Chapter 28 Seneschal #2
Placing both hands around Solace’s hilt, I imagined the sword becoming two. When I drew my hands apart, I knew that the god sword would be reformed, brand new, brilliant and shining. And so it was.
The short swords were beautiful. Old Fae ran along the edges of both honed blades, engraved in winding script. I still couldn’t read the language. A message from the gods, maybe. I would decipher them later . . . if I lived through the next twenty minutes.
“Come now, child. An affiliation with the Winter Palace could be beneficial to you.” Orious’s eyes were twice the size they’d been moments ago. “My king is benevolent.”
“Tell me something, Orious. Did you swear an oath before the Firinn Stone?”
The truth flickered the seneschal’s eyes before the lie could reach his lips. “Naturally,” he said. “You can trust me to honor my word.”
I just laughed.
The earnest look on his face faltered. “All right, then. Have it your way. Kill her.”
The soldiers streamed past Orious toward me, bows raised.
They loosed their arrows, but an Alchemist couldn’t only manipulate quicksilver.
I was an element worker. All metals were at my command.
The pointed iron came for me, and I pushed with my mind, gently, as if nudging a leaf floating on top of flowing water.
The arrows weren’t even halfway across the room before they changed direction, all five snapping upward and embedding into the ceiling.
Their shafts juddered from their impact, their fletching quivering.
The soldiers hesitated. They looked up at the ceiling, and then back down at me. All at once, they reached for new arrows.
“I wouldn’t bother,” I told them. “The next ones will be coming back at you.”
“For the love of the gods, use your knives!” Orious snarled. “Hold on to them tight.”
The archers discarded their bows, drawing steel from scabbards. Their knives were made from alloys, I sensed. There was a strangeness to them. I could close my will around them, but only just. They barely moved when I tried to shove them with my mind.
“The Winter Palace remembers,” Orious said, shaking his head.
“That’s right. Your kind were dangerous.
No power that vast should have ever been gifted to one group of people.
My king discovered how to limit your magic a long time ago.
Our traditions have lasted far longer than your kind did.
Every soldier in the king’s army is equipped with a null blade on the day they complete their training.
Good luck fending off five of those, Alchemist.”
Null blade. The term was unknown to me. Fisher hadn’t ever used that term. Nor had Renfis or Lorreth.
As Belikon’s men approached, each armed with a dagger, that sense of strangeness hit me again. Unnatural. Their weapons bore simple handles, their blades straight and unembellished. They were unremarkable in every way. And yet . . .
I saw them in a new manner. A second sight that seemed to overlap reality. The air shivered and distorted around the blades, as if it were being pulled into them. The closer the guards came, the more my skin crawled.
The short swords blazed in my hands, humming with energy.
Solace’s magic had returned to it back in Gillethrye.
It had flared to life when Malcolm had attacked me, but it had lain dormant ever since.
I hadn’t called on it. There had been no need.
And in truth, I’d been too scared to try.
The quicksilver had granted Avisiéth magic because it had judged Lorreth’s blood and found him worthy.
I wasn’t the girl I had been back in the maze.
I was different now. Changed. The idea that Solace would recoil from the person I was now had been enough to keep me from trying.
But as I drew the newly formed short swords, Solace’s magic surged down the lengths of metal, buzzing up my arms like lightning.
Not Solace’s power, halved to accommodate the new split weapons. This was twice the power, and it was electrifying.
The first male came for me. He was light on his feet. Limber. He swung at me with his dagger, and I blocked upward, easily deflecting the blow. The shock of his weapon, clashing with my short sword, rocked me, though—a wave of nausea that made me suck in a sharp breath.
Unpleasant.
Very fucking unpleasant. But not enough to distract me from the task at hand.
He was already twisting, finding new footing, coming at me from a different approach.
Two more of the males came, lunging for me, their metal gleaming.
With a monumental force of will, I shoved the first male’s dagger away with my mind, managing only to avert it at the last second.
The male stumbled forward, balance lost as his weapon suddenly jerked to the side—and I met his friends in a flurry of steel and gritted teeth.
The forms Lorreth had drilled with me flowed, making sense at last, second nature . . . but they weren’t enough. A fourth male joined in the fight, the fifth hot on his heels.
The sounds of scraping metal thundered in the air.
Fire lashed around the top of my right arm. One of them landed a hit on me, their blade slashing through my shirt. Heat spilled down my arm, the copper-bright smell of blood exploding in the back of my nose.
Footwork, Saeris. Footwork. Concentrate. Lorreth’s voice was stern in the back of my mind.
I had been training only with him, though. One male. I was trying to fend off five now.
I could almost hear him laughing as I spun and dropped low, striking up and sinking my right short sword into one of the male’s chests. Come on, Fane. You’re selling both of us short. You don’t think I’m worth five of these fuckers?
The guard gasped. I yanked my weapon back without assessing the damage and immediately blocked up, parrying another null blade.
A thud to my left.
I slashed at another of the male’s ankle tendons.
Spun away.
Blocked.
Mentally shoved another blade away with everything I had.
Blocked.
Blocked.
Retreated.
One of them—the one I’d stabbed in the chest—was on the floor, dead.
Only four of them now.
Ha! Only four of them.
I danced back on the balls of my feet—that’s what this was now, a dance—letting them come for me. They prowled forward, eyes blank, faces emotionless.
Don’t panic. You’ve got this. Preempt them. You know where they’re going to be, Saeris.
“Last chance,” Orious called. “There’s still time to change your mind. The king won’t extend another opportunity.”
My canines felt long in my mouth. I was bleeding from my leg somewhere; I could smell it. Setting my jaw, I ran the edges of the short swords together, and burning blue-white sparks leaped from the metal. “I gave you my answer,” I snarled. “Let’s get this over with.”
The guards didn’t wait for Orious’s command. They charged.
Sharpened steel rained down on me.
I gulped down air, forcing myself to breathe. One at a time, faster than fast, I rebuffed the males, pushing their weapons away with my mind as best I could, or else meeting them with my own.
One of them broke through my guard. Fire tore up my side, pain igniting fury in me as I went after the bastard who had cut me.
I scythed my right god sword at him, the weapon trailing blue-white light behind it, and slit the male’s throat wide open.
Blood spurted from the clean slash I left behind, and down the male went.
Three left now.
My breath sawed out of me. I’d never moved this fast in my entire fucking life.
One of them kicked, aiming to blow my knee out, but I darted closer to him, hooking my elbow and smashing it into his face. He staggered back—
—and the other two were in my face.
“Fuck!”
I ducked and spun through them, scissoring my swords, spinning them in my hands. One found its mark, biting through the guard on the right’s arm. The other guard lunged sideways. I followed him, blocking his downward blow, driving upward into his gut—
“Saeris!”
My heart stilled.
I didn’t dare look for him.
I could feel him, though.
Suddenly, the tomb was wreathed in bands of glittering black sand.
Kingfisher.
Kingfisher.
Kingfisher.
His name had replaced my heartbeat.
A black rope lashed around the closest male’s throat, and suddenly his head was no longer attached to his body. Blood sprayed everywhere as his body lifted into the air and was hurled away as if it weighed nothing.
And there he was.
My mate’s hair was wild. His eyes locked onto mine, simmering with rage.
Say something, he said into my mind.
“I’m okay,” I panted.
Do you need me?
I dodged a blow from the male on the right—I’d broken his nose with that elbow—and pivoted, kicking out at the other male hard. The sole of my boot slammed into his rib cage. Staggering sideways, he righted himself and came again, but I was ready.
My short swords blazed light, power singing like lightning through my veins.
No. I was firm. I’ve got this.
“Don’t! Don’t you dare!” Orious was screaming somewhere.
The tomb walls blurred as I moved, ducking, lunging, spinning on the balls of my feet.
Another shout echoed around the small space—a yell of anger—but I stayed focused on what was in front of me. My power was building, flowing, rising inside me. My runes didn’t burn this time. They pulsed hard, my magic begging to be set free.
Without thinking, I slammed my short swords together, and suddenly they were one again, Solace humming with energy in my left hand. I thrust my right hand up, out in front of me, and—
“Holy fuck!” Carrion’s shout bounced around the tomb.