Shimmer and Burn Page 16

  Neither does he.

  “Are you all right?” he asks, eyebrows furrowed.

  “Yes. You?” I look back, unable to meet his eyes, staring instead at his chin, the divot beneath his mouth, his lips.

  Don’t do that, I tell myself. His lips are not part of my plan.

  “Yes,” says North. His forehead creases. “Where did you learn to do that?”

  “Previous life,” I say with a low burr of warning. This is too close again. Only a foot higher and he could touch my face and devour my secrets.

  A foot higher and I could uncover his secrets too. For half a heartbeat, I regret my self-restraint, because that skin is all I want in this leftover moment of adrenaline and triumph.

  North smiles again, a disarmingly sweet rise of his mouth. “So you’ve been a farmer, a royal servant, and a golem hunter,” he says. “That doesn’t sound like a tragedy, Miss Locke, that sounds like an adventure.” Ash settles in his hair and he softens his grip, fingers sliding down my sleeve, skating past my wrist before settling light on my waist.

  “Adventure suits you,” he says quietly.

  My smile fades, guilty. Lying suits me even better, because North has no idea that that golem came from Brindaigel—that there are probably more on their way. He could have died tonight, and I didn’t even warn him.

  I’m no better than Bryn, manipulating North to get what I want.

  I sit up so he’s forced to shift out of the way. The cold creeps in and I hug myself, shivering as fog eddies around us. The smell of burnt meat lingers. “We should go before any more come,” I say.

  “Wait.” North rocks onto his knees, grabbing a stick and poking through the ashes. My stomach sinks when he drags something out, a glass vial like the ones Alistair uses, full of shimmering threads. He rolls it across the ground to cool it before hefting it in one hand. The spell that gave the golem life.

  “Don’t want to waste it,” he says with a forced smile, pocketing the vial and standing.

  “Will Tobek try to trace the spell to its caster?” I force the question light, but inside, I’m terrified. If Tobek traces the spell back to Perrote, not only will Bryn know her father’s nearby, but North can use it to find our kingdom without needing either of us. Why would Corbin sign a treaty if he can simply invade?

  But North shakes his head, staring through the trees. “No need. Baedan’s the only one with the luxury of golems anymore.”

  The hellborne woman who found me in the forest outside Cortheana—the one who told Kellig to kill me. “Baedan?” I repeat, surprised. “You think it was her?”

  He frowns at me. “And you don’t?”

  “Our king uses golems as spies,” I say slowly, watching him for any reaction. “Rats and birds, mostly, but never men like this. Maybe it was him.”

  “That’s impossible,” he says, scanning the trees again. “You need water for a scrying spell, and golems are made of smoke. They’re brutes, Miss Locke, built to obey simple commands. Corthen used them in the war as a frontline of attack, to force Merlock’s men into wasting magic dismantling them.”

  “But—” I frown. Shadow crows are the king’s eyes in the dark places his guards can’t go. “Then why call them spies? Magic soldiers would be more effective.”

  “Too effective,” North says with a quirk of his mouth. “No one goes to war against a spy, but they will rise up against an army. Sounds like he’s worried a good transferent would take down his golems and steal his spells.”

  “There are no transferents in Brindaigel.”

  “Your mother.”

  “Was executed for stealing magic,” I say drily. “But not from a golem, from the king’s treasury.”

  He looks over, surprised. “Your king stores his magic in a treasury?”

  “You store yours in rocks.”

  “I’m not a king,” he says. “Storing magic in any exterior vessel is the easiest way to have it stolen. Merlock made that mistake. Your king should have learned from it.”

  “Who’s going to steal it? You’ve never even heard of us before and Perrote kills anyone who might be a threat.”

  He gives me a strange look as rain slides down his nose and drips from his chin. “If your king is looking for you, he wouldn’t have sent a golem. This—”

  Pain ignites around my wrist, bright enough to make me gasp. The binding spell tightens, nearly a solid bridge of black across my skin that hums all the way into my shoulder.

  North reaches for me, his hand wavering in the space between us. “Miss Locke?”

  Shouted voices rise above the wind, along with the thickening smell of sulfur. Clutching my wrist to my chest, I straighten with a sense of dread. “It’s Bryn,” I say, turning for camp. “Something’s wrong.”

  He nods, expression grim. “As I was saying,” he says, “golems are usually the first line of an attack.”

  Seventeen

  BY THE TIME WE REACH camp, the gods are battling for dominance again, battering us between Rook’s icy skies and Tell’s rolling earth. The pain in my wrist worsens, inching across my shoulder, into my chest. North unspools magic around his fingers, ready for attack, while I curl the box of matches in my fist, just in case.

  I see Bryn first. Standing in the open doorway of the wagon, her red hair looks almost gold in the light behind her. North’s crossbow is settled against her shoulder and she sights down the tiller before releasing a bolt into the dark beyond camp. There comes a grunt, a curse, and a sudden flash of movement. Only then do I notice the figures standing in the rain, outlined by the stormy skies. They’re too hard, too rough to be anything but hellborne. Two bodies are already laid out on the ground.

  Aim for the heart shudders through me as Bryn bends for another bolt from the quiver at her feet, notching it in place with a movement too smooth to be anything but practiced. So she does know how to shoot, just like I suspected.

  Only one figure stands within reach of the light from the wagon, crouched by the perimeter, hand hovering above North’s stones. Baedan. The rain wilts her hair into scraggly ribbons down bare, muscled shoulders, and Tobek paces her, his crossbow loaded in position. What is he waiting for?

  Baedan sees North and grins, white teeth against dark lips. Poison laces her cheek like an old bruise, and her eyes shine silver as she stands. “You killed three of my men the other night,” she calls in greeting.

  “They got in my way,” says North.

  Baedan lifts her chin, her smile thinning before her eyes slide toward Bryn. “Name your price.”

  “Not for sale.” Grabbing my arm, North hauls me over the perimeter, into the safety of camp. He holds me behind him, fingers tight through the sleeve of my coat.

  Baedan’s smile flickers when she sees me, and she casts a dark look over her shoulder toward one of the figures prowling at her back. I can’t see his face beneath the hood of his coat, but I can guess the recipient of such disapproval. Kellig, who didn’t skin me like he was told to.

  “I’ll give you two spells for her,” Baedan says, turning back to North. “That’s more than fair.”

  “Your spells are sloppy and have too many tangles,” North says. “I lose most of the magic unraveling them.”

  Baedan reaches into her trouser pocket and demonstrates a glass vial, small as the golem’s heart, full of liquid fire. “Clean magic, then,” she says. “I’ll match you ounce for an ounce. I’ll even let you cut her open and measure the blood so you know I’m not cheating.”

  North wets his lips, shifting his weight—an almost unconscious step toward her. Toward the magic.

  “No,” he finally says, and for such a small word, it takes a lot of effort.

  “Then make me an offer, North. You know how this works.”

  “You’re wasting your time,” North says. “She’s not Merlock’s daughter.”

  “Then you have no reason not to sell.” When he doesn’t reply, she begins tapping the vial against her upper thigh. “You still have your prince. You don�
�t need a princess, too.”

  “He already said you’re wasting your time,” Tobek says, all gruff and bravado.

  Baedan doesn’t acknowledge him. “I’ll overlook three dead men, but I will not overlook greed, North. Don’t throw away years of peace on a redundancy.”

  Bryn tightens at the insult, still sighting down the tiller. Her skirts stick to her legs, outlining her slender frame. “If you want me, come and get me,” she says, loosing the bolt. It strikes Baedan and bounces back against her leather vest, useless, no doubt blocked by some protection spell.

  Baedan smiles, eyebrows arched. Bending, she picks up the bolt before dropping into a mock curtsy, arms spread wide. “Invitation accepted, your majesty.”

  With a grunt, she flattens her palms to the earth as poison bleeds down her arms, fast as lightning, thick as weeds. The grass beneath her smolders and turns black, racing along the edge of the perimeter. The rain hisses into steam as the earth ignites.

  The Burn.

  Straightening—staggering—Baden tosses her damp hair out of her face, silver eyes cutting toward North. Despite the pain carving lines in her face, her smile sharpens, turns deadly. “This is the moment you lost any hope of saving this kingdom, North,” she says. “This is the moment you and I became enemies.”

  North shifts his weight, still holding me back, and doesn’t reply.

  “Don’t stray too far from your master,” Baedan says, finally looking to Tobek. “You fall once, you fall again twice as fast. I know how to tame lost slaves like you.”

  Tobek doesn’t flinch away from her, still holding steady position.

  She begins backing away. “Start running,” she calls, before turning and barking an order to her men. They fall back, disappearing into the darkness. Kellig lingers, eyes on me, before he too fades away.

  “Why isn’t she fighting?” Bryn lowers the crossbow, eyes wide, wild with the hunt.

  “She can’t.” Mud streaks North’s face and he grimaces with pain, releasing me and pressing a hand to his chest. The unspooled magic he’s been holding on to has twisted the knuckles even further out of formation; dark cracks line his skin like dried blood. “Creating the Burn isn’t a spell, it’s an act of transference. She pulled the poison out of her blood and it’ll take time for the blood to regenerate. She’s too weak.”

  “Then why aren’t you fighting?” Bryn asks darkly.

  North sags, eyeing his ward. “I can’t,” he says. “I need magic to combat the spells she wears. I don’t have enough and it’d be a waste of resources to try.”

  A draw. The worst possible outcome in the fighting ring, when you’re both too weak to take the final blow and the house wins the bet.

  Tobek hurries over, shouldering his crossbow. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m so, so sorry, North. I should have been able to sense them. I should have warned you, but they came up so quickly. The storm must have caused interference—”

  “It’s all right,” North says. “The ward held, that’s all that matters.” Though he forces a smile, there’s a hard edge to his mouth that belies the gesture: He knows it wasn’t the storm distracting Tobek from his duties.

  Tobek knows it too. He wilts beneath North’s disappointment. “I still should have sensed them coming,” he protests weakly. His hands curl around his weapon. “That’s the only thing I’m good for.”

  North squeezes his shoulder and I envy Tobek that gesture of kindness. A history is built into that touch. “We need to move before we’re cut off completely,” he says. “Ready the horses. Miss Dossel,” he says. “I may need you. How many bolts do you have left?”

  I stare at him, wounded: Her but not me?

  Bryn quickly counts. “Half a dozen.”

  North nods, rubbing his mouth. “Can you watch the rear?”

  She stares at him, eyes half lidded, before shrugging with disinterest. “I guess.”

  I hover, uncertain, waiting for my own task, but North barely glances at me. “Wait inside,” he says.

  “I can help. I know how to fight—”

  “You can’t fight them with fists,” he says, in a tone that means no argument. “We need range. Magic. Please.” His eyes meet mine, dark and pleading. “Just stay inside.”

  He doesn’t wait for an answer, turning to salvage what he can of the perimeter yet untouched by the spreading Burn. I stare after him, feeling lost. Useless.

  Tobek steers the panicked horses into position as Bryn steps down from the wagon. “You’re hurt,” she says.

  Tobek brightens at her attention, touching a thin trickle of blood along his temple. “It’s nothing,” he says with staged humility. It’s everything, if it means she’s looking at him.

  “This is why you need to be paid,” she says, fingers grazing the edge of his temple. “You were as good as a soldier, you know.”

  Tobek stands straighter, trying to look taller than he is.

  Feeling sick, I drag myself inside, picking up Darjin and cradling him to my chest. Sinking onto the bottom bunk, I stare numbly toward the door before shouldering out of my damp coat. Within moments, we’re on the move and Bryn and North step inside. Bryn wears the quiver across her chest, holding the crossbow as if it’s an extension of herself, and I look away, envious. Still offended.

  North doesn’t meet my eyes. “I’d like to put protective spells on both of you.”

  Bryn scoffs. “Absolutely not.”

  “I don’t think you appreciate what just happened. Baedan believes you’re Merlock’s daughter. Merlock,” he repeats, when she makes no sign of having heard him. “The king whose heartbeat feeds the Burn—whose heartbeat feeds the dead magic that keeps Baedan and the hellborne alive. Avinea’s kings cannot die by their own hand, and only someone with blood tied to the crown can perform the sacrifice. If I find Merlock, Corbin inherits. If Baedan finds Merlock, she’ll bury him somewhere I will never find him, and Avinea will be consumed with the Burn until only the hellborne can survive. And now that Baedan believes you’re a missing heir—a potential threat to that plan—she won’t stop until you’re dead.”

  “Lucky for me, I have Faris to protect me,” says Bryn.

  “Damn it, listen to me!” North slams his palm against the wall, hard enough to rattle the glass jars above the stove. Darjin wriggles out of my arms, bolting beneath the table. “You’re useless to me if you’re dead!”

  Bryn stares at him, eyes wide. I doubt anyone’s ever spoken to her like that. No one would dare.

  “I risked everything I had on a hope and a promise,” he says, lowering his voice, spitting each word between clenched teeth. “Merlock is my priority. Avinea is my priority. And if your kingdom has magic and you’re willing to offer that magic to Prince Corbin”—he takes a deep breath, ducking his head—“then you are now my priority. This is about more than just a binding spell, Miss Dossel.”

  Bryn rolls her shoulders back, recovering. “It always has been,” she says.

  I look away, prickly beneath my skin. Alistair withheld evidence and exploited my weaknesses to get what he wanted from me, so at the very least, I should be grateful that North tells the truth, that he doesn’t pretend I’m anything more than a footnote to his plans. A fail-safe to his priority.

  But my priority is my sister, not Bryn and not Avinea. I’m not naive enough to believe a night in the rain and a poisonous flower will trump the desires of a man who sacrificed four years of his life to finding Merlock. North will not risk losing the magic he needs for me. He won’t risk losing Bryn.

  Supply and demand.

  “No protection spells,” Bryn says at last. “Not until we reach New Prevast.”

  Of course not, I think bitterly. If her father finds us, she can’t be complicit in her own captivity.

  North sighs, raking a hand through his hair. “I’ll take a horse in the morning while Baedan’s still limping, and ride ahead to Revnik. There’s a market there—I can buy the magic I need to get us through the Kettich Pass. We can only hope
Baedan won’t try to attack until we’re closer to her territory by the Burn. Once through the pass, we don’t stop until we reach New Prevast.”

  “Right on schedule,” Bryn says.

  North stares at her before his eyes shift to me. Guilt briefly darkens his face before wordlessly, he takes his crossbow and quiver from Bryn and ducks back outside, joining Tobek on the running board. He slams the door behind him.

  The stove belches in the silence that follows. I shove my coat off the bed and lie down, curled in a ball.

  Bryn stares at her fingers tented across the table. “Where were you?”

  “Nowhere. I went for a walk.”

  “What if I thought you’d run away?” she asks, straightening, folding her arms across her chest. “What if I thought you weren’t coming back?”

  “I’m not going to run,” I say. Not at the risk of losing Cadence. Doesn’t she know that by now? “I came back as soon as I heard you—”

  “Twelve minutes and eighteen seconds,” she says. “That’s how long it took you to come back. What if they had broken through the ward?”

  “I would be the one who died,” I say darkly.

  “And what do you think happens to me after my safety is dead!? The next time I call for you, I want you here in three minutes. Do you understand me?”

  I close my eyes, fingers tightening into knots against my stomach “I went for a walk,” I say, teeth clenched.

  “Do you know how long three minutes is?”

  “Bryn—”

  She slams her palm on the table, startling my eyes open. “I have warned you how to address me! Three minutes, Faris! That is how long a soldier is given to report for his summons, and that is how long you are given to report to me! One.” She pinches the flesh of her arm and twists; a bruise blossoms on my own arm, dark yellow and cherry red. “Two”—another bruise—“three.”

  Closing my eyes, I grit my teeth and swallow my cry. Every nerve in my body stands on end, rattling with pain as saliva floods my mouth.

  Straightening, Bryn tugs down the hem of her bodice. “I thought you were committed to this,” she says, softer. “To me. Or if not to me, then to Cadence.”