Death Sworn(80)

Sorin dodged them as if they were in slow motion and took off at a dead run, straight for the chasm between him and Karyn. At the very edge, he launched himself over the black space.

Ileni couldn’t help a brief, strangled scream. It was an impossible leap. But Sorin’s hands thudded onto the rock on the other side, and he tucked himself into a ball and rolled. When he unfurled himself, sleek and swift, he was on his feet, another dagger in his hand, its point inches from Karyn’s throat.

Karyn lowered her hands and sighed. Smoothly, she tucked the lodestone away under her tunic. Ileni felt a ward flare up, and then the stone went silent to her senses. Its sudden absence made the cavern duller. “You bore me, assassin.”

“Ileni,” Sorin said, very calm, “break through her wards.”

Ileni opened her mouth, then closed it. The silence stretched for a long, terrible moment. Sorin glanced at her, a swift look stark with betrayal.

He didn’t know she couldn’t do it. He thought she was choosing not to.

Sorin. No. But Ileni couldn’t speak. She could barely breathe.

Karyn laughed again. She turned on her heel as if Sorin wasn’t there, and he lunged and struck. His dagger slid across the side of Karyn’s neck as if along marble rather than flesh, leaving her unharmed. As he finished the lunge, he twisted and tangled his legs with Karyn’s, throwing both of them hard on the flat rock.

They rolled once, and then Sorin was on top, kneeling over the sorceress, fingers wrapped around her neck. The dagger was gone, but he didn’t need it. His fingers dug hard into Karyn’s throat. Her eyes fluttered dazedly—she had knocked her head hard on the rock—and she opened her mouth, but all that emerged was a croak. His fingers tightened, and her heels kicked frantically at the rock, her mouth open in a soundless plea. Sorin leaned down, arms taut, a hunting animal lunging in for the kill.

And then he hesitated. He turned his head and looked across the chasm at Ileni. Their eyes met, and his weren’t deadly and focused at all. They were . . . afraid.

This thing between us wouldn’t survive my watching you murder someone.

Sorin’s face hardened. He turned back to Karyn and pressed down.

But that momentary hesitation had been enough. Karyn twisted her head to the side and gasped out a word. A burst of power erupted from her, flinging Sorin through the air, his body twisting as he arced down into the chasm.

Ileni screamed as he fell into the darkness, and reached for her magic. It was like scraping the insides of her soul.

Sorin jerked to a stop and hung suspended between the white rocks and the empty blackness. A sob broke from Ileni’s throat. For an insane moment, she believed that somehow, she had done it; she had saved him. Then Karyn surged to her feet and beckoned with one hand, and Sorin turned helplessly in midair to face her.

“Now,” Karyn said pleasantly, “perhaps we can reopen our discussion.”

“Don’t waste your time, Sorceress,” Sorin snarled. “I’m no traitor, and I’m not afraid to die. You might as well drop me now.”

Don’t. Ileni had never felt so helpless. She had betrayed everyone, ruined everything, and now Sorin was going to die. Dropped into a dark canyon, gone forever, his death wasted. Because of her.

“How noble.” Karyn’s neck was mottled red with bruises. “But I’m still not speaking to you.”

Ileni tore her eyes away from Sorin.

“Ileni,” he said. “Don’t. She’ll kill me anyhow.”

“Why would I do that?” Karyn murmured. “Some of us prefer not to kill, if it’s unnecessary.” She gave Ileni a small smile, including her in that some of us. “I wouldn’t expect an assassin to understand.”

Ileni forced herself to straighten, to meet the sorceress’s eyes. Sorin was defying Karyn despite the abyss beneath him. How could she do less? “What do you want to know?”

“Many things. But mostly, I would like to know how to get through the Renegai wards around these caves.”

Ileni froze. She could feel Sorin struggling to use magic against Karyn, like a fitful breeze against the strength of her spell.

She hadn’t betrayed everything after all. She hadn’t betrayed her own people yet. But in exchange for Sorin’s life, she would.

“You think I can tell you that?” Ileni said finally. “Right now?”

“Can’t you?” Karyn rolled her shoulders back. “Then let’s start with an easier question. Why have your assassin friends been killing off sorcerers? Do you know the answer to that?”