Return (Lady of Toryn trilogy) (24 page)

He was insane. He had no idea who she was.

What she was seeing wasn't plausible Ashlyn recoiled, appalled at the unbelievable horror she was witnessing. Tag was completely unrecognizable now, the fur covering his broad back rippling with muscles that just didn't exist in the human anatomy, his slightly elongated mouth-muzzle curling its lips back in a growl to reveal jagged white teeth.

"Oh gods, oh gods, oh
gods
," Ashlyn babbled, her feet moving of their own accord away from the terrible beast. She'd seen transformation before- Lord Angelo had become a monster right before her eyes in his final battle, and Drake’s fangs elongated when he was in hunting mode- but there were logical, valid
reasons
for those. Rare, explainable reasons like science and vampirism.

Never before h
ad Ashlyn seen the magic of a stane do what she was seeing now. Never had she thought it possible.

She turned to look at Skye
, wanting some sort of comfort from this awful thing. His face was white as a sheet. Ashlyn clutched numbly for his hand, not even caring that mere minutes before she had sworn never to touch him again. Apparently he felt the same, because his fingers laced through hers, holding so tightly that his knuckles cracked. Ashlyn wished that the pressure could be comforting, but all it did was increase the gravity of the situation. She wished that Skye would swallow his fear, reassure her- pretend that watching this earnest Toryn man shape-shift into a bear was not the scariest thing he'd ever seen.

The Tag-creature focused on the both of them standing there, green eyes fierce. The awful sounds he was making were so loud that Ashlyn could barely hear her own thoughts. As much as
she wanted to, as shocked and terrified as she was, she couldn't rip her gaze away from his. Those blazing eyes seemed to tear right through her.

As often as Ashlyn found
herself in unbelievable predicaments, this had to be the worst she'd ever encountered. A man she knew- a man she had only just met, to be sure, but still a man she knew- had transformed into a monster right before her eyes. Worse, his animal self seemed to have none of his human alter-ego's thoughts and ideas.

She swallowed hard. "Enough," she said, and her voice sounded pitiful even to her own ears, "I've seen enough."

Kou was leaning against the door, hands braced behind him on the heavy oak. He was staring at his feet, as if he were just as affected by the sight of Tag's transformation as Ashlyn and Skye and didn't even want to watch. At her words, he looked up and nodded. "Go," he said, and moved away from the door, holding it open for her.

Ashlyn brushed past him and ran up the stairs. She wanted to get as far away from that snarling as she could. There were no footsteps behind her, but she couldn't find the coura
ge to look back and see if Skye was following. As she entered her bedroom, Tag's cries faded some, but not entirely, and suddenly it wasn't enough to be upstairs. Ashlyn turned to leave the house- and bumped into Skye.

"Hey," he said, steadying her with his hand on her shoulder. "Calm down. There's a reason why he showed this to us-"

"What-" Ashlyn choked on the word, and swallowed again, trying to ignore how dry the inside of her mouth was. "What possible reason could he have for making me watch something so terrible?" she cried, voice rasping. "He didn't have to make me- gods, he could have just
told
me-"

"I'm so
rry," Kou said from behind Skye. He was standing at the head of the stairs, although she hadn't seen him ascend. "I should have warned you. I think Tag thought it might be better for you to see it now, so you wouldn't be so shocked if you encountered it…later."

Ashlyn took a deep
breath and stepped around Skye, ever-conscious of the weight of his hand remaining on her shoulder as he turned with her. "Later?" she repeated. "I don't ever want anyone to use that kind of magic again. You think it's dangerous? Come
on,
that's the most potent dark magic I've seen in my life, and I'm taking it to the North Triangle at the first opportunity. I'm going to bury that stupid thing so freaking deep in the planet that no one will
ever
find it again."

"That won't help y
ou," Kou answered. "Do you honestly think that’s the only one?"

She remained still for a long moment, trying to get a solid grip on the panic that was ricocheting around in her mind. "What are you saying?"

Kou's expression was bleak, impossible to draw any hope from. "This stane is not the only one imbued with that kind of magic."

Silence.

"What you're saying," Ashlyn said slowly, careful not to raise her voice, "is that there's another one of those out there. A shape-shifting stane."

"Who has it?" Skye
asked, suddenly all business. Ashlyn's tears had taken him out of his element, but tracking a potential enemy was right up his alley. "Just give me a name, the direction they went- anything. I'll find it and destroy it."

Kou shook his head. "The man who wields it is too powerful to be challenged by a single soldier."

"Then it's a man," Skye said. "Someone from Toryn?" He frowned, staring at the floor and narrowing his eyes, as if he were making a mental catalogue of attributes to file away for later use.

"Yes. But I cannot you tell you anything more about this man until you have heard the story from the beginning," said Kou. "You must understand how grave our situation has become."

"I understand that this magic could be dangerous if it has fallen into the wrong hands," Skye answered.

He moved away from Ashlyn and leaned against one of the support beams running vertically up the wall. The pose he struck was a familiar one to Ashlyn, deceiving in its feigned nonchalance. She'd seen it more than once during their long, d
ifficult battle with Lord Angelo.

"I
t's powerful, even for its weakest users, and appears to render the spell-caster incapable of human thought or memory. If someone managed to get their hands on this magic- someone who didn't care who they hurt or what they sacrificed- it could be lethal. But if there's only one other stane with this kind of magic, then we can certainly capture the man who has it and prevent it from ever reaching someone who might misuse its power."

"That's not the half of it," Kou said. He seemed uncomforta
ble now, taken aback at Skye's casual stance in the midst of this dramatic exposition. Ashlyn figured that was probably Skye's intention. It had certainly worked in the past.

Kou glanced around and finally took a seat on one of the mats scattered across the floor, probably wanting to appear just as indifferent as the
blond swordsman. "You're correct in your assumption that the magic removes all humanity from the spell-caster. The creatures created with
shift
retain animalistic instincts and almost nothing else. No logic, and limited memories. All that’s left is rage…and inescapable bloodlust." He paused and drew in a deep breath. "Perhaps you would prefer to sit down for this, Ashlyn."

She really didn't want to, but figured there was probably no harm in it. She sat, abruptly and ungracefully, not bothering to smooth her kimono over her legs so that her knees didn't show. "All right, I'm sitting.
Spill."

Kou's eyes were so sad when he looked at her that Ashlyn focused on his eyebrows instead. No use twisting her heart around just to hear his story- and you know, now that she actually thought ab
out it, his eyebrows were way more animated than she would have expected for such a stoic guy. Huh.

"Lord Li discovered
shift
almost a year ago," Kou began, "in a cave on Na Michico. I was told that he nearly died during the climb. When he realized how weak he had become, he made the decision to find someone to succeed him. But first…before he chose his successor, he had to know that you were truly gone. He offered a reward for any tips leading to your whereabouts." He met Ashlyn's eyes. "Or any proof concerning your death."

"You told him you saw me die," Ash
lyn said, remembering what Skye had said that rainy night in Storim. "You lied about my death for the reward."

"Not for the reward!" Kou prote
sted. "I would never lie for credits."

Ashlyn raised her eyebrows.
"Then what?"

"I have…" He faltered.
"Visions. Of things to come. My mother called it foresight, but I don't know what it is. I've had it since I was a child. I can see things before they happen. Sometimes seconds before- sometimes months- sometimes
years
. Long before I ever heard about the reward, I saw you in the Heavenly City."

"Being killed by a wolf, I'm guessing," Ashlyn said. She didn't attempt to keep any of the acid out of her tone; none of this psychic stuff had ever appealed to her, and it would take a lot more than some guy telling her it was true to make her believe in it. "At least, that's what I heard."

Kou forced a smile. "It must have been disconcerting, hearing a confirmation of your own death."

The experience of finding out she was widely regarded as dead had actually been
less
weird than finding out Kou was Devlyn, but the transformation she'd just seen with Tag mattered a lot more than changing names. She simply stared at him now, waiting impatiently for him to continue.

"Yes, by a wolf," he went on quietly. "I didn't know who you were, before. But when I heard the reports inquiring about your death-"

"I'm not buying this," Skye interrupted. "Telling Li that Ashlyn was dead wasn't a coincidental happening. You went to great lengths to make him believe you. You even presented him with Ashlyn's shuriken as proof."

"Yeah!"
Ashlyn said, remembering suddenly that the bo shuriken had been missing for years. "Someone stole it from me in Storim.
You
must have stolen it! You
lied-
you said you'd never been to Storim before you stowed away on the airship!"

"Calm down," said Kou. He held up his hands in a defensive gesture. "I didn't steal your shuriken, and I
certainly never gave it to Lord Li. He took it away from a peddler that came to Toryn. He said he recognized it as yours. It only served to confirm what I'd already told him."

"A
peddler
stole my shuriken?" Ashlyn shrieked, jumping to her feet. "He tried to
sell
it? Did it still have any stanes in it? Did you get it back? Did you-" She slurred the last word and trailed off, touching a hand to her aching forehead. "Gods, what's
wrong
with me?"

"I'm trying to finish so you can get some rest
, if you would stop interrupting," Kou replied, standing and grabbing her elbow before she fell over. "You're exhausted. Sit down."

Too dizzy to do anything else, she sat. "Okay, fine. Tell the rest of the story. I'll listen."

Kou looked at Skye, who shrugged noncommittally. "All right," he said. "I'll start with my clan. You probably know that the people of Lunai severed ties with all other Toryn clans years ago."

"Right around the time that my dad started turning Toryn into a tourist trap," Ashlyn remembered out loud. "Yours must have been one of those clans who didn't agree with- um…" She bit her lip. "Sorry. Go on."

Kou shifted on the mat, sitting back so he could brace his hands on the floor behind him. It should have made him look more relaxed; instead he seemed awkward, uncomfortable. "We were virtually cut off from all avenues of communication with the outside world. My clan and I didn't even know you were missing until one of the Toryn Lords came to us and asked if we had any information. When I told him about my vision, he brought me here." He glanced around, as if he were seeing Ashlyn's home for the first time. "Your father liked me. I was chosen as a potential heir. So I stayed."

That must have been convenient, Ashlyn wanted to say. But she kept her mouth shut.

"It wasn't as easy as I had anticipated," Kou admitted. "I…I was one of many, lost among the other selected potentials and eager to prove myself to the Lords. Elder Lord Li seemed to hold me in great esteem, and I, foolish as I was, tried my utmost to capitalize on his favor." He met Ashlyn's gaze. "He used to tell me that I had your eyes. I think that, even with my power of foresight and the…other reasons I was chosen, he would not have paid me any heed if I did not in some way resemble you. He told me that if you did not return, there could be nothing he would delight in more than allowing me to assume leadership of Toryn."

Ashlyn stared at the floor, deliberately ignoring the lump in her throat, the tears that stung at the backs of her eyes. "I understand," she said softly.

Kou shifted, glancing sideways at Skye- or maybe at Skye’s sword, which was balanced against the wooden beam next to the blond. The giant sword looked formidable enough on its own, but the magic-charged stanes that gleamed from its hilt added to its deadly intimidation factor.

"I'd been here less than a m
onth before Lord Li showed me
shift
." Kou drummed his fingers nervously on the floor, hunched over and looking more vulnerable by the moment. Almost like a child who was confessing to a lie. Ashlyn stayed still, waiting for him to continue.