The Sylph Hunter Read online

  Easier to see were the sylphs. Water and earth sylphs didn’t fly, of course, but she could see all the other types flying around, many of them swooping past the balcony as they saw she was there, calling their morning greetings to their queen. Eapha smiled and waved back at them. Their voices were so sweet in her mind. For all of them to have their freedom still felt like such a gift to her.

  Eapha turned away from the beautiful view, raising her hands through her thick hair as she took a deep breath. The wind teased against her skin and she spun gently, moving her feet and legs into a dance. She’d always loved to dance in the harem, spending hours at a time perfecting the movement of legs, hips, and arms.

  Eapha danced on the balcony, throwing her arms up as she swung her hips and belly, lifting up onto her toes and then down again, crossing the stone as though it were her own personal stage.

  Only one pair of eyes watched her performance. Unblinking and the color of fire, they regarded her from within the bedroom, half hidden by the mass of sheets piled atop the bed. Unaware, Eapha continued dancing, her eyes closed and her lips wide in a smile as she moved her legs and arms, kicking them high and spinning more. The eyes continued to watch as she raised her arms back over her head, rotating her entire body from the waist.

  Finally, the owner of the eyes got up and padded out onto the balcony. Four inches taller than Eapha’s five foot six, his skin was even darker, his hair short with sideburns that reached down to his narrow beard. Lean with muscle, he padded nude to the side of the dancing woman, ducking in around her spin and catching her in his arms, her back against his chest and his hands soft against her breasts.

  Eapha gasped as he caught her, her arms coming down as he caressed her breasts, his thumbs rubbing gently against her nipples. “Tooie,” she breathed. The battle sylph who’d made her queen of Meridal mouthed his way down her neck, licking the curve of her shoulder as his hands continued massaging her breasts and then gripped her robe, yanking it open. Eapha leaned back against him, her eyes closed as her breath deepened with desire. Tooie’s lust was flowing through her, making her damp for him, and he pulled the robe away, his body warm and hard against her back and buttocks. His hands left her breasts, moving down her bare skin and between her legs, where his fingers were gentler still.

  “Didn’t you get enough last night?” she whispered, turning her head to the side and up toward him. He kept her up late most nights as it was.

  “Never,” he breathed and kissed her.

  As always since she’d become his master and then his queen, Eapha thought she’d never breathe again. She could feel his pleasure as his mouth covered hers, the touch of her skin against his body, all as clearly as she felt her own joys. More, she could feel how he felt them as well. Their combined pleasure created a cycle, always reinforcing itself, always growing, binding them soul to soul and making her cry out even before he lifted her enough to slide his silky length inside.

  Eapha’s back arched, her mouth gasping for breath as she leaned back against him, letting him do as he wished. Tooie lifted her up again, holding her beneath her thighs and against him as he thrust into her. It was perfection. Eapha rode the waves of pleasure, loving him, feeling him love her, and letting the core of that love grow until it overwhelmed them both, exploding through her.

  Tooie set her gently down onto the stone, Eapha leaning against him for a moment while her legs trembled. Quickly, she belted her robe closed again and kissed him.

  “Do you think any sylphs saw that?” she asked, only a little embarrassed at the possibility. Public sex had been something of an occupational hazard during her years as a concubine.

  Tooie shrugged, his whole torso shifting with the motion, his red eyes—made that way since it was her favorite color—crinkling shut. “If they did, the elementals wouldn’t care.” They were all neuter anyway.

  “And the battlers?” she teased.

  “Ten seconds into that and they probably ran off to find their own masters.”

  Eapha laughed and he nuzzled her. It was most likely true. All battle sylphs were sensualists and loved sex, which was why the old emperor had ordered them kept docile by giving them beautiful women, and most of the nearly seven hundred of them in Meridal either had female masters or were looking for one. None of them were staying willingly with the strictly male feeders who’d been caged to provide them with energy, but they had no choice until they found a woman who was willing to take the place of each sylph’s feeders. Of the men who’d once actually commanded the battlers, Eapha didn’t think there were any left. Sylphs were bound to whoever named them when they first crossed the gate into the world. During the emperor’s rule, those masters would then order their sylphs to obey the commands of dozens of other men in a complex hierarchy of control that made Eapha wonder how the sylphs could keep it all straight. The command of a master, however, was inviolate, trumped only by the word of Eapha, once she became queen. She could overrule the hierarchy, but the battlers weren’t willing to take chances. If there were any men left who once gave orders, they wouldn’t last long. The sylphs could track them through the same bond their masters used to make them obey.

  Not that it mattered. Meridal was at peace, the emperor was gone, and the sylphs were in charge. Eapha kissed her lover again and preceded him back into the bedroom. He probably wouldn’t let her get out of it for a while longer, but it didn’t really matter.

  She had nothing important to do today anyway.

  Zalia woke long before the sun rose high enough to take the chill off the desert. Opening her eyes, she looked from her blankets to the other side of the small hovel she shared with her father. Xehm was lying on his own blanket, his mouth hanging lax as he snored. Grimacing, since sand didn’t make a comfortable bed, she checked her blankets to make sure an asp or scorpion hadn’t bedded down with her, and then rose and dressed. Her only dress was old and worn, but still serviceable enough given she would be wearing an apron over it once she got to work. Slipping it on, she put on her sandals and went outside, shivering in the cold air. For all the heat of the desert during the day, it froze at night and even the fires they burned weren’t enough to keep them warm.

  There were close to forty hovels just outside the city, built by the lee of a massive boulder where the winds weren’t so bad. The hovels themselves were made of stone or whatever other materials they could find, all inhabited by people who were living on the edge of starvation, even in what was supposed to be Meridal’s new golden age.

  Leon Petrule had told them things would change with a human woman as queen of the sylphs. Zalia certainly didn’t blame him for being wrong, but he’d left and nothing was really different. At least, not for her and her father, or any of their neighbors, and what had changed didn’t seem to be for the better for anyone.

  Zalia made her way through the darkness and climbed over the crumbling wall that marked the edge of the city itself. From there, she started down the narrow streets that would take her to its heart, going past tall, narrow buildings jammed in like too many teeth crowded into a mouth. Some were abandoned, surely had to be abandoned with all the people the battlers killed in the last weeks, but no one was really sure who owned what. There were people who had laid claim to entire neighborhoods, and if they had a sylph, the battlers took their word as truth. Those who didn’t have a sylph were entitled to nothing. So no one lived in most of the houses and she and her father still had to scrape a living, surviving in the hovels that no one else wanted. It was a cruel thing, but she’d grown used to cruelty in her life.

  Her arms wrapped around herself, Zalia trotted down the roads, trying to keep warm. Her shift started at daybreak and if she were late, there were hundreds of other hungry women who’d be willing to take her place for the few pennies she made. It was barely enough to buy food and water with, but it was better than the alternative. She couldn’t arrive like this though. Presentable as her dress might have
been, the rest of her wasn’t.

  She came at last to an extensive series of stables that had once housed the finest steeds in the city. Now the animals stood listlessly in their paddocks and stalls, tossing their tails at flies. All of them were looking thin from lack of proper care, though the sylphs were trying. There was no telling where most of their human tenders had gone, as hundreds of humans had abandoned the city in the first weeks after the queen’s ascension, preferring the familiarity of human rule offered in other cities.

  Zalia darted behind one of the stables. There was a barrel of tepid water there, good enough to drink and certainly decent enough to bathe in. Glancing around quickly, she filled her water bag and then pulled a bar of fatty soap out of her pocket and stripped her dress over her head, laying it carefully over a fence. Rapists she didn’t worry about, not in a city of battlers, but if there were any supervisors left at the stable and they sent her away, she wouldn’t have anywhere to bathe. That would cost her her job and her father only worked consistently during the fall slaughtering of the livestock. There was no guarantee that would even happen this year either, given how things were going.

  She bathed as quickly as she could, rubbing wet soap over her body and gasping at how cold it was. The sun was still down and she jumped up and down to keep warm, her teeth chattering furiously. Her hair at least was good enough for her to get away with just a thorough brushing. The days she had to wash it were truly hellish. Splashing the water over herself, she gasped again, shuddering violently.

  “Pretty,” a voice said.

  Zalia spun with a shriek, her hands up to cover herself. Standing by the side of the stable was a tall, muscular man dressed in a white shirt and pants that went to his knees. He was barefoot and he smiled at her, his teeth gleaming white in the darkness.

  “Very pretty,” he told her.

  Zalia jumped for her dress, dropping the soap. She grabbed it up, but he caught her, his hand closing around her wrist as his warmth pressed against her cold back. “Don’t,” he purred. “I like you bare.”

  Zalia screamed, shoving back against him as hard as she could. He was much stronger than her and his nose pressed against the side of her neck, sniffing. Where were the battlers? she thought in a panic. Even before everything changed, they would tear rapists apart.

  There were no battlers in sight though, and something was happening to her. Zalia’s cold body was becoming very warm where he blanketed her, his arm sliding around her. She clung to the fence with her fingers, frightened and not understanding, but she was becoming very aroused, almost painfully so. The arm he had around her slid up to cup her breast and she cried out softly, the shock of his touch arching through her entire body and down to her toes. He nibbled on her ear and she shuddered, the place between her legs tingling with need.

  What was wrong with her? She’d never been with any man in her life, but here she was nude with a stranger, just standing there while he adjusted himself, preparing to take her against an old stable fence where anyone might come and see. She couldn’t seem to get enough air and lust had swamped her brain.

  Her attacker sighed happily, shifting behind her, and she felt something that was strong as steel but coated with velvet press against her. She almost wanted to let him, her belly screaming that she allow it to happen. One push and it would be done, but a tear trickled down her cheek from the eyes she squeezed shut.

  “Don’t,” she whispered.

  He hesitated, stopping against her. “What?”

  “Don’t,” she repeated. “Please let me go.”

  “But,” he protested. “You want it.”

  No, she didn’t. This wasn’t real, it couldn’t be real. “No. Please!”

  He huffed, sounding more confused and disappointed than angry, and stepped back, releasing her. At the same time, the lust that had been all but consuming her vanished and she was left shivering and sick to her stomach. Grabbing her waterskins and the dress, close to tearing the cloth as she yanked it over her head, Zalia ran, looking back fearfully over her shoulder while she did.

  He still stood where he’d been left, staring morosely after her. His shirt had pulled mostly open and his pants were undone, showing the part of him that had nearly taken what she hadn’t been prepared to give. Yet it was the sight of the tattoo branded on the dark skin over his heart that made her gasp. 111. It was the marker brand of a battle sylph. A battle sylph had nearly taken her for his lover and what would have happened to her then?

  Zalia ran on, afraid to look back again.

  One-Eleven, since he hadn’t thought of a name for himself yet and had the romantic notion that his new master would choose it for him, watched her go. She’d been so beautiful when he saw her from above, bathing in the water with her lovely breasts bouncing, the dawn’s light glimmering off the beads of water on her nipples.

  It hadn’t occurred to him that she might not want to make love with him. The women in the harem had always been willing and they were the only women he really had experience with.

  Since the queen rose, everything had become confusing. There were close to seven hundred battle sylphs in the kingdom, but only a hundred concubines. None of them were available anymore. Most had already been bound as masters to battlers and, to his amazement, some had chosen not to have a battle sylph at all. They had all left the kingdom, not that he understood why. One-Eleven had been spending weeks trying to find a female master among the women in the city who made his heart sing.

  It hadn’t been as easy as he’d expected. His old orders had told him to leave women alone unless they were concubines. It hadn’t occurred to him during those years that other women wouldn’t be interested. Now they seemed to think he was some kind of monster and the idea of making love with him was repugnant to them. Empathic, he could feel it, and it hurt.

  Finally though, he’d found this lovely creature. Seeing her nude and unafraid, he’d thought that she was different from the other women, more open with her love like the concubines. He’d gone to greet her and she’d turned away. Almost though, almost he’d had her.

  It was too much to give up on. One-Eleven straightened his clothing and frowned, looking through the darkness in the direction she’d gone. He had her pattern now; if he got close enough, he could find her again. He’d convince her to be his master, he decided. She was frightened of him? He’d change that. He’d find a way to make her love him, and then everything would be perfect.

  CHAPTER TWO

  The Racing Dawn dropped gently toward its cradle in the biggest harbor Devon had ever seen. He’d heard how big Meridal’s harbor was, but the reality was almost unbelievable. Wharfs that stretched out a mile or more into deep blue waters had oceangoing vessels of all kinds docked at them. Hundreds of people went back and forth along them, working around numerous piles of stacked goods. Devon’s ship passed over all of them, and the young man looked nervously over the side while it did. Even more impressive than the wharves was the huge city that sat on the edge of the shore, framed by beige sand that seemed to go on forever.

  “It’s unbelievable,” he murmured, feeling intimidated and utterly out of his depth.

  I thought you were afraid of heights, Airi said to him.

  “Don’t remind me.” He blew out a breath and watched the ship lower to the ground, settling into a wooden cradle beside the pier. It was close enough to the oceangoing ships to make moving cargo easier, but still above the waterline. The feel of the ship stopping sent a shock through his legs and Devon staggered a bit, grabbing the railing for balance.

  We’re here, Airi said.

  So they were. Devon looked out over the city that he’d come to as Solie’s ambassador. Just within the area around the ship’s cradle, he could see a marketplace fifty times larger than the square in the Valley and streets flanked with tan buildings that led to an immense wall encircling the city. Beyond it, the city itself rose, tall bu
ildings stepping back into the hazy distance. Looking at the far horizon, Devon wasn’t sure when the land gave itself up to the sky. He’d never seen such a massive city before. The heat, once the ship’s air sylph dropped her shields, was immense.

  When Leon had briefed him on Meridal, he’d described how large the city was. Devon just hadn’t been able to appreciate what he’d heard until he saw it for himself. The older man had also told him that the streets were crammed with people, so much so that it was hard to go anywhere without bumping into someone.

  That part of the description didn’t match. The harbor was indeed filled with ships and their crews, but the streets themselves were next to empty, with only a few dozen people that he could see. The men coming up from the wharves seemed confused, as if they were expecting the thronging crowds Leon had talked about as well.

  Devon started looking more closely at the buildings at that point. There were a lot of them, yes, but when he paid attention, he could see they were worn down and in poor repair, their colors and edges dulled by sand and neglect. There were holes in the street as well, none patched, and garbage in every gutter. Animal waste was left to bake in the sun and lent to the overwhelming stink of poverty.

  “It’s a slum,” he murmured.

  The chancellor did say that most of the wealth had been kept by the nobles on a floating island, Airi said uncertainly.

  “Yes…” He searched the skies for it, though of course, Leon had told him about the hundreds of battlers who bore the floating island out into the ocean and dropped it into the waters, along with the entire ruling class of the city. The only thing Devon saw in the sky now was what might have been a tiny floating building, though it was so far away it was hard to tell.