The Hunter didn’t need to look inside to know what he’d find. The reek of decay hung thick in the airtight Chamber, tinged by smoke and the sharp tang that filled the air after lightning struck. The corpse within had shriveled, its skin blackened where it was tethered to those strange flexible tubes within. Whether it had been male or female, the Hunter would never know. The poor soul had died too long ago for its features to remain visible.
“Come on.” Taiana’s voice took on an edge as she strode to the second Chamber. The Hunter helped her to pry the lid open and tensed in expectation of the same foul smell. This Chamber was empty, except for the coil of tubes in the cradle carved into the stone.
Taiana’s shoulders tensed, her expression growing hard. “There are more to examine.” Frustration, worry, and dread mingled in her tone. Every empty Chamber meant she had failed to find Jaia. Every desiccated corpse could mean she’d found the child too late.
The Hunter had chosen the northern room on the ground floor, but there were rooms along the east and west wall of the Keep as well. He did quick calculations and estimated they had another twenty rooms to search before they reached the uppermost level—the eighth floor—of the Keep. At this rate, they’d be lucky to get through the entire Keep in an hour. That only left an additional twenty-one Keeps to search, plus the massive Illumina in the heart of Enarium. They’d have to push their pace hard if they wanted to search the entire city for their daughter before the Withering struck at noon tomorrow.
A part of him knew they would never do it all in time—not with the Sage to hunt and Hailen to rescue—but he couldn’t bear to say the words aloud. The tension in Taiana’s shoulders, the lines in her face, and the pain in her expression increased with every Chamber they searched. A glint of hope would flash in her eyes, only to be dashed at the sight of an empty Chamber or, worse, a charred and withered corpse.
“You said the Cambionari locked Bucelarii in these Chambers, right?” the Hunter asked.
Taiana nodded. “That is where I found Kalil, Cerran, and the others.”
“Do you know how many?”
She shook her head. “Whenever the Cambionari came to Enarium, I would lock myself away in our towertop room until they left.”
A thought flashed through the Hunter’s mind. Sir Danna had spoken of dragging the corpses of the Bucelarii they killed to Enarium, and in his memories, he’d known of graves in the mountains beside Khar’nath. Yet they hadn’t killed all the Bucelarii—and Cerran and Kalil were proof. Some had to have been brought back and locked away. The walls of his and Taiana’s room were transparent when looking out, so perhaps…
“Did you ever see which Keeps they went to?” he asked. “When they brought their prisoners—”
“Yes!” Her eyes went wide, as if she hadn’t had the idea before. “Not all the time, but on a few of their visits, I could see them moving through Enarium with their prisoners.”
“Prisoners that had to be Bucelarii, right?”
Excitement sparkled in her eyes. “I know I saw them going into the Northeast Keep on both the Base and Medial Echelons. And the Eastern Keeps as well.”
“The ones nearest Hellsgate.”
Her enthusiasm waned. “Yes.”
“Then those are the Keeps we need to search first,” the Hunter said. “Those are the ones most likely to house Bucelarii.”
Taiana’s brow furrowed in thought. “A good plan, except—”
“For the hordes of Elivasti, right?” The Hunter shrugged. “We’ll find a way to get past them and into the towers. It’s the only way we get any sort of reinforcements to help us fight.”
“But let us finish searching this Keep first. We’re already here, and we’ve only got two more floors to go.”
The Hunter nodded. “Lead the way.”
North Keep’s sixth and seventh levels of housed only empty chambers, which brought the Hunter a sense of relief. At least he hadn’t found a child-sized corpse charred by magick and withered by the ravages of time.
Taiana, however, didn’t seem as relieved. If anything, her expression revealed frustration.
“We’ll find her,” the Hunter said in a voice that rang with confidence—far more than he felt at the moment.
“I should have known we wouldn’t find her here.” Taiana shook her head, and a mixture of sorrow and guilt flashed in her eyes. “I should have remembered what our child’s prison looks like. I should, yet I can remember nothing but the sound of Jaia’s cries and the glee in the Warmaster’s demon eyes.”
“Take comfort in knowing the bastard died a painful death.” The Hunter bared his teeth in a snarl. “Screaming in agony, Soulhunger draining his life.”
“You fed the demon’s blood to Thanal Eth’ Athaur?” Something unreadable passed across her face.
The Hunter nodded. “Every demon I’ve found across Einan. It was the easiest way to put them down.”
Her expression grew musing as she turned toward the stairs to begin the descent toward the ground floor.
“Wait, what about the eighth floor?” The Hunter pointed to the stairs that ascended to the top level. “Aren’t there more Chambers to search up there?”
Taiana shook her head. “That is the Keep’s control room. There are no Chambers there, simply the magical mechanisms to activate the power of the Keep. They will not serve us, for they only respond to the blood of the Serenii or their Elivasti descendants.”
Or Hailen’s blood.
Taiana turned and started down the staircase without a backward glance.
The Hunter followed. “Did the Serenii build these Keeps for the sole purpose of housing the Chambers of Sustenance?” he asked. All twenty-one rooms had held one or two Chambers, but nothing remotely resembling a bed, chairs, or any sort of furniture.
“I do not know.” Taiana shook her head. “Too much about the Serenii remains a mystery. But from what I have learned, these were built initially to absorb power for the city. The Chambers of Sustenance were a later addition.”
For a moment, the Hunter could have sworn she was about to continue, but she’d cut herself off mid-sentence.
“So these towers gather the light of the sun and transform it into magical energy?” he asked. “But what happens to all that energy?”
Taiana shot a strange look over her shoulder, then shook her head. “It is needed to sustain life.”
Again, the Hunter found her behavior strange. She answered his questions, but it felt like she only revealed part of the truth. A reminder that she was hiding something from him.
His thoughts flashed back to the conversation they’d had the first night he’d arrived. She had spoken of her time trapped in the Chambers of Sustenance, how it had changed her. She had also mentioned someone who would explain everything and make it clear.
No sense dancing around things any longer, the Hunter thought. Better to come straight out and ask.
“You mentioned speaking to someone who would explain it all,” the Hunter asked as he accompanied her down the stairs. “When will I meet this person?”
Taiana faltered for a heartbeat, her foot freezing in midair above the step. “Soon,” she said. “Once we have found our daughter, I will take you to him.”
The Hunter grabbed her arm and pulled her around to face him. “Why not now?” His eyes narrowed. “Why won’t you tell me who he is?”
Her face twisted into a mask of sorrow. “I can’t.”
“Why not?” the Hunter growled.
After a moment, she let out a slow breath. “Because you wouldn’t understand.”
“Why wouldn’t I understand?” Her stonewalling fanned the flames of anger he’d been trying to control.
She met his gaze, and beneath the sorrow, steel sparkled in her black eyes. “Because you have believed the lies.”
“What lies?” the Hunter demanded.
“There’s too much to explain.” Taiana pulled free of his grip and returned to descending the stairs. “And too little time
in which to do it.”
“Damn it, Taiana, stop with this cryptic horse shite and tell me what the bloody hell is going on!” The Hunter leapt around her and planted himself on the stair directly in front of her.
She stopped, and her expression grew pleading. “Drayvin, I want to tell you. More than anything else, I want you to understand everything. But we have to find Jaia before the Withering.”
“Why?” The Hunter demanded. “Why is it so important that we find our daughter before noon tomorrow? You know I want to find her as much as you do, but can’t you see we have more important problems to deal with? Like the Keeper-damned Sage and his Elivasti, and getting Hailen out of his clutches before he uses the boy to activate the power of Enarium.”
“It is precisely because he has your Hailen that we need to find our daughter.” Her voice rose to a shout, and an anger born of frustration and desperation glittered in her eyes. “With the Melechha’s blood, he has everything he needs to activate the power of Enarium and, in doing so, turn every soul trapped within the Chambers of Sustenance to ash.”
The thought of his daughter being turned into one of those blackened, withered corpses drove a dagger of horror into the Hunter’s gut.
Taiana gestured around her. “These Keeps are designed to collect the light of the sun and transform it into magical energy, which is stored in the bodies of those housed in the Chambers. But when the Keep is activated, it draws that magical energy out of its hosts. The draining will happen so quickly and with such force that it will suck all life from those within the Chambers. Not even the body of a Bucelarii could survive that. They were designed for the Serenii, after all.”
The Hunter pictured his daughter, barely more than an infant when the Warmaster had ripped her from Taiana’s arms, crumbling to ash as the Keeps tore the magical energy from her body.
“No.” His fists clenched with such force his hands trembled. “We will not permit that to happen.”
“We must free all those within the Chambers of Sustenance not only in this Keep, but in every other Keep in Enarium.” Taiana’s face creased into a frown. “We’ll have to move quickly to get to them all before the Withering, but with Soulhunger—”
“Even with Soulhunger, we’re not going to have time.” The Hunter thrust a finger upward. “But if we destroy whatever controls activate the power, we could stop the Sage from using the Keep at all. Surely there has to be a way to--”
“No!” Her voice held a burning intensity he’d never seen in her before. “The Keeps must remain functional.”
“Why?” the Hunter asked. His eyes narrowed. “You don’t want the Sage to activate their power, but you don’t want their power shut off. Why the bloody hell not?”
“Because Enarium has to remain intact.” Her eyes slid away from his. “The power of the city is vital.”
“For what?” Anger flared hot within the Hunter. He’d had enough of her half-answers. “Why is it so important? You’ve seen what happens to people locked away in those Chambers. Why would you want that to continue? What is so important that you would risk the Sage using the power?”
“I told you,” she said, and her expression grew guarded. “It is something he must explain to you for himself. He will make you understand.”
“This again?” The Hunter threw up his hands. “Who in the fiery hell is this mystery man that you follow blindly, like a calf to the slaughter?”
“It is no man.” She spoke in a quiet voice. “I answer to the one below us all.”
Something in those words froze the Hunter’s blood to ice. “No,” he breathed. He knew what she was about to say, but he couldn’t bring himself to belief it.
Her face grew as hard as the stone beneath their feet. “Yes. All of this is for Kharna.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Horror roiled in the Hunter’s gut. He’d wanted to believe that even after all this time, they had similar goals. He could understand her driving need to find their daughter, but this?
It can’t be!
Acid surged in the back of his throat. “You’re serving the Devourer?”
“Never!” Fire flashed in her eyes. “We’re fighting to stop it!”
“But you just said—”
“Listen,” Taiana gripped his shoulder in a strong hand. “The Devourer is death and destruction, the end of all things.”
“Which is precisely why Kharna needs to be stopped.”
“No!” Taiana growled, a gesture that reminded him a lot of himself. “Kharna is not the danger you think he is. He is—”
“The Keeper-damned Destroyer, the Devourer of Worlds!” The Hunter’s voice rose to a furious shout. “After everything that has happened to us because of him, how could you serve him? You know what will happen if he returns to Einan.”
“The world will end.” Taiana spoke in a flat, cold voice. “Total annihilation for our world.”
“Exactly!” The Hunter thrust a finger at her. “Yet you are serving him, just like the Sage.”
Her face twisted into a snarl. “Never. The demon seeks to loosen his bonds.”
“And you?” the Hunter demanded. “How do you serve him?”
“I seek to ensure that he remains alive, that he is fed.”
“Which, one day, will give him the strength needed to break free of his prison and return to Einan.”
Taiana shook her head. “No. This is what I meant when I said that you believed the lies.”
“So tell me the truth, Taiana!” The Hunter fixed her with a hard glare. “If what I know, what everyone in the world knows, is a lie, give me the truth we are missing.”
“I want to!” she shouted, a desperate, sorrowful cry. “More than anything, Drayvin, I want to tell you everything. But it is too much for me to share. You will not understand unless he shows you.”
The Hunter stepped back, horrified. “You want me to speak to Kharna?” His thoughts flashed to the night in the Serenii tunnels beneath Voramis, when he felt an enormous heartbeat echoing in his mind. It had been Kharna, sustained by the magick of Soulhunger and the other Im’tasi, the weapons of the Bucelarii, all these years.
Taiana took a step toward him. “Yes. I need you to know the truth so you can help me do what has to be done.”
“And what is that?” the Hunter growled, his voice cold with rage.
“The power of Enarium is sustaining him. We cannot allow the Sage to turn that power to freeing him.”
Her words made no sense to the Hunter. Everything he’d learned about Kharna—from the First and Third in Voramis, from Queen Asalah in Al Hani, and the Sage in Kara-ket—had led him to believe the Destroyer wanted to be freed from his eternal prison. He’d fought the urge to kill with Soulhunger because of the fact that every life taken sent power to Kharna. One day, the Devourer of Worlds would have enough to break free of his shackles.
The Sage sought to hasten that day by using the power of Enarium. Taiana claimed to be at odds with the Sage, yet planned to feed the Destroyer the very power he needed to shatter his bonds.
Dread sent ice curling down his spine. As the Beggar God had been corrupted by the seed of Kharna’s consciousness, has Taiana been corrupted by her communion with the Devourer as well? He stared at her as if truly seeing her for the first time. Everything she’s told me, was it all just another attempt to manipulate me into helping her feed Kharna?
His worst fear, the one he hadn’t dared to put into thought, had come true. He’d dreamed of the woman before him for years, yet now that he’d found her, she was a stranger. He didn’t know her any more than he knew himself. He’d clung to his faint memories of her out of desperation to find a sense of who he was, a sense of identity. Now, that last fragment of hope shattered and turned to ash in his hands.
“No.” He had only strength enough for the single word. Everything he’d endured over these last months, all the suffering and hardship, the endless leagues of travel, it had all come down to finding her. And now that he’d found her, h
e wanted nothing more than to flee.
“Please, Drayvin.” She reached for him. “Please, for the love we once shared and the sake of our child, trust me.”
“How?” Tears welled in his eyes and blurred his vision as he retreated a step, out of her reach.
“Everything you know about Kharna is a lie.” Taiana’s tone turned pleading. “You must speak to him yourself, and he will show you the truth. You have to know the danger—”
“I know the danger.” He scrubbed the moisture from his cheeks, but the tears refused to stop. “I wanted to trust you, Taiana. So badly. You were all I had. Now…”
“You still have me!” She moved toward him, and he backed down another step. “I swear, on my life, I would never do anything to hurt you.”
“Like put a dagger in my chest and turn me over to the Illusionist Clerics?”
She flinched, as if he’d struck her. He was surprised by the vehemence of the words. He understood the logic of her actions and believed he’d forgiven her. Perhaps he’d simply pushed down the anger, but never truly gotten past it. Now, the sting of that betrayal flared to life, compounded by his fury at the discovery that she served the very god he sought to thwart. His wife served his enemy, the enemy of all living things on Einan. That made her his enemy as well. The thought made him want to vomit.
“Did I find out what you planned to do all those years ago,” he asked in a quiet voice, “so you betrayed me, had my memories erased?”
“No!” Pain flashed in her eyes. “I told you, I did that because I thought it was best for our child.”
Anger bubbled within his chest and formed into hard, cold words. “Our child.” He swallowed the lump in his throat and continued retreating down the staircase, away from her. “The child I never had a chance to see, to hold in my arms. A child whose life is now being drained to feed the god you serve.”
“Which is why you have to help me find her!” Taiana followed him, trying to match the pace of his descent.
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