by T. A. Miles
Vaelyx felt remiss for not telling everything to Vlas, but he imagined the headstrong and cynical nature of the mage would have had him dismiss the threat.
“Where will we find these tools?” Imris asked, innocent of Vaelyx’s internal justifications and maybe accepting his previous answers.
Vaelyx looked around them. The sound and smell of the pyre they’d made of the ghouls permeated the damp air. The odor was enough to make a person ill and hopefully enough to ward off any others of the coven’s unfortunate members.
“The area where we entered,” he said. “Seems a good place to start.”
Whether or not Imris agreed, she didn’t say anything. They continued on in silence until they arrived at the burning bodies of the ghouls who had tried to ambush them. A sign that Serawe was alert to attack. She’d been at odds with the Ancient Mother for some time by now, desperate to counteract the old woman’s betrayal. Serawe had received what she’d bargained for; durable bodies for her demon ranks that were easy to inhabit and difficult to be shaken out of by the specialized tactics of the mages. The crone had asked for peace for her own followers, time during which they could fortify themselves and her from the inevitable strike that would occur when Serawe learned of the deception. They were made for each other, yes … soul sisters in their cunning and their duplicity. It went without saying that, even had the crone been honest in her dealings, Serawe would have sooner or later betrayed her and brought down the coven. Vaelyx tried to warn Ersana, as he’d tried to warn Raiss and the Seminary, but by one way or another they were all deaf to his warnings.
And now here we all are.
Vaelyx understood that he’d been a tool, one of convenience. He’d made himself available and been cast aside afterward. Serawe didn’t respond to his presence, either because she was so accustomed to it through the dreams that it all felt the same to her, or because she was simply not interested. And, as the dream promised, she hadn’t noticed Vlas. Of course, she did have another mage actively confronting her. Vaelyx wasn’t convinced that one was enough to challenge her, though. Not for long.
He watched Imris make quicker steps to the pyre of ghouls when it came into view. She grabbed up one of the torches left on the ground after their earlier skirmish and refreshed it in the still smoldering pile of bodies.
Vaelyx summoned himself to the task ahead and moved in to haul away one of the corpses hosting more smoke than flame. With a path opened, he and the constable continued back toward the mining site they’d been dropped down onto. There would surely be the tools they required for the dramatic use of fire, enough force and fuel to bring down the well chamber. And that moment, if successful, might be the last either he or the constable would see of Mage Vlas.
Within the section of caves where the Vadryn had been temporarily detained, Merran considered how vain it would be to retrace their steps. There was no outlet that they could reach the way they had come. Magic was going to be required, which meant that Merran had to recover enough energy to transport the three of them, or Ersana had to access one of the coven’s portals. Surely, there were more in a place as vast as the caves, which had clearly been a place of ritual and use of magic for years.
“Is there a better route we can take?” Merran asked her. “One that leads out more directly or that will take us to another portal?”
“All of these entryways are portals going to one place or another,” Ersana replied. She calmly pointed to the archway with emblems. Many of the carvings were disrupted or obscured by green growth that had not been there when he and Korsten examined them previously. “Mother doesn’t want us to leave,” Ersana continued.
Merran looked at her, then at Dacia. “Is there a better route?” He asked Ersana again.
“The caves are a mystery to all of us, except for Mother,” she answered. “My passage here was always direct, and not frequent. We have not used the inner chambers of this place for many years, respecting the sanctuary of our Mother.”
“Providing privacy to your betrayer,” Merran corrected and while Ersana’s expression seemed both depressed and defiant as she tried to insinuate herself between what she had long believed and what she’d witnessed, he didn’t allow the subject to take hold of the conversation. “You’ve utilized the exterior chambers?” He asked.
Ersana nodded. “Yes.”
Merran considered the distance, and what he recalled of the first chamber he and Korsten had entered earlier that night. It would be easier than attempting to Reach the distance to Irslan’s home. Eventually he gave a nod of his own and said, “I will take us there.”
Ersana accepted that, reaching for Dacia’s hand. The girl provided it immediately, her dark eyes taking in all that they could of an environment she clearly did not recognize, in spite of having seen it not long before, filled with demons.
Merran stepped closer to the pair. Ersana lifted a hand to his shoulder this time and closed her eyes in a meditative fashion. For a woman who had introduced herself to them as purely obstinate and with contempt for their station, she took guidance well. But Indhovan’s coven was not their enemy; the crone was. Unfortunately for Ersana’s faith, it was an enemy they shared.
Drawing in a breath to level himself and summon what of his strength he hadn’t spent, Merran focused on retracing his steps mentally. In his mind, he traveled with Korsten and if he’d had his gift, perhaps he would have gone to him directly. He didn’t have that—he knew no other mage who did—and by the time his memory brought him back to the first chamber of the caves, he’d let go of the fact that Korsten was elsewhere and focused on the two who were with him, who he meant to bring with him to safer ground.
The necessary hand gestures were made and the portal formed. It glided toward the three of them in the same instant the crone’s extensive limbs broke through the walls, followed by her deep and persistent laughter. The time she’d spent on the summoning, collecting enough magic and prolonging her existence had deranged her in a way Merran had yet to witness. Not to this extreme. Her current state was as dealing with one of the ancient Vadryn, intoxicated by the power they’d stolen and fermented.
The Reach gate passed over them and brought the upper chamber at the start of the caves around them. They stood in the center of multiple, well-lit tiers. The crone had been left behind for the moment.
Ersana knew her directions immediately and guided her daughter toward the archway that would lead to the tunnel behind the waterfall. Merran stayed behind for a moment, feeling a pressure in his mind, as if something were pending. It seemed more as if it were ongoing, but hidden from full notice. He listened, detecting the sound of water from the falls, but also something else. It was like the pressure he felt inside, but it had a sound now … a low droning noise.
In the periphery of his senses, Ersana and Dacia had stopped to look back at him. Doubtless, one or both of the women perceived it as well. Merran looked at the elder of them, making eye contact that jolted them both to action.
“Go!” He urged the mother and daughter.
The floor bowed and was torn like a bursting seam by the rise of an arm of wood that could as easily have been a serpent. Merran lowered to steady himself against the disruption, but was knocked forward by another rupture in the floor, created by a second limb. Debris showered around him. He rolled onto his back and cast Barrier to shield himself from some of it. He felt a few bits of rock against his lower legs especially, but nothing damaging. He sat up and moved backward, away from the arms of the crone as she manifested her grotesque form through the rift she’d made in the floor. Her face had grown wider, spread across a tangled pillar of growth that was green where the growing persisted.
“We’re not done here,” she said in a voice that barely separated itself from the moaning of the air and water passing through her sanctuary. It seemed almost a labor for the Ancient to speak, perhaps even to move, but when she did the force was overp
owering … like the wave she’d summoned, a confrontation Merran felt would be on the city very soon. He hoped that Ersana had the sense to take her daughter and what they’d learned out of the chamber. Someone had to alert Indhovan and Merran doubted he would be in a position to. He had little hope of defeating or even containing the crone.
He dropped his Barrier, a little too soon; sharp pebbles scraped across his cheek and forehead. He ignored the sting of their assault and rose to his feet, casting Fire with each hand.
The crone laughed at him, though her face began to contort with rage the longer he stared back at her, letting the spell build in his hands. Fortunately, she was still raising herself to the surface with great effort owed to her weight and perhaps her own weakened state in the wake of the summoning. It would come down to whoever mustered the last of their strength first, then. Merran determined in that moment that it would be him, if it required all that he had left in him. He would leave the wave to the others. May the gods see Korsten back from wherever he had gone in time to assist.
The flames danced around his hands, swelling in size and density, smoke rising in erratic tendrils toward the ceiling. The air surrounding him wavered, distorting his view of the crone, who shouted something unintelligible as she shifted to throw some of her weight at him.
He heard a whisper in his mind—Nature is with you. The light shines around you. Use it!—and he obeyed it purely on instinct that was sharpened by panic. He needed more strength and in that instant, he was told where to get it … and did so. The light which traveled into the caves, channeled through the walls by the crystals which cast it onto the rock’s silvery veins, created a web of energy that could be felt. It was a raw source of the Essence, as potent as the blood lilies or as blood itself. He’d been soaking in it since he arrived in the caves, as the crone had been. She had years to his hours, but he had the advantage of being a vessel in motion to her idle storage and solitary focus.
The crone bellowed as she raised one massive limb and brought it down, into a stream of Fire. The flames engulfed her arm as it was coming down, reaching past to the main body. The fire began to gorge itself immediately and the crone fell. Like a tower toppling to its foundation, her gigantic form crashed against the floor, breaking off portions of it. Merran was sent to the ground by the shudder she sent radiating through the rock. The surface beneath him continued to break and he quickly rolled to get to his feet, but his feet very quickly had no purchase. He caught hold of the lip with one hand. One of the crone’s narrower tendrils caught hold of his other hand, coiling around it as she fell and pulling. The crushing was so immense as her weight dragged that it forced a shout from him—one of pain and of frustration as he lost his grip with the other hand.
As the crone burned, she quickly fell away from him. Her immense form fell into water, in pieces. Merran saw a great burst of water and steam rise to meet him. It split around him in the instant his body crumpled against an unseen force. It was not as painful as it should have been, or he was numb to the impact. He could not feel his hand at all and found himself too exhausted to comprehend much else. He lay uncomfortably curled against whatever had interrupted his fall, tensing only slightly when it began to drift upward. A sensation of potentially rolling off it sent minor waves of tension through his body, but beyond that, he felt cold and weak.
He may have briefly lost consciousness at some point. He couldn’t say when he rolled onto his back, but looking up, he saw Ersana hovering over the broken floor above. She was deep in concentration, so he let her be … and closed his eyes.
The view overhead was of blood, raining down in steady streams as the Vadryn encased in Serawe and the crone’s concocted vessels tore at Serawe’s web of veritable flesh. The basins on the chamber floor had been all but emptied for the canopy she’d made. They were filling again while the demons tore at their mistress’ veil. She retaliated with ferocity that scattered bits of her minions wherever they may have fallen. The lesser demons carried on in spite of injury and were stopped only when Serawe managed to inflict a wound that enabled her to suck the dark spirits from their casing. After realizing the crone’s betrayal, they had wanted freedom from the vessels and Serawe had wanted it for them, but not this soon and not this way. Korsten could feel her frustration, as surely as he could feel that of the others and as surely as all of them could feel his.
Serawe had been stationed here to weaken the coastal border … to poison it slowly with the Islands coven and to use her cult to harvest valuable materials that were then supplied to Morenne. The knowledge spilled from her mind to Korsten’s as if from an overfull cup in an unsteady hand. She’d come too close to him, but the others had come closer still, enough that they felt a claim. Korsten was slow realizing that it wasn’t a claim over him that they felt, but rather as if they had been claimed … by him, and now they would endeavor to defend and impress. They were all vying for favor, rendering their attacks on Serawe all the more vicious. They would not stop until they each had the larger piece to bring back to a new master.
Korsten was awestruck by what he felt, not only from them, but from himself. He was encouraging them, as if he’d dipped his hand into water and stirred it. They responded to the motion he generated and as they moved with that spinning flow, threads of their being radiated back to him. Serawe pulsated at the distant center of the vortex. Korsten felt that he could dive into it and absorb her.
It was then that he realized he stood on the edge of disaster, that he’d been brought to that dangerous threshold where those in intimate contact with a very ancient of the Vadryn were tempted into oblivion. But it was not Serawe’s seduction which brought him here … it was his own power over her. And now they were too close.
You cannot take me, though, he considered, more to himself than to her. You cannot sustain off a soul that hides from your senses.
I can taste your blood! Serawe assured him.
You would find it unsatisfying, he replied knowingly, recalling the moment when Renmyr had tried to take from him. The moment that had inspired Renmyr to give Korsten what he believed he wanted then; death. The scars were still visible on Korsten’s arms, like the scar on his neck … the seal Merran had put upon his skin against a demon’s poison. Korsten would not allow himself to be poisoned by another of them, and death was a destination for later. Serawe would not bring him to that place, or anywhere near.
You will not defeat me! She shrieked in his mind, frustration tearing across his senses, like a cut on his skin. I’m fed here, and I will smother you….and take you as well. When your body expires and has satisfied me, I will find the rest of you. I will smear the essence of you all over me and use it to lure your lovers and your kin. You will come back to us after all.
I was never with you, Korsten answered, more for himself than for her. He had to enforce to himself that she was attempting to manipulate what he remembered so that he would not succumb to her efforts. He loved Renmyr. He had not allied himself with a demon.
Ignorance of the truth does not negate it, Serawe told him ruthlessly. She knew how it cut, for she could feel it as well as he could. They were at each other’s mercy, or the lack of it.
The lack of it….
For an instant, Korsten pressed the lesser Vadryn to attack her more vigorously. For an instant, he urged them to do it for him. The immediate response that he felt—the instant rise to his command—sickened him so much that he dropped his spell … the only spell he’d ever cast that required nothing more than thought and only enough of it to generate a level of emotion that would sustain it. That was the danger of it. Especially coming from someone like him. What a curse the gods had put on him and others … except it was Adrea. His predecessor had chosen this for him. Why? She should have let it die with her.
Serawe felt his emotion grow too heavy for him. She detected it collapsing on him, and she struck him a heavy blow. The instant he withdrew from the other Vadryn b
y withdrawing Allurance, the demons became somewhat confounded again. The blood and their own rage left them in a sort of frenzied state, but some of the vigor and focus had left their attack. Serawe dropped out of her net like a pouncing spider, directly onto Korsten. They both tumbled briefly, stopping when Korsten rolled against the edge of one of the stone basins. He wound up on his side with Serawe’s claws gripping one arm and sunken partway into his side. Her weight and the immensity of her dark presence helped to pin him in place.
“I am going to eat you,” she said, almost giddily. She put her mouth on his shoulder, fangs edging through her lips while her dark hair hung in saturated bloody strands around her face.
Korsten thrust his arm back, managing to shoulder her in the chin and to rake her claws further across his skin in the process. The scratches stung immensely, but the superficial nature of them would ensure a full healing. Lurching away from the stabbing claws at his side while he twisted to shove her off was less certain. He could feel a burning with the blood loss in that area. He did his best to ignore it, folding a leg between them to hold her off while he manifested his weapon, punching a shorter, wider version of it at her. He was surprised at how instinctively he went for her throat, though he just caught her collar as she rolled herself unnaturally up and over him. She grabbed onto his shoulders to bring her with him and he went, letting himself fall on top of her. A strange satisfaction juxtaposed against her anger as their bodies collided solidly. Serawe rose up to put her mouth onto his, but he put his left hand on her throat to stop her. His right hand still held his blade, though before he could consider using it, she threw him from her with strength that should not have surprised him.
