Brimstone Angels (25 page)

To his credit, Lorcan didn’t look up at her. “Does it matter?” he said. “It will lead him where he needs to go and keep him from stopping along the way.”

“And when he can’t set it down?”

“Once he kills the people he’s hunting, he’ll be able to set it down.”

Sairché shook her head. “That’s the orc who wants to kill your, ahem, paramour isn’t it?” Now, that startled him. She fluttered her silvery lashes. “He won’t put it down until she’s dead, will he?”

“He doesn’t even know her,” he said, shaking his head. “But you’re right; he wants someone else dead, someone I’d rather he didn’t kill.” He finally turned to face her. “Who have you been talking to?”

Sairché shrugged. She didn’t need to talk to a soul as long as Lorcan blustered and shouted from the battlements about the orc staying away from his warlock. Connecting the orc to the fresh-faced little tiefling she’d caught him with had been a gamble.

One she wasn’t certain she’d won at yet—Lorcan might be a fool in some ways, but in others, Sairché had to give him his due. She was never completely certain if Lorcan was lying or not. With all those warlocks, he might be telling the truth, after all.

“Why?” she said, approaching from another tack. “Do you have confederates in stealing mother’s things?”

“Well, you, now that you’ve watched me and not bothered to do anything about it.” Pulling the door open, he added, “We both know she’ll be just as unhappy about
that.
”

“Hmph,” Sairché said. “Well-played.” But the game wasn’t finished.

Lorcan paused in the doorway, and for a moment, Sairché tensed, afraid he’d come after her with a spell or his sword—Sairché knew magic aplenty but her spells were better for ferreting out secrets than blasting attackers.

“Do you know,” Lorcan said, “how old you are?”

“Older than you. Younger than the Ascension. Why?”

He shook his head. “Curiosity,” he said, with a grin so wicked, she wondered if she ought to be worried about what he could do with such a detail.

F
ARIDEH KEPT HER EYES ON THE HORIZON OF THE ROAD AS IT WOUND
down through the high hills, in and out of Neverwinter Wood. Eventually, the city would be there. Eventually, she would have to tell Mehen she wasn’t going on with them to Luskan. She was staying in Neverwinter. Her stomach knotted. She hadn’t said a word to Mehen since the night before, and after another night of fitful, interrupted sleep, Farideh didn’t trust herself to make it through a conversation as fraught as the one she intended, and she ran through it for perhaps the thousandth time in her imagination.

First she would say, “I’m staying in Neverwinter.”

“No,” Mehen would say, “you’re not.”

“I am, I need better training. I will stay here and find a warlock who knows what I can do. Who knows how I can do … Who knows how to do what we do better.”

She chewed her lip. She needed to be more convincing than that.

“You want me to control Lorcan better. How am I to do that without training?”

Mehen would say, “I don’t want you to control Lorcan. I want you to get rid of him.”

As if it were that simple. As if she only had to say “Begone!” and he’d vanish forever. As if she would be happy once she had no pact, no devil, no Lorcan—as if the sword would suddenly be enough.

No, she thought, as if having Mehen and Havilar as my protectors would suddenly be enough.
Stay here. Keep out of the way. You’ll just cause trouble
.

Surely Mehen did not want her to continue clinging to his elbow like a little girl—no weapon, no profession, no future? He would never say such a thing, but everything he did say to her seemed to draw a heavy line under the idea: Nothing was as good as being the foster daughter of Clanless Mehen. To look outward was to imply the life Mehen wished for them was not enough.

But it wasn’t enough, she realized now. For so many years, it had been fine—better than fine—but now … now it was as if she’d outgrown her leash and choked on the collar. She couldn’t bear, she realized, to be nothing but the daughter of Clanless Mehen.

Havi … Thinking of leaving Havilar was even harder.

Sometimes it felt as if the world looked at them and saw one person. And all that person’s attributes had to be divided between the twins. If Havilar was the reckless one, Farideh must be the responsible one. If she was the cheerful one, then Farideh was the gloomy one. If Farideh was the clever one, Havilar was the foolish one. How much, Farideh sometimes wondered, are we who we are because of that divide? Was she gloomy, because people had said all along Havilar was cheerful? Did Havi act foolish sometimes because people called Farideh clever? Did Farideh worry because there could only be one reckless one?

But I
am
reckless, she thought. I took the pact. I won’t leave Lorcan. I’m planning to abandon my family before they can abandon me.

She had always known Havilar was Mehen’s favorite—a little detail that rubbed against her heart like a grain of sand, until she hardened against it. It just was. But last night … last night, he had been afraid—they all had been afraid—and he had blamed Farideh for everything.

In fact, she thought, the only person who had asked her if she was all right at any point in that terror of a night, was Lorcan.

She rubbed her arm where her scar lay, dull and ordinary as it had been for the rest of the night and the entirety of the morning, and wondered, for perhaps the hundredth time that morning, whether Lorcan was all right.

Lorcan
was
lying about the rod. Farideh had gone off into the woods before they left and tested it. Nothing but her usual spells. Nothing extraordinary. It didn’t make the wave of fire happen on its own. The fact that Lorcan had lied to her—or at least talked her in a circle again—had her grinding her teeth.

But at the same time she was so grateful he had wrapped his arms around her and given thanks she wasn’t dead. Even though the archer had shot Havilar, Farideh looked into his eyes and saw—without a doubt—that the orc wanted her dead. When she tried to sleep, all she could see were those dark, vicious eyes watching her as if she were prey, and Havilar’s wound becoming her own.

If she said this, Mehen would be angry she wasn’t worrying about Havilar.

If she pointed out only Lorcan checked to see if she was all right, he would think Lorcan was corrupting her.

But if she was walking all the way to Neverwinter, worrying about the fact that her scar hasn’t so much as twinged … had he been corrupting her?

She squeezed her eyes closed and opened them wide a few times. Maybe someone would call for a halt. Not her, not after last night. She’d rather pass out on her feet then ask Mehen to stop.

Havilar dropped back to walk beside her, and for a few dozen feet, she didn’t say anything. She tucked her arm around Farideh’s.

“You’re swaying a little. And you’ve got shadows under your eyes, worse than ever.” Havilar kept step with her, watching her face. “Do you want me to tell Mehen I’m going to throw up?” she whispered. “So we can stop? I might throw up from the poison, right?”

“No,” Farideh said. “It’s fine.”

Havilar squeezed her arm. “I never said thank you,” she said quietly.

“You would have done the same.” Farideh cracked a smile. “Probably quicker, too, and with less … excess.”

“No,” Havilar said. “Well, yes, that. Thank you for getting rid of him. But I meant the arrows.” She clutched Farideh’s arm a little more tightly. “Gods, you can’t imagine how they hurt … Mehen might have been upset, but I’m glad you did cut them out. Especially since it probably wasn’t easy.” She swallowed. “Actually I
might
throw up if we talk about it.”

“Let’s not then,” Farideh said, and she squeezed Havilar’s arm back. They walked a little farther on, before Havilar pulled her to a stop.

“I told,” Havilar whispered. “I told Mehen about Brin. And the spell he did. The prayer. It wasn’t fair,” she said when Farideh tried to interrupt, “that he was blaming you for the arrows.”

“What did he say?”

She hesitated. “I was trying to help.”

“Havi? What did he say?”

Havilar bit her lip. “He’s angry we lied. And he’s still angry about Lorcan. I thought you said Lorcan wouldn’t come through if there were people around?”

Farideh shook her head. “He does what he wants, I suppose. I’ll work on it.”

“Mehen thinks you ought to—”

“I know what Mehen thinks.”

Havilar let go of her arm. “Well I think it too. Where does this end? You aren’t even trying to get rid of him anymore.”

“No one told you to get rid of Kidney Whatsit, there, just because you kept hitting people on the head when you started. I just need a chance to practice.”

“There’s a
very
big difference between a devil and a blunted glaive. And it’s Eater—”

“Oh, go argue with Brin!”

Farideh hurried to catch up to the rest of the group, where Havilar would be less willing to give her trouble. After last night, it was all too clear what Havilar’s problem was: she was jealous. Jealous of all the wrong things, Farideh thought. Havilar didn’t care that Farideh could cast a wall of flames or make lava erupt out of the ground. Havilar cared that somebody was paying attention to Farideh and not to her.

Havilar was jealous that Farideh was doing something without her.

She lifted her head and saw Tam watching her. She dropped her eyes and scowled at the ground. As far as she knew, the silverstar hadn’t worked out that she was a warlock, but the way he looked at everything it seemed far more likely he knew and just hadn’t decided to say anything. Yet.

“There it is!” Brin called.

From the crest of the road, Farideh could see the shattered remains of old Neverwinter, the bones of the new city growing over them. In places, the reborn city looked as if nothing had ever happened to it. In others, the damages of the fall of Neverwinter were fresh as if it had happened mere
tendays ago. Rivers of hardened lava poured down the mountain’s slopes. The wide wall that stretched away as far as she could see was broken through in places. And slashed across the western end of the city—

“
Karshoj,
” Havilar breathed. She clambered up on a rock. “What in the Hells is
that?
”

Beyond another high wall, dotted with soldiers on patrol, a rift split the southwest quarter city in twain. It was as if some god had taken an enormous blade and sliced through the surface of the city, peeling open the world and leaving behind a deep wound that festered with blue fire. The hairs all along Farideh’s spine stood up.

“Spellplague,” Brin said.

“Spellplague?” Havilar repeated, excitedly. “Hells and broken planes—do you think there are
spellscarred
here? It would be so exciting to have a—”

“
Thrik
!” Mehen barked. “Don’t you even tease about that. If you so much as go
near
that rift—”

“All
right,
” Havilar said. “I was only saying.”

Farideh watched the dancing blue light that illuminated the deep rift and played up the crumbling walls. How many people thought the same as Havilar joked?—that there was power to seize there, that it might be harnessable. That they might be able to tame something as unpredictable as spellplague. As many as think the same of devils? she thought bitterly.

“What if the quarry went near it?” Havilar said. “Or
into
it?”

“Then we let her go, because none of us are going near that,” Mehen said. “And stop trying to make up reasons to.”

The size of the remaining walls beggared belief. Like mountains, they distorted the distance between the rise where they’d first spied the city and the gates themselves, and it was only as Farideh registered the people ahead of her on the road that she appreciated the massiveness of the city wall of Neverwinter.

The road leading to the gates of the city was crowded with carts and horses and bodies. Farideh pulled her cloak closer and concentrated on keeping the shadows from swallowing her up.

The guards at the gate kept a close eye on them as they passed, but between Tam’s shabby stateliness, Brin’s well-cut clothes, and Mehen’s stiff back, the guards seemed to approve of their little group well enough, and pointed them in the direction of the northern districts.

Now, Farideh thought. Now is when you do it. She looked at Havilar, and thought about their argument, the last one they might ever have.

They don’t have to leave you, Farideh thought. They just have to let you stay. It didn’t soothe her any. Mehen and Havilar would never agree to her plans. Especially as ill-formed as they were. Where did one find warlocks?

“This is where we part,” Tam said. He took out his coinpurse and handed over two gold pieces to Mehen. “It’s been a pleasure. I’m sorry we never tracked down that archer.”

Mehen grunted. “May your roads be clear and your travels easy.”