The Shadow Games: The Chronicles of Arianthem VI

by Samantha Sabian

  “My name is Skye.”

  “Yes, my little Tavinter,” Ingrid said in a condescending tone, knowing the revelations had been inevitable. “Your name is Skye.”

  The girl still was very unsure what that meant. But she did know that this sorceress could easily kill her friends, and she was the only one who could stop that.

  “Please don’t hurt them.”

  “Hmm,” Ingrid said, enjoying her position of advantage, “then perhaps we can make a bargain.”

  “Skye,” Dallan said pleadingly, “do not bargain with her.”

  Skye assessed the situation, still battling the massive confusion that was taking place in her head as memories continued to rush back and attempted to reorganize themselves. It made it difficult to concentrate, and her tongue felt thick, her speech slow, when she responded to the sorceress.

  “What kind of deal?”

  Ingrid smoothed her robes. “I could easily kill your friends and take you by force, but I must say, I have enjoyed our relationship these past months.”

  Dallan nearly choked on her rage. For the witch to even speak of a relationship when she had never even given Skye the opportunity to consent was obscene.

  Skye looked to the four around her, Syn, who could not move and was still gasping for air, Rika, who could barely be seen through the roots encasing her, Torsten, who was still helpless and unconscious on the ground, and Dallan, who for all her strength, struggled futilely against her ice restraints.

  “So what do you want of me?” Skye asked.

  The sorceress removed an amulet from the folds of her robes. It glowed bright red as it twisted and turned on its gold chain, sending off rays of ruby light as the sun struck its many facets. Ingrid held the amulet at arm’s length, took the rubicund in her hand, and crushed it. A blinding light flashed out, and now, where the amulet had been, was a hole in the air that swirled with red turbulence.

  “This is a portal,” Ingrid said, “one that you and I are leaving by. I can incapacitate you with a spell, and we will be gone, leaving your friends’ bodies behind us.”

  “Or—?” Skye asked carefully.

  “You will come with me of your own free will. You will give me your word that you will stay with me. Forever. That you will not try to escape.”

  “No!” Dallan nearly screamed. “Don’t do this, Skye! Don’t sacrifice yourself!”

  But Dallan knew that she would, just as she had done in the Ha’kan war against the Tavinter, giving herself up so her people could go free. And the sorceress knew it as well.

  Skye contemplated her options, her thinking still so muddled she felt she had but one.

  “Very well,” she said at last. “I will come with you. And I give you my word.”

  “You know,” Ingrid said, “I actually believe you. The Tavinter are terrible liars, and you are telling the truth. In that case,” she said raising her hands, “you won’t mind if I cast a spell of binding on you, one that ties you to me just as I have described?”

  Skye squared her shoulders. “I have given you my word, so do as you will.”

  The sorceress smiled and cast the spell.

  Raine frowned, taking another brief rest on a rock ledge. She had lost count of how many vampyres she had killed, but really, the last creature was too much. She wasn’t sure if it was a spider or a crab or a giant centipede, or the divine-knows-what, but it had claws and pinchers and antennae, and far too many eyes and legs for any living being. It was hideous and spit acid, and it made a terrible clicking, screeching noise that did not stop until the damn thing was gurgling out green pus at the end of her sword. And then the smell was so bad that Raine kicked the carcass off the edge into the abyss, realizing how far they had come when she could not hear the shell hit the bottom.

  “What was that thing?” Aesa asked, horrified.

  “I don’t know,” Raine said, disgusted, “some weird ‘welcome home’ present for you, I imagine. Or maybe I was supposed to be its lunch. But either way, it’s just one more dead thing in our wake.”

  Raine’s breathing slowed to normal, but Aesa wished for her to rest a little longer. The gods themselves would have grown tired at the unending battle this Scinterian was waging single-handedly.

  “So, you spoke of your love earlier, was that the blue dragon?”

  Raine laughed. “Oh, no. That was Kylan, and I only just met her. She serves my love, however.”

  “Serves her?” Aesa said in surprise. From appearances, that formidable creature served no one.

  “My love is Talan’alaith’illaria.”

  “The Queen of all Dragons?” Aesa asked in disbelief, “She has not been seen since the Great War!”

  “You were in a tomb for quite some time,” Raine reminded her. “I stirred her from her solitude a few decades back, and she has been much more visible since.”

  “I would love to see her,” Aesa said.

  “She does not care much for mortals,” Raine said apologetically, “although she has deigned to meet with many of late.”

  “And why is she not here helping you?”

  That was a good question, Raine thought, and although she knew her response was correct, she did not think it complete.

  “She must deal with the dragons, the ones who are on the other side of this contract I seek to have revoked. Both sides of this matter are dangerous. The Shadow Guild can sow seeds of chaos, and the dragons can create their own upheaval.”

  “So you split up to deal with both.”

  “Yes.”

  There was a tinge of sadness in the matter-of-fact response, one that Aesa keyed upon.

  “You don’t like being separated from her.”

  “I hate it,” Raine said, “but in truth, my love is always with me, and I am always with her.”

  Aesa was envious of the utter romance of that statement, but not the responsibility that weighed so heavily on these two lovers.

  “We should move again,” Raine said.

  Talan was growing weary. The restraints felt heavy, heavier than the chains that pulled the Great Scales of Dark and Light that she had destroyed at the Gates of the Underworld. Volva seemed content to loll about on the sofa, and Jörmung sat staring at her with a greasy sheen on his forehead and upper lip. He leaned toward with anticipation as Talan went to her knees, still proudly upright, but no longer able to stand.

  “Starting to get to you a little, are they?” Volva said mockingly. “You’ve actually lasted a lot longer than I predicted. And by the way, if you’re expecting your forces to return with any swiftness, you can forget that notion. I’m sure your followers have been annihilated by now, ambushed in the Frost Straits. Such a narrow passage, offering a magnificent tailwind, but so strategically vulnerable.”

  “I do not expect my forces to return any time soon,” Talan said, testing the restraints for the thousandth time since they had been placed on her wrists. “I told them to avoid the Frost Straits at all costs.”

  “What?” Volva said, sitting upright from the couch.

  “In fact,” Talan said, “they should be meeting your forces when they exit from the south side of the Straits, wondering where in the world their quarry went. And your unsuspecting, traitorous bunch will meet with every elder dragon under my command. Many dragons will meet their doom today, but I don’t think any of them will be mine.”

  Volva got to her feet, her thoughts racing. How could Talan have outwitted her on this maneuver? She calmed herself, however. The Queen was weakening, and at the end of the day, it didn’t matter what happened to every other dragon in Arianthem if Talan fell. She gave voice to her thoughts.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Volva said, “a little thinning of the herd is probably a good thing. Once their Queen is gone, they will all fall in line behind me.”

  “So sure that you are the next in line?”
>
  Both Volva and Jörmung whirled at the sarcastic tone. A woman in spiked, scaled blue armor that twinkled like the stars strolled into the great hall. Her icy blue eyes looked to the two Ancient Dragons with disdain, and she shifted her enormous sword from one shoulder to the other.

  “Kylan,” Volva said, spitting out the name. Jörmung slunk back a bit, then remembered that they had Kylan outnumbered and stepped forward once more. His waffling merely made him look both stupid and cowardly.

  “I beg your pardon, my Queen,” Kylan said, addressing Talan. Her tone was off-handed but her eyes swept Talan with concern: she did not look well. “I was delayed fulfilling your orders, but thought you would easily hold these two off until I could arrive.”

  “That most likely would have been the case,” Talan said wearily, “were it not for Hel’s interference.” She held up the glowing restraints. “These are her curse. I cannot break them, and even now they drain me.”

  Kylan’s dismay was evident.

  “It’s a good thing you brought Talan’s sword,” Volva said derisively.

  “It’s not her sword,” Kylan said, whirling on the golden dragon, her menacing tone causing Jörmung to shift once more. “It was a gift to me from Talan centuries ago. Ilkar had two legs, remember?”

  “Even so,” Volva said, her own menace rising to the occasion, and her “s” sounds beginning to come out like hissing. “you are outnumbered. There are only four Ancient Dragons left, and your Queen is quite incapacitated.”

  “No,” Kylan said, shaking her head. “There are five Ancient Dragons left.”

  Jörmung started to laugh but his laughter was cut short by a body that was flung at his feet. It was a young man, bloodied and bruised, his wounds grotesque and his face beaten beyond recognition. His arms and legs were angulated where there were no joints. He looked as if he had been crushed to death, pulled apart by his extremities, then crumpled into a ball. The only thing that identified him was the shock of reddish-brown hair that clung to the remains of his scalp.

  “I believe that bit of filth belongs to you,” Drakar said, stepping from the shadows, his dark eyes for once deadly serious. In fact, there was a severity in his tone that Volva had never heard. She made as if to speak, but Drakar would not let her.

  “My father was Ilkar’anaton’alar, an Ancient Dragon,” Drakar said, biting off his words, his voice hardening. “My mother is Talan’alaith’illaria, Queen of all Dragons,” he said, raising his mother’s sword in front of him, “and one day I will be an Ancient Dragon.” He swung the massive sword in a great arc that created its own wind in what had once been the throne room of the keep.

  “And when I do, it will be at my mother’s side.”

  Volva was furious and her breasts heaved with that fury. Talan had anticipated everything, had outwitted her at every turn, and where she thought she had allies, she had only enemies, and where she thought she had spies, she had only pawns that had been removed from the game long before she knew it. Were it not for the gift of the Goddess, this whole thing would have been a disaster.

  Even though Jörmung knew Volva would face Kylan and he would be left only to battle that boy, the rapidity with which everything had unraveled had spooked him. He had gone from lazy fantasies about sodomizing Talan to fearing he would be beaten to death by that dark-eyed hurricane who had somehow gone from fop to tempest overnight. He hurriedly considered his alternatives, weighed his options….

  And fled the room.

  A brilliant flash of light, the thud of enormous footsteps, a huge gust of wind, and the leathery flapping of wings told the story of Jörmung’s transformation and winged escape.

  “Drakar, my dear,” Talan said tiredly.

  “Yes, mother?”

  “Go get the fat one.”

  Skye flinched as the spell came towards her, feeling its strength and knowing that she would indeed be tied to the sorceress for all of time. Dallan screamed in agony, knowing she was about to lose Skye forever. Rika felt hot tears slip from her eyes, the only movement she could manage so encased by the roots was she. Syn just closed her eyes, unable to watch.

  But the spell was blocked, its deflection obvious as some force was inserted between Skye and the spell. Rays of light shot outward from the deflection in every direction except towards Skye.

  “Now how is that possible?” Ingrid murmured. She thought for a moment that the girl had accomplished the feat, but Skye looked as baffled as she. Then she felt some enormous power behind her, something different and yet very, very familiar.

  “Isleif?” Ingrid said, disbelief in her voice as she sought to identify the source of the power.

  “Not Isleif,” came the amused, sultry voice from around the hedge. A woman stepped around the corner of the labyrinth, a primordial, smoldering creature of fire and ice whose eyes were full of mirth and destruction. She was as dark as the sorceress was light: raven hair, dark eyes, dark robes with arcane symbols of magic and dragons, robes that were draped about her everywhere but the front where the vest she wore dipped to her navel, revealing all but the tips of perfect breasts that Sjöfn herself would envy.

  “Idonea,” Skye whispered.

  “Hello, little one,” Idonea said. She held up a tiny vial of blood that glowed as brightly as a small red sun. “Found you.”

  “Who are you?” Ingrid demanded.

  “Oh, I think you know who I am,” Idonea said. With a wave of her hand, she released Syn. A mere gesture melted the ice around Dallan in a flood. A mere glance caused the roots to withdraw from Rika and disappear back into the earth. Even Torsten stirred from his near-mortal blow as Syn knelt down at his side.

  “I am Isleif’s protégé,” Idonea said. “The one he has chosen as his successor.”

  Ingrid burned with anger. That should have been her title. Isleif should have trained her as his replacement. Her hatred of the old man made her bold where caution was more in order.

  “Then I would strike at you just to strike at him.”

  “You can try, my dear,” Idonea said, raising her staff. “Shall we dance?”

  Talan had no more given the word, then Drakar dropped his sword and sprinted from the room. He was so swift, there were no thudding footsteps, merely a flash of red light as he went airborne before he was entirely transformed. There was the sound of strong young wings, then the sleek black dragon disappeared into the clouds in pursuit of Jörmung.

  Kylan kept her eye on Volva as she knelt down beside Talan.

  “Can we break these chains together?” Kylan asked.

  “Perhaps,” Talan said. “Let us try.”

  “You can’t break them,” Volva said shrilly, “you can’t escape your fate, Talan.”

  And unfortunately, Volva was correct, at least about the breaking of the bonds. Even with the full strength of two Ancient Dragons, it could not be done. And the effort exhausted Talan, so she leaned against the bench behind her to keep from collapsing.

  Kylan was angry, and turned her wrath and her sword upon Volva.

  “You will pay for this treachery, you bitch.”

  Volva watched with pleasure as Talan slowly slid to the floor, unable to keep herself upright even with the support of the bench. Kylan was torn between wanting to destroy Volva, and wanting to protect her Queen. She cried out and kneeled at Talan’s side.

  Raine knew they were almost at the top. Time had lost all meaning as the world had become a series of violent deaths one after the other, a windstorm of blood, dismembered body parts, and black ash. The part of her that was Arlanian was numbed by the carnage. The part of her that was Scinterian was more alive than ever. It was this alternating subjugation of one heritage to another that made her such a dangerous and unique individual. Her markings were in vivid relief on her skin, the blue and gold scars livid as if they had been inflicted yesterday. Her breath, however, was calming once
more, just as it had done a thousand times since entering the caverns, or so it seemed.

  “You fight like one of the gods,” Aesa said in quiet awe.

  “I’d like to think I fight a little bit fairer than them,” Raine said.

  Aesa was curious. “You speak of the gods as if you are familiar with them.”

  “No,” Raine said, “not at all. Well, one of them, I am. I can count Fenrir as a friend and ally.”

  “Really?” Aesa asked. “That surprises me. We consider him evil, or at least untrustworthy.”

  “Most of the stories you’ve heard about him aren’t true, he’s nothing like that.”

  “Did he really bite off Tyr’s hand?”

  “He swears that he did not.”

  Raine grew quiet again, and Aesa’s next question was tentative.

  “The blue dragon spoke of Fenrir’s sister.”

  Raine stiffened and Aesa was almost sorry she asked. But her curiosity was too great.

  “She spoke of Hel, did she not?”

  “Yes,” Raine said, her eyes the light blue of her father’s people.

  “I was not even sure she existed,” Aesa said, “I thought she might be a story made up to frighten people.”

  “Trust me, she’s real, and she’s frightening. I’ve had the displeasure of meeting her, and she is not as pleasant as Fenrir.”

  Raine leapt to her feet, obviously wanting to end the conversation. Aesa was surprised, therefore, when Raine came to a halt within a few feet, growing very still.

  “What is it?”

  Raine turned to Aesa and the Empress once again noted how mercurial the Scinterian’s eyes were. A second before they had been light blue. Now they were so dark they were almost purple.

  “Something’s wrong.”

  The battle between Idonea and the sorceress was pitched. The garden was in utter ruins, a victim to fire and ice and wind and lightning, conjured beasts, monstrosities raised from the dead, creatures assembled from whatever was at hand including plants, insects, rodents, snakes, in whatever combination the mage and the sorceress could imagine. A creature made entirely of thorns lashed out at creature made entirely of rock. A mass of flame in the shape of a dog was drowned by a raptor made of water. Ingrid was a picture of furious, ice-cold focus while Idonea was a whirlwind of diabolical fire.