“That’s not my only reason,” she said. “I must do what I think will help my country most. Kiran may be Alathia’s best hope, but he is not our only hope. Marten and I have other ideas on how to counter Ruslan, and Marten will need my help to set those plans in motion.”
Cara said, “It won’t help Alathia if you get mindburned. I still don’t see how you’ll avoid that.”
Lena said, “Once through the border, Kiran must destroy my memory of this last day and leave me unconscious for the Watch to find. They will see the damage in my mind and the traces of blood magic, and assume Kiran forced me into helping him escape.”
That was disturbing on so many levels I didn’t even know where to start. To ask someone to fuck up your mind…Khalmet’s bloodsoaked hand! I felt like fire ants were crawling over me just thinking about it.
Cara said, “Afterward, you won’t know either, will you? You’ll think Kiran proved himself every bit a blood mage, and you’ll hate him for hurting you.”
“Perhaps,” Lena said. “Though again, Marten and I may suspect otherwise…but the Council will have no proof to condemn me.” She looked at me. “Kiran will live, and I will have given both you and Alathia the best chance I can. The sacrifice is one I’m willing to make.”
I wanted to protest Lena’s decision; if nothing else, because the thought of facing Ruslan when Kiran couldn’t cast to protect us was enough to turn my spine to ice. But I could see in Lena’s face that Cara and I could argue ’til the Whitefires crumbled to dust and it wouldn’t change her mind.
Lena said, “I’m going to Kiran now. Consider what supplies you will need; if he agrees, we leave soon.”
“How will you get us out of the camp?” There had to be at least thirty mages here. Hard to imagine we’d be able to steal enough supplies for three adults and two kids and tiptoe off into the woods without a single one of them noticing.
Another faint smile touched Lena’s mouth, though it didn’t warm her eyes. “I will not. Kiran will.”
* * *
I paced between cots in the darkened cabin, trying to walk quietly so I wouldn’t wake Janek. We’d left him sleeping; Melly, we’d woken, and told an abbreviated version of our plan. She’d only said dully, Good. I don’t want to stay here. They look at me like I’m some bug they’d rather squash. Now she sat slumped on her cot, staring at something only she could see. Cara leaned against the window, peering out at the dim magelights held by the guards around Kiran’s cabin.
“Any sign of Lena?” I asked. She’d been inside with Kiran for a good half hour now. I’d warned her he’d assume her offer of escape was a trick. She said if he balked at letting her into his head straight off, she would offer to prove her sincerity by first taking us to the border—but he had to let her give him his memories before she’d take us through.
“Not that I can see—wait.” Cara sucked in a breath. “Dev. Come look.”
I hurried to the window. The guards outside Kiran’s cabin had their hands raised, their rings glowing. One of them shouted something. Mages poured out of nearby cabins in response, Marten among them.
“Oh, shit.” The guards must’ve caught Lena out somehow. Khalmet’s hand, what would we do now? Melly had turned to watch us, her small body gone tight. I moved for the door, not sure what I meant to do, but certain I couldn’t just sit here and watch our plans fall to ruin.
Cara caught my shoulder. “Remember what Lena said.”
Lena had made us promise not to leave the cabin until we saw Kiran leave his, no matter what. “You really think this is part of her plan?”
“I don’t know, but I think you shouldn’t go charging out there.”
Reluctantly, I returned to the window. Melly slid up against my side to peer out. I gave her shoulders a reassuring squeeze, praying Cara’s faith in Lena was warranted.
Lena emerged from Kiran’s cabin. Marten stepped forward to meet her. My nerves settled a little at the calm assurance of her body language as they talked. After a moment, Marten called an order to the crowd of mages. Silent and purposeful, they formed a circle about Kiran’s cabin. Lena and Marten backed to join them.
The mages started singing. Silver light flickered over the wards around Kiran’s cabin door.
Abruptly, the song cut off. Magelights and rings alike went dark. Every mage in the circle collapsed to the ground, including Marten. Lena was the only one left standing.
I held my breath, waiting for cries of alarm, for magefire—but nothing happened. The camp stayed dark and silent.
The cabin door opened, and Kiran staggered out, weaving like a drunk. Lena caught him, helped him pick his way through the downed mages.
I said hastily to Melly, “Wake Janek. I need you to watch out for him in this, same as you did with the littlies in the den.”
She nodded, and I was glad to see a spark of resolution in her eyes. Helping Janek might help her fight despair. As boss Tainter in Red Dal’s den she had plenty of experience in cajoling younger kids through difficult situations.
I ran outside to meet Lena and Kiran. “How the hell did you pull that off?” I asked, pointing at the sprawled bodies.
Lena let Kiran slide to the ground. He was breathing through clenched teeth, pain in every line of his body. I didn’t think he’d seen those memories yet. What I could see of his face was merely wary, not stunned or anguished.
Lena said, “I told Marten that the guards and I had caught Kiran breaking a ward and we needed to recast them to a far stronger level. All the Watch is needed for such a casting, and we link minds to complete it. When we began casting, I let Kiran into my mind, and he used my link to pull soulfire from every mage here, enough to send them unconscious.”
She looked down at Kiran, who had curled in on himself, his hands pressed to his temples. “He needs another dose of the drug, right away. I’ll get the drug and the amulet, and then break the wards for you on our supply stores.”
I wanted to demand she bring the Taint charm along with the amulet. The Alathians had taken it from me at the border, back when I’d been too dizzy and nauseated from their translocation spell to put up much of a protest. I knew I couldn’t wear the charm for more than bare instants without serious damage, but I hated to give up a weapon…or the pure, delirious joy of feeling the Taint once more.
Then again, Ruslan had made the charm. If I took it back into Arkennland, would he know? I wouldn’t put it past him to have put some kind of find-me spell in the damn thing.
Well. If Kiran could give up blood magic, I could give up this. “How long before the mages wake?”
Kiran answered, his voice strained. “A few hours at most. We should hurry.”
Thank Khalmet, the Alathians were as meticulous about the organization of their stores as they were in everything else. They didn’t have ropes or mountain gear, but they had food, charms, blankets, and warm clothing, and that was enough. Cara and I shoved as much as we could into packs and rigged up a sling from a sliced-up carriage harness so we could carry Janek. His short legs would never keep our pace. Melly had him well in hand. As she moved about helping us pack, he stuck so close to her side you couldn’t have fit a piton between them.
By the time we finished, Kiran had recovered enough to help us too. Lena had given him the amulet already; I could see the lump of it beneath his shirt. When we started off into the darkness beneath the cinnabar pines, I flashed him a grin and said, “Just like old times. Nothing like a death march in the dark.”
He looked away, his shoulders hunching, and I sighed. Just like old times, indeed. It had been hard enough for us to trust each other then.
The forest was open, the only undergrowth between the pine trunks a mix of ferns and furry-leafed silverweed. Lena’s magelight made the night travel easy. I carried Janek in the sling, and Melly matched our pace without complaint. But she was silent, never once looking up from her feet, and I knew how deep her pain still ran.
Soon enough we heard the river. When the rush of the
water grew loud, Lena stopped next to a dead cinnabar pine. Moonlight filtered down through the gap in the canopy, bright enough the ferns cast soft shadows.
“The border is here.” She waved a hand at the air behind her. I couldn’t see anything different about it, but Kiran was squinting like a man staring into the sun.
Lena turned to him. “I’ve proved my good faith in taking you here. Before I take you across and give you a supply of the drug, you must fulfill the first part of our agreement.”
Kiran was still for so long I feared he would refuse. Yet in the end, he reached for the knife at his belt. She put her hand over his.
“I don’t need blood contact. Not if you release your barriers.” Lena glanced at us. “This will take a moment. Rest while you can.”
Janek was asleep in the carry-sling, his body warm against my back. I eased myself down into the ferns, my heart thudding. I knew one memory Marten would have been sure to pick, and I didn’t envy Kiran one bit for having to relive it.
* * *
(Kiran)
Lena took Kiran’s hands in hers. A gentle touch ghosted over his barriers like a soft knock against a door.
Every instinct in him screamed against lowering them. A panicked voice yammered within, insisting this could still be a ruse on the part of Martennan. They bound you, hurt you, and they will do it again…
But the border waited beyond, a deep, soundless thrum of magic he hadn’t the power to break on his own. Dev, Cara, and Melly watched him, silent and waiting. If Dev’s memories were true, he owed them the chance at freedom.
If Dev’s memories were true…the pain in his head was nothing to the pain in his heart. Ruslan, Lizaveta, Mikail…they were his family. To think they had hurt him so terribly, when he’d been so certain of their love…how could it be true? And Alisa, who’d supposedly been his lover and died at Ruslan’s hands…he’d seen his own grief and anger and guilt through Dev’s eyes, but it felt no more real than a scry-vision. Had he really fallen in love with a nathahlen despite all Ruslan’s warnings? He found it impossible to fathom. He remembered nothing of her, didn’t even know what she looked like.
Doubtless he was about to find out. Slowly, nervously, Kiran dropped his barriers. Lena slid into his mind, her cool, quiet presence reminding him of Mikail’s. She reached for the damaged web of his memories.
I can fill only a few of these voids for you…but I hope it is enough.
A shining set of memories rolled over him, bright and beautiful and full of joy. A slender Arkennlander girl, her amber eyes alive with curiosity, her smile dazzling in its radiance…Alisa. Laughing with him, sharing her favorite volumes of adventure tales, talking with wistful eagerness of the lands she hoped to explore; and all the while, he’d been so happy, so amazed by her eager intelligence, so captivated by the world seen through her eyes: a place where love did not have to coexist with cruelty, where every life held value. Later, he’d reveled in the softness of her lips, the gentle coaxing of her hands, her eyes dark with pleasure as they savored each others’ bodies in a sweet, stolen moment…
He wanted more, more, but he felt Lena’s regret. I am sorry, Kiran. I have only this last one.
A new memory welled up. He was standing before Ruslan’s workroom, the akhelashva ritual about to begin—
He knew what this memory would be. In Dev’s mind, he’d seen himself standing amid the charred remains of Simon’s spellwork, white-faced and stricken, shouting at Ruslan: You stole not only her life from her, but her pain, her tears, her blood…
He tried to recoil, to tear free. No, he begged Lena. I don’t want to see this. I don’t want to know this—
But her magic bore down on him, and he was too weak to stop her. The memory swallowed him, horrible and inexorable. Alisa, screaming agonized pleas he was helpless to answer, rage and horror beating behind his eyes as Ruslan mutilated her flesh—
He wrenched free of Lena and stumbled aside, gagging. Tears were wet on his face, his mind a black, confused whirl of images. Ruslan, cutting out Alisa’s eye—his own knife stabbing deep into Stevannes’s heart—
Kiran fell to his knees, shuddering. He wanted desperately to deny the memory of Alisa’s death, to believe it was false, some Alathian trick…but he couldn’t. He’d sensed not one false note in the thoughts of his past self. That was him. He’d watched her die…and then he’d forgotten her, let Ruslan seduce him into betraying everything she believed in. Even now, his soul hungered to cast again, to taste once more that delirious, unleashed flood of magic…he covered his face, a hoarse, anguished cry escaping him.
“Kiran.” Lena laid gentle hands on his back. “It’s in the past. You cannot change it. But you can change yourself.”
Deep in his mind, a soft, insistent voice whispered, Remember. Something rose from the depths, pushing toward his consciousness—
No. With force born of terror and instinct, he shoved it back. He wanted no more revelations, no more horrors. He shook off Lena’s hands and staggered to his feet. “You want me to forswear blood magic, yet you want me to burn out your memory. To…to hurt you, as Ruslan did me. How can you ask it of me, after this?”
Dev, Cara, and the children were watching him with wide, worried eyes. Lena said, “I do not ask it lightly. I’m sorry, Kiran. But come…spark your amulet, and I’ll take you through the border.”
He drew out the jeweled disc on its chain. The pattern within was intact, ready to be kindled and fueled with his own ikilhia. He sent a burst of power into the charm. It flared blue, spitting sparks, reacting against the magic of the border wards. He’d have to move away quickly once on the border’s far side, lest the pattern be damaged to the point of failure.
Thinking of practicalities, he could block out the morass of confusion and pain that threatened to swallow him. One step at a time; he dared not think beyond that.
Lena took Kiran’s hands again. Her magic washed over him, shrouding him in a shimmering wash of green. She backed, drawing him with her. The immense wall of power parted around them without even a flicker as she led him through. He hastily retreated from the border until the amulet cooled against his skin, its energies flowing smoothly again.
Lena brought the others to him, one by one. Dev said to Cara, “Take the kids and start; I’ll follow with Kiran when we’re done here.”
He must not want Melly and Janek to watch Kiran hurt Lena. Just imagining it made Kiran cringe.
Lena handed him a warded silver flask and a folded piece of paper. “Here is all we had of the drug at the camp. Swallow one capful a day, and it should be enough to last you six weeks if you stay clear of confluences and spellcasting. I fear only Marten knows the drug’s exact formulation, but I wrote down what information I could. I suggest you go to Prosul Akheba—the scholars there know enough of herbal and healing lore they may be able to safely wean you from the drug.”
Prosul Akheba was just over the Varkevian border, in the red-rock desert beyond the southern end of the Whitefires. To travel so far south would eat up a frighteningly large chunk of time, but Kiran knew he had little choice. Six weeks’ supply of the drug wasn’t enough to ensure success against Ruslan.
Kiran still couldn’t believe he hadn’t realized something was wrong in Ninavel. The sickness he’d felt after spellcasting, that had gotten worse with time instead of better—but he’d been so focused on his struggle to accept blood magic that he’d never thought to look for a physical cause for his discomfort.
He felt sick now, but it wasn’t from the drug. Cara and the children had gone. Lena’s face was calm, but he could see her ikilhia flickering. She was afraid.
“Don’t,” he said. “Don’t ask this of me. Come with us.”
Dev nodded. “It’s not too late. We’ve enough supplies we could manage with you along.”
Lena said, “No. This is my choice.” She put her hands on Kiran’s shoulders. “Not all gifts are pleasant, but this is a gift you give me, nonetheless.” She leaned close and kissed
his mouth before he could react, her lips butterfly-soft. “Twin gods preserve you, Kiran. I hope you find peace.”
Kiran didn’t think he’d ever find peace again, but he nodded tightly.
She released her defenses, leaving her mind wide open. Do it.
The echo of Stevannes’s words stabbed him to the quick. Yet while he could feel Lena’s fear, he also felt her determination, hard as spelled iron. He eased into her mind, cautious, reluctant. She did not flinch. He sought her memories, found them unguarded.
She’d asked him to destroy everything since they’d translocated from the cirque. He slid backward through her memory, searching for the translocation—and found a memory of Marten, sitting on a cot with his face buried in his hands, utter defeat in the slump of his shoulders.
I succeeded in our mission, Lena. Yet in every other way, I have failed. Alathia is in far worse danger now…and Niskenntal is right. If I had said nothing in the cirque and let Kiran die, Ruslan might never have realized the reason, and Alathia would remain safe. But I couldn’t bear to let Kiran die, not when I was the one to cast him into darkness. I thought I could save him, as I couldn’t save Reshannis…but now my oaths bind me, just as they did then, and I must watch Kiran’s soulfire burn to ash.
Lena had said, You chose rightly in the cirque. If we build our country’s safety on the blood of sacrifices, how are we any different than mages like Ruslan?
Marten had given a pained laugh. I think we are not. Stevan’s blood is already spilled…he would curse me for my choice, and I’m not sure he is wrong. But it is Talmaddis that I see when I close my eyes…he tells me that if only I hadn’t been so blind, I could have turned him from his path in time to save them all. Talmaddis…How is it that I hate him for his deceit, and yet I miss him more than my own breath?
Lena had said nothing, only wrapped her arms around Marten, her heart full of regret and concern and a deep, abiding friendship. He had returned her grip, desperate as if he clutched a lifeline. I only thank the gods you survived, Lena. If I had lost you with all the others, I don’t think I could bear it. Though if you choose to leave my Watch for another…I will understand. I think it better if you do…Niskenntal intends to destroy me over this, and I don’t want to see you burned in the spillover.
The Tainted City Page 53
