The Chaos Crystal (54 page)

'Kentravyon's crazy.'

'So you keep insisting.' She dried her face off with a small towel and turned to look at him. 'He seems perfectly rational to me.'

'He murdered an entire town in Stevania, once. Killed every man, woman and child in a ten-mile radius because some careless farmer ran over his foot with a wagon and refused to apologise,' Cayal told her. 'He seemed perfectly rational then, too.'

She shook her head in disgust. 'Tides, you're all mad.'

Cayal wasn't sure he could argue about that. He glanced around the cabin. There was a small candle, which barely lit the room, burning in the sconce by the door. He couldn't see the Chaos Crystal, although in here, so close to it, the Tide was barely perceptible. It was like one of his senses was muffled; as if a part of him had been hooded, bound, and thrown in the corner until the ransom was paid.

'Where is it?'

Arkady didn't need to ask what he meant. 'Safe.'

'I can feel it,' he said. 'Or rather I can't feel anything, which amounts to the same thing
...
Tides, Arkady, have you been crying?'

She wiped her eyes impatiently with the heel of her hand and shook her head in denial. 'No.'

'Don't lie to me.'

'Then leave me alone so I don't have to.'

He reached out, taking her by the shoulders, forcing her to look at him. There was nowhere she could go to avoid him in such a confined space, but she turned her head away so he couldn't see her tears or her puffy eyes.

'What's the matter?' he asked gently.

Swollen eyes forgotten, Arkady looked up and treated him to a baleful glare. 'That's a joke, right?'

He smiled. 'Let me rephrase the question then. What — out of all the calamities that have befallen you since I came into your life — has finally reduced you to tears?'

She tried to shake free of him. 'You arrogant bastard. Why do you automatically assume that my being upset has anything to do with you?'

Cayal hadn't stopped to think about it, but she was right. He did assume her tears must somehow be related to him. 'You mean it's
not
my fault?'

'As it happens, no.'

'Then why are you crying?'

'I don't want to talk about it.' Her bottom lip

trembled as she spoke. She was one kind word away from losing her composure completely, he guessed.

'You look like you need to talk to someone.' Gently, he pulled her to him and wrapped his arms around her. She resisted, rigid in his embrace 'Come on, Arkady. There's nobody you have to be strong for here.'

'I'm not strong,' she said, pulling away from him. 'That's the problem. I'm weak. Spineless. A coward
...'
'How do you figure that?' 'Because I left him behind.'

Cayal looked at her with a puzzled frown. 'You left who behind, where?'

'My father,' she said, choking back a sob. 'He was alive; Cayal and I left him on the ice with Jaxyn. He told me to run and I did it with barely a second thought, and then you and the other immortals broke the ice, and now he's dead, and it's my fault, because if I'd
made
him come with me, he'd have been safe
...'

The words fizzled out as the tears overtook her. Cayal gathered her into his arms again and this time she didn't resist. This time she put her arms around him and sobbed against his shoulder, as if everything had finally caught up with her. As if she no longer had the will to hold it back. Cayal said nothing for a time. He just held her and let her cry, partly because he wasn't sure what else he could do, and partly because he knew that her tears would ultimately be cathartic.

For a time, she sobbed like a broken-hearted child. Cayal held her, wishing he could ease her pain. And hoping that somewhere between here and Jelidia he could find a way to prevent Elyssa from killing her in a futile attempt to steal her body for her own — a process Cayal secretly believed was never going to work, even with the Tide magic of two worlds at their disposal to make it happen.

CHAPTER 49

Arkady woke in Cayal's arms. For a moment she couldn't imagine how she came to be there, and then she remembered breaking down last night and Cayal comforting her, which had led to Cayal kissing her, which had led to, well
...
this.

'You snore. Did you know that?'

She shifted on the narrow bunk. Cayal was awake. She wasn't sure how long he'd been lying there holding her, watching her. Long enough to realise that she was snoring, apparently.

'Well, aren't you the last of the true romantics.'

He smiled. 'I like to watch you sleep.'

'Why? Particularly if I snore?'

'It's the only time you're ever truly relaxed, Arkady.' He bent forward and kissed her gently on the lips. 'It's past sun-up. I really should go
...'

'Before your fiancee finds you in here?' she finished for him.
Tides, what have I done?
Last night's moment of weakness, Arkady realised, may end up costing her her life. She was under no illusions about the capacity of the Immortal Maiden for jealous retribution if she thought Arkady her rival for Cayal's affection.

'Don't worry about Elyssa,' Cayal said, showing no inclination to get out of bed, despite his stated intention of leaving. 'I'll take care of her.'

'She looks at me strangely,' Arkady said, making no move to escape the comfort of his unnaturally warm body beside hers on the bunk. The air in the cabin was

freezing. She could feel it on her face. The rest of her, however, was snuggled beneath the fur coat she'd brought from Glaeba, pressed against Cayal's warm, hard-muscled length. 'That's just her way.'

'If I was a horse and she looked at me the same way, I'd be certain I was destined for the knackery.' 'Now you're exaggerating.'

'No, I'm not,' she insisted. 'And I
will
be destined for the knackery if she finds out you spent the night in my cabin.'

He nuzzled her ear. 'Then we shan't tell her.'

She shook her head and pushed him away as far as she could on the narrow bunk. 'Tides, Cayal, do you any have conscience at all?'

'Not so's you'd notice,' he said, in a better mood than Arkady had seen him for a very long time. 'And before you start accusing me of being morally bankrupt, your holiness, might I remind you that you're lying here beside me, naked as the day you were born, a willing participant in my moral decline?'

'Your moral decline didn't need any help from me, Cayal,' she said, a little miffed to think he was trying to make her equally culpable for the lapse in good judgement that had brought them to this pass, and this bed.

Why didn't I say no? Why didn't I tell him to leave
when he started kissing me last night?

Arkady knew the reason. She'd been cold and guilt- ridden, frightened and lonely, and Cayal had a talent for offering her comfort when she was at her most vulnerable.

'And for your information, I'm lying here with you because you give off heat like a walking glass-furnace and I'm going to freeze to death the moment I get out from under these covers. Why couldn't you and your insane friends build your magical, crystal-powered, immortal-killing chamber somewhere warm?'

'It has something to do with being near the magnetic poles,' he told her. 'Are you going to keep complaining about the weather?'

'Every chance I get.'

'Maybe I will let Elyssa kill you after all,' he said with a smile.

Arkady eyed him curiously. 'Is there a particular reason she
wants
to kill me, Cayal?'

'You know the reason,' he said. 'She thinks I fancy you. She's jealous.'

'So why hasn't she killed me already?'

'Because I asked her not to.'

'And the other reason?'

'What other reason?'

'The real reason Elyssa is allowing me to live.' Arkady turned on her side, pushing herself up on her elbow so she could read Cayal's expression. 'Elyssa is itching to be rid of me, Cayal. I can see it every time she looks at me. And yet she allows me to keep on breathing. Why?'

'You're carrying the Chaos Crystal for us.'

'You could have
hired
someone in Glaeba to do that if you had to. You don't need me, just a cooperative human who can't touch the Tide.'

Cayal looked away guiltily for a moment, and then he shrugged, as if he'd decided there was really no harm in her learning the truth. 'Well
...
it might be because I
...
sort of promised her
...
your body.'

Arkady wasn't sure what he meant. If Elyssa had a taste for taking pleasure with her own gender, Arkady had never seen any sign of it. 'I thought you said she wasn't that way inclined?'

'I mean
literally,'
he clarified, with some reluctance.

'I don't understand, Cayal.'

He sighed, more than a little uncomfortable. 'Ah
...
well, you see
...
Lukys's offer to help me die is, I recently discovered, only a sideshow to the main event, which is transferring Coron's consciousness back into a proper

body. I may have
...
um
...
implied
..
. during my discussions with Elyssa while I was trying to get her to help, that if she was willing to help me die, I'd ask him to do the same for her.'

Arkady frowned, unable to grasp what he was telling her. 'Let me get this straight. Lukys wants to transfer the consciousness of his pet rat into a human body — Tides, I don't even want to think about the story behind that — so
you
told Elyssa he could do the same for her, using
my
body?'

The Immortal Prince nodded and ventured a cautious smile. 'It won't work. I mean, you're not even a little bit immortal. The process would most likely kill you anyway, so Lukys probably won't even agree to try it. You really have nothing to worry about

'Nothing to worry about? Are you insane? Well, yes, you are, aren't you?' she said, giving him no chance to answer. 'What possessed you to promise her something like that, you fool?' No longer fearful of the cold in light of Elyssa's dire plans for her, Arkady threw back the covers, climbed out of the bunk and attempted to retrieve her clothes from the floor of the cabin while staying on her feet. She shivered in the icy air, trying to keep her balance. The deck was rising and falling with the roiling sea outside, something she'd not been quite so conscious of while lying in the bunk next to Cayal.

'I thought it would save your life,' he protested, managing to sound both wounded and innocent at the same time. 'Tides, I was only trying to help, Arkady.'

'She wants to
possess
me, Cayal! How exactly is that saving my life?'

'You're still alive.'

'I think I'd
rather
be dead!' She pulled her bodice on over her slip and began the laborious process of doing up the scores of tiny nacre buttons that held it closed. 'I can't believe you brought me all this way just so Elyssa can kill me.'

'I didn't bring you here so she can
kill
you
...'

'No? Then how else do you think this is going to play out, Cayal? Do you imagine that when we get to Jelidia and arrive at this fabulous ice palace of yours, I'll hand over the crystal and then you'll say, "Oops, my mistake. Sorry, Elyssa, Arkady has to leave now"?'

'Well, obviously we'll have to think of a plausible reason she shouldn't attempt the transfer,' he said. 'And find a way for you to return home. But I'm sure, if she hears it from Lukys, and he tells her it won't work, Elyssa won't try to force the issue.'

'Assuming you ever have such a discussion,' Arkady said, knowing Cayal better than he imagined. 'She's here because you promised her my body. If she finds out she can't have it, she's going to tell you where you can shove your plans to die, refuse to help you at all and then you're screwed. So I seriously doubt you're going to tell her a damned thing.'

With the buttons finally taken care of, Arkady turned and sat on the edge of the bunk so she could pull on her shoes.

'I won't let her hurt you, Arkady,' Cayal assured her, reaching out to stroke her hair.

Arkady shook him off impatiently. 'Of course you will. You've been trying to kill yourself for over a thousand years. You're not going to let the life of a mere mortal get in your way now. Not when your goal is so close.'

'That's a cruel thing to suggest.'

She glanced at him and then turned her gaze away.
Tides, he could look wounded, even when he's
completely at fault.

'Doesn't make it any less true, though,' she said, tugging on her boots. Finally dressed, she stood up and turned to look at him, cursing herself for the weakness that left her so blind when it came to the true nature of the Tide Lords — this man in particular. The icy cabin suddenly felt too stuffy and close. She couldn't breathe.

'You know what I think?' she said, reaching over to open the porthole to let in some fresh air. 'I think —'

'Land ho!' came a distant cry from above.

Arkady closed her eyes.
Tides
...
we're here.