Through the Veil (12 page)

“They are kids, Kalen.”

He rose from his desk and turned back to her. Her soft blue eyes were dark and troubled, but he couldn’t say anything to help her. She was troubled because she saw him sending a couple of kids off on a war mission. He was troubled because he knew if he didn’t, more lives would be lost. “I know this isn’t something you can understand. I know you don’t remember much, even though you’ve spent so much time fighting at my side. I feel as though I know every thought that runs through that canny mind of yours. But in war, you make choices. Surely even you can understand that.”

The corners of her mouth turned down in a sullen frown. “Doesn’t mean I have to like it,” she muttered.

Kalen sighed, crossing over to her and cupping his hand around her neck, arching her face up to his. “Does not mean that I have to like it either. But there’s been little in my life I’ve enjoyed over the past twenty years.”

Her breath whispered across his mouth as her lashes lifted and she stared into his eyes. Before he could give in to the temptation to taste her again, Kalen moved away. “How is your head?”

He heard the soft sigh in her voice as she replied, “Better. A lot of better. I don’t feel like drilling a hole in my temple just to release the pressure.”

“Good.” His ears heard the light footsteps falling on the ground just outside the shelter and he said quietly, “I hope you feel ready to work.”

“Work?”

Just then the door swung open, and the tiny, stooped figure in the doorway said, “Yes. Work. I hear you’ve forgotten everything I taught you, so now they make me teach you again.”

“Corida,” Kalen said, smiling despite his dark mood. The top of Eira’s head didn’t even reach his shoulder, and she looked entirely too frail, but Kalen knew from experience just how
not
frail Eira was.

The old woman ignored him as she moved in, leaning on the cane heavily, her blue eyes still sharp and bright even though she was nearing her first century. “Well. You look the same. Feel the same, just a little . . . hesitant. That power, hmmm, I can taste that power of yours. Sweet as the water from the mountains used to be,” she murmured, moving in on them, staring at Lee with those sharp eyes.

“Um, do I know you?” Lee asked, her brows winging up as Eira moved closer.

The old woman laughed, the sound a dry hollow cackle that echoed through the small unit. “You hate my guts—surprised you don’t remember that,” Eira finally said, wheezing with laughter.

Lee’s cheeks flushed a very charming pink. Kalen covered his smirk with his palm as she opened her mouth, then closed it without saying anything. Finally she gave Kalen a dirty look and he returned it with a bland smile. “I really doubt I hated you,” she finally hazarded, tucking her hands into the pockets of the jacket Kalen still hadn’t taken back.

Eira smiled, lifting one brow. “We will see. Mmm, yes, we will see.”

“I hate her,” Lee stated with utter conviction.

They’d spent three days sleeping out in the mountains, her and that old witch, Eira. And she didn’t mean witch as in hocus pocus and spell books. She meant witch as in that woman is evil. Lee had slept on the forest floor with nothing between her and the rocky, uneven ground but a thin blanket, nothing between her and the chill of the night air but another thin blanket and her borrowed clothes.

Every last muscle in her body hurt, and her belly was so empty, she was so hungry, she actually ached with it. Three days. It had only been three days since Kalen had turned her over to Eira’s hands, but it felt like a decade. That woman had done her best to kill Lee. She was certain of it.

The first two days, that wicked crone wouldn’t let Lee eat. Then she was allowed to eat, but nothing but bark and leaves. Lee wanted a steak. She wanted a steak so bad she could cry. She wanted a bed. She wanted a hot bath, a good book and a glass of wine.

Instead of getting any of that, she was stuck in a gloomy, sunless world where apparently imminent death was commonplace and some ancient, evil bitch was in charge of her. Lee hated anybody being in charge. It was one of the reasons she’d gone the artistic route—she had the illusion, at least, of being in charge of herself.

“Your mind is cluttered.”

Eira’s voice was like a bee buzzing in her ear, but smacking a bee away would have been easy. Eira wouldn’t go away so easily. “Clear your mind, Lelia, and focus on the flame.”

Lelia—it was a pretty name. But it wasn’t her name. Instead of saying anything, though, she tried to focus on the damn candle burning inches away from her face. If she managed this, maybe the mean little pygmy would shut up.

She stared at the lone flame, watched it flicker, sway and dance. She hadn’t ever noticed how sensual fire was. How sinuously it could move. As she stared at it, everything else in her vision seemed to fade away until there was nothing but the flame.

Eira continued to talk, but her voice wasn’t quite as intrusive and Lee managed to tune her out a little as she stared at the flame. The yellow and orange were so pretty—she could see the wick, faintly red, burning down to black. Wax melted and dribbled down the side of the candle, fat white tears that rolled down the side and puddled on the stump.

“Focus, Lelia! You aren’t just doing an artistic study on fire.”

The flame flickered, and the odd, spellbound trance shattered into a thousand pieces. Lee was once more aware of the hard, cold ground, the rocks digging into her ass, the empty aching hole of her belly, her dry mouth and throat and the painful tension that turned all of her muscles into knots. “Damn it.”

She blew out an irritated breath and surged to her feet. Lee felt Eira watching her, and she turned around to glare at the old woman. “I’m hungry. I’m tired.”

Eira shook her head, a queer smile on her lips. “You don’t understand what tired is, vassa.” Eira had been calling her that for the past three days. The first day, Lee had pretty much decided it meant “target,” but Eira had told her on the second day it meant “young one” or “one who learns.” Basically a student. Lee had a feeling “target” and “student” probably had the same meaning to Eira, though.

“Lelia. Sit back down and focus.”

She opened her mouth to say something, but she found herself just snapping her mouth closed. Lee wanted to argue. Hell, forget arguing. She wanted to storm away and lock herself in a room so she didn’t have to see this crazy woman again. But every time she said much of anything, she ended up feeling like a kid who’d just gotten caught swiping candy.

That mental image was enough to keep her from sitting down like Eira had ordered. “I can’t focus until I get some food.”

“You’ve forgotten all of your control.”

Those words circled around and around in Lee’s head and she wanted to choke that witch bitch. Desperately. And judging by the way Eira looked at her, Eira knew exactly how Lee felt. “My control is just fine,” Lee grumbled. If she hadn’t had any control, she would have already killed the crone.

“Bah. You hardly understand the meaning of the word,” Eira said. Then she waved a hand. “Go on. Go rest. Go and eat something before you come back in the morning, but do not gorge yourself. We still have much work to do.”

Lee didn’t wait another second. Turning, she headed back. It was a long, exhausting walk, and for several reasonsshe had to move slower than she wanted. The first one, she was so damned tired, she felt like she was going to collapse onto the ground. The second? She didn’t trust Eira, and she was listening to make sure the old woman wasn’t going to sneak up on her again. Eira had sprung trap after trap on her during the past three days. Tests, she called them. Lee knew without asking that she had failed every one.

When she saw the twins standing guard at the gate, she wanted to cry with relief. Almost there. Finally, after what seemed like hours, she arrived at the small, squat cabin that had become her new home. At least temporarily.

She shoved a hand through her hair and winced as she realized how dirty she was. There was no damned way she had the energy for a bath. No way. Her hands trembled as she shoved off the jacket, and the clothes reeked. She was hot, sweaty, and dirty, and her hair was oily and matted.

But Lee was too damned tired to give a damn. She was even too tired to mess with finding something to eat. The empty, aching pit of her belly was just going to have to ache awhile longer.

Tears fell down her cheeks as she stared at her hands. Her nails were broken down to the quick. Although it seemed like a whole different life entirely, just a week ago, she had paid thirty-seven fifty for a manicure. The remnants of a sparkly coral still clung to her nails. Now her cuticles were ragged and her hands already had calluses.

Lee hadn’t ever thought she was big in the personal vanity department, but for some reason, looking at her ruined hands made her feel even more depressed. She lifted her eyes and stared at the exposed timbers that made up the small barracks-style house she now seemed to call home. It boasted a bed, a washstand and what looked like a camp-style stove. A toilet behind a privacy wall. A desk. That was it. She’d seen motel rooms with more luxuries than this.

When she had to bathe, there were communal areas for it. Granted, they were impeccably clean and the baths were wonderful, some kind of mineral spring that felt amazing.

She had left behind a home she had designed from the bottom up, to come to this. She wore clothes that didn’t belong to her, clothes that didn’t fit and stank to high heaven, and her body was filthy, sweaty, and she didn’t have the energy to get undressed or clean up or even fill the empty hole in her belly.

Eira had finally told her the three days of fasting were over and she could eat, but lightly, mind you . . . and Lee didn’t want to so much as look at food. That steak she had been drooling about just a little while ago now sounded about as unappetizing as the bark and leaves Eira had made her eat.

Lee just wanted to sleep. Her legs felt like they’d been strapped to cinder blocks as she shuffled over to the bed and fell face-first down onto it. She still had tomorrow to go. And the day after. And the day after.

I want to go home . . .
, she thought darkly. Back to her nice comfy bed, back to sanity, back to her safe job. So what if she got a little lonely, and she was plagued by dreams that made no sense—haunted by a bastard with silver eyes and a mouth that made her weak just thinking about it . . .

Home . . .

But she didn’t know how in the hell to get back there. And even if she did, these people were desperate. Kalen, damn his fine ass, seemed to think she could make some sort of difference.

“Insane,” she whispered bleakly. “Whole damned world has gone insane.”

Whimpering, she curled into a tight ball and sank into the warm arms of oblivion.

Kalen watched from the surveillance tower as Lee came dragging back in to the base. He hadn’t ever seen a woman look so tired before.

Although he wanted nothing more than to go to her, he had watch duty for another three hours. He had no doubt that by the time he got to his quarters, Lee would be fast asleep and dead to the world. Sympathetic, he watched as she entered the encampment, her shoulders slumped and her gaze downcast. He’d been there before. Eira was a hellish taskmaster.

“Speak of the devil,” he muttered. He felt the tingle race down his back long before he really sensed her. Eira was a disturbing woman, very disturbing.

She’d been one of the first people to successfully face off against a Raviner when the things first started invading their world fifty years earlier. Not only had she fought him off and lived to tell about it, she’d killed the thing. More often than not, when Raviners attacked, there was little more than a drained corpse left behind. Sometimes not even that. But Eira hadn’t just survived attacks, she’d killed her assailants.

Eira had trained his father. She’d trained him.

Although she no longer fought, she continued to serve by training the witches and guiding the psychics. She’d continue to do it until she no longer could. They had others who could teach, but they were young enough that Kalen couldn’t justify taking them out of the field for it. So it fell to Eira.

“She looks like you made her run the gauntlet.”

Eira moved into the corner of his eye, just barely in his field of vision. “She is stubborn. Behind the wall in her mind, the knowledge she needs lies in wait. But she won’t look. So for now . . . I train her as though she just discovered her magick,” the old woman said, lifting a shoulder in a negligent shrug.

“Which means you made her run the gauntlet,” Kalen said dryly. “I know how your mind works, corida. You push and you push—eventually she will tire of it, and strike back. You think that through action she’ll rediscover the pieces of knowledge that are missing.”

She smiled and reached up to pat his cheek. Then she hobbled over to the stool in the corner of the tower. As she sat down, she sighed wearily. “I am tired, Kalen. Do you know how very tired I am?”

“Eira—” Kalen floundered for words. Yes, he could see how worn out she was. But there wasn’t much he could do. He opened his mouth twice, only to shut it without saying anything.

Eira waved a hand at him. “Let it go, boy. I am old. I am tired. We are in the middle of a war, and unless you have some spare messengers sequestered away somewhere, we cannot make contact with the other units. Sending them out just to find a replacement for a tired old woman is taking them away from where they need to be. Our sat-relays are unreliable. Whether we like it or not, we are stuck.”

She looked off to the east, and Kalen knew she was thinking about her family. Six months ago, she had finally convinced her granddaughter to take her family farther away from the Roinan Gate. Since the fall of the key gate in Yorkton, it was a little safer in the east. Elina had inherited her grandmother’s magick skills—getting her to leave had been nearly impossible. She was a warrior and she wanted to fight. But Elina was also a mother. Her husband had fallen in battle, and Eira had used that to convince her to leave. Elina didn’t want her children orphaned.