by Tammy Salyer
They soon reached the flanks of a heavily treed mountainside, and the bruhawks perched in a mat of thick branches. In the back of Ulfric’s mind, the unfamiliar sights and smells of the world drew his natural curiosity, but then, through the bruhawk’s senses, everything was unfamiliar. Or rather, radically enhanced to the point that each thing almost seemed new and strange. But these observations didn’t hold his attention now. He settled his thoughts, prepared Urgo for what he might expect, and reached out through his Mentalios link.
Symvalline, my love, are you out there?
Urgo blinked several times, as if ruffled by the experience. Ulfric waited a few impatient moments, then tried again. Symvalline? Symvalline, it’s Ulfric. Can you hear me?
This time, the bruhawk emitted several deep clicking sounds in the back of his throat, making his displeasure clear. The effort he was putting into reaching across this wide space was taxing the bird as it drew from his strength. If Symvalline is here, she is too far to reach. I will exhaust Urgo if I continue to press the link this hard.
If he was going to be any good to his family, or himself, he needed Urgo to remain hale. Yggo as well.
It had been nearly half a thirty-night since the events on Mount Omina that had launched this maelstrom of peril, after all. The starpath would have delivered them to the same valley, but Symvalline and Isemay could be anywhere in the realm by now. He longed to kick something, throw something, punch something—anything to dilute the wrath building inside him at his helplessness and impotence.
Then a thought came to him, those moments aboard Balavad’s warship as Vaka Aster had tried to persuade Ulfric to release his mind to her. She had brought him, somehow, to Arc Rheunos just for a moment and allowed him to speak with his daughter—through the memory keeper pendant he’d given her.
In all the ways that mattered, the pendant was itself a Mentalios, and Vaka Aster had already shown him how to use it.
Once more, Urgo. Stay with me, boy, and we will try to reach Crumb. The hawk gave a small shiver of anticipation at his thought. Both of the winged creatures had always seemed perhaps not fond, exactly, but indulgent of Isemay.
Stealing himself against the fear that he would not find her, and the deeper fear that he would find her in peril, Ulfric sent: Isemay? Symvalline? Are you there?
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Trembling, Isemay pressed her back against the cold, uncaring granite of the labyrinth wall. No sun penetrated the floors of this maze, and she realized how much colder it was without the reassuring warmth of Salukis beside her. She hadn’t seen the daystar for two and a half days. His wings had covered the two of them most of that time, and she’d been concentrating deeply on counting each endless step nearly every moment they’d been in the maze, hardly aware of anything but his body, the sound of the wagon wheels grinding along the gravel floor somewhere ahead, and her feet.
But she wasn’t trembling because of the cold. It was the sharply pointed chin, the oddly clear, needle-like teeth peeking through colorless lips, the knife-edge cheekbones, the hollows where eyes that were a flat gray color that no eyes should be were sunk, and the hissing breath of the Deathless Guard now approaching her that filled her belly with water and her heart with lead, causing her to quake.
It—Isemay struggled to think of this thing as a woman—loomed over Isemay, holding a sword, only the second she’d seen since arriving in Arc Rheunos. The weapon’s lethal point was level with Isemay’s throat, almost touching it. Isemay didn’t speak, didn’t move, did nothing to indicate she might run or fight. She wished she could melt into the wall behind her, become as solid and unfeeling as the stone, if only to end this moment of unendurable anticipation.
She’d beaten a fist-sized rock against the maze’s wall to draw its attention, and the Deathless had found her moments after Salukis had returned her to the maze floor. She’d had to give Salukis a slight shove to get him to leave her, and she hadn’t missed the tears that filled his eyes. He’d clutched her pendant and promised to return, then disappeared overhead. Isemay had been too petrified to cry, but not to pray. She’d beseeched all five Verities, even, irrationally, the malicious Balavad, to see him safely back to Maerria.
Now, the Deathless Guard merely stood there, not speaking either. Isemay wondered if the things were capable of talking. She’d heard them scream and hiss, but no words.
“I-I surrender,” she forced through her fear-constricted throat.
The guard’s flat eyes didn’t blink. It showed no sign of having heard her at all. What was it waiting for?
Isemay caught sight of its urzidae mount behind it. The creature was nearly the size of a horse, but different in form. Broad in shoulder and hindquarters, it walked on all fours but looked as if it were capable of rising to two legs. Its pelt was thick, shaggy, and dark, but in an unexpected aubergine hue, like the sky over a mountaintop as night pushed the daystar away. One horn sprouted from the center of its massive head, at least three feet long. It was tipped in a wickedly sharp metal cap, more lethal-looking than the sword at Isemay’s throat. Aside from the weaponized horn, though, once she looked into the creature’s eyes, she thought it looked merely disinterested, not dangerous, with nothing of the Deathless Guard’s malevolence.
She looked back at her captor. “What are you going to do with me?”
At that moment, a man descended. He was a Minothian, she could tell by his militant brown and purple clothing and the net-flinging bow on his back. She’d seen them carried by the other Minothian sentries at the gate, made to disable Zhallahs.
“I’ll take it from here, Guard,” he said to the Deathless as he eyed Isemay.
The Deathless backed up a few paces, still holding her sword point up. Isemay noted that the new Minothian didn’t approach until after the Deathless was at arm’s length. She understood why. She too felt relief as it put distance between them.
“So, Vinnric, you are a clever one,” the Minothian soldier said. “But stupid. Why would a foreigner and a plague-bringer be trying to reach Minoth? To spread your pestilence?”
The man’s question seemed idiotic to her. Surely he knew they held her mother captive. She surprised herself with her less-than-artful answer. “Only cowards have to hide behind walls and mazes. We wanted to see for ourselves what one looks like.”
If she’d been trying to anger the soldier—and he was right, it was stupid of her to do so—she succeeded with the high marks of a Conservatum acolyte. His fairish umber face, nearly the same shade as Knight Nazaria’s, flushed dark.
“Turn around and give me your hands, or you’ll wish your Zhallah friend had dropped you instead of what I’ll do.”
Her body cried out to fight, but her mind told her to do as she was told. This was why she’d allowed herself to be caught, after all. She put her face toward the wall and tried a more conciliatory tone. “My mum and I are not here to threaten the Minothians. You don’t need to treat us like prisoners.”
“Then why did you run from us when you arrived?” he asked flatly, and she could think of no response. They’d met the Zhallahs first, and they’d treated her and her mum kindly. Not to mention having warned them against the Minothians. Running from the Minothians, and their hideous Deathless, had seemed the natural response.
The soldier bound her hands behind her tightly, then turned her back. “Now, walk. We’re taking you to see the Archon.”
She took a step, and the weariness that was becoming all too familiar flooded Isemay, as if it was tired of waiting behind a dam, which was cracking. She took another step, gritting her teeth against a gasp. The tiresome days were catching up to her, that was all, she told herself. They were near the end of the labyrinth already. Once they reached it, eventually she would be able to rest, to regain some strength. And she’d be reunited with her mum. Symvalline would know how to help her. She would be all right if she just held on for a few more weary hours.
Her one consoling thought was that, finally, she’d done somethi
ng to help the people who had helped her. She was no longer merely a burden.
Da, please listen to Salukis. Help the Zhallahs and come find me and Mum, she thought, and to still her fears of all that had to be done before any help would come, she once more began counting her steps.
Chapter Thirty
The two women standing guard at the Cosmoculous Tower were far too trusting. Symvalline, after having observed them for several minutes without them being any the wiser, came around the side of the tower’s wide base, hiding her face beneath the hood of Agatha’s cloak. She approached stealthily as they were looking off down the paved way to Everlight Hall, completely unaware. They hadn’t expected someone to come from the rear of the tower. Gripping the dagger she’d taken from the dead guard, she prepared to get their attention. But…no. She didn’t need to do that. Harming them wasn’t necessary.
As they spotted her, she feigned stumbling as if she’d taken a wrong step and went down to her knees. “Please,” she called from a few paces away. “I’ve twisted something.”
The first to react started toward her before even considering there might be any danger. “What are you doing here? You know none are allowed.”
Symvalline poised in a half crouch with her face still hidden. “I was sent to give you both a message.”
The guard, now joined by the other, reached down to offer her assistance. “What is it?”
Instead of answering, Symvalline allowed herself to be pulled up by the arm, then blew a small cloud of dust from her other hand into the guard’s face, careful not to blow all of it. The woman blinked, confused, but still held Symvalline’s arm. “What—?”
She quickly pulled her arm free, holding her fist clenched tight around the rest of her sleeping powder. The second guard stopped short, confused at what she was seeing, but Symvalline was able to lunge forward and blow the powder into the other woman’s face.
It was all too easy. Clearly no Minothian dared to test their so-called Verity’s will and visit this forbidden place. The guards didn’t know what hit them.
The second guard sneezed, and even as she reached for a small bludgeon worn on her belt, she staggered and fell. Symvalline reached out to catch her by the shoulders and soften the landing. Before she turned back, she heard the first guard drop behind her.
Carefully, she knelt and cleaned any remaining powder from her hands using one of the guards’ shirts, then searched them both for a key to open the simple, unadorned doorway into the tower. She also took a short but heavy bludgeon from the waist belt of one guard.
The structure was massive, easily wide enough to house the main hall of Vigil Tower in Asteryss. Which made the nondescript entrance, no bigger than a house-sized door, a puzzle. Why build such an enormous tower if it wasn’t meant to be used?
She had no time to ponder the mystery, just another in a long list. Collecting the key the guard wore in a small waist pocket, she opened the iron door and went inside.
The interior was indeed as big as it looked from outside. Unlike Vigil Tower, however, the structure was not divided into floors or even rooms. It simply rose from ground to roof in one long, empty cylinder like a bell tower, only a few arched struts stretching from one side of the tower to the other for support. She had to crane her neck back before she could see the top, which was capped by stone. The Cosmoculous crystal must have been above it. A winding stone staircase on the other side of the hall led up toward the ceiling, inviting her to explore, but there was no time for that.
As she got her bearings in the dim space, for the tower had no windows, she noted a faint sensation caressing her skin, and more. A rapid fluttering that started at the end of the hairs not just on her head but on her arms and legs as well and moved up the shafts and seemed to sink just below her flesh. It reminded her of the tiny fluttering you felt from the ceaselessly vibrating wings of a dragørfly when you held one in your hand, their rapid buzzing that you could feel just as much as you could hear, but this went deeper than merely her fingertips.
It was a sensation she felt anytime Vaka Aster’s living vessel had accompanied the Knights, long ago, before the vessel had grown dormant and silent.
After marveling at the feeling for a few moments, her eyes adjusted, and she realized what little light there was inside the tower was not static. It seemed to surge briefly at moments, becoming brighter and then dimming again, with no discernable pattern.
What was this place? Was this unusual sensation truly the power drawn by the Cosmoculous? Or was Mithlí’s actual vessel here?
She suspected that was the truth of it. And worse, she had come to realize what the journal was talking about. Only the maker can unmake the cage. The reason Akeeva and Tuzhazu could get away with their enormous deception was, with Balavad’s aid, they had done to Mithlí what Balavad had tried to bring about in Vinnr. The Arc Rheunosian Verity was locked in a cage, confined through treachery.
She could not expect aid from that direction. Therefore, it made no sense to seek it.
The well, she needed to find it. Looking around, she noted the flagstones making up this level were laid in a ring pattern, the rings shrinking toward the floor’s center. Somewhere, there had to be a stairway going down, and it would likely extend from the stairs on the other side. She began moving across the floor, cutting across the middle to reach the stairs as quickly as possible.
She’d have imagined her footsteps, light though they were, would still echo slightly in the confines of the stone tower, but they didn’t. Instead, she heard a slight susurration, like a stream, getting louder as she moved toward the center of the floor. She hoped it was the sound of the underground river. The strangeness of the tower was getting to her, and she struggled to ignore the buzzing on her skin, the odd surging light, and the unusual acoustics.
She was nearly to the middle of the hall when a pale hand rose from beneath the flagstones, as if from a grave.
Her steps halted abruptly as a little bird of fear began to flutter in her chest. The hand seemed to have come through a metal grate, almost like a drain, centered in the innermost flagstone ring. Calming down, she realized the hand’s owner must be in a room below this.
Agatha hadn’t mentioned the possibility of anyone else being inside the tower, and Symvalline, in her haste, had not asked. It was an oversight that could cost her time, or worse, and she promised herself she would be more careful.
“Who’s there?” she called in a quiet voice.
The hand instantly disappeared, and the barely heard sound of wings came to her ears. A moment later, the quiet susurration of the water was joined by the even quieter murmur of voices, several, but she couldn’t quite tell how many. The sounds seemed to come from far below her, so the chamber under her must be quite large and deep.
Was this tower a prison? Hesitantly, Symvalline stepped forward several paces until she could look down through the grate. Far below, at least three stories down, she could see the light of a fire. Shadows moved outside the light’s range. Who would be down there, and why?
She tried again. “Hello? Who are you?” And because she sensed that these were not Minothians to be feared, that, indeed, they seemed to fear her more than she them, she added, “I’m not going to harm you.”
The voices hushed, and the silence filled with anticipation, as much theirs as hers. Not knowing what else to say, she decided to try one last thing. “I’m a Knight Corporealis, or what you call an Archon, from the realm called Vinnr. I’m trying to…to find a way to reach the Zhallah people.”
Ages passed, then a youth’s voice came up through the darkness to her. “We are the Zhallahs.”
If this revelation should have been a shock, she didn’t feel it. In its place was a cold acceptance. It was true, all she’d heard and surmised. The Minothians, for reasons she couldn’t guess, coldly and cruelly held these captured Zhallah people in a prison, a dungeon by the looks of it. Taken from their homes and families and exiled into a dark tower far from sunlight or fre
sh air. Symvalline had met a handful of the people here, but aside from Tuzhazu and the delusional and possibly dangerous Akeeva Raamuzi, few seemed outright capable of this kind of malice. The real question, then, was whether this deed was truly perpetrated by all Minothians, who seemed only to fear and shun the Zhallahs as so-called plague-bringers, or was it solely orchestrated by Tuzhazu and the false Verity?
“Can you help us?” the voice asked. “Can you get us out of here?”
Faced with this sudden pull on her conscience, Symvalline wanted to think she’d do what she could to release them from such harsh confinement, despite the urgency of needing to find Isemay. But the truth was that they were between her and the way out. She would do what she could for them, yes, but Isemay was first. Her daughter was always first.
As she leaned over the edge of the grate, the face of the speaker, as pale as his hands had been, rose from the gloom and stared back at her. Startled momentarily, she quickly recovered and looked into his eyes. She was correct. He was young, perhaps sixteen or seventeen Arc Rheunosian years, Isemay’s age.
“How do I get to you?” she asked.
“By the stairs, there’s a door. It’s barred on your side.”
She rushed to the other side of the hall. The doorway hadn’t been visible from the tower’s entrance because it was set into the floor. Two hinged doors overlapped each other and closed over an opening to the chamber below, covered by a metal bar as thick as her arm. She shoved it free and pulled open the top door, then the bottom.
Another stairway descended into the dark. She could see nothing but the bouncing light of the fire rising along the walls like a child’s nightmare. She dumped her last bit of powder from her pouch into one hand and gripped the small bludgeon she’d retrieved from the guard in the other. She did not fear these people, who, by the looks of the first boy, were only children, but she also did not believe in chancing being unprepared.
