People could be looking for her.
That thought filled her with both elation and fear—after all, if her friends were looking for her, then the burning man’s friends could be looking, too. Always expect the worst things to happen—that was what D’Jenn told her. If things could get worse, Bethany sure didn’t know how.
She was lost, she was terrified, and she was hunted.
She had to summon her magic again. It was the only thing left that she could do. Without it, she could wander these halls for days and never get out. The corridors felt ancient, like they went on forever and ever, right to the center of all Eldath. They even smelled old. Bethany was afraid that she might end up living the rest of her life like a tunnel rat, scraping together dirt to eat, gone blind from never seeing the light.
Bethany tried to calm herself. She placed her hand on the dusty wall, feeling the steady stone beneath her trembling fingers. She packed her sobs away one by one until they were all tucked into the smallest part of her chest, and no longer caused more than a sharp breath. She wiped away her tears.
The stone felt cool under her hand. She ran her fingers over its surface, until they alighted on a cold, swirling design laid into the stone. Bethany realized it was some sort of metal. They were probably runes similar to those in other places in the Conclave, swirling designs that made the eye want to twist to follow them. Bethany followed this one with her hand.
She let the smooth contours of the metal calm her, and before she knew it, there were no more sobs. Bethany took a few deep breaths, listening to the sound echo from the stone around her, and closed her eyes against the dark. She didn’t need to close them, exactly, but with her eyes opened to nothing but shadow, she fancied that she could feel them straining to see. Bethany began to wall off her emotions one by one, seeking the inner silence she needed to embrace her magic.
She could feel it low in her chest, like a thunderstorm inside her ribcage.
Her Kai came to her like a scared animal, but it sang. Bethany almost cried in relief to feel it coursing through her again. She relaxed, tension fleeing her shoulders.
Now—if she could just figure out how to make light. Dormael and D’Jenn had never shown her, but even with her senses heightened by her magic, there wasn’t enough light to see by—the tunnels were too deep below the ground. She would just have to figure it out on her own.
Bethany clenched her jaw, and gathered her will.
Light!
Nothing happened.
She scrunched up her brows, closing her eyes tight with effort. She pictured everything she could imagine that was connected to light—torches, sunlight, the sun, windows, flowers, campfires, heat, wood, high noon—and fixed those images in the front of her mind. She could feel her Kai rumbling like thunder.
Shine!
The darkness stayed in place.
Her Kai continued to sing, lilting through her senses like a butterfly—which did nothing to push back the shadow. Bethany ground her teeth, trying not to let her frustration intrude on her magic. She’d been forced to practice Flying Rock hour after stupid hour, but could they have taught her to make a little bit of light against the dark, maybe some fire for company?
No!
“I never learn anything bloody useful,” she said, listening to her voice echo in the dark. There was no one to hear her curse, so she couldn’t get in trouble for it.
“Bloody stupid,” she said. “Bloody stupid, bloody stupid, bloody stupid!”
None of that helped her magic, but she had known that it wouldn’t.
Bethany hummed under her breath—a tune she had learned somewhere—and took steps down the dusty, black hallway. She ran her hand along the wall, letting the grit roll beneath her fingers against the smoothness of the stone underneath. She began to get her emotions back under control.
“I’m only stuck if I want to be stuck,” she said, after a long, deep breath. “Pirate-Queen of the bloody stupid Seas!” Bethany took two deep breaths, then two more. She listened to her heart, made it slow down by slowing down her breathing. Her anger began to die away.
Her Kai moved through the darkness, feeling along the walls and down the corridor. The world around her let out constant hum, a low drone just below the edge of hearing. Bethany cleared her mind of her worries, and listened.
Everything has magic in it, Dormael had told her once. You, me, Shawna—everything. If you listen hard enough, you can hear it. The trick was keeping all the little voices in her head quiet—that, and to stop thinking about food for one minute of the day.
Even now, she wished for a big, steaming piece of buttered bread.
“Stop it,” she whispered, a smile tipping the tears on her cheeks into the corners of her mouth. “Listen. There’s magic in everything—you just have to listen, girl.” Bethany was pretty satisfied with her impression of Dormael’s voice. She would have to show him, maybe he would laugh.
Bethany cleared her throat, crept forward through the hallway, and listened.
It took her a moment to hear it, but the cool metal under her fingers was pulsing with a magical tone, reacting with the song of her Kai. Why hadn’t she noticed that before? It was a quiet thing, and she guessed that if she wasn’t listening for it, she could miss it. There it was, though, ringing like a bell.
But what could she do with that?
Bethany bit her upper lip, and brushed her Kai across the metal. Her magic returned a note to her, something warbled and dissonant. She scrunched up her face, the sour note making her skin crawl. Bethany wasn’t sure what to do. She could barely play Flying Rock, and not for very long. Something nagged at her about the tones playing through her Kai, though.
When she was alone, Bethany often sang to herself. She would hum tunes that she’d heard from all over, and tap out the rhythms on whatever surface was available. When people were around, she just tapped. Bethany changed the note her Kai was singing, applying a force of will to her magic the same way she changed her voice when she was singing. Something about it just felt right, like a shoe that hugged the heel.
As she did, she felt her Kai sing in tune with the metal, and it began to shine, pushing the darkness away with soft, yellow light. Bethany felt a smile spread on her face, and she clapped her hands together in excitement. She even jumped up and down a little. She’d done it!
Pirate-Queen of the bloody Seas!
It took her eyes a moment to adjust to the warm light. The metal was shining all up and down its length, like someone had written a message in fire. The walls were made of a mottled, sand-colored stone, while the floor was colored black. Bethany could see no doorways in either direction. The only footprints in the dust were her own.
Bethany felt certain that the runes were made to shine that way—something about the way it sang to her told her so. Why would the wizards have put the runes down here, though? What did that tell her? She could almost feel D’Jenn standing over her shoulder, arms crossed, scowling as he waited for an answer.
“They don’t want people without magic coming down here,” she said out loud, looking up and down the hall. “No more storerooms, no more wooden doors, no more torches on the walls. Just these runes.” She ran her hand over the humming metal, listening to the tone play in her Kai. “I must be pretty deep in the tunnels.”
Not bad, D’Jenn would say, but what else? You’ve got a mind, girl—use it.
“The…the runes must be connected to something, they must lead somewhere! Why have them here to see where you’re going, unless there’s somewhere to go in the first place? I just need to follow the runes!” she said, clapping her hands.
If D’Jenn was here, he’d be proud of her.
She was struck with a thought. If she could use these runes to light up the hallway, then so could anyone who might be looking for her. They might be able to tell that she was using them, maybe even figure out how to find her. Was the light worth the risk of discovery?
Leyton wasn’t afraid of risk. Leyton was the P
irate-King of the Seas, a rescuer of princesses. Bethany wasn’t going to be afraid, either. She was only stuck if she let herself be stuck.
“Pirate-Queen of the Seas,” she growled. “Rescuer of princesses!”
Bethany set off at a jog, following the glowing runes down the corridor.
***
“How long has she been missing?” Dormael asked, unable to keep an edge out of his voice.
“Since the afternoon,” Shawna said, giving him an apologetic look. “If I’d known…”
“No need for that,” D’Jenn said, holding up a hand to forestall another apology. “No one expected any of this.”
Dormael took a deep breath and let it out, trying to send his worries out with it. The truth was that he wanted to scream. He wanted to blame someone. He’d been taken off the street in the one place in the world where he had been sure that could never happen, he’d been tortured to the brink of death and back multiple times, and now his daughter was missing.
He wanted to start breaking things.
“It’s nobody’s fault,” is what he said. After a deep breath, he realized that he meant it.
“I saw her at the Bruising Stretch,” Shawna said. “She was there, watching me spar. When I went looking for her, though, she was gone. No one had seen her, or even knew who she was.”
“She’s nimble,” Dormael said, unable to keep a smile off his face. “I swear she could hide between shafts of sunlight, if she wanted to. Where could she have gone?” The last bit came out a bit more anguished than he had meant to sound, and he felt his brother’s comforting hand on his shoulder.
“We’ll find her, brother. The girl’s too smart to get lost for long,” Allen said.
Everyone stood around him, crowded around a bench in his sitting room. He was plopped onto the seat, his shoulders slumped, his stomach a mess of fluttering anxiety. A fire burned in his hearth, the wood crackling with warmth. The light flickered over the walls of his room, playing over the odd implements and trophies he’d collected over the years.
“I just hope no one grabbed her,” Dormael said.
“They wouldn’t have any reason,” Shawna said. “I killed Grant, remember? She’s beyond the reach of that creature forever. Why would anyone else take her?”
“Actually,” D’Jenn said, “there may be a reason.”
“What do you mean?” Dormael asked, shooting his cousin a sharp look.
“It’s why I came to find you in the first place,” D’Jenn said. He made a sharp gesture in the air, and Dormael felt his cousin’s Kai reach out into the room, sealing it away from eavesdroppers. “I had a bug in my hair about something today, so I went to try and dig it out.”
“A bug about what?” Allen asked.
“Kitamin Jurillic,” D’Jenn said, “and his miraculous rescue.”
“You mean that story my Pop told you?” Dormael asked. “Was the old man on to something for once?” He didn’t see what in the Six Hells this had to do with Bethany, but he waited his cousin out. D’Jenn wouldn’t say anything that wasn’t worth the effort.
“He’s not as stupid as all that,” Allen said. “The old man is on to a lot of things.”
“He certainly was this time,” D’Jenn nodded. “Something about our conversation with Victus bothered me all day. The thing your father had said about Kitamin Jurillic—that someone powerful had been behind his rescue—kept nagging at me. I knew only one person with the kind of power to affect a rescue operation good enough to remove someone from Rashardian slavers.”
“This is what you meant when you said he’s been using us,” Dormael said.
“Aye,” D’Jenn nodded. “Victus had him rescued, Dormael. What’s more, he’s been buying up influence on the Council of Seven. Nyra Jurillic even believed he was murdering people, or she alluded to it, anyway. I don’t know what the money is for, yet—I still don’t have all the pieces—but I know one thing. Victus Tiranan is a traitor, and we cannot trust him. Jurillic said that she could see his hand in the Council Meetings. He’s deep into something, some operation he’s been planning. I know the way his mind works, Dormael. This isn’t good. I can feel it.”
Dormael took a moment to soak it all in. He knew his mentor had lied during their debriefing, he and D’Jenn had shared their suspicions of him. Victus as a traitor was hard to imagine, but D’Jenn had never led him down the wrong path.
“What would he have to gain?” Dormael asked. “Let’s say that he moves some pieces around on the board, gets elected Mekai. What then? The Mekai serves only an advisory position. If he reached for real power, then all the Sevenlands would turn against him. Wizards are forbidden the leadership of tribe, clan, or family—this is one of our oldest laws.”
“He doesn’t need to be the figurehead,” D’Jenn said. “Think about it. Victus has spent an entire generation grooming a crop of Warlocks, selecting the wizards he wanted to train specifically for the characteristics he valued. He oversaw every step of the training, adopted the lot of us into his care.”
“He’s like a father to all of us,” Dormael said, a cold spear of realization twisting in his chest.
D’Jenn nodded. “He says it all the time—we’re a family. If he’s Mekai, he might as well be choosing the next deacon outright. Anyone who is elected to the position will be one of his disciples—as are we all.”
“Any operation he wanted to push, he would get it,” Dormael said, the realizations sliding into place. “He could sit at the center of a spider’s web, and pull strings that reached across the world. He’d have his own personal army of Warlocks.”
“That sounds terrifying,” Shawna said. Dormael nodded in agreement.
“He’d still be breaking the old edicts,” Allen said. “He’d just be hiding it.”
“Still—why would he come after Bethany?” Dormael asked.
“He said it outright,” D’Jenn said. “She could be the most powerful wizard the Conclave has seen in generations. He wants to train her as a Warlock. Now that I’ve realized what he’s done, I can see the the reasons behind the moves he has made. Bethany represents power, and he needs to gather as much of it to his side as possible. You heard what he asked us in the War Room.”
“If we would do what was right when time comes,” Dormael said, the words now settling into his stomach like bricks, one by one. “He may as well have said it to us.”
“He wants us on his side,” D’Jenn said. “He’s planning something, Dormael. I don’t know if he has Bethany, but if he doesn’t, then we need to find her first.”
“Agreed. Let’s go, then,” Dormael growled.
“I’ll check the dining hall,” Allen said, “see if anyone has seen her stealing food. The girl can eat like three grown men. I’ll come back here if I find her.”
“Be careful,” Dormael said. “We don’t know whom we can trust.”
Allen nodded, checked the axe at his hip, and ducked into the hallway.
“I’ll check the grounds—on this side of the river, and the west side. Maybe she hid out the storm in one of the greenhouses, or ducked into a garden,” D’Jenn said. Dormael nodded, and his cousin disappeared through the door on Allen’s heels.
Shawna lowered herself to sit on the bench next to him. He gave her a wan smile, and she placed a warm, comforting hand over his. Dormael paused a moment, the energy fleeing from him in the face of all that had happened. The day weighed on him like a load of bricks.
“Where should we search?” Shawna asked. The question jolted him from his reverie.
“I’m going to search through the Conclave Proper, see if I can pick up something with my Kai—a trace of her magic, perhaps, or a sense of her consciousness. If she’s using her magic, maybe I’ll be able to hear it,” he said. “I’ll be immobile. Would you mind standing guard over me? After what happened today—”
“Sure,” she said, saving him from having to go on. “I’ll be right here. What should I do if someone we don’t trust comes through that door? How b
ad have things gotten?”
“Just wake me,” Dormael said. “Hopefully they’re not so bad that we’d have to worry about violence in my very apartments. If someone comes in, scowl at them and grumble about disturbing the wizard during his studies.”
“You want me to act like your bodyguard?” Shawna asked, a laugh escaping despite the grim situation. “You’re mad, Dormael Harlun. I’ll do it, though. You’re lucky I like you.”
Dormael gave her as genuine a smile as he could muster, then crawled onto the floor. He sat cross-legged, straightening his back and taking deep breaths. Shawna paced across the floor, hands planted on her shapely hips. Dormael gave her one last nod, then closed his eyes.
He floated through the hallways of the Conclave Proper, his Kai bringing him the world in harmonious tones as he passed through it. The world was a beach, each sandy pebble a tiny bell, and each bell ringing its own unique note as his consciousness rushed by. He could feel a storm of noise and impressions, deep rhythmic beats felt in his chest, and bright flashes of song as other wizards used their gifts.
The Conclave was as chaotic a place as one could find through the lens of a wizard’s Kai.
Dormael flashed down the hallways of residential quarters, listening for the resonance of Bethany’s song. He floated down winding stairs, through bustling kitchens, past teams of servants who cleaned in an almost hypnotic pattern, and flitted between clouds of noisy conversation. Bethany was nowhere, and had been nowhere. Dormael grew worried as he searched floor by floor, finding an abundance of nothing.
Then, he came to the Common Hall, on the ground floor of the Conclave Proper.
There was a buzz—an excited, dreadful quality to the energy in the room that caught his attention. It whipped through the air in the hall like ghostly lightning, originating from somewhere just past the common areas, toward the official chambers where petitioners came to plead their cases. Dormael sent his awareness toward the confusion, following it to its source.
In back of the Common Hall, there were a series of offices where representatives of the different Disciplines met with the public. The Hedge Wizards, Philosophers, and Scouts all had offices. The Warlocks, of course, had no office. All day, petitioners would fill the hallway, waiting in every corner of the room at their chance to sit before a desk in one of those bland little offices. The crush of bodies in the Common Hall every day was a challenge for the Conclave staff to deal with, and created a mess of problems on its own.
The Seven Signs: Three Book Collection Page 72
