Erin Evans - The Adversary

“Does your lord care?” Rhand said. “There are plenty of souls for his use left in this one.”

“My lord cares about mere mortals assuming his preferences,” Sairché said. “And I care about being made to seem a fool. So it would seem,” she went on, as she’d rehearsed all the hours of the night, “I’m very fortunate to have that sixty-first section to fall back on. You’ll find it very clear: in case of dispute, His Majesty, Asmodeus, Lord of the Ninth Layer and All the Hells Beyond, Ascended God of Evil, claims temporary ownership over all Hellish assets involved for three days, during which the dispute is decided. By him. You are entitled to a fiend to stand as proxy for said assets and your requirements are not in force during the deliberations-although I don’t suggest you dawdle, you have quite a few souls outstanding-and your own soul is not in forfeit.”

“Until it is,” Rhand said.

“Now, now,” Sairché said. “We have rules about this sort of thing. That’s why they’re in the contract.”

Sairché kept smiling, wishing privately this had been Lorcan’s problem to deal with. What she’d said was true-every word-but she hadn’t claimed the contract in dispute, and she wouldn’t. Even if there was no chance of Rhand being in the right, Sairché wouldn’t run the risk of drawing Asmodeus’s attention to what she had or hadn’t been doing. Since Farideh hadn’t left the camp, she remained-in the most technical of senses-in Rhand’s possession and all the terms of their agreement were being met well enough to stand. Still, it made Sairché’s nerves itch-too close to failing the agreement. To finding out what happened if she reneged.

“It does get a bit dull by the sixty-first section,” Sairché said, to cover her nerves. “I don’t blame you for skimming.”

The dark rage lingering under Rhand’s calm facade took over. “I don’t have three days to spare. You call her back.”

Sairché shrugged. “Alas, I cannot.”

Rhand pointed the wand at her head. “ Yuetteviexquedot. ” The shielding spell dissolved with a dull whine. Sairché tensed, but in the same moment, the erinyes struck. Sulci’s sword swung up like a club, setting off Adolican Rhand’s own shield. He startled as it erupted, throwing Sulci back to the floor, and giving Nisibis a chance to dart in and clout him hard behind the head. The wizard fell to his hands and knees. . and found Nisibis’s sword held close under his chin.

“You can’t kill me,” he said.

“Really?” Sairché replied. “Where in our agreement does it say that?” She stepped down from her perch. “Did you really think you could twist an agreement better than a devil from the Hells?” Lords of the Nine, how satisfying would it be to give the signal, let Nisibis cut his throat, let Rhand clutch and the blood that fountained from the wound? She drew a breath-not now. Killing him now would mean she’d failed. She nodded to Nisibis instead, and the erinyes moved to stand beside her.

“You are still of a use to me, fortunately,” Sairché said, opening the portal to Malbolge again. She looked down at Rhand, crouched on the carpet, and smiled. “Don’t disappoint.”

But she had no more than turned her back on him before he spoke once more.

“If those are the terms,” he said, “then I select you as my proxy, Lady Sairché. If you’ll come with me?”

Havilar woke, hazy and aching. When Brin had tried to brew the tea for her the night before, she’d put him off and climbed into her bedroll where she willed herself to sleep before he could say another word to her. She did not need caring for.

Brin dozed against a tree, on the other side of the fire. When she stood, he stirred and turned toward her, hand on his sword, and altogether she was still angry at him, and still so glad to see him.

“Good morning,” she said.

He smiled crookedly and let go of the weapon. “Good morning. You sleep all right?”

Havilar shrugged. “I guess.” She still wasn’t happy about being told to sleep. “Did you stand watch all night?”

“Not exactly. I sleep lightly,” he said. “You never know when some noble’s going to get it into his or her head that offing me in the night is in their best interests.” He rubbed his eyes. “Usually, though, my room’s not full of owls and voles and things. I feel as if I woke a hundred times last night.”

Havilar wondered what his rooms were full of, what noises he was used to. How many of them were someone else. It wasn’t her business-not yet and maybe not ever. “You should have woken me.”

“I’m all right.” He stretched and tried to smother the yawn that escaped him. Havilar gave him a very pointed look. “All right,” he admitted. “I should probably have woken you. You seemed like you needed the rest.”

Havilar squatted down beside the fire. “You could sleep now. I’ll pack things up. Or just rest your eyes at least, if I’m too noisy.”

He gave her another crooked smile. “That would be perfect.” He eyed her a moment. “Are we going to talk today, do you think?”

Terror sank its teeth into Havilar. “We’re talking now,” she said lightly. “Havi,” Brin sighed.

Havilar stood and went over to her bedroll. “Can we just get on our way before we worry about this?” He sighed again, but said nothing else, and when she glanced back, he was settling down to sleep.

She ought to be brave enough to hear him say that there was nothing between them. She ought to be sure enough to know if that was what she wanted or not. She ought to be more concerned with finding Farideh who- yet again-deserved the worry more than she did. It made her feel unseated and upset, like a plant pulled up by its roots and tossed onto the stones. She finished packing everything up, and considered waking Brin.

Havilar picked up her glaive instead and turned her attention to the pull of her muscles, the solidness of her bones. The weight of the glaive steadied in her hands. She didn’t imagine opponents, this time, or make an enemy of a tree or a shrub. She moved the glaive through careful steps, patterns she knew by rote-a sweep, a slice, a carve, a chop. Step and slide and step and turn. Once upon a time, people had said her glaive was as good as her right hand. Once upon a time, Devilslayer had been the perfect anchor-as long as she had her glaive, Havilar knew who she was.

And now everything was different, but Havilar was the same. And she wasn’t sure she ought to be.

Slash, sweep, pull the blade up.

Brin was certainly different-he was so sure, and so bossy, and she hated that pothac beard. Every time something dangerous came up, he tried to make her go home, back down, turn into someone else. Every time he sighed at her, she wanted to curl up and hide.

Chop, press forward, sweep low. Step forward. Turn.

And then he would laugh when she said something funny and everything was the same again. He would smile at her with that glint in his eye that made her think they were sharing a secret, and she was his again, and that was exactly right.

But then he’d sigh.

She lunged forward, barely holding on to the weapon’s haft, the weight nearly pulling it out of her hands. She took an extra step trying to keep it, and stopped, panting. Again, she told herself, and she started over. She hadn’t done these passes in years- more years she amended. She hadn’t done all manner of things in years. It made her feel a little melancholy and a little giddy at the same time-like she was a girl again, learning for the first time.

She’d run through the passes once again and started a third time, when she realized Brin wasn’t sleeping, but lay on his side watching her practice. She faltered, and pulled the glaive close. “Sorry. Was I loud?”