Music. Mandolin music. Beautiful singing. The rain stops. I’m inside on the wood floor. Whoever is dragging me stops. I open my eyes. Push my hair out of my face. Watch Ki run off again. Out of the tavern. Into the rain. Into the fray. Skeletons. Magic. Dogs and creatures.
I push myself to my feet. Start to run back out into it. I can sense another one of them, the source of a spell. This one dark. A Necromancer. Someone grabs my shoulder, though. Pulls me back. Pushes me into a chair. He’s young. Azi’s age. Dark hair. Serious looking. Dacva, I think Rian said his name was. He puts his hands on my chest. Prays. I feel my throat open up. I can breathe. The pain leaves. I feel much better.
“Thank you,” say. I jump up and try to run out again. The action makes me dizzy. He puts an arm out. Blocks my path.
“You need to rest a moment,” he says. I hesitate. Outside, the battle is raging fiercely. I want to be out there, not in here.
“Rest, Tib.”
“Don’t tell me what to do!” I shout at Mevyn, who’s tucked safely into a space between the shutter and the frame, watching out the window. I turn to Dacva. “Not you, sorry.”
“You have to give your body time, or the healing will be undone,” he says. “Sorry. My healing is weak. It takes longer to set than Father Donal’s.” He shifts himself on the bench so he can see past Mya, who’s standing near the open door, playing. Her song makes my heart drum in my chest. Makes me believe I could take down every last one of those enemies out there. I want to go back to it, but I heed Dacva’s advice. I try to be still.
In the street, the fight is fierce. Hard to make out, with so many enemies on so few defenders. I look for the villagers who were under the spell of the Sorcerer, but I don’t see them. Their door is back on its hinges, closed tightly. Brightly colored light splashes across the house fronts, dancing erratically. Its source is the center of the fray. It beams from Azaeli, who swings her sword with fury and purpose. At her collar, Flitt’s bright hair bounces with Azi’s movement. The light is hers.
Creatures who charge her are completely blinded by the fairy’s glare. They swing and bite ferociously but miss. She hits their heads with the flat of her blade. Knocks them out cold. Dog-men and Wildwoods are strewn in defeated piles at her feet.
Beside her Rian scans the distance, searching for the source, watching for more Sorcerers. There are three more. I know there are. I can feel them. There’s also the storm that hovers. The darkness. Dreamwalker.
Bryse is not as gentle as Azaeli. He slashes at the creatures, slicing them in two as easily as a scythe through fresh grass. The others fight furiously, driving back the throngs of attackers, sending skeletons clattering to the ground.
I look for my sister, but don’t see her. I see her arrows, though. Firing into the melee from the roof above us. Hitting their mark every time.
I bounce on the balls of my feet impatiently. I need to be out there. I have to fight. I see another one of them, a Sorceress. She stands in an alley between two houses across the street. Her cloak is deep purple. The wind flaps them open, revealing robes of crimson beneath. Red like the flowers. The petals. The scoop of dye in a barrel. She moves her hands gracefully. Fallen skeletons reassemble. Rise. Stalk forward. I draw my knives and my orange vial. I wet the blades.
“Be smart,” Mevyn says, watching me. “Don’t just charge out there again. And add the black, as well.”
I glare at him. Uncork the black. Spread it on. Turn to Dacva.
“Long enough?” I ask him. My heart is racing to Mya’s music. I’m confident. Strengthened. Dacva nods and I start out, but stop at the threshold. Close my eyes. Think about it. How I stepped out of hiding before, for Mya. If I stepped out, surely I can step in again. I will it. I take a step. I feel it again. The shift. The spider webs brushing across my skin.
“Good.”
“Shut up,” I murmur. I stalk away from the tavern. Into the rain. Straight through the battle. Nothing turns to me. No one sees me. Flit’s light dances across my vision. My boots squish in the mud. They’re not new anymore. Properly broken in. Dirtied. Flecked with blood. I fix my eyes on the Sorceress. Watch her fingers in the air, dancing, conducting. Letting those she manipulates do all of the work.
Mya’s song is far away now, but my confidence doesn’t fade. I stride into the alley. Right up to the Sorceress. She doesn’t see me. She has no idea I’m here. I raise my knives like scissors. They slice through her wards like nothing. Take her pretty hand right off. Her wrist sizzles orange, then the black starts creeping up, up. I stare at it. Watch its slow progress, fascinated. She screams. Writhes. Panics.
Then she collects herself. Speaks a word or two. A spell. The black fades, leaving a stump where her hand was. She waits for more to happen. Nothing does.
She screams again, this time out of rage. Thrusts her good hand forward. A charge of red energy wells at her fingertips and bursts toward me. I brace myself. It strikes me with the force of a pleasant breeze. Passes through me. Shoots up and across the street. I turn in time to see its new mark: Ki, perched on the balcony railing high above the tavern door.
Blue light bursts from her necklace. It absorbs some of the spell, but she didn’t see it coming. The force of it throws her off balance. She tries to right herself, but can’t. She plummets. Lands with a sickening, muddy thud. Doesn’t move.
“No!” I scream. I start to run toward her and the air shifts again. I realize too late that I’ve revealed myself.
My skin crawls. Bony fingers catch me by the back of the collar. Drag me back to the alley, out of sight of everyone. More hands clamp around me. Disarm me. Throw my knives into the mud. Wide white grins and dark eyes loom over me. Bones. Death. The Sorceress bears down on me, seething. She raises the charred stump of her arm.
“You’ll pay,” she growls. Snaps the fingers of her remaining hand. A knife of flames stretches from her fingertips. The skeletons press my wrist against the stone of the house. Hold me so I can’t struggle. Can’t kick. Can’t move. Can’t do anything but scream until a stinking bony hand clamps over my mouth. It smells awful. Worse than the roots. Like a grave. I gag. The woman’s eyes glint in the fire. Her face fades into the darkness of her hood. It’s covered with black swirls.
She presses close. Brings the fiery knife up. Holds it to my wrist. One of her bony servants rips off my glove, my bracer.
“Yours will be a suitable replacement,” her laugh is wicked. Maniacal. Insane. She presses the spell-made blade to my skin. I feel nothing. No heat, no slice. The spell fizzles. Fades.
“You little freak,” she spits furiously. “What are you?”
She screams in frustration. Rips a knife from my bandolier. Raises it to slash. I close my eyes. Brace myself. Focus on the sounds of battle outside of the alley to distract me. Maybe someone heard. Maybe they’ll save me. I try to fight, but the skeletons are too strong. Like the roots. I can barely move. I wait for the pain to come.
The blade slices into my skin with searing pain. I fight. I struggle, but they hold me.
She’s unskilled with the knife. Not strong enough to make the cut cleanly. There’s nothing I can do. I try to focus on something other than the pain. Try to distract myself from it so I don’t pass out.
I feel my vision closing in on me, like before. See the tunnel that comes right before the darkness. I force my eyes open. Fight to keep myself awake through this. I know, if I let my eyes close, it will be for the last time. She’ll take my hand first, then she’ll kill me.
I imagine myself as one of her undead servants and push the thought away. Instead I focus instead on her eyes, wild and filled with madness. Determined and filled with blood lust as she makes her cut. She doesn’t notice the flutter of gold at her shoulder. Isn’t aware of the spear until it plunges into her neck. Twists. Releases a flood of red that spills over her robes. She chokes, sputters. Stumbles.
The knife clatters to the ground as she falls backwards, clutching at her throat. Mevyn hovers over her. Drives his
spear into the other side of her throat. Watches her life drain away. Gazes into her eyes. Steals her memories until she’s gone and her skeletons crumble to piles of bone. Lifeless, as they should be. Someone in the street cheers.
“Pink vial. Rest. Search her,” Mevyn says to me before he fades again. Hides himself away. Leaves me to sink into the filth of the alley and clamp my bleeding wrist to my stomach. The rain makes the blood spread. Makes the wound seem worse than it is.
I fumble a pink vial from its loop. Pull out the stopper with my teeth. Pour it on the jagged slice that would have taken off my hand. Watch the blood stop, the grisly insides knit together, the skin close neatly. Drink the rest of it, just for good measure. Tip my head back against the stone. Breathe. Listen. In the street they’re still fighting. Something’s off, though. Missing. The music. Mya’s playing has stopped.
I push myself to my feet. Sway dizzily. Cling to the wall. Peer out. Try to see Ki. She’s gone. Mya’s gone. Dacva’s outside, kneeling. Healing someone. Donal. Azi’s gone. Rian’s gone. Bryse and Benen and Cort are fighting dog-men and Wildlings. Keeping them away from Dacva. Not many left. Ten, maybe. They can manage.
I catch my breath. Try to calm my racing heart. Try not to think about what just happened. What could have happened. I crawl toward the lifeless Sorceress. Retrieve my glove, my bracer, my knives. Look at her. She’s got a belt of pouches. An amulet.
Search her, Mevyn said. He saved my life. I do it. I take the necklace. The belt. Rings from her fingers. Find the severed hand. Take its rings, too.
For now, I wear it. All of it. It’s the easiest way. There are still two Sorcerers out there. I can feel them. One controlling the dog men, one controlling the forest creatures. I step to the mouth of the alley. Stare at the place where my sister landed. Steel myself. Step into hiding again.
Overhead, the clouds rumble and swirl unnaturally. Dark, like a cloak. I can feel him pressing down on us. Dreamwalker. Watching. Laughing. Taunting. I ignore it, and run across the street to where she fell. I can’t tell what happened after. Too many soggy footprints all muddled together.
“Ki!” I shout. Light glints in the distance, all the colors of the rainbow. Flitt. I charge toward it. Race toward it. Find them at the edge of the village, fighting the third Sorcerer. Azi is swinging her sword. Rian is casting his shields as fast as his opponent can break them. I sprint. Slide between them. Draw my coated blades. Drive them into the Sorcerer’s robes.
They glance off, stopped by a shield that’s stronger than I expected. I strike again. The shield weakens. Azi swings her sword. Breaks the shield down completely. I stab again. This time my knives sink into flesh. Blacken it and the robes around it. He starts to cast like the Sorceress did, to stop the spread. Rian counters with a spell that binds his tongue and clamps his lips shut.
Together we watch the black and orange crackle and creep over him, encasing him until he is completely covered. I give him a push and he falls backward and smashes into pieces.
“Whoa,” Rian whispers. He stares at me in awe. “How did you…”
“Fairy embers,” Flitt says from the safety of Azi’s pauldron. “Clever.”
Azi pokes at the crumbled remains with her toe. “It’s like what Iren did to Emris,” she says, somewhere between impressed and disgusted.
“Look out,” Rian spins on his heel. Spreads his arms. Casts a shield just in time to block us from the charging dog-men. They don’t attack, though. They run past, into the woods. Free now.
“One more left,” I whisper, mostly to myself.
“How do you know?” Azi asks.
“He’s right,” Rian says. “See, all that remains are those grass creatures.” Rian points to the creatures in the center of town, fighting with Bryse and Cort and Benen. Donal is up now. Dacva’s retreating to the tavern again.
“Oh Rian, they don’t stand a chance. They don’t know what they’re doing.” She winces as Bryse slices the last two of them apart with one strike.
“Can you tell where it is, Tib? The last Sorcerer?” Rian asks me.
I close my eyes. Concentrate. Listen. All I can feel are the clouds pressing in. Darkness swirling down from them. Touching everything. Then, Dreamwalker speaks. His ominous voice thunders over us.
“See how they destroy your town, these so-called Elite. They come with their banners and their Mage. Careless. They fight in your streets. They have no concern for any of you. They’ll watch you burn. Watch your children die. See them, how they threaten. Stop them.”
“Oh, no,” I whisper. All around us, villagers open their doors. Look outside. Some of them have weapons. Cooking knives. Cleavers. Axes.
“Stay inside,” Lisabella calls to them from beside Benen. “It isn’t safe yet.”
They don’t listen. They charge together, twenty, thirty, forty. A mob of villagers. Furious. Unskilled. Wild and raving. They clash into the defenders: Bryse, Cort, Lisabella, Benen, Donal. They engulf them. They kick and stab and punch.
“No!” Azi cries. “No, oh Rian!” She sobs and starts to run toward the crowd, but Rian pulls her back.
“Just wait,” he says. “Your mum is in there. Have faith.”
I don’t know what he means, but it doesn’t take long to figure it out. From the center of the mob I feel it. Peace. Soothing. It radiates toward us, washing over the throng, placating them. Slowly they turn away. Shake their heads. Go back to their homes. Close the doors. Lisabella slumps into Benen, who gathers her close.
“Get inside,” Donal says. “Everyone. Quickly!”
Rian grabs my hand and Azi’s. We run together through the rain, through the street. Follow the others back into the tavern. Slam the door behind us. Latch it. Inside, we’re greeted only by Dacva. The sleeping tavern patrons are still asleep, undisturbed. Mya is gone. Elliot is gone. My heart aches for my sister. I hoped, but no. She isn’t here, either.
Rian paces near the door, casting spells. Protections. He looks beat up. Exhausted. Flitt goes to him. Shines her light. He looks a little better. Keeps going. The others slump together near the fire. Donal whispers over them, healing them. Lisabella is the first to speak. She turns to Dacva.
“Mya? Elliot?” she asks wearily.
“He woke up when that spell hit the balcony,” Dacva says as he presses one of Cort’s wounds closed. “He charged outside and chased after someone. Mya went after them. I didn’t see who they were chasing, but whoever it was was carrying someone off.”
“Ki,” I say quietly. “She was up there, shooting. She fell. I saw her. By the time I was able to go help, she was gone.”
“Never saw anything like it,” Bryse grumbles. “Try to defend their village and they come stalking out, kicking and punching and stabbing.” He rubs his arm with a scowl. “What got into them?”
“Not what,” Azi says, gripping her mother’s hand, “who.”
I know the answer to that. She does, too. We know exactly who.
“How do we stop him, though?” I ask quietly. “How do you fight against that?” I turn to Mevyn, who is only now emerging by my side.
“Stop who?” Cort asks.
“Yeah, someone going to fill us in?” Bryse scowls. Crosses his arms. Looks at me. I remember how he took out two of those creatures with one blow. How he sliced them in two. He could do the same to me. I shiver. Look away. I’m glad he’s on my side, at least for now.
“Dreamwalker,” I say. My voice is shaky. I lean on the table. Start taking off the dead Sorceress’s things. An amulet of teeth and silver. A belt full of pouches that I don’t want to look through for fear of what I’ll find. Gold and gemstone rings. Cort comes over.
“Good haul,” he says, and dumps what he’s looted onto the table. Bracelets. Coins. Lumpy pouches of mysterious things. Treasure, I guess. Some magical, some not. I don’t care what any of it’s worth. I drop it all onto the table. Shove it away from me. Go to the window to watch for my sister.
Mevyn stays, of course. Scavenges through the thi
ngs. Rian sits. Picks up a ring. Turns it in his fingers.
“He’s a Sorcerer,” Azi says. “He’s not like the others, though. He was just a boy when they locked him in the Dreaming. Younger than Tib.”
“What he is, is an abomination,” I say. The words are Mevyn’s, not mine. Still, I agree with them, so I don’t fight him putting words in my head.
I stare out into the street. The storm clouds have lifted. The sun is sinking low. It glares red over puddles of mud. Casts long shadows across the lifeless bodies littered everywhere. He did this. All of this. And I’m the one who’s supposed to stop him.
“We should go,” Cort says, “search for Mya and Elliot.”
“I would advise against it,” says Donal. His tone is soothing. Kind and wise, like a grandfather. “We all know that they have means of tracking and traveling that don’t suit us. Most likely, any of us would impede their progress. It wouldn’t be wise to go after them now. Have faith. They’ll return.”
The others reluctantly agree. Donal and Dacva leave the tavern to go check on the villagers. Heal them, if they need it. I watch them go from door to door, knocking and going in. I never heard of such a thing, healers, just giving their talents away like that. Helping without being asked. It doesn’t happen in Sunteri. Healing is for the rich. If you want it, you pay. Lots.
I pull off my gloves, my bracers. Run my finger across my wrist. There isn’t even a scar. Nothing to prove that it really happened. Lisabella is the first to break the thoughtful silence. She comes to my side. Looks out, too. Rests a hand on my shoulder.
“They’ll find her,” she says. “In the meantime we need to know everything there is to know about this threat. Tell us, so we can help. We’ll fight beside you.”
“Him? He’s just a kid,” Bryse grumbles. “Loose cannon, too. He broke Rian’s ward. You saw him. Ran right out of it. Left us all out in the open. Everybody knows you don’t just plow through a shield ward.”
Call of Sunteri (Keepers of the Wellsprings Book 2) Page 30
