CHAPTER 36
C HAPTER 36
S ETH CHARGED into the chaos of the battle, slashing brutally at any man not wearing the golden armor of the Hammer. He ducked blades, dodged around spears, narrowly missed several arrows.
He had no patience for this. He had to get through. So he hacked and stabbed in a frenzy. Blood sprayed across his face and torso. It ran down his arms. If any of it was his own, he didn’t yet know and certainly didn’t care as he fought his way to the edge of the room, trying to get to the empress.
He even forgot about the homunculus—until it emerged from the wall beside him. Head. Part of its torso. One arm. A clay hand clamped onto Seth’s throat as the homunculus drew itself fully from the wall. It lifted Seth from his feet.
Too close to use his sword, Seth dropped it and snatched his knife from its thigh sheath. He hacked at the clay wrist. Seth dropped to the floor with the severed clay hand still clenching his throat. He ripped it away and hurled it across the room, gasping in a desperate breath.
Seth snatched up his fallen sword as the homunculus reached for him with its other hand. Seth got his sword up in time to stab the homunculus through its torso, but of course that was of no consequence to the creature in its body of lifeless clay.
Then the end of Nasrin’s quicksilver whip wrapped around its throat. Even then the clay face was impassive. It was yanked back. Seth’s shoulder was nearly wrenched from its socket as he held onto sword. It pulled free with a spray of clay dust.
Seth leaped to his feet, watching as the homunculus crashed to the ground and shattered. But the fragments were already drawing together. Even the severed hand was creeping past the dancing feet of the combatants to rejoin the rest of itself.
Seth raced toward Nasrin as she snapped her quicksilver whip. It coiled itself, allowing her to keep her sword in her other hand. Zarina was huddled behind her, one hand over her rounded belly.
Seth shouted, “We found Kahzir in the catacombs! He got Raider! I have to get back there!”
“Help us get to the dais,” Nasrin replied, swinging her blade across the throat of one of Prince Rahim’s men. “From there, I’ll point you in the right direction.”
Seth nodded. Reaching the two women, he took position flanking the empress.
The homunculus had already reshaped itself. Triggering his arcane glove, Seth yanked his chakram from his utility belt and hurled it. The spinning circular blade sliced through the clay figure’s torso. The top half slid off and hit the floor.
The reprieve, of course, would be brief.
Seth caught the chakram on its return, then he, Nasrin, and Zarina worked their way toward the dais. Zarina held her heavy belly. Seth and Nasrin battled swords and spears.
At the dais steps, Nasrin shouted for Zarina to flee ahead of them as she and Seth dealt with a surge of combatants determined to stop the empress.
Seth hacked with furious speed. Nasrin was equally ruthless. They had just bought themselves the time to turn and flee when Zarina cried out and came backing away from the curtains at the rear of the dais. She stumbled down the steps toward Nasrin as Kahzir stepped into the light falling around the throne.
Seth readied his chakram, but a boom had his head whipping around to look out across the throne room. The doors, which someone had closed, exploded open, shattered by a quicksilver fist.
Even across the long space of the throne room, Seth could see Raider’s right eye blazing. He could also see the silver collar around his throat.
Barefooted, wearing only his dark blue shalvar pants and yellow sash, he came stalking into the throne room.
Seth tried to call Raider’s name, but Raider could not possibly have heard him over the clashing of swords.
As when he’d fought the sand serpent, quicksilver lashed out from his body, whips of it snaking out to strike and impale any who charged him. Some of the traitors. Some, too, of the Hammer. It wouldn’t take Raider long to fight his way across the room.
Seth turned to face the real threat. Atop the dais, Kahzir stood unafraid. Seth could see his pleasure, the certainty in his eyes. From his neck, over his dingy white scholar’s robes, hung a glittering orb in a cage of gold. The Alchemist’s Stone.
As Seth took aim with his chakram, Kahzir raised his hand, displaying an undoubtedly arcane device, though Seth didn’t know what it was.
“I can kill him!” Kahzir shouted in warning. “If I shock him at full strength, his brain will shut down. So I suggest, Curator, that you throw down your weapons.”
When Seth didn’t immediately comply, Kahzir pressed a button on the device. Raider’s scream split the air. Seth’s head whipped back Raider’s direction as Raider dropped to his knees.
“Throw down your weapons, Curator!”
Seth dropped his chakram and sword.
Raider’s scream cut off, and he climbed back to his feet, quicksilver lashing out to drive back the men who had thought to attack him while he was down.
Raider proceeded toward the dais. Seth stormed toward him. Reaching Seth, Raider halted. His right eye was still blazing gold, burning out any emotion that Seth might find there. The left, of course, was arcane and without life, made by Kahzir. Forced on him by Kahzir, just like the quicksilver. Just like that fucking collar around his throat.
“Baby,” Seth pleaded. “Come back to me.”
Seth could read nothing in Raider’s expression, so he wasn’t prepared for the quicksilver that lashed out from Raider’s body. It caught him around the torso and flung him out of the way.
As Seth crashed to the ground, he dimly registered that Raider and done the same thing to Nasrin. Zarina, too, he had pushed aside—and he was stalking past them up the dais steps.
With a snarl, Kahzir hit the button on his arcane device again. Raider’s body arched horribly as the shock seized his limbs.
Then a cat-sized blue shape shimmered into sight beside Kahzir. Adavasti snatched the control from his hand and hurled it at the wall.
Raider had fallen down the steps, but released from the torture of the shock, he got up—and the homunculus grabbed him by the throat and threw him across the room.
Seth, on his feet, was racing toward the dais again. He vaulted the steps.
Kahzir began to dissolve in a cloud of blue smoke, but Seth tackled him before he lost all form. Kahzir’s body solidified as Seth tackled him, slamming him into the throne. Seth reached for his knife, but it wasn’t in his thigh sheath. He’d dropped it after cutting off the homunculus’s hand and had lost track of it.
But it would do him no good in any case, not with the Alchemist’s Stone around Kahzir’s neck. Seth snatched for it, thrusting his hand past Kahzir’s scrabbling hands. Heat pulsed at Seth as flames grew in Kahzir’s hands, but Seth ignored it. He grabbed hold of the Alchemist’s Stone and ripped it away from Kahzir. He yanked so hard that the Stone went flying out of his grasp, but he didn’t care about that right now.
Seth took Kahzir’s head in his hands. The dark eyes widened, all arrogance gone. Even the thin lips had lost their superior tilt. He knew what was coming—and, yes, it fucking was.
Seth wrenched Kahzir’s head in a twisting motion, snapping his neck. Still hot with rage, Seth hurled his limp body down the dais steps.
Seth spun to hunt for Raider and saw his quicksilver spear into the clay body of the homunculus. Raider slammed the creature to the ground. It shattered into a hundred pieces—which were already drawing together once more.
Nasrin, with Zarina huddled behind her, shouted, “How in Hasa’s hell do we get rid of that thing?”
Seth’s eyes darted around as he sought the Alchemist’s Stone—and he found it glowing bright in Adavasti’s spindly fingers. He had found it on the other side of the dais.
Seth’s heart leaped with terror at what the ifrit might do with that vast source of power.
“Adavasti!” came a boyish shout from the throne room doors. Julian. “Do it!”
The Stone flared bright in Adavasti’s thin fingers, blazing out. Then the light seeped from the Stone into the ifrit, who glowed like molten gold. His body hummed and shimmered, half losing its shape.
As the Alchemist’s Stone fell from his grip, it hit the floor of the dais as a sphere of dull lead.
Then Adavasti seemed to burst like an exploding star. Dozens of streams of light shot out from him. White. Blue. Gold. They wove through the air, twisting and brightening, almost seeming to laugh in pure joy and release.
Seth’s eyes went straight to Raider, who had two hands of clay around his neck—but the homunculus had stilled, nothing now but lifeless clay.
Raider broke free, shattering the clay hands. This time, the dust that rained to the ground stayed there.
Seth raced down the dais steps toward Raider, who had fallen to his hands and knees amid the last chaos of the fight as Prince Rahim and the other traitors fled, pursued by the Hammer.
Seth slammed to his knees before Raider. Raider’s quicksilver had retracted, leaving its usual wounds. Seth touched his bowed head cautiously, unsure how he would react. Then Raider’s head came up, his eyes terrified. As Seth tugged at him, Raider fell into him, shaking so hard that he couldn’t keep a grip on Seth, but Seth didn’t let him fall.
“It’s okay, baby. I’m right here.”
“Get this—” Raider gasped. “Get this thing off me. Please, Seth, get this off me!”
The collar. Gods .
“Okay, baby, let me see it.” Seth ran his hands over the collar but found no clasp or button.
“ Seth .”
“I’m trying, baby, we’ll get this thing off, just trust me, okay? Stay with me. Stay calm. Tell me that you trust me.”
“I trust you.”
Seth hunted in vain along the collar. “Julian!” he shouted. “Help!”
Julian came running across the bloodied floor of the throne room, leaping over bodies and fallen weapons.
“Isn’t there a control?” Julian asked.
“Smashed,” Seth answered, trying to keep calm so he could keep Raider calm. “Gods, help, please.”
“Adavasti!” Julian shouted then yelped when the ifrit popped into sight inches from his face, still glowing bright. “Get my exo-cranial—my magic hat!”
“Okay, Jewel-man!” Adavasti replied and vanished in a puff of smoke.
“Is he okay?” Nasrin asked, limping over to them, Zarina’s hand in hers.
“He just needs this thing off,” Seth said as he held Raider’s face against his shoulder and stroked his hair. Fuck, he was shaking so hard. “Stay back.”
Nasrin edged away with Zarina. Julian scooted back as well, giving them space.
“You with me, baby?” Seth murmured.
Raider’s head moved in a barely perceptible nod.
Adavasti popped into sight, startling Julian by smashing the bizarre contraption onto his head.
“Easy,” Seth warned as Julian scooted over.
Eyes wide, the young arcanist nodded. Carefully, he knelt beside Raider.
“Baby, Julian is going to get this thing off you, okay?” Seth stroked Raider’s head. “I need to know that you understand.”
Raider lifted his head, nodding. Kneeling, resting on his heels, he let Julian crowd into him. Julian rotated the magnifying lens in front of his eye and began examining the collar. The young arcanist was sweating, but his hands were steady. His touch was light.
Julian apparently found what he was looking for on the collar. Plucking a couple of tiny tools from his exo-cranial whatever, he set to work almost like he was picking a lock.
Raider closed his eyes. His hands were fisted at his sides, so Seth clamped his hands onto Raider’s thighs, making sure he felt that Seth was there.
The collar clicked open. When Julian removed it carefully, Raider shuddered. Then he flung himself into Seth’s arms and gasped, “I knew you’d be here.”
Seth hugged him back fiercely. “Always.”