Page 40 of Shadows and Flames (Twin Blades #2)
Chapter Twenty-Five
TANA
I walked as casually as I could, right in back of Von Herron’s apartment building. Cursing myself for leaving the sleeping powder in our room, I resorted to the next best thing.
The aether I called forth left my hands glowing, something that certainly drew the guards’ notice as I drew closer, but I moved past them too quickly for them to react.
My palm waving in front of their faces was enough to leave them unconscious, but without the blend of jasmine, valerian, and other herbs, the spell would only last for so long.
Hopefully enough time for us to grab Von Herron and be on our way.
Like we’d planned, they slumped at their post. We didn’t want to kill where we didn’t need to, and, like in many cities, no Vharans came to their aid. If we could slip past the ones inside without brute force, that would be preferable.
Something told me we wouldn’t be so lucky.
I pulled the guards behind the stone fencing bordering the apartment building.
It wasn’t finessed, nor the most discreet, but we hadn’t the time!
At least their sprawled forms were partially obscured, and if one was keeping their head down or concentrated on their destination, they’d be none the wiser.
Meline emerged from the shadows of the alleyway, approach smooth and pointed, but my senses noticed another figure, a familiar note of vetiver, coming from behind me.
He approached at the same time as my cousin, but instead of passing by like the rest of the Vharan people were likely to do, he stopped beside me, hands in his pockets.
“Um. I’d like to talk to you if that’s all…” he trailed off, and I followed his gaze to the sleeping guards.
Fuck . “Uh, Fenix! That’s really not—another time, yeah?”
Meline was already grabbing my arm, pulling us to the door, but he bloody followed . “I just, I never properly… apologized. For my behavior on the ship.” It sounded like it pained him, admitting that he should’ve accepted our help. But now was definitely not the time or place!
Meline shoved us through the door, our cover of stealth all but obliterated, and the three of us stumbled inside. There were two sentries stationed on this level, but the bulk would be upstairs. Even from here, I could sense them.
The expert stealth with which we’d entered that duke’s home and taken out every one of his guards, him, and left without a soul’s detection, was long gone.
I wrestled my arm out of Meline’s grasp and pivoted around to Fenix. I roughly shoved at his chest, trying to push him back out the door. “Apology accepted, so glad you’re alive, almighty thanks be to Rhaea, good bye .”
But he didn’t relent, and the guards who’d been standing by the bottom of the stairs began walking over to us. Unfortunately, these two seemed intent on doing their jobs.
“For goddess’s sake.” Meline stalked toward them, shoulders back, and her daggers materialized, straight out of nothing but pure power.
Before the guards dressed in light armor could call for reinforcements or properly draw their weapons, my cousin’s daggers were in their hearts.
Meline didn’t bother pulling the weapons out of their chests. She just dropped her hands, and they evaporated, damage already done. The guards fell to the carpet on the floor, and I felt Fenix flinch beside me.
Why was he still here?
Meline rounded on us—him—and with a flick of her wrist, a flash of night darted at Fenix. I didn’t open my mouth to object, nor did I block the attack.
Instead of killing him, though, Meline secured Fenix to the wall and silenced him with a band of darkness around his mouth.
“You better pray that I remember to release you before your life is drained.” She didn’t bother keeping her voice down, now that the rest of the guards were marching toward us.
Over my shoulder, I glared at Fenix, wriggling and panicking while Meline’s power held him.
I wasn’t certain how quickly said draining would occur, and I wasn’t sure Meline was either.
But my frustrations were clouding my normal kindness.
First his refusal of our help, then his mocking, and now this?
I didn’t offer help. I didn’t beg my cousin to release him.
Thank goddess I’d worn my staff at my side this evening, and I drew it now, willing the aether to fortify it. To infuse power in it to make my strikes hit with impact tenfold.
And we began, my cousin and I. We weren’t dressed for this sort of work, but Meline had me train in all sorts of clothing, all sorts of weather and terrain. What we could manage in the short years and with limited supplies, at least.
Two guards approached us with unsteady feet, attention flicking between us and Fenix who was still mumbling frantically on the wall. I wound my staff in arcs, hopping it from hand to hand as they approached.
A few more, five if my quick counting could be trusted, were waiting just at the top of the steps to descend should need be. How many could I take out before Meline?
The two directed their attentions at me first, swords held at the ready, and charged. Over my head, my staff whistled in the air, taking flight as I batted the first blade of steel away and brought it down on an unprotected head with a satisfying crack.
I kept my staff moving, rounded, and swept my other opponent’s leg out from under them. As they fell, I brought my weapon around again, swatting at their head as if it were a ball for sport.
Blood sprayed the walls of the stairwell as the body launched backward and toward the floor, a few paces away from their felled comrade.
My cousin elected to use her power as manifested weapons instead of the sinister snakes that could reach in and snuff out life far more quickly.
I’d once asked her why, when we first started training and realized her powers had honed greatly.
She’d stated that this level of power, of unearned death, scared her.
That it exhausted and excited her too much.
When I looked to the stairwell now, she was still making far quicker work than me, already having cut down three guards with her dual blades.
I ran after her, keeping my footfalls swift and light, and joined the fray.
She didn’t need me, but as I butted the end of my staff into the chest of a guard charging forth with a broadsword gripped by two gloved hands, Meline used his stumble to transform her daggers into short swords, increasing her reach.
The guard left his middle vulnerable as he tried to regain his footing, and Meline slashed with the left, then right, deep enough to be fatal.
And the fifth guard, stunned and gaping, I ended swiftly with the dagger I now always carried at my hip. A quick plunge to the heart, and the sounds of battle were over.
The body in my arms became dead weight, and I lowered it to the floor now stained red and littered with a mess we had no intention of cleaning up. The scent of it was a heady cloud.
With a press of the familiar button, I retracted my staff to its more portable size and secured it to my belt. All while we approached Paschal Von Herron’s door.
My cousin caught it before I did, what was amiss. Her hesitation was minute, a moment split between seconds, but it sent her expression from focused intensity into rage.
I noticed that first, then the same anger mirrored within me. Instead of crouched at the ready, we straightened, nearly stomping as we flung wide the door to Von Herron’s apartment.
It opened to a fashionable if not bare sitting area, but our mark and the source of our discontent was in the back, toward what we assumed was the bedroom.
We’d not used the full extent of our Lylithan speed before, but we used it then.
And came to an abrupt stop as Tomás’s form stood at the threshold.
“Well, hello, there, loves. Thank you so much for dispatching the guards. Made our jobs a whole lot easier.”
“You—reprobate!”
His clothing was just the same as it’d been at the tavern, relaxed as ever. “Reprobate,” he repeated, unimpressed. “That’s the best word you can use, witch?”
“What about motherfucker?” I shot back while Meline shoved. He relented with a cackle, like he wasn’t the seasoned assassin he purported himself to be.
My head was halfway turned, ready to verbally spar with him some more, our job be damned, but the glint of candlelight on steel had the words dying in my lungs. Meline froze, too, arms slack at her sides.
We didn’t have to argue over Von Herron, spar physically or verbally to determine who would bring him back to Blackwood. We wouldn’t get the chance to negotiate a deal with our mark that may work better in our favor, one that led us more directly to Francie.
No, with a plunge of sword into heart, Elián ended all of that.