Tears of War (44 page)

Kirynn paused, her face clouded with concentration. “I wish I could place the voice. He left before I was fully awake and the memory is buried under layers of fog.” Her eyebrows drew down. “I will find him and then I’m going to kill him.”

Vaddoc smiled, a hard glint in his eyes. “Bathe quickly then. I will not promise to save him for you if I find him first.”

Her eyes narrowed. “You will not steal this kill from me.”

He held up his hands. “Bathe quickly.”

Kirynn turned with a growl and sprinted toward the Great Hall. Vaddoc launched himself into his saddle with a chuckle. Maleena frowned slightly at him. “You know she will injure you severely if you kill him. Her thoughts were broadcasting loud enough that I think even the weakest Spirit mage heard them.”

Vaddoc crooked a smile at her. “It is fun to anger her, but there is a line between fun and stupidity. I am not a stupid man, Maleena. I will not take this kill from her.”

Maleena laughed softly as Namir lifted off, the wind whipping around her. She stood and walked past where Kellinar, Anevay and Taela stood with their arms around each other in a tight hug. A smile tugged at her lips. Kellinar had certainly found his place with his bondmates. Maleena climbed in the saddle and fastened the safety straps. The three bondmates still held each other as Nydara lifted off and opened the Slide.

“This is unacceptable!” Alrendoc slammed his fist against the large table and stood. As he started to pace the room, Kirynn kept her eyes on the members of the Council of Seven seated around the table. One of them was a traitor. It was possible that the traitor was directly beneath one of these men in rank though her gut told her otherwise.

Deslin rubbed the top of his forehead. “We must find whoever this is.”

Mannoc frowned. “I never thought I would see the day when a man of Shadereen would abandon his watch so thoroughly.” He shook his head. “To intentionally allow Kojen not only into Shadereen but into the heart of Marden, and Shadow Riders into the very belly of this fortress…”

“A sad day indeed,” the graying Rashar said gravely, his expression troubled.

As the talk around the table continued, Kirynn watched each of them carefully. Whoever it was, he was very good at hiding things. No twitch of an eye, no beads of nervous sweat, nor even strain in a voice gave away the traitor. It was a shame Maleena or Taela couldn’t be present at this meeting. Either one of them would have ferreted out the traitor in no time.

Kirynn leaned back in her chair and tuned out the mostly worthless discussion. How could they plan to keep it from happening again when the traitor sat among them? It didn’t help that they refused to believe it might be one of them. That was alright, she could be patient.

A
zurynn sat at the desk she’d brought into the alcove off the main chamber of the Kormai. The large tome of the Kor’ti lay open on the top. A dull pain thrummed in her head as she carefully read through the symbols, searching for her mistake in the making of the chain.

It didn’t matter that she was a Shadow Rider. A Shadow Rider who used Spirit magic was a rare thing despite the fact there had been two of them at once until Sulwyna had gotten herself killed. It still hurt to use Shadow magic, but Azurynn had grown accustomed to the pain and largely ignored it.

She had learned long ago that pain could be pushed aside and ignored. A brief memory of her previous life flashed through her mind. The reeking sludge in the bowels of the boat where she and the other girls and women were forced to sleep, the sweaty men who came down for only one thing, the screams and cries of those who hadn’t accepted their fate yet. The smell of the sickness that so often took the women due to the living conditions.

Azurynn shook her head to dispel the unpleasant memories. She’d shown them. When her magic came to her and set her free, she ensured the men on the boats had all felt the horror and pain they had caused. Azurynn made sure they felt her revenge. They’d deserved it. Deserved it for what they’d done to her and the other women; for how they had twisted her. She could barely remember a time before that. A time before she’d been sold as a slave on the boats of Turindar.

Azurynn rubbed her temples. Enough of this. That life was gone. She was what she was now and her new life assured she would never face that kind of abuse again. There were more important things to think about now. She refocused on the book. Where had she gone wrong with the chain?

Ah, there, that symbol. Was that the one—

“Azurynn.” A mage walked into the alcove, interrupting her thoughts.

With a growl, Azurynn lashed out at the mage. The woman let out a soft cry as her eyes rolled back in her head and she fell to the floor, blood trickling from her nose.

Azurynn sucked in a deep breath and let it out, rubbing her forehead as if that would help the spike of pain. Now, where had she been? Oh yes, that symbol.

“Azurynn.”

She let out an exasperated growl and looked up. Sadira swept into the room and froze, staring at the body of the mage. She turned slowly and glowered at her with dark eyes that showed none of the deeply buried fear Azurynn sensed. “You killed another of my mages?”

Azurynn glanced at the dead woman on the floor and shrugged. “She interrupted me.” She sent Sadira a pointed look.

Sadira leaned her hands on the desk. “It took me forever to gather the mages we have. And yet you kill them. Do you know how hard it is for me to find more?”

“How tragic for you.” Azurynn turned back to the book, already dismissing Sadira from her thoughts. She smiled at the frustration rolling off Sadira as the dark-haired beauty left. Sadira didn’t dare push her too far and Azurynn knew it.

She concentrated again on the symbol. Azurynn now saw she had constructed it wrong. It didn’t bother her that the first try had failed. She would make another and this time it would do exactly what it was designed to do.

Kovan sat on one of the cushioned benches around the edge of the main chamber, sharpening his sword. He could have had someone else do it, but the task calmed him.

Sadira came stomping across the cavern, her pretty face twisted into a murderous expression. Kovan groaned, so much for feeling soothed. No doubt she was here to gripe about Azurynn.

Sadira stopped in front of him, her hands on her hips. “Do something about Azurynn. She can’t keep killing my mages.”

Kovan threw back his head and laughed, partly because the suggestion was ludicrous and partly because he knew it would irritate her. “Azurynn does as she pleases. Why don’t you do something about her? Oh wait, that’s right, she would kill you before your shadows could kill her. And because if she chooses to, she can get into your thoughts and make you kill yourself.”

“I am
not
afraid of her,” Sadira snapped.

Sadira was close to losing control, but Kovan didn’t care. He was an even match with her. If they ever went head to head they both had the same chances of coming out alive. Azurynn, however, was quick to kill and had no trouble reading the minds of those around her to observe their intentions. A fight with the blood-haired woman was not something he wanted. Kovan would rather get into it with Sadira.

“If you aren’t afraid of her, then you truly are insane.” He bent back to his sword.

“So she just gets to do as she wishes whenever she wishes? Like run off with a bunch of Kojen to Shadereen and not tell anyone.”

Kovan looked up at her again. Damn the Fates, why couldn’t he just kill Sadira and be done with it? “Azurynn doesn’t try to take over or give orders; she pretty much stays out of everything if we leave her alone. I don’t care what she does as long as she doesn’t challenge us for leadership because the Fates know she would take both of us down.”

“If we are the leadership, she should have to ask before running off with Kojen to play with her experiments. She got another Shadow Rider killed.”

Kovan narrowed his eyes. He didn’t like the situation with Azurynn any better than Sadira, but there wasn’t anything they could do about it. Fates knew he wanted to kill Azurynn but even if she was somehow an easy target, he couldn’t do it. He would love to see Sadira dead too. Kovan’s frustration over his inability to kill women rose to the surface. He couldn’t kill her, but he could piss her off. “Your father died almost two months ago.”

Sadira’s face became a frozen mask. “What?”

He shrugged and bent back to his sword. “Word came in yesterday. Apparently he died. Your brother became a Guardian and your sister Kalila has taken the throne.”

Sadira turned and walked away calmly. For a moment, he thought he had miscalculated how she would take the news. She almost made it across the cavern before grabbing a chair with both hands and hurtling it into a wall with a shriek. It splintered into wooden shards against the rock. Kovan ignored her and went back to work. That was the reaction he’d expected. More shrieks and crashes followed her as she continued down the hall. Several of the other Shadow Riders in the cavern watched the doorway Sadira had disappeared through with wary eyes.

Kovan chuckled. That should keep her busy for a while. He had just lost himself in the soothing motions of sharpening the blade again when Dusa landed at the mouth of the Kormai. Oksana ripped away her safety straps, jumped down and then stormed into the cave, her green eyes flashing. Kovan leaned back. “How did it go in Trilene?”

She shot him a glare. “I told you that either you or one of the other men would have been a better choice. They reacted just as I said they would. Those moronic Trilene and their views of women didn’t make it easy. I had to kill several of the ruling house’s children to get it through their heads that I was no longer one of their women to be kicked around.”