Black Magic (24 page)

"I'm so sorry you were forced to endure what you didn't want, necromancer," Sorin said bitterly. "Rest assured it won't happen again. I don't consort with demons or their necromancers." He grabbed Koray by the front of his robes and threw him outside. "Arrest him, for falling under the sway of a demon. You three, we have a demon to attend."

"No!" Koray screamed. "Goddess damn you, Sorin, listen to me. If you won't listen to me, listen to Her! Don't kill Brekk!" He tried to go after Sorin, but three paladins held him fast, only looking somewhat ashamed and reluctant as they fastened heavy manacles to his wrists behind his back.

Tears stung Koray's eyes. Why had he been stupid enough think a damned paladin would ever listen to him? That Sorin had meant anything he had said and done.

Shouts came from inside and there was a flash of brilliant purple-silver light. Brekk appeared in the doorway, then surged out of it. He snarled, eyes glowing purple as he attacked the paladins holding Koray. When Koray was free, Brekk scooped him up and launched into the air. Koray screamed.

"Calm down!" Brekk growled. "I'll drop you if you keep moving around like that and it won't be a pleasant landing. I've got you, just hold still."

Koray closed his eyes, but opened them again because that was much worse. "I think I hate this more than horses."

Brekk gave a ragged laugh. "I just want to get us far enough away they'll have a hard time finding us. Though what we are going to do from there, I don’t know." He started to say something more, but stopped and fell silent.

Silence was more than fine by Koray, even if it left him remembering all over again the horrible fight with Sorin. The look on his face, his cold words, the way he had ordered Koray arrested. He had known whatever they had would never last, but he had dared to believe it would not end so horribly. Sorin had ordered him arrested. Men he had started to believe might be on his side—had thought finally realized Koray was on their side—had put him in manacles.

Nothing had changed at all, and worse, he had been foolish enough to believe everything had changed to the point he'd left most of his few true belongings back at the castle. Koray forced back tears because he would be damned if he let that bastard reduce him to so low a point.

He never should have let his guard down, and he certainly would not be that stupid again.

When they landed, Koray jolted, clinging tightly, terrified of falling. "We're safe," Brekk said and set him down, slowly pulling Koray's hands from his shoulders. "We're on the ground again, Koray."

Koray pulled his hands into the folds of his robes and somehow, remembering the robes had been given to him by Sorin was just the one last little thing he could not take. He sank down to his knees and buried his face in his hands, struggling to get ahold of himself but unable to shake the memory of the recent fight.

It was over. Whatever fragile thing he had thought was there had been destroyed, if it had been there at all. Sorin, in the end, still thought him little better than a demon. Had arrested him, probably had planned to sentence him to execution, without ever giving him a chance to explain.

A hand felt on his shoulder, squeezed gently. "I'm sorry about your lover," Brekk said softly. "I wish you had not come to help me if it cost you so much." He sighed. "I wish Emel was here."

"I don't," Koray said bitterly. "Sorin would have had him arrested too and that would have hurt everyone in the castle. What happens to me makes no difference to anyone. Having to arrest his own second would have devastated everyone. Maybe when Emel gets back he can do something to get Sorin to listen."

But he couldn't believe his own words, he just couldn't, not when even saying Sorin's name made him want to scream and rage and cry. He'd been a fool, lesson learned. It would all be so much easier to bear if his head did not ache so fiercely, if he did not feel compelled to go back. But he wouldn't. Going back felt too much like begging, and Koray would rather die than beg Sorin for anything.

Drawing a deep breath, Koray let it out slowly before finally standing. "So what do we do now? We cannot go anywhere near the royal castle, even though that is where you—we—need to be. There's something there you need to see. If only that bloody moron had listened to me."

Brekk gave a snort. "I have not been free for long, necromancer, but I've been around long enough to know when a man is lost in a jealous rage. If I had walked into a room to see Emel standing close to another man, and that man half-naked and the enemy, I would have handled the situation even worse. It's not a flattering trait, and certainly not an excusable one, but I think perhaps it is understandable?"

"I think it just made clear that it was stupid to think—" Koray bit the words off. "It doesn't matter. Right now, we need to be safe, and we need to find a way to get it through to their stupid heads that you are good and the fifth person we are missing."

"We need Emel," Brekk said. "The two of you together …"

Koray shook his head. "Emel, maybe. Neikirk, definitely. He has understood all of this better than the rest of us from the start. He can make Sorin and the others see. But Neikirk and Emel have gone to Navath. They will not be back for weeks, more likely months. If we see them before spring I will be surprised."

"We're not waiting for spring," Brekk replied. "If they are headed to Navath, then that is where we will go. We're going to fly, though. It's the fastest way to travel, and the safest since it means we can travel at night. You'll have to get us supplies at some point though, necromancer."

"Fine," Koray said tersely. "Are you feeling any different?"

Brekk blinked. "Yes, actually. I still feel drained, but it's not the desperate, raging ache from before. I don't feel that at all except as a very distant memory."

A smidgen of Koray's tension eased. At least not everything that night had been a waste. "You just need rest and you'll feel better than ever."

Or, he thought miserably, Brekk just needed to curl up with a paladin and share energies, let cold and hot combine until both were warm. He balled his trembling hands into fists, blinked his eyes until the sting went away, and ruthlessly buried all memories of waking up lying next to Sorin.

Those moments were gone forever, and they had probably never been real. Pulling up the hood of his cloak, Koray returned to the necromancer he had been before he foolishly let a stubborn, clumsy-mouthed, beautiful high paladin make him think he could be anything else.

Brekk swept him up again, and Koray held fast as they flew off deeper into the night.

The fire had gone out at some point, but Sorin did not bother to relight it. He had endured far worse temperatures while out hunting demons, or as a child when he had slept in the great hall with so many other children and servants.

His stomach churned as he thought of just how thoroughly one moment had ruined his life.

Every time he closed his eyes, all he saw was Koray in that demon's arms. He had never been a man inclined toward jealousy—or so he always prided himself—but apparently jealousy enough for a lifetime had been waiting to hit him in one damning blow.

Sorin scrubbed at his eyes with one hand and tried to think like a high paladin rather than a scorned lover. Because he wasn't a scorned lover, just a jealous fool sulking in a dark, cold room.

Whatever was going on with Koray and the demon, he would never know, and he had no one else to blame. Why had that idiot snuck off to see a demon? Why had Koray been touching him so? Jealousy rose up again, laced with bitterness and hurt. He should have listened to his own doubts about whether or not Koray really wanted any such thing to do with him.

Why would Koray be so easy around a demon and not around him? Sorin knew he excelled at saying the wrong thing at the worst possible moment, but was he really so much worse than a demon.

Koray's words played over and over again in his head.

"I'm trying to help him. I'm trying to help all of us!"

"What happens when I'm no longer needed?"

"You beat us and throw us out and knock us down hills without ever listening."

"You never listen to anyone. You just assume that what you want lines up with everyone else, that you could never be wrong."

The dinner he had choked down threatened to rise, but Sorin forced his stomach to settle with deep slow breaths.

With a sudden burst of rage, he threw his hand toward the fire, balled it into a fist, and the dead logs burst into brilliant flame. Sorin glowered for a moment then turned away with a rough sound. But everywhere he looked he saw Koray: his book, his robes, his jar of incense. He had even left his precious staff. Sorin was relieved he had at least taken his sword.

Thoughts of swords drew his eyes back to the table and the bundle still wrapped in cloth that lay upon it—the missing sword of the Lost Paladin. His men had found it inside the demon's cabin and given it to him with everything else that the demon and Koray had left behind.

How had the demon come to possess it? Sorin had seen it fly off still buried in the chest of a white demon. The only possible way the demon could have gotten it was by chasing down the white demon and taking it … but to what purpose?

The pulsing presence of the Goddess burned in his chest, made him wince and clutch at it. He had messed up, badly. But Sorin had no faith in his abilities to fix it. There was no taking back or repairing what he had said. All the regrets and apologies in the world did not make up for such terrible words and actions.

Whatever he did, whatever he managed to set to rights, it would not regain him Koray. Sighing and scrubbing at his face, Sorin finally dragged himself to his feet and went to the door. He started to bellow for a servant when he saw that a guard was stationed outside his door. "What are you doing there?"

"Um," the knight said. "The high priest said to make certain you did not do anything stupid."

Sorin sighed. "Order me a bath."

"Yes, High Paladin," the knight said and ran off.

Closing the door again, Sorin stripped off his clothes, grateful that someone had already helped him with the armor. He pulled on a dressing robe and waited by the fire until servants arrived with a bathing tub and bucket after bucket of hot water.

His stomach growled as a plate of food was brought in as well, though he hadn't thought dinner had been so long ago. When the room finally emptied again, Sorin stripped out of his clothes and climbed into the tub, scrubbing down ruthlessly. Usually a bath made him feel better, but all the soap and water in the keep could not wash away the ashen taste of his destructive words. No matter what he did, his room—his bed—would always lack what he most wanted. Sighing, Sorin pulled on fresh clothes and settled at the table to eat.

He looked up when the door opened again, not really surprised to see Cerant. "Greetings."

"I was going to ask if you are all right, but you look about two steps away from throwing yourself out a window."

Sorin made a face. "If I thought it would help, I might. Angelos tried to tell me a thousand times that one day I would say something unforgivable. I should have listened to him."

Cerant regarded him with sympathy, but mercifully without pity. "You don't know for certain you can't fix it, Sorin. Not until you find Koray and speak with him."

"I never had him," Sorin said quietly. "You cannot get back what you never had in the first place."

"Do you know how long Neikirk and I have been lovers? Not even a day when that paladin found me to recall me home. Nine years we lived together, worked together, became the best of friends—and in all those years I wasted the chance to being something more because of the things I did not say. Still he stood by me and gave me a chance to say them. Do not be me. If your necromancers means so much to you then find him. Speak to him. I've only been here a couple of days and there was no mistaking the bond growing between you. Do not give up yet."

Sorin shook his head. "I don't think he ever really wanted me. I think he felt he had no choice and was making the best." It hurt to think that Koray had felt that way, that all Sorin had felt was not echoed, only endured. How was it fair to be so … besotted, he conceded … with someone who felt nothing in return? He could remember exactly how Koray tasted, how he smelled, how he felt … and the whole time Koray had just …

Had he really made Koray feel as though he had no choice in the matter? The very idea made Sorin sick, made him hate himself. It was not his way to force anyone, and yet that was how Koray had felt the entire time. "I am not certain I merit the position of High Paladin and I wonder now if I ever did."

"Now you're just feeling sorry for yourself," Cerant said sharply. "Stop wallowing in pity and be High Paladin, Sorin. You messed up—badly. Try your damnedest to fix it instead of giving up. The Sorin I grew up with would never have given up so easily. Do not quit now just because the mistake is so much greater. You are not the only one affected by your behavior. The kingdom needs Koray back—and that demon who was with him if I am hearing the Goddess' whispers correctly. So stop being a child and be High Paladin. Go after him. Make amends. Fight for him. If you just give up now, then there will come a day you throw yourself out the window and a chance to save the kingdom once and for all will die with you."

Sorin said nothing, but his knuckles turned white where he gripped his cup. Knowing he had failed and lost everything did not hurt nearly as much as the hope Cerant had planted. Or the reminder that so many people depended on him and that his jealous rage had hurt more than him.

But it was a reminder he needed. The hope, though …

"I don't know where to begin to look for them," he said quietly.

"Lucky for you, the Goddess wants everything set to rights as much, if not more, than you," Cerant said. "That is part of the reason I came to see you—you owe me mightily for the headache I am currently enduring. I lost my dinner it hurt so much. I suppose I'd best get used to it though, hmm?"

Sorin wanted to throw his cup across the room just to release the coiled tension. "Tell me," he bit out.