The Tainted City (33 page)

“What is it? What do you see?” Dev asked.

“This—it’s mine.” Kiran reached for the diagram, but Dev pulled it away, his hands tightening on the parchment.

“How do you know?” Despite his white-knuckled grip on the diagram, Dev didn’t sound defensive, or disbelieving. Instead, he almost sounded eager.

Kiran didn’t need to look at the shorthand symbols denoting the channel layerings again; they were burned into his mind’s eye. Especially the third symbol, the
zalephka
, with its hook drawn slanted instead of properly curved. How many times had Mikail teased him for drawing it that way? And Dev’s name…that was in his handwriting as well. The memory of Dev facing Mikail in the Aiyalen Spire leaped into his mind, accompanied by sudden conviction.

Sometime, somewhere, he and Dev had met before, the details gone in the void of his lost memories. And something related to that meeting had inspired Mikail’s unusual display of anger—anger directed not at
nathahlen
in general as Kiran had assumed, but at Dev in specific.

“Dev, was I the one who—” Deep unease rolled over Kiran, harsh whispers clawing at his inner senses. He hurriedly reinforced his barriers, only to stagger back with a cry as the confluence exploded, wild energy crashing all around him.

“Kiran! What the hell?” Dev reached for him, green eyes gone wide.

Under the wild roar of the confluence battering against Kiran, a sharp flare of energy collapsed in on itself, turning into a voraciously strong current that tugged at him even through his barriers. Horror froze Kiran’s blood. Ruslan had told him,
Once you are
akheli
in truth, you need never fear physical violence. Should you suffer a mortal wound, your body will reach instinctively for the
ikilhia
needed to heal
.

“Mikail!” Kiran’s voice cracked with the force of his shout. Almost, he dropped his barriers, despite the danger posed by the roiling confluence energy. Beside him, Dev gasped and fell to his knees. The dim pulse of his
ikilhia
guttered as the current of Mikail’s need pulled at it. New horror lanced through Kiran.

Dev had no barriers, no protection—that sucking, hungry current would rip his life away. Mikail must be unconscious, the power draw wholly without volition, bypassing Ruslan’s will-binding. Kiran couldn’t cast to harm Dev, but perhaps he could cast to save him.

He snatched at Dev’s wrist. Between one heartbeat and the next, he cast a protective binding fueled by his own
ikilhia
, weaving a barrier tight around Dev.

Stymied, the current swirled around Dev and flowed onward, still seeking. Kiran felt the shock when Mikail connected with another source of
ikilhia
. Raw power surged past him in a flood.

Kiran released Dev’s arm and ran. Dev would be safe enough now, but Mikail needed help. He skidded around a corner and pounded up the stairs leading to the workroom, digging frantically in his pocket. With the confluence so wild, he didn’t dare drop his barriers to call power. But he and Mikail both carried
vidya
charms, meant to reinforce their defenses. The power stored within could be safely drawn by touch and used to fuel magic.

The copper workroom doors were shut, their wards silent and still. Kiran didn’t slow. He threw out his free hand, releasing a swift, pure pulse of power. The doors slammed open.

Mikail lay crumpled against a stone wall beneath shelves glittering with charms, his clothing sodden with blood. A dark figure bent over him.

Kiran yanked power from the
vidya
charm and struck. A tornado of azure fire lanced at his enemy. A brilliant flash seared the room white, the shock of energies sending Kiran staggering to one side. A howl of pain and rage echoed throughout the room. Fierce triumph filled Kiran as he raised his hands to strike again.

A blow drove the breath from his body, throwing him hard against the wall.

Kiran!
Ruslan’s silent shout filled his mind, his master’s presence suddenly with him as strongly as if he knelt at Kiran’s side.
Strike again!
Through the mark-bond, power flooded into Kiran, humming and sparking in his blood. Kiran’s vision doubled, the room wavering in his sight, but he sent the borrowed power blazing in a firestorm at the dark figure advancing toward him.

The dark shape shimmered and disappeared just before the magefire hit. The subsequent explosion shook the room and blinded Kiran once more. He gasped for air, feeling as if a giant sat astride his chest. When his vision cleared, only a charred jumble of rubble remained where the table and far wall of the workroom had been. The dark figure was nowhere to be seen. The seething roil of the confluence ebbed.

Mikail lay still and silent in a pool of blood. Kiran pushed himself upright, desperate to reach his mage-brother. Pain seared his torso, and he sank back with a strangled cry. He reached a shaking hand to his side.

Blood soaked his shirt and pattered to the floor from deep slashes in his stomach and side. Underneath the stabbing physical pain, a different ache gnawed at his senses, a throbbing pulse of wrongness yearning for power and held in check only by his defensive barriers.

Kiran reached for power again, but the
vidya
charm was dark and empty, its magic drained. Pain swamped his concentration, his barriers growing ever more difficult to hold. If he released them, his body would draw power instinctively as Mikail had—but from living things. People.

One
nathahlen
—perhaps more—had died already for Mikail’s sake. Kiran shut his eyes, nauseated, thinking of the blood leaking from Torain’s mouth, Dev’s choked gasp when he’d fallen. He couldn’t steal a man’s life, not deliberately, couldn’t kill some innocent servant whose only fault was to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

He could seek power in the charms on the workroom’s shelves. But many were melted and misshapen, their magic burned out by proximity to his magefire strike. When he strained his senses, he felt only faint flickers of magic in those that remained intact. Not enough, not nearly enough to stave off his body’s insistent cry for power.

The unsettled, sullen throb of the confluence caught his attention. The only way to safely tap confluence energies was with a channeled spell, or so Ruslan had always said. Yet an attempt to use confluence power directly had to be better than killing blindly. He focused on the confluence, readying himself to try.

No, Kiran. I forbid this.
Ruslan’s will pressed down on Kiran through the link, building an impenetrable wall between Kiran and confluence.

Ruslan, please!
Kiran knew Ruslan felt his desperation, but the wall remained.

“Kiran!”

Kiran opened his eyes. Dev squatted beside him, his green eyes full of concern.

“Fuck, that looks bad.” Dev reached for Kiran’s stomach, then snatched his hand back, clenching it into a fist. “I know, I shouldn’t touch you.”

“You’re safe,” Kiran said, the act of speech sending new agony stabbing through his gut. A faint glimmer of power still shielded Dev’s
ikilhia
. The binding he’d worked should hold for a few hours yet. Questions welled up through the red weight of pain. How Dev had known the danger in touching him while Kiran was injured? Did the Alathians understand blood mages so well? Or was it another clue about the past?

Dev’s eyes narrowed, holding his. “You did something to me, back in the hallway. I felt it.” He rubbed at his wrist.

Kiran gave him a tiny nod, trying not to jar his side.

“Two of the women in the kitchen are dead, though. The others were screaming…” Dev’s jaw clenched. He eyed Mikail’s slumped form. “Was that because of him? Did he kill them?”

“Not…on purpose,” Kiran said softly. “Instinct. Unconscious.” He stopped; talking hurt so much.

Dev’s face darkened further. “I’d have been the one dead, if not for you, huh? ‘I vow never to
knowingly
cast’…should’ve known there was a fucking boulder-sized loophole in that.” He shook his head. “Your wounds—we’ve got to halt the bleeding. Here—” he shucked off his shirt. “Press this against your side.”

Kiran obeyed, with cold, fumbling hands. Dev glanced up at the mangled charms on the workroom’s remaining shelves.

“There’s gotta be something here we can use as a bloodfreeze—”

“Mother of maidens protect us!” The black-haired courtesan appeared in the doorway, her black eyes wide as she surveyed the destruction in the workroom.

Dev jerked as if touched by magefire. He jumped to his feet and spat, “Jylla, what the fuck are you doing? I told you to get out of here!”

She approached, her gamine features set in stubborn lines. “I heard Callie screaming, and found Jesa and Loris dead. I came to see if you were all right.” She eyed Kiran with cool interest, showing no sign of being upset by his gaping wounds. “A mage survived an attack? That’s new, isn’t it?”

Kiran gathered himself to speak, fighting the pain. He had to tell Dev to make his friend leave. She had no binding to protect her. When his barriers failed, as they would all too soon from pain and blood loss, if she were the closest source she would meet the same fate as the kitchen servants.

The pounding thump of footsteps broke his concentration. Ruslan burst into the room at a near run, his face grim. Kiran swallowed his words, his heart thudding painfully in his chest. Too late now for a warning.

* * *

(Dev)

When Ruslan charged into the room, I swear I felt the touch of Khalmet’s bony hand on my shoulder. What the fuck had possessed Jylla to poke her nose in here instead of running like she had from the Aiyalen Spire? And how had Ruslan beaten the Alathians here? I’d signaled them before I even reached the workroom—where were they? I stared at Jylla, wishing I could make her disappear by force of will alone. She’d frozen in place like a hopmouse in the shadow of a desert hawk.

Ruslan took in the half-destroyed workroom in one quick glance. “Mikail,” he said, the name a command.

Across the room, Mikail stirred. He pushed himself up to his hands and knees, his head hanging low.

At my feet, Kiran let out a shaky breath. Relief softened the strain etched in his face. Personally, I was pretty fucking disappointed that Mikail had survived. Especially given the means he’d used to do it.

“I’m all right,” Mikail croaked. He staggered to his feet. Blood dripped from his sodden shirt, but the skin I glimpsed beneath was unmarked. He shook his head, as if to clear it. “Where’s the mage who attacked me? I couldn’t—” His gray eyes went wide as he caught sight of Kiran crumpled on the floor. “Kiran! Is he—”

“Do not concern yourself,” Ruslan said. “Our enemy escaped, though not unscathed, I suspect. As for your mage-brother…” He bent over Kiran, his expression growing stern.

“Kiran, why have you not obeyed me?” He sounded sorrowful rather than angry, but Kiran’s hands whitened on the bloodsoaked wad of my shirt. His blue eyes flicked between me and Jylla. The desperation in them chilled my spine. I took a slow step toward Jylla and willed her to look at me instead of the blood mages.

“Ruslan, please,” Kiran said, in a choked whisper. “Give me a
zhivnoi
crystal, I need…” He coughed, blood showing on his teeth.

Jylla finally looked my way. Low down at my side, I twisted a hand in one of our old signals, the one we’d used to abort a job if the risk was greater than we’d thought. Her mouth tightened, and she darted a glance at Ruslan. Thank Khalmet, his whole attention was focused on Kiran. She eased backward toward the door, and I prayed to all the gods that he wouldn’t notice.

“I see no reason to waste a
zhivnoi
crystal.” Ruslan folded his arms. “All you need is within your reach, Kiran.”

Shit. He meant me and Jylla. I stood closest. But Kiran had said I was safe. I remembered the needling rush that had raced over my skin when he grabbed my wrist in the hallway, the abrupt end to the horrible, draining weakness that had assaulted me. Whatever he’d done to protect me from Mikail might save me again—but it wouldn’t help Jylla.
Move faster,
I willed her. She was still ten paces from the door.

Mikail shuffled along the wall to block her path. He looked straight at me with a little, malicious smile, and his eyes said,
I don’t think so.
I suppressed a snarl of fury, wishing that the killer had ripped him to screaming shreds.

All at once, Mikail’s broad face lost its smile. He said reluctantly to Ruslan, “Your promise to Lord Sechaveh…”

Ruslan pointed one long finger at me without taking his eyes from Kiran. “He’s protected,” he said, his voice edged with irritation.

Surprise flashed in Mikail’s eyes. He scowled past me at Kiran.

“I did it to keep your promise,” Kiran said to Ruslan, still in that raw-throated whisper. He sounded earnest, but his eyes fell away from Ruslan’s as he spoke.

Ruslan surely guessed that wasn’t all of the truth. But he only said smoothly, “You see, you need not fear. Drop your barriers, Kiran,
and all will be well.”

Kiran swallowed, hard. His blue eyes were dark with pain, the pupils huge, and he looked at Jylla the way a man stranded in the desert might look at the snowcapped summits of the Whitefires.

Oh, fuck. Kiran had told me once that not taking life to heal an injury was like deliberately holding your breath: impossible to do forever. If I told Ruslan Jylla knew something important to the investigation, that might save her—for the five minutes it’d take him to tear her mind apart and leave her as good as a corpse. For all the pain she’d caused me, every fiber of me rebelled at the thought of those clever black eyes gone blank and dead.

I was lucky she wasn’t dead already—from what I knew of the mark-bond, Ruslan could easily force Kiran into killing Jylla. Instead, he stood watching Kiran with cold, unflagging patience.

Yet Ruslan’s stance didn’t match the patience on his face. His body held the eager, checked energy of a man anticipating some long-awaited event.

My throat locked. Shaikar take the soulless viper, he wanted Kiran to
choose
to kill someone.

“Drop your barriers,” Ruslan said to Kiran, his voice gone dangerously soft. Kiran shut his eyes and didn’t answer, sweat standing out on his brow.