Lodestone

by Katherine Forrister

  “Leave this place, and I will be,” he murmured.

  “No,” she said. “I’m not going anywhere. Didn’t I make that clear already?”

  “I am ordering you to leave,” he said. “Do not disobey me.”

  “You can punish me after if you want,” she said. “You can kill me.” She was shocked that she meant it, but she set her jaw with stubborn resistance. “But I am not abandoning you. I’m going to find out what Serj knows, and I will help you.”

  Melaine turned around before he could protest. She walked to the door and then ran through the dark halls. Eerie green torches of everflame cast dim light and deep shadows, and she couldn’t shake the feeling that the shadows were filled with more than simply an absence of light.

  But she heard no whispers and saw no apparitions. She saw no sign of the monstrous Sateless. She reached the biting cold air of the garden without harm and descended into the dank dungeons.

  She knew the way to Serj’s cell by heart now. When she reached the barred door of the ancient torture chamber, she used her lingering magic to unlock the warding spell. The devious devices inside all paled in comparison to the torture she had witnessed the Sateless inflicting on the Overlord.

  “Serj,” Melaine said, approaching the cell. Serj shot up from the floor, then melted against the bars with overwhelming relief.

  “What do you want?” he asked, feigning his casual demeanor and failing.

  “What did you do?” she demanded. “What did your brother do?”

  His eyes sharpened, and the vein in his neck pulsed faster. She raised her wand at him.

  “Tell me,” she said.

  “We found a way to end him,” Serj said, pride surging through his mask of fear. “And not just kill him. We found a way to torture him. Like he’s tortured so many. Like he tortured Talem.” His voice broke a little when he said his brother’s name. “And it’s working, isn’t it? Why else would you be here?”

  “No one deserves that,” Melaine said. “No one.”

  “Why do you defend him?” Serj asked. “Were you too buried in Stakeside garbage to know what was happening in the rest of the city? Do you know what happened, what he did, in the war?”

  “It’s latched onto me now,” Melaine hissed, pushing away Serj’s words. “That creature. Do I deserve that fate?”

  Serj spasmed once as if she’d slapped him in the face.

  “No,” he said. “You don’t.” Confusion blighted his usual confidence. “Is the Overlord dead?”

  “No,” Melaine said. “And he won’t die. You are going to tell me how to stop it.”

  “I don’t know how to stop it,” Serj said. “My brother was the scholar, and he’s dead.”

  “I don’t believe you. You know more than you are letting on. I can feel it. I can see it in you.”

  Serj lifted his chin a little and adopted a taunting, stubborn expression that made her want to punch him in the face.

  Instead, she lowered her wand and smiled.

  “You know what will happen if you don’t tell me,” she said. “If this thing is as insatiable as the Overlord says, then it won’t stop with him. It won’t stop with me. Maybe it will pursue Karina afterward, but between you and me, I think you’re more powerful than she is. Besides, she has the freedom to leave Highstrong if she wishes. I doubt she’ll stick around because of me. So, what is the Sateless to do? Oh,” she said, stroking one of the bars with one finger. “There’s a prisoner trapped in the dungeon for its delight. How convenient.”

  Melaine enjoyed watching the progression of horror in Serj’s eyes with her every word. But he blinked it away and caught Melaine’s hand fast through the bars.

  “Melaine, don’t you hear what you’re saying?” he said. “Talem said that the Sateless latches onto the most powerful person around. The Overlord had so much magic within him, he was a feast that lasted for months. His body weakens, but the quality of his magic doesn’t change in the Sateless’s gut. It may not have many meals left in his lordship, but each of those meals will be just as divine as the first.

  “But your magic is so powerful, Melaine, the Sateless didn’t even bother to finish the Overlord before it had to taste you. Maybe it will still feed upon him since he’s there, but it wants you. It’s your magic it craves. This proves that you are more powerful than the Overlord. Think of what you could do, especially if you never had to make another lodestone again. You try to be like him, but you’re not. You have a conscience. He never did. Take his place, Melaine. Rule in his stead.”

  He pressed his forehead against the bars. “Free me, and the people of Centara will back you as their ruler.”

  Melaine pried his clammy hand away from hers and stepped back. She was overrun with everything he was saying, but for now, her one goal remained at the forefront. Letting oneself get distracted was yet another way to die in Stakeside. Melaine had come to find that Highstrong Keep was worse.

  “The only way I’ll free you is if you tell me how to stop the Sateless,” she said.

  “I don’t know how,” he said.

  Melaine turned toward the door.

  “Wait,” Serj said. “I…I know that Talem used an Insight to discover how to release it. But I don’t know what the Insight was, and he said he destroyed it afterward.”

  “Destroyed it?” Melaine said, turning halfway back around. “You’re sure? Because if it’s only empty, I may still be able to learn something from it.”

  Serj frowned and shook his head against the bars. “He said it was gone. Perhaps he learned how to seal the Sateless back up as well, but clearly, he didn’t want anyone else to possess that knowledge. Not even me.”

  “So, the knowledge died with him,” Melaine said, a sinking feeling in her stomach. She looked at the floor. “No, there’s got to be something else you can tell me. Even if you don’t think it’s relevant. Anything at all.”

  Serj was pensive for a moment. A growing look of quiet anger and grief darkened his features.

  “I want to see him before he dies,” Serj said, his voice low as he stared through the bars at empty space. “I want to see the Overlord feeble and in agony. I want to look him in the eye and see his hatred for Talem, for me.” He looked back at Melaine. “Take me to the Overlord, and I’ll tell you what little I know.”

  Melaine closed her eyes to stop her tears from flowing at Serj’s words. In that moment, she hated him, but she needed his help. She nodded and opened her eyes. She lowered the tip of her wand to the heavy iron lock of the cell. Serj stepped back as the lock burst apart, and the cage door swung open.

  “Do as I say, or you’ll regret it,” Melaine warned. Serj held his hands up in defense and nodded. “Move,” she said, jerking her wand toward the door. She kept it aimed his way as she walked him to the door and out of the chamber.

  “The Sateless is loose,” she said as they made their way up the stairs and into the labyrinthine dungeons. “I suggest you stay quiet and on guard.”

  Serj gave a quick nod and sped up. Melaine kept pace as she navigated him through the halls, all the while her heart thumping and her wand slick with sweat as she kept her eyes and ears pricked for any signs of the Sateless.

  They finally reached the door to the Overlord’s—Actaeon’s—chambers, and Melaine felt dizzy with relief when she saw Karina still seated at his bedside and heard his voice murmuring from his place on the bed. Karina turned sharply, and her eyes widened as she saw Serj enter the room at Melaine’s wand-point.

  Karina spread an arm in front of Actaeon.

  Serj laughed. “Need your nursemaid to protect you now?”

  “Shut up,” Melaine hissed.

  “Karina,” Actaeon said. Karina’s mouth thinned in a frown, but she stood at his simple command and stepped to the side. She folded her hands neatly together, her every muscle tight as if she was trying to restrain herself from tearing Serj’s throat out in the politest manner possible.

  “All right, Serj. You’ve seen him. Now tell
us what you know,” Melaine said. She kept her eyes locked on him. She wanted to look at Actaeon, but her brief glance as they entered the room had revealed his condition was worse. She knew, without a doubt, she would break down if she let her fear for his life overtake her.

  Serj stared at the Overlord. She had expected cocky satisfaction on his face as he looked over his brother’s handiwork, but there was nothing now in his round eyes and slack mouth but quiet horror.

  “Serj,” she said with a firm tone that made him jump. He looked at her as if he’d emerged from a dark dream. He swallowed, then rolled his tongue within his dry mouth before he spoke.

  “Talem was a Proxy of Lux,” he said. “As was my father, Nazir.”

  Actaeon huffed through his nostrils but said nothing.

  “Talem was in deep enough to know certain secrets, secrets that have been concealed by the Luxian Order for centuries. Apparently, some of those secrets had to do with Highstrong. When Talem heard you’d taken up residence here five years ago, not even paying attention to the people you fought a war to rule”—Serj looked Actaeon over with a judgmental curl of his lip—“he started researching as much as he could about the keep. It has quite a history. He wouldn’t tell me all of the secrets. Being in the Order prevented him from sharing with…nonbelievers like me. But I was his brother. We shared the same hatred for you. He said he knew a way to stop you and that he needed my help. I agreed without question.”

  “How exactly did you help him?” Melaine asked. “What parts of the secrets could he tell you?”

  Serj hesitated, but after another glance at the Overlord’s frightful condition—no doubt one that Serj himself wanted to avoid—he continued.

  “The biggest thing he told me was that this entire place, Highstrong Keep itself, is an Insight.”

  “What?” Karina asked in shock. Melaine looked her way, but her attention was captured instead by Actaeon. His eyes were keen as if with sudden understanding, but his brow then knit, and his gaze hollowed. He clutched his stomach, his head and shoulders bowed, and his expression caved into profound guilt. Melaine frowned and looked back at Serj.

  “Explain,” she said.

  Serj licked his cracked lips. “Highstrong Keep was built and occupied by an ancient warlord from the First Era. He was a lovely individual not unlike yourself, my lord.”

  “Keep talking,” Melaine snapped.

  “The warlord was called Eylul. He conquered the entire southern lands back then, what was once Dramore and Thillacia. He built this keep as a stronghold for his army and made it his seat of power. And that power, well, he wasn’t keen on letting other people take it from him. So, he built Highstrong upon the blood of his enemies. Literally. Countless dead soldiers and slaves drenched this place in their blood, blood that was then used to create the very mortar that seals Highstrong’s walls.

  “Eylul used the keep as an Insight to store his darkest, most powerful magic. All of the knowledge of his enemies’ war tactics and battle spells entered the Insight along with their blood. Eylul fueled his army through the Insight to strengthen them and make them the most ruthless in the land.”

  “That amount of power is unheard of,” Karina said.

  “He didn’t do it alone,” Serj said. “He had help from a sorceress advisor, Desiderata. She was a member of Luxad Obscus, an ancient predecessor to the Luxian religion. That’s how Talem found out about all of this. Apparently, she passed down some of her knowledge to people who knew where to look.”

  Serj shook his head and half-shrugged. “But like I said, Talem couldn’t share most of his secrets with me. He told me he had found an ancient curse buried in the depths of Highstrong Keep. He said the curse involved a creature that would feed on the Overlord’s magic. If we unleashed the curse in Highstrong, near the Overlord’s presence, he said it would focus solely on him. I…I honestly didn’t know it could spread. I thought it would kill you and then leave.” Serj’s face grew troubled. “Talem never contradicted my assumption, but he didn’t tell me the truth either. I trusted him. He was my brother, and I trusted he wouldn’t risk anyone else being harmed.”

  “Sounds like your trust was misplaced,” Melaine said. Serj winced but didn’t deny her words.

  “Did you help him unleash that monster?” Karina asked, her voice quiet but simmering with restrained rage. When he didn’t respond, she asked, “How did you do it?”

  “Talem needed my help getting him into the keep,” Serj said. “He said there was some kind of secret entrance on the cliffside, leading to a hidden chamber beneath Highstrong. Talem was powerful in many scholarly ways, but I have a way of…getting around places. A path of underground rebellion will do that to a person. So, I used my knack for infiltration, found it, and got him inside. The dark wards of the keep didn’t extend that far underground. Maybe Desiderata was the only one who knew about the chamber. I don’t know. Anyway, Talem didn’t let me inside the innermost chamber. But when he came out, he was…triumphant. A little disturbing, too. I…I didn’t know he was capable of such a wild…” Serj took a swelling breath and shook away a shudder through one hand as he exhaled.

  “I was ready to get out of there, but Talem wanted to see if it worked. He convinced me to try to get inside the keep itself. That’s when we must have tripped the wards, and”—he bared his teeth at Actaeon in a vengeful grimace—“he knows the rest.”

  “So, he caught you,” Melaine said. “And Talem.”

  “And you killed him,” Serj said, looking into her eyes.

  Melaine didn’t speak.

  “I killed him,” Actaeon said. “Make no mistake about that.” Melaine looked back at him. He was speaking only to her, and his dim eyes held compassion and deep remorse. “You were just the tool I used to do it.”

  Serj chuckled. “See, Melaine? You’re just a tool. He admits it.”

  Melaine frowned, Talem’s triumphant laugh and tortured body digging into the conscience that Serj claimed she had. She felt less sorry for Serj’s brother the more she heard, but it still made her insides squirm when she thought about her part in Talem’s death. No matter what Actaeon said, she felt responsible.

  Then, another tortured visage entered her thoughts: a pale, black-veined woman who, nonetheless, seemed to utter words of comfort and warning. When Melaine had spilled the vial of blood magic on the library floor, she had seen a brief vision of the same woman in her beautiful, living prime, wielding a staff. She had looked intense and powerful. Could she have been the ancient sorceress, Desiderata, Serj described? Whoever she was, her whispered words started to compile in Melaine’s head and make sense.

  Go.

  Walls.

  It’s hungry.

  Melaine looked between the three people around her, her searching gaze landing on Actaeon’s gaunt face.

  “If Highstrong Keep is an Insight, then it might hold knowledge about the Sateless,” she said. “Knowledge I can access. Even if Talem thinks he destroyed all traces of knowledge about that monster, there still might be enough residual magic in Highstrong’s walls, right?”

  “Perhaps,” Actaeon said, and for the first time that night, Melaine saw a shred of hope in his eyes.

  “Talem made it sound like he used a separate object, not the keep itself, to find out how to unleash the Sateless,” Serj said. “I don’t know…”

  “The walls know something,” Melaine said. “They have to. Any clue would be something to go on.”

  “Melaine,” Actaeon said, his voice raw. “My study is built over the strongest reserves of residual magic in the keep. I never suspected the castle itself was an Insight, but I’ve used the residual magic it carries ever since…” He frowned deeply, his clouded look of regret returning. “Ever since my army stayed here before the war. The magic was powerful and potent. I could sense it carried darkness, but I never realized it was steeped in so much blood. I never would have…”

  He winced and stopped. Karina placed her gentle hand on the top of his hair in comf
ort.

  “So, my best chance of tapping into Highstrong’s knowledge is in your study?” Melaine asked. Actaeon nodded.

  “But Melaine,” he said between strenuous breaths. “You must be careful. Learning from residual magic can be dangerous. The knowledge can be fractured, misinterpreted, either consciously or within your very marrow. Sickness isn’t the only danger in repurposing magic, Melaine. I haven’t had time to teach you all…” He stopped, his chest concaving as if another word would kill him.

  “I don’t care what the dangers are,” Melaine said. “I’ll be careful. I’m going to do this.”

  Actaeon closed his eyes.

  “Hurry, Melaine,” Karina whispered. Melaine looked at her in surprise. The woman’s usual, judgmental disdain was gone. Karina was as desperate for Actaeon’s survival as Melaine was.

  “Aye,” Melaine nodded. She turned to Serj. “You’re coming with me.”

  “What?”

  “You think I trust you around him?” she asked with a nod to Actaeon.

  “Through the door,” Karina said as she pointed to a small door across the room. “Down the stairs.”

  “No,” Actaeon said as if he were only just now able to speak again. “I’m coming with you.”

  “Actaeon,” Karina said.

  “Mel…Melaine needs my help. It’s dangerous. Please.”

  “Follow when you can,” Melaine said. She knew how awful Actaeon must feel, weak and helpless. For people like her, like him, that was as bad as dying. “Let Karina help you. Serj and I will go first. We can’t wait.”

  Actaeon nodded. Karina frowned but gave Melaine a grateful nod. Melaine felt a fraction better, knowing Karina at least knew him well enough to understand.

  “Come on,” Melaine said to Serj.

  He looked apprehensive but followed her across the tower. She opened the narrow door and directed him inside before stepping into the dark stairwell herself. She felt a thud in her heart as the door closed behind her. She couldn’t stand leaving Actaeon, even for a second. What if he was dead by the time they made it back?

  “Hurry up,” Melaine said as she followed Serj down the dark staircase.