Black Rose Queen: Black Rose Sorceress, Book 3

by Connie Suttle

  If he'd had mindspeak, he'd be here instead of Jubal, who had to be carried throughout the city behind my raver.

  Besides, the two young ones were still alive. I'd ponder the takeover of their minds later, when I felt less angry. If I were to attempt it now, I'd likely blast their few brain cells by accident, just from the bleed-through of my fury.

  Too bad my father wasn't alive to see what I'd become; he'd commit suicide rather than look upon me at full power.

  "Father," I mumbled to an empty room, "I'd have helped you on your road to oblivion if I could. I still hate you, too—after all these years."

  It made me think of the bitch, who told me that hate destroyed the soul. As if that were a thing. Let the masses believe that tripe; I had no use for it, other than to control their tiny minds.

  "Look at me, getting maudlin now, of all times," I considered. "Guards," I shouted. "Send for Liam."

  The planes were almost ready. I wanted an update. Az-ca had taken something from me. I would take more back.

  North

  Kaakos was sending troops across the river. I stood far down the bank to watch them cross the bridge reserved for the military.

  Many of the escaping citizens had built rafts of boards from their shacks to float across; it was a good idea, as they were taking their building materials with them when they went.

  I'd gone across myself a few times, urging the refugees to move southward, away from the city's filthy air. Besides, some would be injured in the crossing—they weren't experienced navigators and the river was wide.

  A healer was much sought-after, once they knew of my talents.

  Reports had reached me, too, regarding work in Kaakos' factories. Planes would be finished and ready to send soon. Decisions had to be made regarding that information.

  Most of those decisions involved whom to approach with that information, and my concern as to whether they'd believe me.

  If I knew how to reach the shining woman—but that could spell danger. Much danger. Too many fates balanced on the head of a pin. One thing going awry could topple all, and my work would be for naught.

  All those I could depend upon—dead. Far in the past, too. For now, I felt more alone than I'd ever been, and just as troubled.

  Except—perhaps there was someone to approach after all. He'd asked for my help. That help could be offered—for a price.

  Sherra

  "I've been thinking," I said, when Caral and Cole arrived in my study to work. Caral turned to Cole, as a smile spread across her face. Cole answered with one of his own.

  "Why are you smiling?" I asked.

  "It's just that whenever you've been thinking, amazing things happen afterward," Caral turned toward me, then. "I never hear Armon say you've been thinking too much anymore."

  "That's true," I grinned.

  "So, what is it?" Cole asked.

  "Well, actually, Misten deserves credit for this."

  Caral's eyes widened. "How?"

  "She's the one who said follow the gold. We're looking for evidence of it now. What I thought, though, is this. All that gold has to come directly from Kaakos, don't you think? He doesn't want anyone else to know he can get it from Ny-nes to here, unless I'm very mistaken."

  "That makes sense," Cole nodded. "Since power is frowned upon except in the rarest of cases there, and Kaakos has those talented ones directly under his thumb." He didn't add that we both knew the census was now useless in identifying Kaakos' spies. We needed another way to find them.

  "The gold comes from Kaakos. What does that knowledge do for us?" Caral asked.

  "Well, I may have to consult with Barth, but I'm really hoping that we can perform a long-distance divination."

  "You've lost me," Caral grimaced.

  "Oh. I'm thinking ahead of my mouth," I admitted. "I know Kaakos' power signature. Don't ask how," I held up a hand as Cole prepared to do exactly that. "I just do. Now, I need to find a way to project that information across miles, to look for places where that power signature may be hiding."

  "We find the gold, we find his spies," Caral breathed.

  "We haven't tried it, yet, so don't get your hopes up," I cautioned as a light appeared in Cole's eyes. "We don't know it's possible, yet."

  "Is Barth available?" Caral said. "How long will this take?"

  "I don't know. I haven't determined whether that kind of divination is even possible. Barth has to touch something, remember? I was just thinking about how we could focus on something—like a truck, and step it somewhere else. I want to do that with divination—step it somewhere else."

  "I need tea while I consider this," Cole sat heavily on a nearby chair and gazed out my window. His mind was whirling with possibilities, provided we could get this idea to work.

  "I'll send for tea," Caral headed for the door.

  "What's this?" I didn't know Barth was meeting with Kerok and Hunter when I sent mindspeak to him. They all showed up in my study.

  "It's just an idea," I said.

  "She wants to send divination out, like sending a truck to North Camp," Caral smiled at Kerok.

  "That's an interesting idea, but why?" Barth queried.

  "We want to follow Kaakos' gold," Cole said. "If we can divine from a distance, perhaps we can focus that divination on a single thing."

  Kerok blinked at me before turning to Cole, then Caral, and finally to Barth. "It sounds impossible," he sighed. "And I'll keep my hopes alive that it's not. Make this work, my love. Please."

  He'd seen the possibilities, just as I had. If I could locate Kaakos' gold, who knew what else we might focus on?

  "I need time to consider this," Barth said. "I'm not sure how to begin, even."

  "Tomorrow, then?" I asked him. "I think we may need to be in contact to attempt it. We'll start with something nearby, but not touching either of us."

  "I'll do this for the King," Barth released a sigh. I understood he thought it a foolish notion, but we had to try. If we failed, then we failed. There was no shame in that; the shame would lie in not making the attempt.

  Thank you, I sent mindspeak to Kerok.

  He's balking because he doesn't like to fail at anything, Kerok responded. Give him room to doubt, then show him the way.

  I don't know that it'll work, either, I admitted. But I have to try.

  My love, I pray for your success, he said. "We'll go, now," he said aloud, leading Barth and Hunter from my study.

  "Want your tea warmed?" Caral asked once the three of us were alone again. "Armon showed me how."

  "Kerok usually does it for me," I said, pushing my cup toward Caral. "I need hot tea after all that."

  North

  Jubal? I sent mindspeak. I could see his wheeled conveyance ahead as two warrior-priests heaved his cart through cluttered, narrow trails between empty shacks and lean-tos.

  The boards easiest to carry had been stripped away, leaving a wretched monument of rubble to lives lived in squalor for centuries.

  Who? He was too frightened to turn his head, now.

  North. You asked for help. Tell me why I should give it.

  He took me from my home and forced me to do this, his mental voice wobbled.

  Kaakos? How did he find you? I assume you were hidden from his sight for a very long time—he doesn't take kindly to those less than whole, and neither do his warrior-priests.

  I came from Az-ca. I watched him hunch his shoulders in the distance.

  How did you come to Kaakos' attention? Suddenly, I knew, without his excuse of a reply. You were a spy for him. Weren't you? Tell me it isn't so, and don't lie—I can tell if you do.

  I'm sorry I ever fell in with him. I swear.

  And I'm sorry, too—sorry that I ever considered helping you. You are on your own, Jubal, and I sincerely hope your demise is less painful than most I've seen at Kaakos' hands.

  No—please, he begged.

  I didn't answer. I was done with this one.

  I had one more to call upon, once night
fell and he was in his bed. He was also from Az-ca, and no doubt had an interesting tale to tell concerning his arrival in Ny-nes.

  I knew Kaakos hadn't pulled him here. He'd arrived in a different manner, and that he'd never spied in his life for the one who named himself Supreme Leader of this grace-forsaken land.

  I didn't know his name.

  Yet.

  He was responsible for sending Kaakos after me, though, and for the countless deaths of citizens who stood in the raver's way afterward.

  Yes. He would serve or he'd be exposed.

  The choice would be his to make.

  Chapter 14

  Ny-nes

  North

  A sound sleeper.

  Who snored.

  Wake, I tapped his forehead, never suspecting such a large man could move so swiftly. He was awake with his back against the wall before I had time to register his movement.

  Until it dawned on me—he'd stepped, albeit a short distance, to get far enough away to protect himself. His fists, clenched, glowed dimly in the night; he was prepared to level blasts against me.

  Stop that and listen to me, I snapped at him in mindspeak.

  Who? He demanded to know.

  I'm North. You know—the one you goaded Kaakos into hunting down? The one that too many citizens to count have lost their lives over—when you decided to kill off seven of Kaakos' pet warrior-priests?

  His eyes widened. Nobody knew about the first one; he'd killed the other six who'd been with the raver. He'd killed Aspe first, and hadn't owned up to it, yet.

  What do you want? he silently growled.

  I want you, I said amiably. Now, you can come quietly, or I can make so much racket, the guards will come running and the entire servants' quarters will be wakened. Is that what you want?

  I can't go. I'm here with someone else, he grumbled. I have to protect her.

  Who? The name, or I'll turn you over to the guards myself.

  Kyri. He turned his head away at the admission.

  I went still. Never did I think—well, it no longer mattered. I suspected Doret would be the one, and that was—well.

  Where? I gripped the collar of his tunic.

  Women's quarters, he responded, as if any dolt would have known it.

  Come. I jerked him toward me, while the breath whooshed out of him in surprise. Then, I stepped both of us to the women's quarters, to collect the one called Kyri.

  Kyri

  "Let me go." I fought with Garkus. Somehow, he'd gotten me out of the women's quarters without waking me or any of the others.

  Except Garkus wasn't the one whose arms were holding me against him, telling me to shut up and not bite him again.

  That's when I went still, my face pressed against a hard shoulder. Slowly, and with deliberate movement, I disentangled myself from my captor's clutches and stood back to look at his face.

  A lop-sided grin met my angry gaze.

  I hauled off and slapped him.

  Hard.

  North

  "I'm not the only one lying to you. Who's lied to you," I amended as Kyri glowered in my direction. I'd stepped us to an ancient bunker that nobody remembered, now, Kaakos included.

  "Hmmph." Her response wasn't a word. It was a one-syllable dressing-down.

  Garkus, arms folded across his wide chest, was almost as displeased as Kyri. I'd get to him in a moment. "He lied to you, too," I flung out an arm in Garkus' direction. "He killed Aspe, then complicated the killing with an asinine note that resulted in the deaths of many."

  At least she'd turned to glare at Garkus, now. His arms dropped, as did his head—an admission of his guilt in anyone's eyes. Kyri was furious, now.

  "What, in the name of the first fucking warrior are you doing here, alive?"

  Now it was my turn to drop my eyes. "I could ask you the same thing. Kaakos locked you out, last I checked."

  "Why didn't you help me, then?" she demanded, her teeth clenched, her words hissed.

  "The time wasn't right."

  "And it is, now?"

  "Yes. I was waiting for a sign. Not long ago, the sign came. I came out of hiding and began weaning the population away from Kaakos and his lies."

  "Is that what this is?"

  "It's my plan, yes."

  "Who the hell is this?" Garkus decided to speak, a finger pointing an accusation in my direction.

  "Shut up." Kyri and I shouted him down simultaneously.

  Doret

  I have no idea how it's possible, and I'm really not speaking to him right now to find out. Truly, I doubt I want the answer anyway, Kyri said.

  You know we can't tell anyone about this, I warned. This is impossible, I added, almost to myself.

  You think you're telling me something I don't already know?

  No. I just—I don't know what to think, I admitted. Will you let Adahi know? That had just occurred to me.

  He could have helped us last time—Adahi and me—if we'd only known he was here instead of, well, that's water under the bridge, as they say. Adahi gave his life to get me out, then. What do you think he'll say if he discovers this?

  Nothing good, I huffed. What do you think will happen if the bastard finds out who North really is?

  No idea. It's not a pleasant thing to consider, you know.

  Do you trust him?

  I didn't trust him before. You know why.

  I do. I thought about commenting on what might have been, but Kyri and I had argued too many times about that already. It all boiled down to poor choices and distasteful things ignored or left undone.

  You know Sherra and Thorn are planning to attack Ny-nes, don't you? Now that Kyri was away from Kaakos and his palace, I felt safer allowing her to have the information.

  Fuck, Kyri's reply was swift. He said he was waiting for a sign, and that it had come to him recently. I suppose that's what it was.

  Then I hope he also sees a successful outcome in this, I said. Or we'll all be screwed.

  We may be screwed anyway, Kyri informed me. Kaakos' Chief of Technical Sciences has been seen at the palace quite often, lately. That spells new disasters for Az-ca, if I know anything at all.

  Fuck. It was my turn to say it, I suppose, so I said it again—fuck.

  Bloody, fucking hellfire.

  History had turned upside down and it could work to our detriment in too many ways. Kyri said she'd slapped him.

  I wanted to slap him, too.

  Fuck.

  Anari

  "I thought Cole was supposed to be here today. Sherra, too," Kyal kicked a small piece of driftwood toward the water. The beach was shadowed by the cliff above us as we walked toward a new set of blasting targets.

  "They're busy," Laren draped an arm over Kyal's shoulders.

  "I think they're worried," I said.

  Kyal's head lifted. Now he looked worried. "About what?" he whispered.

  "You know—Ny-nes." Laren was also whispering. He let his arm drop back to his side as Kyal turned to face him.

  Cole and the others generally didn't answer our questions about Ny-nes, and I wondered why that was. We'd stopped asking about it after a while, because we never received a satisfactory answer.

  "I think we should look for stuff on Ny-nes in Kyri's library," I said, before clamping a hand over my mouth.

  "It's probably in all that stuff we can't read," Kyal said, sounding gloomy. He hated that there were books he couldn't read. He really wanted to know what was in them.

  I did, too, but I didn't tell him that. We were sneaking around in Kyri's library when we shouldn't, and if we were caught, I had no idea what the punishment might be.

  "We'll go tonight, if you want," Laren said. "We'll look around. Here come Liri and Giles—they're probably wondering why we're taking so long to get to lessons."

  I turned; Liri had stopped a distance away—Giles was still walking toward us, nodding when he saw we'd noticed them. Kyal, Laren and I began our trek down the beach again. Giles and Liri were go
od teachers and patient, but we never moved so fast in our lessons as we did when Cole and Sherra were here.

  Sherra

  I'd asked Cole to hide a small bag of Jubal's gold. He'd hidden it somewhere in my study, and neither Barth nor I had any clue where it was. What we did have was a single, small nugget from Jubal's stash, to link with the other.

  If we could.

  Barth fingered the nugget we had, his eyes closed as he worked his divination. I saw his mouth tighten after a few moments, before I saw anger passing over his features.

  He'd seen a part of Kaakos, no doubt.

  "I only see the intent," Barth set the nugget down on my desk. "I couldn't get past that, to see anything else."

  "It's probably just as well," I told him. "It may be the same as reading a coiled rattlesnake."

  "That concerns me," Barth said. "Very much."

  "Now that you have a feel for the intent," I said, "let's join hands and send out a search for the same elsewhere."

  My hope was that my usual talent for amplifying Barth's divination would come into play, and we could locate the hidden gold. I'd handled the nugget, just as Barth did, and Kaakos' malevolence was very apparent in it.

  When I gripped Barth's fingers in mine, I could tell he was working to recall the feel of the nugget.

  "Barth," I said, closing my eyes, "Lift the nugget in your free hand."

  His fingers tightened around mine the moment he lifted the nugget to connect with Kaakos' intent.

  With the two of us touching, in my mind, I saw the nugget throbbing in a purplish, black color. I saw what Barth was seeing in it. Casting about my study, I searched mentally for the same vibrating colors.

  There! Barth's mindspeak was sudden and almost made me jump.

  He'd found the answering signal from the other gold—hidden behind a vase on a corner shelf.

  "I'll be damned," Barth mumbled, letting go of my hand and stalking toward the vase. He lifted the bag of gold seconds later, as if it were a trophy to display. "You know we have to do this together, don't you?" He added after a moment. "There's no way I can do this on my own."

  "Maybe it's time to test it with other diviners—pooling your talents, like we've been pooling our shields and blasts," I pointed a finger at him. "And this is only across a room. We have to try it longer distances, too."