"Quite sure. This mage holds more power than any I've ever seen. Much more than me, I'm afraid.”
“Well. I've never met a mage yet who was immune to a knife in the throat.” Of course. I didn't happen to have a knife, just at that moment.
“Let's try to stay positive until circumstances force us to become otherwise, shall we?”
“All right. I'll play nice.”
As the boat drew even closer, I noticed the pole used to propel it was three times my length, which made me feel better about not trying for the shore. I also noticed that the mage was a woman, which surprised me.
It's not that I'd never heard of female mages, but I had never actually seen one. They were rare, unless you counted blood mages. Women excelled in blood magic. Low Country women were accorded an extra measure of civility based on that fact alone—you just never knew who you might be insulting.
This was no Low Country mage, though, blood or otherwise. She was as brown as a nut and her hair was straight and dark. As she drew closer, I could tell her eyes were a brown that could almost be called black. Such a combination of physical features was as rare in the Low Countries as ice in summer.
Just where she was from, I couldn't say. Somewhere far to the east of the Dragonsea, most likely.
When she had approached to within fifty feet or so, she pushed off with the pole one last time and lay it down in the punt at an incline, wet end on the boat's bottom, dry end sticking out the back, rising at a slight angle above the water. She took a wide stance in the center of the punt. The boat slowed as it approached the quay. When it came abreast of us it was moving at the pace of a leisurely stroll. She hopped out onto the slick stone quay a few feet away from us, lithe as a dancer, then stuck one foot back out over the water and stopped the punt.
“Good morning,” she said. “I've come to collect you.”
“Who the hells are you?” I asked. Holgren tutted me.
“Forgive me." she said with false heartiness. “Goodness only knows what you must be thinking. First things first. I am Ruiqi. I'm afraid I only know you by inference. I suppose there could be others about that match your descriptions, but it's highly unlikely, no? They don't call these the Empty Lands for nothing.”
Her name pretty much confirmed my ideas as to her origins. It had a distinctly Chagan flavor.
“What exactly do you want?” I asked.
“As I said, I'm here to collect you. If you prefer not to accompany me, you're certainly welcome to wander about on your own—but I'm sure you're well aware of the dangers once night falls.”
“Where is it you intend to convey us, Ruiqi?” asked Holgren. Mages tend to talk like that in each other's company, I’ve noticed. Won't bother with one word if three will do, and won't use a little one if they can think of a big one to take its place.
“Why, to my master, of course. I'd think that was obvious.”
“I’ll bite,” I said. “Who's your master?”
She looked at me, as an adult would a particularly slow child.
“The Shadow King, my dear. The Shadow King.”
It's probably a good thing I didn't have a knife. I settled for glaring at her. It wasn't very satisfying.
“He's sent me to convey his sincerest apologies for the treatment you've received thus far. It has been a case of mistaken identity.”
“You mean he collared me instead of Athagos.”
“Oh. You've worked that out, have you?” Her tone rode the edge of condescension.
“Indeed.” Holgren replied.
“Then you know how dangerous my master's intended quarry is, and why he felt it necessary to employ the methods he has, to secure her. Empires have risen and fallen in the vast span of time he has waited for her.”
“History concerns us less than future events, Ruiqi,” said Holgren. “You've acknowledged the fact that we are not your master's quarry. What does he want with us, then?”
“The Shadow King wishes to discuss a matter with you. It involves the necklace your companion wears.”
“If he wants this Kerf-damned necklace back, I'd be more than happy to give it to him. In fact, why don't you take it to him? Just show me how to get it off and I'll hand it right over.”
“I'm afraid it isn't that simple.”
It never is.
“I cannot free you of the necklace," she continued. “Certain conditions must be met. Come with me, and all will be made plain. The Shadow King wishes you no harm.”
“No? You could have fooled me. What were those raiders doing two nights ago, giving in to high spirits? And the Sending? I suppose she was just trying to throw a scare into us. Do me a favor and don't bother to lie. You're no good at it.”
“As I said, my master expected another to be wearing the necklace. The umbrals were on ... other business when they came across you and recognized you as the necklace bearer.”
“What about the other one? She knew I wasn't Athagos. She didn't care.”
“Shemrang is often willful. She will be castigated.” She raised her hands in a conciliatory gesture. “Truly my master wishes neither of you harm, but he requires the necklace you wear. If you do not accompany me, you will leave him little choice but to compel you to come to him. He has sent me as proof of his desire to avoid such measures.”
“He's already tried to 'compel' us. It didn't work out quite the way he planned, did it?”
She gave us both appraising looks. “Somehow I doubt you'll be able to resist his invitation again, come nightfall. Be sensible. Why take a hard road when there is a much easier route? In the end the necklace will draw you to him no matter what. That is its function.”
I didn't trust her, and I damn sure didn't trust her master, but she was right. The necklace wasn't going to let me go free. If the beasties of the night didn't get me, I'd end up going to him on my own. He had me, whether he wanted me or not. It was only a matter of time. Kerf’s crooked staff.
“Fine,” I said. “Go. Wait here for me, Holgren. I'll be back as soon as I can.” No reason for him to stick his head in the noose. I was the one wearing the necklace.
“Don't even think it. Where you go, I go.”
“I don't want to argue about this, Holgren—”
“Then don't. Just accept the fact that I'm coming with you, because I am.”
I pulled him aside. Ruiqi turned her back to our whispered conference with a smirk.
“That's stupid,” I hissed. “How are you going to rescue me from the clutches of evil if evil is clutching you as well?”
“Don't be so melodramatic. If anything happens, our best chance of dealing with it is together. I wasn't able to be there for you in Thagoth. I will be for this. Nothing you say will sway me.”
“You had a good excuse, being dead and all. All right, fine. I could use the company. She gets on my nerves.”
He smiled, “I don't think you're her favorite, either. Try not to antagonize her. She's too powerful.”
“I promise nothing.”
“You've decided, then,” she said. “Good. Time flies and my master waits.”
“Keeps you on a short leash, does he? Keep your robe on. We're coming.”
I helped Holgren to the punt and he settled in the center while she held it steady. I would have liked to have sat in the back, to keep an eye on her, but that was where she poled from.
When we were settled she pushed off, turned the punt around with practiced ease, and set out for the far side of the lake, and the Shadow King. The lake was larger than it looked from the cliff. Ruiqi poled us along for nearly an hour before we caught sight of the far shore.
During the ride I decided to do a little digging.
“Ruiqi. Can I ask you a question?”
“If you must.”
“From everything I've heard, this Shadow King isn't a particularly nice individual. Why do you serve him?”
“For power, of course.”
“I see.” Though I didn't. Not really. “Care to elaborate?”<
br />
“No.”
“Suit yourself.” I looked out into the green-brown water and at the wooded shoreline sliding by at a deceptively lazy pace.
“So how’d you get so good at boating?”
“Practice.”
“Where?”
She cast a suspicious look my way. “Why would you want to know?”
“I'm working on my conversational skills. Holgren seems to think I can be a little abrasive when I first meet someone.” He grunted behind me.
“Imagine that,” she said.
“So?”
“So what?”
“So where did you learn to pole a punt?”
I didn't think she would answer, but she did, after a fashion.
“On a lake, much like this one. Like this one, that lake was slowly being strangled by plants and accumulated silt. In a century or so this will all be marsh, most likely.”
“What a pleasant thought.”
“Change is nature’s way. What cannot or will not adapt disappears, to be replaced by something more able to survive. Or something more willing. You would do well to remember that, when you meet the Shadow King.”
“I’ll keep it in mind.”
“Listen to me,” she hissed in an entirely different tone.
I whipped around to see her face twisted in some inner agony. Her body, too, was twisted to one side, abnormally so. She looked like a completely different woman.
“Listen to me. Don't anger him. Don't balk him. You will live to regret it.” And just like that she stood up straight again and snapped back to the snide, overconfident woman we'd first encountered. I just stared at her, openmouthed.
“What are you looking at?” she asked, brow furrowed.
“Nothing. Sorry.” I turned back around and looked out at the water, shaken. Something was very wrong with our gondolier. Whatever power she'd gained from the Shadow King, I was willing to bet, came with some serious tradeoffs. I didn't feel sorry for her, but I found it hard to keep my animosity sharp. I didn't feel like baiting her anymore.
I kept quiet the rest of the trip. So did everybody else. Including her second voice, thankfully.
I don't know what I expected to find on the far side of the lake—something akin to the death lands, perhaps, all twisted foliage and vile monsters. The reality was far different, and far more dangerous in its innocuousness.
We came to a simple wooden dock, with a dirt path that led off through knee-high grass into a stand of evergreens. Sparrows flitted and chirped in the grass and the trees. It would have been the perfect spot to put up a cabin. There was nothing to hint at the power that resided beyond.
“Nice place. Yours?”
“No.”
She let the boat ground itself on the muddy shore next to the dock.
“Follow the path. A meal has been prepared for you. I have been instructed to assure you it isn't poisoned or drugged. My master will speak with you after nightfall.”
“Are you coming with us?” Holgren asked.
“No. I have other business to attend to. Just follow the path.”
When I got Holgren and myself on to the muddy shore, she pushed off again. I didn't wave good-bye. I don't think her feelings were hurt.
“Well partner, let's go climb inside the dragon's mouth,” I said as I led him off towards the path.
“We're well inside the mouth. Let's go see what the belly of the beast looks like.”
“How's your head?”
“A little better, not much. Hurts like all hells. Hard to concentrate. I'm barely up to counting fingers or casting most spells.”
“Which is different front your normal state in what way?”
“I should turn you into a toad for that.”
“You couldn't turn a profit on Silk Street wearing nothing but a bow.”
The path led us, eventually, to a pretty little sun-dappled glade. A low block of some glassy black stone stood in the center of it, and food had been piled high atop it. Fish, fowl, red meat, fruits, vegetables, bleached bread, fresh butter, flagons of wine—there was enough food for a dozen people. I figured I could handle my half, but Holgren had always been a picky eater.
“Well, he’s laid out a hearty last meal.”
“Indeed.”
“What do you think?”
“My head thinks we'd be fools to touch it. My stomach has a conflicting opinion.”
“I know what you mean.” I looked at all that food and my stomach rumbled as if on cue. “Oh, well,” I muttered, and tore off a drumstick.
“So much for caution,” he said, and joined me.
I ate until I was in danger of becoming sick. Six months starving in Thagoth followed by a month of soldier's rations had left me virtually incapable of moderation. That meal was good.
Holgren showed more restraint. To him, food was little more than fuel, which is an attitude I can't really understand. Good cooking is as much of an art as sculpture or painting.
When I was done I lay back on the grass in the early afternoon light and waited for the first pangs of poison to shoot through my gut. Holgren and I made small talk. I looked around the glade and felt a measure of contentment. I suppose that was the intended effect, and I suppose, too, that I should have mistrusted it. But a person can only go through so much horror and suffering and face so much death before she begins to become inured to it. At that moment, I'd had my fill.
A nonchalant sort of fatalism had overtaken me. I had a full belly. I had Holgren. I had a short space where nothing was trying to kill me or worse. And there was nowhere to run. The necklace held me as surely as the bars of any prison. All I could do was wait for events to unfold, and keep my eyes open for any opportunity that presented itself. Most luck is made.
Afternoon passed to evening. Holgren lay napping on the grass beside me and fireflies began to appear in the gloom beneath the trees. It was a pleasant sight, reminding me of early childhood summers spent with my grandmother before she'd died, when my father had still been able to get caravan work—
Fireflies? In winter?
“Holgren, wake up. Something’s happening.” I nudged him in the ribs, and he came up quick and clear-headed.
“Powerful magic is at work.”
I looked around, and the trees were melting away like phantoms. The lights I had taken at first for fireflies were expanding, brightening, and aligning themselves along intricate geometric lines. They bled into one another until solid planes of glowing green light came into being. Walls formed, hundreds of feet high. Even the meadow grass retreated back into the ground and was replaced by some hard, flat surface. As these new surroundings took shape, that eerie green light faded, to be replaced by weak starshine. The walls took on the appearance of tangible shadows. Precise as every angle was, there still seemed to be something organic about the structure, in a way I couldn't pin down.
When everything stopped shifting, we stood in the courtyard of a huge fortress. Walls surrounded us on three sides. The fourth side of the courtyard, behind the obsidian block, was taken up by a massive archway, beyond which lay only a shadowy void. It was the entrance to a massive structure that stretched up and blotted out the stars. I craned my head back and saw a confusing welter of walls and windows and eaves, and high above them a thin spire that seemed to pierce the sky itself. No human hands could have built such an edifice.
Welcome to Shadowfall, said a rich, disembodied voice. It was familiar. It was a younger version of the voice the Sorcerer King's crippled husk had owned.
Ruiqi will be joining us momentarily, the voice continued. Please, enter and make yourselves comfortable.
I glanced at Holgren. His face was unreadable. I took hold of his shoulder and we went through the arch.
I thought I had experienced discomfort when I entered the gate to Thagoth that Holgren had conjured up, months before. This was something else again. It wasn't pain, but was as if every particle of my body was taken apart studied, sniffed over, tasted, and put back
together in a fraction of a second. It was over almost before it began. As I stepped through the archway to the room beyond, I felt an impulse to scream that dissipated before I had a chance to act on it.
The room was much like any drawing room, with a hearth in one corner containing a small, flickering fire. Two upholstered chairs were drawn up beside it. I glanced back at the archway, and it was now the size of a normal door. Beyond I could see nothing but shadows.
I apologize for the brief discomfort but I find such measures save time. Now I know just who—and what—partakes of my hospitality. Welcome Amra, Flame-chosen. Welcome Holgren, resurrected mage. Please take a seat. We have much to discuss.
I led Holgren to the chairs, saw him settled, and sat down myself.
“Why don't you join us?” I asked. “I like to see who I'm talking to.”
Your partner spoke closer to the truth than you guessed when he jested about being in the belly of the beast. Rather than being in the room with you, it would be closer to the truth to say I am the room. I can, however, create a manifestation if will make you more comfortable.
“It doesn't really matter to me, I suppose. And I doubt it makes much difference to Holgren. Though I thought you wicked types liked to make people uncomfortable, as a general rule.”
Have you ever considered the notion that every so-called hero is actually a villain, from someone's perspective? The reverse also applies, as in any equation.
I said, truthfully, “I don't tend to think of such things. I'm a more practical person. I try not to let the larger issues distract me.”
The flames in the hearth sort of rippled, and twisted, and out of them stepped a man of medium height. He was naked, and bald. Those same tattoos adorned his skull. Shadows sloughed off him like dead skin and drifted like ash to the floor at his feet.
He was handsome in a boyish sort of way, though his eyes were two dead things that reflected no light. I sort of had to squint to see the resemblance, but he could have been a younger, able-bodied version of the Sorcerer King.
The Thief Who Spat In Luck's Good Eye Page 11
