by Barb Hendee
Leesil felt completely at a loss.
End what? There was nothing here but that hiss, whatever it was. From what he’d once seen when the first orb was opened, opening all of them wouldn’t touch anything that wasn’t physically here, alive or dead. And the orbs were supposed to be a last resort.
And no one knew for certain what the orbs would do.
—My child . . . where is she? What have you . . . they . . . done with her?—
Leesil went cold.
He knew “child” meant Magiere. This thing—whatever and wherever—might be what had spoken in her dreams, and if so, had it lost touch with her? What had happened to Magiere?
—Then you will serve me a last time—
“Ignore it!” Ghassan ordered. “Get the orbs, quickly, and take off your thôrhks for use.”
Leesil looked around, wondering to whom that voice was actually speaking. Was it to him, someone else here, or all of them?
“Why do you hesitate?” Ghassan whispered, rushing two steps toward Leesil. “This is why we came here.”
“What is happening?” Chane rasped, making everyone start.
Leesil twisted about and startled Chane in turn. The vampire watched only Ghassan.
—Open the anchors . . . end this now . . . and forever—
“Do you not hear it?” Ore-Locks whispered.
In one glance at the dwarf, Chane’s eyes drained of all color, becoming clear in the light of Ghassan’s crystal. Chane turned to Leesil.
“Do not listen to what you think you hear!” he rasped.
Leesil’s every instinct took hold of Chane’s warning.
• • •
Whirling in search of the archer, Chap spotted Osha. The young one stood not far off, haloed by Wynn’s distant light. And that light glinted too brightly on the head of another drawn arrow.
Osha’s large amber eyes streamed tears down his long face.
He had shot Magiere, most likely with a white metal arrowhead from the Chein’âs. Chap could not even guess what that had done to her. Osha’s eyes then blinked. Did his aim falter at something else?
Chap quickly looked back.
Sau’ilahk had recovered from shock, and he slammed his hands to the earth again.
Twisting around, Chap shouted into Osha’s thoughts.
—No!— . . . —Shoot Sau’ilahk, the duke!—
Osha’s aim shifted instantly, and the arrow released. Chap heard the shriek before he could follow the arrow’s path.
Sau’ilahk reeled back on his knees, mouth gaping. An arrow still shuddered from impact in the center of his chest, and he began to shake. Inky lines spread up into his face from beneath a strapped leather collar and then down into his hands as well. Those lines split and bled as smoke rose from the same cracks. He fell back upon the broken earth.
Sau’ilahk’s wild thrashing was quickly obscured by the increasing smoke, though his wails and screeches still rose in the night.
Chap bolted for Magiere, lying still and prone, and he lunged past her, planting himself between her and the wild thrashing amid the smoke. Uncertain of anything, he watched the broken ground for whatever might still come out of the earth from the conjurer’s touch.
One shriek cut off too suddenly. Not another sound or movement disturbed the billowing smoke.
Chap remained rigid in waiting and watching, even when he heard Osha come running. As the smoke began to thin, he saw something more. The body was still, dead, and the skin was blackened. Chap began to wonder if something more than just Chein’âs metal was at work here. But nothing came out of the earth where Sau’ilahk had crouched a moment ago.
Doubtful relief kept him watching longer. Osha stepped beyond him toward the duke’s finally fallen and charred body, at last the corpse that it should have been. Then the young one turned, looking back beyond Chap.
Osha cringed, back-stepped once in visible anguish, and dropped his bow.
No matter what Chap felt, no matter what he wanted, he had no time for Magiere. She would not be the only one to die if he did not reach Leesil, and there was only one way to accomplish that.
Chap snarled at Osha with a snap of teeth and a short lunge.
—Where is Chuillyon . . . where did you part from him?—
Osha back-stepped, looking down.
—Answer!—
“With . . . Wynn . . . and Wayfarer and Shade,” Osha panted out, pointing toward the light.
Chap could not help glancing at Magiere, lying still and black marked. He gave Osha a final command before bolting toward Wynn’s light.
—Pick her up and follow—
• • •
Osha went numb as Chap raced off.
Remaining in place, Osha cringed at the thought of what the elder majay-hì had demanded. He could not bear to look upon Magiere’s remains—upon what he had done.
Slowly, Osha crept toward Magiere’s body but only looked to her nearest hand. There was no smoke rising from it. He did see the lines in her flesh, as if every vein beneath her pale skin had blackened and swelled. But the skin had not split, bled, or charred as with Sau’ilahk’s stolen flesh.
Then Osha’s gaze worked upward, first to the hauberk’s shredded skirt, then to the sword belt nearly severed, upward to the torso, and finally to where that arrow was still embedded in her shoulder.
Osha choked once and stumbled, doubting what he saw. He dropped beside her, putting an ear near her mouth—and heard a shallow breath.
Quickly straightening, again he hesitated, not knowing if he should jerk out the arrow. That might worsen any bleeding and end what little life to which she clung. Rising to his feet, he cast around.
Most of the nearby fighting had scattered, as even the living members of the horde had fled when the nearest undead had run from the light and tore at anything in their way. Fighting was still intense farther south, and he saw one rider among others harrying everything within reach.
Osha put fingers to his mouth and whistled over and over as loudly as he could.
Finally, that one rider clear of the others wheeled its mount his way. At a distance, he could not tell who it was, even as it charged toward him.
Dropping to one knee, he pulled a knife from a sheath at his back and set its edge low against the arrow’s shaft. Using the blade, he snapped the shaft some three finger widths above Magiere’s armor. He then slung his bow and reached down to grip Magiere beneath her shoulders.
He had barely lifted her to sitting in a slump when a horse’s hooves thundered up beside him, and he looked up into the severe eyes of Commander Althahk. The commander of the Shé’ith appeared little better than Magiere, blood marred, torn, and ragged, with his sword’s blade obscured in black and red smears.
“You abandoned your squad!” Althahk shouted at him.
Osha ignored this and pointed down at Magiere. “I must take her north to the light while she still lives. The majay-hì demands it!”
The commander barely noticed the black-haired woman leaning unconscious against Osha’s right leg. A puzzled, confused scowl turned to outright fury.
“We have dead and injured scattered everywhere,” Althahk snarled. “And more if we do not stop it . . . and you deserted!”
Osha realized there was nothing he could say that would accomplish what he needed. Then his frantic, wandering eyes fixed on Althahk’s mount. Froth-covered and stained in sweat and blood, En’wi’rên snorted over and over, watching him.
The Shé’ith did not see their horses as mere mounts but as their allies, their battle mates. Could she possibly understand what the commander would not?
He had never learned enough about her kind, but he had no other recourse.
“Please,” he begged. “I must do this . . . as the majay-hì commanded.”
That did not even make
sense to him. How could anyone—even she—understand what he asked? Or understand how different Chap was from even his own Fay-born kind?
En’wi’rên whinnied—and then bucked and twisted violently.
Althahk’s eyes snapped wide. He dropped his sword to grab for the saddle’s front edge.
Osha almost backed away, but he would not leave Magiere undefended as the horse pranced wildly. The commander’s furious shouts were impossible to follow in his strange dialect. En’wi’rên did not relent until . . .
“Bithâ!” Althahk shouted, over and over.
En’wi’rên settled. With a final thrash of her head and a sharp snort, she looked to Osha, and he stared back in disbelief.
“Very well,” Althahk snapped. “Osha, get the woman up and over, behind the saddle.”
Osha quickly put his hands beneath Magiere’s arms. As he lifted her up, he could not help a last glance at En’wi’rên. It was a struggle to get Magiere draped over the horse’s haunches, even with the commander’s help, but as Althahk reached behind himself to grip hold of her belt, Osha stepped back, at a loss.
There was no space for him to mount as well.
“Grab the stirrup’s strap!” Althahk ordered. “And run with her!”
Osha took hold, and En’wi’rên lunged.
• • •
Chap’s claws scratched hard ground as he ran for Wynn’s light. The closer he came, the more he squinted, until he finally could not look at it at all. He heard other paws coming toward him, but when he glanced ahead, he almost blinded himself again.
The sun crystal had never been that brilliant before.
Those other paws grew closer.
Shade caught up on Chap’s right side, and he conveyed a message to her with as few words as possible.
—Osha . . . Magiere . . . behind . . . bring—
Without answering, Shade veered off, and he ran onward.
Something broke the light’s glare, and Chap looked ahead. A tall figure in a long dark robe stood too close to the sun crystal to be an undead.
Chap slowed, panting as he approached.
Even with his hood pulled forward, Chuillyon had to squint amid the bright light as he looked down at Chap in stunned silence. Somewhere beyond the tall elf was Wynn with her staff and Wayfarer as well. Chap could not help wondering again how the staff’s crystal had been made so brilliant this time.
Chuillyon crouched down, cocking his head slightly.
—We . . . must go to . . . Leesil—
Chuillyon’s eyes widened at that demand, hearing the words in his head. In puzzlement, he looked up beyond Chap, perhaps to the mountain.
—Where . . . did you . . . hide . . . the sprout?— . . . —We must . . . take . . . Wynn . . . and go there . . . now—
“Does Leesil still carry his branch?” Chuillyon asked.
—Yes—
While reaching for the pocket of his robe, Chuillyon answered. “Then we can reach him from here. I have already retrieved the . . .” He faltered, looking up.
Chap heard hooves pounding closer behind him, and he spun around.
• • •
Khalidah faced Leesil as he heard Beloved speak again.
—Open the anchors and break my bonds. Unmake me and unmake existence. My kin will pay, and I will be free. End my bondage—
Is this what his god thought to do, to unmake existence and be free? That would not happen, though certainly Beloved would die. Any nonsense concerning “kin” meant nothing. A new master would take Beloved’s place, no matter how many else died for him to become a god.
The lines, symbols, and signs of sorcery took shape in Khalidah’s sight.
He turned on Leesil first.
• • •
Ghassan heard every word within the prison of his own flesh. He heard the very thoughts of his captor. Wild fear grew in his effort to understand what was about to happen.
The Enemy sought to die and spoke of “kin,” and Wynn had let slip enough references to orbs—the anchors. Perhaps some of that had come from the majay-hì they called Chap. A few times Ghassan had seen strange things concerning that one.
Then there was the other black majay-hì called Shade.
Two descended from a Fay-born race, one little renegade sage, a half-blood, and a dhampir—half-undead—had sought out the orbs. A fallen Lhoin’na sage who traveled via the gift of a fabled tree, supposedly as old as the world itself, had joined them. And along the way there had been too many tenuous connections he had overheard in his prison as those with Khalidah sought to recover all of the anchors . . . of Existence.
Ghassan knew theories of the Elements—and there was one orb for each. If they were “anchors,” and even one was opened to free what it anchored . . .
Existence itself—everything—would end.
Ghassan had failed so many times against the specter, even to the loss of his own flesh. It had kept him alive within it merely as a resource, if needed. And he knew what had happened to all other such hosts it had taken.
He could not defeat Khalidah, but he would not need to do so.
• • •
Leesil heard every hissing whisper of the Enemy, as if those words had been spoken aloud to echo through the cavern. He was left at a loss for their meaning, and he second-guessed opening the orbs, one or all.
Why would something that thought itself a god want to die? Why would it want them to kill it? While Ghassan appeared lost in some seething thought, Leesil looked from one companion to another. There was only one that he could trust now.
Chane hadn’t heard the whisper—because of his ring—and didn’t know what the Enemy wanted.
“Chane,” Leesil whispered, “don’t let . . . anyone . . . anyone . . .”
Suddenly, his voice failed, and he couldn’t make a sound.
Chane stared at him. “What? Do not let anyone what?”
Leesil tried to answer but couldn’t. Both his hands opened of their own accord, and he dropped his winged blades.
He felt a weight lift from around his neck, and as his hand came up, he was holding Magiere’s thôrhk. He didn’t even know he’d removed it until he saw it in his hand. He tried to turn but couldn’t.
He could see Chane looking away, looking at something beyond him, and still he couldn’t turn his head. Instead, he faced the orb chests in the cavern’s entrance. As he took a step toward them, he saw Ore-Locks doing the same. In panic, he struggled to look for Brot’an, and then . . .
Chane’s face twisted, lips separating over elongated fangs. He half crouched for a rush, then twisted and stumbled back as if struck by something unseen. Again, and again, and the third time, he wrenched backward, toppling and flipping across the cavern’s rough floor.
Everything around Leesil became fuzzy, like a half-remembered dream upon waking, as he took another step toward the chests.
• • •
Brot’an heard Léshil falter in speech and then saw him reach up blindly to remove Magiere’s thôrhk. Instantly, Brot’an fixed on Ghassan, who stood passive, still, and silent. Ore-Locks copied Léshil’s every action, as if he were under the same influence.
Chane tried to rush Ghassan and was somehow thrown backward.
As Chane’s feet left the cavern’s floor, Brot’an flicked loose the tie holding his left stiletto. The blade’s handle dropped against his left palm as he pulled the bone knife from behind his back.
Ghassan’s head began to turn his way.
Brot’an threw himself back and left over the smaller vertebrae of the skeleton’s tailbone looping toward its skull. He ducked and half crouched against the larger vertebrae near that skull. Inside his mind, he repeated a litany:
The stillness of thought is a silence, unheard and unnoticed.
The silence of flesh leaves only sh
adow, impenetrable and intangible.
Mind and body but not spirit became one with the shadows, and as Brot’an watched, Ghassan’s expression shifted to shock.
The domin backed away, spun around, and looked everywhere in trying to find his vanished target. He back-stepped even farther and then turned to reacquire his original targets.
Both Léshil and Ore-Locks faltered in shuffling toward the chests. Chane rose, stumbled, and tried to pick up one dropped sword. Again, at Ghassan’s glance, the undead flew backward, and he slammed into the far wall with an audible crack.
Brot’an did not move in thought or flesh. Though shadow held and hid both, spirit alone kept his presence and awareness. Deep within he already knew who had to be saved most of all.
Léshil was somehow the way to kill the Enemy, if it was truly here.
And Brot’an believed it was, for he had finally realized that it had a tool among them. He watched Ghassan without conscious thought. He had set his next action deep within himself before vanishing. He waited in stillness for Chane’s next attack to trigger his own reaction. And when that came . . .
• • •
Leesil’s forced steps faltered just before he heard someone grunt amid a clatter of something striking stone. That was quickly followed by the rough sound of someone falling on the cavern floor.
For that instant, nothing drove Leesil forward, and he was able to barely turn his head.
He saw Ore-Locks do the same with visible effort. His last clear glimpse of Chane had been of the vampire trying to pick himself up.
Leesil knew Ghassan was still somewhere behind him. His body lurched, his hand clenched tighter upon Magiere’s thôrhk, and one of his feet slid forward. However he and Ore-Locks were being controlled, Chane was not affected. And the one person Leesil hadn’t seen anywhere was Brot’an.
He knew the old assassin’s tactics.
Brot’an must have shifted to the cavern’s far side and melded into the shadows, but if he even moved, the shadows wouldn’t hide him anymore. Unlike Chane with his ring, if the domin fixed on Brot’an, he might be able to use Brot’an against Chane.
There was only one way to give Brot’an an instant to strike.
Chane had to move the other way to draw Ghassan’s attention.
