by E. C. Blake
“Good.” The Lady looked at her. “As you did with Whiteblaze, reach out for their magic. Remember, focus it on the amulet you wear, not on yourself. Draw it into the black lodestone crystal, and only then let it flow to you. Can you do that?”
“I . . . think so,” Mara said. She closed her eyes. There was no real reason to do so, but it helped her focus. She reached out, feeling the magic in the bodies of the young people around the table. To her Gifted senses, the amulet she wore seemed heavy and solid as lead. She tugged tentatively at the magic within the volunteers. It flowed out easily, far more easily than she had expected, and rushed toward her. She gasped, and barely managed to direct it away from her and into the black lodestone amulet.
She sensed the magic pouring into the crystal, far more than an ordinary urn of black lodestone could hold. But the feel was the same: and magic collected in black lodestone she knew well how to control.
She reached into the crystal and cautiously drew some out.
The power tasted like the raw magic she had drawn on so many times before, fresh and powerful and alive, but it flowed into her smoothly and, above all, painlessly. It filled a void inside her, the vacuum that could only be filled by the life-magic she had never before tasted without searing agony. Now it was just there, inside her, making her tingle from toe to crown. She heard a slight moan of pleasure and knew it had issued from her own mouth, but she was beyond feeling any embarrassment. Breath coming in short pants, she opened her eyes. The people around the table sat with heads bowed, as though half-asleep. She no longer cared what their names were.
“The stone,” the Lady said. “Can you lift it?”
Lift it? Mara thought contemptuously. I can do more than that.
She reached out with her magic, a lash of red fire that seized the stone and not only lifted it from the table but hurled it out the open window, driving it in a straight line unaffected by gravity until it vanished from her sight and she felt her connection to it vanish.
She turned to the Lady. “How was that?” she said, ready to be praised.
But the Lady glared at her through narrowed eyes. “Foolish,” she said coldly. “I hope there was no one under that rock where you lost control of it and it crashed down.”
Mara blinked. She hadn’t thought of that.
The Lady’s expression softened. “But as far as control of the power goes . . . that was excellent,” she said. “Excellent, and very encouraging.” She looked away from Mara to the six volunteers. “They will need time to regain their strength. Let us leave them to it. Walk with me.”
They went out from the chamber and back onto the battlements where Mara had stood earlier. “How did that feel?” the Lady asked.
“It’s hard to put into words,” Mara said. “But it was . . . good. No pain. And so much power . . .” She glanced at the Lady. “Would the amulet . . . could the amulet . . . also protect me from the . . . the ‘soulprints’ of those who die in my presence?” Or those I kill? she thought, but didn’t say out loud.
The Lady smiled. “Yes,” she said. “The potion blocks the nightmares. Whiteblaze can take them away. And the amulet keeps them from happening at all. If you are alert, and direct the magic from the dying person into the black lodestone crystal, it will have no impact on you at all.”
“Beyond the ordinary impact of a person’s death,” Mara said.
The Lady inclined her head. “Of course. I am not suggesting it prevents any emotional impact. But there is a difference between that and endless nightmares of the dead returning.”
Mara nodded. “Thank you again for this, then,” she said, touching the amulet. And then a new thought occurred to her. “These soulprints . . . the fact that magic is so intimately bound with a person’s thoughts and feelings . . . that’s how the Masks work, isn’t it? There’s a link between the Mask and the person’s mind, and the Watchers know how to read it.”
“Exactly,” the Lady said. “Which brings us to the subject of tomorrow’s lesson, since you passed today’s with such ease.” She smiled a little. “I’m going to show you how to make Masks—real Masks that will cling to and take the shape of their wearer’s face and not fall apart, but also Masks that tell the Watchers nothing. I will also teach you how to take an existing Mask and alter its magic so that it can no longer betray its wearer. If all goes as I hope when we move against Aygrima, you will not need that skill. But if things go awry . . . then you may. I have plans for more than one contingency.”
“Catilla’s dream come true,” Mara said. A Maskmaker at last. Daddy would be so proud . . .
She blinked away sudden tears. Then she frowned. “If you know how to make Masks . . . could you also make Masks that do what the Autarch’s newest ones do: drain a little magic all the time, and feed it to you constantly?”
The Lady’s smile vanished. “I could,” she said.
“And Masks that put some of your magic into those who wear them, so that you can control their thoughts and actions?”
“I could,” the Lady said. “But why would I? Those with sufficient command of the Gift can manipulate the magic that fills every living thing in endless ways . . . without Masks. I have that ability. I suspect you do, too.” Her smile returned. “But that is a concern for another day.” She looked down into the village. “No more lessons today. There is work in the village that requires my assistance. Every year when the ground thaws there are buildings that need repair. The villagers do most of the work themselves, of course, but in an emergency—if a building appears in imminent danger of collapse—I lend a touch of magic. Hamil has identified several structures he would like me to help with.”
“Can I come with you?” Mara said.
The Lady glanced at her. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Why?”
“You just used your amulet for the first time to draw magic from humans,” the Lady said. “You should rest.”
“I feel fine.”
“I’m sure you do. But I am your teacher and your guardian.” She put a hand on Mara’s, to emphasize her statement. “Trust that I know best, Mara. Stay in the fortress.”
Mara said nothing.
“I will be back in time for our evening meal together,” the Lady said. She turned and walked back into the tower, leaving Mara alone.
Mara stared out at the unMasked Army’s tents, fuming. “I feel fine,” she muttered again. In fact, she felt better than fine. She felt elated, thrilled, excited. She was gaining control of her Gift/curse at last. She wanted to tell someone about it, someone who would understand what that meant to her.
She wanted to tell Keltan.
The Lady would be using the waterwheel-driven lift to descend to the village. But Mara, true to her promise when she’d first arrived on that infernal device, had long since discovered the narrow trail that the wolves used. Filled with snow and ice, it had looked terribly steep and dangerous. But the snow and ice were mostly gone. And if the wolves could do it . . .
She glanced at Whiteblaze. But not him, she thought. Not this time. It would be hard to sneak through the village with one of the Lady’s wolves at her side.
She went into the tower and back to her room, Whiteblaze trotting happily at her side. She took her warmest cloak, which had the added benefit of having a large hood useful for hiding her face, and then went back to the door. “Stay,” she told Whiteblaze. Obediently, he lay down, tail thumping. But he whined as she closed the door on him.
Alone, Mara hurried through the fortress’ labyrinth of corridors until she emerged into a courtyard on the west end of the fortress, where it overlooked a narrow ravine that opened between the spur of the mountain on which the castle stood and the vastly larger bulk of the mountain proper beyond. An opening at the base of the wall, too low for a human to pass through without crawling but just right for a wolf, gave access to the wolves’ trail, which zig
zagged down the side of the ravine. Not all the ice had melted from it, and halfway down Mara slipped and fell painfully onto her rear, sliding a few heart-stopping feet before catching herself by jamming her boots against a boulder with a bone-jarring impact. Sore and shaken, she clambered to her feet again and made the rest of the descent at a snail’s pace.
At the bottom she followed the ravine downhill to the right, emerging onto a stone-paved road that snaked up the mountain in one direction and led to a small side gate of the village in the other. The camp of the unMasked Army was on the other side of the river. To get to it, she’d have to enter the village and cross one of its three bridges, unless she wanted to travel miles down the valley, and she didn’t have time for that. The danger, of course, was that the Lady, who had forbidden her to come, was somewhere in the village, and Mara had no way of knowing where.
She also had no way of knowing just how angry the Lady would be at her for disobeying her and sneaking out to see Keltan. She didn’t particularly want to find out. Well, she thought, at least I’ve had lots of practice sneaking through streets without being seen, dodging Watchers after curfew in Tamita!
Although to be sure that had been at night, not broad daylight . . .
Steeling herself, she pulled the hood of her cloak up over her head, though it was really too warm for it, and slipped through the gate.
She wondered where the road she had followed led, up the mountain—a mine, perhaps? She had seen no one on it, and the street on the other side of the gate from it was likewise empty. She slipped along that street, splashing through puddles and dodging the drifts that still clogged the shadows. The stone buildings, sturdy and warm and well-built, would not have looked out of place in the better-off sections of Tamita. Well, the Lady’s father was a builder, Mara reminded herself. She wondered what the village had looked like when the Lady had arrived there as a teenager. Surely not like this. She really has made a difference in their lives . . .
Even as she thought it, she rounded the corner of a tall stone house and found herself no more than twenty feet from the Lady herself. Mara gasped and ducked back behind the corner, heart pounding. Fortunately, the Lady had had her back to her. After she’d caught her breath, Mara peered around the corner again to see what the Lady was doing.
Arilla stood in the middle of a small courtyard, peering up, hands outstretched, at the house directly opposite Mara. Hamil stood beside her, along with others she recognized as belonging to the Lady’s Cadre.
A flare of red light made Mara flinch before she realized she was seeing magic, not fire. The red glow encased the building opposite for an instant. The grinding sound of stone on stone filled the air. Then, both the glow and the sound abruptly ceased.
Around the Lady, three of the villagers sank to their knees, heads bowed, just as she had seen all of them do when the Lady had stopped the avalanche from destroying the camp. She took magic from them, Mara thought. Why them, and not the wolves?
Then she realized that, for maybe the first time since she’d met her, the Lady had no wolves with her. Where has she sent them? Mara looked around uneasily. She still didn’t know exactly how the Lady used the wolves’ eyes. What if they’re hiding all around the village as spies? What if one of them is watching me now?
And then she got a shock as she realized she was being watched—but not by a wolf. Hamil, who had not been affected by the Lady’s draw of magic, had turned his head and was looking straight at her.
She jerked back behind the house, heart pounding again. She waited for a shout, for the Lady to come around the corner of the house, for something to happen . . . but nothing happened at all except that she heard voices going away from her. She peered around the corner again as carefully as she could.
The courtyard was empty.
Mara took a deep breath, and hurried on.
She managed to avoid being seen again until she reached the easternmost bridge. The village streets didn’t exactly bustle anywhere, compared to Tamita, but there were still a score or more villagers out and about, because shops stood at both ends of the bridge: baker, shoemaker, candlemaker, tailor. But at least the Lady wasn’t in sight. There’s no reason the villagers should be surprised to see me, she told herself. They don’t know the Lady told me not to come down here.
It still took her a minute or two to work up the nerve to step into the open, from the narrow space between the tailor’s and the baker’s, and walk toward the bridge, an elegant stone arch erected, no doubt, by magic. The village seemed too small to need three bridges: Mara suspected the Lady had built them in tribute to her father, and the thought made her feel closer to the Gifted young girl the Lady had once been. If I’d known her then, we might have been friends, she thought. With the same Gift in common, the same fears . . .
...the same enemy . . .
The villagers turned to look at her as she strode toward the bridge. She slipped the hood back from her face and gave them bright smiles. No one smiled back. She couldn’t tell what they were thinking, but they didn’t look afraid. In fact, they looked . . .
Hopeful?
Now why would she think that?
As she crossed the bridge, she met a woman coming the other way. The woman stopped dead, mouth open. “Hello,” Mara said.
The woman’s mouth clicked closed. “Hello,” she said. “I . . . you’re . . .”
“Mara Holdfast,” Mara said.
The woman stepped closer. “Is it true?” she whispered. “You have the same Gift as the Lady? You’re as powerful as she is?”
“I don’t know,” Mara said. “My gift is similar, but of course she’s far more experienced . . .”
“Help us,” the woman said, so softly Mara could barely hear her. “Help . . .” And then she looked past Mara and, sudden terror on her face, slipped by and hurried away.
Mara glanced back . . . and saw one of the Lady’s wolves trotting across the courtyard behind her, seemingly unconcerned with her presence or the presence of the villagers, though they all drew back from it.
The wolf disappeared between two buildings. Did it see me? Has the Lady seen me?
Those uneasy possibilities propelled her on across the bridge and into the streets beyond. A few minutes later she hurried out through the village’s main gate, hood once more drawn up over her head, and, two minutes after that, into the camp of the unMasked Army.
There was no point hiding her face there. They all knew who she was. And even though she knew many of them blamed her for what had happened to the Secret City, she would not slink among them. She pulled back her hood and strode boldly into the camp.
There weren’t very many people in among the tents: presumably many were in the village, doing . . . whatever it was Catilla and Arilla had arranged for them to do. Chopping wood? Carrying water? Digging holes? Mara was uneasily aware she didn’t have a clue how the affairs of the camp had been ordered.
Which meant there was no guarantee Keltan was even in the camp—a little flaw in her scheme she rather wished she’d thought of before she was actually walking toward his tent . . . assuming he was still using the same tent he had shared with Hyram during the journey to the village, recognizable by a distinctive black patch sewn into the white canvas.
He wasn’t there . . . but Hyram was.
The great-grandson of the leader of the unMasked Army emerged from the tent as Mara approached. For a moment he looked blankly at her as if he didn’t recognize her; then he straightened abruptly. “What are you doing down here? Shouldn’t you be with your precious Lady?”
Mara felt a surge of anger, but pushed it down. Hyram had plenty of reason to dislike her, but he had saved her from falling overboard from Chell’s flagship, Protector, during the storm that had driven them ashore. He might no longer be a friend, and the infatuation he had shown with her when she had first arrived at the Secret City was gone without a trace, but
he wasn’t her enemy.
“I’m looking for Keltan,” she said levelly. “Do you know where he is?”
“He’s with my great-grandmother,” Hyram said. “Talking about you, I suspect.”
He’s trying to hurt you, Mara told herself, still holding her anger in check. “And where is she?”
“Arilla has provided her with a house in the village,” Hyram said. “Just inside the gate. You must have walked right by it. You didn’t need to come out here at all.”
“If I hadn’t, we wouldn’t have had this lovely conversation,” Mara said. She tried again to force down her anger. “Hyram, I’m sorry for what happened. How long are you going to hold it against me?”
“I don’t know,” Hyram said. “How long will my friends who died defending the Secret City stay dead?”
Mara’s anger ran away from her, then, slipped through her fingers like water, even as she tried to hold onto it to shield herself from the dagger-thrust of his words. Her eyes blurred with tears. “I’m sorry, Hyram,” she whispered. “I knew them, too. I’m so, so sorry.”
“You already said that.” Hyram’s voice did not thaw at all. “Better go find your friend. He’s the only one you’ve got down here.”
Blindly, Mara turned and stumbled away from the tent and back through the camp, back toward the village. So many mistakes, she thought. So many wrong decisions. So many people hurt and killed because of me . . . by me.
But all of that pain and suffering, she reminded herself, as she slunk out of the camp she had promised herself only a few minutes before she wouldn’t slink into, could be laid ultimately at the feet of the Autarch. The Masks were his creation. The mine of magic operated by the slave labor of the brutalized unMasked served him. The Watchers who manned it, the Watchers who had attacked the Secret City, were his warriors. The magic that had driven Chell’s ships ashore after they had rescued the unMasked Army had been triggered at his command.
Everything came back to the Autarch. And only one person had the power, and a plan, to defeat him: the Lady of Pain and Fire.