Private Tales A World Governed by Providence

[Priestess Marta Maisal]

"You can talk," said Daelin to Emelia. "Don't pretend like you can't."

"I have but one question for you, Daelin."

"And that is?"

With stern reprimand, and yet also with a hint of sorrow for another life subsumed by Chaos, Marta said, "Why? When you could have committed in earnest to all you said, rather than allow such fine words to wither to lies; when you could have embraced that which is good rather than that which is wicked, and known in time a life far better than that which you have led. Why?"

But Daelin just shook his head. "There's nothing to say."

Marta closed her eyes in brief frustration, and her chest and shoulders deflated with a sigh. And then she placed in Emelia's empty hand the knife she beckoned for. "So be—"

"But there's something I can do!"

In a flash, Daelin's deception became clear. He had sat there, biding his time, as the trait of his Letai kin spirit, that of a kind of lizard, slowly regenerated the wound he'd suffered. With his hand over his stomach he had covered it, and kept up the ruse of his debilitating injury until this moment. But now he was whole again, his wound gone and all his strength returned.

And he sprang up from where he sat, and lunged to seize hold of the knife-wielding arm and hand of Emelia.

Emelia Atchins

 

[Emelia Atchins]

She might not be a trained fighter, but Emelia wasn't a naive fool either. She had watched Marta with cold eyes and watched Daelin with equal absence of emotion. And readiness. She had been caught unawares once, too confident by half and more. She shook her head at his assertion; of course, she could speak but she had made a deal with a devil-

-searing heat running through her body-

-and the deal had been explicit. She had no desire to indebt herself further.

The hilt of the knife slapped against her palm and Daelin made his move. Her immediate reaction was a widening of the eyes and an 'o' of surprise. In the same moment, her body moved of its own accord, jerking the hand back and slide away from the man.

She made a desperate swipe at him as she retreated, reversed her grip and crouched for all the world as if she knew what she was doing. Her eyes smoldered with wild rage tamped down to a cold burn.

 

[Priestess Marta Maisal]

Daelin missed his mark, and with a thrust of his body backward, so did Emelia.

Marta, then, attempted to intervene. A quick flight of her hand saw her fist, if obliquely, connect with his cheek. But now entangled by closeness, her arms and his arms grappling madly for advantage, Marta and Daelin stumbled about, now smashing into the stone wall, now crashing into the bars of the cell. But Daelin with his strength proved the victor in such an entanglement where bursts of speed counted for little, and overpowering Marta he slammed her head into one of the cell's bars and knocked the wits from her. The clang of the impact reverberated in the dungeon.

Marta fell. On the ground she lay, eyes closed and lips dancing to the murmurs of stupefying pain, and a few trickles of blood ran freely now from where her head had hit the metal.

Daelin stood over her body like a champion over a conquered foe in an arena.

Breathing heavily from the struggle, but far from winded, he held out his hand and beckoned with his fingers and said to Emelia, "Give me the knife. Don't make me take it from you."

Emelia Atchins