The Labyrinth of Flame

by Courtney Schafer

  Ness blinked at me. “You mean…you’re our handler now?”

  “Not a handler.” I didn’t ever want to be compared to Red Dal. “More like a guardian.”

  The kids darted uncertain glances at each other. They liked me well enough, but they didn’t know me like they did Red Dal.

  Tamin piped up. “Does that mean you’ll bring us candy every day instead of only sometimes?”

  “Maybe not every day,” I said, grinning at him. “But I’ve got some now, if anybody wants a treat.” I tossed Melly a bag full of sweets, which she promptly set about distributing. Pure bribery on my part, maybe, but it did me good to see the kids’ bulging cheeks and sticky grins. Even Ness wasn’t too old to clamor for her share, her worries temporarily forgotten.

  The toddler in Liana’s arms squirmed, reaching. She set him down, and he made a beeline for the action. Liana was still staring at me in disbelief.

  “You’re serious. You bought the entire den? Where did you get the money?”

  “Very long story. But, look. I’ve got the contract. Blood-marked and everything.” I pulled out the paperwork to show Liana. Pages crowded with names and descriptions and details, proving I’d bought out not only the kids’ contracts, but also hers, and purchased the den itself.

  Some of the handlers I’d gone to see remained in a state of shock, unable to believe their kids were truly no longer Tainted. They’d spouted all manner of crazy theories, like how the vanished Taint was a symptom of a city-wide curse that Sechaveh and his mages would soon break. They’d come around and sell eventually, but I’d have to keep poking at them. Red Dal, however, had leaped right on my offer in exchange for some choice charms from Ruslan’s vaults. He’d always had a gift for sniffing out the best chance of profit. He’d realized how insanely valuable strong charms would become once highsiders got their heads around the idea that the city’s mages couldn’t so easily make more.

  I leaned close enough to Liana that the kids couldn’t hear my next words. “You don’t have to stay on as minder. I can give you enough coin to start a new life. But if you want to stay, I’ll pay you a proper wage. Enough so you’ll never need to fear for your future, even after they grow up.”

  “Oh, Dev.” She grabbed me in a hug as tight as one of Cara’s, though she was all soft, plump curves instead of Cara’s lean strength. “To think I could see them grow up…” Her face was wet against my neck. “All these years, caring for Tainters only to watch Red Dal sell them off…I hated it, hated him, sometimes, but I didn’t think there was anything I could do other than make their lives as happy as I could, while I could.”

  I’d been caught in the same trap ever since my Change. I’d been so determined to save Melly, but I hadn’t let myself think about all the other kids in the dens. I’d told myself there was no help for it, nothing I could do for them. Life was hard in Ninavel, and that was that.

  But Zadikah had the right of it when she called that cowardice. I’d thought myself so immune to fear, dancing with death on the highest of peaks. But I’d been too scared of ganglords to lift a damn finger against them.

  Not anymore. “The old days are done,” I said into Liana’s curls, my eyes hot and my heart full. “The city’s different now. Everything can be different, if we fight for it to be.”

  * * *

  (Kiran)

  Lord Sechaveh’s audience chamber was quiet and shadowed, the only light a cool wash of purple from a single magelight in one of the iron sconces between the windows. The silver ring that had once provided a window onto the confluence’s fire now contained only an ember of blue so faint it was barely visible, even in Kiran’s enhanced sight.

  The room was empty of guards. Sechaveh sat alone in his great stone chair, slumped and brooding. He was no mage, but his life was bound to the confluence; with its power drained to a mere thread, Sechaveh’s former vitality had likewise ebbed. His seamed brown face had become wizened, his silver hair sparse, his shoulders stooped. Yet there was a spark deep within his lizard-yellow eyes that warned the lord of Ninavel was not as feeble as he appeared.

  He did not yell for his mages when Kiran appeared, or reveal the least sign of fear. He only said in a husky rasp, “Young Kiran, is it? So it is true, what my shadow men claim. You’ve become a demon.”

  “Something like,” Kiran said levelly. “So if you think to seek revenge, you’ll find it a futile endeavor. No magic any of Ninavel’s mages can cast can touch me—and do not think to touch my friends, or I will end your life as I did Ruslan’s.”

  Sechaveh chuckled. “Revenge…ah, boy, you mistake me for your former master. Ruslan was always given to temper. But, hah! He could afford it. I, on the other hand…I have always been a practical man. I don’t deny you’ve cost me and my city dearly, yet Ninavel still stands, and I still survive. I’ve never found profit in bitterness and regrets.”

  He leaned forward, his gnarled fingers gripping the polished white quartz of his chair. “In truth, I was hoping you’d come to me. After Vidai zha-Dakhar’s attacks on Ninavel, I had my scholars research these creatures called demons. It would seem they once lived in our realm and built many great cities and wonders that survive now only in scattered, broken remnants. I had been considering how best to open a dialogue with them—preferably without leaping into any dangerous bargains as I feared Ruslan had—and now, here you are. A ready-made ambassador.”

  Kiran had known Sechaveh’s single-minded focus on profit. He and Lena had counted on it, even. Yet still, the man was unbelievable. “Do you realize that Ruslan nearly turned your largest trade partner into a lifeless waste? That his so-called allies would’ve done the same to all of Arkennland if they had succeeded in taking me? Thinking solely of what advantage you can squeeze out of demons isn’t practical; it’s idiocy.”

  “An idiot, am I?” said Sechaveh, undisturbed. “Tell me, how will these demons respond to your sudden presence in their midst? Am I wrong in thinking that while their attentions have strayed far from humankind these last centuries, now their focus will return to us? I suspect that is a danger we can’t avoid.”

  Sechaveh was not wrong. Kiran had spent much time discussing the problem with Lena, Dev, and Cara, but now he remained silent. Make the old bastard think he’s got to convince you, Dev had said.

  “You don’t seek profit,” Sechaveh said. “But you seek safety, and not just for yourself but for your human friends. I have resources you do not, to plumb ancient texts and call together the brightest of scholars and mages to study this problem of demonkind. I ask you to consider what best serves your own goals.”

  “You want me to be your ally, as Ruslan was.” Kiran didn’t hide his disgust at the idea. “To take his place, while you continue to let others just as vicious as he was do as they please to those who lack protection.”

  Sechaveh sighed. “Ah, you are so young. Do you think draining the confluence has made any difference to human nature? It’s the nature of most people—not all, I’ll grant you, but most—to seek personal gain at any cost. No ruler can change that. The Alathians have tried, it’s true; but I think you have no love for their methods either.”

  No, but Kiran refused to believe there was no hope of a middle ground. He and Lena intended to find in Ninavel those honorable people Sechaveh thought so rare, and build with them an alternative to Sechaveh’s rule. But Kiran didn’t fool himself that would be a fast process. In the interim, they’d planned a different tactic.

  Kiran said, “I see no point in allying with someone who encourages the worst that humans do to each other. You say you are a practical man. Well, then: if you want my alliance, you’ll have to show me you’re worth my time. Find a way to give protection to those who need it most—the untalented, the poor—so they can at least live without fearing death may come at a moment’s whim.”

  Sechaveh’s wizened face was impossible to read. “You ask much,” he said. “I have not the lever I once did.”

  “You’re a clever man,” said Kiran.
“If you put your mind to the problem, I have no doubt you could find a way. And if you lack inspiration, I have someone who can help you.”

  He went to the chamber door and pulled it open.

  In the hallway beyond, Lena stood before a pair of uneasy guards. She wore tightly fitted trousers and tunic of dark blue, marked with silver sigils of her own design. Her hair was pulled back into a sleek little tail, her freckled face set in lines of proud formality.

  Kiran beckoned her within the chamber. The guards moved to follow, but Sechaveh twitched a hand, and they retreated.

  Kiran said, “You may remember Lenarimanas, formerly of Alathia. Consider her my representative in your realm, and treat her with the courtesy you extend every ambassador in Ninavel. Should she tell me you have proved serious in your efforts, I will consider alliance.”

  Lena gave Sechaveh a sharply precise bow. “I too can offer the city much. My magic does not depend on a confluence. Plus I spent a year stationed at Alathia’s coastal shipyards.”

  Sechaveh gave his crackling laugh. “A renegade Alathian! Now there is a rarity almost as intriguing as you, Kiran. Oh, you are clever, to offer me such an ambassador. You are so very like your master. He was an idealist too, in his own way.”

  Once, Kiran’s ikilhia would have seethed hot in angry denial of the comparison. Now, with the distant sense of Dev warm in his mind, and Lena a reassuring blaze of silver at his side, he merely shrugged. “So long as you remember that my desires are not Ruslan’s.”

  Sechaveh inclined his head. “I will work to satisfy them. But I ask you to think on this: Ninavel is no easy city to maintain, especially now you have removed its greatest resource. If I fall, I guarantee you this city will crumble within a season. Help me, and together we can ensure its survival.”

  Lena shot Kiran one coolly satisfied glance. “Then,” she said, “let us discuss how you might ensure free access to the lake for all the city’s residents.”

  * * *

  (Dev)

  I hopped down a giant’s staircase of boulders surrounded by graceful pines. Ahead, Cara was crossing a swift-rushing stream, her blonde braid swaying as she balanced on rocks poking through the foaming waters. I cast an appreciative glance back at the jagged summit of Stormfang Spire thrusting high above the pines. The peak’s pale rock was kindled by the setting sun into a deep, burnished gold, though down here in the valley we’d long been in shadow. The air had a sharper bite than the ordinary chill of approaching evening; summer had faded into the brief, glorious mountain autumn. The catsclaw bushes beside the stream blazed vivid orange, and the meadows had turned sere and yellow. Wouldn’t be long before the first snows fell. I’d seen frost on the cliffs this morning.

  Gods, what a climb. Pitch after pitch of clean, quartz-studded granite, some of it challenging as hell, but striped with enough ledges to make belaying a breeze. Stormfang’s summit was so narrow that only one of us could balance on it at a time. I’d stood with my arms spread wide, glorying in the expanse of peaks stabbing skyward all around—and reveling equally in the sight of Cara grinning up at me from the ledge below.

  She had a new set of ice tools strapped to her pack, I had a beautifully braided new rope, and even Melly would have to agree that we’d sealed our promises of contracted partnership as well as any tale could ask. I hopped across the stream, caught up to Cara, and swung her into a kiss that left her laughing, her eyes alight.

  “What was that for?”

  “Because today was one of the best climbs of my life.” It felt so good to be in the mountains again. Between me rushing around to ten different dens of Tainters, and Cara’s work with Lena in organizing guilds to oppose ganglords, our time away from Ninavel had come in scant, stolen days. Thank Khalmet for Kiran, who’d traced earth-currents until he found a few valleys in the Whitefires with enough natural magic that he could take us to them.

  He was waiting for us back at camp. On Stormfang’s summit, I’d felt the gentle brush across my mind that was his way of seeking invitation. Stormfang was way too far from the earth-current for him to reach in person, but he’d watched through my eyes and shared in my joy, until he’d withdrawn so I might make the climb down undistracted.

  Cara said, “I say we add to our contract that we have to climb a peak as fun as Stormfang every month.”

  We’d written up a contract, but hadn’t yet signed it. There was one last issue we wanted to work out once we reached camp.

  “I’m all for a climbing clause,” I said. “I’ll go crazy if I don’t get out of the city more. I need to get Melly up here, too. City climbing’s all well and good, but she’ll need more practice on real rock to be an outrider.”

  Cara said, “She’s a good climber, but I’m not sure she’ll be an outrider.”

  “What?” My pace, which had picked up in anticipation of seeing Kiran, slowed again. “Why not?”

  Cara shrugged. “She likes the mountains, but I think she likes the city more. She’s sharp, and she likes bargaining, and people. Wouldn’t surprise me if she ends up working for one of Lena’s guilds. Or heading down to Prosul Akheba to work with Janek.”

  I still couldn’t wrap my mind around it. She was Sethan’s daughter, she was trained in climbing same as I was, and I’d just assumed she’d want to be an outrider like him and me. How could she not love the mountains?

  Cara said, “Don’t you dare show her you’re disappointed, if that’s what she chooses.”

  I scrubbed at my face, abashed. “It’s just a surprise, is all.”

  Cara laughed. “Get used to it. My mother always told me that children are the gods’ way of testing your balance.”

  We broke from the trees into a narrow meadow backed by soaring cliffs. Kiran was standing by a rough stone shelter on the meadow’s far side. Cara and I hadn’t had time yet to make the shelter much more than a glorified windbreak, but I had visions of building a full-fledged cabin if we kept visiting the valley.

  Kiran waved at us in welcome. He’d learned to disguise his eyes; now he looked as human as he’d once been. The only telltale was the cold, unchanging pallor of his skin. In the old days, his cheeks would burn red at the slightest teasing. Now he stayed white as ice no matter the provocation. A difference I hadn’t brought up to him.

  “I brought you a feast to celebrate your contract.” Kiran indicated the bulging pack at his feet. “I’ve got all your favorites. Now that boats are going across the lake to reach the trade routes, Chadeil’s shop is even selling spice cakes again.”

  I could smell them, too. Honey and cinnamon and currants and moist, rich cake…my stomach growled loud enough to deafen me.

  “Kiran, have I told you that you’re amazing?” Cara caught him in one of her exuberant embraces. “Good to see you, and not just because you brought us real food.”

  He might not be able to feel the warmth of her arms, but he’d gotten a lot less tentative about returning her affection. His teeth flashed in a smile, and he said something in her ear that made her laugh, bright and uninhibited. Before he could let go, she kissed him—just a quick touch of her lips, but his eyes went wide in sudden, startled vulnerability.

  I braced for the stab of loss he so often suffered when one of us touched him, but to my surprise, the pain didn’t come. I wasn’t sure whether to be glad or unsettled. It wasn’t that I wanted him to be hurt, but I also didn’t want him getting used to being bodiless…oh, hell, now I was just being stupid.

  “Welcome back,” I said, and hugged them both. Kiran felt as solid and real as Cara in my arms. Almost, I could pretend that the cold of his skin was merely from the chill of the evening.

  He was brimming with such excitement he hadn’t noticed my idiocy, thank the gods. “I have news from Ninavel. The Council’s made a decision on Marten. He’s been stripped of his rank and put in a snapthroat charm, but they haven’t recalled him to Alathia. Ambassador Ponallan requested that Marten serve the first term of his sentence in the embassy. I think Marten convinced P
onallan to use him as a type of advisor.”

  Cara shook her head. “That man, I swear. He could charm the snakes from the dunes. The ambassador’s one thing, but how d’you think Marten talked the Council into leniency? I was certain they’d toss him in one of their coal mines.”

  Kiran said, “Ambassador Ponallan is new to Ninavel, and the Council has recalled all of their other mages back to Alathia. They’re still panicked over how to enforce their laws without their border wards and detection spells. I suspect Marten made the case that Ponallan would benefit from having an advisor bound to his service who understood foreign magic, demons, and Arkennlanders—and better yet, one who is both clever and expendable, should the city slide into chaos.”

  “I imagine Lena is happy he’s staying.” My thoughts weren’t on her, but on Kiran: sometimes it struck me so powerfully how much he’d changed from the naïve youth I’d once shepherded across the Whitefires.

  “She is,” Kiran said. “That’s not my only news. Raishal’s had her child—a girl she’s named Vedda. The birth was difficult, but Teo says they’ll be fine.”

  I shared Kiran’s relief. “Now that is good news. I don’t suppose she’s let Teo join the marriage?”

  “Not yet,” Kiran said. “But I hold out hope. I think Teo does too, though he’s afraid to admit it.”

  “I think we all know what that feels like,” Cara said, aiming an arch glance at me. “But right now, I confess, all I can think about is how much I want to devour whatever smells so good in your pack.” She unlaced the flap and dug inside. “Oooh, salt cheese…and firewine…”

  I said, “I’ll go refill the waterskins, if you promise not to eat everything before I get back. Then we can share a proper dinner.” I bent to unlash the skins from our packs.

  “I’ll help you fill the skins,” Kiran offered. “That way, you can get to the food faster.”