by Alana Serra
Darting around the side of the building, she made her way to the guard tower. A risky move, as it put her closer to the orcs that remained, but she imagined herself shrouded in shadows, and from the wave of cold that swept over her, she could guess her powers had made it so. None of them noticed her escape, and the ones near the gate seemed none the wiser. Focusing on what she already knew, Rhia set a gout of shadow magic to erupt beneath the orcs clustered at the gate.
Unfortunately, her magic didn’t distinguish friend from foe. She’d only envisioned it exploding the orcs, but the blast slammed into the gate, as well, cracking planks in half as though they were mere twigs. Chips of wood were sent flying, the rope holding them together doing a terrible job against her magic. Archers who’d been posted atop it went flying back, and Rhia held her breath, her eyes widening as she realized what she’d done.
No. It was happening again. Aeredus’ magic was enacting a cost even if she hadn’t wished it. She’d killed the orcs—not a soul moved beyond the gates. But how many humans had she taken with them? The priests of Belisan might crow about the greater good, but to Rhia, individual life was not a thing that should ever be bartered away to achieve some kind of spiritual gain.
Unconcerned with shrouding herself, she rushed toward the gate. It was easy to step through the gaping hole she’d blown into it, her frock snagging momentarily. The village beyond was quaint. A church to Belisan at its center, just like many human villages, and various buildings all centered around that main square. But Rhia’s focus was on the people—specifically the woman who lay some distance from the gate, groaning in obvious pain.
Her leg was bent at a sickening angle, and Rhia felt a chill run down her spine to know she’d been responsible for it. There might be more damage, as well, but it didn’t matter. She would fix it. She’d make up for her mistakes, negate the cost of the magic and learn from this so it didn’t happen again.
“I’m here to help,” she assured the woman, kneeling beside her.
Despite the broken leg and what must have been excruciating pain, the woman tried to squirm away from her, using her arms to pull herself back. Her eyes were round and wide, her face pale. Pure terror nested in her expression, the likes of which Rhia couldn’t understand. Did she not know the orcs were dead? Perhaps the few who’d gone looking for her had come back.
“Stay away from me, you witch!” It wasn’t the orcs she looked at when she spoke those words, though. It was her.
“I just want to heal you. It will only take a few moments, I promise.”
She could not promise it wouldn’t hurt. The healing magic she’d seen used in the past had varying stages of competency, and considering how new she was to all of it, she imagined hers fell under the “effective but painful” label. As much as she might want to focus on minimizing that aspect of it, there were more important things she had to control: Like not drawing the life out of the other villagers who were coming close and trying to help as well.
Closing her eyes, Rhia focused on the corpses of the orcs she’d seen outside the gates. She drew from them, from the last vestiges of life that clung to their bodies, channeling it into the woman with the broken leg. She could feel flesh and bone mending, one entity giving life to another. Only this time, it wasn’t a group of guards and citizens who’d known no better. It was a handful of orcs who’d wished harm upon these people, who were now being used to help them.
There was something satisfying about it, the justice poetic. Yet even after the magic took hold, even after the woman could clearly see she meant to help, she still wasn’t interested in seeing Rhia as anything other than a threat.
“What have you put inside of me, witch?” she asked, her voice breaking in fright.
She scrambled to her feet, her gaze fixed to her leg. Rhia looked, as well, her heart pounding in her chest as she half-expected to see those same black tendrils. But the woman’s skin was clear. There was no evidence of dark magic, only a fully healed leg, the skin smooth and healthy.
“I healed you, just as I said. I know it likely looked like something dangerous, but it—”
She’d stepped forward, imploring the woman to listen, only for that same woman to bend in one fluid motion, retrieve her bow from where it had fallen, and nock an arrow. Rhia put her hands up, as if that was going to help matters any.
“You stay right there. Move an inch and I’ll put an arrow through your eye.”
“All right,” she said, her heart hammering in her chest. “I don’t mean you any harm.”
It was just a misunderstanding. She could explain, and once she did, these people would see what she’d done for them. She didn’t need recognition—not really. But it would be nice not to be the subject of immediate scorn.
“Velos!” the woman called over her shoulder. A tall man with a dark, bushy mustache approached, his biceps thicker than Rhia’s thighs. “I’ve got the witch here who directed the orcs. Thought she could hex me and get away with it.”
Rhia’s eyes widened and she looked between the two of them, her gaze lingering on the massive claymore Velos drew from his back. “I’m not—”
The crack of flesh against flesh sounded through the village as he backhanded her. Rhia’s whole face stung, her nose throbbing, jaw aching deep within. She gritted her teeth and ignored the tears springing into her eyes.
“That’ll be enough out of you. Belisan doesn’t suffer the tongue of a charming harpy, and neither shall I.”
She opened her mouth to say something again, but the words stilled in her throat when she saw him raise the blade. He looked as if he intended to cleave her head from her shoulders right there. A tremor shook through Rhia and she closed her mouth once more, not putting up a fuss when two other men yanked her hands behind her back and bound them in irons.
“Don’t even try to use your magic, witch,” Velos sneered. “Those shackles will make sure you regret it.”
She could feel the metal biting into her wrists, burning. She gasped at the sensation, clenching her teeth down on her tongue to keep herself from crying out. She’d heard of such shackles in the past, but she’d only ever thought they stopped magic from being cast. No one had ever said how painful they were for someone to wear. But if they were binding her, they didn’t intend to kill her. They would give her due process and a chance to speak at trial. They had to. That was how things were done in the northern kingdoms.
“String her up, boys!” Velos called into the center of town. “Looks like we’ve finally got the witch for our pyre.”
“Your what?!”
The butt of a spear jabbed into her back right between her shoulder blades. Rhia lurched forward, unable to catch herself before she was sent sprawling into the mud, her face impacting the ground first. Everything hurt, and as she was yanked to her feet, she could see there was going to be no trial. No due process. She’d already been found guilty, and was about to be burned alive for the crime of helping this village deal with their orc problem.
Pain didn’t matter. Not when her life was on the line. So Rhia fought, violently, thrashing against her captors. She screamed out, tried to imagine her magic working beyond the shackles. For a moment, she felt that cold tingle that told her it was going to work. Then there was another cracking sound, a sharp pain in her temple before the world went black.
Chapter 6
Wesley sat on the edge of a lumpy, too-thin mattress, his hands on his knees, eyes closed in some approximation of meditation.
He’d never been that good at focusing without something in front of him. True, he’d devoured an entire library’s worth of books in little more than a week. He’d sat through the most difficult exams in all of Atram. He’d trained tirelessly, day and night, until he’d mastered every aspect of his magic. But just sitting in silence, in the middle of an empty room that smelled of stale, moth-eaten clothes and something foul from the inn’s kitchens was not conducive to Wesley’s focus. Even the sun peeking in through the window was distracting. He
could feel every stitch of fabric touching his body, could even feel each strand of hair on his head, and—
Wesley’s fingers clenched on his knees and he gritted his teeth, squinting his eyes more firmly shut. If he couldn’t block out everything around him, he needed to look inward instead—to examine why he wanted to do this, and for whom. His magic wasn’t strong enough to simply will an outcome into existence, but as his professor told him years ago, intent was nine-tenths of the recipe when it came to using magic. So Wesley focused on what he intended, on the reason he was doing this in the first place.
Emma.
It’d been years since he’d seen his younger sister for longer than a glance across a crowded market. In his mind, she was still fifteen, just barely beginning to mature into a young woman. No, even that was too recent, for when Wesley pictured Emma, he pictured her at eight years old, when she’d been his shadow. When she’d wanted to be everywhere he was, do everything he was doing, listen to him go on about the studies of the arcane with rapt attention. That was the Emma he remembered most, before Father had ruined their lives.
And that was the Emma he focused on, hoping her spirit was still the same and that his spell would work. He’d only done it one other time, and it’d been purely by accident. Right after she’d been sent away, he’d managed to project an image of himself to her, his worry making him sick, his righteous fury shoring up his convictions, and his desire to protect and comfort his sister taking both things and turning them into something usable.
He hadn’t tried it purposefully. Not since the pact. But he was convinced it could work, if only he could focus. Grasping at the threads of reality, at his memories and what he knew to be true colliding into one central point, Wesley followed. He imagined himself walking down an endless corridor with a series of doors lining either side. The correct door was among them. All he needed to do was find it.
Reaching out in his mind, Wesley gripped the handle of one such door. A chill washed over him, making him shudder within the images that played inside his head. He knew better than to open that door, and yet he found himself doing it anyway. As soon as he did, shadows spilled into the hallway, spreading around him, coalescing into the form of… not a man. He was a creature of the abyss, another horror that haunted Wesley’s nightmares. Freakishly tall, with long limbs and almost skeletal fingers, a neck that was longer than any human’s, and a face that was simply two dark-as-pitch eyes set into a shadowed face, a wicked smile the only source of “light” from the entity.
Wesley ripped himself out of his spell the same way he’d ripped himself out of his own nightmares. Only this time when he opened his eyes, the horrific vision didn’t clear. That shadowy figure was standing before him, lips twisted into a wry grin. He looked down at Wesley expectantly, and it took everything in him not to scramble away and clutch for the comfort of his spellbook.
As if it would do any good.
“Still no luck?” Aeredus’ voice was surprisingly smooth—it might have been soothing, had it not been coming from an abomination. “You’ve been at it for years now. Do you ever wonder if it’s just beyond your capabilities?”
There was a glint in those soulless black eyes. He knew he’d struck true, and Wesley’s pride suffered the blow. “If it is, then who’s fault is that, exactly? These powers come from you.”
Aeredus laughed, the sound filling the tiny inn room. Wesley swore the walls shook with it. They certainly felt like they were closing in.
“I gave you everything I could possibly give a human. You have only yourself to blame for not unlocking your full potential, Wesley.”
The words wrenched something deep inside of him. They sounded so much like his old professor’s. So much, in fact, that Wesley was sure Aeredus had pulled them from his mind and used them against him. The answering laugh—perversely delighted—was proof enough.
“Get out of my head,” he growled.
“Why should I vacate a space I own, my dear boy?” he purred, his breath suddenly warm against Wesley’s ear. Despite himself, he shuddered. “I did not force you to pact with me.”
He hadn’t, and Wesley would own his own decisions. He’d done what he’d needed to do. Without that pact, there was no way he would have had enough power. Not as quickly as he’d needed it. He’d known the consequences, too. He would be Aeredus’ pet, his plaything until the day he was no longer useful to the Dark God. At that point he suspected he would be sucked dry, a lifeless husk used to sustain Aeredus’ avatar and nothing more.
But that day wasn’t today. He needed something, and Wesley wasn’t going to play the games he was so fond of. Rising from the edge of the bed, he moved to the basin of cloudy water and splashed it over his face. There was a small-looking glass propped behind the basin, a lens through which he could view what he’d become. Dark circles under his eyes. A shadow where his jaw should be clean-shaven. Sharper cheekbones than he’d ever remembered having.
This pact had taken its toll, but he’d do it a thousand times over if the outcome was the same.
“Lucky for you, I do have a way to remedy your arrested potential,” Aeredus said, breaking the silence as Wesley knew he would.
Most people believed the Dark God subsisted on the souls of the innocent, or some such nonsense. Wesley knew the truth was simpler than that. He was kept alive by the attention others paid him, and by hearing himself speak. Pity someone would always pay him mind, otherwise he might wither and die like a spring bloom in summer.
“I have summoned a new sorceress to represent me and wear my mantle in the fight against Belisan,” he said as if he expected Wesley to care.
“Did you wear out the old one already?” he asked, still looking at himself in the glass surface.
“She took a more… direct route to her demise than the one I encouraged.”
Wesley’s eyes closed. Was that supposed to be humorous? The lilt to his voice suggested it was. His stomach twisted at the implication, but of course Aeredus knew he was sending all who pacted with him to their doom. That was the point. They were damned the moment they spoke the words.
“I believe this new one will far surpass her, though. She is clever. Stubborn. Defiant. She thinks she can thwart my wishes…” His lips curled into a cruel grin. “It’s quite adorable, really.”
Wesley felt that now-familiar sinking feeling. Whenever Aeredus spoke of his newest pet, he recognized himself in the words. He’d only ever wanted to right wrongs. To save his sister. To carry out justice where Atram had delivered none. In the end, he was just like all the others. This woman would be, too, and though he didn’t know her, he felt for her.
“I don’t see why I should care about your newest whore. If you’re here to tell me to stay out of her way, you needn’t worry about that.”
“On the contrary, my dear boy. I want you to stay very close to her. You are going to be one of her guardians.”
He froze at that, then whipped around to face the Dark God. Seeing his reflection in the glass wasn’t enough. He needed to see that expression on his otherworldly face. He needed to see if Aeredus was just toying with him. It seemed the god’s favorite past-time.
But while he was still smiling, his eyes glinting with mirth, he didn’t appear to be joking. And deep inside, Wesley knew that. Something in his soul confirmed it, tugging toward the existence of this woman he’d never met and hadn’t cared to meet until moments ago.
“What is this?” he asked in a growl. “What have you done to me?”
“It’s merely part of the pact. Did you not read the fine print? I would think a man as learned as you would never skim a contract,” he said with a wolfish grin. When Wesley stared up at him, his expression hard, Aeredus just waved him off and continued. “You have been chosen to defend this woman. You will lend her your power and she in turn will lend you hers.”
Wesley searched through his memories, through all the knowledge he’d acquired over the years. Countless hours when he’d sat in the restricted secti
on of the academy’s library, poring over texts that might have given him any insight into the power he needed. His first experience reading about a Dark Lady was in the Razing of Veramor, where one woman had burned an entire city to the ground in the space of fifteen minutes. There’d been mention there of an entourage made entirely of men, and he’d learned over time that such a thing went hand in hand with the Dark Lady’s presence. Wherever she was, three men followed, bound to her by something they couldn’t explain. Something that made them loyal enough to forego their own hopes and dreams and give their life for hers.
It was something that made him ill to think of. Everything inside of Wesley rebelled at the thought. Almost everything. Because there was one spark that lit brightly within him. One driving force that pushed him toward a woman he’d never met. He hated it. Hated that he was likely going to crumple at her feet, fall down and beg to serve her no matter what type of person she was.
All because of this pact.
“I forgot how much you like to brood,” Aeredus remarked, his lip pulling back in a sneer. “You and Rhiannon will get along swimmingly.”
Rhiannon. An old name, left over from when humans still worshiped a pantheon of gods and goddesses. The wild goddess of the wind, ever-shifting. Was she as tempestuous? The thought sparked something inside of him—something he’d never experienced before. A desire to be with this woman in every sense of the word. To bask in her presence, to serve and possess her in turn. It was such a fierce, powerful feeling that Wesley nearly staggered from it. He was only brought back to his reality by the icy chuckle of Aeredus.
“I see I wasn’t wrong in choosing you.” Wesley looked up to find those dark eyes fixed on him. “You’ll find her southeast of here, a half day’s ride. She’ll be at a human village, likely getting herself into some kind of trouble, if I had to guess.” The glint in his eyes suggested he didn’t have to guess at all. “You’ll also find the other two I’ve called to the task. Play nice with them, Wesley. You three are the only thing stopping this woman from ending up like the last, and if she does fall before pacting with you, you’ll never see your precious Emma again.”
