‘It wasn’t just the power,’ Ji-yeong said. ‘His style . . .’
‘Jinn don’t feel fear or pain the way we do,’ I said. ‘They don’t care about their host getting hurt.’ A normal lightning mage would have flinched when he’d seen my sovnya swinging towards him, tried to defend or dodge. Sam had just taken the hit and blasted me. ‘Even when he jumped away, it wasn’t because he was afraid. It was because he knew he was going to get his body destroyed if he didn’t.’
We walked for a little while longer while the burning in my legs grew worse. When it became hard to concentrate, I finally let myself stop. ‘I think that’s far enough. Ji-yeong, can you take a look at my injuries, please?’
Luna stood watch while I lowered myself down to lean against the rock wall. I had to hold back a sigh of relief as I took the weight off my feet. Ji-yeong knelt next to me, green light hovering at her hands as she placed a hand flat against my chest. ‘Electrical burns through both legs, especially the right thigh. Looks painful.’
‘Anything serious?’
Ji-yeong shook her head. ‘No, you were lucky. Internal organs were out of the path of the current. It’ll regenerate with . . .’ She tailed off, eyes widening. ‘What the hell?’
‘Oh, right,’ I said. ‘It was like that when I got here.’
Ji-yeong stared at my right arm. ‘What is it?’
‘A symbiotic imbued item. Don’t worry about it.’
‘That can’t be a graft. Is that . . . transmuted flesh?’
‘I said, don’t worry about it.’
‘If something had eaten my arm and was starting on my shoulder, I’d worry about it.’ Ji-yeong put up her free hand. ‘Fine. I won’t ask.’
‘Thank you,’ I said. I could see that Luna was listening very closely. ‘I’m going to path-walk. Stay quiet for a few minutes.’
Ji-yeong was as good as her word, and as her magic got to work the pain from my legs faded. I took advantage of the rest to see what was happening elsewhere in the castle.
Landis’s force from the Order of the Shield seemed to be doing reasonably well. They were still skirmishing, but the heavy fighting looked to be over and the futures where I reached out to their minds with the fateweaver were reassuringly free of panic. Whatever was going on, they seemed to have it under control.
Nimbus’s force was another story. All the futures in which I tried to open up a link rapidly broke down into chaos, and in a tiny but significant fraction the links cut off in pain and darkness, suggesting that the additional distraction of my presence had been enough to cause someone’s death. They were still in combat, possibly one that was not going well.
Richard’s group was an enigma. The only two mages from his group that I knew well enough to forge a link with were Richard and Vihaela, and there was no way in hell I was entering into telepathic contact with either. I couldn’t even say for sure whether they were in the castle, but all my instincts said yes.
I drew back to the present. Ji-yeong was finishing up, green light glowing softly around her hands, staring into my legs as if she could see through the skin. ‘Done?’ I asked.
Ji-yeong nodded and I got up. Weakness swept through me and I had to pull myself upright with my right arm, but the pain was gone, and as I tested my legs, they felt far better. ‘Much better,’ I said. ‘Thank you.’
‘You’ll need to eat in the next couple of hours,’ Ji-yeong warned. ‘Oh, and I wouldn’t go fighting any more jinn until you’ve had a night’s sleep.’
‘Well, I’ve got some good news as far as that goes,’ I said. ‘Looks like Anne’s throwing everything she’s got against the Council main force. We should be free to move for the next half-hour.’
‘So now that Richard’s done his completely predictable betrayal,’ Luna said, ‘what do we do?’
‘We join up with Landis.’
The three of us started walking again. Ji-yeong’s light illuminated the curved, shadowed walls of the cave, bright enough to drown out the glow of Luna’s torch. Hermes stayed ahead, appearing now and again in a flicker of movement before vanishing.
‘So . . .’ Luna said. ‘Not to ask a stupid question, but whose side are we on?’
‘We aren’t completely on anyone’s side,’ I said, ‘because no one’s completely on our side. You and I are here because of Anne and Vari. And Ji-yeong’s here because . . . Why are you here?’
‘I left all my make-up back in my room in the keep.’
Luna and I looked at her.
‘You know how hard it is to find decent lip stain outside of Korea?’ Ji-yeong asked. ‘The stuff you guys have is terrible.’
I kept looking at her.
Ji-yeong sighed. ‘Fine. I don’t like losing, all right? This castle was my home and I’m not running away without a fight.’
I nodded. I was pretty sure that was true as far as it went, although I knew there was more she wasn’t saying. ‘Anyway, for now, we can mostly trust the Council. Landis’s group, at least. As long as we’ve got the threat of Anne hanging over us, we’re on the same team. Richard is probably more hostile right now than he’s ever been. In the past, he needed me because of Anne. He doesn’t any more. If he can kill us, he will.’
‘And Anne?’ Luna asked.
‘There’s probably enough left of her that she’ll want to talk to us at least a little bit before enslaving us.’
‘You’re a real ray of sunshine lately, you know that?’
We kept going. At regular intervals, I checked on the futures in which I tried to contact Nimbus’s force. The combat kept going for another fifteen minutes, then died away.
At last the tunnel began to widen into a cavern. The air began to stir with a breeze, carrying the salt tang of the sea. Hermes came into view in Ji-yeong’s light, sitting with his tail curled around his legs. He looked to our right at the wall, where a small doorway led into a spiral staircase. We entered and started climbing. Up, up, up, step after step.
At last I stopped, feeling Ji-yeong and Luna come to a halt behind me. ‘Hey there,’ I called up softly.
My voice echoed around the spiral staircase. No answer.
‘Friendlies coming up,’ I called.
A voice called back down from up above. ‘No friendlies down there, mate.’
‘Mage Verus with my team,’ I called. ‘Confirm with Landis. He knows we’re coming.’
A moment’s pause. ‘Stay there.’
We waited for a minute before the voice called again. ‘All right, come on.’
Three Council soldiers were waiting at the top of the stairs, dressed in body armour and carrying rifles. One of them nodded at me. ‘This way, sir.’ He led us through a narrow tunnel. Light and the murmur of voices began to grow ahead of us, and as we came around a corner and out into the open, we walked out into bright light and noise.
The room was a huge stone structure built for some forgotten purpose, and had been turned into a combination mess hall and barracks in which dozens of Council soldiers were bustling about, laying out bedrolls and readying gear. Electric lights made the stone walls look almost friendly. A portable kitchen had been set up in the centre and men were lining up with bowls; I could hear sizzling and smelt frying sausages. In the corner was what looked like a small field hospital, marked out with white banners holding red crosses.
‘What are they doing?’ Ji-yeong sounded slightly insulted. ‘Camping?’
The man leading us acted as if he hadn’t heard. ‘Captain’s this way, sir.’
We walked through the men. I recognised a few and nodded. Many looked cheerful, and I heard the odd laugh. The hospital didn’t seem very crowded – it had four camp-beds, one of which was empty. Whatever the battle had been like, they’d obviously come through in good spirits.