Soul of Fire (49 page)

But that didn’t matter. He’d done what he thought he should do. When the authorities discovered his involvement and came for him, he would go quietly.

William had started along the narrow dark passage between the barracks and the wall of the encampment, when a hand shot out of the shadows and held his arm. “Wait,” a voice said, almost soundlessly.

William turned. In the shadows, he could just barely make out Bhishma’s face.

“Why?” Bhishma asked, still in that almost soundless whisper.

“I . . . couldn’t allow the injustice.”

The hand on his arm let go. “Thank you,” Bhishma said. And then he was gone.

TOWERS OF SILENCE; TWO BAD CHOICES

“Look. There,” Sofie said, sinking her hands into the
dragon’s neck ruffle, trying to get his attention. For hours they’d been flying—first in one direction, then the other—trying to evade the rugs.

Now there was only one in pursuit, and as it got too close, St. Maur turned and burned it. Rug and rider went up in flames.

Sofie knew, because it had happened before, that another rug would appear to take up the chase. She’d come to the conclusion that they were tracing them through witch-sniffers. She didn’t know how they were managing to call up rugs, but it didn’t matter. They’d done it again and again for hours.

They’d been flying all day. She could feel the tiredness in the great body beneath her, the weariness with which the great big wings lifted and flapped. He couldn’t fly much longer—certainly not without either food or sleep. She must find them shelter. She saw the towers rising ahead of her.

From the towers came a feeling—something she couldn’t quite identify, except for saying she’d felt it before, around the temples in Benares. It was the feeling of divine power. It would be enough to mask them from any witch-sniffer. For a while, at least.

She pointed at the towers and the dragon went toward them. The towers stood on a hill rising almost straight up from the sea, and she was surprised to see the sea—surprised they’d got so close to it, somehow. How long had St. Maur been flying? They must stop somewhere as soon as possible.

The area around the towers was built into a beautiful garden and shaded by tropical trees. The roads leading up to the area were well kept. Perhaps here she and St. Maur could evade ambush for a while.

The towers were twenty-five feet or so in height and ninety feet in diameter, and the vultures that flew over them in circles squawked in fear and winged away as St. Maur flew near.

“The tower,” she yelled, indicating that he should land. But instead he moved away from it, flying down to its base instead. She started to open her mouth to reproach him, but he shifted, and in the shape of a very pale man, collapsed to the ground, dropping their bags.

“The tower,” she said, almost in a whisper. “You were supposed to fly up to the tower.”

He shook his head. He was taking long, gasping breaths. “No. These are the towers of the Parsees. The Towers of Silence. They follow the dictates of Zoroaster, who thought not only fire but also earth and water, too, were too sacred to be polluted with dead bodies. They expose the corpses atop the towers, to the vultures.”

“Oh,” Sofie said, thinking she understood. “You thought it best not to defile the rites of another religion?”

He flashed teeth at her, in something far less than a smile. “No. I just can’t trust myself right now. Not as hungry as I am.”

“Oh,” she said again, not knowing what else to say. Hard to speak to this urbane man and know that part of him, deep inside, was the beast, and that the beast was seeking to get out. Hard to understand. She had spent all this time with him, and she was not sure where the division lay, nor how much control St. Maur had over the dragon.

He rose, tottering on his feet. “I must eat,” he said.

She looked in horror from him to what looked like a great city nearby. “Here?”

Another flash of teeth, not quite a smile. “I hear vulture is quite tasty,” he said, and she felt her face set in horror. Then he grinned more genuinely. “Fish. There are fish in the sea. Dragons are always at least half aquatic. You sit here, in the shadow of the divine power. I’ll go fish.”

Instead, she followed him to the edge of the cliff and looking out of the sea. The sun had set, and the dragon’s wings were quite visible—shining with their own fire—as he flew and dipped over the sea. There were boats of native fishermen, with torches, but no one seemed to take notice of the dragon.

He dipped into the sea now and then, and she presumed he caught something for his trouble, but when she saw him dip toward one of the fishermen’s boats, she stood up in alarm. Only, St. Maur didn’t touch the fisherman. He only dipped momentarily, then flew toward her. He changed as he tumbled onto the cliff, so he landed as a man, holding something in his hand.

As he extended the something toward her, she saw it was a fish, between two slices of bread. A smoked fish, she determined, as she accepted it. “Why, milord,” she said, “how clever of you. Getting fish already smoked.”

“Isn’t it?” he asked. He sat holding his knees.

“Are we going to sleep here?” Sofie asked. “In the shadow of the divine influence from the towers?”

He sighed. “I don’t know. I don’t think it’s enough to shelter us for long. They will find us.”

“But then . . .”

“I don’t know, Miss Warington. I don’t know what to do.”

Sitting on the ground near towers used to dispose of the dead, eating a smoked fish and thin, circular bread while a completely naked man sat beside her, Sofie felt suddenly very confident. Her whole life, people had decided things for her and told her what to do. She’d rebelled against marrying the repulsive raj, but since then she’d done nothing but follow St. Maur’s lead and allow him to protect her. Now it was time for her to think.

There were only two ways to stop her from being a target for the tigers. One, there was a chance they could wake the ruby with the blood sacrifice, but the last thing that Sofie wanted was to give power to creatures who would use blood sacrifice to obtain it.

And two . . . She looked slyly at St. Maur, out the corner of her eye. “You could deflower me,” she said.

He made a sound between a choke and a splutter and turned to look at her. “I beg your pardon?”

“Wait, please, listen. If I . . . then the tigers wouldn’t be able to perform their ghastly sacrifice, would they?”

“You must . . . truly, you must pardon me.” His face was aflame. “I don’t think I could. Not . . . like that. If the world were different, if we were different, I could maybe be the right man for you. I’m as well born as you could hope for, and I’m not, I hope, of a boorish frame of mind, nor wholly terrible to look at. But what I am and what I do . . . What happens to me when I change shape is not something that you could wish for in any husband. Or that you deserve in your husband.”

“I wasn’t asking you to be my husband,” she said, tiredly. “Just—”

“No,” he said. It was almost a scream. “No. If I were to . . . No. Your entire life would be blighted. Forever. I can no more do that than I could kill you.”

“I see,” she said. “And you’re quite sure you can’t activate the ruby?”

“It’s dead,” he said in a faraway voice. “There is no soul there.”

“I see,” she said again. “So there’s nothing for it, but . . . to go on.”

He was silent. Silence stretched between them. Sofie thought of how hot it was, how muggy. All these days, with them together, it had been hot, and everything around them parched. The sun of India. How she’d missed it all the time she’d been in England. And now, how she longed for the monsoons’ cool rains. The rains she’d never see. “Milord, I am still hungry I don’t suppose those fishermen . . .”

He looked at her, amused and just faintly surprised. He smiled a little. “I suppose you didn’t eat much,” he said. “What with running away from your friends and all. And even if you don’t change . . . yes, I could see you’d get hungry.”

He stood. He allowed his body to become a dragon. She watched him fly away over the sea, toward the little boats with their lights. She hated to see him risk himself so, on a ruse of hers. But she didn’t know what else to do. The fate of the world depended on this one jewel. And the only way to make the jewel live was for her to die—or for one of her descendants to die. Her death, alone, would heal the world’s magic and restore it to its normal pattern. Her death or that of her daughter . . . or her granddaughter.

How could she live knowing that by living she was probably condemning a descendant to sure death?

She got the ruby from its wrapping and held it in her hand, its broken light dazzling madly. She thought she saw the dragon turn toward her. No. She must do it quickly. He wanted to spare her. He didn’t understand there were fates worse than death—such as living knowing you have blighted the life and ended the mission of the man you loved. Such as living always looking over your shoulder for the enemy trying to harm you or seize the jewel. Such as knowing if you had a daughter you’d be raising her for the same fate. Probably spelled and followed by tigers before the cradle.

The dragon was flying back. Sofie pulled her small knife from the pouch inside her sleeve, where she’d hid it, and unwrapped it from her handkerchief.

Now, now, now,
her mind urged, as Peter flew back. It occurred to her she didn’t even know how to do this. All she knew was what she’d seen in the one play she’d watched in London.
Romeo and Juliet.
She held the ruby to her chest. And she drove the dagger into what she hoped was her heart.

Brilliant ruby light exploded all around her.

LOVE AND MADNESS; WHEN A HEART BREAKS; THE LAST POSSIBLE CHOICE