Syphon's Song (32 page)

Selene’s pale skin glowed under the light of the waxing moon. “If you’re looking to please people, you’re bound to fail.” Her tone turned absent. She looked away as if she couldn’t hold Bronte’s gaze. “The Council has two necromancer apprentices other than myself. They are two and four years old. They also have a siren, a dispirit, an oracle and three statics. But they are all of age, serving out their apprenticeships. Those two necromancers are practically babies. They have no true home within the Council. No mother. They will never find acceptance when they’re freed. They have no hope for happiness. No one likes the dark side, after all. No one.”

Selene’s flowery mouth squeezed tight. The night’s shadows washed over her and seemed to coax the darkness of her death power to bleed through her skin with a frightening glow. Bronte erased the thoughts as quickly as they came. She was falling prey to the prejudices that ran through mage society. She’d thought herself above that. “So what are you going to do? Take the kids?”

“Take them where?” Selene sounded as if she’d thought on the subject for quite a while and had yet to think of a suitable solution.

Bronte lifted her face to the moon, no longer full, but its white and gray glowed in the sky. “You could move back to Casteel and live with Mom and Dad. You seem to intimidate them. I’m sure you could use that to your advantage. Blackmail them. Tell them you’ll expose them as coldhearted, horrible parents if they don’t hide the kids.” Bronte paused, her words snagging at threads in her memory. Was that what Selene had been trying to do at the hearing? Had she been saying that she would expose their parents’ secret necromancer daughter if they didn’t sign Bronte over to Casteel?

Selene raised an eyebrow. “A bit weak, sister.”

Bronte shrugged. “I thought it was just a myth that the High Council took children.”

Selene gave a self-deprecating laugh. “Of course they take children! Any child that will do them good. Any they want! And the good Mayflower families conveniently look away and let the Council have their head in most anything so long as it doesn’t bother them.

“And you are the worst offender of all, did you know that? Poor, helpless little syphon. Doesn’t even rank on anyone’s scale of power until the badass colonel rubs up against you, or you step your delicate little toe into his gyre. Beautiful, independent Bronte Casteel thrown to the winds by her family, just keeps her head down, doesn’t look around to see how anyone else might live who’s right there in the winds with her.”

“Selene, your bitterness is getting old. I’m sorry I didn’t rescue you. But I didn’t know you existed. Get over it.” Bronte glared at her until Selene finally looked away.

A far away holler reached her ears and faded quickly, as if the sound was too exhausted to linger after traveling through the thick magic of the gyre. It was Gregor, she thought. “Everything alright, Bronte?”

Bronte waved her hand. “Oh yes,” she said too softly for him to hear. “We’re just fine, fast friends out here.” She turned to Selene. “Let’s finish this and get out of here.”

* * * *

“It’s going to be dark down there. Do you have your flashlight?”

Selene squinted at her. “Mages don’t need flashlights.”

“This mage does.”

Selene circled her finger in the air. Instantly the entire gyre glowed with the power of a white sun. Bronte’s ears burst with the pressure as a scorching pain burned her eyes. Reflexes forced them closed, but even the speed of a blink was too slow to protect her vision. The light seared through her eyelids. She buried her face in the crook of her elbow as the pained protests of those who stood watching them drifted over. Selene’s hand jerked away from Bronte’s for the briefest moment. The light flared uncontrollably, penetrating the minuscule cracks in Bronte’s makeshift barriers.

“Hellhounds!” The swear sounded as if it were yanked out of the woman and stuffed back down at the same time. Selene groped at Bronte’s arm until she found her hand again. The light extinguished. “Damn it to the stars but that hurt. I can’t see a shitty sacred thing.”

It was no comfort to hear that Selene couldn’t see either.

“Maybe a flashlight would be safer than mage light.” Her words were muffled beneath her arm. “I think the gyre makes it harder to control your sixth sense.”

“I do not have a blessed flashlight! How about we use yours?” Selene’s sarcastic lash was woven with embarrassment over her lack of control.

Bronte stayed silent.

“What?” Selene continued, “Don’t you have one handy in your pocket?”

“You’re the one with all the pockets!”

Bronte moved her arm from her eyes but kept them closed. The inside of her eyelids flamed red. She slowly lifted them, but the view didn’t change. The world was on fire. “It wouldn’t do me any good at the moment anyway.”

“Your vision will come back.” Selene’s voice was clipped. “Nothing’s dead on your eyes. I can tell from here. You smell nothing like rot, not even the smallest nerve.”

“How reassuring. Thank you.” Even as she spoke, her peripheral vision slowly returned. The red bleeding across her line of sight collapsed in and left the edges of her vision clear. “How about you? Are you rotting anywhere?”

“No more than usual. I can’t believe I did that in front of everyone. The Council guards aren’t going to forget it.” Selene’s head drooped. “I suck at mage light. It’s at the opposite end of the spectrum from death energy.”

“Don’t feel bad. Vincent was hesitant to even try his mage power in here.”

Selene’s head shot up. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me that before we came in here?”

“Because I didn’t think of it before!” She waited for the insults, but they didn’t come. “We still need a light. Should we go ask if anyone brought one?” Besides, it was a good excuse to put off the inevitable dead body search.

“No!” Selene’s protest shot through the air. “We are not going back there without accomplishing our mission. We return only when we have something to show for all this.” Selene had a dot of a light going before she finished. Bronte’s ears whispered a protest at the spell, but the pressure was manageable.

The light hovered above Selene’s fingers like a baby bird undergoing a growth spurt so rapid its feathers burst from its body. Sparks drifted down to the ground and disappeared into the dirt. When the light spell steadied, it was no bigger than the tip of Selene’s pert little nose. The utter blackness of the cave would devour that meager beam. They’d probably trip over the body.

 
“Let’s go.” Selene’s words sounded defensive, as if she’d heard Bronte’s thoughts. The necromancer led the way, their arms stretching between them before Bronte moved her feet. The light went first. It moved between the two tall rocks in the middle of the gyre and then down into the opening in the ground. It lit the cave walls with a golden glow. Selene descended like she stepped down a spiral staircase, most of her body still above the ground as she turned once, and then Bronte was pulled down with her onto the descending ramp.

Instantly the power of the gyre changed. Its energy deepened as if somewhere down here the heart of the goddess beat. Life pulsed from it. She was in the presence of the sacred. She opened her mouth to tell Selene.

“It’s not far. I can smell it.” Selene’s glee sizzled through the cave.

Bronte closed her mouth with a snap. Selene was unlikely to appreciate sacredness at the moment. Instead, her sister murmured about the decay rates of mage bodies, a forensic mage on the case.

“Do you track down bodies in caves often?”

“Not in caves, no.”

Bronte decided she didn’t want to know where Selene worked. The woman probably traveled all over since it was unlikely that bodies showed up in the Council House frequently. Or maybe they did. Considering they took babies, Bronte was quite uninformed about how they worked.

They walked down the twirling cave in single file, the passage so tight in places Bronte’s shoulders brushed both sides of the cave at the same time. They descended farther. The circumference of the tight circles loosened wider and wider. The energy spiraled up to meet her. She could have closed her eyes to luxuriate in the feeling.

Except she risked tripping over a dead body.

Reaching out a hand, she let her fingers run along the wall as they walked by. It was grooved with a thousand tiny channels as if water had rushed by them in individual currents the width of a thread. But it wasn’t water that had marked them. It was the goddess’s energy.

“I wonder who brought him down here,” Bronte whispered.

“You could have done it.”

“I didn’t!” Surely she wasn’t about to come under suspicion for this. General Wilen would have questioned her about it.

“You’re right. You’re too wimpy. It would have taken someone brave. Bold. Willing to take on a fight for the good of others. Someone courageous enough to take the Casteels’ power and hand it to their enemies in hopes that this family could help.”

Bronte stumbled to a halt. “Really? Is that how you describe Double-Wide? Bold and brave?”

Selene halted and spun around. “What?”

“Double-Wide. They took the body.”

“No, they…” Selene shook her head with a squint of her brow. She closed her eyes and slumped against the wall of the cave. “Blasted hells.” She dropped her head with the whispered curse. “I suppose it doesn’t matter anymore.”

“What doesn’t matter?”

Selene opened her eyes. “Nothing that concerns you.” A sneer accompanied the snide comment.

“You know, I’m tired of your attitude.” She took the lead and yanked Selene down the gyre, circling through the cave with a fury.

Selene halted after a half-dozen turns. “We’re close. Let me take the lead. I want to see the body before you trip over it.” She slid past her and led them for a single loop down the cave before she stopped. She cocked her head, focused on something in front of her. The body.

Bronte froze, keeping her eyes on Selene’s shoulders, but avoiding visual contact with the body didn’t work. Her sister crouched down and pulled Bronte with her, giving her a glimpse of dark shoes and suit pants at the other end. Selene leaned over his head, blocking her view.

“He’s amazingly well-preserved. The embalmer did a superb job.” Selene held out her free hand over the body and let it hover over his torso.

“Great,” Bronte squeaked, staring firmly at the wall.

“Oh, don’t act like a Non. It’s part of life, and it’s going to happen to you too. I swear by the universe, I don’t understand how Nons can live so detached from death. It’s time to face the life cycle, sweetheart. Move your hand to the back of my neck. I need both hands free to find out if he died of natural causes. Not that I’m sorry he’s dead. I would have killed him myself if I’d had the chance.”

“That sounds like a confession to keep between sisters. If I told people that, you’d probably become a suspect, especially considering you’re his discarded granddaughter.”

“Does that put you under suspicion too?”

“I think I was for awhile.”

“There are a lot of people who wanted him dead. He ruled a territory filled with his enemies, Nons and mages alike. Now, do you think touching me on the neck will work? Or is touching a bone witch there too much for you?”

Bronte sighed long and slow. Keeping her right hand clasped in Selene’s, she took her left hand and placed it on the back of her sister’s bare neck. Then she let go of her sister’s hand. “Does the attitude come with the gift?”

“Does cowardliness come with yours?” Selene’s hands hovered above the body and froze, her head bent slightly.

“I’m so glad we’ve had some time to get to know each other better.”

“Poison.” Selene spat the word.

Bronte nodded. It was a good way to describe their time together.

“Ingested at the mouth.”

A good murder weapon, too.

“There are still traces of it despite the powerful cleanse. Did it absorb in the mouth, or in the gut? I can’t be certain. Most likely in the gut.” Selene conversed with herself. She leaned farther over the body, forcing Bronte to do the same to keep touching her neck. Selene leaned over the senator’s head until she was close enough to kiss his lips. If only Selene’s hair had been out of its hat, Bronte wouldn’t have witnessed it.

“Tell me you’re not going to kiss him. Please tell me that.” Bronte put a knee on the ground to keep her balance.

Selene looked over at her. Her face glowed eerily with the mage light floating above the body. She smiled and pulled the senator’s mouth open with a finger on his chin.