The Crown of Stones: Magic-Price

by C. L. Schneider

  Jarryd got up. He walked away from the body. Watching him, I tried to reconcile the personality of the young man I met in Kael with the unflinching kill I just witnessed.

  I couldn’t.

  I felt the sand shift as Reth’s spell dissolved, and I ran up to Jarryd. “That was…”

  “You,” he said. But it wasn’t resentment burning in his eyes as I expected. It was excitement. “Did you see that?” he laughed. “What I did?”

  Appalled, I shook my head. “I never wanted this for you.”

  “Well I got it.” Jarryd rubbed at his chest like it hurt. His face probably did as well; it was a mess of cuts and bruises. “It’s a good thing, too. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to stay alive at your side?”

  I wasn’t sure how to answer that. “You can’t be here right now, Jarryd. With the Kayn’l in me I can’t connect to the stones. I can’t protect you.”

  Jarryd glanced at Reth. “I don’t trust this.”

  “Me neither.” I gestured at the bridge. “It looks clear, but there could be sentries on the other side, so don’t travel the road. Stay in the trees alongside it and take the first fork. The house at the end belongs to an old healer friend of mine. His name’s Broc. It’s been years, but if you tell him you’re with me, he’ll hide you. As long as you don’t flirt with his daughter,” I threw in.

  He gave me a half-hearted grin. “If you don’t show...”

  “I’ll show.”

  There was skepticism in Jarryd’s nod, but he winced his way up onto the back of his horse, turned, and rode swiftly up the beach to the bridge. When he crossed over into Rella, I grabbed Kya’s reins and went back to Reth. “So let’s have it.”

  He dismissed the remaining two warriors. As they started walking mindlessly toward the road, like an invitation, Reth said, “Neela Arcana?”

  My grip tightened on the reins. “Sienn broke your dream spell.”

  “I’m not surprised. She’s powerful magic user.”

  “Maybe you should stop hurting her then. Or someday she might hurt you back.”

  Reth’s white eyes tensed. “Sienn won’t betray me.”

  “Sienn’s loyalty isn’t real. You created it with magic.”

  “I enhanced it. She wanted someone to save her. All it took was a little push.”

  “That’s quite a skill you have, finding and exploiting the weaknesses of others.”

  “I prefer to call it, motivating.” He lifted his head up and down, scrutinizing me. “I see your mental and physical state has improved since the dreams stopped. You do understand that the reprieve is temporary? That when the woman you crave is standing before you in the flesh, your desire will return anew. And if I hurt her,” he paused to smile, “you will do anything to make it stop.”

  “I won’t go against Rella. I can’t. The spell that binds me to protect the realm is older and stronger than yours. It will always be the dominant force in my life.”

  “When Draken claims it, Rella will no longer be. Which means your spell to defend her will have no basis to exist.” Watching me expectantly, he stepped closer. “Draken will forgo his marriage to Neela. Cast her into exile, somewhere remote and private. She will no longer be a Queen. Just the girl you felt at peace with in your dreams. You can go to her. Live the life you played at. Have a child. Several if you like. There will be no more fighting. No more wandering. Just a happy, stable existence growing old with the woman you love. All you have to do is remove the shard.”

  I turned from him and wandered out into the waves. Staring at the horizon, watching the evening sun turn the water into a bed of diamonds, I struggled like hell to ignore the need in my gut. I couldn’t believe how strong it was. I hadn’t even known I wanted the things Reth offered until he showed them to me. Now, I couldn’t stop thinking about them. I couldn’t stop thinking about her.

  There was only one thing he did wrong.

  “It isn’t love,” I said, “what I feel for Neela. What you made me feel.”

  “You’re right. Obsession was better for my plans.”

  “Obsession and I are old friends.”

  “Then you know how hard it is to shake. How it clings to you. Suffocates you.”

  “I know how to fight it.”

  “Do you?” he chuckled, and my confidence wavered.

  I have to, I thought. I have to fight it, to bury her, like Jarryd did.

  Jarryd…

  Gods, maybe I was wrong. Maybe he can protect me from something.

  Reth was still talking, but I shut him out and delved deep inside; to the place that harbored a part of a soul that wasn’t mine. I started peeling back the layers like the petals of a flower. Concentrating on Jarryd’s memories of Neela, I rummaged swiftly through them. Every strong thought of her, every recollection and emotion, all the things I’d been dodging since we joined, I reviewed. They flashed across my mind in the blink of an eye and I began to grasp the impact she had on his life. I witnessed their early friendship and their budding, adolescent flirtation. I saw the physical closeness that almost was and the frustration that grew as their relationship fell apart. I watched them become strangers as Neela’s tenderness, warmth and trust wilted beneath an emerging coldness. I felt Jarryd’s pain as he tried to accept their separate paths, how he struggled not to hate her and to instead transform his desire and affection into a fierce, undying loyalty.

  Converting resentment into resolve, Jarryd’s disappointment became conviction. He turned heartache into a steadfast devotion, allowing him to faithfully uphold his oath to Rella’s crown.

  It was an impressive feat. I was proud to let those parts of him become part of me. And as I did, as I saw Neela through Jarryd’s eyes, the woman he knew started to prevail over the illusion in my mind. His version came into focus and the allure of mine, dimmed. My emotions surrounding her evened out and I felt stronger than I had in weeks.

  I knew better though than to think I was cured, or that Reth couldn’t destabilize my newly found armor with a few, choice words. He was damn good at that. He was also damn good at making me want to kill him. Only, this wasn’t the time. He didn’t have the crown on him and I couldn’t even cast. Without access to magic, remaining in his presence right now wasn’t looking like a very smart move.

  I grabbed Kya’s reins and started pulling her down the beach.

  “Where are you going?” Reth demanded. “We aren’t finished.” He got louder as I kept walking. “Don’t turn your back on me. Troy! Get back here. Do you hear me? I said, get back here!” I didn’t, and rage shook his voice as he called out. “L’TARIAN!”

  Kya bumped into me as I stopped short. “What did you call me?”

  There was a short hesitation. “L’tarian.”

  “My mother was the only one to call me by that name. How do you know of it?” When he didn’t respond, I drew a breath and faced him. “I asked you a question.”

  Reth threw the heavy cloak back over his shoulders. He unhooked the clasp and let the dark covering drop to the ground. “L’tarian was your birth name.” Reaching both hands behind his head, he undid the buckles on his mask. “It was chosen by the man who gave you life.” He pulled the covering away from his face. It made a soft squelch as it hit the sand. “It was chosen by me.”

  FORTY TWO

  Age and slavery had taken little away from Jem Reth. His chin was sharp and defiant. Prominent cheekbones rested high on a strong face. His tall frame, similar to mine, was impressively built. At one time, standing side by side, there would have been no mistake that I was his get. Now, you had to look real close. My parentage wasn’t the only thing he’d been hiding behind the mask.

  “Your face,” I said tensely. “The Crown of Stones did this to you?”

  “You just learned your father is alive and that’s all you have to say?”

  He was right, I suppose. But how could I say anything else? It was as if someone had taken a shade from each of the crown’s stones, blended and twisted them together
into a dank, ugly color. And then they used that color to patch my father’s face together.

  Magic scars, infinitely worse than mine, streaked his nearly bald scalp. The few patches of hair he had left were dull, thin strands that were no longer white, but a murky, grayish brown. The same muted, mottled color stained his skin. It bled down in wide, jagged seams out of his hairline, across his brow, over the length of his cheeks, to cross his nose and dip down past his jaw, into the collar of his shirt.

  It was repulsive. Yet in his ruin, I saw common ground.

  Putting a hand in the fringe of hair over my eyes, I pulled it back, showing him the vague, colored imprints on my skin. “They’re not like yours, but…”

  Reth looked at me with blatant disinterest. “Power comes with a price.”

  I let the hair flop back down over my forehead. “Perhaps this one is too high?”

  “Do you care, L’tarian?” He eyed me inquisitively. “Do you truly care?”

  “About what you’ve done to yourself? Did you think I would?”

  “What I thought was to see more of me in you.” His lips hooked down in a deep frown. “And a bit less of your mother.”

  “I am nothing like her.”

  “Nonsense. Her blood has tempered you. It kept you from your full potential.”

  “And what’s that,” I laughed, “to become like you?”

  His stained jaw tightened. “The origin of your name goes far back in the Reth line. It actually pre-dates the empire. Do you know what it means?” He answered for me. “Dark Lord. V’loria didn’t want such a label for you, but my ancestors deserved to be honored, and you deserved a worthy a name. It was my right after all, to name that which I created. And it isn’t every day a descendant of our Emperor is born.”

  “I don’t want to hear this.”

  “It’s important that you understand how you began.”

  “No. It isn’t.”

  “You will listen when your father speaks.” He raised a muddy-hued eyebrow for my reaction. I was too sick to give him one and he went on. “It was a different time then in Kabri, before you were born. The war you knew was just beginning. But the estimate for casualties on the Rellan side was grim. Raynan’s father was yet King, and he decided they needed an edge. He chose me to lead his army.”

  “You were a soldier for Rella, like me?”

  “Not quite like you. Having been on Kayn’l all my life, my natural inclinations took a while to emerge. I had to be taught how to cast and how to fight. Raynan and I sparred every day. He was quite the swordsman in his youth.”

  “And my mother?”

  “Being King’s Healer and mistress to the Prince, V’loria resided at the castle. She tended me those first few weeks off the Kayn’l.”

  “So you knew them both.”

  “Knew them? We were inseparable—and young. So young and full of mischief,” he said, an unexpected wave of nostalgia softening his voice. “The night we went to see the oracle, it was only for fun. We hit every dice game in every respectable tavern. Then we moved on to the not so respectable ones.” He chuckled briefly. “It was the last time we were content together. After that night, it all changed.”

  He had me hooked. “What happened?”

  “It was just a dirty roadhouse on the edge of the city. But that woman, whoever she was, was one hell of a seer. We were all shaken after. None of us spoke of our visions. I have no idea what they might have witnessed. But, I saw you.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “It was disorienting. I was new to magic. I had no idea oracles could take you into lives other than your own. I didn’t know I was seeing the future through my son, not at first. I—we—were in the middle of a battle. There was a quake. You fell. The ground opened and there it was.” He smiled, remembering. “It was beautiful.”

  “You saw me find the Crown of Stones?”

  “I felt the power when you used it. The rage. It was incredible. They were all dying around you and you didn’t see it. You didn’t even care. And I knew. I recognized you as mine. I saw what you would be capable of. That you could wield the magic needed to rebuild our empire. I just had to wait for you to grow up, to be ready to accept the responsibility and the honor of taking up where Tam Reth left off. To become a son I could be proud of.”

  My heart was racing. I ran a helpless hand through my hair and staggered back. “You knew what the crown would do…what I would do…and you let me?” I searched his eyes for some morsel of compassion or remorse, but the nothingness I found turned my stomach. “All those people…all those lives. You let me kill them. The Langorians, the Rellans…Aylagar.” I let go of Kya’s reins and drew the sword across my back. “Do you have any idea what living with that day has done to me?”

  “Yes. And it isn’t what I’d hoped.”

  “You could have stopped me. Warned me.”

  “When I had that vision your mother wasn’t even with child yet. And if I’d come to you later, telling you that you would one day annihilate thousands, you wouldn’t have believed me. You were just a boy, L’tarian.”

  “Don’t call me that,” I snarled at him. “That is not my name.”

  “You are a child from the Reth line. You carry the blood of the strongest Shinree soldiers to ever live. To hear you deny your birthright pains me.”

  “Not nearly enough.”

  Reth’s eyes narrowed. “V’loria and Raynan had a plan. By compelling you to devote your life to saving others, they hoped to ensure that you would never know the wonders of the darkness flowing in your veins.”

  “I know darkness well enough.”

  “But you shrink from it. You don’t use it, don’t embrace it.”

  “Most days I’m not that weak.”

  “I see it now.” He nodded solemnly to himself. “I’m already too late. You will never come to me willingly.”

  “You never wanted me willing. Forcing magic on me…the eldring…the shadows…the dreams—you tried to break me from the beginning.” Recalling all that he had done, my voice came out as a roar. “Who does that to their own fucking child?”

  “I was trying to make you obedient. I thought once you knew who I was, once you saw what we could do together, you would understand. But…it was all for nothing. She died for nothing. Nothing,” he said again, raising a hand to massage the discolored skin of his brow. He stood there a moment, wincing and rubbing his forehead like it hurt. Then, abruptly, he rushed up. Agitation quickened his words. “You must understand, L’tarian. I wanted you strong. I needed you confident, focused. I thought it was for the best. She would have stood between us. I couldn’t let that happen. But…I was too late.” Suddenly despondent, his voice fell. “In just those first few years, she destroyed you.”

  At the start of his outburst, I assumed he was talking about Aylagar. But there was shame and honesty in my father’s white eyes. There was pain and regret in his words. And it started a chill of foreboding on my skin. “What did you do?”

  “I never meant for you to be alone. I went back to get you, but you had already left Kabri. And I had no idea Raynan would know it was me. Or that he would actually be capable of hunting me down. Drugging me, leaving me at the gates of that Langorian slave camp…he knew what they would do to me. How they abuse their slaves. I misjudged how much he loved her, and what lengths he would go to avenge her death.”

  “No.” The blood drained from my face. “You didn’t. You couldn’t have.”

  “I wanted to raise you, to make you ready to claim the Crown of Stones and lead our people. It was too important. I couldn’t leave you with V’loria. She would have smothered every part of me that was inside of you. Can’t you see that?”

  My throat was burning. I could hardly get the words out. “It was you? You killed her? You killed my mother?”

  “You were my son, too L’tarian. My flesh. I couldn’t stand her ruining you.”

  “All this time, I…I thought…” burying the grief, I clamped my jaw shut un
til it hurt; I wanted the pain. It was preferable to the flood of loss and confusion I was drowning in, the feeling that I was a child again, standing over my mother’s corpse, fists balled with rage, believing that I had to hold it all in, that I didn’t deserve to cry.

  Because there were times I hated her. There were times I wished her dead.

  And then she was.

  “My spells,” I said painfully; thinking back. “They were always erratic. I practiced for hours but I had trouble controlling them. I thought I did something wrong, let something slip.” I shook my head. “I thought it was my fault.”

  “Really?” He sounded surprised. “I suppose you would have known whether or not you were in control of your magic if your mother had taught you focus or restraint.”

  “Maybe she would have—if you hadn’t killed her!”

  “The choices I made were for the good of us all. One day you will understand that.” He reached for me and I pulled away. I raised my sword between us and looked at him down the length of it, saying nothing, feeling nothing. I was blank inside. He’d stripped me of everything. Dignity. Pride. Family. He’d molded the course of my life, influenced my thoughts and emotions, and I hadn’t even known he existed.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” he said then. “But your aim is wrong. I’m on your side. After all, I just let your other, the messenger, leave unharmed. I could have turned him to dust. Although,” he cocked an eyebrow in thought. “Losing him, having his soul ripped from you, could be just what I need to push you over the edge.”

  “If you harm him…”

  Reth laughed, trivializing my warning as if I were no more than a foolish child.

  His child, I reminded myself and a shiver of revulsion ran through me.

  “Rage all you want, son, you can’t stop me. I’m faster than you. Better.” Magic swirled across Reth’s eyes, a gloomy, blended shade that radiated up from his stained skin, and spread right in front of me. The cloudy combination of auras flowed across his face like a mudslide running downhill. It traveled to engulf his jaw and throat, and in its wake his skin took on a gray, leathery appearance, like it was petrified.