“There will be other air pockets along the way. Would it help you to be let free to recover a bit?”
Ayna looked sharply at her through the glass. “I don’t need your patronizing. Just swim.”
“I’m not trying to patronize you,” Calypso said, taking a turn and holding the jar up to decide where to head next. “You are in distress. I am trying to help you.”
“It won’t help!” Ayna said.
Calypso made another turn. “Why won’t it help? I know that fairies don’t like to be cooped up, but I don’t know why.”
“Just swim,” she rumbled.
“I can swim and talk. But if you help me understand why you’re scared, maybe I can help you calm down.”
“I’m not scared,” she snapped. “You couldn’t possibly understand. You aren’t a fairy.”
A half-dozen replies flitted across Calypso’s mind as she used the anxious fairy’s glow to navigate. Making the proper choices, at least in this section of the cave, was relatively simple. Water-smoothed stone had a way of betraying the direction of the water’s flow. A quick scratch across the surface was enough to let her know which way the floodwaters shifted, and thus which direction the dry stretch of the cave was. But making the proper choice of how to deal with Ayna was trickier. Calypso’s instinct told her to be kind, to be gentle. But she’d known Ayna long enough to know she was far more liable to shift toward anger than toward serenity. And anger was an improvement over being beside herself with stress.
“I see. I thought you were a master. A teacher. I suppose everyone has their limits when it comes to articulating complex concepts.”
“Stop it.”
“When this is over, if you need help in putting your notions to words, I can lend a hand.”
“I know what you are doing.”
“Deacon always had a way with words, perhaps he could—”
“It is not beyond my capacity to explain!” Ayna snapped. “I am a fairy. We all are children of the wind. And I am a master of wind magic, so my connection with the wind has been honed to a needle point. The wind is a part of us. We feel it like an extension of ourselves. The motion of wind is like another sense. It connects us, to each other, to the rest of the world. I am stopped up in a jar. I am cut off from the wind. I have gone from knowing my place precisely, being one with a world-spanning flow of energy, to being trapped. Isolated. And it won’t matter if you let me free in a vast cavern. If it doesn’t connect with the rest of the winds, it is just a bigger jar.”
She shut her eyes and shuddered. “The last time I came through this cave, I was restrained like this, in the possession of scoundrels who treated me like a tool. And now I am back again. Cut off. Alone.”
“Well now you’re here with me. I’m not a scoundrel, and you’re not alone.” She held the jar up to her face. “So things are looking up.”
Chapter 8
An icy form stood like a lonely sentry on the frozen surface of a lake. At Myranda’s behest, Ether had been whisking through the three kingdoms to survey the supposed sites of curious events that had plagued the world in recent days. There was little here to suggest such an event had already happened. Now she waited, senses alert, to see if one would occur.
There was wisdom in Myranda’s request. To observe one directly, from beginning to end, could indeed provide useful insight into their nature. And though it was a stretch, the locations along the journey of the Chosen were as good an indicator as any of those sites that might suffer an attack. Before arriving here, she had taken what had become a very familiar, and very comfortable trip to Celia’s home. It was important to her that the woman be safe. Her health had improved, and the place had yet to see any flicker of disturbance. With that concern set aside, Ether was free to enjoy the solitude and vigilance that had defined so much of her existence. As a statue of ice, she watched the sky.
She remembered this place every bit as well as Myranda and Myn did, though not for the same reasons. For them, this place was a black stain in their memories, a place where they very nearly lost one another. At the time, Ether had yet to have truly embraced her allies and hadn’t come to see the value and essential truth of emotion. Looking back upon that moment after having experienced the sort of loss that was all too common in the life of a mortal, she almost felt a pang of guilt for her callousness over the apparent death of Myn. She had changed more since that day than she had in the thousands of years before it. She had grown as a result of her alliance, her friendship. She never could have predicted such a thing, and a part of her feared what might have become of her if she’d not allowed it to happen.
The moment of self-reflection was cut short as a new sensation crackled through her mind. Something was happening. She focused all her senses upon this curious new feeling. There was no hint of magic behind whatever was twisting the world around her. No will guided the change she detected, no focus aided it. This was something more basic, more fundamental. It was closer to a sudden shift in temperature than a spell or curse, just a part of the world changing in a very natural way. But it was a part Ether had never supposed could misbehave in such a way without an outside force. Time was shifting. The fabric of the landscape was twisting, curling and drawing together. She swept her gaze across the sky. Black forms became visible. Dragoyles. She crackled herself free from the surface of the lake and changed to flame. She’d not been thrown back in time. Her place in the world was every bit as solid and secure as it had always been. It felt more like the past had curled upon itself, overlapping the present. This warranted further experimentation.
She streaked toward one of the dragoyles. Moments before impact, she shifted from flame to stone. Her solid body tore through the stony black hide of the beast. It released a stricken squeal and plummeted to the surface of the lake. She shifted to flame again and hung in the air.
“So they are solid, and they can be attacked. Valuable information. If they can be attacked, we can defend ourselves. I have no memory, fresh or old, of my own secondary interference in the battle, so it would appear that doing so will have no impact on events that have already occurred. Valuable information as well.”
She hung in the air and gazed at the swarming monsters. There was a very specific moment she was waiting for. The moment that had marked this place as a tragic memory. She knew it took place in the air above the lake, so she did not allow her eyes to waver. In time, the telltale motions began to coalesce. They swarmed and gathered about an empty patch of ground, then an empty patch of sky. The monsters were undeniably focused on something, but that thing was not visible. It simply did not exist.
“Fascinating… The dragoyles behave as though we are there. The ice breaks as though Myn’s tiny form smashed through. But we are absent. Does this phenomenon only effect the D’Karon creations, perhaps?” She let her gaze shift to the field below. “Perhaps it has to do with…”
The speculation vanished from her mind as her eyes set upon a sight that seared her very soul. A figure sprinted across the snowy field. It was no dragoyle. It was no working of D’Karon magic. It was something much more important to the world. Much more important to her.
“Lain…” she breathed.
He moved precisely as she remembered. She could even feel the smoldering, restrained point of power and light his spirit traced across the world as he moved. She was trapped in the raw emotion of seeing him, living and breathing, after all this time. Then, at the edge of her consciousness, she felt the crackle of change once more.
“No… No!”
She streaked toward him, but already she could feel the layers of existence sliding back into place. Before she could reach the ground, he was gone. Her fiery form shuddered and trembled, fingers clawing at the air where he had been. She pulled her body together into a human form and dropped down onto the snow. At her feet, the footprints Lain had left remained in the snow. She crouched and touched her fingers to them. For a time, she let herself dwell upon the feeling
s the mere sight of her lost ally had stirred up in her. But she couldn’t wrap herself around the pain of the old wound forever. There was work to be done in the here and now. If she was to protect the world from these events, she had to make sense of what all of this meant. She had to inform Myranda. Her job here was done.
#
Back in Kenvard, Ivy paced through the halls of the castle. In her heart, she knew that her presence here had been important. She’d kept Leo safe, kept his spirits up, and thus allowed Myranda to devote herself fully to the task at hand. But there was still the lingering sense that all of this was beyond her. She’d always had a place in the other threats to the world. She could beat back the forces of darkness if they had form. She could talk sense into minds too blinded by years of war and fear to see the value of peace. But these events felt smoky, unreal. There was nothing she could do. Myranda still struggled with what they meant, and she was one of the most clever people Ivy had ever known. If it was beyond her dear friends, it was well beyond her. At this precise moment, even her dubiously heroic role as a babysitter was uncalled for. Myranda was waiting for more information, and thus had allowed herself to take the reins of the child’s care for the time being.
Ivy should have been sleeping. She’d gotten precious little rest in the days since these disturbances had begun occurring. But she couldn’t bring herself to lay her head down. Her mind was too stirred up. And so she paced, waiting for either exhaustion to claim her or a useful job to present itself. Her aimless journey had taken her to the royal vault. It was interesting how a disaster could shift the priorities of an entire kingdom. On any other day, the vault would be under constant guard. As it was, every available soldier in Myranda’s command had been placed on lookout and defense, lest history repeat itself in a more violent way. The vault, home to some of the kingdom’s greatest treasures, paled in importance to the safety of its people.
She smiled softly, proud of her kingdom and its priorities.
The smile faded from her lips. Something wasn’t right. She squinted at the space between the vault’s doors. Deacon had been quite proud of them. Rather than a simple external brace or even a complex lock, these doors were braced from within. Potent enchantments were layered atop spells that Deacon himself had devised to turn away would-be thieves. But as she gazed at the entrance, she noticed two things that worried her. In the tiny crack between the heavy doors, she saw no brace. And she knew from prior trips past them that the potency of the magic was such that even her own untrained mind could detect it. But the warm, fuzzy sensation of the spells was completely absent from her mind.
She tilted her head and sniffed the air. There weren’t any worrisome scents, but there was one very strong and very familiar one that seemed out of place. Ivy placed her hands against the heavy doors and threw her weight against them. They swung sluggishly open.
“What is going on?”
She slipped through the crack between the doors. The vault had no lighting of its own. It should have been completely dark. Instead, a soft amber glow, too steady to be a candle’s flame, glinted off the many polished relics and heaps of coins in the vault. Ivy crept forward, muscles tense. She didn’t want to raise the alarm unless she had to. The guards were elsewhere for a reason.
The first chamber of the vault was filled with the mundane treasures of the palace. There was gold enough to handle the finances, mostly freshly minted Kenvard coins. Some of the recovered gems and jewelry from the days before the Northern Alliance had formed were kept safe there as well. To the rear, a second, equally secure door led the way to the artifacts with value beyond sentiment and rarity. That door was open as well, and she could hear someone moving about inside.
Ivy charged in. “Who goes there!” she barked.
A frazzled figure turned to her. It took Ivy a beat to realize just whom she was looking at.
“Deacon!” she squealed.
He was dressed as he had been when he’d left for his treatment, but the outfit had seen better days. His clothes were layered with multiple shades of grime, ranging from the general haziness one accumulates from a lengthy journey along the sloppy roads of the north to the gray silt of the Cave of the Beast. His hair was ragged and unkempt. He looked like he’d had a rough few days.
Ivy didn’t care. She pounced upon him, wrapping him in a tight hug.
“Deacon, I’m so glad to see you! Things have been bad. None of us knows what to make of it. I don’t know if you knew about the weird events that were happening all over the place, but they’re getting worse, and none of us can figure it out. All I can do is keep Leo busy and hope we untie the knots before someone gets hurt.”
“It will be all right, Ivy. Myranda has it all in hand. I’m sure she does,” he said softly.
Ivy took a step back. “Are you healed? That was what this was about, wasn’t it? It’s only been a few days. How did you even make it there and back again?”
“It is a long story, and I am sorry to say I don’t have time for it right now.”
“Have you seen Myranda? You’ve got to tell Myranda you’re back. She’s been trying to get in touch with you. Why didn’t you answer?”
“My things are still in my pack, and my pack is still in the cave,” he said.
“Then come! We’ll see her now. You can help us with what we’re working on, and we can help you with whatever you’re working on.” Ivy tugged his hand to lead him toward the door.
He resisted. “Ivy, please. I don’t have time to explain. I need to do this myself.”
“Don’t tell me you don’t have time to talk to your wife and see your son,” she said, hauling him a bit more forcefully.
She staggered back, nearly knocking into a shelf carefully arranged with locked-up mystic artifacts. She’d not lost her grip on his hand. Her fingers had simply passed through, as though his hand was no longer there. Ivy looked down. Where Deacon’s hand should have been was a strange white silhouette, something of a reversed shadow, featureless and without substance. He shut his eyes. The gem in the other hand pulsed. Flesh wove its way back down his hand, restoring it to solidity.
“Deacon… where is your ring?”
“There is too much to explain, Ivy. I promise you, this will all be over soon. I just need some more time.”
Her eyes drifted to his face. A bit of desperation colored his features. Then she looked to his hair.
“Deacon, where is your crown? You need help. Something is wrong.”
She turned to head for the vault door. Deacon raised his hand and pulsed the gem again. The door to the inner vault slammed shut, sealing them inside.
“Ivy, please, don’t make me do something I’ll regret,” he said.
The malthrope turned to him, expression fierce.
“Did you just threaten me?”
“No. I just… it is more than I can explain. I don’t even fully understand it myself. But I have found a way to ensure the D’Karon will never find their way in again. No one will. I just need to change a few things.”
“If it needs to be done, we will all help you. Why would you hide it from us?”
“Because it’s dangerous. And it’s…” He shut his eyes tightly and twisted his head aside. “If I do it, I will know an essential truth about this world that no one has ever dreamed of. To reveal such a thing should be valuable enough to ignore the dangers. And the security in the future will offset any of the risk now.”
“Deacon, there’s something wrong. I can feel it. I want you to come to your senses. You are sneaking through your own palace. You’ve given up the things you were using to keep your hand under control.”
“I needed a new perspective. A new angle. I needed to think differently. And I needed new insight as well. I needed to know what… I just needed to know. And I learned so much, so quickly. I have answers, Ivy.” His hand shifted briefly, blurring to a new form and back again. “It doesn’t matter, I can’t ask you to understand. No one can unders
tand. But for now, I need the affliction. I need the chaos. It is what was missing. And I need this.”
He held out the crystal to a heavy wooden case in the rear of the vault. Sigils and runes etched over the box flared away, burning like tissue paper. Nails slid from their places, planks lifted away, and the contents of the box drifted free. It was a damaged sword. Deep gashes marred every surface, but despite the long, rough road the weapon had taken, its brilliance and grandeur was not subdued. It was the Sword of the Chosen, bejeweled and emblazoned with the mark. The blade remained straight and true, paired with a sheath made far more recently than the weapon itself.
Deacon didn’t take the sword in hand. He willed a length of the cloth wadding from the case to wrap it tightly, such that only the strap of the sheath remained exposed.
“Deacon, put that back. That is dangerous. And only evil people ever seem to want it.”
“I will return it when the job is done.”
Ivy planted her feet and tightened her fists. “You will return it right now, or I will take it from you.”
“Ivy, please,” Deacon said, his voice pained and pleading. “You have to trust me. I don’t want there to be violence.”
“Then put the sword back and come see Myranda. There have been too many times I’ve faced people who seemed to be friends but were something else. I know Deacon better than I know almost anyone, and he would not raise a weapon against one of the Chosen. This is your chance to prove to me you are the man I think you are. Put. The sword. Back.”
Deacon held his ground. His expression was stricken. Something inside was tugging him in a dozen different directions. Ivy watched and waited. She wanted to give him every chance to do the right thing, but she couldn’t afford to let him make the first move. He turned his head, eyes sweeping across the many items in the vault. There were other weapons and armor, but also things scavenged from Kenvard’s past, things of mystic or historic importance that Deacon himself had expressed a desire to gain a better understanding of when time and circumstances permitted.
The Coin of Kenvard Page 18
