by T. A. Miles
“If you can walk,” Ersana said implacably, her eyebrows lifted slightly while she set aside the bowl and dried her hands on her skirt.
“I’ll manage it,” Merran assured her.
Dacia returned while he was maneuvering to his feet. She seemed surprised to see him doing so and stared a moment before her mother chided her by prompting for what she had. The girl recalled herself and passed the item to Ersana.
Still knelt on the floor, the witch took Merran’s arm with one hand and with the other coiled a thin rope around his wrist in such a way that the crystal threaded through it rested on his wrapped hand. She slid her own hand over it and closed her eyes, whispering a few words. When she removed her hand, the crystal glowed faintly and she looked up at him.
“Keep it on,” she instructed. “Gods allowing, it will lessen the injury enough that one of your own—or time—might repair it.”
Merran nodded and on his way out of the room, he managed to say, “Thank you.”
Vaelyx felt a peculiar absence in him. It was impossible to describe beyond the sensation that something once there had simply vanished. He believed that bits of himself had been dying off for years, lost to madness, impotence, age...
Maybe Serawe had been feeding off his soul all along. Now that she was gone—wherever she’d gone to—the numbness of her incessant embrace left him awake and alert to what remained. And what remained was greatly diminished from the man Vaelyx once had been. I’ve been falling apart since you died, brother.
A rueful smile drew to his lips while he packed powdered ore materials into casings. When lives went wrong...how they went. Thankfully, Irslan was Dahn’s son. He had his uncle’s knack for floundering into obsession, but his father’s sense enough to see it before it became an illness. He had his mother’s generous nature as well. His ability to think about others would keep him from losing himself to himself.
Vaelyx comforted himself with those thoughts, glancing to Vlas as the old youth passed. He was a good man at the core of his unusual being. It made sense that Imris took to his side with such alacrity.
The priest crouched down beside the constable and together they worked out the wicks for the tools they were putting together; the tools that were going to bring this level of hell down on itself. With them in it, he reminded himself, and his subconscious replayed a portion of the dream he and Dacia had shared. The well came down, yes, with sheets of rock obscuring his view of the blond priest. He’d quickly lost sight of him altogether. Vaelyx realized now that they would all three be buried in this place. Priests had their ways, yes, but he imagined the suddenness and sheer force of what was to come would overpower him. Maybe he was wrong.
The sounds of unhappy men who were barely that anymore drew his attention to the darkness beyond the well entrance.
“The ghouls must have found their way around the fire,” Vlas said, expressing Vaelyx’s thoughts. “Vaelyx and Imris, if you could locate these at the mouth...”
Vaelyx finished with the one he was working on and gathered up the handful of others on the floor beside him. Imris was already on her feet with her own batch and making her way the few paces it was to the mouth. He followed along and moved off to the side opposite the constable to make a mound.
Vlas came along and placed one with a wick on top of the pile. He looked to Imris, who stood beside her own small heap of potential disaster, also armed with a torch. They communicated readiness to each other and lowered the flames to the wicks. When the fire took hold, Vaelyx was already backing off. The priest and constable followed, and the three of them retreated to the well.
“Quickly,” Vlas urged, sensing the doom those small containers could release perhaps.
Imris was quick. The priest only had to usher her past him. In Vaelyx’s case, he literally slowed to a near stop and waited for him, then reached out to bring him forward. Vaelyx had never felt more like a tired old man.
The stark, felt eruption of elements was a recurrence of what had dropped them into the caves to begin with. Only here, it was worse. The sound blared through the well, shaking the air itself. Vlas shoved Vaelyx ahead of him and then turned, hands in motion. His hasty, patterned movement seemed slow and almost elegant against the chaotic flare of fire and rock, and blood. A wall of it rushed at them, and was stopped by a wall of magic. The reality of the violence was still enough to cause the priest to flinch, even behind the protection he’d manifested. It was enough to drop Vaelyx to his knees.
The blast from the mouth was herald to the collapse. The ceiling was coming down, and there was no magic that was going to hold it up.
Vlas turned toward Vaelyx and Imris, calling out to them. Imris was already in motion and Vlas reached his hand out to her, continuing to shout to Vaelyx, who found himself either unable or unwilling to move.
Take care of my daughter. Whomever the thought was for, he was out of time to form another.
The look on Vaelyx’s face, like a man who had too many regrets in a single moment to comprehend, was stuck in Vlas’ mind to the point of sure disaster if he didn’t evict it. He gave himself to instinct, which had him pull Imris into his space as closely as he could. Both arms wrapped around her and he articulated what may have been a last command to the strength left in him with his hands at Imris’ back. Her face was tucked against his chest and as the Reach portal was forming, looking eerily unstable in the shower of debris around them, he placed a hand on the back of her head to keep her as close and protected as possible.
Dislodged boulders pounded the floor directly beside them. Scattered shards scraped across his back and legs. The Reach portal slipped around them, as if pulling heavy drapes across an ugly view. The drapes were in warm colors, accompanied by the sound of the sea.
He’d cast the Reach thinking of the first place that leaped to mind...the pier, where he and Imris placed their trust in Vaelyx. Vlas hadn’t realized then that the man had wanted someone to help him reconcile his past. Had he known, he may not have gone along and, smart enough to realize that, Vaelyx had kept the entirety of his motivation to himself.
Imris stirred within his arms and he relaxed his hold to let her move away. She didn’t, except to turn her head toward the island that a heavy morning mist shrouded from their view. He let her stay in his shelter for the moment and eventually allowed himself to consider that he may have been lingering in her shelter as well.
The sounds of activity around them carried them out of the moment. They parted gradually and looked down the length of the docks.
There were men in numbered, uniformed groups moving with purpose amid the ships. Vlas and Imris looked to one another, a puzzled expression preceded his taking another step back from her and tagging her arm lightly as he turned to venture into the crowd. Imris followed at his elbow for the most part, though there were instances that the number of bodies in motion caused them to separate for a space.
“Any idea what may be going on?” Vlas asked her at one point.
Imris frowned. “No. We’ll find out.”
Vlas accepted that, noticing in the rising sunlight that the constable had dust and drying blood in places on her clothes. She looked as if she’d been in a fight and the first person they came to whom she appeared to recognize noticed that immediately.
“What’s happened to you?” The man asked, casting a cursory glance at Vlas in the process of assessing any damage that may have come to his colleague.
“We were ambushed,” she began to explain and that seemed to set a few of the men in earshot off. They exchanged looks with one another, along with a few words and were gone.
Imris looked at Vlas, then looked at him again when she seemed to finally notice that his clothing hadn’t fared as poorly as hers, thanks to magic that wasn’t necessary to explain at the moment.
“What’s going on?” Vlas asked Imris’ colleague.
“We’re readyin
g the city’s defenses,” he answered without delay. To Imris, he said, “You’d better check in with Rahl.”
Imris nodded and assured that she would.
Vlas found himself happily surprised by the man’s answer, though it was quickly tempered by the seriousness of the situation. If Indhovan was preparing the city’s defenses, then an attack was pending. How far off? From which direction? How many forces?
Where was Cayri?
“I have to return to Irslan’s,” Vlas said while they moved away from the docks.
“I have to learn my station for the defense,” Imris answered.
Those two statements held for several steps. And then it came time for their paths to separate. Imris reached her hand out to him without looking at him as she veered in her direction and in response Vlas did the same. Their hands connected wordlessly and without interrupting their steps, and separated as unceremoniously.
Vlas didn’t know what the gesture meant for either of them in the moment and he didn’t analyze. They each had duties to fulfill.
Merran was tired and hurt most places where feeling remained to him. It had been a long while since he’d felt quite so spent.
The crone had been more than he anticipated finding in those caves, though he knew there would be something of significant importance there. Distressingly, the greater concern lay still beyond the city and he could not work at the pace he would have liked to. The very light of a new day seemed an obstacle, a golden-red glow intent on being in his line of vision and that made the air heavy as it heated the moisture in it, like a pot boiling slowly.
Beside him, Dacia performed the task set on her by her mother; to ensure that he did not fall to his exhaustion and injury in the streets. The girl’s obedience was automatic, not mindless but oddly void of consideration, as if she would drift through her life guided by whim alone if not for the direction she received very deliberately. Already what dismay she had felt in the caves appeared to have dissipated.
He let her be and the walk to Irslan’s was both silent and taxing. Dacia seemed to recognize the house when they arrived at it, and moved off ahead of Merran to announce their arrival at the door. The stairs presented themselves to Merran and he found their very existence further antagonism to his condition.
He wasn’t certain how long he considered them by the time the voices of Dacia and Irslan filtered down to him. It didn’t seem to matter; the stairs threw themselves at him before he’d made sense of the words.
Twenty-Seven
The last person Irslan would have expected to find at his doorstep, collapsed from exhaustion and injury, was a priest. It was sobering to see that they damaged, he supposed. Sobering, not disappointing nor in any way satisfying. They were people also and while he’d carried forward a child’s inclination to make them heroes above human in some ways he couldn’t say that even in his most downtrodden state over the war that he had ever had the urge to prove them anything less.
With Dacia’s help, he’d managed to get Merran situated on a divan in the parlor. It was near the window, but not directly beneath it, so he should have the benefits of some sunlight, but not turn a sweat over its warmth. Irslan couldn’t say the same for himself; the priest was not a small man and much heavier than one might have expected to look at him, concealed in that coat of his. Irslan had removed the garment with some effort and had considered undressing the wrapping around his hand as well—it appeared a rude attempt in its simplicity, but Dacia had impressed upon him that it should stay. Her purist mother had set a casting of some sort on it and Irslan was not in a state to argue too strongly, since he knew very little of either magic or healing beyond a basic understanding.
He considered that Konlan might have been able to address the matter with some skill. There was a bitterness in his mouth over that thought, whether it was spoken or not. He felt deeply betrayed and more than a little helpless. He had no idea where Konlan had gone or why. Perhaps Konlan felt that his scheme was coming unraveled.
Irslan had spent the remaining hours of darkness reading until his eyes ached and he eventually collapsed onto an open book. Doubtless, he would have to go over much of it again with a better, more wakeful focus, but what he had uncovered in his uncle’s works spoke of dangers he never realized existed. Men and women serving a demon…sacrificing people to it, in order to create a literal reserve of foul energy for it, and for another enemy as well.
That was what his uncle had uncovered—in the midst of intense obsession over what he was uncovering, but the level of his interest did not alter his discoveries. He had drawn images. He had drawn diagrams used in rituals and spells by the cultists, some of which too strongly resembled what he had found in Konlan’s study. To make it worse, the coven in their own city was up to something. Irslan hadn’t connected or uncovered everything himself yet. Truthfully, he didn’t know if he would be able to make sense of it, any more than his uncle had. But he knew who would.
Thinking about all that he had managed to uncover and retain, he could only shake his head. He continued to come back to the same detail. Another coven on the Islands...hosting demons. And he still did not know everything the priests had discovered here in the city. Enough to have spent at least one of them and hopefully not killed the others.
“Two mothers died,” Dacia said suddenly, from the chair she’d settled herself in.
“I’m sorry?” Irslan queried, drawing himself slowly to focus on her. His head was beginning to ache from a lack of proper rest, and from stress.
Dacia took her gaze from Merran and looked at Irslan. “They were as sisters. They’d grown to despise each other. It was their undoing. Ours, too.”
Irslan didn’t know if he should be more startled by her words, or the glib manner in which she divulged this information...or story. Some of it eerily aligned with passages he’d read the night before…penned by his uncle’s hand.
“What do you mean?” he asked the girl, and tried to maintain an air of conversation.
“Mother chides me for talking about my dreams,” she went on. “Especially with others, but I had such a strange one this time. It was of two sisters, who were also mothers of many. One of them was the Ancient Mother, the matriarch of our coven. The other had her own coven. They were supposed to join, but there was betrayal. I felt so angry over it, as if I’d had some part in all of it myself.”
“Really...” Irslan said, observing the girl with a little more scrutiny. He was considering the fact that a demon had at least once tried to claim her when she continued.
“Of course, I hadn’t, but it was very real in feeling. When I awoke, I was with my mother and Master Merran. The Ancient Mother had become a fantastic tree and she was bent on drowning all of us.”
Irslan allowed a space of silence, unsure what to make of her story, except to ask, “Are you sure that you had awakened for that last part?” Perhaps he wasn’t fully awake yet himself.
“Yes,” she said very plainly. “Master Merran can tell you.”
“I’ll be certain to ask him,” Irslan answered. He glanced to the dark priest by the window—still appearing asleep—then drew in a breath and said, “But...let me ask you, Dacia. Do you recall having seen Priest Korsten during all of this? The dream...and after you were awake?”
Dacia tipped her head to the side and studied the floor momentarily before looking at him again. “He went with the other mother.”
The girl’s gaze moved past Irslan a mere moment before someone else said, “He went with Serawe.” Looking over his shoulder, Irslan made eye contact with Priest Vlas, who stood wearily in the doorway, adding for clarification, “A demon.”
Irslan had needed clarifying, so he appreciated that. He believed he also needed a drink as well, but he refrained from getting one for the moment.
“Where is Cayri?” Vlas asked, but before an answer could be given, he looked to the divan and said,
“I see you’ve found Merran.”
“He came here, actually,” Irslan said. “Exhaustion overcame him when he arrived. Lady Cayri has gone to a meeting with the governor’s wife and not returned yet.”
Vlas nodded. Irritably, he said, “Vaelyx...” And then he stopped himself.
The pause made it very clear what he’d meant to blurt out. Irslan didn’t know what to say. He’d just spent more time with his uncle, reading through his writings, than he had in twenty years. It had rekindled a sense of reunion that he had hoped to fully realize. Now he wouldn’t.
“I’m sorry,” Vlas offered.
Irslan acknowledged him with a nod, then raised his hand to wave any further condolences or concerns away. This was not the time and even if it had been, he was not willing to go any deeper into the matter just yet.
The priest’s gaze moved to Dacia and sat there for an extended moment that Irslan could not translate. He didn’t bother trying when Merran stirred.
Vlas went immediately to the divan. “Thank the gods,” he said, followed by, “How do you feel?”
It was then that Vlas seemed to notice the other priest’s hand and there was a look of graveness in his features in that instant.
Merran didn’t answer his question. “There’s a wave coming,” he said.
Vlas took a moment to pry his concern from Merran’s hand. “A wave? What do you mean?”
“A wave is coming from the sea,” Merran answered, his blue eyes taking in the room, perhaps assessing his location and who all was present. “It was a Summoning, by a witch occupying the caves set into the cliff.”