Flare: The Sunless World Book Two Page 15

  Isabella fought the invasion, but her kyra was weakened and stretched thin as it was. Her resources came from within herself. There was only so much she could borrow from herself—her own future—before the well ran dry.

  There had been no food and no water, either.

  Only once, she’d fallen asleep. It was the nightmarish doze of the truly exhausted and the supremely uncomfortable.

  The alarum had jolted her awake. It howled on and on as she fought, confused, to figure out where she was and how she’d gotten there.

  Then came the splash of ice-cold water.

  It drenched her from head to foot. She gasped from the shock, the breath knocked out of her. Water dripped from her hair and crawled down her back. She stuck out her tongue just to catch a few droplets of the precious liquid.

  The magnitude of her thirst broke in upon her for the first time. Her throat and mouth were wicked dry, and her tongue swollen. Her limbs trembled with weakness and her stomach cramped. She nibbled at her own clothes, but all too soon there was no more water to reach.

  She heard the drip-drip of it as it trickled from her pants and onto the floor. She fancied the ground sucked it up greedily, leaving not a trace for her.

  She could’ve wept for the waste of it, if she could afford the luxury of tears.

  Isabella couldn’t.

  After the water, the wind had come. It came with chilly fingers that poked and prodded and found all the holes and gaps in her clothes. They clung wetly to her, leaching heat from her skin. Isabella held in her mind images of great, crackling fires, factories full of sweat-damped, red-faced workers stripped as far down as was decent, quartz veins blazing in agri-caves. She depleted internal reserves of heat built up over years of being just a little too cold for comfort.

  It was not enough.

  The Prima Matria had warned her of stealing from her future. With kyra, it was possible, but tricky, with unforeseen circumstances.

  Isabella, shivering, her breath clouding in front of her face, her hands and feet turning into blocks of ice, made the decision before she even knew it.

  Just a pinch of warmth, a handful of heat. She took only a little, knowing that even that might be too much. Her insides contracted, and there was a weird hitch to her world, as she reached out.

  It seemed that everything held its breath as she stretched. Then, pop! and she was back in the now, still cold, but no longer dying of it.

  Isabella probed herself for immediate side effects. Nothing, though the krin had curled up into a whimpering ball inside her. She felt its pressure at the base of her spine.

  Good.

  Her mind and soul were leached of anything that could feed it—not anger, not fear, not grief.

  Life was but a series of trials to endure.

  Isabella was very good at enduring. The krin could not gain a foothold into her mind.

  But she wasn’t just dealing with the krin.

  No, somewhere beyond these walls, was Karzov.

  And soon he would turn his full attention to her

  Her insides clenched.

  She told herself it was only hunger.

  Heavy footfalls sounded in the corridor. Two people. Isabella lifted her head, turned her face towards the sound. There, in the shadows of that alcove, was the door.

  Hinges squealed and metal grated. The door banged open, and a light shone full in her face.

  Not an unexpected trick. Isabella was ready for it. With kyra, she sent her sight skimming around the sides of the mage light to see who was behind it.

  A stazi in uniform held the light in one hand and a low stool in the other. He advanced, the light straight at Isabella’s prone form. For one nauseating moment, Isabella caught a glimpse of herself: a pale stiff woman in chains, clothes stained and unkempt, braided hair in a rat’s tail, open eyes facing the light unflinchingly.

  Demon. Witch. People often whispered this where they thought she couldn’t hear. And for a moment she understood why.

  The stazi felt that way. He muttered an oath, dropped the stool with a thud, put the light on the ground, and backed away.

  The boy behind him said impatiently, “Oh, get out of here now. I’ll call you when we’re ready.”

  The boy she knew. Fitz was his name, the one who used the magic of motion to his advantage.

  In his arms he carried a girl, a golden-haired waif with blue eyes too old for her face, a pretty flowered flock, and wasted legs. She had one arm around his neck, while her other hand clutched a rag doll.

  Interesting.

  Isabella withdrew her sight back to her body. She blinked once to adjust her vision and watched impassively as Fitz lowered the girl carefully onto the stool, as if she was made of china. The girl smoothed her dress over her knees and sat primly, while Fitz hovered protectively behind her and glowered at Isabella.

  Isabella waited.

  The girl tucked her doll against her side and unwrapped a cloth-tied bundle.

  Isabella went on alert.

  Her twin daggers, Eya and Voya, lay on the girl’s lap. Both where quiescent, but the promise of life and power glinted in the silver blade of the one and jet-black blade of the other.

  “These are yours.” The girl lifted Eya by the handle with a thumb and two fingers.

  “Be careful, Gloriana—!” warned Fitz behind her. “Those things are creepy. And so is she.” He glared at Isabella. She couldn’t see it—not the way Rafe did anyway—but she sensed the pressure building around him as he gathered magic.

  She knew how strong he was. A direct blow from him would leave her with damage, no doubt. Her only choice in an uneven match with him was how to use her kyra to redirect the damage to non-essentials. Broken nose? Dislocated collar bone? A cracked rib? Isabella ran through her options.

  Pity she had already sacrificed a kidney in the Emerald Affair.

  Gloriana ignored Fitz. Her mouth pursed as she considered Eya. “I cannot figure these out at all. There are no tiny machines in them. They do not use ka to function. They are made of no substance I know of. And yet they are magic.” She directed her gaze to Isabella. “Why?”

  “I did not make them,” said Isabella. After the enforced disuse, her voice came out cracked. “Only inherited them.”

  “But surely you must know something about how they work!” Gloriana insisted. “Tell me!”

  “I don’t need to know the why or the how in order to use them,” Isabella pointed out. The words rasped against her parched throat.

  Eya fell from Gloriana’s fingers and onto her lap. She stared, eyes wide and her mouth rounded into a pink O.

  “But—but aren’t you the least bit curious?” she breathed.

  Isabella suppressed a smile, but could not quite keep the quiver out of her voice. “I don’t indulge in idle curiosity.” Her muscles protested, her body ached, but her mood had lightened, if only by a little.

  Fitz shifted. Isabella flicked a glance at him. A restless boy, prone to fidgeting and twitching. The bane of every school master, though judging from his accent, he’d received his education on the streets.

  “C’mon, Gloriana,” he muttered. “The longer we stay here, the more she can twist us into knots. She can read your thoughts. Like she did when we fought.” He cast a dark, suspicious look at Isabella.

  Isabella kept her expression blank. She could only read body language very well—and Fitz tended to telegraph—but why deny it? Perhaps she could turn the boy’s fear against him.

  “Just a moment, Fitz,” commanded Gloriana regally, and the boy subsided. She sat very straight and spoke very correctly, but Isabella had detected a hint of a gutter accent when the girl was surprised.

  “The white dagger,” Gloriana went on, “is a device whose function I can glean: it purifies small amounts of ka and gives its wielder a small ability to use it. Fitz told me about your fight. For a mundane, you did well.”

  “Thank you,” returned Isabella gravely.

  “The dark one, on the othe
r hand…” Gloriana’s finger hovered above Voya. She didn’t touch the dagger, and Isabella didn’t blame her. It took a brave person—or a very foolish one—to handle Voya. “Is it folding space?” she mused. “A gateway to another dimension? I can’t figure it out, though I’ve examined it with every instrument I have!”

  “It catches krin,” said Isabella. “That is its job.”

  The krin inside her stirred at this. The krin lurking in the walls drew back, their emotions hissing in her mind.

  “But—” began Gloriana again, no doubt to insist that Isabella have some idea.

  She never got to finish the sentence. The door flung open with a metallic clatter.

  Fitz turned around with a scowl, mouth open to scold, paused. Gloriana peered over her shoulder.

  Bryony Grenfeld marched into the chamber, pebbles crunching under her heeled boots. She wore a smart blazer and a straight skirt, and carried a crop thrust into her belt.

  Bryony stopped in front of Gloriana, faced Isabella, and folded her arms. “Isabella Solange.” Her sneer marred a face that nature had endowed with beauty.

  “Bryony.” Isabella inclined her head, voice neutral.

  Bryony looked at Isabella from head to toe, and her smile grew. It was not a pleasant sight. “So pleased to see you enjoying our hospitality finally, Isabella. Though you don’t look at all well. You’ve let your looks go.”

  “I could say the same for you,” Isabella responded.

  Bryony’s eyes widened. Then she laughed, short and ugly. “I never thought you could be catty, Isabella! Perhaps you’re a girl after all.”

  “Catty?” Isabella thought about this. Then she shook her head. “I answered as I see you. No more, no less.” Bryony’s lovely face had gone hard in the intervening two years. Not all the creams in the world could hide lines grooved by discontent and anger. “Envy leaves its mark.”

  Bryony’s smile came off, like a paper mask falling away. Her mouth contorted. “Don’t,” she hissed. “Don’t you dare judge me!”

  It was such a silly remark that Isabella raised an eyebrow. “If your actions affect others, then you lay yourself open to both praise and censure.”

  Bryony stamped her foot. “Stop moralizing!” she demanded. “I’ve always loathed that about you—you always thought you were so superior to the rest of us.”

  “In some ways, yes.” That was so patently obvious that Isabella was mildly surprised when Bryony’s hand clenched around the handle of her crop. “In others, not.”

  “Miss Bryony,” said Fitz uneasily, while Gloriana’s head moved from side to side, following the exchange between the two women, her blue eyes rounded.

  “And yet, you are the prisoner, Isabella,” snarled Bryony. “And don’t think that your dear Rafe will rescue you. He’ll never find you here. Never!”

  “I don’t know about that,” Isabella said thoughtfully. “Your little trick with your older brother’s blood didn’t stop him.”

  Bryony’s cheeks were a splotchy red. Her knuckles on the crop tightened.

  Isabella’s triumvirate of Eya, Voya, and her kyra were in this chamber. She might never have a better chance of escaping.

  If Bryony gave her the opening.

  “Betraying both your brothers, Bryony?” She shook her head. “I suppose nothing is too low for you anymore.”

  With a furious cry, Bryony sprang forward. Her crop came out of the belt; she raised it in a slash.

  Voya awoke, sucked all the light into itself, plunging them in darkness. Fitz gave a startled yell, Gloriana squealed.

  Eya! The crop whistled through the air and struck Isabella across the cheek. She took it without flinching, but all her remaining strength and Eya’s small magic was concentrated in her right hand.

  Isabella reached for Bryony. The chain holding her right arm cracked and broke. She grabbed the woman with an arm around her throat and pulled against the chain confining her left hand.

  Eya sparked and that chain broke. Bryony fought and struggled. Fitz yelled again, inarticulately, and threw magic in their direction. It missed easily, whooshing above Isabella’s head.

  “Don’t move,” whispered Isabella to Bryony. “I could easily kill you.”

  Bryony went rigid. “You wouldn’t dare.”

  Isabella didn’t respond. She had killed the krin-possessed, who had not deserved it. Why would she hesitate to kill one who’d chosen evil?

  And yet, as kyra and Eya’s magic combined to snap the restraints on her feet, she knew why.

  She wouldn’t kill Bryony for Rafe’s sake.

  Damn him.

  He’d been a thorn in her side from the start.

  The temperature dropped rapidly in the cavern—Voya sucking up warmth. Gloriana gave a pitiful whimper.

  Isabella shoved Bryony to the side, and ran for the daggers, knowing exactly where they were. Come to me! They were just as eager to be reunited with her as she was to get them back.

  Fitz yelled again and this time his magic came for Isabella like a massive sledgehammer. There was nowhere to dodge. Isabella put her head down and brought all her kyra to her front, in a shield.

  Ka and kyra met, and kyra lost.

  Fitz’s magic slammed Isabella into the ground. Her ears rang and her mouth was full of blood. She bounced back up, but her body had slowed to the speed of molasses. Could she make it?

  Gloriana gasped in the dark and the light came back on. She was inches away from Isabella.

  Isabella’s eyes were on Eya and Voya. The daggers seemed to want to fly to her hands; she just had to snatch them up and she’d be gone, out the door…

  Chains whipped through the air, caught Isabella around the waist and the neck. She staggered and they pulled her back. Gloriana dumped Eya and Voya to the ground. The girl raised her arms to the ceiling and her eyes rolled up, showing only the white. Behind her, Fitz’s face was contorted with concentration.

  Isabella didn’t resist. More chains dragged her back. They slipped and fused to cuffs around her ankles and wrists, pulling her higher off the ground.

  She’d tried. She’d failed.

  Next time.

  Both Gloriana and Fitz were breathing hard, looking at Isabella with a mixture of awe, anger, and fear. “Scorch her,” Fitz whispered. “She broke through the punishment chains.”

  Bryony, sprawled a little way away, struggled to her feet. Her boot caught the hem of her skirt, and she staggered. Stitches ripped.

  Her hair had come undone, tumbling around her face. A cut on her forehead seeped blood. Bryony’s face was white with fury, and she still held the crop.

  Isabella watched, dispassionately. What would she do next? Attack again?

  “You,” said Bryony, shakily. “You freak. With your strength and your stoicism. You think you’re going to win, don’t you? You think even if you die, you’ve won. But that’s not what Karzov has in mind for you.”

  Her eyes glinted with obscene triumph.

  “He’s not going to let you die, you know,” she whispered. “He’s going to flay your soul and break your spirit first.

  “And when he’s done, he’s going to let the krin have you. Think on that, Isabella. The krin slayer becomes the krin puppet. What’s left of your mind screaming as your body does Karzov’s bidding. You can watch as your hand kills Rafe—or his kills you.”

  She cast a gloating look at Isabella. “I pray I’ll be there to watch it.”

  With that, chuckling, she left, taking the light with her.

  Fitz’s face was pale. With trembling hands, he used cloth to pick up Isabella’s daggers. Gloriana tied them neatly into a bundle and raised her arms. Fitz gently picked her up and tip-toed away.

  They left the stool behind. The door slammed shut, bolts shot home, padlocks clanked.

  In the darkness, the krin scooted closer, nibbling at the edges of Isabella’s mind, whispering to her.

  Soon. Soon you will be ours.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Isabella<
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  THE GIRL STOOD ON a platform, looking out at slender minarets and steeply-sloped roofs.

  She stood because there was no room to sit. She stood, like she had for an entire day and a half.

  A cold-toothed wind bit into the bare skin of her arms and legs. It snagged her hair and tugged her skirt. Her flesh had broken out in bumps and her skin was tinged blue.

  She barely noticed it.

  All around this compound of narrow and elongated edifices, the mountains fell steeply away, jagged teeth around the maw of the Divide. Only a few peaks rose taller—the highest and closest, its obsidian sides hoared with frost, gave its name to the human habitation as well.

  This was the Point.

  An aurora crackled in curtains of rose and sapphire overhead. Above them distant stars wheeled in stately dances across the sky. The girl had watched them for hours and her vigil was nearly at an end.

  She spoke, as if to the air and the mountains and the undulating light. “Will this make me stronger?”

  Below her, a voice replied, “It will.”

  A figure, tall and thin like the buildings, stood on the narrow thread of a bridge beneath the platform. It was shrouded in black robes, with a cowl over its head. Its voice was a woman’s, but with strange bell-like tones that rang oddly in the ears.

  “Will it make me strong enough?” persisted the girl. “Strong enough to help Papa? Will I be”—her voice lowered—“unbreakable?”

  The figure said, “Nothing is unbreakable, not even this universe of ours. Nothing, save for the God who exists outside it.”

  An exhalation, heavy with the scent of metal and must, came from the crack the bridge spanned, a crack that plunged into the heart of the mountain.

  “I wish to be unbreakable,” said the girl, with the simplicity and surety of the very young.

  “You will persevere and outlast afflictions that undo most people,” agreed the other. “But you won’t be unbreakable. Even you have limits.”

  Even you have limits.

  The Matria had said that with every achievement, every milestone, every level.

  She had set Isabella impossible tasks she knew the girl would fail.