Sworn To Secrecy: Courtlight #4 (18 page)

It was hard to believe that Christian was one of those monstrous
koreschie.
Everything about him looked human, from his blue eyes and black hair, to the radiant smile he would flash. He was so friendly. But then again, Thomas had looked even more human, if possible. Imperfect and bumbling, the boy who had tugged at her sisterly heartstrings now stood as their foe.

Christian turned to keep an eye on Thomas as he said, “We are healers. And we are killers. A
koreschie
can heal any wound, grievous or light. But more importantly to this particular situation, I have the power to kill the satyr.”

Ciardis heard hesitation in his voice. “But?”

Christian looked over at Thanar. “It’s a double-headed gift, and because of this the use of my power comes at a great cost.”

“Well that’s...useful,” said Caemon when no one else had anything else to say.

Ciardis couldn’t help but think,
“A healer and killer rolled into one. But at what cost?

Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth
, thought Sebastian back at her as he faltered under the onslaught of Thomas’s rapidly growing orange mist.

Caemon said, “Why can’t you heal Thanar first, then? We’d have a much better chance against Thomas with him by our side.”

“Because,” said Christian, forthright, “I’m ill, and I only have enough power in me to do one or the other. Healing is taxing, and not just physically. Every time I heal an individual, a part of me dies. I fear that with what’s left I only have enough power to kill Thomas before he can strike again.”

They all stilled. “When were you going to tell me?” said Stephanie.

“I just did,” said Christian with a painful laugh.

“All right, this shield is going down,” said Sebastian.

“Then we need a plan,” said Ciardis.

“Here’s the plan,” said Christian. “Distract Thomas long enough for me to get close to him. I have to be touching him for my powers to work.”

Ciardis was half-hoping he was kidding.

Christian turned to look at her with a half-cocked smile through tired eyes. “It’s our only choice.”

She nodded and tensed, ready to move.

Sebastian dropped the shield and with no better ideas they sprinted off, all four going in different directions to encircle the satyr. With their heads down and faces covered by their cloaks, they bullied their way through his noxious clouds. Thanar remained behind, too weak from blood loss to participate.

As Thomas was encircled in the center of their group, contemplating them all with his tail twitching behind him, Thanar said from a distance, “Seems the rumors were true. No matter what form they take, satyrs are the ugliest
kith
around.”

And apparently his plan was to mock the satyr.

Dismay ran through Ciardis. Thomas’s tail lashed faster.

Aloud, Sebastian said, “You know, I had heard the rumors that your kind was ugly. I just didn’t expect it to take such a grotesque form. The horns on your face are enough to scare any woman off.”

Thomas bared his pointed teeth in a snarl. “My horns are a sign of mighty virulence.”

A light came on in Ciardis eyes.

“You’re baiting him, aren’t you?”
Ciardis asked Sebastian.

“
Exactly
,” he replied tensely, “
Just enough to give Christian time to get into position.”

Ciardis held her glaive at the ready as Christian focused on sneaking up on the satyr’s back.

“Mighty virulence, huh?” quipped Thanar from the ground, his torn and bleeding wings lying around him. “You couldn’t even speak to Ciardis at the ball, you were so shy when a beautiful woman approached you.”

The satyr’s eyes widened and his tail snapped to and fro like a crazed whip. “You know nothing!”

This time Thomas’s clawed hands visibly fisted and he snorted as he shook his horned head. Before the satyr realized the eminent danger, Christian leapt onto his back from behind and wrapped his arms around the goat-like creature’s throat in a hurry. Christian wasn’t trying to strangle him, but rather get a hold on as much open skin as possible. As Thomas thrashed around with the human riding his back, Ciardis soon saw why.

Christian’s hands and skull turned transparent until she could see the muscles and veins under his skin. As his power flowed out through his arms, the veins underneath glowed an otherworldly purple like the bright starfish moss under a moonlight lake. As the ghostly power reached the transference point between Christian’s hands and Thomas’s neck, the satyr stopped struggling. It was as if he was petrified by the power of Christian above him. Meanwhile, the
koreschie
threw his head back and poured his remaining power into Thomas. For a moment the satyr glowed the same otherworldly purple. Then Christian released him from his hold. The satyr stumbled away on his hands and knees and collapsed to the ground.

As they watched the satyr curled in on himself as thick, bubbling pustules formed on his skin like lesions. His face began to crack and bleed as he whimpered through gritted teeth because of the pain. It was much faster than any of the legends said.

Stumbling back, Christian shook himself. “Well, that was fun.”

Ciardis glared at him. “If you meant it was as creepy as the gods’ own deaths, then yes.”

“I may have forgotten to mention details on what exactly I had to do,” Christian admitted.

“Is he dead?” questioned Thanar from where he knelt on the ground, his torn and blood wings hanging limply beside him.

Thomas was silent. His body still bore the signs of infection on every limb.

“Yes,” said Stephanie with a thankful sigh.

“No,” said Christian at the same time.

“What?” shrieked Caemon, Sebastian, and Ciardis.

Christian held up a hand to forestall their protests. “I infected him with a deadly virus. He’ll be out of this world within the hour, and for every second of that hour his pain and suffering will grow instrumentally worse.”

Then Christian looked to Sebastian and Sebastian nodded grimly.

“And for that hour we will get every shred of information out of him that we can,” Sebastian said.

Ciardis gulped as she looked down at the satyr who lay convalescent on the ground, his shudders the only indication he was still alive.

W
ith Thomas dying, the vines entrapping them in the gardens withered and died. Their master could no longer spare the power to keep them invigorated and growing. The entrance doorway appeared as the vines blocking their exit drew back into their natural state. As they did so servants poured into the garden with voices clamoring to know what was happening. They had seen the garden’s rapid development from a distance. As they raced from the manor over the desolated maze, they said they feared the worse.

“Another attack?” said one man.

“No, an ambush of the emperor’s guard,” speculated the maid beside him.

But it was clear that even their wildest speculations hadn’t come close to what they saw inside the eternity pool’s garden. The strained and haggard faces that greeted them froze a man in his tracks for a moment. Then the head footmen set to work leaning over Thanar and they soon rallied to their charges. The servants set about moving the weak, including Vana and Thanar, quickly onto stretchers and back into the manor. Thomas they were more cautious with as they transported him. Even with Stephanie holding a knife to the throat of the pain-wracked satyr as he thrashed in the mobile stretcher.

When they arrived at the manor entrance to the garden, Lillian took one look at them all and whispered harshly, “Into the master’s study on the second floor. It’s soundproof.”

The servants bore all their burdens into the requested room without a word.

Sebastian paced in front of Thomas while Ciardis and Caemon carefully saw to the various wounds of Vana, Thanar, and Stephanie. They couldn’t do much since Christian was the only healer in the room and he was too incapacitated to do much else then give instructions on how to care for the cuts and lacerations they all bore. Within five minutes Lord Steadfast arrived, assessed the situation in a glance, and hastily summoned his on-call healer to their bedsides. When the healer tried to force his attention upon Christian, the
koreschie
gave him a terse look and told him, “There’s nothing you can do for me.”

“But—”the healer said with a frown. Fresh-faced and clean-robed, he was a medic from the Healers’ Guild. If he could heal Thanar’s wings, which had looked like useless bits of paper torn to shreds before he had set his magic to them, then surely he could heal a man who looked like he just needed a good night or two of rest.

“I’m ill with the aerdivus,” said Thomas flatly.

Upon hearing that, the healer stepped back with pale and shaking hands. The aerdivus infection was notorious in the healing community as the only illness that their professional guild couldn’t combat in a human patient. In fact, most healers who had previously tried to heal an aerdivus infection in a patient had succumbed to the same infection themselves and died very quickly. Those who had lived had only spread the virus further. It only took a dozen or so deaths within the guild before the Healers’ Guild Council had issued a proclamation that none of their members would treat a patient with aerdivus at all. And if something couldn’t be treated with magic by the best healers in the empire, then there was no hope for the herbal remedies produced by the village sages throughout the land.

Because of the virulence of the aerdivus, all the marshes and swampland of the western lands, where it was said the virulent infection had originated, had been cut off from the Algardis Empire entirely. Sealed off by magic. What had once stood as thirty percent of the empire now lay behind a mighty mage barrier that prevented travel into the empire or out of the western lands. More than fifty years ago, those former citizens who resided there, thousands of people in the western lands, had been summarily cut off to save the lives of the greater population. 

All of this meant that if someone claimed to have aerdivus, there was no way a healer would interfere with or seek to treat them. In fact, it was against the law not to report the appearance of the contagion in person to the imperial throne. Ciardis had heard of village survivors who had disappeared in the middle of the night, supposedly for quarantine, but they were never heard from again. Some said the empire maintained a mighty prison where survivors of the aerdivus were sent to live out what was left of their lives. Of course, she had never seen a patient with the dreaded infection and could only go by conjecture. Others said that those who had fallen ill of aerdivus, survivors or not, were executed on the spot by imperial troops and burned by bonfire to ensure the safety of those around them. Neither rumor would ever be verified by the imperial throne, of course.

“A hot tea is all I need,” said Christian as he watched the healer hastily back away with fearful eyes. The healer gulped and motioned for his medical assistant to procure what Christian asked for. The rest of the duration of his visit the healer stayed well away from Christian, walking in convoluted patterns to attend to patients in order to avoid even the pretense of a conversation or contact with him.

Ciardis’s face twitched in irritation while watching the healer’s discrimination. After the second time he nearly stumbled over a stool as he tried to keep an eye on the
koreschie
, she walked over to Christian. As they watched him tend to Thanar once more, removing the paste that cover his healing scars, she said, “Why did you tell him that?”

Out of the corner of her eye she saw a half-smile come to Christian’s face. A smile filled with sadness but no regret. “Would you rather I told him I’m a
koreschie
? I believe that’s the one thing he would fear more.”

“Fear doesn’t mean he wouldn’t tend to your wounds. He swore an oath.”

“He might have sworn an oath, but sometimes fear can overtake even the greatest of men,” said Christian flatly. “Besides there is nothing he can do for me. There is a reason my people are known more for being murderers and serial killers than healers. It feels good to wrap my hands around a person’s fragile neck and push the pestilence of my
koreschie
race into their veins. To watch them burst and die on the ground at my feet. It’s like the high you would get after a night with a very pleasant lover, I’m told.”

Ciardis flushed. Opened her mouth and then closed it. There was nothing to say. She couldn’t imagine feeling such joy from someone’s pain, such joy from killing. It would be like being eternally happy every time she stabbed someone to death. Even when she had deliberately killed the Shadowwalker in the shadow of that grassy knoll by pushing his powers so high that they overwhelmed him and sucked back into him like a vortex, she hadn’t felt pleasure. She had felt satisfaction knowing that he was going to die, satisfaction that she was the one who would end his miserable life, but never true emotional pleasure at wielding the instrument of his death or watching him take a last gasping breath.

Christian continued, unabated, “In contrast to that feeling of emotional happiness when I kill, healing is painful. Emotionally and physically so. I see the joy of another’s life renewed while I manifest the physical sentiments of their ailments in my very veins. What’s more the power it takes to heal is drained from my very life force and cannot be replenished.”

Ciardis closed her eyes. Blocking the vision of Thanar before them and the very real images in her mind of a
koreschie
in essence feeding their pleasure. She hadn’t thought to gauge Christian’s emotions when he had incapacitated Thomas. Now, as she remembered the incident, she couldn’t get the ecstasy written on every line in his transparent face out of her mind. She licked her dry lips and then turned her gaze to Christian. “Then why? Why did you heal me when I was so close to death at the hands of the duchess of Carne in the spring?”

Christian turned to her with a frown. “Because you needed it. I may enjoy viscerally killing, but I am not a
koreschie
who emotionally enjoys the act of killing. Not like most of my kind. There are those among the
koreschie
who can no longer feel enjoyment aside from what they are—a serial killer. I feel joy in a bright summer’s day, in laughter, in healing and in life. I wish to repent for my people’s crimes for as long as I can. And then I will die.”