by ML Spencer
Someone grabbed him, hauling Markus upright. Another man moved in to help restrain him. Markus fought, but there were too many of them. They pulled him back away from where Sergan was standing, watching Vandra struggling to breathe.
Just then, a raging gust of wind swept over them, accompanied by a ferocious roar. Markus looked up in time to see Siroth falling upon them from the sky in a gush of flames. The people holding Markus screamed and scattered as the dragon landed in their midst, lashing out with his tail and spewing fire all around the courtyard.
The flames stopped just shy of Sergan, for Siroth saw Vandra lying at his feet. With a roar of frustration, Siroth leapt into the air, snatching Markus up with his talons.
“No!” Markus cried as the ground fell away beneath him. “Take me back!”
He couldn’t leave Vandra there to die.
But Siroth ignored him, his powerful wings straining to gain height as they soared away from the overrun fortress.
Chapter Ninety
Siroth carried Markus to a ridge high above the fortress, where he set him down. Markus dropped to his knees, dazed with shock, and gazed upon the smoke wafting up from the walls below. Vandra was down there still, with Sergan. She might still be alive. There had to be some way to get back to her—
Siroth’s head snaked toward him, and the dragon let out a threatening growl. Images of himself lying dead next to Vandra came to Markus’s mind, but he shook them roughly out of his head.
“I can’t just leave her!” he shouted.
But the dragon would have none of it. With a jerk of his head, Siroth ordered him onto his back. Markus’s shoulders slumped as despair took hold, wringing the strength out of him. Vandra was one of the best people he knew. She had stood up for himself and Aram, even when it seemed the whole world stood against them. Never had she lost faith in them.
She didn’t deserve this. Not this.
He knelt there for a long time, watching smoke pour from the fortress’s towers in a great, dark plume. At length, he pushed himself to his feet and walked back to Siroth. With heart-numbing regret, he climbed onto his dragon’s back.
Siroth walked forward and stepped off the ledge of the cliff, falling for a heartbeat before stretching his wings and catching the air beneath them. They banked sharply over the fortress then gained height, following the ridgelines to where the deep furrow of the gorge opened out of the surrounding bluffs. The whole flight home, Markus fought back tears of sorrow, feeling strangled by grief and self-contempt.
Eraine Vandra knelt on the ground at the sorcerer’s feet, hogtied, a rope running from her ankles to her wrists. She had stopped struggling against the bonds. They were tied too securely, and all she’d succeeded in doing was abrading her wrists. The sorcerer still maintained the invisible stranglehold around her neck, forcing her to fight for every breath. The struggle for air filled her with a desperate panic that she couldn’t shake, which was worse than the physical pain she felt from the wounds she had taken during the fight.
The sorcerer reached down and patted her head as though she were an animal. “I’m sorry about this,” he said in a conversational tone. “I’m almost out of essence, you see. There’s a pathetic amount in you, but it may be enough to fill a vial or two. Unfortunately, the procedure’s not comfortable, and since I’m not an Extractor, I’m going to have to do some real damage to your body to achieve the levels of pain that are needed.” To a leather-clad man standing next to him, he said, “Take her over there. Strap her down.”
The man bowed and moved quickly to comply, dropping down behind Vandra and drawing a large knife. He sawed quickly through the ropes that bound her ankles then jerked her upright. More men came forward, taking her roughly by the arms and forcing her toward an enormous block of stone that had fallen from the tower above them. They lifted her onto the stone slab and tied her down with leather straps.
When Vandra saw the man walking toward her with a sledgehammer, a heavy-handed fear choked her, and she clenched her jaw in expectation of the pain. The one thought that gave her comfort was of a boy she knew who had survived four years of such torture. If Aram could endure it, then so could she.
“We’ll start with your feet and hands,” said the sorcerer. “Then we’ll work our way up.”
Markus was barely aware of the cliffs moving by them in a blur. He had no idea they were close to Skyhome until Siroth slowed his flight and descended onto the large terrace of the Southern Eyrie. Seeing them land, people rushed toward them with looks of concern. The entire Wing knew he had left with Vandra. They also knew he hadn’t returned with her.
Climbing down from Siroth’s back, Markus leaned heavily against his dragon’s side, gripping the riding harness for support. He couldn’t bring himself to look up, to meet their eyes, to admit the magnitude of his failure. The crowd parted to admit a tall man with wind-whipped hair and a face like sunbaked leather. Markus recognized him as Ansul Stroud, the Wingmaster of the Lower Eyrie.
“Where’s Vandra?” Stroud demanded. “Ragath’s beside himself!”
Markus grimly shook his head, unable to speak. There were cries of dismay and denial from the people surrounding him, but then it grew quiet as the loss sank in. Stroud stood glaring at Markus in shocked dismay, looking frozen between sentences. He clenched and unclenched his fists, the muscles of his jaw bunching in anger. Grief and guilt-stricken, Markus wanted nothing more than to flee the eyrie. He turned and put a foot into Siroth’s harness, but a hand on his arm stopped him from climbing up.
He turned to see Calise standing next to him, her face pale and damp with tears. She asked, “Is Aram with you?”
Grimacing, Markus shook his head. “He never came.”
Visibly upset, she turned and made her way back into the crowd. Markus watched her go, a heavy weight of despair bearing down on him.
“The fortress is lost?” asked Stroud.
Markus nodded.
“What happened? Where is Raythe?”
Markus slumped back against Siroth’s side, leaning heavily on his dragon’s strength as he recounted the story of Eld Anoth’s fall to all who stood around them. When he came to the part where Siroth pulled him away from Vandra and the battle, his voice broke, and he couldn’t continue, for the weight of guilt compressed his chest so hard, he couldn’t speak.
“There’s nothing you could have done.” Stroud squeezed Markus’s arm consolingly, though the gesture did little to help. “Your dragon did the right thing. Sometimes they know better than us what is best.” He stood quietly for a moment, gaze downturned, then, at last, turned to address the people gathered around them. “It doesn’t end here. It’s only beginning. They’ll be marching on to Eranor. We must prepare.”
Sergan knelt next to the woman who lay moaning on the stone slab. In his hand, he held a cobalt-glazed distillation flask. His eyes were closed in concentration, sweat beading on his forehead. He wasn’t an Extractor; he had little Talent for it. The woman whose essence he harvested was on the verge of passing out, which made the extraction easier, the way applying grease to an axle allows the wheel to turn freely, though he couldn’t let her slip entirely out of consciousness. There wasn’t a lot of essence in her to begin with, and the process was taking time, along with all of the concentration Sergan could muster. In the end, he could barely wring more than a few a vials out of her.
When the flow of essence from her slowed to a trickle, he removed his hand and stood, for a moment feeling dizzy. He raised the flask to his nose and inhaled deeply.
“Phaw,” he spat, corking the flask. He had never known such a hard, unbreakable woman, and he feared her essence would taste like acid going down.
Grimacing in annoyance, he patted his victim’s shoulder and nodded at the men of the Lizard Clan who had gathered to look on. “Carry her to my tent. Make her comfortable.” He grimaced, too weary to appreciate his own irony.
“Your pardon, Exilar,” said a voice behind him.
Turning, Serga
n quirked an eyebrow at the pale and sickly-looking man who had come up behind him. The void-man bowed low, spreading his hands in the tradition of ancient Nimare. The man had white hair that flowed to his waist and wore a long, uncut piece of cloth stitched up the side and pinned at the shoulder. His features were skeletal, his skin paper-thin, with the texture of parchment. Tiny veins could be seen squiggling beneath it, dark with inky blood. The man’s eyes glowed with the cold, empty blue of the void.
“I bear word for your ears alone,” the Nimarean man said in an accent so thick that Sergan could hardly understand him.
He sighed heavily, glancing down in irritation at his moaning victim. “Fine.”
He allowed the void-man to lead him away from the group of soldiers toward one of the very few walls of the courtyard that had somehow remained intact. Sergan stared at the wall warily, not trusting it to remain standing. He was almost ready to suggest they find another location when the man halted and caught his arm.
“Our Lady Lazair has fallen in battle,” the Nimarean said in a lowered voice.
Sergan blinked, convinced he hadn’t heard the man right. For seconds, all he could do was stare at the void-man in shock. “What?”
“I said—”
“Yes, I heard you!” the sorcerer snapped. “How the hell did that happen?”
The pallid man spread his hands again, a pithy gesture of apology or deference. “Exilar, the Lady Lazair was slain by their Champion.”
“Aram Raythe killed Lazair?”
He had a hard time believing that. Hell, he didn’t believe that. The void-man had to be wrong. Perhaps the boy had been there, but to kill Lazair all by himself … A tingle went down Sergan’s spine, and he felt his skin pale to the shade of the Nimarean’s. He remembered the brilliance of the boy’s radiance, how rich his potential had been, even when his body had been weak and near death.
Apparently, Aram had grown into that potential. Perhaps he truly was a Champion.
Sergan shivered, for the very thought terrified him. If Aram could dispatch someone of Lazair’s talent, what could he do to a mundane sorcerer?
“My Lord,” the Nimarean said, and motioned to someone behind him.
“What now?” Sergan asked, for it had been Lazair who led this bizarre coalition. “Who’s in charge?”
The Nimarean man inclined his head. “Exilar, we have received word that the Divine One himself is on his way to personally lead the assault. He is expected imminently.”
Sergan felt the rest of the blood drain from his flesh. “Kathrax. Himself. Coming here?”
The Nimarean winced, his face pinching into a grimace. Sergan wondered if the reaction was in response to his speaking the Archon’s name.
“Yes, Exilar.” More bowing and hand-spreading. “The Divine One himself is on his way. But until he arrives, it would seem you are in charge.”
A man came forward bearing a bundle wrapped in black cloth, bowing before presenting the parcel to Sergan. Sergan accepted it with a frown and was shocked when his hands grew cold the moment the fabric touched his fingers.
Pulling back the black silken cloth, Sergan’s breath caught at the sight of the Baelsword’s bone hilt.
It was nightfall, and Aram still hadn’t returned.
Markus sat beside the hearth in Esmir’s eyrie, staring down at the bowl of cinnamon-flavored namas the old man had prepared for him. When he had first arrived in this world, the flavor of namas had seemed a betrayal to everything that supper was supposed to be. In the Vardlands, cinnamon was a spice used only in pastries. Never before coming to Skyhome had he tasted a main dish seasoned with it. But the peculiar flavors of the food here had grown on him, and he usually looked forward to namas, even when it was Esmir cooking it.
Not today, though. He wasn’t hungry. Markus set the bowl down and stared into the fire.
“You’re not going to eat?” asked Esmir.
“No.” Markus offered him the bowl. “Thank you, but I can’t.”
Esmir grunted but didn’t take the bowl. Markus set it down in front of him and stared at the contents, watching steam curl from the broth. The smell of cinnamon reminded him of happier times. His eyes kept going to the mouth of the eyrie, hoping for a glimpse of Agaroth’s red body. Esmir’s eyrie was on the level below their own, and it would be impossible for a dragon as big as Agaroth to return home without being seen. But there was still no sign of the crimson dragon, and Markus was ill with worry.
“He should be back now,” he grumbled.
“He should.” Esmir leaned forward to stir the namas in its pot. “But that doesn’t mean something went wrong. Aram is not incapable, you know. His task could have proven much bigger than we thought.”
Markus’s fingers tapped out an anxious pattern on the floor at his side, and he did nothing to still them. “I want to go look for him.”
Esmir shook his head. “The Winmarch is a very big place. You could search for days and never find him. And we need you here, not out looking for one blade of grass in a literal prairie. What if something else happens while you’re gone?”
“Some people are blaming him,” Markus said, staring blearily into the fire.
Esmir plopped the ladle into the kettle and leaned forward, casting Markus a sidelong glare. “Don’t let them get away with that. It wasn’t Aram’s fault, and they need to be made aware of that. That’s one of the burdens Champions have to live with. People expect them to be everywhere at once, and when they can’t be, they take the blame. It can be a heavy weight for the soul.”
Markus hung his head, for Esmir was right. When Aram returned to find that Vandra had been left behind, he would blame himself. He would have a hard enough time without having to deal with the accusations of others.
“He’s going to need you,” Esmir said, poking at the coals of the fire with a stick.
Markus nodded. Sighing heavily, he pushed himself to his feet and walked stiffly out onto the terrace to where Siroth lay stretched out across the rocks. Hearing him approach, the dragon opened an eyelid and peered up at him. He felt Siroth’s question in his mind, and he shook his head in answer.
“No,” he said, kneeling to scratch a place on Siroth’s neck that was always itchy. “Nobody’s heard anything yet.”
The dragon let out a long sigh, echoing Markus’s own.
“He’ll come,” he said at last, staring out into the night.
Aram awoke to find himself lying in a bed of straw, a cloudless night stretched above him in all its star-filled glory. He started to sit up but cried out as a shooting pain stabbed into his side. He rubbed his ribs, wondering whether they were just bruised or cracked. Other parts of him ached, too, but his side was the worst. With a groan, he managed to push himself upright.
He was in the slender valley of the Wellspring, surrounded by dozens of edylberry trees whose weeping boughs glittered silver in the moonlight. Dozens of fireflies danced above the lake, the lights of their bellies flickering in the darkness. From somewhere far away, he heard the mournful cry of an owl. Other than that, and the crackle of a small campfire, the evening was silent and still. Agaroth lay on the far side of the fire, surrounded by Elesium who stood with necks downstretched, grazing in the moonlit grass.
“You’re awake,” said a voice.
Althea stepped around the campfire and knelt at his side. She still looked haggard, though much better than she had. She took him by the shoulders and ran her gaze over him critically.
“Your wounds are mending quickly,” she said. “How does your side feel?”
Aram groped at his ribs. “It hurts.”
The smile that flitted across Althea’s lips was as brief as the fireflies’ flickering lights. “I’m sure it does. You took quite a blow.”
“I don’t remember,” Aram said with a frown. He brought his hand up to feel the skin of his face and was shocked to find that it was peeling. “How…”
“I’m skilled with healing, especially burns. Not so much with deep
er injuries. That was Mandrel’s Talent.”
Althea must be very skilled, for Aram remembered the excruciating pain of Lazair’s magic scorching his face. He trailed his fingers over his cheeks, unable to believe that he could recover from such an injury without lifelong scars.
“Thank you,” he breathed.
With a groan, he pushed himself to his feet. It felt like every inch of his body was covered in bruises and scrapes. As he walked stiffly toward the campfire, Althea’s people noticed him and stood. One and all, they inclined their heads toward him.
Aram raised his hand. “Please. Don’t.”
“We reserve the right to feel grateful,” Althea said, coming to stand at his side. “Without your intervention, the Elesium would be slaughtered, and this sacred place would be defiled.”
Feeling uncomfortable in more ways than one, Aram averted his eyes, unable to look at them. “Thank you,” he whispered again, staring at the ground.
The old woman kissed his cheek.
Agaroth raised his head and regarded Aram with a trace of irritation in his eyes, for humility was something the dragon did not understand or condone. But it wasn’t humility that Aram felt; he simply didn’t understand the magnitude of what he had done.
But the people around him did.
Chapter Ninety-One
Morning arrived, bearing with it a spectacular golden light that angled down upon the valley of the lake, making the silver waters sparkle and the coats of the Elesium glow iridescently. Aram climbed gingerly from his bed of straw and walked toward a nearby hill, upon which Agaroth had made his perch. As he made his way through the camp, the people smiled and brought their hands to their brows. He gestured back, happy that, for the most part, Althea’s people seemed healthy and well. The water of the lake had worked its wonders upon them, and those who had survived the flight from Winhome would recover.