War of the Magi: Azrael's Wrath (Book 2) (8 page)

They sat and watched the Dusk Leyen flow by.

“And it’s not even the greed,” he blurted out. “So what if he wants more? He could want all the money and all the crowns in the world, for all I care. He could throw out every minister and bring in every friend he’s ever had. Fine, whatever. But killing? Killing those people, those… They were good people. They were my friends. They were all just—”

“Shhh.”

He felt her hands on his face, wiping the tears from his cheeks that he hadn’t even realized were falling from his eyes. He let her turn his face toward hers again.

Those eyes. Those lips.

She kissed him lightly, and he kissed her hard. He squeezed his eyes shut and he gently held her face against his, and then he wrapped his arms around her shoulders and pulled her against him. She glided easily against his body, pressing the curves of her breasts against his chest, slipping her hands around his neck and waist to cling all the tighter to him.

Together they leaned back into the soft grass and he felt the weight of her on top of his legs and hips, and his flesh stirred. Her hand snaked inside his robe to find his bare skin, and then slid down his belly past his navel.

“No.” He turned his face away from hers and gently pulled her hand away. Lying there on his back, he stared out across the surface of the river through burning eyes blurred by tears that couldn’t fall away.

She laid her head on his chest and he slowly put his hands on her back. It was a little harder to breathe with her there, but it was better with her there. Her weight, her warmth, her breath all felt very real and very far away from the red visions in his mind, and by small degrees those visions faded. The faces dimmed. The cries fell silent.

“It’s not your fault,” she whispered.

Iyasu gasped as the tears streamed down all over again. His body shook, his throat ached, and this time he wasn’t even sure why. He wasn’t thinking about Darius, or Faris, or the dead, or the dying. He was just there, on a riverbank, holding Petra, and sobbing.

She said nothing. She just lay there, holding him tightly.

When he finally stopped, he was exhausted. His whole body was sore and he wanted to sleep for a year. But the pain felt smaller and farther away, and when he cleared his throat to speak, he found it didn’t ache anymore.

“It is my fault,” he said calmly. “I chose him. Faris wouldn’t have even considered him if not for me.”

“But you didn’t swing the sword or give the order, or any of that,” she said.

“But I made him king.”

“And Arrah made you a cleric.”

He frowned.

“And your parents gave you life.”

He said nothing.

“And God created the heavens and the earth.”

“Stop.”

“No.” She lifted her head to look him in the eyes. “You didn’t kill anyone. Whatever mistakes you made, you didn’t kill anyone. If you want to cast blame, at least cast it fairly.”

He kissed her. He wasn’t sure why, but he wanted to, so he did. She moved up so her eyes were level with his and eased her body off to the side so they could lie more comfortably with their arms around each other, kissing gently and briefly, again and again.

I didn’t kill anyone. I didn’t. And I tried to stop it. I tried to save them. I’m trying to save them now. That’s all I can do. Try. She’s right.

He kissed her harder and her tongue flickered into his mouth. It was soft and warm, and he instantly wanted more. He explored her lips over and over, lingering on the top, then the bottom, then both together, and thrilling at the sensation of her lips and tongue and teeth caressing and teasing and attacking his own.

The kisses began to migrate from her lips to her cheeks and down her neck, making her scarves unravel to spill her long brown hair on the grass and on him. He brushed it away to kiss her more, venturing into new curves and corners of her neck and chest. She descended on him as well, biting and kissing his neck as her fingers gently clawed at the back of his head and down his spine.

Clothing slipped up and down as hands massaged and pawed and raked and pulled at warm, smooth skin.

When he slid inside her, the sensation made him stop and shudder. It felt so perfect, so natural, so wondrous, and yet so alien and bizarre.

My body is inside her body.

He looked at her as though for the first time admitting to himself what he was doing. She smiled and pulled him down on her to kiss him.

They began to move, at first with aching slowness as every moment was filled with new feelings, new reactions in his blood and fingers and brain and muscles. But he learned quickly. He saw the widening of her eyes, the flush of color in her lips and cheeks, the quickening of her breath. He saw the way her fingers stretched wide in his grasp as he held her hands down. He saw the way her breasts shook as her back arched.

It was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

And then he felt the change as he grew even harder, as the sensations came faster and louder, roaring through his blood, making his hips pound against hers as a sweet desperation burned through his flesh.

His climax was half a minute of sweet white noise, shaking and thrusting and gasping, crushing himself against her to squeeze every last drop of ecstasy from his blood. And then it was over. He slumped down on her breasts, feeling the heat and sweat of her skin against his.

She separated herself from him, prompting another small shock of pleasure in his spine, and then let him roll off onto the grass to luxuriate in the cool breeze and the sight of the deep blue sky above the leaves.

As his skin and blood cooled, his thoughts swam back into focus and then promptly swam away again. He didn’t want to think. Thinking was too real, too dull. He wanted to sleep, content in that moment to believe that the world was a glorious place and that he had just fulfilled his entire life’s purpose.

But that feeling also passed.

Petra dressed quickly and quietly, standing up and walking a little ways away as she did so. Watching her, he became aware of his own nakedness and slowly pulled his trousers and robes and shoes on as well.

“Your first time?” She turned around.

He nodded. Almost on instinct he started to ask, “Was it…?”

She smiled. “You did fine.”

He smiled back, but all too briefly. The moment, in all its heat and wonder and hunger and revelation, was already fading with nothing but an impression in the grass to prove it had even happened. And now he was once again standing alone by the river with thoughts of death and regret pawing at the edges of his mind.

To keep them at bay, he asked, “Do you think you might conceive?”

“Not this time, I don’t think. As I said, djinn quicken like a flame. I think I would know by now.”

“After only a few minutes?” He managed to hide his surprise. “Well, I have to say that with all the madness in the world, with all the people who treat life so cheaply, it’s nice to meet someone who wants to create life so much. I hope you do become a mother one day.”

Her eyes narrowed. “A mother? Me? I guess those seer eyes of yours aren’t as sharp as I’d heard.”

“What?”

“I don’t care about being a mother. What do you think I am, some pathetic little girl desperate for the unconditional love of a mewling half-breed?”

Iyasu felt an icy splinter of fear and disgust slide down into his belly. “What? But, why?”

“I want to create something that no one in all the world, in all of history, has ever created. Not even God himself has ever made a child of both clay and fire. I will be the first, because my vision is grander and bolder than his. I will reach farther and bring forth a new race upon the earth, a master race with the strength and ambition of humanity and the intelligence and longevity of the djinn.”

“A master race? Is that really… is that really why we just…?” He looked at the ground where the grass was already starting to spring up again.

“Of course. Why else?” she asked innocently. “Not that it wasn’t a pleasant diversion. As I said, just sitting here is boring.”

Iyasu turned away from her. His stomach lurched and the faint scent of bile wafted out through his nostrils.

…to defy God? To spite God? And I was helping her to…

As his eyes wandered up the riverbank he caught sight of the alchemist Bashir still sitting just a long stone’s throw away, staring out from the shadows at the rippling waves.

He heard us. He saw. He knows.

Iyasu sank down to his knees at the water’s edge and spat a trace of vomit from the back of his throat. The lingering wetness between his legs felt like a stain, melting into his flesh, branding him as a fool, a thing to be used, a pile of filth more concerned with his own momentary pleasure than the needs of the world, or of the divine.

“We found it!”

Iyasu turned his head woodenly to watch Zerai and Veneka dragging a log out of the forest. Samira walked beside them with her hand on the teak tree, and on the underside of the freshly felled timber Iyasu could see how the djinn cleric made the wood ripple and roll to help the humans haul its weight down to the river.

The teak tree, with most of its branches still attached, broke free of the confines of the forest and tumbled down into the water. Samira caught it by a small twig and took a long breath.

The beautiful tree melted into a long sweeping arc of pale gleaming wood, transforming swiftly from a thing of nature to a thing of engineering, a wide-bellied felucca with a narrow stern and a long sharp prow, and from the deck grew two tall, slender masts from which hung a pair of leafy green sails. There were thin cords lashed to the sails, and a pair of oars inside, and a rounded tiller reaching back to a long-tailed rudder.

Iyasu still wanted to vomit, but instead he croaked out, “It’s beautiful.”

“Thank you.” Samira stepped aboard and sat down by the tiller as she took hold of the lines to the sails. “Now, we will be much swifter than before.”

Iyasu stood there and watched Zerai and Veneka board the lovely new vessel, followed by Petra and a moment later the tall figure of the alchemist.

“Iyasu?” Veneka waved to catch his eye. “Are you ready to go?”

He looked down one last time at the grass, which had nearly risen completely, and only his keen vision allowed him to see where her head had been, where his toes had dug into the earth, where his hand had held down her hand. He shivered.

“Yes, please.”

Chapter 6
Veneka

“Something is wrong.”

Veneka sat up in the boat and peered at the surface of the lake. The Dusk Leyen had brought them swiftly west and north, and now they sailed across the open water in near silence, with only the soft churning of the waves beneath the felucca’s prow where the waters of the Dawn Leyen mingled to form the mighty Leyen River that would carry them the rest of the way north.

“What’s wrong?” Zerai sat up beside her.

The afternoon sun glinted red and gold on the lake.

“Just a feeling. I have been here before,” she said. “And before, it was more lively. There should be more fish jumping, more frogs croaking.”

Zerai slapped his leg. “Plenty of bugs though.”

“More than I remember.” Veneka frowned. “Iyasu, do you see anything amiss?”

The young seer opened his eyes and peered at her. Slowly, he sat up and squinted over the edge of the boat at the lake. “There’s something in the water. See the shine on the surface? Rainbow stains. Oil, maybe.”

“Oil?” Bashir raised his head and stared at the youth. “How much? From where?”

“A lot.” Iyasu sniffed. “And I don’t know.”

Veneka stood up and felt the soft warm breeze on her skin. “I smell something. Sulfur? Something rotting?”

“Probably just some dead fish,” Iyasu muttered as he huddled back down in the boat.

“I don’t see anything,” said Samira from the stern. “I haven’t seen any signs of danger since we set sail.”

“There is no danger,” the seer said. “Not out there, anyway.”

Veneka frowned at him.

What’s gotten into him? He was so broken when he arrived in the city, but these last few hours have been different. He’s… angry.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen him angry before.

“Wait. I feel something.” Zerai placed his hand flat against the side of the boat and looked up at her. “Do you feel that?”

“No.”

A short distance away, the surface of the lake erupted in a fine spray of oily water as dozens of huge bubbles rose up and burst into the air. Everyone spun to watch the mist rise and fall, and the waves churned for a moment before melting back down into the lake.

And then it was over.

“What was that?” Veneka shaded her eyes with her hand. “I have never seen that before.”

“Gas bubbles rising from the bottom of the lake, from rotten trees and fish,” Iyasu said, his eyes still closed as he nestled down under his blanket.

“That’s no rotten tree.” Zerai pointed to a pale shape in the water.

Veneka saw the decomposing arm float past them. It was slender and hairless, and a wooden bracelet floated near the wrist.

A woman’s arm.

She looked left and right around the lake, instinctively searching for the owner of this lost limb, but she stopped herself.

It’s been here for days. Maybe weeks.

“Look there.” Bashir pointed ahead. “More of them.”

Veneka looked, and then looked away. There were dozens of small things floating in the water, pale brown and ashen black things, long and short, all wrapped in loose papery skin that was slowly sliding off.

A man’s leg.

Two fingers.

Half of a foot.

Part of a hand.

“Is this from the war?” Veneka asked. “Did these bodies drift here from the Navean kingdoms?”

“Upstream?” Samira shook her head. “Not possible. Either they traveled downstream from the south, or…”

“Or they died right here.” Iyasu rose up and this time the miserable glare in his eyes and lips was gone, replaced by something only slightly less unhappy. Worry.