From somewhere she managed to muster a voice. “Some kind of drug. Can’t think straight. Can’t conjure.”
“Ah. Clever.” He leaned back on his heels. “Well, I can fix that easily enough. But you will have to let me past your defenses for that. Assuming, that is, you have any defenses left.”
The full magnitude of what he was suggesting took a moment to sink in. When it did, she shuddered. If she agreed to such a thing, she would have no way to protect herself. All the secrets she had guarded so carefully since the night of her First Transition would be laid bare for his inspection, if he chose to seek them out.
“Time is short,” he pointed out. “The alternative is my leaving you here to fend for yourself. Frankly, I’d rather have you fully functional, as I could use some assistance, but I haven’t time to play nursemaid. So what is your answer?”
It cannot be worse than what Lazaroth did to me.
She nodded.
She could feel his power enter her, tentatively—respectfully—then with greater confidence as he saw there was indeed no resistance. She struggled to lock away the memories of her recent violation so that he would not find them, knowing even as she did so that the effort was a futile one. But she had to try. Then fire took root in her veins, a sorcerous flame whose purpose was to seek out one special fuel and consume it: Lazaroth’s drug. Shutting her eyes, Kamala trembled as it burned through her body, invading every muscle, every internal organ.. Perhaps it went on for a few seconds longer than it should have. Perhaps under cover of healing Ramirus used a more subtle sorcery on her as well, searching for hidden knowledge in her mind. There was no way for her to know.
Finally the fire subsided. For the first time since she had been struck down, Kamala found she could think clearly. Tentatively she bound a bit of power to heal the bloody mess the shackles had made of her arms, and to restore the rest of her body to full functioning. It was difficult for her to bind her athra properly, but there was no way to know whether that was the result of her weakened condition or of Tefilat’s malevolent influence. The sweat on her body was banished, along with other fluids too foul to mention. The psychic foulness of Lazaroth’s touch would be harder to get rid of.
She looked up at Ramirus, and found him gazing at her with the kind of intensity that a hawk reserved for its prey.
“You will want to call in your favor now.” He said it quietly, but there was no mistaking his meaning.
How much did he know about her? He would have known the truth of what she was as soon as he made contact with her soulfire, but had he learned about the murder of Raven from her mind as well? Or was that something he had always suspected and had just needed to confirm? Either way, it was clear from his expression that he knew there was a price on her head.
“Protect my life,” she said.
His eyes narrowed. “Here and now. You haven’t paid me enough to ask for more than that.”
She nodded.
With a brusque nod he stood and offered her his hand. As she rose to her feet, some clothing appeared on her body, a reasonable simulacrum of what she had worn in Kierdwyn. Evidently he had seen how she was struggling to control her power and decided to take care of that himself.
“Where is Colivar?” he asked her.
She shook her head. “I don’t know. Lazaroth said he was here but that no one—”
“Lazaroth?” The look of naked surprise on his face was unmistakable. “Lazaroth?”
So. Apparently he had not claimed all her secrets. “He’s allied to Siderea. He said he was holding Colivar until her people got here.”
“Son of a bitch,” he muttered.
She looked at him curiously. “How did you get to me without going through him?”
“I conjured a complicated distraction to occupy the mind of whoever was master of this place. It won’t last forever. Lazaroth knows my resonance better than most; it won’t take him long to realize he’s been had. Fortunately, the same spells will warn me when he comes back—”
“No, they won’t.”
A white eyebrow arched upward.
“Trust me. They won’t”
Curiosity flickered in the depths of his eyes, but he was no longer inside her mind; her secrets were her own once more. After a moment he nodded sharply, accepting her statement at face value. “Then we have to find Colivar as quickly as possible.”
“Lazaroth said that sorcery would not be able to detect him.”
He nodded. “I tried when I first arrived, and the only trace I was able to pick up was yours. I thought it might be the chaotic resonance of this place that was to blame. But perhaps not.” He shook his head. “We’ll have to search for him by physical means, then.”
“Maybe not.” She drew in a deep breath. The mere thought of working sorcery right now was daunting—her soul still felt raw and tender—but she thought she knew how she might locate Colivar without actually having to search for his person. That might circumvent whatever spells Lazaroth had used to hide him.
Closing her eyes, she reached out with her sorcerous senses into the underground complex surrounding her. Not only the chambers themselves, but the walls of those chambers, the air that flowed through them, the very stone that surrounded them. And she searched for any kind of anomaly. The heat that a human body might generate, lying against cooler rock. A bit more moisture in one room than another, where human sweat had added its burden to the air. The subtle vibration of a heartbeat beating against some solid surface. Signs of the presence of a living body that were not dependent upon its metaphysical signature. It was hard to focus on such minutiae in her current state, and she had a few false starts, but at last she thought she detected clear signs of a living creature elsewhere in the complex.
It was not far away from where she had been taken. If she had gone a bit further in her earlier search, she might have found Colivar.
“This way,” she said.
They walked quickly through the labyrinth, checking every chamber they came to, with sorcery as well as human sight. Kamala explained to Ramirus what sort of life signs she had detected, so he knew what to look for. While they moved, she kept looking about herself nervously, even though she knew that if Lazaroth wanted to approach them unseen, it would be a wasted effort. If Lazaroth was truly a woman and bore the seed of a queen within him—within her—then he would share in Kamala’s ability to mask her presence from other Magisters.
I should tell Ramirus what he really is, she thought. But that would be of little help to him. She wasn’t about to reveal to any Magister the full extent of her power, which she would have to do in order to explain Lazaroth’s. She would just have to guide Ramirus through this trap as best she could without that, feeding him what he needed to know when he needed to know it.
Could she stand up to Lazaroth after what had passed between them? The mere thought of having to do so made her knees feel weak. But she had her sorcery now, not to mention a personal score to settle. It was possible to feel violated and unclean and still kick a man in the balls when you had to.
Assuming he actually had balls when you did that.
Down a narrow staircase they went, single file, down into the depths of the earth. Ramirus maintained the sorcerous light that allowed them to see where they were going, but it flickered now and then as currents of untamed power eddied about it, and once it almost went out. This was not a good place to be trapped in the dark. It had the feel of a prison about it, and she was not surprised when they got to the bottom of the stairs and found a heavily barred door blocking their way. Locked, and probably warded as well. Ramirus considered it for a moment, then put his hand on the nearest wall. Sandstone crumbled to dust at his touch, pooling about his feet. Within minutes he had an opening large enough for a man to squeeze inside. A few minutes more and his tunnel opened out into a dark space from which warm, fetid air flowed.
And the smell of human sweat.
Heart pounding, Kamala followed Ramirus into the room. It was a small
space, and the shackles affixed to the walls left little doubt about what purpose it had been designed for. But the shackles hung empty, and the body that lay in the middle of the floor did not seem to be restrained in any way.
Colivar.
He lay upon one side, curled in on himself as if in pain. His outstretched hand had bloodied fingernails, where he appeared to have scraped them along the coarse sandstone floor. But otherwise he was still. Deathly still. His eyes were open, but they were empty, and he gave no sign that he was aware of their approach, or of anything else around him.
“What’s wrong with him?” she whispered.
Ramirus shook his head and knelt down by Colivar’s side. While he was using his sorcery to inspect the man, she used her Sight. And what she saw chilled her to the bone. For there was nothing but a body in front of her. No living essence resonated from Colivar, nor any hint of power. Both should have been discernable, if only faintly. A sorcerer was never without such things until the day he died.
She focused all her senses on the physical rhythms of his body and was relieved to discern faint signs of life. A rasping, tortured breath. The feverish pounding of an overworked heart. The scent of fresh sweat on his skin. But outside the boundaries of his flesh it was as though the man did not exist.
“We don’t have time for mysteries right now,” Ramirus said. “Let’s get him out of here. We can worry about his condition later.” He reached down to pick up the body. It was not limp, not in the way that dead flesh should be limp, and it was hard for him to position it over his shoulder.
“Can you transport us out of here?” she asked. Given the nature of the currents in this place, she was certain that her own skills were not up to the task.
“Bad idea in this place. Doubly so when dealing with unknown sorcery.” He indicated Colivar. “Let’s get some distance from this cursed place, first.”
With Colivar’s body over his shoulder, Ramirus barely fit through the tunnel he had carved. Kamala could see Colivar’s arm scrape against the rock, tearing the fabric of his sleeve, and she thought she heard him moan softly. It was a sound more of horror than of pain. What if this wasn’t even Colivar? she thought suddenly. Without being able to read his essence, they had no way to confirm his identity. For all they knew, this might be a goat that had been crafted to look like Colivar, the ultimate joke on any rescuers.
But it’s the only living creature I detected in this place, she thought. So we won’t be leaving Colivar here, regardless.
At last they came out into the main chamber. Ramirus’ light expanded to fill every corner of the room as they entered. He attempted to bind it so that it would not shine into the corridor beyond, advertising their presence, but his spell was imperfect, and a few trickles of light seeped through. Little wonder he didn’t want to invoke sorcerous transportation until they got a safe distance away from Tefilat. One wrong move in conjuring a portal, and your body could wind up splattered across half the desert.
“I cut a tunnel coming in so that I could avoid any wards on the main gate,” he told her. His voice was pitched low now, little more than a whisper. In any other place he would have trusted to sorcery to keep others from hearing it. “We can use it going out.”
He turned toward an opening at the far end of the chamber and gestured for her to follow him. It was then that she felt a sudden shiver along her spine. Something in the chamber had shifted. A silent, secret, metaphysical something. She could not even say where that knowledge came from, but she knew her own instincts enough to trust it.
Had Lazaroth returned?
The concept that he might be in the room even now, watching her, made a wave of sickness come over her. Fear and shame and loathing churned in her gut, and for a moment it was all she could do not to vomit. And in that moment she hated herself for feeling that way, for being so weak, almost as much as she hated him.
Hated her.
She put a hand on his Ramirus’ shoulder. He was startled when she did so; Magisters didn’t usually touch one another. But it gave her a connection whereby she could channel a message to him without need for speech.
Lazaroth is here, she thought to him.
He nodded almost imperceptibly to indicate that he’d gotten the message. He did not look around the room in a physical sense, but she was sure that he was doing so via sorcery, trying to pick up any clue as to Lazaroth’s location. It was a hopeless task. Even Kamala couldn’t have picked Lazaroth out in this big empty space, devoid of any landmarks to focus on. And Ramirus had no experience whatsoever in dealing with a queen’s power.
Her one consolation was that she was pretty sure Lazaroth did not want Colivar dead, which took a number of things off the table. But it still left a lot of unpleasant options. Kamala strained her senses to the utmost as she and Ramirus hurried across the room, trying to catch any whiff of sorcerous intentions, any change in the metaphysical balance of the space surrounding them—
Suddenly sorcery blazed up directly in front of them. The light of it was blinding to Kamala, and she shielded her eyes with one hand as she cursed the sensitivity of her Sight, expecting that at any moment that Lazaroth would strike at them.
But he did not.
The light faded. Her eyes adjusted.
The exit was gone.
They turned about quickly, to see what had become of the other doorways. All gone. The rock had healed over all of them, like flesh closing over a wound. Sandstone stripes coursed across the walls in fluid perfection, as if men had never sliced through them. Even Kamala’s Sight could not pick out the place where the doors had once been. It was as if she and Ramirus were standing in a chamber that had never had—and never would have—exits.
Instinctively they moved to the nearest wall and put their backs to it. One less direction to worry about. You can cut off a Magister’s head with a single sword stroke, Ethanus had taught Kamala, so long as he does not see it coming. Wasn’t that how Kostas had died? Facing off against anyone other than Lazaroth, they would not be in such danger. His sorcery would be visible, even if his person was not, and that would give them at least a moment’s warning if he launched an aggressive spell at them.
But the power of a Souleater queen changed that equation completely. And Ramirus didn’t know about it. He’d be watching for conventional warning signs. Conventional sorcery.
We have to get out of here, Kamala thought desperately.
Sorcery was beginning to shimmer about the walls and ceiling of the chamber. She saw Ramirus furrow his brow as he bound enough athra to read its purpose . . . and he drew in a sharp breath as he did so. She looked upward and did the same.
The chamber was being sealed off. Not impermeably—no Magister could cut himself off from the outside world entirely, lest he lose his connection to his consort—but with a barrier no transportation spell would be able to pass through. Lazaroth was making sure they would have no avenue of escape before taking further action.
They could not afford to be trapped here.
Shutting her eyes, Kamala reached out to the barrier with all her power. Ramirus was attempting to break through the thing by sheer force, and for a moment she joined her sorcery to his, to help him. It was important that Lazaroth think they were both thoroughly engaged in that effort, so that he did not question what else she might be doing. And then—quietly, carefully—she disengaged from Ramirus’ sorcery. Slipping tendrils of her own power through the weakest points in the barrier, she extended them into the layers of sandstone beyond. A plan was beginning to take shape in her mind, and she desperately tried to remember everything Ethanus had ever taught her about the mechanics of sorcery. Particularly about how quickly it worked. You could only wield sorcery as quickly as you could summon forth athra from your soul and mold into the proper shape, but a spell that was crafted in advance, and required only a trigger to set it in motion, might be all but instantaneous in its action. Yes?
Pray that I am remembering correctly, she thought to her distant me
ntor. Or else your prize student may soon be no more than a messy splotch on the ground.
Trusting to Ramirus’ defensive efforts to keep Lazaroth distracted, she began to transform the rock surrounding them. She left the inner surface of the chamber walls untouched, so that the change would not be visible to Lazaroth, but she transformed everything beyond that. Sandstone into sulfur—into charcoal—into saltpeter. It seemed she could feel the weight of the rock pressing down on the chamber now, no different in volume than what it had been before, but infinitely more volatile in potential.
And then, trembling with anticipation, she returned her awareness to her body. Ramirus had failed to break through the barrier, and it was nearly complete now; as soon as it was done she had no doubt that the next phase of Lazaroth’s assault would begin. She reached out and grasped Ramirus’ arm, holding onto him tightly so that even if everything went to hell in a handbasket, they would not get separated. He looked at her in surprise.
“Transport us,” she whispered fiercely. Praying to all the gods that he would trust her and just do it.
For a moment he stared into her eyes, and apparently whatever he saw there satisfied him. Grimly he nodded and proceeded to summon the power that would be needed. As his sorcery took shape around them, she saw that he understood her intent, for he did not attempt to fashion a portal in front of them, that they might step into—the normal configuration—but rather to conjure one right where they were standing. The risk of that was immense in this place—any flaw in such a spell would kill them all—but if Lazaroth’s barrier faltered for even an instant, they would be in motion before he could repair it.
“Keep trying,” she whispered. Squeezing his arm tightly. “Keep trying!” She hoped it would sound to Lazaroth as if she were merely desperate and was urging Ramirus to try to force his way through the barrier by brute force. Good. Good. The more he thought he understood what they were doing, the less likely he was to realize what she really had planned.
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