The Smoke-Scented Girl (42 page)

Evon leaped down from the horse and helped
Kerensa dismount, then smacked its rump hard, hoping it might find
a way out of the melee. Kerensa’s face was fixed in concentration,
tears leaking from her closed eyes. “I can’t hold this for much
longer,” she said. Her skin was already a little too pink. Evon
took a few deep breaths. He wasn’t allowed to give in to panic.

“Take his left hand with yours,” he said,
“and press your first three fingers against his pulse.” He pushed
up Kerensa’s sleeve and drew runes along the inside of her forearm
with his coppery chalk, then turned his attention to the Despot
only to realize the man was wearing hardened leather vambraces with
rusty, tight-fitting buckles. He tugged at the straps with his
fingertips to no avail, then pulled out his penknife and began
hacking at the leather where it attached to the buckles. It was
hopelessly inadequate to the task.

Movement caught his eye, and he looked up
from his work toward the Despot’s head. The shadow under the man’s
cheek seemed to shift in the dim light. Then Evon realized that
nothing else, under the pall of smoke and the higher clouds, was
casting a shadow. “
Wystylth
!” he shouted, acting on
instinct.
“Help!
”

Then Wystylth was by his side, looking where
Evon pointed, and without a word threw himself atop the Despot’s
frozen body and sank his claws deep into the man’s temples. The
shadow quivered, lay still, quivered harder, strained to get away,
and finally fell still. Wystylth grinned. “I have seen the Enemy
before,” he said, “and it evaded my Claws. This time it is not so
lucky, I think. And I am curious as to what you intend.” His grin
tightened as the shadow made another break for freedom. “Knife, on
my belt,” he added, jerking his chin, and Evon snatched the knife
from its sheath, nearly cutting himself on the sharp blade, and
sliced through the leather straps of the vambrace as if they were
wet paper.

He yanked the vambrace away, then shoved the
sleeve of the Despot’s shirt away from his arm and chalked other
runes there. He put his hand over the two joined ones, traced a
rune on the air, and said, “
Vertiri. Torpia misca ademi
.”
His mouth burned as if he’d swallowed a live coal, and a throbbing
pain went through the small of his back as he cast the powerful,
complicated spell. It felt as if someone had tied a knot in his
spine and was pulling it tighter. Evon gritted his teeth and
ignored it. He would have enough reserves for this. The alternative
was unacceptable.

Kerensa gasped, and her skin went a shade
pinker. “That feels strange,” she said.

“Stay focused. It’s just making the Despot a
suitable host for the fire,” Evon said. It wasn’t as
straightforward as he made it sound. This was the part he was least
certain of, and if there had been more time...but there wasn’t more
time, and Evon had had to guess.
Ademi
was doing something,
he was certain, because he could see the Despot’s muscles twitch as
part of his body began to change. Evon just hoped it was the right
part.

He ducked low as a saber struck at his head,
heard the cry of its wielder cut short as Alvor hit him so hard
with the mace that the man flew back into two of his fellows. The
twitches came more slowly now. Wystylth grunted as the entity tried
to break away again. Kerensa closed her eyes and moaned a little
behind her clenched teeth. The twitches stopped. “It’s almost
time,” Evon said. “Just one last thing.” He released Kerensa and
the Despot’s joined hands and began unbuttoning her dress.
Kerensa’s eyes flew open and she reached up with her free hand to
stop him.

He met her eyes, so beautiful and so full of
pain. “Do you trust me?” he said. He removed her hand and continued
to unbutton her bodice.

She nodded. “But I don’t understand.”

“I know,” he said. “I’ll explain everything
later.” He laid his palm flat against the hot skin of her chest,
between her breasts, and chalked an awkward left-handed rune on the
back of his hand. “I love you.
Vertiri. Desini madi.
”

Kerensa’s eyes went wide as all the air
rushed out of her lungs. Evon felt her heart give one final beat
and stop. She blinked once, her hand reaching to her throat, then
the life left her eyes and her hand went limp and fell to her
side.

Evon caught her before she could hit the
ground, though she was now beyond caring. Dry-eyed, he twitched the
edges of her bodice closed; he couldn’t spare the time to button
it. Modesty was another thing that no longer mattered to her. Her
skin had already begun to cool, returning to its normal hue. He
laid her down next to the Despot, took out Wystylth’s knife and
hurriedly began carving runes into the frozen ground, making an
uneven oval around Kerensa and the Despot.Now was where he learned
whether he was right.

Wystylth was looking at him as if wondering
if Evon had gone insane. Evon wasn’t sure about that himself. “It
makes sense,” he shouted over the noise of the battle raging around
them. “There’s only one control spell. If the—” The knife caught on
a clump of dead grass, and Evon hacked at it until it gave, feeling
panic rise up in him at even that small delay. “If the original
volunteer’s children inherited the fire,” he went on, letting this
recitation of logic calm him, “it would burn them when they were
born—maybe burn them in the womb, even. It was
the...modifications...that were being passed on. And yet the fire
and the spell survived for a thousand years, so they were being
passed on too, just not at birth. In death. One host dies and it
finds another one, and the spell goes along with it.” He made a
final cut and then stabbed the knife into the ground, where it
quivered for a moment from the force of the thrust. His reserves
were almost gone. Flashes of light darted before him, and he
scrubbed his eyes to dispel them.
No distractions.

Wystylth’s shoulders tensed, and he snarled
as the entity made another break for freedom. “But suppose the
Despot is not a descendant?”

“That was the first thing I did. I made the
Despot’s body mimic Kerensa’s, part of it anyway, so he would be
the nearest available host. At least I hope I did.” Evon gestured
at Kerensa’s lifeless body. “And now we see.
Solto epiria
.”
It felt like a knife driven deep into his back, and he closed his
eyes briefly as the battlefield swayed around him.
No falling
unconscious, Lorantis. Stay focused. She’s counting on you.

The familiar blue ribbons came into view,
along with a shimmering golden haze that surrounded Kerensa’s body.
Evon breathed out in relief. He also hadn’t been certain the
improved
epiria
rune circle would show free magic. There had
been a lot about this situation that he hadn’t been certain of. He
checked his watch. Maybe four minutes left before it was too late
for Kerensa. He wanted to wave his hands at the golden haze to make
it move faster. He clenched his fists instead.

Then it moved, pouring like melted honey
across the gap between their bodies and settling around the Despot.
The spell-ribbons flowed after it. Evon flexed his hands; this was
where timing was essential. The golden haze settled into the
Despot’s body. The spell-ribbons’ glow began to increase. Evon
raised both hands and shouted,
“Desini cucurri!
”

The spell-ribbons stopped in place, but they
shivered, straining against the paralysis. It would take no more
than a minute for them to overcome it. “You should go now,” Evon
said. “When the spell breaks free, it will complete its cycle and
release the fire, and I am only able to shield myself and Kerensa
from that.” He hoped. He was nearly at the limit of what he could
manage.

“If I go, the Enemy will go free,” Wystylth
pointed out. “And I find I am eager to meet Merenna beyond the
gates of the Underworld.”

“But—” Evon began, then met the man’s eyes.
“I understand,” he said.

“Do you?” Alvor said. He stood beside Evon,
his mace hanging heavy in his hand. One of his arms was bloody and
he held it at an awkward angle. The fighting was less fierce,
though Dania and Carall were still heavily engaged with holding off
the enemy forces. “We none of us came into this expecting to
survive. Think you that we are such craven weaklings as to allow
this young woman to face her death alone? We were prepared to die
when last we fought the Enemy. This is simply fate delayed.”

“But—” Evon said again.

“I hope for your sake you can revive her,”
Alvor said. “Now, Evon, finish this.” He turned away and raised his
mace to take another soldier in the chest. Evon stared after him in
wonder.
Kerensa will never forgive me if I do not remember,
he thought, and spared a few precious seconds to look at them all,
at Alvor roaring defiance at the horde, hurling soldiers away from
him with his mace, at Carall’s undead eyes so intent on his bloody
sword slashing and impaling his enemies, at Dania sweeping her arm
and sending fifteen soldiers to the ground with their heads hanging
limp from broken necks—did they know what was coming? As if she
could hear his thoughts, Dania turned briefly to look at him, and
smiled, a rueful, resigned smile that told him everything he needed
to know. Evon exchanged one last glance with Wystylth, who nodded
at him in salute and grinned that now-familiar grin. Evon took
Kerensa’s body in his arms, curled them both into as tight a ball
as he could manage, and said,
“Presadi.”

An iridescent bubble sprang up around them,
just large enough to encompass their bodies. He hoped there would
be enough air to get him through this. Two and a half minutes left.
He closed his eyes and buried his face in Kerensa’s hair.

Light blazed so brightly it burned pink
through his eyelids, even as well guarded as they were. He felt a
silent blow ring through
presadi
that rattled his bones and
made him bite his tongue, a blow hard enough to send them flying as
if they’d been kicked by a giant’s foot. For a moment Evon felt
weightless, and clutched Kerensa’s body in an irrational fear that
she might be left behind. He clenched his eyes shut tighter and
prayed to both Belia and Cath for survival; he hadn’t considered
what the spell’s explosion would do to
presadi
, and he was
aware that even if
presadi
protected against external
attacks, it would do nothing to prevent his ribs being cracked or
his neck being snapped from being tossed off a cliff. Then they hit
the ground, hard, and Evon cried out in pain just before
presadi
bounced, then bounced again, and after what seemed
like hours came to a rolling halt. For a moment, Evon just lay
there, curled up around Kerensa, then shook himself, dismissed the
spell and laid Kerensa on her back on the stony ground. He wiped
the back of his hand on his shirt to remove the chalk, laid his
palm against her skin once more, and said, “
Vertiri. Madi
sepera
.”

Nothing happened except the taste of cinnamon
passing across his tongue. Her skin no longer looked poreless and
felt smooth and too cool beneath his hand. He repeated the spell,
pressing harder into her chest. One minute left. His reserves were
drained.
No. I did everything right. I can’t fail now. Dear
Gods, I just need one more miracle
. He pounded at her chest,
shouting the words over and over again, drawing the runes between
her breasts and striking her again in desperation. Nothing. He
forced himself to become calm and thought again, trying not to
picture the seconds ticking away. Carefully, he scrawled runes
across her forehead, pushing her hair out of the way, pulled her
eyelids open and said
“Vertiri. Torpia cucurri
.”

She blinked, dragging her eyelids away from
his fingers, then took a deep breath and pressed her hands to her
chest. Confusion deepened. “You
undressed
me,” she said.
“And—where are we? Where’s the Despot?”

“He’s gone,” Evon said, tension draining out
of him. “He’s gone. It’s over.”

She blinked at him again, her fingers pulling
her bodice closed across her chest. “It’s over?”

Evon nodded. Kerensa’s eyes went wide, her
mouth opened and closed soundlessly a few times, then she began to
cry so hard her whole body shook. He gathered her into his arms and
held her tightly. “I’ll tell you all about it,” he said, “but I
would like to sit here with you, just for a moment, because you
were dead and I am so, so grateful that we’re both alive now.”

She nodded vigorously, drawing in a deep
breath as she tried to control her tears. “It doesn’t seem real
yet,” she said. Then she sat up quickly, breaking his grasp. “Evon,
what is
that
?” she exclaimed.

They were on a low hill, sitting in about an
inch of snow, completely alone, but far in the distance lay
blackened ground three hundred feet across around which tiny
figures lay collapsed like broken ants. Further away from that
center, more tiny figures milled in confusion. Smoke, warm and
wispy, drifted toward them, smelling not of burned flesh or grass
but sweet, like honey. In the center of the blackened area rose a
column of shifting, translucent fire, probably thirty feet tall,
that put out short tongues of flame all along its length. At the
top, the fire fountained up and out, letting off sparks that faded
before they touched the ground. Not a fountain, but a flower with a
million petals that it shed and then grew again. It swayed a little
in the wind.

“I think that’s what the fire was trying to
be, all this time,” Evon said. “It’s beautiful. It’s a fitting
memorial.”

“For the Despot?” Kerensa wiped her eyes and
made a face. She began buttoning up her dress. “And you
wrote
on me, too.”

“It was to save your life,” Evon said. “But
now I think I should tell you one last Alvor story.”