The Silvered

by Tanya Huff

  It wasn’t the stairs that terrified, they were as new and sterile as the hall they’d just left, but the smells that coiled up them spoke of an older, darker part of the palace. Ryder used to tease her because her nose was so limited, but she’d have given anything right now to be able to smell even less.

  Blood. Offal. Rot. A dark patina layered onto the stone by centuries of pain and fear.

  Stone all around them now, huge ancient blocks. Almost no light. The shadows told stories of desperation and the death of hope.

  Danika’s shoes barely touched the ground as her guards half carried, half dragged her forward. She begged, pleaded, fought…

  Then Jesine, who’d been so strong, so sure since they were taken, keened. The sound rose up and spread, the closest she could come to a howl. It was cut off short by an open-handed blow, too hard to be named a mere slap, and Danika remembered she was Alpha.

  Her feet found the floor and she walked, head up, past six low iron doors, dark and stained and a cruel parody of the doors they’d first seen. Those doors had said shelter; these said prison. Her lips drew back. She twisted as far as she could and through bared teeth breathed, Calm. Stay calm. Be water. Be earth. Be air. Be life. Be strong. She was Alpha. They’d find their strength in her.

  When the thinner of the two guards moved around in front of her and pulled a knife, she didn’t flinch. When he cut the cord holding her hands together, she managed a heartfelt, “Thank you.” Close enough the words brushed his face, she saw his eyes widen in confusion. He barely managed to step aside in time as the guard still behind her shoved her into the cell.

  She landed on her knees, her hands sliding along the damp floor. She saw rusty steel rings on the wall in front of her, dark rot softening the corners.

  The door slammed shut and Danika froze.

  The darkness was complete. No window. No light around the edges of the door.

  She sat back on her knees and wiped her hands against her skirt. She wasn’t afraid of the dark.

  But she hadn’t seen the whole cell.

  Was she alone?

  Had they thrown her in with someone…something…?

  Breath held back behind her teeth she listened. Heard nothing. Nothing at all. They could have taken the rest of the Mage-pack away and she wouldn’t know. They could leave her. Forget her. Alone…

  No.

  Her hand dropped to the curve of her belly.

  Not alone.

  Her child. Ryder’s child.

  A reason to survive.

  Chapter Ten

  DANIKA HAD NO IDEA how long they left her in the dark. She tried to keep track of the passing time, but couldn’t do it. She relieved herself in the far corner because she had to. She found the small bucket of water by tripping over it and spilling half. She settled against the wall opposite the door. She wasn’t afraid of the dark and at least the cell wasn’t moving. If she ever had to get in a coach again, it would be too soon.

  She slept. She woke. She slept. Nothing changed.

  The water was gone.

  No one came.

  She slept. She woke. Relieved herself again. Maybe again.

  She thought that maybe she’d screamed because her throat felt like she’d been swallowing broken glass, but she had no memory of doing it.

  When the door finally opened, the dim light spilling in hurt her eyes so badly she flinched away and they had to drag her out. Out into an empty corridor. Empty. Silent. Where were the others?

  She was afraid to ask. Afraid they’d throw her back in the dark. Hated herself a little for that fear.

  At the top of the stairs, were four doors—two facing her, one beside her, one to the right. They all had identical brass locks. Big brass locks. Locks. She had no keys. But the door to the right was open and the soldiers dragged her to it.

  Inside the door was…

  Danika had no idea.

  It was a small, narrow room, tiled, pipes running along the ceiling at the far end, and a grate in the floor. Her heart slammed against her ribs as she realized it would be an easy room to clean. The guards shoved her forward. She shook her head and resisted. She couldn’t be brave about this. Not when all she could think of were knives and her baby and pain and…

  There was a woman in the room.

  Danika squinted, trying to bring the woman’s features into focus. It was too bright. But she was tall. As tall as Annalyse and large. Not softly rounded like Stina but squared. Competent.

  The door slammed closed. She heard the key turn and the woman say in accented Aydori, “Clothes off. Now.”

  When Danika moved too slowly, she was efficiently stripped, handled as though she were an object not a person, and shoved toward the grate where she could smell…

  Soap?

  She turned and looked past the woman to see a large piece of unbleached linen toweling and a robe of the same fabric hanging on the back of the door. Frowning, Danika stared up at the pipes as the woman muttered and pulled a wooden plumb on the end of a chain.

  Oh.

  The guards took her back down the hallway with the six wooden doors. It had to be the same hallway Danika had seen before, but the door they’d entered the palace by no longer existed. Concrete blocks a very little bit lighter than the rest filled in the space as though there’d never been an opening in the wall. The guards yanked her to a stop at the second-to-last door, and she assumed the last door was for the missing sixth mage.

  Her shadow went through the door before her, so she turned to see a lamp behind a sheet of glass above the door. The room had no window. There would be light only when their captors allowed them light. Given where she’d just been, the threat was implicit. Both hands clutching the robe, tiled floor cold against her bare feet, Danika saw a bed made up with sheets and blankets along one long wall, in the far corner a commode and next to it a basin on a small washstand. Beside the basin were a tin mug and a plate of bread and cheese.

  She cried out and spun around when the door slammed behind her, but the light stayed on.

  This was it. This was…

  This was…

  This was a room with food.

  She ripped chunks off the bread and shoved them in her mouth, coughed, caught the wet mass in one hand and forced herself to eat it slowly. Then the cheese. It was mild and almost tasteless and the best thing she could remember eating. When the food was gone, she gulped down the warm barley water in the mug, then staggered to the bed and collapsed more than sat.

  This wasn’t a cell; it was a room. She could smell nothing but the soap she’d washed her hair with. She could see into all the corners. A nightgown had been thrown across the end of the bed. Scooped neck, long sleeves, unbleached muslin. A nightgown.

  Then…

  A sound…

  A sound so faint only an Air-mage could have heard it.

  There was a crack, not quite the width of her baby finger under the door. Lying on her side, Danika could feel the air moving down the corridor and hear the door to the room beside her close. She heard two pairs of booted feet move away and the door at the end of the corridor by the water room open and shut.

  She might have slept, her body surrendering to relative safety, because it seemed like no time had passed when she heard the door at the end of the corridor open again. Two pairs of booted feet moved closer, but this time she could hear the soft sound of bare feet beside them.

  The door to the room beside the room beside hers closed.

  They were bringing the others up.

  The guilt that had come with being clean and out of that horrid darkness faded.

  Feeling almost lightheaded from the loss, she got to her feet, slipped out of the robe, and slipped on the nightgown. It was large on her, would be tight on Stina, short on Annalyse, swamp Kirstin, but fit Jesine if the gowns were all the same size.

  She hadn’t worn a nightgown since she married Ryder.

  Wearing the fabric like a shield, she was back on the floor in time to hear the
fourth door close.

  And then, in time, the fifth.

  They were safe. They were all safe.

  Rolling onto her back, Danika took a deep, cleansing breath. She listened to multiple boots moving about in the hall. Froze as they stopped outside her door. Stifled a scream as the lamp went out.

  Clung to the sound of the boots moving away.

  Remembered the sound of the doors closing. Four doors had closed. She wasn’t alone. They were all here.

  The room was dark. As much of a cell as those ancient stone holes for all it smelled better.

  She wasn’t afraid of the dark. Not this time. She had her crack under the door.

  And then…

  …in the distance, so faint she thought she heard it because she wanted to hear it, a howl.

  Rolling back up onto her side, Danika pressed as close to the crack as she could. Nothing. Nothing but the barely perceptible movement of the air against her cheek. Just when she’d begun to think she’d been imagining it, she heard the howl again.

  Young. Male. Terrified more than defiant.

  “Hush. I’m here now. We’ll fix this.” Danika blew the words out under the door and waited, sending her presence on every exhale. When the howling finally stopped, she hoped it was because he’d heard.

  Rolling over on her back, she wrapped a hand around the curve of her belly. It seemed there were more Pack here to save than those she’d come with.

  The roses in the border had clearly needed deadheading for some time. Danika had no idea why she’d left it so long. She pulled the faded blossoms toward her, one by one, barely managing to snip them off the canes before the next rose wilted and then the next. This was rapidly becoming more complicated than her small gardening ability could deal with. She’d have sent a message to Tylor, the second level Earth-mage who oversaw the estate’s flower gardens, but the air was so completely still she was afraid to disturb it.

  The air was never that still naturally.

  Turning to call, she realized that the house had moved again and she was staring down the west lawn toward the pond and the rough land beyond it. She heard a bird and then Ryder came over the hill, running toward the pond. Highlights danced over his fur and his tail looked unnaturally fluffy. He changed as he dove in, and stayed on two legs as he climbed out of the water, having swum across to the nearer side. His dark hair hung down into his eyes, the water made the muscles of his arms and shoulders gleam. She drew her gaze down the line of hair on his chest, over the flat planes of his stomach, between his legs…He’d obviously caught her scent.

  She smiled and stepped forward.

  He ran toward her, but ended up farther away.

  The light behind him grew brighter until she had to raise a hand to shield her eyes…

  Staring up at the tiled ceiling, Danika blinked and remembered. When the distant howling had finally stopped, she’d made her way to the bed. It had been comfortable enough, certainly more comfortable than anything she’d slept on since being taken, and her body had almost convinced her she could die of tiredness. But her mind hadn’t allowed her to rest. Fear for the others had chased its own tail around and around her head. Jesine and Stina would manage, but Annalyse was very young and something had been broken in Kirstin. She’d suddenly realized warm water and food and a bed did not translate into her ever seeing the other women again. This was a better prison—and the thought of going back into the dark, into that hole with its patina of old death and fear made her feel like throwing up—but it was still a prison. They should have fought. Screamed. Struggled.

  Died free?

  No. As clichéd as it was, where there was life there was hope.

  Eventually, her body had won and she’d slept.

  Her body had won because it was no longer only her body. She could feel tears prickling behind her eyelids and wished she could give in to a prolonged bout of sobbing but was afraid that if she started, she wouldn’t be able to stop.

  Taken from her husband. Taken from her home. Her family would be frantic. All their families would be frantic and, for all that their families were high in the leadership of Aydori, Danika doubted they’d be able to count on anything as civilized as diplomatic recourse. There was no one country left in this part of the world strong enough to stand against Leopald’s armies. Should the news of their kidnapping reach the international community, the action would be weighed against the chance of losing Imperial trade and then ignored. Leopald, she’d told Ryder at dinner nearly a year ago, had begun to conquer with his purchasing power as much as with his armies—and although Ryder had laughed to hear it put that way, he’d had to agree she was right.

  The five of them would have to free themselves.

  Danika rubbed at the tears running into her ears and then scrubbed her nose with the sleeve of the nightgown. She had no idea how long she’d been in Karis. How long in the hole in the dark. How long asleep in a bed. No idea if it was day or night.

  “RISE!”

  The voice filled the room and pressed against her as if it needed the space she filled as well. The nightgown twisted around her legs, Danika nearly fell out of the bed but managed to get a foot free at the last moment. An Air-mage could have sent such a message, shoved it in under the door as she’d slipped her messages out under the door last night, but Danika would have recognized the use of the craft. The voice had not come from an Air-mage. Trolls and giants were creatures of myth. Therefore, in order to achieve that volume, the voice had come from a machine. She searched for a speaker and found a small circular grill set almost invisibly into the tiles of the ceiling. Without the net she could have followed the air currents back, if not to the speaker at least to the machine. As she understood it, machines were delicate. She wouldn’t have to be.

  A thought occurred and she searched again, finding no lenses. They might be listening, but they weren’t watching.

  “Use the commode!”

  Not quite so loud this time and identifiable as a woman’s voice. Older. Embarrassed by her failure to use the machine properly the first time. Angry at those who’d made her feel embarrassed. She was trying to hide both, but words were air given form and Danika had been…was the most powerful Air-mage in Aydori. It could have been the woman from the wet room.

  Why would their captors believe they needed to tell five expectant women to use the commode?

  Danika had barely finished when the sound of the bolts slamming back announced the opening of the door.

  Perhaps it had been a time warning rather than a command.

  She didn’t recognize the two guards who stepped into the room. They weren’t the two who’d taken her to the cell, but they might have been the two who’d taken her from it. The uniform, the hair cut short, the cap pulled low on the forehead, all worked to obscure individuality.

  They reminded Danika of a line in The Governing of Reason by Gregor Mertait, a politician from Talatia in the Southern Alliance. Safe within the obscurity of the mob, many deeds are performed that would not be countenanced by the individual. If Leopald had read the book, she could only assume he thought no one else had because Mertait went on to say: The mob cannot be reasoned with and will sweep all before it, but divide the mob back into individuals and it loses its power.

  The guard on the left had a mole under his right ear. The other man had a black thumbnail, the edges still red and swollen enough the accident had likely just happened.

  They both held pistols pointed at her and black batons thrust through loops on their belts. Clearly, Leopald was taking no chances on two grown men being unable to physically overpower one pregnant woman. More evidence that Leopald didn’t trust the net. Nor did he know exactly what he’d taken. If the net failed this moment, this very instant, they’d have no time to pull the trigger before they were slammed against the far wall of the corridor hard enough to splatter their brains over the stone!

  Danika took a deep breath and let it out slowly, knowing they’d see the trembling of her hands a
s fear rather than reaction to the sudden violence of her thoughts. She’d killed once. She didn’t want to do it again.

  She would.

  Want had nothing to do with the situation she found herself in.

  Mole-under-ear gestured with his free hand, indicating she should move forward into the hall. He moved with her, backing up as she advanced. Bruised-thumb stayed where he was. As she passed him, she murmured a polite, “Excuse me.”

  Manners, her mother had taught her, could be a shield in troubled times. And she remembered the confusion of the guard she’d thanked. Given the insults from the soldiers who’d taken them, the guards had very probably been taught the mages of Aydori lay with beasts and were therefore less than beasts themselves. Confusing the guards was a place to start.

  Once in the hall, the guards…

  No, as portentous as using the descriptions might be, she needed to always think of the guards as individuals.

  Once in the hall, Mole-under-ear and Bruised-thumb fell in on either side of her. Mole-under-ear on her left, was left-handed. Bruised-thumb on her right, was right-handed. As they stood beside her, their weapons were in their outside hands, making it all but impossible for her to grab one—had she decided to do something so incredibly stupid. Either the more over-the-top stories about the Pack had not only been believed but applied erroneously to the Mage-pack, or Leopald really didn’t trust the net.

  Or, she reluctantly admitted, it was coincidence.

  The lamps were on over the other doors, but the doors remained closed. Wherever they were taking her, she was going there alone.

  She could feel the weight of their attention. She didn’t dare try and send a message.

  The door at the end of the hall opened into the vestibule…