Dragonsword Read online

  <><><>

  Jason came out of the shower, drying his hair.

  “Showers. I might have missed showers more than sex.”

  Samantha glanced up at him from the floor.

  “One of the downsides of doing a stint on the other side from inside your own body,” she said.

  “Do demons sweat?” Jason asked.

  “No, they don’t.”

  “Huh.” He sat down on the floor next to her and looked up at Sam.

  “What’s up with him?”

  “Fighting with Kerk,” she said. “Long term, once we get everything else done, we’re going to have to do something about that.”

  “Any ideas?” Jason asked. She shrugged.

  “Not really.” She crossed her legs in front of her and leaned over flat onto the floor, self-conscious with Jason watching but not willing to let him interrupt her. “What happened hellside?”

  “They ran,” Jason said. “I gotta admit, that was gratifying.”

  Samantha laughed.

  “It’s a good day when demons who recognize you take off the other direction.”

  “They kept making these signs on the ground, like they thought I couldn’t cross them.”

  Samantha glanced up. That was unexpected. She sat up and opened her palm, focusing to pull the dragon symbol up into a mark on her skin.

  “This one?”

  He stared at it.

  “What is it?”

  “Kha. It means dragon.”

  “I know what it means,” Jason said.

  “It’s so weird for you to speak hellspeak,” she said.

  “I get that. Looks like Sam speaks angeltongue, now.”

  “Better than I did, at that stage.”

  “Weird. Why kha?”

  “I can only guess that they believe that since I wouldn’t go through a door with kha on it, maybe they could use it to keep you away, too.”

  “You wouldn’t go through a door…?”

  “When I was looking for you. Part of a grand bargain that a demon made with me to keep me out of the city, as it turns out.”

  “I’ll take your word on it,” Jason said.

  “What did you do?”

  “Cut a few of ‘em down, because it made me feel better. Wandered around a bunch.”

  Samantha nodded.

  “Good.”

  “What was I supposed to do?”

  “Whatever you wanted to,” Samantha said. “As long as you didn’t do what you thought I wanted you to do, you were right.”

  Jason raised an eyebrow at her, and she put a leg out in front of her to stretch again.

  “The rules really are complicated in your world, aren’t they?”

  “Yes.” She breathed out, sliding her back leg straight behind her and pushing her forehead against the ground next to her knee. “Soon to be your world.”

  Sam started typing harder on the keyboard.

  “What is he talking about?”

  “I don’t think they’re talking anymore,” Samantha said, sitting up to listen. “I think they’re just fighting.”

  “Better him than me.”

  “He’s changing,” Samantha said, tipping her head to the side.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t think he even knows it’s happening yet, but it’s happening.”

  Jason looked harder at his oblivious brother, then back at Samantha.

  “Good or bad?”

  “I don’t know yet. Nothing is forcing it, so it’s probably normal, but that doesn’t say anything, really.”

  “He isn’t going to turn into a psychopath and hunt down Kerk, is he?”

  “If he did, I’d go with him,” Samantha said and smiled. “That man is impossible.”

  “Better him than me,” Jason said. “What’s next on our list?”

  “Take your pick,” Samantha said. “We’ve got a host of demons running around unchecked, we’ve got training to do for you, we need to figure out who opened the hellsgate, and we need to figure out how Carter is involved in all of it.”

  She looked hard at Jason for a long moment, and he returned her gaze, unconcerned.

  “Did they ever manage it?” she asked.

  “What?”

  “Possessing you.”

  Jason threw his towel up onto the bed and rolled onto his stomach, resting his chin on his elbows.

  “I don’t know.”

  That was not on the list of options Samantha had thought possible.

  “What?”

  He closed his eyes and took a slow breath.

  “There was a time, right at the end, once, when I heard a voice in my head that wasn’t mine. I thought I might have been going crazy… that the mind games were working.” He paused, looking up at Sam again. “Then when they grabbed me from Doris’ place, I heard him again.”

  Samantha chewed her lip.

  “Just a voice in your head?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You were still… you? It wasn’t like someone else had control of you?”

  “Yeah, just the voice.”

  Samantha chewed her lip harder.

  “What does it mean?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. Demons can put thoughts in your head. You have to be in a certain state, and they usually sound like your voice… or just an idea. Demons are very good at planting ideas. To use a voice that wasn’t yours… I don’t know what that means.”

  “What do you mean they can put thoughts in my head?”

  “Most of your impulses are yours. We don’t need a lot of help to be pretty messed up, as people. But they help. They can nudge you in the right direction… But to just speak, openly, in your head in a strange voice… That sounds more like possession than influence.”

  “Every time I think I’ve got a handle on things…”

  “Sorry,” Samantha said. “They can do things I’ve never even considered, I promise. It’s a power struggle. Carter at least got that much right.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Jason said.

  “No, sorry. You’re right. I wandered off. So it’s possible they possessed you. Not fully and not well, but… partially?”

  “Is that possible?”

  “I don’t know. You’re theoretically immune, because you’re kha, but they think they can possess you anyway. Who knows what’s possible and what isn’t.”

  “If not you, probably no one,” Jason said.

  “Sorry.”

  “Not your fault,” Jason said. “Let’s start with what we’re good at. Let’s go after them.”

  “What?”

  “The demons who crossed. They used the gate I was stuck in to do it; I think I’m entitle to a little payback.”

  Samantha smiled.

  “Sure. That sounds like a good place to start.”

  She looked up as Sam slammed the laptop shut.

  “I am so done with him,” he said. He looked from Samantha to Jason and dropped an eyebrow.

  “What’d I miss?”

  <><><>

  They drifted back to Houston.

  Samantha was pushing Jason hard, and he slept a lot of hours, so they’d stop and sleep in the car or at a cheap motel for a few hours then drive a few more hours before Samantha would stop them and take Jason through another exercise. They were all sadistic. Samantha didn’t know any better way to do it, and she felt deathly guilty about it. She apologized dozens of times a day, past the point where Jason and Sam were both sick of hearing it, and then she’d apologize again.

  Outside of Dallas, they were parked on the side of the road in the hot August sun, and Jason was dripping sweat as his skin gradually turned redder. Samantha and Sam were sitting in the car drinking bottled water out of a cooler. Jason hadn’t moved in three hours.

  “When does it stop?” Sam asked. Samantha squinted through her sunglasses at the setting sun.

  “He should be able to focus better in the dark,” she said. “
It ends when he does it.”

  Sam drained his bottle and reached for another one.

  “Can’t we throw a blanket over him or something?”

  Samantha shifted to get out of the reflection off of Anadidd’na.

  “No. If I were doing it right, we’d be drinking mojitos instead,” she answered.

  Sam wasn’t seriously concerned for Jason. They both trusted her implicitly, and that only made it worse. Thirty to sixty percent of the men and women that her people chose to train ended up not making it because the training killed them, depending on which people you counted and which parts you counted as training. Under the strictest set of definitions, the numbers went up to 90%, but even Samantha didn’t agree with those.

  She had no intention of being careless with training and exposing Jason to unnecessary risk, but every day he was in danger, and to push him as fast as she needed to, it was only getting worse. She bit back an apology. Not only was it unappreciated, it was inappropriate.

  “It’s not just physical,” she said. “It’s mental, too.”

  “You know you’re driving him crazy right now, right?”

  “Yeah. That part’s not so bad.”

  Sam laughed.

  “I told you I couldn’t train you,” Samantha said.

  “Yeah, I get it now,” he answered.

  “Abby isn’t one of us, by strict definition, if it makes you feel any better,” Samantha said. “Carter trained her as a psychic, which isn’t any better, but she only belongs to him.”

  “I still can’t believe she let him mark her.”

  “She was afraid.”

  There was a long silence as they watched Jason sweat.

  “You were, too, weren’t you?”

  That surprised her.

  “Yeah. I was.”

  It was a cold shock of memories, watching Jason in his silent struggle. She’d been afraid, but not like Abby. Abby was afraid of the darkness. Samantha had been afraid of being alone. She’d put up with all of it, because she didn’t want to be alone.

  “He’s going to burn like he hasn’t since we were kids,” Sam said.

  “Already has,” Samantha answered. Sun had been one of the punishments Carter hadn’t really had access to, but Lange had told her about it over drinks one night. He said that once the barriers in your skin break down and you really start to burn hard, it’s like feeling your skin flame up. Worse than real fire, he said. Argo had watched him bake in the Arizona sun for days in one test. Argo had only had one of his apprentices survive.

  Samantha had recommended he close his eyes before she set the spell, because she wasn’t certain he was going to be able to blink. Voluntary muscle verses involuntary muscle. It was complicated.

  “You did this one?” Sam asked.

  “In a freezer.” She jerked her head to look at him. “You think I’m just making these up?”

  “Feels like it,” he said, unconcerned. “How long did it take you?”

  “Ninety minutes. Abby thought I was frozen solid and dead.”

  “How weren’t you?”

  She looked at Jason.

  “Either he’ll figure it out or he won’t,” she answered. She wanted to take his heart rate and look in his ears, but the focus he needed was incredible, and the act of concern comforting. While on a simple scorecard the distraction would balance out the comfort, it wasn’t that simple, and they both worked against him. She cracked another bottle open and tipped it back, letting air bubble loudly into it as she drank. His shoulders and back were dry, now. He was hitting the beginning of dehydration.

  “What does it feel like?” Sam asked.

  “Hmm?”

  “Shutting down your nervous system and booting it back up.”

  “Terrifying. Like jumping off a cliff when you have no idea what you’re going to do next. And then, when you figure out how to reclaim it, it hurts so bad you don’t want to. Like stabbing your open eye with a needle.”

  “Can you tell what part he’s on?” Sam asked. His stomach grumbled.

  “There’s food down here, if you want it,” Samantha said. He shook his head.

  “Too hot to eat.”

  “I can’t tell. Only one who knows is him.”

  She got out a bag of candy and took out a handful before passing it to Sam. He took a bunch and handed it back.

  “This is really boring,” he said.

  “I know. The stuff that involves sending him across is at least much faster.”

  Sam took out his cell phone and checked his e-mail.

  “Kerk is still trying to prove he’s got us on a short leash.”

  “Takes two to hold a tiger’s leash,” Samantha said absently.

  “What?” Sam asked.

  “Hmm?”

  “What did you just say?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You said two people have to hold a tiger’s leash,” he said.

  “Did I?”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I saw it once. They put two chains on big cats to lead them around, and then stand on opposite sides, so if it charges one of them, the other can hold on to it.”

  “Because a leash doesn’t do anything to keep it from attacking you,” Sam said. “You’re right.”

  “Oh, good. What am I right about?”

  “How to deal with Kerk.”

  “Are you going to attack him to try to get him to make Simon tag back in?”

  “No. I’m just going to make him wish he had never tried to leash us in the first place.”

  “How are you going to do that?”

  “No idea.”

  “Oh, good. Glad I could help.”

  They chewed candy and drank water in silence. The sun continued to set, dropping in color and intensity to a hot red out in front of them. Samantha considered asking Sam to start the engine and turn on the AC, but knew that it was a foolish thing to do in a state as big as Texas.

  Jason gasped and fell down.

  “Go get him,” Samantha said, standing up and going around the Cruiser. Sam helped Jason into the back seat and got into the passenger seat as Samantha started the car.

  “Why do you get to drive?” Sam asked.

  “Because you’re too worried about him to focus,” Samantha said.

  “And where are we going?”

  “Someplace he can lay in a tub full of ice.”

  Jason was shivering in the back seat, fingers clutching at his arms as he tried not to touch anything.

  “He doesn’t look good,” Sam said.

  “You try holding a sword out like that for that long,” Samantha said. “He’s destroyed his arms and he’s cooked his skin. And he’s the one who turned the lights back on to find out about it. Sucks to be him right now.”

  She stared at the road, trying to keep Sam’s inquisitive mind out of her own. She had to be numb long enough to get him patched back together. Then she could feel. And remember.

  Jason coughed on yelps of pain as Samantha eased the car onto the highway and each time she changed lanes. He didn’t have the strength to brace himself, and bracing himself didn’t help under that much sun burn. He had a nice social tan, normally, but his skin simply was not prepared for that much persistent attack. It would come off in sheets.

  The motel she’d found on the internet wasn’t that far away, and she helped Jason into the room after she sent Sam for ice. He shivered and winced at her touch, but she was merciless.

  “You did good,” she said into his ear, then wrapped her arm across his back to help hold up his weight. He tried to drop away, but she held him up by the arm and half-dragged him into the bathroom.

  “Get in,” she said. Two cautious steps into the tub, and then she helped him lay down after taking Anadidd’na’s sheath off his back. The skin stuck to it. She ran cold water and he moaned. It wouldn’t take much to cause hypothermia at this point, but he needed the cold. Sam arrived with a bucket of ice and Samantha sent him out for another. Jason tr
ied to claw his way out of the tub, the cold more than his body was willing to bear, and Samantha put her hand firmly on his chest, holding him in.

  No mercy. Not yet.

  He shuddered away, and she pushed harder, driving his spine down until it reached the bottom of the tub, his face just barely far enough above the water line for him to breathe. He shivered and whimpered, struggling to keep his mouth above water as she held him. Sam dumped another bucket of ice and left again, leaving his concern with her that she was taking it too far. She pushed him away. That wasn’t helping anything right now.

  The water temperature kept dropping, to the point that her hand sent shooting pains up to her elbow. Jason fought feebly against her, trying to get out, and Sam brought more and more ice until the surface was more than two inches thick with ice, then Samantha mentally indicated to him that he could sit down and watch, as long as he didn’t interfere.

  Jason’s fight was going out of him, and his face bobbed down through the ice and back up in rhythm with his breathing.

  “Sam,” Sam warned. She pushed him away hard. Not now.

  Her hand was numb with the cold. The medical risk of permanent damage was becoming real, and yet she held Jason on the edge between life and death, barely conscious, the effort to breathe exhausting him. She took his wrist in her hand to keep his pulse. Slow.

  He let go, sinking to the bottom of the tub under her hand, bubbles pouring out of his nose. She let up and stood, taking a step back. His body floated, but he didn’t move.

  Thin sheets of skin floated in the water around him as the damaged tissue deteriorated, and the water turned pink with the capillaries that opened underneath the skin.

  Jason sat up, eyes closed, and put his hands out to find either side of the tub. He drew a long, easy breath, then looked over at her.

  “I couldn’t do what you’re doing,” he said.

  “I didn’t think I could either, back then,” she answered.

  He stood and long, thick sheets of skin pulled free under a weight of water, revealing perfect skin underneath.

  “What the hell?” Sam asked, standing.

  “How bad is it?” Jason asked.

  “Nothing,” Sam said. “There’s nothing. You’re fine.”

  Jason ran his hands over each arm, stripping away the red, blistered skin and revealing smooth, healthy skin like he had had half a day earlier. Samantha reached down to the bottom of the tub and pulled the stopper.