The Ritual (5 page)

Satisfy.
I shrugged, pushing the thought away. “It’ll do. Besides, I suspect that you wouldn’t care if it didn’t.” I winked at him, and this time his grin stayed.

“True enough. So, how long did you train with Naerev for?”

“Seven years, since I was sixteen. We left him a year ago.”

“So you’re twenty-four. Where are you from?”

“Innis, up north. Grew up in the orphanage there. We might have stayed, but then Shani started setting things on fire.” I stared ahead, lost in the memory. “She was terrified, didn’t know how she was doing it, but then they brought in a sorcerer who explained things to her, showed her the basics of controlling it.”

“And no doubt told her that Lord High-and-Mighty or Count Snooty, or whoever your local elf lord was, would be coming to collect her to be his sorcerer slave,” Zashter finished for me with quiet venom in his voice. For a moment his heart was in his eyes as he looked at his brother, and I deduced that their story was much the same as ours.

“Shani was so innocent,” I murmured, wanting to preserve that moment of camaraderie, wanting to think that he really was a kindred spirit after all. “She asked whether I would be going too.”

Zashter gave a short, mirthless laugh. “I can imagine what the reply to that was.”

I nodded morosely. “She got a beating for asking, on top of the derision at ever having thought of something so silly. So we escaped, ran off.”

“How?”

“She set the superintendent’s bedroom on fire. It was a good fire too – big and fierce. You know,” I added, “I’ve sometimes thought that that sorcerer purposely taught Shani how to concentrate her fire. He was a half-elf as well. I like to think that maybe he wanted to help us, wanted us to escape. Wanted us to do what he himself had never been able to do. Anyway, it gave us enough cover to hotfoot it out of there,” I finished, resurfacing from my memory. “What about you two?”

“Very similar, as I’m sure you’ve guessed already,” he said, staring ahead. For a few heartbeats that was all, but then he sighed. “They never understood what it was like for us, being twins. Never understood that separating us would have killed us. Maybe not our bodies, but our souls. I doubt they even cared.”

“
I
understand,” I replied quietly.

He looked at me, his expression pensive but guarded. “Yes, you would,” he admitted, and turned his gaze forward again.

Without the mockery, sneering and sarcasm his voice was beautiful, I reflected. Velvety smooth and warm as the sunlight on my face. It seemed unfair that someone could be so beautiful in so many different ways. I studied him covertly, wondering how old he was, then couldn’t resist asking him.

His mouth quirked into a smile. “Twenty-seven, or thereabouts. And before you ask, I’ve been a thief since I was thirteen, and I learned from Milarev.”

That stopped me in my tracks. Every thief had heard of Milarev, and stories about him ranged from brilliant feats of subterfuge to barely plausible heists. Sometimes I had wondered whether he even existed, so to hear that now confirmed caused an irrepressible sense of awe.

“Gods, no wonder you’re so good,” I blurted out before I knew it, and winced when it turned his easy smile to an arrogant grin.

“I’m the best, Little Firelocks,” he said, the confidence in his voice as solid as granite. “You ought to thank the Gods on your knees that I’ve agreed to take you on.”

I stared at him, wondering how he could be nice one moment and loathsome the next. “So modest too,” I managed to say, then added viciously, “so why have I never heard of you?”

A flicker of annoyance passed across his face. “Milarev has been near blind for the past three years, but still took credit for all the jobs I’ve been doing for him,” he muttered.

“But not anymore?”

“No, he died a few months ago. This is the first job we’re doing on our own.” Then he changed the subject, clearly unwilling to discuss Milarev any further. “So, last night I established that you’re worth teaching. Today we need to work out just how much your education is worth to you.”

I hid a grin, certain that he expected me to bargain. “Whatever I steal is yours, bar enough to keep us in clothes, food and a little extra for unexpected eventualities,” I said before he could state his own offer.

“What?”

I could see he was truly startled, and allowed myself a chuckle. “I already told you, we have no goals, no aim in life. We have nothing to save for, nowhere to go. What use do we have for bags full of gold? They’d just encumber us.”

He narrowed his eyes at me. “You’re a thief. Why steal, other than for the money?”

“It’s all I know how to do. It supports us, pays for what we need. It means we don’t have to earn our keep in one of the whorehouses.”

“You’d probably earn more if you did, with faces like yours,” he sneered, then ran his eyes over my body with such cold calculation in his eyes that it chilled me. “In fact, I’d say that you could earn a fortune on your back. Men would be queueing up for a piece of your–”

He reeled back, and with a sense of shock I realised I had slapped him. My hand stung, and I could see its outline forming on his cheek in red as he raised his fingers to it, staring at me in astonishment.

“Shut. Up!” I hissed, clenching my fists at my side to stop myself from hitting him again. “I already explained to you how I feel about that, and I don’t see why I should need to again, nor should I have to listen to your innuendos! You talk about people not understanding, imply the same hatred of slavery that we have, and then you come out with a comment like that? What the fuck is wrong with you?”

He took a breath, then seemed to reconsider, turned and walked on. “It won’t happen again,” he mumbled, barely loud enough for me to hear it, and looked away when his brother fell into step with him.

“You deserved that,” I heard Mior say, and the barely concealed amusement in his voice almost made up for the lack of an apology from Zashter – an apology I knew would remain lacking.

Well, fine, I don’t need an apology
from you anyway, you selfish bastard,
I thought, staring daggers at his back.

Until we stopped to make camp that night, none of us spoke again.

Setting up camp was an easy routine, finessed quickly. It had proven easy to adapt our existing task divisions to accommodate four people rather than two, and within half a measure we had built a roaring fire with our sleeping rolls surrounding it, a teakettle on the go and a large carp baking on a bed of coals, sending fishy scents of promise to my hungry stomach. Whilst we were waiting for it to cook Mior started the practical assessment of my sister’s skills, and I lay back on my sleeping roll to watch them, glad of the opportunity to divert my attention away from Zashter.

Mior
started with illusions, creating intricate tableaus out of scintillating colours, which he then expected Shani to copy. She did well, though her images lacked some of the finer detail, and I could see that Mior was pleased. He was far easier to read than his brother, and generous with his praise, and Shani glowed with pride as she worked her magic for him.

Pride, and something else. As I watched her I began to realise tha
t she was as attracted to Mior as I was to Zashter, that she wasn’t just responding to his flirtatious attention, but I wasn’t sure whether it reassured me or worried me. Still, at least her attraction had a little more rationale to it, given Mior’s obvious interest, and I could do little more than mull it over and file it away in my head as we ate the carp in silence.

After dinner Zashter disappeare
d to wash the dishes, and Mior progressed to the more difficult magics – wards, bindings and sleep spells. He warded himself, telling Shani to break it, and pursed his lips in disappointment when she failed. When he reversed their roles she predictably failed to block him and dropped like a stone when his sleep spell took hold. He dispersed it, waking her up again, and I saw her shoulders droop when he shook his head at her, biting my lip in sympathy.

“How are you with fire?” he asked, just as I was about to get up to comfort her, and I grinned when she perked up.

“Shall I show you my fireball?” she said eagerly, almost bouncing on the spot, and Mior nodded with an indulgent smile. For a heartbeat I considered warning him, but then decided against it. Shani knew what she was doing with fire magic, and the impact would be greater if he had no prior warning.

That, and I rather wanted to see his face.

We were camped near Lake Mazar, and Mior was cautious enough to beckon my sister to the shore and point out towards the middle of it. “Give it your best shot,” he encouraged her, then got distracted when I stepped close behind him. “What…?” he began, but Shani had spread her arms and now brought them together with a muttered litany, fingers moving like lightning.

Far out on the lake a giant sphere of fire exploded with a roar like thunder, followed by the sizzling hiss of evaporating water. Even at this distance I could feel the heat as the shockwave blew past us, hot enough to singe eyebrows and rattling the leave
s on the trees behind us. Mior whimpered as he got the brunt of it, but he was a good shield – I barely even frazzled the tips of my hair.

My sister’s laugh echoed over the water, followed immediately by a bellowed curse from somewhere to the right of us. “What the
fuck
was that?” Zashter shouted, sprinting towards us, then he stopped in his tracks when Shani collapsed to the ground, giggling.

“Gods, I
love
fireballs,” she sighed, as if in the aftermath of pleasure.

“That was
you?
” Zashter asked, mouth agape, before staring at his brother. I could see that he wanted Mior to deny it, to say that it had been him, but the sorcerer merely shrugged and pointed at Shani with a chuckle.

“She’s good with fire,” I said smugly, before bending over and pulling at my sister’s arm. She already looked half asleep, and I knew a fireball of that size would have used her last reserves of energy. “Come, Shani, up,” I encouraged her, but she shook he
r head and looked at Mior instead.

“I showed you mine, now show me yours,” she challenged him, and I saw him swallow, look at Zashter, then shake his head.

“I can’t beat that. I wouldn’t even come close,” he said. “But you’re exhausted now.”

“You wanted my best shot,” she managed to say, then her head dropped and she sank into sleep. I was
ready to pick her up, but Mior gently pushed me aside and lifted her instead, the look in his eyes almost tender.

Zashter’s eyes, on the other hand, spat fire. “
Fantastic
display,” he hissed, for some reason addressing himself to me. “Now every fucker around knows there’s people here. We have work to do tonight!”

Oh, it was wonderful to have the upper hand for once, to be able to emulate his sarcasm and raised eyebrows. “Since when do thieves use fireballs?” I enquired. “All that they know is that there’s one sorcerer around somewhere. Why should that hamper us? Besides, I thought you were the best? Surely this is only a minor annoyance to someone of your
breathtaking
abilities?”

I watched with something akin to admiration as he brought his anger under control and locked his mask-like expression back into place. “We move at midnight,” he said curtly, and stalked off to retrieve the dishes.

*   *   *   *   *

Time dragged as I waited, but instead of my nervousness of the day before, I was now restless with excitement. This time I would be the one following and observing, and I could not wait to see Zashter at work.

I prepared as meticulously as I had the day before, hesitating over my lockpicks and loot bag, then deciding that I should treat this as if I were going out on my own. My fatigue had disappeared entirely, and in the last measure towards midnight I paced around, too animated to sit down.

In contrast, Zashter sat staring at the fire for a long time, although I occasionally caught him casting
a pensive look at me or Shani, now fast asleep in her sleeping roll. His eyes were as inscrutable as ever, but his anger seemed to have disappeared, and as a distraction I studied him covertly.

I still felt the same incessant tug of attraction whenever I looked at him – it had not lessened even a fraction since that moment I had first bumped into him, despite his distasteful attitude, and it puzzled and annoyed me equally. I had been attracted to men before
, of course, but never this strongly, and it had never survived if I subsequently got acquainted with the subject in question and he turned out to be a cock.

Was that Zashter, then? He could certainly act arrogant and abrasive, but he had shown me enough of a glimpse of something else that I wasn’t sure it was as black and white as that. Moreover, I wasn’t sure whether it mattered – I was attracted to him to an extent that it influenced my behaviour, and that stung. Every time I found my gaze being drawn to him, just to look at him, I wanted to scream at myself, yet all I could think was one thing:
want
.

Gods, he was dangerous. Luscious and dangerous, and I knew next to nothing about him, least of all why he was letting us tag along. I couldn’t think of a single reason why he would profit from us being there, which made me all the more wary of him, of letting him know that I was interested. Apart from that I also knew that there was sense in not muddying our professional relationship with a personal element.