to catch them and yet the risk remained. Too
much risk with the High Priest staying at the castle and the throne on the
line. He couldn’t believe she would risk so much for a little fun.

    
Kneeling
in the grass,
Daniella
took a tinderbox from the
satchel tied around her waist and lit the candle. She sat back on her heels to
stare at the resultant blue flame. “Do you love me?”

    
The
question, and the serious tone in which she asked it, took him completely by
surprise. “You are my princess. I worship the ground on which you walk. As
would any man.”
 

    
“I’m
serious, Mark.” She stood and turned to face him. “Do you feel love for me? Not
infatuation or lust or worship, but love. Real love. I need to know. Are you in
love with me?”

    
Mark’s
heartbeat first slowed and then sped up. Could it be possible she was about to
say the words he had so longed to hear fall from her lips? Or was this some
cruel joke? If he told her he adored her, that she was everything he wanted,
that yes, he was deeply, insensibly, hopelessly in love with her, would she
brush him off with a laugh? He didn’t doubt such wickedness was in her.

    
“Say
something,”
Daniella
demanded. “A simple yes or no is
all I require.”

    
“I...”
But his voice was frozen with fear of what this moment meant.

    
Daniella’s
sharp features softened. “You are in love with
me.” She traced her fingers across his cheek and then leaned forward to rest
her head against his chest. “I was bored and you seemed a bit of fun. I never
intended...” She sighed. “Everything I thought I knew, everything I thought I
wanted... I’ve been so wrong. How did it come to this?”

    
It seemed
to Mark as if his entire body had become suddenly lighter. Though she hadn’t
said the words, he knew then what this was all about.
Daniella
loved him. The impossible dream had become reality. No moment in his life had
been filled with greater bliss.

    
He
wrapped his trembling arms around her. “Where do we go from here?”

    
“Nowhere.” The word dripped with horrible finality and pain. “This is to
be my punishment for all the wrong I’ve done.” She pushed away from him and
their gazes met for a brief instant before she turned back to the candle.

    
Confusion
stole Mark’s ability to speak. This was no game, the look he had seen in her
eyes was proof enough of that, but the perfect moment was marred by something
he couldn’t understand. Something terrible.

    
Daniella
whispered strange words in a voice broken and on
the verge of tears. The ground vibrated beneath Mark’s feet. A sound like muted
thunder echoed, sending the birds shrieking from their nests.

    
Beyond
the candle, the air split in two to reveal a barren, rust red landscape. A
monstrous winged form, all covered in black scales, landed before the opening.
Fear twisted in Mark’s guts at the sight of it.

    
“Mark,
look at me,”
Daniella
said.

    
Somehow
he wrenched his gaze from that terrible sight to the vision of his lover bathed
in a fiery glow. Dawn had broken, painting the trees beyond in lurid red light.
“
Wh
...what...”

     
“Kiss
me,”
Daniella
said. “Please.”

    
Senses
reeling, Mark obeyed his princess as he always had. She grasped the back of his
head and kissed him with a sort of desperate intensity that at any other time
would have stolen his breath. When their lips parted her hand remained there.
She pressed her forehead to his and looked deep into his eyes.
     

    
“I love
you Mark. More than I knew. More than I wanted to know. But it was you or
Richard and so, this could end no other way. I’m so sorry.”
  
   

    
Her words
had barely registered in Mark’s mind before a sharp, twisted pain bloomed in
his abdomen, sending white sparks across his vision. He hit the ground face
first before he even knew he was falling.
   

    
Mark
reached out for
Daniella
, but his fingers only
brushed the hem of her skirt as she moved away. He wanted to ask why, but this
time it was blood choking off his words. The last thing Mark saw as life
slipped away from him was the black monster staring at him from beyond the
rift.

CHAPTER
TWENTY FOUR

    
“I swear,
I’m going to die of heatstroke before we reach the temple,” Ethan complained. A
complaint which was not completely without merit. The sun was just creeping
over the horizon and already the heat was oppressive.

    
Kat wiped
the back of her hand across her brow. “If you don’t quit complaining every five
minutes, you’re going to die from something all right, but it won’t be the
heat.”

    
“Really,
Katherine, that is no way to speak to me after you begged me to help you out on
this little job of yours.”

    
“Begged
you?” Kat twisted around in her saddle. “I did not
beg
you. I merely
offered you a part. Which I am highly regretting. If I could go back and trade
you for Brandon, I would. He might be missing a few bricks, but at least he
wouldn’t spend every minute of the day mewling like a kitten hungry for its
supper.”

    
“Why
don’t you both shut up?” Jesse snapped. He was feeling bad enough about the
entire situation without having to listen to the two of them going at each
other. It wasn’t the heat, or the sand, or the long ride bothering him either.
It was Manny walking out ahead of them with
Nika
. As
if Jesse were an outsider and no longer family. He didn’t know if they felt it,
but
he
certainly did.

    
Manny came
to a sudden stop, his eye scanning the horizon to the south. “Something comes.”

    
Jesse
followed his gaze to see a cloud of dust approaching. His heart sank. It was the
one thing he had feared most about traversing the desert, but he had hoped
their party was too small to draw attention.

    
“Pirates.”
Nika
breathed the word.

    
“Pirates?” Ethan squinted at the dust cloud. “This is hardly the high
seas.”

    
“They’re
bandits,” Jesse said. “Same as we have in Hyacinth, only the Children call them
desert pirates. They’re a nasty lot by nature. Very nasty.” He glanced at
Manny. His friend’s brutally scarred face was a reminder of how nasty. Jesse
bore his own scars from , though they weren’t visible to the eye. “Do you think
we can outrun them? Is there anywhere we could hide?”

    
“What?”
Kat stared at him. “Run? Hide? What are you talking about?” She drew her staff.
“We aren’t defenseless. We stand and fight like always.”

    
“Too late
to run,” Manny said. “Kat is right. We must stand our ground.”

    
Kat
nodded. “Like my father says, better to face an enemy head on than to flee and
have them at your back.”

    
“You’ve
never dealt with these people,” Jesse said. “You have no idea what they’re
capable of.”

    
“And how
do you know so much about them?”

    
Jesse’s
hands tightened around the reins. “I’ve had a run in with them before.”

    
“So what
are you so strung out over?” Kat asked. “You came out of it alive.”

    
“No, I
didn’t.” He met her gaze and found himself telling her something no one else
beyond his adopted family knew. “The last time I had a run in with these
pirates, I died.”

    
It was
easy to tell by her expression how this little statement had hit her. Despite
being romantically involved, Jesse had done his best not to reveal too much of
his life before arriving in Marigold to her. In his opinion, the past was dead
and buried and best left that way. But it was kind of hard to ignore the past
when it was riding toward them in a cloud of dust.

    
Somehow,
with death bearing down on him, Jesse felt the need to unburden himself on her.
It surprised him to find he wished he’d told her a long time ago, on one of the
dozen or more occasions she asked after his past.

    
“It
happened when I was twelve,” Jesse said. “I was with my father and a group of
Children, including Manny and
Nika
. My father had
word of some exotic materials to be had for a rock bottom price in Martinique.

    
“One night,
our camp was overrun by pirates. They came in so quick, so quite, we had hardly
any warning at all. They didn’t kill us. Not right away.” Even under the
burning sun, he could still feel the chill of that night. Could still hear the
screams over the sigh of the wind.

    
“I
remember lying in the sand watching the sun rise and thinking to myself it was
the last dawn I would ever see. And then I died.”

    
Kat shook
her head. “But you’re not dead.”

    
“Only
because of
Nika
,” Jesse said. “If not for her, Manny
and I would be nothing more than bones bleaching in the sun right now.”

    
“It’s the
earth spirit we have to thank,”
Nika
said. “He saved
me. Wrapped me up in sand and hid me until the pirates had passed on. And it
was he who gave me the power to save you both.”

    
“Then
maybe he should give you the power to do something now,” Kat said. “If these
pirates are so fearsome, summon up the earth spirit and ask for his help.”

    
“One does
not summon a spirit,”
Nika
said. “They choose when
they will intervene in mortal affairs.”

    
Jesse
eyed the dust cloud, which was rapidly gaining on them. “Now would be a good
time for a little intervention.”

    
“If the
spirits will it, then it shall be.”

    
How she
could be so at ease was beyond him. True, she had been spared living through
the horror of that long ago attack but she had seen the aftermath. Jesse had no
intention of going through anything like it again, nor did he intend to allow
Kat and
Nika
to fall into the hands of the pirates.
Death was better.

    
“Do you
have your palm pistol, Ethan?”

    
“Of
course.”

    
“How many
bullets?”

    
Ethan
quirked his brow. “Six.”

    
Jesse
nodded grimly. “Then we’ll have one to spare. Give me the gun.”

    
“What are
you thinking, Jesse? Are you crazy? As for you,” Kat pointed her staff at
Ethan, “get off that horse and I swear I will crack your skull.”

    
“This way
will be quicker and cleaner than if the pirates get us,” Jesse said. “Trust me.
I know. I’m trying to save you.”

    
“Don’t do
me any favors,” Kat replied. “If I’m going to die I’d rather go down fighting.”

    
Any
further argument was cut off by the whooping cries of the pirates as they bore
down on the companions. A dozen strong, all men, and clearly wildlings though
they wore their hair long and strung with bones.

    
Jesse’s
stomach clamped, but he drew his sword and prepared himself to fall on it if he
had to rather than be taken alive. And then something exceedingly bizarre
happened. With a sound like ripping paper, the air between the companions and
the pirates split open and woman on a black horse leapt out.

    
She
tossed her long, blonde hair over one shoulder, eyed the advancing pirates, and
grinned. “Oh, looks as if I arrived in time for a party.”

    
Jesse’s
mouth fell open. He’d missed out on seeing the nightmare himself when it busted
into the Duke’s manor to kill Lady Anastasia, but Brandon’s description had
been so detailed he had no doubt the mount this woman rode was no mere horse.

    
The
pirates seemed to take no notice of the arrival of the nightmare, but their
horses were another matter entirely. Even Jesse’s mare, who had been rock
steady through all manner of encounters, went a little crazy. She reared up
with a sharp, loud cry, unseating Jesse. He hit the ground with a thump hard
enough to steal his breath. All around him his companions and the pirates alike
were sharing similar fates.

    
The
pirates weren’t down long. They leapt to their feet, weapons in hand and murder
in their eyes. Jesse had lost his sword as well as his breath when he fell and
scrambled to regain both, a swift pain up the side of his leg warning him
something was broken. He glanced down at a bloody patch on his pants to see
bone poking up through the skin.

    
Ethan
backed toward the nightmare. “Priscilla if you could stop laughing long enough
to give me a hand it would be much appreciated.”

    
“You mean
you can’t deal with this bunch on your own?” She leaned over the nightmare’s
neck. “Losing your touch?”

    
“No.”
Ethan ducked a bolo aimed for his head. “But I may need my companions alive and
I can’t take care of my own hide and theirs without a little help. So be a
sweetheart and pitch in.” He fired his palm pistol, striking the bolo thrower
dead center between his eyes.

    
“Oh, all
right.” She swung her legs over the side of the mare and slid down. “But I had
better not break a nail.”