Dawn of Ash (30 page)

The blade had passed through the same place barely months before, but then, she had gone into a dream controlled by Cail. Then, it had been a walk in the park. Now, she was on her own, trapped in the mind of my father, trapped in his control.

“We should get moving,” I tried to keep the light comfort in my voice, the heavy, candy-coated persuasion thick. It didn’t matter; she knew what I was threatening.

With a strangled sob, she pushed herself up, body convulsing under the effort. Her good hand gripped against the wall, against the ground, and then reached for me as she tried to find a balance between the uncontrollable movements of her joints.

“Don’t touch me,” I snarled as I stepped away, letting her stumble into an upright position, as though she’d had one too many to drink. “Let’s go.”

Wyn’s eyes glossed over, her body straightening as if someone had flipped a switch. Her movements, while still jagged, became a bit more fluid. She was giving in bit by bit.

As I followed her through another alley, the cathedral fell away from view before we emerged on a small side street that, for whatever reason, looked more untouched than the rest of them. There wasn’t quite as much blood here, and the trash and debris had been moved aside into what looked like tiny, little piles, like someone was taking care of it, cleaning it. The idea was ridiculous, yet the cathedral was right there, towering over us.

“Zdechnout,” I whispered as a poisoned Vilỳ flew toward me.

The tiny thing dropped to the ground with a thud.

Bright, beady eyes looked out on us from where they had hidden themselves throughout the wide street. My heart braced at the sight of the specks of color and light. I felt the fear momentarily before I smiled, stepping farther into the street and staring around at the monsters with glee.

Vilỳs used to be the smartest creatures among us, wise beings that would gratefully converse about philosophy for hours. Now they were vermin, tortured until their minds had broken. Now they couldn’t even string two words together.

“Zdechnout,” I said more loudly this time, laughing as the winged monsters retreated, hiding themselves in fear, leaving us standing alone in the middle of the street. Just one more hurdle until we reached our destination.

“Thhhh … Rrrrr…”

It took me a minute to realize Wyn was actually trying to say something and wasn’t drowning in a pool of her own saliva.

Her tangled body faced the high tower, staring at something I couldn’t quite see with a mixture of dread and excitement.

Her hand shook as it lifted, one jagged finger pointing to the high dividing wall that had been built sometime in the 1500s. But it wasn’t the wall she was pointing at; it was the tower.

“What is it, little puppet?” I snapped, running my fingers through her hair as I moved around her, taunting her, watching the fear in her eyes increase as the reality of what was about to happen settled into her soul. “Don’t worry; I won’t hurt anyone. I’ll be nice.” I said the words with a smile, grabbing the jagged stone again and twisting it, a strange hissing noise dripping from her lips.

I didn’t even try to stop the laugh that seeped from me at her pain. I glared at her, threatening her to try to defy me, while saliva mixed with her tears, and the will in her eyes slowly broke.

The musical tone of my phone broke through my laugh as I dropped her hand, and the Vilỳs around us perked to attention before shrinking back again in fear.

“Father,” I gasped as I put the phone to my ear, my shoulders tensing for what could come.

“Where are you?”

“In a street, near the cathedral—”

“Can you see the bell tower?” he asked, interrupting me abruptly with his hasty question.

“Yes.” My focus snapped to it, my eyes narrowing in instant curiosity. “We are right below it.”

“Good.” Even through the phone, the swirl of his devious voice wound through me pleasurably. “I’m not getting much; she is still trying to block me. But the secret is in the bell tower. Somewhere above it, some kind of white space.”

“A white space?” I asked, thoroughly confused now.

I stared at the bell tower, trying to see it against the darkening sky. If I was supposed to find some magical white line, I had better hurry. In minutes, it would disappear along with the sun.

“Yes, it looks like it is a tear in whatever Ilyan created. You need to go through there.” He didn’t wait for confirmation; he merely hung up.

Wynifred’s body jerked violently as he reconnected with her in an attempt to leech more information out of her.

“Don’t worry,” I soothed, patting her head like the dog she was before moving away from her. My eyes traced over the bell tower and the sky around it as I searched for the needle. “It will all be over soon, Wynifred. You are going to help me get inside this dratted fortress. Show me where they are keeping all those lovely
Chosen
. Help me give them a little gift, and then we can be on our way, back to your new mate. I am sure you are as excited to complete a bond with Edmund as I am to see it.”

She screamed again with a wail of pain and fear.

Spinning to face her, my wide hand collided with her face in a loud thud that sent her spinning to the ground, the scream silenced into the low whimpers of her tears.

“Shut up!” I hissed as I kicked her away from me, causing her tears to increase with the new pain I was ripping through her. “Shut up!”

I expected her to cower, to move back into compliance, but her screams continued. The sound was loud as she pushed herself up like a dog before running along the asphalt with jerky motions that were both haunting and frightening as she moved away from me.

The eager anticipation of what was to come vanished into fear as I watched her move, as I sent a stream of magic toward her in an attempt to catch her.

But it was too late.

With one jump, her body was like a child’s paper airplane: up and down, rolling awkwardly, as if she had been thrown off a cliff in reverse.

“Wynifred!” I screamed as my magic streamed after her, attack after attack missing as she tumbled through the air before disappearing into the white line I had missed before, the line I probably would have missed if it wasn’t for Wyn’s little escapade.

When my phone rang again, I answered it without hesitation, a smile quickly widening on my face.

“She went into the cathedral—”

“Without you?”

I cringed at the volume of my father’s anger yet wouldn’t let it deter me. She might be gone, but I wasn’t far behind.

“Don’t worry; I’ll get her back. She showed me right where to go.”

I could almost hear his smile through the airwaves. “Then go.”

He didn’t wait and neither did I. With one sharp click, the phones disconnected, and I took off into the air, soaring right for the white line Wynifred had disclosed to me, my shield tight as I pushed through the tiny opening and into an asylum that we never would have found otherwise.

If only I had been prepared for what that meant…

The second I came in contact with the barrier, it was as though I had been hit by a truck, flattened by the broadside of its heavy metal siding. I couldn’t breathe. The strain was so great I wondered if it was nothing more than a stutter gone wrong.

I tried to gasp for breath, fear growing when it did not come. The weight increased until I was forced out to the other side like an egg, my body hurtling end over end toward the ground.

With a snap of fright, I checked my shield, verifying my body was shrouded, only to stare at the spinning world, the ground moving too close for me to truly be able to land safely.

In a rush of fear, my magic pulsed, sending me back into the air, my hair flying as I landed on the roof of the familiar bell tower in what I hoped to be silence, even though it was anything but graceful.

Thank goodness no one had seen.

Regretting my choice in shoes, I looked over the packed courtyard below me, hunting for any sign of Wyn yet knowing she would be long gone.

Men, women, and even a few children moved through the open square like ants, their movements disjointed, panicked even. Fingers were pointed toward the building that still gushed smoke from the massive hole in the roof, something I was sure was a recent addition.

It was pathetic. If one simple explosion could work them up to that level of hysteria, how could they even hope to master themselves during a war?

I didn’t even try to restrain the laugh at the thought, the sound flowing over the open space like the bell of the tower I sat in. No one noticed; they only continued their dance.

Now I needed to keep it that way.

One jump and I soared down into the cavalcade, my wind gentle enough that, unless someone was really paying attention, they wouldn’t even notice anything beyond a light breeze. Careful to keep my shoes silent this time, I straightened, the tense exhilaration of what was to come heightening through me. My sly smile would have easily given me away if anyone could see.

“I knew he was right. No one should act like that…”

“But if she can’t even control her magic…”

“Did you hear what Ilyan…?”

“I saw the smoke. That was no ordinary magic.”

Snippets of conversation bounced around me as I moved toward the place I had agreed to meet Sain. The frightened voices pulled me right into what had happened, right into the possibilities of what I had walked into. Listening to them, watching their mannerisms, it didn’t take a fool to put things together. All Sain had said was that it was “something with Joclyn,” but that something was a deranged interlude to much darker things.

Wonderful.

My soul danced at the news, a smile spreading over my face as I leaned against the wall, taking in as much information as I could, each word a vital clue toward my father’s plan.

Suddenly, it was very clear I was going to take much more from this trip than the destruction of Ilyan’s army.

In a way, I was sad I had missed whatever show Joclyn had put on.

Crazy Queen Joclyn.

That was the single downside to all of this.

Shaking my hair down my back with the thought, I lifted my chin with excitement just as Sain sidled up beside me so closely I was afraid he would run into me.

The fool.

“Watch where you step or lose your feet,” I warned with a hiss, my voice clear even though I was still hidden from view.

Sain jumped at the warning, the motion slow and controlled, before he took a step away from me, toward one of Ilyan’s men who was making a beeline for him.

“Stay close,” he growled at me as he stepped toward the man, his demeanor changing so abruptly from what I had seen less than half an hour ago that I did a double take, staring at him in disbelief.

He stood tall, his eyes wide, his jaw set.

When he had stood before my father and me, he had been a weakling, a pathetic bug that wasn’t even worth squishing. Right then, he was powerful, commanding. He was something I had never seen before.

My heart thumped painfully as I watched him, my magic stretching toward him in a type of needy hunger I had felt days ago when we had stood in the snow, and he had talked about Joclyn’s disposability.

This was the same man, but not the one my father had seen.

I stared, trying to understand exactly who this man was and how deep whatever game he was playing went.

“Sain!” the man called as he reached him, his voice eager as several others turned toward the exchange. “The queen, is she all right? Have you heard anything?”

Sain shook his head as if he was about to deliver the news of a death, his eyes downcast, even though his shoulders still stayed straight and taut.

“It is the end; I’m afraid,” he sighed, his voice breaking with what I was positive was feigned emotion. “I am going to be with her now. All that can be done is to pray to the Well of Imdalind that all will be well. Excuse me.” Sain bowed gently to the now heartbroken man before he stepped to the side, his posture clear as he walked through the hordes like a god, the former sheep parting before him like waves in the Bible.

With a start, I realized I hadn’t moved. I stood still, my heart thundering in my chest in disbelief, in what I was refusing to accept as awe. I moved then, my feet tapping loudly as I attempted to catch up to my charge, realizing for the first time how much power this man really held.

Huddles of people continued to call out to him, desperate for information, as we passed. Most of the time, he would wave them off, a few muddled replies passed back and forth on occasion.

“It takes strength to be a Drak. We can only pray now,” he continued to say on repeat, the redundancy making it clear he was trying to get through them as quickly as possible. Otherwise, I was in no doubt we would be there all night. His pride wasn’t something he had ever been able to hide, and I was realizing with a start that he wasn’t holding back here.

Not anymore.

“Only those who are chosen can hold a Drak’s power,” he repeated.

The sentiment was grating on me. He had said the same words to me when we had been bonded.

If only he knew…

“Here,” Sain announced as we turned the corner into a long hallway, the familiar vestibule the same as it had been hundreds of years before: brick and open casements, plain and simple. Monks quarters were never ornate. “The first three doors here.”

Fortunately, it seemed everyone had congregated on the patio, so the hallway before us was barren and forgotten.

At least it would make my job easier.

With one flash of magic, I let my shield fall away, shimmering to the ground like some elegant gown, revealing my tall frame.

I was going to enjoy this.

“Where’s Wyn?” Sain’s voice was loud from behind me, the worry in it catching me off guard. It was so different from what I had seen in the courtyard a few minutes ago. His mask was back on, it seemed. Everything about him was starting to make sense.

I spun to meet him, my hair fanning out in a swirl of white. I always liked it when it did that. Sain liked it, too, judging from the way his eyes widened at it.

“Dear Wyn got away.” The acidic honey dripped from my voice, burning away any romantic ideas he might have had. “Don’t worry; we will find her as soon as we are finished here.”