by Azalea Ellis
“Well, that seems like an obvious ‘yes.’ Should the others come, as well?” I asked.
“They are welcome to attend, if they wish. You should at least alert them that they will likely be feeling sick in some manner, sometime within the next hour.” He turned and led the way down into the bowels of the castle in silence.
I sent a Window to the others, explaining what Torliam had told me, and sending a map of my route and location so they could follow. “How exactly does one break a blood-covenant?” I asked.
His jaw clenched. “By changing that which is shared. The method to do it is one of the old ways. It is forbidden, and highly restricted. But some still know the process, and as queen, my mother-lord has the ability to approve it. If done incorrectly, I will die.”
“Whoever’s doing this better know what they’re doing,” I muttered. “Does that also stop the other Seeds NIX took from you from being able to create new blood-bonds?”
“It does. That is why we must do it this way.”
We arrived in a big cavern, with a narrow path cutting through the stalagmites rising from the ground. It led to a large ritual circle in the center of the cavern, surrounded by orbs of colored light that lit up the ground and the tips of stalactites hanging down from the ceiling far above.
People I assumed were healers stood off in a group to the side, and the queen turned at our arrival and nodded regally at us, though the tension in her body belied the serenity of her expression. Her eyes returned to the people in cheesy hooded robes who moved around the inside of the circle, setting things up.
The other Player members of the team, plus Blaine, arrived by the same path Torliam and I had taken, and though I’d heard them talking faintly before they entered the cavern, they quieted at the oppressive atmosphere of the place. They joined me, and Blaine, ever-curious, sent me a Window.
—Is this some sort of cultural … ritual magic? Not real magic, of course. It is just advanced science. But is it something they treat with ceremony as if it is magic?—
-Blaine-
I shrugged and shook my head. I knew as little as he did.
The hooded people began to chant . . . or sing. I didn’t know the language, and somehow the lilting, rhythmic way they spoke could have been either. The colored orbs resonated with their voices, seeming to reflect and throw them, till they seemed to come from everywhere at once, and the hair on my arms vibrated with every word as it pulsed through the air.
Torliam let out a sharp pulse of his blue misty power, and suddenly he was bleeding from the middle of his left forearm. He walked around the circle, filling the little lines that surrounded and connected the base of all the orbs with his trickling blood, in one continuous path that ended with him standing back in the middle without ever walking over the same blood-filled line twice. He looked a bit pale, and I knew that a comparatively smaller human would probably have passed out from blood-loss already.
The lilting chants grew louder, and louder, the sound of it a physical thing, kind of like the way the Boneshaker moved me from the inside.
The lines of blood flared with white light, and the orbs seemed to explode. With the flash of light and sound, something shattered. Like a crystal chandelier breaking forever in slow motion.
When the spots cleared from my eyes I noticed that the blood was gone from the circle. Torliam knelt in the middle, sagging from exhaustion while a couple of the healers worked on him.
I looked over at Jacky, who was hunched over and looking pale and slightly green, like really old fish. I bent over and threw up what little was in my stomach.
Chapter 29
I have been one acquainted with the night.
— Robert Frost
One of the healers came to make sure my team was all right, and Blaine questioned her. “I have two kids, and they were both given Skills from a goddess. I am very worried that the power is too much for them, and might backlash. Is there something you might be able to do for them? Or at least examine them to see if my worry is founded?”
The healer refused. “That is beyond my realm of ability. Beyond most healers, in fact.” She left.
“Ifkana,” I said, turning to Zed, who’d barely seemed to be affected by the bond-breaking ritual. “Isn’t that the name the healer from the village recommended? He said he’d be one of the few able to extend my life.”
Zed didn’t even have time to nod before Blaine jumped in, “We need to see this Ifkana, then. As soon as possible.”
I nodded. “I agree. We should take Chanelle, too, just in case. If he’s able to do something for me, he might be able to help her, too.”
I passed along the plan to the others, and would have asked Torliam to accompany us, but the other healers had taken him off somewhere, presumably to rest after his ordeal and significant blood loss. I tried to ask the queen, but she’d disappeared, too. When we returned to the palace, I asked a servant to tell the queen I’d like to meet with her, but they said that she had left the palace, and they did not know when she’d be back.
We waited around for an hour, then grabbed another servant, and asked if they could take us to Ifkana the healer. They hesitated, but agreed, noting that no one would turn down an audience with Eve of the returned line of Matrix, even if an appointment hadn’t been set up ahead of time. I was amazed by the wildfire spread of gossip, but if it would smooth the way for what I needed, I guessed I didn’t mind.
We grabbed the kids and Chanelle, and followed the servant through the streets. The percentage of people walking or riding huge animals rather than vehicles surprised me.
The servant explained to Blaine that vehicles not meant for long distance travel, goods transportation, or attack were considered lazy. “It is as if one is making a statement that they are not powerful enough to travel on their own strength,” he said. He brought us to a mansion almost as opulent as the palace, though significantly smaller. We were then forced to wait in a room with very uncomfortable chairs that were too big for all of us.
Jacky leaned back in her chair, half-sliding off it. “Is this person busy healing half the population of a small country all at once, or are they just ignoring us?” she whined.
Chanelle spoke. “We are waiting to see a healer?” she asked, looking at me.
We all turned toward her, weariness instantly gone.
“Yes.” I nodded. “He’s supposed to be the best. Maybe even good enough to help you and me.”
She smiled, a jerky stretching of the mouth that didn’t look very practiced. “That’s good. I can’t stay . . .” she paused, searching for the word, “awake for very long, still.” She sniffed, a little like a dog. “I’m hungry. Is there any food?”
I dug out a fruit from my pack and tossed it to Chanelle.
She caught it, and grinned brightly at her success, the expression looking just a little more natural this time. She stayed lucid and kept eating until the healer finally deigned to see us, and one of his servants escorted us to a larger room filled with a couple jacuzzi-like tubs of water, strange devices, and a fat woman wearing an extremely long sheet that had been wrapped around her several times in artful ways. The translucent fabric glowed, and strands of what looked like gold glittered among the rest. Obviously, she was rich, and she wanted everyone to know it.
She turned to us with a smile, as if she’d been distracted from something, though I saw nothing she could have been working on. “Welcome, Eve of the line of Matrix,” she said. “And companions, bearing the marks of Testimony and Lore, I hear?” She tilted her head like a little bird, eyes seeking out the crystal symbols on us.
Birch coughed at her, and she cooed over him, snapping her fingers at one of her servants and instructing them to go grab a snack for the, “darling little creature. And so rare a species, too!”
“Thank you for meeting with us on such short notice,” I said, giving one of the bows Torliam had taught me for someone who wasn’t socially above me, but who I respected. “I have heard you are the
best, and we are in need of your services.”
She tittered, waving a sausage-fingered hand. “Oh, of course I am the best. Queen Mardinest has been trying to retain me since she first came into power, you know.” She smirked. “I hear our great ruler is supporting your claim of heritage and Testimony?” The words were tinged with a hint of derision for the queen.
I raised an eyebrow. “It would be hard for her to deny it, with the abundance of proof. You are certainly well-informed, though. We only arrived in the city yesterday.”
“Oh, I have my ways, you know. I am a powerful healer,” she said, a kind of smug significance in her tone. She asked me who needed healing and of what, and then motioned me forward. She waved her hand about, and a bright purple light arced from it, almost like ribbon unfurling. It spun around me, changing colors, and making patterns which she seemed to pay only passing attention to, more interested in making conversation with me. She wanted to know about my connection to Torliam and the queen, my quest from the Oracle, and the gifts Testimony and Lore had given my team.
I felt strangely reluctant to reveal too much information, because her questions had sharp teeth, hidden behind her facade of pleasantry. I wondered if she was one of the people who wanted Queen Mardinest removed from power. They weren’t allies, that was definite.
Finally, the purple ribbons returned to Ifkana, disappearing into the hand that had created it. “Your regenerative power is strong,” she said. “I will boost it, but there is not much more I can do for you at the moment. When that wears off, you come back to me, and I will keep you healthy a while longer. You know that no mortal can stave off the effects of a greater god’s power indefinitely, though?”
I nodded.
Kris and Gregor were next, and she told them to come forward together. Once again, she waved out the purple ribbon, and it began to swirl and dance around them, as she asked them about their Skills from the Oracle.
Gregor pouted while Kris exclaimed excitedly about summoning spirits and putting them into bodies to play with her or complete tasks. When Ifkana tried to get Gregor to talk about his own Skill, he scowled down at the ground and refused to speak.
Ifkana seemed to find this more irritating than endearing, but was distracted by Jacky, who was more than happy enough to talk about her own new Skill. The purple ribbon, still focused on the kids, let out a pulse of red halfway through one of Jacky’s sentences, and Ifkana’s attention snapped toward it as if it had slapped her.
“What?” she said aloud, waving her arms and moving her fingers in complicated motions that seemed to control the ribbon. It turned all red. She gasped, and stepped back, hand over her heart.
“What’s wrong?” Gregor asked. “Is the Skill killing us after all?”
Adam took a step forward, but froze when Ifkana screamed, “Do not move! Everyone stay still.” Once her back was pressed against the wall, she spewed out another purple ribbon, this time sending it weaving among the rest of the group.
It stayed purple, until it reached Chanelle, where it turned an instant bright red.
Chanelle looked down, blinking at the ribbon of light circling her. “That’s . . . not good, is it?”
“You are infected,” Ifkana said, her voice wavering. “It is not the Skills you need to worry about, but the Sickness.”
Chapter 30
A star shines brightest at the edge of collapse.
— Omar Thornton
“That is impossible!” Blaine said. “Kris and Gregor do not have your world’s disease. They’re not even Estreyan!”
“It is early,” Ifkana said, “but I do not err. I am the best healer on this side of the seven seas! The children have the Sickness, and the fair one,” she pointed at Chanelle, “will soon succumb to it.”
“We have been here a long time, now,” Chanelle said, in a soft voice. “And some of us much longer than that. Maybe the weakest of us picked it up along the way.” She spoke in English, and Ifkana flinched from her words, like they might somehow hurt her.
There was silence, then. My mind was reeling. Of all the things we could have learned, and all the bad news I had braced to hear from Ifkana, I had not expected this.
“What does this mean?” Gregor asked. “I’m going to die?” His breath came a little too fast.
“No,” Blaine and I both said immediately.
“You should go,” Ifkana said.
Blaine shook his head desperately. “Is there nothing you can do?”
“No one can heal the Sickness! It has no cure, and—” she calmed herself with a visibly shuddering breath. “You may find the cure for them, if you are what you say, Eve of the line of Matrix. The very marks on their hand set them on the path to save themselves.” She straightened. “You should go. It is not safe for you to be here, only in part because the Sickness may spread. The warrior-queen may pardon those with the Sickness. Otherwise, the solution is always death. To reduce the chance of it spreading, or the affected going on a rampage and killing indiscriminately, those with the Sickness are to be killed, everything that they are and have owned obliterated from the face of the planet.”
Kris whimpered, and Blaine knelt down to hug her and Gregor, glaring at Ifkana over their shoulders. “I swear I will not let that happen,” he said.
“Go,” she said. “Take them back to the palace.”
“Don’t say anything about this,” I ordered her. “I don’t want anyone doing something stupid.”
“I will not tell anyone,” she agreed, nodding rapidly enough that her second chin jiggled.
We’d waited so long for her to see us that it was night out when we excited the house.
Gregor grabbed onto my hand as we hurried through the streets. “You really can fix this, right?”
“Yes. It’s going to take me a bit of work, but don’t worry. We won’t let anything happen to you.”
Sam and Blaine shared a look, and then Sam sent out a group Window, connecting everyone but the kids and Chanelle to it.
—Your quest isn’t actually to stop the Sickness, though, is it? Just to get information about it?—
-Sam-
I ground my teeth together. My quest had nothing at all to do with the Sickness, but everyone in the world, and now even my own team, needed my lie to be the truth.
—No. But Testimony and Lore seemed to think it was. Maybe the third puzzle will have information about that, or I’ll get another Quest.—
-Eve-
—Do we actually have time for that? How fast does the Sickness progress?—
-Adam-
—I need access to a lab. There’s no way a cure isn’t possible without some alien god’s help. Science doesn’t work like that.—
-Blaine-
We were almost back to the palace when the blast knocked me off my feet. We’d been walking through mostly deserted streets, with what were probably shops and warehouses, since there weren’t any people in their beds within.
My body and face smashed into the wall of the alley I’d been blown into, and I bounced off, dizzy and burning. I scrabbled blindly at my unprotected arms and neck, ripping off the smoldering remains of my clothes and pack.
“Get into the alley!” Adam screamed, throwing up a broad ink shield in the direction the attack had come from.
I rose to my feet, looking around frantically. Wraith lashed out, but found no others—wait, no—“There!” I screamed, spinning around to face the form rushing from the alley’s other opening.
Zed’s guns were out and shooting in half a second, but the person dodged the bullets as I watched, racing inevitably closer.
Adam threw out another shield, this one covering the other end of the alley.
The attacker stopped before it for a second.
Another explosion made me stumble, and Adam’s first shield disintegrated.
“What’s happening?” Sam screamed, the children and Chanelle pressed up against the wall behind him, protected by a human shield formed from himself, Blaine, and
Jacky.
“We were betrayed,” I said, the words coming to my mouth as soon as they formed in my mind.
The speedster took a few steps back, and jumped at the wall, bouncing off it onto the other wall, and then tossing himself over the top of the ink shield.
“I won’t let you hurt them!” Blaine screamed, reaching for his own gun, and pointing it at the attacker falling straight toward us. The bullet shot out, spinning, and fragmenting outward and inward simultaneously in a way that baffled even the Perception of my Wraith Skill, and threatened to give me a headache if I focused on it too hard.
The wall of the building behind Speedster ruptured when it hit, but he was no longer in its path. The stone statue that had replaced his form mid-fall exploded outward, chunks raining down on us.
Instead of being pulverized by Blaine’s weapon, Speedster stood atop the building above, looking down on us, beside another huge form, which was so wide and muscular it looked like an orc.
“Agh!” Adam screamed, as his multi-leveled ink barrier against the street attacker failed. The heat grew dizzying. He was blown back when his last ink shield disintegrated under the touch of the floating female form made of magma.
My eyeballs burned as the water evaporated from them, and I smelled burning hair.
Blaine shot at it, and it threw a hand forward. A blast of fire pulsed out and engulfed the bullet, the two attacks meeting above Adam. The bullet released its effects, which were enough to blow the fireball apart and tear into the magma creature, blasting her stomach apart and blowing pieces of her everywhere.
Adam screamed as the heat of the exploded fireball hit him, turning him pink instantly, and sizzling away the hair on his face. He scrambled backward, pushing himself along the ground with his legs, covering his face with his arms.
Blaine shot again, but the huge form up above gestured, and the slow-moving bullet was replaced by some pebbles which fell impotently onto the ground. In the air far up above, the real bullet exploded, with a similar lack of damage to anything important.
