Cast in Flame (48 page)

The Emperor roared.

Kaylin didn’t understand a word, but the voice that followed was Bellusdeo’s. She could guess. She didn’t stop to look; she ran in a straight line from Severn to where the Arkon stood. He was in Dragon form, although his voice was almost— almost—normal.

And he was reciting true words. His voice reminded her very much of Sanabalis’s voice, on the day she had heard him tell the Leontines the story of their beginning.

The ancestor’s fire flared from behind, catching more of her hair. She wheeled to see Severn. The fire parted at his chain, but joined again beyond him; it was much, much weaker. Her hair still burned. Her lip was bleeding—movement was painful. And she had to move, and quickly.

The Arkon’s eyes were bloodred. They were also the size of Kaylin’s head. He glared at her, his eyes rounding; she could see fire and its destruction reflected in them. That, and herself. Severn was invisible.

He didn’t break the flow of his speech to shout at her, and he didn’t sweep his extensive jaws to throw her out of the way; on a night like this, that had to be counted as a win. She continued toward him, ducking under his head until she stood directly between his gigantic claws. She didn’t remember the Arkon being so
big
in his draconic form.

But at least this way, she couldn’t see his eyes.

What she could see, as he continued to speak, were the words that formed in the wake of his voice. They were golden, and in size and shape very similar to the runes engraved in Helen’s heart—but they were floating in the air. She couldn’t speak them. The Dragons—with knowledge and practice—could. The Arkon had that knowledge.

It was why he had chosen to land.

Bellusdeo was screaming in Dragon frenzy—but to Kaylin’s ear, it sounded more like rage than pain. She let it go. There was nothing she could say to Bellusdeo now. Nothing she could say to the Arkon. He clearly had a plan—and he didn’t have the time to tell her what it was.

Do you understand what he’s trying to do?
Kaylin asked the familiar.

Yes. I do not believe he will succeed.

Kaylin closed her eyes. It didn’t shut out the noises of combat. It didn’t shut out the very mortal voices that had joined the fray, coming from above and behind. It didn’t shut out the crackle of fire and the harsh thunder of magical lightning.

But it did shut out every visible thing that wasn’t a true word. True words, when spoken, had physical shape and form. Even the Arkon’s.

She trusted Severn to be aware of where she was; she trusted the Arkon’s magical protections. The latter were being tested—and the less she thought about that the better. She thought of the words. She looked
at
the words formed by his speech.

And she remembered, as she so often did, Tiamaris’s words. True words had an innate shape; a sense of “right” or “wrong” that had almost nothing to do with comprehension. She took a deep breath, and headed out of the Arkon’s shadow and into the glow of words. She could touch them; they were solid. She had to open her eyes because the ground beneath them wasn’t always
as
solid.

And yes: people were dying.

Barrani were dying.

Aerians.

She had no doubt that mortals on the ground would join them. The Aerians seemed to be carrying something—fine netting, line, something—as they circled. When one fell, someone flew in to pick up what they’d been carrying. Whatever it was, it didn’t catch fire the way—

The way wings did.

At this point, the discomfort magic caused her couldn’t get worse; she wasn’t numb, but she couldn’t gauge power or direction. There was just too much of it. But the heart of whatever defense—or offense—the Emperor’s forces intended was here, where the Arkon was. Where he was speaking.

Where he was telling some ancient, difficult story.

She reached out and touched the true words that had form. She adjusted the fall of lines and strokes, the subtle placement of dots, the fine, spidery wisp of light that looked almost accidental unless seen as part of the whole shape. She could do this without speaking.

No, Kaylin,
the familiar said.
You can’t. You
are
speaking.

I’m not—

He’s right,
Severn said.
I can hear you. I’m not the only one.

The ancestor’s skybound attacks ceased, at least briefly. As Kaylin moved between one stable patch of ground to another, touching words, jostling them, discretely changing the way the elements of each aligned, a new voice joined the Arkon’s.

She knew she had never heard the voice before.

She felt as if she had heard it every day of her life.

And she saw the words form, across from the Arkon’s, their shapes and patterns far clearer and far more consistent, their form in harmony—that was the word Tiamaris had used—with the meaning that would forever escape her.

She almost stopped breathing, then. She understood that all the Imperial forces combined—many of whom were now also dying—would possibly, on a very very good day, be equal to this
one man
on a bad one. She understood why the Barrani feared them; she didn’t understand how the Barrani had
survived.

No,
the familiar said.
But you are here. The Arkon is here. The Barrani you have chosen to support are here. All elements of your life are now in play. Remember what your Teela told you, Kaylin. It is important that you remember.

Teela had told her
a lot.

Mortal memory
cannot
be this defective. What she said, she said in my hearing, although she spoke to you.

This was not helpful. Kaylin continued to move between the Arkon’s summoned words, but she knew that his summoning was too slow, too laborious, and her refinements too haphazard; the ancestor’s words were pure.

They were pure and essential and whole, and he spoke them so bloody quickly.

Think,
she told herself.
Panic is not helping anyone.

She looked at the words assembled before her—the ancestor’s, not the Arkon’s. Why did the Barrani fear—and loathe—their ancestors?

And she understood.

His words were not simple words. They were true
names.
A visceral, terrible
anger
gripped her as the realization sunk roots. The ancestors had tried to destroy their lesser kin in order to possess their names, because their names
were
words of power. They were almost the ultimate words of power: they contained the essential essence of life.

And every word—every word he had chosen to speak, every word that was now on display to her eyes, if no one else’s—had once
been
the heart of a living being. She had seen words like this in the Lake of Life. She’d touched any number of them in her search for the word that might, somehow, make the High Lord whole.

She had even taken one such word for herself, blindly and without intent. She had no idea how to return it; she’d never asked. The Consort had never demanded its return, although she knew.

And she was certain, if the Consort could see what she now saw, her rage and fury would know no bounds. Kaylin wasn’t the Consort, but she had touched what the Consort guarded, and she felt an echo of the revulsion the Consort would have known.

These were lost words. Lost lives. They would not return to the Lake, although the Barrani who had been brought to life when they were bestowed were long dead. They did not belong here. They did not belong in the hands of a creature who destroyed life, rather than created it.

“Arkon,” she said, knowing he couldn’t answer. “If there’s anything you can do to cover me, do it. I can see the source of his power, now—and I think I can break it.”

Looking up to her familiar, she said,
Can you carry me again? I need to reach the words, and the ground will kill me.

Yes.

And I don’t have to kill people?

No, Kaylin.
He moved as he spoke. He didn’t land. Instead, he gripped her shoulders with his solid talons, and lifted her.
That is not the choice you have made. What is done—or not done—now, will be done by you. Or failed—by you. I give you what your Hawks would give, if they could hear you or see you; I give you what your Bellusdeo would, if she understood the whole of your intent.

She wouldn’t survive it. The Hawks wouldn’t.

That is not guaranteed.

Her feet skirting molten rock, the air rippling with heat, her eyes watering at the ash and debris the wind threw at them, Kaylin approached the ancestor’s words.

* * *

They were true names.

They were true names, and his story would either consume or destroy them—because she was certain he was telling a story, just as the Arkon was. Both stories were true. That was the nature of the words they used.

She had touched—had
taken
—true names from the Lake. She reached out for the closest of the words the ancestor had spoken, and grabbed it. It was smaller in shape—and weight—than the single, long stroke that had been a component of the High Lord’s; it weighed less, and it didn’t cut her palm.

Why could you destroy the barrier?
she asked, as she gathered a second word. A barrier—faint, golden, sprang up around her; it wasn’t evenly centered, and it followed her with a delay.

The barrier?

That surrounded the High Halls.
She picked up a third word; she could not easily grab a fourth. Her hands were full. And there were more than four words.

There was also an angry demigod standing in the streets. He gestured and the ground
froze.
Stones cracked. Shards flew. He was coming, Kaylin thought.

I can intervene.

That’s not a small intervention. I couldn’t bring that barrier down.

No. But your Arkon could. Your Sanabalis, with time, could. Your Evarrim—

He is
so
not mine.

—could. They could not do what you asked of me; not in isolation. What you asked of me is possible. Even in your world. But to do it, the world itself must be altered, the shape broken, the word at its heart—vast and complicated—redrawn. No one who lives now in these lands you call home could do this.

She remembered Teela’s stories of Sorcerers of old. Stories of the sundering of worlds. Stories of what was done to summon a familiar at all. She even thought she understood why someone might consider it worth trying.

What you are doing now, Kaylin, you
can
do. I do not change you or alter you or alter the rules that govern this world; I do not change the name at its heart; I do not devour any part of its essence. Your Lady
could
do what you now do. She is the only other who might gather what was taken, because she has seen the Lake, and she serves what it represents. But so, too, have you.

She couldn’t pick up a fourth word. She tried.

What am I supposed to
do
with them? How am I supposed to send them back to where—to where they should be?

I cannot answer that, Kaylin; I do not know. But there is one who does.

The shell of shielding around her grew brighter as wind flew, pushing everything but Kaylin and the words toward the Arkon. The familiar hissed.

* * *

Ynpharion.

Lord Kaylin.
There was no resistance at all in the communication; it was almost as if he was waiting—or hoping—that she might reach out for him. He failed to acknowledge this, if it was true.

Is the Consort still with you?

Yes. We are not alone.

I don’t care.
But damn it, the Consort
would.
The fighting is going on outside—how many guards does she need?

Silence.

Fine. I need you to ask her a question for me—and I need the answer right now.

Ynpharion turned to the Consort. There were a half dozen Barrani guards in this chamber; they wore white armor. They were hers. But among the Barrani, that meant almost nothing. Teela’s guards had attempted to assassinate her.

You are right,
Ynpharion said, and Kaylin realized that the attempted assassination was probably not common knowledge. Teela was going to kill her.
She will not, as you well know. But we do not trust where we have choice. Men and women of power do not. No one who is in possession of something highly coveted can afford to take that risk.

I need the information. I think we can—we can take him down if we
have
it.

What information, Lord Kaylin?

I need to know how true names return to the Lake when the Barrani who possess them die.

She felt his shock and his fear.
You cannot ask that question.

I
have to
ask that question! The ancestor is using true names for power. Barrani true names. I can gather them—but I can’t gather all of them if I can’t send some of them back!

He was frozen for one long moment; had she been standing beside him she would have shoved him out of the way. The screams and the sobs and the orders blended in her ears with the spoken ancient words; the air was thick with smoke and cold with ice and loud with magic.

Let me see.

Kaylin didn’t even hesitate. The lack of hesitation disgusted him; he had firmly classified her in the “too stupid to live” category. But he clawed some of that disgust back, and she felt one small, hard, Barrani resentment unknot.
You cannot—you cannot speak of this to any of my kin.

Except the Consort. I know.

You are speaking of it to me.

I don’t have a
choice,
Ynpharion. How do I send these back?