Ghost in the Storm (The Ghosts) (13 page)

Caina shrugged. “It was a close thing. She tried to unseal the prison below Black Angel Tower. I crept behind her and pushed her in.”

With the aid of Lydia Palaegus’s spirit, one of Jadriga’s many victims. The girl would never again walk under the sun, but her murder had been avenged. 

“If that is a joke,” said Andromache, “you will find that I do not have a sense of humor.”

“She’s…telling the truth, sister,” said Kylon, staring at Caina with new fascination. “At least about this. She truly believes she slew the Moroaica with her own hands.” 

“Enough of this,” growled Rezir. “I know what is going on.”

“The enlighten us, my lord emir,” said Andromache. 

“She is a Ghost,” said Rezir.

The older stormdancer laughed. “A Ghost, lord emir? The Ghosts are a myth. The Emperor of Nighmar’s elite spies and assassins do not exist. The Ghosts are only a shadow upon which idiots blame their failures.”

“You’re a fool, Kleistheon,” said Rezir. “The Ghosts have bedeviled Istarinmul for generations. They infest my lands in the Vale of Fallen Stars like gnats. Do you know how many of them I had to kill to pull off this attack?” He shook his head. “This woman is a spy. She is only pretending to be your Moroaica to gain information. Or to assassinate me.”

Andromache said nothing.

Rezir scowled. “If you will not deal with her, I will.”

He spurred his massive black horse toward Caina.

###

Kylon watched Rezir Shahan tower over the Ghost. She backed away, eyes wary.

“Oh, go ahead,” said Rezir. “Draw that knife and stab me. Not that it will do you any good.” His right hand curled into a fist, the crystal in his black ring pulsing with green light. “Tell me everything I want to know. Now.”

For some reason, the Ghost stared at Rezir’s horse, and Kylon felt her emotional state change.

Excitement? Or anticipation?

“No,” said the Ghost.

“Do not deny me,” said Rezir. “If you refuse to use your tongue to answer me, I will have it torn from your mouth. If you look at me with insolent eyes, I will have them burned from your skull. Or perhaps I will hand you over to my Immortals. The alchemical elixirs give them appetites beyond those of normal men. After they are finished with you, after you are naked and bloody and beaten, perhaps you will be ready to speak.” He loomed over her. “You are mine, to do with as you please. My family has broken slaves for a thousand years, and I will break you, unless you answer me.”

The Ghost gazed up at the emir without blinking.

“Your gilded armor,” she said, “looks painted. Tawdry and cheap. Perhaps if you had not squandered so much of your wealth upon slaves, you could have hired a proper armorer...”

Rezir Shahan's enraged bellow drowned out her voice. 

He leaned down, seized her by the throat, and lifted her with one hand, fingers digging into her neck. The Ghost was not a large woman, no more than one hundred and thirty pounds, yet it was still an impressive feat of strength. Her face went red and then purple as she gagged.

“Rezir!” said Andromache.

Yet the Ghost did not grab Rezir’s wrists. It was the logical thing to do, both to take some of the pressure off her throat and pry the emir's grip free. Yet she did not. Why?

“Idiot!” said Andromache, stalking to his side. “If you kill her, we shall learn nothing! Put...”

The Ghost thrust her arm in front of the horse's face. The beast reared its head back, teeth bared, nostrils flaring. 

Near a sleeve soaked with half-dried blood. 

Rezir's mount was a war horse, trained to withstand the sight and smell of blood and violence. Yet even the best-trained horse could panic at the scent of blood, and Rezir’s horse panicked. The beast reared up on its hind legs with a frightened whinny, iron-shod hooves lashing at the air. Rezir overbalanced and fell from his saddle with a curse, pulling the Ghost down with them.

They both landed in a tangled heap atop Andromache. 

Kleistheon cursed and yanked his sword from its scabbard, blue-white lightning snarling around the blade. Kylon raised his sword, white mist swirling around the weapon. The ashtairoi hurried to Andromache's side, while Sicarion yanked his daggers from his belt.

The Ghost was already running. 

She darted between two ashtairoi before they could stop her and tore down the street alongside the damaged warehouse. For an agonizing moment, Kylon hesitated. With the aid of his sorcery, he could run her down easily.

But if Andromache had been hurt...

He turned, stooped, and pulled Rezir off his sister. Andromache coughed, her face red, and Kylon helped her up.

“Are you injured?” he said. Gods of the brine, if she had been hurt, they were finished.

She coughed again, and rubbed her stomach. “I am well. I lost my breath. And my pride, it seems.” She glared at Rezir Shahan. “Fool! What were you thinking? We will learn nothing of use if you kill the woman!”

Rezir heaved himself to his feet, murder in his eyes. “The House of Shahan has ruled over slaves for a thousand years. My father's fathers knew how to keep the vermin in line, how to break them! When I was finished with her, she would have told us everything we needed to know.” 

“Your plan certainly worked well,” said Andromache. “Truly a work of genius. Little wonder the Padishah never reconquered Cyrica from the Empire.”

Rezir's eyes narrowed. “At least I was not fooled into thinking that some Ghost bitch was my esteemed teacher!”

Andromache drew herself up, her emotional sense scarlet with fury, and things might have gone further, but Kylon stepped between them. 

“We have more important tasks,” he said, “than assigning blame. If the Empire retakes Marsis, there shall be plenty of blame for us all.”

Rezir's scowl did not diminish, but he nodded. “You speak truly. I shall lead our assault into the Plaza of the Tower.” 

“And I shall settle with the magi,” said Andromache. “We shall meet again in the Plaza of the Tower, once you have secured it.”

Rezir gave a curt nod and turned to his black horse.

“High Seat,” said Kleistheon, “what about the spy? The woman overhead more than I would wish.”

“She is unimportant,” said Andromache. “If the Ghosts try to impede us, we shall simply crush them underfoot.” She gazed in the distance. “And yet she was clever enough to fool me.”

“I can find her, mistress,” said Sicarion, bowing. “Quite easily.”

“I'm sure,” said Andromache. “You did such a fine job finding the Moroaica. Kylon.”

“Sister?” said Kylon.

“Meet me at the Magisterium chapterhouse,” said Andromache. “But first find the spy and kill her.”  

Chapter 10 - Walls of Flame

Caina ran, her lungs heaving, her throat burning. She heard shouting and the clatter of Rezir’s armor against the cobblestones. No doubt Rezir and Andromache were blaming each other for her escape. That would not last long, though. Once Andromache and Rezir regained their tempers, they would resume their assault on Marsis. And then they would dispatch someone to kill her.

Sicarion’s ability to track her was bad enough, but she suspected that Kylon was more dangerous. His ability to sense emotions had let him see through her deception with ease. She didn’t know how far his ability to sense emotions extended, but his power might let him track her. Or he might bring Sicarion along, which would let him find her infallibly. 

And if Kylon caught her, she was dead. It was as simple as that. She couldn’t possibly defeat a Kyracian stormdancer in a straight fight. She might not be able to even wound a stormdancer in a straight fight. 

She had only one chance.

Halfdan’s safehouse. Her shadow-cloak was there, and it protected the mind of its bearer from any arcane intrusions. Which meant it would shield her from both Sicarion’s and Kylon’s powers. 

She ran faster, ignoring the burning pain in her throat.

If she did not get to the cloak before her pursuers found her, she was dead.

It was as simple as that.  

###

Kylon raced down the street, the sorcery of air lending his limbs speed.

He opened his arcane senses, letting the emotions of Marsis wash over him.

As a child, when his untutored abilities had first manifested, it had been terrifying. The constant barrage of emotion rising from the city of New Kyre made him wake up screaming. Later, Andromache had taught him to control his arcane senses, but he had never forgotten the overwhelming terror.

Now, he felt no terror. The self-control pleased him.

At least, he did not feel his own terror. Fear flowed over his arcane senses, rising from Marsis like smoke from a fire. The horror of the slaves trapped in the Great Market. The gnawing fear of men and women the Istarish had missed, hiding like mice in the surrounding buildings. 

So much misery the attack had wrought. Was it truly worth it?

He shoved aside the thought. Andromache knew what she was doing.

Then he caught the sense of the fleeing Ghost. 

There. That strange mixture of burning rage and cool intellect. She was running as fast as she could. Wise of her. But she could not run fast enough. 

No one could outrun the stormdancers of New Kyre. 

Kylon jumped, sorcery fuelling his leap, and landed atop a nearby warehouse. He sprang from rooftop to rooftop, gaining on the Ghost. Soon she would come into sight. And then Kylon would jump from the roofs and kill her. 

He admired her cleverness, her courage. Instead of brutal torture at the hands of a brute like Rezir, he would grant her the mercy of a quick death.

###

Caina felt the crawling tingle of sorcery.

Not the queasy feeling of necromancy she had sensed around Sicarion and Andromache. This was gentler, quieter, washing over her like lapping water. 

Water sorcery.

Kylon.

Or worse, both Kylon and the older stormdancer Kleistheon. She would have no chance against two stormdancers.

A laugh burst from her throat, her lungs tearing with pain.

Not that she had a chance against a single stormdancer!

She risked a glance over her shoulder. The alley behind her was empty, tenements framing a narrow strip of blue skies. There was no sign of any pursuit.

Yet the pulsing tingle of sorcery grew stronger. 

Kylon was after her, she was sure of it. But where was he?

The answer came to her, recalled from the training Halfdan had given her in stealth.

No one ever looked up.

###

Kylon saw her.

The Ghost sprinted down an alley between two tenements. She looked like she was fleeing blindly, yet her emotional sense was utterly without panic.

She thought she could escape.

Kylon worked a spell to give his muscles the strength of surging waters.

He leaped from the roof of a four-story tenement, his sword angled down, white mist trailing from the icy blade. 

###

Caina felt the surge of arcane power.

She threw herself sideways just as she saw the gray blur overhead.

An instant later Kylon fell like a thunderbolt, his sword sinking to the hilt into the street. A jump like that would have killed a normal man, but not a stormdancer with the power of water sorcery. He looked at her, brown eyes wide in surprise. No doubt he had expected to cut her down where she stood. 

Frost spread from his sword, covering the nearby cobblestones in a white layer. Caina didn’t want to find out what that blade would do if it pierced her skin.

She kept sprinting, turning a corner into another narrow alley lined with rickety tenements. She could run fast, faster than most people, but she could not outrun a stormdancer’s spell-enhanced legs. Once Kylon recovered his balance, he would catch her.

Unless she did something clever. 

Despite Kylon’s speed, she had managed to dodge his attack. He couldn’t change his direction after he had begun falling. And the same thing applied to his supernatural speed – it was much easier to turn a sharp corner walking than running. 

Caina saw a narrow doorway on the left, leading into one of the tenements.

It was her best chance.

###

Kylon wrenched his sword free from the street. It was undamaged – the spell-forged blade of a stormdancer was far stronger and more resilient than a normal sword. He saw the Ghost disappear around another corner. 

Kylon hurtled forward, driven by the power of his air sorcery, the wind a thunderous gale in his ears. 

He stopped at the corner, saw the Ghost running up an alley so narrow two horses could not have passed each other. There was no place for her to turn, no place for her to escape. She may have been clever, but no amount of cleverness could make her run faster.