Oracle (6 page)

    
“So, you
have no say in any of this? No choices?” Kat asked. She couldn’t imagine having
the entire course of her life dictated by the whims of some so-called spirits.

    
“We want
no choices,”
Nika
said. “It is a great honor to be
chosen and to then dedicate our lives to proving our worth. This is the only
way we fulfill our destiny and attain oneness.”

        
“Do
any of these chosen ever fail to prove their worth?”

       
Nika’s
smile faded. “It happens from time to time. If a
soul has strayed too far from its intended path.” She flicked a glance at
Manny, who was intently staring at the wall. “It’s not something we like to
talk about.”

       
“I
know something
I’d
like to talk about,” Ethan interjected. “Do you
people bathe here?”

      
“Ethan.” Kat was truly socked by his rudeness. Usually he turned on the
charm when in the presence of an attractive woman.

    
“What?”
Ethan asked. “Do you see this shirt?” He lifted his arm to show off the dark
stains. “This shirt is made from silk imported from a country whose name I
can’t even pronounce and now it’s ruined.” He dropped his arms to his sides.
“If I must wear ruined clothes, then I would at least like to be clean in
them.”

   
 
Kat glared at him. “You’ll have to excuse,
Ethan. He’s pretty to look at, but beyond that he doesn’t have much going for
him.”

    
Ethan
sniffed. “I’m certain I could think of a rejoinder which would make your
pitiful attempt at an insult all the more sad, if only I weren’t so filthy.” He
gave
Nika
an imploring look. “Surely a lovely lady
such as yourself bathes.”

    
“I have a
wooden tub,”
Nika
said. “I’d be happy to bring you
some goat milk for a bath.”

    
“I’m
sorry, I must have sand in my ears,” Ethan said. “I thought you said goat
milk.”

    
For the
first time since they started out on this journey, something close to a smile
touched Jesse’s lips. “Oh you heard her fine. Water can sometimes be scarce in
Kartesk
so they don’t use it for something like bathing.
Goat milk is more abundant and it comes out warm, so you don’t even have to
heat it.”

    
“Oh. Oh
dear.” Ethan fanned himself with his hand. “Oh good God Above,
goat milk?
Someone tell me this is a jest.”

    
Jesse
shrugged. “It’s that or stay dirty.”

    
The
expression on Ethan’s face was so hilarious Kat had to press the back of her
hand to her lips to suppress a laugh.

    
“It’s
quite pleasant,”
Nika
said. “And I can find you more
clothes, if you like.”

    
Ethan
sighed. “Nothing made of silk, I don’t suppose.”

    
“No. But
they will be clean and comfortable.”

    
“Well,
then I suppose in a place like this it’s all a man can hope for.”

    
“I
believe this is Ethan’s way of saying thank you,” Jesse said.

    
Nika
nodded. “Let me go and see about the milk. Please,
make yourselves at home. If you’re hungry, feel free to eat. Jesse, I assume
you remember where everything is?”

    
“I
remember,” he said.

    
Kat watched
her leave, feeling again an irrational spark of jealousy. “She’s pretty. Does
she know about your preference for whores, or has she yet to see that aspect of
your personality?”

    
Jesse
gave her a flat look. “She’s my sister.”

    
“Your...
what?” Kat stared at him. “Your
sister
? So her parents were the ones who
adopted you?” It was only recently she’d discovered even this much about him.
For a man she had been desperately in love with, there wasn’t much she
did
know about him.

    
He shook
his head. “It’s complicated. You wouldn’t understand.”

    
“Why
don’t you try me?” Kat wasn’t sure why she was pressing. One of the luxuries of
having broken up with him was she no longer had to care about the past he’d
kept so carefully hidden from her. She no longer had to try so hard to bring
down his walls, or to fight the same old argument again. And yet, she still
wished he would talk to her.

    
“I don’t
want to talk about it.” Jesse knelt in front of the trunk and lifted the lid.

    
Kat
gritted her teeth and, not for the first time, wondered if a good
thunk
in the back of the head with her staff might do him
some good. “Fine. Whatever. What are you looking for?”

    
“Something to eat.” Jesse took a cloth wrapped bundle from the trunk and
stood. “Want some?” He opened the bundle to reveal about a dozen strips of dry,
dull colored meat.

    
It wasn’t
the best looking food Kat had ever seen, but she’d eaten worse. She took two
strips and found the taste to be good, if unfamiliar.

   
 
“What about you?” Jesse offered the meat to
Ethan.

    
He eyed
it warily. “What sort of animal was that before someone killed it and cooked it
dry?”
 

    
“I don’t
know, but it’s edible.”

    
“That’s a
matter of opinion.” He pulled a handkerchief out from inside his pocket and
sighed as dirt crumbled to the floor. “If I had known the sort of barbarous
conditions under which I was going to be expected to live I might have thought
harder about refusing Kat’s offer to join her on this particular job.”

 
   
“If only I could have been so lucky,” Jesse
muttered as he went to sit beside Manny. He held the meat toward the wildling
without looking at him. Manny took a piece without saying a word.

    
Kat
rubbed the back of her neck. She wished Ethan
had
said no and Cole had
said yes. Not only would he have been better company, but it would be nice to a
have a friend around who she could trust to watch her back. Jesse had his own
stuff going on in his head. He was distracted. Manny was more likely to look to
him if they found themselves in trouble, no matter how angry he might be. And
forget trusting Ethan. He was as apt to stab her in the back as was an enemy if
there was any profit in it for him.
 

    
“
Starstones
,” she whispered under her breath. “Lots of
starstones
.” Maybe if she kept reminding herself of the
fortune awaiting her at the end of this job it wouldn’t seem like such a
mistake to be there.

    
Sometimes
she thought she should call this entire thing off, but she never came close to
saying the words. After this job was over, she could retire to a mansion on the
coast. No more living under her father’s shadow. No more dealing with Jesse. No
more nights sleeping out in the damp and the cold praying she didn’t end up
with dysentery.

    
What she
had waiting for her was more than a fortune in
starstones
.
It was a chance at a life away from the drudging, bloody work of a mercenary
into which she had been born and raised. A civilized life which might even
include a real home with a family of her own.

 
   
Freedom. This was the one thing she wanted
more than anything else. Freedom to do and live as she pleased. The kind of
freedom which cost a lot to buy. Her future was what she was really stealing
here in the Wild Lands. Not some tablet from some temple, but a chance at a
fresh start. Whatever she had to live through until then, whatever she had to
sacrifice, it was worth it. Even if it was something which wasn’t really hers
to sacrifice in the first place.

CHAPTER
EIGHT

    
Cole
raised the blade from the water and laid it out on the table. He wiped the
sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. Forge work was hot and
tiresome, but he found a certain peace in helping to mold and shape bladed
weapons he didn’t feel at any other activities in his life.

    
Apprentices moved about, doing the menial work neither he nor Sean had
the time for. A crowd had gathered to watch, as much to stare at the brothers
as anything else. The stares were something Cole had grown used to in the years
since he and Sean came to live in Marigold. Their height alone would have
marked them out in a land where anyone who stood over six feet was an oddity,
but combine that with the coal black color of their skin and they turned heads
wherever they went.

    
Peaceful
as the routine was, Cole soon found his thoughts wandering, as they often did,
to Kat. He could still see the look in her eyes when he’d turned down her offer
of joining in on her latest job. A dangerous job, it sounded like, and he would
have liked to be there to have her back. But he was needed here and he couldn’t
step out on his brother, even for Kat.

    
Cole
called an apprentice over to take the blade, and then stepped out behind the
forge, where a little bench sat beneath a shade tree. It was a fine place to
take a rest until his thoughts were more firmly on his current task. A man who
couldn’t concentrate on what he was doing in a forge was a man who would soon
find himself in serious trouble.

    
Sitting
on the bench, he drew himself a cup of water from the nearby barrel. The last
time he’d sat there with Kat she’d been in good spirits despite a long stretch
in the Dells. Now she was off in the Wild Lands, which he doubted would suite
her any better. Off with Jesse. Cole had no doubt she was still in love with
the man and only wished, for her sake, Jesse felt the same. It seemed to him
the man didn’t even know the meaning of the concept.

    
Maybe it
was foolish of him to worry over her heart when her life was at stake, but he
couldn’t help himself. Going up against a Magus was insanity and it wouldn’t
help if she was too busy worrying over Jesse to take care of herself. They had
no magic on their side and though Ethan was a dead shot, he wasn’t sure it
would be enough. He was worried and try as he might he couldn’t put the idea
that Kat might not come back this time out of his mind.

    
Sometimes, as now, he would find himself regretting not going with her.
Sometimes he even thought of jumping on a horse and racing after her. But of
course to do so would be foolish. He could never hope to catch up before they
reached the temple. He wouldn’t even know the way.

    
Besides,
his brother would never forgive him. Sean needed him, not only at the forge,
but in case they were called upon for the rebellion which had been brewing over
the past two years. Cole almost wished something
would
happen soon. At
least it would take his mind off Kat. But they were waiting to see who won the
crown, per the orders of Duke Victor
Lassard
. Sean
might consider himself the rebellion’s leader, but he still took his orders
from the Duke.

    
As if
Cole didn’t have enough on his mind worrying over Kat, he also had to worry
over what Sean might do if the Duke chose to put an end to the rebel movement
he had started. He might do it too, if Lord Charles took the crown. With Duke
Victor backing the man it hardly seemed reasonable he would want him
overthrown.

    
Sean
wasn’t loud about it so most people didn’t know, but he was highly ambitious.
Always had been. He had no desire to spend the rest of his life in the forge,
oh no. He wanted to
be
somebody. Somebody important. His part in the
rebellion thus far had given him a taste of that and it wasn’t something he
would easily turn loose of if the Duke chose to back out on them.

    
It was a
lot for one man to have hanging over his head all at once and not a thing he
could do about any of it. The people he loved most were in danger and he
couldn’t aid them. It left him with a feeling of helplessness, of being pulled
along by events rather than affecting them, as he was sadly accustomed to.

    
It had
been this way for so long as he could remember. Constantly pulled along in his
brother’s wake, he had often found himself with no control even over his own
life. And despite having become a mercenary in order to separate himself from
his brother, he had never really found that control. Probably never would so
long as Sean was alive.

    
Sean had
ever been the center of his own universe. Ever the sort to do whatever best
suited him without the ability to understand his actions had an effect on
others. Marrying Lauren and fathering the twins hadn’t changed him, as Kat
hadn’t been able to change Jesse. They were much alike, these two men who had never
gotten along and who on the surface had nothing in common. Both were too caught
up in themselves to really see those around them.

    
Such men
were bound to self destruct eventually. He’d always known it would be this way for
Sean. Jesse too, if he continued on the way he was. The only question was
whether they would take down the people who loved them when they did.

CHAPTER
NINE

    
Brandon
trailed after the rest of the group, idly flipping a dagger into the air and
catching it as he walked. He found he was not enjoying the trek through these
strange and gloomy woods as much as he thought he would. It was boring. He
missed his mare, Blue Bell, who had been left behind at the Death Dealer
temple. And he missed Jesse. A man he genuinely liked even if the feeling
wasn’t mutual. He was beginning to wish he’d stepped out of this not-so-grand
adventure when he’d had the chance.
       

    
When
those creatures first appeared he’d hoped they were in for a fight, but no, the
critters simply turned tail and ran off without a fuss. And nothing interesting
had happened since. Everyone else was so tense, as if they were expecting an
attack at any moment. If only. He wished
something
would happen.
Anything. If not something violent, then at least something interesting.

    
A shriek
cut through the silence, followed closely by the appearance of an incredibly
large bird with blazing red feathers. It came swooping down at them from
practically nowhere, sending most of the group scattering off the trail.