Over this she slid an illusion, one that suited her. Simply because she felt like it, she made herself look like her mother: a beautiful sun elf with eyes like tar pits and lips like rubies. A gauzy black gown spun itself out of the air around her thin limbs.
It was exactly as Fayne remembered her mother, in the few years they'd had together before the crossbow bolt that had given Fayne the scar on her cheek.
Fayne crossed to the door, opened it as silently as she could, and stepped into the outer chamber. She heard Cellica snoring and saw a sleeping bundle slumped in the center of the room. Fayne smiled gently.
Then she heard a whisper of leather on wood, and she looked just in time to see Rath rushing her out of the shadows. She did not have time to speak.
Once again, Cellica awakened to what sounded like Myrin weeping. 'Gods,' she murmured, brushing away the stickiness of sleep. She'd had such vivid and bawdy dreams, too.
The first light of early dawn crept through the windows. An hour would yet pass before the sun peered over the horizon. The city lay quiet.
Cellica heard shuffling sounds and stifled sobs from her own bedchamber.
Thinking of Kalen, she lifted her crossbow from the table. Mayhap she'd shoot him for being such an idiot and sleeping with the wrong woman.
She paused to look again through the keyhole into Kalen's chamber. She braced herself for what she w amp;uld see, but he was alone and unmoving on the bed.
Blushing a little, Cellica tiptoed toward her room. She heard a stifled moan, then something ctashing down, like a chair, and the hairs on her neck rose.
The halfling slid the door open a crack and stopped dead.
On the bed, illuminated by the moon, was a struggling Myrin in a nightgown, two hands tying a cloth around her mouth to gag her. Those hands belonged to a black-robed dwarf-the one they had seen in Lorien Dawnbringer's chamber: Rath. Half his face was a burned wreck, but she knew him.
'Don't move,' Cellica said, mustering as much command voice as she could.
The scarred face blinked at her, holding Myrin on the bed with one hand. 'Child…'
'I'm not a child.' Cellica aimed at his face. 'And if you think this is a toy, you're damn wrong.' Her hands trembled. 'Kalen!' she cried-'Kalen!' He would hear that, she hoped-unless his wall suddenly blocked all sound, or some such nonsense.
'Calm yourself, wee one,' the dwarf said. 'I am unarmed.'
As if that mattered, Cellica thought. From what Kalen had told her, he could kill them both with his bare hands, if only he could move. Her voice had trapped him.
'Don't call me wee, orc-piss,' Cellica snapped. 'Take her gag off.'
'I wouldn't,' Rath said. As he could not otherwise move, his eyes turned to Myrin. 'This girl is dangerous.'
'Do it!' Cellica hissed. 'And where s Fayne?' She raised the crossbow higher. 'What have you done with Fayne, you blackguard?'
'Cellica,' came a voice.
A shadow loomed out of the corner, and Cellica turned to find-her.
Of all the nightmares she might have imagined, she never would have expected this one. A specter from her past-from before she and Kalen had gone to Westgate, from when she had been slave to a demon cult. One she had never told him about, and one who had haunted her every nightmare through all the years in Luskan and since.
The golden elf lady with the eyes of darkness.
'You,' Cellica said, terrified.
The woman paused, considering. Then, finally, she smiled. 'Me.'
A dagger flashed and pain bit into Cellica's stomach. Her legs died and she slumped to the floor. The world faded. She heard only Myrin's muffled voice crying her name.
THIRTY-ONE
Ralen must have been weary-and indeed, he hadn't slept until shortly before dawn. He awoke near highsun- rested, thirsty, and ravenous.
He was mildly surprised Cellica hadn't awakened him- perhaps with an ewer of water, as was her habit. In a way, he was disappointed he wasn't waking up dripping wet. He would have seized Cellica's pitcher and drank the rest of its contents, he was so thirsty.
Kalen felt around the bed next to him, but Fayne was gone. In truth, he wasn't surprised. A woman like that couldn't be kept abed all night and half a day. And had she stayed, she certainly would have awakened him in the morning-he knew that for a certainty.
The desires of that woman-that creature…
'Growing up like that-hated and beaten and unloved,' she said, her wide, silver, pupilless eyes gleaming at him. 'It muddled you- ruined you for mortal women, did it not?'
'Yes,' he gasped. Her magic heightened his senses' and her hands burned him through his hardened skin. Her lips, oh gods, and her teeth
…
Her sharp-fanged grin widened. 'Good.'
Kalen shivered at the memory.
He pulled himself from his cool, tousled bed and stretched. It smelled like her. Her scent was everywhere, sweet and intoxicating and wicked.
In the mirror, his face had a short forest of brownish bristle, which he would leave to grow. Fayne had giggled when she touched his rough chin. f
The previous night blurred in his mind-he had an eye for detail but his awareness had ruptured against her. She existed to him as a forbidding yet alluring ideal-a memory of pleasure and shadowed pain. *'You have to tell me if I'm hurting you,' he had told her.
'Why?' had been her reply.
She whispered a word in his ear that filled him with shuddering agony. He fought through the dizziness to kiss her harder. His fingers dug into her flesh, wrenching a gasp from her lips.
'I can't tell my own strength-I can't always feel everyrhing. You have to-'
'You misunderstand.' Nothing about her smile was innocent or confused. 'Why?'
He shivered again and the image faded.
There had been pain, yes, but none of it physical. It had been in their hearrs. Things had broken rhat had needed breaking.
He shook his head to clear it. He wandered, in only his loose hose, to the door.
In the main room, all looked much as it always did. But he saw immediately that the coals that kept the simmer stew hot through the nighr in preparation for the morn had gone out, yet the pot still hung over them.
Kalen frowned. Had no one eaten today?
And-when he entered the room fully-he discovered an oily red-black puddle spreading across the floor, coming from the other bedchamber.
Instantly, Kalen was on alert and listening. He heard weak, haggard breathing and recognized it immediately. Heedless of an attack, he hurried to Cellica's room.
The halfling lay within. Her middle was a mess of red and she was paler than chalk. Kalen would have thought her dead if he hadn't seen her chest moving, just barely.
'Cellica,' Kalen said, kneeling beside her. 'Gods. Gods!'
The halfling's eyes opened and her lips parted. 'Well… met. Coins bright?'
Kalen cupped her face. 'Cellica,' he said. 'Sister…'
'Look at this, Kalen.' One feeble hand indicated the black mess that soaked the front of her linen shift. 'Killed me, Kalen. Knife cur all my insides. Poisoned. Too much for you.'
Kalen's fingers lingered over her breast. He knew she was right. The wounds were too deep, and puckered
