Cold Steel (Spiritwalker 3)

I dislodged his grasp and retreated to the edge of the balcony. The white rock wall behind him was pitted with gouges and holes. A frail ladderlike stair, leading up the cliff face to the next level, had also been smashed. From the far side of the balcony, the cleft cut away deep into the heart of the massive structure, shearing away into the inky depths.

It was strange he was so disheveled and dust-stained when we stood on a spotless white balcony with ribbons streaming off the railing. His trousers were ripped at one knee. A cuff on his dash jacket had torn, and ragged slashes raked through the fabric of its left shoulder, although no blood stained the cloth. The smell of mortal blood lay heavily on him, yet he might be my sire, flown down to confound me with blood still coating his tongue.

“Show me your navel!”

He turned his back on me. “I’ll let you find it yourself, if you can tell me how many buttons this jacket has.”

“Are you telling me all your jackets are cut to the same pattern? For if they are, then that one has fourteen.”

He turned back with a suspicious frown that made him look a little like the mansa. “After all, I am reminded you might have counted them. You’ve assaulted me before in the guise of my wife.”

“Are you saying my sire has tried to seduce you more than that one time in the carriage?”

“How could you know about that?”

“Such secrets are best left unspoken within hearing of they who can see and hear all.”

He took a step back, halting beside an object I had mistaken for a boulder but that I now realized was the bundle of stolen clothes, food, and leather bottles from Salt Island. Such a bolt of joy flooded through me that I had to struggle to catch my heart before it crashed right out of my chest. Only Vai would have thought to drag the bundle with him out of the coach. His sword lay sheathed on the ground. I was almost certain my sire could not touch cold steel.

He thought I was my sire.

I shrugged off the pack to ease my shoulders. “You claimed you would always know where I was. So I would think you would know this is me, Vai. Who else can carry my sword?”

“There are many things I am no longer quite so sure of.” His wary gaze made me cautious, and made me bitter, for I could see my sire’s abduction had injured him in an intangible way.

“What was the first thing you said to me, when we first met?”

His lips curled into the scornful sneer I had seen too often in the first days of our acquaintance. “Easy enough to tell. When I saw you that night coming down the stairs, I thought it was the other half of my soul coming to greet me. But I’ve spoken those words aloud more than once. You might have overheard them.”

I raised an eyebrow, trying to mimic his disdain. “Yes, that’s lovely and romantical, Vai, but that isn’t the first thing you actually said to me.”

“Ah. Something about the theater, then.” He ran a finger down the line of his beard. “That you’re not cut out to be an actress.”

“If I’m no actress, then surely you should know I must be me. Yet you stand there with no welcoming embrace! Since you cannot recall your exact words, let me remind you. You said that I might have the looks to be in theater, but not the skill.”

“Did I? A truthful statement, you must admit.”

I had meant to tease him into recognizing me, but his comment chased all thoughts of teasing from my mind as curiosity burned instead. “Why did you praise my looks? With Bee around, it’s a compliment no young man ever threw my way. Bee always dazzled them all.”

His rigid posture relaxed. He closed the distance between us and cupped my face in his hands. His fingers had the roughness of a laborer’s, but his touch was gentle. He examined my windblown hair and dirt-smudged skin.

“All the better for me that they were blind.”

I tried not to look gratified—certainly this was not the place for it—but a blush warmed my cheeks regardless.

“I’ve always wondered what you thought when you first saw me.” His hands slipped down to grasp my hands as he preened just a little with the lift of his chin and the squaring of his shoulders.

I felt obliged to prod him. “I thought you weren’t as handsome as you so obviously thought you were.”

A laugh crinkled at the corners of his eyes without quite making it to his mouth. “How quickly did you realize you were mistaken?”

“Oh, Vai,” I breathed. “I was so afraid I wouldn’t find you.”

I threw my arms around him just as he crushed my body against his. At first I simply held on, letting my heart beat into the rhythm of his. It felt so good to embrace him. When I tilted back my head to look at him, he pressed kisses on my eyes. I pressed my mouth to his throat. Hot blood pulsed beneath my lips, so close I could have ripped through to it with a single bite and joined in the feast now consuming the thoughts and attention of the spirit courts. I shook myself away, pulling out of his arms.

“We have to go,” I said. “The courts will finish feasting and remember you. And what if the tide of a dream washes through and catches us?”

“We’re safe from tides here. The walls ward the pit.”