Remnants: Season of Fire (6 page)

“I would like to see Ronan,” I grit out, my fingers clenching around his throat. “And I demand you treat me with more respect.”

A low laugh behind me pulled me out of my fog of fury.
Keallach
.

I dropped my hands, knowing I couldn’t handle much more of the guard’s growing panic, and not wanting Keallach to note my weakness. I glanced over my shoulder at him. Sethos was right behind him, scowling, but Keallach was
shaking his head, bemused, all traces of his previous irritation evaporated. “That’s hardly ladylike, Andriana,” he said, almost teasing in his tone.

“Yes, well, ladylike manners are hardly my first priority.”

“You’ve gone and gotten this man’s blood all over your pristine white skirts,” he noted.

“Cleanliness is not quite my priority either,” I said, brushing past him, pacing, hoping he wouldn’t see my trembling. I’d been too furious to notice that my armband had grown painfully cold with Sethos so near. I tried to get as far from him as the small deck space allowed, but I could feel his dark eyes on me, taking in far more information than I liked.

“All I wanted was to see Ronan,” I said, speaking only to Keallach. “Will you allow him to accompany me on the island?”

“No,” Keallach said, as friendly as if he’d said yes. “I promised that
you
would see Kapriel. Ronan will stay belowdecks to insure you return with us and don’t try anything foolish.” He gestured to the guard, scowling as he held a handkerchief to his dripping nose. “You are apparently more lethal than your beauty would lead one to believe. Your trainer did well.” He nodded in appreciation, his dimple deepening.

I had to make a conscious effort not to bite my lip as I tried to think my way through this. I couldn’t do it all alone — freeing Kapriel, that is. Not with so many of Keallach’s men about. And Sethos. The man would stick as close as a leech. Here on a ship, or on the island . . . we’d be too easily entrapped. We’d need to return later for Kapriel. For now, all I could do was meet him and hopefully gather information to help us later.

“Do not trust her, Highness,” Sethos said slowly, arms folded, squinting at me.

“Her?” Keallach said, frowning. “What could an empath do? Here on the island? Alone?” But I saw the shadow of doubt cross his face, as if he’d remembered how I’d cast emotion into him.

Sethos strode over to me and when I tried to evade him, he grabbed hold of me, forcing me to look him in the face. “What are you planning, girl?”

“Sethos, stop,” Keallach said, but the larger man ignored him.

Sethos’s features were angular, sharp, his nose long and thin, and there was devastating strength within him. With him so near, a chasm seemed to open within me — a gaping hole that made me gasp — and I remembered the feeling of darkness encapsulating me on the battlefield.

“Sethos! Stop at once!” Keallach commanded, enraged. He gripped Sethos’s arm.

Finally, the man gave me a brief look of understanding and let go of me. Involuntarily, I reached up and touched my cuff; it almost hurt, it was so cold. Like it felt in the Valley when I was a child, holding my hand beneath the frozen crust of the river, hoping to catch a fish. His eyes followed my movement with interest, and something kindled in his dark eyes. I let out a breath of exasperation and turned, striding to the railing.

Neither of them said another word to me as shouts and commands and whistles filled the air. We were entering the tiny harbor of the island, and two guard boats came out to circle us, each with a machine gun mounted on the top. When they spotted Keallach and Sethos, they saluted and sped off.

A loud noise came from belowdecks, and I could feel the big ship begin to slow. Churning sounds emerged from the
back, and we came to a neat stop in the slip of a huge dock. Sailors tossed down heavy ropes, and soldiers below tied them to enormous cleats on the pier. The gangplank emerged and Keallach stopped beside me. “Ready?” he said, looking excited, as if he was truly eager to reunite with his brother, not face a man he’d sent away to prison.

I stared at him for several seconds. He was utterly confounding. One moment standing as leader of his menacing forces, the next as close to my heart as any other of my Ailith kin.

“Come,” he said, turning to shimmy down the ladder.

I followed him down to the main deck, well aware that Sethos had disappeared. As much as I detested his presence, having him away from my line of vision made me all the more nervous. Taking a chance on the moment’s camaraderie, when I reached the end of the ladder, I touched Keallach’s arm. He glanced down at my hand in surprise.

“May I have a quick word?” I said.

He frowned and then nodded, pulling me a bit away from the nearest soldiers. He folded his arms and faced me, cocking his head as if waiting, clearly wary of my touch.

I licked my lips. “Keallach, you need to dismiss Sethos. Send him away. He is vile — the very definition of evil.”

His frown deepened. “More of this, now? What can you know of Sethos?”

“I know that he fights against everything — and everyone — who fights for the Maker. And he has powers . . .” I shook my head. “Fearsome powers.”

“And you know this by . . .”

“Because every time I’ve been in his presence, I’ve felt it.”

“He was after you,” Keallach said with a dismissive shrug, pulling away. “On my orders, he was out to capture any Ailith
he could and bring you to me. Perhaps you confuse his intense drive with something more grave.”

“I don’t think so.”

“This is a conversation for another time.” He turned to leave and I grabbed his arm. Pointedly, he looked from my hand to me.

I dropped my hand but edged closer. “It’s a conversation for now,” I pressed. “Don’t you see? It’s he who has drawn you away from the Ailith cause and calling. He who divides us.”

“Nonsense. Has he not allowed you and Ronan to be aboard my very ship?”

“Only to see if he might find a way to stop us. Or destroy us.”

Keallach let out a dismissive noise. “You feel
too
much, Empath. It has confused you.”

“There is no confusion in this,” I insisted, following him when he strode away from me.

He folded his arms and turned toward me again. “You’ve gotten the wrong idea of Sethos, Andriana. He is . . .
challenging
at times. But there is good in him. If not for him, I don’t know if I’d be here today.”

My mouth dropped open, ten different retorts tying my tongue.

Taking in my expression, he scanned the docks to make sure we were still out of earshot of any of the men and then turned back to me. “It is Sethos who masterminded the public health operation that keeps Pacifica Cancer-free. It was he who began imports and exports with the Trading Union, which have saved countless families from starvation. From
both
sides of the Wall.” His hand pierced the air in angry emphasis. And then he dropped his voice. “It was he who came to me and told
me that Kapriel was ill, and convinced me I ought to reach out to him again. Does that sound like the voice of evil to you?”

My mind whirled and I shook my head in confusion.

“Come,” he said, gesturing toward the gangplank.

I passed him, agitated and angry. It made no sense. Sethos was wholly evil. Wasn’t he? Again, I looked for him, and a shiver ran down my back when I couldn’t find him. My armband was cool, but not frigid. He and the Sheolites were present . . . just not where I could see them.

“Where is he?” I asked him, panting as we left the sun-bleached slats of the pier and took to the steep, cobblestone road that presumably led up to the prison. “Sethos and his men?”

“Sethos and his men tend to upset my brother,” Keallach said. “I thought it best if they wait for our return down at the docks.”

I turned away before he could see my small smile. It was good to put some distance between me and the Sheolites, and it gave me hope about finding some way — some crazy way — to free Kapriel. Mentally, I sized up Keallach, wondering if I could take him, if we could somehow ditch the guards. He was taller than I by several inches, and certainly broader at the shoulders. And yet maybe my training had been better than his own. Hadn’t he just admired how I took down that guard with a few swift moves?

But the thought of Sethos back aboard the ship, with Ronan tied up and unable to defend himself . . . any small sense of hope I’d felt was immediately snuffed out. I slowed alongside Keallach, sensing his trepidation, his fear over what I assumed was the coming meeting with his brother. Anger
and frustration were present within him too. Was he preparing his defensive argument to present to his twin?

Around the next bend, there was a heavy gate. We stopped and the others — six guards in gray — gathered around me.

Keallach glanced at me and then gestured to two men. “Chain her and see that you never let go of her arms.” His eyes met mine again. “Forgive me. But I can take no chances.”

“What? Wait —” I began, but my protests were buried beneath the soldiers’ quick agreement.

“Yes, my liege.”

“Right away, Highness.”

It rankled, their titles for him. His claim on any measure of royalty had sent his brother here, to this cold prison isle, for season upon season. I hoped guilt would rot within Keallach, tear at him, poke at him. Perhaps it would open him up to his brother — and to his fellow Ailith — anew.

Heavy, rusting iron rings clamped down on my wrists, tiny anomalies in the steel poking at me. A chain spread between them and then down to meet another, which they clamped around my ankles. I looked to Keallach in disbelief, playing upon my femininity. “Is this truly necessary?”

“From what I know of you and yours, yes,” he said abruptly, then moved on ahead of me and up a winding staircase. He looked over his shoulder. “You will wait out here,” he said, gesturing to the platform beside him. “When I am done speaking with my brother, you will have your turn to meet him.”

He disappeared then, and I shuffled over to the staircase and made my way up it with some effort, given the extra thirty pounds of chain and long gown that encumbered me. I could hear the soldier behind me, snickering, and ignored him. At the top at last, I moved over to the far wall and looked down.
We were on the very edge of the prison wall, and far below the sea crashed against dark gray rocks. I quickly edged away, my stomach flipping.

A soldier pretended to push me, with a shout meant to startle me, but I managed to not cry out. I looked at him with as much loathing as I could muster, and he gave a small, nervous laugh and looked to his friend, who chuckled with him. But he took a step away from me, even as he continued to toss out derisive comments I chose to ignore. My eyes moved to the horizon and the gathering storm building there. Would we be trapped on the island? Already the swells of the sea were growing, much bigger than when we’d crossed, with whitecaps on their long crests.

I put my chained hands on the wall and closed my eyes, reaching for my Ailith brothers, feeling the damp wind whip across my face and send my dark hair flying behind me. There was the scent of rain on the wind, and I welcomed it like a message from home. It had been days, even weeks, since I had felt the comforting droplets from the sky, so much a part of most of our days at home in the wet Valley.

That was when I felt the emotion from within the very walls, it seemed. I actually pulled my hands away, so fierce was the hurt, the anger. After a second, I put my hands down on the stone and concrete again, and there it was . . . explosive and excruciating. It was Keallach, I knew, and his twin. I could feel my Ailith brothers’ emotions, almost as clearly as if I was in the same room with them. Agitation. Frustration. And yet beneath it all, still, love. It was such a cacophony of emotion I couldn’t bear it and pulled away. The storm over the sea seemed to echo what was happening inside the prison, the clouds climbing in a billowing, angry mass. I inhaled deeply.
The air carried the spicy tang of lightning even before I could see it. I shivered, the chill sending goosebumps over my arms. Or was the chill internal?

I forced myself to touch the wall again, knowing I had to learn what I could. But what I felt then was only a deep, harrowing sorrow. I wanted to weep it was so strong, like diving into a dark pool of grief itself. The door opened behind me and I turned. Keallach, ragged, his eyes red-rimmed, emerged. He paused when he saw me, and even in that moment, he seemed to really
see
me, enough to notice me rubbing away the cold along my arms. He again pulled his tawny cape from his shoulders and wrapped it around me. “My brother will see you now,” he muttered to me as he passed.

I stared at the dark doorway, partially afraid.

Because it wasn’t only his grief, fear, and agitation I felt. But his twin’s too.

CHAPTER
5

ANDRIANA

I
paused at the threshold of the door, feeling Keallach’s trepidation and sorrow — sorting it out from his twin’s. Ahead, Kapriel promised nothing of that to me. All along, he’d been nothing but hope to me — the lost prince — the end goal in every Ailith’s mind. Somehow we knew that in freeing Kapriel, our destiny would be that much closer, a key piece in place. But now, in trying to extricate my own feelings from what Keallach had experienced, I battled anxiety on several levels and fought to separate myself.
It is his pain, not mine
, I reminded myself.
His frustration, not mine.

Half of me wished I’d been present to hear their conversation.

Half of me was glad I hadn’t.

I pressed through the doorway and felt the relief of being out from the howling wind, even with the protection of
Keallach’s cape. I glanced backward, but no guard accompanied me, apparently on the emperor’s order. I supposed they figured that in chains, within the very prison, I wasn’t able to go far. I shivered and moved forward, the metal between my ankles scraping over the stone. I sniffed and regretted it, my nostrils filling with the scent of human waste as well as the foul scent of rotting flesh.

I turned a corner and heard the weeping, then, over the wind, so gut-wrenching that tears immediately sprang to my own eyes. It was an honest cry, the sort of wail that didn’t care who heard, who knew. Total brokenness.