The Skylighter (The Keepers' Chronicles Book 2) (29 page)

Johanna gasped at the sight. Its face resembled a candle half-melted. An eye socket dripped down onto a cheek, puddling into the corner of a ruined mouth.

“Don’t,” it gurgled. And as a backup to the threat in the half-masticated word, it encased Jacaré’s arm in ice.

The rat fell limply from Jacaré’s frozen fingers and scurried across the rocky ground to its master. Jacaré forced his arm to straighten, and the ice shattered. He pulled on his weak
essência
and reached for his weapon simultaneously, but the steel was too cold to draw. Instead he created a small field of electricity, a thin mesh that flickered weakly around his friends.

A high laugh dribbled from the man’s twisted lips. “Even now,” their attacker said as he pulled himself onto the shelf of land. “Even without any extra power. I’m stronger than you.”

Jacaré couldn’t divert his
essência
to take the chill from his sword without weakening the already-dwindling strength of his shield.

“Oh, come now. Don’t you recognize me?” The man ran a hand over the ragged clumps of brown hair on his head. “I looked a bit different before your little friend hit me with a fireball. Sadly for everyone, it wasn’t a direct hit. And he’s lying somewhere under a pile of prison rubble.”

“Leão?” Johanna asked, her voice soft.

“Was that his name?” their attacker asked, then giggled. “I didn’t stop to shake hands and introduce myself. I can only imagine how that would have gone: ‘Hello, you melted my
face
. Let me do you the favor of crushing you with tons of stone.’ ”

The ice makes him a Water affinity. Member of the Nata. That voice.

There was something there, prickling the back of Jacaré’s mind, but he couldn’t find the name.

The rat skittered up its master’s body and perched on his shoulder.

“This is embarrassing,” he said, with a pout that stretched his skin into a swirl of pink, red, and white—puckers of skin and oozing blisters. “I’ve been holding a grudge for all these years, and you can’t even remember the nickname you gave me.”

“If it’s me you want,” Johanna said, edging out from underneath Rafi’s head, laying it down as gently as possible, “then fine. I’m all yours.”

Jacaré held up a hand, stopping her from brushing against his shield, which was rapidly losing power.

“Yes, yes. I’ll take you, and the boy, too, since he’ll be the one Sapo wants now.” The stranger rubbed his palms together in expectation. “But what I want, right this moment, is for Jacaré to
say my name
.”

A dozen rats, smaller than the first, ran up the slope and hurtled into Jacaré’s shield. A few died instantly, their singed fur filling the air with an awful stench. Small as they were, they took a toll. The ones that didn’t die shook off the shock and tried again.

No collars or bracelets were visible on the rodents; they were controlled by the other Keeper’s mind.

Animal control. Animal control. Animal control.

“Barrata?” Jacaré asked, his voice low and disgusted.

“Yes!” Barrata squealed, clapping his hands together excitedly. “Vibora’s little cockroach. Do you remember me now?”

“Always hiding in darkness, watching her from the shadows, and fleeing as soon as you were exposed. I could never understand why she could stomach your company.”

“And yet I’ve spent the last three hundred years with her and Sapo—”

“A Mage stabbed her in the stomach. I watched her bleed out.”
Gasping and crying, and me too far away to do anything about it.
Jacaré had gone back for her body later, sneaking across enemy lines, only to be caught by his own crew and dragged back to face Tex’s rage.

Barrata clicked his tongue, but it sounded like someone slurping soup. “Sapo’s an excellent healer. He’ll be able to fix this,” he said, running a hand over his face. “He can bring someone back from the gates of death.”

Jacaré reached for the dagger tucked in the top of his boot. The chill of the steel drew him out of his most painful memories.

“Funny, how easily your affections can be swayed by someone when they save you. Especially when you’re abandoned by the one person you trusted more than any other.” Barrata gave a gleeful laugh. “Such a pretty, pretty turn. I’m so glad I’ve lived long enough to witness the fall of the untouchable Jacaré. After all those years of your teasing and torture, I have the chance to return the favor.”

From the corner of his eye Jacaré spotted movement. Rafi, lying prone at the foot of the wall, shifted slightly. Jacaré could see the strain on Johanna’s face, knowing she wanted to rush to Rafi’s side, but instead she positioned herself in front of Barrata.

Jacaré felt a sudden surge of pride at her courage. No matter the odds, she’d always stand in danger’s path if it meant protecting someone she loved.

Shutting his mind to Barrata’s taunts, Jacaré figured the trajectory the dagger would have to follow and what it might encounter. His shield dissolved and the knife flew at its target, but a stinging blast of frozen hail blinded both him and Johanna. They fell backward, raising their hands to protect their faces. Jacaré reached for Johanna’s bow, knowing the weapon would do nothing against a magical attack.

But the attack never came, and after a moment the hail stopped.

“Rafi?” Johanna’s voice trembled.

Jacaré wiped blood from his eyes—the hail had opened a gash at his hairline. When his vision cleared, he realized Rafi was sitting up, though he seemed to be leaning heavily against Johanna.

“What did I do?” he asked, looking at his hand. “He was there, and then . . .”

Jacaré picked himself up and walked toward the cliff’s edge, but stopped a few feet short. Where Barrata had stood, a pile of white ash stirred in the wind. A still-twitching rat’s tail writhed alongside it.

“You vaporized him,” a breathless voice said from behind them.

Turning slowly, Jacaré raised his eyes to the hill beyond the wall. Four figures, two dressed in long robes and two in too-familiar uniforms, stood on the rocky hillside beyond Donovan’s Wall.

Amelia—head of the Mage Council and Leão’s grandmother—wiped beads of sweat off her forehead with an irritated flick. She was not the kind of woman to sweat. Ever. But a wet patch stained the front of her long robe. Beside her, two of Jacaré’s own soldiers panted under the heavy packs they carried. They must have run a great distance to be so winded.

“You,” Amelia said, pointing to Rafi, “will now return the power to where it belongs.”

Rafi stood slowly and Johanna tucked herself under his arm, becoming his crutch. “Actually,” he said, something new and hard lining his mouth, “I think I’ll keep it for a while.”

Rafi had been forced to accept that the Keepers, an entire clan of magic-wielding
people
, not demigods, lived somewhere over the mountains. But seeing them beyond Donovan’s Wall—in rough, travel-stained clothes, breathing hard—seemed like an abomination.

What was more distressing was the blue halos that surrounded them. Bright as moonlight around the old woman, fainter around a man who looked to be near Rafi’s mother’s age, and a glimmer around the two men who wore matching uniforms and carried large canvas packs.

The same shade surrounded Jacaré, but it was muted, like light through stained glass. Johanna had it too, but it flickered and faded, one moment there and the next gone.

He leaned against her for a moment while the buzzing in his head subsided. Without an explanation, without a word from anyone, Rafi understood exactly what had happened. He could see it out of the corner of his eye; the glow that surrounded everyone else was nothing compared with the light pouring off his own skin.

I’m one of them now,
he thought, raising his hand and watching the blue undulate over his skin.
I have magic.

The woman was talking, saying something about returning the power to where it belonged.

Rafi wasn’t really listening, trying to decide if he should be disgusted that he’d snuffed out a life so easily or horrified that he wasn’t at all upset. Killing Barrata had been effortless, mindless, a reaction. This new, terrible power gave Rafi the ability to control the outcome of . . .
everything
.

He could walk to Belem’s estate—
Wait, if I’m a Keeper now, can I fly?
—and force the fat duke to call off his troops and swear fealty to the DeSilvas. Then, on to Maringa to do the same with Inimigo.

The power rushed into Rafi’s fingertips as he imagined pulling Inimigo’s castle down and crushing the duke into a mangled pulp, pulverizing his bones, and using the remnants to paint the walls of the city with a warning against anyone who wanted to rise up in rebellion.

From a distance he heard a muffled cry of pain, and he shook off the haze in his mind. Johanna was on the ground at his feet, her eyes startled; Jacaré had his weapon at the ready, his eyebrows set in a tight line. The other Keepers had come down from the hillside and were scurrying over the wall.

“What happened?” Rafi asked, reaching for Johanna, but she scuttled away, a look of fear on her face.

“You shocked me when I tried to touch you.”

“I—I—what?” He looked from Johanna to the glint of Jacaré’s blade.

“You were pulling on the
essência
,” the old woman said as she leaped down from the top of the wall, moving with more grace than he anticipated. “You were preparing to use it.”

“I wasn’t,” he said hastily. He had been thinking about it, surely, but he wasn’t actually intending to kill the other dukes in a dozen different ways. Destroying them without considering the consequences—the political upheaval, finding replacements—that would be . . . wrong.

But as he looked down at his glowing arm, he realized it might make things so much easier.

“You can’t possibly control that much
essência
.” The man in the robe stood one step behind the woman, as if in deference, but condescension was clear on his face. “You’re not even one of us.”

Rafi felt the power flare in response to the insult.

“Cristoval. Enough.” The woman lifted her hand, stopping the man from taking another step. “This young fellow is going to return the power to where it belongs. I’ll increase the strength of the barrier’s tie to this young woman. Everything will return to normal, as it’s been for the past three hundred years, with one change.”

She waved, and the two soldiers accompanying her stepped close to Jacaré, each taking one of his arms. They forced him to his knees, though the Keeper didn’t seem to need much encouragement. “Since you’ve been ineffective and unable to follow simple orders, you will be a permanent fixture on this side of the wall. You will serve as a bodyguard to this heir, and her heir, and every heir after, until Mother Lua sees fit to break this curse and you
die
.”

Rafi would never have considered Jacaré a friend, but he respected the Keeper’s single-mindedness and determination to achieve his goal, damn the consequences. It was something Rafi recognized in himself.

“You, like your predecessor, will remain forever an exile. Forbidden to return to Olinda on pain of death,” she continued, her blue eyes flashing, but she said the words with a cool, simple certainty. “Cristoval,” she said, turning to her robed companion. “As we are away from the Council, will you support this motion?”

The arrogant set of the man’s mouth turned to a sneer. “Without question, Amelia.”

Jacaré made no sound, his posture remained the same, kneeling and stoic, but the blood drained out of his face.

“Hold my hand, boy.” Amelia offered her hand, palm up, to Rafi. “Perhaps between the two of us we can fix this mess once and for all.”

“Don’t touch her, Rafi,” Johanna said, rushing to her feet. “Jacaré, how many people died when they gave their power to the wall?”

The Keeper’s mouth opened and shut.

“Was it all of them? Everyone but you?” she asked, stepping closer to Rafi, wishing she could somehow protect him from all of this. “If he puts the
essência
back into the barrier now, he’s going to die. Isn’t he?”

No one answered. The younger of the two soldiers shifted, eyes flicking to his elders as they waited for a response, but he didn’t release his grip on Jacaré’s arm.

“I already said I wasn’t going to return the power.” Rafi gave a cool smile, and his fingers twitched at his side.

“Yes, you will,” Cristoval said. He was about Rafi’s height, but his narrow shoulders and long neck made him seem taller. “You will return it because, though I love my people, when others learn what this Sapo person attempted, they may want to follow his—”

“I, too, love my people and will not allow a madman, a rogue Keeper bent on control and domination, to run free across Santarem. I will not give up the only opportunity I have to bring him down,” Rafi countered.

Johanna saw his Adam’s apple rise and fall as he struggled to gain control of his anger. After a moment the glow around Rafi winked out, and he continued speaking. “I will keep this power until the threats are eliminated and my people are safe. When it’s done, and only then, will I rebuild the barrier as you ask.”

Cristoval’s face was gray enough to match Jacaré’s, but he wasn’t ready to let the argument drop. “You don’t know how to appropriately wield
essência
. How can it possibly do you any good?”

In response the blue light flared around Rafi again, glowing so brightly that Johanna had to turn away and Cristoval raised his arm to protect his eyes.

There was something frightening in the tense lines of Rafi’s back and the sweat curling the hair at his neck. “You can help me, or I’ll figure it out on my own.”

“And watch you burn the world?” Cristoval bent his knees, as if preparing to attack. “I don’t—”

“Peace. All of you.” The woman made a calming motion with her hands. “A compromise, perhaps? Keepers should not venture into your land. During the Mage Wars my people split down the middle. I fear that many, especially the younger generation, would be tempted to join this other faction.”