This was Sidonius’s plan, make one person of two and then? The ritual Cara had talked about. The one that killed everyone but her. This time, she wouldn’t survive.
Memories rose in his mind. Blood on satin. His mother pierced through the heart with the arrow meant for him. Panic nipped at his heels. There was no time for thinking.
Khoury burst into the room, swords drawn. He let anger swell, drawing in the power. It filled his throat with hate and he bellowed, “SIDONIUS, STOP!” The sorcerer’s chanting ceased and the gathering magic flickered like a candle in the rain.
Khoury could have cheered, but a dark fog rose around the sorcerer, covering him like a cloak. Black tendrils guided the sorcerer’s hand to his staff where it leaned against the pedestal. Khoury closed the distance between them but not before the touch of his staff released Sidonius. He deflected Khoury’s first attack with the same inhuman speed he’d shown in Iolair. The moment his staff struck metal, the sword shattered and Sidonius began to chant again.
The captain needed to stop the sorcerer, but how?
Falin’s words came back to him: Still the hands, silence the tongue. He focused all his fear and anger, letting it rise into his throat.
“SILENCE,” Khoury intoned. The word reverberated with a strength he didn’t realize he had.
Sidonius stared at him. His mouth continued moved but nothing emerged.
Seizing the opportunity, the captain swung his other blade. But another strike from the staff broke the second sword as well.
Then the sorcerer coughed as dark smoke flowed out of his mouth and nose. Again, the captain’s hold was broken.
“A Barakani noble,” Sidonius said, eyeing Khoury like a prize. “And powerful. Had I but taken you first, I’d be immortal now.”
So it was immortality he was after.
“Perfect.” Sidonius chuckled. “Whether she will complete it or not, now you are here and my success is assured.” Sidonius held Khoury’s gaze as he began the incantation again, repeating the guttural words over and over.
The magic gathered more quickly. Something pulled at the center of Khoury’s chest. Wielding his broken blades like knives, he attacked again. Sidonius kept chanting as he sidestepped, but not quite fast enough. One blade sliced his cloak down to skin and muscle, and a dark mist, rather than blood, leaked out. Supernatural chill tingled over Khoury’s arm where the mist touched him.
There was evil magic here. Magic that made blades useless. Khoury let the power rise again, hoping to stall until Archer arrived. He was sure the Northerner was only a few steps behind.
“SILENCE,” he Commanded again, putting as much force behind his words as he could. He’d never had the desire to control others like this, but he desperately needed it now.
Sidonius’s chant faltered as he choked to get the words out. The magic waned again, relieving the pressure in Khoury’s chest. The captain attacked with the broken blades, hoping for a lucky strike. Any wound would wear on Sidonius. But with the speed of a striking snake, the sorcerer reached out and grabbed Khoury by the throat.
His long fingers closed, choking off Khoury’s air, preventing him from Commanding again. He thrust the captain back, arching him over the altar where the woman lay as still as death. Khoury tried to bring his broken swords up to slice the arm that held him. A single word from the sorcerer and searing pain shot through him, wringing a strangled groan from his closed throat. His swords fell from twitching fingers as electric tongues licked his limbs. The one that dropped from his half-raised arm nicked the woman’s arm drawing a single drop of blood.
Khoury thrashed wildly, kicking out, hoping for a soft groin or a knee. But the sorcerer wasn’t about to lose hold of him. Sidonius lifted him off the floor with inhuman strength. Khoury’s hands tingled and his feet dangled uselessly as his eyes darkened. He could barely hear Sidonius begin chanting again over the blood rushing in his ears.
The incantation wrapped itself around Khoury’s heart, his very soul, and dragged him piece by piece toward the swirling vortex that had grown from Sidonius’s wound. He fought against the tide, shoring up his will, but tendrils pulled away like gossamer threads disappearing inside Sidonius.
He forced his eyes open, wondering if his sacrifice would save the girl, but she also writhed as smoky tendrils arose from her and stretched toward the sorcerer. Time lost all meaning as little by little he felt himself broken and drawn into the vortex. He clung to life by sheer strength of will, hoping to hear Archer at the door, the whoosh of feathers, the thunk of the arrow. But he heard nothing, and the sorcerer never stopped his chanting. Khoury grew cold; his energy waned. Soon, he’d disappear completely into that darkness and he’d lose everything. He had failed her.
WHEN THE STORM finally passed she returned to herself, bruised but still alive. Her thoughts flitted as lightly as sparrows, unwilling to upset the fragile balance of her awareness. Sensations returned like light at dawn, gradually and yet noticed all at once. She focused on the frigid air kissing her skin and the lumps of fabric beneath her back while the glowing colors faded to the black of closed eyelids. Gratitude swelled as a long breath granted her the feel of air in her nose. She was back.
But not out of danger, she thought.
She felt a tugging in the center of her chest that she recognized as the spell that would transfer her energy to the sorcerer. She couldn’t let him win. She needed to fight back but the part of her that had been a hunter was wary of showing too much. Shouts and the scuff of boots on stone nudged their way into her awareness.
Someone was fighting. She kept her face still as she scanned what she could through shuttered eyes.
She recognized the blue tabard that swam into view. But the creature that held him looked nothing like the sorcerer. Above Sidonius’s human form, around him, encompassing him was a great ghostly shape, the darkness Cara had sensed in him all along. But now, on the verge of its birth into their world, its malevolent intent buffeted her in waves.
The creature’s long hands picked at the glow around the captain and, she noted belatedly, herself. As Khoury tried to attack with his broken swords, Sidonius countered with more magic, and she cringed with sympathetic pain. One of his swords clattered to the altar where she lay. She felt the prick of its edge.
A blade!
She wriggled her wrists ever so slightly, sure that the sorcerer’s attention was completely occupied by the struggling captain. She wasn’t chained!
Mothers’ love! Some luck at last.
She tried not to think about how easily the creature/sorcerer lifted the captain into the air one-handed. Her fingers sought the weapon and slid it into her palm. The pulling in her chest became a pain. She didn’t have much time.
The sorcerer was occupied with Khoury, but she needed him to come closer. She’d been badly injured by the dragon, and she had no idea how well she was healed. She felt the third presence trying to mend her, but the vortex within the creature was draining her magic steadily.
Just two more steps and you’re mine, she thought.
CURSING KHOURY FOR a fool, Archer raced down the hall after his captain. He sheathed his sword and unslung his bow reaching for an arrow as he ran. An eerie whine floated down the stairs, and he prayed he wasn’t too late. He raced up to the final landing where the door stood open and oppressive heat flowed out in waves. Tortured howls echoed off the walls and ghostly black smoke whirled like a tempest about the circular room. There was a woman on an altar in the center, and at her feet was the sight Archer dreaded—Sidonius dangled the limp body of Khoury from one uplifted hand.
An eerie darkness enveloped the two men, translucent but moving as if alive. It made the hair on Archer’s neck stand on end. Pushing down the urge to race into the room, Archer backed up to the wall and lifted his bow. He took careful aim, pulling the string to his chin. Forcing calm, he found the silence within his breathing, the space between his own heartbeats. The noise and heat faded from his awareness as he searched for the
perfect shot. The tension of the bow felt good in his hand as his eye followed the length of the shaft to his enemy. Khoury was in the way. From this vantage, he couldn’t kill the sorcerer, unless one of them moved. Archer waited for the shot, but as the captain’s head fell back, he realized they were out of time.
With icy calm, Archer coughed, risking surprise to create opportunity.
And opportunity came. The sorcerer turned a curious face toward the door, moving Khoury out of his line of sight. In that instant, the bowstring thrummed as one blessed black-feathered arrow sped away.
But Sidonius moved like lightning, stepping forward with a flick of his hand. The door slammed shut in Archer’s face just as a breathless Bradan joined him on the landing. Had the arrow found its mark?
“He’s got Khoury,” Archer said.
“And the girls?”
“There’s at least one woman in there. But Bradan,” Archer turned haunted eyes to the shaman, “Sidonius has a dark spirit aiding him.”
SHE HEARD THE familiar twang in almost the same instant the sorcerer stepped up to the table. She ignored the slamming door. Sidonius was within reach. Without wasting another minute, she rolled to the side and lunged for him. The pain was gone, but her limbs were clumsy and weak like a newborn colt’s. She reached out with her hand to grab his robes, hauled herself close, and thrust the broken blade up under his ribs.
With a hiss like steam, an icy blast of power chilled her hand. Her healing sense burst to her awareness. This was not Sidonius she fought but the incarnate darkness he had once summoned. The creature had been whittling away at him all these years. But now, the spell wasn’t feeding the sorcerer, instead it strengthened the intruder.
There was no way to kill the sorcerer while the darkness overshadowed him. She had to push the creature back through and close the gap before Sidonius could be killed.
We might be able to save him, a small part of her thought hopefully.
She thrust that foolishness away.
Not knowing how the magic worked, she tried to recall all Bradan had said. She groped for the kind presence she had felt, surely that was the healer in her. Forcing the magic to obey was more difficult. She clung to Sidonius with hands that glowed to her supernatural sight. Liquid gold flowed beneath his skin much like the icy black had trickled into Falin in Iolair. It warmed and strengthened as it went, draining her of what little energy she still possessed. Sheer stubbornness steeled her to the task.
Sidonius’s spell took more from Khoury as she resisted. Healing the sorcerer was killing the captain faster, but it couldn’t be helped. Sidonius—or rather the dark entity—had to be stopped.
Hold on, Khoury, she thought.
Soon she noticed the vortex shrinking. The darkness encompassing Sidonius shrank also, pulling back from his arms and head. He dropped the now-limp Khoury to the ground and put both hands around her throat as if the darkness sensed her plan.
Then the door behind her opened with a crash. She didn’t turn. Her only focus was closing the wound. She recognized the groans of Bradan and Archer as the spell latched onto them, further weakening the pull of the spell on her, and on the captain.
Archer raced over, awkwardly swinging his huge sword, trying not to hit her. Sidonius released one hand to deflect the strike as Bradan chanted his call to the spirits. She felt rather than saw the cool mist gather around their ankles.
With Sidonius still holding her by the neck, she slipped a hand through the torn cloak and laid her fingers over the wound. Her healing power flared as soon as she touched his skin. She drew the edges together, her magic stitching them as simply as stitching Khoury’s side. The leaking coldness lessened. The darkness had withdrawn. It was working, though it was exhausting. When the creature had retreated to within the confines of the sorcerer’s physical body, it was time.
Wait, said Cara’s small voice. He can be saved.
You promised, Falin accused. You promised not to stop me.
She felt the wide-eyed girl inside her relent. Taking the captain’s broken sword in her free hand, she stabbed Sidonius again, this time feeling the warm wetness of blood. Now sure that the darkness was contained, she reached up and slit the sorcerer’s throat.
ARCHER THOUGHT HE recognized Falin’s angry scowl on the woman’s face as she slit Sidonius’s throat. The sorcerer coughed once in surprise and was dead before he struck the floor. A burst of fetid energy exploded from within the dark robes when he landed, knocking them all backward.
Bradan sat up first, eyes wide with horror as a ghostly squall whipped around him, tugging at his beard and his hair. “Do you feel them?” he breathed at Archer. “Can you hear them?”
Woozily, Archer picked himself up. “Hear who?”
“Every soul he stole,” Bradan said. “So many…so many deaths.”
The chieftain sounded like Cara. But Archer was more interested in the living. He scanned the room as Bradan climbed unsteadily to his feet. The girl lay unconscious nearby. Bradan listened for her heart and nodded at Archer. She lived.
Archer stepped over the spent body of Sidonius sprawled on the floor where he’d fallen next to the altar. And behind him, near the pedestal, was the captain. Shock shivered through Archer’s limbs at the sight of Khoury crumpled on the floor like a discarded shirt.
He hurried to him and rolled Khoury onto his back, searching for signs of life. The captain’s neck bore purple-red welts and the blue tint of his lips was a faint echo of the eyes that stared out of his pale face. There was no breath, no heartbeat to be found.
Cold guilt set Archer’s heart to pounding as he shook the captain by the shoulders. “Wake up! C’mon, Khoury, open your eyes.”
Khoury’s limbs flopped like wet rags, laying where they fell.
“No,” Archer murmured as the inevitable bumped up against his fading hope. Tension hummed from his chest to his head, making him dizzy and frantic at the same time. “No, you bastard! Why didn’t you wait?” Angrily, he gripped the torn blue tabard and shook the captain again hard. But there was no response.
“I was too late,” Archer whispered mournfully, then his voice turned hard as he let anger comfort him. He frowned down at his lifeless friend. “You promised me, you bastard. Not to be so reckless.”
Bradan laid a fatherly hand on Archer’s shoulder, and the anger fled. Tears blurred his sight.
“He promised not to leave me behind.”
“No one can promise that,” Bradan said, softly. “But I know you were as good a brother to him, as he was to you.”
Archer felt lost. What would he do now that Khoury was gone? He had no urge to go back to the Swords without the surly Southerner.
Maura’s face swam in his mind, and he ached for home.
The woman who’d killed Sidonius stirred with a moan, interrupting his thoughts. She murmured deliriously as Archer joined Bradan at her side, wiping his damp cheek with an angry hand. There was stark white hair amidst the woman’s gold locks.
“Cara?” he asked, but then he thought of her face as she killed Sidonius. “Falin?”
SHE HEARD HER name and struggled toward it. A gentle touch on her cheek gave her focus, and the mind followed the senses. She was totally spent, wanting nothing more than a soft bed and sleep. Then someone helped her sit up.
“Falin?”
She groaned, unable to form words around her thick tongue. Her thoughts were blurred. She forced her eyes open.
“It’s Bradan, girl.”
She recognized the shaman’s bearded face. His brown eyes were haggard.
“What…” It was a croak not a word. She coughed to clear the dryness of her throat. “What happened?” Another face came into view with red hair and beard. She knew him, too. “Archer.” Relief surged in her heart.
“Who are you?” he asked, and then she noticed the dampness on his haunted face.
Something was wrong. Why didn’t he remember her?
Her eyes fell to her hands. Foreign hands, their fl
esh pink and smooth. She turned them over with horror. Where was the burn from her amulet? Where was Rebeka’s revenge across her palm? Only the tiny wine-red drops from a small nick on her arm marred the baby-new skin.
The altar. The darkness.
Snippets of memory returned as Bradan lifted a dress from the dusty stone and helped her into it.
Then she remembered the captain. “Khoury?”
The men were silent. She cast about for the memories. When had she seen him last? Iolair? No. The dragon? No, after that.
She slid her feet under her and pushed to standing with hurried foreboding, slapping at Bradan’s offered hand. “We can stand well enough,” she snapped, swaying as she sifted through jumbled memories.
He had been here. She remembered his voice—his groans. Her frantic eyes searched the scattered debris. She saw Sidonius’s lifeless body and felt neither sorrow nor satisfaction at his end. But next to him was the captain.
“Khoury!” Shock tore the anguished gasp from her lips. She hurried to his side and crumpled to her knees, pressing her palms to his cheeks. “Mason, wake up.”
She willed the warmth to flow, like it had for Archer. Where was the healing that had burst awake for the thorn-cursed sorcerer? But she felt nothing. Worse, there was nothing beneath her fingers but cool skin and a terrifying emptiness where Khoury should have been. He was not here.
She could heal the wounded but apparently the dead were beyond her power.
It should have been me, the Huntress thought. I promised to save you for him.
Archer knelt across from her and reached out to respectfully close the captain’s eyelids. “I’m sorry,” he said. His tawny eyes were full of regret.
Falin’s heart echoed his pain. She’d failed Khoury more than Archer had.
“It’s not your fault,” she said. “We did this.”
I did this, her inner Huntress corrected, knowing it was her bid to push the creature back into its own world that had sacrificed the captain.
Quest of the Dreamwalker (The Corthan Legacy Book 1) Page 38
