Sacrifice (28 page)

Kai Sen cursed under his breath and retreated, making sure that Skybright appeared all right. She was rising to her feet, unhurt but shaken. Another rock flew at his head, and he dodged again in time, beginning to call on wood magic. Wood was the element that controlled the air, the winds, and he drew these strands to himself, feeling light on his feet, as if boosted by a zephyr itself. When the next large stone sped toward him, it hit the wall of air he had woven, and Kai Sen then flung it away from himself at Stone. Stone’s figure shimmered. He twisted out of the way but was lifted off his feet, swept helplessly backward by the powerful gale until he was plunged into the creek with a loud
splash
.

Kai Sen felt smug despite his weariness. Stone did not seem so invincible now, and he was more than happy to take advantage of it. “Skybright!” He threw out his hand. “Run! I’ll hold him for as long as I can.”

Inexplicably, Skybright didn’t move.

Kai Sen summoned another orb of hellfire over his head, this one the size of a large gourd. The moon was slender this evening and dim. “Sky, it’s me,” he said, his voice hoarse.

“Kai,” she whispered, her eyes wide and dark in her pale face. Skybright stared at him with something bordering on horror. As if he were a ghost or a stranger. He didn’t know which was worse. Then, her gaze wrenched away to the bedraggled figure climbing out of the creek. She took a step toward Stone.
She must be under his spell
, Kai Sen thought,
enchanted somehow.

Panicked, Kai Sen grabbed onto strands of water magic. His ability in this element was weaker, and he’d had little practice. Still, he was able to create a small waist-high wave that knocked Stone back into the flowing water. He disappeared for a long moment, then emerged above the creek’s surface, sputtering.

“Please, Sky!” Kai Sen tried again, hoping to snap her out of whatever spell Stone held over her. “Run!” He gathered the last of his strength, for he was exhausted, and the water began to rise again around Stone as he struggled to keep his head above water.

“No!” Skybright said. “Stop!”

He was stunned.

But Kai Sen didn’t listen. He used the last of his reserves to yank harder on the strands of water magic until the black water undulated, rising like a sea serpent, engulfing Stone beneath.

Skybright

Skybright had left the Bei manor with reluctance, unable to shake a sense of foreboding. She felt as if she were abandoning Zhen Ni, although she knew there was nothing they could do for her right now. Still, she whispered a mantra of protection under her breath and wished it upon the wind, that it’d carry to her friend.

She and Stone took the same path through the forest that they had earlier on their way to the monastery. It provided cover, and they were both more comfortable among the trees. They were discussing their alternatives on how they might infiltrate Bei manor when they broke through the forest and emerged near the creek. She lifted her chin, as she thought she caught whiff of a familiar scent. But when she concentrated, all she could smell was the burned demon they had killed earlier, its corpse still flickering with embers in the distance, the pungent odor turning her stomach. Her head throbbed where she had slammed it earlier, and she was having trouble concentrating. In truth, she wanted to shift into her serpent form and rid herself of these mortal inconveniences, the hunger and the aches. But could it ease the anxiety she felt? Her sorrow and fear?

They were midstride, Stone’s travel lantern casting a small aura around them, when the burned corpse’s red embers extinguished at once, as if doused by water. Stone stiffened beside her, and she stopped as well. There was a dark figure standing behind the dead demon that she hadn’t noticed before, and all her serpentine senses leaped toward it.

Another demon? She latched on to the figure’s scent—a scent that had been so familiar to her in the past.

It couldn’t be
.

In the next instant, a gigantic blue ball of fire flew toward them at breakneck speed, and before she could react, Stone had shoved her away from him. Taken by complete surprise, she fell to the dirt, crying out when her shoulder hit hard against the ground. The blazing blue fire enveloped Stone, but he stood in the center of it, seemingly unhurt. It crackled, shooting blue sparks outward. One lashed her bare shin, where her skirt had rumpled up, burning her so painfully that she screamed, rolling away from Stone.

“Sky!” Even through her haze of pain, she knew that voice.

“Keep back!” Stone said, although it was too bright to see his features. “It’ll burn out. It can’t hurt me.”

Tears obscured her vision as she crawled away from Stone, her breathing coming in short gasps, before she struggled to her feet. The strange blue fire was so incandescent she could barely make out the outline of Stone’s figure within it. Her shin throbbed, each twinge reverberating through her entire body like some strange poison, and she wondered if she were dying. Kai Sen was attacking Stone but did he mean to hurt her too? Had Abbot Wu finally convinced him to finish the job?

A gust of wind swept past her, and the blazing brightness of the blue fire disappeared. Where was Stone?

“Skybright,” Kai Sen shouted again. “Run! I’ll hold him for as long as I can.”

Confused and reeling from pain, she turned to him. She felt her pulse in her throat, could hear her heartbeat pounding in her ears. “Kai,” she whispered. She didn’t know what to think, what to feel, what to believe.

The young man she had made love to, whom she had found so familiar, had changed. This Kai Sen appeared taller, broader, and his shoulder-length hair had been cut short, cropped close to his ears. The most unrecognizable part was his face, leaner now, so his jawline and cheekbones were more defined. Any remnant of boyishness had disappeared entirely since the last time she had seen him at hell’s breach. His eyes were haunted. Dried blood was smeared across one cheek and over his chin like he had been feasting on raw meat. But even as the gruesome thought crossed her mind, a droplet of blood fell from Kai Sen’s nose; he didn’t seem to notice.

Could she trust Kai Sen? Skybright didn’t know. Loud splashing drew her attention to the rushing creek, where Stone was struggling to climb out of the water. She felt an overwhelming sense of relief to see that he was all right. She took a step toward Stone.

“Please, Sky!” Kai Sen shouted behind her. “Run!”

The dark waters in the creek began to swirl like a whirlpool, gathering behind Stone, when a wave struck him straight on, thrusting him back into the creek. He disappeared underneath, then popped to the surface a long moment later, sputtering. Skybright knew from playing in this same creek that it ran deep at its center, and as she watched Stone’s upturned face, she suddenly understood that he didn’t know how to swim.

When he was more powerful, he didn’t need to know, and if he had known as a young man, he’d certainly forgotten how a few thousand years later. The dark waters began to rise again around Stone, like magic.

Magic
.

“No!” she shouted. “Stop!”

She whipped toward Kai Sen, who stood with fists clenched, staring at the turbulent waters with glazed eyes. The wall of water continued to rise, before slamming down on Stone, swallowing him into its depths. She shifted. The excruciating pain quieted to a twinge in her serpentine body, and Skybright dove headfirst into the creek. She had never learned to swim as a girl but instinctively could in her serpent form. The currents churned, roused by Kai Sen’s magic.

Despite her heightened vision, she could see nothing in the black waters. Instead, she used her serpentine senses to locate Stone, who was struggling beneath the surface, in a deep chasm where his feet couldn’t touch the riverbed. She lunged for him, wrapping her arms around his torso, and hauled him upward, using her powerful serpent coil to propel them. He stiffened in fear for a moment, then realizing it was her, relaxed and let himself be dragged to the surface. He would have been much too heavy for her had she been in mortal form, but as half serpent with her demonic strength, she easily pulled him on to the muddy bank.

He crouched on his hands and knees, coughing violently, looking as pathetic as a sodden dog. She let him be, tasting in the air his wounded pride more than any serious injury. Stone didn’t want her to linger, she knew; he needed to gather what dignity was left for him to muster.

Kai Sen stood, a lone figure in the distance, the single fireball still hovering over his head, illuminating him in cold, blue light. But as she observed him longer, he began to take on a faint glow, lit from within. Confused, she blinked, trying to clear her vision. But the glow didn’t fade, and she realized what she was seeing: Kai Sen’s
goodness
. She had almost forgotten about her own magic in gauging the souls of mortals. And all those times in the past, when she had seen Kai Sen from afar, and he appeared to be limned in faint light—that was her power manifesting before she was aware of it.

Slowly she slithered to him, his dark gaze never leaving her face. She stopped less than an arm’s length away and lifted her hand toward him. He flinched, forced himself from jerking backward. She knew how in control he always was, how spare his movements; he had to be to be a good fighter, to be a good monk. Still, he was afraid of her in her serpentine form. Why shouldn’t he be? It was instinctual and visceral, crucial to his survival. This would
never
change between them. No matter what he said. No matter how much he was willing to try. Her demonic side would always be monstrous to him.

Her heart ached to know it.

She swept her fingertips across his bloodied cheek. Her hand was wet, and it smeared the dried blood, wiping away some of it. The planes of his face, more defined now, cutting, were unfamiliar to her. He felt more like a stranger than a lover. “You’ve had a nosebleed,” she said, her voice coarse as gravel.

He caught her wrist, and it was her turn not to wrench back. She wasn’t used to another’s touch while in serpentine form, and definitely not from Kai Sen. Even his scent had altered, sandalwood mixed with ash, determination with grief. Mortals could change so dramatically in the span of a few months.
How different would Zhen Ni be now
? she wondered. But she liked his touch—her skin against his skin—remembered how well their bodies had fit together.

“Why?” he asked, softly so only she could hear it.

But she didn’t know what he was asking. So much had happened since she last saw him, since she agreed to give up her mortal life to save his and Zhen Ni’s. It was as if they were speaking to each other in different languages.

“I wanted to save you,” he said, when she didn’t answer him.

“But I don’t need to be saved,” she replied.

Kai Sen blinked, searching her face, appearing completely lost. Then he laughed, that full, unrestrained laugh she remembered, shaking his head. “Skybright,” he said. “Never mincing words.” He still held her arm and tenderly rubbed his thumb across her inner wrist, igniting her senses. His touch almost familiar.

He never stopped glowing with that inner light, and she felt herself pulled into him, unable to control her power in glimpsing his past and his secrets. She twisted her arm free, not wanting to intrude with her magic. Kai Sen jolted; she had pulled away with more force than she had intended.

The light around his figure dimmed. “I see,” he said, his jaw flexing.

No. He didn’t. She wanted to explain.

Stone gave a short laugh behind them. He had changed into dry clothes, but his hair was still wet. “That is a true understatement,” Stone said with a sarcastic curve of his mouth. “Skybright doesn’t need to be saved.”

Kai Sen’s eyes narrowed at the other man, his fingers curling, and she could smell the magic emanating from him like the air before a storm. Skybright said, “I’m all right. Stone has no hold over me any longer.”

“Then why are you still with him?” Kai Sen asked.

There was too much to say, and she had so many questions. Instead her head felt muddled and her tongue too thick to speak properly. “We’re trying to close the new breach,” she finally managed.

“So am I.” Kai Sen leaned down and picked up a large oval rock. The moment he touched it, its core lit with pale blue light.

“A divining stone,” Stone said from behind her shoulder. “A powerful one.”

Kai Sen clutched it closer, glaring at the other man with suspicion. “It was a task given to me before Abbot Wu died.”

“Abbot Wu …” she said.

“The monastery was attacked,” Kai Sen said. He swiped an arm over his face, smearing blood. “We have wards set, but they broke through somehow.”

“So you are the chosen successor,” Stone said.

Kai Sen stiffened but didn’t respond, although his expression was answer enough.

“Abbot Wu would never have shared that divining stone with anyone but his chosen. And no other would be taught to wield elemental magic,” Stone went on.

“Is it true?” she asked. This news was as shocking as learning that Zhen Ni had wedded without her even knowing she had been betrothed.