“Why?” He blinked again and looked around, his eyes widening farther, which Kaylin would have bet was impossible. He turned quickly to his right. “Get Michael,” he said. “Michael!”
He was clearly looking for someone. “There’s no one else here,” Kaylin told him as Severn began to pull him back toward the safe side of the street.
“He was right beside me,” the man insisted. “We were—” He frowned. “We were heading to Luvarr’s.”
“You were heading in the wrong direction. There was no one else with you.” Kaylin’s hands slid to the tops of her daggers as she gazed down at the street. At the height of day, the boundary that existed between Tiamaris and Nightshade seemed almost invisible. But Kaylin looked toward the fief of her childhood, the street that continued into it, and the buildings that stood at its edge, drained of all color. What was left was gray, black, and white. The border had a width that normal maps didn’t give it.
“Kaylin?”
She shook her head. Something about the shapes of the buildings looked wrong at this distance. “Take him back to Tara.”
“Not without you.”
Yvander was bewildered. “I don’t understand,” he said in a tone of voice that made him sound much younger than he looked. “Why am I here? Where’s Michael?”
“That’s a good question. Go back to the Lady,” Kaylin said gently. “I’ll look for Michael.”
“Kaylin—”
“That will not be necessary.” The fieflord stood yards away, the Tower’s Avatar—and his figurative crown—to his left. “Yvander.”
The young man dropped to his knees with no grace at all; Kaylin suspected fear had caused his legs to collapse. “Lord.”
There was no official title for the fieflord, because if you were very, very lucky, you never had to meet him. Tiamaris, however, accepted this in stride. He turned to Tara. “Lady, this is Yvander?”
She nodded, her eyes obsidian, her wings high. “You were not with Michael,” she said.
“I—I was, Lady— He was just—he was right here.…” Severn caught his arm and helped him to his feet, for a value of help that saw the Hawk doing most of the heavy lifting. He then guided him toward Tara, who hadn’t moved an inch. As Yvander approached, she lowered her wings.
“Private Neya.”
“Lord Tiamaris.”
“Tara does not believe it is wise to remain where you are standing.”
Kaylin turned to look back at the street. “Tara, can you come here?”
“I? No.”
“You’re certain?”
“I am the Tower, Kaylin; in exchange for power within the boundaries ascribed me by my creators, I am left with very little beyond them.”
“This is now beyond your boundaries?”
“Yes.”
“And in theory, that means I’m standing in Nightshade.”
Tara was silent for a long moment. “You are aware that that is not the case.”
Kaylin nodded slowly. “But I don’t understand why.”
“Come back to Tiamaris, Kaylin.”
Kaylin, however, frowned as she caught movement out of the corner of her eye. Someone was standing at the window of one of the gray, washed-out buildings. He wasn’t gray in the way the buildings were; he wore loose robes that might have been at home in the High Halls. She recognized the long, black drape of Barrani hair.
His eyes widened as he realized she was looking directly at him.
“Tara, there’s someone here!”
Severn sprinted across the ill-defined border to her side as the hair on the back of her neck began to stand on end. She had enough time—barely—to throw herself to the side before the street where she’d been standing—gray and colorless though it was—erupted in a livid purple fire. She rolled to her feet and leapt again as the fire bloomed a yard away.
The small dragon squawked in her ear; he’d been so still and so quiet she’d almost forgotten he was attached. “Go somewhere safer,” she told him sharply.
Her skin ached as her clothing brushed against it, but she didn’t need the pain to know that magic was being used. Severn stopped in front of the building as he unleashed his weapon’s chain. “Get behind me!”
Kaylin managed to avoid a third volley of ugly purple fire, and the leap carried her more or less to Severn’s side, where she narrowly avoided his spinning chain. The fourth gout of flame broke against the barrier created by the chain’s arc.
“Kaylin!” Tara said, raising her voice. It wasn’t shouting, not in the strict sense of the word. Her voice sounded normal, if worried, but much, much louder.
She heard a curt, sharp curse—in a normal voice, if Dragon voices could be said to be normal. A shadow crossed the ground as Lord Tiamaris of the Dragon Court left his demesne. He landed to the left of where Severn now wielded his weapon, his wings folding as he lifted his neck toward the building that contained the unknown Barrani.
The ground didn’t shake at the force of his landing; it gave, as if it were soft sand and not cracked stone. Or as if it were flesh. It reminded Kaylin strongly of the gray stretch of nothingness that existed between worlds, although it in theory had shape, form, texture.
The unmistakable sound of a Dragon inhaling was surprisingly loud when it happened right beside your ear. Purple fire broke against Severn’s chain and sizzled where it touched Tiamaris; Kaylin could no longer be certain that the blasts were aimed at her, they were so broad. Tiamaris was angry enough that he didn’t appear to notice them.
The Dragon fieflord exhaled fire. Had the building been a regular fief hovel, it would have been glowing. This one, although it had the shape leeched of color, wavered in the wake of the flame, undulating as it slowly lost coherence. If the Barrani Lord was caught in the Dragon’s fire, he made no sign, but in the distance, Kaylin could hear weeping. It was soft, attenuated, and clear somehow over the roar of flame.
She reached out and rapped Tiamaris; he didn’t appear to notice.
The building continued to waver, melting at last into a gray smoke or fog. She would have panicked, but the crying didn’t get any louder; it was almost as if it were entirely unrelated to the demise of the building itself. Only when that building was gone did Tiamaris acknowledge Kaylin.
“You should not be here,” he told her in his deep, bass rumble.
“You’re here,” she pointed out, perhaps unwisely given the color of his eyes. “Severn, can you hear that?”
Tiamaris hadn’t looked away, but the question caught Severn’s attention. “Hear what?”
“I’ll
