Page 34 of HeartTorn (WarBride #2)

TAAR

The flash of raw, red fire and hellish heat breaks through my battle rage, drawing my eye.

I look just in time to see the wild form of a hearttorn licorneir break free of one of the chaeora nets. Those dark fibers kept her fire subdued, but the heat, the energy, was all still there, increasing in pressure. Now liberated, that pressure erupts from the center of her being, a small core of light which expands to a blast strong enough to knock me from my feet.

I cry out. Somewhere nearby, Elydark roars just before a flash of pure magic races along our soul-tether and envelops me in protection. I land hard on one arm but roll and quickly pick myself up into a crouch.

The crimson cloaks lie scattered about me. Caught in the same blast, their cloaks are on fire, their putrid flesh roasted. Even as I watch, the red light of necrolipha magic bubbles across their rotten flesh, healing their wounds, restoring the reanimation spell to its original state. Some of them throw off their burning garments, and I see their faces for the first time—all faces I know, men and women who fought with me in Agandaur. Some are those who stood with Shanaera and clung to their virulium addiction. There is Nuviar, the one-eyed, and Minuvae, his ferocious wife. Riluan is with them as well, though the last I’d seen him, he lay spreadeagle on the Agandaur battlefield, blasted through the heart by a Miphates death spell. Black virulium poison had dripped down their faces in those final hours, warping them into fiends incarnate.

But the rest? These are people who were loyal to me. Good soldiers who fought bravely for the cause of Licorna. I recognize Kydroth, who used to sing as he fought, cleaving limbs and heads in tempo with his chosen song. And Jomaer, who could stir up a hearty stew out of a little tough game and herbs scrounged from seemingly nowhere. Every one of those faces sparks another memory—Sairdara and Alavar, Varoris and Corymar. All long dead. All under the thrall of Morthiel and the Miphates.

Cursing, I get to my feet, sword at the ready. The undead are momentarily stunned, and now is my only chance to escape. Elydark! I sing along our soul-thread. He answers at once. I turn to see him hasten toward me, mane and tail flying. He sports an ugly wound in his shoulder, torn by the horn of that undead licorneir. Silvery blood runs in shining rivulets down his leg, but he pays it no heed. He draws near, and I prepare to leap to the saddle, then pause.

Ilsevel.

My heart stops.

I know the truth. Suddenly and with absolute certainty. I know who freed that wild licorneir. I know who is responsible for that blast of soulfire.

Turning from Elydark, I shoot my gaze through the struggling dead, straight to that place where the chaeora net lies smoldering. There. Her small body, lying on the ground. Smoke rises from her charred garments, from her blackened skin.

“No.”

The word falls from my numb lips, like a prayer, a protest.

I don’t know if it’s the velra that pulls me so viciously or my own sudden, all-consuming need to be by her side. Even if they had the strength to try, the dead could not have restrained me. I cross the distance between us so swiftly, my feet barely touch the ground, and collapse on my knees beside her in the ashen dirt. “No, no, no.”

The words tumble from my lips as I lift her, as I draw her into my arms. Her skin is scorched. Red and black and raw. “Ilsevel,”

I whisper. “Zylnala, can you hear me?”

She’s alive—she must be. I would have felt the moment the velra broke. But she clings to this world by a thread. My arms shake. My whole body and being rocks with horror, with rage, with sorrow. I want to crush her against my breast, to force strength back into her by sheer will.

Vellar, Elydark’s voice sings in my head, beware!

A shadow falls across me. I yank my head back and stare up at Shanaera’s hideous form. Her face is half-burned away, caught as she was in Nyathri’s expulsion of pent-up soulfire. But the necrolipha spell works fast, pulling her rotten flesh back to the way it was when she first returned to this life under its thrall. She sneers as she looks down at me and the woman in my arms. “She’s useless now,”

she says. “To you. To Morthiel. To anyone.”

I grind my teeth. I want to leap to my feet and throw myself at her, this abomination that was once the woman I loved. I want to take up my sword and run it through her gut, back through that same death-wound I dealt her three cursed years ago.

But that won’t help Ilsevel. She’ll die even as I spend my useless rage.

“I can heal her,”

I say. The words are fumbling and most likely false. But I swallow back the despair lodged in my throat and look down at Ilsevel’s face, almost unrecognizable beneath those burns. “I can make this right.”

In the same breath, I send my voice rippling along the soul-tether to my licorneir. Elydark! Help me!

He appears behind me, head bent, horn angled toward Ilsevel’s fluttering heart. I’m sorry, Vellar, he says, his song heavy with sorrow in my head. There’s nothing we can do.

There is! I respond fiercely. The Star Children sing the songs of healing. We’ve done it before, you and I. We can do it again.

Not like this, he replies, shaking his head. Once there was a time, perhaps. But those days are long gone—

They aren’t! You called me back from the virulium. I was nearly dead, but your song found me, restored me, healed me. I am frantic, desperate. I gaze up pleading into his eternal eyes.

But I sang with her, he answers gently, not you. And her voice is touched by the gods.

I grind my jaw to keep from cursing. I can do it. I can—

“Put the human down, Taar.”

I jerk my head up again, staring into Shanaera’s half-repaired face. “Let me sing over her,”

I say, my voice rough.

She raises a brow. The gray skin around her eyes tightens.

“I can fix this,”

I say, heedless of Elydark’s humming protests. “I can heal her. Then you can take her back to Morthiel, take her back to her own kind.”

“And what about you?”

I swallow hard, that knot of despair swelling so that I can hardly breathe. “I will submit to you, Shanaera. I will lay down my sword, surrender myself to your keeping.”

As the words fall from my lips, I lower my gaze back to Ilsevel, searching the scorched flesh for any sign of her features. Her eyes are closed, or perhaps she has no eyes anymore. There’s so little of her left. But it seems to me that her brow is furrowed in that same, stern knot I’ve seen so many times.

Larongar’s daughter.

Gods-damn me!

More questions tumble through my brain, every almost-answer only adding to my overall confusion. But I shake my head, let the tumult still. Of one thing I am certain: She is Ilsevel. My enemy. My zylnala. The bane of my existence, the torment of my sanity. The woman for whom I have surrendered everything of worth in my life.

And I know—in a moment of terrible clarity—that I would do it all again.

Is this the velra bond driving me still? Maybe. But I don’t care. If this feeling inside is nothing more than magic compulsion, it’s so entangled with my own heart, I can’t tell the difference anymore. There was no compulsion when I bought her in that auction. When I took her before the young priest, offered my arm for the marriage cord, and willingly spoke those vows. Reasons, circumstances, feeble excuses, none of those matter.

I chose her. And, if the gods will be kind to me just this once, I will choose her again now.

“Let me heal her.”

I lift my gaze to meet Shanaera’s gaze. “You will have both your prize and my submission. What more could you ask?”

She snarls, flashing rot-stained teeth. “And if you fail?”

I can’t fail. I won’t.

“I’ll surrender even so. You have my oath.”

“Your oath means nothing.”

She spits the words, full of poison, full of pain. For an instant those death-glazed eyes of hers clear, and I see again the snapping light of the Shanaera I know gazing out from that rotten skull. I see her fury, her pain, her betrayal. I see the woman I loved, the woman to whom I promised my heart. What must it be like for her to see me like this, with my arms around another, begging for her life?

I draw a long breath. “You want Morthiel’s prize undamaged, don’t you?”

“I don’t give a shakh about Morthiel.”

I must tread carefully. There is madness in her gaze. She has nothing left to lose, while I have everything. My very heart lies here in my arms, struggling to breathe through fire-seared lungs.

“Whatever you want from me, Shanaera,”

I say. “That is the price I will pay. Whatever you want. My death, my life, my body. What you ask of me, I will do. I won’t fight you, I won’t resist. You may slay me where I stand and carry my corpse back to your masters to be remade.”

The words are anathema. To become like her, a slave of the Miphates? A weapon turned against my own people? There is no worse fate for me. But if it’s the only way to save Ilsevel . . .

Shanaera’s eyes are dead once more. Dead and calculating and cruel. “What of your licorneir?”

she asks, flicking a glance at Elydark, who stands still by my shoulder.

I cannot speak for him. Though we are bonded, his life and soul belong to no one but himself. I sing my uncertainty into his heart. He looks back at me, a world of sorrow contained in his solemn eyes. If we give ourselves over to her, she will kill us. And worse.

Then I will release you, I say. I will end our bond, and you can flee this place.

A furious note vibrates through our soul-tether. Elydark shakes his head, and fire leaps to his eyes. Do not say such things, Vellar! I would rather be undead than torn from our bond. He sighs then and turns his great head to gaze out at the eastern horizon and the rising sun. He seems to peer into a far world, perhaps the heaven of his spirit’s origin. A heaven he will never again see if he chooses to follow me into hell.

I will help you heal your Ilsevel, if I can, he says at last, the wordless song layered with meaning beyond mere language. And I will submit.

Tears stream down my face. I do not know when they started, nor can I recall the last time I wept. But I nod, accepting his sacrifice. Whatever fate lies before us, we will march toward it together, as we have always done.

I turn to Shanaera. “He will not fight you.”

Her nostrils flare. She is silent for some time, studying me, studying my licorneir. I feel the precious moments slipping away, feel Ilsevel’s life force growing fainter, fainter.

“Very well,”

Shanaera says at last, and motions to her people to stand back and give us room. The crimson cloaks, their burnt flesh already repaired, stand in silent witness, their dead eyes expressionless as they watch me lay my wife out on the charred ground. Every little movement causes her more pain. A terrible moan rasps in her throat. The sound is like a knife to my heart.

What do I do, Elydark? I look up at my licorneir again. I have sung healing songs before, the last time on my wedding night, when I channeled Elydark’s power from a distance to knit a small cut on my bride’s hand. This is different, a daunting task far beyond anything I’ve attempted.

Follow my lead, Vellar. Elydark touches his horn to her heart. Sing with me.

His voice in my head begins to move, to swell, growing in layers of increased complexity. I see colors in my head, far more brilliant and multitudinous than any sights of this world. Closing my eyes, I press my hand to Ilsevel’s chest, beside Elydark’s horn. I rest my other hand on the licorneir’s cheek and let my soul sink into the bright depths of our bond.

His fire leaps from him to me, covering us both in a sheen of flame. I feel our twin souls united, feel my own power linked with his, becoming something greater and more complete in the joining. I open my lips and let song pour forth untamed. My rough voice, mingled with his glory, becomes something beautiful, a channel of heavenly magic.

A rushing torrent fills my body. I feel a thrill, like the moment just before a plunge, and let myself go, releasing restraint and letting the sensation take me. I’m tossed upon a wave of sound and exaltation, and I know then, in a way I have never fully known before, the power of celestial song, ancient and ageless, which resides inside this being. This otherworldly creature, who chooses to wear physical form and dwell in this world with me. In that knowledge, my love for Elydark deepens. I channel that love into my song, pouring it and everything else I’ve got through my hand and into Ilsevel’s broken body.

O gods.

O Nornala, Gracious Lady.

O Lamruil of the Dark, and great wonder-working Aenerin.

O Divine Ones, in all your power and wisdom, you saw fit to link my life with that of this woman. Save her now. If I am worthy of any mercy, any grace, let it pass to her.

A sense of timelessness surrounds me. I may dwell in this space of song and prayer and hope and fear for ages or mere moments. But eventually my physical body can take no more of this power. I feel myself weakening, feel my voice faltering. It’s simply too much, and I am too frail a vessel.

My voice cracks. The song staggers, begins to disintegrate. Elydark leans in, trying to pull it back into proper shape. I reach as well, but it’s like grasping at wind. The harmonies break apart in my head, scattered back to the heavenly realms where they belong. The soulfire which surrounded me begins to dim, and the physical world reasserts itself.

Blinking hard against the dazzlement still dancing on the edges of my vision, I look down at my wife, eager to see what our song has wrought. “Ilsevel?”

I whisper.

Her face comes slowly back into focus. Her ravaged, burnt, agony-twisted face.

I shake my head and look again. No. No, this cannot be! Not after such a song, not after such an outpouring of magic.

I look up at Elydark. Sing again! I demand.

He backs away, sides heaving with exertion. I cannot, Vellar, he gasps. His fire is dim, his spirit-light burnt down like an ember. I gave everything. There’s nothing left.

It isn’t true. He can’t have given everything, because it wasn’t enough. Damn him, it wasn’t enough.

Sing again! I cry, sending my voice searing across our soul-tether. I command you! Sing, sing! Sing for me, sing for her!

But my licorneir shudders. Even in the face of all we stand to lose, he cannot summon more fire. He poured his very essence into that song, but it was insufficient. I was insufficient. I wasn’t strong enough, I could not channel it properly. It was too much power, and I could not control it, not with all the desperate prayers in the world.

A wordless cry rips from my throat. I bow over Ilsevel where she lies on that unforgiving ground. My tears fall on her scorched skin as I cradle her head between my hands. Where is she? Where is the valiant young woman I know in that ruinous face? She’s still there, still present, but only just. And the pain! She must be in so much pain. If only I could take it from her, if only I could endure it for her.

Shanaera’s boots step into my line of sight, just beyond Ilsevel’s head. Her voice hits me like a series of blows. “I never thought I’d live to see the day when the last king of Licorna would make a fool of himself over a human.”

Then she chuckles darkly. “I suppose I didn’t in the end.”

Then she reaches out. Her fingers latch hold of my head, twine in my hair. She yanks my face upright, forcing me to meet her eyes. “You failed. She’s as good as dead.”

Her lips ripple back, revealing a rotten grimace. “You’re mine, Taarthalor. And I will do what I must. I will make of you the king Licorna needs, from now to the end of all ages.”