She stepped forward, futile anger in her eyes, and climbed into the carriage.
“Smart girl. Now, Desmeres. I know how this woman feels about you. Intimately. But you’ve taken great pains to keep me from gaining any insight into your feelings for her. Tell me this. What now? Do you attempt to keep your precious wisdom to yourself? Do you let another woman in your life die because of yet another poor, selfish decision in a lifetime of such?”
“You know my plan, Epidime,” Desmeres said. “And let us not pretend I should be calling you anything else. You know I want you to follow me into that cave. You know I have taken every precaution. Things not even Genara was or is privy to. You know if you and I enter that cave, there isn’t a damn thing you can do to keep me from making sure you never leave it.”
He shook his head, a smile of genuine delight on his face.
“Utterly unwavering confidence. You wear it like a suit of armor, like it could protect you. Make your claims to these men of who you think I am. Lie to yourself and say that you know me, what I’m capable of. None of that matters. What you believe, what you know to be true, has no bearing on the subject. You want me to enter the cave, I want to enter the cave. That is what we call an agreement. Lead the way, sir, and we shall see what we shall see.”
“Then you come alone.”
“Oh, no. That is quite unacceptable.”
Desmeres let a final weapon, one that had been concealed in his sleeve, drop to his hand. He raised it to his own throat. “I’m afraid it is non-negotiable. The information you seek exists in precisely one place. And there is a very simple way to make sure you’ll never get it. I am ready, willing, and able to destroy it before I let you have it.”
Anrack looked hard at Desmeres. “Do you believe for one moment you could achieve that by your own hand? Destroy yourself so thoroughly?”
“You’ve seen what my weapons can do. Do you believe for one moment I can’t?”
The two men stared at each other, long and hard.
“Very well,” said Anrack. “Never let it be said I was not willing to compromise.”
He turned to one of his men. “You, to the carriage. A pack, provisions. Two men, five days. Food only. Water will be present in abundance, I suspect. You will await our return for the full five days. If at any point Desmeres returns unaccompanied, you will capture him and deliver him to the capital. If at any point you are approached by an individual of any kind who speaks the code phrase I dictated this morning, you will follow their orders to the letter. And if this woman or her brother show any signs of plotting or other misbehavior, kill them both.”
Almost before he’d finished dictating orders, a pair of packs had been prepared. Anrack sheathed his weapon and took them effortlessly, then stepped forward.
“Your move, Lumineblade. Lead the way,” he said, offering the second pack to Desmeres.
Desmeres took the pack and hooked it over one shoulder. He held his blade firm but at his side. Epidime gathered the gem-studded blade from the ground.
“I wouldn’t dream of letting this fine piece languish on the ground,” he said, slipping it into his belt.
Desmeres gripped his weapon tighter and glanced at the pulsing gems of his sword. Before this day was through, he had no doubt one of them would taste blood. The only question was whose blood it would be.
#
Desmeres led the way, torch in hand, as Epidime paced behind. The former General and current commander didn’t even have the decency to keep Desmeres at sword point, as though the thought of him escaping or even becoming a threat hadn’t even occurred to him.
The walls gleamed and sparkled with ice and flakes of crystal. A weak stream of water trickled down the center of the tunnel, making the floor utterly treacherous.
“This water isn’t a good sign. The tunnel is only passable when the stream has run dry,” Desmeres warned.
For his part, he showed very little concern over his predicament as well, as though all was going according to plan. It was the attitude with which he’d lived his life, and he wasn’t about to abandon it now.
“Then we shall travel as far as the water will allow,” Epidime said.
“You are giving me a great deal of credit, mind you. I came though this cave once, heading in the opposite direction, and more than seventy years ago.”
“You would have taken great care to commit the proper path to mind, both to allow yourself to retreat if the way forward was impassible and to provide yourself a means to return to Entwell if you were unable to achieve your goals elsewhere,” Epidime said.
“Sound logic. You’ve been thinking about this for some time, I gather.”
“While the other D’Karon were present and your world was our aim, I had other tasks to command my attention, but as soon as I’d discovered both the presence of a portion of your world that could remain secret to me and the evidence of what nestled in that dark corner, I knew I would one day seek it out. Thus, plotting the means to do so was an engaging way to spend the evenings. When sleep is not necessary, one finds many hours each day to indulge oneself in pondering and plotting.”
“I can only imagine. And in your plotting, did you work out how exactly you could be certain I wasn’t leading you astray? Or for that matter, how you might force me to reveal that information?”
“Naturally I’d assumed I would take it personally from your mind. I’m sure a solution will present itself.”
“Epidime, there is something genuinely to be admired in you.”
“There are a great many things. To which of them to you refer.”
“I’ve been accused of arrogance in my life, and those accusations are quite well earned. But the raw audacity with you underestimate and disregard your enemies is at an entirely new level. You didn’t even attempt to search me or disarm me. For all you know, I’m still carrying the sigil.”
“Perhaps you are.”
“This doesn’t concern you?”
“Why should it. You won’t have time to heat it enough to brand me, and anything less is not permanent enough to be a threat to me. To say nothing of how unlikely it is that you’d be able to overpower or outmaneuver me enough to use it.”
“We’ll see,” Desmeres said.
He glanced at the subtly increasing density of crystalline flecks embedded in the stone around them.
“How does it feel?” he asked. “I’m not much of a mystic, but even I can detect the confounding influence of these walls. Can you feel them closing in on you, boxing you in? A unique sensation for you, isn’t it.”
Epidime grinned. “Trying your hand at mind games. It is fascinating. Like watching an infant take its first steps. Do you expect me to lose my nerve? To abandon my plan?”
“It would certainly make my life easier.”
“This is not the most dire situation I’ve found myself in. And I suspect still more dire threats exist than a unique but unremarkable cave in a stubborn but doomed world.”
“Oh, we’re doomed now, are we?”
“All worlds are. Nothing lasts forever. Granted, the moment I slipped through the portal, your world’s end moved much closer.”
They came to a wall polished nearly smooth from the ancient cycle of flooding and receding waters that made the cave so treacherous.
“There’s a bit of climbing now,” Desmeres said.
“Then climb.”
He held up his bandaged hand. “My grip strength isn’t what it might be right now.”
Epidime drew Desmeres’s sword, casting an ominous glow on the walls. “Then this will be rather painful for you I suppose. Climb.”
He flexed his fingers a bit, wincing at the stiffness of his burned digits that were only beginning to recover, and found the first decent handhold. It was difficult to find grips that were firm enough to support him and large enough to grip with his bandaged hand. The presence of a powerful and well-armed mystic was a strong motivator, however. He was soon hauling himself onward at a reasonable rate. Epid
ime maneuvered Anrack’s body with a grace and ease the aging man likely hadn’t displayed in years, but climbing still required him to holster his weapon. As for the matter of the torch, he left it behind. In its place, he conjured a ball of violet light from the very air.
“Why even take the torch in the first place,” Desmeres asked, breathing heavily.
“Surely you know by now that the human mind is fully willing to dismiss the absurd but will fixate endlessly on the mundane. The battlefield is the only part of the Northern Alliance that has had ready access to healers. A man restoring himself to good health in the time it takes to reach one's destination is perfectly normal. But to enter the cave without a torch? No mystic at the front would dare squander his power on something so minor as conjuring light.”
Epidime did not seem in the least bit fatigued by the climb. The degree to which the D’Karon could ignore the petty needs of the bodies he inhabited was unnerving to no end.
“You seem awfully forthcoming with your insight,” Desmeres said.
“I exist to learn, and what joy is there in learning if one cannot also educate?”
Desmeres pulled himself onto a ledge to rest. “The mad part of all of this? Your pursuit of knowledge, your predilection to pontification? You are a natural candidate for Entwell.”
“I felt precisely that way from the moment I became aware of it.” He stood beside Desmeres, waiting for the elf to catch his breath. “A place devoted entirely to knowledge for the sake of knowledge. There is something beautiful in that. Finding that place would feel like returning home.”
“And how much do you know of it?”
“Fleeting glimpses. Scraps from Myranda’s mind when I tested myself against her. More from Lain’s mind.”
“Then you should know that you’ll never be able to slip inside unnoticed. You will be revealed for what you are. Your very existence in our world is against the few rules imposed upon the students of Wizard’s Side. Once they’ve found you, they will end you.”
“They won’t detect me.”
“I did.”
“You worked it out faster than I would have liked, I’ll grant you. But do you honestly believe you would have had the necessary clues if I’d not intended you to? And don’t think I don’t know about your chat with Oriech pointing you in my direction to begin with. That meddlesome fool is flagrantly overstepping himself in his interference. I despise when the defenders of a world insist upon bending the rules in their favor…”
“Why push the issue? Why would you allow yourself to be discovered?”
“What fun would life be if I gave you all the answers?” he said. “That’s enough of a rest. Move.”
For the moment, Desmeres was more intrigued with the riddle than anything else, working at it as he climbed. Not two minutes had passed before he had the answer.
“You didn’t think I’d trusted her. You wanted to see if I had some other weapon against you than I’d shown or spoken of.”
“Correct. And if there is one thing that has surprised me about you, it was the discovery that you had been open with her. I almost didn’t take her when you sent her on her way. A wise foe, the sort of foe I imagined you to be, would have been using her as bait. It is disappointing in a way. Women? So simple a weakness for a figure who in so many ways have proved almost worthy of my respect?”
“Funny. You learn this about me and call it a weakness. I learn it about myself and call it a strength.”
“Oh? And in what way to do you find strength in such an act, laying yourself bare to another person knowing full well the risk it exposes you to?”
“What fun would life be if I gave you all the answers?”
The journey continued slowly. Ledges became wider and more frequent as the cave branched into a long, tall, narrow chamber. Desmeres led Epidime forward with a blade pressing into his back. Their steps echoed and intermingled with the constant sound of trickling water. The farther they progressed, the louder the sloshing and trickling became. Two other things became more evident as they progressed as well. Flakes of crystal embedded in the stone of the walls became increasingly common, and as their density increased the glow of Epidime’s conjured light dimmed. Soon it was barely a match for the weak glow of the sword’s gems.
“Would you like me to fetch a torch from the packs your men so generously provided? Because it seems your magic won’t serve us for much longer.”
“If something besides your guidance is required, I assure you, I will inform you.”
Desmeres let his fingers brush across the wall. Moisture dripped through pores that riddled the stone. To his left, the ledge dropped smoothly away into an inky void. The air here was heavy with moisture, and as they had progressed inward, the cave had become warmer as well. A dank, stagnant scent hung in the air that brought him back to the last time he’d traveled through the cave. It was certainly true that he’d taken care to memorize, to the best of his ability, the path he’d taken. And this stretch, so near to where it led out into Melorn Forest, was particularly vivid in his mind.
“You can feel it, can’t you? The way the mountain tugs and teases at the edge of your soul. Spells unravel. And spirits… I’ve heard tales from the wizards who made it through. There were parties of spellcasters who lost most of their groups not to the innumerable hazards and the failures of their navigational spells, but because of the madness of wailing spirits rendered too weak and unfocused to leave the chamber of their demise.”
“Intimidation. I should warn you, that hasn’t been a tactic of pronounced success with me.”
“I suspect that is because no one has ever presented you with a credible threat. But you and I wouldn’t be here right now if this cave did not pose a threat to you. So I will offer you one last opportunity. Give up on Entwell and hide yourself as best you can. You’ll need to. Because the remaining Chosen are beyond a shadow of a doubt ready, willing, and able to destroy you as soon as the state of the world is stable enough to make an open hunt for your vile, manipulative spirit worth the risk. But if you force me…” Desmeres turned to face him. “I think this is as far as we shall go.”
Epidime looked coldly in his eye. “So soon? I would have imagined you would try your gambit closer to the cave’s center.”
“Call me impatient.”
Desmeres took two swift strides toward the edge. Epidime moved with deceiving speed and reached out with one hand, gripping him viciously by the arm to keep him from hurling himself off the edge. Desmeres smoothly pivoted, digging one heel into the slippery slope and delivering a punishing kick to Epidime’s ankle. Not a hint of pain painted the D’Karon’s face, but the shifting weight and balance proved too much for him. He began to pitch forward. Flares of magic became visible around him as wisps of dim violet light, but the influence of the walls stripped his attempted spell of its strength and a heartbeat later both Desmeres and Epidime were plummeting into the void.
Epidime must have been trying his very best to summon some manner of mystic effect to arrest his fall, because the weakening spell that had lit their way vanished entirely, replaced with the sparks and flashes of failed magic and the weak glimmer of his own sword. Without light, the fall was a soul-twisting and terrifying experience, no indication of where the walls were, where the ground was, or when their tumble would come to a sudden and violent end. They struck the opposite wall twice as they fell, thumping painfully into it but neither stopping or slowing their descent.
Several seconds later they plunged into icy water. The cold seized Desmeres’s chest. He had to fight from wheezing out what might be his last breath. He drew his small blade and sliced the straps of the pack on his back. In the darkness it was difficult to know which way was up, but if he didn’t shed his load, it wouldn’t matter. It was why he’d been so willing to leave the bulk of weapons behind. Anrack’s precious Elite Armor would not be so easily shed.
After an eternity he burst to the surface and gasped for breath. The water was flowing swiftly, t
hrashing him against the walls. Biting cold stung at his wounds, but when a curve in the flow threw him against an almost glassy slope he managed to dig his blade into the stone and haul himself free of the current. The darkness was absolute, and he had no means to conjure light of his own. He didn’t need to. This part of the cave was intimately familiar to him. Twice during his attempted exit he’d found himself tumbling into this very pool. The walls were treacherous, prone to crumbling collapse. Mounds of jagged, dislodged stone marked where sections of the ceiling had fallen. He fumbled with his already numbing limbs as he tried to pull himself higher along the stone outcropping, but each wrong move threatened further collapse. The chamber was nothing short of a death trap… which was precisely what he hoped it would be for Epidime.
Once he was firmly out of the water he steadied his breath and took stock of the situation.
“Pitch-black and potentially stranded with the greatest remaining enemy of my world. Difficult to imagine this has so far been going as I’d hoped…” he wheezed.
He shut his eyes and thought back to his time here. Scaling the wall back to the ledge above would be impossible. The slick and frozen stone formed itself into overhangs that would be dangerous to climb with the proper gear, contributing more to the collapse hazard than offering handholds. He tried to blink the water from his eyes. There was so much silt, stone, and crystal stirred up within that he felt as though he’d gotten glass powder in his eyes. It made it too dangerous to drink, which was its greatest threat when he’d found his way here during the exit, but moreover the tiny bits of crystal just might make it a proper defense against Epidime. He wouldn’t be able to leave Anrack’s body without succumbing to the diffusion and diffraction of the crystal shards, and thus the commander’s body would be his tomb. Now, all that remained was to avoid a similar fate for himself.
#
Genara and her brother sat upon the running board of the carriage, surrounded by the Elite soldiers. She seemed resigned to her fate, simply sipping some of the brandy from her pack which the soldiers had, with great reluctance and greater scrutiny, allowed her to fetch.
The Redemption of Desmeres Page 36