The Sapphire Manticore (The Lost Ancients Book 4)

by Marie Andreas

  He might have said he wasn’t concerned, but the way he broke into a jog told me otherwise. It was amazing how both he and Alric could manage to run with big packs on their backs and still look good. By the way I felt my pack flopping around, I was sure I probably looked like a drunken moose in heat.

  A shrill screech echoed from where we came. Clearly an alarm, but one even the faeries couldn’t handle. All three clutched their ears and would have fallen from the air if Bunky hadn’t swooped and grabbed them. He didn’t seem to be bothered by it.

  I felt a creepy tingle in the back of my head from it, and I really didn’t like it, but I could keep moving. But Alric and Padraig were seriously slowing down.

  The door Padraig had been leading us to was about twenty-five yards away. No guards. But I couldn’t get the elves to move faster.

  I tried pulling them but both were slowing down and looked ready to fall. Considering they were both bigger than I was, that wasn’t an option.

  I motioned for Bunky to get behind them and pantomimed pushing while I grabbed an arm from each and started pulling.

  The contact from Bunky and I seemed to help both of them and we made it out the door before any guards arrived. The siren was still going on, but once we were out of the doorway I felt my ears pop and both elves started moving better. Both still seemed injured and limping, but at least they were moving.

  The faeries recovered the fastest and led Bunky back to shut the door, and then flew back to us. “Move.”

  I knew that look from Garbage, and I was now trusting it completely. Padraig had obviously been wrong about no one knowing what he did to the guards, or maybe it was a spell triggered when he opened the door from the stairwell. Nevertheless, I agreed with my tiny orange friend, we needed to get out of sight fast.

  We were in what looked like an abandoned side garden with a ten-foot-high wall. Night had fallen, but even though the garden was abandoned, that weird glowing moss lit the area up better than any glow could. The surrounding wall was tall enough that there was no way any of us were getting over that way except Bunky and the faeries. The dead and dying condition of most of the plant life around us gave little coverage.

  Both Alric and Padraig were still clearing their heads but I needed to ask them where to go. Suddenly, and very painfully, a map of the garden, as seen from up high, appeared in my head. The fact that the entire image was done in various shades of blue gave me a hint as to where the information was coming from.

  The information was welcome even if the way it came to me and the stabbing cold pain between my eyes was not.

  In the far corner of the garden was a large gully. Like everything else here, it was old and unused but deep enough for us to crawl through. It went under the wall, and may have been used to keep planted areas from flooding when this thing was built.

  I grabbed both elves’ arms. They were moving better now but still not fully functioning. I pulled them to the corner. Bunky and the girls followed but I pointed for them to go over the wall. I was impressed when they all nodded and silently complied.

  We had to take off our packs and push them ahead of us, and I was very glad my current wardrobe was mostly black, but we made it through.

  We came out on the edge of a forest. The city’s border appeared to be less than a half mile away, or at least I assumed that’s what those lights were.

  It was shocking how much darker everything was around us without the moss. If we all did Alric’s little trick with glowing stones, we’d stand out to anyone searching for us. But without any light, I was going to walk into something for sure. Maybe I could get Padraig to use one of those clearthin glows. I wasn’t sure how well they’d fly about in the trees…and the faeries were awake now. Visions of the faeries chasing bouncing glows all over the forest convinced me that walking into a tree or two wasn’t so bad.

  Both Alric and Padraig seemed to shake themselves off and looked no worse for wear after the effects of the siren. They got their packs on and started a debate as to where to go. Whatever tricky little map thing my newfound internal freeloader did before wasn’t kicking in now. Great, another not so reliable new magic trick.

  “If we cut through this stand of trees, we can get to Qianru’s mansion in a few hours,” Alric said.

  “And if we go around it, we’ll only lose an hour or so, and we’ll be less likely to get caught out in the open.” Padraig pointed in the direction of the city lights.

  While they discussed, I tried to hear anything from over the wall. It was too thick, or our pursuers gave up once we fled. I motioned for Garbage to come closer. Bunky and the faeries were clearly bored now and playing loop around the trees.

  Garbage got in a few more loops, and then finally flew over.

  “I need you to quietly peek over the wall and see who is there.” She started to take off, but I grabbed her. “Don’t be seen, and be quiet. I know you can do this, you’re the leader, right?”

  Garbage smiled, nodded, and shot off.

  I was learning.

  She came back with a scowl. “Is sniffer out there.” Then she flew back to her friends.

  I walked closer to where Padraig and Alric were having their whispered debate. “Guys? Garbage says there’s something sniffing around the yard we left. Might want to move.”

  Padraig looked back at the wall with a scowl. “Sniffing? They wouldn’t use…damn.” He nodded to Alric. “You win. The guards are using some of the inquisitor’s experiments to find us. Or rather, to find whoever set off the alarm.”

  Alric nodded, adjusted his pack a final time, and then struck out into the woods. I motioned for the faeries and Bunky to follow since their night eyesight was excellent. Mine not so much, I’d stick close to Padraig.

  “So what is after us?” I’d been trying to gauge the freak out level. He’d been upset at the information, but not like facing a rakasa invasion upset. Almost a more annoyed upset.

  “Nothing you or Alric would have heard of. The Grand Inquisitor has been trying to make constructs, but the making of them was really a purview of the Ancients long before us. Some of the very powerful old ones of our clan still probably could craft simple ones, but it was decided long ago that creating such beings wasn’t ethical.” He looked up with a smile and I assumed Bunky was flying over us. A black construct on a black night wasn’t easy to spot. “I think if they met your little friend, they might change their minds though.”

  I made a mental note to work even harder to keep Bunky away from most of elven kind.

  “The Grand Inquisitor and Lorcan don’t see eye to eye, but I’m thinking he is sending out constructs and guards because they had a breach, not because he knows who caused it.”

  “But won’t those guards say it was you when they wake up?”

  “That, my dear, was part of the spell.” His smile was clear from this distance even if most of his face was in shadow. “They will recall nothing.”

  Alric had been a few feet ahead of us, but then stopped. We were close enough that I could see his hand held up. Both Padraig and I stopped talking.

  Alric led us behind some bushes, ones tall enough to cover us if we all crouched down. I mentally sent a call to the faeries to stay wherever they were and stay silent. I threw in a bunch of ales once we were safe into the deal in the hopes they’d obey.

  While part of me was glad our little mental communication only seemed to go one way—being in one of their heads would be a one-way trip to a crazy room—it would be nice to know when they heard me.

  “I told you, this ain’t gonna work.” The male voice was scratchy and sounded tired. He also didn’t seem to be trying not to be heard, so that probably took him off the list of folks who might be looking for us.

  “They have to give us food and a place to stay,” the second voice said. Also male, he was younger, but also sounded tired. “Wasn’t our fault that mage war broke out on the perimeter. We can’t be held accountable. King Jionth will make it right by us, I know he will.”r />
  Two shapes, vaguely man-like, passed by about five feet from our hiding spot. I had my hand on Alric’s shoulder to steady myself in my crouch and felt him stiffen. A moment later the men were out of earshot and sight.

  I was close enough to see that both Alric and Padraig looked like they’d seen a ghost when we came out of the bushes.

  “What mage war are they talking about?” I knew things were starting to go bad inside the enclave, but there had been no war that I knew of. Certainly nothing that would warrant the look on both elves’ faces.

  Garbage and her crew drifted down from the trees above us. The faeries were all shaking their heads, and looked almost as upset as Padraig and Alric. “Walls too thin.” “Bad.” “No boom now.”

  We were back to separate comments from each faery. Moreover, as usual, none of them made sense. The closest wall was the one we’d just left, and thin was not one of its problems. Normally, I would say not having any sort of boom would be good, but given their weird context I had to assume it was bad.

  “There hasn’t been a mage war since five hundred years before the Breaking,” Padraig said as he continued to look where the two men had gone.

  “We have a serious problem.” Alric had been looking the other direction—where the men had come from. He grabbed Padraig’s arm and spun him that way. I looked as well but I couldn’t see that far in the dark.

  “There are more, and they’re making their way back to Raviel. Or trying to. They don’t know it had already been destroyed and there was nothing there for them. The famine…” Alric sounded in pain and then dropped to one knee clutching his head.

  Padraig tried to help him up but then he too crumbled.

  Bunky, the girls and I were fine, but I could see the shapes of more faintly glowing people walking through the woods. They were all ghosts.

  I wasn’t sure why these ghosts were so much worse than Reginald, but up until him I’d never thought they existed. I also had no idea why both Alric and Padraig were frozen on their knees, both staring ahead but not responding to anything.

  A chill started at the base of my spine and crept outward. This was bad. I had no idea what was going on, but this was bad.

  A group of the ghost figures split off from the rest of the group and seemed to be aiming for us. They had a red tinge and walked stiffer than the rest. They also held glowing swords and pikes. One even carried a standard but I couldn’t make out the flag.

  I tugged on Alric’s arm. “Guys? Seriously, this is bad.” Garbage joined me and tried pulling Alric’s hair, clothing, anything. Then the other two faeries helped as well.

  Nothing moved them. Both were on one knee, both looking forward, and neither would move.

  Crap.

  The only spell I really had down was my push spell. I didn’t know what pushing would do to evil spirits but I was running out of options. I started gathering the spell in my head when my sword popped up.

  Really? I had no idea what good a sword was going to do against people who weren’t really there, but it apparently thought it needed to come along.

  I stepped around Alric and Padraig, my sword held up and my hand ready for the spell. The closest armed ghost smiled and lowered his sword as if to run me through. “We are fated. Meeting to end all.” His accent was very odd. His vague face kept changing through many different options, some elf, some not. I think I even saw a dwarf.

  Before I could respond, he swung his blade.

  I’d allowed myself to get distracted by the faces and didn’t release the spell. Instead my hand went up and I blocked his sword with my blade. Actually, my sword went through his and it vanished.

  He looked as surprised as I felt.

  My sword glowed, almost a challenge to the other dozen or so armed ghosts surrounding us. They didn’t come closer, and the one before me nodded.

  Then I remembered my spell. Garbage and the girls swooped down, and when my spell sent the ghosts flying, they flew after them. I was relieved to know that my little spell worked on the disembodied dead as well as it did on the living. None of the ghosts landed. The faeries came close to each of them as they tumbled through the air, and either my spell or whatever the girls did made them vanish. A second later, so did my sword.

  The rest of the ghostly hoard seemed oblivious to our battle and continued toward their long gone city.

  Alric recovered first, coming to my side as soon as he gained his feet. He held me in a tight hug. “I saw it all, but I couldn’t move.”

  “Ghosts shouldn’t have had the power to stop us like that. There was something else behind the ones you defeated.” Padraig came up next to us, and nodded to the faeries and Bunky. “Well done, little friends.” Then he faced us. “We can’t stay in this forest, and we need to get word to Lorcan. The dead are rising.”

  “But they shouldn’t be here. This enclave wasn’t around back then.” Alric gestured around the forest.

  “No, but they were all defeated during the mage wars and marched for months coming back from the front lines, only to find everything they knew gone. They could have gone through here.”

  That weird tingling was back and I looked up. There really wasn’t much of a moon, just a sliver that stayed hidden behind clouds. Between the sky and us a bloody tinge spread, then moved on. I had no idea how big it was at this point, nor whether it was leading or following the ghosts.

  I pulled on Alric’s arm and pointed upwards. “That evil mage goo is up there. It went the same way the ghosts did.”

  He swore. “We need to know what spells that bastard took with him when he died.”

  “Agreed,” Padraig said. “But since we have no idea who that mage was, aside from the fact he was probably more powerful by far than you or I to have a spell that can live on within a shield when he’s not even alive, there’s no way to assess how much damage it is doing. It could be calling the dead whether that was its goal or not.”

  Both of them were walking as they talked, so I waved in the general direction I’d last seen the girls. All three dropped a bit lower so I could actually see them in the starlight. The blob of inky darkness behind them that was purring had to be Bunky.

  They were quietly arguing between themselves. They often had discussions, ones that usually ended with Garbage being victorious and the other two pouting. But they were always far louder than this. I’d like to think that they were actually paying attention and realized that even though the ghosts had all vanished, we still needed to be quiet. I covered my mouth when my own laugh flew out at that thought.

  More likely they were up to something they didn’t want us to know about. Silence wasn’t good with those three, or the other nine we’d be meeting up with soon. Unless they were passed out drunk.

  I was about to call them closer, but Padraig and Alric had stopped and were both looking at us. I hadn’t realized how much I’d slowed down.

  “I can make move?” Garbage swooped down and pantomimed grabbing my hair. That I ducked only made her chortle—albeit softly—with laughter.

  “No, I can move fine.” As soon as I caught up, Alric and Padraig started moving again. “I’m not complaining, but why are you all being so quiet?”

  Garbage’s face fell. “Walls too thin, things get trapped. Respect. Bad times.”

  That was helpful and not at the same time. Pretty much meaning that they were up to their normal antics. Nevertheless, the compassion on all of their faces was new. Then it dawned on me that they were talking of the walls between worlds. A shiver went through me. The way she said too thin, it wasn’t that they had been too thin; it was they were currently too thin.

  I suddenly didn’t want to ask them any more questions—at least not out here in the dark woods. It was bad enough there might be living people out here looking for us—I couldn’t cope with more undead assassins. “Let’s catch up with the elf boys, shall we?”

  Alric dropped his arm around me as soon as I came up next to him. The casual way he did it, and the fact he
didn’t stop in his ongoing debate of something magical with way too many vowels actually made me smile. We hadn’t had any time to be together the last few weeks, and definitely not enough time to really talk about how we felt about each other. Hopefully once we got out of here, we could resolve a few things.

  The trail was wider here, and I found myself mentally drifting about. I’d slept fitfully last night in my tower, and things had been a bit crazy since then. It was all catching up to me and I was almost sleep walking.

  “How long has this been going on?” Alric asked.

  Whatever weird magical technique they’d been talking about when I first walked up was dropped but I hadn’t been paying attention. The trees all looked different here as well and I must have zoned out for a good hour or more. The tone in Alric’s voice told me I needed to pay attention now.

  “For at least the last year.” Padraig held up his hand. “Yes, you’ve been back since then, but not much and those months you did spend here were not in the castle, nor even in town. But the factions are getting worse.”

  Alric shook his head. “I can’t believe it’s gotten that bad, but it does make that chest we found, not to mention the attack on the outpost when we came in, make more sense. They are probably speeding up their plans because we survived.”

  “Halt! Who goes there?” A glow flared to life right in front of us but aimed at us in such a way we couldn’t see who was behind it.

  It would have been scarier if the person behind the glow’s voice hadn’t cracked mid-sentence. Plus, I could see the faint outlines of buildings not too far ahead of us. I must have slept-walked the entire forest. I shot a suspicious glance at Alric, but he refused to catch it. I might have had some help on the dozing off part.

  “Someone who thinks you should be in bed, Joie.” Alric released my shoulder, and holding both of his hands up, stepped in front of Padraig and me.

  I hadn’t recognized Qianru’s primary houseboy’s voice like Alric did but he had better hearing. Besides I was still shaking off that walking slumber spell he’d slipped on me.

  “Alric?” The glow tilted down, then dimmed. Now I could see six houseboys all in Qianru’s horrific livery. If I was shocked by her chosen colors I wondered what the ascetically minded elves thought of it. “I beg your forgiveness. There have been strange sounds and beings coming out of the forest the last few nights. We’ve been posting guards.” He noticed Padraig and bowed. “Good evening, Lord Niamel.” Then he smiled with far more warmth than I thought he had in him—at least toward me. “And Taryn, and her faeries, and Bunky. Well met.”