The Crown of Stones: Magic-Price (38 page)

“He trained you,” I said with disgust. “He trained all of you. You follow him around, do his bidding. Like dogs.”

Emotion flushed her face. Short, rapid breaths of anger made her small chest heave and her nostrils flare. Sienn’s icy stare put me in mind of a fierce,
winter storm, and as she found her voice and seethed out a breathless, “I am no one’s dog,” I couldn’t decide if the urge building in me was to hit her, or kiss her. “If you knew him you would understand. All Jem wants is a place for our people.”

“No, he wants an empire Sienn, an empire that he’s building with blood. And he’s making no apologies for it.”

“Jem doesn’t second guess. He doesn’t regret. That’s who he is.”

“Yeah, I got that. He takes no responsibility for the lives he’s taken.”

“You mean he doesn’t drown himself in guilt? Jem is stronger than that.” She eyed me critically. “Stronger than you, perhaps.”

“I got that too. Now, you brought that book to me for a reason. So let’s hear it.”

Sienn sat down hard on the bed. “Jem came to us a little over two years ago.”

“He’s been free that long?”

“A few months before me,” she nodded. “He was, apparently, quiet about where he’d come from. He just showed up in camp with these grand plans. He was committed, knowledgeable. No one remembers how he came to be in charge, he just did. When he discovered the mistake with my name, he came personally to rescue me. There was an excitement, an eagerness about him. Jem had secrets, but his decisiveness, his passion for our cause, for life...” A smile wanted to come but she forced it away. “Then, he disappeared for over a week. When he came back he was different. He was distant and demanding. Impatient. Harsh. I thought it was the weight of responsibility.” Sadness shrunk her voice. “It all makes sense now. That week he was gone, Jem must have been in Langor, being bound to Draken.”

“That would explain the changes.”

“But the purpose of the ritual is to make two souls better, not worse.”

“The spell shares and distributes what it believes each needs from each other. It probably saw Draken’s madness as one hell of a need and didn’t know what else to do but try and distribute it between them. It might still be doing it, altering their minds in some futile attempt to eradicate it from both of them.”

A little pale, Sienn lowered the book onto her lap. Runes were carved on the front, but her arms were blocking them. “This never leaves his side. I had
to wait until he fell asleep to take it.” She patted the cover. “According to the title, it’s the journal of Emperor Tam Reth. But the pages are blank. I know it’s spelled. I’ve tried everything.”

“Then try everything again. If Tam wrote about the Crown of Stones, what’s in there could help me gain an advantage.” I stepped closer. “I want you with me on this, Sienn. But before we go any further, I need to know. Do you condone what Jem Reth has done? The lives he’s taken? Do you believe what he’s doing with Draken is right?”

Sienn set the book beside her on the bed. “The Shinree deserve to be free, Ian. The Crown of Stones can give us that.
Jem
can give us that. He could be a great leader.”

Not surprised, I nodded. “If that’s how you feel...”

“It is. But Jem has gone too far. The Langorians are butchers. I can’t accept a future with them as our allies. I won’t.” A tear slid down her cheek. Sienn swiped at it furiously. Another one fell. Her shoulders began to tremble, slightly at first, and then harder. “Damn you, Jem,” she wept, “how could you?”

I crossed to the bed and crouched down in front of her. “I’m sorry, Sienn. Jem Reth isn’t the man you knew. Not anymore.”

Nodding, Sienn leaned forward and rested her head on my shoulder. My hands settled on her knees, hers rested on my arms, and we sat like that as she cried for a while.

After a time, her breathing slowed. It fell in step with mine and I felt the anxiety go out of her. A measure of apprehension left me as well and it struck me that I was more than a little content in our half-embrace. I enjoyed the smell of pine on her clothes, the scent of soap in her hair. I was aware of the places where our bodies touched. Not lustfully. That was there, but below the surface. This was a comfortable moment. A shared easiness that told me I could hold her for hours and it would be satisfying and tantalizing in a way I wasn’t accustomed to.
Is she right? Is it because we’re the same, both of us with pure Shinree blood?
Or was it simply the fact that Sienn was real? That she wasn’t imagination like the Arullan girl.

She has a name now,
I thought, and I suddenly felt sick all over.

“Sienn,” I said. “I need your help.”

She sat up. “The dream spell? Jem cast it on you, didn’t he?”

“He claims he doesn’t want me dead, but I feel half there already.”

“I’ll do everything I can.”

“Then do it quick, before I change my mind.”

Her head tilted. “Why would you do that?”

“Because he’s got me, Sienn. He’s fucking got me.” I pulled away and stood. “What I see when I dream is something I should never want to see again. But there’s this part, these moments that are so beautiful, that when I’m not dreaming, I want to be. I crave it. I
need
it,” I said, my jaw grinding. “I suffer through all the bad just to have that that one, small morsel of good.” I turned from the look in her eyes. “I know how it sounds.”

“It sounds like magic. Come here.” I sat down beside her. Gently, Sienn guided me to lie back. “You need to dream for me one last time, Ian. But I swear, after that, it’ll be over. Whatever demons plague your sleep, you will never have to see them again.”

Sienn was wrong. What plagued my sleep was waiting for me in Kabri. But I closed my eyes and wished that it wasn’t.

Bit by bit, my Arullan girl’s body was coming apart, separating like smoke caught in a strong wind. The pieces were pale, ghost-like.

They tore off, shredded and blew away.

The whole world was shredding. But I cared only for her. I felt her leaving, deep in my chest. And I had no idea how I was supposed to breathe when she was gone.

“Wait…” I tried to catch her. She was like sand in my grip. “Don’t go. Don’t leave!”

The last of her drifted out of sight and I was alone.

It was dark, barren.

Panic and darkness swallowed me.

“
NO!” I raged.

There was no light without her. “Come back!”

The scream still in my throat, I threw open my eyes. In the room with me, Sienn spun around, startled.

Running both hands through my sweat-drenched hair, I rose up onto my elbows and panted at her, “Is it done?”

She nodded. Her smile was tentative, almost placating; a look she no doubt reserved for the sick and unstable. “The nightmare will never come to you again.”

I felt a twinge of alarm and locked it away. “Thank you.”

“How do you feel?”

“Tired.”

She gave me that smile again. “That’s to be expected. You should feel better in a few days. You can remove your bandages,” she added kindly. “While you were out, I sealed the cuts on your hand and corrected someone’s disgraceful attempt to mend your wrist. I also arranged for private accommodations for your messenger so I could look at that hole in his leg without drawing attention. I checked on the wound to his face as well. Though, fixing you and your friend is becoming quite a habit.”

“Thanks,” I said again.

“There’s an extra bed for you in Prince Malaq’s room. Or, you can stay here.” For Sienn, it was a subtle proposition. “I want you to stay here.”

So much for subtle,
I thought.

“I can change back into Imma,” she offered, “if you prefer.”

“Is that what you think?” Shaking my head, I slid off the end of the bed.

“I don’t understand, then. Why don’t want me?”

Her voice held such an odd mix of passion, neediness, and shame that the words were out before I could stop them. “What happened to make you like this?”

Sienn’s face turned as white as her hair.

“Never mind,” I said. “You don’t have to answer.”

“If it matters to you.”

“It doesn’t.”

“It might.”

“No, Sienn, really. I shouldn’t have asked.”

She took a resolved breath. “It’s all right. It may help you to understand.”

Sienn stood up. Hugging her arms to her chest, she moved about the small room, back and forth, passing the fire, walking in and out of its glow. It was distracting. One second the light breached the fabric of her dress. The next it didn’t. I just wanted her to stand still.

“You, Ian,” she said at last, still pacing, “perceive
Kayn’l
as a means to curb the danger we pose to the world. And you are correct. But coming off
it, being aware of what you did and what you were deprived of…you can’t imagine the confusion and the anger, the fear. The shame.”

“It must have been a lot to take in at once.”

“It doesn’t happen like that. My senses didn’t work right for days. My mind returned in pieces, in these vivid, frustrating, random flashes. It took months for the details to fill in. Eventually, I remembered.” She hugged herself harder. “I remembered men. Lots of men.”

She was right. I couldn’t imagine. But the look in her eyes got me damn close. The ache inside Sienn, the animosity toward those that owned her and used her; I could see how it fanned out to encompass pretty much everyone, including herself. It made me think,
this is Jem Reth’s doing
. He may have rescued Sienn, but he’d done nothing to help her recover. If anything, his manipulations had broken her even more. “You’re safe from that now, Sienn. That part of your life, what you did, it’s over.”

“For me, perhaps. But so many others are being abused and neglected, and I want to help them, Ian. I want to show them what it means to live, to be free to choose.” She gave me a quick smile. “To find someone.”

I tried not to flinch. “I hate what happened to you. But we aren’t together, Sienn. We can’t be. Not now.”

“Why, so you can concentrate on recovering the Crown of Stones? I think Jem’s spell had you more out of focus than anything I could do in one night.” Sienn lowered her eyes, bit her lip, and the gesture went right through me.

“I’m not so sure about that.” I forced myself to move. “I should go,” I said, reaching the door. “We’ll look at the book together in the morning. Maybe between the two of us we can figure out the enchantment. I want to break it before we reach Kabri.”

My hand was on the latch when Sienn came up behind me. She pressed her long, lean body against my back. Her arms wound around my chest. I could feel her breath through my shirt.

Still, for a moment, I entertained the thought of pushing her away.

Then her hands slid down my stomach.

They moved lower and I sucked in a breath.

Lower still, and I did nothing to stop them. I couldn’t—Sienn’s hands held me. They hardened me. Her rhythmic caresses were skillful and intuitive.
Her vigorous strokes raised a heat that made the leather between her skin and mine melt away.

Her stroke quickened. Blood thundered through my veins. Tension had my body pulled so tight; easily, she could bring me with just her grip.

If it were Imma, I could live with that. But it was Sienn. Whatever it was between us, it made me want far more than just her hand.

With a growl I seized her wrists and pulled Sienn around in front of me. Lips parted, breath coming quick, desire had her white eyes sparkling like icicles in the sun.

It was too much.

Overcome, I gripped her face in my hands, pushed my fingers into the delicate bones of her cheeks, and pulled her mouth to mine. As my tongue pushed in, Sienn fumbled with the rigging for the sword on my back. Sliding the straps down my arms to the floor, she stripped off both my braces and my shirt, and went for my breeches.

As she untied them, we stumbled toward the bed. All I had to do was lie down; from sleeping with Imma, I knew Sienn was well versed in pleasuring a man.

Now, I knew why. And it gave me pause.

I couldn’t erase what she’d been through. But maybe I could make her forget for a little while.

Capturing Sienn’s head in my hands, I held her eyes. “Sit down.” I placed her on the edge of the bed and knelt in front of her. Her frost-colored hair clung to the sweat on her face. The neck of her dress was off-kilter and I made it more so, tugging it down off one shoulder so that I could pull her breast into my mouth.

Moaning, Sienn arched her back, forcing the smooth mound deeper in.

I lifted her skirt. I ran my hands over her thighs, then my tongue. I was spreading her knees apart when something moved in the corner.

Moved wasn’t exactly the right word though. Nothing was there to be moving. No form. No light. No breeze; the window was closed. There wasn’t even a shadow.

I stopped to stare. Sienn pawed at me, trying to win back my attention. But as I focused, I could make out two darker forms hovering inside the larger one.

Small and slightly oval in shape, they were aimed right at me.

They looked like—

Eyes,
I thought.