He stopped pacing to stare her down. Still, she was silent and blank-faced, her face pale and her shoulders slumped.
“Will you say nothing?” he asked, daring her to fight with him. To show anger. To prove she cared enough to fight for him here as well as on the battlefield.
She dropped her gaze to the floor.
“You’d rather lose me now than in Sulit,” he said, guessing at what hid in her core. The presumption of her thoughts incensed him, but he managed to control the anger long enough to wait for her answer.
Her eyes rose slowly, meeting his, and he saw they were drowning in tears. Resh cursed again, more violently. He was right, then. She cared for him, but she thought she was saving him by pushing him away now.
It was stupid, but it was all she knew.
He couldn’t combat a lifetime of ignorance with a single conversation, though. Only time would teach her new ways.
“Fine.” His voice was flat, his anger pulled away with each drop sliding down her cheeks, leaving only a great emptiness. “I’ll be around, Your Majesty.” He bowed deeply, unable to stop the mocking words or the overly-polite gesture. With the fire of anger doused, all that remained were the bitter, blackened embers.
Resh pivoted and strode from the room, intent on getting as far from the Queen of Riata as he could without leaving the palace grounds.
He hoped - no, prayed - that she would come for him. That she would regret. But now he’d seen how much Coren had changed outwardly while still managing to remain the same inside. She was still terrified to place her trust in anyone. She always believed she should do everything herself, even if she doubted her ability to make it through.
Stalking through the halls with pretended purpose, Resh suddenly found himself in the wing he knew contained Lord Gernant’s office. A spark of an idea flared to life, and his desire to prove Coren wrong fanned the tiny flame. He would be useful, after all.
Shifter magic may have overlooked his blood, but he could still become powerful with Riatan alchemy.
Locating the correct door, Resh knocked. There was such a long pause that he almost turned away.
“Come,” a voice called finally, laced with annoyance.
“Lord Gernant,” Resh said, bowing as he opened the door enough to slip inside. “I hope my visit is no trouble.”
Gernant merely watched him, not committing to an answer.
“I’d like to ask your help in some matter. I’m prepared to offer payment,” he added. This man would want something - he was sure.
“You’re the Weshen without magic,” Gernant stated. Resh gritted his teeth, nodding. “You want me to give you some of ours.”
“I wish to be helpful to my Queen,” Resh admitted, surprised as the truth slipped from his lips.
“What payment are you prepared to offer?”
“What payment do you require?” Resh parlayed.
Gernant raised a thin eyebrow, considering Resh for several long seconds. “Silence, for one. My methods are secret. My position has always depended on others’ inability to replicate my results.”
Resh nodded, forcing away any hesitation. He could always back out later. “Of course.”
“I will bind you to your promise,” Gernant warned. Resh shrugged. He’d guessed much of the Riatan alchemy used Sulit spells to reinforce it. But there were plenty of people who could break a binding spell if needed. He could always visit Shanta in EvenFall.
“Can you bring me your brother’s blood before he sails for Sulit? And the prince’s?” Gernant asked.
Resh balked. “Why?”
“Research,” Gernant answered. “Shifter magic comes from shifter blood. I could always use new samples to compare.”
Resh studied Gernant. The Lord would have no issue with lying, of course. The blood could be used for Umbren magic.
“You know I will get their blood regardless of whether you help,” Gernant said. “I already have Corentine’s. And vials from nearly everyone in the palace, including the Wesh your Queen is sending home and the witches we captured on the docks. A man has to have a hobby.”
Resh snorted. Gernant was worse than a back-alley witch. But he had a point. Blood wasn’t exactly difficult to take. It would make more sense for Resh to do this and get something out of it. If he waited, he would lose the opportunity.
“How much?”
Gernant opened a drawer and drew out two vials the size of a thumbnail. “Very little. You lose more than this shaving.”
Resh took a deep breath. “All right.”
“And you will let me keep some of yours?”
Resh sighed, tiring of the barter. “If blood is all you need, Gernant, then yes. Yes again. Blood is simple.”
Gernant smiled then, his thin lips stretching wide over perfect teeth. “No. No, my young man. Blood is one of the most complex sources in the world. For me, it is like a currency all its own.”
“Then it is a currency I am prepared to pay.” Resh knew he sounded impatient, but he’d stopped caring. He reached for the vials and pocketed them.
“Wonderful. Bring me your payment, and we’ll begin.” Gernant’s eyes slipped over Resh, measuring him.
Resh bowed again, though not deeply, and left the room, strolling the palace halls at a more leisurely pace. He would show Coren.
He would show them all.
Second Son, magic-less supplicant to the distant, silent twin Magi. These weaknesses would no longer exist.
Beginning today, Resh would claim a new sort of magic. He’d be strong enough to stand by Coren’s side and protect her from anything. Together, they could change everything.
Chapter 22
SAFE IN THE DEEP COVER of the Sulit woods, Penna and Kosh were settling into the cottage in the clearing with the natural resilience of children. Much more easily than StarSeer herself, whose dreams had been filled with winding, smoke tendrils of dark memories.
Kashar continually made himself useful, unable to sit still. He hunted meat for the children and helped fix leaks in the thatched roof and cracked spots in the window frames and the cotes for the duskdoven which still hadn’t abandoned the cottage.
Kosh had already read all of her small library, barely a dozen books of magic and history. He and Penna had set about learning basic Sulit spells, much to their father’s dismay.
“Encouraging them will draw nothing but attention,” he argued to Star as he helped her fix a leaky windowsill. It would have been easier if he’d been a shifter, though. He was making a mess of its pretty violet paint.
“There is enough attention on them already,” she returned. “They are better having weapons of their own, especially until they learn to shift. Blades of magic reach much farther than those of steel, and they cut deeper.”
Kashar glowered at her, but he didn’t dispute this, at least. Both of them knew their respite here in the forest was only temporary. Eventually, they would need to fight, whether it be witches or Riatans or, Sulit Mother forbid, shadows.
“Father!” Kosh came running at them, excitement awakening his serious face. Of the twins, he had been the one to take to Kashar. “Father, Penna’s mastered a new trick. Come see!”
He tugged at his father’s hand, and Star saw the awe the man held for the boy. Her heart warmed that this bit of family had come together under her roof. Following them to the edge of the bank in the center of her clearing, she peered around Kashar to see what magic Penna had managed.
Kashar’s sharp intake of breath yanked her closer, and she gulped at what lay spread before them. What was she seeing?
“Can a shifter control fire?” she whispered to Kashar. For this was no simple Sulit spell. Kosh settled next to his sister, gazing at the flames dancing around her fingers and down her arms, disappearing between the threads of her tunic and back again on the other arm, like a game of hide-and-seek.
Star didn’t have much knowledge of shifter magic, but she knew it only controlled the physical sources of the world around them. Fi
re had no source. It was heat and combustion, not matter.
Kashar moved closer, peering at his daughter’s work. “I believe she’s shifting the sources that burn, and the rest is simple illusion,” he finally responded. “I have no idea how she avoids burning her skin, though,” he added, his voice low with awe. “That must surely be a spell.”
Penna, still flat on her back, cut her eyes to them and smiled. She lifted both hands into the air and cooed into the canopy above. Starbirds flitted down from the branches and wove between her palms, dancing just above the fire floating between her fingers. The tips of their wings should have singed in the flames, but they remained unharmed, singing haunting notes as they moved like the shooting stars they were named for.
“It’s just a FireFalse spell.” Penna giggled, calling the magic back to her. “The trees told me a story about it last night, and so I tried it. It’s easy.” The birds hopped away, one pausing to drink from the edge of the water. Kosh reached to pet it with a single finger, and the tiny creature allowed it, preening beneath its wing as he smoothed its silvery white feathers.
“What else have you learned?” Kashar asked.
Penna shrugged. “Just a few pretty things.”
Kashar didn’t push his daughter, though Star wished he would. FireFalse was a complex spell, something that should be too difficult for someone without Sulit blood. It was much more challenging to create illusions than to pull at reality. If Kashar didn’t begin asking questions soon, Star decided she would.
She sensed a bit too much pride in Penna. Pride in magic was always discouraged among the Sulit because it often drew the darker emotion of jealousy.
And once jealousy mingled with a witch’s spells, they became dark like a sooty smoke and dirty like ash smeared across the pages of a book. Star shuddered. This stain had turned friends into Brujok too many times.
GRANDSCREAM WAS THE first to land her narrow, single-rider boat at the edge of SunMelt Lake, several hundred paces north of the Conqueror’s Channel. Using that entrance before had been a mistake, and she’d adjusted. This time, the Brujok would sneak into Riata unannounced, send their message, kill what soldiers they could, and leave the palace vulnerable and full of fear.
Two dozen witches followed her, silent on the lake, each with her own separate assignment. Witches didn’t fight in rows like the Riatans - they would spread through the forest like spies.
Grand grinned into the early morning fog, breathing deeply of the forest scents. These trees didn’t speak to her, but they would still be useful cover. Stepping onto the narrow strip of beach, she tugged her boat farther up, tying it to a nearby tree. Her magic was begging to be loosed, pulsing in her chest even harder than her own heart.
As she walked into the woods, new shoots of green twined up from the dew-damp earth, young saplings responding to her spell, growing faster and faster. She daubed them with paste from a green glass jar as she passed, and the ends began to smoke like wet logs, burning gray-green and pungent. The saplings grew until they were as tall as the older oaken, then taller, filling the air thickly with smoke.
Other Brujok were now doing the same, fanning out beside and behind GrandScream, as they all made their winding ways toward the palace. WarWind pushed them along faster than they could ever run, their feet gliding over the forest floor as they rode the breezes.
Reaching the maze in minutes instead of hours, Grand used a bit of old-fashioned fire to catch a few dry leaves. She snickered to herself as they caught much too quickly. An early autumn wind lifted the smoke and encouraged the flames. Grand added a bit of her own magic to spur the breeze along, pulling the tendrils of air from her own throat in a silent scream.
She wasn’t as strong with this skill as WarWind, but it would do.
Now that the maze was aflame, all that was left was to remove the wards, and StarsHelm’s legendary defenses would be meaningless.
Grand strode around the outside edges of the enormous maze, painstakingly unweaving the tendrils of the same spells she had set as a much younger witch, first beginning her time under Mara. It gave her a delicious sense of accomplishment to overthrow this twisted symbol of Brujok slavery.
Yes, slavery - this whole maze was nothing more than an unnatural overgrowth of vine and witchery. Grand’s gaze hardened as she thought of how quickly the alliance between Mara and the Brujok leaders had shifted from mutual goals to Mara’s dominance. But by the time they realized her duplicity, she had become too entrenched in their world.
A cry came from her left, breaking Grand from her mutterings. She cocked her head and realized she could hear heavy footsteps in the distance, and shouts beginning above the crackle of the maze. She laughed with glee. The battle was beginning. She stretched her muscles into a run, rushing her way through the rest of the wards. She was eager to smell Riatan blood on the air.
The entire maze was blazing now, and the smoke had floated forward with the wind, now hanging over the palace like a cloud of doom. Grand grinned and cackled at their plans coming alive.
She caught glimpses of soldiers rushing down the hill toward the forest, but their learned lines and ranks were lost in the smoke and fire. The new saplings crowded the forest floor, forcing them onto a narrow path, rife with witches ready to attack.
Grand took a deep breath, tasting the metallic scent of blood and weapons and the cloying sweetness of smoke on her tongue. She had planned well, and today the Brujok would be victorious.
Shrieking, she clashed her way into the battle. She tapped into her Sulit affinity for plants and raised new growth from the ground around the Riatan soldiers as they neared, chanting swift spells to grow the vines longer and tougher, and with deadly thorns.
She guessed each witch could easily capture and kill two or even three soldiers at once, especially such untrained ones as these. But this time she had instructed them to go more slowly, to feed the ego of the soldiers. Their mission today was not one of death, but of destruction. Some would be killed - the witches did love blood. But truly - they were preparing for a future attack.
Soon, the people of StarsHelm would reach a tipping point of fear. After today, they would have no maze, no forest, and no idea when to expect the witch’s wrath again.
Then, Grand guessed, they would be open to a treaty. Or to a crushing defeat, if diplomacy didn’t work.
Grand licked her lips as she bound a soldier in thick, thorny vines. She knew she should wish for a treaty so her sisters could take the palace easily, but really she hungered for the Riatans’ defeat.
A different sort of shriek filled the air above, and Grand knew the Vespa Queen had arrived. Another roared and crashed through the burning trees - this would be the Grizzlin General.
But there were no other creature sounds, and Grand couldn’t help but snicker that the Lord of Witches still had not merged with a MagiCreature. If she had to guess, she would say Lord was safe in the palace, keeping his hands clean.
She sprinted in the direction of the young Grizzlin, lashing out at a passing soldier with enough vines to take him down but not kill him. The Grizzlin was loud, but Grand couldn’t seem to find him. He was always a few steps ahead of her.
As she neared the heart of battle, she found a few of the soldiers brandishing weapons made with talismans to ward away the smoke and vines.
She burst through a clump of new saplings and spotted a soldier fighting very well against WarWind. The stupid witch wasn’t even using her natural power over the wind but was instead toying with the man. Grand watched as War bound one of his arms to his body with her breath, ducking his thrusting sword, then released him, only to bind the other arm.
War could be at this all day, Grand knew. She was always slow to strike. He was growing tired, though.
“Finish him,” she shrieked at her sister. War grinned and danced closer, switching the man’s bound arms yet again. But this time she was too slow. Too close.
Grand shrieked in rage as the man slipped a dagger from his bel
t, tearing it across War’s neck and leaving a jagged, gaping hole where her heart vein was. War gurgled and tried to yell, but her knees buckled, her life spilling on the ground before her head hit the earth.
The wind died away from the man as she died, and he whirled, locking eyes with Grand.
“Filthy male,” she screamed, yanking more vines from the ground, growing the thorns as long as her own fingers. He hacked at them with his sword, but they only regrew, faster and faster, locking him in a ring of deadly green-brown blades.
Grand smiled in satisfaction as panic grew in his eyes, and she snapped her fingers together, bringing the vines toward each other, spearing the soldier from all sides. The dripping blood called to her, offering her strength and satiety, but she turned away.
There were more Riatans to find.
THE ATTACK WAS UNLIKE anything Resh had imagined. He’d been trained to fight with steel and wood, and he’d learned the witches’ tricks with vines and smoke. But the Brujok here were something different.
All around him, the battle raged. The unnatural rolling of the ground kept his feet scrambling. Trees fell as their roots unearthed, and they blazed with fire but were not consumed. Witches screamed in pleasure while soldiers screamed in pain.
Still, he’d managed to find and kill one witch. The others had refused to fight, merely drawing him in only to dart away. Resh remembered how Coren had guessed Mara was playing games, and this was how he felt now. He’d never admit it to Coren after their argument, but he was fighting fear as much as magic right now.
Resh hacked his way through the green saplings and thorn-studded vines to where he could at least glimpse Sy and Coren. Their magic was phenomenal to watch, and Resh nearly forgot where he was for a second as his widened eyes took in the great Grizzlin and shrieking Vespa shredding their foes, shifting the horrid vines and tree limbs into nothing but green mist and wood shavings.
Suddenly, a rope as thick as his arm wrapped around Resh, and he screamed as though life were leaving him. He felt it was. The rope was not a rope, but a living vine of thorns grown as long and cruel as Coren’s Vespa claws.
Dream of Darkness and Dominion (SoulShifter Book 3) Page 22