The Diamond Sphinx (The Lost Ancients Book 6)

by Marie Andreas

  Padraig had been silent and had his head tilted. He was looking at things with something more than just his eyes. “Both have been near the hedge, this side of it. They’re coming from town or just outside of it.”

  Alric dropped to his knee and put the palm of his right hand flat on the ground and closed his eyes. He opened them with a shake. “There will be more. There’s a pressure building, but I can’t get a feel where it’s coming from.”

  “Now see here. We don’t like being trapped. If you’re doing this to get us to side with you folks about that ring of greenery, that—” the Beccian’s comment was cut short by yet a third explosion. The biggest one yet.

  My friends managed to stay upright as the ground rolled under our feet. A few of the Beccians tumbled.

  A second, smaller jolt almost sent me to the ground as well, but Covey caught my arm. Once she was sure I had my feet, she tore off in the direction of the newest black plume. Unfortunately, it was in the direction of where we came back through after the aqueduct adventure. Covey was out of sight almost immediately. When she wanted to, she could probably outrun anyone in this town.

  Amara slowly came out of the pub, her steps growing stronger as she saw the smoke. Her bright green eyes flashed in anger.

  I’d heard that phrase before, but never seen it. Even without knowing she was a long lost goddess, I wouldn’t want to be on the other side of that look.

  “I decide when it comes down, not you!” Unlike some mages, apparently tree goddesses didn’t need spell words or movements to cast something. Her eyes did flash to a blinding white for a split-second though. And even from this distance, it was clear the hedge had grown taller. A rumbling crossed under us, but unlike the prior jolts, this one seemed more natural.

  “Roots?” I hadn’t meant to say that out loud as it sounded stupid even as I thought it.

  Amara flashed a small smile. “Aye. Someone is trying to destroy my hedge, which tells me it is still needed.” With a quick glance to the stunned Beccians, she scurried over and ducked under Foxy’s arm.

  “Now see here, that’s what we were coming to talk to your man about.” The forefront Beccian nodded to Padraig, but a worried look crossing his face took out much of the force of his words.

  “And we would have discussed it, had the situation not changed. I’d say that’s a bigger worry.” Padraig pointed back to the smoking hedge.

  “Aye, the town has enough supplies to hold out longer. But we might not survive whatever is attacking us.” Foxy shifted the pike to his other hand to keep his arm around Amara, but he didn’t put it down.

  I studied the Beccians as they muttered among themselves. They were all from this part of town. “Where are the town guards? The private guards from The Hill?”

  I knew the rich population who lived up on The Hill wouldn’t be out and about if the city was under attack. But they had small standing troops in their compounds. And, although mostly corrupt and incompetent, the city did have its own guards.

  Foxy shook his head. “The Hill folks either fled or locked themselves up as soon as that Kenithworth mayor started pushing people around. Especially after our own mayor and the town counsel died sudden like, of poisoning. The city guards went to Kenithworth’s side at that point. They should be on the other side of the hedge with the rest.” Foxy wasn’t shocked by the behavior of either the rich or the guards. None of the Beccians around us looked like they felt any differently.

  I looked up to see Covey jogging back to us. Her face was grim and she held something out away from her. “The ground where we came through the hedge is blackened, but the explosion appears to have actually been on the outside of the hedge. But unless we go outside the hedge there’s no way to know for sure.” She held up what she carried, a twisted arm the size of a child’s. It had been ripped from its owner; but those long clawed fingers didn’t belong to any child. “I found this in the hedge. I think it had been trying to come through and the plants destroyed it. The rakasa are back.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Somewhere in the back of my mind a tiny voice had mentioned the monstrous little creatures as soon as we heard the first explosion. I’d squished that thought too soon apparently. “I thought we destroyed them out at the Spheres?” At least I knew that the basilisk had taken out a hell of a lot of them.

  “For a species that had supposedly been destroyed centuries ago, they seem to be far more populous than would be expected.” Lorcan looked around as he and Mathilda came out of the pub.

  “But could the hedge have really tried to eat it?” I looked over to Amara. Her smile didn’t admit to anything, but it didn’t deny it either. Note made—do not piss off the tree goddess.

  “The hedge was attacked,” she finally said with a shrug of her thin shoulders. “I told it to defend itself. And it will continue to do so.”

  A hedge that ate its enemies. Could be good. Was definitely scary.

  The leader of the Beccian group looked back to his companions and finally nodded. He was a bit paler than he’d been and not near as determined in his stance. “I think you might be right. Can always ransack the abandoned rich homes if need be. Maybe the ones outside will go away after a bit.” The more he spoke, the more he looked like he was far more afraid of Amara than whoever was blowing things up.

  Padraig drew himself up, even flicked back his long hair to show his ears and remind them he was an elf, still a rare sight in Beccia. Harlan needed to take acting lessons from him. “It is agreed then. It would be best if everyone returned to their homes for now. We will make sure the town is secure and the hedge will keep it that way.” He turned to Alric and me and held his arms out. “How can we fail with the protectors of Beccia on our side?”

  I knew that I hadn’t told him about how the people had viewed Alric and me after both the glass gargoyle incident and the mess with Glorinal and Jovan. A smirk from Covey told me who had.

  It was as if the Beccians hadn’t even seen Alric and I until Padraig mentioned us. Their smiles grew, and they gave a few cheers, then turned and trudged back to their homes. Or to a pub.

  “We’d been with them since the aqueduct. What changed?” I was glad they were leaving, but I really didn’t want a return of the general population thinking we were going to save them.

  “They weren’t thinking of who you were then.” Padraig’s smile dropped. “This will keep them out of our way and hopefully help rally them if we need to gather to fight.”

  My sigh at his comment was far too loud in the new silence of the street. “I keep waiting for another explosion.”

  Amara peeked out from her Foxy embrace. “There shouldn’t be. At least not on this side. They had actually managed to get some exploding spells through my hedge. They were trying to blow it up, but the spells passed through. I put an end to that.”

  I didn’t know if it was all of us knowing she was a tree goddess, or Mathilda’s thanks in the old way, but Amara seemed stronger than I’d ever seen her. She was also definitely glowing.

  I waved her over as if I needed to show her something. All of my friends knew what she was except Foxy, and I thought she might want to keep it that way. Besides, we were standing in the middle of the street.

  Foxy was discussing some plan with Alric and Padraig so he wasn’t paying attention when she came over to me.

  “You might want to watch the glow.” I kept my voice low and watched over her head to make sure Foxy was engaged. “It’s going to cause attention.”

  At first she looked confused, and then looked down at her softly glowing skin. “Oh no.” A second later the glow was gone. “It’s been so long since others knew what I was…I’ll have to watch out for this. Foxy can’t know.” She looked at me with huge pleading eyes.

  I agreed on that. Most likely Foxy would take it in stride, but on the offhand chance he didn’t, it was better he didn’t have a clue.

  “So just having others know who you are makes you glow?” Yes, there were other more urgent issu
es right now, but this could be important. Having a goddess on our side might help, but it would be good to know her limitations.

  “In a manner of speaking. Deities need recognition, love, worship, whatever you want to call it, to build our strength.”

  That explained a lot about some of the religious zealots I’d seen over the years. I doubted their gods and goddesses were out stomping around though.

  “What is that?” Covey’s eyes were better than mine, but even I saw the plume of dust coming our way.

  Followed by faeries yelling. “Seriously? They are cat racing now? With what’s going on?” I’d punish them but in the time I’d known them I’d never found anything that stuck.

  “No, is training.” Garbage had silently flown over us. “Training good.” She looked far too smug as she folded her arms and watched the herd of cats and faeries, with Crusty and Leaf flying over them, tearing right for us.

  “We might want to move, not sure how good they are at stopping.” I pulled Amara to the side with Covey and me. The rest of our group jogged to the other side of the street just as the racing cats tore by. I thought I saw pieces of metal, either being held by the faeries or on the cats. But they’d been moving too fast and they kicked up a lot of dust.

  The cats ran around the bend a block down and vanished down an alley. Garbage, Crusty, and Leaf stayed near us though.

  “What was on them?”

  If Garbage got any prouder her wings were going to pop off. “Practice with armor. Meows good.”

  Armor? I started to ask, then shook my head and just smiled instead. This might be one of those better-not-to-know situations.

  The wallpaper in my pocket rustled and reminded me of another probably better not to know situation. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I’d held on to the thought that once we found and destroyed these relics, I’d be able to go back to my little house, my pub, and just relax. I knew the odds weren’t in my favor, but I needed to know if my house was standing.

  I pulled out the piece of wallpaper and held it up. “I know we have a lot of bigger things going on, but I’d like to go see if anything of my house still stands.” The faeries dropped down when they saw the paper, and Garbage tried to rip it out of my hand. I shoved it back in my cloak pocket. It might be all I had left.

  “No boom. Not time.” Garbage looked up and glared in the general direction of the house, but she and the others stayed with me.

  “My house was supposed to boom at some point?” That, and the fact the faeries knew about it, was almost more upsetting than the fact it might have already done so.

  “Maybe…not good.” Leaf also glared down the road.

  “Boom!” That was Crusty’s contribution and she was looking at the Shimmering Dewdrop instead of the direction where the house was.

  “I’ll go with you,” Alric said. “Padraig wants to get some more information before we do anything. And it’s more his and Lorcan’s area than mine.” Alric was no slouch when it came to academia and research, but he really was a more physical guy. That had been extremely noticeable the last few hours.

  I was happy at the first part, a bit annoyed at the second. I logically knew that my house wasn’t as important as what we were doing. Emotionally it was a different matter. One I’d have liked Alric to pick up on. The distance between us kept growing and I wasn’t sure how to fix it. However, I’d like him along even if his motivation wasn’t as emotional as I’d hoped.

  “I’m going to keep the girls and the constructs with me, unless you need them?” I asked Covey. I knew she’d be staying behind to search through the dusty scrolls.

  “I think we’re good,” she said and looked around. “What about the extras and the cats?”

  “They come back, stay.” Garbage really needed something more impressive than beat-up overalls and flower petal caps if she was going to be a general.

  Covey nodded and waved us off as she and the rest made their way back into the pub.

  Alric started before me, but I quickly caught up. If he thought I wasn’t going to talk during this, he had another think coming. I gave him two minutes of silence, and then I jumped in.

  “This is going to get old, you know. We can’t just ignore it.” We were far enough away from the pub that I knew our friends wouldn’t hear, even if they were outside.

  Alric kept walking.

  “Damn it, we need to talk.” I grabbed his arm and turned him my direction. “Yes, I shouldn’t have left. But you’ve ditched me too. And I had a damn good reason.”

  He first looked ready to keep walking, then, instead, grabbed me and kissed me. At first it was an angry kiss, not meant to hurt me, but just angry at himself. Then it softened and he pulled back, tilted his forehead to mine, and caressed my cheek. “I know. You did have a good reason. I disagree with it for a number of reasons, but it was valid.” His right arm gave a twitch and he shook it off.

  “What’s wrong?” I pulled back his sleeve. The geas mark on his inner wrist was glowing faintly. Considering how much glamour was on it, no one should see anything at all. He’d been marked by an old mystic elf when we’d inadvertently gone back in time a thousand years. “How long as it been doing this?”

  “It started when we got to Beccia. I think my current mood—I wouldn’t call it that, but I know you would—is more because of this and the way I feel, than what happened when you left. I’ve just felt on edge since we got here.” He flexed his fingers.

  I looked around the deserted street. The faeries and constructs had gone ahead, and no one else was around, but I kept my voice low. “Do you think it’s sensing something?” The mark on his arm was a geas supposedly passed down through his family and reactivated by an old witch at the ball we’d attended in the distant past. It would make Alric kill the person or persons behind the destruction of the missing Ancients. Since it was doubtful they were around after twenty-five hundred years—and as far as Lorcan could tell even Nivinal wasn’t that old—we hadn’t worried about the geas.

  Alric pulled the sleeve down over the mark and shook his head. “I’ve no idea. I just feel a general annoyance, not as if I need to kill someone. Maybe the geas is picking up on other things. We didn’t even think of how it might react to the relics. Someone used them to destroy the Ancients and they could cause the geas to act up.” He nodded to me then started walking again.

  “We probably need to tell Lorcan and Padraig.”

  “Agreed. When we get back.” He wrapped his arm around my shoulder. “We need to see about your house. I do understand you taking off, but if you ever scare me like that again, I’m going to find new ways to get the faeries to sing at you…all the time.”

  I slipped my arm around his waist and settled into walking next to him. It felt good to be back. “Fine, next time I turn into something monster-like I’ll tell you it’s me. Just promise you won’t slay me by accident.”

  “Agree—” Alric froze as we came around the corner to the block with my house. I hadn’t been looking that way but I found myself standing there slack jawed once I turned as well.

  Chapter Seventeen

  I’d been bracing myself for my house being demolished. Or for it being seriously damaged in some way. I was not prepared for it to be floating five feet in the air. Mostly intact, but with a few blown out sections near the back kitchen wall.

  “How…why…and how?” I barely felt Alric pull his arm away as he took a few steps closer and I stayed rooted to my spot. The faeries and the constructs were buzzing around as if a house floating in the air was an interesting, but not that uncommon, occurrence.

  The houses on either side were untouched. I assumed my neighbors had fled at some point. I didn’t think even Beccians could be so jaded that they wouldn’t come out to see a floating house.

  “This wasn’t just an explosion; someone was looking for something.” Alric waved his hand under the front door. “Interesting. The spell got cut off. Probably when Amara increased the strength of the hedge. This reinfo
rces that whoever was sending those explosions was outside of the hedge.”

  I slowly walked forward. I had to admit it was damn good to see the place. I just wished it wasn’t hovering there like that. “Can we get it down without destroying it? And if the spell was cut off, shouldn’t it have let go?” I touched a wall. I’d expected it to at least feel wobbly. It was just hanging there, sort of like Crusty would do those times she forgot how to land. But it was solid. Just as if it were five feet lower and snuggled on the ground. I gave it a push. Nothing.

  Alric walked around the entire house, pausing every once in a while, but staying silent. After a few feet the faeries decided it was a game and started bobbing along behind him. Bunky and Irving stayed near me.

  “That was an impressive spell.” He finally came completely around. “The damage to the kitchen was because they used too much force when they punched through. They locked the house in place so they could do something, but there’s no evidence that they were ever on this side of the hedge.”

  “And…can we get it down?” I finally repeated when he seemed lost in his own thoughts. He also looked like he was seriously thinking of going a few houses down to where the hedge was. I wanted my house grounded first. It wasn’t lost on me that this mage had specifically gone after my house when there were three houses closer to the hedge. Had causing mayhem by explosions and flying houses been their agenda, they could have picked another one closer. Which meant I was the target. Again.

  Alric nodded slowly. “Yes. I’d rather leave it there until we can figure out what they were looking for, but the longer we do that the more likely people will notice. Your immediate neighbors are under a light sleep spell, but it’s been cut off as well, so they will be waking soon.”

  The faeries buzzed closely around him as he raised his hands. The house didn’t move at first, but then started wobbling and lowering. Alric’s spell caught it, not helped by the faeries who were now flying under it. They shot out just as it dropped the final few inches to the ground.