Kale. Kale, hear me! Delilah heard stories of twins who shared an almost psychic mental connection. Reaching out to her brother in her mind was an act of desperation, and Delilah was grateful no one could see her blush in embarrassment. Often she empathized with her brother, and sometimes they finished each other's sentences when their minds were on the same track, but she never thought they had a psychic connection.
At any rate, she didn't hear back from Kale. The muscles in her arms and shoulders trembled from fatigue. Delilah felt as if her arms would pop out of their sockets. Knives of fire sliced the muscles in her shoulder, and she felt her tears soaking into the sackcloth around her neck.
The door opened. She heard a group of people approaching, as well as one pair of what sounded like hooves on stone. She lifted her head in hope. Pancras?
"As you can see, we have one of your draks." The voice belonged to Princess Valene. "I know you are plotting something with my husband, Pancras. I also know threatening your life will have no effect. So, I offer you this: the truth for the life of this drak. Tell me what you're plotting, or I will kill Delilah."
* * *
It pained Pancras to see Delilah hanging from the wall in shackles. A guard stood near the drak, his spear pointed at her chest. Princess Valene crossed her arms and awaited his response, Lady Milena by her side.
Pancras licked his lips. Reaching up, he rubbed his right horn, prompting the guards around him to raise their spears. Lady Milena gestured for them to stand down. "First, I will have you know I hold you in the highest regard, and it was never my intention to bring harm to you. I would like to know if you have mistreated my friend in any way before I answer."
"Fair enough. I will show you, because I like you." Princess Valene gestured to the guard nearest Delilah. He pulled the sack off the drak's head. Delilah blinked her eyes. Dark lines stained her cheeks where tears had fallen, but she looked otherwise uninjured. Straps wrapped around her mouth muzzled her. A wise precaution.
Delilah's eyes followed him as he paced the room, as did the spears of the guards. "You may not want everyone to know what I am about to tell you, Highness. If you doubt the loyalty of anyone in this room, you may wish to send them away."
Princess Valene considered Pancras's words. Her eyes flicked to Lady Milena and then to Pancras. "Very well. Guards, leave us. Lady Milena will protect me." The guards hesitated until Lady Milena nodded her assent.
Pancras waited until the guards were gone and Lady Milena closed and locked the door behind them. He approached Delilah and laid his hand on her cheek. Her eyes pleaded with him. It didn't matter to him if she wanted him to stay silent and sacrifice her or tell the truth to relieve her suffering. He couldn't bear to contribute to her pain.
"Your husband's deal with me was this: my freedom, and that of the draks, in exchange for a hex to render you barren." He sighed, letting his hand slip away from Delilah's cheek. He turned to face the princess, to look her in the eye. "I have been stalling for a few weeks now, trying to develop a way to make it look like that's what I was doing but without bringing any actual harm to you."
"Indeed?" Princess Valene clasped her hands behind her back. Her emerald eyes flashed in the dim light as she looked up at Pancras. "I am to believe this?"
"You asked for the truth. He seeks legitimate grounds for divorce, grounds that will enable him to remain in power and seek a new wife, one who is more… open to his advances."
Lady Milena jerked her head up, looking over at the princess. "Do you think—"
"Silence!" Princess Valene paced, her lips moving in silent thought. "A mistress, were she made public, would cause him to forfeit his wealth." She stopped and eyed Pancras. "What is your plan?"
Pancras shuffled his hooves and looked down at the ground. "I don't have one yet."
"We need to force him to show his hand, to reveal his plot. No one will believe the testimony of one minotaur, and an outsider at that." Lady Milena stepped alongside Princess Valene and took her hands. The princess pulled them away from Milena and shook her head.
"I could confront him, in front of the court." Pancras didn't like the thought of sticking his neck out, but he didn't see any other options at the moment. "He'd likely order my death right then and there. I want protection."
"Some of the Royal Guards are more loyal to me than to him."
Lady Milena nodded. "I could ensure all who served that day were loyal to you."
Pancras glanced at Delilah. "Do you suppose you could release Delilah? I will cooperate with you fully. I swear on my life I will."
Princess Valene resumed her pacing. "Very well. Milena, help him."
Lady Milena and Pancras worked at freeing Delilah from her restraints. She whimpered as Pancras moved her arms to free them from the wall.
"His reaction would be key. He is not a man of even temperament, and it is unlikely he could control his reaction to an extent that would conceal his true mind."
Pancras knelt down and removed Delilah's muzzle. She threw her arms around his neck and hugged him. She whispered, her voice hoarse and ragged, and Pancras was unable understand what she said. "I've found it impossible to rely on what you think someone's reaction will be."
"I could tell my guards to watch him closely. See if he has already chosen a mistress to replace you, Highness." Lady Milena untied the restraints securing Delilah's feet.
"I doubt he'd be foolish enough to keep her in the palace. If he leaves, however, it would be best if you would attempt to put a loyal man on his retinue of guards."
Taking Delilah's hand in his, Pancras looked into her eyes. "I am so sorry this happened. I tried to keep you and your brother uninvolved. You weren't supposed to get hurt."
"It was nothing personal… Delilah, was it?”
The drak sorceress narrowed her eyes and bared her teeth at the Princess. Pancras squeezed her shoulder.
Princess Valene paid no heed to Delilah’s response. “I needed the truth from Pancras. If you need a healer, one can be arranged." Princess Valene pulled Lady Milena aside. "Pancras is not to leave the palace until we have arrived at a solution."
"What?" He stood up and turned to face the princess. "I may need additional supplies to continue the ruse."
"Send your draks to retrieve them. I have a feeling keeping them confined to the palace is more trouble than it's worth."
"What—" Delilah's voice was a croak. "What about Dusan and Mirek?"
Princess Valene cocked her head and then glanced over at Lady Milena.
"The two guards I assigned to escort the draks into town."
The princess nodded her understanding. "They won't be needed. I do not believe the draks will abandon Pancras here." She looked at everyone in the room. "I needn’t say this, but I will anyway: speak of this to no one. Lady Milena will be our liaison. I have the utmost faith in her."
Lady Milena saluted and bowed as Princess Valene left the room. She escorted Pancras and Delilah out of the dungeon and back up to their living quarters. Delilah tugged at Pancras's sleeve to get his attention before they opened the doors.
"My grimoire. I think it was left behind in the sitting room where the guards captured me."
"Which one? I can retrieve it for you." Lady Milena dropped to one knee so she was eye-level with Delilah.
"I'd prefer to get it myself."
Pancras understood Delilah’s trepidation in allowing someone else to retrieve the grimoire for her. Handling powerful books of magic could be dangerous for the lay person, and there was no guarantee Milena would recognize it for what it was.
"Very well. I insist on escorting you. Most of the guards are probably aware you were taken to the dungeons. Not all will yet be aware that you have been released. It's safer if I'm with you."
Delilah hesitated, glancing up at Pancras before exiting. Lady Milena stood and followed her. Pancras straightened and smoothed his robes before entering the parlor. Kale, Edric, and Kali sat in a circle in the center of the large rug playi
ng a dice game. Kale looked up as Pancras entered.
"Is everything all right? Where's Deli?"
Pancras jerked his thumb toward the door. "Everything's fine. We just had a minor emergency. Delilah had to leave her grimoire behind, so she's retrieving it. She'll be along shortly." To Pancras's relief, Kale accepted the explanation and didn't inquire further.
By the time Delilah returned with her grimoire, dinner arrived, and they ate while listening to Kali and Edric one-upping each other with the outlandishness of their stories. After dinner, Pancras elected to retire early. He shut his bedroom door behind him and sorted through all the materials he acquired to create the cursed fetish for Prince Gavril. It occurred to him that he might be able to create some sort of protective fetish instead, in case things went wrong when they confronted the prince about his plot.
Pancras was familiar with the abjurations required to create such protective objects, and they were often taught alongside necromancy to protect wizards from the various evil forces they sought to control. The undead Pancras created were always mindless, and so less dangerous that intelligent undead, but he still lost control on occasion, particularly in his youth.
After a thorough examination of his supplies, he picked up a quill, ink, and paper. The equipment was sufficient, but he would need different materials and reagents. He smiled to himself as he wrote a list for Kale and Delilah, confident the situation would improve now that he had the support of the princess.
* * *
Over the next several days, the weather continued to remain pleasant, though cold. More streets were sufficiently cleared of snow as to be passable, and Kale and Delilah reveled in their newfound freedom to come and go from the palace as they pleased.
They split Pancras's list between them. Delilah and Edric searched the marketplace for the esoteric reagents and materials, while Kale and Kali searched for the more common items. Most of the humans and minotaurs they encountered stared at Kale's wings. Their stares made his scales crawl. Despite the discomfort they caused him while they grew and that they made it more difficult for him to find comfortable sitting and sleeping positions, he liked his wings. In Drak-Anor, he never felt he stood out enough. He was always "Delilah's brother." He decided everyone else was jealous of his wings, and he was quite satisfied he now featured a unique attribute.
They met for lunch at one of the taverns near the marketplace, relishing the variety of meat-filled pastries served there. After lunch, Delilah wanted to return to the palace. "I'll take all this stuff back to Pancras. Keep out of trouble, and come back at dusk. I don't want to have to come looking for you."
Kale dismissed her concerns with a snort. He and Kali made no plans to do anything dangerous, and they all agreed to keep Edric out of gambling dens. "Yeah, yeah, we won't be much longer. I just have one more errand to run for Pancras, and then we'll be back."
The minotaur had given Kale the old tips he used to wear on his horns. He needed them melted down and remade. The process of melting them would release the magical energy that bound them to Pancras, and the gold would be safe to make into ornamental tips. Kale wasn't sure he liked the idea of releasing magical energy, but both Delilah and Pancras assured him it would be perfectly safe. Still, they counseled him not to mention anything about wizardry to the jeweler and to commission new ones if he had to, using the old ones as trade if they couldn’t be reused.
"I need the best jeweler in town, Kali." Kale patted his pouch to make sure the gold horn tips were still within it.
"That would be Icos the Elder in the Foundry District. They say he can see a fly's footprint on a rock and has the steadiest hands in Etrunia. I know the way."
"I'll bet he can't hold a candle to a dwarven jeweler." Edric tossed a silver talon to a vendor selling ale and grabbed two bottles out of the snowbank.
"Well, I don't know any dwarves making jewelry in Almeria, so old Icos will have to do." Kali led the way as they exited the marketplace and made their way through the snow-covered streets toward the Foundry District.
His wide-brimmed hat adequately shielded his eyes from the sunlight above, but he squinted to minimize the light, reflected from the snow, from blinding his eyes. The sun felt warm on Kale's wings, despite the cold winter air. He spread them as they walked to increase the surface area upon which the sunlight fell. Whatever changes the chaos rift caused in him seemed to be permanent, and he found he enjoyed feeling warm all the time. He pitied all the people who required heavy cloaks and coats in order to function at even a basic level in the severe weather. By the way they all complained about it, even bundled up, they never felt warm.
Kali took them down a familiar road. He saw the signs for The Sleeping Viper and The Assassin's Dagger ahead. She turned down an alley across the street from the tavern. The snow stood as high as their hips, but the extra heat from Kale's body melted it faster around him, leaving a path wherever he stepped. He pushed ahead of Kali and Edric, melting a path for them to follow.
Icos the Elder's shop protruded from the side of a dwelling seemingly as if the builders changed their mind halfway through construction. The tower climbed to the second floor of the structure and featured its own door separate from that of the residence. The conical roof covered a row of tall windows that composed most of the second floor wall.
A bell jingled as the group entered. A grey-furred minotaur sat in a chair near the entrance, one leg crossed over the other, as he chewed on the end of a long-stemmed pipe. His horns curved upward and out, reaching half-again his head's total height. His ears flicked toward the newcomers, and he raised one eyebrow as he regarded them.
"Are you Icos?" Kale pulled the horn tips out of his pouch.
"The Elder." The minotaur's smooth baritone voice sounded like it belonged to a much younger minotaur.
"I have some jewelry that needs to be remade."
The minotaur removed his pipe from his mouth and stood. He held out his hand, casting an eye toward Edric. "Mind you don't touch anything, Dwarf. Most of these creations are works-in-progress for paying customers."
Kali pulled Edric away from the jeweler's workbench. Kale dropped the horn tips into Icos's open palm. The minotaur weighed them in his hand and grunted. He stepped to the workbench, his hooves clopping on the wooden floor. He tossed the pipe onto the bench and held one of the horn tips up and peered into it.
"Where'd you get these, huh? I can feel the magic in them."
Kale wasn't sure how to respond. Pancras didn't say anything about the possibility someone might realize they were of arcane origin. "My friend's a minotaur wizard. He doesn't need those anymore but wants another pair that's similar and just ornamental. You know, to put over the tips of his horns."
"Hm. Vain fellow." He blew into the horn tip and then tapped it against his own horn. "What does he want, exactly?"
"Something fancier, I think. But no dangly bits." Kale really wasn't sure. Pancras only told him to get them melted down and recreated. Kale assumed Pancras still wanted to appear well-dressed, even if he no longer used them as his arcane focus.
"I can do some embellishments. Maybe some rose gold in a knot pattern or a rope pattern. Give me a week. Pay half now."
Kale nodded and reached into his pouch. Pancras had given him some gemstones to use and hoped that a jeweler would accept them as payment. He felt around and pulled out a rough, translucent forest-green gem. "Will you take this in trade?"
"Hm? Give me that." He took the rough gem from Kale. "Do you know what this is?" He hefted the fist-sized rock in his hand and then measured it in with equipment on his workbench.
"Not really. Emerald, maybe?"
"No. Looks like a kind of garnet. This is worth far more than the work I'm going to do."
"Oh, well," Kale dug in his pouch. He found a handful of crowns and twice as many talons, but nothing in between. "I don't have enough crowns, probably. I can bring something else later. I have more, just not with me."
Icos put the stone on his workbe
nch. "I'll hang onto this as deposit. Bring me three hundred crowns, or the equivalent, when you pick this up and I'll give you the new tips and this one back."
Kale noticed Kali gesturing to him, but he ignored her. "Fine. I'll be back in a week."
Holding up his hand, Icos spread his fingers. "Five days is fine."
Later, after they left the shop, Kali grabbed Kale's arm. "Are you insane? That rock was probably thousands of crowns! You'll never see it again!"
"That's what Pancras gave me to pay with." Kale shrugged. “Icos will give it back when I come back with real money.” His expertise was in locksmithing and trap-building, not the value of gemstones and jewelry. "Let's get back. I'm getting hungry."
* * *
Delilah, pleased they were able to acquire everything Pancras needed in one trip, hummed to herself as she returned to the palace. Kale, Kali, and Edric could spend their remaining time in town throwing dice or visiting all the taverns in Almeria for all she cared as long as she could resume her study of the grimoire. The business with the salt mine and Pancras's plotting with the prince or the princess were all distractions.
She felt that she was on the verge of discovering the trick behind silent casting, if only she could study the grimoire uninterrupted. The book revealed its images to her swiftly now, and she was able to lose herself in it after concentrating on a page for only a minute or two.
The images of the battle returned. Gil-Li's eyes glowed red. She drew a dagger over her palm and made a fist, squeezing blood through her fingers. Her enemies exploded in clouds of blood and gore. She raised her arms in triumph as fire and lighting raged around her. The image shifted.
A crowd of humans and draks cheered as Gil-Li rode a horse down the street. A rock flew from the crowd and struck the drak in the head. She reached up to touch the wound, and when she looked at her fingers, they glistened with blood. She pointed at the crowd, in the direction from which the rock came and a ray of fire burned through the crowd, seeking her tormentor. The man who threw the rock tried to flee, but Gil-Li burned his legs with fire. When he fell to the ground, screaming in agony, she struck him again and again and again with lighting, electrocuting him until nothing but a charred corpse remained. The cheers of the crowd changed to screams of outrage and fear. Gil-Li destroyed them all, calling down fire and lightning from the sky until nothing remained alive.
Malediction (Scars of the Sundering Book 1) Page 30