The Chaos Crystal (40 page)

That wasn't going to happen now. They were stuck here until Warlock died.

Boots snatched the bucket and headed up the stone steps to the surface. Arkady checked on the pups, who were across the room playing with that damned skull they'd found in the lower levels. They were rolling it across the floor to each other, giggling as the gentle blue glow waxed and waned when it left the clutches of one pup and neared another. Arkady thought the artefact too valuable to allow babies to be playing with it, as well as more than a little creepy, particularly the way it glowed around the pups and changed colour to a sickly green whenever Boots went near it.

Or maybe I'm just jealous,
she thought.
Because
when I touch the damned thing, nothing happens at all.

Warlock muttered something incomprehensible, distracting her from the pups. She hurried over to him and knelt on the floor beside the pallet where he lay, picking up the rag soaked in snowmelt they'd been using to wet his lips. With his intestines laid open, there was no question of giving him food or water, but they could ease his thirst a little with the wet rag without him actually swallowing anything.

'Can I get you something, Warlock?'

His eyes opened slowly, fixing on her as if he had trouble focusing. 'The pups
...
are they
...?'

'They're fine,' she assured him. 'Absolutely perfect.'

'They are Crasii,' he said, his eyes welling up with tears.

Arkady smiled down at him. 'I know they are,' she said soothingly. 'The most beautiful little canines I've ever —'

'No!' he said, gripping her arm weakly. 'You don't understand, my lady. You must help Boots
...
keep them out of the hands of the suzerain. They are
Crasii.'

It took a moment for her to grasp what he was telling her, but when she finally realised what he meant, she sat back on her heel, shocked. 'But how can that be? Both you and Boots are Scards, aren't you?'

'Crasii throw Scard pups all the time,' Warlock told her, struggling to speak. 'Why is it odd to think the reverse can't happen to Scards?'

'So if you run into any immortals
...'

'Then our babies will betray us,' he said, his voice strained.

'I'm so sorry, Warlock,' she said, leaning over to wipe his brow. 'If I'd known it was you
...'

'I would not have expected you to remember me, my lady,' he assured her, every word an effort, his forgiveness all the more poignant for its generosity. 'Our acquaintance was brief and more than a year ago.'

'And what a busy year it's been,' she said, smiling down at him. 'You've found a mate, made a litter of beautiful babies
...'
Got yourself killed by the foolish
woman who thought she was doing you a favour by setting you free
...

The irony in knowing that had she not forged her husband's signature and given Warlock a pardon, he would be safe and well in his cell in Lebec Prison right now, did not escape Arkady. She wished she had more time with Warlock to find out what he'd been up to this past year. More time to discover how it was a freed criminal wound up spying for the Cabal. How he'd met the escaped slave from her own kennels who was now his mate.

Even as far apart as their worlds normally were, that they could still collide so profoundly left Arkady wondering if there really was such a thing as fate or destiny. It all seemed too coincidental to be mere random chance.

'Will you help protect my babies, your grace?' he begged, the strain of speaking so great his voice was little more than a whisper. 'Boots acts tough, but she's very young and very frightened and three pups is a lot for any mother, let alone one on the run.'

Arkady nodded, and wiped his damp brow again, the matted fur cold under her fingers. 'I give you my word, Warlock. I'll do whatever I must to keep them safe.'

Before Warlock could respond, Boots barrelled down the stairs in a panic with the empty bucket in her hand. 'They're here!'

Arkady rose to her feet and looked at her oddly. 'Who? Who is here?'

'The suzerain!' she said, her eyes wild. 'Can't you feel them? No, of course you can't. You're only human.' She hurried to the pups, snatching up Missy who was the closest. 'Perhaps if we hide in the lower levels
...'
Then she turned to look at Warlock, her eyes filling with tears. 'Tides
...
we can't leave him here!'

'Why don't you go and hide, and I'll go out there and talk to them.'

'What for? To protect us?' Boots glanced pointedly at Warlock for a moment and then turned her baleful glare on Arkady. 'Oh, yes. Let's. Because that worked out
so
well the last time.'

'You have no choice, Boots,' Arkady told her. 'It nearly killed us getting Warlock down here, and we don't have the time to take him anywhere else. And you need to keep the puppies quiet. Let me go out there.'

Boots was angry and frightened but she understood that Arkady was making sense. 'What will you tell them?'

'The truth. That I am the wife of the Duke of Lebec and I managed to swim to safety when the ice broke. The Caelish have won the war and Stellan was fighting on their side. I'll probably be all right. You, Warlock, and the pups — you're the ones who can't risk being found.'

'I don't know
...'

'You have to trust me, Boots. Can you tell which suzerain they are?'

Boots shook her head. 'I can only smell them. I can't tell them apart.'

'Then let me go out there and lead them away from here.' Arkady glanced at Warlock and added, 'Under the circumstances, it's the least I can do.'

Boots was still angry with her, but not so angry she couldn't see the sense in what Arkady was proposing. 'You won't tell them we're here? Not even a hint?'

'I'll pretend to be grateful they've found me,' she promised. 'Tell them I haven't seen another living soul since the ice broke.'

'What if it's Jaxyn?'

Arkady shrugged, a little surprised to discover that she really
didn't
care about her own fate if it meant saving Boots and her family from falling back into the clutches of the immortals. Or perhaps guilt was driving her, making her think she deserved to be recaptured. Freedom was a fine notion, but it was a hard pill to swallow when it felt as if it had come at the expense of her father's life. 'I'll be fine, Boots. At the moment I have more value to these people alive than dead. You just find a way to keep the puppies quiet.'

Boots nodded reluctantly. 'All right. But don't let them come into the temple, because if it's Elyssa who's found us, I'll kill myself, my mate
and
my babies before I let that bitch get her hands on my family again.' By the fierce look in her eyes and the proud way her tail was poised, Arkady could tell Boots wasn't making an idle threat.

'Then hide that damned skull while you're at it,' Arkady suggested with a faint smile, trying to ease the tension a little. 'You can hear them giggling all over the temple when they're playing with it.' She gripped the young canine's shoulder reassuringly. 'And don't worry, Boots. I'll do whatever I must to keep you and your family safe. I promise.'

'That's what you said the last time,' Boots said gruffly, shaking off Arkady's hand as she shifted Missy to a more comfortable position on her hip. 'And you ended up trying to kill my mate.' She quickly looked up the stairs. 'The smell is getting stronger. You'd better go.'

Arkady nodded, wishing she had time to say goodbye to Warlock or give the pups a hug, but if Boots could smell the suzerain from down here, then they were very close. She grabbed her coat from the floor, tugging her arms through the sleeves as she climbed the stairs. By the time she emerged into the main part of the temple, blinking in the bright daylight reflecting off the snow that surrounded the ruin, she could already hear their voices.

The immortals who were heading for the ruins weren't trying to conceal their approach. But then, why would they? They had no reason to suspect anybody was here. Arkady quickly swept some of the scattered leaves across the entrance to the lair in the hope it would pass idle scrutiny and then hurried to her right, away from the door, to stand near the pillar where she'd stabbed Warlock. Arkady could hear voices, male and female, but she still had no idea which of the immortals had found the temple. She truly feared it was Jaxyn, although the ice had broken days ago. Surely he would have stumbled ashore somewhere else along the lakeshore before now?

There was only one way to be certain; only one way to ensure the immortals came no closer to Warlock and Boots and their Crasii babies.

Arkady hurried forward, following the sound of voices. As she emerged from the ruins, she discovered it wasn't Jaxyn, with Diala and Lyna by his side, as she'd feared. These immortals were male and they had only one woman with them. Arkady hesitated on the top step, thrusting her hands deep into her pockets against the biting air.

Two men and a woman approached the temple. Arkady didn't know the woman, nor did she have any idea who the older man was, but the figure on the left she knew all too well.

I'll do whatever I must to keep you and your
family safe, Boots. I promise,
she'd foolishly told Boots.

Tides,
Arkady thought.
I'll do anything but this.
Please, I don't have the strength to deal with him again.

Nobody was listening, however. The ground didn't open up and swallow her. No lightning bolt came out of the blue to strike her dead when the immortals stopped and stared up at her in astonishment.

The man on the left was the last person she wanted or expected to see here in Caelum.

It was Cayal, the Immortal Prince.

CHAPTER 38

'This is absolute nonsense, Jaxyn,' Diala scoffed after Declan had finished explaining what Lukys and Cayal were planning. They'd retired to the elaborately decorated room that had once been Stellan Desean's study. It seemed strange to be standing here without Arkady gracing the room, looking every inch the duchess. Strange to be here and not have Stellan sitting at his desk staring at Declan with that odd look caught somewhere between fear and contempt that he always wore when Declan was in the palace. Declan used to take it to mean Stellan feared the spymaster knew the truth about him and was just waiting to expose his secret. Declan never did. He loved Arkady too much to expose her to that sort of trouble.

And he was protecting her now. In the past few hours, he'd told Jaxyn, Lyna and Diala as much as he could. He'd included almost everything in his tale — meeting up with Cayal in Senestra; Lukys's ice palace with its chamber designed specifically to channel the Tide; Coryna, Maralyce, Kentravyon's revival from his frozen prison — even the story of his own immortal transformation. He'd left out, however, anything to do with Arkady, particularly the bit about how the feline Crasii Jaxyn had employed as his personal bodyguard was a Scard in the employ of the Cabal of the Tarot and had actually let her escape.

Declan behaved and spoke as if he believed Arkady was dead, and held no hope for any other news about her fate.

In truth, Declan was sick over what might have happened to her. He felt even worse that instead of going after her — the very reason he was back here in Glaeba — he'd been forced to abandon his search for Arkady to concentrate on the much larger problem of, well, saving the world.

For his own sanity, he clung to the notion that Chikita had let Arkady escape in plenty of time for her to get clear of the ice. It was late in the day when Cayal, Kentravyon and Elyssa finally broke the ice-sheet with the Tide, after all. She could have been halfway to anywhere by then.

At least she was no longer being pursued; there was that to be thankful for. Jaxyn and his immortal conspirators had other things to worry about.

Jaxyn clearly considered breaking the ice nothing short of shameless cheating. At least that's how he referred to Elyssa teaming up with Cayal and Kentravyon to defeat him. That bothered Jaxyn a great deal more than the fate of any mortal human — even the wife of the man he was trying to browbeat into submission by threatening to kill his wife.

The immortals took the news about the imminent end of the world well, all things considered. But then, Declan supposed, when you're immortal, after a while nothing must really surprise you any more.

'I don't know,' Lyna said doubtfully. 'His story has a ring of authenticity about it.' She studied Declan thoughtfully for a moment and then turned to the others. 'You can't deny he's telling the truth about being one of us now.'

Jaxyn had remained silent while Declan spoke, offering no opinion or any hint as to what he thought about Declan's tale. He was leaning against the desk, his arms folded, and hadn't moved the whole time Declan was talking.

'I don't doubt for a moment that it's true,' he said after a moment, surprising Declan by adding his weight to Lyna's argument.

'Why? Because he used to be your spymaster?' Diala asked, rolling her eyes.

'No,' Jaxyn replied patiently. 'I believe him because Cayal is a lunatic. Destroying the entire world just to end his own misery is exactly the sort of insane, selfish and entirely idiotic thing he'd do.'