Wolf's-own: Weregild (24 page)

Umeia held Xari's gaze evenly. Her finger tapped the card on the table. “What does it mean?"

Xari swallowed, laying a bony hand over the Obelisk, fingers hiding the painted flames like they had a mind of their own and thought perhaps they could make it unreal just by virtue of their obstruction.

"Choices,” Xari said. “To fall or to fly. Let go or risk being shaken off.” She shook her head. “You must tell me why you've come, child. I cannot read properly unless I know—"

"The card, Xari,” Umeia cut in, a little harsh, just enough to remind Xari across from whom she sat. Kamen might overshadow his sister in power, but that didn't mean Umeia hadn't been bestowed with plenty of her own.

Xari drew herself up, met Umeia's eyes squarely. “Change.” She kept her tone even and bland. “Disastrous change.” She tapped the card. “The Obelisk of falsehoods, its foundation built on sand and gravel. Lies you have told yourself. Lies that set it too heavy on its perilous foundation. If you do not push it over yourself with elucidation, it will fall beneath its own weight.” Her fingertips drifted once again to the orange flames licking at the peak of the Obelisk. “Fire purifies. Its ash is virtue."

"So, I've been lying to myself,” Umeia said softly, her voice shaky, her eyes filling.

Xari resisted the urge to reach over and take up her hand. “That is one interpretation,” she said carefully. “I cannot know unless you tell me why—"

"Do you still love your son, Xari?"

Xari sat back, eyeing Umeia carefully. She reminded herself again who it was that sat across from her.

"Blood is Blood,” she said, wary now. “There are many things that can take the love in one's heart and change it, but very few that can wipe it out altogether. Even if we might wish it."

Umeia sucked in a long breath and nodded, a sad, shaky smile trembling her chin. “And you do what you do now—you plot with my brother—because you hope to save your blood, even though you know it will hurt him. Make him hate you. Perhaps kill him."

"He already hates me,” Xari said evenly. “Were it not for your brother, he would have already sought me out and sent me to spirit. And only one sort of death means anything to our kind. Hurt...?” She shrugged. “We have not the same goals, you and I. I am godless; you have never been. I would dig out the heart of Asai myself, if Dragon would but ask it and give me back my place. My own redemption is why I help your brother."

"And what about Wolf?” Umeia asked softly. “What if one of Wolf's-own was willing to speak for you, swear for you? Would you take Wolf for your god if he would have you?"

Again, Xari's eyes narrowed. “No
Temshiel
or maijin would refuse Wolf, should he call.” Her head tilted to the side. “And what would one of Wolf's-own ask for in return for this boon?” She didn't mention that Kamen had already made her the same promise, and a petition from him would likely go farther. Dragon might take her back before the Cycle shifted, if she had a hand in stunting Asai's plots, but a call from
Wolf
....

Xari would never have to fear her son again, even if he escaped the suns a second time.

Umeia leaned forward, her eyes intense, a light behind them that approached madness in its passion. “Warn my brother off. Lie to him, if you have to. He is no longer necessary to this grand plot you have between you, both of you tools of vengeance for Husao and nothing more. Leave the Catalyst to me."

Xari kept the shock from her face. “And what would you do with the Catalyst, Wolf's Daughter?” she asked softly.

Umeia's eyes hardened. Her mouth remained stubbornly shut.

A strange grief rose to Xari's heart. “Kamen Wolf's-own has claimed the Catalyst as his own,” she told Umeia calmly. “They are bound as tightly as souls can be without the pledge of oath. You yourself have sworn to those the Catalyst holds most dear.” Xari leaned in, met Umeia's cool gaze squarely. “What use for a Catalyst has Wolf's Daughter, Paladin of Souls that was?"

For a long moment, Xari thought Umeia would remain silent. But then her eyes shifted away, flickering down to the card on the table before lifting again to Xari's. “Blood is Blood,” she said quietly. “And I stand now on an Obelisk of lies. I would taste the ashes of virtue."

"The Obelisk is Death and Temperance both,” Xari warned. “Even falling can feel like flying until you're broken on the ground. You cannot know which it is that awaits you unless you tell me what answer it is you seek. Always more than one meaning in the cards—it is not the cards themselves that guide but the one who reads them."

Umeia only stared at her again, implacable, just as stubborn as her brother. Xari's mouth tightened, and she shook her head. She set to irritably dealing out the rest of the configuration.

"If you will not tell me, I shall read the rest myself,” she snapped. “Impudent children who think they can interpret for themselves what it takes centuries to—"

Umeia's hand pushed Xari's away, snatched up a clump of cards, and swept them to the floor. Xari wouldn't have been as appalled if Umeia had just plunged a blade through her heart.

"Wretched girl!” she cried. “What—?"

"Some things I would keep for myself,” Umeia said. She stood calmly and stared down at Xari, her face unreadable. “You've been as helpful as I expected you to be, Xari.” She bowed her head, bizarrely deferential, considering her blatant disrespect for Xari's craft and her tools. “Goodbye,” was all she said, then she turned and pushed through the curtains that hung in the doorway, their dangle and sway holding Xari's stunned eye longer than they should have done.

She shook herself, rubbed at her brow. She hated to be taken by surprise. She should have read her cards last night. She should have been more prepared. These precarious days called for vigilance, and she'd been caught lacking.

Sighing, Xari heaved herself up from the table and hobbled over to the cards scattered over the floor. Damn it, it was going to take an annoying amount of time she apparently didn't have to purify them so they would read properly again.

She needed to speak to Husao. And she needed to send for Kamen.

"This...” Xari muttered as she bent to one knee on the floor and reverently began to collect her cards, unsure whether to be dismayed or relieved that the Obelisk sat faceup atop the otherwise haphazard mess. “This absolutely will not do."

"
Yes
,” Malick growled, wanting to be anywhere but where he was at the moment—sitting on Fen's bed with three sets of eyes staring at him in different degrees of accusation. “Yes, I thought we would likely find your mother through Yakuli, but I had hoped we wouldn't.” He shook his head when Fen's fists clenched even tighter, and Malick held up a hand, trying to stave off the wrath too apparent on Fen's face. If Fen had access to all those little throwing knives on his clothespress right now, Malick would already look like a porcupine. “I wanted to find her, Fen. I just didn't want to find her
there
."

"What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Fen snarled.

Amazing what a little fury could do for him—he was healing faster than Malick had thought, faster than he should be doing, but a minute ago he'd been gray and exhausted. Now color flooded his face, and anger livened up his eyes.

Malick raked a hand through his hair, blowing out a long breath. He'd known this was coming, and he supposed he was lucky Fen hadn't already killed him. Damn it, how had he let himself get so mired in how he'd hoped this would go, as opposed to planning for contingencies when it inevitably went the way he knew it would?

Oh, right—optimism and libido. Lethal combination. Clearly.

"I'm subject to different laws than you are,” Malick tried to explain. “We don't have the same... values, morality, whatever you want to call it."

"So, that means you can turn a blind eye while all those people—?"

"
No
,” Malick snapped, “it means I
should
. It means I'm supposed to. Except I can't. I've never been able to, I've never...
fuck
."

With a vicious glare at Shig, Malick shuffled across the mattress until he was right in front of Fen. Fen made it a point to move his leg to the side to avoid touching him. Samin had conspicuously taken up a place right behind Fen's chair, his not so subtle way of informing Malick that, on this subject at least, Samin was firmly on Fen's side.

Malick sighed, trying to order his thoughts, irritated that they were so messy, when he'd known this was coming. He should have had a speech all prepared, a ready defense. Except he'd never been able to find one in him, not for this, and,
Yeah, it pissed me off, so I flipped off the gods and went to sulk for a few decades
, didn't even sound good in his own head. He expected it would get an even less enthusiastic reception out loud, considering his current audience.

"We serve the Balance,” he said, keeping his gaze on Fen, as open and honest as he could make it. “Sometimes the defense of innocents is a tool to do that. Sometimes looking the other way is. There is no moral choice for us. We do as the gods tell us, and if the gods are silent, we use our judgment, our knowledge of our gods and what they wish, and hope we don't fuck it up and burn for it."

Fen was still glaring, but he had that ring clutched tight in his fist.

Malick pointed at it. “You know, that won't work anymore if you kill me,” he said, a little bit desperately, and ignored Shig's little snort entirely. A lie, of course—the fact that it
didn't
lose its magic upon the death of its contributor was rather the appeal of
Temshiel
Blood in the first place—and Shig likely knew it. Shig seemed to know far too much these days, but she kept her big mouth shut this time.

Samin was frowning, skeptical. “So,” he said slowly, “you're saying that the gods want Yakuli to keep doing what he's doing?"

"No, not exactly.” Malick shot a look at Shig, but he'd already known she'd be no help. At least she wasn't glowering at him like everyone else was. “The gods don't care about right or fair or just. The gods want Balance.” No, that wasn't going to work. He was going to have to start at the beginning.

"There were
Temshiel
who made the mistake of loving mortals. And from that love came the Ancestors. The gods were angry, they wanted to wipe out the Ancestors and the
Temshiel
who made them, because they were a potential threat to the Balance—mortals aren't supposed to have magic just
given
to them—but Wolf called them all to his Cycle. In a sense, they all became Wolf's children."

"And their children became the Jin,” Fen said.

Malick was a little surprised—Fen was actually
participating
in a conversation, with
him
, and without having to be forced to it—but not terribly encouraged. Fen was still glaring, nearly vibrating with rage.

"Yeah,” Malick said. “The Jin have always been Wolf's favored children. But then the Ancestors pushed too hard. They bound their magic to their people. Even Wolf wouldn't come to their defense that time—they hadn't just threatened the Balance; they'd rocked it—and the
Temshiel
were ordered to abandon the Jin or burn. Most of those who'd either sired or birthed the Ancestors burned. But still, Wolf would not allow the Jin to be destroyed, and none of the other gods had the strength to defy him. So they simply waited until Wolf was no longer in his Cycle."

"The Binding War,” Fen said, eyes narrowed.

Malick stared. “You already knew."

What would he think if he knew on which side you fought in the Binding War?
Umeia had asked, and for all that it had clogged anger and betrayal in Malick's chest at the time, it had still stoked the low simmer of unease to a smoldering coal. Because, yeah, what
would
Fen think? Except it appeared he already knew.

"How?” was all Malick could think to ask.

Fen only stared for a long moment, his face unreadable, then he shrugged. “I had a good teacher."

"Not Asai, surely."

"No."

Right. Husao. Maybe his pain-in-the-ass interference had actually proven helpful this time, because Fen had known for days that Malick was
Temshiel
, and he'd obviously already known what the
Temshiel
had been to the Jin, and he hadn't actually tried to kill Malick. Malick supposed that Fen having Husao as a tutor was perhaps one small blessing in Malick's own favor right now.

"Maybe
he
knows,” Samin put in irritably, “but some of us would like to know what the fuck you're talking about."

"Yeah, yeah,” Malick muttered as he scrubbed at his face. “No one knew that the Ancestors had also bound their magic to their lands. And when the Jin used their magic against the Adan, it was the last straw. Some believe Raven influenced them, but it doesn't really matter, in the end—they did it and they had to be punished.” He sucked in a deep breath. “So, Raven set the
Temshiel
on them. Even those of us who aren't Raven's had to obey. And since maijin and
Temshiel
are equal parts of the—"

"The maijin fought for the Jin,” Fen said, nearly breathless. He tried to stand, back away, but only ended up with his back pressed more firmly into the cushions of the chair. “Asai—"

"
No
, Fen.” Malick reached out, clamped down on Fen's wrist. Fen stilled, but Malick could feel the vibrations in the taut muscles beneath his fingers. “He'll tell you he fought for the Jin and he serves Wolf, but it's only true enough that it can't be entirely negated. He wants to get the Jin out from beneath Adan rule, it's true, but only so that
he
can rule them.” Fen snarled, tried to jerk his arm away again, but Malick jerked it right back. “Those charms, Fen—don't forget where they came from. Don't forget what he's done with them. Skel made them, but Asai used them.
He's
why all of those people have been Disappeared. The Adan never would have even known it could be done, were it not for Asai.

"He got hold of
Temshiel
Blood, and he saw what could be done with it, but he saw too late—he'd already betrayed the one who gave him the amulets and taught him the spells. Skel went to the suns for it, but if he hadn't, Asai would have seen him murdered for Heart's Blood."