“There is something you should see, first,” whispered Eva.
“I like that phrasing,” said Ari. “After I see it, let’s pick up from right here.”
Eva sighed and gave him a quick kiss before setting a hand on his chest and gently pushing back. She gestured to the door, and Ari followed her outside.
It only took a glance upward to see what she was talking about. The storm cloud that Ari had noticed the night before had drawn significantly closer in the time since, moving with a slow, methodical pace compared to its puffy, white and generally benign-looking cousins.
“We came all the way here,” muttered Ari. “Wherever ‘here’ even is, and we’re still beset by the same threats.”
“Kerys and I wanted to talk to you about what we should do about it,” said Eva.
Ari shrugged. “There’s only one thing we can do. Find a way to get enough essence to get out of here.”
“Those were my thoughts, yes,” said Eva. “We have to assume that the Weatherblight still threaten Deepwater Spire, even though it is separate from the continent itself and an artificial construction.”
“Agreed,” said Ari. “There’s the possibility of us trying to hide within the spire itself, given the general lack of wandering mesmers that there seem to be in the first level.”
“I brought that up with Kerys,” said Eva. “She says that we do not have enough food to outlast another storm if it decides to linger for days, like the windstorm did.”
“That’s a really good point,” said Ari. “The same would also apply to the tower, though I doubt it would take the fishers long enough to find a way past the door for us to have to worry about food.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Ari caught sight of Kerys heading back toward the tower. She had a small bundle of lettuce leaves, enough for another stew or two, assuming one of them managed to catch another bird.
“Hey,” called Kerys. “I’m glad that you’re up.”
She surprised him by drawing in close and planting a quick kiss on his lips. Ari grinned in response, enjoying the slight flush that came to her cheeks, as though him acknowledging her affection was a minor source of embarrassment.
“Yeah,” said Ari. “We were getting ready to head back into the spire.”
He looked at Eva, and she nodded slowly.
“I was trying to see if there was anything I’d missed that’s edible,” said Kerys. “We’ve basically eaten this rooftop bare. I… I’m not sure if we’ll have enough food to keep going in a day or two.”
She frowned and let out a quiet sigh, looking to the world as though she blamed herself for their shortage of supplies. Ari set a hand on her shoulder and gave it a reassuring squeeze.
“We’ll be long gone by then,” he said. “Don’t worry, Kerys.”
“I don’t want to stay up here on my own today,” said Kerys. “There must be something I can do down in the spire to help you two.”
“I do not think that is such a good idea,” answered Eva. “It would be unsafe for you.”
Kerys glanced back and forth between Ari and Eva, and Ari caught sight of a familiar, suspicious emotion in her expression. He brought a hand up and ran it through his hair, wondering how much of what she was feeling was part of the residual claustrophobia of being stuck on the spire.
“Trust me, Kerys,” said Ari. “This is for the best.”
“Right.” Kerys gave them both a quick nod, looking very much like she still had more to say, and then hurried past them toward the tower.
Ari sighed and shot a look at Eva.
“She’s not handling this well,” he said. “The situation. The lack of constructive things for her to do. The way her womanly intuition is probably tipping her off to the fact that we’ve started building our bond again.”
“I think it would be best if I talked to her,” said Eva. “As you said. This is, at least in part, a manifestation of her womanly intuition.”
“You should… probably phrase it differently when you bring it up with her,” he said.
Ari made a quick trip back to the tower to grab their supplies and a small portion of the remaining dried fruit for breakfast. They ate as they walked down the sloping, spiral hallway. The main chamber of the spire’s upper level was exactly as they’d first found it, outside of the ruined tunic Ari had left in the middle of the floor.
“We need to do a test,” said Ari. “I’m not interested in going back into combat with you without knowing what our bond currently allows us to do.”
Eva nodded. “Good thinking.”
She flashed with light, transforming from a beautiful woman into a beautiful sword. Ari caught the hilt with a flourish and swung it from side to side.
“Can you hear me?” he asked.
“I have had no problem hearing you,” Eva said, through the bond. “The issue, if you recall, has been with you hearing me.”
“Oh, enough with your accuracy and specifics,” said Ari. “There were no muffled words that time, so at least on this front, I think we’re good.”
He tossed Azurelight into the air, letting it arc toward the high ceiling of the expansive chamber for an instant before focusing his will and calling it back to him. The sword continued on its normal path, eventually falling to the floor with a clatter.
“That didn’t hurt, did it?” asked Ari, as he picked the weapon up.
“I do not feel pain while in this form,” said Eva.
“Right,” said Ari. “Anyway, I guess I’ll have to keep a tight hold on you for now. I never realized how handy it was to be able to call you back to me like that until I lost the ability to do it.”
Eva didn’t say anything, and Ari got the sinking suspicion that she was blaming herself for the lapse in their bond.
“We’ll manage without it for now,” said Ari. “It’s no trouble.”
It was tempting, in a masochistic sort of way, to head back down the hallway that had led to the purple mesmer. Ari set the impulse aside in favor of investigating one of the other exits from the main chamber. Not counting the massive door with the three locks, there were two other hallways that they hadn’t yet explored.
Ari sheathed his sword as he slowly began exploring the hallway closest to the chamber’s entrance. It was identical to the one that had led to the purple mesmer’s chamber, with a door at the end of it that he could only assume led to a similar room.
“You should be ready for a fight,” said Eva.
“I always am,” said Ari. “Let’s just hope that this time it’s a fight I can win.”
He swung the door open and then hesitated. The room on the other side appeared to be completely bare of any ornamentation aside from a single chest in the corner. Several ward lights gave off a nice amount of illumination from the ceiling, revealing that the room’s far wall had been used as a writing surface. Dense sentences layered every inch of it, in some places completely overlapping, the chalk lines made faint from the passage of time.
A glowing green sphere moved back and forth along the wall, pausing in front of one section of the writing before moving to the side or upward to investigate another.
“Weird,” said Ari. “What’s your take, Eva?”
“Tread cautiously,” she said. “From the mesmer’s coloring, I would assume that it is not that powerful, but that does not mean that the room doesn’t pose any danger.”
Ari nodded, and as he started forward, he saw the truth of her words far sooner than he’d been expecting. Something clicked in the floor as he set his foot down on a random tile. A wave of heat gave him an instant of warning before a gout of flame blasted through the air in front of him, exactly where he would have been standing if he’d put his foot down completely.
“Mud and blood!” shouted Ari, as he hopped back. Several more gouts of flame erupted from the walls and ceiling in a seemingly random pattern, each one spanning the width or height of the room.
The trap finally went silent after about thirty seconds. Ari crouched dow
n, examining the spot where he’d stepped for any sign of a trigger and finding nothing. He began to doubt that he even had the right spot, though the floor was so uniform and symmetrical that it was impossible to know either way.
“Eva,” said Ari. “I think you’d be more helpful here in your incarnate form.”
He drew Azurelight from his scabbard and held it out to the side and a few feet back from where the trap began. The sword flashed with light, and Eva carefully brushed her ponytail over her shoulder as she lowered herself down to examine the floor next to him.
“This is less than ideal,” said Eva. “I can’t see anything that would reveal which portions of the floor are trapped and which are safe. If it even is the floor that triggered the trap, that is.”
Ari licked his lips, carefully considering their options.
“I have an idea,” he said.
He reached into his tunic and pulled out one of the sarkin flower smokes he’d rolled the previous night. After gesturing for Eva to step back, he approached the section of floor he suspected had triggered the first trap and tapped it with his foot.
The flames burst to life once more, scorching the air in the room and crisscrossing through the space in a complex, shifting pattern. Ari held the tip of his sarkin flower smoke out, catching a light off the first plume of fire and burning his knuckles in the process. He whistled and took a quick hit.
“Was there any point to that, milord?” asked Eva.
“Of course,” he said. “The sarkin flower will help my eyesight, which might let me see the traps.”
Eva folded her arms and looked like she was fighting to contain a smile.
“Kerys warned me about your burgeoning addiction,” she said.
“It’s not like there’s a ton to do on top of the spire,” said Ari. “Who knows? Maybe it really will let me see one of these traps.”
It didn’t, though the mild buzz the drug gave him was a minor consolation prize. Ari and Eva gave up after a few fruitless minutes examining and testing the floor. The traps seemed to be placed at random and at far too high of a density for either of them to risk sneaking through.
Ari didn’t bring up the fact that if their bond was still strong enough for him to summon Eva, he could have simply thrown her to the other side of the room and called her back once she’d raided the chest. Pointing that out would have been like rubbing salt into the wound, especially after how upset she’d been over how the fight with the purple mesmer had gone.
“We still have one hallway left,” said Ari. “Third time’s the charm.”
“Let us hope so,” said Eva.
CHAPTER 9
The final unexplored hallway and adjoining door were both the same as what they’d encountered before. Ari stepped into what appeared to be a woman’s bedchamber, though it was covered in a thin layer of dust. A pink glowing sphere hovered over the bed in the corner, and a single chest sat along the back wall.
“We should proceed slowly,” said Eva. “There may be traps here as well.”
Ari nodded. “Are pink mesmers usually dangerous?”
Eva shook her head.
“I do not believe so,” said Eva. “They are slightly unusual amongst mesmers, as they are predominantly female and often created from women who were… unusually welcoming, during their life.”
“Ah,” said Ari. “I think I catch your meaning.”
He slowly approached the chest on the other side of the room, coming within a few feet of the bed as he did. The glowing pink sphere solidified into the ethereal form of an attractive woman in a night robe, lying languidly across the sheets.
Ari tried opening the chest only to find that it was locked. There was a strange mechanism on the outside of it, a series of small disks that could be twisted to reveal different symbols.
“Foiled again,” muttered Ari. “Do you think we can force this chest open?”
“I doubt it, milord,” said Eva. “Perhaps there is some clue regarding how to open it within the room?”
Ari nodded and turned to look at the pink mesmer, which in his opinion, was the most interesting thing in the room. She made eye contact with him and then made a come hither motion with one finger.
He felt a mixture of emotions as he walked toward the bed. Trepidation, curiosity, along with a healthy appreciation for what he could see underneath the attractive mesmer’s thin night robe. He expected Eva to stop him, but she was rifling through a desk on the other side of the room.
The pink mesmer held out her hand. Against his better judgment, Ari reached out and took it into his own.
The room flashed with light, and he felt his eyes adjusting to a space that was aesthetically different but unchanged in overall layout. He was still in the chamber he’d just been in, but it was clean now, and the ward lights on the ceiling were giving off a healthy glow.
Most importantly, the attractive pink mesmer was now an attractive, scantily clad woman with red hair and voluptuous assets. She had a flirtatious smile on her face, and her fingers were tracing over Ari’s palm, which she still held in one hand.
She said something to him in a language that Ari couldn’t understand, and he shook his head.
“Uh…” He frowned at her. “How is this possible? I’ve never seen a mesmer do anything like this before…”
“Ah…” said the woman. “I should have guessed that you spoke Subvios. I can speak it too, of course, and it’s got a very rugged feel to it, which can be fun.”
Ari glanced over his shoulder. The door to the room was closed, and he couldn’t see Eva anywhere. He was relatively confident that he hadn’t actually traveled backward through time to the age the mesmer woman had lived in, but he wondered if he could still find a way to take advantage of the moment.
“How are you doing this?” asked Ari.
“Doing what?” The woman shifted on the bed, crossing her legs and letting her robe come open to expose a hint of cleavage. “Have you never seen a highborn woman in her nightwear before? What’s your name, young man?”
“Aristial,” he said. “And I’m just, uh…”
He trailed off, unsure of how to explain why he was there, and what he needed.
“Lord Diya sent you, did he not?” asked the woman. “I requested that he come in person to pick up the key. I get the strangest sense that he’s avoiding me at times like this.”
Ari nodded slowly. “He’s feeling a little under the weather. He sends his most sincere apology for not being able to come himself.”
“I’ll have to find another way to keep myself entertained for the afternoon,” said the woman. “Why don’t you take a seat, young man? You have a rough, masculine way about you and are quite pleasant compared to many of the Hume slaves on the spire.”
In truth, Ari wanted nothing more, especially given how much it felt like Eva and Kerys had been teasing him over the past few days. The woman was gorgeous, and the robe she was wearing was made from sheer black fabric that allowed hints of the pink nipples of her large breasts to peek through.
“Lord Diya had a question about the keys,” said Ari, leaning into the bluff. “He was wondering why they’re kept separate. There is one in each of the three chambers on the upper level, correct?”
“Of course,” said the woman. “I don’t know why this bears explaining, given that it’s information Lord Diya should already know. The secrets of Deepwater Spire are valuable, and the Emperor appointed a representative from each of the three main holds to share stewardship. I’m Lady Prestia, the representative from Farhaven, in case your lord has forgotten.”
There was an edge to her last sentence that made Ari feel rather curious about what the relationship between Lord Diya and Lady Prestia had been. He didn’t see much to gain in exploring that realm of questioning, however.
“Well then,” he said. “I should be off with the key. If you can just show me how to open your chest…”
Lady Prestia let out a delighted giggle.
“I’d be mo
re than willing to.” She reached out and grabbed Ari’s wrists, pulling her hands onto her large, supple breasts. They were unbelievably soft, and he almost melted as he watched Lady Prestia bite her lower lip and let out a soft moan.
“I’m not so sure that this is the best…” Ari trailed off as Lady Prestia pulled open her robe, revealing her lewd nakedness to him in its entirety. She had what the boys down in Golias Hollow would have called a ‘wife body,’ full of all the best kinds of curves in all the right places.
“I’ve been told by men before that I’m near insatiable,” said Lady Prestia in a breathy voice. “Diya was one of the few who could keep up with me. I’m assuming if he sent you in his place, it was for good reason.”
She starting undoing the belt of Ari’s trousers, and he felt his arousal warring with his common sense. She was a mesmer, not a woman. There was a possibility that just by being in direct contact with her, he was having his soul essence slowly sapped away. Clearly, there were better and safer ways to go about opening the chest than frolicking around in bed with an ethereal nympho.
Lady Prestia pulled his cock loose from his underwear and ran her tongue along the length of it before engulfing the tip in her lips. Ari groaned and ran a hand through her silky, soft red hair. The key could wait for a couple of minutes. Half an hour, tops. No big deal.
She bobbed her head back and forth while keeping a tight seal with her lips, basically pulling Ari down to the bed using the suction of her mouth. It had been a few days for him, and he felt himself approaching his limit under the onslaught of Lady Prestia’s soft tongue and hot mouth after an embarrassingly short time. He pushed her head back before he completely lost control.
“You’re so strong…” cooed Lady Prestia. “Is there a slang in the lower tongue for what a man does to a woman in the heat of a passionate moment?”
Ari smiled, rolling her underneath him and roughly pulling her thighs open.
“Dirtying a woman,” he said.
“Then I want you to dirty me,” whispered Lady Prestia. “Can you do that?”
His response came in the form of entering her in a single thrust and pounding forward with as much strength as his hips could muster. Lady Prestia was wet and ready, and very vocal in response. Ari knew that it was all just a vision, and because of that, he let himself go wild in the moment.
Vision Voyage (The Weatherblight Saga Book 2) Page 5