Darri moved with the force of her kick, rol ing over and onto her feet with an ef ort that wrenched her back.
Blood dripped down the side of her neck, but not enough to concern herself with. She shot a quick glance at Jano, caught in a tangle of translucent boy and opaque bed, then raced across the room and scooped up the dagger she had kicked out of his hand.
Jano floated right up through the bedspread and went solid. “What do you plan to do with that—tickle me?”
Darri ignored him and slid to a stop in front of her brother. Varis had pul ed himself into a sit ing position, leaning against the closed door, blood spreading across his upper arm. He met her eyes and nodded. Darri stepped behind him, grabbed the hilt, and pul ed.
She grunted with the ef ort, but Varis made not the slightest noise. The dagger pul ed through his flesh with a sucking sound. Varis immediately tore of the blood-soaked sleeve and wrapped it tightly around the wound, twisting the ends under his armpit with a deft one-handed motion. Then he stood up.
Darri felt that standing up was taking stoicism a step too far. She shook her head at him, and he grinned faintly. The two of them strode side by side into the center of the room, facing Jano.
“That was a wasted ef ort,” Jano said. He stood on the bed with his feet braced wide apart. “You do remember the way things work here, right? You can’t use those against me.”
Darri passed the clean blade to Varis, who reached his uninjured arm across his chest to take it. “We know,”
she said. “But now you can’t use them against us. I invite you to try to at ack us unarmed.” She grinned, every muscle tense and ready, and felt Varis’s identical readiness beside her.
“Or you can run along,” Varis added. Blood stil seeped through the silk of his sleeve, but he appeared to be in no pain at al . Darri, who had been knifed once, knew that couldn’t be true. “Isn’t it past your bedtime?”
Darri tried to catch Varis’s eye; when he wouldn’t look at her, she looked around the room, trying to figure out where his silver dagger might be.
“You Rael ians are such a disappointment,” Jano sput ered. His face had gone beet red, which only made him look more like a child. “Even from barbarians, I expect some capacity for thought. You real y believe I can’t at ack you?”
“Do you have ghostly powers we don’t know about yet?” Varis managed to sound like he was sure of the answer to that question.
“Idiots.” Jano moved so fast his hands were a blur. “I have another dagger.”
“Idiots.” Jano moved so fast his hands were a blur. “I have another dagger.”
The blade flew straight across the room. Darri grabbed Varis’s wrist and yanked, pul ing him downward.
The third dagger sliced past her arm, leaving a sharp line of pain and a trail of blood. But instead of hit ing the door, it made the distinctive sound of a knife striking flesh.
“Ouch,” Clarisse said behind them.
Darri whirled. Clarisse stood in front of the door with the hilt protruding from her chest, sticking incongruously out from the lace that lined her bodice.
Clarisse sighed, reached up, and pul ed the blade out. It came smoothly and soundlessly, without any gush of blood. Clarisse frowned down at the rip in the front of her dress, and a moment later it was gone.
Darri glanced over her shoulder at Jano, who was so insubstantial she could barely see him. There was no way she and Varis could fight both of them—not when Clarisse had a weapon. Darri struck out anyhow, aiming her bloody steel blade at Clarisse’s wrist. At the last moment she changed direction and struck instead at the weapon in Clarisse’s hand.
Clarisse didn’t fal for it. She drew her hand back, and Darri’s blade sliced uselessly through the air. Darri staggered, of balance for what could have been a fatal moment, then whirled in a circle and threw.
Clarisse lifted her other hand and flicked her fingers. Darri’s dagger hit hers and sent both crashing to the ground, along with a thin swath of violet silk cut from Clarisse’s sleeve.
Clarisse blinked at the fal en daggers, then let out an aggrieved sigh and folded her arms across her chest.
“Right,” she said. “I keep forget ing that doesn’t work anymore.”
Darri stood panting, legs so taut they shook. She wanted to dive for the two weapons lying at Clarisse’s feet, on the of chance she could snatch them before the dead girl did. But that moment when Clarisse had avoided her strike, when Darri had been of balance, her entire right side undefended—that moment should have been fatal. Clarisse could easily have stabbed her before she recovered.
Instead of lunging for the daggers, Darri regained her breath and said, “Why are you here?”
“To finish what we started,” Jano snarled—at Clarisse, not at her.
“Oh,” Clarisse said, glancing up at him. “That plan’s been changed. Sorry, Jano—did I not tel you?”
Jano glared at her, fists clenched at his sides. “Then what are you doing here?”
Clarisse brushed an invisible speck of dust of her sleeve. “I’m here to talk to Prince Varis.”
Jano and Darri both looked at Varis, who was crouched on the floor in readiness to at ack. He rose slowly to his feet, like a snake uncoiling, his eyes fixed on Clarisse. “Why?”
Clarisse’s gaze dropped, and her voice softened. “Because I couldn’t stay away.”
Varis snorted a laugh, then winced and pressed his hand to his shoulder. Clarisse looked at the dark blood soaking through the white silk and lifted an eyebrow. “Shouldn’t you have that bound?”
“Thank you for pointing it out,” Varis said through grit ed teeth. “I haven’t had the leisure just yet.”
“Then I’l leave you to it.” She knelt smoothly to retrieve her dagger. “When you’re done . . . can I assume you know where my old rooms are?”
“Yes,” Varis said shortly.
Clarisse held her smile and his gaze. Then she stepped around Varis and held a hand out to Jano, who was now standing at the foot of the bed. “Let’s go.”
Jano folded his arms across his chest. “Why should I listen to you?”
“Because,” Clarisse said patiently, “it wil be easier than fighting me.”
“I’m hundreds of years older than you,” Jano spat. “What makes you think you can fight me?”
Clarisse considered for a moment. Then she smiled, but her teeth weren’t teeth; they were fangs, long and white. Her figure blurred and changed; her fingers lengthened, sharpened; her hair loosened from its coils and formed lashing tendrils.
Jano stumbled back, and Clarisse landed on his chest, throwing him to the ground. She crouched over him, stil wearing her rose-colored gown, a horrible mixture of human and beast. The sight of her—of the thing she had become—made bile rise in Darri’s throat. She swal owed hard, feeling it burn its way through her body.
Clarisse’s hair writhed around her head, whipping at Jano’s face. She snarled, a purely animal sound, and tore at his throat. Jano’s body turned to mist, and Clarisse’s fangs hit the floor. She snarled again as Jano rol ed out from under her and leaped away, the slashes on his face disappearing as he straightened.
Clarisse rose to her feet, and by the time she was standing she was human again: tapered fingers, finely boned face, blond hair fal ing neatly around her cheeks. When she smiled, her teeth were smal and straight.
Only her eyes stil glowed, so bril iantly green it was as if they were lit from within.
“Spirits,” she said breathlessly. “That’s my favorite part of being dead.” She whipped her head around to look at Varis, lifted her eyebrows at the horror on his face, then looked back at Jano. “Can you change your body that much, lit le boy? Because if you can, a fight between us might be fun.”
Jano stared at her, eyes wide, lower lip jut ing out. Then he shot through the air to the door, going through part of Darri’s body like a fetid chil . Darri shuddered but didn’t move, not even when Clarisse walked right past her.
At the door, Clarisse turned; and Darri couldn’t help stepping back before she saw that the ghost’s face was stil human in appearance. Clarisse slipped the dagger into her flowing sleeve, gave the room in general a satisfied smile, then walked through the closed door.
satisfied smile, then walked through the closed door.
When they were final y alone, Varis let out a long breath. “Help me wrap this wound more tightly.”
Darri waited until she was sure she could move without trembling, then crossed the room to her brother.
Several strips of linen cloth and one hastily concocted poultice later, Varis said a curt thanks and got to his feet. Darri dropped the remaining cloths when she realized that he was heading away from his bed. “You’re not actual y going to see her, are you?”
“I am. She has information that I want. And she’s no longer trying to kil us.”
“You saw what she—what she can—what she is!”
“I’l handle it.”
Darri folded her arms across her chest, and her brother laughed. “Worried about my welfare?”
“At least take a silver dagger.”
He moved his hand as if to press it to his shoulder, then changed in mid-motion and dropped it to his side instead. “And let you see where I keep them? Not likely.”
“Them? You have more than one?”
He looked annoyed and tried to step around her. Darri slid in front of him and looked up at his closed-of face.
“Varis. I need a weapon that wil work against the dead. Please.”
The word scraped against the inside of her throat, and emerged harsh and angry; but Varis hesitated, his eyes narrowed.
“It’s not that that I’m not wil ing to die,” Darri said fiercely. “But if I die here, I’l be worse than dead. Don’t let that happen. Don’t leave me helpless against them.”
Varis bit his lip, and Darri knew she had him. Just a moment ago, they had stood shoulder to shoulder against a pair of ghosts. They had done it without thought, without any need for discussion; because they were kin, and that would never change.
No mat er what Cal ie thought.
Darri stood her ground, knowing there would never be a bet er time, and final y Varis heaved a sigh. He turned his back on her and spent a few moments unlocking one of the clothes chests. When he stood, he had a steel dagger in his left hand, which he held out to her hilt first. “Try to wait as long as possible before you make me regret this.”
Darri crossed her arms over her chest. “I have daggers, Varis. A number of them, in fact.”
“It’s silver,” Varis said.
She blinked. “It doesn’t look like silver.”
“That’s rather the point.”
She took the weapon and touched a finger to the blade. Flecks of dul metal came of on her skin. “It’s coated?”
“Prescient of Father, wasn’t it?”
She turned it over in her hand. A few more flakes fel to the ground, but there was stil no silver that she could see. “Is that the plan?”
“I beg your pardon?”
She looked up at her brother. His eyes were cool and opaque again, on guard against her. That was almost a relief. “Is this Father’s plan? Silver weapons disguised as steel?”
Varis adjusted his bandage. “Don’t think so much, Darri. Just take it.” He strode past her and out the door.
Darri scowled and slid the dagger into her boot sheath. When she straightened, she was smiling grimly.
She hadn’t lied to Varis; she did need a weapon to defend herself against the dead. She had merely neglected to mention that she might also need it to at ack one of them.
I’l avenge you, Cal ie. Even if it’s too late to save you. I’l do the one thing I can.