Page 44 of House of Dusk
This was not the sort of bridge she could collapse. She’d already cast out boulders. But so had Sinoe.
“So you’re taking them back. Saving kittens and sending me to slay skotoi.”
Sinoe nodded.
“And what about the ones Lord Lacheron interprets? Do you think they’re being misused? That they might mean something different?” That was as far as Yeneris dared go. She tensed, as if she truly stood at the end of some fragile span of stone, waiting to see if it would carry her.
“Yes. And I think I have a way to prove it.” The princess fixed her with a look that was half wary, half challenge. “But I need your help.”
Was this blackmail? Sinoe had said she would keep Yeneris’s secrets if Yeneris kept hers. “What sort of help?” she asked, warily.
Sinoe’s crescent grin flashed. “You’ll see. And I promise we don’t need to climb out the window this time.”
CHAPTER 13
SEPHRE
“Let that baby go,” Sephre ordered. She was deeply aware that she had no weapon, but then, Nilos had not drawn his sword either, his hands being full of squirming infant.
“What, just drop the little one onto the cruel earth?” He tsked her. “I’m not going to harm them. Quite the opposite. So long as you don’t interrupt.”
“Put them down on the ground.Carefully.” She brandished one hand, kindling the holy flame. “Then back away.”
“I can’t do that,” said Nilos, far too calmly. “Not if you want the baby to live.”
Timeus joined her, breathing hard but wearing a determined expression. Good lad. He had even thought to grab the oil lamp from the cottage. The tiny flame wouldn’t do much, but it was better than nothing. “Be ready to take the baby,” she told him. “Leave Nilos to me.”
“Indeed,” said Nilos. “We do have unfinished business, you and I. But this is more important.”
He glanced down at the baby, who had stopped wailing, and was actually smiling up at the man. And was that agurgle? Sephre huffed.
“On your left,” said Nilos, suddenly.
She barely had time to register the rush of movement, the sudden stink of decay, the burning eyes, before the skotos was in her face. Not a dead snake this time, but some other animal. Maybe it had been a deer once? A goat? Now, it was a stomach-churning slither of bones and weeping flesh, hide mottled with rot. It had too many limbs. Four of pale bone, four more of slithering darkness. The black tentacles reached for her.
Sephre flung her handful of flame, but the movement was stilted. She’d been too focused on Nilos. The golden fire spattered across the stones in front of the skotos, merely an inconvenience. It leapt to one side, coiling down. The long jaws split, lined with needle-fine teeth. Her own death waited there. Desperately, Sephre clawed her hands. Only flame could save her.
Crack! Something smashed into the dark maw. And suddenly the skotos was ablaze, flames boiling from its mouth. Shards of pottery fell to the ground. Dimly, Sephre recognized them as a broken oil lamp.
She lanced her own golden flames at the monster, but it was already crumpling, bone turning gray. As it fell to ash, she glanced to Timeus. “Well done.”
For a moment she was afraid he might faint. His skin had gone gray, his eyes enormous. But her words seemed to free him. He gulped, then managed a wan smile.
“Yes,” said Nilos. “You have my thanks as well.”
Sephre whirled back to face the insufferable man. “What is this?” she demanded. No more games. No more lies. Only answers, even if she had to rip them out of him word by word. “Why are there skotoi everywhere you go?”
“Because they seek the same thing I do.”
“Speak plainly,” she snapped. The flames coiled around her fingers, and a brighter flame filled her chest.
“Easier to show you.” He spared a moment to tickle the baby’s belly, loosening the swaddling, revealing a plump brown shoulder dusted with darker freckles. Then he traced one hand lightly over the skin.
Sephre gasped. It was as if Nilos had dipped his finger in ink. The lines bloomed beneath his touch, one by one, until they formed a faceted ring. The same mark she had seen on Iola, on Castor.
Nilos made a face at the baby, who began to gurgle in delight.
“What are you—?” Sephre broke off, casting a hand over her face against a sudden burst of light. Lines of brilliance blazed against her eyelids, as if she were staring up into the stars themselves.
