by Cindy Dees
“Vesper is the scion of Ammertus. She is only one generation removed from the kind of power Maximillian wields. Given how devastated Ammertus was by her destruction, we can assume that he must have imbued her with a lot of his power. Her death was extremely costly to him.”
“Still, she’s only a child of a Kothite,” Rosana insisted.
Rynn snorted. “Endellian’s only a child of Kothites. And she’s arguably the most vicious, dangerous one of them all at court.”
Will neither knew nor cared much about the goings-on at the Imperial Seat. It was a world away from him and his life, and he planned to keep it that way.
Eben said fervently, “If Endellian’s more powerful than Vesper, then I do not ever want to cross her path. I saw Vesper possess three people on this plane last night.”
Rynn jolted. “How?”
“She got ahold of physical items belonging to them and created three exact phantasmal duplicates. Her phantasms were going to possess the people when they fell asleep, or something like that. I didn’t understand the details, but she was definitely going to control them.”
“To what end?” Raina asked.
“She told them to seek out any items that once belonged to an ancient king of these lands.”
The group collectively gulped. Great. As if it wasn’t bad enough having Anton Constantine sending kidnappers and assassins after them, and Imperial hunters, Mages of Alchizzadon, and the Coil, now a powerful child Kothite was working against them.
Will said sourly, “Remind me again why it’s so important that we risk our lives to complete this impossible quest?”
Of all people, it was Sha’Li who answered. “In the first place, impossible it is not. In the second place, many more people than we can see or know are depending on us. Common people. Simple people. Innocent people who cannot do this thing for themselves. We attempt the quest on their behalf.”
“But why? What for?”
Sha’Li answered forcefully, “For freedom, Will Cobb. For hope. For restoring balance to nature. Think you the tree lord within you actually belongs inside you? Restored to his native home, he should be. Returned to a tree. The one we seek can make that happen.”
He’d grown so accustomed to Bloodroot’s alien, uncomfortable energy inside him, he had a hard time imagining life without the tree lord inside his head, draining life from his body.
Sha’Li continued, “We attempt the quest because it is the right thing to do. We are among a precious few with the courage and skill to stand up to evil among us. I speak not of laws but of justice. Of indignities against those who have done nothing to deserve them. Of prejudice and hate and small-mindedness. We dare to think bigger. We dare to think of a king worthy of his subjects. Of a world where dignity for all living beings is not a privilege but a right.”
Will blinked, shocked. That was quite a speech for the taciturn lizardman girl. “I had no idea such passion burned within you,” he murmured.
“I speak not of it often, but I agree with Kerryl Moonrunner. The world we live in is not right, and something must be done to fix it.”
A powerful response stirred deep in Will’s belly. Whether it was his own noble fervor or Bloodroot’s, he could not tell. At this point, he wasn’t sure it much mattered. They had become one in more ways than he cared to contemplate. How was he ever going to let go of the tree lord’s spirit when the time came? It would be like ripping out a piece of his own heart.
And this was why he needed to wake the Sleeping King. If anyone could safely and successfully disentangle his spirit from Bloodroot’s, Gawaine could. As he was the greatest nature guardian of all time and the son of the Green Lady herself, no one else would have the knowledge, power, or skill to remove Bloodroot without destroying Will completely.
And he did want the treant removed eventually. Right? He still wanted a normal life. With Rosana. Settling down. Living out a quiet existence. Right?
Why, then, could he not conjure even the vaguest picture of a life lived thus that included him in the picture? Was he already becoming the vessel, totally controlled by his host, that Aurelius warned him about? Was he too far gone to Bloodroot?
CHAPTER
13
They spent two days at the kindari camp. On the third morning, Will, Eben, Rynn, and Sha’Li went out on a hunting expedition with a number of the Hanged Men and kindari while Raina stayed behind. Bored half to death, she turned to watch an elf nimbly free climb one of the great trees leading up to the village, eschewing the rope ladders entirely.
The fellow hopped over a railing not far from her, and Raina did a double take.
“Cicero?” she murmured in disbelief.
She flung herself forward to embrace the elf who had helped her escape Tyrel and then kept her alive in those early days after she’d fled her home. He’d been her stalwart protector and a true friend.
Cicero suffered her enthusiastic hug stoically, eventually muttering dryly, “If I say I’m glad to see you, too, will you let me go?”
Laughing, she took a step back from him.
“Please tell me you are not out here all by yourself in the middle of the Sorrow Wold.”
“I’m not. Will, Rosana, Eben, and Sha’Li are here, along with our new friend, Rynn. You will like him. His sense of humor is nearly as dry as yours.”
“I have no idea what you’re speaking about.”
“Ah, Cicero. I have missed you dearly. What brings you here?”
“I received a message from Moto that you were in the wold. And knowing you, it won’t be two minutes until you’re in some terrible trouble and in dire need of a rescue.”
“Have you so little faith in me?” she exclaimed.
“Nay. I merely know you.”
They traded grins. He was not wrong about her.
She followed him across one of the precarious-looking rope bridges to the common hut, where Cicero took a long drink from a bucket of cool water and grabbed a handful of dried berries, nuts, and jerky from the communal bowl. They sat down beside the great, circular hearth and stretched their feet to the fire.
“Why are you out here, Raina?” Cicero asked plainly of her.
“I am supposed to meet a guide who will take me to visit the Mages of Alchizzadon.”
“The Mages of Alchizzadon you ran away from home to avoid and who did their best to kidnap you?”
“Yes. Those mages.”
“Are you mad?” he exclaimed in a rare display of emotion.
“Probably. They say they only want to talk with me. That they respect my colors and will let me leave whenever I want to go.”
“And you believe them?”
“Why wouldn’t I? The Royal Order of the Sun is very powerful.”
“Oh, really? So you have a couple of Heart knights tucked away somewhere in the village where I haven’t seen them yet?”
“No, I left my Royal Order of the Sun protectors back in Seastar.”
Cicero shook his head in undisguised disgust. “I swear, you have a death wish.”
“I’ve been told that before.”
“What is wrong with you? Why would you agree to go with these mages? They’re evil, Raina.”
“We don’t know that. Even if I disagree with their program of breeding powerful female mages, I still am the beneficiary of that. I can’t very well revile them for making me into the healer that I am.”
“They’re evil. I’m telling you,” he repeated stubbornly.
“And how do you know so much about them?” she challenged, a little frustrated with his insistence.
Cicero was silent for a minute and then muttered reluctantly, “I know someone who knows something about them.”
She pounced on that. “Really? Who? Can I talk with him or her?”
“I don’t know if she’d speak with you.”
“Please? Can you ask? If they’re evil like you say, the more I know about them before I go to them, the better off I’ll be.”
“You can’t meet
with them!”
“I gave my word.”
He rolled his eyes, clearly expressing his opinion of that. “She lives some distance away. Is the mage supposed to meet you here in this village?”
“He said merely to come to the Sorrow Wold and he would find me.”
Cicero grunted, sounding displeased. “If you’ve a few days before your guide is due, I can take you to her. Perhaps she can talk you out of this madness.”
“Who is this friend of yours?” she asked curiously.
“She is no friend of mine!” Cicero replied sharply. “I merely said I know her. Not that I like her.”
“Do you trust her?”
“Not particularly, but I do not believe she would harm you. At least not after she finds out how much you two have in common.”
“What do you mean?”
Cicero merely scowled. “How soon can you leave to go meet her?”
“As soon as the others get back from hunting, we could be on our way, I suppose.”
Cicero sighed. “The sooner the better. It’s not wise to move in the wold at night. If we want to reach the next village before dark, we’ll have to leave soon.”
Fortunately, the hunting party came back within the hour, and her friends were willing to explore the wold further.
As they descended the great rope ladders to the dank, dark forest floor, Raina immediately began to regret agreeing to go with Cicero to meet this woman with information about the Mages of Alchizzadon. The sad, angry spirit pervading the wold weighed on her, so heavily that by suppertime she felt nearly unable to walk.
They spent the night in a kindari village nestled under a copse of massive pine trees and surrounded by a crude palisade. The sounds were awful as Raina huddled in her bedroll, wondering if the flimsy fence was enough to keep the creatures making the hisses, clicks, howls, and screams at bay.
It was a long night.
The next morning saw them traveling into deeper, darker, wetter, more dismal forest than they’d experienced so far. Even Cicero seemed jumpy as they made their slow, miserable way through the gloom.
“There it is,” Cicero announced at around noon, if Raina had to guess. A cold rain dripped through the forest, impeding visibility.
She had to gasp at the beauty of the sight that met her as they reached the edge of a large clearing. But then her gasp turned to dismay as she realized what she was looking at.
A gigantic spiderweb stretched at waist height across the clearing, rising in the center to go over a low structure. Every gossamer strand of the massive web dripped with glistening droplets of water. It looked as if thousands of diamonds had been arranged in an intricate and delicate mosaic. They cast beautiful rainbows of color, painting the mosaic in brilliant, breathtaking hues.
A circular cottage squatted under the center of the web, its black sides coated in bright green moss and slime. It might have been a pleasant, even cheerful dwelling in another location with a fresh layer of whitewash. But here, it was nothing short of menacing. Was this the fabled dream spider’s web?
Will asked low, “Who lives there, and is she a threat?”
Cicero retorted, “The Black Widow lives there, and she could kill us all without hardly lifting a hand. So be polite and don’t stare at her.” He picked up a stout stick and took a swing at the nearest strand of web silk. Bell-like sounds sparkled across the web as raindrops flew in all directions. Silently, ponderously, a great pole rose out of the center of the cottage, lifting the web up, a deadly parody of a children’s maypole.
“Don’t touch it,” Cicero cautioned as he ducked under the low edge and made his way to the center of the tentlike space now beneath the web.
Gulping nervously, Raina did the same and followed him toward the dome. It did not help her trepidation that Cicero looked as apprehensive as she’d ever seen him—and she’d seen him proceed calmly into some pretty dangerous situations.
“Weapons out?” Will murmured under his breath.
“No!” Cicero said sharply. “The widow is guarded by a cadre of spider changeling fighters you do not want to tangle with. They all cast poisons that will kill you where you stand, not to mention they’re big, strong, and fast.”
“Thanks be to thee for the kind words about my companions,” a raspy voice said from a deep shadow in the side of the cottage that turned out to be some sort of doorway.
Raina about jumped out of her skin. She’d heard no door open and seen no movement. An apparition glided into view, making an odd scuttling sound on the wooden boards of a porch that circled the dome. The Black Widow was a humpbacked humanoid draped in a wispy black cloak with a heavy black lace mantilla covering her head and partially concealing her face. But then she turned, and Raina had to bite back a gasp. The widow’s skin was leathery and gray, and long fangs protruded from each side of her mouth. Her eyes were big and black and round, too widely set for a human face. Her forehead was too far back, her jaw too far forward, and the overall combination of arachnid and human was hideous.
“Who have you lured into my lair, Cicero?” the widow asked in a distinctly threatening tone.
“I have brought a young woman to see you, my lady. A daughter of Tyrel.”
A sharp hiss of indrawn breath made Raina flinch.
The lace-covered head swung left and right as if examining every member of their party, but the widow’s head didn’t seem jointed to her body in an entirely human fashion.
Rosana edged closer to Will, and every scale on Sha’Li’s body was standing up. Even Rynn was poised on his toes as if ready to leap into battle, or mayhap flee for his life. No wonder Cicero disliked this creature. She was the nightmare that lay beyond creepy.
“I would invite you to step into my parlor, but we would not want to be cliché, would we?” the Black Widow rasped.
Had that been humor? Did a human heart beat inside that monstrous, arachnid form? Raina took a hesitant step forward. This meeting had been her idea, after all.
“Greetings, madam. My name is Raina. I belong to the White Heart.”
“Charlotte’s girl. You’re the mirror image of her at that age.”
“You know my mother?”
“Of course I know my own great-niece.”
Great-niece? Shock made Raina’s mind go blank. This … thing … claimed kinship to her?
“I … I’m sorry, I’m afraid I don’t … How are we…” Her voice trailed off. She had no idea how to ask this spider changeling why she called Charlotte of Tyrel her great-niece. Raina knew the family history backward and forward, and never, ever, had there been any mention of a spider changeling anywhere on the family tree.
The widow chuckled, a sandpaper-rough sound that did nothing to inspire confidence across Raina’s cringing flesh. “I did not always look like this. In my day, I was considered a great beauty, like your mother.”
Raina frowned. Then how …
“I gather you’re a second daughter of Tyrel since you are not walking to your death in the Arianna Plains. You’re about the right age to be sent on the death march.”
Raina frowned. “The Ariannas in my family leave to see the world and enjoy their freedom. They do not die.”
The widow leaned forward, jabbing Raina angrily in the shoulder with a gloved finger. “They die, child. The Mages of Alchizzadon lie in wait for them and kill them. That is if the other Ariannas do not find her first and whisk her away to safe haven, hidden from those monsters.”
“The mages kill them?”
The Black Widow shrugged. “They tried to kill me, but my beloved husband came across me fighting for my life against the mages and intervened to save me.” Distant memory clouded the widow’s expression for a moment, but then she shook it off, adding lightly, “My husband ate them all. It was most satisfying.”
Raina had no idea what to say to that. At length, she circled back to the woman’s previous statement. “What do you mean, the other Ariannas?”
“There is a daughter named Arianna
in every generation, is there not?”
Raina nodded.
“That’s one every eighteen to twenty years. Where do you think they all go? Why do not some of them come back home to Tyrel to be with their family? They’re young, vital women when they leave, gifted mages all. What happens to them? Have you not secretly wondered when you lay in bed late at night all alone?”
“Of course I’ve wondered, but I assumed they found new places, started families…”
“Oh, the ones who live do. We’ve even formed a little enclave of our own—Ariannas and our descendants. As far as I know, at least three generations of Ariannas before you yet live, child.”
Raina stared, stunned. “Why was I not told? Why could I not visit them?”
“The Mages of Alchizzadon would kill them all if they knew where to find them.”
“But why? The Ariannas served them faithfully!”
“It’s all about power, girl. Magic.”
The word vibrated through Raina’s brain like a dark prophecy. It always came down to her magic and who wanted to control it. Leland and Aurelius might have had noble reasons for manipulating her, but even they’d gently forced her into the White Heart and into the quest to wake Gawaine. Because of her magic.
The widow was speaking again. “The Mages of Alchizzadon have figured out how to take magic from people permanently and store it. Now they just have to figure out how to give it to their precious king and wake him.”
Raina was half tempted to let the mages have her cursed magic. Her life would be so much simpler without it. But that was the point, wasn’t it? Her magic allowed her to pursue goals that were not simple. That were important. That made a difference.
“Come, all of you. Sit. Tarant! Bring out a brace of chairs for our guests!” the widow called.
A burly spider changeling covered in bristly brown hair about the length of Raina’s palm carried out four chairs, one in each arm. He went back inside and returned with four more. Eyeing him with abundant caution, Raina took a seat next to the widow, where their hostess indicated.
“Cicero says you know a fair bit about the Mages of Alchizzadon, madam,” Raina said politely. “I would love to hear anything more you can tell me about them. They wish to meet with me, and Cicero is concerned that they will do me harm.”
