Lupi 04 - Night Season

her. Otherwise, how would you have known about the obab?”
    â€œBut Cynna tells me everything.” He stroked her cheek. “Don’t you, sweetheart?”
    She had that puzzled look again. “The obab…that’s the slug-men, right? The ones whose touch was poison?” She looked at them again—right at Cullen, in fact. And her left eyelid dipped in a slow wink.
    Fierce and strong, victory shot through him.
    â€œOf course Aduello didn’t do that,” Cynna continued. “I don’t know why he accused you of it, ma’am, because he knows who did it. The humans.” She sighed. “There’s a cabal of them, humans unhappy with their place here in Edge. They tried to kill me because they hope to lay hands on the medallion themselves, poor fools.”
    She looped her hand around Aduello’s arm and turned a smile on the bastard so saccharine it was all Cullen could do not to laugh out loud. Or warn her not to overplay it. “Aduello would never hurt me.”
    Aduello didn’t see what Cullen saw, perhaps because he wasn’t looking. He patted Cynna absently, his attention on those confronting him. “I will allow you to take my other guests away with you, if they wish to go. I will allow you to question Cynna concerning the medallion—that is what you wish, I assume? I will even wish you well in your search. But then I must insist that you leave.”
    Kai looked at Cynna. “Ms. Weaver, do you know where the medallion is?”
    Cynna glanced first at Aduello. He nodded once. She met Kai’s eyes then and said quietly, “After the Ahk captured us, I decided I couldn’t let them find it. I misled them. We came out of the mountains well away from the medallion’s trail.”
    Kai glanced back at them. “She’s speaking the truth.”
    â€œBut I do know where it is.”
    Did Cullen imagine it, or had Aduello’s hand suddenly tightened on Cynna’s arm?
    â€œAt least I think I do,” she went on. “The trail leads back toward…” Her eyes lifted as Cullen heard movement to his left, near the grand staircase. She glanced that way, where her father, Gan, and Steve were emerging…and smiled. A real smile, a Cynna smile, cocky and reckless. “This rat bastard beside me.”
    She jerked her arm free, pushed to her feet, and jumped.
    â€œHe’s calling them!” Kai cried.
    The sidhe lining the walls burst into action, swords flashing from their sheaths as they charged.
    Cynna landed on the grass at the foot of the dais and rolled. Fire shot out from Aduello’s clenched fist, missing her by inches.
    And the woman standing silently beside Cullen—the husky woman who hadn’t spoken, whom no one had introduced to Aduello—turned into eight feet of pissed-off kitty cat.
    The sidhe flowed around Cullen, moving into the defensive circle they’d planned—but Cynna wasn’t within that circle.
    Neither was Cullen, by then. He walked forward, concentrating on fire. Fire was his , dammit—and so was the woman that rat bastard was trying to burn. He flung out his hand and sent a rope of fire to meet the one menacing Cynna.
    The two flames kissed. Clashed. Cullen felt sweat break out on his forehead. Rat bastard was strong. He opened the diamond on his finger. His flame went from orange to blue…and the tips flickered into black. Aduello looked at him, startled and furious. He spoke a word, made a gesture, and his fire vanished—replaced by a wall of water shooting up from beneath the ground.
    Mage fire could burn anything. Even water. But mage fire was damned dangerous to play with, and Aduello wasn’t his job. Cynna was, and right now she had a problem with a sidhe slicing at her with four feet of steel.
    Cullen throttled way back on the power and sent the fire that way. The sidhe screamed and fell back. Cullen raced to Cynna. “You’re okay? You’re all right?”
    â€œWatch out!” she screamed.
    He spun and sent fire at the pair of sidhe advancing on them. Then called it back, fast, as a huge silver-gray cat leaped on the pair.
    â€œMy father,” Cynna cried. “And Steve and—hey! He’s really something!”
    As soon as things broke, the hellhound had drawn his sword and raced to where Steve and Daniel stood beneath the overhang of the staircase. A single guard, realizing the value of hostages, held a sword at