Stone of Inheritance

by Melissa McShane

  “I agree,” Perrin said. There was no mug in front of him, just a glass of water. “I hope I can stay awake for my watch.”

  Across the room, Borris stood and waved at Sienne. She nodded back, making the room swim. Definitely too strong a drink for her. She watched Borris walk toward her, smiling, and doubts surfaced. Had he thought she was flirting? It had been friendly fun as far as she was concerned, but if he thought differently… maybe Alaric hadn’t been wrong to be disturbed, if it looked like more than it was.

  Borris staggered and caught himself on a table. It seemed the beer was too strong for more than her. He took another step, and his smile vanished. Closing his eyes, he collapsed, his knees bending, his shoulders relaxing, until he folded entirely. Sienne stood as he hit the floor and had to catch herself to avoid following him down. “Somebody help him!”

  Dianthe rose, then sank back into her seat. “I feel dizzy,” she said.

  “The beer was too strong.”

  Dianthe shook her head. “Not the beer,” she said. Her words slurred together. “In the food…drugged…”

  Alaric stood, gripping the table with both huge hands. “We have to get out of here,” he said. The rest of the men and women at the trader Marko’s table lay fallen over their bowls, one of them half on the floor where she’d slid off the bench. Sienne took Perrin’s elbow and tried to help him up. He looked up at her, closed his eyes, and slumped into his bowl. Kalanath’s staff lay on the floor where it had slipped from his limp hand.

  Sienne turned with some effort to see Alaric wobble and then fall to the floor, not even trying to catch himself. She tried to say his name, to say all their names, but her lips were numb and her jaw felt locked tight. Her knees wobbled, sending her flailing to the bench. She stayed upright solely because of her grip on the table’s edge. No one in the room was still upright but her. She called out for help, and to her relief saw a man come to the kitchen door. He stared at them all in horror, then disappeared again. Right. Not everyone in the inn would have eaten the stew. But why would the cook poison them?

  She realized her eyes were closed and tried to open them. Nothing happened. Everything was so difficult, including staying upright. She felt herself falling, hit her head on the table, and knocked the bowl still half-full of stew across the table to land on the floor beyond. The sound of wood hitting wood echoed hollowly in her ears, followed by the sound of someone gabbling incoherently—or maybe it was normal talk, and she was the one who couldn’t understand it.

  Someone took her under the arms and hauled her off the bench. Good, she thought, help is here, but staying awake was too much effort, and she fell unconscious just as a second person put his hands around her ankles and lifted her into the air.

  24

  Sienne drifted into consciousness to a ringing in her ears and the sound of someone clapping. Not the rapid patter of applause, but a slow, measured beat, three or four sharp claps every minute. Her arms were raised above her ears and ached horribly. The ringing subsided, and the clapping turned into the sound of water dripping on stone, echoing off unseen walls. She knelt on a cold, wet, rough surface that smelled of dirt. The smell, and the lingering nausea from the drug, made her want to throw up. She didn’t know how long she’d been there, but it was long enough that the wet had seeped into her trousers.

  She opened her eyes to dim, blurry light, the yellow-gold of a lantern burning somewhere to her right. The light illuminated a cavern, its pendulous ceiling twenty feet high in places, hollowed out not by man but by some long-lost underground river, based on how irregular its shape was. Its walls bulged and dripped with moisture, though the echoing drip was invisible, and they gleamed an unrelieved black that sparkled where the light struck them.

  Across the cavern, perhaps fifteen feet away, Dianthe slumped against the stone wall, unmoving, her arms stretched out above her head and chained to the wall. Kalanath leaned against the wall some distance from her, his arms similarly restrained. As she watched, he shifted slightly and let out a low moan. She couldn’t decide whether to be relieved that he was alive, or frightened that she couldn’t see Alaric or Perrin.

  She shifted her weight, and heard metal scrape against stone. A heavy iron cuff circled her wrist—both her wrists, she discovered—and chains attached to the manacles dragged her arms above her head, connected to rings in the wall behind her. She shivered, and could not stop shivering. The room, or cave, or wherever this was, kept the chill of winter locked inside it, a damp chill that made her think of tombs and catacombs. But her shivering had nothing to do with the cold.

  Footsteps approached, drowning out the echoing water. “Don’t try to stand,” a woman said. “You’ll just fall over.”

  Sienne pushed herself up with her feet to kneel erect on the stone floor and looked up at the woman. She was middle-aged, slim, with dark hair threaded with silver piled atop her head and hazel eyes unmarked by crow’s feet. Her gown was rich burgundy velvet, over which she wore a cropped vest embroidered with silver and tiny winking gems that were black in the low light. She cradled the emerald falcon in her left arm and regarded Sienne dispassionately, the way someone might look at a dog or a horse they were considering buying. Sienne matched her stare for stare, though her heart was in her throat and her mouth was dry. She didn’t need the woman’s warning; she was sure her legs would not support her.

  “You should have sold the artifact to Winifrey,” the woman said. “It would have saved everyone a world of trouble.”

  “Who are you?”

  “Does it matter?”

  Sienne cleared her throat. “I like to know the name of the person threatening me. Unless you’re ashamed of what you’re doing.”

  The woman laughed. “Hardly. My need for secrecy will soon be over. But if you insist… my name is Lady Pyrenna Nerus.”

  “Where is Alaric? And Perrin?”

  “Here.” Lady Nerus gestured vaguely in the direction of a fold in the wall that blocked Sienne’s view to the left. “It’s irrelevant. You are in no position to rescue yourselves, if that’s what you’re hoping. They’re chained as you are, and my trusted servants are watchful.” She waved a hand, and Sienne realized some of the shadows were people, guards in plain black jerkins over red tunics, leather trousers, and leather caps, armed with longswords and daggers. They stared straight ahead, not looking at Sienne or Lady Nerus, and their expressions of alert disinterest made Sienne’s stomach churn again.

  She said, “You want the artifact.”

  “How nice that you aren’t going to play the ignorant ingénue,” Lady Nerus said. “I have the artifact. You will teach me to use it. And then I will let you go. Not immediately, of course. Not until I’ve achieved my goals. But soon.”

  Someone coughed, out of sight to the left. “We’re not stupid,” Alaric said, and despite herself Sienne’s heart leaped. “You can’t afford to let us live.”

  “Is that what you think?”

  “You let us see your face,” Sienne said. “That says you think we’re disposable.”

  Lady Nerus smiled. “Aneirin said you were clever—too clever to give away your secrets. He was impressed that you perceived his presence despite his invisibility. But you don’t have all the facts. I really don’t need your deaths. There’s nothing you can do to stop me getting what I want, and unlike some people, I don’t enjoy killing for its own sake. I even choose to forgive you for Caberri’s death.”

  “Who?”

  The smile disappeared. “You weren’t introduced. There wasn’t time before you destroyed him with the artifact. His magic wasn’t strong enough to defeat you.”

  “I—” Sienne remembered in time that giving information to the enemy was stupid, and shut her mouth. “He tried to kill us. I won’t apologize for defending myself.”

  “As I said, if you’d sold Winifrey the artifact, all of this could have been avoided.” Lady Nerus stood and walked away, out of Sienne’s sight. “Why didn’t you? You can’t possibly have any loy
alty to the Figlari woman.”

  Sienne opened her mouth to reply, but Alaric said, “Then you don’t understand anything. We don’t deal behind our client’s back.”

  “I don’t believe you. Scrappers sell their services to the highest bidder. You must have had plans for the artifact. Who were you going to sell it to?”

  “Tonia Figlari.”

  “That’s a lie. Tell me the truth. You will eventually. Save yourself some pain.”

  Alaric said nothing. Sienne saw Dianthe stir and sit up. Now only Perrin was unaccounted for.

  Lady Nerus came back toward Sienne, shifting her grip on the falcon. “It doesn’t matter. Whoever your buyer was is doomed to disappointment. Now, I want you to tell me how to activate the artifact.”

  Sienne glared at her, but said nothing. Behind her defiant façade, panic gripped her insides. This woman was no wizard and wouldn’t be able to use the artifact even if Sienne told her how it worked. Sienne wasn’t entirely sure she knew how it worked. Telling her the truth didn’t matter. But if the woman had another wizard available, Sienne didn’t dare risk handing Lady Nerus such a powerful weapon.

  Lady Nerus smiled again. “People are so predictable. Of course you won’t tell me. You probably think I’m the villain here. That I’ll use the weapon for evil.”

  “You tried to kill us and you kidnapped us. I think that makes you the villain,” Sienne said.

  “Such a limited understanding. I’ve attacked you, so of course I must be unrelentingly evil. As if your little concerns mattered at all in the grand design. I’m trying to save this country from a tyrant who treats it as his own personal playground.”

  “Are you talking about King Derekian? He’s not a tyrant!”

  “I’d expect a scrapper to think that. Your understanding is so juvenile. If you were noble, if you’d ever been to court, you’d know how wrong you are. Derekian isn’t the even-handed, compassionate monarch he wants people to see him as. He gives preference to his favorites and plunders the treasury to pay for his lavish entertainments. He’s whimsical and disregards the laws when it suits him, which is always. Rafellin deserves a ruler who cares about its people more than his own desires.”

  Sienne yanked on her chains. They gave not at all. “I take it that’s you.”

  “Why not? Again, it’s not like I expect you to realize my superiority to the clown who currently sits on the throne. You’re just a scrapper who’s in over her head. But I assure you, my rule will be far more even-handed. I’ll use the artifact wisely—”

  “That’s impossible. I don’t care if you’re the next avatar of God Herself. The artifact is too powerful for anyone to use wisely. If you’re so convinced you’ll be a better queen than the king, go ahead and try your coup. You’ll have to do it without the artifact.”

  Lady Nerus smiled in a pitying, supercilious way. “You really don’t see it, do you? The artifact will let me destroy the few key individuals who stand in my way. No mass bloodshed, no armies fighting armies, just a couple of clean, quick deaths. Rafellin will have a better ruler, and you’ll go free to do whatever it is scrapper wizards do.”

  “I won’t help you,” Sienne said, desperation giving her words an edge.

  Lady Nerus looked down at her and shook her head. “I was hoping you’d see reason. Do you want money, too? A bribe, in exchange for your knowledge?”

  Sienne shook her head. “I won’t do it for anything.”

  “I wouldn’t be so quick to declare that. Last chance. Tell me how it works.”

  Sienne shook her head again.

  Lady Nerus bit her lower lip in thought. “You, Ansorjan,” she said. “Tell her to comply. You’re the leader of this scrapper team, Aneirin tells me—it’s in your best interests to do as I say.”

  “She wouldn’t obey me if I did,” Alaric said, “and she’s right, we won’t help you.”

  “Very well. I didn’t want to do it this way, but you have to understand—I need this weapon, and you will give it to me. Get her up.”

  Two of the shadowy men detached themselves from the wall and moved to stand on either side of, not Sienne, but Dianthe. They hauled her to her feet and forced her to stand spread-eagled with her back against the wall. Dianthe cried out weakly. Chains rattled, and Alaric shouted, “What are you doing? Let her go!”

  “That’s entirely up to you,” Lady Nerus said, setting the artifact at her feet. She gestured, and a third guard stepped forward and handed her his long knife. It had a wide blade that tapered at the tip and was sharp on only one edge, as the woman demonstrated by laying the dull edge along her palm. “Let’s see what you value more—this artifact, which matters nothing to you but some abstract sense of what’s right, or your companion’s hands.”

  The third man grabbed Dianthe’s left wrist and pressed her hand open against the wall. “I’ll start small, to give you plenty of time to think about it,” Lady Nerus said, laying the blade against the first joint of Dianthe’s pinky. Dianthe screamed and struggled against her captor’s grip. Sienne leapt to her feet and strained against the chains, screaming to match Dianthe. Kalanath was at the end of his chains, shouting and flailing to reach her. Sienne sobbed Dianthe’s name and tried to use her invisible fingers to snatch the blade away, but Lady Nerus’s grip was too tight. The woman pressed down hard on the back of the blade, and Dianthe’s finger disappeared in a spurt of blood. Dianthe screamed again, longer this time.

  “Stop!” Sienne screamed. “Stop, I’ll tell you, just stop!”

  “Sienne!” Alaric shouted.

  “I can’t let her hurt Dianthe anymore,” Sienne sobbed. “It’s not—you can’t tell me you wouldn’t choose the same.”

  “Sienne is right, the artifact is not important,” Kalanath said.

  Sienne wasn’t sure that was true. Giving Lady Nerus a weapon of that magnitude might be disastrous. But the alternative was watching her chop Dianthe’s fingers off, a little at a time. Sienne couldn’t bear that. She hated herself for her weakness, but she couldn’t do anything else.

  “That was easier than I’d expected.” Lady Nerus sounded pleased. She signaled to the guards to release Dianthe and withdrew a handkerchief from her sleeve, which one of the guards wrapped tightly around Dianthe’s maimed finger.

  “All right, tell me how to activate it,” Lady Nerus said, picking the artifact up and returning to stand in front of Sienne.

  “What do you know about artifacts?” Sienne asked.

  “Are you stalling?”

  “No. Do you understand artifacts have requirements you have to meet to make them work?”

  “I’d heard that, yes. You’d better not be about to lie to me about this one’s requirements.”

  “That would just get me or my friends hurt. But you won’t like this one. You have to be a wizard to activate it.”

  Lady Nerus blinked. “Impossible.”

  “I can prove it if you give it to me.”

  “Hah! And give you a weapon against me? Not a chance.” She gestured. “I’ll take the rest of the woman’s finger.”

  “No!” Sienne lunged for Lady Nerus, who stepped back, smiling and running her thumb over the dull edge of the blade. “I swear it’s true!”

  “If you touch her again, I’ll make it my mission in life to destroy you,” Alaric snarled.

  “Hmmm.” Lady Nerus pursed her lips in thought. “You leave me with a conundrum. I can’t let you demonstrate, because I’d certainly be your first target. But I don’t think I want Winifrey handling it, either. She’s loyal, but who knows what might happen if she got her hands on that kind of power. On a third hand, I have to trust Winifrey, as Caberri is dead.” She absently wiped the blade on the nearest guard’s jerkin and handed it back to its owner. “Someone send for Winifrey. Her duties can wait. Tell her this is a royal command.”

  Sienne wanted to snap something nasty about Lady Nerus not being royal yet, but it would have been pointless. She leaned against the wall and looked at Dianthe, who was pale
and sweating but otherwise composed. Kalanath strained against the limits of the chains tethering him to the wall. They were attached to iron rings embedded in the stone as hers were, probably with sculpt based on how the stone bulged over it. The whole thing had an impromptu look to it.

  Sienne pulled against the chains. They were short enough that Sienne couldn’t quite reach her opposite wrist. The manacles were held closed by a simple pin, no lock. She tried her invisible fingers on it, but the pin was heavy and hooked in a way that was too complex for that small magic. The knowledge filled her with more despair than anything else. To be so close to freedom…!

  Sienne.

  Perrin. She’d forgotten about him; he’d been so quiet she’d thought he was still unconscious. But that had clearly been his voice, if distant and echoing.

  Don’t speak. She’ll hear you.

  Confused, she looked around. She still couldn’t see him. Lady Nerus stood about ten feet away from Sienne, toying with the hem of her vest. She didn’t seem to have heard Perrin.

  Just think. I will hear your response.

  Sienne lowered her head in case her confusion was evident on her face, and the woman might see it. How are you doing this?

  We can discuss that later. Can you weaken the chain connected to your right wrist? With the invulnerability magic?

  Yes. Why?

  Just be prepared for Alaric to move. When he does, stretch that chain taut against the wall. Understand?

  She didn’t understand. She also didn’t care. I need about one minute. And a distraction.

  You have it.

  “So you intend to take the throne,” Perrin said aloud. Sienne couldn’t understand how she hadn’t realized he’d been in mental communication with her before; his voice sounded so much fuller now. “Do you expect the rest of the nobles to simply fall into line?”

  “Power in this monarchy is concentrated in only a few individuals,” the woman said. “With those individuals gone, I can easily take control. It helps that so many of my fellows believe as I do, that Derekian’s reign is tainted.”