The Silver Pear (The Dark Forest Book 2)

by Michelle Diener

  They knew her. Knew she was fair. They only knew this new sorcerer would give up the code for money or a bribe.

  She gave William a bitter smile. A liege lord was only as strong as the loyalty of his men.

  As if he knew the direction of her thoughts, he wiped his forehead with his sleeve.

  Suddenly, coming from behind the men standing in the entrance, a slim figure darted forward, hands raised, and shot a spell at her.

  She knew this was a pincer move. She’d have to respond, and the sorcerer beside William would hit her a moment after she’d defended, when she was at her most vulnerable.

  But she had no choice.

  She chose to reflect, bouncing the young sorcerer’s spell straight back at him, and threw herself sideways, creating a magical shield as she did.

  It almost covered her, but one part of her rival’s spell was fast enough to hit her foot, and the pain of a thousand knives sliced at her, getting a lock-jawed grip on her and biting down.

  She screamed, her hand coming up to the silver pear. She couldn’t let him have it. No matter what. She thought of her father’s tunnel, hidden in the walls, the way out for her and Soren, and sent the silver pear there with the last bright threads of her consciousness.

  Then her world faded to black.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  SHE WAS A SORCERER.

  Soren tried to temper the rage he felt at what had been done to her with the knowledge of what she was, but as she was lifted from the ground, her face absolutely white in the moonlight, he had to breathe deep to keep from attacking the guards who surrounded her.

  She could have left him.

  He understood that the moment he’d come to himself and seen the door was closed and sensed her to his right, hiding in the shadows.

  She had stayed.

  He even understood that when she’d bespelled him, it had been to get him out, to save him, and not for any dark reason of her own, no matter how much he’d hated the sudden loss of his own will.

  “Where is the man? The man who was here with her?” William of Nesta turned in his direction, a frown deepening on his forehead, and Soren stood absolutely still, the moonstone clutched tight in his fist, just in case his shoes made a noise on the cobbles.

  He’d remembered he had the moonstone, could become invisible, moments before the second sorcerer had attacked, and as every eye had been on Mirabelle, it had been the perfect moment to disappear.

  He could wait for them to take her away, gather his courage and face the dark of the secret passage, or even simply walk out the front gate the next time it was opened. He could leave Miri and her rival to fight it out, but he knew even before the guard carrying her left the courtyard that he wouldn’t.

  William’s men treated her gently. He would give them that.

  And William himself seemed strangely conflicted by her defeat.

  He’d cried out when she’d screamed, reaching a hand to her, and then had turned on the sorcerer, arm raised as if to strike, before he remembered he had instigated the attack himself.

  He and his new sorcerer had stared at each other for a long moment, then William had turned to look at the ball of wild magic that hovered nearby.

  It had taken Soren and Rane a while to work out what wild magic was. How they were coming across it more and more often in the Great Forest, and it was only when they’d seen Jasper’s brother Nuen cast a spell they’d realized the truth. When a sorcerer called down sky magic for a very powerful spell, they seldom drew exactly what they needed. Any power left over became wild magic, as dangerous to the sorcerers as it was to everyone else. And so they magicked it away.

  The Great Forest had become their rubbish tip.

  The sorcerer followed William’s gaze, and Soren thought he swayed a little with exhaustion as he lifted his hand and the wild magic disappeared in a flash of blue.

  With a grunt, William turned away, calling to his guards to take Mirabelle to the dungeon and to look for Soren.

  “He must have slipped out of the courtyard while we were distracted. Check the grounds. He can’t get out. Make sure everyone leaving the stronghold is identified.”

  William gave the instructions as he followed behind the guard carrying Mirabelle, and Soren fell into step behind him and the sorcerer, walking to the right of them, and far enough back there was no danger of brushing against them accidentally.

  “What of your apprentice?” William paused just before they left the courtyard, and Soren realized with a jolt he’d forgotten about the young sorcerer who’d attacked Mirabelle in concert with his mentor.

  The apprentice’s body lay crumpled on the ground, a small ball of wild magic hanging just above his head, and the sorcerer moved nervously, lifting a hand and flicking his fingers. The wild magic seemed to implode in on itself, and disappeared.

  “If you could get one of your guards to take him to his bed, I will see him after we speak to these other prisoners you are holding, and I have stripped Mirabelle of her power.” He spoke slowly, almost slurring.

  “That wasn’t part of the deal.” William lifted a hand and grasped the sorcerer’s arm. “Banish her, yes. Not strip her of her power.”

  “How do you think a sorcerer is banished?” The sorcerer looked down at the hand on his sleeve and seemed to gain a little more energy. William released him as if he’d been stung. “If she is left with her power, she can return to fight another day. That would not be good strategy, now would it?”

  “I made promises to her father . . .”

  “All of which you broke when you came to me. You understand that by aligning with you, I have broken agreements as well. So we are both now outside the law.”

  “I hadn’t thought . . . ” William’s words trailed, and Soren realized the men around them were listening as well, and William was aware of it.

  “Don’t let it trouble you over-much.” The sorcerer gave a low laugh. “It has worked out quite well for Eric the Bold and Nuen of Harness, being outside the law. Although one couldn’t say the same for their liege lords. Or those they’ve imposed themselves upon. I hear the king of Gaynor is not Eric’s willing patron.”

  William ran a hand over his face and said nothing. Soren decided he wasn’t the only one to hear a threat in the sorcerer’s words.

  They had reached the side of the castle, and the guard started down the stairs to the dungeon. Soren pressed himself against the wall as he followed them. He was glad of his precaution when the guard with the pitchfork hurried on their heels with the key, the hem of his cloak brushing Soren’s shins as he went by.

  The man struggled with the lock, and then pushed the door open, stepping back to let the guard carrying Mirabelle in first, William and the sorcerer right on his heels.

  A noise like the screech of a million rusty hinges, inhuman with pain, came from within the dungeon, going higher and higher, and then cut off abruptly.

  Soren forced himself to run down the rest of the stairs, uncaring of the guard standing in the doorway. He shoved the man aside, and with a cry he went down, pitchfork clattering beside him, and scrabbled out the way, pressing himself into a corner of the stairwell, facing the wall.

  Soren braced for monsters, for anything at all.

  Instead, William stood just within the doorway, staring down at a crumpled figure on the ground.

  Soren first thought it was Mirabelle, but then he saw her, lying on her side, dropped by the guard who’d carried her near the door to the cell. The guard was turned away, hanging onto the bars for support.

  The figure on the floor was the sorcerer, his hood thrown back, baring a sharp-featured, strong face and dark hair pulled back in a queue. His mouth was set in a rigor of death, and faint blue light glimmered here and there around him, and then winked out.

  From the way he lay, the sorcerer had arched his back as he died, his arms thrown wide.

  Soren’s mouth fell open. He remembered Mirabelle staying behind a few moments, remembered the flash of blue
within the room before she’d closed and locked the door behind her.

  But whatever spell she’d cast, it had affected only the sorcerer. William and the guard were dazed and frightened, but seemingly unharmed.

  Mirabelle was another story. Even from where he stood, he could see her forehead had been grazed on the uneven stone of the dungeon floor.

  He stepped into the room, his only thought to see if she was alive, and it was only after he was crouched beside her that he realized he hadn’t thought whether her spell would affect him or not.

  It seemed not.

  He touched her neck, looking for a pulse.

  It beat, thready and quick, and he resisted the urge to draw her into his arms. Warm her cold limbs.

  Instead, he got back to his feet, standing over her, an invisible sentinel. He would need darkness and no guards to carry her out of here. If he tried it now, he would be caught, and the moonstone taken from him.

  “It wasn’t Mirabelle who did that, was it?” William looked over at her, and frowned when he saw her tossed in a heap. He turned to the guard, who was still crouched up against the cell door.

  He shook his head. “She was completely unconscious.” He looked into the cell and went still, as if suddenly realizing they were alone in the room. “The prisoners are all gone.” His voice was hushed.

  William looked into the empty cell, then back to the dead sorcerer at his feet. “I . . .” He rubbed his eyes. He was a man whose world was crumbling around him. “I knew someone was trying to take Halakan from the inside. Those men were sent by a sorcerer, and somehow he’s got them loose, and he bespelled this room.” His face was worried as he looked through the door to the outside, as if he expected an attack at any moment.

  Soren didn’t feel any sympathy. One look at Mirabelle, and he only wished things were worse for the liege lord.

  “What should I do with Miri?” the guard asked, and the familiar way he said her name, as if he were speaking about a friend, jerked Soren’s attention to him.

  Irritation and some hot, prickly emotion he couldn’t quite name rose up in him. If the guard was her friend, he’d stood by when she’d been mistreated. No matter how gently he’d carried her, he’d still carried her to a dungeon. And when he’d been frightened, he thrown her to the ground to protect himself.

  “I don’t . . .” William hunched, stepping around the sorcerer to get back to the door. He stopped before he stepped over the threshold, looked back into the room, and Soren noticed he’d straightened up, was pulling the mantle of leadership back over himself.

  “Lock her in the cell. Put her on a pallet and we can wait to see if she recovers.” He tugged at his ear, a man contemplating begging forgiveness from the only possible ally he had left.

  “There are no pallets.” The guard looked deeper into the cell.

  “Why not?” William frowned.

  The guard who had the keys, just visible in the stairwell from where Soren was standing, pushed himself up against the wall, and looked into the room with eyes that couldn’t settle. “You said to make things uncomfortable for them.” His voice wavered.

  William turned sharply to him. “I didn’t mean treat them like animals. Why would you think that?”

  The guard said nothing, hunching over himself and shivering. He kept his eyes on his feet.

  “So they are loose in this stronghold, have a powerful sorcerer to hand, and they have a legitimate grudge, as well.” His voice was sharp. “Get a few pallets for her, and then put her on them and lock her in the cell. And be sure she has water and food right beside her when she wakes up. Is that specific enough for you?”

  Both guards nodded.

  “And the . . . body?”

  William jerked at that. “I’ll get Henry to sort it out.” Then, barely giving the guard in the stairwell time to jump back, he stalked up the outer stairs.

  Soren kept watch as the guards got pallets, water and food, and others came to get the dead sorcerer. He struggled with himself when they lifted Mirabelle up again and locked her in the cell, but there was no way to stop them without making himself known. He kept himself outside the cell itself, even though he had a strange urge to be inside with her.

  It was almost laughable, actually wanting to step inside a dungeon cell. Just a few hours ago, he’d have sworn nothing would induce him to ever consider such a thing, let alone to help a sorcerer.

  Eventually, the outside door closed, locking them both in, and he slid down the bars of the cell door, leaning back against them.

  They had lain Mirabelle close to the door, and he reached out through the bars and touched her, letting his hand rest in the crook of her elbow.

  And waited.

  CHAPTER SIX

  SHE CAME AWAKE SLOWLY.

  The pain was gone, but her body felt as if it had been shaken by a giant dog, her every bone rattled and even her sense of touch scrambled.

  She was lying on a pallet that stank of old sweat—rank and musty. Unable to lie on it a moment longer, she tried to sit up, sliding off it and landing on cold flagstones.

  “Shh.”

  Her whole body jerked at the sound of someone with her, and she blinked, straining her eyes to make out who it was. She could see no-one.

  “Who’s there?” Her throat was so dry, she was barely able to croak the words.

  “Soren.”

  “Where are you?” She searched the darkness, suddenly fearful of having gone blind.

  “Oh. Sorry, I forgot.” One moment there was nothing, the next, he was right up against the bars on the other side of the cell, staring right at her.

  She jerked back with a cry. He was close enough to reach out and touch, his big body pressed up against the bars. “You were invisible?”

  “Wild magic.” He didn’t explain further, but reached out and touched her. His hand was warm, almost burning her she felt so cold. “Are you all right? You’ve been asleep for more than a day.”

  She gave a slow nod. “What are you doing here?”

  “I was waiting for you to come round, to help you escape.”

  He had stayed for her. For more than a day.

  She hadn’t expected it, and unsure how to react she curled up on herself, stretching the kinks out of her back. When she raised her head, his intense blue gaze was on her, and she wrapped her arms around herself as she rose to her feet.

  It was coming back to her; the scene in the courtyard, her duel with William’s sorcerer and his apprentice. She realized why she felt so lost. “Why am I still alive?”

  “They planned to strip you of your powers, they said, not kill you, but when everyone walked in this room, something . . . happened to the sorcerer.”

  “Hurt him, did it?” She couldn’t help the satisfaction that curled through her words.

  “He’s dead.” Soren’s words were neutral.

  “Dead?” Her legs nearly collapsed under her, and she grabbed for the bars. “That means . . .” She leaned forward, touching her forehead to the cold iron. She shouldn’t be shocked. Hadn’t she been surprised she was alive? “He was planning to kill me.”

  Soren said nothing.

  “The spell I set was a do-unto spell. Whatever someone planned to do when they walked into this room was what happened to them.”

  “But the sorcerer wasn’t the first person in the room.” Soren rubbed his arms.

  “The spell doesn’t work like that. It only affects negative emotion, feeding on itself until it uses itself up.”

  “I think it used itself up,” Soren said.

  He was right. She could feel nothing left of her construct. She sighed. “I set it when I thought William would be coming in here with his new sorcerer, wanting to use magic on one of you to get information. It would have given us time to get away, hurting them exactly as much as they planned to hurt you.”

  Soren turned his head, and looked at a spot on the floor near the outside door. “Instead,” he said, and there was a rough edge in his voice, “it
saved your life.”

  Miri thought back to what he’d said. “William came in here with the sorcerer?”

  Soren nodded. “A moment or two before the sorcerer stepped in.”

  That did surprise her. “He wasn’t affected? I thought William meant me harm, too.”

  Soren made a humming noise at the back of his throat. “I don’t think William knows quite what he wants to do. He seemed ill at ease over the whole thing. Nearly struck the sorcerer for hurting you in the courtyard. Argued with him over stripping your powers. If the sorcerer hadn’t planned to kill you, perhaps William’s clearly divided loyalties changed his mind.”

  She thought about that, leaning against the bars. Soren was so close to her she could feel the heat of his skin. “Thank you.” He turned to look at her as she spoke, his face hard to read in the gloom of the cell. “For staying. You could already be halfway home by now.”

  “Not really.” He gave her a crooked smile. “You could have left me in the courtyard. Ducked into the passage and left me to my little breakdown. You could be halfway home by now.”

  She gave a bitter laugh. “Not really.”

  He waited a beat. “If you feel better, are you able to unlock the door like you did before?”

  She lifted her hand to the silver pear, and felt a jolt of pure fear, searing her heart like the touch of a blacksmith’s brand.

  “What is it?” He went from half-slouched against the bars to absolute focus in a moment.

  “My . . . talisman. Most sorcerers use a staff. I used a magical item my father gave me. A silver pear. It hangs like a pendant around my neck.” She thought back to what had happened in the courtyard. The pain, her hand coming up . . . “The passageway! I sent it to the passageway so that William’s sorcerer couldn’t get it.”

  He frowned. “Did the others close the far door of the passage behind them, or was it still open?”

  Miri felt her world drop away, as if the floor had disappeared from beneath her feet, and she fell.