by Victor Poole
She thought again of Rosk, who had been as opposite to the priests of Slavithe as any man could be, and her mouth twisted into a squiggle of disapproval. She told herself that she had not even met these imprisoned priests, and that it was premature to make up her mind about them. I am prejudiced towards these priests because of the rudeness of the king, Ajalia told herself, but her heart did not listen to this counsel. Instead, her heart rumbled in indignation, and her fingers itched.
"King Fernos," Ajalia said suddenly, and stopped walking. The old king turned to her with exaggerated patience, and smiled. "Did you have the thought," Ajalia asked, "that you could lock us both up, and save the kingdom for yourself?" Delmar looked swiftly at Ajalia, and then at Fernos, who continued to smile broadly.
"Well, such a course of action would, of course, be quite foolish, young lady," the king told her.
"I think he's losing his marbles," Ajalia told Delmar. The old king laughed, and his voice was strong and sensible.
"What on earth do you mean by that, slave?" Fernos asked. Ajalia was sure now that she had hit on something near to the truth, because the king had changed from calling her "young lady" to "slave," and she had found, in her experience, that such a change of appellation generally indicated a souring mood.
"Do you know how to get us out of here?" Ajalia asked Delmar. They were partway down a long and darkened stairway. Delmar nodded, and grabbed Ajalia again by the hand. He had let go of her, when they had started down the stairs, but now he wrapped her fingers up in his own, and led her swiftly up the stairs.
"You are being superstitious!" Fernos called after them. He did not follow them, and Ajalia pressed her lips together in annoyance.
"I'm sorry I didn't think of it sooner," Ajalia told Delmar. "I thought he had some sense."
"That's all right," Delmar said, his eyes moving slowly from side to side, "I didn't think of it at all."
"Do you think he's led us into a trap?" Ajalia asked.
"Possibly," Delmar said. "He is not following us now." Just then, they heard the king cry up to them, and then they heard the shuffle of his footsteps behind them on the stairs.
"Just wait up for me, please," the king called up. Delmar glanced at Ajalia, and then continued up the stairs. They soon reached the hall at the top, and Ajalia was led straight into a room that was crowded with guards, all of whom were holding spears.
"Well, hello," Delmar said to the guards, who glowered back at him with threatening faces. "Yes," Delmar said to Ajalia, tightening his grip on her hand, "I think he did set a trap for us."
THE SHADOWS BENEATH THE MOUNTAIN
"Wait up!" Fernos shouted. Ajalia heard the old king panting for breath as he reached the top of the stairs, and then he appeared in the room behind them. Ajalia felt a slight shimmer of heat, and she knew that Delmar was forming a protective shell of magic around the two of them.
"Use the light from the earth," Ajalia murmured, and Delmar glanced at her, his mouth turned in a twist of annoyance. "You'll need the power later," she said. "Today is not over yet." Delmar uttered a small sigh, and nodded, and Ajalia felt the tenor of the energy around them change. It became deeper, and more soothing in its nearly-inaudible hum.
The magic did not produce actual sound, but Ajalia could feel it trembling in the air near her. The cords of light that she drew up from under the earth or sky did not produce this vibration, but the strong mixed magic, and the mixed blue magic from the stars and the deep earth, made a constant thrum through the center of her bones that was both steady and calming.
Ajalia saw that the guards did not see or notice the invisible magic. Now that she knew what to watch for, and how to recognize the slight shimmer in the air that the hidden magic made, Ajalia could see where it was, but until she had looked for it, it had been wholly invisible to her, and she saw, when she looked out at the guards, that none of them had a white brand.
"Delmar," Ajalia whispered into the Thief Lord's ear. Fernos had approached behind them, and was now staring out at the room full of armed guards with a benevolent expression.
"Yes," Delmar murmured back. He had not reached for his knife, but Ajalia could feel the readiness in Delmar's spine, and the tension that rose through his legs. She reflected, while telling herself not to be distracted, that Delmar had very satisfying legs. I need to marry Delmar, Ajalia told herself, and then she brought her mind back to the matter at hand.
"Do you think that Fernos has been eating people's brands?" Ajalia asked, close into Delmar's ear, so that the old king, who was only a few feet behind them, would not hear. Delmar, his face quickening with surprise, looked at Ajalia.
"I hope not," Delmar said quietly.
"But if he's mad," Ajalia said softly, and Delmar's brows drew down in a look of anger.
"Well," Delmar said, and he turned and looked at his grandfather.
"Are the two of you discussing me?" the king of Talbos asked, a grin of absolute pleasure passing over his face. Ajalia, now that she was thinking of madness, saw a strange glint in Fernos's eye.
"Do you know that you cannot win against me, grandfather?" Delmar asked. Fernos laughed.
"Anyone with a little luck can win," Fernos said boldly, and he raised his arm up.
"Wait," Ajalia said sharply. Fernos paused, and looked at her.
"Yes, girl child?" Fernos asked, his lips trembling in anticipation. The cloud of white hair that floated about the old king's head was like a piece of summer sky. Ajalia wanted the old man to be kindly, and benign, but, she told herself, he had been alone in the palace for a long time, and his mind had probably gone.
"Do you know that you are nibbling on people?" Ajalia asked. She was sure that Thorn and Lerond, as evil as they had been, had not been consuming white brands. They had planted energy in Fallor, she thought, because they saw that he was the favorite son, and they meant to disable and control him. Fallor had been missing a brand in the way that Daniel had lacked a brand, but Elan's white brand had been partially eaten away, and she was convinced that Thorn and Lerond had not been eaters of white brands.
She hoped that the king would reveal himself now as an eater of people's brands. She was not sure yet that the king was eating the brands of his subjects, but she knew that somewhere in the palace was a person who did so, and she had not yet grown suspicious of anyone else that she had met. Perhaps, she told herself, without feeling much hope, the priests in the dungeons eat the white brands of the people from a distance.
Fernos was regarding Ajalia closely. The king let out a bark of laughter.
"I do not know if it is possible," Fernos said in a cold, hard voice, "to consume the white brand without knowing what you are doing. The slave woman accuses me of witchcraft!" the king cried to the guards. The king flung his hands up into the air as he spoke, and Ajalia, who was watching the old king closely, saw a glimmer of black under each of his ribs.
"Delmar, hold his arms up," Ajalia murmured to Delmar, who blinked, and then extended invisible cords of power towards the king. "And block his mouth for a moment," she added. Delmar nodded, and Ajalia turned towards the guards.
The guards were all staring at her, their weapons ready in their hands. Ajalia was sure that they were almost ready to charge at her and Delmar, and that they were waiting for the command of the king. Her accusation of witchcraft had made the guards' eyes darken. There were about fifteen guards in the room, all armed with spears, and their faces were not pleasant faces. Ajalia thought that one of the king's sons, probably Elan, had gathered the guards, and brought them here for his father. She asked herself if Fernos had ever meant to reach the dungeons at all, or if he had planned on Ajalia becoming suspicious, and going back up the stairs. The cunning of the old king, if he had thought out this far, and had a standing order with Elan to enact such a scheme, made Ajalia's head ache.
"What are your orders?" Ajalia asked the nearest guard. This guard glanced uneasily at his fellows, and then frowned, and turned back to Ajalia.
&nb
sp; "No," the guard said.
"What are you orders?" Ajalia asked again in a friendly voice. "Are you to kill me?"
"Don't speak to her," another guard told the one whom she had addressed. The guard nodded in agreement, and closed his hands more tightly around the shaft of his spear.
"Why won't the king talk?" another guard shouted. "What have you done to the king?"
The guards, who had all been staring in readiness at Ajalia and Delmar, now looked behind them, at the old king, whose eyes were wide. The old king's lips were parted, and his wrists and ankles were bound in the air.
"Talk to them," Delmar told Ajalia.
"No," Ajalia said. "Wait."
"Why?" Delmar asked urgently.
"Wait and see," Ajalia said softly. One of the guards came close to the old king, and Ajalia sent a tendril of her own red light out towards Fernos. She wound the red light around the king's ribs, and drew out the black patch of ugly power she had seen there. Ajalia got a whole string of black pulled out; it was like the cords of darkness that the witches had used, but a little thinner, and it spread out from under the old king's armpit, instead of out of the center of his chest. "Look at this, Delmar," Ajalia said. Delmar was still facing all of the guards, his whole body crouched a little. Delmar turned, and let out a shout of horror and dismay.
"Where did you find that?" Delmar demanded.
"Look," Ajalia said, and she sent a second tendril of light, and drew out the opposite patch of darkness from within Fernos. Delmar watched with fascinated disgust. "He's been eating his children, and the guards, and anyone else with a brand," Ajalia told Delmar. "I don't think he's killing people, or collecting souls, like the witches do."
"He's eating the white brands," Delmar said, his voice vibrating with anger. Ajalia nodded. She looked around at the guards, who were all watching them with expressions that were full of fear and doubt.
"Can you show them this?" Ajalia asked Delmar.
"I don't know if they will believe he is a witch," Delmar murmured softly. Ajalia could not quite believe that none of the guards were saying anything, or doing anything for so long. She looked closely at the guard who had walked up to Fernos, and saw that his eyes were glassy.
"Delmar!" Ajalia shouted, and she flung up a wall of deep magic from the earth, just as Fernos broke free of the restraints that Delmar had put around his ankles and wrists. Fernos spat violently to the side, and his eyes, as he approached Ajalia, were mad with anger and delight.
"I have to say," Fernos told her, coming slowly nearer, the two long threads of blackness wiggling out of his ribs like living tentacles, "this is the most excitement I have had for many, many years. I look forward to having you around, slave girl."
Ajalia drew down a handful of star lights, and smashed them into the deep earth magic she had put between herself and Fernos. Fernos, it seemed, could no longer see the colors of the magic, but he heard the crackle that the mixed magic made, when it swirled into the beautiful ocean-blue tone. Fernos let out a hiss, and Ajalia saw him concentrating. She thought that it looked as though the old king was trying to draw his black threads back inside his ribs. The old king let out a gasp; the black reaching tentacles would not retract.
"Ah!" Fernos said. He put a hand to his side. "I am getting old," Delmar's grandfather laughed. "Will you do that magic on me again," Fernos asked Ajalia, "so that I can see this wonderful magic that you are doing?"
"No," Ajalia said. Her voice was terse; she was afraid of Fernos. When she looked to the side, she saw with horror that Delmar had gone a little slack-eyed as well. A crest of rage rose up in Ajalia; she had been interested, and she had felt danger, but she had not, until now, been angry. "You get your filthy insides away from my Delmar," Ajalia growled, and she sent a shower of sparks from the blue magic wall at Fernos, who yelped in pain and fear, and leapt backwards. Delmar let out a gasp, and his whole body jolted.
"The king is trying to possess you with invisible magic," Ajalia told Delmar. "Protect yourself, quickly." Delmar looked at her, his eyes jittery, and nodded. The old king, who had fallen down when he jumped back from Ajalia's magic, got to his feet, and laughed.
"You cannot win against such an old and cunning man as myself," the old king said, spreading his hands wide.
"Star lights," Ajalia muttered at Delmar, "and the brightest gold inside the earth. Mix them." Delmar nodded again, looking shaken, and after a moment, Ajalia heard Fernos give out another shout of anger.
"Stop fighting back!" Fernos snapped. "You are supposed to defer to my authority. I am your king, and your grandfather. Not yours," Fernos added to Ajalia with a smile, "but you will soon be mine, and then you will owe me fealty as well." Ajalia, who suspected the old man of seeking to distract her while working some dark magic on the roomful of guards, had begun to wind the hot, red-gold magic from deep under the earth into the legs and thighs of all the assembled guards. She knew now that Fernos could not see the colored magic any longer. He seemed to be blind to the colored lights, as the witches had been. Ajalia thought that this blindness came from the dark cords that protruded, like hideous second limbs, from just under Fernos's arms. The witches, she told herself, had cut themselves off from the colored light by embracing and using the darkness, and Fernos, who had been able to see the light earlier, when Ajalia had reconnected him to the ground and sky, had cut himself off again by drawing the blackness into his body, and sending it out towards other bodies.
Fernos was watching Ajalia, and he seemed to think that she was frozen in fear. Ajalia, while she worked on the bodies of the guards, kept her eyes fixed steadily on Fernos; she knew that he did not suspect her of doing magic yet, aside from the blue wall that he could not see.
"I am more powerful than your Delmar will ever be," Fernos told Ajalia. "You should choose me. I am wiser than the others you have met in our lands. They have all tried to marry you, haven't they?" the old king asked with a laugh. "They do not understand you as well as I can. I can give you everything you desire. Everything, and nothing more." The old king was blazing with heat now; the tendrils of darkness were thickening, and growing. Ajalia stared at the tendrils, and followed their path through the old king's body. They extended from his ribs, and then stretched into the old king's heart.
Ajalia stared at Fernos's chest, and tried to see where the black cords came from in the first place. Ajalia was sure that there had been no blackness in Fernos earlier, when she had looked into his spirit. She was sure the blackness had not been there before, which meant, she thought, that Fernos was used to putting the black cords away, and only taking them into his body when they served his purpose. She thought of the two black serpents that she had destroyed, and she wondered if the black cords came originally from them. If this was so, Ajalia thought, Fernos would be reaching down and looking for some part of the black worms. If the black cords came from the serpents, she thought, then the black dragons would have left pieces of their ugly skins seeded throughout the earth. She thought that she would be able to see the source of the darkness that Fernos was pulling into his body, and sending out from under his ribs.
Fernos was watching Ajalia with hungry eyes. The old king did not seem to count Delmar as a threat, and Ajalia could feel Delmar coating himself with the strong blue magic beside her. She studied Fernos, and began to reach for the lights from the stars high above, and she was surprised to find that Delmar had already begun to gather long cords of silver, and to wind them through the guards that she had filled with red-gold from the earth. Delmar reached out his hand, and grasped Ajalia hard by the wrist. She breathed, and Fernos laughed.
"You are playing some little game of magic, aren't you?" Fernos asked, and his voice was warm and coaxing, like the voice of a kindly father. "I do not mind," Fernos told Ajalia. "You try all of your tricks, and I will wait. You cannot beat me, and your little friend can do nothing to harm me. Can you, Delmar?" Fernos asked in a mocking voice.
"Delmar is the Thief Lord," Ajalia said, "and he
is the falcon who rises from death. And you have been eating your guards." A long crackle filled up the room. Just as the king looked around curiously at the noise the blue magic made as it burned in the centers of the guards, Ajalia drew her knife, and dipped it into the blue wall she had built between herself and Delmar and the king. She stepped through the crackling blue wall of power, and felt the now-familiar shimmer over her skin. The king was watching her now, and his lips were hungry.
"Yes, young one, come closer to me," Fernos said, and Ajalia knew that he was thinking of eating the white gleam that shone brightly over her heart. Delmar watched her as she went close to Fernos, and sliced at both of the black tendrils with her blue-coated knife, one at a time. Fernos was watching the knife; he did not seem, to Ajalia's surprise, to notice the hideous cords fall away, leaving stumps behind. Delmar stepped closer to Ajalia, and Fernos laughed. "You missed me, girl child," Fernos told Ajalia. He reached out a hand, and gripped her hard by the wrist. Ajalia snarled, and twisted her arm free.
Delmar leapt forward, and hit up against an invisible wall of power. Delmar howled, and Fernos, who was beginning to look rabid with desire, put out both of his old and claw-like hands, and grabbed Ajalia by the shoulders.
"I will eat you, and then I will keep you for myself," Fernos breathed in her face. Ajalia did not want to kill Fernos. She wanted to know where the black tendrils came from. She ignored the closeness of the old king, though snaking shivers of disgust and fear were trawling over her back, and she fixed her eyes on the stumps of black power that stretched down into Fernos's heart. Almost before Fernos's hissing words met the air, she heard Delmar give a shout, and he broke through the invisible wall, and ripped Fernos away from Ajalia.
"Are you all right?" Delmar demanded. Ajalia lifted a hand to Delmar, her eyes still focused sharply on the black gleam of darkness in the old king's heart. A rabble of noise came up in the room; the guards, their bodies connected to the earth and sky lights, could move again, and Ajalia heard them shouting, and pointing excitedly at the blue wall of magic, and the shimmering sparks that went over the whole room around them. The guard who had been nearest the king went to help the king stand up. The guards had not been themselves when Delmar had thrown Fernos away from Ajalia, and this guard now went to pick up the king, as though he thought Fernos had fallen down. The guard bent down, and then saw the stumps of ugly black that extended from under the old king's ribs. The guard yelled, and stumbled back sharply.