Wolf's-own: Koan by Carole Cummings

Author:Carole Cummings [Cummings, Carole]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, pdf

5

KAMEN, Imara thought with a weary sigh, when you come back, I’m going to kill you again.

Just what exactly had Kamen been doing all this time?

“So, when are you going to tell me what’s really going on here?” Fen Joori asked. Hostile. Suspicious. Imara couldn’t really blame him.

With a stifled growl, Imara rechecked the wards she’d set in place last night as she’d shuffled the Patrol off with excuses and high-handed commands, and a grudging promise that she would see that the Incendiary was brought to the Statehouse tomorrow. Today. The suns were already rising. She sighed, glanced over at the bed, and pursed her lips.

“When I understand it fully myself,” she replied.

She’d thought it best last night to keep watch over Fen Jacin herself. The one called Kojoi Shig—the one with the mark of the spirits almost blazing out from her soul—had bullied the younger brother out the door, and Kel Saminil had kept the watch across the hall. The twin, this Fen Joori, had refused to be moved from his brother’s side and slumped now, trying not to let bloodshot eyes drift closed, propped against the headboard of the bed where the Incendiary lay unconscious. Imara had been afraid for a while last night that the potion Fen Jacin submissively—indeed, dazedly—allowed Kel Saminil to pour down his throat wasn’t going to work, but it seemed like it had finally kicked in. Perhaps she could put Goyo off a little longer; he could hardly question the Incendiary if the Incendiary was drugged unconscious, right? Imara couldn’t even detect any dreams.

Then again, she supposed she wouldn’t. If Kamen’s magic hadn’t been able to penetrate the void that was Fen Jacin, Imara didn’t imagine her own stood much of a chance. Though Imara had the finesse of years and knowledge, while Kamen had blunt power and the brass to use it. Not much of a match in an actual fight, but for something like this….

Perhaps.

“If you don’t understand it,” Fen Joori pressed, “why should we trust you to protect him?”

Imara tried not to roll her eyes. “Because at the moment, you seem to have little choice.”

Fen Joori’s lip curled but he went silent. Thank the gods. Honestly, did these people think she had nothing better…? No, she wasn’t going to let herself bow to the antagonism. She would remember that they had every right to suspicion. And she would remember that this was the earth-bound who’d released the Ancestors and sent them home, and that Wolf had marked him. A Jin imprisoned all his life by the Adan, and what had Temshiel or maijin ever done for his people in his lifetime but use and hurt them? Well, besides Kamen, of course, but if Imara was reading Fen Joori correctly, Kamen was only a little higher in his esteem than Asai. Which, she had no doubt, pleased Kamen immensely.

A smirk threatened.

“He’s had enough,” Fen Joori said quietly, fingers idly teasing at his brother’s hair. “You saw him. He can’t take much more.

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