Unspoken: The Lynburn Legacy (38 page)

Kami stepped into the shadow cast by the quarry wall
and wormed herself into her old hiding place. She was far bigger than she had been the last time she had tried this. Every extra inch of her was in pain, her head jammed painfully against her knees, but she was hidden just in time.

Rob Lynburn did not climb down into the quarry. He leaped, and landed on his feet on the quarry floor, knife in hand.

R
ob landed lightly for such a big man. Kami saw grit, the color of sand, crunching beneath his heels.

He had one hand braced on the side of the quarry as he leaned over his son. Out of the corner of her eye, Kami saw Rob’s hand: big, square, rough, and capable. She forced herself to stay quiet in her hiding place. She saw Angela lying perfectly still beneath her chains.

“You couldn’t do it?” Rob Lynburn sneered.

“I know her,” Ash said in a low voice. “I can’t … hurt someone I know.”

Kami heard the hesitation, the way he could not bring himself to even say “murder” or “kill.”

So did Rob.

“I wonder if you’ll ever have the strength to be a real sorcerer,” Rob said. Ash flinched at every word, as if each one was like his father was piling stones on his chest. “You have to understand they’re not like us. They would take control of us if they could. Would you want to be a slave to one of them like your cousin?”

Ash lifted his head. “No,” he said hoarsely.

Angela went tense. So did Kami.

Rob echoed their fear in a voice full of anticipation. “So have you changed your mind?”

Kami hated Ash for doing this to Angela, but something about his anguished face did make her wonder. What would have to happen, what pressure would have to be applied by someone who was supposed to love you, before picking up the knife seemed like your best option?

Ash’s restless, glittering gaze met Angela’s, wavered, and held.

“No,” he said. “I haven’t changed my mind.”

“Then I’ll have to do it,” said Rob, and pulled the larger Lynburn knife from his belt. It shone like treasure in the sunlight, marred by dark lines across the grooved blade. Kami realized the lines were her own blood.

The weapon made a bright arc as Rob swung it down toward Angela.

Angela rolled out from under the chains, gathering one up and wrapping it around her fist even as she whirled. She swung her chain into the side of Rob Lynburn’s head.

“Go on and try,” she suggested.

Now Kami understood what Ash had meant when he told her he had already chosen, when he told Angela that he had not changed his mind. He had set Angela free before Kami even entered the quarry, and they had arranged her chains to look like she was still bound.

Rob staggered. Angela hit him again.

Rob fell on his face and Ash scrambled away, dropping his knife as he retreated from his father. Kami watched as Angela stood braced, centering herself as Rusty had taught them, and brought the chain down in another unstoppable arc.

The end of the chain struck Rob on the face, laying open his cheek. There was blood on the stone now, but not the blood Rob Lynburn had been planning on. He would never have anticipated that an ordinary human could attack him like this. Angela brought the chain down again hard, splitting the skin of Rob’s back.

The floor of the quarry trembled, a crack running between Angela’s feet, and Angela pivoted and slammed her foot down on his neck.

“I don’t think so,” she said, and rained down blows.

The wish for revenge burned fierce in Kami too, along with Jared’s, protective and furious. Even so, Angela looked almost terrible. When Angela’s arm was caught and her next blow fell short and useless, she nearly snarled in thwarted rage, blinked and focused on Ash.

Ash was panting. “You can’t beat my father to death!”

“Can’t I?” Angela panted back. She let her mouth curve more fully, into the shape of a scythe. “Watch me.”

Ash did not let go of her arm. Angela looked down at Rob Lynburn.

Kami had promised to stay still and be quiet, no matter what. She believed in Angela enough to keep her promise. Rob was down, Ash was on their side, and Jared and Lillian were coming. They could contain Rob.

Angela flicked her gaze from the father back up to the son and stepped back abruptly. Then she offered Ash the hand not holding the chain.

Ash glanced at her upturned palm, then back at her face.

“You unchained me so I had a fighting chance,” Angela said. “Which, as you can see, is the best kind of chance. So
you can come with me and Kami, if you want. Or you can stay with him.”

They both looked down at the murderer, lying sprawled in his own blood at the bottom of the quarry.

Ash put his hand in Angela’s.

Angela turned, with a chain in one hand and Ash’s hand in the other, toward where Kami was hiding. “All right, Kami,” she called out, and moved toward her. “You can come out now.” Her eyes were blazing with pride and fury.

Kami was so proud of her, and so sorry about what she had to tell her.

“Angela,” she said. “Look behind you.”

Angela and Ash both whirled around. The blood was still there, scarlet trails over stone. But Rob Lynburn was gone.

Kami had only looked away for an instant. She had not considered how the wild power of the woods and a source’s blood might help a sorcerer heal.

Angela took a deep breath and said, low and calm, keeping her grip on Ash and her chain, “We should run.”

“You both run,” Kami told her. “Go get Jared and Lillian and Holly; they’re coming toward us. Find them and bring them here.”

“Why can’t you come too?” Angela snapped.

Kami saw fear under her anger for the first time. Angela was never, ever scared for herself. Kami looked at Ash’s face and saw he understood.

Kami kept her voice steady. “Because the rock has closed in on me. Rob did it, and I’m trapped. I can hold him off, I’m a source, but you need to go get help. Angela, I trusted you, please trust me now. Please go.”

Angela hesitated, then whirled around and left. She used her grip on Ash’s hand to help him as they scrambled out of the quarry, Angela more familiar with the terrain. She stood on the lip of the quarry and pulled him up to stand beside her with ease.

Kami watched their heads, one dark and one bright, going into the woods, until they disappeared from her sight.

Angela did not know Rob had spilled Kami’s blood with that knife. She did not know how weak Kami felt, trembling in her stone prison. She would be furious if she found out that Kami had made her leave when Kami could not defend herself, but Kami wanted to be sure Angela was safe.

Kami drew in a slow shuddering breath, and reached out for comfort where she could always find it.
I can hear him coming back
, she told Jared.
I’m scared
.

One of Rob Lynburn’s boots hit the heap of chains with a dull clang. Kami looked at him stepping over his own blood and shivered.

Don’t be scared
, Jared told her.
He won’t touch you. I’m coming, and I’m going to kill him
.

Kami swallowed. Her breathing was so loud in this small space, hissing and furnace-hot, like the roar of a dragon in its cave. She was afraid Rob might hear. Kami turned her head as far as she could and looked at the dark stone instead of at Rob Lynburn. She turned her mind toward Jared.
Come soon
.

The hollow closed in tighter on her, like a stone fist. Stone pressed against her back, her sides, and her face, cold against her lips. Its grip seemed to go right through her flesh and promise to grind her bones to powder. She could not help it: she let out a small, stifled sound of agony.

Rob Lynburn made a soft, delighted noise. “Come out,” he called.

Kami stayed where she was. The stone tightened around her. She did not know if she would be crushed or suffocated first. Jared’s cold, clear terror cut through the dark confusion of her brain.

If she did not get out of here, she was going to die. She had to take her chances with Rob.

“Come out,” Rob repeated. “Or be buried alive.”

She tried to will the stone to open and free her, but she had no air and he had her blood. Kami made a small, strangled sound of assent. The stone grip released her, easing by just a fraction. She turned her face toward the light and began to drag herself out on her raw, bleeding hands and knees.

Rob stood over her, smiling against the sun and looking like Jared’s dependable uncle. The knife was shining in his hand.

Kami looked up at him, her vision hazy so his golden hair blurred with the autumn leaves. She cleared her throat and whispered, low and hoarse, every word painful: “I’ll cut the link.”

Jared was running through the woods, trees and light going by in a blur. He could hear Holly and Aunt Lillian running after him, neither of them able to keep up. Holly was still shouting questions somewhere in his wake. Aunt Lillian had given up asking.

Jared’s heart was louder in his ears than their footsteps or
their voices. Most of him was with Kami, stone on all sides and closing in. He thought nothing would be able to stop him, and then Angela and Ash burst out of the trees.

Angela’s hair was tangled with twigs and leaves. Her mouth was a snarl, and from one of her hands a knotted chain swung. She looked ready to use it. Her other hand was in Ash’s. He looked as if he had gone wild too, but wasn’t adapting to it as well as Angela. His face was distorted and marked with signs of tears.

For a moment, they all stood staring at each other.

Then Holly shattered the stillness by throwing herself at Angela. “God, Angie!” she exclaimed, arms locked around her neck. “What happened?”

Angela started and went still, seemed about to say something and checked herself. Her face changed, the snarl dropping away. She dropped Ash’s hand and lifted her own hand to gently touch Holly’s bright hair.

Ash looked very alone. Jared felt a presence at his elbow and glanced to see his aunt Lillian had drawn level with him. She had her eyes fixed on her son.

“Yes, Ash,” she said, her voice horribly, ferociously calm. “What happened?”

Ash swallowed and suddenly looked innocent, a storybook hero beholding horror in the woods. Jared wondered exactly how much practice he’d had looking innocent for his mother. Nicola Prendergast had died the night she asked Ash for help. Jared was prepared to bet that Ash had told his father.

“Your husband is the one killing people,” Jared informed her flatly. “I’m guessing Ash knew it. And I don’t care which
of our nest is the worst monster, because he has Kami. We have to get to the quarry now!”

Angela’s eyes narrowed, the snarl returning. She looked eager to use that chain. Jared felt in perfect accord with her for the first time, and his lips curled in a silent snarl back.

Then they were all running, Angela holding Holly’s hand and carrying her along with them, Ash and Lillian at their backs. And still most of Jared was with Kami, alone with a murderer and trying to make a bargain.

Oh God, please don’t do it
, he begged her.
Please hold on. We’re coming
.

Kami spoke rapidly, ignoring her cracking voice, trying to replicate her usual reporter’s tones, sweeping someone into an interview with the force of sheer conviction. “That’s why you came to my house and told me I was the one who could break the connection. You’ve been recruiting sorcerers who you thought would agree with you about the best way to get power—you tried to recruit a stranger from London; why wouldn’t you want your own nephew? If I die, he dies. But you came to me and asked me to cut the link because you didn’t want him to die, and you didn’t want his powers to be chained to me. You want him free? I’ll free him.”

Kami could see the sudden calculation in Rob’s eyes. He had to believe she had a reason for severing the connection.

“I told you it was something I might want to do already, in my garden,” Kami went on. “I had no reason to lie. I might get magic out of the deal, but people shouldn’t be tied to each other like this. I don’t want either of us to be a parasite. I don’t
want his voice in my head, his feelings running through me like a disease. I want to be my own separate self. I was thinking of cutting the connection anyway. I swear I’ll do it.” She stopped, out of breath, her throat one long, silent scream of pain.