The Crown of Stones: Magic-Price (30 page)

In fact, the Shinree woman was affecting me in a far different way than any woman had before. I was mute. Mesmerized. I had the urge to put my hand against her small breasts, simply to feel her chest rise and fall. I was preoccupied with how her skin glowed wet from the heat of the bathhouse. How her hair picked up the colors of the stones and shimmered with light. She met my eyes and the striking rainbow of magic reflected in hers was quite possibly the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. It pulled me in and held me captive. So much, that with the soft upturn of her thin, pink lips and the touch of her hand as it brushed my face, I found that all that I was going to say, all that I had planned to accuse her of was gone.

I cleared my throat. Remembering the bottle in my hand, I took a drink. After another, I found my voice. “I’ve never seen anyone like you.”

“Pity,” she said.

“That spell you cast, in the tavern…?”

“You’re welcome.”

My interest shrank some at her blithe tone. “A lot of people died that night.”

Eyeing me, she pulled the wine out of my hand, wrapped her lips around the rim and tipped the bottle high. I watched the muscles of her neck move as she swallowed, and the room suddenly went from hot to unbearable.

Licking the spill from her mouth, she pressed the bottle back in my hand and her fingers lingered on mine. “I simply did what you would not.”

“Which was? Cast among innocent people? Use their lives to feed your spells?”

“Innocent?” Frustration clouded the magic in her eyes. She shook her head, making the braids bounce and the myriad of stones clack together. “How can you care so much about what happens to the other races, yet do nothing to save your own?”

“You make it sound like I’m happy our people are slaves.”

“No, you’re apathetic. You see us as deserving of what Fate has decreed.”

“We earned what Fate decreed. Our ancestors enslaved the Langorians. They terrorized everyone else. They weren’t good people.”

“Haven’t we suffered enough for their deeds? Isn’t it time for us to be free?”

“That’s a nice sentiment, but the same problem still stands. Our people need to be controlled. Without
Kayn’l
, their urges would return. They would crave magic again.”

“As they should. It is a natural thing.”

“Natural and deadly. They would use it as they please.”

“They would learn restraint.”

“Just like that?”

“You did.”

“Do you think it was easy for me? It took being responsible for the deaths of thousands to give me a reason to hold back. All they’ll have is revenge. Like you.”

“It’s not revenge I seek, Ian. It’s liberation. Something you could have given us a long time ago with the Crown of Stones.”

“The crown?” My burgeoning anger turned to suspicion. “And how would I have done that exactly? By challenging five hundred years of law single-handed? Or by wiping out everyone that isn’t Shinree?” I stared at her a moment and it became clear. “That’s what you would have done, isn’t it?”

“I would have done what was necessary. I don’t fear what lies inside me.”

“Maybe you should.”

With a hiss of aggravation, she brushed past me. I half expected Imma’s scent of lavender to follow in her wake, but that was gone. Everything of
Imma was gone. The woman who was sitting down and pulling off her boots was nothing like the spirited girl who caught my eye in the tavern. That girl didn’t exist, not anymore at least.

“Your name isn’t Imma,” I said, staring at the smooth arch of her foot, the graceful bend of her ankle. “Is she dead now? The girl whose essence you stole?”

Completely ignoring me, the Shinree woman stood and unhooked the chain girdle from her slim waist. It hit the floor with a clank and the gown billowed out away from her body. “My name is Sienn Nam’arelle,” she said proudly. “I am of the Erudite.”

“Nam’arelle?” I didn’t bother masking my skepticism. The name she claimed was one of the oldest in Shinree history. A family of miners, it was said they were the first to discover our people’s innate talent for stone magic. They wrote the first spells, started the first schools. They created the Ruling House and were one of the most preeminent families in all the history of the empire. For any erudite to have survived its violent fall was hard to imagine. For one of the original and most powerful of our kind to have been allowed to procreate and produce descendants, for centuries after, seemed impossible. “There hasn’t been a teacher born in hundreds of years.

“I am born,” she said, as if those three words were the answer to everything.

“Are you the only one?”

“Are you? Is Ian Troy the only Shinree to have the craft of war?”

“There are other soldiers among the slaves. But they aren’t like me. They weren’t made from pure Shinree blood on both sides.”

“You are right in that,” she said, undoing the leather tie on one shoulder of her dress. As the first knot came undone, it became clear that the ties weren’t decorative. They were actually holding the entire garment together. And she was actually going to take a bath in the bathhouse.

Sienn went for the other shoulder. “Regardless of what you’ve been told, Ian, no lines have died. They have simply been suppressed. I am proof of that.” The tie came loose. As the dress began to fall, I wasn’t sure why, but it unsettled me. As Imma, when she wasted no time disrobing in front of me, I took full advantage of her boldness. Yet, as the cloth fell over Sienn’s body
to puddle about her bare feet, her oddly-timed, complete lack of modesty, had me backing away.

“You don’t seem very suppressed,” I told her.

“I was liberated almost two years ago. I’ve had time to adjust.”

“Two years?” That surprised me. “Who freed you?”

“I believe you call them rebels. They’re labeled as weak and ineffective by the other races. Discarded like trash.” Sienn stepped over the rim of the tub. Water rose up around her slender backside as she sunk down inside the cask. “In truth, they are simply people as any other.” Her body disappeared beneath the surface. The tips of her hair floated around her face, darkening. “They are free people,” she added.

“Why did they release you? Did they know what you were?”

“They were raiding camps all over Rella, looking to grow their numbers. Their leader came into possession of a record book from the slave camp where I was born. He discovered a mistake in the log where the name of my line had been misspelled for generations. The imbeciles had no idea what they had.”

“I’m sure your new friends are taking good care of you.”

“They are,” she said, missing my sarcasm. “They gave me tomes and scrolls full of spells, information on my ancestors. With their help I have become what I should have been all along. And with the knowledge I’ve gained, I’m repaying them.”

I squinted at her. “Repaying how?”

“Imparting my wisdom, enlightening their minds…as any teacher would to those anxious to be taught.”

“You’re training a band of thieving dissidents how to enhance their magic? How to tap into other lines? You can’t be serious.”

“They’re slow learners. My ways are difficult for them. Being Shinree is difficult. They’ve been ignorant of what it means their entire lives. As was I.”

“These precious pupils of yours have been harassing Rella’s cities and villages for years, Sienn. And now you’re making them stronger? Instructing them how to do real harm? Don’t you see how quickly this could get out of hand?”

Apparently she didn’t. Unaffected by the shock and concern in my voice, Sienn offered a nonchalant shrug and leaned gracefully back in the water.
Floating serenely on the surface, her hair fanned out behind her. Water lapped against the sides of her breasts and the curves of her thighs.

The moment was remarkably similar to my first encounter with the Arullan girl. Nevertheless, I was very aware that Sienn wasn’t a dream. She was here in front of me, accessible and, evidently, uninhibited. I was fairly certain she was mine for the taking too, if I could get past her lies and her not-so-subtle evasions.

“What do you want?” I asked her.

“You.”

Her response was as irritating as it was arousing. “Anything else?”

Sitting up, Sienn tilted her head to the side. Water trickled down out of her hairline and over the planes of her face as she held the pose, considering her words or (more likely), debating how truthful she should be. “Magic is so much more than attack or defense,” she said at last, which was not an answer at all. “I can help you move beyond that. I can teach you to cross the boundaries that blood has drawn, to retain your strength when casting and avoid an unwanted magic-price. Ian,” she said my name with what sounded like sincerity. “You don’t have to be at the mercy of your cravings. I can train you to control your need for magic, or at the very least, how to live with it.”

“Thanks, but I’m living with it right now.” I took a long, slow swig of the wine.

“Perhaps, I can show you a more constructive way?”

“Such as?”

“Learning to let go of what drives you to cast. And what limits you.”

“I’m a soldier, Sienn. You can’t change that.”

“Owning a particular blood is not the issue, Ian. Guilt, empathy, anger, pain—love. Emotion blocks your abilities. It clouds your judgment. Weakens your will.”

“Then, if I want to cast like you, I have to feel nothing?”

Sienn smiled like I was a dense. “I feel. Emotion merely does not shackle me. I can separate myself from it whenever I need to.”

“You say that like it’s a good thing.”

“Ten years ago when you wielded the Crown of Stones against Langor, emotion drove your casting and things happened you did not intend. Now, you live in fear of it happening again, and that fear chokes your abilities. It
suppresses them. You don’t need chains or
Kayn’l
to make you a slave, Ian. You do it to yourself every day.”

My jaw tensed at the eerie familiarity of her words. They reminded me of the ones that came out of Taren Roe’s mouth in the swamps. “What’s the cost for this help you’re offering, Sienn? I had to sell myself to get you to save Malaq’s life back in Kael. Is that why you’re here, to collect on my debt?”

“Not at all. I ask only that you meet someone. His name is Jem. He leads us toward a new future. He believes that with your help we can—”

I cut her off with a wave of the bottle and a rude bout of laughter. “That’s what all this is about? Your spell at the Owl, breaking into the castle, seducing me, this elaborate ruse… You’re trying to recruit me?”

“We could do great things together.”

Looking at the wisps of hair curling about her face, at the water breaking over her taut, pink nipples; I was pretty sure I wasn’t thinking of the same great things she was.

“How did you find me in Kael?” I asked. “Were you tracking me?”

“I was in the city when that foul Langorian arrived.”

“Danyon,” I nodded.

“He wasn’t very discreet, asking questions, threatening the merchants. He hired some locals as spies, so I tracked them. I assumed one would eventually spot you.”

I stepped up to the tub, squatted down and felt the water with my hand. “You tried to get me out of the tavern before the ambush.”

“I tried to keep you out of the city entirely. My boundary spell alerted me when you were close and I cast on that the page—the jittery young one with all the hair?”

“Liel,” I said, smirking at her description. “Why him?”

“He had an honest face, and I knew you wouldn’t question his ties to the castle. It was painfully easy to make him believe it was his duty to bring you to King Sarin.”

“You do realize that these are people you’re casting on? They aren’t here for your amusement.” Flinging the water off my hands, I stood up. “Are you behind all this? Stealing the Crown of Stones, stealing my magic, bolstering Draken’s conquests? Are you allied with Langor?”

“If I had the Crown of Stones, Draken would be dead and enslaving a Shinree would be punishable by death.”

“Your rebel friends were in Kabri when it fell. They looked the other way while the Rellans were being slaughtered. Which makes your claim of no alliance sound like complete bullshit.”

“The Rellans are not our problem, or our enemy. Draken’s attack simply gave us an opportunity to rescue many of our kind. We have no alliance with anyone.”

“How do you know? Maybe you’re esteemed leader is keeping you in the dark.”

“He would never.”

“Then you’re just choosing to look the other way.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“A Shinree who is adept at crossing bloodlines is working with Draken of Langor. He resurrected the eldring, stole the Crown of Stones, and murdered both Rella and Kael’s Kings. And he just sent a nasty spell my way. So right now,” exasperation lent an edge to my voice, “I need you to wake the fuck up to what’s really going on and give me the name of anyone you trained that might even be close to capable of wielding that kind of power.”

Her lips pursed. “It isn’t one of us.”

“What about this man, Jem. How well do you know him?”

“Jem is my savior.”

“Your savior?” That was the second time I’d heard that term recently. “Is that your assessment, or more of a self-appointed title?”

“It’s what he is. He pulled me out of slavery. Fed me. Clothed me. When the
Kayn’l
wore off and I was lost, he was there. As I am now for him. To my dying breath I will aid Jem in ending the Law of Suppression and bringing freedom to the Shinree.”

“That’s quite a goal. And quite a vow,” I added, finding the level of passion in her voice worrisome. “You really think he can do all that?”

“I do. Jem is a persistent man. A driven man.”

“Is he a man who would use the Crown of Stones to make Draken High King?”

“A Shinree would never support a Langorian.”

“Yeah, well there’s been a lot of
never
happening lately.” I flopped down hard on the bench behind me. “I’m starting to think the word doesn’t mean what it used to.”

Sienn watched me a moment. “You really are troubled by all this. Perhaps, if you unwind the answers will come? I can help with that.” Lowering her lids, she gave me a persuasive smile. “If you so desire.”