Ghost in the Winds (Ghost Exile #9) (38 page)

She was alive, and she was unharmed, and she was running towards him, and that was the only thing that mattered…

Then other observations started to penetrate his brain.

Her eyes were burning. No, that wasn’t quite right. Rather, smokeless fire filled her eyes, and veins of the same fire glowed beneath the skin of her face and neck and hands. Kylon had seen that smokeless fire in his dreams, burning in the eyes of the Knight of Wind and Air. Had the ancient djinni possessed Caina? No, that was absurd. She could be possessed, but not controlled. The Knight would lodge himself inside of her flesh, but he would be bound to her, his abilities lost to her control…

In a flash, Kylon understood why the Knight had gone to such lengths to save Caina’s life. All that effort to bring her here, at the moment when she would be most effective, and could use the Knight’s power against Callatas when the djinni himself could not.

As the realization crossed his mind, a shadow on a rooftop caught his eye.

A nightmare from his past started to replay itself. 

On that awful night in New Kyre, the Red Huntress had erupted from the shadows behind his wife Thalastre, stabbing her first through the belly so that she would know her unborn child had perished and then killing her in front of Kylon. She had moved fast, so fast he had not been able to save Thalastre.

And now Kylon saw the Red Huntress leap from the rooftop, a ghostsilver short sword in her hands, and plummet towards Caina with the speed of a crossbow bolt. Caina’s eyes were fixed on Kylon, and she hadn’t noticed the Huntress.

The Huntress was moving fast enough that Kylon could not stop her.

Kylon roared in fury and fear and surged forward, using every scrap of the power he could gather to augment his speed, hurtling forward as his muscles and joints screamed from the strain. Caina blinked at him in puzzlement, her stride faltering, and the Huntress grinned a wild, mad grin, the ghostsilver sword glittering in her fists. 

Kylon sprinted forward, but a horrible dread seized him.

He was fast, but not faster than gravity. 

The Huntress would reach Caina before he did. 

Frantic, he flung the valikon in an overhand throw, the silvery blade spinning.

###

Caina just had time to wonder why Kylon was shouting at her, then both her own instincts and Samnirdamnus screamed a warning, and she whirled, trying to duck as she did so.

A red-armored shape in a black shadow-cloak filled her vision, and Caina glimpsed cold blue eyes that glinted with purple fire, white teeth bared in a manic, gleeful smile. 

The Red Huntress had come for her at last, and Caina could not dodge, could not evade, could not avoid the ghostsilver short sword plunging for her heart.

There wasn’t even time to curse herself for her folly. 

Then Kylon’s hurtling valikon clanged against the side of Kalgri’s short sword, deflecting it to the side, and the Huntress slammed into Caina, driving her to the ground. Caina landed hard, Kalgri sitting on her chest, the Huntress’s knees pinning her arms in place. She tried to draw on Samnirdamnus’s power to throw off Kalgri, but the djinni’s power gave her the ability to command the wind and the smokeless flame, not to make herself stronger, and the Voice gave Kalgri a grip like iron. Caina could not break free, and if she called smokeless fire to her hand, she could not raise her arm to strike.

Kalgri giggled, the sword of dark force snarling into existence in her hand, and Caina saw her death descending towards her face. 

Ghostsilver flashed, wreathed in white fire, and Kylon shoved his valikon a few inches before Caina’s face, deflecting Kalgri’s swing. Kalgri whirled, driving her free hand into Kylon’s chest, and the raw power behind that blow knocked him back. He raised the valikon in guard, and Kalgri sprang off Caina’s chest like a snake, the ghostsilver short sword in her left hand, the sword of dark power reappearing in her right hand. Using the sword of the nagataaru should have slowed and weakened her, but she moved in a blur, both the ghostsilver blade and the sword of dark force weaving a maze of slashes and thrusts as she attacked. 

Kylon had to fall back, his valikon snapping back and forth to deflect Kalgri’s attacks. Caina tried to sit up, but the Huntress’s impact had knocked the breath from her lungs. She heard Morgant and Annarah charging to help, heard shouts from the other end of the Old Bazaar, and knew the others were coming to join the fight. 

But Kalgri was moving so fast that it would be too late. 

Kylon leaped to the side, the power of air sorcery hurling him a dozen yards. Caina had seen him use that maneuver a score of times to put himself beyond the reach of a foe.

Except this time, Kalgri followed him. 

She jumped, and wings of shadow and purple flame erupted from her back, propelling her forward like vast ragged sails. Kalgri crashed into Kylon and leaped again, and the two of them went tumbling upward into the air, blades flashing back and forth as they struggled. 

At last Caina managed to shove herself to a sitting position, but by then both Kylon and Kalgri had vanished from sight.

###

Kylon spun through the air, the Red Huntress stabbing and slashing at him. 

Somehow, she had gained the ability to fly. Perhaps the opening of the gate had made her own nagataaru stronger. When he had last faced her in the Tower of Kardamnos, she had been fast and strong, but now she was faster and stronger, and it seemed she could use the sword of the nagataaru while also enhancing her strength. 

That was bad. Kylon had barely defeated her the first time. This time, if she defeated him, she would come for Caina, and despite whatever powers the Knight had given Caina, he doubted she could face the Huntress in a fair fight. 

Kylon had to stop her. Kylon had to keep her away from Caina.

No matter what the cost. 

The Emissary’s prophecy of his death flashed through his mind.

He drew on all his power and wrenched away from the Huntress’s iron grip, and suddenly he was tumbling through the air. One of the rooftops of the Old Quarter hurtled up to meet him, and Kylon landed, using water sorcery to augment his strength as his legs collapsed beneath him. Even with watery sorcery, the impact shocked him, and he shattered a score of roof tiles beneath his boots.

The Huntress glided towards him, the wings of shadow and purple fire trailing behind her like a tattered veil, the dark sword snarling and spitting in her right hand. She landed a dozen yards away, smiling at him, her eyes blue and wide and gleeful. The vile creature looked so much like Caina...gods of storm and brine, but it made him angrier. The Red Huntress had murdered Kylon’s wife and his unborn daughter. She had almost murdered Caina. The gods only knew how many innocents she had slaughtered, how many lives she had shattered, how much wreck and ruin she had left behind her over the decades. 

“Kylon, Kylon, Kylon,” said the Huntress. She giggled, a coquettish sound that should have come from a flirtatious noblewoman, not an ancient murderess drenched in the blood of hundreds. “That noise you made when you attacked! I’ve heard it before. You made that sound when I gutted your pregnant sow of a wife…”

“No,” grated Kylon. He wanted to cut her smirking head from her neck, but he knew that she was trying to goad him into something foolish. “No. This ends, now.” 

The Huntress laughed, mad and wild. “You’re right. I’m going to kill you, Kylon of House Kardamnos. I’m going to cut off your head and take it to the Balarigar. Perhaps before I finish her, I’ll make her kiss your head. I’ll listen to her scream before I kill her, as slowly and as painfully as I know how…and I want you to dwell on that failure as you die.”

“Not if I kill you first,” said Kylon, lifting the valikon. “Have you forgotten about this?” 

“Not in the least,” said the Huntress. “You can’t stop me now. I’ve taken your measure, and you cannot match me. It’s the end of the world, and the end of the old humanity, starting with you.”

“Is that what you want?” said Kylon. He kept a close eye on her, waiting for her to strike. “A world full of corpses?”

“So long as I get to kill them, yes,” said the Huntress. 

She hurtled towards him in a blur, and Kylon raised the valikon in guard.

###

Caina got to her feet as Annarah helped her to stand, catching her breath despite the throbbing pain in her ribs. 

“Are you all right?” said Annarah. Morgant stopped a few paces away, weapons raised, while the Imperial Guards and the Kaltari warriors hastened forward. 

“You are not seriously injured,” said Samnirdamnus in her head. Evidently he could take inventory of her physical condition without much trouble. “Some bruising, but nothing more.”

“I’m fine,” said Caina, looking around. “Kylon, where’s Kylon?”

“I don’t know,” said Morgant. “Last I saw him he and the Huntress were fighting across the rooftops, heading towards the Anshani Quarter.” 

“He must have wished to draw her away from you,” said Annarah.

“I have to find him,” said Caina. “I have to help him.” Kalgri had always been fast and dangerous, but with the Apotheosis underway, she seemed to have become vastly more powerful. Kylon could have fought her to a standstill before, but it would have been a challenging battle. Now, with Kalgri’s power so vastly increased…

“You cannot,” murmured Samnirdamnus.

A bolt of pure rage went through Caina. 

“Behold the sky,” said the djinni.

Caina looked at the sky and blinked.

The battle between the armies of spirits raged overhead, but Caina had been so focused on getting to the Golden Palace that she had lost track of that fight.

The djinn of the Court of the Azure Sovereign were losing.

Their lines had scattered, the vast storm breaking apart into individual bands of horsemen and chariots. The vast plume of shadow swelled even further, with more streams of nagataaru breaking off to charge at the djinn. The djinn had held back the nagataaru for a while, but their defense was crumbling, and soon the nagataaru would be free to possess more wraithblood addicts. A horde of the winged creatures would rise from the city, and Istarinmul would drown in a sea of blood.

“The Lord of Storm and Frost has done what he can,” said Samnirdamnus, “but too many of our nobles are imprisoned in the Desert of Candles, and the nagataaru lords have no restrictions upon them now. Soon the Host of the Court of the Azure Sovereign will be scattered once more, and the nagataaru will be unchecked.” The sardonic voice was cool and level. “If Callatas is still alive by then, the nagataaru will devour your world.” 

Caina hesitated, looked towards the towering plume of shadows, and back towards the direction where Kylon and Kalgri had disappeared.

“You can go after him if you wish,” said Samnirdamnus. “Certainly, I cannot stop you. If you do, by the time you go after Callatas he shall have tens of thousands of the new humanity at his command. Even with my help, you cannot overcome that many. And the stalwart stormdancer fights the Huntress to save you, my darling demonslayer.” She could almost see him shrug. “If you go after him, most likely the Huntress will kill you both, and then return to kill all your friends. But I cannot command you.” 

“Damn you,” whispered Caina. “You never need to command, do you?”

Samnirdamnus did not answer. He was right, and she knew it, and since he was inside of her head, he knew that she knew it. 

She looked up just in time to see Prince Kutal Sulaman Tarshahzon approaching her.

The Prince wore plate mail and chain, Mazyan following him like a scowling storm cloud. With him came Tanzir Shahan, Nasser and Laertes, Strabane and Kazravid, and Lord Martin and Lady Claudia, and a score of minor nobles. To Caina’s mild surprise, Damla and Nerina and some of the other Ghosts of Istarinmul followed after Martin and Claudia. 

They were all staring at her in astonishment, likely at her burning eyes and veins.

“I knew it,” murmured Nasser. “I knew she would be the one. You were right, Annarah.” 

Morgant gave him a sharp look. 

“By the Living Flame,” croaked Kazravid, his eyes wide. When Nasser had recruited him to help rob Callatas’s Maze, he had been full of bluster and arrogance, but now he looked shocked. “It’s true, isn’t it? All of it. She really is the Balarigar.” 

“She’s possessed,” said Claudia, hand gesturing as she worked a spell. “Some kind of elemental spirit. Ah…an air elemental, I think…”

“A djinni,” said Caina, and they flinched at the double echo of her voice. “A noble of the Court of the Azure Sovereign, come to fight the nagataaru.”

“The Court is losing, is it not?” said Sulaman. Perhaps his supernatural vision had revealed the future to him. Or maybe he had just looked at the sky.

“Yes,” said Caina. “I’m going to kill Callatas. That’s the only way we can stop this. Get to the Golden Palace as quickly as you can. The djinn will hold back the nagataaru while their strength lasts, but we’re almost out of time. Get to the Golden Palace, and kill Callatas.”

She did not wait for an answer but called to the wind.

The wind answered and carried her aloft, sending her soaring towards the Golden Palace as the spirits battled overhead.

###

“By the Living Flame,” said the Saddaic mercenary standing next to the coffee merchant – Damla, that was her name, Morgant remembered. “She can fly?”

“She never used to,” said Damla, blinking as she clutched her crossbow. She looked bewildered and terrified, but she was still alive, which was impressive considering everything that had happened today. 

Sulaman and Tanzir Shahan started speaking together in low voices, while Annarah hurried to Nasser’s side. Morgant trailed after her, curious what she would say. Nasser and Annarah had a secret between them, he knew…and he suspected the Knight of Wind and Air had something to do with it.

“Your vision was right, loremaster,” said Nasser. “After all these years, you have been proven right.” 

“I knew it would be her,” said Annarah, her voice shaking with emotion. “I knew it when I saw her lift the Subjugant Bloodcrystal in the Inferno and lead the undead to their freedom.”