A Sorcerer’s Treason

by Sarah Zettel

  “So, now we know each other, Lord Sorcerer,” said the dowager, her clawed hand clutching the back of his head. “Now, when it is too late.”

  Kalami struck her hand away, and smiled at the surprise on her face. “While we breathe it is not too late, and you will yet give me what I need.”

  “No.”

  And he gripped her, and they changed again.

  • • •

  Bridget, Ananda, Sakra and eight of the house guard led by Captain Chadek poured into the dowager’s apartments. The fine, cold, dark rooms were empty, except for Medeoan’s last lady-in-waiting, who sat like a statue on the sofa, her hands clasped before her. A silver tray bearing wine and a loaf of black bread and soft cheese had been dropped on the floor beside her, and the thick red liquor puddled like blood at her feet.

  While Sakra ran to the inner treasure room, Ananda strode to the waiting lady.

  “Where is your mistress?” she demanded.

  The lady just turned her head and gave Ananda a look of such contempt, it could have curdled cream.

  “Your empress speaks to you!” shouted one of the house guard.

  The lady just pressed her mouth into a thin, tight line and shook her head. The guard raised his gloved fist, ready to swing it down, but Ananda threw up her own hand to stop him.

  “Stand away,” she said. “The lady serves her mistress. She will not be punished for it.”

  The soldier bowed, and retreated, but only one step.

  “This too is my fault,” said Chadek dully. “Mistress Imperial — ”

  “No,” said Ananda firmly. “We spoke of this already, Captain. No one is to be punished for any failings tonight. We must find out what has happened and address that.”

  Bridget looked across to Sakra, who was standing in the threshold, his arms dangling at his side.

  “Agnidh?” said Ananda, hurrying to him a bare inch ahead of Bridget.

  The beautiful clockwork model of copper, bronze and gems had been smashed. Its filigree was twisted and torn. The gems lay scattered about the floor like marbles, and the works … Bridget felt a stab of regret at the sight of all that delicate instrumentation so bent and battered. A staff bound with silver lying on the floor beside the table spoke as to how this destruction had been accomplished.

  “This was the Portrait of Worlds.” Sakra gestured toward the broken clockwork. “I had only heard of it. It was a magnificent work …” His voice trailed off. “I thought when I took the keys … I thought her too weak …” His fist closed around the words. Then, a thought struck him and his cheeks paled.

  Bridget already knew the reason for it, as the same thought filled her own mind. “The Firebird.”

  Ananda backed away as they both fell to their knees, scrabbling underneath the rug for the stone that concealed the trapdoor. Bridget threw the door open, and Sakra leaned so far down the ladder, she feared for a moment he might topple down. But no, he pulled himself up, and his face had turned ashen.

  “Gone,” he said. “I feel no trace of heat. It is most surely gone as well.”

  Bridget, remembering the burning fields and the dead hearths she had seen, covered her mouth with both hands. Medeoan had taken the Firebird. Kalami had vanished. Where in the wide world could be safe from such a trinity as that?

  To Bridget’s surprise, the empress let out a soft laugh. “And I thought when Mikkel was free there would be a respite from all such scheming,” she said. She looked as if she wanted nothing more than to go off and be quietly sick, and Bridget could not blame her. But her hesitation did not last.

  “I cannot stay long from Mikkel,” she said, her voice growing stronger. “He is better by the moment, but he is tired, and we must accept the oaths of fealty from so many …” She turned to Sakra. “Find them. Take whatever you need, do whatever you must, but find them. Mistress Bridget will do all she can to help.”

  “Of course.” Bridget reverenced alongside Sakra, who had already given his bow.

  “Take me back, Captain,” said Ananda, sweeping from the little room as if she could not wait to leave it behind. “Let us leave the sorcerers to do their work.”

  The guard and their captain formed up behind her, and Bridget vaguely heard Chadek giving orders for the lady-in-waiting to be taken to the Great Hall. Her attention, however, was on the glittering treasure that surrounded them, and the ruin in its midst.

  “What happened here?” asked Bridget, turning in place. “What did she want?”

  Sakra was not listening. He was staring at the one uncovered mirror in the room. It was as tall as Bridget, and might have been made of polished silver. “A weaving would take too long …” he said, incongruously, but he let the end of that sentence trail away as if another thought struck him. Whatever it was, he did not take a moment to voice it. Instead, he dove toward the ruin he called the Portrait of Worlds, digging through the twisted springs and loose gears, flinging them aside to clatter and clang against the floor.

  “Where is it?” he demanded. “Where is it?”

  “What is what?” shot back Bridget.

  “Here!”

  Sakra straightened and whirled toward her, an artifact of gleaming bronze clutched in his hand. It was an eagle, Bridget saw as he hastened to her side. The same spread-winged bird she had seen in so many different motifs since she had come here.

  Without asking permission or any of his other usual courtesies, Sakra pushed the tiny eagle into her hand, and turned her toward the looking glass. “The mirror saw what happened here, Bridget. So might you.”

  For once, Bridget did not protest her lack of ability. She would try. She must, or her prediction might come true. The whole world might burn if the Firebird were not found.

  She closed her hand around the eagle, feeling its delicately carved feathers rough against her palm. She shut her right eye and with her left, stared as hard as she could into the polished silver. Sakra stood behind her, his hands grasping her shoulders. He began to chant, as he had over Richikha. But this one had a different cadence, it was more urgent, its tempo quicker, its command stronger.

  Show me, she ordered silently, letting out a long, slow breath to weave together with Sakra’s chant. She had woven her need with air and breath before. She would do it now. Show me!

  She saw. She saw Medeoan pick up the silver staff and methodically smash the beautiful Portrait. She saw her, straight-backed and decisive, choose her tools and bundle them up. She opened the trapdoor and she descended to the Firebird, ready to take it away …

  Where? demanded Bridget. “Where!”

  She saw, whether with her body’s eyes or her mind’s eye, she did not know, but she saw a blanket of white, and the dark line of trees. She saw the brownstone tower.

  “NO!”

  Her scream broke the vision and there was nothing left but the silver mirror and Sakra to turn her around and shake her shoulders. “What? Bridget, what do you see?”

  But Bridget could not speak for fury. She hurled the bronze eagle against the wall so that it pinged and rattled off the delicate chests and clattered to the floor.

  “Tell me!” roared Sakra.

  “Sand Island,” said Bridget. “She’s gone to my home. She’s taken the Firebird to the lighthouse.”

  Shock at her words made Sakra step back. “Why would she do so?”

  “It doesn’t matter!” Bridget shouted across whatever he would add. “She’s taken that thing …” Images flickered through her mind, so fast they stole the strength from her legs and she staggered. “Oh, God almighty, Sakra, there are people on the island! They’re stranded there for the winter. They’ll die without their stoves. That bird, that thing, it can drink fire up. I saw it. It could burn down the tower. It could …”

  “I hear, Bridget,” said Sakra softly, raising his hands to her storm of words. “I attend your words and they are grave. We will find them before they can do any harm to your people. We will go, now, together.”

  “No,” croaked a st
ranger’s voice.

  Without thinking, Bridget snatched up the silver staff and ran out into the main apartment. On the arm of the sofa perched a withered brown man, his cape of black feathers trailing out to either side like wings.

  It was one of the dwarf-crows. Bridget swung the staff, seeking to smash its head.

  “No, Bridget!” Sakra grabbed the staff from her hands. “No!”

  Bridget lowered her shaking hands. The dwarf-crow did not move. It just blinked at her, as if mildly astonished at her method of greeting.

  “Oh,” she said softly, her stomach twisting with unwelcome memories. “I forgot. They’re yours.”

  “Not mine.” Sakra leaned the staff against a table. “I have only had dealings with them.” He stepped past her to the little man, who seemed perfectly comfortable on his precarious perch. Sakra bowed, his hands covering his face. “Sir,” he said.

  The dwarf-crow inclined his head once.

  That seemed to be all that courtesy required. Sakra stood up immediately and inquired, “How came you here? This place is protected.”

  Surely it was some faint draft that made the feathered cloak flutter so. “You owe me a promise,” the dwarf-crow said. “More than that, I saved your life, so you are doubly in my debt.”

  Saved it how? Bridget longed to ask, but she held her tongue. The dwarf-crow was not done. He blinked his too-round eyes at Sakra. “If you go into the Land of Death and Spirit, the Vixen will cut you down.”

  Why? Bridget bit her lip. What is happening?

  Sakra glanced toward the window, his face grave, but he only shook his head. “I thank you for your concern, but that is as it may be. I cannot leave the Firebird to Medeoan.”

  The little man cocked his head first one way, and then the other. “I fear you must.”

  “You cannot forbid.” Sakra’s voice took on a warning note.

  “Oh,” said the dwarf. “But I can, and that by the same right which allows me to enter these walls.” He swept arm and cloak back. “Until the debt is discharged, you are my servant, and I forbid you to go.”

  Unable to keep her peace any longer, Bridget made herself step forward to stand even with Sakra. “What is going on?”

  Sakra did not answer. The dwarf-crow grinned, and to her shock, Bridget saw he had no teeth in his pink gums.

  “Your sorcerer shed the blood of the Vixen’s children,” the dwarf-crow said. “She will have her vengeance. The Land of Death and Spirit is her home. There is no treaty concerning roads there. If she catches him within its confines, she will kill him. It is that simple.” He brought his hands together in front of him.

  The blood of the Vixen’s children … the men in the fox’s den, with the gashes in their sides, so badly infected … “But they lived!” cried Bridget. “I healed them!”

  “You!” Sakra exclaimed. “How …”

  “It does not matter that they lived.” The dwarf-crow pulled his neck deep into his cloak. “Nor how it was accomplished. It matters only that they were sore hurt, and that it was his hand that caused that hurt.”

  Bridget opened her mouth to protest further, but Sakra waved at her to remain silent. Bridget shut her mouth like a box lid. This was ridiculous. Insane. How could any of this matter?

  But it did. Sakra was shaken, his cheeks and voice both hollow as he spoke. “Sir, I beg of you.”

  The dwarf-crow shook his head. “No.”

  “Why are you doing this?” The words came out more plea than question.

  The dwarf-crow cocked his head again, one quick, birdlike movement. “Perhaps it is because I can.” He shrugged, rattling the feathers of his cape. “Perhaps it is even because I like you, sorcerer.”

  “I cannot permit the lady to go alone.”

  “So do not. There is no need. They must come back for you. Let them come.”

  “No,” said Bridget. “I can’t wait. I don’t know what she’s doing there. It could be anything. I have … Some of my mother’s family is still on the island. I can’t just leave them.”

  “Name your price. Do not make me abandon her.”

  His face wrinkled with regret, but he only let out a single caw. “Not this time, sorcerer,” said the dwarf-crow. “You cannot escape the Vixen’s jaws. She will not be appeased, and I will not have you die before I’ve had my use of you.”

  “Sakra.” Bridget swallowed. “Is this true? Can he do this?”

  Sakra did not look at her. “He can, Bridget. I am sorry.”

  The burning fields, the cold hearths. The lights. All the lights, boarded up and abandoned for the winter, all alone beyond reach of any help if fire should come to them. The houses of Eastbay. The men, women and children sitting by their stoves.

  With all this ringing around her mind, Bridget stepped up to the dwarf-crow. “What price will buy Sakra’s contract with you?”

  “No, Bridget.” Sakra touched her arm. “You do not understand this.”

  She did not turn or hesitate. “What price?”

  The little man smiled his toothless smile at her. “The request does you credit, mistress.” He bobbed his head in approval. “But I do not choose to sell. Not now. Perhaps later.”

  Thick silence filled the room. Even the brazier’s flames seemed to sink under the weight of it. Bridget steeled herself and drew in a deep breath. “Then we will have to settle this when I return.”

  “Bridget, do not do this.”

  “Sakra, stop.” Although it made her skin crawl, she turned from the dwarf-crow to face him. “Since Kalami came to me, I have been told and told again what I may and may not do. I’m done with it.” With each word, her conviction grew firmer within her. “If it was only a house they threatened, I would say let them winter there, and welcome. But they are at the light. If the light is broken … if the Firebird burns it down … there are shoals off Sand Island. Without the light, the ships won’t know the way to stay clear.” She bowed her head. “And even if it were just that, I might stay, but I cannot let her harm the people in Eastbay. Not if I can do anything at all to stop her.”

  His hand closed around hers. “This may be what she plans. It may be a trap.”

  Now it was Bridget’s turn to shrug. “Trap me here, trap me there, that’s all she and Kalami have planned since the beginning. I am not feeble, nor am I stupid.” She squared her shoulders, tipping up her chin to look at him directly. “I’ve seen the toll it takes for Kalami to work magic in my home. I know something of my own strength as well, now. If she has laid out a spell, she has weakened herself. I am not afraid of her spells, and I am not afraid of an old woman alone in the cold.” She turned her hand, so now it was she who held him. “Let me go. Your task is to find Kalami. Bring him back to face his punishment for what he has done.”

  Slowly, Sakra lifted his free hand to brush the air beside her cheek. “And what will I do if you fail?” he whispered.

  Bridget heard the tight undercurrent below the words, but she could not let it touch her. Not now. Not yet, even though it pulled with unexpected strength. “You’ll still be here for your empress,” she made herself say. “That’s your duty, isn’t it?”

  Solemnly, he nodded.

  “My duty is to keep the light. I owe it to …” She broke the sentence off, dismissing the needless words. “I am going back.” She could not stand to look at him anymore. Even facing the dwarf-crow was preferable to reading any more of what was written behind his eyes. “Unless sir has some objection to that?”

  The crow chuckled, a deep, throaty noise. “You are your own mistress. You may flap your wings and fly to the moon, for all of me.”

  Sakra let go of her hand. One measured step at a time, he crossed to stand directly in front of the dwarf-crow. “I would know the reason for this interference,” he said so softly, Bridget could scarcely hear.

  They stared at each other, the dark man and the dwarf-crow, for a long, unblinking moment. Then, all at once, the dwarf threw up his arms and jumped up. In the next instant, he was o
nly a crow, flapping its wings and cawing to the air, and in the next, he was gone.

  Bridget said nothing. There was nothing to be said. She was tired. Hunger gnawed at her. She had not eaten since the feast, and only a mouthful then. Doubts and old fear twisted inside her until she was sure she must be sick. None of that mattered in the least. She had to go home and she had to go at once.

  She looked into Sakra’s eyes once more, and saw there how well he understood all of this.

  “Let me help you go,” he said softly.

  “With all my heart,” Bridget answered. “I would hardly know where to begin.”

  Sakra’s smile was more sad than merry. “It will not be hard. We return you to the place of your birth. In some ways that is the most simple road to walk.”

  “And in others?” asked Bridget, feeling a tiny spark of levity.

  The smallest bit of amusement touched his eyes. “The laws of the human heart are far different from the laws of sorcery,” Sakra said. “And I understand them much less.”

  Together, they returned to the treasure room. “I wish we still had her keys,” Sakra murmured, gesturing to all the little chests. “Or had time to force the locks. There is no telling what talismans she hoards here. But …” He waved, dismissing his wish as so much air. “We need to find you here something that you also keep in your home, Bridget.”

  She almost laughed. “Nothing so easy.” Bridget crossed to the poor, ruined Portrait and from the wreckage plucked two brass gears and a length of copper wire. “My light is filled with such.”

  “Good, good.” Sakra nodded, his gaze already sweeping the room again. “Their making is a binding skill that ties your home and this place, and metal is one of the elements that exists in all the worlds.” He retrieved the staff Bridget had used to attack the dwarf-crow. “Stand before the mirror, and place your palm against it.”

  Bridget faced her reflection, one hand against the smooth, cool surface, and the other cupping the brass gears that felt so familiar to her touch. “And now?”

  “And now,” said Sakra, resting the butt of the staff against the floor, “we hope your power is as great as it seems. I can open the way, but you must hold yourself strong enough to walk it.”