The Chaos Crystal

by Jennifer Fallon

  'Missy? Dezi? Tory?'

  The giggling stopped again at her call.

  'Come on! I know you're down here. Where are you, you little rascals?'

  The torch provided only a small circle of light in the darkness. She figured they couldn't be that far away, given she'd been able to hear them upstairs. Arkady took a further step and let out a yelp as she stubbed her toe on another fall of rock that must have been dislodged during last night's tremor.

  Her eyes watering with the sting of yet another scrape added to her litany of aches and pains, she squatted down to examine the small rock fall blocking her way. As she did, she spied three pairs of eyes shining in the darkness off to her left. The fall had exposed another chamber on the other side of the wall. Somehow, the three pups had managed to find their way down here and crawl inside.

  'Tides, how long was I asleep?' she muttered to herself. Then she forced a smile, putting on her very best coaxing voice. 'Come on, you three. Mama's waiting for you upstairs. Are you hungry?'

  The pups giggled but made no move toward her. It was a foolish idea to think they would. They didn't know her. They couldn't speak. They couldn't understand a word she was saying. Arkady moved the torch a little closer. Although the chamber beyond gave the impression of being quite large, she doubted she could fit through the small hole the pups had found to enter it.

  Arkady sat back on her heels to rethink the problem, moving the torch away from the entrance in case the pups were afraid of the fire. She jammed it between the stones off to her right, and turned to look at the pups again, surprised to discover the cavern where they were hiding wasn't completely dark at all, but lit by a soft blue light, although Arkady couldn't determine its source.

  'Come on, sweetie,' Arkady coaxed to the nearest pup, not sure which one it was in the odd blue light. 'Come to Aunty Kady.'

  The pup giggled again and rolled something toward her. Arkady had no idea what it was, but it proved to be the source of the strange blue light. She reached through the opening and scooped it up, surprised by the weight of it. As soon as Arkady touched it, however, the strange glowing object went cold and dead. She moved it closer to the light of the torch and let out a yelp of disgust. About the size of a small melon, it seemed to be made of polished quartz. And it was shaped like a skull.

  'Oh, that's just horrid,' she muttered, but she turned back to the entrance to the cavern and held up the quartz skull. 'Is this what you want?' she asked, holding it just out of reach. 'Come on, then; come and get it.'

  The pups were too young to understand what Arkady was saying, but they wanted their shiny toy back. The nearest pup — Arkady still wasn't sure which one it was — reached for the skull, which began to glow blue again as the pup approached. When Arkady pulled it away, the glow disappeared. Fascinated, she moved it toward the pups once more, and sure enough, the closer it got to the Crasii the more it began to shine.

  Arkady was entranced, but she was also acutely aware that Boots was due back at any moment and would not be pleased to discover her pups had been allowed to wander down here on their own while Arkady was — quite literally — asleep on the job. But she understood what had fascinated the pups so much. The skull — its purpose, its age, or who might have crafted it — were all questions begging for answers. But not now. Not until the pups were safe. Putting aside for the moment the mystery of this strange artefact, Arkady held it closer to the entrance, the blue glow filling the chamber beyond as it neared the puppies.

  'Here you go,' she called in a sing-song voice. 'Come and get the pretty skull. Come on.'

  The pups probably weren't even listening to her, so spellbound were they by the shiny object beckoning them forward with its soft blue glow. They approached it warily, giggling a little in that odd way Crasii pups had of mimicking human children. 'That's it — come to the shiny skull. Follow the pretty light...'

  Dezi emerged first from the hole, so as a reward, Arkady let him hold the skull. The other two didn't seem to like that at all, and quickly followed their brother, scrabbling over the fallen stones to get to his prize.

  'Ha! Gotcha!' Arkady exclaimed, grabbing Missy first, followed by Tory. The pups wriggled in her grasp, trying to free themselves, not so much to escape from

  her as to get to the shiny skull their brother was holding. With some difficulty, Arkady managed to secure both pups under her left arm. She scooped up Dezi, glowing skull and all, glancing at the torch with a frown as she discovered she didn't have a hand free with which to hold it. Then Arkady glanced down at the puppy in her arms and realised she wouldn't need the torch while one of the pups had the skull.

  'You hold on to that now,' she told Dezi, who was paying her absolutely no attention. 'Because if you drop that thing and break it and the light goes away, we're going to be stuck down here until your mother gets home.'

  Dezi giggled in response, while the other two pups struggled in her arms, trying to get to the shiny skull. With the three of them balanced precariously in her arms, and their way lit by the eerie blue glow of the strange artefact, she headed back to the surface on her aching feet, wondering what was going to be harder —explaining to Boots what it was the pups had found, explaining how they'd found it, or trying to figure out exactly what it was.

  Arkady took the time to rebuild the barricade once the pups were safely back upstairs in their furs. She left them playing with the glowing skull while she worked because it kept them amused, although she did have to intervene a couple of times when Missy became a little possessive of it and wouldn't share it with her brothers.

  By the time Boots returned, the barricade was repaired, the pups asleep, and Arkady was sitting by the fire examining the skull, trying to glean some sense of its origin.

  'Tides, you got them to sleep?' Boots said in a low voice as she descended the stairs. She was carrying two rabbits in one hand and a large knife in the other. From the look of her bloody mouth, Arkady guessed she'd already eaten her fill.

  'I think they wore themselves out,' Arkady said with a smile. 'You had some luck, I see?'

  Boots nodded. 'Not a lot out there to find, but it should see us through the next few days. Can you cook?'

  Arkady nodded. 'I wasn't always a duchess, you know, Boots. Do you like cooked meat?'

  'I used to,' she said, tossing the rabbits onto the floor by the fire. 'But ever since I got pregnant I seem to prefer it raw. I go by the name Tabitha Belle now, by the way, your grace. Not Boots.'

  'I beg your pardon?'

  'Boots is a slave name. I'm free now. Tabitha Belle is my free name.'

  Arkady smiled at the canine's proud but slightly defensive demeanour as she declared her emancipation. 'Technically you're an escaped slave, Boo ... Tabitha. Being on the run and wanted for murder doesn't really qualify as freedom.'

  'So you say,' Boots said a little huffily. 'What's that you've got there?'

  'I don't know,' Arkady said, handing the skull to Boots, certain she was never going to be able to think of her as Tabitha Belle, a name much too pretty and, well, girly, for a creature as feisty as this canine. 'The pups found it down in ... Well, it doesn't matter where — but they found it. It seems to glow whenever a Crasii touches it.'

  Sure enough, as soon as Boots took the crystal from Arkady, it began to glow, but not quite the same shade of blue as it did when the pups touched it. When Boots held the skull, it had more of a greenish tinge.

  'Do you know what it is?'

  Boots shook her head. 'Never seen anything like it. What happens when you touch it?' 'Absolutely nothing.'

  Boots frowned, turning the polished skull this way and that as she examined it. 'It's kind of morbid, isn't it? Maybe it's something to do with Tide magic'

  'How do you figure that?'

  'Crasii can't swim the Tide, but we can sense it. At least we can sense the immortals on it. Even Scards can do that, although it reeks something awful to us. You're just a mortal human, so you wouldn't even know the Tide was out there if so
meone hadn't told you about it. Maybe it's just reacting to how much sensitivity you have to the Tide.'

  That was a plausible explanation, Arkady supposed, but it still didn't explain the purpose of the skull. 'It glowed blue when the pups touched it. Not green.'

  Boots's frown deepened and she tossed the skull back to Arkady as if she was suddenly impatient with it. 'It's probably because they're younger. I don't know. I don't really care, either. You gonna do something with those things or not? Rabbits don't skin themselves, you know.'

  'What should 1 do with the skull, do you think?'

  'Give it to the pups to play with.'

  'But it might be valuable.'

  'Valuable to who? Let them play with it. It's not like they have much else —' Boots fell abruptly silent at the sound of someone calling out above them in the ruins.

  'Hello?'

  Boots looked at Arkady, her eyes panicked. 'Did you let the pups out?' she hissed. 'Did someone see you?'

  Arkady shook her head. 'We never went near the surface,' she whispered back. 'I swear.'

  'Hello! Is anybody here?' The distant voice was muffled and sounded male, but not especially threatening. It might just be a passing fisherman from the lake or a woodsman, who'd caught a whiff of smoke on the air and had come to investigate.

  'Stay here,' Boots ordered, turning for the door.

  'No!' Arkady protested softly. 'I'll go.'

  Boots looked at her askance. 'You can barely walk.'

  'You have pups,' Arkady replied.

  The canine hesitated and then nodded. Tossing the skull onto the furs beside the pups, where it began to shine a soft blue, Arkady quickly pulled on her stockings and damp shoes, ignoring the pain in her feet, tied up the laces, and stood up. Boots handed her the knife she was holding. 'Can you slit a man's throat if you have to?'

  Arkady nodded. 'If I have to.'

  'Then go. Get rid of him. Do whatever it takes.'

  Arkady hefted the knife, a little surprised at the weight of it, and then tucked it into the waistband at the back of her skirt. 'I'll get rid of him if I have to promise to leave with him,' she said. And then, before she could think better of it, with the knife pressing against her back, Arkady turned and climbed the stairs to the surface.

  The interloper proved to be male, certainly, but he wasn't human. He was Crasii, wearing a hooded jacket against the bitter cold, which obscured his face. Arkady found him poking about the main part of the ruin upstairs, calling out periodically, and making no attempt at stealth. Although there was nothing overtly threatening about his behaviour, he was huge and acting as if he knew there was somebody hiding here. She watched him for a time from the shadows and then edged her way around the hall, trying to put as much distance as possible between herself and the hidden entrance to Boots's lair, more than a little worried by the sudden appearance of this canine Crasii.

  Despite her attempt to be stealthy, however, Arkady was still limping. A scrape of shoe leather on stone betrayed her. The canine's sharp ears picked up the sound. He spun around to look in her direction but Arkady was able to draw back behind a column before he caught sight of her.

  'Is someone there?' the Crash demanded. Even more worryingly, he demanded it in Glaeban.

  Arkady's heart hammered in her chest as she tried to work out what that meant. He was Crasii, so it was reasonable to assume he was here at the behest of an immortal master. With so many immortals abroad these days, all Crasii were suspect, except Scards like Boots whom Arkady had known since she was a pup, and whom she'd witnessed firsthand defying a Tide Lord.

  Was this creature here at the behest of Jaxyn Aranville? Had he sent someone in pursuit of her? This wasn't likely to be a Crasii sent by Elyssa, she reasoned, hunting a lost dam and puppies. Any Crasii she sent in pursuit of Boots would be speaking Caelish. Unless, of course, it was a trap, and the canine was speaking Glaeban in order to deliberately lull Boots into thinking she was safe ...

  Tides, what should I do?

  She could hear the canine coming to investigate the noise. Arkady had only seconds before she was discovered. If this Crasii — this creature magically compelled to obey the orders of his immortal masters — found her here, she could be back in the sadistic hands of Jaxyn Aranville before nightfall. There would be no reasoning with this beast. No chance of talking her way out of this one. No way to make him defy his orders ...

  Silently, Arkady withdrew the knife from the back of her skirt and held it in front of her. She knew what she had to do. Her freedom, the puppies' freedom, Boots's chance to reunite with her mate one day — all of them were dependent on not being discovered here and now.

  Arkady thrust the knife forward as soon as the Crasii rounded the pillar, ramming the blade as deeply as she could into the belly of the enormous creature before he could react. The beast lashed out at her with a snarl, scraping the side of her face and her shoulder

  before he fell, gripping the hilt of the knife with a howl of agony.

  Her face and shoulder stinging, her heart in her mouth, sweating as if it was high summer, Arkady jumped back as the canine crashed heavily to the leaf- strewn floor, blood seeping through the hooded jacket where he clutched at the knife.

  'Help me ...'

  Arkady took another step backward. She wasn't stupid enough to get any closer. Even writhing in agony and obviously dying, the canine was still dangerous, and if he managed to get that knife out of his belly, he'd be armed as well.

  'Please ...'

  Arkady hardened her heart to his pleas, figuring if she had the guts to kill this Crasii, she should have the courage to stand here and see it through. And it isn't like you haven't killed countless Crasii before, she reminded herself harshly.

  'Tides, my lady, what happened?'

  Arkady spun around to find Boots running toward them. 'It's all right, Boots, go back. I've taken care of it.'

  The dying canine looked up as she spoke. 'Boots ...?'

  'I heard someone howling like the ...' She stopped and stared down at the howling Crasii. 'Tides, woman. What have you done?'

  'Stay back, Boots,' Arkady urged, trying to stop the young female from getting any closer. 'He'll be dead soon.'

  'He'd better not be,' Boots said, shaking off Arkady. She ran to the canine and fell to her knees beside him.

  'Boots! Don't go near him! He's still dangerous!'

  The canine ignored Arkady. Instead, she pushed the hood from the intruder's head and pulled him onto her lap, her eyes filled with tears, muttering soothing nothings to him as she rocked him back and forth, tears streaming down her face. It was then that Arkady

  got her first good look at the canine. He seemed familiar, but she couldn't recall where she'd seen him before.

  It was Boots's distressed cries that finally revealed who her victim was. Arkady's heart lurched as Boots stared up at her accusingly.

  'He's not dangerous,' the Scard said with a tear- filled snarl. 'This is Warlock. The father of my puppies.' Boots leaned down and kissed his forehead before adding with a sob, 'You stupid bitch. You've killed my mate.'

  CHAPTER 32

  Cycrane seemed unnaturally peaceful. For a city that had been at war a couple of days ago, it was surprisingly quiet. Cayal leaned on the balcony of the Ladies Walking Room of the Cycrane Palace, barely noticing the bitter winter chill in the air. He looked out over the warm dots of light that marked the snow- shrouded city below him, and the dark stain behind the town, sucking in all the light, that marked the deep waters of the Lower Oran. 'Admiring the view?'

  Cayal didn't bother to turn. He'd felt Elyssa approaching on the Tide and had time to brace himself. 'I was trying to remember what this place looked like before the lake was here.'

  'Really?' she asked, coming to lean on the balcony beside him. 'And here I was thinking you were just sick of listening to my mother.'

  Cayal allowed himself a small smile. 'Well, there's that, too. Don't you ever get sick of her?'

  'All the tim
e.'

  He turned his back on the city, brushed the snow from the railing and perched on the edge of the balcony to study Elyssa in the starlight. She hadn't changed at all in the thousand or more years since he'd seen her last. She was still cursed with a receding chin, eyes set too far apart and a face that could most kindly be described as unfortunate. 'Why do you stay around this insane family of yours, Lyssa? You have the power to do anything you want. You could beat Tryan into a

  bloody pulp if you wanted to, and the rest of them can't hold a candle to you.'

  'They love me.'

  'Is that what you call it?'

  Elyssa turned from looking at the city to face him. 'They love me, Cayal. And they've been there for me. Through ten thousand years of immortality, they've always been there for me. Everyone else leaves eventually. If they're mortal, they die. If they're immortal, they just let you down.'

  'You're very bitter.'

  'I'm bitter? Tides, Cayal, you're suicidal.' She searched his face in the darkness, as if she was looking for answers he was certain she could never find in him. 'Do you really think Lukys can help you die?'

  'The question you should be asking yourself, Elyssa, is: can he help you live?'

  'In another body? One that's beautiful? One that's not a virgin? One that doesn't devour every lover she takes as he tries to enter her?' She smiled sceptically. Kentravyon had told her the story about Coryna and Coron the Rat. Cayal didn't think she believed a word of it. 'You do know Kentravyon is mad, don't you, Cayal?'

  'Yes.'

  'And yet you still believe him?'

  'It's not just Kentravyon. I've seen the lengths Lukys has gone to, to make this happen. Tides, he's built a palace in Jelidia for his one great love, Lyssa, to rival the one your mother built in Magreth.'

  'That's kind of romantic, when you think about it.' After a moment, Elyssa's dubious smile faded and she shook her head. She wasn't convinced. 'Kentravyon says Lukys has a new body selected for his lover.'