Chapter 23 - Jael
Jael
XXIII
I had spent most of my adult life terrified of the dark.
My greatest fear was not knowing what might be creeping up on me, being closed off and shut out.
Isolated. I’d learned to internalize that nothingness, weaponizing it until I was the darkness other people feared, but always I avoided getting trapped in it again myself.
Yet now, with my eyes covered and being forced to rely on strangers to keep me safe, I almost dreaded leaving it.
I’d found a sort of comfort in having everything be out of my control.
With every passing day, I became more aware of Kalla’s particular scent, a subtle difference from the other vampires we travelled with.
Like a low, hidden harmony that sweeps through a symphony, driving deep into heart and soul and lingering long after the rest of the song is forgotten.
She’d never returned to my side after transferring me to someone else’s guidance in the tunnel, but even so, I remained mindful of her, my anchor in the emptiness.
The softness of her breathing, the evenness of her footsteps, the sound of her voice.
I could almost picture her facial expressions every time Corban made yet another aggravating comment.
But what dominated my mind, whether we were walking through grass or across road or over forest debris, was her silence whenever I played my flute.
I hadn’t realized what a critical error I’d made in playing it for her the first time.
I hadn’t known the addiction that would take hold of me.
The craving for her attention had hooked itself into my muscles and bones.
Even unable to see her, I sensed her gaze on me whenever I pulled the flute out of my pocket.
I felt when she moved closer to me, eager to catch every note, and heard the catches in her breath when emotion overwhelmed her.
Over the next couple of days, I gave in to that growing addiction, playing every time we stopped, different styles of songs to evoke different reactions, and savouring every one.
From the sounds of her small movements, she enjoyed the jaunty tunes I chose to lift our moods, but by her breathing and her stillness, she preferred the softer melodies, the ones I played when it was time for us to sleep before the slog of the next night.
How long had it been since I’d enraptured anyone with my music?
Long enough that it pained me to think about it.
Music had been the centre of my world from the time I’d been old enough to beat a rhythm on a hand drum, and for most of my youth, I’d believed it would be my future.
The day I was recruited to join the royal musicians, I’d thought my dreams had come true.
Naive fool that I was.
There had been a time after that where the idea of picking up an instrument had filled me with rage. I’d joined the Coynfare off that rage. I’d attacked the royal guard with that fury.
Kalla had inspired my first song in over six years, and not only had she sat through it, she’d been enthralled by it.
And now I was fucked, because all I wanted was to keep her listening.
More than killing some irrelevant princess, more than returning to Soldara to look Leonine in the eye when he realized his ambitions were ruined, I wanted to tear off this blindfold and watch her expression while I played.
Would it be similar to the look in her eyes when I’d slid inside her?
Would it be even sweeter because she was connecting with my soul instead of my body?
I needed to know, and that need terrified me more than the darkness.
“Hey, Cliff?” Ria called out beside me. “I think we might need a break soon. The musician’s slowing us down.”
I’d been lost in thought after too many long, uncomfortable nights and had tripped over one too many divots in the uneven terrain. “Perhaps if you guided me around the holes instead of through them, we wouldn’t be lagging behind.”
“Perhaps if you allowed me to lead, I wouldn’t have such a hard time guiding you,” she shot back.
“Allowed you to lead?” I replied with a harsh laugh. “I see nothing. If you haven’t been leading so far, I’m astounded we’ve stayed with the group.”
“And I’m astounded—”
“I’ll take over.” Kalla’s voice cut through the other woman’s argument. “We have a carriage to catch up to and don’t have time for you two to bicker.”
There was practicality in her tone, a hint of authority, but something else as well. The slight emphasis on “you two,” perhaps, that made me swear a jealous streak was buried under her pragmatism.
Her familiar hand slid under my arm, replacing Ria’s rougher grip, and my blood sang at the closeness even as my flesh craved something more. Skin to skin contact at the very least. But I could be satisfied with this for now. A trickle of water to quench my parched throat.
I wracked my brain to come up with a clever quip to get Kalla talking and break this tension between us, but every word fell flat before it reached my lips.
I wanted to hear her voice, but every question I came up with was too personal, too invasive.
So instead we walked in silence. My stride evened out thanks to her gentle guidance and my hyper-awareness of every minor twitch of her fingers.
We seemed to be making good time, though I had no idea how much distance we’d actually covered, and I found myself counting steps towards our final goodbye. Until Kalla drew to a sharp halt with a hissed, “Shit.”
“What is it?” I whispered back.
“Why are we stopping?” Corban asked at a normal volume. If he’d been closer, I would have kicked him in the shin for his inability to pay attention. Cliff replied with a few sharp whispers, and then we were moving again.
Kalla’s grip on my arm tightened, and our pace quickened. I did my best not to slow her down, but the urgency made me wish I could remove the blindfold to see what was happening.
We stopped again, and Kalla pulled me down into a crouch.
“How many do you see?” Ria asked.
“I spotted four to the west,” Kalla replied, and I knew the fae we’d heard from the cave were close.
On my left, Birch said, “Three to the east.”
“And another two north,” Cliff added. “Fuck me. We’re overrun.”
“Think we can avoid—” Ria asked.
“Nope!” Kalla didn’t bother to keep her voice down as the sound of rattling armour closed in around us. “Blades ready. Protect the fae.”
To the sky with that. If guards had found us, I knew what they were capable of. Four vampires alone wouldn’t stand a chance. Taking off my blindfold would break my vow to Kalla, but that didn’t hold me back from saying, “Let us help.”
No one acknowledged me, and in another breath, the first blows were struck.
The song of steel on steel rang in my ears, and I whirled left to right, struggling to face the fighters so my back wasn’t vulnerable. Kalla kept her hand on my arm, dragging me with her while she fought.
Verbena-scented metal polish tickled my nose and left little doubt who we were dealing with. The gleaming armour of the guards flashed in my vision as I fell into memories of my last encounter with them. I knew how quickly they moved, how ruthless they were, and my fears for Kalla clogged my pores.
“Take this blindfold off and let me help you,” I growled, but her only response was to grunt and whirl me around again. The citrus scent grew stronger, and acting on a whim, I threw out a punch in the direction I believed it to be coming from.
By luck, my blow landed, and my knuckles crunched against something hard and sharp.
Teeth, maybe. A curse followed, and I allowed Kalla to jerk me back to avoid being hit in return.
A whoop of victory sounded beside me as she took advantage of the fae’s shock, and the stench of blood mingled with the lemony polish.
More fae swept in. A scream that sounded like Ria’s shot through the night, followed by Cliff’s cry for her. Between the clash of blade against blade and the creak of armour, the previously peaceful wood was overwhelmed by the sounds of battle, and I didn’t think we were winning.
“Come on, Kalia me. If you want to survive this, let me help you.”
She stumbled in her footing, and I heard a sharp “By the fucking blood” from under her breath, and then my blindfold was gone.
Even in the middle of the night, the world was too bright for those first few seconds, the near-full moon spilling its ethereal glow through the trees to douse the battle and turn the spilled blood black.
I blinked through the adjustment and pulled my daggers, then set my back against Kalla’s and let the fae come.
There were more than I’d thought. There had to be at least twelve, not including the few I spotted dead in the grass. All city guards, I noticed. No royal emblems among them.
Birch was down as well—not dead, but not far off. Ria faced off with two, and Cliff fought three on his own while he strove to protect Hethyr and Pimmin.
Ria spun out of one fae’s reach and cut through Pimmin’s blindfold, who rushed to take off Hethyr’s.
Corban stood on his own, spinning left to right as I had done, gauging where the greatest threat was so he could avoid it.
The vampires were too busy to watch out for him—or didn’t care enough to protect his ungrateful ass.
Fucking sky, we needed him here. The man was a beast with a sword.
Abandoning Kalla, I tore through the trees towards Corban.
A fae cut in front of me, and I ducked under his swinging arm, jabbing up with my dagger to catch him under his armpit, in the slim gap in the armour.
Blood spurted from the wound, and he stumbled to the side, leaving enough space for me to veer around him and yank Corban’s blindfold free.
As I whirled around to defend myself against the fae I’d cut, a scream rang out that turned my blood cold.
Kalla.