by David Hair
A horse shrieked, and they heard it crash to the cobblestones, its rider screaming.
Elena? Ah, there you are. Vedya’s tinkling giggle filled her mind.
‘Faster,’ she croaked, screaming inside in frustration and terror. We can’t survive Vedya, not when I’m so far gone …
Booted feet echoed behind them. Luca had already reloaded; now he fired again, and as they heard another death-cry, someone yelled, ‘It’s a dead-end! They’re trapped!’ from somewhere nearby.
It better not be a rukking dead-end, Elena thought as her mind filled with images of what Vedya would do to her if she caught her. ‘Run!’ she whispered.
Luca ran past them, guiding them to the gap in the walls where they had slipped through, one of the many points Dolman hadn’t had time to fix. He pushed Elena through, then helped Lorenzo carry Solinde through. An arrow flew out of the darkness, struck the wall and pinged away, followed by another that flew through the gap. Luca grasped a support strut in the half-completed structure and pulled with all his strength until a section of the wall fell inwards, sealing the gap. They turned away from the blockage and found themselves at the top of a slope that led down to the close-packed shacks of the Jhafi.
Lorenzo led the way, Solinde in his arms, mercifully still unconscious. Luca helped Elena down. Though his eyes betrayed his horror at what Elena had become, he didn’t falter. Barely had they reached the Jhafi shanties when an incandescent shape appeared above the walls. Vedya wore a silk dress, red as blood, and her waist-length black hair flew about her like the wings of a raven.
‘Do you have a plan, Ella?’ Lorenzo whispered, pulling her into the lee of a half-built wall. Luca knelt and reloaded his crossbow, as his eyes tracked the witch.
Not really. ‘Get under cover, damnit, before—’
Vedya swooped over them and a vivid blast of blue fire erupted from her finger and struck Luca even as he fired. His bolt was snatched away by the torrent of energy that picked him up and flung him against a mud-brick wall. His mouth was open in voiceless agony and he started twitching, as if being moved by the invisible strings of some puppet-master.
Vedya vanished behind a roof, no doubt wary of a counter-strike, but Elena didn’t have the energy.
Lorenzo put Solinde down and stood over her, his broken sword in hand, scanning the skies. ‘What is the plan, Elena?’ he demanded.
I had a plan, but in that plan I was fresh and undamaged. ‘We have to draw her in, Lori, and take her down with weapons. She isn’t a fighter.’
‘But all she has to do is stay up there and the Gorgio will be on top of us!’
‘I never said it was a good plan.’ She struggled to put one foot beneath her. On the ground Solinde moaned. I do this for you, Princessa. She grimaced in pain as she stood, then tottered out into the narrow alleyway. A bright shape swooped towards her like one of Kore’s angels.
Vedya Smlarsk first met Gurvon Gyle at Northpoint, the tower placed by the Ordo Costruo where the Leviathan Bridge was anchored, south of Pontus. She had come with her man, Hygor, to look upon the great tower – the Tower of the Eye, the Sydians called it, Ureche Turla, where the hated magi gazed out eternally over the Bridge. The Bridge itself was deep beneath the waves, midway through its tide-cycle. Ureche Turla was a mighty sight: as delicate as an ivory carving, yet a mile high, festooned with massive cables and platforms where windships could dock. The blue light in its uppermost tower room shone like a star.
Vedya’s mother had seduced a Bridge Builder mage nineteen years previously, though she was already married. There was no shame in the seduction – all knew that to bear a mage-child was to bring wealth and status to the clan. Her mother had been nubile and skilled in the arts of the flesh. She was often called upon to consecrate the sacred union with the priests on feast days, when they would mate before the tribe to bring blessings upon the harvest – though they were nomads, horse herders, they would settle in spring to grow a single harvest of barley, oats and wheat to sustain them through winter.
Vedya grew up a privileged child, one whom men fought over. The few magi the tribe had managed to breed lived together in the Sfera, or Circle, sharing an intense rivalry and kinship, teaching each other what snippets of mage-craft they learned. All the Sfera were part-Rondian, of course, mostly quarter-bloods and eighth-bloods, but Vedya was a full half-blood, with affinities to water and animals. When she bled, she was married off to a powerful man, Hygor of the Armasar Rasa clan, as his fourth wife. He took her virginity before the whole clan at the height of the wedding celebrations while his three other wives watched her with dark unreadable eyes. He was twice her age. She was thirteen.
That night in Pontus she became aware of another man watching Ureche Turla. Hygor had already noted him, wary hunter that he was. At first she thought the stranger, clad in Sydian leathers, one of the clan, but as he approached, the wind pushed back his hood, and the moonlight revealed that he wasn’t Sydian at all; he was Rondian. And he wasn’t watching the tower. He was watching her.
Hygor growled: an outsider looking openly upon a Sydian woman was an unacceptable challenge to her husband’s manhood. This man didn’t look like a fighter, but neither did he cringe when Hygor strode angrily towards him. He was smallish for a Rondian, with a ferret-like face and a compact body. Hygor no doubt intended to kill him – until he saw the crystal pulsing at his throat. The man was a vrajitoare, a mage.
Vedya had feared for Hygor. He was a good mate: he was virile and protective and he favoured her above his other wives. But the vrajitoare had raised a hand in peace, and he and Hygor had talked. The vrajitoare knew the Sydian tongue. When Hygor returned, it was with a stunned look upon his face. In his hands were three woven leather bracelets, each set with twelve diamonds, each stone alone worth one hundred horses. She remembered the tremor she felt when she saw them. Hygor reached out and broke her bridal necklace, spilling the pottery beads onto the rocky hillside. ‘Wife, you are no longer my wife. You belong to this man.’ His eyes were like plates, luminous in the moonlight.
She had fallen to her knees and wailed – it was expected. But her mind was already moving forward, even as Hygor walked away.
‘My name is Gurvon Gyle,’ the vrajitoare told her as he silenced her grief-cries with a gesture. ‘You belong to me. Come.’
She missed Hygor and the simplicity of tribal life sometimes, but her first child to Hygor had left her barren, so she could no longer strengthen the clan. Her daughter would enrich the Sfera, but she brought Hygor nothing more now. She was worth considerably less than three thousand six hundred horses. Hygor had got a very good price for her.
At first she had been confused: this man Gyle would not consummate their marriage, instead spending his nights with a tired older woman who was also not his wife. But gradually things became clearer to Vedya: she was merely Gyle’s servant; the other woman, a hostile, cynical creature called Elena Anborn, was his lover. Gyle had purchased Vedya not for his bed, but to teach her, to realise her potential, he said, to make her useful to him. So she learned how to shield, and how to blast enemies with energy, and other skills even those of the Sfera didn’t know: wonderful things; how to fly, how to read minds, how to deceive people. They opened up her horizons, clever Gyle and his cold Elena.
Gradually the thought grew in her mind that were she to supplant Elena in Gyle’s bed, she would enjoy greater status and privilege among the other vrajitoare he employed. She noticed that their relationship was based on habit, old memories, remembered passions. When she spied on them, she saw the dull, uninspired way they coupled briefly, then rolled apart, and how they talked, sharing ideas but never dreams. It was easy to drive a wedge between them: she was young and beaut
iful, exotic, comfortable with her body and her desires. She had performed before the entire clan with Hygor many times, and witnessed others, learning new tricks to please a man – and herself. It was easy to drop hints, to expose a little flesh for his eyes only. She could be patient, for him – and there was much more for her to learn, once she understood their purpose: to kill enemies for money. That came easily to her too.
It wasn’t hard to find ways to be alone with Gurvon Gyle. The first time, in Verelon, he had fallen upon her without finesse, taken her quickly, guiltily, but the next time she had slowed him down and taught him how to enjoy her fully. And though she had no pretensions of intellect, she was a good listener; it took no great mind to know Gyle wanted to be thought wise, not to be contradicted, as Elena always did. And he believed himself to be a masterly lover – all men did. She knew better than most how to make a man feel good. With his body enslaved and his mind engaged, he was hers.
She had enjoyed watching the realisation come upon Elena Anborn that her lover was being stolen. It was amusing to witness the way she pretended it wasn’t happening, how she humiliated herself trying to look more beautiful, while Gyle found reasons to send her from him. He might have pretended to Elena that she was still important to him, but they were empty words: Vedya ruled Gurvon Gyle.
Vedya swooped above the forest of crude buildings that fringed the inner walls of Brochena, seeing with night-sighted eyes. Elena Anborn hobbled out of cover, her face hooded, her movements awkward. Is she wounded? Vedya licked her lips. Now was the time for the pupil to become the master. The little crossbowman lay twitching in the open and she blasted him again, enjoying his death-spasm. There was still no counter-strike from Elena, to her surprise.
Has she nothing left? She fought a sense of exultation and focused on the second man below: a Rimoni knight, cowering under cover… And Jhafi, hundreds of them, huddling like beetles in a rotting log. Vedya knew many ways to destroy an enemy. This will be amusing, she thought as she started building a fresh attack based upon mesmerism-gnosis.
With a harsh cry she sent a wave of despair through the minds of all in the vicinity. She felt old men and women of the Jhafi imagine their own deaths, and their hearts gave up beating. Children dreamed the deaths of their mothers and wailed in utter despair. Men suddenly thinking themselves castrated howled in agony, hands clutched to their groins as they grovelled in the dirt. Women clenched their wombs, imagining them shrivelling and cancerous. All the while she expected the bent figure of Elena Anborn to counter her, but nothing came.
She has nothing left! She concentrated next on the Rimoni knight, slid inside his mind, knew him in a heartbeat: a young man, infatuated with Elena Anborn. What is it with this shrivelled old woman? His sexual awakening had come at the hands of an older woman and in his mind he had interwoven Elena with that now-dead lover. But this night he had seen the ruthless killer behind Elena’s fair mask. Vedya crowed as she saw him relive the way Elena’s youth had been destroyed by Sordell; his mind showed her just how horrifically disfigured Elena was now, like a shattered egg, the yolk spilled, the shell broken. His confusion was a tangible thing, an easy weapon to grasp.
Vedya exulted as she saw him step from the shadows behind Elena’s back. This was truly her hour. She glided down, parrying a feeble mage-bolt. Elena’s hood fell back, exposing aged skin and coarse grey hair. She was bent like an old woman, her hands clawed. The knight was four easy strides behind her, his sword raised – it was broken, but still a foot long, still lethal.
Vedya spoke to distract her. ‘Elena. You’re looking your age.’
Elena straightened slightly, her prematurely old face grimacing with effort. Behind her the knight swung, but somehow Elena twisted, did something that made the knight collapse as if deflated. Vedya recoiled in alarm, but Elena’s leg buckled and she fell to her knees, gasping for breath. The light within her periapt dimmed. She looked like some toothless granny, begging for gruel in the markets.
Ha! Vedya landed, stepped in and slapped her, her hand cracking across Elena’s face. No shields softened the attack, and the satisfaction of that physical blow was magnificent. Elena tried to raise her own sword, but Vedya stamped on her wrist. Bones snapped. Elena whimpered in agony and Vedya slammed a bolt of gnosis-fire into her. As she convulsed her mouth opened in a wordless scream as her skin seared and blistered. The energy crackled, frying her. One more would kill her.
No – too merciful. She knelt above her, the woman who’d taught her more about the gnosis than any other: her mentor in magic, her rival in love, now utterly helpless beneath her. ‘Elena, darling, do you remember teaching me the Soul-Devourer,’ she whispered, ‘how to consume the mind and powers of another? That is what I shall do to you, and your soul will dwell eternally in mine, shrieking in despair and rage as I take everything that was once yours: your powers, your memories. You will be at my disposal, helpless within me for the rest of my life.’ She slid her mind through Elena’s remaining shields. The woman’s resistance was pitiful. See, I remember the spell well … She let the snake of her gnosis coil about the tiny, fragile core that was all that remained of Elena Anborn’s power and opened her jaws to swallow.
A dry voice whispered inside her mind,
The darkness changed. The lights went out and she screamed. And kept on screaming as a billion claws pulled her into oblivion.
Elena came to herself slowly. It had been such a gamble! She had been totally emptied out, her stamina gone, her powers all but spent. Countering Vedya’s manipulation of Lorenzo had used up her last reserves – all but the one sliver she forced herself to hold back, the only slim chance she had left. If the Sydian had used mage-bolts or stabbed her, or simply sat and waited for the Gorgio soldiers, Elena would have been helpless – and now dead. But Elena had taught Vedya that the Soul-Devourer technique was always the best way to destroy a helpless mage, for it would give the devouring mage greater power. That was true, but it was also something of a trap, for it opened a path for a counter-blow, one that could only be blocked if you knew the technique. Elena had never even mentioned that to Vedya, let alone taught her that technique. Always have a plan …
Now her rival’s empty carcase was lying in the filth of the alley, her glassy eyes lifeless. She was as dead as it was possible to be: her soul was gone for ever. The spirit world would never receive her, no Necromancer or Healer could ever restore life. That tiny spark of awareness that had flowed into Elena had dissolved and gone. Beautiful, manipulative, obsessive Vedya had simply ceased to exist.
What a monster I have become. But I live and I have her life-energy, until it dissipates …
She pulled herself up. Ignoring her bloodied knees, she dragged herself through the stony dirt of the alley to Lorenzo. She rested her head on his chest. It rose and fell shallowly. Thanks be …
She used some of what she had taken from Vedya to send calmness to the surviving Jhafi, huddled unseen in the surrounding hovels. There were dozens dead, and many more who would be mentally scarred for life. She closed Luca’s staring eyes, berating herself for being unable to protect him, then turned to the Rimoni knight.
She sent a little wakefulness into him and cushioned his mind as consciousness returned. When he woke and his eyes found her face, she heard him stiffen and gasp. He threw her off him and cringed in the dirt. ‘Diablo,’ he hissed, ‘don’t touch me.’
How much was the remnants of Vedya’s spell she couldn’t tell. Oh Lori. I warned you not to come.
The hue and cry died down; the Gorgio had seen Vedya’s demise and now feared to follow. Jhafi men came out of the rabbit-warren of buildings and found Elena, huddled protectively over the prone body of Solinde, with Lorenzo in a daze nearby, his f
ace turned away. These men were loyal to one Mustaq al’Madhi, ostensibly a trader, known as, amongst other less salubrious nicknames, ‘the Sultan of the Souks’. But Mustaq al’Madhi had a complicated personal code which currently favoured the Nesti among the Rimoni noble families. Elena and Solinde were wrapped in bekira-shrouds, then the three survivors were borne through the tangle of alleyways ripe with the smells of rotting food, human and animal waste and the sweat of unwashed bodies. The smoke of a myriad cooking fires set Elena coughing helplessly, like the oldest crone in the market.
Behind them, more Jhafi men were carrying the bodies of Sordell and Vedya and shouting in triumph, waving weapons produced from hidden caches. Drums started beating and torches lit up the night, gleaming scarlet and orange off bared scimitars and knives. They wound their way to Dom-al’Ahm Plaza, where Mustaq al’Madhi awaited them, surrounded by his fighting men. Some had brought meat-hooks for the corpses of the hated magi. His brutish face was beaming as he clapped Elena on her shoulders, nearly sending her sprawling.
‘This is a night of glory, Lady Elena!’ he shouted exultantly. ‘Five of the devils! It is a shame that Shaitan Gyle was not here too, to taste the same bitter defeat.’
If Gurvon had been here this would not have happened, she thought numbly, but what she said was, ‘Bring me scrolls, to pin on their bodies.’
Her voice was so cracked that even al’Madhi, who barely knew her, noticed. ‘Lady, you are afflicted?’
‘Just temporarily, Mustaq. You need not worry. I will be fine again soon.’
He backed away a little at this reminder of the dreaded gnosis, but he remained friendly. ‘You have given much for us, lady,’ he said. ‘We will tend you. Everything we have is yours. May Ahm bless you eternally.’
I don’t know that Ahm cares much for Rondian magi. She bowed in thanks, nevertheless. ‘I will keep the princessa with me,’ she told him. ‘She must be restored to the Queen-Regent.’
