by Watson Davis
“Yes.” Shiyk’yath nodded. “She wanted you to run away from her. She told you to run away from her. So run away.”
Sifa pointed at him. “You go. Go to Morrin. I’m going back to the temple, and I’m going to bring her out. They won’t expect it.”
Alizadeh blinked his eyes and shook his head. “You are an insane little girl.”
“Fine,” Sifa said, snatching up a couple of sets of robes they’d stolen from the cleaners. “But have a wagon or something ready for me when I come out of the temple complex. You can do that much, right?”
“Yeah, sure.” Alizadeh shrugged and pursed his lips. “I guess.”
“Don’t guess. Do it,” she said, and she stormed out the door, fitting one of the cloaks over her clothes as she walked. Shiyk’yath chased after her.
“I’ll come with you to the gate,” he said, striding past her, “but I’m not going back in there. You can’t make me.”
She smiled. “Thank you.”
He burped.
A HUGE SECTION OF THE central tower’s wall had been blasted away, revealing the workrooms and offices inside. Sifa shuffled along a path once lined with trees thick with leaves that were now merely burned, smoking trunks. Glass from the shattered windows lay along the ground and crunched beneath Sifa’s boots. She closed off her nose and tried to breathe through her mouth, the air heavy with the stink of brimstone.
“I need a fire mage over here!” a priest with soot and blood smudged on his face called out, waving his hands. He glanced at Sifa with a question in his eyes, meeting her gaze for a heartbeat, the question hanging between them about whether Sifa was a fire mage.
She shook her head and shrugged, feeling the need to apologize.
He looked away, calling out again, “Fire mages? I need one!”
“I’m coming,” someone yelled. “Hold on!”
A priest walked by, moving his glowing hands left and right, his concentration on the walkway. With each of his movements, the puddles of water swept right and left, clearing the debris from the walkway.
Smoke and steam spiraled into the black sky, the steam coming from the still hot stones being sprayed down by water mages who pulled the rainwater up from the plaza in an intricate net of channels and then directed that water onto the stones to cool them down.
Sifa stood amid the sound and confusion, sweating beneath her robes, and she closed her eyes, reaching into her heart, touching that feeling and letting it guide her forward—until she saw Dyuh Mon speaking to Bishop Diyune. The Bishop limped along with his hand on Dyuh Mon’s forearm, the left side of his face swollen and bruised. Bishop Diyune’s clothes were tattered but the skin beneath appeared healthy enough for all it was stained by blood and sweat, recently healed and the worst of his wounds removed.
They strode toward Sifa, but were not looking at her.
Sifa found one priest helping another to walk. She rushed to the injured priest’s other side. “Can I help?”
“Oh, please, thanks,” the priest said, a young man, nice-looking with bright eyes and a strong chin. “It’s so crazy. Me—I’m Chad’thas—and my friend here, Yun-aik, just got in from Mendenen and everything just blew up in our faces. We don’t know where to go or anything.”
Diyune and Dyuh Mon strode by, arguing in angry voices, though Sifa couldn’t make out the words.
“I just got in from Ehseaft,” Sifa said, shaking her head. “I don’t know anything, either. I don’t know what to do or where to go. First day in the big city and I’m lost.”
Chad’thas laughed, and bent to look Sifa in the face. He said, “I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”
Sifa forced herself to grin, and she said, “Oh, I’m... ah... Sifa.”
“Ah-sifa?” Yun-aik asked, squinting his pain-filled eyes and studying her face. “Is that a common name in your realm?”
Sifa swallowed and licked her lips, looking back to make sure Diyune and Dyuh Mon had passed, struggling to keep from telling the young man that she was not Summoned. “In my realm?”
Yun-aik said, “I can’t help but noticing that you’re Summoned. And it’s an honor to meet you.” He inclined his head with a hint of deference. “But where are you from?”
Sifa thought back to the stories Ka-bes had told her, trying to remember some name of some realm, and she said, “Stone.”
“Oh?” Yun-aik gulped. “The Realm of the Stone Giants. You seem very... um... frail for such a place.”
Sifa smiled and shrugged. “I’m tougher than I look.”
“I didn’t realize the temples along the Ohkrulon were allowed to summon,” Chad’thas said.
“Really?” Sifa said. “Why not?”
“Well,” the injured priest said, his face scrunching up as though he’d been asked why water was wet, hopping on his one good leg with the two of them helping him bounce along. “All the old magics there from the First War make it a dangerous place, don’t they? All sorts of resonances between the realms, a thin veil there. All manner of creepy-crawlies sneaking through.”
Chad’thas nodded and said, “Seems a dangerous place to be performing a summoning, that’s all I’m saying.”
“Yeah, well.” Sifa rolled her eyes and smacked her lips. “There are plenty of creepy-crawlies running around the desert out there, what’s another one?”
Both priests chuckled.
Something flashed to Sifa’s left. She gasped, and stared back toward where the flash had come from.
Yun-aik said, “Is something wrong?”
“I’m sorry.” Sifa licked her lips. “I... um... I just realized there’s something I need to do.”
“Oh, sure,” Chad’thas said. “I’ve got him. We’ll be fine. It was nice meeting you.”
She bowed to them both, and then scampered toward a pile of stones from the temple that had been thrown into the plaza during the battle. Steam emanated from the rocks, bits of fire burning on them, and in the fire lay a rawhide string and a black gemstone with streaks like lightning, untouched by the flames—her necklace.
Sifa took a deep breath to prepare herself, then stuck her hand into the fire, stabbing her fingers at the string. She grabbed it, and jerked it out, clenching her jaw against the pain. She dropped it into a puddle, then eased her burning fingers in to soothe the throbbing. A bit of flame clutched the hem of her sleeve, searing her skin, so she swept her wrist through a puddle to douse the flame.
“What in Dispatro’s name do you think you’re doing, you mewling idiot?” someone said—a priestess, a beautiful woman with haughty eyes and a cruel mouth.
Sifa tumbled to the side, frightened, surprised, and she bowed, slapping her hand down on the necklace, her hand landing on the now invisible jewel. It seared into her hand, but she closed her fingers around it. Tears welled in her eyes, and her nose filled with snot, and she began to cry. “I... I’m sorry...”
“I know.” The priestess knelt beside her, placing her arm across Sifa’s shoulders. “Hush now. It’s over. The evil witch is all but dead in the infirmary. There’s nothing more to fear.”
Sifa struggled to control her breath, and she nodded, saying, “I know. I am sorry.”
“Victims are sorry,” the priestess said, her hands on Sifa’s shoulders. She stood, pulling Sifa slowly and gently to her feet. “You must be strong and you must never fear. Do not be a victim. Do you understand?”
Sifa nodded, not trusting herself to speak.
“You are not familiar to me,” the priestess said, touching Sifa’s cheek with the back of her hand, a movement surprising in its gentleness. “Who are you?”
Sifa took a deep breath, the pain now subsiding, but she kept her gaze from the woman’s eyes, keeping her own eyes averted as though shy. “I am Ah-sifa just come from Mendenen and I’m very confused.”
“With Chad’thas?” the priestess asked, her eyes squinting, seeming to be trying to catch Sifa in a lie.
Sifa nodded. “And Yun-aik, but they arrived before me, and I don’t
know where to go.”
“Ah,” the priestess said, her suspicious countenance now gone, replaced by a smile, and then a look of confusion and concern. “That explains that, but what were you doing with the fire? Trying to put it out? We have fire mages who’ll handle that.”
“Oh, um.” Sifa held up her throbbing left hand, letting a bit of the rawhide string fall out, the faint glitter of magic sparkling around it. “I dropped my good luck charm. My mother gave it to me and I wouldn’t want to lose it.”
“And you burned yourself, didn’t you?” the woman asked, her tone now accusatory, her face scrunched up in frustration and anger. “You acolytes... Not a brain amongst the lot of you. How bad is it? Hellfire can be damnably hard to douse, and it hurts like... well... it hurts like hell, as it should.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Sifa said, her head bowed, transferring her necklace to her good hand.
“Let me see your hand.” The priestess snatched Sifa’s hand and turned it over, palm up, and she shook her head. “Well, your good luck charm is not so lucky. Perhaps you should have just left it to burn.”
“But it’s from my mother,” Sifa whispered.
“Of course,” the priestess said, patting Sifa on the back, “not a brain between the lot of you. Go to the infirmary and tell them Vicar Noami Eshon sent you and for them to heal your burn.” She pushed Sifa toward the infirmary. “Go on, now. And don’t drop your lucky charm again unless you say a prayer and hurl it as far away from you as you can.”
“Thank you.” Sifa bowed and jogged to the infirmary, a tower with a colonnade leading up to the door, sitting against the outer wall near the north gate of the complex—the very place where the tugging in her heart compelled her to go. She slipped the necklace over her head under her hood, and a sense of relief flooded into her heart, a weight seeming to lift from her shoulders. The tears that had been building behind her eyelids seemed to evaporate.
Now sure of her victory, she darted up the steps to the infirmary, entering with two priests. Another priest, this one wearing the white robes of a healer stained with red splotches of blood, held up his hands, stopping all of them. “We’re very busy in here. What’re your injuries?”
One priest said, “We’re here to see my friend, Yak’el. We’ve heard he was badly injured and—”
“Now is not the time,” the healer said. “You’re going to have to go to wherever you’re bunking and come back when things calm down. Might be a few days.”
“But—”
“No.” The healer pointed back the way they’d come. “Get out of here.”
Sifa said, “But—”
“No!” the healer yelled. “Did I stutter? Are you hard of hearing?”
“I’m not with them,” she said, raising her burnt, stinging hand, palm up so he could see the damage. “Vicar Noami Eshon told me to come get myself healed up.”
He smiled at her and took her hand, guiding her through the door, through a cot-filled entry with priests and priestesses lying down and moaning, down some steps and into a big cavernous circular room that seemed so much bigger than the dome outside.
Cots filled the floor, arranged in neat circles, and magic flashed and strobed as healers worked at the cots, trying to minimize the damage and heal as much as they could.
“This is going to sting,” the healer said. He dipped his fingers into a salve sitting on a table by the head of a cot near the door. A man lay on the cot, his skin a horrid network of fissures and peeling flesh revealing the red muscles underneath and the bones of his jaw and teeth.
Sifa gasped and stared at the injured man, and then quickly averted her eyes, tears welling and blurring her vision. She whispered, “Will he recover?”
The healer ignored her and whispered a chant, then spread the salve across Sifa’s palm. The cold of it shocked her, spreading up her arm, ice-blue sparkles of magic rising from her skin and floating off, and then the cold transformed into a comforting warmth, the blue magic turning red. The burns faded, but left a mark on her palm, a triangle with rounded edges and one point stretching up to between her middle two fingers—the shape of the gemstone.
“Well, that’s unusual,” the healer said, stretching her hand, lifting it up closer to his face. He poked her palm with his finger, his face right up close. “But I guess you’ll heal just fine. No infection. Don’t overuse it. Try to keep it clean.”
He set the salve back on the table by the cot.
“Thank you.” She bowed slightly, awkwardly, then glanced at the injured man and whispered, “Will he heal?”
“She.” The healer glanced down, and shrugged. He placed his arm around Sifa’s shoulders, and guided her back to the door. “If the right gods be willing, she will. And if someone wishes to expend the energy and strength to put her right, she will be put right. But everything costs, whether it be a pact with a devil, a prayer to a god, or a casting of a spell, everything costs someone somewhere. Now, it’s time for you to leave.”
“Excuse me,” she said, resisting his guidance, bowing once more. “Could I just take a moment to find—?”
“Ah, no,” the healer said, shaking his head, his eyes hard and serious, his tone grim. “Everyone has a friend in here, and everyone wants to make sure they’re not dead or dying. But there are a lot of people in here working hard and if we let everyone in, they’ll just be in the way, and that will cost lives.”
“But sir, my mother was injured and I know she’s in there.” Sifa pointed the direction her heart told her, toward a specific cot over on the farthest side. “She’s just over there and I will keep out of everyone’s way.”
“Your mother?” the healer asked, waving his hand, magic coalescing around it.
“Yes,” she said, and the magic around his hand twinkled.
He blinked. “Well. You’re telling the truth? Fine. Listen. I healed you and told you to leave. Then I left you to your own devices and didn’t give you permission to hang around, right?”
She nodded. “Yes, sir.”
He stomped off toward the door, leaving her there.
SIFA EDGED UP TO THE cot, placing herself in such a position as to hide Che-su from prying eyes. She peered around to check if anyone was watching her.
Master healers stood and knelt at cots throughout the room, their magic whirling around them, their prayers reaching out to the gods, their chants mingling together in a crazy haze. Injured men and women, priests and priestesses, lay in their cots, some shifting around, crying out in pain, praying for themselves, screaming for painkillers, with other healers and their assistants rushing around, yelling orders.
Sifa choked back tears and knelt beside Che-su, placing one hand on her mother’s arm, reaching up with the other. She touched Che-su’s blood-spattered face—one eye swollen shut, an angry cut above the other, most of her blistered and burned. Her head tipped back, her body having been dumped unceremoniously on the cot, with her left leg sprawled over the side. Her right arm dangled over the far side of the cot, a chain connecting the shackle around her wrist to the floor.
Someone, probably one of the assistants, had thrown a blanket across her body, and it covered her up to her neck, the top edge of it over Che-su’s mouth. That edge moved up and down with her breath. Sifa took the edge of the blanket and folded it back away from Che-su’s face. Her hand moved down Che-su’s face, but near her neck it shrank back. A field of magic interacted with her hand—a dark, noxious magic. She yanked the blanket back.
A slave’s collar hugged Che-su’s neck.
With no back exits to the tower, the only way in or out was the doors through which she’d entered. Sifa closed her eyes and bowed her head as though in silent prayer and meditation, trying to calm her nerves.
I can’t carry her out of here. What am I going to do?
“Mother?” Sifa whispered, touching Che-su’s shoulder.
The tendrils pulsed, as though they heard Sifa, as though they were trying to respond to her. Sifa gulped.
She
placed her fingertips on the collar, ran them down it, found the node for which she searched and pinched. The collar disintegrated into black worms that fell from Che-su’s throat and disappeared, chittering, into the floor.
Sifa whirled, her hands on the cot, looking back, sure everyone would be staring at her, that this horrible racket would have drawn some attention, but with the screams and cries of the injured and the chanting of the healers, no one noticed.
She turned back to Che-su, touching her cheek, whispering, “Mother?”
Che-su’s eyes flew open. She gasped, sucking in air, filling her lungs. She struggled to rise, screaming the words of a spell, and magic swirled around her.
Sifa put her finger across Che-su’s lips. “Shh.”
The tension of the magic released into the air grew, an explosion building and about to go off. Che-su moved her left hand, tried to move her chained right hand, and whispered a counterspell, dissipating the magic she’d summoned before it could backlash.
Sifa leaned toward Che-su, putting her head near her mother’s, placing her hands on her mother’s shoulders and squeezing them, her heart exploding with joy. “We have to get you out of here.”
“What have you done?” Che-su whispered, her breath still heavy, ragged. “You should be far away from here by now.”
“I just—”
“You can’t be here!” Che-su craned her head to stare past Sifa’s shoulder. “Are you a fool? Did Ka-bes teach you nothing?”
“Ka-bes taught me loyalty and honor.” Sifa peered over at Che-su’s manacled right wrist. She reached across and touched the metal: steel, cold, no magic. “I am getting you out of here”—she tugged at the metal—“if I can figure out how to open this damned lock.”
Che-su touched Sifa’s cheek, turning her head so they peered into each other’s eyes. “You have to leave before Dyuh Mon realizes you’re still here. Vellin will stop at nothing to harvest your soul.”
“My soul?” Sifa shook her head and shrugged. “Whatever. I am not leaving without you again. You are not sending me away again. Let us be clear on those matters.” She yanked on the chain connecting Che-su’s manacle to the floor. “You do not belong to them. You belong to me.”