Through the Veil (23 page)

He shouted something, but Morne just shook his head and smiled before he turned on his heel and walked off without looking back at Lee. Each step he took away from her seemed to clear her head, and by the time he was out of sight, Lee felt a little more like herself. She could think.

Lee could also hear, and that probably wasn’t a good thing, either, because for some reason, Kalen was pissed. She wasn’t quite sure why, but when she looked into his pewter gray eyes, there was no doubt about it. They glowed hot and bright, swirling from dark, thunderous gray to misty silver and back again. She hadn’t heard half of what he’d said, and nothing she had heard made sense. Slowly, she stood, her tense muscles uncurling. Sitting in one place for a couple of hours sure as hell made the body stiff.

“Would you quit yelling and tell me what in the hell the problem is?” she asked when he paused long enough to take a breath.

For a second, he looked a little startled. “What the problem is? What the problem is?” One hand shot out and fisted the neck of her tunic. He jerked and she flew forward, crashing into his body. “You spent the night in my bed. You’ve spent the past week in my bed. And I find you letting Morne put his hands all over you?”

Fury bubbled and spilled over, side by side with shock. She shoved at his chest and snarled at him. “You bastard. He didn’t have his hands all over me.” Had he? Hell, Lee couldn’t remember half of it. She remembered Morne slipping out of the woods. Approaching her. He had said some things, and like a forgotten song, his words lingered just beyond her grasp. But he hadn’t touched her, had he?

One side of her face burned. Itched. Vaguely, she remembered his hand there. Okay, maybe he had touched her. But just her face—that was it, she thought. And she couldn’t believe what Kalen was implying. He wasn’t really . . . But one look up at his face and she knew he was implying just that.

Lee twisted away from him. She struggled her way free from his arms and got loose, although she knew it was only because he let her go. They might insist she was some kind of warrior here, but she sure as hell didn’t feel like one. She knew the self-defense she’d learned through the Y—so what if it had seemed to come to her very easily? She’d gotten a brown belt in tae kwon do before she got bored and dropped out. But she didn’t think that compared to the kind of training these people had. Not just self-defense, but weaponry, battle tactics, subterfuge. Warrior stuff. And Kalen was about as hard core as it got, when it came to that warrior stuff. It didn’t make her feel any better to stand there and look at him and know that she couldn’t quite hold her own with him.

Shaken and hurt, Lee faced him with her hands bunched into fists to keep them from trembling. “You bastard,” she said, forcing the words through clenched teeth. There were others things she wanted to say to him, she knew it. But for the life of her she couldn’t form the words. So instead of saying anything, she just bent over and grabbed her gear from the ground. She jammed her arms into the cavinir jacket as she stomped away. The light, flexible armor molded to her skin, and instinctively, she wanted to jerk it off and toss it on the ground, stomp on it.

The armor seemed alive at times, too alien for words, yet another reminder that she wasn’t in Kansas anymore. Too damned far from home, and she didn’t even have a cute little dog in a basket to cuddle and take comfort from. No ruby slippers either.

Stuck here. Even though she was outside, it suddenly felt like everything was closing in on her. Lee couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think. She was too hot. Hot, irritable, confused—and scared. She’d felt something rumbling in the earth, and she’d felt the echo of power whispering to her when Morne touched her. Something familiar and terrifying all at once.

She started to head toward the small unit she shared with Kalen, but instead, her feet took another path. Retreating to the space she shared with Kalen wasn’t the answer. She needed someplace a little more neutral than that, although there wasn’t much neutral ground to be found here. And nothing that was hers.

Lee was almost shocked to find herself standing at the medicon. Eira lay inside, and oddly enough, Lee didn’t feel any of the resentment she’d felt every other time she’d been in Eira’s presence.

She felt—comforted, even though the sight of the old woman was enough to make her pause. Lee had seen stroke victims before, not often, but enough to recognize that that was what had happened. Half of Eira’s body seemed to work as it should. She could move her right hand and right leg, but she couldn’t even hold a brush in her left hand.

As advanced as the technology seemed in this war-torn world, they couldn’t undo the damage when part of the brain died.

“Something troubles you.”

Lee jerked at the harsh sound of Eira’s voice. Her words were slurred and she talked a little louder than necessary. It was like each word had to be ripped from her throat, and it gave her voice a guttural tone.

Her one good eye focused on Lee’s face, bright as a bird’s and full of curiosity. Eira patted the bed beside her and said, “Come. Sit.”

For a second or two, Lee considered leaving. But she really didn’t have anywhere else to go, and for some reason, talking with Eira felt—right. More, it felt like something Lee could call her own. Nobody had forced her here. She hadn’t come to train, and she hadn’t even come out of duty to check on the old woman.

So instead of leaving, she edged her way around the narrow cubicle that passed as a room and settled her hip on the edge of the bed. Concern welled inside as she studied Eira’s face.

A graying brow lifted. “What do you see when you look at me? A weak, sick old woman?”

With a sad smile, Lee shook her head. “A stubborn, strong one. A weak woman would have already died.”

Eira closed her eyes, but the corner of her mouth tugged up, pleased. “Strength, it’s something you need here.”

Lee shrugged. “I don’t know. I think strength would come in handy everywhere. Although it’s a bit more crucial here.”

They fell silent for a time. Eira spoke first. “Will you tell me what bothers you?” she asked. She spoke with odd little stops and starts, each word stilted.

Swallowing around the knot in her throat, Lee said, “Kalen. Morne. Everything.” She looked down and saw Eira’s hand close to hers. Cautious, she closed her hand around the other woman’s. When Eira squeezed her hand lightly, Lee found it a little easier to speak, but it wasn’t the issue with Kalen that came to mind.

“Can you draw power from the gates?”

Now, that seemed to surprise the old woman. Her lid flickered. Then she squinted, studying Lee’s face with shrewd eyes. “You saw them?”

“Yes.”

Eira’s face relaxed a little and she murmured, “Good. Good . . . So you saw the gates and the power there. A great deal of power.”

That was an understatement. The one brief glimpse she’d caught before Morne’s intrusion had been like staring at a tidal wave. Immense and unending. “I felt it.” She licked her lips and tried to puzzle her way through the thoughts jumbling in her head. There was something important about that power. She had sensed it, felt it. “The power at the gates—where does it come from?”

Eira smiled. “From life, Lee. Life is power. It sinks into the earth, all around us, and it waits.”

“Why is there so much at the gates?”

“The lives of two worlds are connected there. Many lives—it creates a great deal of power.”

Quietly, Lee asked, “Is the power dangerous?”

“Power is a weapon. Its danger lies in the hands of those who would wield it. But none from our world can tap into the power of the gates. It doesn’t know us. It doesn’t recognize us. Most of us cannot even see it, talent or no. Whatever power is needed to manipulate them, we do not possess it.”

“I was told that the power there isn’t stable. That you can’t tap into it. Who can manipulate it?”

Eira sighed. Her chest rose and fell in a heavy sigh. There was a faint, gurgling sound to her breathing, like there was fluid building up inside her lungs. Her lids drooped low over her eyes. “Warlords.”

Lee dropped her head into her hands. The Warlords. So far, she hadn’t seen the men that were spoken of only in whispers, usually followed by a sign that Lee had come to correlate with a Catholic crossing himself. As though even saying the word was enough to bring down the Warlords’ fury and the speaker needed divine protection. “So nobody here knows how?”

Eira’s undamaged lid lifted. Her gaze met Lee’s. “It is not that we do not know. We cannot. The gates recognize power, but it is selective. It does not seem to feel our power—the gate will open to a power it recognizes.”

“And it recognizes the Warlords?” She started to stand up and then she stopped. Looking at Eira, she leaned over and took the old woman’s hand. “Do you feel its power? I do—it’s like a song in my head. It was calling me, Eira.”

A small, secret smile flirted with the unaffected side of Eira’s mouth. “Tell me.”

So Lee did. When she got to the part about Morne, she skipped some of it. Like the way she’d felt almost hypnotized when he stared at her. The music she’d felt coming from him. And the part about Kalen. She wasn’t going to share that part. But the rest . . . yes, she told Eira about the music of the storm, the drums that seemed to call her name.

“Has it happened to you?” she asked when she finally finished. “Have you felt them?”

Eira was quiet for so long that Lee thought maybe the old woman had fallen asleep. “No. Magick isn’t a song to me. I haven’t heard these drums. But it doesn’t surprise me that you have heard them.” Eira yawned. “Lee, I need to rest. But come back—tomorrow. There are things I need to tell you, while I still can.”

Lee stood reluctantly. She wanted more answers. She was so confused. She murmured a good-bye, but Eira was already asleep.

“This is quite an opportunity.” Char glanced at his spy and nodded approvingly. “Yes . . . yes . . . a good opportunity. Tell me, my friend, where are their other witches?”

“Gone, Warlord. The old witch’s daughter left for the east. It’s safer there.” The spy smirked and added, “Relatively speaking.”

“Hmmm. And when Eira is gone, they have no true magick left?”

The spy shrugged. “What magick remains is minimal. A few soldiers that have small fighting magicks, but nothing impressive. There is one other powerful witch, a woman. But she’s young and she doesn’t know her power yet. She has mastered her minor magicks, but the true power still lurks deep inside, waiting to wake. Without Eira there to train her, she will pose very little opposition. I don’t know how reliable this woman is. She’s come and gone before, for years. When events take a turn for the worse, I imagine she will do as she’s always done and leave. When Eira dies, she will be the only one left with any true power, Warlord. The Sirvani have captured many that have been born the past few decades. The ones with significant power that haven’t been captured have either died during the battle or have left.”

Char tugged on his lower lip thoughtfully. “Not many witches left in this area at all.” If he didn’t already have other plans for his world, the lack of witches could prove to be a serious predicament. He did have his plans, though, and the witches bred well in captivity. Already the newest generation of Warlords was in training and proving to be quite powerful.

“What about the witch’s daughter? Their weapons aside, if their witches are truly gone, the Roinan Gate is all but ours. Quite a coup, yet I can’t see them leaving themselves so unprotected. They would send for help.”

“The only daughter she had left retreated into the east. They have sent for her, but it will take time for her to reach them. They still will not use anything but the most basic means of transport for fear of the wyrms.”

Char smiled. The wyrms had been an inspired choice. The High Lord had made few very wise decisions, but the wyrms were definitely one of them. It had been a risky choice, with possibly deadly consequences, sending battalions of Sirvani to the wetlands to harvest the wyrm larvae. The wetlands were far to the south, and the entire venture had taken decades to complete. The fools across the gate had no idea how long the Sirvani had been using their world as the breeding ground for the wyrms.

Wyrms were like addil fish, growing as large as their environment would allow. In the wetlands to the south where food was scarce and the wyrms overpopulated, the things didn’t grow so well.

But across the gates, the rich, fertile soil was like manna. They grew huge, so damned big they could swallow a flank of soldiers and still have room for more. And they were drawn to the pulse and thrum within the cities and towns. The power that the people relied on was like a siren’s song, calling to the ugly beasties. Or maybe a dinner gong, Char thought with a smile. The cities beckoned to the wyrms, and the wyrms learned quickly that where they sensed that pulse, they would find food.

It was the wyrms that had turned the tide. The resistance armies had held their own against the Sirvani, even against the demons that Taise had sent through the gate.

All of Taise’s plans had seemed madness at the time, at least to Char, who had seen the way the High Lord deteriorated, but that madness had worked in Char’s favor. Even as he shook his head in disgust at the way Taise had allowed the demons to run amok in Ishtan, Char hadn’t worried.

If he had been concerned about the continued need for slaves, Char would have been more worried, and indeed, he might have been forced to take drastic measures to protect the future of Anqar. But he already knew that they didn’t need Ishtan—it was like a mama weaning a babe. The babe would fight, but Char had no doubts he would prevail over it.

Once Taise was out of the way.

But the wyrms, yes, they were inspired. The resistance had proved helpless against the wyrms—they were all but defenseless. It was almost pitiful.

He heard a soft sound and glanced up to meet the gaze of his spy. A broad palm, scarred and calloused, was held out, and Char smirked. “Always the mercenary, aren’t you, old friend?”

A smile came and went. Char paid him, adding a little extra because the news had put him in such a good mood. Nature had done what his men had failed to do—eliminated the old witch. She might not be dead yet, but it wouldn’t be long, not if she had another attack. With the witch out of his way, the Roinan Gate would fall so much more easily. Lives would be lost, but mostly men. The resistance had finally figured out they were wise to get most of their women away from the gates. What few remained would be warriors and healers, and Char’s men knew that women weren’t to be harmed, if at all possible. Securing the gate and the land beyond it would take some time, but he had reliable men he would leave in charge of that.