Chapter 31
‘Ley lines don’t exist singly. Nor do they appear spontaneously,” Jack mused as he wandered Queen’s City shortly after dawn.
Cloaked in the face and body of the slightly built palace magician, he peered easily at the land beneath his feet with every sense available to him. His magic had recharged during the time he had spent standing above the pocket of power in the workroom. A relief from the weeks of weakened abilities.
Burned out ley lines rotted at every street intersection. If the land did not heal soon, the old channels would collapse, taking building foundations and street paving with them. Jack foresaw a shift in the riverbed and upheaval in the hills behind the city. Death and chaos would follow.
Simeon deserved whatever destruction the Stargods visited upon him. The innocents of the city didn’t.
Everywhere he saw the sings of decay, heightened by the short-sighted belief that the land’s resources were unlimited and meant to be exploited. When the belief proved false, no one knew how to rectify matters. Abandoned shops and houses. Dirt and crumbling mortar strewn through the streets from the collapse of a warehouse, and no one with enough energy to clear it away. No refuse for dogs to scavenge. And everywhere, the haunted eyes of the hungry and the hopeless citizens. Only the nobles seemed unaware of the lifeblood of the country bleeding into the river along with the land that no longer had trees to hold it back.
Having lost all sense of the Kardia, SeLenicca, its people, and culture were dying. Only the export of lace kept the economy alive. Lace was not enough to employ an entire nation.
Nowhere in his day-long search of the city did Jack discover any active ley lines. The city was as dead magically as it was economically. Shayla was King Simeon’s only source of power. Did he and the members of his coven know how to combine the magic and make the power grow well beyond anything a solitary magician could throw?
Jack already knew he was incapable of gathering the dragon magic. After last night’s confrontation with the palace magician, he had little hope he could complete his mission and escape without detection. In a magic duel, Jack’s only chance of survival was one grouping of hair-fine ley lines beneath the warehouse.
If only he knew why the ley lines had sprung up beneath Katrina’s workstation and nowhere else. Once he mastered that puzzle, he might be able to force more lines to grow and feed his magic.
Katrina was the answer. Katrina and the lace she wove for the love of the shimmering threads and the patterns that bloomed beneath her hands while she sang little tunes in the dead of night; not the lace she made for the owner to exploit.
Her gentle little work tune danced through his mind and gave his feet a lighter step. He hummed it lightly as he prowled the city. His mind cleared of puzzles and worries.
A crowd gathering on the bridge ahead of him caught his curiosity. The black robes and tall hat, crowning a city official, flapped in the wind like the wings of a jackdaw. Wearily the clerk intoned a prayer and scattered something into the water. Jack merged with the solemn listeners.
Two middle-aged women wept. Their sharp chins and close-set eyes suggested a strong family resemblance. Between them stood a tight-lipped man, probably husband to one, grinding his teeth in his effort to restrain his own tears.
A funeral, Jack decided. An all-too-common occurrence in a city where food shortages were a constant worry and lack of firewood kept buildings chill and dark. The customary sun break at noon seemed to be the only source of joy left in Queen’s City.
Jack pushed past the funeral goers. He might as well check out the slums on the far side of the river for some trace of magical activity. The homeless and unemployed might have a better relationship with the Kardia than the elite of a mercantile city.
A winter chill filled his body with atavistic dread. He came to an abrupt halt. The day had been warm with a gentle breeze two heartbeats ago.
He scanned the center of the bridge with his already extended magical senses. A woman in soaking garments stood directly in front of him, flailing her arms as if fighting to the surface from the depths of the river. Her double plaits streamed down her back, dripping water. No drops or puddles formed on the wooden planks. For a moment Jack thought he was staring at a vision of Katrina grown into the beauty of maturity.
Only then did he notice the knife protruding from the woman’s breast and blood staining the front of her gown. None of the mourners seemed aware of the injured woman or her plight. Instinctively he reached to withdraw the knife.
His hand passed straight through the woman. The hairs on the back of his hand and arm stood straight up. Lumbird bumps danced down his spine.
“The ghost of Tattia Kaantille,” he whispered.
The apparition nodded at the sound of her name.
“Murder, not suicide?” Jack asked in a silent whisper.
Again the ghost gestured the correctness of his assumption.
“Who? Why?”
A shudder of effort seemed to pass through the spirit of Katrina’s mother. She opened her mouth to speak, but no sound emerged.
Jack concentrated on the shapes her lips formed around soundless words.
“Simeon. Runes,” he repeated the two words back to her.
She smiled and faded to wisps of water vapor.
“You were talking to that new man, Katrina. You are not to speak to any of the men I employ. And now you revert to the two plaits I forbade you to wear. To impress the new watchman? I’ll not have it, Katrina. Why do you disobey me?” Brunix stood behind her left shoulder so he wouldn’t cast a shadow on the lace shawl that grew beneath her fingers.
Katrina knew from experience she was not to interrupt her work while answering him. Lace provided the income that kept the factory going. Lace was more important than any of the workers within the factory. If a lacemaker fell short of her daily quota, Brunix would dismiss her without a second thought. If Katrina displeased the owner or made him angry he would sell her—possibly back to King Simeon.
“I was working and heard a noise,” she explained. “I knew about the thefts and investigated. The watchman was already there.”
Brunix moved in front of her, blocking her light so she had to look up to him. “The watchman was supposed to be there. You were not.” He slapped her across the cheek, hard.
Pain lanced through her eyes to her jaw. The blow set her ears ringing and brought involuntary tears to her eyes. His violence shocked her senses and numbed her thoughts as his lovemaking had not. Never before had he hit her. The world centered on her pain and his burning anger.
“ ’Tis not your position to put yourself into danger. You are mine. My slave. My possession.” He backhanded her again across the face.
She tasted blood. This new blow jerked her head back, twisting her neck awkwardly.
“You are not to speak to any other male. You are not to venture below to the warehouse without my express permission.” His long fingers grabbed her shoulders and he shook her, hard, rattling her teeth. “Do. You. Understand. Me?”
Katrina couldn’t force words past her clenched jaw and reeling senses.
“Do you understand!” Brunix demanded again.
“Y . . . y . . . yes,” she ground out.
“Good. I will find another watchman. This one broke my rules when he spoke to you.” Brunix released her, seemingly oblivious to the blood that dripped from the corner of her mouth and the bruises forming on her cheek.
Katrina touched the back of her hand to the blood on her face, careful not to stain her fingers which might transfer blood to the nearly completed shawl. She had to think, had to overcome the shock that closed down her senses.
Brunix couldn’t dismiss Jack. She needed the outland magician to decipher the runes. He was the only person who could help her bring about King Simeon’s downfall.
“Before the evening meal, you will move all of your things into my quarters. I am tired of waiting for you. Henceforth, you live with me, eat with me, and sleep with me.
I can make you feel pain. You will respond to me, if only in pain. Only one-quarter of my blood is Rover. I have observed their prohibition against rape more than one quarter of my time with you. I would take you now, but I have business that will not wait. This apartment and the workroom are the only places you have permission to be.” Brunix stalked to the door of his apartment. “Do you understand, Katrina?”
“Do I have the right to a sun break?” she asked calmly, though her heart beat so loud and fast she could barely hear her own words. She couldn’t allow him to see the panic rising to choke her.
“You will take your sun break with me. I allow you outside the building only because the law requires I must and a complaint from one of your friends would bring me ruinous fines.” He left her alone, slamming the door behind him. A heartbeat later, the lock clicked, sealing her inside.
“I can’t read runes,” Jack muttered to himself. “I wasn’t at the University long enough to learn that skill. Where would I find runes, if I could read them?” He trekked back across the bridge into Queen’s City. A glance over his shoulder confirmed that the ghost of Tattia Kaantille had vanished once her message had been passed along to him.
His growling stomach reminded him that he hadn’t eaten since last night’s supper, and the day was half gone. He must return to the factory in time to share supper with the other male employees—after the women had eaten and retired safely to their dormitory. He had almost no chance of seeing Katrina before midnight.
The official with the tall black hat, who had presided over the funeral brushed, past Jack. His black robes flapped in the wind, reminding Jack once more of a giant jackdaw. The flowing sleeves of the black robe caught briefly on Jack’s belt buckle. As the man tugged the fabric free with a deep frown of disapproval for Jack, the black embroidery on the black robe caught the magician’s eye. Straight lines and slashes jumped into his perspective.
A primitive form of writing.
Runes!
This was no government clerk or judge, but a priest. Old temples sometimes had runes decorating tombs and icons.
Jack fell into step behind the man, thanking the Stargods as he kept a discreet distance.
A temple constructed of huge stone blocks, each as tall as a man, loomed before Jack. Bigger than the Palace Reveta Tristille, he’d never seen anything like it before. In Coronnan, the temples were small, little larger than a house, and scattered throughout the city for the convenience of each neighborhood, mostly taken for granted because they were an everyday part of life. This place of worship demanded attention by its imposing height and impossibly huge building stones. Men could not have built this place. It seemed designed for the entire population of the city to gather at once. The priest strode up the two dozen steps with the ease of long familiarity.
Jack followed him, stretching his legs to mount each broad stair. A long line of people dressed in sober colors filed into and out of the sanctuary. Jack joined them.
Inside the impressive structure, darkness ruled. No windows allowed daylight to penetrate beyond the porch. Hundreds of lighted candles lined the walls in banks of nine rows and nine tiers. The building was so massive in size, the candles lit only small areas around icons dedicated to one of the three red-haired Stargod brothers, or the painted canvases of the queen before her ailment. Nine tall candles in each of nine candelabras drew Jack’s eyes to the altar.
One solid piece of lace spilled over the focal point of worship. Soft light reflected from the shimmering threads of the design. From the distance of one hundred arm-lengths, Jack knew the lace was made from Tambrin. The magic inherent in the Tambootie tree vibrated inside his body like a finely tuned instrument ready to sound the most beautiful note ever heard.
But it was a power he dared not draw into his body. Dragons were the only beings who could safely digest any part of the Tambootie. Madness trod the path of the Tambootie. Simeon’s obsessive search for Tattia’s lace shawl exhibited some of the signs of that insanity.
The line of worshipers in front of Jack moved forward. To his right, a series of tiny chapels bulged outward from the main sanctuary. Some were no wider than a single person. Others could accommodate three or four kneeling side by side before altars dedicated to images Jack couldn’t identify. Incense hung heavily in the air.
A sneeze tickled in the back of Jack’s throat. He held his breath. The sneeze subsided along with the thick perfume of burning herbs. Priests used incense in their rituals in Coronnan. Jack had never heard of them saturating the air with it, nor of using such heavy and exotic scents. Like so many things in this decaying city, the incense sought to hide unpleasantness rather than cleanse it.
He looked up, way up, to see how high the cloud of incense hovered. Four or five stories above the center of the sanctuary, the bowl of a huge dome separated the worshipers from the weather. Painted night skies with stylized stars decorated the interior of the dome. Most of the constellation groupings were inaccurate, broken by seams. Ah, the priests did do something traditional in SeLenicca. The panels in the dome opened, by a series of just barely visible pulleys and ropes, for observation of the night skies.
The architecture seemed to be centered on that dome. Did the entire temple date from the time of the Stargods or was the open dome added later to accommodate stargazing?
He sidled out of line to examine the side aisles and their stone tombs. Jack guessed the stonework was much older than the religion of the Stargods and the efficient alphabet introduced by the three divine brothers. The ancient runes should still adorn places considered sacred through all the changes of dynasties and worship. Somewhere in this vast building there must be some runes and he intended to find them.
Then he’d worry about a translation.
Katrina paced the circumference of Brunix’s sitting room. Two burly warehousemen carried her trunk of personal possessions between them into the bedroom beyond. A third employee hauled her extra pillow up the stairs.
“Where you want it?” he asked, not daring to lift his eyes to meet hers.
“By the window.” She pointed to a cleared space beside the pillow where she worked the new shawl. Since the factory owner’s uncharacteristic violence this morning, she hadn’t been able to work, to concentrate, to think of anything but the night to come. The nights to come. For as long as Brunix desired her, she would have no peace.
“Think he’ll let us have a go at her when he gets tired?” The two men with the trunk giggled and nudged each other.
Katrina felt all heat and sensation drain from her head to form a knot in her stomach. Brunix had promised her pain in order to force a response from her. Would he add the degradation of being mauled by these thugs as well?
The third man lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “What can I do?” he mouthed. His eyes pleaded for forgiveness from Katrina.
She didn’t know how to reply to the man. Any attempt to help her escape Brunix tonight, or any other night, would result in his own dismissal from a job he sorely needed.
“Get Jack,” she whispered. A ray of hope opened before her as soon as she whispered his name. Jack who persisted in his quest despite the dangers. Jack who held her tenderly and granted her the unique privilege of reading his mind as readily as he read hers.
If he had any secrets left, after that special rapport they had shared while eavesdropping on Brunix and the palace guard, those secrets were no danger to her.
“Gone, all day.” The man ventured one step closer to her, casting about to ensure the other two weren’t watching.
“Send his pet bird!”
“I’ll try.”
The three men filed out without a backward glance to Katrina. A loud click proclaimed they had followed orders and locked her in once more.
“Come quickly, Jack. I need you.”
Chapter 32
“Damned birds!” Rejiia cursed the flock of black birds that circled away from her window.
The aerial display of the flock separated and settled i
nto individual birds. For the fifth time this morning, Rejiia concentrated her mind probe on a bird. Slowly she merged her consciousness with the creature. Her vision tilted, shifted colors to reflect heat patterns, and distorted to the perspective of one high above the city.
A moment of euphoric flight filled her. Contact with her body diminished. “Almost. Almost total blending.” A thin silver tendril of magic tethered her to the person in the window. She absorbed more of the bird.
Eebon, the bird announced his name.
Mistress, Rejiia said. You will call me Mistress.
He was ready. Another moment and the crow would be her winged familiar, bound to her for life.
She tugged on the tether. The bird banked and circled back. Another tug and he flew faster toward her.
Rejiia regained enough of her own body to stretch out her arm as a perch for her new pet. Eebon extended his talons to encircle her padded wrist.
“Newak!” a second bird screamed. The menacing jackdaw with white tufts over his eyes dove between Rejiia and Eebon.
The slender silver tether shredded from the force of the bird’s descent. Eebon jerked away from the villa window squawking his confusion.
Together the two black birds turned and flapped until they caught an air current that took them away from Rejiia.
“Simurgh curse you, bird,” she screamed in frustration. Every time she made contact with a bird, the interloper shattered the spell. Who controlled the jackdaw? Only another magician could direct a wild creature to do such a thing. Who?
That boy! Yaakke had to be the jackdaw’s master. “He’s the only magician strong enough to thwart me. I’ll have that bird. I’ll torture it to death and enjoy every moment.”
Jack wound his way among the alcoves as if seeking an unoccupied corner for private prayer. As he paused by each small altar, he examined all of the decoration for signs of the distinctive lines and slashes chiseled into the stone.
The Dragon Nimbus Novels: Volume I: Volume I Page 95
