The Burning White (Lightbringer #5) - Brent Weeks Page 0,170

shin, trapping her.

Levering her other foot against him, and arching her back to press against the wall, she tried to push his weight off her leg.

He rolled with it suddenly, surprising her and snatching her leg with a hand. It sent her flipping over him. She was obviously lighter than he’d expected.

He threw a punch at her leg, but missed. Catching a glimpse of his face, she saw the collision with the wall had made him tighten his eyes from sub-red back to the visible spectra. In the dark, he was momentarily blind.

But vision wasn’t nearly as important when grappling.

She threw a knee into his face, and teeth and blood exploded everywhere.

He roared, falling back on the bed, but the motherfucker did not let go of her leg.

Using her trapped foot to brace herself as if she were doing a great sit-up, Teia levered herself upright. She kicked at his kidney, once, twice. He blocked, blocked, trapped her right foot hard against his side, under his arm against his ribs again, and rolled to fling her over him.

But she’d been expecting it.

As he rolled, it freed her foot from the ground, allowing her to spin. She pulled herself down toward him with her trapped left leg, and jump-stomped on his head with her right.

He lost his grip, and she tumbled across the room away from him.

This time she rolled to her feet first.

He shook his head like an enraged bull, snot and sweat and blood and bits of broken teeth streaming from him. He reached one hand out toward the wall, perhaps to steady himself, even as his eyes flared back to sub-red.

Where was all the paryl she’d packed? Had she lost it all?

Then Halfcock plucked Teia’s dagger from where it had been buried in the wall, unseen by her, and his face filled with grim triumph as he saw the warm glow of her small figure against the dark cold.

He crouched to pounce—and dropped like a sack of slops before the pigs as Teia’s last paryl pinched his spine.

She sealed the crystal—important to hold the paryl open while the target dropped, so they don’t break the crystal with their fall. Then she turned her back and limped to the door. She opened it, trying to appear careless, but attuned to any sound in case she’d screwed up anything else.

Fresh, cold, alien paryl filled her lungs. It was power. It was life.

Life was good. Better than the alternative, today. She filled herself full of her monochrome power, then closed the door again. Barred it.

“So, Halfcock,” she said, “let’s talk about the Order.”

Chapter 47

“We’re missing something,” Karris said as Andross approached her at her morning forms, and the sweat dripped from her trembling shoulders. But she kept her voice level. The exercise was making her mind sharp once more. “Something that may cost us the war.”

“It’s so nice to see you taking a break from our labors, daughter,” Andross said, as if the Blackguard training yard were his home, not hers. “Grinwoody was just worrying for your health, wondering if you were pregnant. The weight gain, you understand.”

That shot a bolt of fury through her. She almost lost her balance.

She could hear the smile in his voice. “Naturally, I punished him for such impudence. But I’m so glad to see you returning to the sweat and grime you rose from, like a flame eagle rising from the ashes of its old home—oh dear, pardon, that came out all muddled. I didn’t mean to mention ashes to a White Oak.”

She continued the form. Breath in, foot held above waist height, imagine a smug face for the next strike. She snapped it out, then held the position perfectly.

“I’m beginning to worry about your health, father,” Karris said. Don’t say it, Karris. “I know it’s not age. You’re very sharp for your advanced years. But you seem irritable, pissy . . . are you premenstrual perhaps? I know a good masseuse.”

“Oh, I know you do,” Andross said. His voice was ice. “Rhoda works for me, you know. Has a lovely way of turning your neck just so, doesn’t she? Just shy of where you worry it’ll break. Hmm.”

And now her fury stilled. The threat chilled her.

It was pure Andross Guile to try to drive a wedge between Karris and anyone who brought her joy. But as she thought about it, she had a hard time believing Andross would tolerate Rhoda’s insouciant flamboyance, or Rhoda Andross’s icy disapproval. No, Andross was simply aware that the