All Spell Breaks Loose (30 page)

Suddenly Sarad Nukpana paused in his speech, looked directly at Carnades, and graciously gestured toward me. I just stood there stupefied. I couldn’t believe this. Nukpana was giving Carnades his royal blessing and personal permission to come over to me to gloat right now—or he had something else up his embroidered sleeve.

Either way, Lady Luck had just tossed me a bone, and I wasn’t about to turn my nose up at it.

“I have never beheld such a vision of loveliness,” Carnades
purred just above a whisper once he was next to me. “I’m sure His Majesty would agree with me. You on your knees before him and the Saghred… Jealousy nearly overcame me.”

“Don’t stand next to me; I’m not going to protect you,” I purred right back, keeping my voice for Carnades’s ears only and barely moving my lips. “Every goblin in this place would love to see you chained to that altar. You’re not just an elf; you’re a traitor.”

“It’s merely a word.”

“Everyone hates a traitor. It doesn’t matter that you’re betraying your own people for goblins. If spit would fly that far—and if Sarad Nukpana wouldn’t strike them dead for trying it—you’d be taking a shower right now. You’re up here because Nukpana wants you to know that the only thing keeping you from being torn limb from limb is his royal goodwill.”

Sarad Nukpana was stepping carefully now. He was explaining to his subjects why an elf was wearing the sacred robes of a Khrynsani. Nukpana told his people exactly what Carnades had done: revealed to him the Conclave’s evacuation routes, as well as all of the elven defenses and their locations. As a result of Carnades’s strategic and magnanimous generosity, the elves would be the first to be attacked when the Saghred reached full power and the Gate was activated.

“Hated traitor,” I said in a singsong voice out of the corner of my mouth.

“And as his reward,” Sarad Nukpana was saying. “Magus Silvanus will be the representative of our new government in the elven capital until such time as I can appoint a regency there.”

Carnades kept the smile on his face, but sucked in his breath through his clenched teeth.

I bit my bottom lip against a smile. You know, it was downright enjoyable when Sarad Nukpana did his sadistic
bit with someone I hated. “He didn’t mention anything about you being king, did he? You think that’s just an oversight?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see that two Khrynsani black mages were closely watching Carnades. They had been standing on either side of the elf mage before Nukpana gestured him over to me.

“Those two are sticking close enough to you to qualify as a second skin. They must be a recent acquisition. I don’t believe they were with you when you confiscated the Scythe of Nen from me, were they? You can’t risk hiding it anywhere in the temple, so you’ve got it on you.”

Carnades’s left eyelid twitched once.

“I’ll take that as a yes. You shared the evacuation routes and elven defenses with Nukpana, but you didn’t share your shiny, new dagger. Best friends should share everything.”

Carnades’s upper lip was beading with nervous sweat. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“Oh, you bet your baby blues I would. Give me that dagger, put it in my hand, or I’ll share
you
with Nukpana.”

“You’re bluffing. If you tell him I have the dagger, he’ll take it and you will still have nothing.”

“Wrong. I’ll be taking you down with me. Either way I win.”

“What’s to stop me from giving it to you and then telling Sarad that you have it?”

“I’ll say you gave it to me to destroy the Saghred,
traitor
. You wanted to be king of the elves. Nukpana just screwed you over in front of everyone, so you’re trying to use me to take your revenge.”

Carnades turned smug. “He’ll never believe you.”

“Think not? I’m naked under this gown; I’m not even wearing shoes. Nukpana’s mom personally oversaw my undressing and dressing to make sure I didn’t pick up any sharp trinkets. You’re the one who searched me when we were caught, and I know the guards with you recall you finding and pocketing a certain silver dagger.”

“Filthy bitch.”

“I’ll have you know I just had a bath.” I put my free hand at my side and beside Carnades’s robes. “I either get to destroy the Saghred, or I will destroy you. I win either way.” I gave his robe a sharp tug. “I know you’ve got it where you can get to it. Put that dagger in my hand now, and both of us might just make it out of here alive.”

Carnades’s breath came in a hiss, but two seconds later, he slipped the Scythe of Nen into my waiting hand.

Yes.

I closed my hand around the small scabbard, my fingers quickly working to free the blade. Suddenly, the temple went completely silent.

Sarad Nukpana had stopped talking and was looking at us.

Carnades’s voice rang out. “Raine Benares has the Scythe of Nen!”

Asshole.

An unseen hand snatched the dagger free of the scabbard, slicing my fingers as it was pulled away from me.

The Scythe of Nen now glittered in Sarad Nukpana’s upraised hand.

My hand was bleeding, and the Saghred blazed red.

Oh, crap.

I dropped the scabbard and pressed my bleeding fingers as hard as
I could against my thigh, desperate to get the bleeding stopped. That blazing red glow told me the rock was getting impatient. It must not like long speeches.

Sarad Nukpana tucked the Scythe in his sash and leisurely walked toward us, his own personal spotlight keeping perfect pace with him. This was a game to him, entertainment for his guests, and Carnades and I were the game pieces the goblin was playing with at the moment.

“Raine, do not concern yourself with the Saghred’s intentions,” Nukpana said. “It assured me it would not take you until such time as I give it leave to do so.” His black eyes glittered as he shifted his attention to Carnades. “The
Saghred’s
loyalty is unquestioned.”

Ouch.

“From her injured hand, it is quite obvious that Mistress Benares was in possession of the Scythe—however briefly,”
Nukpana continued smoothly. “But that begs the question of how she came by it. She has been closely watched.”

“Told you so,” I muttered to Carnades.

“She’s a thief who picked my pocket and stole it before I could present it to you,” the elf mage replied.

I had to hand it to him; Carnades was doing a fine impersonation of righteous indignation.

“Nice recovery, but no dice,” I told him.

Carnades bristled.

Nukpana’s voice was amused. “Magus Silvanus, nothing happens in this temple that I do not know—or am made aware of.”

The elf mage drew himself up. “Are you questioning my loyalty?”

I snorted. “He’s already said the rock’s more loyal than you.”

Carnades turned on me and hissed, “Shut up!”

Fear makes a man
so
much easier to goad. I smiled. “Wrong move. I won.”

The elf mage froze as if the Scythe of Nen had already been plunged into his back. He could feel Sarad Nukpana’s presence looming behind him like Death himself. The goblin was holding out his arm and hand, stopping his personal guard from coming any closer. This was still a game and Nukpana wasn’t finished playing yet.

“Magus Silvanus, I permitted your conversation with Mistress Benares because I wanted confirmation that you had the Scythe in your possession, instead of being forced to be so crass as to have my new partner searched. As a host, I owe that courtesy to my guests. You have abused my hospitality.”

Carnades’s face twisted into something ugly. “You promised that I would be king of the elves.”

“I promised nothing aside from what I have just told my people,” Nukpana replied mildly.

Unlike Carnades, the goblin had himself under complete
control. Then again, he wasn’t the one staring Death in the face.

“Any conclusions you arrived at were driven by your own grandiose imagination,” Nukpana added. Then he smiled. “I possess a unique gift of simultaneously speaking and listening from a distance. It is a talent I have cultivated over many years in the goblin court. As Mistress Benares so eloquently stated, everyone hates a traitor. By keeping the Scythe of Nen from me, you have unequivocally proven that you cannot be trusted by anyone. Therefore you have no worth to me.” He lowered his arm, the only thing that was keeping his guards at bay.

Game over.

“Strip him of that robe and then burn it,” Nukpana told his guards. “It’s been tainted. Then prepare him for the altar.”

Carnades Silvanus was in the top 5 percent of the most powerful mages in the seven kingdoms. Did he cut loose with everything he had? Try to take out as many Khrynsani as he could before they brought him down?

No and no.

Carnades knew this was a fight he was going to lose. Badly. So what did he do? The chickenshit coward used me as a shield. I was shackled to the Saghred and couldn’t move, so I didn’t know what he hoped to accomplish.

Sarad Nukpana’s voice dripped with contempt. “Once again,
Magus
Silvanus, you lay hands on what is mine.”

Faster than thought, Nukpana shoved me aside, grabbed Carnades’s shoulder, and plunged the Scythe of Nen to the hilt in the elf’s chest. The goblin gripped Carnades’s shoulder, holding the elf upright until the last signs of life had faded from his ice blue eyes. Then and only then did Nukpana release him, and Carnades Silvanus’s dead body slid off of the blade and crumpled at my feet.

“Dispose of that,” Nukpana told the guards.

I watched as Carnades’s body was dragged away, his final expression one of utter disbelief.

One of the Khrynsani had retrieved the Scythe’s scabbard from the floor and presented it to his leader. Without another word, Nukpana sheathed the Scythe, tucked it into his sash, and descended the steps to where Princess Mirabai stood flanked by her needlessly big guards. I’d almost forgotten about the wedding. He had to marry Mirabai first to secure the alliance of her family. Then he’d come back to me and celebrate with a night of sacrificing.

Business before pleasure.

Nukpana glanced up at me and smiled. I wouldn’t have been surprised to hear a little sigh of contentment. If my hands had been free I would have given that smile the response it deserved. I had to settle for an aloof glare. He’d finally gotten everything he wanted; he was one happy psycho. A beautiful, stolen bride at his side to secure his political power, the family of his lifelong enemy at his mercy, and me chained to the Saghred’s pedestal, my torture the icing on his wedding cake.

Sarad Nukpana turned to Princess Mirabai and lifted her veil. With an involuntary whimper, the girl stepped back—trapped against the crossed pikes of the guards behind her. Sarad smiled and reached out to touch her face.

“Take your filthy hands off of her!”

The roar came from everywhere at once, echoing off of the ceiling vaults and filling the temple with his rage.

I knew that voice.

I wasn’t the only one. Mirabai’s head came up, her face the very picture of hope.

Her prince had come to save her. Either that or die a really slow and gruesome death.

The people began murmuring and looking around trying to locate where the voice was coming from.

You’d expect one of the most wanted men in the city to stay hidden, or if he was going to taunt Sarad Nukpana directly to do it from afar—way afar. In the time that I’d known him, Prince Chigaru Mal’Salin had never done the expected. The
crazy and suicidal, yes. The expected, no. I just hoped he’d had the sense not to be this crazy without backup.

Not only had Chigaru made himself heard; he’d ensured that he could be seen. There he was on a gallery right above the door that Kesyn and the Nathrachs had been brought through, dressed like a king about to go into battle in Tam’s spare suit of armor. Chigaru looked appropriately regal and, if Mirabai’s expression was any indicator, sexy as hell.

The people’s mutterings turned to shouts and gasps of surprise and shock.

While I didn’t doubt that the prince could bellow when he put his gut to it, Chigaru’s volume went way beyond that of a prince being trained to project. There was master spellsinger magic at work. Now it was my turn to grin like a smitten schoolgirl.

Mychael was here and he was close.

Sarad Nukpana suddenly had a public relations problem on his hands.

Yes, Sathrik had named Nukpana as his heir, and had been conveniently assassinated immediately afterward, but Chigaru was the legitimate successor. The goblins in the temple had supported Sathrik Mal’Salin, and had transferred that support to Sarad Nukpana because of his power over them, not due to any dynastic loyalty. They may not have agreed with Prince Chigaru’s politics or even liked him, but he was the only sibling of their late king, and, most important, his last name was Mal’Salin, the family that had been their ruling dynasty for the past two thousand years.

Goblins were big on intrigue, but even bigger on tradition. It didn’t get more intriguing than what was happening right now.

To the goblins in the temple, it appeared that Sarad Nukpana had merely taken the position that was his by right, along with possession of his late king’s bride. However, with only his presence and the demand that Nukpana unhand his woman, Prince Chigaru Mal’Salin told everyone within
sound of his voice that the only thing Sarad Nukpana had the right to was his choice of method of execution.

Nukpana could have quickly eliminated the problem by eliminating Chigaru, but he’d risk scuttling his plans. If he killed the prince now, he might be doing the same to a lot of his political alliances. Until I was dead and the Saghred’s power his, Sarad Nukpana wasn’t a demigod yet. I stood perfectly still, and tried not to breathe or otherwise draw attention to myself. Hopefully Nukpana was too focused on Chigaru to use the Scythe of Nen or any other handy, sharp object on me to correct his oversight.

I needn’t have worried; Sarad Nukpana had come too far to let a little thing like the appearance of the legitimate successor ruin his night.

Nukpana stared at the prince impassively for a moment, his eyes steady. Then without melodrama, he said, “Kill him.”