The Secret Texts

by Holly Lisle

  The image danced down to a long, bloody knife, and to a thumb that tested the edge of it. “Really? Tell me more.”

  “I’ll . . . I’ll tell you anything you want to know. Anything.”

  She heard a soft chuckle that raised the hair on the back of her neck and made her stomach churn. “I know you will. First tell me how you made it. We’ll get to how you used it soon enough.”

  Alarista gripped Yanth’s hand and squeezed. “He’s torturing him.”

  “I know.”

  “Oh, gods! Oh, Hasmal! We have to help him.”

  “I know. But how?”

  Alarista couldn’t turn her eyes away from the nightmare in front of her. “I’ll have to draw the Dragon’s soul to me. I’ll have to capture it.”

  “You couldn’t do it before,” Jaim said quietly.

  “I’ll just have to do it this time.”

  “And if you fail, we lose Hasmal and you. We’re going to need you.”

  She turned to Jaim, snarling. “I can’t sit here and watch him die!”

  Jaim jumped back. “I wasn’t suggesting that you watch him die.”

  “Then what?”

  Jaim looked over at the healer working on the unconscious Dùghall. “Dùghall could beat the Dragon if he had his strength.”

  “As could I, if I had his skills.”

  “Dùghall said you had as much control of magic as he did, only in other areas. Could you use your magic to help the healer heal him?”

  Alarista stared at Jaim. She wasn’t a healer, and just healing Dùghall wouldn’t do her any good. Even healed, he would be drained of energy and incapable of besting the soul of a rested, powerful Dragon. But where the healer could make him well, she could give him strength. Her strength. The price she would pay . . .

  She chose not to think about the price she would pay.

  She asked the healer, “Namele, are you nearly finished?”

  “I’ve done all I can—he hasn’t woken up yet, but now he’s merely sleeping. A few days’ rest and he should be able to sit up again. He’s very frail—whatever happened nearly killed him.”

  “But he’s healed.”

  Namele looked over at her, eyes wary. “As much as magic can heal him, yes. He’s old, he’s worn out, and simple healing can’t fix that. He won’t be able to do any more Dragon fighting.”

  Alarista turned to Yanth and Jaim. In a low voice, she said, “Drag him over here. Then sit by me—when I finish what I have to do, I’ll need you to catch me. Finally—and this is the most important thing—when Dùghall wakes, the very instant he wakes, show him Hasmal. Don’t let him waste time on me. Tell him he has to stop the Dragon before he kills Hasmal.”

  Yanth said, “What do you plan on doing?”

  “The only thing I can. He needs youth and strength to fight the Dragons. I’m going to give him youth. And strength.”

  She heard the healer gasp. “You can’t—”

  “Shut up. I can.” She glared at Yanth. “You’ll take care of this?”

  He nodded. “I will.”

  They dragged Dùghall to her, assisted by two guards and impeded by the protesting healer, and propped him across from her in a sitting position. Then, while the guards held him upright, Yanth moved to Alarista’s left shoulder, and Jaim to her right. She heard Hasmal scream once, and she shuddered.

  Hold on, Has, she thought. Hold on. Help is coming.

  She summoned all her courage, and rested her hands on Dùghall’s shoulders. Then she lifted her chin, and stared toward the heavens where Vodor Imrish held his court, and in a loud, clear voice, she commanded:

  “From my strength,

  From my blood,

  From my flesh,

  From my life,

  I offer all that I am,

  All that I have,

  All that Dùghall Draclas needs

  To make him whole.

  Take from me to give to him,

  Strength and blood,

  Flesh and life,

  Even unto my own death.

  I freely offer my gift,

  And in his name accept my offer.

  Vodor Imrish, hear me.”

  She did not draw her own blood, nor scrape her skin. She had no need of that. Their bodies touched—hers strong and whole, Dùghall’s weak and worn. She would not limit her offering or mark off with a circle that which she would give and that which she would hold back. Whatever Vodor Imrish chose to take from her to give to Dùghall, he could take.

  She knew in offering that she might die—that Dùghall, so near death, might take from her more than she could give and survive. He might absorb her. But Dùghall knew what she did not, and he could win for them where she could not. If she died, she would do so fighting to destroy the Dragons and to save Hasmal, and that would be enough. If she died, her soul would go on, and she would someday find Hasmal again. And meanwhile, her Hasmal would live.

  She felt the fire flow into her veins, Matrin’s magic stirred by the godtouch, and she knew that Vodor Imrish had heard her. She rejoiced for just an instant, for until that moment he had been deaf to all prayers and all entreaties. Then, as the fire filled her, it burned through her and emptied her. Her world grew dark and she heard a rushing in her ears. Her mouth grew dry, her body heavy, and a giant weight pressed down on her, making each breath a fight.

  She knew she was falling, but could not stop herself. Her soul tugged at the moorings of her flesh, called by the wind of approaching death. She did not fight that wind, but at the last instant, when she was sure she would leave her body behind, she felt a surge of energy flow into her, binding her soul tightly to her cage of skin and bones. She was too weak to move—too weak even to open her eyes—but she lived, and knew she would live yet a little longer. Her last coherent thought was a prayer: that Dùghall had received from her enough to do what he needed; that Hasmal could hold on until he did it.

  Chapter 2

  Dùghall Draclas came roaring out of unconsciousness like a man trapped underwater who at the last possible instant breaks free from his trap and bursts to the surface. He lunged to his feet, gasping, his eyes open but for an instant unfocused.

  His body burst with uncontainable energy. He felt as if he could fly, as if he could run from one edge of the known world to the other without his feet ever touching the ground, as if he could rebuild the Glass Towers single-handed. He had a hunger that he hadn’t felt so overwhelmingly in years; he desired sex with the obsessive full-body yearning of a young man.

  He stared around him at blurred bright colors and at shapes that he could not force to resolve into anything meaningful. The voices in his ears were clear and sharp, startlingly loud, full of nuances and depths but lacking meaning. Smells filled his nostrils, pungent and heady and rich. It was all new, all wondrous, all incomprehensible but glorious.

  I’ve been reborn, he thought. Have died, have come into the world in a new body. I am once again a squalling infant, and in a few moments or a few days I’ll forget that I am Dùghall Draclas. . . .

  Sound was the first thing to resolve into comprehensible patterns, the first thing to shatter his illusion. “. . . don’t know whether she’s going to survive the shock.”

  “What about him? He looks healthy as peasant hell.”

  “Dùghall? Can you hear us? Can you see us?”

  “Nothing. She’s paid a terrible price for nothing.”

  Sight resolved next. He was in a tent . . . no. He was in the tent, where he and Hasmal had been pulling the souls out of Dragons. He was standing up, weaving back and forth, with a soldier at either side keeping him from falling on his face. He was looking down—Jaim stared up at him, Yanth and the healer Namele were crouched over a white-haired woman that he did not recognize.

  He licked his lips, and they felt . . . different. Thicker, firmer, moister. He still felt that wondrous energy, that illusion of incredible strength, that inescapable sexual fire. “What . . . happened?” he asked, and wondered at the new dep
th of his voice, at the richness and the range. At the clarity of the sound when he spoke, at the presence of soft sounds he hadn’t heard in years. Decades.

  A relieved smile flashed across Jaim’s face. “Dùghall? You with us?”

  Dùghall nodded. “Yes.”

  “No time for explanations, then. A Dragon pulled Hasmal physically through the connection between them. He’s torturing him now. If you can’t pull the Dragon’s soul from his body, he’s going to kill Hasmal. You don’t have much time; Hasmal looks bad.”

  Yanth and the healer dragged the old woman out of the way, and Dùghall dropped to his knees beside Jaim. He stared into the viewing glass Jaim indicated and saw quick flashes of Hasmal, of a knife, of blood and horror. He heard a scream—whisper-soft through the viewing-glass connection but no less chilling for its lack of volume—and heard a gentle, soothing voice say, “More. Or I’ll cut out a lung, dear fellow, and pull it out through your back. You really only need one, you know.”

  Jaim said, “Hasmal managed to plant a talisman on the bastard only a few moments ago. It’s been going on like this ever since. He’s been lying—making up all sorts of wild stories and talking as fast as he can. But the snake-futtering whoreson keeps cutting him anyway.” Jaim’s voice sounded tight and dry in his throat.

  “I’ll get him,” Dùghall said. “I’ll stop this.”

  For the moment he didn’t question his strength. He accepted it, and with it the miracle that had brought him back from sharply remembered pain and utter exhaustion. Jaim handed him a featureless gold ring attached to a tripod of twisted silver wire; this would become a tiny Mirror of Souls—a house and a prison for the soul of the Dragon who tortured Hasmal. He set it on the rug directly in front of him and with a quick swipe of his index finger scraped a bit of skin from the inside of his cheek.

  He’d refined his technique since the first time he’d snatched a Dragon soul from its captive body, but the process was still fraught with danger. He glanced at the guards. “Have them watch me,” he said to Yanth. “If you have any reason to think the Dragon has won and has pushed my soul into the ring, give them a signal. They’re to kill this body without question.”

  Jaim paled. “How can I know?”

  Dùghall shrugged. “You might not. You might make a mistake. But, Jaim, you listen to me. Better that you make a mistake and kill me by accident than that you accidentally let a Dragon live. You understand?”

  The young man looked at him with frightened eyes and nodded slowly.

  Hasmal screamed again.

  “I have to do this,” Dùghall said. “What’s the Dragon’s name?”

  Jaim said, “Hasmal has called him Dafril.”

  Dùghall nodded. “Dafril.” He crouched over the tiny tripod. He rested his hands on the viewing glass that connected to Dafril’s soul, and willed his soul to link through that ethereal connection to the monster at the other end. When, after a moment, he felt the hot darkness of that evil other, he concentrated all his will on the band of gold and said:

  “Follow my soul, Vodor Imrish,

  To the Dragon soul of Dafril,

  To the usurper of a body not his own,

  And from this body expel the intruder.

  Bring no harm to the intruder,

  The Dragon Dafril.

  Instead, give his soul safe house and shelter

  Within the unbroken circle before me—

  Unbroken that it may guard

  Dafril’s immortality, and

  Protect the essence of his life and mind,

  While safely reuniting the body and soul

  Of him whom Dafril has wronged.

  I offer my flesh—all that I have given

  And all that you will take—

  Freely and with clear conscience,

  As I do no wrong,

  But reverse a wrong done.”

  White-hot magical fire burned through him once more, searing the anchor that held his soul to his own body, searing the tenuous connection between him and the Dragon; and within the blink of an eye it enveloped the Dragon’s soul.

  The fire pulsed and drew, and he felt first astonishment and then rage from Dafril. Because Dafril’s soul could have no permanent anchor in the body he had stolen, the fire ripped him loose and pulled him toward Dùghall as fast as light raced through a keyhole. Dùghall braced and the enemy soul was upon him in the same instant; and this enemy held power he had never experienced before.

  Dafril’s soul dug into his mind and burrowed into his flesh seeking purchase; the Dragon fought with a thousand years of experience and cleverness to pry Dùghall from his body and force Dùghall’s soul into the eternal prison of the ring. Dùghall strengthened his connections with his own flesh. He felt he was fighting an octopus—no sooner had he shored up one weak spot than Dafril had wedged a tentacle into another and dug in. Every self-doubt, every half-remembered shame, every wrong he’d ever done anyone became a weak point that the Dragon exploited.

  He caught brief thoughts and images from his enemy’s mind; he discovered he was fighting the head of the Dragons. Dafril was the monster who had conceived the immortality engine a thousand years before, and had planned out and designed the Mirror of Souls. This was the very monster who, when the Wizards’ War turned in favor of the Falcons, had gathered his faithful followers and locked all of them into the Mirror of Souls, priming it to bring them back when the world was ripe for their return. This was the master.

  Dafril reached into his mind with a will forged of iron, and drove commands like knives into his soul. Give in. Give up. Surrender.

  Dùghall gathered his strength and channeled his purpose and determination. He visualized himself as the core of a sun, burning everything that was not him, expanding with unstoppable power, filling all the cracks and crevices, all the weaknesses and shames and uncertainties of his existence with the pure fire of his life. He accepted his self-doubt and admitted his imperfections, and when he did, he no longer questioned his worthiness to exist.

  At the moment that Dùghall accepted himself as he was, Dafril lost his hold. His soul erupted from the center of Dùghall’s chest in a fiery river that poured into the center of the ring. The light began to spiral around the rim, and the room filled for an instant with a deafening wall of sound—a wail of terror and rage so loud Dùghall felt it more than he heard it. Fog poured out from the center of the fire, white and dense and ice-cold. And for just an instant, Dùghall choked on the stink of rot and honeysuckle.

  Then the air cleared and quiet returned.

  Before him, pure golden light rose upward through the center of the tiny tripod and swirled into the ring, spiraling slowly. It had become the Mirror of Dafril—a thing of beauty with a heart of evil.

  Dùghall shuddered and looked up at Jaim. “I beat him,” he said quietly. “I beat that monster. Hasmal should be safe now.”

  Jaim stared into his eyes, and Dùghall became aware of the point of a sword pressed lightly against his back, high on the left rib cage. A downward thrust would shove it through his heart and kill him in an instant. He recalled his peril and realized its extent as he saw the doubt and the distrust in the eyes of the man who held his life in a word.

  Jaim’s hands trembled. He nibbled at the corner of his lower lip. He stared at Dùghall as if staring could strip away the skin and bone and reveal the shape of the soul beneath. “Tell me something that only you and I would know,” he said.

  Dùghall took a deep breath and let it out slowly. He shook his head. “That wouldn’t work. Dafril’s soul would have had immediate access to my memories. He could tell you anything I could.”

  Jaim frowned. A spot of blood appeared on that lower lip, quickly licked away. Abruptly he laughed and looked up at the guard. “He’s Dùghall,” he said, and the pressure of the sword at Dùghall’s back vanished.

  Dùghall nodded. “I am. But how could you be sure?”

  Jaim said, “Dafril would have told me something to convince me he was
you, in order to save his life as quickly as possible. Only you would say something that wouldn’t give me any reassurance at all.”

  In the viewing glass, Hasmal was smiling through blood and pain. “You’re the rightful owner of the body, aren’t you?” he was saying.

  Dùghall felt he could relax. Hasmal would be taken care of by the grateful man who had gotten his life back. Meanwhile, he, Dùghall, could take the time to find out what had happened to him. He stretched and pulled his hands away from the viewing glass that still showed images of Hasmal. “Tell me how I got my strength back.”

  Jaim glanced at the old woman still lying where Yanth and the healer had dragged her. “Alarista knew she couldn’t take on the Dragon who was torturing Hasmal and win. So she fed her youth and her strength to you. You look like you’re in your late thirties or early forties now.”

  Dùghall looked at his hands—really looked at them—for the first time since he woke up. The skin was smooth; the arthritis that had bent his knuckles sideways and swelled them into knots was gone. He made a fist and saw the muscle below the webbing between his thumb and index finger bulge, big as a mouse. The air flowing into and out of his lungs moved slowly and easily. His spine felt straight and strong, and no dull throb of pain grabbed at him when he arched his back or turned his head. And lust coursed through his veins and filled his groin with urgent hunger.

  He was young again.

  And Alarista was old.

  He twisted around and stared at the wasted body and wrinkled face of the woman across the tent. That was Alarista? She had sacrificed herself to save Hasmal; had torn most of the years of her life away and gifted them to him. He tried to conceive of a love that would do that—in all his years, he had known and desired and enjoyed many women, but he had never found the one woman for whom he would move the world.

  He envied her the power of her passion, and realized in the same instant that he could not keep the gift that she had given him. He had to return her life to her, though he didn’t know how.