by S. M. Boyce
“So we might face it again?” Audrey asked, exasperated.
Fyrn nodded. “I’m afraid so. We must be prepared, though even I’m not entirely certain how we could possibly defeat such a creature. I’ve only faced something that powerful a handful of times in my life.”
“That’s reassuring,” Victoria mumbled.
“We need to rest,” Diesel said, his familiar smile long gone. His gaze darted round the tunnel as though something might attack them any moment and he shifted, apparently unable to sit still. If the tunnels to Lochrose and the sphinx in its depths had rattled Diesel out of his joking charm, they were truly in deep shit.
“I’m not tired,” Audrey countered.
Diesel shook his head. “You are tired, Audrey. I guarantee it. We’ve been traveling at least ten hours straight, and after that excitement we need a moment to breathe. I’ve read about the wizard enchantments in this city. They were designed to wear you down until you died of exhaustion. You’d amble through the tunnels with no sense that you needed to sleep. Until today, I never thought such spells were possible.”
Victoria shot a knowing glance at Fyrn, who nodded almost imperceptibly. Her mentor always seemed to have the upper hand, and it made her feel a bit giddy to know Diesel was unaware of the secret project hiding beneath Fairhaven. Her mentor had trusted her with something not even the second most powerful wizard in Fairhaven knew.
“I’ll keep first watch,” Diesel said, leaning against the wall as he peered down one end of the tunnel.
Victoria studied him for a moment. She had never seen him truly rattled, not even when they were on their knees before the Atlantean king. It unnerved her to see him serious.
As if he felt her stare, he turned his head and caught her eye. This time he offered the barest of smiles. “It’s okay, Victoria. We’re safe.”
“For now,” she added. With that, his smile fell.
***
Victoria woke to a fizzling silver light inches from her face. She gasped and pushed herself backward, only to hit her head against the hard rock wall. She grimaced, holding the sensitive place at the back of her skull, and tried to get a sense of what was going on.
A blond man scowled at her. He held the piece of wood that had the light coming from the end as though it were a sparkler. He aimed it at her menacingly, and in her sleepy state she nearly laughed at the ridiculousness of a man trying to hurt her with a sparkler.
Only this wasn’t a sparkler. It was a wand.
As she fully woke, the realization crashed into her like a wave. This was a wizard, someone she didn’t know.
She scanned their makeshift camp and in the dim light could make out Diesel bound with glowing white rope between four men, all of whom aimed their wands at him and held a bit of the rope to keep him steady. Diesel glared at the man holding Victoria hostage as though he wished he could reach out and rip him to pieces.
Another six men surrounded Fyrn, and her mentor eyed her warily as if waiting to see what she would do. Styx chattered furiously from a metal cage on the ground, banging his tiny fists against the bars. Two more men surrounded Audrey, who seemed to be holding her breath.
Oh, no. If they find out she’s Atlantean, they’ll—
But they hadn’t killed her yet. In fact, as Victoria studied her friend in the dim light, she realized the tiara was missing from her head.
Audrey had shifted, and she was barely hiding the Atlantean Artifact that would mark her as an instant enemy to these wizards.
The only one left was her…a Rhazdon host. Hopefully no one would lift her sleeve.
The wizard barked an order at her in a language she didn’t understand. Baffled, she turned to Diesel, but he shrugged.
Great. Even the know-it-all didn’t have a clue what was going on.
The strange wizard gestured for her to stand, and she got the gist. She obliged him, calmly surveying the scene as she strategically lifted her hands in front of her. The wizard would think she was surrendering, but she could easily summon her sword and skewer him if need be.
If these men were powerful enough to overtake Fyrn and Diesel without making enough noise to wake her, she might not stand a chance. However, she had the element of surprise on her side. If she could summon her blade fast enough, perhaps—
“Don’t,” Fyrn said simply.
Victoria stared at him in astonishment. He nodded calmly, as though he weren’t being held captive.
Baffled, Victoria lifted her hands in full surrender. The wrist guards on her sleeves were more than enough to keep the cloth covering her Rhazdon Artifact in place.
The wizard shouted something at her and shoved the wand in her face again.
“That’s getting old, buddy,” she snapped, glaring at the wand he kept waving in front of her nose.
He shouted at her again and began to pat her down while holding that stupid little wand in her face.
She frowned, about ready to draw her sword and slice the damn thing in two. “Talking louder doesn’t make me understand what you’re saying!”
“Victoria, comply,” Fyrn said calmly.
“What? Why?”
“Trust me, Victoria,” was all the old wizard said.
And she did. With a sigh she set her hands on her head and walked ahead of the wizard, exposing her back to someone who had just threatened to kill her.
Fyrn had better have a damn good reason for this, or she was going to beat the ever-loving crap out of him.
Chapter 15
Victoria trudged through the tunnel with her hands on her head, eyes scanning the half-dozen wizards in front of her and wondering where those behind her were.
Fyrn marched ahead with six wands pointed at him, and the wizard who held both his and Diesel’s staffs also carried Styx’s cage. Diesel and Audrey had been maneuvered to the back, and in the shuffling of so many feet she couldn’t tell where they were.
Whoever these men were, they seemed intent on keeping her in the dark as to where her companions were. Any time she turned around to try to check on her friends, the man at her back shouted at her and gestured for her to face forward.
After an abrupt left turn, the timeless sensation of the tunnels lifted like a fog and exhaustion hit Victoria square in the face. She slowed, her eyes drooping with the sudden need to sleep.
Brilliant light blinded her, and she had to blink several times to rid herself of the imprints on her retinas before her surroundings would come into focus.
Before her was a magnificent paved square covered in elaborate golden stones, and above her an enormous cavern stretched upward for thousands of feet. Massive honey-colored gemstones covered the entire roof of the cavern, casting warm golden light over everything below. The crystals reminded her of Fairhaven, but these were rounded, like domes protruding from the rock. There were thousands, and each gleamed like a tiny sun.
Beneath the amber crystals was a magnificent palace topped with spires and domes like something out of an Arabian fairytale. The castle was painted in reds and yellows, and each of the hundreds of windows was shaped like a massive keyhole.
On either side of the gold-paved road leading to the castle were ornate homes carved from the rock. They gleamed impossibly bright, as though the gray stone were a façade and solid gold lay within every molecule. People stood on the doorsteps and peered from the windows, and they all stared at Victoria.
While the city was beautiful, the hundreds of scowling faces were not.
Everywhere she looked, a witch or wizard stared at her and her companions. It seemed as though every wand in the city had been drawn and aimed at them.
Victoria wanted to crack a joke to alleviate the tension, but she figured it would only make things worse. She kept her mouth shut.
As their captors led them toward the palace, two elaborate doors swung open on a balcony that overlooked the paved square. A regal woman walked out with an elegant red cloak draped over her thin frame. As she lifted a proud chin, the golden chains o
n her headdress dangling around her beautiful face and high cheekbones.
The woman said something in a cold voice that sent a shiver down Victoria’s spine. She wished she could understand what had been said, but it was in a language that seemed to befuddle even Diesel. His mouth parted as though he were trying to place bits of the dialect.
Victoria shot Fyrn an icy glare, but her mentor’s gaze remained focused on the regal woman above them as he spoke. “Your Majesty, I—”
She snapped at him in a harsh voice, again in a foreign language.
Crap, this was going to be more difficult than Victoria had initially thought. If they couldn’t even communicate, they stood no chance of solving this diplomatically. She prepared to draw her sword again, though now she wished she had done it in the tunnel when the odds of escaping were more in their favor.
The men who had ambushed them kicked Victoria to her knees in front of what could only be Lochrose’s queen, and several other wizards did the same to the rest of her group. She narrowed her eyes in challenge to the woman above her, but they were now vastly outnumbered. If Fyrn had simply let her take care of those men in the tunnel…
Damn him.
The queen raised one slender hand and gestured toward Fyrn, who was already kneeling at the end of their line. He grimaced as if the gesture hurt him, and the queen’s eyes glowed white.
“Fyrn!” Victoria tensed and prepared to run to him, her instinct to protect her friends overriding her sense of self-preservation.
“Don’t,” he said through gritted teeth, face contorted in pain.
Victoria nearly ignored him. She wanted to tackle him out of view of this regal woman who had, with barely a moment’s hesitation, begun to hurt one of the most important people in her life.
But for his sake, she waited. She leaned forward, ready to sprint the moment he asked for help. She scanned the wizards guarding them, who all watched her warily.
Good. They should be afraid of her. If she had to, she would kill them all to keep her friends safe.
Though it felt like an eternity had passed while Victoria waited for Fyrn to ask for help, his expression slowly relaxed. He hunched over, chest heaving as he let out a long, slow sigh of relief.
The regal woman’s eyes returned to normal, and she let out a small hmm. “English. What an odd tongue.”
Victoria snapped her head to the queen, baffled. Only seconds ago the woman had been unable to speak to them.
The woman pointed to Victoria’s mentor. “You are Fyrn, disgraced wizard of the Order of the Silver Griffins, but a wizard nonetheless. You are one of us. You will not die here today.”
Victoria’s mouth dropped open, and she couldn’t help herself. “How is it you can speak our language?”
The queen bristled at the interruption, but her eyes scanned the rest of Victoria’s party and noted the general confusion. She nodded to Fyrn. “Along with many other details, I extracted the language from his mind. Lochrose is home to the most powerful witches and wizards on Earth, girl. You should not underestimate our ability. Not ever.”
Victoria resisted the impulse to shoot a worried look at Audrey. Obviously the queen hadn’t extracted everything, or there would have been an instant kill order on the Atlantean in their midst.
“Your Majesty—” Fyrn tried to interject.
“Silence.” The woman, apparently their queen, turned to Diesel. He knelt beside Fyrn, glaring at the balcony as though he could destroy it even without his staff. For a fleeting second, Victoria wondered if that were possible.
He shot a wary eye toward her just as the queen used her spell on him. He tensed, grimacing as information was unwillingly dragged out of him too.
This woman was stealing information from the heads of the two most powerful people Victoria knew. Worse, though, was the woman’s brazen cruelty. She hadn’t let them speak for themselves, but had ordered them dragged before her like criminals.
Victoria and Audrey were not wizards. They would not be welcomed, and she didn’t want to find out what they would do when they realized what she and Audrey were.
Nervous for Audrey’s sake, Victoria risked a peek at her oldest friend. Audrey knelt between Victoria and Diesel, next in line for the assault on her mind. If the queen learned what Audrey really was, it would be game over.
The queen smiled approvingly. “Diesel, master wizard of Fairhaven. It is an honor to have you, but you will understand that I won’t release you until I’ve learned who your companions are.”
Diesel cleared his throat. “Your Majesty, I—”
“Wait,” the woman said simply. She spoke with authority, as though her word and whims were law.
Hell, down here they probably were.
The queen turned her icy gaze on Audrey, and Victoria did the only thing she could think of.
“That’s enough!” she shouted, pushing herself to her feet.
Fyrn lowered his head in frustrated defeat, but Victoria didn’t care. If the queen found out Audrey was an Atlantean, there would be blood and a frantic frenzy of spells. There would be a battle, one Victoria wasn’t sure they would win. They were simply outnumbered.
Victoria wasn’t about to leave her friend’s life to chance, even if it shifted the entire city’s attention to her in a negative way.
If Victoria had to choose between her own life and her friend’s, she would always choose Audrey.
One of the wizards behind her grabbed her wrists, and she landed a vicious kick in his stomach. He doubled over and flew backward, hitting the paving and rolling a few feet. Her attention on the queen, Victoria summoned her sword to save the cruel woman from having to fact-check her identity.
Everyone in the city gasped, but seconds later there was only silence. The wizards who had been poised to grab her stepped back in fear as realization set in.
The queen gasped, one slender hand over her lips as she studied the sword. “A Rhazdon host.”
Surprisingly, the words came out more amazed than frightened. Her dark eyes narrowed as she studied Victoria. It was the look of an inquisitive and curious mind, as though she could dissect Victoria where she stood.
Victoria didn’t want to give her the chance to try.
“We have done nothing to you,” she snapped. “We are trying to help you, and you have the audacity to not only kidnap us but infiltrate our minds and force us to our knees like criminals? What kind of a pathetic excuse for a ruler are you?”
“Victoria,” Fyrn hissed.
“Enough, Fyrn,” she snapped. “You might put up with her bullshit, but I won’t.”
The queen tapped a dainty finger on her chin. “You said you were here to help us. What makes you think we need it?”
Okay, Victoria had to be honest with herself—she was making it up at this point. She had written more than one English essay analyzing some classic book or another, but most of her time in English class was spent writing horseshit she knew would get her an A.
She could do this. Probably.
After all, she had a few key pieces of evidence on her side to back up her theory that the witches and wizards of Lochrose not only needed help, but needed it desperately. Since that was all she had to go on, she would run with it.
“We’re here to slay the sphinx that has trapped you underground,” Victoria said.
A murmur erupted through the onlookers, and the queen eyed them with annoyance. Good. Apparently Victoria’s hunch had been correct—they were indeed trapped here. That monster wasn’t their pet, and it had likely munched on more than a few of their own citizens.
The queen lifted one hand, her elegant cloak sliding up her thin arm as she did so. “You are a Rhazdon host. The only person you help is yourself.”
Victoria’s shoulders drooped a bit, and she stared at Fyrn. “Why is it that everyone believes I’m completely evil? I’m starting to get offended.”
Her mentor nodded once toward the queen, and she got his message. Focus on our main problem.
&
nbsp; Victoria eyed the woman, but her neck was starting to hurt from craning to see the balcony. “We’re here to help you. You can accept it, or let us go on our way. I take it we’re the first outsiders to enter your home in a long time—maybe ever. Do you really want to kill us?”
“Possibly,” the queen said softly.
“I promise you don’t.” Victoria tightened her grip on the blade, ready to switch to the shield if she needed to protect herself and her friends. This was the moment of truth. Either they were going to be allowed a private audience with this woman, or a volley of spells and attacks would rain on them.
Even though Victoria didn’t want to admit it, the ball was fully in the queen’s court. With nothing to do but wait, Victoria kept her gaze locked on the regal woman who eyed her disdainfully from the balcony. Whatever happened next depended on the queen’s next words.
At an almost imperceptible gesture from the woman, the glowing ropes around Fyrn, and Diesel fell to the ground. Her friends stood warily, the wizards rubbing their wrists as they eyed the monarch on the balcony.
“Join me,” the queen said, and disappeared once more into the palace. Beneath the overhang, a set of hidden double doors swung open.
Apparently still afraid, the wizards who had captured Victoria’s group stood back and gestured toward the door, allowing them to enter on their own.
Victoria helped Audrey stand, but the Atlantean looked about ready to keel over from exhaustion. Holding a shift this long must have been excruciating, especially with the fatigue that had set in after leaving the charmed tunnels.
Audrey simply nodded her head in thanks and hobbled through the door, leaning on Diesel as she entered. Free of the threat of immediate death, he shot a grateful smile at Victoria.
She, however, couldn’t celebrate yet. They weren’t out of trouble until they left this damned city.
Fyrn walked beside Victoria as they entered the massive double doors. “Never undermine me again, Victoria. You could have gotten us killed. You could have—”
