by Bec McMaster
“Can you summon a fog?”
Everyone turned to Bryn. She was swiftly braiding her hair, clad in the battle-hardened leather armor she often wore. Sýr preened in the trees behind her, turning a dark eye upon him as if she’d caught him looking at her mistress and she disapproved.
“Aye,” Sirius said, “though it will take most of the morning, and leave my magic sapped.”
“I thought you were all-powerful,” Tormund said.
“Fog is complex,” Sirius replied. “You’re battling both the forces of wind and the moisture wicking off the lake. It’s also a rather large expanse of grass,” he pointed out. “Unless you think a mysterious patch of floating fog won’t be noticed by the guards.”
“They won’t notice.” Bryn flashed him a smile. “They’re going to be too busy chasing you.”
Sirius’s eyes narrowed. And then he smiled.
“I like the way you think, woman.”
The three of them slipped across the plains.
It was difficult going, trapped in the fog, but Tormund kept a close watch on the compass.
They finally reached the skirts of the volcano, slipping under the shelter of an overhang, before they could breathe easily.
Tormund was just about to brush the dirt off his hands when a trumpet of pure fury echoed through the mountains.
He froze.
The fog was starting to thin now, and the sudden harsh flap of wings sounded as though they were close enough to touch. Another dreki bugled, somewhere to the north. And then another. And another.
“That sounds like the local dreki just realized there’s a big black lizard flying around out there,” he whispered.
Haakon gave a curt nod. “We need to move. And fast. Before they realize we’re here. That fog won’t last forever.”
Marduk knelt in Zorja’s private throne room, his hands clasped behind his head. There were no windows here. And only one door.
And by the look of the two enormous dreki warriors who had followed the queen inside, getting out of here would be close to impossible.
The queen sank onto her throne, crossing one leg over the other. “What are you doing here? How did you find her?”
“Who is she?”
“Answer the question,” she growled.
He considered his options.
This was not merely the woman who’d once been his aunt. Nor was she merely Sirius’s mother.
Zorja ruled a dreki clan by her own right, and she’d made a strategic alliance with his clan—with her former mate, Stellan—in order to secure her throne. She’d walked away from two sons in order to take that throne without a backward glance.
He wasn’t dealing with the aunt he’d heard rumors of, but a queen. And a ruthless one at that.
If he made a misstep here, it was entirely possible she’d put his head on a pike, family or not.
“I have heard her song all my life,” Marduk replied simply. “I didn’t know who sang it, or how to find them until several months ago. The song seemed to grow stronger and I could feel its pull increasing. It felt as though someone had slung a noose around my neck and was hauling me toward them. I can barely think for the sound of it. I can barely sleep. And so I came.”
“Illarion?” she asked sharply, turning her head toward one of the massive warriors at her side.
The warrior stared at Marduk flatly. Thick dark tattoos swirled across one half of his face in an ancient language Marduk couldn’t quite make out. “Her magic has been increasing of late. We’ve tried to contain it but she’s managed to breach the wards several times.”
Zorja’s long nails drummed on the edge of her gilt throne. “And why am I only now hearing of this?”
Illarion hesitated.
“Because we were aware she was communicating with someone in the outside world.” The gruff, bearded dreki on the other side of the queen stepped forward. He wore the same inky tattoos on his face as Illarion, and his eyes were flat and cold and merciless. “We wished to set a trap.”
Those tattoos….
Something about them stirred Marduk’s memory.
“Set a trap.” Zorja’s voice held entire octaves of disapproval. “In my court? With my people unaware of what may descend upon them? With me unaware of what you were planning? How dare you? Am I not your queen?”
“With all due respect, my queen,” the dreki replied, “we serve our order first and yourself second.”
“You agreed to our terms when we first contained the girl,” Illarion replied.
Finally, that stray thought fought its way to the surface.
“You belong to the Keepers of Order,” he said incredulously. He’d thought them a myth told as bedtime stories to dreki kits.
Don’t dabble in dangerous magics or the Keepers will come to lock you away….
Or worse, kill you.
They were legendary: an ancient order of dreki warriors who had banded together after the fall of the mother-goddess Tiamat, to prevent another agent of Chaos from rising.
The younger of the warriors eyed him curiously. “He knows too much.”
Zorja cut Illarion a sharp glance. “He is a clan prince with powerful allies.”
“And my disappearance would not go unremarked.” Which was technically true. Marduk failed to mention that nobody even knew where he was. It was clear Zorja hesitated to kill him, but the Keepers of Order were renowned for their fight against the agents of Chaos. He wasn’t quite certain what lengths they would go to in order to keep the existence of their captive unknown. “Who is the woman?”
The queen’s lips thinned.
“I already know too much,” he pointed out. “And the more you don’t tell me, the more I’m going to want to know.” He flashed her his most dazzling smile. “I am the most curious of all my family.”
“She is my ward.”
“It seems a strange way to treat one that has been gifted into your guardianship,” he said diplomatically.
Zorja snapped her fingers at a handmaid he’d barely noticed, calling for wine. “Did you not see her eyes?”
“I could hardly miss them.”
“She is locked away for her own protection,” the queen replied. “There are those who would kill her if they knew of her existence. And… others who would seek to use her. She is drawn to dangerous magic, and I must protect her at all costs.”
“Chaos magic.”
“Yes.” The queen accepted a goblet of wine, then her eyes grew canny. “How did you find her? I’ve laid runes around this entire peninsula that deceive and suggest others should keep away. No one knows of her existence. And any who stumble upon us are discouraged.”
“Killed, you mean?” He sipped at the wine. An excellent vintage.
“As you would have been,” she said.
“Had I not alerted you to my identity.”
Zorja nodded.
He took another sip, considering how to put the story into words. “I’ve always been able to hear her song. It drifts on the winds, almost on the verge of hearing at times. A few notes that chill me to the bone. A longing to listen to more. An urge I cannot deny. It fills my dreams, and when I was exiled from my mother’s court, I set out to find the owner of such a song. I felt your wards, but they slipped like gossamer from my skin. There is only the song. And nothing else.” He released a laugh. “It’s taken me ten years to finally track her down. I thought perhaps it was the Goddess, trying to show me the woman who would be my true flame, but…. There was no bond. No connection. Or not the one I expected.”
“She is not your true flame.”
“How could you be so certain?” he demanded, putting the goblet down with a clunk.
“Because,” Zorja said, leaning forward on her throne, “she is your sister. I named her Ishtar, after the goddess, and when she was born it was clear she was Chaos-blighted. Her eyes fair glowed with the magic. Your mother insisted she should be put to death. But,” the queen drew herself up, “I could not bear to see a
baby murdered. And so I stole her from your court and brought her here to raise in secret, hoping I could somehow counter her power and teach her to be dreki.”
The breath exploded from him and he half pushed to his feet. “I have another sister?”
The two keepers set their hands to their swords, but Zorja waved them away.
“A sister you shared a womb with,” she confirmed.
The words rocked him to the core.
And they also somehow filled a hole within him that he’d never known existed. A gaping emptiness in his soul that had always taunted him, though he’d not known the reason.
“I have a twin sister,” he whispered, half to himself.
But the queen slammed her goblet of wine down upon the edge of the throne. “I was wrong, Marduk. Ishtar’s magic is dangerous. But I could not let her suffer, and so I owe a debt to the world to keep her away from such power. She must remain locked away from her magic. Her powers are so immense, I fear she could break the world.”
“Locked away?” He straightened, his chains rattling. “In what way is she dangerous?”
“You don’t understand, Marduk.” The queen shook her head sadly. “I can see it. She is not dreki. She is pure Chaos. And she hungers for more of such magic. She yearns to suck the Chaos from the marrow of the world and bleed the oceans dry. She has no understanding of our world. She barely even sees what goes on around her, for the magic that overwhelms her. She is nothing but hunger.”
Alone. Frightened. Sensing the same gaping wound he himself felt.
“She can be reasoned with. I felt it. For a moment the song stopped and she was trying to communicate with me.”
“Do you not think I have tried, all these years?”
“I think you keep her locked away in the dark like a—”
“She prefers the dark!” Zorja snapped. “And being so close to the groan of the earth and the whisper of its fire seem to be the only things that calm her. Do you think I would imprison a child that I raised as my own if I could help it?” Her lip quivered. “That I loved?”
That’s not love. That is only fear.
But he could see she would not be swayed.
“Promise me you will stay away from her,” Zorja snapped.
A dreki could not lie. “I cannot make that promise.”
Zorja’s eyelids half-shuttered her eyes. “You’re a fool. Seeking dreams and songs and hearing none of my warnings. If you will not give me your oath, then I have no choice.” She snapped her fingers. “I’m sorry. But I must give you to the Order.”
Illarion and his brother stepped forward.
“Throw him into the abyss,” she whispered, and for the first time he thought he saw a flicker of sadness in her depthless blue eyes. “I’m sorry, Marduk. Truly I am. But I cannot risk your sister gaining her magic. And if I cannot trust you, then you must endure eternal darkness.”
They stared at each other through the bars of the cage, though they didn’t speak. There was no need, and as far as Marduk knew, his sister had not yet breathed a word. Perhaps she didn’t know how.
Reaching through the bars, he offered her his hand.
“Ishtar,” he whispered. “Your name is Ishtar.”
She eyed his hand curiously, that eerie green light flaring in her irises. Marduk gestured for her to reach for him again, though the wards kept them apart.
The second she almost touched him the song he’d spent a lifetime listening to swelled to a crescendo in his mind. Marduk gasped as images cascaded through his mind.
There was darkness and pain, and a terrible, terrible fear that grew like a dark pit within him until it threatened to swallow him whole.
“Kill it,” hissed the beautiful female. “Get it out of my sight!”
The older male dreki blanched. “Amadea, no. She’s but a baby.”
“I don’t want to see it. She reeks of magic.”
Marduk came to on his hands and knees, trembling.
“It,” whispered his sister in his mind.
He felt the overwhelming urge to retch. “Don’t ever believe a word she ever said. She knew nothing but cruelty and ambition.”
“Who?” It was more a thought than a word.
“She was your mother. Our mother. Or no, not a mother. She was the creature that birthed us into this world. Nothing more.”
And then the song was swelling; rage and anger and hurt lashing against him like a whirlwind.
He tried to calm the storm, to send her thoughts of love and understanding, but she tore away from him, her eyes glowing a vibrant, eerie green.
“I’ll set you free,” he whispered, clinging to the bars between them even as they burned his skin. “You’re not alone, Ishtar. I won’t ever leave you.”
Ishtar simply cocked her head to the side.
“And I’ll protect you,” he promised, feeling the Goddess waking as she heard his oath. His resolve firmed. “I’ll protect you from everyone who may seek to harm you.”
Even from herself.
Chaos magic was the most dangerous force on earth. He wasn’t fool enough to think his aunt’s warnings nothing but air, but perhaps all Ishtar needed was to know love.
Perhaps he alone was the one dreki who could reach her.
Eight
It was time.
Ishtar paced the warm confines of the cave, feeling more and more unsettled. Her foster mother was late. She’d ventured into the cave where her foster mother came every night to bring her food and brush her hair, but there was no sign of the queen.
Zorja was never late. It set every inch of Ishtar on edge, because she could feel time rushing her inexorably forward—
A key rattled in a distant lock.
Zorja was here.
Her foster mother arrived, carrying the tray of food. Illarion walked behind her, and he looked at Ishtar, his dark eyes turning intense, before his gaze slid away as it always did.
Ishtar crossed to the rock she usually sat upon and folded herself onto it.
She was used to feeling invisible. And it was easier this way—to stay down here where it was dark and she could hear the earth grumbling like a contented cat. Where nobody from the court would scurry away from her as if she was going to bring the ceiling down upon their heads. Again.
But sometimes she wished she wasn’t invisible.
To him.
Illarion used to talk to her, and tell her stories of how the Goddess created the world. He’d let his gaze linger upon her once upon a time, and she’d been told by some of the dreki women at court that was a clear sign of a male’s interest in a female. When she’d broached the subject with him, however, he’d become angry.
“It is forbidden,” he’d told her, and the words echoed in her ears, even to this day. “I cannot touch you. I cannot want you. I am your guard. I am… a Keeper. A Void. I was born to protect the world from your magic.”
And since that day he no longer told her stories or let his gaze rest upon her.
“I have brought you some bread and cheese,” Zorja said, setting the tray near her feet. “Your favorites.”
Ishtar stared at them in disinterest. She would have to eat, because Zorja would persevere until she did, but the inside of her skin felt as though it itched.
He was coming.
They were coming.
She’d seen them in her visions.
“There will be a full moon in three days,” her foster mother said, taking a fistful of Ishtar’s hair and gently tugging the brush through the ends.
She could barely think when her hair was being brushed. Every part of her ached to pace, to knot her fists and clench her hands until her knuckles cracked. But she sat instead, trying to keep still.
“You know you must stay in the caves,” Zorja said, finally setting the brush aside. “Even though the moon is full and you want to see it. No more of this nonsense about talking to the moon. Promise me you will stay this time.”
I can’t. I won’t be here.
; Zorja made an expression Ishtar couldn’t read, and gently disentangled their thoughts. “Use your words, Ishtar.”
It was far easier to merely link.
She could never quite explain herself with words. But Zorja would insist.
“I can’t stay.” Her throat felt rusty with disuse. “They’re coming for me, and it is time to leave.”
“Who?” Zorja’s voice grew sharper.
“Friend Tormund.”
Zorja looked at Illarion sharply. “Tormund? I’ve never heard that name before.” She let go of Ishtar’s hair. “Who is this Tormund? Where did you meet him?”
“I haven’t met him. Yet.” She’d only ever seen him in her dreams—when she let her mind slip into the future.
Zorja pinched the bridge of her nose. “You’re not making any sense. I know this is frustrating for you. But it’s safer for you to stay here, where nobody knows—”
Ishtar pushed to her feet and walked away. They all wanted her to stop using her magic. Even Marduk promised to protect her from it. But she might as well cut off her foot. It was a part of her.
And she’d tried to explain but they couldn’t understand her.
Her entire world gleamed with green, and it had taken her long years to realize her foster mother couldn’t hear the constant ebb and flow of the Song. Sometimes if Ishtar hummed along in tune with it, the veils would part and the world would thin, until she could see directly into another world.
It was everywhere.
And she couldn’t stop seeing it.
She couldn’t stop touching it.
She couldn’t stop hearing it.
She had tried to ignore it after she collapsed the throne room, but with every breath she took, she could sense the magic on her breath.
Ishtar reached out and touched the walls, feeling the power ebb through the stone. Sometimes she imagined she was in the great belly of the Goddess herself, and every shiver of stone was the goddess’s breath. Blessed Tiamat had been a creature of Chaos, and she was revered by every dreki in the court.