The Sylph Hunter (27 page)

“No one back where I came from had names,” he told her, “except the queen and her mates, of course. When I came here, some of the concubines gave us names in the harem. Like Tooie. I always really wanted one myself, except I didn’t have any way of asking and no one thought to give me one.”

“You want a name,” she said slowly. Her arms were still around herself, but they’d dropped down lower, no longer so tense, and her shoulders were straighter, the muscles less tight. “From me.”

“Well, yes. I figured it would be better for my master to name me since she—I mean you—would know me better than even I know myself. That’s how it’s supposed to work anyway.” He looked at her hopefully, remembered her naked and wanton beneath him, and had to forcefully push the memory away before instinct made him drown her in lust again. It wasn’t easy.

“I don’t know you at all,” she told him, and that hurt so much it crushed the desire he was feeling. “How am I supposed to name you?”

“But…” They knew each other intimately, he wanted to remind her. He’d tasted and touched every part of her body, but he knew already that wasn’t what she’d meant. Tooie had told him to talk to her from that start. Sex didn’t mean as much to her as it always had to him. If he wanted sex again, he had to give her what she wanted, whatever that was.

“I’d like to get to know you,” he told her, “and you can get to know me. Then you’ll be able to pick a name for me.”

She thought about it. He felt her do it, felt her emotions swirling as she considered the perfection of it. Then her arms tightened again. “I don’t know. I have someone.” Her eyes lifted to look at him, dark and clear enough for him to see his misery and shock reflected in them. “I’m not looking for anyone else.”

Find the bastard. Kill him. Rip his human heart out and crush it. He had to be human; no battler would have gone near One-Eleven’s woman once he laid his hand on her. No other battler would have been stupid enough.

“I’ll give you anything,” he promised her, just as Tooie told him he should. “I’ll always be there for you, always keep you safe. With me, you’ll never have to be alone. I’ll love you forever!”

Her face tightened with misery. “So will he.”

No, he wouldn’t. One-Eleven stepped forward, Zalia stiffening until he bent forward and kissed her as chastely as he could manage on the forehead. “I have to go think,” he whispered. “But I promise you. I love you. I’ll always love you and I’ll never leave you.” He turned and hurried out, before he could fully hear the protests she was starting up behind him, running toward one of the great windows left open in one wall of the room and diving out, immediately taking on his natural shape and arcing upward, heading up and over the floating palace toward the city. He knew where Zalia’s man was, knew just who it had to be.

She’d love him. He’d win her slowly and surely like Tooie had suggested, convince her that loving him was the only thing for both of them.

Once there wasn’t any competition to worry about.

Zalia ran to the window after One-Eleven, screaming his name, though of course, he didn’t answer. Since she wasn’t his master, he didn’t have to. That little conversation had actually been the most human and comfortable she’d had with him, letting her feel as if she could communicate with him and perhaps even be friends. She’d even relaxed enough to make the worst mistake of her entire life.

“What have I done?” she mourned.

The men it had been planning to feed on were gone, retreating into some kind of hive of their own. The Hunter dragged its tentacles across the top of the main hive, considering its options. It had eaten a lot of them, and felt filled to the point of needing to hang on lest it rise too high, but it had wanted to be able to rely on them for a lot longer than this before it tried to leave. In all honesty, it was afraid to trust the winds to take it to a new food source, not after having been sucked out onto the ocean the last time. It was truly going to have to trust to the spirits of its kind to keep it safe, and it was afraid in a way that the worst storms of its home world had never been able to make it.

Ultimately, it had no choice. It had fuel for now, but not enough to feel safe giving in to the wind. The men had gone somewhere, but it wasn’t sure where and it didn’t have time to go looking for them. It had to get into this hive.

Carefully, it edged itself over to the floating palace and used all its strength to start raising its tentacles over the dome of its body, up toward the heavy building so conveniently waiting for it, careful not to touch any of the battle sylphs who periodically rushed in and out, just in case they got a warning off as they died. Straining from the effort it required to lift its tentacles so high, it searched for a way in.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

T
he skies over Meridal were clear, the sun dropping toward the horizon and another night, though the air was still blisteringly hot. One-Eleven didn’t notice, though of course, his kind rarely noted the temperature. He’d have to be a lot lower on energy to do so, and though he had no master to feed from at the moment, his energy levels were still high enough to do what he needed.

The men were easy to find. Just by crisscrossing the city, he would have located them once he came close enough to sense their emotions, but his feeder masters were with them and he could have tracked any of them across the world.

Their emotions led him to the harem. At first, he tried to dive down through the access ports that he’d used when the emperor ruled. The narrow tunnels were blocked, filled with solid stone. He went from one to the other, finding them all that way and turned in disgust to the entrance that humans used.

It was closed as well, though the stone that filled it felt different. One-Eleven wasn’t an earth sylph by any means, but he could tell the difference between what was meant to be a wall and what was meant to be opened again.

He shifted to human and pounded on it, yelling along the hive line.
Let me in!
He’d find the man who had his Zalia’s heart and destroy him. Then she’d be his. He didn’t think of how Zalia would react to that or anything else. As usual, he was just caught up in instinct. Face the threat, destroy the threat. Nothing else mattered.

He pounded on the wall again and felt the stone start to shimmer underneath his fist. Grimly, he waited.

He’d found a flute in the storage room.

Actually, Airi had. There’d been a lot of supplies in there beyond the food: clothing that, of course, was for women, linens, games, and other musical instruments as well. Airi brought the flute to him while he and Xehm had still been doing a preliminary count of what was there, with Blithori’s help. They’d also conscripted a scrawny young man named Glorki, who’d worked as a scribe before the emperor was overthrown. Devon already intended for Xehm to be in charge of the supply room, but the old man could neither read nor write. He’d need Glorki’s help, as well as the half-dozen other men with stanchions who stood at the door. The last thing any of them needed was a riot to get control of the supplies.

Airi hovered over his shoulder, spinning the flute until it made an eerie, whistling noise.
Look look look look look,
she chanted excitedly, whirling it in front of his face.

It struck him as a good excuse to take a break, after everything he’d done already. Besides, as Leon told him once, just because he could do something, and even if he could do it better, it didn’t mean he should. Xehm had it under control, as did his helpers and the men guarding the door. They looked content, in control of their own destinies. Right now, they didn’t need him. Later, they would, but he wouldn’t be any use if he was exhausted.

“Keep taking records,” he told Xehm, clapping the older man on the shoulder. “It’ll be good to know everything that’s in here.”

Xehm smiled at him. “We’ll get it all sorted out,” he promised.

Devon made his way out of the room, the guards letting him through with their greetings and rough jokes. There were more men and boys in the hall outside, curious about what was happening, but everyone looked content to wait. They were men with a purpose now, not just refugees, and they’d found the food supplies before anyone had time to get really hungry. Devon didn’t like to think about what the atmosphere in the pens would have been like if they’d started to become desperate. If they had, the six men on the door likely wouldn’t have been enough.

Devon made his way through the crowd, offering reassurances that the food would be available and they wouldn’t hold it back from anyone. There were some questions about when and just what was available, as well as how long they’d be down here, but he noticed that no one asked about the women. That would come in time, he suspected, once the shock and fear wore off. Devon wasn’t looking forward to dealing with their anger when it did.

This flute is pretty,
Airi said hopefully, still floating it through the air over his head. It was, as well as being larger than the one Devon had left behind in the hive, but he suspected he could manage to play it. Letting her continue to carry it, he looked back toward the arch that led into the feeder pens. Strange noises came from there as their small group of sylphs worked to turn the feeder pens into something that a human being would actually want to live in. Given that so many of the men down here were ex-feeders, Devon hoped that the results would be healing for them. From the look of the feeders he saw crowded around the entrance and watching, he suspected it just might be. He left them to it, too tired to even consider checking on their progress. They could do it without his supervision. Right now he needed sleep, food, a bath, and some time with his own sylph. For the moment, only three of those things were really possible, since he didn’t see a bath happening anytime soon, and despite his own weariness and hunger, he knew which of the three was most important to him.

“Let’s play you a song,” he murmured and felt Airi’s joy as she cheered in his mind and swooped with the flute into the harem.

As he’d figured, most of the alcoves were taken, many of which seemed to be inhabited by men who’d brought their sons along. Devon looked down the length of the room and could only see two alcoves with their curtains still pulled back and empty. They were on either side of an obviously claimed alcove, where a man sat against one of the jambs of the doorway, his foot up on the other jamb opposite him, his face obscured as he looked into the alcove. The alcoves to either side didn’t have belongings set down to mark their ownership, but Devon recognized Gel sitting outside one of the alcoves just beyond. Airi dancing above him, still spinning her flute in distracted happiness, Devon made his way through the crowd to join the man.

“Hey,” he said to Gel, crouching down. “How are you feeling now?”

The former feeder looked up at him, really making eye contact as he reached up to scratch his neck. “Shasha says this is the safest place now. I don’t want to leave.”

“I guess it is,” Devon smiled, “and you don’t have to.” He gestured at the empty alcove beside him. “Has anyone taken this one?”

Gel slowly looked at the alcove and finally shook his head. “No one wanted it.”

“I guess it’s mine then.” Even when the feeder pens were converted, Devon doubted they’d be terribly comfortable, not unless they spread all these cushions around. At least now no one would say he was taking advantage of his new supposed authority, not with the alcove going unclaimed for this long. He sat down cross-legged in front of it and held up his hands. “Give it over, okay?”

Immediately, Airi dropped the flute into his palms, squealing. Devon tested the holes, checking the balance as he thought about what he could play. Because the flute was larger than his, it likely had a deeper tone. It felt more suited to a somber piece, or perhaps that was just the way he felt after everything that had happened. Zalia taken, seeing the Hunter…What was he supposed to do now? Hide until it went away? Tell the battle sylphs he could see the thing and have them laugh at him? Or use him to hunt it? He, go to a battler deliberately? Unbidden, he remembered Heyou, who’d forced him into fatherhood and then into what was essentially exile. He couldn’t go back, and didn’t want to either, not now that he’d found Zalia; except she’d been taken by a battler, who could make her feel ecstasies no human man could match. How was he supposed to compete? How was he supposed to do anything?

He put the flute to his mouth and blew, his lip vibrating as a song that was mournful and slow came out of him, detailing his sorrow and helplessness. Airi settled down, her emotions shifting to match his sadness, even as she was happy that he played for her. Gel stared at him, his mouth hanging open, while men nearby lifted their heads to listen.

Devon played an aria of doubt. They couldn’t stay here forever, not here. Nor could they just expect the Hunter to go away as the sylphs obviously did. It would only go somewhere else and kill someone else, and there was no guarantee it wouldn’t come back. Meanwhile, the very foundation of their society was torn apart, families broken, and everyone was hiding and wondering, not knowing how their loved ones were.

His fingers danced rapidly over the holes of the flute, changing the tune as he swirled down the scales. The Hunter would destroy them all; break them if it couldn’t devour them. The sylphs couldn’t see it, but humans could. Devon’s memory of the monster was haunting and horrible, a series of notes as low as the flute could go before climbing up to the highest in discordant triumph. The battle sylphs couldn’t kill it because they couldn’t see it. Men could, if they got close enough and lucky enough and it didn’t eat them first. He had to tell them.

Sudden terror made him lose his mouth position and the flute fell silent. Devon lowered it, wishing beyond anything that Zalia was there with him, just so he could lay his head on her breast and not worry about the world for a while.

That was beautiful,
Airi said.

“It was.”

The comment came from beside him. Devon turned to see the man who’d been sitting in the doorway of his alcove, next to the empty one Devon had claimed. He was the man Devon had seen carrying an ancient woman into the hive, and Devon froze in terror at the sight of him while Airi squeaked above. Now he knew why the alcoves on either side of the creature had been left unclaimed.

The battle sylph regarded him evenly for a moment before he looked up at the ceiling of the harem. He studied it for a moment and turned back to Devon again. “She liked your music. Play for her until I get back.” He leaned into the alcove, whispering something Devon couldn’t even pretend to hear, and finally stood and walked away. Men scrambled to clear his path as he left the harem.

Do we have to live next to a battle sylph?
Airi complained.

Devon couldn’t answer her, too busy trying to get his lungs to take in air again after the shock. Battle sylphs. He just couldn’t handle battle sylphs, not at all.

Still, something niggled at him. “Shasha said that the elemental sylphs weren’t listened to,” he said. “Right?”

Usually,
Airi agreed.

“But battle sylphs are?”

I think so. The ones who can blow the most stuff up usually are anyway.

So that battle sylph could take word to the others about how men could see the Hunter. Devon had an image of being surrounded by the creatures, leading them into battle, and nearly fainted.

A low whine sounded from the alcove the battler had been guarding, rising to a cry of despair and loneliness. Startled, Devon got up and walked over to see the woman the battler had carried in lying on the cushions, her face creased with distress. It was hard to imagine the ancient woman with the beautiful battle sylph, but it was obviously happening. She looked around desperately for the creature, her withered face damp with tears as she tried to push herself up and failed.

Even if it hadn’t been a battle sylph who told him to play for her, Devon couldn’t leave anyone like that. Dropping to his knees, he brought the flute up to his lips again and resumed playing.

This time he didn’t play of his own sorrow, not wanting to think about it. Instead he played a song about Zalia, and how deeply he loved her. The song nearly danced as it twirled through the air, forming an aria that sent Airi swirling up to the ceiling and had the old woman smiling by the end of it, her head bobbing nearly in tune. Again, men fell quiet in order to listen, while boys ran up and down excitedly, a few dancing in place, just being happy.

For the moment, it was enough.