AllFreeNovel
Share Us
But of course he didn’t. What the hell was I thinking? Caedmon looked like some kind of god himself, which he sort of was, because god + fey is a hell of a lot less diluted than god + Roger freaking Palmer! And, of course, I’d taken after my father, who was good at running scams—and running, period, when those scams blew up in his face—but not much else.
Which was why he and Mom were dead and I was here, and probably about to screw up massively because I was due
, and—
I felt when it hit, an incipient panic attack boiling under my breastbone, tightening my chest, threatening my breathing. My head went swimmy, and I simultaneously wanted to throw up and start laughing hysterically. There might be something wrong with me, I thought, as the corridor started closing in.
And then snapped back to normal when a fussy-looking little guy burst out of a door just up the hall. He looked spooked, like a mouse with a hawk after him. Which wasn’t far from the truth, I thought, as Mircea’s voice followed him through the opening.
“—constantly undermining my authority. I won’t have it!”
“You won’t have it?” The consul’s usually honeyed tones sounded more like the lashes of a whip. “Parendra is a consul; you are not. You would do well to remember that.”
“I am head of this army. He would do well to remember that!”
Caedmon and I looked at each other, and he made little hand motions that somehow managed both to be comical and to convey “let’s tiptoe on by this mess, shall we” at the same time. I bit my lip. Because, yeah, normally that would have been my go-to as well, but Mircea had sounded a little . . . tense. And for him, that was basically the same thing as anyone else having a meltdown.
Maybe an interruption wouldn’t be a bad thing.
I tried to head down the hall, but found a damned demigod in the way. And then the door the little man had come through closed and the sound cut out, so completely that it probably indicated a ward over the entrance. Not a problem, I thought, and started to shift—
But Caedmon grasped my arm again, preventing it. And he did prevent it. My magic swirled around us and then paused, as if waiting for him to release it or for me to push it. My eyes narrowed, and he nodded abruptly.
“There you are,” he said. “I knew you were in there somewhere.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The goddess. I saw her on the battlefield; I haven’t seen her since.”
“You haven’t seen me at all since!”
“Oh, but I hear things,” he said, bending closer. And suddenly the whimsical joker was gone, and the king was looking at me. “I hear you have a number of talents: seer, necromancer, opener of ways—”
“What’s that to you?”
“A great deal. I have talents, too. We need to spend some time together, Cassie Palmer, and find out how our gifts can complement each other. Make sure that we know them all—and that we’re not afraid to use them.”
“I’m not afraid,” I said, and meant it. I should have been; Caedmon had just proven that his power could at least impede if not stop mine. But not overcome it. I could feel it, waiting, surging at my fingertips. I could push back if I wanted, it whispered, and right then, I damned well wanted!
“Yes, there she is,” he smiled, but it was a different one this time. I couldn’t name it, exactly, like I couldn’t name the expression in his eyes. But it made my power surge. I wanted to push it, to find out what he could do, to force him to show himself.
To see which one of us was best.
“It’s your mother’s blood you feel,” he told me. “Our people’s blood. It sings in my veins as well. Did you think it was only the Pythian power that made you strong?”
I just stared at him, trying to will myself calm when my every instinct said go.
“As I said, I have talents,” he added. “But I have had thousands of years to learn them, their gifts and their limitations. If we are to win, you must learn yours. And accept the role you were born to play.”
I wanted to ask him what the hell that meant, but I didn’t get the chance. He finally let go, and not just physically. My power surged, my interrupted shift grabbed me, and the next thing I knew—
I was back on that damned battlefield.
Chapter Thirteen
For a moment, I was sliding in gore and stumbling across bodies. I smelled the sharp, metallic stench, felt viscera slipping beneath my shoes, tasted blood in my mouth. And then I snapped back in time to see it all again, spread out on the floor all around me.
And being dragged through a set of double doors in front of me.
