Page 14 of Tempest

“Well.” Iason cleared his throat. “Not that I’m telling you to speak to him more than is absolutely necessary, but it seems Lazaros shares your distaste for death.” Sophie twisted round to look at him, and Iason shrugged. “This rebellion wants to set a precedent, apparently. No executions.”

“Oh.” Sophie nodded. “I can see that. His demon was so nice, you know. She felt soft, when she was in my head. Have you ever had a demon?”

“Demons are for life, so no.” Iason shrugged. “My magic is too—” Too small, he was going to say, but if his magic was so weak that he couldn’t even summon a demon, how had he drawn magic from that beast in the sea? “Different,” he said. “Why, are you thinking of summoning your own, perhaps?”

Sophie didn’t answer. After a few seconds, Iason shook her shoulder and found she was already asleep, though her brow remained furrowed. Dying and being brought back to life, only to have an irate dragon toss you into a country full of unrest, had to take it out of a girl, even one as resilient and stubborn as her. Iason draped the blanket over her. He could let her sleep, for a time. No one knew who Iason was yet, and so long as he kept the illusion over his face, they didn’t need to know. He could allow himself a moment to breathe.

Just one. Then he would find a way to get Sophie back to Staria, and he could find somewhere quiet to disappear.

He got up, carefully checking the illusion over his face, and left the tent. Despite the cool rain and the wind off the sea, his skin felt warm, as though residual magic were lingering in his body. He passed the spell nets, which had little glass beads and runestones woven in for protection, and touched his cheek. The scars on one side of his face were from a spell net thrown by a young light mage before Iason left Mislia. It looked as though someone had set a net on fire and pressed it over his cheek, leaving just enough space for his eye and mouth, and while he’d grown used to it, it was far too distinct not to hide.

A girl came running up to him as he approached the water, holding up the hem of her uniform to keep it clear of the foam splashing around her ankles.

“Excuse me, sir.” She couldn’t have been older than Sophie, but there was a slave tattoo on her chest, partly visible above her shirt. Another ripple of uncertainty ran through him. He’d always thought the slaves in the mage’s private army were former traitors, initiated when they came of age, but none of the teenagers running about in black robes looked old enough to be registered as a proper adult. “No one’s allowed in the water right now. Lazaros’s orders.”

“My apologies.” Iason paused, then asked, “How old are you?”

“Thirteen.” The girl danced out of the way of an incoming wave. “Why?”

“I have a godsdaughter your age.”

“Oh. Well, maybe she can do supply runs with us some time. They’re safe, and we usually go the long way back so we can get ginger soda from the drinks lady on Green Street.”

Iason tried to recall if any of those things had existed when he was a child, but he couldn’t even remember there being a Green Street. “I’ll let her know.”

He waited for the girl to run back to the main tents, then went to the water again. The cool foam washing over his feet was a relief to his overheated skin, and he closed his eyes, letting his awareness spread as it had when he was in the ocean with Sophie in his arms.

Magic flared to life around him. The mages rushing past glowed like small fires, as did their demons. The spell nets glimmered, tents shone with spells to ward off damage and repel water; even the cookpots sparkled with magic. It was everywhere, humming like a thousand insects, and when Iason looked down, he even felt sparks in the sand itself. He dug in with his toes, and as he probed deeper, he staggered as he felt a surge of magic under Mislia, as though the land were a source of power so old it was almost as strong as the beast Iason had called on in the sea.

He shook his head and stepped back from the water, breathing hard. No one had spoken to him of anything like this. Alistair had been a mage, and he’d always said that Iason had it easy, not having to memorize spell patterns or study how to channel through a demon. Iason fled the shore and returned to the tent, where Sophie had gathered up most of the blankets. She stirred and handed him one, and he collapsed onto the second bedroll with a heavy sigh.

He was asleep before he could pull the blanket over his chest.

He drifted, too exhausted to dream, and when he woke, the sky was heavy with dark clouds and muted light. He got up, twitching the tent door aside, and groaned when he saw the rain pounding the sand.

“Just our luck, huh?” Sophie said, and Iason snorted. Sophie giggled, and Iason couldn’t stop the laugh that burst out of him as the immensity of it all crashed over him.

“Oh gods,” he said, wheezing as he fell back onto his bedroll. “We really were attacked by a dragon.”

“Right?” Sophie slapped his arm. “Right? Who gets attacked by a dragon in the middle of the fucking ocean?”

“We do, apparently.”

“My aunt just happened to hire assassins to chuck us in the water right when a dragon came by.” Sophie laughed so hard she went breathless, then dropped to the floor next to Iason. “Scale of one to ten, how good of assassins were they? Professionally.”

“Four. Maybe three.”

“You’d know!”

Iason laughed again. It was almost impossible to stop, the shaking, desperate response that wasn’t humor so much as it was sheer exhaustion and terror running through a body too overwhelmed to handle it. “And then who finds us? A rebellion.”

“Tough luck there, Iason. What do you think? Better off with the dragon?”

“Neither one seems inclined to kill us, at least,” Iason said, and Sophie cackled.

“What are we?” she asked, giggling helplessly. “Bad-luck catchers?”

“I am, definitely,” Iason said. “It’s all my influence.”

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