The box housing the apparatus was bright gold, with arcane runes etched upon its surface. The grooves were filled in with tiny, crushed rubies. Representations of men and women suffering the torments of the damned rose from its slightly dull surface, and, when viewed from a distance, the figures meshed together to create a face that was screaming in terror. One of the eyes looked as if it had been put out. A sky-blue marble flecked with crimson had been placed in the remaining socket. The box's sides had strange figures that gave the overall impression of hands that had been fused to the metal by touching a red-hot surface.
Her instincts told her that this was far too easy. Lucius looked over at her and nodded, as if confirming her thoughts.
"The easier it looks,…" he said, his voice trailing off sorrowfully. He cleared his throat and said, "Perhaps you should go back."
"My place is with you," she said.
Lucius turned away and said, "What will you tell my children of how I met my end?"
"That you died to save others."
He nodded, then completed another spell. Myrmeen shuddered in surprise as her field of vision took on a crimson hue. She looked down to see a glowing field of energy surrounding her body, an aura of protection.
"Spirit armor," she said angrily. "This spell steals some of my life's essence!"
"It may be worthwhile if it saves your life later."
"Or you may have just taken a few precious days, a month, or more, for no reason. Next time, ask me first."
"You would have refused," he said dryly.
"I notice you didn't cast this spell on yourself."
Lucius shook his head. "I have no life essence to utilize. I am a dead man walking."
Myrmeen had no reply. The damage was done. All they could do was get on with the task at hand.
The gaunt mage took a handful of loose stone from the edge of the niche and threw them at the box. The stones crackled, and a blinding flash of light consumed them as the rocks were vaporized against an invisible wall of force.
"Get back!" Lucius shouted as he shoved at Myrmeen, forcing her to swing out of the niche as the spell trap's small, glowing orb rushed in and collided with the unseen wall. The explosion sent each of them hurtling toward the opposite wall of the shaft, where they groaned with the impact, then found the area once again wreathed in darkness. Myrmeen could no longer see her red aura, and wondered if the spell had saved her already. Her body drifted in a pendulous motion, swinging back to the alcove where the box had been stored. A hand gripped her arm and she allowed herself to be dragged into the small niche.
"Hold out your hand. This won't hurt you," Lucius said.
Myrmeen did as the sorcerer asked. She heard him whisper in the darkness, then jumped as a flaming sphere appeared in her hand. Her head struck the hard ceiling. Lucius had kept a tight grip on her arm, and she quickly calmed herself, realizing that the flames were not harming her. "Whatever you do, keep away from the box."
Myrmeen nodded. The mystical blast from the destruction of the spell trap had left the mage shaken, his flesh burned, lacerations visible beneath his shredded white smock. Myrmeen could see the wounds that had killed him, and turned away in disgust from the sight. She once had desired this man, had suffered through her life.
She had been betrayed.
During her career as a politician, betrayal was an accepted factor in her day-to-day existence. She had come to expect it and knew precisely how to deal with a certain lack of integrity on the part of her associates. That had been tolerable only because she had been trained to rely on no one but herself; as long as she decided well in advance that no one could be trusted in a given situation, she was never hurt by their unscrupulous actions. Give someone an opening and invariably they will hurt you.
From the moment she had summoned the Harpers, Myrmeen had been forced to surrender her trust, and had paid dearly for the mistake. Lucius, with whom she had been emotionally and sexually intrigued, had revealed a loyalty to his family and a fear of eternal torment that had caused him to hand their lives over to the creatures from whom he had sworn to protect them. Eyen Varina's sacrifice was difficult for Myrmeen to accept. To spare her husband a worse death, she had taken Burke's life, then given her own to help her friends escape. Myrmeen knew that on the surface her sacrifice was noble and heroic-but a part of her could not help regarding Varina's actions as cowardly and selfish. Varina did not want to face life without her husband at her side and so she chose to have no life at all. Myrmeen was ashamed of her feelings. However, she could not deny that she was angry.
Everyone goes away, a taunting voice whispered in her mind. You can trust no one.
Not everyone, she thought desperately. Reisz would take me back. He still loves me. He always will.
But you don't love him, and you know it.
She thought of the woman-spider and its unexpected generosity, sparing Myrmeen's life when the beast easily could have taken it.
Perhaps that was the point, Myrmeen thought. This way I know it can have me at any time. I live or die by its wishes.
No, that was not it. The look on the woman-spider's face before it retreated had revealed that it had been as confused by its own decision as Myrmeen had been.
Thinking about the mysterious woman-thing caused Myrmeen to recall her strange dream, then she moved beyond such unpleasantness, to gentler memories of her parents and their life before that fateful morning that her father was convinced would change all their lives forever. He had been correct, but not in the manner he had anticipated.
Suddenly she remembered the lonely nights after his death, when bizarre nightmares plagued her and she woke up screaming. Don't abandon me! Don't go away! Don't leave me for the shadow people to come crawling up from the floor when the lanterns are blown out! Father, please don't-!
"I am finished," Lucius announced.
Myrmeen looked up in shock, glancing away from the pulsing, hypnotic fires that were dimming in her hand. She looked at the pair of boxes on the ground, darted forward with the speed and ferocity of an animal, and clutched the sides of the arcane box holding the apparatus. Before Lucius, who was trembling with fatigue, could stop her, Myrmeen hurled the box over the edge, into the pit.
The lazy sound of swords scraping against one another rose from the darkness outside the niche. Myrmeen had heard the sound only a few hours earlier, in her room, when the woman-spider had tried to kill her. The creature appeared on the opposite wall, the box clutched in two human hands. Myrmeen looked over the edge of the niche and saw that, fifty feet below, the monster had spun an intricate web. When she turned her gaze back to the box in Tamara's hands, she saw that white, sticky strands clung to its sides.
"Sudden movement," Lucius said, horrified.
Myrmeen spun in his direction to see the second box flaring with a rainbow of colors. The mage covered his mouth, his brow furrowed as he rifled through his vast mental library of spells, hoping to find one that would purchase their lives.
"The spell," he whispered, "was not yet fixed. No sudden movement, or it would all be undone."
"By the gods," she whispered, suddenly aware of the cost of her actions. The flames in her hand flickered out and several strands of lightning reached from the second box like newly awakened hands eager to explore. "Lucius!"
Myrmeen was aware of nothing but the feel of powerful hands on her back as she was dragged back from the niche, into the darkened shaft. She was quickly carried upward as an explosion sounded from where Lucius had remained.
The walls of the pit shook and Myrmeen looked up to see that she was in the woman-spider's arms. Tamara desperately tried to hold on as clouds of light and smoke billowed up from beneath them. Suddenly they were at the rim, over the top, stumbling forward. A beautiful shaft of greenish white light shot up from the pit and licked at the cavernous theater's ceiling, charring the stone black before the stream of light faded abruptly and was gone.
There had been no sound. Lucius's body had been de
stroyed, and he had not even issued a scream. Myrmeen scrambled to her feet and clutched at Lord Sixx. He held her at bay with ease.
"Help him!" she shouted. "Release your hold on his soul, before it is too late."
"It is too late," Lord Sixx said with genuine regret. "I prefer to keep my word, but there is nothing to be done."
My fault, Myrmeen thought. It's my fault he's gone, his soul wandering forever in torment. Lucius, I'm sorry.
Behind Myrmeen, Tamara had regained her human form. She approached Lord Sixx, the box containing the apparatus in her hands. Before she handed the box to her leader, she glanced in her husband's direction, hoping for a sign that he would be willing to take the box instead. Imperator Zeal stared at her in displeasure and angled his head in Sixx's direction. Tamara felt her arms grow heavy as she presented the box to Lord Sixx and withdrew quickly. Myrmeen stood beside the dark man.
"Now," Sixx whispered as he held the ornately designed gold box high over his head, intoxicated by the end of the quest and the security this object brought him: No challenger would dare usurp him. "Now we may begin again."
A roar sliced through the theater surrounding the pit as the Night Parade creatures cheered Lord Sixx. Myrmeen ran to Krystin and embraced her. Tamara watched them, her arms folded over her breasts. She was the only member of the Night Parade whose gaze was not riveted to the object Lord Sixx held out to his subjects. Her husband, Imperator Zeal, glanced at her and hoped that Sixx would not become aware of the woman's distraction.
When he was certain that the moment had passed, Lord Sixx allowed his people to break off into smaller groups, friends and allies congregating to discuss in hushed, excited tones the importance of this event to each of them. Although the conversations were diverse, many conducted in languages spawned by cultures that had not originated on this world, the content of each was invariably the same: With the apparatus back in their leader's possession, the long delayed Festival of Renewal finally would be held.
Lord Sixx went to Myrmeen, who held Krystin tightly against her. "You may live."
"And my friends?" Myrmeen asked.
"Yes, whatever. I'm feeling benevolent, and you've certainly done me a service." He gestured grandly. "Zeal, Tamara, take them outside. Make sure they get what they need for their journey, wherever they wish to go. Any who harm the humans will answer to me."
The fiery-haired man and his wife brought Reisz and Ord forward. Zeal gestured, and the creatures that had followed him in the hallway retreated from the corridor.
"Wait," Krystin said, surprising Lord Sixx and Myrmeen equally. "You owe her more than that. You should tell her the truth about her daughter."
Lord Sixx's many eyes narrowed uniformly. "Why don't you do that, child? You know as much as I do."
"What's he talking about?" Myrmeen asked, despite her instincts, which told her to leave this place before Lord Sixx changed his mind and slaughtered them.
Krystin turned to face Myrmeen. "I'm not your daughter. I never was."
Myrmeen swallowed hard. "When did you learn this?"
"Days ago, in Calimport. It's my fault they're here," Krystin said, watching Myrmeen's features grow hard and cold. Despite this, she could not bring herself to stop. "I led them here."
"You didn't," Myrmeen said flatly, becoming numb.
" Alden followed the traces of blood I left behind."
Myrmeen felt as if she were about to pass out.
"In the beginning, all they wanted was for you to think I was your daughter and take me away," Krystin said. She wrung her hands and explained in full the deception that Lord Sixx had perpetrated and the part she unwittingly had played in his schemes. Then she told Myrmeen of how the locket had related to her stolen and bastardized memories. Finally she spoke of the deal she had made with Lord Sixx to save all their lives in Calimport.
"You're a fool," Lord Sixx said, aghast at the child's stupidity. He wondered how he could use it to his own advantage.
Tears soaked Krystin's face as she said, "Myrmeen, forgive me, I'm sorry-"
"What she's told you is true," Lord Sixx said, "but it's not the whole truth. For example: What happened to your true daughter? I can tell you that."
Myrmeen shook her head and said with a quavering voice, "I don't want to hear any more lies."
"You don't understand," Lord Sixx said as he motioned for Zeal and Tamara to come closer. "I also don't have any reason to tell you a damned thing. Give me some incentive,"
Myrmeen almost laughed. "I'm not playing any more games."
"You're not?" Lord Sixx asked quietly. "Do you mean to say that you have traveled so far, been through so much, lost friends to horrible deaths, seen living nightmares that will scar your dreams until you die, and now that the truth is before you, you would turn away?"
"Yes," Myrmeen said. A part of her wished to hear Lord Sixx's words, even if they turned out to hold only a glimmer of truth, because now she was left with much less than she had before entering the city.
"All I ask is a favor now and then, nothing of great import," Lord Sixx said, his delivery powerful and seductive.
That was his mistake. Myrmeen had dealt with men who had tried to use her all of her life. She knew how to resist them. "I'm not interested."
Lord Sixx frowned. "Fine. If you ever wish to find me, you will not have difficulty. And if you ever wish to know the truth of what happened to your child, the price will be the blood of this one."
His hand moved quickly, a dagger shaped like black lightning slapping into his palm. He pressed the knife against Krystin's throat as Zeal grasped her arms from behind. Tamara's arm's already had transformed, and the point of a steely spider-arm suddenly was pressed against the hollow of Myrmeen's throat.
Krystin's hand brushed hers, and Myrmeen realized that despite what the girl had revealed, she still meant what she had said to Krystin earlier that night. Losing her would be like losing her daughter a second time.
"Go to hell," Myrmeen said.
"Only if you'll join me," Lord Sixx said as he held her with his dark-eyed gaze. He then withdrew his blade and instructed Zeal and Tamara to lead the humans to safety.
Twenty
Imperator Zeal and his wife led the humans to the makeshift stables where Shandower had secured their mounts. The gags maintaining Ord and Reisz's silence had been removed, but the Harpers had said very little during the journey. Myrmeen had surprised Krys-tin by taking her hand while they were being ferried across the tiny lake where glowworms laid glittering traps for their prey. When the troupe had reached the shore, each of the humans was given an armful of provisions for the long ride to Calimport.
Tamara's dark eyes followed Myrmeen, her gaze clinging to the woman with the strength of the webs she had expelled while in her other form.
"I don't understand," Myrmeen said. "Why are you letting us go?"
"Because you no longer are of any consequence," Zeal said coldly. "And this is what my lord desires."
The wall leading out to the cliff vanished as Tamara kissed its cold surface, revealing a shoal of stars above the gently surging waters of the sea below. The humans led their mounts to the difficult trail outside, Myrmeen intentionally going last so that she could face Tamara, who remained close to her at all times.
"Why didn't you kill me when you had the chance?" Myrmeen asked. Tamara raised her hand, and the wall appeared, separating them.
Myrmeen, the Harpers, and Krystin led their mounts along the rise, where they retraced their steps and eventually made their way to the top of the cliff. They mounted their horses and rode toward the city as if the red-haired man were chasing them, spitting fire at their heels.
Near the cavern's entrance, Imperator Zeal confronted his wife. The candles and torches lining the walls flared as if they were about to explode. "What was the Lhal woman talking about?"
"I went to her room," Tamara admitted.
"You were going to kill her?"
"I had planned to, yes," Tamara
said. "She burned our home to the ground, destroyed all I had, all that was important to me."
"Those were just objects. They can be replaced."
"You never had a family," she whispered. "You wouldn't understand."
The fiery-haired man touched her arm with a gentle caress, his anger fading. Upon the walls, the brilliant light waned until the fires resumed their normal intensity.
"What stopped you?" he asked.
"You did," she said, burying her face in his hard, muscular chest, "I thought of the displeasure you would face from Lord Sixx if she were found dead. I couldn't do it."
He knew she was lying but held her close. "I love you, wife."
"And I love you," she whispered.
These words he believed. As he brushed her hair with his nearly smoldering hands, Zeal formed another explanation for his wife's actions. He decided that his wife had grown tired of having him ignore her urging to take Lord Shoe's power. She had planned to assassinate the Lhal woman to force the two men into confrontation. Sixx would have wanted Tamara's life for her actions, and Zeal would have murdered the man to protect her. At the last moment, she had changed her mind, granting Zeal the opportunity to decide for himself if he would try to usurp Lord Sixx, something that would be nearly impossible now that the man had the apparatus.
Imperator Zeal pulled back and kissed his wife's hungry lips. As he felt the flames of passion stir within him, several torches exploded, startling them both. Once they realized what had happened, Zeal and his wife began to laugh uncontrollably. They sank to the ground, their arms still around one another as they rolled on the hard stone, giggling like children.
Between gasps of laughter Zeal said, "Yes, I will do it."
The smile faded instantly from his wife's face. "What are you-what do you mean?"
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