Carnival of Secrets (21 page)

In a move uncharacteristic of curs, he struck Sol to injure, not to incapacitate, tearing small wounds in the bigger daimon’s chest and abdomen.
Death will end the energy.
Kaleb tried to force himself to remember why he should want Sol to die. If Sol stayed alive, the energy would keep filling Kaleb.

Sol slashed at him, and Kaleb let the blade graze his side so he could feel his body repair itself. He stayed perfectly still for a moment, staring at Sol and waiting for another pass of the sharp edges against his skin. His fur was matted with blood, but he wanted to feel that next infusion of strength.

The weakened, but not yet dying, daimon was speaking to him, but in this form Kaleb couldn’t understand anyone other than another cur. Sol bowed his head for a moment. His body was sluggish, and Kaleb knew it would take only one carefully aimed swipe of his claws to bring death to his rival.
Not yet.
He lunged forward, presenting his side as an obvious target, but Sol merely stared at him through glazed eyes.

Kaleb growled.

Sol spoke again, but this time he stumbled toward Kaleb. He bowed his head, hiding his throat, asking for mercy.

Kaleb backed away. He couldn’t make Sol raise his blade again, but he didn’t want him to die. With a snarl, he charged the circle, giving them both a shock. The energy rushed toward Kaleb, drawn from Sol again, and the combined pain of the shock and the loss of more of his strength and health made Sol fall facedown. Kaleb padded over to Sol and prodded the hand holding the blade. Sol didn’t react, so Kaleb nudged harder with his muzzle.

Then Sol’s lips formed a word, and the need to understand that word was urgent enough that Kaleb shed his animal form. Once he was no longer in his other shape, he understood words again. He stared at Sol.

“Forfeit,” Sol said. He repeated the word again and again, adding, “Mercy, cur.”

Kaleb straightened and stared down at Sol.
Cur?
Even now, Sol couldn’t give him the respect of a name.
If he stays alive, I can keep taking his energy.
Kaleb looked past the fallen fighter and saw Aya watching them. Her expression revealed nothing, but Kaleb saw her lips form the same word Sol had, “Mercy.”

Resisting the urge to bound to his feet from the surges of energy humming in his body, Kaleb stood slowly. He looked out over the mostly unmasked crowd and then settled his gaze on Aya. Watching her, he called to the assembled judges, “Break it. I’m done here. Sol forfeits. I accept. I want nothing else from him.”

There were gasps that he had accepted a forfeit, but Kaleb didn’t care. He shouldn’t have tortured Sol. All that mattered in that instant was getting away from the fight, the crowds, and the horror of what he’d done.

The circle dropped, Aya nodded, and the connection between him and Sol stopped as if it had been cut. The loss of that flood of strength made him falter as he stepped forward—and for that, he was grateful. If the crowd knew how not-injured he was, they would be suspicious. That he’d won this fight was surprising enough; winning without being exhausted or injured would be alarming. The blood covering his body hid the fact that the injuries he’d sustained in the fight were mostly healed.

The circle falling meant that the press of the crowd was upon them. Strangers touched him, their fingers coming away wet with the combined blood of the two fighters. Later, bits of cloth stained with that blood would be sold in the market. The twisted mementos were collected by the macabre and the zealous, and Kaleb wasn’t sure which group he found most unsettling.

“This way,” a spectator called, trying to summon him closer. Her hand was outstretched, fingers splayed, as she shoved herself through the swarm of bodies. “I’ll nurse your wounds, Kaleb.”

“No,
here
,” a Watcher called.

“I’ll match any offer,” a blue-masked daimon called. This one held out a marker with a sum that Kaleb would have once accepted, despite the sting to his pride and sickness in his soul that followed every time he’d been hungry enough to whore himself.

His emotions must have been obvious in his expression because the masked daimon added a second marker, thereby doubling the offer. Kaleb opened his mouth to negotiate, here in front of any and all watching. He was a cur, an animal of the lowest order, a daimon to be used by those who could pay for him. Even if he won, he’d still be that creature.
Why deny it?
If he were a better person, he’d have been revolted by stealing Sol’s energy. Instead, he had tortured the other daimon to prolong the theft. Instead, he was wondering if that connection was permanently severed. Aya might be terrible for creating it, but he was no less awful for enjoying it.

“What terms?” Kaleb asked the woman.

“No,” Zevi murmured. The younger cur had forced his way through the overly energetic crowd and was now directly beside Kaleb.

“We could live on that for months,” Kaleb replied just as quietly.

“So you fought and killed to be an expensive fuck?”

Kaleb’s gaze snapped to Zevi.

“Don’t let guilt change you.” Zevi shoved an eager spectator away from them with a snarl and audible snap of teeth. “You let him live. Even though you were transformed, you stopped. You gave mercy.”

The daimon with the markers had pushed to the front of the crowd. “One night. Only me . . . you can bring your . . .
him
if you want.” She pointed at Zevi. “I’ll pay extra.”

Zevi turned his back to her, to all of them. “We leave here now. You set these rules, Kaleb. Don’t do this.”

After a brief pause, Kaleb told the woman, “No.” Then he let Zevi lead him away. “I didn’t want to stop. It wasn’t kindness that made me, but wanting that ener—”

“I know,” Zevi interrupted, “but the only people who do know are you, me, and
her
.”

At that, Kaleb’s gaze again sought out Aya where she stood in the crowd watching him. He shuddered. There were good reasons that witches weren’t allowed to roam freely in The City. For the sort of exhilaration he’d just felt, there were a lot of depths Kaleb would sink to. In his seventeen years, he’d done more than a few things that he’d rather forget, but he did them to survive or to protect Zevi. He’d maimed; he’d killed; and he’d allowed things to be done to his body that made him retch afterward. Never once had he had given in to cruelty for sheer pleasure.

Until today.

Until Aya.

A
FTER
Z
EVI LED
K
ALEB
away, Aya watched with the rest of the spectators as Sol was gathered by his family’s servants. Unlike the curs who entered the competition, ruling-class daimons had the ability to resume their lives if they forfeited. If she weren’t carrying the secret she had and if she weren’t female, she could do that too. The daimons who filled The City didn’t know she was as trapped as the curs were, but she did.

She didn’t have the comfort of being in either group. Her class made her separate from the curs; her independence made her barely tolerated by those of her class. She was neither at the top or bottom, and she was definitely not welcome in the trades class.

As Sol passed her, he had his eyes downcast, but she knew that his humility would fade as his bruises did. As a result of today’s fight, he would either be extra harsh to curs, or he’d learn from it. Only time would tell.

All things considered, the fight had turned out well. The worst that had happened was that Kaleb saw a part of himself that he disliked—and blamed her.

“Haage hired the cur to kill Marchosias’ child,” a Watcher whispered.

Aya turned her head, but the woman was already leaving. She walked toward three black-masked daimons who stood silent and waiting. As the Watcher reached their side, they turned.

The last one nodded at Aya as her gaze fell on them.

The missing child was the daughter of a Watcher. Aya knew that much, but no one had been able to find the girl. Until Marchosias’ announcement, the girl had been assumed dead by many daimons, but the last news that Aya had learned—news that was never made public—was that the girl had been spirited away by witches. Most daimons had no ties to the Witches’ Council, and although Aya did, she had no further information. Evelyn had been decidedly closemouthed when Aya had asked. They protected their own, and even though Aya was technically one of them, she was just as much daimon as she was witch.

More perhaps.

She looked toward the teeming masses in the carnival and saw what she assumed to be one of the same black-masked daimons staring at her. He—
or she
—nodded again and then beckoned her forward with a slight head tilt.

“Right,” she muttered. “Follow the masked assassin. Great idea.”

The unpleasant reality was that although the black-masks weren’t precisely organized, they
were
often influenced by Haage. As brother to The City’s ruler and as one of the most successful assassins, he inspired—or otherwise enforced—a lot of allegiance. As much as she had qualms about Marchosias as an individual, she respected the hell out of him as a ruler. Haage, on the other hand, made Marchosias seem positively forward thinking. He had tried and failed at various attacks on The City’s ruler; he exploited scabs, curs, and trades-class daimons. The only caste he wouldn’t strike outright was the ruling class, but that would pass in time too. For now, he stuck to killing off any witches bound to them. Witches’ heads were found skewered on pikes at the edge of The City. Their bodies, presumably, were discarded in the Untamed Lands or simply destroyed. Within The City, many moves toward civility were done at Marchosias’ behest, just as the most barbarous of acts were credited to Haage. Aya knew enough to suspect both daimons of barbarism and deceit, but she also knew that The City would become a deadlier place if Haage gained power—and that the witches who remained in The City would all be killed.

There weren’t too many daimons she’d rather not cross outright. Her rank and her hidden skills meant that if she couldn’t avoid trouble, she could resolve it permanently. Haage, however, was a daimon whose attention she’d like to avoid. She wasn’t fighter enough to take him on directly, and she couldn’t kill him with witchery without exposing herself. If these assassins were in his employ, she was in trouble. Actually, if they weren’t in his employ, she was in trouble too. Going with them could mean crossing Haage or inadvertently working with him. Neither was the sort of action that led to longevity.

Nice of you to warn me of your brethren’s interest, Kaleb.

As stealthily as she could, she followed the assassin through the carnival—or maybe she followed several different assassins. She kept losing sight of the nondescript black masks he or they wore, only to see a subtle gesture beckoning her forward.

Aya followed the black-masked daimon through a circuitous route around the carnival. Each time she lost sight of the daimon, she paused to inspect vendors’ wares, lingered in front of market stalls examining cloth and fruits, and idled to watch dancers. Each time, she was led farther until she’d left the carnival behind and found herself trailing her unknown guide through the thick of The City. The streets were filled with all classes of daimons, who gathered to talk or made their way to their homes, jobs, or recreations.

She kept watching for a doorway that she was to enter, but her guide continued on until they stood at the far edge of The City. Strange gnarled trees shredded the ruins of buildings that had been abandoned by daimons who had moved farther from or into The City. Animals roamed in undergrowth; their cries made their presences known even though she couldn’t see them. Scores of Marchosias’ best fighters patrolled the perimeter, hidden among those same verdant plants and trees.

The assassin, thankfully, didn’t lead her into the Untamed Lands. She—and now that they were side by side, Aya could tell that this assassin was female—stood silent. Before them was the massive expanse of the wilds that pushed in toward The City. Behind them was the overcrowded, class-divided morass of The City. Even though she couldn’t see it, Aya knew the Carnival of Souls pulsed in the center—a swirl of masked pleasure and violence. Outside The City was something unordered. There, class lines were not observed. Food was what one killed or stole. The City was rife with corruption, but it had order that the Untamed Lands lacked.

“Haage would have all of our world like that.” The black-masked daimon stared into the Untamed Lands. “You’ve been out there. Is that what you think best?”

Aya wasn’t about to start talking about her trips into the Untamed Lands. That wasn’t anyone’s business but her own. The scars she’d earned there were the only ones she’d had removed. If what she could do out there became known, it would be the same as announcing that she was a witch stronger than any allowed to live within The City.

And I’d be dead by the next morning.

There was no way to convey her desire to help The City without Marchosias feeling like she was power hungry. Power-hungry witches died. Strong witches died.