Fire in the Blood, page 46
Sairché’s wand lit. “Stay back.” Moriah’s eyes fluttered, but she didn’t move.
“Moriah?” Havilar said, easing a little nearer.
Moriah took three swaying steps forward. Havilar pulled back the blade to strike—whatever Moriah was, she wouldn’t harm Havilar. But the priestess’s leg buckled and she fell forward without even lifting a hand to break her fall.
Havilar crept just near enough to see her reddened, lifeless eyes, the still blades of grass beside her parted mouth. “She’s dead.”
“I can see that,” Sairché said. “Get away from her—she’s riddled with something.”
Havilar peered at the corpse—the same sores that had been eating at Irvel’s skin when they found him. “She followed us all the way from the Hullack like this?”
Soft footsteps approached and Havilar turned toward them, weapon raised. Brin stepped around the ferns. “We found Moriah,” Havilar said grimly. Brin smiled.
All the hairs on Havilar’s neck stood on end, and Zoonie let out a low growl.
“Well met again, Havilar,” Brin said, but it wasn’t Brin looking at her. It might have been his body, his face, his features, but the voice, the cold malevolence in his eyes was the same as whatever had looked out of Moriah. What had looked out of Crake, Havilar realized. It looked over at Sairché, dismissively. “Baatezu,” Brin said. “I see you haven’t scurried back to your master yet. Pity for you. Put the wand down or I’ll unmask you.”
Sairché lowered her weapon. “Who are you?” she asked, peering at Brin.
“Get away from him,” Havilar said, squeezing her glaive. But there was nothing to hit—it was Brin and something using him like a shield. Her heart started racing.
Brin clucked his tongue. “None of that now. You had your chance to come along easily, and you didn’t take it.”
“All I recall is you telling me not to trust devils.”
“You never let me finish. Let’s finish, Havilar.”
“First get out of him.” Havilar heard the tremor in her own voice.
“It’s quite simple,” the creature in Brin said. “You have something I need, locked deep inside you. First, I would be certain it is there and, to do that, I need you—Havilar—to get out of the way. Ideally, I would have found a way to possess you or the priestess would have had the sort of tinctures to lock you aside. Ideally, you would have been eager to aid me, but that moment has passed. So I need you to get very close with dear Moriah’s mortal coil and find a way to give yourself a fever, and get nice and addled for me.”
“A fever?” Havilar said. “That might take days.”
Something else smiled at her, twisting Brin’s face into an unfamiliar mask. “I can wait. I’ve waited a long time already. And when someone chooses not to aid me … I like to make sure they regret it. Touch the body.”
Havilar didn’t move. Brin stretched out his right hand, considering it. He took hold of his own index finger, met Havilar’s eyes, and wrenched it back with a sharp crack of bone. She clapped a hand over her cry of horror.
Brin smiled. “He means nothing to me. Do you understand that? I will cut his body apart, bit by bit, and all the while … he’s still here. He’ll know it’s your obstinance that’s killing him slowly, and he’ll feel every bit of it.”
“Don’t do it,” Sairché said. “You can fix a finger.” She tilted her head. “You can’t fix betrayal.”
Brin smiled. “But you can repay it. Touch the body, or we see how well he handles a broken leg next.”
Havilar clung to her glaive as she crouched down beside Moriah’s oozing corpse, swallowing against a lump in her throat. If she took the glaive to Brin, it would only hurt him, not the ghost. Crying out would alert the Shadovar. She glanced across the field to where Constancia and Mehen crouched behind an emptied henhouse. Constancia stared straight ahead in a way that Havilar knew meant she was focusing very hard on what lay to her side—on Havilar and the hellhound no doubt. The way the bracken grew, they couldn’t see Moriah, but they could see Brin and Havilar, if she stood.
“If his plight doesn’t move you,” Brin said, “there is always your own. I’m prepared to kill you and hold fast to your whole soul if need be. I’ve done it …” He trailed off, as if he forgot what he was saying, then blinked his eyes hard as if the ghost was reaffirming its control. “Touch the corpse.”
“Brin, I am so sorry about this,” Havilar whispered. In one swift move, she straightened, keeping her grip near the base of the glaive, and swung the flat side of the blade into Brin’s head. He gave a hideous, horrible grunt, and toppled over. Sairché cried out.
“Get back,” Havilar advised, as she turned to the sound of Constancia’s booted feet, the sound of a blade being drawn.
She dropped the glaive, hands raised high. “Ghost!” she hissed, as loudly as she dared. “Turn it! Turn it before he wakes!”
For a moment, she thought that Constancia wouldn’t stop in time, that the paladin’s blade would take her. Beside her, Zoonie coiled as if to spring. Mehen was rushing across the gap to tackle the knight.
But Constancia looked down at Brin as he stirred, that alien malevolence shining through his eyes for the briefest moment.
The ghost contorted his face in terror. “She killed Moriah,” he whispered. “She was going to kill me. Constancia, help.”
The paladin’s expression hardened. Her hand went to the gauntlet symbol welded to her armor. “By Loyal Torm I cast thee back to Kelemvor’s mercies,” she intoned. A bright light swelled around the symbol, surging down Constancia’s hand as she slammed it against Brin’s chest. The air went out of him in a whuff, his eyes bulging, and he screamed in two terrible voices, twining together. The something that smelled of mildew and brimstone and ice streamed out of his nose and mouth and ears, thick as blood and swirling in a strange cloud over him. Brin stopped screaming, went slack.
Shouts. A trumpet’s blare.
Constancia’s eyes were ice. “Get him on that stlarning animal and run.”
Glaive in the harness—Havilar hauled Brin up and over Zoonie’s shoulders, pulling herself up behind him. Up the rise, through the forest—if they glimpsed the hellhound, there was no way the Shadovar wouldn’t chase it. The hellhound lurched forward, then yelped as another weight settled behind Havilar.
“You are not leaving me behind,” Sairché said as Zoonie started forward, into the brush again. An arrow zinged past them. The shouts of the Shadovar soldiers came nearer—at least a dozen. She glanced back, past Sairché—a score. Were the others running?
“If ever there was a time I needed to pull you back—”
“You’re not pulling me anywhere,” Havilar snapped, as Zoonie hauled herself up onto the rise. Havilar turned and shoved Sairché off the hellhound’s back and onto the grass. “And I’m not taking our wizard. Throw spells at them, and run if you have to.”
“You little fool!” Sairché shouted. “Where are you going?”
“To distract them,” Havilar said grimly. She leaned over Brin’s slack form and spoke in Zoonie’s pricked ear. “Can you make a lot of fire?”
Zoonie yelped twice and then a third, deeper bark that sent a plume of flame out over the brush. She shook her head, raining sparks.
“Good girl.” Havilar wrapped the chain around her fist and one arm around Brin. “Let’s go.”
Freed of the extra weight, the hellhound bounded down the steep slope, darting between the trees. The others were hurrying up the same slope, off to Havilar’s left, and as she passed, she heard Constancia shout at her, but she paid it no mind.
Zoonie raced toward the Shadovar soldiers—all ordinary men and woman armored in black—jaws sparking through the muzzle. She darted near enough for Havilar to glimpse the whites of one terrified soldier’s eyes as he scrambled to a stop. Zoonie snarled at him, and bounded toward the road.
Havilar couldn’t understand the shouted orders, but a blaze of blue-black magic seared through the air past her head, and when she glanced back, a solid half of the soldiers—including their wizard—were chasing her. Zoonie stopped, prancing in a circle, as if she wanted to dive back into the attackers racing toward them. Another blast shot past Havilar.
“Go!” she shouted, tugging on the chain. “Lead them off.”
Another fiery bark, and the hellhound ran for the road—it was all Havilar could do to hold tight to her and to Brin. They broke out into the road. More shouts—another band of Shadovar soldiers had stood at a blockade there. Havilar cursed and nudged the hellhound to go faster, farther. From up on the ridge, a smattering of burning hail rained down on the Shadovar. She was far enough ahead they might not catch her. A swarm of arrows zipped past—
She felt the first arrow’s impact in the back of her shoulder before the pain registered, knocking the wind from her and abruptly sapping the strength from the arm around Brin. She gave a wordless cry as pain burned through her. The second didn’t hurt nearly as much, buried below the first.
Run, she thought. Run, run, run.
A whirl of shadows—a gray-skinned man suddenly stood in the road, one hand upraised. A pulse of energy, cold and airless, slammed against them and Zoonie’s legs went out from under her as she scrabbled to a stop. Havilar clung to Brin as they were thrown free. The arrows snapped beneath her, driving another cry of pain from Havilar.
“Well, well,” the shade said. “What a strange little spy.”
Havilar clambered to her feet, sliding the glaive from its harness. Her vision swam as she did, but she kept herself firm—this was no time to faint. Dimly she heard Zoonies’s pained whine. She stepped between Brin and the shade, and he smiled.
“You’re going to die one way or another,” he said. “But come with me first, and I promise it will be swift.”
Havilar shifted her grip, focusing on him instead of the screaming pain in her back. “Better fools than you have tried.”
The shade’s smile widened as he drew his sword, shadows unfolding from the blade.
He darted forward, so fast that Havilar didn’t have time to think, only move. The sword’s strike rattled her glaive—once, twice. She caught both, and sidestepped a third before slicing the blade down toward his shoulder. The shade seemed to blur, to skip across her vision. Devilslayer cut through the empty air and the sword came at her from the right now.
Twist. Swing the butt of the glaive up—the shade stumbled back. But he was coming at her again, and Havilar’s feet danced backward before she could tell them to. Her vision prickled, a thousand tiny lights flashing around the edges, and her ears ached with Zoonie’s whines. She lunged forward with the glaive, forced the shade back—away from Brin, away from Zoonie.
Gods, gods, any minute those archers would be here. She slashed at him, quick as the glaive would move, but he only retreated. He’s wearing you out, she thought. Henish. Her shoulder was screaming, pain all down her arm. Her grip was weakening.
The shade attacked again, his blade so quick it might have been made of shadow and air. But it struck the glaive’s shaft with the joint-shaking strength of steel.
Any moment now, she thought. You have to end it.
She dived forward, past his guard, and managed to pull the glaive’s heavy blade up into the joint of his arm. But the sword came around her side, slamming into her ribs. The air exploded from her lungs. A lightning bolt of pain exploded across her ribs, tangling with the pain from the arrows. Havilar hit the road.
The shade came to stand over her. “Now. Will you come give Lady Marsheena and Prince Yder your audience?” he said. He twirled the sword that still leaked shadows. “Or shall we continue?”
Havilar couldn’t draw breath enough to answer. She looked past the shade, at Brin struggling up from the ground, at Zoonie trying to regain her feet—
A dark shape plummeted out of the sky, larger than any hawk. Sairché, redskinned and bat-winged once more, hit the shade square in the shoulders with both feet, driving him hard into the ground. His head slammed against the road, stunning him. Sairché checked the fingers of her left hand, then wrapped her fist around the silvery ring there and punched him hard in the back of the skull. A burst of light exploded outward. The man screamed, an unearthly sound, as the radiance seemed to scour the shadow from his body. Sairché pulled the dagger from her belt and plunged it into his back, before stepping off of him.
“Listen, you little mongrel,” Sairché said, coming to stand over Havilar. “I don’t care who you’re the Chosen of, don’t you push me off that shitting hellhound again. I have one job here, and it should be simple! If you so much as look cross-eyed at another Netherese soldier, I swear on everything you hold dear, I will drag you back to the Hells, back to that shitting stasis cage and I will feed the trigger ring to the godsbedamned Dragon Queen and let you guess which head got it!”
She pulled a small vial from her pocket, checked it, and dropped it on Havilar. Then she retied the chain she wore about her neck, resuming the appearance of an older human woman. “Drink the potion, get up, and let’s get out of here.”
“You’re not coming with us.”
For a terrible moment, Havilar was afraid it was the strange ghost again. But when she lifted her head enough to see, it was Brin—only Brin—rising to his feet, the holy symbol of Torm grasped in his whole, shaking hand.
“Well,” Sairché said, “I suppose that little ruse is ended.”
“Quite right,” Brin said. The symbol in his hand took on a faint shimmering.
Sairché sneered at him. “As if that’s worked for you lately.”
Brin never took his eyes off the cambion. “Havi,” he asked, “did you know?”
“Brin,” she managed. She pulled herself up onto her hands, and nearly vomited from the pain. Zoonie was opposite her, standing with one hind leg tucked up, one front leg bent.
“Did you know?”
“She has arrows in her back and a rack of broken ribs from trying to save your pitiful self,” Sairché said. “Drink your bloody potion.” She stared back at Brin. “And then get up: we’re leaving.”
Havilar shook her head. She’d rather wait here for the Shadovar archers.
“No, you aren’t. You’re right,” Brin said. “Torm hasn’t been answering my prayers the way I’d have hoped. But this one’s been enchanted with something extra.”
A ball of burning light struck Sairché between the shoulder blades, knocking her forward. She spun around to face Constancia, storming across the road toward her.
“And Torm seems to like her fine,” Brin finished.
Sairché threw herself out of the reach of Constancia’s sword, nearly tripping on the dead shade in the process. The knight advanced, but the devil was quick. Sairché pulled the ring from her finger and, with a last glance at Havilar, blew through it, casting a whirlwind that sucked her out of the plane and back to the Nine Hells.
Constancia’s sword sliced through the air where she’d been, landing with a clank against the paved road.
“Havi!” she heard Mehen shout. “Havi!” He was running down the hill toward them, sword out. Kallan and Irvel behind him. Havilar’s arm was shaking.
Constancia turned, sword on the dragonborn. “Stay back. Your daughter’s been in league with devils.”
Mehen didn’t slow. “My daughter is injured.”
“Constancia,” Brin said. “Put your sword down. The devil’s gone.”
“One devil’s gone. And what did she do but run you straight into our attackers?”
Havilar’s arm buckled, no longer able to hold her, and her vision closed briefly. She woke to Kallan tipping a healing potion into her mouth, Brin close beside, while Mehen shouted at Constancia.
“Havi,” Brin said, smoothing a hand over her cheek. “Did you know she was Sairché?”
Tears flooded Havilar’s eyes—how could she have thought it was a good idea to keep it a secret? It seemed so obvious that it was always going to get away from her.
“I didn’t have a choice,” she said. Then, “I didn’t think I had a choice.”
“Will you all hush!” Irvel shouted. “Someone’s coming.”
Havilar jolted upright. “Archers. There were archers—”
An arrow landed with a meaty thwack in the dead shade’s thigh. Another clattered to the pavement. Another grazed Brin’s arm.
“Move!” Mehen bellowed. Havilar scooped up her glaive. Zoonie barked and tried to follow.
“Havilar, come on!” Mehen shouted.
Sairché’s healing potion still lay on the ground where she’d left it. No one else had seen it, so no one else had fed it to her. Havilar snatched it up and jammed the end of it through the muzzle’s cage and into Zoonie’s mouth. The dog balked, but Havilar held the vial firm. An arrow hit Zoonie in the hindquarters, and she leaped out of Havilar’s grip on new-healed legs. Havilar sprinted after, chasing Mehen and the others toward the trees, toward cover.
Then over the rise, another army appeared, and her heart nearly stopped—how could they be expected to outfight yet another enemy?
And then she saw the fireball scream out of the hands of the dark-haired woman hanging in the air beside the lead riders and slam into the ground at the center of the Shadovar archers.
Pikemen ran ahead of the riders and it was all Havilar could do to get out of their way. Mehen caught hold of her and pulled her close. A rain of arrows fell from the sky, sent this time by Cormyrean bows to clear the way for the pikemen. The riders came up the sides, closing the paths into the woods.
Another rider, a man in a purple tabard, came forward and reined his horse in beside their little party. Zoonie gave a low, rumbling growl. He was dark-haired and a bit thick, like a dock worker or a butcher—all muscle with a layer of softness.
“Cousin,” the dark-bearded man said, with a little smile. “How very fortuitous.”
“Erzoured,” Irvel said, chillier than Havilar expected. “What are you doing here?”
The man gave Irvel a grin that put Havilar entirely too much in mind of Lorcan. “Winning your war, Your Majesty,” he said. “Shall we help you home?”
