Read Online Wolf's-own: Weregild by Carole Cummings - Free Book Online Page B

possibility—and he'd truly hate to see Jacin-rei lose more than he had to. Still, the boy might well make it necessary to take a ruthless step or two. Asai would debate the value of laying the responsibility at Jacin-rei's feet later, after Fate had set the Cycle, when Asai was better able to gauge the feasibility of keeping his Ghost. Guilt was always an efficient tool, when it came to Jacin-rei, but there was such a thing as too much of a good thing. Asai was going to have to be very careful when Jacin-rei found his way back to his beishin.
    Still, he'd had his glimpse, he knew now, knew the who, the what and the where— on his own lands , for pity's sake; he could weep at the frustrating irony, in his reach all that time, and he hadn't seen it—but he couldn't help the frisson of unease that curled up his backbone. He needed Temshiel , certainly, but he hadn't counted on Kamen. In fact, Asai had rather thought Kamen had retreated to spirit after... well. And Asai certainly hadn't counted on the Catalyst's Temshiel being one of Wolf's-own. It could complicate matters beyond repair if Asai wasn't extraordinarily careful, and there wasn't time to start again. There was less than a decade left in the Cycle, and he saw no possibilities in any of the other pitiable Untouchables—whether born or as yet unborn—fated to be crushed in the Wheels before the Cycle was through. Not a true Catalyst among them. It was, and had always been, Jacin-rei who held the Balance.
    Damn, damn, damn the boy for slipping his traces before Asai had set his course.
    "Seyh?” Vonshi knocked softly on the jamb of the open door and entered the study with his head bowed in apology. “She will not leave, seyh. She insists she must see you."
    Damn. He'd rather thought she wouldn't take, Lord Asai is abed, come back tomorrow , for an answer, but he'd hoped. He knew what he needed to know, and he saw no real reason to listen to her tell it to him. He'd caught the “where” from the little one, but the “who” came directly from Leu not an hour after she'd gone to collect her thugs. Asai had known she failed before she'd even crossed onto his lands.
    He sighed, gave Vonshi a weary nod, and rubbed at the headache winding beneath his right temple. “Show her in, then."
    He'd only caught a brief spark of his prospects through the little girl tonight, but it had been enough to show him what he had to work with now, before the veil had clamped down tight over her and hers again, even more impenetrable than it had been for all the months preceding. And no wonder—he was dealing with Kamen, Wolf's-own, already the strongest of the Temshiel , handed unprecedented power by his god when Wolf made him, and now in his own Cycle, apparently emerged from his retreat and taking up his place again. Tantalizing, to imagine all that power at Asai's own fingertips. The possibility was nearly torment for its lack of present reality, but that unease wouldn't leave him.
    Kamen didn't take losing very well, and he'd lost spectacularly. And now he knew Asai was here, perhaps had known all along, and it was too much to hope he didn't know already what Asai was after. If he was still angry over Skel—and of course he would be; Kamen had petitioned to have Asai sent to the suns , for pity's sake—he might well do his best to interfere, would not hear the sense in the liberation of the Jin, and if Kamen learned that Skel's Blood had been instrumental in obtaining the Blood of others— Skel's Blood....
    Asai couldn't help the shudder.
    Still... he knew what appealed to Kamen, knew what set his too naked, mortal-bound heart to thumping, knew his rage, when all was said and done, was less on Skel's behalf than it was unreasonable emotional reaction to an affront to his senses of loyalty and justice. Knew why Kamen had loved Skel, what had attracted him. And Asai himself had built the Catalyst. Perhaps he'd foreseen more than even he'd suspected.
    "This way, please, misin