The Staff and the Blade: Irin Chronicles Book Four (44 page)

“And there, my love, is the sticking point.” Damien leaned forward and rested his chin on her shoulder. “Do you think the Elder Council wants to admit they need the Irina? Not only back in the Library, but in every scribe house in every city around the world? Think about it. Any Irina who took such a posting would have to be powerful enough to teach and train the
kareshta
. Not only matrons and builders and healers.
Martial
Irina. In every scribe house.”

Her back went up. “And is that a bad thing?”

“To a council that has wielded absolute control for generations without answering to anyone? Absolutely. They see the martial Irina as a threat. Women who took the law into their own hands and fought under no one’s authority before the restoration of the singers’ council. No rules. No protocol. It will take time for attitudes to change.”

And Sari had to admit that most Irina trained in combat would buck at the thought of obeying a watcher’s commands. She was one of the few who had operated within the hierarchy before the Rending, and even that had been tempered by being a watcher’s mate. She couldn’t imagine Renata following orders. Or Mala. So who would take these positions?

She took a deep breath and leaned back into Damien’s chest. “I hate this.”

“There are no easy answers, Sari. We do the best we can.”

Move forward. That’s what they’d agreed on. Move forward to make a difference. To create a better world. No looking back.

But why did it have to be in Vienna?

“I hate politics.” She sat up and started yanking out weeds again. “I hate councilors who change their minds. And singers who can’t make up their minds. Factions with no leaders, and coalitions that exist solely to reject every reform proposed.”

Damien knelt beside her and began to pull weeds. “Don’t forget the polite speech.”

“Double-talk.”

“Endless compromise.”

“Fluid principles.” She ripped a stubborn dandelion out by the root.

“Covering your ass before looking out for the greater good.”

“Campaigns!” Sari yelled. “When no one is supposed to be bloody campaigning!”

Damien laughed and grabbed her around the waist, tackling her to the grass before he kissed her.

“We are not politicians, my love.”

Sari huffed. “I hate being bad at things.”

Damien laughed harder.

“But I’m shit at politics,” she said, his laughter making her smile. “I’m utter and complete shit at it. All I want is to walk into the Library and bash them all about their perfectly coiffed heads and kick their linen-covered asses. Maybe break some things.”

“I think you already did that.”

“Well, I’d like to do it again.”

His laughter fell away, and Sari closed her eyes as Damien traced a line along her jaw.

“They need you,” he said quietly. “Whether they appreciate you or not. They need you kicking their asses instead of kissing them. They need your passion. Your principles. Your unwillingness to bend.”

She sighed. “I know compromise is necessary.”

“There are plenty in Vienna willing to compromise,” he said. “What is needed is others who will hold them accountable.”

“So you approve of my obstinate disregard for political subtlety?”

“My love”—he kissed her nose—“I revel in it.”

※

Sari was chatting online with one of the haven guardians in Canada the next day. Several e-mails from Gabriel had told her everything she needed to know about the
kareshta
registry vote and the status of the motion. The council was still stymied, but this time it was by a few of the elders who didn’t want
karesht
a to have any political status or protection at all… unless they were mated to Irin scribes.

It was an extreme position, but it had split the coalition enough that no mandates would be handed down in the near future. For the moment, watchers would retain control over how they dealt with the women and children who came to them.

Sari was hoping that if enough of the watchers tapped Irina resources in their area to help them deal with the new
kareshta
, then the registry might become a moot point. Local singers and scribes could deal with each case individually, without the need for intervention from Vienna. It would also move more Irina into scribe houses and back into mainstream Irin society.

She heard a key rattle in the door.

“Sari?” Damien called.

“In the library.” She signed off from her session with Abigail’s daughter and closed the computer. “Why are you home already?”

She expected a teasing reply about missing his mate, but Damien said nothing. He wasn’t the most talkative of men, but his silence that afternoon unnerved her.

“Damien?”

He walked into the library and leaned against a bookshelf. “I received a letter from Katalin today.”

Sari frowned. “I didn’t see anything in the mail.”

“She sent a messenger.”

Sari rolled her eyes and decided to sort her own mail, which had been piling up for a week. Her mate’s mother could be singularly aristocratic, old-fashioned, and paranoid. “What did the letter say? Did she ask if I was dead yet?”

“Please don’t joke about that.”

Sari looked up. “You’re in a mood.”

Katalin had been appeased by Sari’s connections when Orsala was on the council, but she was still obsessed with bloodlines, and Sari suspected that—should she meet a tragic end—Katalin would waste no time in trying to breed Damien to a singer with Mikael’s blood.

Or breed him to any singer. Damien’s mother had been more than clear about her desire for grandchildren, a topic that Sari and her mate were currently avoiding.

“What did Katalin want?” she asked absently, sorting through the mail and mentally bracing herself for the children discussion again.

“She wants us to come for a visit.”

The letters dropped from her hand. “A what?”

“A visit.” Damien didn’t look any more thrilled than she did.

“To Rěkaves?”

“Yes.”

Sari paused, unsure of what reaction Damien might be expecting. “Do we have to?”

“When has my mother ever specifically requested that we come to visit her?”

Sari blinked. “Never.”

Sari and Damien had never been invited to his mother’s home even though the old castle where Damien had been born, raised, and trained as a warrior was only a little over four hours away by car. They had met his mother in Vienna twice. Once before the Rending and once in the past year after the Irina Council had been reformed. Both meetings had felt more like diplomatic visits than family dinners. Sari had briefly mentioned the possibility of Katalin becoming involved with the new council only to receive an unblinking, glacial stare.

Katalin of Vértes did not become directly involved in politics.

If Damien’s mother was requesting a visit, she had a reason other than meddling in Damien and Sari’s life.

“I think we must go,” he said. “She would not be asking unless it was important.”

Sari nodded, watching Damien as he read the letter again. It was written on thick linen paper with black ink calligraphy. Katalin didn’t use a computer or a secretary for her letters, Damien had once told her. If you received a letter from the
praetora
, it was written in her own hand.

“Damien?”

He looked up. “Yes,
milá
.”

“We’ll go. As soon as you like. I don’t have any meetings this week that can’t be postponed.”

“Thank you.”

“You don’t have to thank me,” she said. “How long has it been?”

Damien looked up. “How long has what been?”

“How long has it been since you’ve been home?”

“Home?” Damien laughed, walked over, and kissed her, tossing Katalin’s letter on the pile of Sari’s mail. “I’d hardly call Rěkaves home.”

She smiled. “How long has it been, Damien?”

He stopped and stared out the window that looked into the back garden. “I went home briefly in 1890.”

“When your father died.”

“Yes.” He paused but said nothing more about his father. “Before that? The last time I lived in my mother’s home was at the end of the thirteenth century.”

Sari blinked. “So long?”

“I was only there for a few years before I left for Paris with the rest of the order.” He crossed his arms, but did not turn to her. “I went to Orkney after Paris, and you know the rest.”

Sari tried to imagine being so distant from her roots. Though she’d traveled, most of her life had been spent in Northern Europe and Scandinavia. Sarihöfn was home.

Damien turned and caught her expression. “Don’t look at me like that,
milá
. I am not a wanderer to be pitied.”

“But where are your roots, Damien?” The earth singer in her was dissatisfied with his response. “Where do you feel most at home? I can’t imagine,
reshon
.”

“Sarihöfn. London. Istanbul.
You
.” He walked over and kissed her cheek. “You are my home, Sari. I can wander the world for the rest of my life. The only home I need is you.”

CHAPTER TWO

D
AMIEN
used the hands-free calling on his phone to speak to Malachi while Sari caught a nap on their way north.

“So while we’re seeing more activity from new Grigori,” his first lieutenant was saying, “none of it is organized. Those we do track down are either low-level irritants or connected to Kostas in some way.”

Damien’s ears pricked at the mention of the rogue Grigori commander. “Are his men hunting in the city?”

“Some. So far everyone we’ve encountered has checked out with Sirius.”

Kostas was the leader of a faction of free Grigori, and Sirius was his second-in-command. They were sons of the Fallen whose angelic sires were dead and who chose to lead a more disciplined life. They did not hunt human women, though a few of Kostas’s men were in consensual—if precarious—relationships with humans.

Most of their focus was on hunting fallen angels. They also found and cared for
kareshta
and Grigori children who had not yet been corrupted. The more Fallen they killed, the more Grigori had free will. It was one of the reasons Damien had allowed the Grigori commander to take some of the heaven-forged blades from Mikael’s armory during the Battle of Vienna. To his knowledge, Kostas and his men had tracked and killed two Fallen since then, though they were only minor powers.

“Use caution when dealing with them. I don’t know how disciplined their command structure is,” Damien said.

“I suspect it is even more strict than ours.”

Because though a Grigori could live life without killing humans, it was still rare. They did not have written magic to control their need for human souls, nor did they have mates who fed their energy as the Irin did. The few who managed did so because leaders like Kostas kept them on a tight and brutal leash.

“How often do you speak to him?”

Malachi asked, “To Kostas? Rarely. But Ava has regular contact with his sister, Kyra, and Sirius and I have exchanged phone numbers.”

“Keep me informed if anything looks like it’s changing.”

Istanbul, his post for centuries, had always been a quiet one. Jaron, who had controlled the city for most of Damien’s term as watcher, had not allowed his sons to run rampant, nor had he hundreds or thousands of them as other fallen angels did. There was a brief spike in violence after Volund had taken over, but that had calmed when Jaron and Volund killed each other in Vienna. For the most part, Istanbul was a peaceful part of the Irin world, well able to allow him and Sari to travel.

“Can you spare Leo right now?” he asked Malachi.

“I can.” The man paused. “Is there something I need to be aware of?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“I thought you and Sari were in Vienna.”

“My mother called us to Rěkaves, her castle west of Prague.”

“Going home for a visit?” he asked. “So why are you asking about Leo?”

“I have a feeling this isn’t a simple visit,” Damien said. “My mother does not do simple visits. She has some task for me.”

“You have Sari. And a veritable army of Mikael’s warriors in your mother’s training, if rumors are correct.”

“They’re correct…” He rubbed his jaw. “But I don’t know them. I don’t trust them. Or my mother. So if you could spare Leo, he would be welcome to join us.”

Malachi thought. “I can spare Leo. Max is here and grumbling about not having enough to do lately. So I’ll just double up his patrols. Do you want me to ask Mala as well?”

Damien’s ears perked up. “Is Mala there?”

“She and Orsala came for a visit with Ava and the children.”

He smiled. “And how are your tiny terrors?”

Malachi groaned. “Still not sleeping. Well, I should say that Geron sleeps very well. Until Matti wakes him. The poor little man has no rest from his sister.”

Sari grumbled at the talking and turned toward Damien in her sleep, a frown marring her face.