Oath Bound

by T. G. Ayer

  I gave as soft sigh and shook my head before grabbing my drink. Then I raised my cup. “Here’s to skeletons and laundry and chests. May they be revealed and aired and…fuck. I knew where I was going with that before I started but I was just about to say ‘gotten off on’ and I’m pretty sure that doesn’t work in this context.”

  Choking off her laugh, Mel said, “How about we go with shoulders, and unburdened?”

  Squinting at Mel, I smile gratefully, then nodded. “Yes. Let’s go with that.”

  She rolled my eyes, “Alright already, do I have to swear on a grimoire or something?”

  I let out a low chuckle. “No, what I meant was what I have to say is also related to…those two subjects.”

  “They are?”

  “Yep.”

  “Wanna tell me already?”

  I grunted, then said, “Okay, sorry. Okay so, after the whole repeated zapping and repeated passing out, my father insisted on doing an MRI. I was against it but I guess I had little choice. And he got me when I was too weak to protest. So I was curious about the results because I…er…I mean—”

  “Out with it, walker,” Mel snapped.

  Raising my eyebrows, I realized I had no choice at all but to reply. “I had a few…episodes.”

  “Episodes?”

  “Yeah. Fainting spells. Etcetera.”

  “Do you even know the concept of explaining?”

  “Yeah, I do. When it’s not my problems,” I muttered, almost under my breath.

  Folding her arms, Mel sat back and waited me out.

  I continued, “So I had a few seizures and figured it was likely best I get ahead of Dad because he in his infinite wisdom had decided that I wasn’t allowed to travel through the veil without his all-clear. And I suspected that whatever was wrong with me would come up on the MRI and thus nix any possibility of going to Drakys to see Logan.”

  Mel responded by rolling her eyes. “And I bet you wanted to get your hot little hands on the results before your Dad saw them? A little bit of waylaying of information couldn’t have hurt right?” I smirked.

  Glaring at Mel, I gave her a stiff glare then said, “And sure enough the results were far from what I’d wanted to see.”

  “Which means what exactly?”

  “Which means I have bleeding in the brain.”

  “What the actual fuck, Kai?!” Mel yelled

  I swallowed hard and winced at the volume. “Look, it’s not as bad as it seems. I’ve had Sienna do a session with her healing fire and I’m going to convince Darcy to get in there and have a nosy around, see if she can do anything to help ease things just until we have the sexy djinn dude back home safe and sound.”

  “And then what?” Mel snapped. “You just up and die because you pushed too hard and didn’t take care of yourself?”

  I twisted my lips. “I’m taking care of myself. I’m not stupid or reckless.”

  “Could have fooled me,” muttered Mel.

  Then I said, “Anyway, I’ll be fine. I do have the odd headache or two, and I may or may not have a seizure and pass out, so we’d need to watch out for that. But otherwise everything is just dandy.”

  “How can you be so fucking calm about this?”

  With a shrug, I said, “‘Cos calm is better than freaking my shit?”

  Mel replied, “Well, I know we agreed on 2 for 2 but I’ll see you two and raise you one more.”

  “Oh?” Frowning, I asked, “What happened?”

  Mel shrugged. “It’s just a memory of something that I didn’t even know had been lost in the first place.”

  “Huh?” Shaking tm head, I said, “This sounds familiar but please go on.”

  Clearing her throat, Mel said, “So I had a memory of my mother’s voice but I don’t remember her or my father at all.”

  40

  My conversation with Mel was cut short by the arrival of Fathima the rebel warrior, and soon we were regrouping and being guided through the dark streets to a dilapidated house that turned out be the rebels headquarters.

  Fathima left Aisha with Logan and me, then took Mel off to meet the rebel commander. Not longer after her departure, one of the soldiers popped by to summon us to the commander’s room where we were met with a spread of food that made my stomach clench with hunger.

  The table was filled with platters of food, dates, cheeses, dried fruits, bread with garlic butter. As soon as we entered the room we were guided to the table to see the commander.

  The commander spoke to Logan, his expression filled with respect, more than even Logan probably thought he’d receive. While the pair talked, I scanned the room, spotting a woman beyond Fathima with harp eyes, a thin smile and a shock of grey-white hair.

  After the meal, the commander requested to speak to the team, and dismissed many of the attendees of their small soiree.

  “Thank you for coming to help us,” the elegant old man said, “And don’t worry. I know full well that you have begun to wonder why we would even need your help other than the privilege of access to your unique skills to use human weapons and technology as part of our defense against the EarthWorld agencies.”

  Mel met my eyes then, and I had to wonder what she was thinking.

  Then the commander continued, “I am much distressed to hear that Saleem’s friends risked their lives on so many occasions in their efforts to get to Mithras to save him and our people. I know this sentiment has been expressed already, but I don’t think we can thank you enough. For now, an explanation will have to be compensation enough.

  “You will know by now that Mithras possesses technology we have seen fit to keep from the many realms of the DarkWorld. Please let me reassure you that the decision was never made lightly and we were never of the mind to hoard such technological advances for the purposes of power.

  “We possessed sufficient knowledge of the workings of the EarthWorld, enough to know that this technology would be infinitely dangerous in the hands of governments and corporations.”

  Mel and Logan exchanged a knowing glance, which I understood only too well. Even here in Mithras, the people were aware of how dangerous the struggle for power was within the EarthWorld.

  “Of course, we did suffer years of doubt in the wake of that decision,” the commander said. “Given the situation in the EarthWorld after the Conflagration. Our councils would often talk it over and wonder if we ought to reconsider, but we held fast to our decision.

  “This tech would have helped the EarthWorld power cities that were affected by the bleeding of magic and the dead spots of energy all over the world would likely have been reduced. Then, one of our senior officials made the mistake of trusting the wrong person. He went to the Earth realm with the intention of learning their technology and finding a way to transform our energy production process in order to make it suitable for human use. He succeeded and began to work on perfecting it, but by confiding in his peers he’d started a ball rolling that he had little understanding of. To say that he was naïve would be the best description.

  “After several attempts by government officials to broker a business arrangement with our world in order to obtain access to the tech and to the power sources, which our people rejected, the scientist’s labs and offices in the EarthWorld were raided and these agencies attempted to take the tech by force.

  “Our scientists returned, understanding they had ultimately endangered their own realm and regretting the compassion with which they’d begun the endeavor to develop the tech to help the EarthWorld. But again we underestimated the tenacity and determination—

  “Perhaps their greed and desperation too?” one of the female soldiers said.

  “Agreed. And we paid for that underestimation. Not too long after our scientists returned, a delegation arrived intending to broker talks with our King and Queen. Which of course we declined politely. And which went exactly as you’d expect. They left in a fury, promising we would not get away with hoarding technology that would help billions of people. And yet a
gain we underestimated their greed. A few months passed in which we were lulled into a false sense of security. What followed were numerous attempts on the life of the King, which resulted in...success I’m afraid. But, even after the king’s death, our Shahbanu wasn’t as compliant as these agents had expected.”

  “They certainly wouldn’t have expected her to be as powerful and as adamant as her husband,” the woman’s tone was dry as she replied. “Despite her status of mourning, the queen attended a diplomatic event in Paris, a meeting with the Supreme High Council. She never returned.”

  The commander gave the woman a nod. “Soon after her abduction, Crown Prince Saleem followed, determined to find her and bring her home. He was reluctant to ascend the throne unless he was certain his mother had indeed passed away.”

  “We would have known had she passed. And we checked the astral planes constantly, even hoping she may reach out, make contact. But nothing. Saleem meanwhile, began to work for a paranormal investigative agency which I’m sure you’re familiar with. He sent back reports with the warriors who visited him regularly—though in secret—that he was beginning to lose hope. But by that time, we’d already been infiltrated. Saleem had been gone just a few months when the Veil was breached and our council ousted.”

  “Agent Blake?” Asked Mel.

  He gave a nod. “He arrived with another man who we understood to be a senior government official representing the United Nations. But the poor man had little idea of the real plot. He soon found himself with a dagger in his brain and his assistant was tortured to death for information she clearly didn’t possess.”

  “Later, they brought in a MindMage who I am sad to say was successful in turning several of our key council members,” one of the older soldiers said. “Those Agent Blake couldn’t sway had to make a choice—toe the line and pretend to play the game, or join the rest of the citizens in the camps.”

  “The camps?”

  The man nodded, eyes icy. “There are industrial outposts located in a number of our main cities,” he bit out, tone furious. “There the people, men, women, and children are used as labor for the energy production factories.”

  I blinked at the man’s words.

  What in Ailuros’ name was going on in this realm?

  41

  Mel seemed to take it all in her stride as she said, “That makes sense now. Gilfillan was adamant he needed maps to a number of cities around the realm. Can we assume he knew more than he’d been willing to admit?”

  The commander nodded, his brow furrowed as he too considered the connection.

  “But wait,” Mel interrupted, finger raised. “What exactly are the people doing in these camps? Why would they need whole cities of people as labor? I thought this process of energy production you developed was even more desirable because it was clean energy, no pollution, no waste?”

  The commander’s eyebrow waggled for a moment, then he said, “I will have Fathima take you to the site so you can see for yourselves,”

  “How do we go there without being seen?” Mel voiced my questions. “It’s not impossible to be seen within the Ether. And Blake’s mage is extremely powerful. Do we have any information about this mage? Who is he? What are his limitations and strengths?”

  Fathima gave her shoulders a quick roll. “What we know is that the mage is a woman—they refer to her as the Witch, and sometimes as the Demon. Seems even Blake’s men aren’t sure what she is. Nobody has seen her face. She moves around the palace, cloaked from head to toe, face hidden. Clearly, her identity is something Division 7 wishes to keep secret.”

  Biting her lip, Mel said, “I guess we know only what we know. The one thing we can be sure of is she is powerful. The queen needed Barry to help build a counterspell—”

  The commander squinted. “Barry?”

  “Baa’ruk, the demon overlord for the Eastern Seaboard. Pretty sure he has some other fancy title that I can’t pronounce. Not certain if you know him, but the queen did say that he and her late husband were good friends.”

  The commander smiled unexpectedly. “Yes. We do know Baa’ruk. And he is trusted, so we are relieved he was able to assist our queen.”

  “Considering she wasn’t able to weave the spell on her own, we can rest assured that this mage, whoever she is, has more power than anyone we’ve encountered before,” Mel said. “Which also means there is a strong likelihood she could sense our movements in the ether, especially when we’re close to a key location like the palace. I hardly think Blake would be complacent enough to dispense with protection around those productions sites either.”

  After looking over first at Fathima, and then at his generals, the commander continued, “Well, that question is directly related to our next problem. We learned early on how easy it was for this mage to detect astral movement and we did lose a few warriors in the process of this discovery. For which I must accept responsibility for being complacent. The mage does appear to be still learning as her methods are more blast-first-ask-no-questions which isn’t at all tactically wise.”

  Mel’s gasp got the woman’s attention. “What is it?”

  Mel shook her head, then said, “Those tactics would explain why our recent attempt at accessing the Veil with a portal key ended in disaster. And also why I’d been shut out of the Mithras ether a few days ago. It’s almost as though she’s arbitrarily firing magic at anything she senses within the Veil and the astral plane. I’m hoping she hasn’t yet developed a sense of the identity of the interlopers she’s blasted out.”

  “We suspect she hasn’t,” replied Fathima, . “But, of course, we cannot be complacent either. As such, we’ve used a protective spell that would shroud our warriors as they travel through the astral planes. Unfortunately, it’s old magic and highly unethical, but the realm is at risk so we had to take drastic measures.”

  Mel’s eyebrows lifted. “Please tell me no newborns were sacrificed in order to create this unethical magic?”

  Though Mel’s tone was a little too sharp to be respectful, the commander didn’t appear to mind. “Not exactly,” he replied, smiling. “Don’t worry. No lives were sacrificed. But, being dark magic, blood was necessary to complete the magic.”

  Swallowing hard, Mel replied, “So the good news is you drained a child of his blood? That isn’t good news to me.”

  “Do not fret, child,” General Amira said, “We were gentle, and the child is unharmed and will not suffer any trauma as a result. It is still a breach of our code of ethics for which we will all be held accountable once all is said and done.”

  Mel may have nodded but her eyes were skeptical. “Okay, so how does this protection work?”

  When the commander had Fathima bring him a little velvet bag, then dropped a kelan into his palm, Mel’s reaction was priceless.

  “Goddess save me,” said with a low groan.

  “Is something the matter?” asked the commander,

  Taking a breath, Mel replied, “Well. We kinda already have those, which makes me want to faint right about now.”

  The commander sounded weary. “She is often one step ahead of me.” Then he rubbed his forehead.

  Mel snorted. “Well, she better not have bled any infants in the EarthWorld or I’m going to have to have a word with her.”

  The commander appeared amused. “It’s likely she used the blood of her own children, so the children of the Earth-Realm are safe.”

  Mel mad a face. “Crap. Is she walking around with their blood in vials around her neck or something? And how would blood that old remain viable for two decades anyway?” The commander seemed to be having a hard time trying not to laugh. Seemed there was another djinn who found Mel hilarious.

  Now the tracker said, “Don’t tell me. The queen is one of the most powerful djinn to ever live. She’s adept enough in magic to figure out a way to preserve blood for however long she wishes.”

  Fathima finally stepped forward to take the bag from the commander. “However the kelans were produced, th
ey have saved many lives, so I personally believe their creation was worth the trouble we will soon find ourselves in. We use the kelans when traveling the ether, but this protective armor isn’t handed out to just any of the warriors. Partly to avoid leaking the fact that we have such a protection, and partly because one needs a certain level of skill to protect oneself from the armor. Over time, the energy the magical armor creates has the potential of injuring to the user unless they know how to protect themselves.”

  My ears were now ringing at this news. I had to protect myself against the effects of the kelan? What in Ailuros’ name did that mean for me now that I was already damaged in the head?

  Fathima appeared oblivious to both Mel’s and my consternation as she said, “We will travel through the ether to this location—to the city of Kenitra in the Planes of Oezzane. It isn’t a taxing journey despite the distance, though I’m sure you will find that your friends will need an adjustment or two.”

  Mel’s expression remained quizzical as she looked around at the team.

  42

  After the meeting with the commander we returned to our room to find the queen gone. A table on one end provided us with a place to eat and work, six chairs, two sofas and a row of hotbeds alone the walls made the place a little more comfortable. Sort of.

  Mel was shaking her head. “That was a serious info download.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “But that’s not what’s bothering you?” I shared a glance with Logan and he looked concerned though he said nothing.

  “Not really. It’s something of a majestic problem.”

  With a snort, Darcy said, “Don’t you have a way with words.”

  Mel sighed and threw herself onto the sofa, drawing the rest of is toward her to gather around.

  She said, “When Horner mentioned that Sentinel was under investigation. I asked about why they would require a medical examination of the queen. He had no idea although I was sure he was more than curious.”