“Let me think about it.” Silver said.
Gaillean sighed. “Well we can at least discover what your magic governs over, that does not require your cooperation.”
More vines snaked down till they reached her hands. Leaves gently scraped against the skin of her palms and then moved quickly to circle Gaillean once before they slithered into the ground disappearing.
“Well that certainly fits.” Gaillean muttered and then uttered a tiny chuckle. “Why not gift the insane wytch with one of the most dangerous and deadly gifts of all? Fate is such a twisted thing.”
“Even twisted, you have to admit it has good taste.” Silver smirked. “So what did I get? Animals? Storms? Don’t keep it to yourself.”
Gaillean sighed. “I agree with Kate, we must be insane to allow this. You are to become the wytch queen of the demonic realm.”
That made Silver turn very quiet, very quickly. Demons. Her powers were over demons.
Visions of the hellhounds she’d sent back to their realm with Kobos’ death flashed before her. They were demons of a sort, and they had terrified even her when they had appeared. They had been the size of horses with the same build as a wolfhound and they had scales that covered their front half while short fur covered their stomachs, paws and back legs. Their tails had been bone, as if their spines had continued out of their backs without any skin or flesh, ending in a blade-like diamond that had looked as sharp if not sharper than the jagged teeth which protruded in two rows from their black gums.
They had the ability to rip your soul from your body, devouring it so that you couldn’t be reincarnated. And she was the queen of beings that deadly and worse? That wasn’t something she was about to complain about.
Though it could make training her gift rather dangerous, she thought, looking at her father. He appeared caught between bemusement and horror.
“I thought that demons were created, that they did not exist naturally.”
“You are confusing the creations of necromancers with the real thing.” Gaillean dismissed her confusion. “The only true demons at the Battle of Elvardis were the hellhounds, summoned from a separate realm where there are many hundreds of races of demons. The people of your world have come to associate the necromancers’ summoned undead with demons, and it is from there that their confusion stems. True demons are different races, not the reanimated corpses of the races of your world.”
“So, do you still want to train me?” She asked. “I think I could manage perfectly well by myself, daddy dearest.”
“You’d die within the first second of touching your power.” Gaillean informed her. “To wield power of any kind requires strength and discipline. You have little of the first and even less of the second. To wield power over the beings of the demonic realms requires both of those but in addition you have to have the will to command beings with powers of their own. That requires you to have willpower of your own.”
“I have willpower.” Silver was put out.
“Stubbornness does not equate to willpower.” He dismissed her with a wave of his hands. “Willpower is staying focused on your goal but being mindful of the obstacles and choosing to continue. Stubbornness is a result of delusion either about your goal or your ability to meet it.”
He called her delusional! She struggled against the vines. “I think I can manage my own powers.”
“Is that so? If you were to summon a demon here right now could you control it and merge with it?” Gaillean asked. “Could you summon hellfire and use it to your advantage in battle? Could you ride on the back of a hellhound without it devouring you? Do you really think you have the will to do any of these things?”
Silver remained silent, her own pure mulishness refusing to allow her to agree with him. But truthfully he was right, she had no idea what he was talking about, so there was no way she would be able to actually do any of those things. Her life wasn’t worth the risk.
She snarled. “So teach me then.” She finally relented, hating his smiling ‘I told you so’ look.
The vines dropped her to the ground, but she caught herself and landed in a crouch.
“First, since demons are not of any of the twenty-one worlds but exist on a separate realm altogether, Kate’s fears about taking you between the worlds being harmful are unfounded. Therefore we will move your training to the area I have already prepared for you in my own world.”
Before she had a chance to object, or even take one step in his direction, vines covered her and she felt the familiar sensation of being teleported.
When the leaves disappeared from her vision she was standing on a different world.
Jungle was everywhere around her. Heavy, humid air felt muggy to her lungs and her feet were up to her ankles in mud. Above her smoke floated steadily into a violet sky from a volcano which was barely visible through the dense crimson canopy. Gaillean was standing by a lake with glittering clear, yet eerily still, water.
Silver tried not to show it, but she was impressed. The Ancients could not only travel between worlds, they could take others with them as well.
Gaillean noticed her expression and scoffed. “You’re going to have to do more impressive things than that.” He muttered, moving towards the edge of the glassy lake. “Conjuring demons from their realm is a far more difficult and specialised branch of magic than mere teleportation.”
“Are you saying you don’t know how to do it? Because that wouldn’t be very godly.” Silver retorted.
“You must really be mad if you think that I am just going to let you conjure a demon for the first time in a jungle.” Gaillean turned away from her and looked upwards. “I already spoke about willpower and your lack of. We are going to deal with that first.”
How exactly did he plan to replace her stubbornness? She wondered, following him as he turned away from the lake and began a slow trek towards the volcano.
It took five hours to climb to the top of the volcano at mortal speed. Gaillean was silent the entire time, despite her efforts to goad him. Even when she brought up Kate or Romana all she got was a raised eyebrow followed by a frown.
Clearly he aimed to kill her with silence.
When he reached the summit, he stood and waited for her, not even offering his hand to help her up. She looked over the rim and saw a lava lake glowing in the darkness of the night.
“Pretty.” She informed him. “Why are we here?”
“Every morning you will be teleported to the base of the volcano where we began.” Gaillean said, ignoring her. “You will then climb the exact route to this very spot that we just took before resuming your work.”
“Work?” She was confused.
“You are going to learn to forge a sword using a volcanic forge.” Gaillean replied. “You will make sword after sword after sword until I am happy with the quality. If you can make three consecutive swords that are good enough then I will teach you to use your powers.”
“I thought you said my powers were over demonic stuff, not forging swords.” Silver complained. “Make up your mind.”
“This is not an exercise designed to teach you power.” Gaillean dismissed. “It is an exercise designed to teach you perseverance, to continue failing but experimenting with different ways until you get the right one. If you are merely stubborn you will stick to the same method of forging and you will never make the blade of a high enough quality. You will fail a thousand different ways before you succeed.” He continued walking, leading them down along the narrowest path imaginable towards the surface of the lake. At the last possible minute when she thought he was going to walk into the lava he turned left, disappearing from view.
She followed, and they emerged in a long tunnel-like cave lit evenly by torches. That seemed to blaze into life as Gaillean walked past them. The tunnel continued downwards back the way they’d come, until it finally ended.
“Watch,” Gaillean insisted as Silver prepared to rant at him for taking her on a useless hike to the end of some useless cave.
At his touch, the rock slid downwards, much like the front door to her caves did.
What was revealed was a large and obviously ancient forge.
“You have two weeks to produce your first sword.” Was all Gaillean said before he pushed her inside and sealed the door.
Chapter Six
THINGS WORSE THAN DEATH
“Still no sign?” Marten asked as Romana reformed in their room on the Isle of the Gifted.
“She’s got to be matured by now.” Romana said. “I don’t understand it! If she were dead, I would be too. If she were captured, someone would have heard something; I would have found some trace. It’s like she doesn’t exist.” She flopped down onto a chair and looked at her food.
Every day for the last nine months one of Silver’s brothers had come to her and asked if she had found anything. She had communed with the air so many times that she had lost count and still nothing could be found of the lost woman. Of her lost sister.
“My mother is still ignoring me.” Romana added. “She won’t tell me anything, but I get the sense she’s mad at something or someone.”
“I’ve asked around, none of the other races are experiencing any problems that could be related to her. If anything, the murder statistics have fallen since she went missing.” Marten informed her.
None of this was good. Silver had been brought back for a reason, but what that reason was, only the Ancients’ knew. And they weren’t telling.
Romana had come to believe that Silver was being confined somewhere against her will, her personality was too brazen to allow her to hide for this long without at least a few of her signature kills. But if Silver’s captors eventually killed her, Romana would die too, and that was why Marten was obsessing so much over this.
Katelyn came bouncing into the room then, followed by Averna and Lynette. Katelyn was back from her studies for a few weeks while the centaurs were doing an ancient hunting ritual, and her trainees were making the most of it. Though sixteen years had passed, Katelyn was still in many ways as innocent has she had been when they’d left the slave shop together so long ago, and it was that innocence that made Lynette and Averna so drawn to her.
Romana refused to talk about war or Silver in front of her for that very reason. Katelyn’s kind heart should never be ruined by the deep horrors she and Marten had to face on a daily basis.
Dinner was eaten with friendly banter; she cooked as usual, with Marten winning the debate over what she cooked for them all by a landslide. Surrounded by family, she smiled. Before the Battle of Elvardis she had thought that freedom was only complete if you weren’t tied down in any way shape or form. But having a family was a new kind of freedom, something she could only now admit she had always wanted.
Silver threatened that family, but at the same time Romana knew that she could also be the key to protecting them. She shook off her thoughts, determined to enjoy tonight.
It was long after their meal, when she and Marten had teleported back to Morendor and she was stood on the balcony of their room that she allowed thoughts of Silver to arise once again.
News had of course leaked of her existence, and many people believed the rumours of the return of the Silver Eyed Wytch; some believed she had simply managed to survive the Battle of Elvardis and then vanished. Others thought she had been spared death by the Ancients as a reward.
Cults had risen up, dedicated to finding and serving her in any way possible. There were even worrying rumours that the Guild of Death sought her as a member of their elite council of twelve master assassins.
If only the guards had kept their mouths shut when they had practically overturned Morendor searching for her, Romana thought. Even when she was absent Silver still seemed to manage to cause uproar.
“Maybe we shouldn’t be searching for her.” Averna surprised her as she came up behind her on the balcony, looking over the lights of the city beyond the palace grounds. “If she is a wytch, her powers would most likely be worse than mine, add to that the fact that she had Ancient blood and she’ll be a wytch queen of something dark and I don’t think it’s wise to provoke her.”
Romana nodded. “I know, but the risk if she’s allowed to roam is too great.” She shuddered. “What she did before… She’s unstable; a single wrong word and she’ll snap.”
“You know her better than most,” Averna conceded. “Just watch out Romy.”
“She won’t kill me.” Romana knew how much Silver’s own life meant to her.
“I know, but there are things worse than death.”
Coming from the Wytch Queen of Death, that was saying something.
Romana looked at Averna, seeing little of the girl she had first met in the palace of Morendor. Back then she had been terrified of her powers, filled with self-loathing. Now, though still not completely at peace with the disturbing nature of her gift, the girl had grown in confidence and in stature till she was as tall and willowy as Romana herself. Averna’s dark gaze roved over the city.
“When she returns, it will be with chaos.” Averna finally said. “I can sense death on a large scale on the horizon.”
The girl’s gauzy white wytch queen robes flowed in the wind, contrasting with the ebony of her hair.
“How long do we have?” Romana asked.
“A while, yet the first attack will be sudden, be prepared.”
With that Averna teleported away; she had learned to be picky over what information she disclosed regarding her gift. She didn’t like to tell people the things she saw, but she did like them to be prepared for what was to come, it was a difficult situation for both her and the people she wanted to warn.
But her warnings always carried weight, and they’d be fools not to listen to this one.
Chapter Seven
FRAGMENT
Nineteen useless swords later and Silver was running out of ideas.
Everything Gaillean had said came true, every morning she was forced to walk the miles to the summit of the volcano, she was sent back to the start if she took one foot from the path laid out for her. Every afternoon till the sun rose she would spend attempting to create a sword that fit his standards. And every fortnight she would fail.
She’d done what he asked, experimented. She’d gone as far as to quench the blade in her own blood. Nothing worked. Nothing could save the metal when Gaillean showed up and smashed it into a thousand tiny pieces against a wall with one strike.
How was she supposed to create a sword that would withstand him?
And this work was boring. She never ate, yet she never became hungry, she never slept and yet she was never tired. All that changed during the day was the temperature. Outside was moist, inside the cave, the only liquids were the ones used to forge swords, and her own sweat.
If only she had another material, something stronger that couldn’t be broken. All she had here was steel, nothing stronger or weaker, and there was no way to get any other materials either.
The first sword had been a joke, more of a dagger really, and she’d barely tried at it, convinced Gaillean wouldn’t be too hard to please. The second she had poured every ounce of muscle she owned into, and it had been no more effective than the first.
The twentieth sword was lying across the anvil, awaiting a final round of tempering this evening. No doubt it would fail as well.
What was even worse was that she could feel herself getting weaker and weaker. There was no way to find food or water without stepping from the trail every morning, and though she had Ancient blood, she suspected she still needed food and rest though she did not feel the urge to partake in eating or sleeping.
So when she reappeared by the lake at the next day the first thing she did was fall to the ground and drink the water there. The second was to fill the bucket from the lake.
After nine and a half months she’d run out of water for blacksmithing with, so this time she had made sure she was holding a bucket when dawn came and she was forced to return to the lake.
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br /> She splashed water on her face and stood, hefting the bucket back along the trail, picking any berries she found along the path to try and regain some strength. The berries did little to help and when she re-entered the cave she looked at the blade resting on the anvil with distain. Silver walked to the slack tub and poured the heavy sloshing bucket of water into it. Then she stalked to the near complete sword and punched it into the flames of the forge.
That tiny piece of violence felt good, even if it was against an inanimate object. She watched as the sword began to glow orange and gold in the heat of the hearth. When it was warm enough she pulled it out with the tongs and dunked the blade evenly into the water. There was a hissing sound as the metal cooled and turned dull under the water.
She pulled it out and started on the finishing. The handle was wrapped in leather, the guard was small and disk shaped. She’d given up on truly bothering with the decoration after the third sword, and Gaillean would be coming tonight, so she didn’t have much time.
Usually upon his arrival, he would remain silent, pick up the sword she’d made and swing it hard against the cave walls using his Ancient strength to strike the blow. At that point the blade always shattered into tiny pieces. Then one of two things would happen, he would either teleport her to the lake once again and she would be forced to make the climb twice in twelve hours and then be gone by the time she arrived. Or he would sit and examine the pieces of the blade before standing, telling her to work harder on the next one and then teleport her to the lake and he’d be gone by the time she got back.
Gaillean was ridiculous. How was this helping her to learn anything? Or was he merely keeping her away from her own world for as long as possible.
She had just finished the polishing when he appeared. But he was not alone; Kate was standing by his side, her face livid.
“You’ve been keeping her in a cave?” She screeched. “I know she’s insane but she’s been a captive for over two decades if you count the time spent locked inside Romana! You’ve probably made her worse.”
Silver's Redemption (Soul Merge Saga Book 3) Page 5
