Quest of the Dreamwalker (The Corthan Legacy Book 1)

by Stacy Bennett

  “Sidonius has larger aspirations, it seems,” Bradan said.

  Khoury’s impatience grew. “From what he’d learned at the Academy, what else could he do?”

  Xantherus gave him a quelling stare then said, “He might summon a beast of his specialty.”

  “Like what?” Archer asked.

  “An elemental or a young dragon, perhaps.”

  At the mention of dragon, the entire hall fell silent. Falin would have paid coin to know what Khoury was thinking right now.

  “Captain, you can stay another night to prepare,” the baron said, obviously shaken by the discussion.

  “No. We’ll leave tonight as agreed. I’m sure your guard is ready at your call.”

  “It is probably wisest to go now if you don’t wish the Academy’s help,” Xantherus said.

  Was it wisdom, Falin wondered, or had the sorcerer tired of Khoury’s disdainful inquisition?

  “I don’t think the Academy will help,” the captain told the sorcerer.

  Not in time to save Cara, Falin realized.

  “Either way, if I can put a sword through his heart, it will solve the problem. If not, then it will be your mess to cleanup, Magus.” With that, Khoury stood.

  Falin was about to complain that she’d hardly eaten but there was an angry restlessness within the captain he could barely contain.

  “Thank you for your gracious hospitality,” he said, bowing to Wallace. “I am in your debt. If I survive, call on me when you have need.”

  The baron stood and bowed in return as a knot of dread coalesced in Falin’s gut.

  If I survive….

  Khoury spun on a sharp heel and strode for the door with Bradan and Archer scrambling after. Falin followed but when she heard Xantherus excuse himself as well, she waited by the door to find out what exactly he wasn’t telling them.

  He turned left instead of right, and she followed him a short way up the hall before she caught up to him and grabbed his arm.

  A sharp blast of air hit her in the chest, hard enough to knock her back against the wall. The blow felt surprisingly solid for being made of wind. She snarled and drew her knife.

  Xantherus turned with a haughty look. “You can’t expect to manhandle someone in a deserted hallway and not expect them to react defensively, my dear. Now, put down the blade. I don’t want to hurt you.”

  She frowned. “What aren’t you telling us?”

  He stared at her for a long moment, his eyes shuttered. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  She wanted to slap him. “You were hinting at something.”

  “You heard your captain. He wants nothing of my theories.” He turned to leave.

  “You think I’m involved, don’t you?” she blurted out.

  He stopped, quietly considering. Then his shoulders softened, and he looked at her. “Yes. I believe you are at the very heart of it all.”

  “But I met Cara only a few weeks ago, and I don’t know anything about the sorcerer.”

  “Yet you recognized him. Let me pose my question again. If a soul is a thing that can be cut, what happens to the pieces you take away?”

  “I don’t know.” Falin was getting irritated. “What does it matter?

  “This girl, she has some kind of power, yes?” Xantherus’s voice rose with impatience.

  “She’s a healer, but—”

  “Ah,” he said as if it all made sense. “A healer.”

  Falin sighed and rubbed her eyes. “So?”

  “So, let’s say that the soul in question has a healing power and Sidonius wanted to cut away everything but the power. Where does that extra go?” The question hung in the hall. “Especially given this particular soul’s natural tendency is to fix things.”

  Fix things. Falin snorted with dry humor. That did sum Cara up fairly well. “You think Sidonius did something to her. With that knife.”

  “I’m sure of it.”

  “Okay, he made her meek, but I don’t see how this involves me?”

  “Don’t you?” Xantherus simply looked down at the knife in her hand.

  “You think…” A hot flush covered her shoulders and neck. The hair on her head lifted in a chill. “Wait, you think I’m the cut away pieces?”

  “It makes sense.”

  “Except that I grew up in Foresthaven. I didn’t appear out of nowhere one day.” Her words were quick with anger but not enough to outrun her fear.

  “Not if you were an infant when he took you,” Xantherus said.

  Falin had no words. She herself wasn’t a motherly sort, but the thought of that man using his magic on an infant turned her stomach.

  “The last time I saw Sidonius was years after he’d been exiled,” Xantherus said. “The Academy had been contacted to help with a coup. My services were offered. I had no idea another sorcerer was involved though I should have realized it when I saw the dragon.”

  “Sidonius,” Falin guessed.

  Xantherus nodded. “The strange part, the part that made no sense, was that I found Sidon in the nursery.”

  “You knew?” Falin accused, gripping the hilt of her blade until her knuckles paled.

  “No. When I saw him, he was alone. I thought he was hiding from the guard. But he did have the soul knife with him.” Xantherus pressed his lips together.

  “He stole and magicked a baby, and you just let him get away?” Anger boiled in Falin’s gut.

  “I had no proof. And he had once been my friend.”

  As a foundling, she’d always thought she had no parents. Sorchia was the only mother she’d ever known or ever needed. But now, she had to wonder if she had another one, or a father. Had Sidonius stolen Cara and her from them, or had he killed them?

  She found that she didn’t care. The despair that nipped at her mind now had little to do with being an orphan. It seemed the truth was worse than that.

  If Xantherus was right, she was just scraps from someone else’s soul.

  Falin put a hand to the wall as the floor tipped beneath her. Hot shock washed over her, stealing her air.

  “No,” she denied it with a snarl, as her heart pounded painfully within her ribs. “No, you’re wrong!” She hated Xantherus then, hated him and all the soulless sorcerers of the Far Isles.

  Is this what magic does to men? she wondered. The Culling made sense now. The Mothers were truly wise, brutal but wise.

  “I know this must be a surprise,” he said with easy indifference, reaching out a reassuring hand.

  She slapped it away and pointed her knife at him. “Don’t touch me, you thornless coward! I’ll slit your motherless neck and be glad of it.” The hatred she felt demanded blood, but killing him wouldn’t stop Sidonius, wouldn’t change the past, and wouldn’t save Cara. So she scooped up the annoying skirts from around her legs, turned and ran. She didn’t know where she was going; she just knew she needed to get away from him. She ran through long hallways, turning randomly left or right hoping for a door to the outside. It hurt trying to wrap her brain around everything.

  She was not the little rabbit’s cast-off parts; she just couldn’t be.

  By the time she calmed enough to walk, she was lost. It took almost an hour to find their rooms. Archer and Bradan were waiting for her. Khoury was missing.

  “Where’d you go?” Archer asked, noting her sweaty hair and wild eyes.

  “Just went for a run. Tired of walls.” She plopped down in a chair, wanting to talk about anything to get her mind off Xantherus’s wild theories. “So, sixty men from the baron. Is that going to be enough?”

  “With Khoury in charge, I’ve seen miracles,” Archer assured her. “Besides, we’ll have more than sixty by the time we reach the Keep.”

  “How?”

  “I have a score of riders in Iolair already and Violet sent the call out today,” Khoury said from behind her. She turned to see him in the doorway and wondered how long he’d been there.

  “Who’s Violet?” she asked.

  “One of my othe
r lieutenants,” Khoury said.

  “Best in the business,” Archer added with a wry smile. “You’d like her.” Then he turned to Khoury. “How many more do you think we’ll get?”

  “Another fifty to eighty perhaps,” Khoury said. “Maybe more with the summer festival coming.”

  Archer chuckled. “If the great Captain Khoury is asking for swords, they’ll come.” Archer leaned close to Falin. “They don’t even ask why as long as he’s in charge.”

  Was Khoury so well-respected that he had only to ask to be provided with an army?

  “Get your things, Falin,” Khoury said curtly. “Meet us in my room.” With that, he backed out of the room.

  Exchanging puzzled looks with the Northerners, Falin went back to Cara’s room and gathered the few items that remained. She stowed Cara’s packet of medicine in her pack. Then she slipped out of the gown, wrapped her breasts tight, and donned her now-clean leggings and tunic, tucking her totems near her heart.

  Once more in familiar armor and having traded braids for her usual knot, she felt more like herself. More able to handle the task required of her. Her destiny was to be Cara’s strength. She had nothing else to give any of them. Now, more than ever, there was no room for weakness. Or self-pity.

  “Ever a Huntress,” she murmured to herself. “By thorn and blade, Cara, I swear I will not fail us.”

  As she reached for her bow and quiver, the soft green material lying in a heap on the floor caught her eye. She picked it up, running sensitive fingertips over the soft fabric. Without knowing why, she folded the gown and stuffed it in the bottom of the pack, and then headed across the hall.

  KHOURY DIDN’T TURN from the window when he heard the Huntress enter. He’d had to think long and hard about what to do with her, especially since she was Sidonius’s next target. He tried to convince himself he wanted her close to use as bait, to bring the sorcerer out. But the image of Sidonius disappearing behind his wall of fire with Cara still haunted the captain. He wouldn’t lose the Huntress, too.

  At dinner, she implied that she wouldn’t join them. He thought about simply asking for her help, but she tended to do the opposite of what he wanted. There was only one way to make sure she cooperated. He took a deep breath and turned, his face like a mountainside.

  “Falin, I’ve decided you should stay behind.”

  Bradan and Archer stared in shock. Falin looked up at him with short-lived surprise. Then, predictable anger crawled across her features. “What?”

  “You should stay in Iolair,” he repeated.

  “I hadn’t said that I was going yet,” she said softly.

  “Even better.”

  The blunt dismissal left Falin speechless. Her brow furrowed as if she misunderstood him. “Are you still going after Cara?” she asked.

  “Yes. But, like I said, we won’t need you.” He hadn’t expected her to look so hurt.

  “You’re going to need every possible blade for this,” she said, incredulous. “I can fight.” He had anticipated anger, but this was something else. The pain in her bright eyes was startling. Still, he had started down this path; there was no turning back.

  “You’re a liability.”

  “I’m as good with a blade as you!”

  “It’s too dangerous,” he said. That fueled the fire he was seeking, but she still didn’t rise to the bait. He’d expected her to yell or lash out at him by now. “Sidonius will be tough, and I don’t have time to babysit.”

  “Captain!” Archer said, coming to stand next to the Huntress. “What is wrong with you?”

  Archer’s pity did what Khoury’s disdain could not. He saw the flush of her cheeks at Archer’s intervention. Fury flared in her green eyes, and she spit at their feet. “I don’t need a babysitter. I’m not Cara.”

  “But you’d be my responsibility,” Khoury said. “I don’t want you there.”

  Archer opened his mouth to speak in her defense but a sharp look from Falin made him think better of it. Her face, when she turned back to the captain, showed the hurt his betrayal had caused.

  What happened since the meeting with Wallace? he wondered.

  After a moment’s thought, she schooled her features back to haughty disdain. Her shoulders relaxed and she crossed her arms, calm as a snake poised to strike. “I don’t care what you want, you motherless bastard. I wouldn’t dream of sitting this one out.”

  “Sidonius said you were next,” he said. “Do you think it’s wise for me to take you straight to him?”

  “Wise for you to take me?” She was indignant, her nostrils flaring and jaw set. “What am I—your dog? You can’t make me do anything.”

  That was what he wanted to hear. “I should lock you in the baron’s dungeon for your own good.” It felt strangely good to argue with her now that her spark had returned.

  “Fine. Leave me here,” she challenged, “if you dare.”

  “Following us would be suicide,” he snapped.

  “Going to the Keep to get Cara is suicide!” Falin shouted. “And this is more about me and her than it is about you. Xantherus said as much.”

  Khoury wasn’t sure what she meant by that, but he was glad she was determined to go. She met his gaze unflinching, refusing to be stared down, and he almost smiled. He had come to like her stubborn contrariness. But he only shook his head with false exasperation. “Fine. Tag along if you wish.”

  He heard her huff of victory as he went to the chair by the window and retrieved the special item he’d ask Vi to find. His lieutenant had outdone herself. On the chair was a brigantine cuirass for Falin. Far sturdier than her Huntress leathers, it had small plates of iron sewn between pieces of leather. He turned, holding it out to her. “You’d better take this.”

  Falin looked suspiciously from the chest piece to the captain.

  “It’s stronger than those leathers of yours,” he explained as she took the cuirass with growing interest. “You should have better protection if you insist on coming.”

  Falin hefted it, testing its weight. Then, she slipped her tunic off over her head, her breasts well-covered by the linen wrap that bound them tight to her ribs. She looked so slender and small that for a moment she reminded him of Cara. An ache of longing shot through him. She settled the new armor over her shoulders. She shifted and bounced and feigned a few attacks, nodding with satisfaction.

  The men chose their weapons and when it was Falin’s turn, she perused them carefully, choosing only a simple curved short sword, settling for her familiar hunting knife and bow. Then Khoury took the wrapped blade from his belt. It was a family heirloom, having belonged to his mother. Still, it had reminded him of the Huntress when he’d seen it in the treasury. He placed it in her hands without a word.

  She unwrapped it carefully, her eyes brightening as she unsheathed the seven-inch barb-tipped dagger, its handle carved with a snarling wolf.

  “Thank you,” she said with hushed sincerity. Then she gave him a proper Sister salute and slipped the blade into her boot with a satisfied pat. Quick as a flash, she leaned up and planted a quick kiss on the corner of his unsuspecting mouth.

  Their eyes met for a brief, awkward moment, then she jumped back. “I forgot something.” She left the room and returned in a few moments with the witchwood staff she gifted to Cara. “Now I’m ready.”

  CARA WOKE FROM dreams of richly colored tapestries and sweet buns to find herself surrounded by black stones as if nothing had changed. An evening gloom was settling over the room, giving it a hint of unreality. The last thing she remembered was breakfast with Khoury. She had no memory of returning to the Keep. Perhaps her adventures had been only a dream and she would go below and find the red-haired Northerner still imprisoned, his stern captain sparring with thin air.

  The idea became so real, it drove her to her feet.

  She tripped with a clank of chains and stared in horror at the shackles about her ankles. There was enough length of chain for her to manage a stumbling waddle but little more. The
fetters were definitely a change but still the idea that her friends were below clung like a burr. Using her skirts to keep the chains out of the way, she tried the door, thankful it opened. She shuffled her way to the dark stairs and painstakingly hopped down a step at a time. No longer did sentinel torches burn in the halls, and the light from outside didn’t penetrate very far into the dusty cloister. From the main floor, she stumbled her way by feel and memory to the stairs that led down to the cells.

  Pausing at the pitch-black landing, her heart thudded in her chest. Everything had changed since she’d left, and not for the better.

  The whoosh of a candle catching flame startled her and she squinted in the sudden glare, pressing herself back against the wall.

  “Still a wanderer, I see.” Sidonius’s rasp reminded her of empty winds and dead things. He towered over her, one raised fingertip alight like a wick. He looked larger than she recalled. Shadows clung to him like fog. The wrongness she’d always sensed in him had grown. And it hungered for her. Forked tongues of darkness darted out to taste her skin, and she shivered. Her leaving had set something ominous in motion.

  “Looking for your friends?” he asked, lifting his hand to let the flickering light tumble down the stairs. Instead of an empty hall, Cara saw bodies pressed together. Not in cells but crowding the entire level. Heads turned at the luminous disturbance, and she gazed in horror on a sea of empty faces and cloudy eyes.

  “What have you done?” she whispered.

  “What was needed,” Sidonius said. He gripped her arm, turning her back toward her tower. She shuffled meekly to the stairs.

  “Perhaps I should thank you,” he added. “Had you not run away, I would never have found the one thing I still need.” Reaching the stairs, he shoved her toward the first step.

  “I’m back. What more could you need?” she asked wearily.

  “Much, it seems,” he said cryptically. “In all the years of failure, the one thing I never questioned was you.” In the flickering light, his look of cold disdain shriveled her soul.