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“The public message to demons and lords was that I willfully attacked my ptarl,” he said after a moment, maintaining the embrace. “They declared the matter to never be spoken of, so great was the anathema.” He made a sour noise. “Mostly because they didn’t want speculation about any of it.”
A shiver went through me. “And Rhyzkahl—who was already pissed at you—did the submersion.”
“Rhyzkahl was furious that I still wouldn’t turn Vsuhl and Elinor’s essence over to him, when Tessa was ripe and available.” He breathed out a small laugh. “Xharbek hadn’t yet told him that you had the essence. And I felt no desire to rectify the error.”
“At least I know now why Katashi wouldn’t train me,” I said. “And Tessa happily screwed me over, too.”
Szerain pulled back and frowned. “You don’t know everything. There were a number of influences on Tessa, reasons why she limited your training—” He broke off and snapped his focus to the sigils. “Xharbek has made his move,” he murmured even as a sensation of wrongness flowed over me.
Chapter 43
“What did he do? And where?” I peered at the sigils as if I had a chance in hell of gleaning any sort of useful information.
“He cranked open the valve at ground zero. Not world-breaking, but enough to disrupt life as we know it if it continues unchecked.” Szerain’s gaze swept over the mass of sigils. His forehead creased. “There’s something else happening at ground zero, but I can’t identify it.”
“He’s trying to draw us out,” I said with a scowl. “He’s got something waiting for us there, a way to get rid of us while he stays nice and cozy within his fucking constraints.”
“I’m sure he does.” Szerain’s tone was mild, but I felt the anger that he held in check.
“Xharbek needs to be stopped,” I said, pissed and unafraid to show it. “He wants to step up his game? Then it’s time for us to take him out of the game completely, give him the equivalent of a career-ending knee injury. Scatter his ass again.”
He met my eyes. “I caught him by surprise last time. Now, he’ll expect it and will either retaliate with extreme prejudice or bolt.”
“All right, so you’ll need a distraction.” I clasped my hands together atop my head as if that could aid my thinking. “A big fucking distraction that’ll let you get rakkuhr on him before he can react.”
“Even so, rakkuhr alone won’t affect him quickly enough.” A smile spread across his face. “But you have all that makkas wire. We’ll twist three or four strands together to give it a bit more stability, and I’ll infuse it with rakkuhr. The rakkuhr-makkas will be the one-two punch to take him out, fast and hard.”
“Hang on,” I said, frowning. “How can you infuse makkas with rakkuhr? I thought the stuff blocked the arcane.”
“It blocks use of the arcane. Both by or upon the user. Not only can’t he tolerate rakkuhr, but infusing the makkas with it will turbocharge the arcane-blocking feature. Once the rakkuhr-makkas is on him, he won’t be able to attack or escape.”
“Once it’s on him,” I echoed, folding my arms over my chest. “So we’ll still need a distraction. Along with a way to lure him to us in the first place, but I think it’s best that we only focus on one impossible thing at a time.”
Szerain scraped a hand through his hair in annoyance. “Yes, yes, we still need a distraction. Problem is, he’ll see it coming. He can’t read me, but if I’m close enough to get rakkuhr on him, our ptarl bond will give him just enough awareness to know something’s hinky . . .” He trailed off, face paling. His throat worked as he swallowed.
“Szerain?” I touched his arm. “You okay? What’s going on?”
“I can break the bond,” he whispered then exhaled a shuddering breath. “I can break the bond,” he repeated with more force. “There’s our distraction.”
Whoa. I weighed my words before speaking. “All right. I’m all for you ditching Xharbek, but I need to play devil’s advocate here and remind you that Rhyzkahl was a puking wreck when Zakaar broke their bond.”
“Rhyzkahl had no way to prepare for it, had no idea what was coming. I will.” He seemed energized, as if finally seeing daylight after eons in the dark. “Plus, I’ll be in control of the breaking, which should make a difference.” He caught my dubious look and gave me a reassuring smile. “Worst case scenario, I’ll be a puking wreck. But so will Xharbek. And that’s when you’ll lasso him with the makkas.”
I turned the plan over in my head in search of holes or weak spots, but it appeared to be as sound as we could realistically expect. Szerain’s breaking the bond was the edge we’d been looking for.
“You won’t be alone this time, either,” I said. “Besides me, we’ll have Pellini and Idris, plus my squad and anyone else I can scare up.” A thought tickled at the edge of my mind—someone I needed to contact, but before I could tease it out into the open, my phone bleeped with Pellini’s you-need-to-read-this-now tone. “Crap.” The need-to-read-this-now texts were never fun. Why couldn’t pictures of fluffy kittens ever be marked urgent?
I angled the phone to let Szerain read the message, then skimmed through the pics. Weirdly deformed creatures. Flowers with claws for petals. Not a single fluffy kitten in the bunch.
Gut churning, I thumbed in a quick reply to Pellini.
“Dekkak sent Ilius to the pods here to somehow control the mutation,” I said. “But the stuff in those pics . . . What the hell is causing it?”
Szerain wheeled toward the sigils and began making alterations. “There’s nothing controlled about the changes at ground zero,” he said through closed teeth. “It’s what I felt earlier but coul
dn’t identify. Xharbek diverted the mutagen—a specialized rakkuhr—into the valve flow. Fuck!” He clenched his hands, but then he closed his eyes. A few heartbeats later his hands relaxed and the tension in his stance eased. He’d pygahed. Probably more than once.
He opened his eyes. “The dose makes the poison,” he said in a more reasonable tone. “A carefully targeted burst of nuclear radiation can kill cancer, but too much will cause all of your cells to die. Caffeine turns Kara into a functioning human being, but fifty cups of coffee would make her heart leap out of her chest.”
