Blood Sorcery (Shadows of Magic Book 2) Page 6

  For some reason, this only set me off.

  “Daiman, these are people who are being hunted down! Don’t you think they deserve our help?”

  “Maybe.” He chose his words carefully. “And maybe we shouldn’t just trust them without confirmation.”

  “I know them,” I protested.

  “No. You don’t.” He was at my side in a moment, holding my arms. “You know you used to be here and you were safe, and that’s all you know. You don’t know which of these people were here then, and you do know that they had no idea who you were. Things are different now, in ways we understand … and ways we don’t.”

  He saw my expression and his own face twisted.

  “Nicky, I’m scared you’re walking into a trap.”

  “We were going to have to deal with Philip sometime,” I argued. “Why not now? Daiman, he’s torturing people for what they can tell him about me. If you’re worried about the old me coming back … you should be with me on this.”

  “I’m not saying walk away from this problem forever.” Daiman shot a look heavenwards. “I’m saying—these people are desperate. They’re scared. And if they had any sense, they’d be wary of you right now. You know it’s true—between who you were, what Philip has done to them, and the fact that you showed up with me, they have no reason to trust you. Why they’re willing to go into mortal danger with you at their side is a question you should be asking yourself.”

  I looked away. That made more sense than I wanted to admit.

  “You can’t trust them,” Daiman said quietly.

  Any chance he’d had of convincing me was wiped away in a moment.

  “Yeah, well we can’t trust the Coimeail, either,” I said flatly. “We can’t trust Terric. The Chief Druid hasn’t lifted a finger to help, the Hunters aren’t on our side, Philip’s trying to kill me, and Eshe’s dead. Who can we trust, Daiman? Answer me that.”

  There was no answer, and we both knew it.

  “Someone is out there right now, being tortured because they helped me.” I wrapped my arms around my body and tried not to shake at the thought of what Philip might be learning right about now. “I know that person, at least, kept me safe. I know that I have the power to help him get out of there, and that means it’s my responsibility to help. So that’s where I’m going. Are you coming with me?”

  I threw the words down, and realized in a moment of pure terror that I was hoping he would say no. I was hoping he would walk away.

  He was going to do it sometime. Might as well be now.

  But after a moment, he nodded.

  “Of course I’m coming with you.”

  It took a second before I trusted my voice. “Okay. Good. Let’s go, then.” My resolve and my anger broke in the same moment. “I’m not trying to be stupid, Daiman, I swear. I don’t just trust anyone, I promise. If it’s that foolish to go, maybe we shouldn’t. I just—”

  A clamor rose from nearby, and we heard pounding footsteps. The domhan fior vanished in an instant, and we both tensed as a figure stumbled out of the brush: Darcy, covered in blood, shaking as she struggled to hold a man’s limp body.

  “We went to scout.” Her face was white, eyes wide. “We didn’t want to go in blind. And we found Isidore.” She looked down at the body, and her arms tightened involuntarily. She slumped to her knees in the undergrowth, her legs giving way. When she looked up at me, her face was horrified. “He’s killing them,” she told me. “Philip. He’s killing them.”

  Daiman and I exchanged a look.

  “Let’s go,” Daiman said. His hand found mine as he looked down at the body.

  I felt a wash of relief and clenched my fingers against his. “Yes.” I was shaking as I stared at the body.

  Every time I thought Philip had a limit….

  “Yes. Let’s take this bastard down for good.”

  Chapter 9

  Philip’s base, it turned out, was not far—at least not within the confines of the secret paths the Monarchists used, or within the domhan fior.

  The Monarchists, however, refused to show Daiman their hideouts, and he refused to show them his.

  Which left me with aching feet and the growing sense that we were wasting precious time.

  Lawrence was like a blond shadow at my side. Whether someone had told him to keep an eye on me, I wasn’t sure, but he certainly had an uncanny sense for the moments when Daiman and I were dropping into a private conversation. His voice would slide in between us, asking a question about my past or about Philip, and Daiman and I would look away from each other, frustrated.

  The only saving grace for Lawrence was that he had a way of turning anything into a joke, making me laugh despite myself.

  Daiman hated it.

  “There is no way that’s true!” I exclaimed, a few hours into our walk. I was trying to laugh quietly, but I was pretty sure I was going to break a rib.

  “My hand to God.” Lawrence held a hand up in a mock oath. “Blue, the lot of them. Have you ever seen a blue crocodile? It would have been funny if they weren’t so pissed about it.”

  He shot a grin at Daiman, who did not return the look, but even Darcy was smiling weakly.

  I took a moment to study her. She’d gone on the first scouting mission, which meant she must be brave, and she’d carried Isidore’s body back, so she must be loyal.

  But whatever she’d seen of death before, it clearly hadn’t been much. She had spent the walk in silence, her skin scrubbed pink from her over-harsh efforts to get the blood off of herself, and her hand always on a knife, as if seeking comfort in weaponry.

  I tried to get a glimpse of the knife—it must be one of the runeblades Sarah had wielded—but I was sure no one was going to show Daiman any more than they had to about themselves.

  I sighed. Some more experienced part of me told me that a divided group didn’t fight well together—and another, more cynical part, said that this was why I’d always liked fighting alone.

  Because this was a divided group if I’d ever seen one.

  Fortunately, I didn’t have much longer to worry.

  “This is it.” Darcy’s voice came out as a terrified breath.

  I took a moment to catch her eyes, and dropped my shoulders, lifting my chin and lengthening my neck. I smiled when she unconsciously echoed the gesture.

  “He meant to frighten us,” I told her. “Don’t let him win before the fight even starts.”

  She looked away.

  I’d done what I could; hopefully, she would take the advice to heart.

  I looked around at the assembled crew. Harry and two of the other sorcerers were back at the hideout, guarding Ari, with the rest of the human members of the cell.

  I was going to have to ask, at some point, why so many humans were involved in this new incarnation of the Monarchists, but this clearly wasn’t the time.

  “All right, so here’s the plan.” I swept my eyes over the group. “I go ahead of everyone.”

  “What?” Daiman and Lawrence sounded equally horrified.

  “Daiman made the very good point that Philip wants me more than he wants Jo,” I said. “Therefore, let’s assume he’ll expend more energy capturing me than he will killing the rest of you.” I considered. “Or … possibly killing me. I really pissed him off.”

  “He wants you back,” Darcy said quietly. She was looking at the ground. “He kept saying he wanted the old Nicola back.” Her face twisted with hatred.

  “Darcy.” I waited for her to look up, but she wouldn’t. “I’m sorry Jo got taken because of me. I really am. I’m doing everything I can to make it right.”

  She gave a bitter laugh. “Right.”

  I sighed. I was trying not to let this throw me, but Daiman had been right—to these people, I was no more than a liability. I might not have known who I was until recently, but that didn’t change the fact that I was all kinds of bad luck.

  And I’d managed to bring it all down on them, too.

  Daiman took the opp
ortunity to make his way through the group to my side.

  “Are you sure about this?” he asked quietly. “I don’t want you out there alone.”

  I smiled up at him. “I was hoping I wouldn’t be. I just didn’t want to volunteer you.”

  His smile was like dawn breaking, and the backs of his fingers brushed my cheek. “You can always volunteer me for that.”

  I was leaning in for a kiss when Lawrence’s voice interrupted us: “I want to go with you, too.”

  Seriously, uncanny.

  I looked him up and down. He wasn’t as young as I’d first thought. His eyes showed that he’d been around at least twice as long as any normal human lifespan.

  It was just that he was likely untried, just like the rest of them. Had he ever used his magic in combat? It was hard enough to fight with fists and feet when the rush of adrenaline hit you for the first time—what about something you had to use your mind to control?

  I stared at him, and then at the rest of them.

  The more I thought about it, the more I realized they were all probably untried.

  No wonder they hadn’t gone on their own to take Philip out. They’d been scared. They didn’t know how to do this.

  And the only thing worse than a divided fighting force was a divided fighting force that didn’t know what the hell it was doing.

  Good Lord, what had I gotten myself into? I looked at Daiman and saw the same trepidation in his eyes.

  “All right, change of plans.” I pointed studied the group. “Darcy, you take Charlie, Samuel, Emme, and James. Lawrence, you and Tamar come with me and Daiman. If I have a slightly larger group, Philip will be even less likely to think there might be something else going on as well, and Darcy, you can help the others through the building safely until we need backup.”

  “I should come with you,” Darcy protested. “I saw some of their defenses. If you’re going first, I should help you. The others can watch what we do.”

  That made good sense. “All right. Tamar, you swap places with Darcy. Everyone stay sharp, remember to breathe, and strike decisively, but do not use all your power on one strike, all right?”

  There were a few nervous nods, and we set off into the darkness.

  I motioned for Darcy to go first, something she accepted without a word—although I could see her shoulders rigid with tension.

  She’d learn how to fight.

  Hopefully.

  The first trap wasn’t too far. Darcy motioned me forward and pointed.

  For a moment, I didn’t see it—and then I caught the glimmer of magic that was only half in this world, a rune shimmering just above the ground, easier to see if you looked at it out of the corner of your eye.

  I studied it, trying to remember what I was reading.

  “Do you know what it does?” I asked her.

  “Sets off alarms,” she said promptly. “That’s the rune, anyway.” She chewed her lip. “I bet there’s something ahead of it. Maybe there’s even something behind us we didn’t notice—the alarms go off, we start running, something else triggers.”

  She might be untried, but she had a knack for this. I gave a laugh, “You sound like Philip’s worst nightmare.”

  “Not exactly,” she said quietly.

  I remembered the body in her arms, and the way she’d even argued against us coming back—though her denials and her fear had told the rest of us that it was more vital than ever to defeat Philip.

  “Don’t worry,” I told her.

  To my surprise, she gave a half-smile. “I’m not.”

  “Good.” I reached out with my magic, closing my eyes to sense the rune.

  The life force inside anything—a tree, an animal, a human—sounded like music to me. At least, that was what it sounded like in the way Daiman had taught me to sense it. And the rune was alive, too.

  It sounded like chimes, echoing sweetly in the air.

  It was such a beautiful sound that it was almost a shame to kill it … even though I knew it wasn’t really alive.

  Even though I knew we needed to get in here undetected.

  Still, I did it. I sucked the power out of the rune and stared at the place where it had been, nodding in satisfaction.

  Darcy looked truly unsettled, poor thing.

  Not everyone was used to death magic.

  “Come on,” I told her, with a smile to keep her fears at bay. I beckoned to Daiman and Lawrence as well, and we slipped onward, toward the hideout. I couldn’t see it from here, but perhaps it was underground, like the Monarchist hideout.

  Daiman’s senses, and mine, caught a few more runes scattered around us. They lay in a wide curve, each circle getting tighter.

  My breath came short. This was going to be over soon. Philip was going to be dead, and it was going to be over.

  No matter what I did with Terric, there would never have been peace while Philip was still alive.

  Hell, Terric might even be here.

  And then lightning burst through the air over our heads.

  “He’s here! Philip’s here!” The words burst out of me on instinct alone. “Wards up! Watch where you step!”

  “This way!” Darcy was pointing desperately. “There’s a path through the runes, come on!”

  I took her hand as we stumbled forward, and pulled her back behind me. “Let me go first!”

  I didn’t want her in the line of fire between me and Philip’s rage.

  Daiman shouldered Lawrence aside to get to me, and Lawrence, with a grimace of hurt pride, put on a burst of speed. We were all ducking, running as the lightning crackled and branched, and then—

  Walls.

  They came out of nowhere, humming with power, barred like a cage. I had a vivid memory of the rabbit the Coimeail had wanted me to save.

  Daiman, Lawrence, and I skidded to a halt.

  “Darcy?” I looked around myself. “Darcy!”

  She was standing a little ways away, looking at me with a curious look on her face.

  “Darcy run.” I didn’t know what was coming next, but I knew she was alone out there—and that was bad news.

  “He was right, you know.” She looked at Daiman briefly. “You shouldn’t have trusted us.”

  The world fell out from under me. “What?”

  “Darcy?” Lawrence’s voice sounded lost, and I had a vivid memory of lying on the cobblestones, staring up at Terric, asking him why he was attacking me. Lawrence looked every bit as betrayed as I’d felt in that moment. “What’s going on?” he asked her.

  “You really think skulking around in the shadows is the way to go?” She glared at him. “As long as the Acadamh survives, we’re not safe. Philip understands that.” She looked at me, and her face twisted in pure rage. “And Philip … wants Nicola Beaumont back.”

  And then I understood all of it.

  It had been right in front of my nose the whole damned time. I closed my eyes in pain.

  “So you made a deal with him?” Lawrence hissed. “After what he did to Jo? After what he did to Isidore?”

  “That wasn’t when she made the deal,” I said quietly. I looked up and met Darcy’s eyes, and I knew there was murder in mine. “She’s how he knew where to find you all in the first place. She was helping him root out everyone who knew about my past. She’s the one who convinced you that you’d never be able to get Jo back successfully, am I right?”

  A glance showed me that I was.

  “And she’s the one who convinced us all that, now that I was there, we had a chance to take Philip down. Hell, when Daiman almost convinced me not to come with you all, she was listening just in case—and she brought me Isidore’s body so I’d stop thinking clearly.”

  Darcy smiled, and I resisted the urge to clamp my hands around the bars of the cage and scream. I hated her. I wanted to kill her. And I just knew there were wards waiting to throw my magic back in my face if I tried to kill her with it.

  But she wasn’t impervious to words.

  “Poor, p
oor Darcy.” I put every bit of venom I had into my tone.

  Her smile faltered.

  “Not important enough to be with Philip at Venice, were you?” I smiled at her.

  Her jaw clenched, and I knew I had her. I felt a spike of pure, vicious joy.

  “You thought that if you just helped him enough, he’d realize he should really be in love with you … right?”

  Of course, what Philip felt for me had never exactly been love.

  But she didn’t know that.

  “Stop it.” She gritted the words out.

  “D’you think for a moment you can match what he and I had?” I narrowed my eyes at her as I smiled. “Do you think for a moment that you’re good enough to be a match for him? You’re not, sweetie. You’re just a middle of the road sorceress with middle of the road powers, and he’s never going to give you a second glance.”

  “You. Bitch.” Darcy raised her hands, power crackling through them.

  And I heard the sound of Philip’s laughter.

  Chapter 10

  “Oh, Nicola….” Philip strolled out through the mist and the darkness. A blue silk cloak caught the light of the magical cage, and he was smiling—not even smugly, but instead with the same appreciation he’d shown in Venice.

  Nicky. I clenched my teeth on the correction.

  I didn’t want him to know he could bother me.

  Beside me, Daiman was rigid, though whether it was with fury or something else, I couldn’t say.

  Philip smiled at him as well, and I could see satisfaction practically rolling off him in waves.

  “Here you are, Hunter, a captive for me again. I have to say … I preferred the ropes.” Something slimy and dark flickered in his gaze.

  Daiman said nothing, but I saw a muscle twitch in his cheek.

  “No answer?” Philip was amused. He considered. “Of course you wouldn’t have one. You know it’s idiocy for a man like you to follow Nicola. After all … you have morals, Bradach. But not for long.” He began to chuckle. “She’ll tear you down to a shadow of what you used to be.”

  I gaped at him, horror coursing through me, and my head jerked for me to stare at Daiman.