Читать книгу Shadowborn - Katie MacAlister - Страница 8

Chapter 2

“Why aren’t any spirits attacking us? Shouldn’t there be spirits attacking us? I was told there were going to be spirits everywhere, blighting the land and slaying the living, and yet all I have seen that was even remotely threatening was a one-legged harlot who seemed to feel you owed her money for services rendered several years ago.”

Hallow, riding next to Deo, looked first askance at his companion, then over his shoulder to where Allegria, the light of his life and fire in his loins, rode chatting with the red-headed Shadowborn woman she had taken under her wing. Allegria hadn’t been all too pleased when the harlot had accused him of partaking of her wares and slipping out without paying—which Hallow had not done, since he had always been very scrupulous about such things—and now he sensed a bit of frostiness lingering in his wife’s gaze when it rested on him. “Yes, well, I think the less mentioned about the lady in Bellwether, the better. As for the Eidolon…”

His words trailed away as a growing sense of unease prickled along his spine. He rubbed the back of his neck, eyeing again the thick copse of trees lining either side of the road that led eastward, toward Kelos. There was no sign that anything was amiss, but he felt as if his nerves were twitching a warning that danger lay all around them, ready to spring upon the unwary.

“They certainly aren’t the threat I was promised,” Deo grumbled, looking dissatisfied.

“You are the only man I know who gets snappish when someone isn’t trying to kill him,” Hallow commented with a wry sense of humor that he knew Deo would ignore. Allegria would have appreciated it, though. He glanced back to smile at her, hoping that her partiality to him would thaw any remaining coldness regarding their landing at Bellwether, but even as he caught her eye, a flicker of movement to the side had him suddenly filled with rage.

Arcany pricked his palms as he pulled on the light of the stars that sat behind the sun, but the chaos magic within him rode high, filling him with a red-hot anger that threatened to spill out at the potential threat to his beloved.

A man emerged from the woods with a basket of fallen branches strapped to his back. He watched the company ride by for a few seconds before lifting his hand in greeting and turning to march off to what was no doubt his home.

“Hallow?” Allegria pressed her heels into her mule, pushing between his horse, Penn, and Deo’s massive black charger. “What’s wrong? Why have your runes lit up like a lantern? Do you sense something? Is it the Eidolon? Ella,” she turned in her saddle and called back to the Shadowborn woman, “tighten your bowstring, and make sure your quiver is at hand.”

“At last!” Deo said, his voice full of satisfaction. He pulled his sword from his back scabbard, glancing around quickly. “Where are they, Hallow? I see naught. Are they visible only to your eyes? That will make it a bit more difficult to smite them, but if you tell me where they are, I will take care of them.”

“There’s nothing,” Hallow said quickly, subduing the various magics that twisted inside him in what seemed to be an endless dance. The arcane power that he pulled easily from the sky even when Bellias Starsong was hidden, as she was now, was as natural to him as breathing. The blood magic that he’d gained during his visit to Eris was a little less natural, its complexity shifting and changing even as the chaos magic roared to life, drenching him with a hot, burning need. The runes etched in silver and bound to his wrists and ankles kept the chaos from overwhelming him, but lately, as his body learned to cope with the three different types of magic dwelling within, the chaos magic’s rush of red power had shifted from the urge to destroy to one much less lethal.

Although certainly more embarrassing.

“Allegria,” he said, his voice husky with desire. The need to slake suddenly overwhelming urges on her body rode high when the chaos magic chose that outlet for its power. There was a plea in his voice for her to move away from him, to give him the space he needed whenever the chaos took over his emotions.

Not that he often had been successful in quelling its demands by such means. Usually, he just hustled her off to whatever bedchamber had been assigned to them and indulged his desires, leaving them both boneless and sated. And although Allegria had said she understood the situation, and never blamed him when he interrupted her with one of the chaos times (as he’d come to think of them), of late she had started to bandy about the phrase, “my lusty stallion”— not at all a nickname he relished.

He’d always been in control of the magic he wielded, dammit, and he wasn’t about to be known as a man who couldn’t so much as glance at his wife without being driven to bed her. Vigorously. Sometimes multiple times a day.

“I don’t see anything,” Allegria was telling Deo, scanning both the tree line and the road ahead. “And the Eidolon I met were quite visible. I don’t think they could be in a corporeal state if they weren’t visible, could they? Hallow, do you know if—” Her eyes widened, accurately reading the mingled desperation, apology, and sexual desire in his eyes. She blinked for a moment, then gave a little chirrup of laughter that she hid with a hand placed over her mouth. “Oh. I see. It’s…uh…no, Deo, get back on your horse. There are no Eidolon here. Hallow was…mistaken.”

It was too much for him. He pulled Penn aside, dismounting and dropping the reins with an order for the horse to stay put. “I believe I need to…er…” He gestured toward the woods, unable to drag his mind from the struggle to control the chaos magic’s lustful demands.

“Ah?” Deo made a face, then nodded. “Yes, I need to make water as well. Too much ale from the one-legged harlot that you refused to pay.”

Hallow would have liked to dispute that comment, but the sooner he removed his body from the temptation of his delectable wife, the sooner he would regain the upper hand with the chaos magic. He stumbled off to the copse, swearing under his breath at the loss of control, promising himself that just as soon as they took care of the Eidolon threat, he would focus his attention on mastering the magic that had been forced upon him. Perhaps new runes? He’d never heard of protection against lustful urges, but he would simply have to search the library of the former master of Kelos for what aids he could find.

Everyone had evidently decided that this was indeed the perfect moment for a nature break, because the sounds of their small company dismounting reached his ears as he pushed deeper into the woods, his hands fisted as he struggled to control the arousal that gripped his entire body. If he could just have a few minutes to himself, he knew he could best it. At least until the next time he felt threatened.

“Hallow?” Allegria’s voice wrapped around him like silken threads. Rustling sounds accompanied his name, along with the snapping of twigs. “Are you all right?”

“Don’t,” he warned, doubled over. His fists pressed hard into thighs while he struggled to leash the chaos that threatened to overwhelm him. One abstracted side of his mind mused over the fact that in recent days, the chaos power was gaining strength. Where once it had lain simmering inside him, controlled by the runes on his wrists and ankles, now it fought him whenever a strong emotion was triggered. “I can’t…don’t come any closer, else…else…”

“Else you’ll make incredibly hot, fast love to me?” Her voice was filled with amusement, even as it stroked over his skin like the softest of silks, making him shudder with want and need and desire, all tangled up with the soul-deep love he felt for her.

He moaned, and suddenly, she was there, her summery scent of flowers in the afternoon sun filling his senses, her hands on his back, stroking him, no doubt intending to convey comfort, but it was too much, all too much.

“Allegria,” he snarled, whirling around, his gaze scorching over her body despite the faded and worn Bane of Eris tunic that obscured it. “If you don’t want me to pin you up against the tree behind you, and impale you on a penis so hard it could probably be used to take down the tree itself, then you had best run. Now.”

She eyed him for a moment, concern making the gold flecks in her ebony eyes glitter. Then suddenly she smiled, and without a word, peeled off both the tunic and leggings that covered her lush, long legs, legs that he knew wrapped around his hips perfectly, as if she had been created just for him.

A wordless moan of need escaped his lips. Unable to bear it any longer, he almost ripped off his own tunic and breeches, then lunged, the chaos driving him into action. But his love, his need to give her the pleasure she brought him just by existing, tempered his movements, gentling his actions so that when he suited deeds to words and pinned her against the tree, she was moaning into his mouth, her legs wrapped tightly around him as he plunged into her body.

They didn’t last long, but that, too, was common in recent days. Before he’d been forced to consume chaos magic, he had preferred to pay lengthy homage to her body before allowing himself release; now it was simply a matter of trying to bring her pleasure before he lost all control.

“I have to say,” Allegria noted a few minutes later, when he let her slide down his body until her feet were once again on the ground, “I really don’t mind your chaos moments. I know you don’t like them because you think it’s the chaos controlling you, but really, Hallow, that was perfectly splendid. Fast, but splendid. Your hip flexibility is a wonder to behold. And that little twist you did—hoo! If such a thing were not unsavory, I’d say you should hold classes to teach other men how to do that thrusting twist. It was most effective.”

He laughed even as he bent to retrieve the clothing that had been strewn on the branches and ground, one half of his mind filled with sated thoughts, the other worried that his need for her was growing stronger each day. “I appreciate your wishing to share the twist—which was inspired by the very same twist you used when you rode me last night—but I would have no idea what to charge for such a class, let alone where I would hold it. My heart, I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

He asked the last when she grimaced while lifting a foot to pull on her leggings, making quick work of the cross ties. “Not at all, although if we have very many more of the false alarms that kick your chaos magic into a blaze, I will end up walking funny. I grimaced because I had a twinge in my posterior. All that time sailing has weakened my saddle muscles.”

He gave her a quick leer as he finished dressing, calling out an answer when Deo bellowed impatiently for them before saying, “I will be happy to massage your abused parts later, but if I tried it now, we’ll both be walking funny.”

She took his hand as he led her through the woods back to the road, casting him a glance that turned from amusement to concern. “We’ll figure out something, Hallow. I’ll talk to Deo about adding more runes to the cuffs. Mayhap that is all that is needed.”

“Mayhap,” he said, but he had a feeling it was going to take more than a few extra containment runes to push the chaos back to its dormant state.

* * * *

It took them two days to ride to Kelos, but the rune that Deo recommended when they stopped the first night seemed to help cage the chaos beast that raged inside him, so that by the time the lone standing tower was visible in the distance, Hallow felt a bit more in control, and ready to face what lay ahead.

“I have to admit that I’m surprised we haven’t encountered any Eidolon,” he said quietly to Allegria where they rode at the rear of their company. Deo and Quinn, the lifebound captain who’d grudgingly allowed himself to be swept into their plan to subdue the Eidolon before turning their respective attentions to locating Nezu, argued over the best way to remove troublesome spirits from the mortal plane. “No one I spoke to in the three towns we’ve passed through has seen so much as a ghostly wisp, let alone a murderous thane and his soldiers.”

Allegria gave a little shiver, rubbing her arms before deftly keeping her mule Buttercup from nipping the rump of the horse in front of them. “You don’t know just how deadly that thane can be. If he’s out of his crypt, and as angry as Sandor said, then I suspect he’s laying plans that go beyond the mere slaughtering of people near Kelos.”

“What sort of plans?” he asked, his curiosity getting the better of him. He had little knowledge of the Eidolon other than what Allegria had told him, and brief mentions in the journals of the former Master of Kelos. “Do you believe they wish to rule Kelos? There isn’t much there but the spirits who are bound to the land, and they are mostly peaceful.”

She raised an ebony eyebrow, silently reminding him that both the captain of the guard and the other spirits had attacked them when they’d first arrived at Kelos.

“Mostly,” he repeated, smiling at her.

“I don’t know what the thane is up to,” she answered after letting her fingers trail over his hand where it rested on his thigh. The chaos magic threatened to wake up at her touch, but he clamped down hard on it. She hesitated, her brows pulling together for a few seconds. “I just have a feeling that he’s up to something. When Sandor said that the Eidolon were running amok, I had the same sort of idea you had—that they were killing anything that lived. But no one seems to have heard of the Eidolon doing anything. It just seems odd, don’t you think?”

“Yes,” he said, absently capturing her hand when she would have withdrawn it, and twining his fingers through hers. “I think that Deo will have the opportunity he seeks to destroy spirits, although I have no idea how he expects to do that when chaos magic is powered by the act of death.”

“I have the exact same worry. I might be able to do it, though.” Allegria sighed and glanced upward, where a few fluffy clouds hid Kiriah Sunbringer from their view. “If Kiriah would remember that I exist, that is.”

Hallow decided that the time was right to broach a subject he’d had some time to think over. If nothing else, it would focus his attention away from just how warm her hands were, and how much he loved their touch. “Does it not occur to you that perhaps Kiriah is withholding herself from you in order to protect you?”

She shot him a startled glance. “Protect me how? I’m a lightweaver, Hallow—wielding Kiriah’s power is what I do. I shouldn’t have to be protected from it.”

“Not her power, no, but—” He hesitated, thinking of how best to put his thoughts into words that wouldn’t insult her. “But perhaps she wishes to keep her power from you so that it cannot be used by another.”

“Another? What other? Who could possibly be able to use the power of Kiriah other than a lightweaver, and possibly a priestess of her temple?” Her eyes narrowed in thought. “Sandor might, but I can’t believe she would misuse such a blessing. Besides, one of the older priests once said that in her youth, Sandor had a sword made up of sunlight, and that she used it to banish the old ones. She has plenty of power of her own, so she need not poach mine.”

“Old ones?” he asked, his mind quickly rifling through the various facts gleaned from his readings. “The stone giants?”

“Yes. But no one has ever seen this sword. Once, when I was a girl, I asked Sandor if it was like my light animals, and she told me it was not a subject fit for discussion, which really doesn’t answer anything, does it?”

He chuckled at the expression of annoyance that crossed her face, wanting badly to kiss her, but knowing full well that although Buttercup tolerated Penn as she did no other horse, there were limits to what she considered her personal boundaries. Instead he squeezed Allegria’s hand and said simply, “There is one who is strong enough to wield the power of Kiriah. Indeed, if what Queen Dasa said is true, he has long sought it.”

“Who—oh.” Allegria looked thoughtful. “But Nezu is a god, himself. Why would he covet Kiriah’s power when he has his own?”

“A power that is limited in scope,” he pointed out.

“Now that he’s off Eris, you mean?” she asked.

“Being bound to Eris was what kept him from accessing power, not the reverse,” he gently corrected her. “Did you not hear the queen discussing what she’d learned of her time with Racin?”

“Before we sailed, when you and Lord Israel were closeted with her? If you recall, that was the morning Quinn decided Ella’s upper story was sufficient to be worthy of his notice, and she stabbed him in the thigh with a fork. I had to intervene before things got too out of hand, so I missed everything the queen said, although you told me it was nothing of great importance. Were you wrong?”

“No. Yes. Possibly,” he said, first shaking his head, then shrugging. “The queen said Racin—or Nezu, as I suppose we should call him now—was banished to Eris by the twin goddesses. The fact that he was able to leave Eris to travel to Genora proves he had greater mastery over the chaos magic than I suspect they realized.”

Allegria seemed to chew that thought over. “That’s why you think Kiriah has withheld her power from me, leaving me a lightweaver with no light? So that Nezu can’t get it? I don’t think I understand how he could take from me a magic granted by the goddess.”

“He’s a god,” Hallow pointed out with another little shrug. “He managed to break his exile. I doubt stripping Kiriah’s magic from you would be impossible for him.”

She was silent, her fingers withdrawing from his. He wanted to take her into his arms, to breathe in the sun-warmed wildflower scent that seemed to cling to her no matter how long she spent in the saddle, and reassure her that all would be well, but he knew she had been greatly troubled by the loss of her connection to the goddess she served. She needed time to consider this new thought.

His concern for Allegria was shoved aside when the road curved and twisted its way to the ruins of the once brilliant Kelos. Hallow paused, hearing faint sounds lifted high on the air. He listened intently for a few moments, the entire company halting when Deo, in the lead, reined in his horse and lifted his hand in warning to the others.

Instantly, the chaos magic inside Hallow burned to life, but he was prepared for that, and pulled hard on the power of Bellias, filling his being with arcany. Its familiar sensation gave him the strength to harness—at least temporarily—the insidious red chaos that demanded so much.

The others—Ella, the little vanth Dexia, and Quinn—all halted, obviously catching the distant sound as well.

And then Hallow was flying forward, leaning low over Penn’s neck, his hands drawing symbols even as he heard the sound of hoofbeats behind him, the shout of “Come on, Buttercup!” telling him that Allegria had gotten the jump on Deo.

Ahead, the crumbled outer wall spilled into the road with spiky fingers of stone that had once been smooth and white, but were now dusted with the gray grime that coated everything in Kelos. Half-standing walls dotted the area, with sharp remains of columns that had once been decorated with stars and moons, now stood as a sad reminder that even a place as venerated as Kelos could fall. Penn leaped one of the fallen columns when Hallow, with his eyes on the figure that flickered back and forth just beyond a pile of rubble, started murmuring spells. He was off Penn, and flinging arcany at the figure. At the same moment he heard a twang, and felt the air next to him ripple as an arrow sailed past and hit the figure just as his arcany peppered it with a dozen little holes of purest starlight.

The Eidolon—and Hallow had no doubt that the now-corporeal being with white, wispy hair flowing around his head like water was indeed one of the warrior race that had inhabited Alba before the coming of the Starborn and Fireborn—shrieked. It turned toward them, but its form melted into nothing, the strain of retaining a wounded corporeal form too much.

The spirit who had been fighting the Eidolon was one of the members of the guard that kept the other spirits in line. He turned a grateful look on Hallow, panting as he made a bow, his voice breathless when he spoke. “Master of Kelos, you are a sight most welcome to my eyes. The captain has been awaiting your—”

The man stopped when a sword was thrust through his chest. He stared down at it in surprise for a moment, then looked up to Hallow, his face filled with regret even as his form dissolved into nothing.

Another arrow split the air, catching the Eidolon who had impaled the guard in the throat. He snarled and yanked it out, stalking forward, a massive sword held in one hand, obviously prepared to cleave his enemies in two.

A roar sounded behind him even as Hallow rained down arcany on the Eidolon, melting him where he stood.

“Eidolon!” Deo bellowed, jumping onto the fallen column to quickly assess the situation before leaping off it with a cry that Hallow knew full well expressed unbridled joy.

There was nothing Deo liked more than a reason to fight.

“To the left,” Allegria said, firing two more arrows before following Deo.

Kelos was originally laid out in a series of concentric rings, the center of which was the sole intact structure, the Master’s Tower, where he and Allegria resided. Normally, a hush lay over the ruins, the grey ground muffling all but the sharpest of sounds. Now, however, the entire north side was filled with bodies as the spirits who resided there, once arcanists and learned men and women, fought two dozen of the biggest men Hallow had ever seen. They weren’t huge, like the Harborym, but tall and thin, and all of them wore the armor of an age long past, their long white hair whipping around them as they spun, slashed, and stabbed.

Hallow didn’t pause to consider the irony of spirits fighting other spirits—he simply ran when Allegria slid off Buttercup, nocking another arrow. “Hallow! That’s the thane over by the armory.”

He ran, gathering up arcany from the skies above and the ground below, the power of life from all living things surrounding him.

Allegria paused long enough to yell back instructions to her apprentice. “Ella, keep to the fringes and watch Quinn’s back. Quinn?”

Quinn nodded, gripping the scimitars he favored. “I’ll keep an eye on her.”

Dexia, the being of dark origins who appeared to be nothing more than a girl child of approximately ten summers, dashed past Hallow, showing a mouthful of extremely pointed teeth, and with a shriek, flung herself on a spirit that was about to cleave Deo’s head from his body. Her hands and teeth shredded the form of the spirit before he even knew what was happening.

Reddish gold light flowed around Deo when he slammed magic into another Eidolon, causing the warrior to burst into a shower of silver rain. Hallow sighted the thane, one of the three kings who ruled the Eidolon, fighting a familiar ghostly form.

The captain of the Kelos guard was doing his best to keep up with the thane, but even as Hallow watched, the captain was cleaved in two, from his shoulder down to the opposite hip.

Anger roared to life in Hallow. Ever since Hallow had assumed his role as Master of Kelos, the captain of the guard had been nothing but a burr in his side, but the captain was his burr, and no one else had a right to smite him. He allowed the chaos magic to slip out of control just a little, sending out a wave of the sickly red energy that destroyed everything it touched. Unfortunately, the thane had seen Allegria and, obviously remembering her visit to his crypt, yelled an oath and charged toward her.

Hallow spun around to help Allegria, but another Eidolon leaped forward, slicing at his leg, cutting deep into his thigh and making him stagger to the side. “Allegria! Behind you!” he yelled, warning her of the oncoming thane. She turned from where she’d taken up a position on the fallen roof of a house, her long, narrow swords flashing silver and gold as she fought.

“Goddesses of day and night protect us all,” Hallow swore, jerking the black staff from his back, aware that it wasn’t as potent as it should be without Thorn atop it, but focusing his arcany into it even as one hand danced, drawing blood magic symbols that hung in the air before slowly forming into a chain. He flung the chain on the Eidolon who had crippled him at the same time he slammed down his staff, blasting the spirit with arcany.

“What the—” There was an answering explosion from the south that for a moment, had him turning in surprise. Had Deo suddenly mastered the magic of the Starborn? He’d been threatening as much during the entire trip from Eris, but Hallow had no time to ascertain what had happened. “Stay strong, my heart! I’m coming to help you.” He ran as fast as he could with his injured leg, his eyes on Allegria while she fought the Eidolon who had climbed onto the roof with her. Over the heads of other Eidolon, Hallow could see the crowned head of the thane, indicating the king was working his way toward Allegria.

Hallow gritted his teeth against the pain and weakness in his leg, slashing out with the staff at the same time he alternated between sending balls of pure arcany into the mass of Eidolon and drawing the blood symbols that formed into chains taking down every Eidolon within range.

Another blast sounded from the south, this one closer, strong enough to rock the buildings.

“That was not from Deo,” he growled to himself. He wanted desperately to see whether it was friend or foe who was wielding arcany, but greater still was the need to protect his love. A half dozen Eidolon stood between him and the thane, who was even now starting to climb the crumbled wall that gave access to the collapsed roof. With effort, Hallow stood still, gathered up every last morsel of arcany he could, and released it in a blast that not only sent the spirits around him flying, but knocked the thane down the wall at the same time. Rock and dust exploded around them, showering down in a painful rain. Hallow ignored the debris as he stumbled forward, slamming bolts of magic into the fallen Eidolon attempting to rise.

The thane snarled something in a language foreign to Hallow, leaping up the wall and lunging toward Allegria at the same time she sliced off the head of the Eidolon nearest her.

“Allegria!” Hallow yelled again, but she had seen the approach of the thane, and spun around to face him. He noted quickly that although she held both swords in her hands, her chest rose and fell rapidly, and her face was dirty with dust and sweat. She’d told him that she had barely escaped with her life the last time she’d met the thane, and now here she was facing him when she was clearly tired from fighting what seemed like a never-ending wave of spirit warriors.

Hallow started chanting as he climbed after the thane, his injured leg buckling under the strain, slipping out from under him and causing him to fall forward. He swore profanely, calling on Bellias to give him the strength needed to wield her magic as he tried to rise. To his surprise, strong hands grabbed him by his arms, jerking him upward.

“Master Hallow, I assume?” one of the two men grasping him asked. He was a short, stocky man with a close-trimmed beard, and the blue eyes of an arcanist. “I’m Tygo. That’s Aarav. You called for us, and here we are. Just in time, it would appear.”

“The thane,” Hallow said, struggling to get up the fallen wall. “That’s my wife up there with him. Help her!”

Aarav, a tall, thin man who was one of the arcanists Hallow had summoned upon leaving Eris, leaped forward, a blue-white ball of arcany in his hands. Allegria, with a cry that warmed Hallow’s heart, leaped to the side, her swords slashing as she turned toward the thane, positioning him so that Hallow—and the other arcanists—could blast him back to his crypt.

Hallow stood at the top of the wall, his breath ragged and rasping while he summoned the last of his strength, holding the staff as arcany rippled down his arms onto the wooden shaft, little white and blue tendrils of magic snapping in the air, making the fine hairs on his arms stand on end. The thane, glancing toward them, hesitated a minute, giving Allegria the opening she was clearly waiting for. She lunged toward him, but just as her sword was about to pierce his throat, he turned, one hand grabbing her hair and yanking her up close to his body, using her as a shield even as Hallow and the other two arcanists prepared to destroy his corporeal form.

The thane’s gaze met Hallow’s even as his heart seemed to stop. “You will not succeed!” the thane snarled. “This time, I will have redemption!”

And then, in the length of time it takes for one moment to pass to another, the thane was gone, clearly having returned to the spirit realm.

And taken Allegria with him.