His voice faded into the night, into silence. For a moment he shut his eyes.
“No human being who accepted such a bond could ever be free,” he said softly. “He might think that he was, but that would be just another illusion. There is no surer way to lose one’s soul than to ally oneself with a Iezu demon.”
Something in his tone made the hair on Damien’s neck start to rise. He was about to say something—more to break the mood than to question the man—when a rustling behind him reminded him suddenly that they were no longer a party of three.
He saw Tarrant’s eyes shoot open as he turned back toward the tent, and he could feel the chill of the Hunter’s scrutiny on his back. He hoped that Jenseny didn’t see it as she stood at the edge of the firelight her dark hair haloed by fog.
“I heard voices,” she said weakly. Her dark eyes flickered toward Tarrant, then away again quickly. As if she feared even to look at him. “You said we’d leave when it was dark, and it looked dark, so I came out . . .”
“Quite all right,” Tarrant said softly. His tone was like velvet, silken and cool. “Come to the fire. Sit down. Join us.”
Damien whipped about to confront him, but the Hunter didn’t meet his eyes. Instead his gaze remained fixed on the girl. As she walked somewhat slowly to a place by the fire, and gradually lowered herself to the earth, her eyes rose to meet his own. She seemed to be trembling.
“If you hurt her-” Hesseth began.
“Shhh.” He was utterly still, utterly focused. The power pouring forth from him was palpable. “I know what I’m doing. Our guest has nothing to fear if she cooperates with us. You know that, don’t you, Jenseny?”
The girl nodded dully. There was a flicker of panic in the back of her eyes. Her breathing was slow and heavy.
“You have no right!” Damien protested.
“I have the right of one who’s risking his life on this miserable quest—and I’ll not let you get in my way, priest, I warn you.” He leaned forward slowly, his eyes still fixed on the girl. “She won’t be hurt. Not if she obeys me. She understands that. Don’t you, Jenseny?”
The girl nodded slowly. Something glistened in the corner of the eye nearest Damien. A tear? He ached inside to help her, but was afraid to interfere. He had seen Tarrant’s power work often enough to know that trying to break in now would put the girl at risk. Behind him he could hear Hesseth hissing softly, and he knew that she had come to the same conclusion. He could only guess how much it was costing her.
Damn you, Tarrant. Damn you for what you put us through. Damn you for what you force us to condone.
Helpless, bitter, he watched while the girl’s eyes glazed over, her mind consumed by Tarrant’s hypnotic power. And he remembered all those other times that he’d had to sit back and do nothing while innocent souls were forced to submit to that malignant will. Senzei. Ciani. A frightened rakhene girl. Now this fragile child. His heart ached to see the fear in her eyes, to imagine the terror that was in her soul.
“If you feed on one drop of her fear,” he muttered, “so help me God, I’ll rip out your heart with my bare hands.”
Though the cold silver eyes remained focused on the girl, a hint of a smile curled those thin lips. “Now now, priest. No need to get violent. Everything’s under control . . . isn’t it, Jenseny?”
The girl trembled, said nothing.
“You are so very relaxed,” Tarrant told the girl. His low voice musical in the darkness, rich with silken malevolence. “So very safe. Isn’t that right?”
The girl hesitated before nodding. Damien’s heart twisted.
“No one’s going to hurt you. No one’s going to hurt you at all. The things you fear are far away, and we’re here to protect you. No reason to be afraid. No reason at all.”
A tear squeezed from the girl’s left eye. She said nothing.
“Reverend Vryce told me you were afraid to talk to us. But there’s no reason to be afraid, is there? Because we can protect you. We can keep you safe.”
The girl was still. Her face was drained of color.
“You want to talk to us, don’t you? Because that would help us protect you. That would help us keep the things you fear away from you.”
She shook her head stiffly, fearfully: No.
“You want to talk to us,” he insisted, and Damien could sense the power behind his words. The raw force that towered like a wave over his cool, even pronouncements. He wondered if she could see it, if that was why she was so afraid. What were the parameters of her special vision?
“Go easy,” he whispered to Tarrant.
If the Hunter heard him, he gave no sign of it. With increasing firmness he told the girl, “You want to tell us what you know. You want to tell us what your father said about the rakh. About the place they came from. You want to tell us everything.”
Beads of cold sweat broke out on the girl’s forehead. She shook her head again, more weakly this time. Clearly she was losing ground.
The Hunter’s eyes narrowed. Though his voice was carefully controlled, Damien could sense the growing impatience behind it. Talk to him, Jenseny. Please. Tell him what he wants to know. It’s the only safe course.
“Tarrant.” It was Hesseth. “Maybe you’d better—”
“She’ll talk,” he snapped. “Secrecy is a luxury in times like these, one we can’t afford. She needs to understand what will happen if she doesn’t help us, and then the words will come.”
Sensing his intention—its tenor if not its form—Damien lunged forward toward the girl. Not quickly enough. The Hunter’s power engulfed her like a whirlwind, and she screamed—a shrill, terrible sound. As Damien reached out for her, he Worked his vision so that he could see what Tarrant was doing, what vision he had conjured for her eyes to see-
And he was back in the village, where the slaughter had taken place. No. He was back in the village while the slaughter was taking place. Dark figures coursed the blood-soaked streets, holding parts of human bodies aloft like trophies. Arms. Legs. Entrails. The screams that came from the houses were deafening, broken only by the beastlike howls of the invaders as they gloried in their gruesome indulgence. Then the scene shifted, as the Hunter’s Knowing focused his vision even more finely: he was seeing the inside of the meeting hall now, where a man and a woman had been nailed to the floor, and two of the invaders moved forward with blades that were clearly intended for disemboweling-
And he attacked. Not Tarrant, nor the girl. The vision. Though he knew he lacked the strength to stand against the Hunter—though he knew that to anger the man now might well be suicidal—he couldn’t stand back and let this happen. Not to that fragile soul. He leaned forward and grabbed hold of the girl—her limbs were like ice—and pulled her against the living warmth of his body, even while he gathered himself for a Working. The power was like a fire within him, scalding fury and compassion and raw indignation all mixed in together, fanned by months upon months of frustration into a conflagration almost too hot to contain. Months in the rakhlands. Months at sea. Months in this place, holding his peace while the Hunter tortured, the Hunter killed, the Hunter remade this land in his own malign image. Choking back on his conscience until it bled, until all his dreams ran red with guilt. No more.
It all poured out of him like a flood tide, too much power for one man to contain. It Worked the fae into a wall of fire, which no undead sorcery might pierce. It wrapped Tarrant’s malignant vision in a scalding cocoon and seared, one by one, the fine strands of its construction. Images melted like wax and dissipated into the still night air. Bodies and blood evaporated into dust. Cradling the girl in his arms, Damien beat back the last fragments of the Hunter’s assault, trying not to think about the power that lay behind them. Trying not to consider the fact that when the vision was finally gone there would be only Tarrant and himself, and the hate which he had conjured between them.