Chapter 14
Esaka was in a state of panic. There were a lot of Raikengana around, running this way and that or giving directions. Some wore gray with a black sash and carried weapons, some wore Nokim’s taupe, and others still were protectors in all black.
The orb led us through narrow streets winding past stone buildings that sat close to one another. It had to be the older part of Esaka, then. We followed the orb down some stairs to a small river, crossed it, and went back up another set of stairs.
“Oh, fuck,” Vergis said. The bagua around us sounded equally bleak.
“What?”
“Smoke on the air.” Inkiri pointed. “Ahead of us.”
I sniffed. “Are you sure? I don’t smell anything.”
Vergis snorted. “Humans can’t pick up scents for shit. Weak human eyes, a weak human nose, soft all over. And bigoted when they encounter something strange.”
Inkiri hissed, but I could tell he was too distracted to really defend my species’ honor.
Which would have been difficult, seeing as how I sort of had to agree with Vergis.
I knew all too well how lucky I was to have entered the patriarchy as a guy, and gay theater major or not, I had parents who were happy to ignore me, no matter if I was gay or straight.
Maybe if I’d been cast as something more promising than a tree, they might’ve even used me to show off to their friends or work colleagues.
For them, I was a failure because I wasn’t a success in any of the ways they measured success, and none of it had to do with who I loved. Lots of people weren’t that lucky.
I looked up at Inkiri. His eyebrows were furrowed and his jaw set. He looked like some fierce warrior prince.
“I’m so glad I’m free to love you, oh husband mine.”
Okay, I was being dramatic. But the images of how the bear had left the cola ash people by the wall still sort of lingered on the backs of my eyelids whenever I closed them, and I needed a distraction. I was just going to focus on the bright things in my life.
Inkiri looked at me. “Who would forbid you to love a mate, sweet thing? Are you feeling well? Your skin looks pale.”
“What’s with him?” Fellisse said, coming up behind us.
“Oh, don’t mind me. I’m perfectly fine.” The next thing I knew, my foot caught on an oddly placed stone in the street, and I would have faceplanted if Inkiri hadn’t had such a good hold on me.
“Sadir?”
“Oh. Now I smell it too.” And then I heard a gunshot, and another. “I’m fine, it’s just, you know, I didn’t watch where I was going. Let’s find Lissir and Nokim.”
There was shouting ahead, and a gust of wind really gave me a noseful of smoke, little gray specks of ash dancing in front of my face. So much for most of the houses being protected against fire by magic.
Vergis jogged just behind the orb, which was keeping pace with him, and glanced around the corner up ahead with his gun ready.
Wisps of black drifted skyward above the roofs.
Fellisse grunted and ran past us to catch up with Vergis while the bagua with us guarded the rear, but before Fellisse reached him, Vergis spun and jogged back to me and Inkiri.
“Road ahead is almost blocked, and I see Koa Esher, their mages.” He gave me a lopsided grin. “I have an idea.”
I stifled the groan that wanted out. This was the bear all over again. “Of course you effing do.”
He gave me a seething look. “You want to watch someone’s home go up in flames and tell them later that you could have helped but didn’t like the idea of it?”
“You never said it was about that.”
“Because you never let me fucking finish.”
Inkiri clicked. “Vergis, your idea.”
“Right. Me and the princess stay here and help with extinguishing the fire. You two take the orb, circle around the other side, and find Nokim and Lissir.”
Another gunshot rang out. I suddenly had a very bad feeling about those noises, and something icy tickled along my spine. We had to do something fast.
I squared my shoulders. “Sounds like a plan. Let’s do it. Now.”
Inkiri looked down at me and opened his mouth.
“Nope. No. I like Vergis’s plan. Can you two please go find Lissir and Nokim?”
A host of emotions passed over Inkiri’s face. He looked at Vergis. “Keep him safe for me, Vergis.” Then he looked at me. “And you, Sadir. Keep yourself safe for me. I promise to do the same for you.”
With a human kiss to my lips, he turned and headed for an even narrower alley between two houses. Vergis made a small gesture, and the red orb changed course and bobbed ahead of Inkiri now.
Fellisse gave us a nod before he followed Inkiri, motioning for two of the bagua following us to go with him. That left Vergis and me with three of them. “Take care, you two.”
“What do I do?” I asked. The cold tingling along my spine was still there and growing stronger, and I didn’t like it.
“You hold those branches. Hmm. Weather is a pretty tall order, but I wonder… Come with me for a sec.” He dragged me to the corner ahead.
The bagu guard followed. One of them said something, but Vergis ignored them.
“Okay, quiet, no sudden movements. Just take a look at what’s burning.
” Vergis pointed at the smoke when we were at the corner.
I nodded and leaned forward. There were the white-clad cola ash people, and there, the ones with the twisted horns and small, equally twisted bodies—their mages.
They were holding their glass jars, but along with them were the military guards.
Pretty much the same setup that had ambushed us at the lake on our way to the Stone.
The mages used their jars and dropped them, then straight away pulled new ones from bags they had slung over their shoulders.
Some of the jars were relatively big, and the animals in there were more than just insects.
They could have been the size of puppies.
Whatever they were, they squirmed in terror inside those jars, and I had to look away.
All of the mages were focused on the burning building up ahead; a wooden structure, close to its neighbors, beautifully built, but slowly being devoured.
I leaned back.
“Saw it?” Vergis asked.
I nodded, and we took a few steps back.
“Here’s what I want you to do. I want you to help with the magic by visualizing the building and imagining rain falling on it and extinguishing the flames.
“If this works, the Koa Esher are going to be pissed, and they might come looking, so we might have to run or hop the veils, just so you know.”
And he didn’t want Inkiri here if the Koa Esher came attacking, which was why he’d come up with that plan to split up. He didn’t want Inkiri to do stupid things while defending his mate.
For once, I liked the way he’d been thinking.
I nodded. “Yeah, okay. Can we get started?”
He raised an eyebrow and held out his hand.
“Imagine it. When you can see it, say you want rain, so I know I can get the magic started.”
I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, which was a bad idea.
Images came flooding into my mind. The fucking bear had torn off arms, and there’d been bone sticking out, and I’d thought how funny it was that bagu skin was blue and my skin was white, but still, bone was bone and looked the same. That fucking bear. I needed to focus.
I pushed the memory of the beastly carnage away, pushed the sight of Vergis killing the white fluffballs at the wall earlier away, and focused on the house.
Someone lived there. This wasn’t Earth, with its abandoned homes that made me sad.
The bagua whose house that was were still here, and they needed their home whole, not burned to cinders.
I saw the flames licking at the timber, and I imagined rain, dark clouds above spouting torrents.
“I want rain,” I said. “I want rain, I want rain.” And over, and over.
Vergis’s grip on my hand tightened ever so slightly, and heat bloomed from inside me, although it did nothing to chase away that eerie cold that had settled along my spine.
My eyes opened, and the bagua guarding us took a step back. Between Vergis and me, magic was radiating, so bright it had to hurt to look at.
Petrichor was the smell of rain bathing the earth, wetting the soil, making way for new life. That was the smell I wanted, and I focused on it.
Something rustled in my mind.
You are far away, Rory. The presence was familiar, like your shadow or your own smile seen in a mirror. You need me.
“I want rain,” I said again. Was it already raining? The magic was still bright between us. In my arms, I felt the branches wilt and turn to ash.
You have called rain to you, but you want the fire to stop. I see it in your mind. Do you want me to take the reins of those flames, tear them from the magic that created them?
“What does that mean?” I mumbled.
“Focus on the rain, princess,” Vergis said, and I saw him pull his knife out of its sheath. My branches were almost gone.
You don’t need your mage’s stored power or the flowers. I am here. Command me.
I took a deep breath. In my mind I said, Make the fire stop.
As you will, the strange-familiar presence that only I could sense said, and I knew the flames winked out just then.
I heard shouts from that direction; shocked, dismayed. The Koa Esher were angry.
“Shit.” Vergis let go of my hand.
The cold in my spine was still there, and if anything, it was getting worse. It was getting to the point where it was very nearly painful.
“Make it stop,” I mumbled, too quietly for anyone to hear, and anyway, Vergis had run back to the corner. I saw him raise his gun and fire off a few shots. The bagua with us split up, two heading to Vergis, one staying with me.
You’re far away, Rory. Do you understand what the cold inside you is?
I didn’t. No.
It’s Death coming for one or your knights. He’s not with Her yet, but will be soon. You will always know now when she is on her way to welcome one of them.
“No, you fuckers!” Vergis screamed, shot, and ran. Toward where I knew the Koa Esher were. Where they waited.