Ghost in the Inferno (Ghost Exile #5) by Jonathan Moeller Read Free Book Online Page A

losing him had almost destroyed her. 
    Caina could not go through that, not again. And given the enemies she faced, men of deadly power and purpose like Grand Master Callatas and Cassander Nilas and Malik Rolukhan, such a distraction could be fatal. 
    Perhaps she was simply fooling herself. Kylon was drawn to her, she was certain of that. But perhaps he still mourned for Thalastre and could not contemplate another woman. Perhaps he thought of her the way Morgant did, as a dangerous madwoman who made a useful ally. 
    Or perhaps…
    She shivered a little.
    Perhaps Kylon knew that he could find someone better. He was still a Kyracian nobleman, even in exile. Maybe he wanted to marry again, to a woman who could bear him children as Caina never could. Perhaps he wanted a woman who was not scarred by the battles she had fought, a woman who was not haunted by the horrors she had seen…
    “Gods,” muttered Caina in disgust, sitting up again. She laughed at herself. The fate of Istarinmul and perhaps the entire world hung in the balance, and she lay in her bed fussing like a petulant child. She had to get some sleep. The next two days would be busy, and then they were leaving to pursue Kuldan Cimak.
    Caina rose, stretched, and started working through the unarmed forms. She had learned them half a lifetime ago at the Vineyard, and the motions came without thought now. High kick, middle block, palm strike, wrist throw, side kick. Again and again Caina worked through the forms, the unarmed moves that had saved her life many times. She practiced until her limbs trembled with fatigue, until sweat made her shift stick to her back and chest. 
    Usually exercise calmed her, but still her mind roiled. 
    She sighed, reached under the room’s table, and drew out a small wooden cask. Caina opened it and poured an inch of amber liquid into a clay cup. Caerish whiskey was useful for cleaning cuts and wounds, so Caina usually stored some in her safe houses. She avoided drinking it, not because she found it unpleasant, but because she enjoyed it too much. It clouded her mind, dulled the sharp edges of her dark memories. She had almost drank herself to death her first night in Istarinmul, and she could easily see herself drinking herself into a stupor once a week, then every other night, and then every night. 
    So she avoided it, but she wanted to sleep. 
    Caina swallowed the whiskey in one gulp, winced as it burned against her tongue and throat, and pushed the cup and the cask under the table. The drink went right to her head, and she felt dizzy and flushed. She sat down, the cot creaking beneath her, and laughed. Just as well she had not invited Kylon up. The cot wasn’t nearly strong enough to support their combined weight.
    The floor looked sturdy enough, though. Or the table. Or perhaps propped up against the wall…
    Caina scowled, rebuked her overactive imagination, and lay back down.
    And this time, sleep found her.
     
    ###
     
    So did the dreams. 
    Once again, Caina dreamed of a place that she had dreamed before.
    She stood in the bleak gray plain of the Desert of Candles, the wind moaning and whistling past her, grit blowing past her boots and making her skirt ripple around her legs. Around her stood thousands of the strange crystalline pillars that gave the Desert its name, jagged shafts eight or nine feet tall that shone with a pale blue glow. In the gloom the light seemed eerie and unnatural, like the glow of dead spirits come to walk the earth. 
    Before Caina rose the fountain.
    Its broad basin of white marble was thirty yards across, dry and empty, the dust of the Desert blowing across it. Despite the endless wind, the white stone was as smooth and crisp as if it had been carved yesterday. A wide stone plinth rose within the fountain, and upon it stood eight statues wrought of the same blue crystal as the jagged pillars. Seven of the statues were children, and the eighth was a woman of stunning beauty, clad in an ornamented