The Chaos Crystal (42 page)

'I can't feel anything,' Elyssa said, a little impatiently.

'That's my point,' Kentravyon said. 'I can barely feel
you
on the Tide and you're standing five feet from me. It's the crystal doing that. Only time you're ever going to be able to sneak up on another immortal is when you're in the vicinity of the Chaos Crystal.' He fixed his gaze on Arkady again. 'Where is it, my dear? If you tell the truth, I promise not to hurt you. Too much.'

Arkady stared at Kentravyon in confusion. 'I
beg
your pardon?'

Oh, Tides,
Cayal thought, hurrying forward to put himself between them. 'Don't mind Kentravyon, Arkady. He doesn't mean to frighten you.'

'Yes, I
do,'
Kentravyon said, trying to push Cayal out of the way.

Arkady stepped back from the Tide Lord in alarm.
'That's
Kentravyon? And you're Elyssa?' She turned to him, looking more than a little panicked. 'What's happening, Cayal? What are you doing
here?'

'How dare you question him,' Elyssa retorted, still glaring at Arkady suspiciously. 'Cayal, how do you know this woman? You never mentioned her before.'

'I was in Glaeba for quite a while, remember? I met a lot of people.' He pushed Arkady behind him as he spoke, alarmed at the jealous edge to Elyssa's question.

Kentravyon looked almost as anxious as Elyssa to get hold of Arkady.

'You'll be pleased to know your husband lives, my lady.'

Although she kept glancing over Cayal's shoulder nervously at Kentravyon, Arkady seemed genuinely pleased to hear the news that Stellan was alive and well. 'Is he all right?'

'Sailing for Glaeba to take his rightful place on the throne, last I heard,' Elyssa assured her. Cayal didn't like the brittle tone of the Immortal Maiden's voice. The problem was, of course, Elyssa knew about Stellan's sexual preferences and was fully aware his marriage had been in name only.

'I'm sure Lady Elyssa would be happy to arrange for you to join him in Herino, once our business here is concluded,' he said over his shoulder to Arkady, hoping to take Elyssa's mind off
his
relationship with Arkady and fix it on her husband instead.

'That's very
...
thoughtful of you,' she said, her voice trembling just enough for Cayal to tell there was something seriously amiss here. Arkady removed all doubt when she asked with forced nonchalance, 'What business could you possibly have in this old ruin?'

'That is none of your concern,' Elyssa said, looking past Arkady at Kentravyon, who seemed to have lost interest in the mortal woman and was poking around the ruins behind them. 'Can you tell where it is?'

'Not specifically,' the madman called over his shoulder. 'The dampening effect makes it hard to pinpoint. But it's definitely here somewhere. Everything

on the Tide feels dulled. Only the crystal could be doing that.'

'Tell where
what
is?' Arkady asked. 'What's he talking about?'

Elyssa didn't deign to answer her. She climbed the crumbling steps, her skirts trailing in the snow, sparing Arkady a disdainful sneer as she pushed between her and Cayal and followed Kentravyon into the ruins. Cayal took Arkady by the arm, wishing he could get her alone long enough to explain what was going on. And to kiss her.

Kissing Arkady might get the taste of Elyssa out of his mouth.

'Be patient,' he told her softly. 'I'll explain everything later.'

She glanced back at Elyssa. 'Cayal, you have to leave this place.'

He looked at her oddly. 'Why?'

'There's nothing here for you.'

'Kentravyon seems to think there is.'

'What could you possibly want from this place full of bad memories?'

So she's figured out this is the place where Fliss died.
Cayal wasn't surprised. Arkady knew the story and she was nobody's fool. It would not have taken her long to put two and two together. 'We're looking for the Chaos Crystal. Apparently the Cabal hid it here.' Cupping his hands, he added with a smile, 'I believe it's about so big
...
channels the Tide
...
probably glows in the dark. Haven't seen it lying about, have you?'

Arkady's eyes were wild. He'd never seen her in such a state. 'Cayal,
please,'
she hissed. 'Get them away from here. Even if it's only for an hour.'

He looked at her oddly. 'What are you hiding, Arkady?'

'Nothing that concerns you.'

'I can smell smoke,' Elyssa remarked behind them, sniffing the breeze. 'Does anybody else smell it?'

'I made a fire to keep warm,' Arkady told her. She was speaking for Elyssa's benefit but her panicked gaze was locked on Cayal, silently pleading for his help. He didn't know what was going on here, but there was definitely
something
here she didn't want the others to find.

'Where?' Elyssa asked, stepping over one of the frost-covered fallen pillars as she looked around. 'I see no fire here.'

'Aren't there several more levels to this place?' Kentravyon called from somewhere inside. He was lost in the shadows, poking about, looking for the stairs that led down into the bowels of the temple. 'I seem to remember something like that.'

'They've probably collapsed by now,' Cayal said. 'Or been flooded. It's been a couple of thousand years at least since anybody's used this place. Let me go down and have a look.' The relief on Arkady's face when he offered to investigate the lower levels rather than allow the others down there heightened his suspicion. 'You'd better come with me, your future highness,' he added to Arkady in a rough tone, mostly to ease Elyssa's mind. 'I'm not letting you out of my sight until we decide what to do with you.'

Arkady willingly complied, letting him lead her into the temple. He directed her unerringly toward the stairs that led to the lower floors, tugging her with more force than was absolutely necessary, when Elyssa glanced over at them.

When he reached what should have been a ruined doorway and discovered it covered by a makeshift leather curtain, his suspicion that there was something going on here solidified into absolute certainty. Arkady hadn't thrown a curtain up in the last few days after stumbling ashore during the battle.

Cayal pushed the leather curtain aside, bent a little to avoid banging his head on the lintel and stepped through onto the landing, pulling Arkady

inside with him. It was dark inside, and the air smelled of canines, smoke and cooked meat. As soon as he let the leather fall back into place and they were out of sight of Elyssa and Kentravyon, he pushed Arkady against the wall in the darkness and kissed her.

For a moment, she kissed him back, almost as if she'd forgotten she was mad at him. And then she broke it off and pushed him away impatiently.

'Tides, Cayal, what are you doing here?' she demanded. 'And with them?' Arkady brushed her mouth after she spoke, as if trying to wipe away the taste of him.

'I could ask you the same thing,' he said, stroking the hair from her scratched and battered face. Her eyes were shining in the darkness and all he could think of was how he wanted her as much as he didn't want Elyssa.

Tides, the sooner I die, the sooner I'll stop getting
myself into trouble like this.

'What are you hiding down there that you don't want the others to see?'

She stared at him for a moment, debating how far she could trust him, he didn't doubt. 'You have to promise me you'll not say a word.'

'About what?'

'I'm not telling you until you promise.' 'All right then. I promise.' 'You have to mean it.'

'Tides, Arkady, what do you want from me?' he asked, wondering if he could get away with kissing her again. 'Should we spit in our palms and seal the deal like real men?'

She pushed him away harder this time. 'This is important, Cayal. If Elyssa discovers who else is here, she'll kill them.'

Now Cayal was intrigued. 'Who else
is
here?'

When she refused to answer him, he added

impatiently, 'I give you my word, Arkady. Your dire secret is safe with me.'

Arkady studied him warily for a moment longer and then nodded. 'Come with me. I'll show you.'

Cayal followed her down the crumbling stairs to the room below which turned out to be quite well appointed for an abandoned ruin. There was a pallet made up in the corner, scattered with furs, a sizeable fireplace glowing red in the darkness and a pile of supplies stacked next to a makeshift barricade around the landing to the next level down. On his left were the 'who elses' Arkady was so desperate to save from discovery. They turned out to be a family of canine Crasii. There was a young female with three pups cowering down next to another pallet with a prone figure, probably their sire. And a wounded sire at that. Cayal could smell the infection on him from across the room.

'All this subterfuge and secrecy for a family of flanking
gemang?'
he asked, wondering what was so special about these particular canines that had Arkady in such a panic.

'Oh, wonderful!' the female hissed at Arkady, pulling her pups to her as she glared at Cayal. 'This is your idea of protecting us, is it?'

Significantly, the canine did not fall at his feet to assure her lord and master that to serve him was the reason she breathed. At the very least, the female must be a Scard. It hardly mattered what the injured male was, Cayal thought. He smelled as if he was only hours away from death.

'Cayal can help.'

'I don't
want
his help. Just get rid of him.'

'It's not me you have to fear,
gemang,'
Cayal told her, walking closer to the prone male to get a better look at him. 'I have friends upstairs who Arkady seems fairly certain you don't want to meet.'

The female's eyes fixed on Arkady.

'Elyssa's out there,' she said.

The young canine's big brown eyes rilled with angry, fearful tears. 'Tides, you've brought them down on us! I
knew
I shouldn't have let you stay! First you kill my mate, then you bring
them
here
...'

'He's not actually dead yet,' Cayal pointed out, squatting down beside the barely conscious male. The female pulled back in fear, but her cubs seemed to be struggling to be free of her so they could get closer to him. Cayal didn't stop to wonder what that meant. He pulled the covers back to get a look at her mate and then smiled at the delicious irony when he realised who it was that lay bleeding and dying at his feet.

He glanced up at Arkady. Nodding approvingly. 'You did this?'

'It was an accident.'

'You know who this is, don't you?'

'Of course I do.'

Cayal sat back on his heels. 'Tides, I warned the stupid
gemang
I'd be there to watch him die someday.' 'You have to heal him.'

Cayal rose to his feet, shaking his head. 'The hell I do.'

Arkady glanced up the stairs before pleading with him. 'Elyssa thinks she owns these Crasii. If she finds them here she'll realise they're runaway Scards and kill them.'

'And this is my problem
...
how
exactly?'

The female growled low in her throat. Arkady glared at him. 'Stop it, Cayal. I know you're only saying that to get a rise out of me.'

'I'm not going to heal him, Arkady. This smug mongrel gloated over my pain every moment he spent on Recidivists' Row opposite me. Let him die. What do I care?'

'If you won't do it for him, then do it for me. '
That wasn't fair.
He threw up his hands. 'What's the point? Elyssa's going to come down those stairs

any minute. And even if I did as you asked, if I heal him with the Tide the others will feel it the moment I do anything and they'll come running.'

Arkady shook her head. 'No they won't. Kentravyon said something is deadening the Tide around here. They can't even feel
you
at the moment. You can heal him, let Warlock and his family get away, and the others need never know.'

'What do I get in return?'

'What?'

'What's in it for me?'

'Tides, Cayal, we don't have time for this.'

'Then you'd better make me an offer I can't refuse.'

'What do you want?' the female canine asked. 'If it's the human woman, you can have her, suzerain. We have no further use for her.'

He smiled at the canine. 'Nice loyal friends you've got there, Arkady.'

'Heal him, Cayal,' she insisted.

'Why?'

Arkady hesitated, as if she was debating something within herself, and then she shrugged fatalistically and said the last thing Cayal was expecting to hear.

'Because I know where your wretched crystal is.'

CHAPTER 40

Arkady Desean figured she knew what it felt like to tumble off a cliff. She knew exactly what it must feel like to discover you were plummeting from a great and dizzy height toward your doom. That's exactly how she'd been feeling ever since they tied her to the Justice Tree in Watershed Falls back in Senestra. Back before Declan appeared out of nowhere to save her because he was now immortal and could wield the Tide. Before Lyna found her and brought her back to Glaeba. Before she'd discovered her father still lived. Before her father had tried to kill himself for reasons Arkady was still unsure about, but she suspected were mostly cowardice. Before Clyden Bell died. Before the battle. Before she'd turned her back on her father and proved she was a coward too, by abandoning him to die on the ice. Before she'd stumbled over Boots and the pups. Before she'd tried to kill Warlock.