“Maybe escaping this cell, but getting out of Varnas-Rav in one piece would be nearly impossible,” said Ari. “In all honesty, I don’t think we need to worry. Especially with Rin doing what she can to help us and explain our value.”
“She certainly seems eager to talk you up,” said Kerys in a slightly pouty voice.
“That’s a bad thing?” said Ari. “She’s the sister of the Vereshi, the leader of the entire flock. She’s someone that we really need to keep on our side.”
A few hours went by before the door to the cell finally opened. There was only a single guard on the other side, and he didn’t rebind their wrists as he led them back up into the forested city.
Rin and the Vereshi were waiting for them. The Vereshi gave Ari a slow nod and gestured for him to follow.
“My sister has convinced me that it would be a waste to not offer you hospitality,” said the Vereshi. “We have allotted a tree hut for you and your friends. It’s not large, but it will serve, as long as you don’t mind sleeping in hammocks.”
“We don’t mind,” said Kerys, cutting Ari off before he could make a joke that was, admittedly, a little less than tasteful.
“For the meantime, we will keep hold of your supplies,” said Vereshi. “This does not mean that the treasure you brought no longer belongs to you. We live a communal existence in the nest, and the gold coins and jewels would serve no purpose other than to make you a target for miscreants.”
“What about our other supplies?” asked Ari. “The stuff in my pack and the short sword?”
“I’ll have them placed in your tree hut.” The Vereshi pointed to a small, elegant structure a few hundred feet away from them. Three trees had been twisted together midway up their length to form the underlying framework, and a leather canopy had been carefully fashioned over it. It reminded Ari of the kellowack that he and Kerys had spent their first night on the surface in, though it was at least three or four times larger.
“For now, I would ask your companions to remain within the tree hut,” said the Vereshi. “Allow me to show you to where you’ll be performing your duties as our enchanter in residency.”
She led him deeper into the forested city, weaving through the trees and thick grass. Ari kept sight of the tree hut where he’d left his companions for as long as he could, though his suspicion toward the Vereshi had diminished significantly, and Rin was still walking with them.
They stopped in front of a small, ruined structure that didn’t seem to fit with the rest of the city. It was barely more than an old stone foundation with one wall remaining. In the center of the floor, Ari saw an ancient enchanting altar, far more weathered in condition than the relatively pristine one back in the tower.
“Will this suffice?” asked the Vereshi. “I would like for you to make me a Feathercloak.”
Ari glanced from her to Rin, who had a very pleased smile on her face.
“Assuming you can provide me with what I need, it should do just fine,” he said.
INTERLUDE (JARVIS)
“Hmm…” said Bloodrose, through the bond. “I think it’s that way.”
“You think it’s that way?” asked Jarvis. “You think? We’ve been walking in the same direction for the past three hours.”
He took another step forward, cursing as the coarse sand shifted underneath his feet. The sun loomed oppressively overhead, intense enough to make the air over the dunes in the distance waver from the heat.
“We can always check again,” said Bloodrose. “I love it! It’s so much fun.”
Jarvis gritted his teeth. “Pay attention this time. Or else.”
He pulled his sword out of its scabbard, glancing over the long, curved blade and the mesmerizing ruby pommel stone, and then hurled it as high into the air as his muscles would allow. The sword spun in circles as it rose, and at the apex of the throw, it flashed with light. Bloodrose, red hair flying askew, performed a single somersault with the last of her momentum as she stared out across the desert dunes that obscured Jarvis’ view at ground level.
She flashed with light, falling back to the sand in sword form and landing point first.
“I was right,” she said. “Why do you insist on doubting me so much, master? It hurts my feelings!”
“You’re a weapon,” said Jarvis. “You don’t have feelings.”
He re-sheathed the sword and started up the face of the next dune on tired, withered legs. He’d been stuck on a slow march through the desert for more than a week. His former companions, Ingrid and Kevo, had died of heat exhaustion within the first few days. Jarvis would have shared their fate had it not been for his armor.
He’d stolen it from Aristial on a whim, more out of spite than out of an appreciation for its magic. The armor was Salamandros scale and imbued with an enchantment that made it extremely heat-resistant. Jarvis had learned early on that while his face, arms, and legs would still heat up and suffer sunburns, having the core of his abdomen insulated by the armor’s magic was enough to make the difference between life and death in the desert.
“This one looks like it’s pretty deep,” said Bloodrose. “The water will be so warm! Master, you have to let me wash off.”
Jarvis scowled. “I thought I told you to only speak when spoken to.”
“You were speaking to me through the bond, weren’t you?” asked Bloodrose. “You told me you loved me, and cherished me so.”
“You’re insane,” said Jarvis.
He’d grown to view the desert as an opponent rather than a feature of the land. He’d managed to avoid most of the windstorms so far, outside of one or two in the first few days, and part of him was perversely disappointed by that fact. He was aching for a fight, be it with a human opponent or the weather monsters.
He continued forward, ignoring muscles that had been randomly cramping for days and the tiny, annoying flecks of sand scraping against his ankles in his boots. The oasis came into sight within the hour. Jarvis fell to his knees at the edge of it, though he suspected his reaction would have been similar had he discovered the doors to the Endfate. Anything but more desert.
His sword flashed, and Bloodrose immediately began dipping a finger in to test the water’s temperature. It was larger than the others that they’d found, and there was even a small palm tree growing on one side of it.
Jarvis gorged himself on the water, sinking his entire face in and drinking with loud slurps. One of the mistresses in Golias Hollow would have chastised him and forced him to drink in slow sips so as to not risk getting sick. He’d always hated them for their incessant worrying and didn’t bother pulling his mouth back from the spring until his stomach started to hurt.
He took the time to fill each of the waterskins, his own and the ones he’d lifted from the bodies of each of his companions. He would have died twice over had it not been for the fact that he’d been carrying a somewhat cumbersome amount of water around with him. It gave him an ample amount of respect for how savage the surface could be even without taking the weather monsters into account.
“It’s so warm!” called Bloodrose. “Oh, this almost makes the entire trip feel worth it.”
Jarvis looked up as he filled the last waterskin. Bloodrose had stripped off her usual Saidican skirt and top and was in the middle of splashing through the shallow end of the oasis, completely naked.
She was beautiful, though as was often the case, it was a deceptive beauty. Bloodrose’s pale skin and large, pert breasts had very nearly blinded him to her true nature in their first few days together. She had a darkness within her, and it seemed as though the more he strengthened the bond they shared, the more adept Bloodrose became at hiding it.
“Master!” shouted Bloodrose. “You too! You haven’t bathed since we first left the grasslands!”
“I didn’t tell you that you could get in,” said Jarvis. “We might need this water again.”
“Oh, no, I don’t think we will,” said Bloodrose.
“Get out now,” said Jarvis, through gritted teeth.
Bloodrose shifted, leaning and floating on her back in a manner that left her pale pink nipples and glistening breasts fully exposed above the water’s surface.
“Make me,” said Bloodrose.
Jarvis exhaled through his nose as he thrust his hand out to the side. He focused his will, summoning Bloodrose to his hand with a stern command. He saw the look of determined rebelliousness on her face, and felt more anger than disappointment when she managed to resist him.
She flashed him a sickly-sweet smile, and Jarvis knew that if he didn’t do something to punish her, he’d never be able to live it down. He stripped off his armor and clothes, forgoing the armor’s heat-resisting magic for a couple of annoyingly hot seconds before he hopped into the water.
Bloodrose let out a cackling laugh and slammed her arms down, splashing water at him. Jarvis surged forward and seized her by the neck with both hands, lifting her a few inches into the air. She gasped and winked at him as she kicked her legs around behind him, locking them both together before twisting at an angle and throwing him off balance.
Bloodrose was already kissing him before they’d even resurfaced. Jarvis set his hands on her chest and pushed her back. She swung her arm and clawed him across the chest, leaving four puffy, parallel scratches across one of his pectorals.
She pulled them back together, kissing him deeply and undulating wildly. Jarvis had fallen for this trick multiple times before. It was what she resorted to whenever she wanted to get her way, or whenever she disobeyed him. She used sex as a weapon, but he was learning to do the same.
He took hold of Bloodrose’s hair and gave a hard pull, forcing her head and neck back. Bloodrose let out a soft squeal as he slammed her forward against the sandy bank of the oasis. He pushed his hard cock inside of her in a thrust that might have hurt if not for the water and Bloodrose’s perpetually aroused state.
“Oh. Trium blessed!” moaned Bloodrose. “Yes, master. That’s it! Take me. Use me. I’m—”
Her words choked off as Jarvis closed his hands around her neck. He kept them there even as his fingers relaxed as a reminder of the power he held over her. He could cut her off, fling the sword into a deep pit and never look back. He was her master, making the decisions and doling out the punishment. Not the other way around.
“Just…” whispered Bloodrose. “A little tighter. You hate me, remember?”
He squeezed his hands tighter and thrust into her body faster. He didn’t hate her. No, it was worse than that. He understood her.
Bloodrose’s nails dug into the skin of Jarvis’ back. He retaliated by giving her hair a hard pull and biting her neck hard enough to leave indentations from his teeth. They kissed again, and she bit his lower lip, drawing blood. Jarvis bit one of her nipples, and Bloodrose let out a squeal that was as pained as it was pleasured.
“There were women like you down in the Hollow,” whispered Jarvis. “Broken women. The men just passed them around, using them like toys.”
“Were you one of those men?” whispered Bloodrose. “Or were you just a little boy?”
Jarvis pinned her wrists behind her back as she tried to claw at him again, pumping into her faster as his anger surged. Bloodrose’s squeals continued rising in pitch until they finally reached a breaking point almost in time with his own. He unloaded inside of her and pulled several feet away as soon as he’d come back to his senses.
“I feel so loved,” said Bloodrose, in a singsong voice. “There is no other warmth like that of your body against mine.”
“Get dressed,” said Jarvis. “We aren’t staying here.”
The windstorm began in earnest less than an hour after they’d left the oasis. Jarvis traveled with Bloodrose across his back in sword form, along with the waterskins, and it became a struggle to keep everything balanced as the sand began to swirl out from underneath his feet.
He’d already seen the wind snakes, or vodakai, as he’d heard the bird girl in Aristial’s party call them. The one that arose from the sand in the distance was so large that it wouldn’t have been able to exist in the desert as a natural predator. It was a thing sustained by the weather of the desert and whatever cursed magic had been weaved into it.
Jarvis felt obliged to break into a sprint as the massive vodakai began circling through the air overhead. Its wings were wider than he was tall, and easily four or five times as long. Its bulk was of a size that made him wonder if any chamber within Golias Hollow could have held it, even if it curled itself up as efficiently as possible.
“I wouldn’t fight it,” said Bloodrose. “It will probably kill you if you try and then eat you.”
“I told you only to speak when—”
His sentence never made it to the finish as an intense gust of wind sent him tumbling down the face of a dune in a spray of sand and dust. The waterskins came loose from his body, and he knew instantly that he would never be able to locate them during the windstorm, let alone underneath the sand once it was done.
He rose to his feet, noticing that he did at least manage to keep hold of his sword. The vodakai was still circling overhead, now joined by at least a dozen small specimens. Jarvis stumbled forward a few steps, unsure of which direction was north.
He wasn’t given the time to work it out. The massive vodakai dove, and its jaws opened wide as it swallowed a section of the sandy desert, and Jarvis along with it.
He saw the vodakai’s mouth closing, and he screamed. The despair took a tight hold of his bowels as the monster’s tongue and neck muscles forced him deeper into its body. He slid backward into what he took to be an elongated stomach filled with viscous, acidic ooze. He couldn’t see. He couldn’t breathe, even when he managed to get his head above the surface of the disgusting contents of the monster’s stomach.
This wasn’t how he was supposed to die. How long would it even take for him to die, he wondered. Did it make sense to spare himself the torment and try to slit his neck with his own sword?
“Are you giving up, master?” asked Bloodrose, through the bond. “Is this truly where your journey ends?”
Jarvis drew his sword. He made sure his hands were tight on the hilt, pointed the point toward its intended target, and slammed the blade forward.
The sensation of the sword impaling the vodakai’s stomach lining from the inside out must have been rather unpleasant for it, as its body instantly began to thrash. The wild, jerky movement only served to make the gash tear open further, and the contents of the monster’s stomach began to gush out. Jarvis slithered forward, pushing his head out through the open wound and then leaning at an angle that caused him to roll completely free.
He fell a good twenty feet before landing flat on his back in the sand. His body was still covered with the disgusting, green ooze, which quickly attracted bits of sand and dirt. He forced himself to ignore it as he staggered upright and set his attention toward figuring out which direction was north.
The windstorm went on for close to another hour, but the only vodakai who continued to bother Jarvis were small enough for him to handle with his sword. He reached the edge of the desert before the sun set that evening and found a small, grassy cove to the northeast.
“Look at this,” said Bloodrose. They’d bathed as soon as they’d found the cove, braving the cold ocean water for the sake of getting the stench of the vodakai’s innards off. Bloodrose was still naked, and she was standing on the grass and nudging something with her toe.
“What?” asked Jarvis. “Rocks? A few sticks?”
“Look at how they’re arranged,” said Bloodrose. “Look at this one!”
She leaned over and picked up a piece of wood with one charred end.
“A campfire,” said Jarvis. “Only a few days old, from the looks of it…”
“What does that mean?” asked Bloodrose.
Jarvis flashed her a rare smile.
“It means that we’ll be staying in this area for a while,” he said.
CHAPTER 21
Ari only h
ad to wait a few minutes for the enchanted items to arrive. An older Ravarian man walked into the ruined building carrying a large sack over his shoulder, which he placed on the ground near the enchanting altar after giving a respectful nod to Rin.
“You have this many enchanted items on hand?” asked Ari. “That’s kind of surprising.”
“These are relics from an earlier time in our people’s history,” said Rin. “The Rav do not have the same type of essence store that the Hume do, so we cannot use enchanted items as efficiently. They recharge much more slowly for us, and we can’t make our own enchantments.”
“You seemed to make use of my Feathercloak well enough,” said Ari. He made a point of eyeing the garment, which still hung from Rin’s slender shoulders. She noticed and flashed a smile at him as she shrugged.
“That’s because it’s a very simple enchantment,” said Rin. “I only needed it to provide a small boost to my own wind affinity.”
Ari nodded, though he was still curious about something.
“Your people really can’t do any enchanting?” he asked. “I’d think that if you were diligent and slowly stored your essence in an enchanting altar over time, eventually you’d have enough.”
“The vast majority of a Ravarian’s essence is anchored to their wind affinity,” said Rin. “You could call it a design choice, along with the fact that you, as a Hume, have such a high capacity for storing essence and recharging enchantments. The Saidicans created the Rav to be messengers and couriers, while the Hume were created to serve as walking stores of magical essence.”
Ari raised an eyebrow. “Is that actually true? It’s not the type of claim I’d generally accept without evidence.”
“It’s a part of our people’s oral history,” said Rin. “So, it’s possible that it could be, and it’s also possible that it’s a complete, ah, fabrication. Who knows, chala?”
Ari turned his attention to the bag, opening it and finding that an expensive white cloak had been carefully folded and placed on top. He ran his hand over it, feeling reminded of the way the silkweave fabric Kerys and her family had produced had felt back in the Hollow.
Vision Voyage (The Weatherblight Saga Book 2) Page 12
