Tall, Dark & Apocalyptic (8 page)

Audie turned away, stepping over a headless reborn and the puddle of black blood it was lying in. “I have some ideas on that.” He turned back to the Sentinel. “You can handle this? I need to go get some answers.”

The big man inclined his chin. “Take care, Hunter.”

“I’m not feeling real careful right now. But thanks anyway.”

“You have my respect.”

Audie stopped, his pulse picking up as he turned to regard the big Atlantan. “That’s high praise, Sentinel. “

“It is. Not many would fight me for what he believes. I can respect that about you.” He arched a single, silver eyebrow. “But don’t let it happen again.”

Audie laughed, rubbing a hand over his bruised jaw. “Not for a week or so anyway.”

He called his guide as he watched the Sentinel scoop up a fallen hunter with one arm and then stride a few yards away to scoop up another, hefting the two, good-sized men onto his shoulders and marching toward the infirmary with them.

Shaking his head at the man’s incredible strength, Audie called forth his translocational magics and waited while the sparkling blue fragments of energy flew toward him from the surrounding air and physical surfaces, coalescing above his palm. “The dead zone,” he told his guide, and then gritted his teeth as the magic ripped him from the spot.

~
TD&A
~

Edwige stood at the large window and watched the ebony wings of her familiar ripple against the steel-gray sky on the horizon. A rare burst of sunlight momentarily shimmered off his blue-black feathers, haloing him in gold. The sun was quickly swallowed up by the bank of clouds hovering overhead and Ebon dipped several feet as a burst of moisture-laden air hit him.

The raven was exhausted from his travel to the dead lands and his…activities…there. She felt his weariness in the heavy slap of his wings against a roiling sky. She also sensed his disappointment that things hadn’t quite gone as planned with Yeira.

Edwige frowned, her mind casting back over the vision of Yeira being snatched away from her by Joris’s men.

She hadn’t seen her lover face to face for several days and had started to worry. Though he seemed as attentive as ever when she scried for him, there was something in his voice that made the small hairs on the back of her neck lift.

She’d begun to suspect he was avoiding her. And now that she’d seen him take Yeira from the dead land she suspected worse. He was planning something.

Ebon’s strident cry pierced the silence as he spotted her in the window and Edwige lifted her arm, opening her hand. The big raven landed gently, his curved, black claws resting painlessly against her skin.

She smiled at him as he cocked his head, fixing her with a curious black gaze. “You are tired, my friend.” Edwige pulled a large, flat seed from her pocket and held it out to him, smiling as he took it carefully in his dense, black beak. “You can rest for a bit and then I need you to find Joris.”

The bird lowered its head and shrugged its wings, clucking softly.

Edwige ran a fingertip over the sleek, black head. “I’m sorry, Ebon, dear. But he’s up to something and I need to find out what. Besides—” Her worried gaze slipped past the bird, to the first, fat droplets of rain falling from the steely sky. “He’s got Yeira now. That’s a dangerous combination. If our plan is to work with her, I need to get her away from his influence.”

The raven cawed in agreement, before snagging a second seed from Edwige’s fingertips.

~
TD&A
~

The dead lands hadn’t changed for the better since he was last there. Standing where Yeira had brought him before, Audie’s grip tightened on his long knives and he looked around, taking stock of his surroundings before moving toward the distant cave.

He was alone in the poisonous zone, with only the dead vegetation and infected air to accompany him as he started off.

But, despite what his eyes told him, something felt different. The stench of black magic hung on the air, rising above even the usual septic odor of fester in the region. Audie briefly wondered whether it was Yeira’s magic that hung in the air. He quickly rejected the idea. The only magic he’d ever seen her use was translocational, which he suspected came from some kind of icon rather than her.

No. This energy smelled like the dark witch.

He stopped suddenly, dropping one of his knives into its hip sheath, and called his guide. As the swirling blue energy coalesced above his palm, Audie called for a power word and held it on his tongue, considering whether he should use it.

He was unique within the Sorceri Authority for his ability to use power words to achieve his ends. It was formidable magic, meant to be used sparingly because of its limitations and side effects, and he always thought carefully before using one.

But something inside Audie told him Yeira was in trouble. And the thought made his bowels turn to ice water.

Surely the search and destroy mission for the dark witch was a worthy use of his power. Without examining his reasons any further, Audie let the power word fly. “Illuminate!”

The energy hovering above his palm rose into the air and spun more quickly, spreading as it revolved like soft, yeasty dough thrown into the air.

When it reached the boundaries of its expansive power, the blue energy sparked once and then, with an explosion that shook the ground beneath his feet and made his eardrums throb, it spread outward in a sparkling wash, encompassing a thirty foot wide circular area that centered on Audie.

A distant tree pulsed beneath the blue wash like a giant weed under rippling waves, its form dancing under the magic’s blanket of power. In its uppermost branches, a large, bird-shaped form showed dark and unmoving, its gaze turned toward a spot only a few feet away from Audie.

The raven!

He followed the raven’s line of sight and found Yeira, her slender form shimmering under the pulsing energy. She knelt on the ground, her chest heaving as tears glistened on her pale cheeks.

Before he could stop himself, Audie had taken a step forward, his fists tightening with alarm. Was she injured? Sick? Had the poisons of the dead lands overtaken her after he’d fallen?

Audie stopped a mere foot away, his hand hovering in the air above her head, as her muffled sobs caused ripples of another kind in his chest.

She’d been crying.

Before he could stop himself, Audie’s hand started to move toward the restructured image of the woman and he was barely able to pull it back before he touched her representation and changed the form of reality as it had been.

Audie fisted his hand and dragged it backward, his teeth grinding together with frustration that he couldn’t ease her pain. “What happened to you, Reborn?”

As if she’d heard him, Yeira pushed to her feet, swiping a hand over her wet cheeks and nose, and turned, her energy-darkened gaze sliding upward, to the creature sitting silently in the distant tree.

The creature cawed, lifting from the branch before dropping into a glide and heading for Yeira.

Drawn by the reflection of danger, Audie started forward. A soft
whoosh
sound preceded a ripple in the surface of his spell, warning him that she was no longer alone.

As he turned his head, his eyes widened with alarm at the sight of the two men, obviously the dark witch’s warriors by the tattoo of a raven on their throats, reaching for Yeira. A slight blond man stood behind them, smiling smugly.

She jerked in surprise as they grabbed her and Audie cried out as she blipped away with the two warriors.

~
TD&A
~

“If this is a trick, I’m not falling for it, Joris.”

The too-perfect face creased in a smile. “It’s not a trick. I want her dead as much as you do.”

Yeira lifted an eyebrow, not bothering to hide her skepticism. “Why?”

Joris shrugged and stood, walking toward a nearby table to pluck a fat grape from the bowl in its center. “I’m weary of her jealousies. I want to be able to live my own life.”

“You wouldn’t have a life if it weren’t for Edwige.”

His head snapped around. “Strange words coming from you, Yeira.”

“Not really. It’s simply the truth. She plucked you from death and made you beautiful and strong.”

He frowned, the expression only slightly marring the perfect symmetry of his face. If anything, the two shallow lines between his eyes made him look more human. As she always did when faced with Joris’s perfection, Yeira couldn’t help being amazed by it.

“As she did you, sister.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Why not? We are all Edwige’s children aren’t we? That makes us family.”

“And yet you plot to kill our mother?”

He shrugged again, taking a tiny bite of the grape and chewing thoughtfully. “It’s an analogy with flaws.” But he smiled at her and, despite herself, Yeira was warmed by his boyish smile. It was Joris’s greatest power—his charm—and he used it to soften the effects of his evil.

Yeira knew him too well to be blinded by it. She smelled a trap. “Look, Joris. I don’t know where you got the idea that I want to kill Edwige…”

“It’s the truth whether you deny it or not. I am certain of it. More importantly, I believe Edwige knows it too, Yeira. You might as well admit your plans and work with me to see them accomplished.”

She bit her lip. He was right. Ebon’s existence in the dead lands was proof that Edwige, at the very least, suspected Yeira of duplicity. Then she realized what Joris had done by bringing her there. Her gaze snapped to his. “I could say the same of you, Joris. She saw you take me. She’ll suspect you of plotting with me if you don’t turn me over to her.”

He took another tiny bite of the grape before flinging the rest to the table in disgust. As if he’d suddenly lost his appetite. “I don’t care what she believes. She won’t find me anyway.”

Yeira’s eyes widened in surprise. “She doesn’t know where you are?”

“No. And I plan to keep it that way.” He turned to her, his gaze sharp and filled with a coldness that had Yeira sucking in a breath. “I’m going to kill her, with or without your help, sister.”

She stood. “And how exactly are you planning to force me to kill her?”

The doors opened behind Yeira and heavy footfalls sounded as the two guards returned. She swung around as they approached, kicking out at their legs before they could grasp her arms again. Pain knifed through her mid-section and Yeira cried out, dropping to her knees as her insides twisted with agony.

The pain was like someone had shoved a hand into her belly and grabbed her organs, squeezing and wrenching them.

She could barely breathe, could hardly lift her head to look at Joris as he approached, stopping before her. “I don’t need your cooperation, sister, only your blood.”

He moved again and Yeira saw the deadly-looking curved knife he held in one hand. The arched blade had a jagged cutting edge and an ivory handle, the image of a raven inset into the handle in onyx.

She recognized the knife as one of Edwige’s power-drenched ceremonial bolines. Yeira tried to jerk away as the two men holding her wrapped their hands in her long hair and jerked her head back.

Joris stepped closer with the deadly boline. “I’m sorry to have to do this, sister. But I can no longer accept Edwige’s interference, or for that matter, yours.”

“So you’re just going to kill everybody who disagrees with you?”

Joris thought about her question for a beat and then smiled. “What a lovely idea.”

His hand lifted, the overhead light glinting off the polished silver blade. “Hold her tight,” Joris instructed the guards.

Yeira wanted to close her eyes but she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. “She’ll get to you, Joris. You’ll pay for your plotting. She’s smarter and stronger than you are.”

His hand halted and his smile faltered. “That’s why I need you, my dear,” he told her agreeably.

His hand sliced downward.

Audie stalked back and forth, his hands shaking and his brow sweaty from using a power word. Since his magic-induced reflection of the past had dropped away, ending with the frantic cawing of an obviously agitated raven, he’d paced the hard, dead ground of the poisoned land, his mind racing. He’d heard stories about the dark witch and her familiar, Ebon, the raven.

If Yeira had been taken by the witch she was in danger. It was possible the raven had seen her and Audie together. And if it had, Edwige would exterminate Yeira.

The dark one wouldn’t hesitate.

She was known for her ruthlessness and she’d survived as long as she had by eliminating any of her followers who showed the slightest sign of weakness or disloyalty.

Audie’s fists clenched on the thought. His heart pounded and pain twisted in his gut at the thought of Yeira in the witch’s hands. He reached for a power word and set it loose. “Retrieve!”