Page 31 of Storm of Fury
“That’s if Sirius doesn’t dump us in the Caspian Sea. And if Bryn doesn’t slit your throat for a gold kroner.”
Tormund clapped a hand on his cousin’s shoulder. “There, there, cousin. She wouldn’t go for the throat. She’d go for my balls.”
Seven
The caves were dark,but Marduk’s keendrekivision could pierce even the darkest of shadows. He’d spent hours traversing the passages, avoiding thedrekiguards who filled the caverns.
And now, finally, he was here.
A figure paced the cave floor, beyond a set of enormous iron bars that stretched to the ceiling. She—and he could instantly tell it was a she—wore a hooded cloak made of tattered homespun and her feet were bare.
Marduk eased his pack onto the floor and then crept closer, pausing at the bars. Some sort of eerie green glow seemed to be emanating from within her hood, and the song was quieter here, almost mournful.
He tried to pluck a chord of it, but as always, the song slipped through his metaphorical fingers. He could hear it but he could never quite seem to touch it.
And yet, she clearly felt his intrusion. She froze, the cowl of the hood turning in his direction.
Marduk held up his hands in a gesture of peace. The ghostly sensation of that strange music that had called to him still filled the air, but it seemed on the verge of hearing, as if the song had been abruptly muted.
“Hello,” he whispered. “I’m not here to hurt you.”
She didn’t move an inch.
Nor did she reply.
A shimmer filled the air, and he noticed she’d kept well clear of the line it marked across the floor. He glanced up, spotting the gold runes painted over the rocky ceiling of the cavern. Magic. A ward that locked magic away—and kept others magic out.
As well as bars.
What did they think she was?
“Who are you?” he asked, his heart beating a little faster.
He’d spent a lifetime searching for her it seemed, and now he had finally found her. Everydrekidreamed of meeting their true mate—the other half of their soul—but a part of him had never truly believed he’d find one. His people called itkataru libbu, a bastardized version of Sumerian that at its most basic meant an alliance of the heart, and yet was so much more.
The woman tilted her head to the side.
Marduk clicked his fingers and lit an orb of burning flame so he could see better. Instantly, she hissed and shielded her face with her hands, so he dimmed it.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “No light, see?”
Silvery strands of hair caught the last dying rays of firelight as he snuffed the flame. The stranger lowered her pale hands.
“I am Marduk. I followed your song all the way here to find you. I feel like I’ve heard it in my dreams my entire life, and I don’t know why.” Nothing. No hint of recognition. He yearned for her to say something. Anything. “Do you have a name? Where does the song come from? What does it mean?”
He mimicked lowering the hood.
The woman cocked her head again.
“Will you show me your face?” Perhaps she couldn’t speak. But how had he heard her singing?
Slowly she lifted her hands and slid the hood of the cowl back.
Marduk gasped.
Her eyes were green, but not with mere pigment. They glowed with traces of Chaos magic, as if her entire body was suffused with it.
And her face….
