Secrets of Blood

by Andy Peloquin

  “One thing I know for sure.” His eyes went to the artifacts spread out on the table. Only a handful of Suroth’s original collection remained, among them the long, cylindrical black stone Hailen had been holding in the Arch-Guardian’s study. “The Iron Warlord needs these things. Something about these artifacts and the secrets in your father’s journal are critical to his plans.”

  The man with the bestial voice and the iron mask had insisted that the success of his villainous plans hinged on some “key”, which opened the way for him to get his hands on the Crown of the Pharus and the Blade of Hallar.

  “Kodyn?” Hailen’s voice echoed from where he sat at the table. “Have you…” The boy hesitated a moment. “Have you seen Evren or heard anything about him?” Worry sparkled in his eyes.

  A shadow flashed across Briana’s face at the mention of Evren. It seemed she, too, worried about the thief. For a moment, Kodyn actually felt a hint of envy—had they been as concerned for his safety?

  He pushed it aside. That sort of pettiness reminded him too much of Bryden. Briana’s relief at seeing him alive had been all the proof he needed that he mattered to them.

  “Last I saw, he was headed off to hunt down the Ybrazhe thugs stirring up the riots.” He shot the boy a crooked grin. “Knowing Evren, he’s probably finished off the Syndicate and is now single-handedly putting an end to the riots.”

  That seemed to comfort Hailen a little. “Yeah,” he said, nodding. “Yeah, that sounds like him.” The anxiety faded from Hailen’s face, replaced by a shaky grin, clearly forced.

  Kodyn, too, couldn’t help sharing their worry. He hadn’t heard from Aisha since before sunset, when she went off to the Keeper’s Crypts alone. To face the dead and the militants desecrating the tombs. He had to trust that she was unhurt, but he wouldn’t rest easy until he knew she was safe.

  But at least for now, it was enough to know Briana and Hailen were safe. He’d arrived in time to protect his friends. He could rest easy and enjoy their company.

  “You said you have a lot to tell me?” He cocked his head. “That means you’ve found something in your father’s journals?”

  “Yes!” An eager glint sparkled in Briana’s eyes, excitement momentarily pushing back her worry. “I think we just found out why this Iron Warlord wants so desperately to get his hands on the Crown of the Pharus and the Blade of Hallar.”

  Kodyn’s eyebrows shot up. “Tell me!”

  Briana held out a hand to Hailen. “Here, let me show you instead.”

  Hailen placed a piece of paper in her hand, and she handed it to Kodyn. Upon it, she had written out that strange poem inscribed in her father’s journal.

  When sword and scepter align

  The blood of ancients revived

  Child of secrets, child of spirits, child of gold

  Half-master seeks the relic of old

  Then Hallar’s blood shall rise

  And sew the final destruction from midnight eyes

  He read it in silence, then looked up at her. “The Prophecy of the Final Destruction?”

  “Yes.” Briana nodded her head eagerly. “Read the first line again.”

  “When sword and scepter align,” Kodyn read aloud. He cocked an eyebrow. “I know I’m missing something. Mind clueing me in?”

  “Remember when I said that the Pharus receives two items upon his ascension?” Briana asked.

  Kodyn nodded. “The Crown of the Pharus and a scepter.” His brow furrowed. “You said they both date back to the days of Hallar, right?”

  “Right!” A bright smile split Briana’s face. “Back when we first started working on the prophecy, we were pretty sure that somehow the Blade of Hallar could be physically aligned with the scepter. Even if we were right, we had no idea what it would do. Until now.”

  Excitement mounted within Kodyn. He’d come to Shalandra to steal the Crown of the Pharus, but had to put his mission on hold. First to help Suroth protect Briana, then to aid Briana in her quest for vengeance against the Keeper’s Council. The assassination of Angrak, the threat of the Azure Rot, and the discovery of Hallar’s Warriors had pulled him away from his Undertaking time and again. Now, it seemed, everything would come full circle.

  “You remember that passage I was struggling with a few days ago?” Hailen asked. “The one about ‘the room of waiting conceals the secret of black eyes’?”

  Kodyn scrunched up his face; he had a faint memory of the boy’s frustration, though the specific words he’d been working on had fled his mind. “Sure.”

  “Something about that phrasing bothered me.” Hailen’s mouth drew into a frown. “Suroth seemed to emphasize that the ‘room of waiting’ was important. And that it had something to do with the Vault of Ancients.”

  “O…kay.” Kodyn still had yet to see where they were going with all the information, but he trusted they’d get there eventually.

  “What if the Vault of Ancients is the ‘room of waiting’?” Hailen spoke in a conspiratorial whisper, excitement in his voice. “What if something within the vault ‘conceals the secret of black eyes’?”

  Kodyn’s mind raced. Something about the way Hailen spoke of “black eyes” held a great deal of meaning, but he didn’t quite understand. The only black eyes he’d seen in the city were—

  “The Face of Hallar?” An image flashed into his mind: a stern, frowning visage stared down from the golden sandstone of Alshuruq’s peak high above the Palace of Golden Eternity.

  Hailen and Briana exchanged excited grins. “What if there’s something inside that face?” Briana said, her words pouring out in a breathless rush. “The secret of black eyes? Just like the tombs in the Keeper’s Crypts hold the bodies of the dead, there’s something hidden inside the Tomb of Hallar!”

  Kodyn’s brow furrowed. The Vault of Ancients stood a few dozen paces from the blank stone wall of the Tomb of Hallar. It wouldn’t be a stretch for there to be some sort of connecting passage or tunnel that led from the vault inside the tomb.

  Could it be? Hallar wouldn’t be the first powerful man to take secrets to his grave. Literally. If he had something he wanted to conceal—such as his blade, a weapon actually a powerful artifact capable of feeding the Serenii that all on Einan knew as Kharna—an impenetrable tomb with no opening seemed the ideal place to put it.

  If Hallar had intended for the secrets to remain buried with him forever, he would have ensured that his tomb could never be opened. But if—and this felt like a big if—the Iron Warlord had somehow found out the way to access those secrets, it would explain why he had made such a concerted effort to capture Suroth’s artifacts.

  Artifacts like Aisha’s pendant, which stored the power of dead spirits—power that had triggered something in the vault door. Or the long, cylindrical stone that Hailen had discovered was, in fact, a key.

  He sucked in a breath. “What if…” He trailed off. It seemed impossible; Suroth had insisted that the vault only opened once every three months. Yet if the Arch-Guardian had underscored the importance of these passages and kept these artifacts close at hand, maybe, just maybe, he’d suspected the same thing Briana and Hailen did.

  “What if there’s actually a way to open the vault?” Kodyn’s words came out slowly. “Not just wait for it to open, but to get it open before the self-locking mechanisms trigger it?”

  Hailen and Briana exchanged grins. “We came to the same conclusion!” Briana said.

  “And somehow, the Iron Warlord found out about it, so he’s coming after the artifacts so he can use them to get the vault open and access whatever power Hallar locked away in his tomb?” Hearing the words aloud suddenly made them more real. He knew it ought to sound impossible, yet he’d witnessed far too many impossibilities in the last few weeks to discount anything. “He sent Angrak and the Necroseti guards to steal them from your father’s study. When they failed, he sent the Gatherers after you. Once you were safely locked away in the temple, he had no choice but to unleash the crowd on you, using the co
ver of the riots to send his militants in to take them. And now, again, with this final desperate attempt.”

  Briana’s brow furrowed. “One man controls both the Gatherers and Hallar’s Warriors?”

  Kodyn nodded. “And the Ybrazhe as well. Through Groebus, the high-ranked Necroseti we suspected was behind it all.”

  Briana sucked in a breath. “By the Keeper!” Her face went pale. “All this chaos, all this violence, it was all so the Iron Warlord could get his hands on these artifacts?”

  “And whatever they’re keeping locked away safely.” Kodyn’s mind was working now. “Hallar had to know that the Vault of Ancients would open every three months, so anything he stored in there would be vulnerable. He had to lock his secrets away in his own tomb, the only place he’d know for sure no one could get at them.” He glanced toward the artifact in Hailen’s hand. “Unless they had the right key and the secrets of how to get in!”

  Excitement set his heart hammering as pieces of the puzzle began to fall into place. “Your father, Briana, spent his life studying the secrets of the Serenii. What if he stumbled onto the vault’s secret? He learned that something within the vault opened the way to the Tomb of Hallar, so he collected these artifacts so he could find how they worked!”

  Briana and Hailen’s eyes fell onto the four stone objects sitting on the table.

  Kodyn thrust a finger at the stones. “Somehow, he discovered that those artifacts are somehow connected to the Tomb of Hallar and the Vault of Ancients. Is there anything in his notes to give a clue as to what or how?”

  Briana shook her head. “Nothing we’ve found yet.” Her face darkened. “Truth be told, we’ve gone over every page. I’m certain he’s hidden a few things using codes within codes, but from what we can tell, he didn’t find out anything much about the artifacts. To him, they were little more than inert stones.”

  “But didn’t he mention something about wanting to test them at the Anointing?” Hailen piped up.

  “Oh, yes!” Briana’s eyebrows rose. She snatched the journal from the desk and flipped through the pages until she found what she sought. “You’re right.” Her gaze lifted to Kodyn. “One entry spoke of putting the artifacts to the test next time the vault opened.”

  “A week from now, at the Anointing of the Blades.”

  Briana nodded. “Exactly.” She squinted down at the page. “It says something here about ‘finding the founder’s secret’. So maybe he did know that there was something hidden in the vault!”

  “But the Iron Warlord knows, too.” Kodyn’s lips curled into a snarl. “The bastard’s been stirring up trouble in Shalandra all so he can get his hands on these artifacts and use them to get at Hallar’s secrets.”

  His jaw clenched. “And it’s up to us to stop him. Not just take down his militants or foil his plans to destroy the city.” His gaze flashed between the two of them. “If we want to save Shalandra from whatever the Iron Warlord’s got planned, we need to get into the vault first.”

  Hailen and Briana exchanged curious glances. “You think we can open it?” Hailen asked.

  “Using that key, Aisha’s pendant, and whatever the rest of these things can do, yes.” Kodyn nodded. A confident smile split his lips. “We can’t let the Iron Warlord get his hands on whatever’s in the Tomb of Hallar. So we’re going to get the vault open and steal it first!”

  Chapter Forty-One

  Relief washed over him as his captors hauled him into a small chamber. A handful of Indomitable Executors stood beside three Keeper’s Blades, including one that Evren recognized from the Fortress as an Elder—Dyrkton, I think his name was.

  Lady Callista stood over a table, issuing terse orders to her men, her face tight with strain and fatigue. She might have been summoned back to the palace to oversee the Pharus’ protection, but she seemed determined to command the battle for Shalandra no matter where she was.

  Ivita slipped up beside Lady Callista. “My lady, we’ve caught a spy!” She gestured toward Evren. “One I believe you’ll want to deal with immediately.”

  The Lady of Blades looked up and her eyes widened a fraction as her gaze rested on him. Without any hint of recognition or acknowledgement, she beckoned to two Blades standing behind her.

  “Take him to the antechamber.” Her voice was cold, hard. “I will see to his…questioning.”

  The soldiers surrendered Evren to the Blades without question. Gripping his arms tight, the two warriors led Evren toward a door in the far side of the room.

  “You are to be commended, gentlemen,” Lady Callista told the four Indomitables. “It takes a keen eye and a sharp mind to…” Her voice grew faint as Evren was hauled roughly into the back room.

  The room was sparse, with little more than a comfortable chair, a wooden table, and a locked wardrobe. The Keeper’s Blades shoved Evren into the chair and stood watching him, eyes wary for any sign of movement.

  A moment later, the door opened and Lady Callista marched into the room, the servant Ivita on her heels.

  “Evren?” Lady Callista demanded. “What are you doing here?” Her gaze dropped to his hand. “And how did you get that—?”

  “It’s Issa!” Evren threw himself to his feet.

  The two Blades seized him, but Lady Callista’s sharp “No!” stopped them from pummeling him or snapping his arms or neck.

  “Tell me, Evren,” the Lady of Blades commanded. Worry sparkled in her eyes. “What happened to Issa?”

  “The Keeper’s Council, they’ve arrested her!” The words burst from his mouth.

  Lady Callista’s face went white and she actually seemed staggered by the news. She recovered a moment later. “Leave us!” she snapped to the two Blades.

  The pair hesitated only an instant before saluting and marching from the room.

  Lady Callista turned back to Evren. “Now, tell me everything!” she hissed.

  “They’re accusing her of murdering Tinush and assaulting Madani.” He hesitated only a moment. “But she’s innocent of it. I’m the one that did it.”

  Lady Callista narrowed her eyes. “Explain.”

  Evren quickly recounted the events, including the details of Tinush and Madani’s conversation. “Then there’s this!” He reached into his pocket and drew out the document Killian had given him. “This comes from a reliable source, and it proves that they stockpiled food before the riots. They knew the riots were coming because they were the ones stirring the people up. First with the Azure Rot and the food shortages, then with Aterallis’ death. They used the Ybrazhe, the Gatherers, and Hallar’s Warriors to turn the people against the Pharus so they could take over.”

  Lady Callista’s face darkened, anger blazing in her eyes. “Traitors!” She slammed a gauntleted fist into the stone wall. “I knew they were angling for power, but I never imagined they could stoop this low!” She shot him a glance. “Good work, Evren.”

  Evren nodded. “And Issa?”

  “I’ll be damned if I let the Keeper’s Council harm a hair on her head!” Rage clouded her eyes and turned her voice razor-sharp. “Those bastards have made their last mistake.”

  Lady Callista rounded on Ivita. “Go, summon every Blade from the West Wing, bring them here at once!”

  “Yes, Lady Callista.” Ivita bowed quickly and hurried out a side door that led deeper into the palace.

  The Lady of Blades stormed into the small chamber. “Irian, Akheem, take two companies of Indomitables and get down to Death Row. Protect the Pharus, at any cost!”

  The words raised Evren’s eyebrows. The Pharus? The image of the heavily-guarded pavilion flashed through his mind, and ice slithered down his spine. But if he’s afraid for his life, why would he be out there, surrounded by so few guards?

  He hurried through the door after her, just in time to see the two Blades racing away.

  “The rest of you,” Lady Callista barked, “I want you marching toward the East Wing and rounding up all the Keeper-damned Necroseti in the palace. Every scribe, eve
ry under-priest, even the Divinities themselves. Bring me the Keeper’s Council dead or alive! Let none of them flee!”

  A flurry of activity suddenly seized the room as the Executors and Blades rushed off to obey the order without question.

  Evren shot the Lady of Blades a curious look. “I’m assuming you’ve got a plan?”

  “I’ve had a plan to deal with the Keeper’s Council since the first day I was Anointed Lady of Blades.” Fury echoed in Lady Callista’s voice and her fists clenched and unclenched, as if aching to draw her huge flammard. “But it only works if they’re in the palace. The Necroseti have a small army of guards protecting the Hall of the Beyond. If they close their gates, there’s no way we’ll get at the Keeper’s Council without a bloody fight. And given how thin we’re stretched, we just don’t have enough men to get in. Not until order is restored in Shalandra.”

  Evren’s gut clenched. “But we can at least stop Issa from being arrested!”

  “Bloody right!” Lady Callista’s face hardened. “I’ll be damned if I let them lock her away!” The Lady of Blades’ voice echoed with a fury—not the anger of a commander concerned for her subordinate, but something deeper, more personal. Her voice dropped to a harsh whisper. “Not after I just got her back.”

  The words made no sense to Evren, but he had no time to question her. A dozen Keeper’s Blades rushed into the room and came to stand before Lady Callista.

  “Sir!” they saluted in unison.

  “The Keeper’s Council has taken one of our own.” The Lady of Blades spoke in a cold, harsh voice. “We’re going to stop them, no matter what.”

  “Yes, sir!” The men didn’t so much as blink. If anything, their expressions grew eager, a glint of delight shining in their eyes.

  Lady Callista unslung her huge sword and marched out of the room, heading east toward the front entrance and the way out. Evren had to hurry to match her furious, driven pace, but he didn’t mind. They’d have to move quickly to intercept the Necroseti guards before they reached the Hall of the Beyond.