Those Who Fear the Darkness (BloodRunes: Book 2) (30 page)

“Indeed,” Nathair humored him though
explaining to the man was not a priority. “I want you to steer
Jezebel in the right direction for me to make sure that our
invasion goes smoothly. Seeing as she’s bound to be a bit perturbed
at me at present,” Devon’s sour face told him he had spent no few
hours hearing about how irritated she was at him and he was glad
for his foresight in dealing with Devon instead, “I want you to
make my plans seem like Jezebel came up with them herself,
understand?” Devon nodded. “I assume she’ll be much more motivated
if she believes that what she is doing is only a part of her own
scheming.” Devon’s face once again told him what he needed to know.
“Before she can be of any use to me, however, we need to get her to
open her channels again.”

“But she’s completely burned out,” Devon
contradicted, “how can she open herself to the power?”

“She may have been burned out, but just like
any wound, it has been healing. The scar tissue, if you will, will
have made it difficult for her to find her way back to the power
once again, but it is by no means impossible. In fact, I am a
little surprised she hasn’t found a way to get it back already.” He
paused in thought for a moment, “Though it does require patience,
something she does not have an abundance of.”

“How can she do this?”

Nathair smiled once again, “You’ll enjoy
this,” he told the man, “and it will be my reward to you for your
excellent service. Really, it requires only that she practice
trying to reach the power until she hits the point that she can
feel the spark of it and then remembering where she hit the spot,
practicing sending down this pathway until it becomes natural for
her once again. Time is all it needs to take, but, it will go
faster if there is a physical connection to the pathway. And, since
she has been down this pathway with you before - I believe you know
the night that I’m speaking of-” he gave Devon a shrewd look,
“repeating that night will help her to make those pathways more
permanent.”

Devon looked doubtful. “Even if that were
so,” he looked frightened again as Nathair narrowed his eyes,
“which I’m sure that it is, I highly doubt that I can convince her
to do so again. She acts as if it never happened the first
time.”

Nathair whispered three words into the mirror
and Devon’s lips glowed brightly for a moment. “There,” he said,
satisfied, “I have just made it so that when you kiss her, she will
feel a spark of power, it will excite her so that she will believe
you enough to try it, and trying it will show her the real thing. I
have no doubt that this will work. Now, once it has and she has
regained control of her power, here’s what you need to get her to
do…”

CHAPTER 18

Katya strapped on her armguards and slung the
leather backpack over her shoulder. She glanced over at Gryffon and
at his nod, the two of them hoisted the handles of the make-shift
sled that they had fashioned to drag Layna’s limp form on into the
air and pulled.

Gryffon grunted softly as it jerked into
motion.

Once it was going, it slid across the muddy
land fairly easily for the two of them, though their progress was
significantly less than had they all been walking. Furthermore, the
conspicuous gouges in the earth that it was leaving behind made
Katya uneasy. For several nights now she had been re-tracing and
covering their tracks, but the lack of sleep combined with the
strenuous labor of pulling Layna along was starting to catch up
with her.

“How much longer until we reach the
mountains?” she asked Gryffon, as much to distract herself from her
aching muscles as actually wanting to know the answer.

“It’s hard to say,” came his reply in between
deep breaths, “I’ve never traveled this far before, and this pace
is a lot different than my normal travel.”

He was doing more than his fair share of the
labor, whether it was because she was slacking a bit due to her
late-night activities, or simply his man-like need to show his
strength she wasn’t sure, but in any case, he was looking extremely
worn down as well.

“Perhaps we should camp early tonight,” she
suggested, “We both are getting worn out.”

“We don’t know how long she can be like this
without it being permanent though,” he reasoned, “I’d rather be
tired for another couple days than not get her back….”

Katya changed the subject. “So how did you
two meet?” It was a question that most couples she had observed had
been asked, and usually the other party would be drawn into a long
string of stories that hopefully would help pass the time for at
least him while he was lost in his memories even if she was bored
to death.

Gryffon looked slightly uncomfortable though.
“Well, it’s a little complicated,” he started and Katya smiled to
herself. Perhaps it wouldn’t be so boring after all. “I was living
with this woman - “

“Excuse me?” Katya interjected. She, of
course, knew all about the awkward situation that Gryffon had found
himself in, but she wasn’t about to tell him that and spoil the fun
of seeing him squirm.

“I know it sounds bad, but it wasn’t like
that. You see, I was sent to Gelendan as a spy, and more
specifically to spy on the woman and her father. So, I had to
create a reason to get close to them, and when she showed an
interest in me romantically I had to take advantage of it.”

Katya looked skeptically at him.

“I didn’t -“ he started, “It wasn’t -“

She exhaled shortly and gave him a crooked
smile. “Go on.”

His shoulders slumped a bit, but he
continued. “So anyway, I was living with this woman, if you can
even call her that, when Layna came to work for her from the
country.”

He paused for a moment so Katya made a small
sound that she was listening and he should continue while adjusting
her grip on the handle.

“I could tell she was special from when I
first saw her, but seeing as how I was supposed to be playing the
part of a noble and she was a maid, I had to play my cards
carefully. I also didn’t want to talk to her too soon because,”
once again he paused and Katya thought she saw a shadow of a blush
creep up his face. “Well, I knew that I would have to report her to
my superiors because she was obviously such a high talent, but at
the same time I wanted her to be my little secret. There was just
something about her, you know?” The affection in his eyes melted
away the last of the animosity that Katya had been feeling towards
him.

“I know.” She whispered softly. There was
definitely
something
about her, why did her parents think
they were going to die and entrust a puzzling heirloom to a
stranger to give her? And what did it all have to do with
Katya?

“But anyway, eventually I did introduce
myself and we started spending time together away from the manor
and it kind-of just went from there…with everything that’s happened
to us though, I’m not even sure if there is an ‘us’ anymore…”

They stopped short as the game trail that
they had been following suddenly cut sharply to the right. The
distant sound of rushing water could be heard ahead of them, but
their way was blocked by a thick overgrowth of vegetation. Vines
spread across the crisscross of bushes and trees, as if
purposefully trying to keep trespassers out.

They set down their load carefully and Katya
checked on Layna as Gryffon inspected the obstacle. They had been
healing both Layna and themselves in small spurts, trying to make
sure that they did not advertise their position to any lurking
dragons, and had almost completely gotten them all back to
normal.

She ran a hand over Layna’s forehead,
determining there was no fever, and inspected her for insects. On
the first day, they hadn’t thought to check on her as much, and at
the end of the day they had discovered a humongous tick behind her
left ear. The removal of which was one story about this trip that
they would definitely not be sharing with her.

When she was satisfied that Layna was fine,
she joined Gryffon.

“What do you think?” she asked him, surveying
the path for herself at the same time.

“Not bad, I think we can cut our way through
and still drag the sled. I can’t tell exactly how far this goes
since it’s so thick, but we can hear the water, so it can’t be that
far, right?”

Katya simply shrugged and went to where she
had dropped her pack, grabbing her dagger from it. “Let’s get going
then, shall we?” She started hacking away at the brush.

Gryffon joined her, but even with two of them
it wasn’t long before they were both balls of sweat and exhausted.
Night closed in on them before they had gotten more than twenty
feet and they reluctantly gave up for the day.

As they each curled in their own bedrolls for
the night, Katya blinked sleepily at him. “What do you know about
Layna’s family?” she asked him.

“Well,” Gryffon started, but yawned before
continuing. The yawn was contagious and Katya found herself doing
so as he continued, “I know she’s from the country. I know she told
me the town, but I can’t for the life of me remember it. It’s in
Gelendan and all and even though we’re supposed to memorize
everywhere, wherever it was didn’t exactly make it to the spy
lists.”

“Did she ever mention any other family?”

Gryffon looked thoughtful for a moment. “I
don’t think so.”

“What did her parents do?”

He looked quizzically at her. “I’m not really
sure, I think they were farmers of some sort. Something that didn’t
require much traveling I know because she mentioned she’d never
been anywhere.”

“Anything unusual about them?”

“Why are you so interested in her?” Gryffon
suddenly became suspicious. “And just who are you? You show up out
of the blue just at the right time to heal her and then suddenly
you have nothing better to do than to travel with me to the source
of the river and act like she’s your best friend when you obviously
don’t know anything about her? I trusted you because you healed
her, but now I’m not so sure. What game are you playing at?”

Katya froze, unsure of what to do. But seeing
no reason not to, she decided to tell the truth.

“I have to tell her that her parents are
dead. And they gave me something to give to her that they said was
very important.” She paused, and wasn’t sure what made her she add
the next part. “She also could be my only clue to who I really
am.”

Gryffon was sufficiently surprised.
“What?”

“I just found out myself. I’ve been the-”
Katya wasn’t quite ready to tell him specifics of her childhood
just yet, so she searched for a suitable word, “-errand girl, I
guess, of a noble since as long as I can remember, but he recently
passed away and I found out that this couple might be able to tell
me about my past. But when I went to visit them, they both
died.”

He had a peculiar look on his face. He seemed
at odds with himself over his response. “And this couple was
Layna’s parents?” he asked her finally.

Katya nodded.

“How did they die?” he asked softly.

“They were poisoned,” she said simply,
sparing him the details.

“Poisoned?” Gryffon’s voice sounded
incredulous. “You show up and they’re suddenly poisoned?”

“I know, I thought it was my fault - I don’t
exactly have a clean slate and could easily have brought my bad
karma with me. Except for something that her mother said. She said
something about how she always expected that day to come. Why would
a couple of farmers expect to be murdered?”

“Maybe they knew about her talent,” Gryffon
murmured almost to himself.

“The priests rush in and publically arrest
you to make an example to others if that’s the case. They wouldn’t
send a professional assassin to poison them.”

“Professional assassin? Is there more to this
story you’re not telling me?”

She debated telling him about the King’s
interference but decided not to. “Only that then with their dying
breath they told me to find Layna and give her this package that
they had hidden under the floorboards.”

“What’s in the package?”

“Just a weird box that doesn’t even open, I
don’t know why it’s so important.”

Gryffon was silent for a moment. “Poor
Layna.” It took Katya a minute to figure out what he meant. But of
course, even with the excitement of the mystery that this
presented, his thoughts were solely on Layna’s feelings. Her
parents had just died. Katya found this refreshing and she smiled.
“I find myself warming to you, Gryffon. I can see why Layna is so
attached to you.”

“Is she?” he asked, and surprisingly looked
genuinely interested in her answer.

“Well, the two of you are…” she left the
sentence unfinished, waiting for him to fill in the blanks.

“I don’t really know,” he said, “We’ve spent
a great deal of time together, but we’ve never discussed what we
are exactly and the majority of our time together has been spent
either hiding our relationship - whatever it is - or running for
our lives.”

“Well, I’m not going to get involved,
especially when I haven’t even had the chance to talk to her yet,
but yes, I can tell that she cares a great deal about you.” She
yawned hugely. “But now, I need to sleep.”

Gryffon gave her a small smile and turned
away from her, pulling his bedroll closer around his head. Moments
later, he was snoring. Katya envied his ability to do so. Despite
her exhaustion, her mind wouldn’t stop spinning. Telling Gryffon
about all of the events which had led her to Layna only made her
that much more curious about what was going on. What if Layna woke
up and couldn’t tell her anything else? What if the package was
simply a family heirloom that Gerald had wanted passed down and it
really was just her own past which had caught up with her and taken
down the people she happened to be with at the time. There were
just too many questions for her mind to slow down.