The Crown of Stones: Magic-Scars

by C. L. Schneider

  I almost told him I’d solved that problem already. Except being unable to access the crown’s magic was as useless as not having it, so I said simply, “I’m working on it.”

  “If there’s nothing else then?” Malaq began to rise from his chair.

  Sienn beat him to it. “There is another solution. We let Draken set sail for Doratae while Ian concentrates solely on repairing the crown. When it’s done we send him through a door and he destroys them—all of them, in the middle of the sea; away from the realms. The loss of unwanted life is minimal. The bulk of the eldring will be gone. Draken and his armies will be gone. We’ve all seen what being cut off from Ian has done to Jarryd. Draken’s death would make Jem more vulnerable than ever.”

  Half the room was standing so I joined them. “Let’s be clear. You’re suggesting the slaughter of nearly an entire race of creatures that damn sure didn’t choose to be involved in any of this, as well as thousands of Langorians. Some of which might be willing to turn against the old ways and follow Malaq. Some already have and are only remaining in Draken’s army to act as spies for our side. Are we really going to repay that by cutting them down?” She didn’t reply, and I took it farther. “My father is training Shinree to fight for Draken, Sienn. There could be Shinree on those boats.”

  “I know. But you’re capable of ending this.”

  “So are you.”

  “No, I can’t.”

  “Yes, you can. You’re an erudite. You have access to the same spells I do. So go ahead. There’s no reason I have to carry the title of mass murderer all by myself.”

  “You don’t understand.” Sienn’s eyes darted around, as if she were wishing we were alone. “I can’t cast spells of harm.”

  “Since when? You certainly harmed a tavern full of people the night we met. Then there was that bastard in Ula who stabbed me. You showed him no mercy.”

  Color drained from her skin. “That was a long time ago.”

  “So my battle spells are suddenly beneath you now?”

  “That’s not it, Ian.” Tentatively, she said, “Jem took them.”

  “What do you mean, he took them?”

  “He took my ability to access your line. It’s why I don’t help defend the camp. It’s why I stopped fighting back in prison.” Sienn’s voice became a strained whisper. “It’s why I stopped fighting you.”

  Hands clenched, jaw tight, I bit back my simmering rage. “How?”

  “I’m not sure. It was some kind of ritual. He killed one of the prisoners and poured his blood on the stones. I’d never seen anything like it.” Shivering at the memory, Sienn wrapped her arms around herself. She looked so fragile. “Jem’s focus is nothing like when I trained him. It took him several tries to get the working right. But after…I couldn’t access a single soldiery spell. The line, the emotions that feed it, the hostility and aggression… I don’t have them anymore.” Biting her lip, she struggled not to cry. “You can’t know what it’s like. To have no outlet for your anger, to want to hurt someone back and not have the will to do it.”

  She was talking about me.

  Giving up her fight, Sienn sobbed and ran from the tent. I moved to go after her, but Krillos grabbed my arm. “Let her go. She needs to work this out on her own.”

  I jerked away from him. “You mean without me?”

  “No,” Kit said, giving Krillos a disapproving frown. “He means Sienn has to accept it for herself. We all know what happened isn’t your fault.”

  “Why the fuck does everyone keep saying that? It is my fault, Kit. Sienn is a fucking mess, yet you all excuse my part in it because it suits you. You overlook my blunders and my ill deeds, no matter how many people suffer. You justify the pain I’ve caused because it doesn’t fit well with your idea of the hero you want me to be. That’s what Liel did, and that’s why I had to put a fucking axe in his head. So I suggest the rest of you wake the hell up and see me for who and what I am. I’m a Reth. A weapon. A killer. That’s what Sienn needs to accept—that’s what you all need to accept.”

  I left. No one tried to stop me. I barged out of the tent with no direction in mind, wanting only to walk, to drift through the camp until I could get Sienn’s eyes out of my mind. I kept wondering how much more pain they could hold. And what they would look like happy. I couldn’t ever remember seeing them that way.

  My wandering had led me not far from Bartlett’s. Looking for something stronger than ale, I turned toward his tent—and ran smack into Neela.

  Startled, she backed up. “I was looking for you.”

  “Not now.” I spun and went the other way.

  “Show some respect,” she called after me. “I am Queen.”

  In mid-stride, I turned and gave her a quick bow. “Not now, Your Grace.”

  Neela ran to catch up. Her sprint loosening the mound of curls on her head, she threw up a quick hand to stem their fall. “That wasn’t funny.”

  “If you don’t like it, then stop playing that card with me.”

  “I’m not playing, Ian. You’re Shinree. I come from generations of royal blood. We are not equals.”

  “Huh. Those nights in the swamp, I swear I slept in the same muck you did.”

  “Not by choice, I assure you.”

  “This conversation isn’t by choice either.”

  “Well. I see this was a mistake. I only wanted to say goodbye.”

  I stopped dead in my tracks. I was going to argue the point, as I had a dozen times. Despite reality dampening my fantasy of Neela, despite our disagreements on about everything, I cared what happened to her. I wanted Neela safe, which she most definitely wouldn’t be if she returned to Langor. But the more time I was in the woman’s presence, the less I wanted to be. “Excuse me,” I said.

  I walked off. I heard her following. She stayed a few steps behind as I wound through the camp to my tent. I didn’t think she would actually come inside. When she did, the intrusion earned her my candid opinion.

  “He’ll kill you,” I said, stripping off my sword belt and tossing it. “And I shouldn’t give a damn if he does.”

  Neela glided around in front of me. “But you do.”

  “What do you want, for me to beg you not to go back?”

  “I want you to say you understand why I must go back. Everything I’ve ever done has been for Rella, Ian. Why can’t you see that?”

  “What does it matter what I see? Do you need someone to validate your sham marriage that badly?”

  “I may not have a sword on my belt or blood on my hands, but I have done what I could. Life is not as it was. My people enjoy no luxuries under Draken’s rule. But he no longer wars against them. We have peace, Ian.”

  “A lack of war doesn’t mean peace.”

  “It may not be the unity Malaq envisions, but progress has been made.”

  “Is that what you tell yourself when you lie down with that bastard?”

  Neela raised a hand. But we’d done this dance before.

  “Don’t.” I caught her wrist. She tried to pull away and I tightened my grip. “I’m not your property, Your Grace. And I’m not disposable. You can’t take me out to play when the mood strikes, turn your nose up at me when it doesn’t, and then expect me to fall in line.” I shoved her away. More of her curls came loose. They hung about her face, making her appear young and vulnerable in a way that immediately dampened my anger. “Damn it, Neela, Draken will not tolerate you consorting with me. You know that.”

  Rubbing her wrist, she sighed. “But if I don’t return, Draken will consider our agreement broken. He will send men into Rella and resume the slaughter of my people.”

  “Malaq is Rella’s King now. He won’t let that happen.”

  “Malaq is King in name only. He isn’t ready to show his hand. Until he does…” Fussing with her disheveled hair, Neela started pulling out the pins; letting it fall a section at a time. “I am forced to do what I must to prevent their suffering.”

  “You aren’t preventing anything by
staying with Draken. Do you think these people would be living in a swamp if they could live safely in their own homes?” I was about to tell her to stop being so naïve, when a pang shot through my stomach.

  Another followed, and another.

  The fourth one doubled me over.

  “What is it?” Neela hurried to my side. “What’s wrong?”

  Wrapping an arm around my waist, I groaned as the pain struck again. This one was stronger than the rest, and I folded, as waves of wrenching hot stabs danced through my gut. Their touch was deep and long, and rolling, like skeins of steel goring through me—so much, I had to lift my shirt to be sure nothing was there. But something was.

  With a cry, I scrambled back.

  “Let me look.” Reaching out, Neela lifted my shirt and gaped at the thick, black veins of magic squirming across my stomach. Wriggling, thrashing like a nest of snakes, with each move, energy pulsed through me—too hard and fast to be anything close to enjoyable.

  The lines coiled tighter. A thumping pain struck my head. Shaking, my insides constricting, a rapid, fierce hunger overcame me: I wanted to cast. There was so much building in me. I had to let it out.

  Then, abruptly, the snakes moved inward. They burrowed deeper, out of view, back into the home I gave them; taking the pain and the cravings like they never existed.

  Neela let go of my shirt. “What was that?”

  Out of breath, it took me a second to answer. “The Crown of Stones.”

  Her stunned gaze met mine. “You found its power? You have it inside you?” My nod seemed to excite her. “Why are you holding it? You need to put it back.”

  “I don’t think it wants to go.”

  “It won’t go? Or you won’t let it? You can’t have that magic, Ian. You can’t keep it.” Unmistakable threat darkened her voice. “He won’t let you.”

  “He? You mean Malaq?”

  “Your father. He won’t let you keep it,” she said again, sharp and crisp.

  I matched her brusque tone. “I don’t want to keep it. But something happened, something went wrong, and I don’t know how to fucking get it out.”

  “I see.” Neela stepped closer. “Well, if it won’t come out on its own…” There was an odd, resolute look to her eyes. She put a tender hand on my cheek, and pain sunk into my stomach. It was piercing; different than before. I looked down for the source and saw one of her hair pins sticking out of my gut. Neela’s hand was wrapped around it.

  Yanking the slender piece of metal out, she shoved it in twice more.

  As my blood spilled out to coat her fingers, I stared at her in disbelief. “Why?”

  “You know magic doesn’t come cheaply. If you want to keep the crown, one of us will have to die for it.” A pin in her other hand, Neela aimed it at my throat. Red swirled in her eyes. It was a look I’d seen before, right here in the swamps when my father was controlling Taren Roe. “Can you kill me, Ian? Is the magic worth that much to you?”

  Gritting my teeth, I removed the pin she’d left in my stomach and tossed it. “This isn’t you. It’s some sick ploy of my father’s to gain access to the crown.”

  “Haven’t you been paying attention? Jem Reth is nowhere to be found.”

  “He could have done this months ago. Something must have activated it.”

  “Your incompetence, perhaps? The memory of your weak, clumsy kisses and fumbling hands?” Neela released a scornful laugh. “Gods, what a useless man you are. What a wretched witch, so castrated by your own guilt.” A pin still in her hand, Neela lowered it down the front of me. “That gives me an idea.”

  “Neela, stop. I don’t want to hurt you.”

  “Oh, but I want to hurt you. I want to see your blood—”

  I drew my arm back and punched her. Neela whirled away and crashed into the table holding the remains of my breakfast. Plates and scraps went into the air. She went down in a mess of bunched up skirts and tangled hair. I grabbed a handful of her dress and dragged her from my tent.

  Throwing Neela down outside, tousled curls striped her face. A trickle of blood ran out her nose. She centered in on the spots of red spreading across my shirt, and laughed. It was an excited, hysterical sound that had the trio of approaching guards giving her a wide berth. They looked back and forth between us and had no idea what to do.

  One, an Arullan man, caught me as I teetered. “What went on here?”

  I hated saying it. “She stabbed me.”

  Doubt leapt into his eyes. He started to voice it. But as his companions tried to help her up and Neela thrashed in their grip, shrieking and fighting like an animal to reach me, I watched his opinion change. “Take her away.” His troubled eyes ran over me. “You need a healer.”

  “No.” I pushed him off. “I’m fine.” Staggering back inside my tent, ignoring the broken table and scattered platters, I went to the trunk in the corner. Falling to my knees in front of it, I threw back the lid. There wasn’t much inside. Some spare clothes and wineskins, a couple of Jillyan’s scrolls I hadn’t read yet, the Nor-Taali dagger that bound me to Jarryd, and the Crown of Stones.

  Easing myself down to sit, I pulled out the crown. I held the cold, dim artifact against the front of my bloody shirt and closed my eyes. Then I activated the shard, and tried like hell to awaken the mass of power I knew was holed up inside me.

  I called to it, shouted at it. I begged for it to respond.

  Nothing.

  I took off the shard, pressed it into the hollow its absence left in the crown, and tried again. There was a small stirring, then. It was followed by a swell of cramping nausea, like I hadn’t cast in days. The blackness appeared then, like before, traveling under my skin. Its glow pushed and writhed toward my wounds. I bit back a cry as its light bled out through the holes in stomach. I tried to force out more. But at my insistence, the auras grew stubborn and retreated. They nestled inside me, deeper and deeper, and the sensations vanished like they never were.

  With a wordless scream, I threw the crown and the shard both.

  There was one person who would know exactly what was happening to me.

  It was time to go hunting.

  FORTY FOUR

  It took a few tries and a few days. Bouncing like a wagon wheel on a stone road, I kept landing in my father’s life at the wrong times. Once, he was young, just a child, but so much Kayn’l swam in his body I couldn’t latch on. Another time, he was with Raynan Arcana in a tavern, with a mug in one hand and a barmaid in the other. Then he was standing in a familiar looking house, gazing down at an infant lying on a bed.

  Right there, I was tempted to march his body to the nearest cliff and jump.

  If I had any real idea what his death might do to the part of me that was in him, I would have. But I didn’t. So I left.

  When I was finally where I wanted to be, I knew instantly. His body felt cold and empty. His eyes protested as I opened them. His back ached from the hard ground I was lying on. Hunger pinched his stomach. There was a fire nearby; not naturally made. Magic wafted off it with each flicker as it lit the cavernous, underground room.

  Reclined at the foot of a massive statue, I stared up at the stone man and woman looming over me. Both were scantily clothed. Together, their cracked hands held what appeared to be a large crystal high in the air. The remains of their severed heads were all around me; huge chunks of alabaster whose fall had driven them half into the sand, and smaller shattered pieces that lay sprinkled atop the ground like shells on a beach.

  All around me were tall crumbling buildings and fractured columns. Farther out, spread all the way to the cavern walls, were rows of elaborately designed homes and pillars; slanted and lopped off like some great wind had come and carried their top halves away. An abundance of soil overflowed the cracked fountain. Lumps of broken road and buckled monuments jutted up like stone swells from the sea of sand.

  Four-foot high runes were etched into the face of several pillars. Two of the symbols I didn’t know. The other two were directi
onal markings. They were all Shinree.

  Road signs, I thought. There was no doubt where I was. My father had left his body deep underground, within the buried ruins of the old empire.

  From the looks of it, he’d been here quite a while. Packs were scattered, with various articles of clothing hanging out of them. Also strewn about the area were a haphazard stack of books, stones (of various shapes and sizes), cooking pots, empty bottles, and the withered, ashen remains of more than a few wild animals and birds. Possibly, their deaths were unintentional. The ten cages, each containing more than a dozen, emaciated, male and female carcasses were most definitely on purpose.

  Pushing back the blanket covering my father’s body, I sat up. I remembered his hands being hideous. But seeing them as my own froze me in place. There were three extra joints in each of his elongated, bony fingers. The tips ended in a set of lengthy, dark tapered nails that held a frightening resemblance to a small set of black claws. The sharp little talons, not yet fully developed, were jointed all on their own, allowing them to bend independently from the rest of his fingers.

  Flexing, I watched in a kind of sick amazement as the claws moved.

  The vile, mottled mix of color on his skin had evened out since I last saw him. His hands were mostly gray now. A dark wet-rock color and leathery in appearance, his flesh more resembled animal hide than a man’s skin. Not animal, I thought. Eldring.

  I couldn’t deny it. Not after my vision in the cave. The Crown of Stones was transforming my father into an eldring. What I couldn’t figure out was why his change was so gradual compared to how I saw it happen to the man in the past. And why was it happening even more gradually to me?

  Checking the rest of him, I pushed up the sleeves of his woolen tunic. His arms were the same in color and appearance as his hands. Gray streaked his chest and stomach, yet sections of Jem’s torso were still normal. His head was smooth, lacking a stitch of hair; eldring or otherwise. There was no pelt on his face, but the texture was rough, and his teeth, as I ran my tongue over them, were unusually sharp.