Shard & Shield

by Laura VanArendonk Baugh

  Ariana set aside the pen and rolled her notes tightly, tying them into place. She stood, stretched, and started for her father’s office.

  The white door stood partly ajar. “Father? Oh, hello, Flamen Ande.” She schooled her expression into politeness.

  Ewan and Ande were sitting near his desk, with Tam and Luca standing behind Ande. “Hello, darling,” said her father.

  “Good evening, young Mage Hazelrig,” the priest said. “I was just about to begin the ceremony.”

  “Everything is to your satisfaction?” The Circle had ordered a wooden frame built over the Shard, matching exactly the sketch Ariana had carried back from the citadel: two beams eight feet tall, connected at the top at a width of five feet. On either upright, six feet above the ground, were iron rings; when Ariana had skimmed the outline of the annual ritual, she had learned incense burners would hang from these rings as the high priest chanted and swayed over the Shard.

  “Everything was prepared,” Ande answered.

  “Do you need anything else? Any assistance?” her father asked.

  “No, thank you. I have all I need.” He rose. “You must excuse me now, as I have to begin as the moon rises. Bring the bag, Luca.” He nodded to Ariana and left, Luca hurrying behind him.

  Ariana sat on the edge of the desk. “I’ll be glad when he’s finished and gone.”

  “Don’t be rude, Ariana,” Ewan said, “even if I agree with you.”

  “He shouldn’t have Luca,” Tam said. “The Gehrn don’t usually keep slaves. They are supposed to live an austere life. I looked it up.”

  A knock sounded at the open door. “May I come in?” Shianan asked.

  “Yes, do,” said Ewan. “We have just sent the flamen to discharge his duty. What can I do for you?”

  “My lady mage had invited me to supper.”

  “And you are welcome.” Ariana rose from the desk. “I want to look in on the priest first. The ceremony looked supremely dull when I read over it, but I confess to a tiny bit of curiosity.”

  Shianan grinned. “Will you peer down the stairwell like a mischievous child, spying where you shouldn’t?”

  Guilt lanced her. “Something like that, anyway.”

  “I’ll go, too,” Tam said.

  “I’ve read the chants,” Ewan said. “That’s enough tedium, and I want to go through the market before the last booksellers are gone for the day. I’ll see you at home.”

  He locked the office behind them and went the other way. The building was quiet; nearly everyone had already gone. Ariana sniffed and made a face. “I can smell the incense already. That must be thick in the cellar.”

  Shianan was frowning at the empty corridor. “Is no one watching?”

  Ariana shook her head. “The flamen didn’t want the Circle present—something about outsiders and sacred rituals and purification. That’s partly why Father didn’t blink when I said I wanted to peek.” She grinned.

  “He thinks something might happen to the Shard?”

  “Oh, no. The Circle picked over every aspect of this annual rite, and there’s no real magic in it.” She laughed. “It took weeks of preparation and more than a dozen mages to work the shield. A cranky priest and a bunch of incense, no matter how potent, won’t hurt it.”

  The stair into the cellar was narrow, and they crept down it. Ariana felt a little thrill of excitement, as if doing something slightly dangerous. The incense was very intense here, and she put a hand over her face.

  There was an odd sound, a sort of hissing thud, muffled by the smoke and coming at irregular intervals. As they neared the base of the stairs, something else, like a muted howl, overlapped the end of the first sound. “What is that?” Ariana whispered.

  Shianan paused mid-step, head tipped. “I don’t—it sounds like….”

  Tam darted forward into the cellar. Ariana dashed after him, heedless of caution. “Tam!” But as she descended into the cellar itself she stumbled to a stop.

  The incense burners were not hanging but on the floor, flanking the wooden frame. The rings held instead the black-haired slave, straddling the Shard with his arms outstretched, and the flamen was whipping his bare and bloodied back, making him twist against the wrist cuffs.

  Shianan swore as he plunged past her.

  Tam was nearly at the Shard, and as the priest swung again he leapt for the frame. The whip cut into him and he cried, stumbling with the force of it.

  Ande paused, staring in furious disbelief at Tam. He whirled as Shianan reached him. “What are you doing?”

  “I could ask you the same thing.” Shianan jabbed a finger toward the slave. “What is this? I thought you were going to perform a simple ritual!”

  “That follows next!” Ande snapped. “This is the purification for a new site. It requires the blood of a prisoner of war and—”

  “No!” Ariana gestured sharply. “This is not what we expected. It might go wrong.”

  Tam came toward the priest, his face set. “You—”

  Ande struck him hard with the butt of the whip, knocking Tam to the floor. Ariana rushed to him as Shianan wrested the whip from Ande’s hands. “We will discuss this with the Circle.”

  Tam sat up, blinking hard. The skin across his temple was abraded, and Ariana brushed at it with her left hand, keeping her right free and nearer Ande. “Are you all right?”

  “I gave you our ceremonial orders,” Ande protested. “You must let me finish!”

  “Wait!” Ariana held up a hand. “Be quiet. Can you feel it?”

  “Feel what?” Shianan looked at her.

  But Tam could sense the magic as well as she. “There’s something wrong with the shield.”

  The Shard was glowing deep in its center with the indigo light she’d seen before, but its pulsing was different somehow, unsteady. And there had been no light once the shield was in place. “Get away from the Shard. Hurry!”

  Shianan threw the whip to the floor and shoved Ande toward the stair. He reached for the slave’s bound wrists as Ariana crouched to look at the Shard between his knees. “Something’s altered it,” she said. Tam crawled beside her. “Something has altered the magic.” She reached her right hand to the dark liquid spattered on its surface, warm beneath her touch. Her finger came away red. “Blood. It’s the blood—it’s changing the properties of the shield.”

  The air around them was sparkling purple through the heavy incense. Shianan jerked the sagging slave free. “Can you hold it?”

  “I don’t know. I need some time to look at it. Move away.” She pressed her hand again to the Shard, and it throbbed though her skin. “I need my father.” She placed her left hand on it, trying to balance the sensation. “I think it’s—”

  Power shattered beneath her hands, burning her. The walls of the cellar flashed purple and an iridescent band appeared, marking the cellar-sized hemisphere that was all that was left of the shield. Shianan dashed for the stair with the stumbling slave, throwing him down as he turned back. “My lady mage!”

  She closed her eyes, visualizing the failing spell, and saw a heavy plate made suddenly fragile, buckling under pressure. She reached for Tam and stood. “Come on!”

  The iridescent line was creeping closer to them, the shield shrinking until it would collapse entirely upon the Shard. Ariana clutched Tam’s arm and ran for the stairs, gritting her teeth against the deafening throb, knowing she would have to pull Tam through the boundary, that it would hurt him.

  She struck the gleaming border as if it were stone, falling backward with a sharp, disorienting pain. Shianan shouted to her. “Ariana!”

  She stared at the border, watching it advance, and it reached her foot. It pressed against her solidly and then began to push her leg across the floor. She scrambled up and backward, unable to breathe.

  Shianan rushed to the iridescent rim. “Ariana!” He struck at the barrier and his fist glanced off as if beating a wall. He drew his dagger and stabbed at it without effect.

  Tam caught Arian
a’s arm and pulled her away from the advancing wall. It will crush us, she thought wildly. She spun and saw the hemisphere shrinking upon them, advancing more quickly now and flickering ominously. It will crush us, we’re going to die—

  Tam faced her and seized her forearms. “Release me!”

  She stared at the glistening shell contracting over them. Shianan shouted, his voice lost in the roar. She saw her father rushing down the stairs, shoving the flamen roughly aside. The rim was near enough to touch now.

  Tam’s fingers dug hard into her. “Release me!”

  Realization came to her and she seized him. She squeezed her eyes tightly shut and saw the cables, the threads, the chains, the one all-binding lock. “Tamaryl!”

  Power blossomed under her hands, expanding and spreading through him, spilling into her, and she felt him change as he clutched her. But it was too late, the walls were pressing against them and even Tam would be crushed.

  Something very cold crashed over her and there was only black.

  Chapter 17

  Shianan stared at the Shard, at the space where Ariana and Tam had been. Where they weren’t. They had disappeared in a spray of violet fluorescence, leaving nothing but the Shard itself, dull and dark. He had heard Tam screaming at Ariana, seen them grasp one another in final desperation, and then they were gone.

  He thought, through the smoke and iridescent gleam, he had seen a flash of membranous wings.

  Guards clattered down the stairs, weapons drawn, and looked uncertainly at the little group. “Mage Hazelrig,” one ventured.

  Ewan Hazelrig stared immobile at the Shard, at the space where his daughter had vanished. Shianan hadn’t seen him arrive.

  “Mage Hazelrig, you called us. You said something was happening to the shield.”

  “They’re gone,” the White Mage said hollowly.

  “Who? Who attacked the shield?”

  “The shield failed,” Shianan said, finding his voice now he had someone to command. “This is the man who triggered its failure. Hold him for questioning.”

  “I had leave to perform our rituals!” Ande protested, himself shocked, frightened, and a bit angry. “I did—”

  He was silenced abruptly as the guards took him. Shianan looked at the mage, anxious to ask questions which could not be voiced before others. “Mage Hazelrig,” he said, hearing his voice quaver. “May we use your office?”

  Ewan Hazelrig shook his head, his jaw hanging slackly. “No. I need a moment—here.”

  Shianan’s stomach spasmed. The mage went to the Shard and examined it without touching, peering at the slave’s blood spilled across it. He crouched and traced in the air the outline of a smudge where Ariana had placed her hand. The soldiers herded Ande and the injured slave up the stairs. “Did he attack the shield?” Shianan asked.

  “I don’t think so. I don’t think he worked any magic.” Ewan placed his fingertips lightly upon the Shard and concentrated. “There isn’t any lingering trace of another effort. I think—I think it was the blood.”

  “My lord mage?”

  “The blood on the Shard made it unstable. That must have been what I felt. It was weakening but still substantially the same, and it passed through us all without incident.”

  “But it was a barrier to them.” Shianan’s voice caught.

  “Ariana touched it here.” Mage Hazelrig swallowed, struggling to keep his own voice. “While she meant well, the shield was already failing irrevocably, and interfering only unbalanced it more. More—someone must have struck Tam.”

  “Yes.”

  Mage Hazelrig nodded. “This is Tam’s blood, here. Ryuven blood was used in the formation of the shield, and then the human blood here. Tam’s provided the catalyst that made it a shield to humans instead.”

  “That’s possible?”

  “It probably would have collapsed before becoming impenetrable, without Tam’s blood.” He straightened, his face strained.

  Shianan’s own limbs were beginning to quiver with shock. He had seen brutal death, but soldiers in battle—not Ariana and Tam, crushed within the shield intended to save them.

  Ewan Hazelrig sank to the ground. “My daughter. Sweet Holy One, my daughter.”

  Shianan stared numbly. “I—my lord mage, I—I am so sorry.”

  Ewan shook his head and covered his face. “She is not dead.”

  Something rushed through Shianan. “But—she could escape the shield?”

  “No. No one, not even a mage, could escape that. She would have been crushed as it collapsed into the Shard.” He swallowed audibly and took away his hands, revealing reddened eyes and damp cheeks. “Did you see?”

  Shianan needed only a moment to grasp his meaning. “She released him.”

  Ewan nodded. “She released Tam to his Ryuven form and powers. The altered shield no longer barred him as a Ryuven.”

  “So he could go to his own world.” Ariana had allowed Tam to flee at the end, escaping the horrific death closing on them. “Better a slim chance with his own kind than certain death here.” He clenched his fists. “But even if she helped him—she would have—how—you said she was not dead!”

  “She is not dead,” Mage Hazelrig repeated heavily. “He took her with him.”

  Shianan stared and then swayed, grasping at the scaffold for support. “Sweet Holy One,” he whispered. “She’s there.”

  Chapter 18

  Ariana was rising, rushing up from a very deep pool of cold and black. Someone wanted her, someone somehow willed that she rise, that she wake.

  She opened her eyes and saw a thousand colors, saw every particle of the air dancing and whirling before her in a dizzying array. A thousand sounds assaulted her ears, deafening her. She squeezed her eyes shut and slapped her hands over her ears, but still she heard them, heard the rush of the wind and the flutter of a bird’s wing and the roar of the storm and the laugh of a man and the friction of grass blades in the breeze and the metallic clink of coins and hundreds of other things, all magnified beyond what her hands could blunt. The air itself bit at her flesh, the movement of the breeze whipped across her skin, the prickle of the grass stabbed a maddening attack on her body.

  She screamed.

  Tamaryl watched Ariana struggle to consciousness, holding his breath as she choked for air.

  He had to return her. If Oniwe chose to execute Tamaryl, Ariana would suffer the same fate, or if they discovered her identity she might be used as leverage. Certainly the Black Mage, daughter to the White Mage, would be quite a prize. But he could not risk carrying her back until he knew how the first trip had injured her, lest the second kill her.

  Ariana opened her eyes and gulped for air. But immediately she flinched, and Tamaryl’s gut contracted—was it the sight of his Ryuven form bending over her? But she clamped her hands over her ears and hunched her shoulders, trying to hide herself, and she screamed as he had never heard her.

  “Lady Ariana!” He gripped her shoulders. “My lady! What is it?”

  She writhed in his grasp and began to rake at her own flesh, gouging stripes in her arms and torso. Tamaryl seized her hands to stop her, but she shrieked and jerked from him.

  His senses prickled as they had done only once in recent years, and he turned his head as three winged forms strode toward them. Walking—they did not see him as a threat.

  They were che, though he did not know them well. The first at least he knew by name: Umbreth, who had led the attack against him in the mountains.

  He took a steadying breath, and energy burned through him. Immediately he drew another breath, and another. Magic poured through him, rushing to fill all the myriad empty spaces. Like water to the dangerously thirsty, it would need time to fully quench him, but for the first time in years, he had a cool spring to quell his parched essence.

  Ariana was still screaming, struggling beneath whatever invisible attack she suffered. Tamaryl turned back, torn between attending to her and meeting the che. As he watched, her clawed fingers loos
ened and she passed into unconsciousness, momentarily freed from whatever plagued her. He brushed her face worriedly—yes, she was only sleeping—and with a guilty gratitude, he straightened to face Umbreth’che and the others.

  They had stopped a short distance away, watching him warily. They could sense, of course, he had power now. Umbreth did not succeed in concealing his surprise and resentment. Finally he managed to speak, breaking the silence Ariana had left. “You have come home, Tamaryl’sho.”

  He had to press his advantage. “You seem surprised to see me, Umbreth’che.”

  “We left you with Oniwe’aru. I thought—but obviously you spoke privately after he sent us away.”

  Tamaryl did not wish to address that. “Where is Oniwe’aru now?”

  “In the Palace of Red Sands,” came the answer. “Who is the human?”

  “I will take her to Oniwe’aru,” Tamaryl answered obliquely. He stooped and gathered Ariana into his arms, taking care her arms did not dangle. She was heavy, and he needed magic to hold her. He began walking, not looking at Umbreth as he passed.

  “One moment, Tamaryl’sho,” Umbreth sallied. “Oniwe’aru did not say to expect your return. Nor has your sentence been lifted.”

  Tamaryl turned to glance at Umbreth over his shoulder, gathering his long-suppressed ability with an invigorating sense of energy and, despite the situation, a certain joy. He let a trickle of power ebb from him. “The three of you are not enough to stop me,” he said bluntly. “I will go to see Oniwe’aru. We shall see what transpires after that.”

  He kept his head straight and high as he walked, but his mind was roiling. Could he reach Oniwe’aru through the female guard? Even if he could speak, would he die anyway? Could he risk taking Ariana back through the between-worlds? How long would the shield remain down?

  The Palace of Red Sands was very near, as Tamaryl had arrived in one of its expansive gardens. That was some unconscious impulse, it seemed….

  Umbreth was not the only one to note his appearance, but the others were more cautious in their response; he saw forms watching from shadowed lanes or doorways as he approached the building of gleaming white stone. The two guards, each armed with a mace, had no such recourse. They straightened and tensed as he approached, raising their wings slightly. “Tamaryl’sho,” one said tightly.