The Sharpest Blade (4 page)

I don’t know
if
he’ll see the truth.

When Kyol draws in a breath, I realize my emotions are completely open to him. His aren’t open to me, though. They’re still very much there, but they’re not overwhelming me like they were when I first entered this world. He’s healed, and even though he’s weak, he’s strong enough to put his walls back into place.

I need to find myself some freaking walls.

Lena releases my arm. Her hands are still shaking. I don’t think that’s entirely due to the energy she just expended. It’s getting to her, ruling the Realm and playing politics with the high nobles.
She
needs a three-week break from this world.

Kyol peels off the remaining shreds of his shirt. I lock my gaze on Lena. I know what Kyol’s body looks like—muscular shoulders, chiseled chest, and strong, washboard abs. He’s built like a warrior. I might have ended our relationship, but that doesn’t mean I’m blind.

“The swordsmen who came with me,” Kyol says. “Have they reported in?”

“No,” Lena answers, her tone way too neutral. That catches my attention. I might not have been around for a while, but I doubt the number of swordsmen who’ve pledged loyalty to Lena has suddenly increased. She can’t afford to lose any fae.

“Some still may, though.” She accepts a clean cloth from one of her guards and methodically begins cleaning her hands. “Your attackers were concealed by illusions?”

Kyol’s responses to questions like that one usually come quickly, and with military precision. This one doesn’t. He hesitates just long enough to be noticeable—noticeable to me, at least—before he answers. “Yes. They were. This place felt wrong. I turned to order everyone to fissure out, and when I did, I must have bumped the fae who attacked me. His illusion broke, and I was able to redirect his attack.”

He wasn’t able to redirect it enough. His injuries prove that.

“You saw your attacker then,” Lena says. “Was he an
elari
?”

Kyol’s mental wall thins, but it holds. He very deliberately doesn’t glance my way.

Lena lets out an annoyed breath. “I don’t think she’ll shatter if she hears.”

“No,” I say, facing Kyol fully. “I won’t.” And I’ll kick his ass if he deliberately withholds information from me. He did that for ten years, and justified it by convincing himself he was protecting me.

His jaw clenches, and I’m pretty sure he knows exactly what I’m thinking.

“Yes, he wore the red-and-black name-cord that suggests he was an
elari
.”

The fae who attacked me had a similar name-cord. I only caught a brief look at it, but there were two shades of red stones separated by black ones. Only the most prominent families keep tradition and wear them now. It shouldn’t be too difficult to find out which family it is. As for the word,
elari
, I’m not certain I’ve heard it before, but it sounds similar to
enari
.

“You were attacked by a servant?” I ask, translating
enari
into English.

“A follower,” Lena says without looking at me. “Already, a false-blood is opposing me, and his supporters are zealots.”

A false-blood. I want to groan. Lena has a strong, legitimate link to the
Tar Sidhe
, the fae’s magically powerful Ancestors, but not everyone who seeks the throne does. In the last ten years, when I wasn’t reading the shadows of fae criminals, I was reading the shadows of false-bloods and their minions. They were considered felons, too, of course, but they created so much more death and destruction than the other fae I tracked. If a false-blood is responsible for what happened here, he’ll be among the most violent and cruel I’ve ever encountered.

But if a false-blood is responsible for this, then most likely he’s also responsible for the slaughter of the Sighted humans in London. The bastard used the same
modus operandi
in both places. The problem is
that
fae is supposed to be locked up in the palace.

“Lorn,” I say out loud. “He’s the one who’s supposed to be behind all this violence, but if he’s still under arrest—”

“He’s not,” Kyol says. His gaze locks on Lena. “She released him.”

My eyes widen. “What? Why?”

“Too many of the high nobles were indebted to him,” Lena says, glaring at her lord general. “The others, he was able to blackmail. I didn’t have a choice.”

I barely suppress a groan. “You caved to the high nobles? Again? Lorn’s going to kill me, Lena.”

“I don’t think he’ll actually kill you,” she replies, expressionless. “Kidnap, threaten, manipulate, yes, but he’d see your death as a waste of a valuable asset.”

“Great,” I say. “I feel so much better now.”

Lena closes her eyes in a long, most likely annoyed, blink. She’s not a big fan of sarcasm. She’s probably right about Lorn, though. He might not kill me, especially since his arrest was, apparently, so short. But three weeks ago, I was the one who suggested he might be manipulating things behind the scenes. He knew who was leading the remnants, but he refused to give us the name, and he outright admitted he profited from the war. Plus, I’m all but certain Lorn is the fae who anonymously gave us the London address where we found the slaughtered humans. There were just too many coincidences for Lorn not to be involved.

Still, it was all circumstantial evidence. It definitely wouldn’t have held up in a U.S. court.

A little knot of guilt lodges itself in my chest. If Lorn is completely innocent in all of this, I’m going to feel like shit for falsely accusing him.

Kyol turns toward me. I don’t look at him because I can already feel his censure. In his opinion, I have no reason to feel remorse for what I did. He’s never liked Lorn, but Lorn has spies and informants everywhere. He knows the rumors behind every rumor, and if you pay him the right price, he can help you win a war.

“So there’s another false-blood,” I say, steering the conversation back to the subject that matters. “That’s not the end of the world. Kyol and I have hunted false-bloods for a decade. We’ll track this one down and take care of him.”

No one responds to my words, and Lena’s expression looks grim.

“What?” I ask.

“This one is different,” she says. Goose bumps prickle across my skin. I don’t think Lena’s words caused them. My sixth sense is tingling.

“They’re all different,” I say absently while I frown into the open doorway on my right. The room’s single bed is empty. No humans were killed there. That should make me feel better, but it doesn’t.

“The others didn’t kill like this,” Lena says. “They weren’t this cruel.”

The fae who first pulled me into the Realm was this cruel. Thrain might not have skinned humans alive, but he starved and hit me. He scared the hell out of me. I start to point that out, but I can’t shake the feeling that something isn’t right here.

Of course something isn’t right,
I tell myself. This is a
tjandel
, and humans were just slaughtered in their prisons.

Kyol notices I’m distracted. I feel him grow more alert. His gaze sweeps down the long corridor, and he takes a step closer to Lena. Or closer to me. I can’t quite tell. It’s his duty to protect both of us, but Lena is far more important than I am.

“No false-blood in the last century has had the support that this one does.”

That statement makes my attention snap back to Lena.

“What do you mean?” I ask.

“We’ve lost—”

Something moves in my peripheral vision. I turn my head toward the staircase and see the light from a magically lit orb reflect off a fae’s blade. He descends another step, then, just as I realize he’s not one of Lena’s guards, he lifts his sword.

“W
ATCH OUT!” I
shout, grabbing Lena’s arm.

The swordsman’s blade is already arcing toward her. I can’t get her out of the way in time, but Kyol’s fighting instincts are insanely accurate. He’s at the foot of the staircase, diving beneath the swinging sword and ramming his shoulder into the man’s knees.

I lose sight of the fae when Lena’s guards rush to protect her. By the time I get a better view, Kyol has one strong arm locked around her attacker’s neck. His struggles to get free cease when Lena and one of her guards rest the points of their blades on the fae’s cheeks.

His eyes widen with fear.
“I’m sorry,”
he blurts out.
“I thought you were one of them. I didn’t know. I didn’t know it was you.”

That’s complete crap. The
jaedric
armor Lena’s wearing has been bleached white, and long strips of blue silk flow down her legs, almost creating the look of a long skirt. It’s definitely not the clothing that any normal soldier would be wearing, but even if her attacker is blind, I’d guess he was standing just out of sight on the stairs for at least thirty seconds. Maybe even a minute.

“You’re not a follower,”
Lena says.

“Of course not,”
he replies, looking affronted, and I can practically see an idea form in his mind. His voice takes on an overly innocent—and in my opinion weaselly—tone.
“I would never follow a false-blood. Only true Descendants like yourself should sit on the silver throne.”

“Why were you here?”
Lena’s question sounds like an accusation.

I feel my lip twisting. It’s clear why he would be here.

“I was just . . .”
The bastard looks at me and immediately shuts up.

I’m not sure when I drew my dagger, but my right hand is clenched around its hilt, and I’m holding it like I’m ready to use it. Add to that the fact that I’m covered in blood and lightning, and I can see why he might suddenly go mute.

If Aren were here, he’d make a comment about how terrifying the
nalkin-shom
looks. Kyol doesn’t say anything; he just hefts the sleazy fae to his feet, then motions to one of Lena’s guards.

“I can tell you what I saw,”
the fae says, as his hands are bound.

Lena turns her back on him. After the guards drag him down the hall, I ask her, “How did you know he wasn’t an
elari
?”

“No name-cord,” she says, sheathing her sword and crossing her arms over her chest.

“All the
elari
come from the same family?”

“No. They’ve twisted the tradition. The stones don’t denote their ancestry. They’re using them to show their allegiance to the false-blood.”

She’s definitely overworked. I can hear it in the slight edge of bitterness in her voice and see it in the set of her shoulders. Plus, she seems oblivious of the fact that she was just attacked.

“He tried to kill you,” I say, nodding toward the fae as her guards manhandle him down the steps to the first floor. “Does everyone want you dead?”

She shrugs like it’s a minor thing. “The bounty on my head surpassed the bounty on yours last week. Neither is a small amount.”

Great.

Kyol picks up the captive fae’s sword. Lena watches him slide it into his scabbard, then slip on the cloak a guard hands him.

“You reacted quickly to McKenzie’s warning,” she says.

He says nothing, but an emotion that feels close to uncertainty pokes a tiny hole in his wall. He
did
react quickly, especially considering how weak he still is.

Lena’s mouth tightens.

“Escort McKenzie to the gate, Taltrayn,” she says after a long pause. “You two need to talk.”

 • • • 

WE
make our way through Corrist’s Outer City side by side, but we don’t say anything for most of the walk. Lena sent only Kyol with me. For privacy, I assume. It’s a cold night, so the cloaks she gave us aren’t out of place. Even so, I watch the shadowed doorways and side streets, tense. Kyol isn’t an inconspicuous man. He’s well over six feet tall and broad-shouldered. I’m not fragile or small-framed, but next to him, I feel like I am. He’s always treated me that way, like I’m something to be coddled. That’s part of the reason I ended our relationship. He protected me too much. He still does.

A gust of wind blows down the narrow street, lifting my hood. I grab it quickly and keep it pulled low, hiding my face. It’s never been safe to be a human in the Realm. We’re all worth something to the fae, and thanks to Aren, I’ve developed a reputation as the best shadow-reader ever to breathe the air in this world. That part of the rumors Aren spread might be true, but the rest of it? I’m not a witch who’s going to suck anyone’s magic dry.

I don’t realize it for several steps, but my mouth has curved into a small smile. As much as my exaggerated reputation annoys me, I can imagine the light in Aren’s eyes as he crafted it. Rumor spreading is something he enjoys and excels at. He was able to convince the entire Realm that
he
was the fae who intended to take the throne from King Atroth, not Sethan, Lena’s brother and Aren’s friend. That protected Sethan and his supporters until the very end, and I have to reluctantly admit that my reputation has bought me a few seconds that ended up saving my life.

“You’re doing well on your own.”

I glance at Kyol. He’s taken off his hood. We’re near the gate, and the guards Lena’s assigned to monitor it will want to see who’s approaching.

I shrug. “I have a job.”

“Do you enjoy it?” he asks. His voice is monotone, and his emotions are muted behind his mental wall.

“It’s a paycheck.” A
miniscule
paycheck. “I’m able to live on my own without help from the fae.”

Half a dozen steps later, he says, “That’s what you always wanted.”

I answer with another shrug as the street we’re on spits us out onto the flat, hard-packed earth that lies between the city and the gate on the river two hundred yards away. The silver wall that separates the Outer and Inner City is to our right, rising into the night sky and shining in the light of the moon. It’s an oddly comforting sight. I’ve missed the Realm. I can’t remember the last time I was away for so long, and even with the chaos lusters on my skin telling me I don’t belong in this world, I feel more at home here than I did back in Houston. It certainly feels more like home than Las Vegas.

But I’ll never be safe here. If the price on my head really is anywhere close to Lena’s, fae will go out of their way to hunt me down. They’ll risk their lives to take mine, just like the fae in the
tjandel
did when he attacked Lena. He was there to
enjoy
the humans. The
elari
killed the others who were there, but he happened to be an illusionist himself. They didn’t see him. He could have escaped entirely if he’d fissured out, but he watched what the
elari
did and, once he learned Lena was there, he was blinded by potential profit.

We’re halfway to the river. Three swordsmen stand guard on the silver plating that lines the bank. While we’re still well out of earshot, I look at Kyol.

“You saw him, didn’t you?”

He doesn’t have to ask for clarification. He knows exactly who I’m talking about.

“I saw a shadow,” he answers quietly. “An almost transparent image of the fae.”

Lena thought so.
I
thought so. He moved too quickly to have just been reacting to my warning.

“You’re seeing ghosts, and I’m fissuring with
tor’um
,” I say. “I guess we can consider these positive benefits of the bond.”

A wince of pain leaks through his mental wall, and I realize the implication of my words: if these side effects are the positive benefits, everything else is a negative.

“I didn’t mean—”

“I know,” he says.

“And I know you didn’t have a choice,” I tell him. “I know it was the only thing you could do, and that it shouldn’t have worked, and if you were really thinking you would have—”

“It’s okay, McKenzie,” he interrupts again, more firmly this time. It’s his way of telling me I don’t have to say anything.

I feel like I have to say everything. The life-bond isn’t easy for me, but it has to be worse for him. My emotions are too open. I don’t have as much practice as he does at pretending to be hard and cold.

Because I know he’s hurting, I change the subject. “Is this false-blood really different from the others?”

I’m almost certain the answer to that question is no, but he doesn’t respond. My stomach tightens uncomfortably as we walk. I’m about to ask my question again when he draws in a breath to speak.

“Derrdyn Province has declared its support for the false-blood.”

I stop walking. “The whole province?”

He looks back, gives me a single, solemn nod.

Lena’s right. This false-blood
is
different. Sethan didn’t even have a whole province declare support for him, and he was a true Descendant. Of course, Aren and the rebels kept his identity secret for as long as they could. Did this false-blood do the same thing?

“Who is he?” I ask. “Three weeks ago, he didn’t exist.”

“Three weeks ago, we were focused on Caelar and the remnants,” Kyol says. He starts walking again, and I fall into step beside him. Caelar wasn’t a false-blood. He was one of the king’s swordsmen, and after Kyol killed Atroth, he organized the soldiers who opposed Lena taking the throne.

“We don’t know the false-blood’s name,” Kyol says after a moment. “His
elari
call him the
Taelith
. It’s an old word that means
anointed one
.”

“Haven’t they all thought they were anointed?”

“An entire province has never believed it before,” he says, his gaze focused on the river. His emotions are locked down tight, but I feel an echo of sadness in him. Kyol loves the Realm. That’s why he always put its needs before mine. It’s always been a violent world—for my whole lifetime and for his—yet that hasn’t discouraged him. He’s devoted his life to protecting it, and in his quiet, steadfast way, he’s always been optimistic about its future. He’s clung to the hope that the bloodshed could end.

That optimism seems diminished now.

The urge to wrap my arms around him, or at least to take his hand in mine, is almost overwhelming. Instead, I pull my cloak tighter around my body.

We’re almost to the river. I can make out the blur on its bank that marks the location of the gate. The guards aren’t watching our approach anymore. They’re focused to our right. I look that way and see Kynlee. She’s walking toward us with two escorts. Trev is one of them. That almost makes me laugh. If I weren’t protected by the fae he’s pledged his loyalty to, I’m certain he’d be the first in line to collect the bounty on my head. He really ought to direct his anger elsewhere, though. I’m not the one giving him shitty assignments like babysitting
tor’um
.

Kyol doesn’t say anything when he sees her, but an echo of the shock he felt when Lena mentioned a
tor’um
fissured me to the Realm leaks through our life-bond.

He looks at me.

“I know,” I tell him, because what else can I say? I was completely out of my mind when I came here.

His emotions soften for an instant, but his hard, neutral expression doesn’t change.

“They’ll fissure you both back to Earth,” he says, indicating Trev and the other fae with Kynlee. “If you happen to need me . . .”

He’ll feel it if I do.

“I’ll be fine,” I say out loud.

He nods. When Kynlee and her escorts reach us, he says, “Good-bye, McKenzie.”

I watch him walk away. One step. Two steps. Three. It feels like a gulf opens between us.

“Hey, Kyol,” I call out.

He turns. The Realm’s cold night air ruffles through his dark hair and wraps his cloak around his body.

“I’m really glad you’re okay.”

 • • • 

A
month ago, fissuring between the Realm and the Earth twice within an hour would leave me disoriented for a few minutes. This time, I’m not even slightly dizzy. That’s definitely a good thing, but it makes me uncomfortable, too. I’m not the same person I was a month ago.

The other thing that’s making me uncomfortable?

Kynlee.

I watch the
tor’um
as she sinks into the passenger seat. Trev and the other fae brought us back to the Vegas gate so I could get my car, and even though she looks semi-innocent sitting there silent with her arms crossed, she can’t be.

After starting the engine, I ask, “What is it you want?”

She toys with a tear in the fabric of her seat, not looking at me. “What do you mean?”

“Why did you fissure me to the Realm?”

“You asked me to,” she says, like I was asking her to pass the salt at dinner.

“No, I asked you to call someone who could do it.” My memory is murky, but I’m pretty sure that’s true. “You volunteered too easily. You didn’t even know what a gate looked like. Have you ever fissured before?”

“Yes,” she says, looking up long enough to throw a glare my way.

I make a U-turn, then glance at her, my eyebrows raised.