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Chapter 48

The Red King raised the knife overlittle scream, a helpless, hopeless wail of terror and despair - and as hard as I fought with the new strength given od about it

I didn&039;t have to

White light erupted over the altar fro let out a screaht hand, the one holding the stone knife, leapt off of his arh the air It fell to the stone floor, still clutched hard around the leather-wrapped hilt of the knife, and the obsidian blade shattered like a dropped dish

I let out a shout as I felt the Red King&039;s will slip off of me The others still held me in place, but I suddenly knew that I couldreeled back screao!" and sent a wash of fire to uar warrior who still stood a couple of feet inside the doorway He tried to flee, and only wound up screa down the deadly steep steps of the pyra my spell found his flesh and set it afla me from the far side of the altar I couldn&039;t have risked throwing destructive energy at the on the altar between us, and I&039;d had no choice but to take out the immediate threat of the warrior so that I could focus on the Lords and the Red King - otherwise it would have been relatively sied by the vaame - and my physical backup was a hell of a lot better than theirs

I drew in my oill and lifted olden masks entered the temple

Where did all these yo-yos co, and the pressure of hostile minds upon me abruptly doubled My left arht aras, as if the muscles in it had become totally exhausted, and the tip of the sword clinked as it hit the stone floor

The Red King rose, and stared for a ht over it As he did, his freaking hand began to writhe like a spider - and a second later, it flipped itself over and began to crawl back over toward hiht I tried to fight ainst ht could only be Susan, veiled behind the Leanansidhe&039;s handiwork and wielding Aht interested in protectingaround Chich¨¦n Itz¨¢? She hadn&039;t attacked yet, instead standing over Maggie - I wanted to scream at her to take him, that it was her only chance If she didn&039;t, the Red King and his Lords could take her out aluar warrior

But he didn&039;t - and in a flash of insight, I understood why he didn&039;t

He didn&039;t knohat the light was

He knew only that it had hurt him when he had tried to murder the child Fro - an archangel standing guard, or a spirit of light as terrible as the Ick had been foul I thought back to the voice coment upon the Red Court, and suddenly understood as : that the entity over the altarhe did not think actually existed - like maybe the real Kukulcan

And he was afraid

Susan couldn&039;t do anything If she acted, if she revealed what she was, the enemy&039;s uncertainty would vanish and the conflict would iain Outnumbered so heavily, she wouldn&039;t have a chance

But she knehat she had, in uncertainty and fear, and she neither moved nor made a sound It was a weapon as potent as the wills of the de But it was a fragile weapon, a sword lass, and I felt my eyes drawn to the broken pieces of obsidian on the floor

I couldn&039;t move - and time was not our ally With every moment that passed, the anized, recover more from the shock of the sudden invasion of a small army smack in the middle of their holiday celebration I needed an opportunity, a ie out of this ainst the wills of the Lords of Outer Night, unable totheir attention locked upon olden ain with the first, tried to test each individual will, to find out which would be the weakest point of attack when hosted into the te absolutely no sound, and it looked to h All of the Lords present were focused on ht shohile his severed hand crawled its way up his leg and hopped over to his wounded arm, where rubbery tendrils of black ooze iman intertwining

Martin had walked into what had to be a Fellowship operative&039;s wet drea&039;s naked back, and no one to stop hi medieval on the leader of the vile edifice of power and terror that was the Red Court

He took the machete from its sheath without a whisper of steel on nylon and drew back, readying himself to strike There was an intensity of focus in his face that I had never seen before

He closed the last two steps in a superquick blur, went into a spin, and I was getting ready to cheer -

- when his foot swept up to streak savagely through the air beneath the glohite light

I heard Susan let out a cry as she fell, startled by the blow Martin, ot close to her, his ar between the the ht as he did - and suddenly Susan was fully visible, bowed into a painful arch by Martin&039;s grip on her The feather cloak had fallen froainst her throat

I screae It came out as a sort of vocalized seethe

The Red King took a swift step back as Martin attacked, his eyes intent Then, when Susan appeared, his head tilted as he worked through what he was seeing

"Please excuse ht bow of his head to the Red King "Drop it," he said in a flat voice to Susan He twisted his bodythe ainst her throat even harder, until Susan&039;s fingers opened and A

"A trick," said the Red King Anger began to pour off of him "A charlatan&039;s trick" His eyes moved from Susan up to Martin "And you have revealed yourself"

"I beg your forgiveness, my lord," Martin said "It seean reo By this time tomorrow, there won&039;t be an operative left alive south of the United States And our financial division will have taken or destroyed well over ninety percent of their accounts"

"You son of a bitch," Susan said, her voice overfloith pain "You fucking traitor"

Martin&039;s expression flickered at her words But his eyes never left the Red King "I give you the Fellowship of St Giles, rantmore contempt and hate into the word than should have been possible "What could they possibly give you, Martin, to make it worth what you&039;ve done?"

The Red King stared at Susan and said, "Explain it to her"

"You misunderstand," Martin said calmly "I have not betrayed the Fellowship, Susan This was the plan from the moment I joined it Think You&039;ve known me for less than a decade and you&039;ve seen how near some of our scrapes have been Did you truly believe I had survived a hundred and fifty years of battle against the Red Court, outlived every other operative ever to serve the Fellowship on my own merits?" He shook his head "No Escapes were provided As were targets It took me fifty years and I had to personally kill two ofmuch as I was, to win the trust of the Fellowship Once they admitted me to the inner circle, their time had come Trust is a poison, Susan It took another century to ferret out their secrets, but it is finally done And our people will finish reful sense, by tomorrow It is over"

Susan&039;s eyes flickered over toin on herself Susan&039;s face isted with pain There were furious tears in her eyes as she looked at me

And I couldn&039;t even speak to her

"And what do you get?" Susan asked her, voice shaking

"Ascension," said the Red King "I have no interest in ad bloodthirsty lunatics to the nobility of my Court Martin has proven himself - his dedication, his self-control, and, most important, his competence, over the course of decades He was a priest for fifty years before he was even permitted to attempt this service"

"Honestly, Susan," Martin said "I told you many times that you can never let emotion interfere with your duties If you had listened to ht on I would have been forced to kill you, as I have several others ere too wise for their own good, but you would have known"

Susan closed her eyes She was shaking "Of course You could ie"

"Correct," he said quietly He turned back to the Red King "My lord, I beg your forgiveness I sought only to give you that which you wished, and the ti made it necessary for me to act, or see the opportunity pass us by"

"Under the circu said "If the strike teams are as successful as you predict, you will have your reward and ratitude"

Martin bowed his head to the Red King, and then looked up at me He studied my face for a er in his sash, my lord, should you wish to co took a deep breath and then blew it out, his expression beco almost benevolent "Martin, Martin, the voice of practicality We&039;ve been lost without you"

"My lord is too kind," Martin said "Please accept my condolences on the loss of Arianna, my lord She was a remarkable wo said "Deter new opportunities She and her entire coterie, determined to underood upon her promise to break the back of the accursed White Council, she would have been a real threat toon it, but her death was meant to be"

"As you say,approached er in , but Martin wasI could do The deck had been stacked so hard against rim His treachery had come at the idealI could

Long ago, when I was little more than a child, my first lover and I had devised a spell to let us speak silently to each other in class It wasstone Ebenezar had crafted, but sie I had never used to it communicate with anyone but Elaine, but Susan had been intiht that at that ie

It h to establish the link, even if it was only one-way

I grasped for thechains of the wills of the Lords of Outer Night, and cast ht at Susan as clearly as I could He doesn&039;t know all of it, I sent to her desperately He doesn&039;t know about the enchant your skin He only knows about the cloak because he saw you use it e got here

Susan&039;s eyes widened briefly She&039;d heard ht The ritual meant to kill us can be turned back upon theo after their bloodline, not ours

Her eyes widenedfuriously

"Martin," she asked quietly "Why did Arianna target gie, and then away "Because the child&039;s father is the son of Margaret LeFay, the daughter of theher, this way she would avenge herself upon all of you"

If I hadn&039;t already been more or less aret LeFay Daughter of the man who had killed Arianna&039;s husband (and vaa Who had been destroyed by the Blackstaff

Ebenezar McCoy

One of the erous wizards in the world A man of such personal and political power that she would never have been able to take hih his bloodline Froie Kill the child and kill us all

That hat Arianna had meant when she said it wasn&039;t about randfather

Suddenly it made sense that the oldhimselfJustin DuMorne Suddenly it made sense why he had been so patient with me, so considerate, so kind It hadn&039;t just been an act of random kindness

And suddenly it made sense why he would barely ever speak of his apprentice, Margaret LeFay - a name she&039;d earned for herself, when her birth certificate aret McCoy Hell, for that aret was his daughter I sure as hell had no intentions of letting theot her out of this mess

My mother had eventually been killed by eneerous man on the White Council, had not been there to save her The circumstances wouldn&039;t matter No matter what he&039;d accoive hihter&039;s life, any ie It hy he had made a statement, a demonstration of ould happen to those who ca, preerandson

And it explained why he had changed the Grey Council&039;s focus and led theirl

And, soh I wasn&039;t even sure that would be a conscious thought on his part, underneath the mountain of issues he had accrued

No wonder Arianna had been so hot and bothered to use the bloodline curse, starting with Maggie She&039;d avenge herself upon race to die in a duel, and upon Ebenezar, who had sierous animal, a workaday h profile Arianna oing exploits against the Reds and their allies would only have le curse, she&039;d kill one of the Senior Council and the Blackstaff all at once My death would be so to crow about, too - since, as Arianna herself had noted, no one had pulled it off yet - and I felt I could confidently lay claim to the title of Most Infaan&039;s death

For Arianna, what a coup And after that, presu was holding the knife, he got the best of all worlds Dead enee, and a more secure throne No-brainer