Warrior and Witch (13 page)

Ice said something that came out mostly vowels. She growled in frustration, then tried a different word. “Freak.”

Mirei regarded her in silence, wondering what to do. She’d used magic in front of Ice. Given the chance, the Thornblood would tell the world. Witches had long neglected the Aspect of the Warrior in their theology; Hunter schools were descended from Warrior cults. The two groups had never gotten along. And now she—a Silverfire, and a witch—was about to steal a Thornblood trainee.

She had the knife in her hand, still wet with the witch’s blood.

If she killed Ice, someone would find the bodies of a murdered Hunter and witch in this room. There would be an investigation. Someone might remember seeing Mirei; this was Angrim, after all. The Thornbloods, and Shimi, might learn what she had done.

If she left Ice alive, they’d
know
who killed the witch. And Ice would put the worst spin on it she could.

Mirage would have killed Ice. It was the logical solution. But the part of her that had been Miryo could not be so cold-blooded about it. The woman was a Thornblood, but also a human being. Could Mirei just pass judgment on her, here and now, and end her life?

Her hand tensed on the knife—and then a small foot hit her in the kidneys.

“Mother’s
tits
,” Mirei swore, and spun around just in time to grab the fist headed for her face.

The trainee struggled, and the contact with her was enough to tell Mirei she did indeed have the Thornblood doppelganger on her hands. Fortunately, even Warrior-blessed strength wasn’t enough to overpower her, not when the body it rested in was a mere eleven years old. Mirei got the girl pinned, then snapped, “Will you bloody well stop that? I’m on your side.”

“Silverfire,” the girl hissed, as if the word were the foulest insult she could think of.

Great. So they’ve indoctrinated her already
. “Try to forget about that for a moment, and concentrate on the fact that I’m the only woman in this room who didn’t want you dead.”

“Don’t listen to her,” Ice said, and went on from there, her clarity rapidly degenerating into unintelligible mush.

“Ice, for the love of the Warrior, shut up before I cut your throat.”

Mirei’s careless threat hit the girl she held like a blow. The doppelganger froze, staring at her, then began to fight all the more wildly. “Murdering witch! You touch her and I’ll—”

“Look,” Mirei said, and hauled the girl to her feet. “You’ll get more of an explanation later. For now, what you get is this. That witch”—she pointed at the body on the floor—“wanted to kill you. Ice”—she pointed at the Thornblood, who had ignored the order to shut up—“sold you out to the witch who wanted to kill you. They both think you’re an unnatural abomination who should be destroyed. Or something like that: I won’t go so far as to assume Ice thought much past the ‘jealousy’ stage. The point is, you’ve probably noticed that you’re faster and stronger and better at fighting than any of your year-mates. As it happens, that’s why certain people want you dead. I, by contrast, want you to live a long happy life with flowers and puppies, and can—as a side benefit—tell you
why
you are the way you are.”

And I don’t give a damn which way you choose, really, because if I have to stab you and cart your dead body out of Angrim tonight, I will. You’ll recover.

The girl had, for a wonder, stopped struggling. She was staring at Mirei’s hair. “Am… am I a witch?”

“Witches cast spells with music. You couldn’t carry a tune if I gave you a bucket to put it in.” Mirei was guessing, but it had been true of Mirage. Sense of pitch appeared to be the property of the witch-half. Still, she didn’t want to start off by lying to this girl. “But there
is
a connection there. Like I said, I can explain everything. I just don’t want to do it here.”

“Why not?” the girl demanded.

“Notice how Ice has finally shut up? She wants to hear what I have to say. I don’t feel like telling her, since she’s a mercenary with the ethics of a dead rat. We’ve also just had a noisy fight in a city full of spies. Explanations can come when I don’t have to worry about being arrested.”

“Don’t trust her,” Ice half shouted, still frozen on the floor.

Mirei didn’t answer that. Instead, she let go of the doppelganger and stepped back, hands relaxed at her sides. The knife lay on the floor next to them where she’d dropped it; she saw the girl’s eyes flick toward it, once.

Six heartbeats later—Mirei counted—the doppelganger dove for the blade.

Mirei kicked it across the floor before her hand touched it and leapt back, singing. The doppelganger crumpled to the floor in a sleeping heap.

Ice was swearing at Mirei again, or at least Mirei assumed that’s what the smear of noise was. She spoke over it. “Count yourself lucky, Ice. I recently became a new woman who’s less pragmatic than the one you knew. Because of that, I’m going to leave you alive. On the other hand, you’re going to be the first person I’ve tried this on, so you’d better hope nothing goes wrong with it.”

Then, ignoring the mounting yells of the paralyzed Thornblood, Mirei began gathering suitable foci for a spell to change Ice’s memory.

Chapter Six

The four remaining Primes stood in a hallway and conversed in low voices.

“It will be ironic,” Koika said wryly, “if the Keys don’t pass her.”

Satomi smiled, though her face didn’t much want to bend. “I doubt it. Ruriko says her memory is excellent.”

“But with this much pressure on her? Perfectly intelligent girls have failed the questioning before, because of nerves.”

Satomi sighed at Koika. “Thank you for the comforting words.”

Arinei was pacing nearby; the heavy blue silk of her skirt cracked with her quick, tight strides. “I still don’t know what you hope to gain by this charade.”

“Come, Arinei,” Rana said. “Surely you learned this, serving in Insebrar. The servants often know far more about the Lords’ affairs than those Lords realize. It’s past time we had a care for that, ourselves.”

“I pay more attention than a Lord does,” Arinei snapped. “The Cousins do their work and go home, like ordinary people. What little they know about our affairs, they do nothing with. We have nothing to be concerned about.”

“Then Eikyo will find nothing, we’ll bring her home and test her properly, and all will be well.” Rana’s expression belied her carefree tone, though. In the meeting where they had argued this plan, Rana had been forced to play mediator between Satomi and Koika on one side and Arinei on the other. She, unlike Satomi and Arinei, had come from the Heart Path. The Hands of her Ray spent plenty of time adjudicating village squabbles, but Rana had little experience with it, and no liking.

Koika held up a hand to stop them all before the argument could begin again. “It’s time.”

Wordlessly, they arranged themselves into a line, spacing out so as not to leave an obvious gap where Shimi should have been. The double doors in front of them swung open in well-oiled silence, pulled by two Cousins on the other side, and together they entered the room.

Eikyo sat in a chair with her back to them, facing the array of the fifteen Keys. The cotton of her dress between her shoulder blades was dark with sweat, and the water glass at her side was empty. The questioning was not an afternoon stroll.

The Keys stood, and after a moment of startled paralysis, so did Eikyo. She turned and saw the women behind her, bowed to them and to the Keys, and stepped aside.

“This one has brought her mind to you for testing,” Satomi said, repeating the traditional words she had uttered countless times. “How do you find it?”

As Key for the Void Head, Hyoka answered her. That, too, was a part Satomi had played many times in past years. “Her mind is sound and well-prepared. We commend her to your trial.”

Which will not be the trial everyone expects.

Eikyo bowed again to the Primes, her knees visibly unsteady. Satomi could not blame her. But neither could she say anything to comfort the young woman; they had to carry out the outward trappings of this ritual, at least.

The four Primes led her from the room, with Naji following them. There had been disagreement over which of the Air Keys should stand in Shimi’s place. Koika had argued in favor of Ashin, and Arinei had argued even more vehemently against her. Naji was a safer choice, politically; before this trouble began, the presumption had been that she would succeed Shimi as Prime.

The outside air was uncomfortably still and hot. Satomi waited, Eikyo at her side, while the Primes and Naji dispersed to their doors around the outside of Star Hall; then she brought the young woman to the northern arm of the structure, the one dedicated to Earth. Koika broke protocol just a tiny amount, to smile at Eikyo in reassurance.

The others remained outside as Satomi led Eikyo inside, down the hall of Earth. Their quiet footsteps echoed against the pale silver marble of the walls, fading upward into the lofty spaces above. Here, in this branch, the stained-glass windows were greens and rich ambers, lit by permanent spells that allowed them to cast colored light down inside the building even when outside was black night. The other three arms showed the colors of their Elements, and as many times as she had been in here, Satomi never tired of its beauty.

In the center, where the four arms converged, was a dais, and the place of the Void.

It no longer looked as it once had. Formerly, the pillars and vaulting of the Hall had leapt upward farther yet, into an untouchable blackness thick with spells that had given the center of Star Hall a disquieting feel. It was the best the architects had been able to do, to represent the Void.