Nightfell Games (The Dashkova Memoirs Book 5)

by Thomas K. Carpenter

  "You're not from Russia," he said, "or at least, not originally."

  The implications of what he meant hit me squarely in the chest. Stunned, I leaned against the wall.

  "I'd wondered who I received it from, you or Father," he said. "But I'm not surprised it's you. You always seemed different."

  "I don't understand," I said. "Explain."

  "Magic isn't a force that anyone can use. Only those who come from the Thrice-Tenth Kingdom can wield it. Our ancestors must have come from there, and something woke the magic in our heads. Their world, our world, has been leaking into this one for a long time. Only now we can finally come over, saving everyone from the destruction of that universe," he explained.

  I believed every word he said. It made sense. I'd wondered why Ben and the others couldn't use magic. When I'd been exposed to the magic of the spectral cannon, that must have woken it.

  He touched my arm familiarly. "So you see, you're on the wrong side. You belong with us, back in Russia. Trust me, when you come back, you'll understand completely."

  Try as I might, I couldn't convince myself to agree with him, even though my deepest desire was to be reunited with my son.

  "I cannot," I said, shaking my head. "Where we were born does not matter. Nor who our ancestors are. It does not make us who we are. Only our actions can do that. I choose America, because it is on the side of the Enlightenment."

  The excitement in my son's face died. I thought he might pull his rapier then, but he only walked next to me through the corridor.

  Desperate to change the subject, I asked, "Have you seen Anastasia? Is she still alive?"

  He glanced at me with a heavy heart and shook his head. "I have not heard from her since she went into exile. The northern lands have grown wild. I cannot imagine that she's survived."

  "I hold out hope," I said.

  "It's not what you think, Mother," he said. "While the myths are all real, they don't tell the whole story. Our people just want a place to live. They deserve that much."

  "Then come with hat in hand," I said. "Not with a sword in the fist. The emperor has tried to kill me multiple times. How can I have any love for him?"

  "I know," he said, head hanging low. "But I swear you would find much to love despite him. There's so much I would tell you, but I cannot unless you join us."

  "I have their actions to judge them," I said. "They wiped out the entire Grand Armée. No quarter was given and no prisoners taken except for Napoleon. How could I side with that?"

  His hazel eyes flickered with surprise and then anger before his soldier's mask returned.

  "It is war, isn't it?" he asked, his jaw pulsing.

  He hadn't known about the Grand Armée. They'd kept that from him. I knew because he'd given me that look many times before. The one of shock, anger, and defiance. He'd given it when I'd taken him with me across Europe to England for his education. He'd hated that I'd controlled his life at that point. He'd only wanted to stay in Russia and take the same path his father had taken.

  This realization only reinforced my opinions. If they were keeping this much from Pavel, why would I receive any fairer treatment? Despite my newly learned heritage, nothing about them appealed to me.

  We crossed into a wide cavern, a surprising space after the torturous pathways. I grabbed his arm and pulled him around.

  "Fight me in a duel," I said, stomping my foot. "Right here. Let's get it over with and then we can ascend together. I will honor the result."

  He laughed incredulously. "You don't have a weapon."

  I tossed him the oestium rapier. "Slap the handle, but take care to point it away from you."

  He did as I instructed, dropping the weapon when the blade appeared. It clattered across the dark surface of the floor. He picked it up, tilting his head back and forth as if he didn't believe what he saw.

  "The balance is perfect," he said, wonder on his lips. "How can it disappear like that?"

  "Magic." I winked. "Do we have a deal? Best of three touches?"

  He laughed, bright-eyed, and the previous anger retreated for a moment. It was the boy I knew, except he was a man.

  "You can't win," he said. "I'm stronger and faster than you."

  "We'll see," I said. "Do you accept my challenge?"

  "Loser helps the winner get to the top and finish the challenge?" he asked with an eyebrow raised.

  "I accept. Best of three," I said.

  I bowed formally, bending at the waist with my rapier held stiffly near my face. When I returned upright, he matched my bow.

  He leaned his blade out at an angle. "Begin?"

  We fell into an amiable rhythm, not really testing each other, but enjoying the sword play between mother and son. He made predictable advances and I countered with the proper defense.

  We danced around the room, him forcing the pace due to his strength and speed. He was barely making an effort, while I had to press to keep up. Hopefully Pavel was coming to the conclusion that he was the better duelist than I.

  In some ways, it was true. Except I had kept to my practice diligently, knowing that speed and strength were window dressings for the real talent, knowing where and how to use your blade.

  After we circled once around the room, I knew he had been negligent in his practice, which peculiarly made me both elated and disappointed.

  When he sensed that I was testing his attacks rather than enjoying the moment, his face tightened with annoyance, and he swung sloppily at my midsection.

  I countered the attack with the forte, snapping my wrist to slash across his arm.

  "Hellfire," he cried, jumping away from me and returning his blade to the prima guarda position.

  "Point to me," I said.

  The blade had cut through the Hussar coat. The edges of the fabric were wet with blood. He scowled at the wound as if it shouldn't be there. He hadn't expected me to take even one point. Maybe he'd even thought I was surrendering to him in my own way.

  I could see it in his eyes, that hardness, the defiance that had kept him in Russia when I was exiled. I'd ruled his life until he'd been old enough to take on his father's noble position. At times I'd been domineering, but he wouldn't have lasted long in the backstabbing halls of the Winter Palace. I'd saved him by taking him to England for his education, but it'd also damned him in the eyes of his peers. He had the taint of Europe on him, especially since he was my son.

  He stomped his foot on the floor like a bull readying to charge, the impact ringing in the open space. He would attack with such fervor that no defense could withstand it. I saw it in his rage-filled gaze.

  He never got the chance to attack.

  The shifting in my head returned as if it were water in a bucket, sloshing to one side. I moved backwards with the internal gravity, avoiding the yawning pit that opened up at my feet by mere inches.

  Pavel leapt out of the way, landing hard on his side as he avoided the hole in the center of the room. In an instant, we were separated by a chasm.

  If I had any doubts about a consciousness directing the internal workings of the Shard, they disappeared when two passages opened, one for each of us. Then to keep us from trying to cross, keening metallic ants flooded from the pit. The horrific sound drove me screaming from the room with my hands over my ears.

  Stumbling dumbly through the passages, I fled. At some point, I realized the tiny creatures no longer followed and that I could hear without pain, but it was too late. Pavel and I had been separated, the conclusion of our duel left unresolved. Whatever truce we had operated under, as mother and son, had been demolished. I had to get to the top of the Shard.

  Chapter Eleven

  On my way up the Shard, I had an insight that both shocked and worried me. It did not come from the prophecies in my head, nor the way the Shard was speaking to me through intuition. Rather it was from my years in the Russian court as a woman surrounded by proud nobles.

  If by the Puritan morals, pride was a sin, then Russian nobles were the
most sinful of all. Dueling had to be banned in Moscow on multiple occasions, under penalty of death, due to the frequent loss of promising sons killed for minor infractions of honor. Death before dishonor had led many to an early grave. Pride was the scale that they weighed their decisions on and pride was the fulcrum that I’d used my levers on to manipulate them when I resided in the Winter Palace.

  When I had wounded my son, I had pricked his pride more than his flesh. He had not thought his mother would have enough skill to win, as he was a soldier of the double eagle. This was unsurprising to me, as I was always underestimated, even by my own son, who had never truly trusted me to guide his career.

  Beneath that pride was a fear, not for himself, for Russian nobles, including my son, had no fear of death.

  It was fear for another. In my delight to see my only son, I’d pushed the potential death of my second, Voltaire, to the furthest edge of my mind. I’d forgotten in my calculation that Pavel would have a second as well, and his second would be under threat of death, the same as Voltaire.

  With a mother’s intuition, I knew the identity of his second. It was his wife, Anna, who I had not welcomed into my home upon their engagement. Even as I scrambled up the passageways leading to the top of the Shard, hearing the echoes of my boots beating time, I blushed at the thought of how I first treated Anna.

  She'd been a slight girl, more of a wisp of grass than anything substantial, and Pavel had loved her. Her only crime had been a father who was not of the nobility. In those years, I had not fully understood the curse of being noble. I should have welcomed her into my family, rather than snub her.

  Years later, when they moved in with me, I tried to make amends, but I had already salted the soil. Nothing would grow after that.

  Pavel loved Anna. Had loved her enough to marry her, even when it would impact his social standing, his pride. If she was his second, he would do anything to keep her alive.

  After I'd pulled him from the edge, his initial reaction to reach for his rapier was made clear by this revelation. He'd only agreed to the duel because he thought he couldn't lose, and now with us separated, and no agreement between us, I couldn't trust my son not to try to kill me if I saw him again.

  The Shard of Time offered little resistance to my ascent. The only thing slowing me was the constant climbing. My legs burned with effort. Undergarments were soaked through, which only made the chill winds more vicious when I chanced to encounter them.

  As I neared the top, dread built in my chest like a smoldering fire, choking me with its bitter smoke. When I'd had my vision at the bottom, one of the things I saw was twins climbing a black mountain. I knew what that meant now. The twins were Pavel and I, not twins, but mother and son. We'd been dressed similarly, enough to be confused as twins in my vision. Which meant we would most likely encounter each other at the top.

  My thoughts proved true minutes later, when we both burst into a chamber similar to the one we'd dueled in. At the center sat a mound of shifting black metal like a billion iron shavings dancing beneath an unseen magnet. The hazy impression of a sword at the center sometimes appeared as the mound shifted.

  Pavel took one look at the mound and pulled a pistol from his coat. He fired the weapon, nearly taking my head off. I ducked as I ran, whipping the pistol out of his grip with my sorcery before he could stop me. It slid across the black surface and out of the tower.

  He screamed, "I won't let you," in Russian.

  I had no defense against the yellowish wave of sorcery that burst from his outstretched hands, picking me off the ground and slamming me into the wall. The impact knocked the breath from my lungs. I struggled to turn over to climb to my feet, like a beetle trapped on its back.

  Pavel's jacket had come unfastened in his rush up the Shard. His hair was askew, his eyes wild. He took one glance at the weapon, hardened his features, and marched towards me while I was still lying on my back.

  "I can't let you win, Mother. Anna is below. The Shard will kill her if I don't win the contest," he said, bloodshot eyes rounded at the corners. "I'm sorry. It's just the way it must be."

  He reached his hands out, ready to pummel me with his sorcery, but hesitated for a split second. If he'd intended to kill me, or at least knock me unconscious, he couldn't do it. Not right away.

  The sliver of time was all I needed. I couldn't hit him with my sorcery. That would require directing it with my hands, and Pavel would unleash his first.

  Rather, I imagined a great hand yanking me across the floor, like the one that I'd used to leap across that gap. As his magic slammed against the floor and curled back onto Pavel, I was sliding and scrambling onto my feet, running towards the mound of shifting metal.

  Pavel's cry of anguish barely reached my ears as I threw myself into the mound, oblivious to whatever dangers it might hold, my hand reaching through the swirling bits of black metal towards the hilt of the weapon. As my hand touched the hilt—strangely warm and alive—the black metal shifted around me into a shield, blocking Pavel's sorcerous attack. Then the floor fell away and I was falling.

  Straight down through the center of the Shard, I fell. The hole in the Shard vibrated with light and I feared my flailing arm would touch the blade of the weapon, sentencing me to an eternity of pain.

  The impact was coming.

  I tensed up, expecting to crash into the base, shattering my bones into a million pieces, when the metal flecks cocooned around me and cushioned my fall, until I landed at the bottom as gently as a cat leaping from a table.

  The Blade of Time wasn't what I expected. It looked like someone had taken a metal rod, dipped it in glue, and then put it into a vat of those black filings. Then repeated the process until it formed a five-foot-long, jagged weapon more suited to bludgeoning than slicing.

  It had a substantial weight that strained my elbow and I swore I detected a faint high-pitched humming emanating from it like a tuning fork.

  "Mon Dieu!" cried Voltaire from his cage. "What is that horrible thing?"

  "Your savior," I said, marching towards the depression near Voltaire that would free him once I placed the blade inside.

  Voltaire backed against the shimmering black wall as if I were going to attack him.

  "What's wrong?" I asked.

  He shook his head. "I don't know, but I do not like that thing. Quickly, release me so we can give it to Neva and be gone from this place."

  I hovered the tip inside the hole, the weight of the outstretched weapon making it hard to hold steady.

  "What are you waiting for?" he asked.

  I glanced upward, thinking of my son and his wife, Anna. An ache formed in my chest. It felt like murder.

  "Katerina, why do you delay?" he asked, face etched with worry.

  "I..."

  I barely got the words out before I sensed the shifting in the tower. The lower section was going to collapse into the dark metal.

  With teeth clenched into a grimace, I shoved the blade into the hole. The shimmering field around Voltaire disappeared and he rushed to my side. I yanked the weapon back out, and we ran out of the Shard as the passages disappeared behind us.

  We made it out to find Neva standing outside with her hand held out, her gaze triumphant. A strange box filled with a web of soft light waited at her feet.

  "Congratulations," she said. "You have won the first contest."

  I looked at the menacing weapon in my hand and then at Neva. Her brow hunched in concern. If I took two quick steps forward and lunged with the Blade of Time, I would kill her and free Morwen and Rowan.

  The blade reacted to my thoughts, the hum increasing in frequency until Voltaire was cringing.

  "You killed my daughter-in-law," I said.

  Neva raised her chin to a regal angle. "I did nothing of the sort. The Shard killed her. If anything, you killed her."

  "This was your contest," I said, shaking the Blade of Time at her.

  "Which you won," she said. "Be glad of that."

  "Wh
at of Pavel? Is he stuck at the top?" I asked.

  Her lips went flat, white. "He grieves on the other side. The tower brought him to the bottom moments after you."

  I took a step in that direction, thinking to comfort him, but remembered that he would blame me, which wasn't far off, since I blamed myself.

  "May I have it, please? Technically, you haven't won the first contest until you give it to me," she said while letting her lips curl into the semblance of a grin.

  I thought again about attacking her, but decided that we would be trapped here without a way back if I killed her. Which wasn't a certainty in itself, since she was a sorceress that had been alive longer than human civilization had existed.

  "What will you do with it?" I asked.

  She gave a half-shrug, looking down her enormous nose. "I'm a collector. I collect. It passes the time."

  Using both hands, I shifted the hilt towards her, which she took. I thought she would examine it, or smile gleefully. Rather, she unceremoniously turned to the long box near her feet and placed the weapon inside, cradling it against the web of light. Then she closed the lid and turned to us.

  "I shall return you to Kings Mountain," she said.

  I nodded, suddenly too tired to make a pithy comment. We climbed back onto the front porch of her hut and returned to the room in which we had travelled to the Shard.

  I fell onto the cushioned bench as soon as Neva left us. Sleep claimed me in moments. I dreamt of my sorcery unleashed, tearing down whole cities. It seemed like a week later when Voltaire gently woke me, and it took me a moment to realize that they'd only been dreams. He explained that Neva had already left and we were free to return to the village.

  Arm in arm, we stumbled out of the hut into the dew covered morning like brother and sister, stepping carefully over the litter of antlers strewn about the clearing, and took the path that would take us down the mountain.

  The village of Gastonia was in its mid-afternoon bustle by the time we reached it, which meant a farmer and his wagon were trundling through town. We paid the innkeeper at the Patriot's Landing for our room, and I carefully inquired about the date, feigning a moment of confusion. It'd only been one day since we'd left Gastonia, despite our adventure taking nearly three full days.