The Staff and the Blade by Elizabeth Hunter
“Maybe once. Not anymore.”
“Don’t fool yourself,” Renata said. “Sometimes I wonder if you see him at all.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” She stirred the wine. “And don’t pretend you know my mate better than I do. It’s presumptuous.”
“Predators don’t roar before a hunt, sister.” Renata pushed away from the counter. “Some of the most dangerous don’t roar at all.”
As if they’d planned it, Damien sauntered in moments after Renata left.
“Your hunt went well,” he said, crossing his arms and leaning against a wall, watching as she poured the wine into a crock made for warming.
“Is that a question?”
“No. Renata said you took out a nest of seven.”
“Six.”
“Hmmm.” He frowned. “She said seven. Perhaps she marked a kill before she joined you.”
“Six or seven. That’s a few less to prey on the humans in the city.”
“Renata told me Volund is close by.”
Sari paused. “Did she say where?”
“No. Should she have?”
Her shoulders relaxed. If Damien knew Volund was nearby, he would report it to the council. The same council that had sent him after more than one angel in his time. Whether he made it out alive was irrelevant to the elder scribes. He was theirs to command, and the knowledge had always infuriated her. But there had been nothing she could do. They would call and he would answer.
That was assuming he still had his heaven-forged blade.
“Do you still have the blade?”
“No.”
She spun. “What? Why? What happened?”
“I didn’t lose it,” he said softly. “Nor was it taken from me.”
“So what happened? Are the elders now demanding control over the spoils of war?” She hated that knife and everything it represented. But her mate had bought it with blood, killing an angel before most scribes had earned their first battle scars.
“I asked to store it in Mikael’s armory in Vienna. Living in Jaron’s territory saw little need for it. The Library Guard will return it if and when I have need of it. I have their word.”
It also made the Elder Council less likely to call him for assassinations if he didn’t carry that blade with him. Yet Damien had never been one to avoid danger. If anything, he plunged into it. There was something more to this. Something he was holding back.
Sari asked, “When did this happen?”
“Why do you care?” His voice took on an edge. “Do you have need of it?”
Her face reddened. “You know I cannot wield it.”
There were specific magics needed to wield a black blade. Magic that had never been taught to the Irina. The spells a scribe worked on his body were intricate and layered, often inscrutable to anyone but the one who had written them. The deep magic that allowed an Irin scribe to command a blade forged in the heavenly realm would be hidden within talesm tattooed over centuries.
In contrast to Irin spells, Sari’s spells were blunt instruments scraped together in desperation. Ancient Irina singers of Mikael’s line once sung battle magic so potent, legends said a single voice could turn an army. There were songs written about them, great sagas of their frightening power.
But most of that magic had been lost.
The Irina had civilized. Modernized. Turned their attention to the burgeoning disciplines of science and art. And slowly they’d been marginalized. Forgotten.
Until they were tame. And then they were dead.
Damien slid closer, glancing at the doorway, which had remained miraculously empty. Magic at work? Or just her grandmother and Renata? Sari would bet on the second.
“I gave up the weapon…” Damien paused. “If you ever called for me, I wanted no tie to the council to hold me back. I could not take such a weapon from the meager arsenal the elders had after the Rending. But I did not want to be beholden to them if you called.”
Sari’s breath fled. He’d given up an object of extraordinary power so that he could come to her if she called.
“You would abandon your men?”
“Yes.”
“Defy the council?”
“Yes.”
She hadn’t believed him. A wave of anger rose up and choked her, but this time the anger was directed at herself. She’d called him a liar. Spat in the face of the sacrifice he’d made, though she hadn’t known he’d made it.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked.
“Would it have made a difference?”
Yes.
She said nothing, but he saw the truth in her eyes. It would have made a difference. Knowing his loyalty lay with her—only with her—might have changed everything.
Damien let out a strangled laugh. Then, shaking his head, he walked away.
CHAPTER SIX
DAMIEN had to leave the kitchen, or he would have screamed. One act—minor in his own mind—might have healed the breach between them over one hundred years before. He walked into the night, striding toward the barn lit with tiny lights to celebrate Ava and Renata. Groups of friends and a few small families were already trickling into the barn. Laughter and light called him, but Damien stopped and stood in the dark.
He’d never told her. He’d never realized it meant so much. Sari had always distrusted the council, but it had never occurred to him that his loyalty to her and to their union was in question.
“Are you sure? I don’t think—”
“The council has demanded it, milá. I don’t have a choice.”
A hundred small memories batted at him, each as damning as the last.
“But why must all the Irina go? Don’t the watchers have any say?”
“This is a ruling from Vienna, Sari. I am not an elder.”
“The elders have mandated…”
“Council protocol says…”
“This is what I do.” He’d left her after their first night together. “Do you understand? This is always what I will do.” He’d abandoned her, warm and vulnerable in his bed, to follow the dictate of a council half a world away. He’d abandoned her and her sisters in a retreat away from his protection, then commanded his men to do the same.
Why shouldn’t she have thought his first loyalty was to Vienna? His every action had spoken that truth, even if she had always been first in his heart.
He turned when he heard footsteps. Orsala joined him in the shadows.
“I am a fool,” he said.
“No more than we all can be.” She put a hand on his shoulder. “The sing is about to start. Come. I think the two of you need healing tonight more than anyone else here.”
He could feel the magic growing in the air, like the heady perfume of lavender in the summertime when the fields bloomed near his father’s castle. Songs drifted on the wind, caressing the land that hummed with Sari’s power.
“I have been blind,” he whispered. “Proud. Stubborn.”
“And so has she.”
Damien turned to the black forest and breathed out a soundless scream of frustration. “What do I say?” he asked Orsala, wishing his mother, as blunt as she could be, was with him. “I don’t know how to fix this, matka. I never did.”
“Words are useless. Truth is not gentle. Show her,” Orsala said. “Tell her everything. Stop trying to shield her and don’t wait for her to ask. Show her.”
Show her what? That she was his heart? The pulse of his blood? The only hope of joy he clung to?
Damien walked into the barn and took a place near the side door. He couldn’t bear to sit with the happy families and laughing friends. He spotted Ava sitting near Astrid and checked to make sure she was well. But though the girl looked uncertain, she didn’t look scared. Only curious.
He let his eyes fix on Sari, who was sitting at the front of the room with Orsala, Renata, and an older woman Damien was guessing was the chief archivist. Not attempting to hide his stare, he noted that his mate continually sneaked glances at him, though her e
Show her.
Orsala stood and greeted the assembly. “We are here to celebrate a new sister among us and a sister returned home. As is our custom, we welcome our sister Ava with the songs of our fathers. It is with our voices we remember, with our ears we understand…”
Sari and Renata started a harmonic hum that was soon joined by the other Irina in the room. The communal magic drifting in the air found focus and began to pulse and flow. It stroked along his arm, teasing his talesm, then twisting away, the curl of energy like laughter against his skin.
Silly scribe, it seemed to say. You cannot capture this power with ashes.
The hair on his arms rose as the chief archivist began the Song of Uriel’s Fall, a creation story about the first of the Forgiven to fall to earth, enchanted by the beauty of a human queen, Anat. It was a song of joy and power that fell into despair when Uriel returned to the heavens. Anat remained, struggling to care for her children, the first of the Irin race. The angel returned, but not to stay. He blessed his children with the magic of long life, protecting them and Anat, who reigned into old age with her children around her.
Legend or history? It didn’t matter to Damien. It was Irina history told in Irina song. It grew and stretched to the voice that sang it, changing and molding itself over time, new with each voice, yet still the ancient story.
Through the tapestry of singing, Damien heard Sari’s magic, a voice unique through all time. A voice that, once silent, the universe would never hear again. A treasure. A gift.
Reshon, his soul whispered.
Created for him as he was for her.
Show her.
Damien let his heart pour through his eyes. Focused on his mate as the song grew louder.
Let the whole assembly see how he adored her. How he longed for her. His mating marks were living silver and Sari’s a gleaming gold. Their eyes met across the room. His soul broke open as he willed her to see his need for her. His joy in her song and his longing for her presence.
Her gaze met his and locked. For a moment, she sang only to him.
Now rest in the power of heaven, my love
Forgive me for my absence
I long for the jewels that live in your eyes
And the golden touch of your hand
He held out his hand. Sari rose and came to him. The magic grew louder and stronger as a single voice rose above the others. He recognized Ava, her magic threaded with darkness and a power unlike any other.
In that moment, Damien saw a great circle rising in the sky, a sun of twisted gold and silver. Behind the sun, a thousand stars hidden by the glow of the swirling star that lit the heavens. A thousand stars waiting to be seen. To be heard.
He and Sari existed in the vision. They were both a part of it. One with the twisting star in the center of the sky. Rising. Growing. Poised on the precipice of change and wholly dependent on each other to survive.
Sari breathed it in as he did, resting her cheek against his chest. Their hands met, palms together as their fingers knit and held.
“Make love to me,” she whispered.
“Yes.”
In a daze of raw emotion and pure magic, she led him out the side door and to her house, up shadowed stairs and into her bedroom. He saw nothing, noticed nothing except her. The skin revealed by moonlight. The waterfall of golden waves down her back. Damien had lost the ability to speak.
Show her.
He took her mouth gently. Urgently. Swallowed her needy gasps and lifted her from her feet. He brought her to the bed and laid her down as he eased off the last of her clothes. His eyes could not take in the beauty of his mate laid before him, her body lit gold as if the sun and stars lived beneath her skin, her hair spread behind her like feathers.
He took off his clothes, his eyes never leaving hers.
“Who said”—he crawled up the bed, fingers spreading her tresses across the pale sheets—“that angels don’t have wings?”
His heart was light with joy.
She reached out and grasped his shoulder, drawing him down to her. Damien rested on his forearms, her breasts pressed against his chest and his legs between her thighs. He felt her heat against him. The teasing scent of her arousal and magic filled the air.
“We don’t have wings,” Sari whispered, reaching down to grasp him. “But some of us have swords.”
His mouth fell open at the pleasure of her hand. “Sari.”
“And songs.”
“Your voice,” he panted, “is the most beautiful sound in the world.”
She arched up and whispered, “Your touch brings me to life.”
He thrust his hips, sliding between her fingers and into the welcoming heat of her body. Her neck arched back, and she closed her eyes with a gasp.
“Eyes,” he said.
“Don’t stop.” She lifted her legs and wrapped them around his hips. “Never stop.”
He wasn’t going to. But…
“I need to see your eyes.” He paused and put a hand on her cheek. “Sari.”
With a shivering gasp, she opened them and stared straight into his.
“I need to show you,” he said. “You have to see.”
Her eyes shone as she nodded. Sari placed both her hands on his cheeks and drew him closer, never letting her eyes leave his even as he made love to her.
A gift. A moment of grace.
Damien didn’t ask why. He took her gift, poured his heart into his eyes, and did everything he could to show Sari that she was everything.
※
They made love twice more that night. Damien didn’t sleep. For long hours he held her, feasting on her touch and the weight of her body spread across his. He had no need to dream. His dream lay in his arms for however long he could keep her. He’d shown her his heart, but did he dare show her his pain when hers felt so much greater than his?
As the dawn light turned a familiar pearly blue, he spoke. “Our daughter would have been born this time of year.”
Sari froze but did not pull away.
“I know you thought it was a son. But I always dreamed of a daughter.”
“Why are you speaking of this now?”
He couldn’t read her voice. “The better question is, why haven’t we spoken of this earlier?”
She rolled over, not leaving his arms but turning her back to him. “It was a long time ago.”
“We never talked about it. Not once. It was as if she never lived.”
“She didn’t.”
He reached down and pressed his hand to her belly. “She did.”
Sari was silent for a long time. When her voice finally came, Damien thought it might break him.
“Don’t make me speak of this,” she whispered.
“Then don’t speak.” He pressed his forehead to her temple. “Let me speak.”
She didn’t move. Not an inch.
“I miss her,” he said. “Every day. The year she would have turned thirteen and sung her first blessing, I was a wreck for months. I traveled to Jerusalem and sat on top of the Zion Gate, watching the pilgrims come and go. I saw a girl who would have been our daughter’s age traveling with her parents, and I broke down weeping. I went to the desert after that.”
“To the Rafaene house?”
Encouraged, he continued. “They didn’t ask questions. I wasn’t the only one there.”
She said nothing more.
“I didn’t lose our child,” he continued. “Not as you did. But I did lose her, Sari. Or him. Do you know how happy I was?” He felt her tears on his arm. “I was over seven centuries old when you became pregnant. I’d lost hope of ever having a family. Then I met you. And you were… so startling. So unexpected. When I discovered you were with child, I thought, I do not deserve this happiness.”
“Don’t say that.”
“I didn’t deserve it. I don’t. But that joy was given to me for a brief time, and I treasured it, even if it ended in tragedy. Because she did live. An
Her chest was heaving, her eyes dripped with tears, but Sari cried in silence.
“I still miss her, milá. I need you to know that. I still think about her. I still—”
“Damien, please.”
“I need you to know that I have not forgotten her. That I never will.”
Her body was still beside him. Her voice, when it came, was a whisper. “Please leave.”
Every instinct in him begged to stay. For her comfort, and for his. Damien closed his eyes and pressed his forehead to the back of her shoulder. “Are you sure?”
“I want to be alone.”
She’d let him say more than he thought she would. Damien placed a soft kiss on her shoulder and released her.
Sari immediately fled to the attached bathroom, shut and locked the door. He dressed in silence and made his way back to his cottage just as the sun broke over the horizon.
※
Damien suspected he’d made a huge error, Orsala’s advice or not, when Sari refused to meet his eyes the next day. And the next. In fact, though Sari had stopped sniping at him, she completely avoided spending any time alone. He’d been afraid she’d leave the haven again, but she didn’t. She just didn’t talk to Damien.
“Ava’s magic,” Orsala said after she’d dragged him to her cottage for tea. “I want to talk to you about it.”
“About the darkness?”
“You’ve seen it too?”
“Felt it.” He paused and thought, trying to tease out the memories of his sister’s magic from the intensity of his night with Sari. “It’s not evil, but it feels…”
“Dangerous.”
“Yes.”
Orsala sat and ran a finger along the edge of her mug. “I think, for now, we watch and wait. She’s still grieving, and that might be part of it.”
“Did you see anything like this after the Rending?”
“No.”
And that had been the most intense period of grief any of them had ever experienced.