Rhianon-5. Along the Way of Deception. Natalie Yacobson

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      For the first time Rhianon was afraid. She could have easily squeezed the pendant, but she didn’t want to leave her friends behind, and meanwhile the flames were growing more fierce. It was near, in front, behind, everywhere. Her skin was about to blister from its proximity. Rhianon swallowed hard. Hot saliva burned her palate. There was still fire inside her, but it was blazing on the outside, too. There was nowhere to retreat to. The fire in front of her blazed brighter and brighter. Behind its wall, she could no longer see the faces of Brom and the rest of the bandits. In a second, one big bonfire would consume her and all of them. Like a witch. It is customary to burn witches. Rhianon made the bonfire for herself. She was frightened, but only for a moment, and in a second she was relieved. The heat seemed to fade, and a gentle breeze blew it away. She could smell the lilies, the coolness of the water, and the nearness of the clouds. Her wings flapped violently over the flames, and then strong arms snatched her up and lifted her off the ground.

      Rhianon wanted to dash downward, but everything was jumbled, the square, the scaffold, and where she had stood was engulfed in flames. Not even a tiny island of unaffected land remained. Absolutely everything was on fire. Rhianon didn’t even have time to feel sorry for her friends. Madael shook her abruptly and pulled her against him.

      «In a moment you would have burned, silly-eyed,» his voice was no longer his usual softness, his hissing savagely, almost scorching. But Rhianon was glad to hear it than the crackling of the fire. «Don’t you ever risk yourself again, you hear me, don’t you ever. Or I will get you out of the other side of the world.»

      «What is it for?» She hissed angrily, turning her back on him so that she could see his eyes glowing furiously, her hair blowing gold in a storm against the darkening sky.

      «To reason,» he said briefly.

      They were flying too fast. Rhianon felt such fierce gusts of wind that she had to hide her face against his chest. The speed and frosty wind seemed capable of destroying her. And yet everything below them was blazing. In an instant the orange-red dot of fire was far behind them. Soon they were home. Madael tossed her onto the polar bear skins that lined the bed and dashed to the window. He seemed angry now that he couldn’t seal up all the entrances and exits.

      «But you were the one who suggested I use the door,» Rhianon said, pulling the pelts together. They weren’t here before, and now the emeralds embedded in the polar bears’ empty eye sockets watched her as if they were living eyes. The dead and gutted doors somehow reminded her of the guards. Now she would not have been surprised if the leaden sphinxes in the park had come to life and blocked her way out of the castle.

      «You didn’t want me to go. Then why did you lie about letting me go? So you would have brought me back even if I had left. And you promised…»

      He turned toward her, only instead of anger his beautiful face flashed a helpless expression. She’d never seen him like that before. He looked as if he’d regained his childlike innocence since his fall from Heaven. Something that looked like tears glistened in the corners of his beautiful eyes. Or maybe it was just that his eyes were too intense a blue color. He can’t cry, can he? Not him. Tears are for people and for those who have lost him. He himself always betrayed, no one could betray him.

      «You didn’t use the door, or I would have called,» he pulled a long golden strand away from her ear, his thin, angelic fingers delicate, but Rhianon knew they could kill. She was frightened that this was exactly what Madael was going to do when his hands rested on her shoulders. Those graceful but incredibly strong fingers could have wrapped around her neck and strangled her, but the angel only leaned over and looked into her eyes. Rhianon became dizzy from his gaze. She seemed to sink into an endless blue abyss. That’s what it means to drown in someone’s eyes. The immense blue sucked her in, stripping her of all resistance, and it was like heaven, cloudy and endless in a storm, with the shrieks of burnt-out fallen angels.

      Rhianon shuddered. She saw before her an unburned face, pure and beautiful, with arcs of golden eyebrows and lips like roses’ petals. The perfect strong body, too, was white, not black with ash. The golden wings behind it, on the other hand, seemed to be beginning to darken. Rhianon blinked a few times to check it out. No, she didn’t think so. Madael himself was still as bright as the dawn, but his wings… They had grown noticeably darker.

      Involuntarily, Rhianon was frightened. Something had gone wrong. Something inevitable and irreversible was happening. She felt it with every fiber of her being and it made her afraid. There was nothing she could do.

      «So you take it back?» She didn’t know where she got the nerve to argue with him again.

      Madael was taken aback for a moment. He looked at her and didn’t know what to say. Maybe he just didn’t want to give her a definite answer.

      «You don’t care what I want, just what you want.»

      «It is not true,» his whisper sounded a little strained, and she continued to press on.

      «It’s just like when we were in heaven. You felt forged, so you rebelled. And now you want to shackle me.»

      «Not shackle you, but love you,» the thin, angelic fingers traced her cheek gently. He wanted to be reconciled already, but Rhianon only shook her head.

      «Love is no substitute for freedom.»

      «Maybe…» His lips were very close, cool and fragrant, and to touch them was like touching a mountain stream. No flame would burst from them.

      «It is for you, not for me. Naturally you feel free to captivate someone else. That’s what you and all your hordes are for, to captivate the imagination of those unfortunate mortals that the lord God is angry at. Perhaps you yourself do not realize how blindly you do his will.»

      His whisper turned fiery for a moment, though. «You know me.»

      «No, I don’t know you. I thought you could keep your word. I thought you belonged to me, not the other way around.»

      «What do you want?»

      Now it was her turn to say nothing. Rhianon was already regretting the quarrel. Walk away right now, and spend all eternity wandering the world looking for a way back to the magic realm? Was that what she wanted?

      She was about to change her mind, but Madael’s last furious words changed everything.

      «You will never leave. I won’t allow it.»

      Now he was really angry. His words were not an empty threat. Rhianon could see that he was angry and perhaps struggling to keep himself from destroying everything here. From the way he clenched his fists tightly, the gold plates of his armor dug into his flesh. He didn’t even seem to notice the pain. His wings fluttered behind him so that the wind alone could have brought down things in the room. He was beautiful in his anger, of course, but his beauty would hardly make the fate of those he went to kill any less enviable. As he moved toward the exit, Rhianon guessed that he would be out there all night, tearing and thrashing until he calmed down. It would be bad enough for humans and dark vassals alike. For the first time, Rhianon felt pity for neither of them. She felt pity for herself first. She wanted some understanding, not empty tantrums. What difference did it make that Madael went to destroy someone else’s armies and torment his own subjects, as long as he wasn’t destroying Loretta’s armies. He could have done her bidding long ago instead of needlessly venting his anger on just anyone.

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