by Tammy Salyer
And as the daystar rose above them on the third day, they were to get no closer.
Even though exhausted, Isemay and Salukis had forced themselves to plod on through most of the night following the wagon and its drivers, who hadn’t chosen to stop. Before midday, Salukis made a quick overhead scout and was rewarded at last by the sight of the Minoth Valley Gate, their destination. The final twists and turns were few, and he could recite them to her without their need to follow the wagon any longer.
Grateful they were almost there, they moved into a shadowy alcove, both nearly bursting with equal parts relief and excitement. “We did it, Isemay,” Salukis whispered, glee and fatigue making his voice hoarse. “We found the way through!”
He gripped both her hands and she squeezed his back, her grin wide enough to make her cheeks hurt. Not too long from now, she’d have the complete map! They could even turn back at this point if they wanted to. And now the Zhallahs, using their innate stealth, could come and find their kin and return to the Churss, all right under the noses of the Minothians. After all, she and Salukis had basically done it, and she couldn’t even yield. The Zhallahs’ success was virtually certain.
“Come on. Let’s skip the final part and start back right away,” Salukis said. “I have the strength still to get us home before evening.”
Thrilled with the idea, she still wanted to make sure they had what they needed. “Wait, let me just check and ensure everything is clear in the memory keeper. If we don’t go to the end, it’s more important the rest is complete.” Though she shared his enthusiasm, one trait of Knighthood was never to be rash or let excitement overcome caution.
Reluctantly, he nodded. “Not here. It’s too near the gate. Let’s backtrack a little way first.”
Speedily, barely trying to quiet their footfalls, they reversed their path. Soon, the maze split into three passages, and they knew through Salukis’s scouting that the leftmost led to a dead end not too far away, which provided the perfect quiet and off-the-beaten-path nook to review the memory keeper’s contents.
They huddled with their backs to the wall beneath his wings. Isemay removed the pendant and said the phrase to help her see inside her own mind.
The images bloomed like morning roses across the pendant’s crystal face. To an unfamiliar eye, they would have simply looked like a confusion of towering stone walls, where the view turned left or right at random points. But Isemay had been clever. She’d counted her paces out in her head and said the number out loud in increments of ten. As the images moved in real time, her voice could be heard. Ten…twenty…thirty—and when they had made turns, she also spoke the number aloud. Thirty-seven paces, left turn. Likewise, every misleading opening had been counted, and the ones that took them in the right direction, she’d spoken. Fifth passage on the right…Seventh passage on the left…Forty-eight paces, right turn at the third passageway. It would take painstaking diligence to create the map from this process, but she’d shown a level of diligence through the last three days that she knew would make her parents beam with pride. She could apply herself when she had to. Even the Resplendolent Prelates at the Conservatum had known she was capable, despite her sometimes shoddy attendance and churlish attitude during subjects she disliked.
“I think we’ve got it,” she said, turning to Salukis.
Instead of the smile she expected to see on his face, his expression was…unusual. He stared at her softly, but with an intensity she could almost feel. Her mouth suddenly tasted of dry metal, like it did when she was nervous, and she had to swallow.
“Isemay, I just want to tell you…I’ve never met anyone like you. You’re different from everyone here. Brave in a way I wouldn’t have imagined someone from so far away could be. And so beau—” He cut himself off, and this time, he was the one who blushed. “Brave,” he said again.
And like that, she wanted to kiss him. Better yet, she felt certain he wanted to kiss her too. She’d kissed two other boys, classmates in the Conservatum. But those boys had treated her like an expensive statue, something to be admired but not touched. The kisses had been brief, almost as if they feared her. She was, after all, the child of two Knights, walking the path toward Knighthood herself.
But when Salukis leaned forward and his hands came to rest on her shoulders, he didn’t seem fearful at all. She leaned forward, matching her lips to his, still expecting him to retreat or divert his face aside and give her a peck on the cheek. He didn’t do that either. His lips stayed put, warm, inviting, and soft like down.
The shock of kissing someone from a foreign realm hit her briefly, then was whisked away completely by the pure silky fire welling up from inside her. She didn’t know how long they stayed that way, but she felt like she’d have spent an eternity kissing him if she could.
The thought of what could lie ahead of them—her becoming a Knight, him an Archon—flashed through her mind. How exciting would that be? How unique? Two servants of the Verities from different realms, crossing the starpaths to be together, lovers who transcended the Cosmos. She reached her free hand up to his chest and laid it there, feeling his strong heart. He would be a courageous and powerful Archon, she knew.
“Isemay? Symvalline? Are you there?”
Her father’s voice crashed through the morning like an avalanche. Stunned, she jumped back and lifted her hand, still holding her memory keeper. Ulfric’s face was there, in the glass, staring out at her.
“Da!” she cried, filled with indescribable relief—and a tiny bit of annoyance?
“Isemay? Oh thank all the Verities you’re safe. Where’s your mum?”
“Da, is it really you? Are you in Arc Rheunos?”
“Yes, I’m here. I’ve just come through the starpath. Are you with Symvalline? Are you in any danger?”
“Make him stop,” Salukis said in a low voice.
For a moment, she thought he was joking, then she thought, crazily, he was implying that she should ignore her father and return to the moment they’d been sharing. But when she glanced at his face, she saw something she didn’t expect.
Fear. Sharp, urgent fear.
“Make him be quiet. Isemay…”
He wasn’t looking at her. He was staring toward the entrance to the dead-end passage.
Where an urzidae mount and its Deathless rider stood.
Chapter Twenty-Five
The Deathless Guard stared at them levelly, unmoving and silent, yet Isemay had never felt fear like this. The metal taste in her mouth grew stronger, and between that and the sudden dryness that seemed to spread all the way down her throat, she felt like she might choke. The Zhallahs had said over and over that all Arc Rheunosians respected life, that they would not kill her and Salukis. But all of a sudden, she realized there were worse things than death. Merely being touched and taken captive by this horrid Deathless abomination, for instance.
“Wh-what is she going to do?” she whispered to Salukis.
“Doesn’t matter. Come on!”
He’d wrapped her in his arms before she could speak and began to lift them from the labyrinth floor. At the same moment, she saw the Deathless spur her urzidae into a charge, an unholy shriek breaking from her wide-open mouth.
“Crumb, what’s wrong? What’s happening?” her father cried from her pendant.
“Da! It’s after us!”
“What is? Where are you!? Isemay!”
“He’s got to be quiet or they’ll be able to follow us,” Salukis said, struggling to get them higher. The long march and little sleep had taken their toll and his tired body was sluggish.
The Deathless Guard was nearly to them. She raised her arm. Isemay saw the flash of something shiny.
The object—a dagger—whipped through the air as Salukis tried to bank away from the Deathless. He cried out in pain, and she heard the clink of metal on rock, then they were suddenly listing dangerously, losing several feet of altitude.
“Oh Verities!” she cried. “Salukis!”
“I-I�
��m all right,” he muttered, struggling to keep them aloft. “Just hold on to me.”
She gripped him under the arms, embracing him the way she’d imagined so many times in these last few days. But she’d never imagined this fear, this adrenaline making her feel as if she might crush him. Somehow, miraculously, they rose to the top of the maze’s walls. The ghastly shrieks of the Deathless echoed from below, making her want more than anything to cover her ears. But that would be childish. She had to try to help Salukis.
They only went a short distance, and he dropped them gracelessly to the top of a wall. The ledge was just wide enough to stand on, but he staggered a bit. She grabbed him by the arm before he could go over the lip.
He was bleeding from the upper edge of his left wing, and she realized they would never make it back to the Churss, not with Salukis injured. Not burdened by her. The Deathless would summon more sentries and they would be chased relentlessly.
Salukis regained his balance. She released his arm and held up the memory keeper to look into her father’s face. “Da,” she said. “Listen to me. This is Salukis, one of the Zhallah people. They helped mum and me when we got to Arc Rheunos. Go with him and get the Zhallahs. Mum and I will be in Minoth. We need your help.” She looked up at Salukis, who stared at her in disbelief. “We need all the help you can bring.”
Salukis started, “Isemay, I’m not leaving y—”
“Listen to me, Salukis! You can’t carry me and get away. If they catch us both, this would have all been for nothing. You know they won’t…hurt me.”
“Crumb, what are you talking about? Where are you right now?” her da said, using the tone of the Stallari, a tone that brooked no dissent.
“Take me back into the maze,” she told Salukis, finding some reservoir of calm deep within her that allowed her to make this decision, no matter what tone her father used. “Then go. I’ll try to buy you time to get away. Then you and my father can tell Archon Raamuzi what’s going on. If she won’t listen to the rest of the Zhallahs, maybe she’ll listen to my da.”
His mouth opened, probably to protest, then closed again. “Isemay,” he said plaintively, his eyes shining.
“I’ll be…I’ll be fine. And I’ll be with my mum.” She held the memory keeper up once more. “Find Salukis, Da. Wait in the starpath valley for him. He’ll be there before nightfall.” She held the pendant out for Salukis to take, and it suddenly felt as if it weighed as much as a Churss tower. Her father had finally come, but she was getting farther away from him than she’d felt before he arrived.
“Please, Lukis, quickly,” she said, trying to channel some of her family’s strength into her voice. “Take me down before it’s too late.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Isemay. By the fires of Vaka Aster’s eyes, her daughter was in the hands of the Minothians. Would they harm her?
Symvalline’s eyes traveled to the neat hole punched through the forehead of newly dead Deathless on the chamber floor. No, they wouldn’t—but Tuzhazu would.
She had to get to Isemay before he did.
A smile that held all the mirth of a worm cooked on a paver by the daystar creased Tuzhazu’s face. “That’s good,” he said. “That’s very good. Where is she now?”
“On her way to the Minoth Valley Gate with a returning supply wagon. One guard and one Deathless are with the wagon now.”
Tuzhazu paused in thought. “Has the Everlight been informed?”
“No, Archon.”
“Keep it that way. On your way back to the Aktoktos Gate, tell them to hold the Vinnric at the valley gate until further directed. And I want a twelve-strong squad of soldiers, including six Deathless Guards, to be scouring the labyrinth, inside and out, from the Minoth Valley Gate to the Aktoktos. There could me more Zhallahs trying to infiltrate. No one comes through those walls. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Archon. Anything else?”
“One more thing, tell the guards at the Everlight’s chambers to expect me shortly, but don’t say why. I shall deliver this news myself. First, there’s a Vinnric healer I intend to pay a visit.” He glanced back at the corpse. “She has things to answer for.”
As he spoke to the messenger, Symvalline was tempted to retrieve her klinkí stones and strike him dead. But he held the Fenestros. The movement of her stones through the air would assuredly be noticed. Her mind and reflexes were quick, but the Arc Rheunosian Archon had the same reflexes she did. If he realized she was near, her only chance to save Isemay would be destroyed. She couldn’t risk it.
The messenger left and Symvalline prepared to tear her way through the parchment and into the room to find the map she needed. Getting to Isemay before Tuzhazu was the one imperative guiding her now. But instead of following the messenger out, Tuzhazu paced back to the Deathless Guard’s body, grabbing something from inside his carryall on the way. He then crouched beside the man, unstoppered the vial he carried that contained the foul elixir he’d given the soldier to turn him into this monster, and set the vial beside the dead man.
What could he be doing?
Next, Tuzhazu held the Fenestros in his right hand, then held his other over the hole in the soldier’s forehead, palm down. He began to speak softly in the same tongue he’d used before when he’d nearly stolen the life from her. The speech of Battgjald, she was sure.
Before her eyes, the soldier began to transform once more. Instead of what had happened last time, his body growing ghastly pale, leaner, and hunched, he was reverting back to himself. A vapor began to rise from the hole beneath Tuzhazu’s hand. Gray, almost oily, it slowly coalesced into a liquid ball in the air and hung there. Tuzhazu moved his palm toward the vial, and the liquid followed. When it was above the bottle’s neck, Tuzhazu lowered his hand and the poison dropped in.
He was taking back the wystic elixir that had transformed the poor Minothian into a ghoul. The soldier, once more his previous self, however, was still dead.
This is why Tuzhazu wants an army sent from Balavad. He doesn’t have enough of the potion to turn as many Minothians as he would need into these unnatural thralls, loyal to him. The Minothians fear the Zhallah too much to attack them, so if Tuzhazu means to, he must have an army that will follow his commands without question.
Which meant: The Deathless can be redeemed. Under his control, they can’t be held responsible for their actions. This makes them innocent.
Tuzhazu rose and gathered his carryall, placing the vial inside. He moved to the door and was gone, closing the door behind him.
Immediately, Symvalline tore the parchment open and scrambled to the chamber floor. She was light on her feet and managed to drop nearly silently. Rushing to the dead man, she quickly searched him for whatever useful items she could carry—a small dagger, that was all—then moved to the bookshelf.
The labels were in Elder Veros, the common tongue here in Arc Rheunos, fortunately. The entire right side of the shelves was filled with scrolls, and she forced herself to carefully read each label: West Tyrns, Pass of Thossos, North Tyrns, Skaphia Caves, Cordu Valley, South Tyrns, Valley of Minoth.
It wasn’t here. She found nothing that could be the maze. The top shelves were too high overhead for her to read the labels, though. It must be up there. It must be.
She turned back toward the table to grab one of its chairs to stand on.
And stopped. A Minothian stood inside the doorway, staring at her.
Symvalline’s mouth dried up, but her heart barely changed rhythm. It was already beating too fast to speed up more.
The woman was silent. She wore an unusual long black tunic with black leggings underneath. Even her boots and the headscarf that covered everything but her eyes were black. Symvalline grasped the hilt of the dagger she’d shoved into her belt behind her back.
The woman slowly reached up, still saying nothing, and pulled the scarf away from her face.
Symvalline gasped. “A-Agatha?” Tulla’s mother.
The woman put her finger to her l
ips to silence Symvalline, turned and closed the door behind her, then lowered the bar to lock it. She hurried to where Symvalline stood.
“Vinnric, what are you doing here?” she whispered, her pale green eyes darting first to Symvalline, then to the body on the floor, and back. “The Archon will do terrible things if he learns you have escaped.”
Relief so strong it nearly took her legs swept through Symvalline. She put a hand on the table to steady herself. “Agatha, I have to get away from Minoth. Tuzhazu is planning something that I fear will endanger all Arc Rheunosians, and if I don’t escape, he won’t just do something terrible to me”—she looked down at the corpse of the soldier, then back at Agatha—“he’ll kill me.”
Agatha’s color faded to ash and her expression grew sorrowful. Kneeling beside the body, she spoke under her breath quickly, the words said in a way that made Symvalline think of a benediction. She made a gesture over the man, then stood and turned back to Symvalline.
“I understand. Many in Minoth fear him.”
“Please don’t tell anyone I’m here.”
Agatha peered at her, and her eyes were a liquid moss-green, so soft and heartsick they made Symvalline want to weep. She said, “I have been assigned to the dead rolls as a barrow tender since…my daughter…” She wasn’t able to go on for a moment, and her skin grew even paler. “But I see the children occasionally. Inder has told me about you. He’s told me how you tried to care for Tulla and what the Archon did with the foreign Fenestros. Where will you go?”
Aching for the woman and her suffering, Symvalline spoke barely above a whisper. “They have my daughter, and I have only a short time to reach the gate at the border of Minoth if I am going to be able to help her.”
“You’ll never get through the valley. You’re too…obvious.”
“Perhaps you could help me with a disguise?” Symvalline asked, almost pleaded.
“You’ll be hunted. The Deathless have senses beyond normal. Even if you’re disguised.”
