by Jess Lebow
The king squeezed her hand. “Or its worst.”
The senator gave him a funny look. “Why would you say that?”
“Because I didn’t turn my daughter over to Arch Magus Xeries,” said the king. “I complied with his demands only as a means to fighting him.”
“What?” The senator stepped back, dropping his hand. “What have you done?”
“My daughter and Quinn are inside the Obsidian Ridge. If anyone can find a way to bring down that citadel, it’s them.”
“Are you mad?” shouted Divian. “You’ve risked the fate of the entire country.”
“I have done what I thought best for Erlkazar and—”
“For your own personal gain.”
“I did not take this decision lightly,” said Korox. “This isn’t just about the safety and well-being of the people. It’s also about us—all of us—being able to live the lives we choose, not pressed into service or lorded over by an arch mage in a floating citadel. Today it was my daughter, but what happens tomorrow when Xeries comes back, demanding that we turn over all the daughters of Erlkazar? Where does it end, Divian? Where do we draw the line?”
“The citizens depend on you to make the choices that will keep them safe. They cannot rule themselves. They need a strong hand, someone who can tell them what they want and when they want it. They don’t want freedom. They don’t want choice. They want to be kept safe, and you’ve put your own needs ahead of theirs.”
The king shook his head. “My responsibility as king is to weigh the options and make the hard choices. I made a choice to fight for our way of life. It has its risks, but I would rather see our home destroyed than held hostage.”
“Then you have doomed us all.”
“Wait,” said the king, remembering their earlier conversation. “You were the one who told me it was only natural to want to save my daughter’s life.”
“Yes. But I didn’t tell you to launch an assault on the Obsidian Ridge.”
“This plan will work, Divian. Quinn isn’t just my bodyguard. He’s the Claw!”
A stiff wind blew in from the open balcony. Then the mage-lit stones all blinked out, dropping the king’s chamber into total darkness.
Korox heard some rustling and running feet. The twanging sound of a repeating crossbow echoed through his ears, and something large and soft collided with his chest. Tumbling backward, he hit his head on the stone floor, and a sky full of tiny white stars flashed in front of his eyes. Somebody was on top of him, and the inside of his skull throbbed, threatening to break out of his ears and through his forehead.
The doors slammed open, and Magistrates poured in to check the commotion. The mage-lit stones re-illuminated, and the king found a man in a large hat lying on his chest.
“Vasser? What are you doing?”
“I was saving you from assassination,” replied Vasser, getting up off his king.
Korox sat up to find Senator Divian lying unconscious on the floor, a bloody gash across her forehead. Five smallish crossbow bolts pierced the inner door.
“Divian!” the king crawled over to the senator and put his hand on the side of her face. “Divian!”
She moaned. “What happened?”
“I’m not sure. Did you see anything?”
Divian struggled up to a seated position and shook her head. “No. The lights went out, and that’s it. I woke when you touched me.”
Korox turned back to Vasser. “What did you see?”
“Nothing,” said Vasser. “I heard a crossbow being cranked, and that’s when I dived on you.”
“And how about you?” he asked the Magistrates searching the room and the balcony.
They shook their heads. “Nothing, my lord. No trace of the assassin.”
Korox got to his feet and helped the senator up. “You should have a healer look at that,” he said pointing to the gash in her head.
“I am a healer,” replied Divian, giving him a weak smile. “I’ll be fine. You worry about the assassin. I’ll worry about my head.”
“You mean assassins,” said the king. “It’s just a guess, but based on the number of attempts on my life in the past few days, I’m still in the running for worst king of Erlkazar.”
“Don’t fret too much over it,” said the senator. “You’re only the second king. It’s not all that hard to be worst.”
Quinn pushed himself deeper into the alcove, kicking at the reaching beasts with the heels of his boots. They clawed at the statue of Xeries. They gnawed at the stone with teeth like boar’s tusks. They whipped the wicked barbs of their tails into the space. But nothing they did could dislodge Quinn from his spot.
He used the statue as cover, defending the narrow openings on each side to keep himself from harm. But the black beasts outnumbered him thousands to one, and they never seemed to tire. If he was going to defeat Xeries, he was going to have to find a better way than fighting his minions one at a time.
Slashing down on the claw of a nearby beast, he severed it at the joint, sending the creature sliding down the wall to the floor below. Two just like it filled the empty space. They climbed over the fallen beast to get around the statue and inside the alcove. They wedged themselves, shoulder to shoulder, into the confined space, reaching and hissing. They shoved at each other, trying to get to their prey.
Quinn scrambled, kicking, punching, and slashing as fast as he could. His blades hit the sides of the alcove as often as they hit the creatures, but he continued to battle. He was not going to die here and leave Erlkazar to these foul creatures.
Clang, clang, slash.
With the flick of a wrist, his blades sank into a fleshy throat, coming out the other side. The creature’s blood spilled in a great gush down the floor of the alcove and out into the chamber beneath. The beast twitched as its life drained away, its body slumping sideways, creating further cover for Quinn.
Xeries’s beasts were hulking masses of unrelenting muscle, bone, and claw. The alcove had not been intended to hold them—cramped for one, impossibly small for two.
The second black beast lunged deeper in, its obsidian claws grinding at the stone. But the corpse of its recently slain ally blocked the way, and the angry creature got stuck—unable to push in farther, unwilling to go back.
Quinn planted his foot on the head of the slain monster and kicked off, pushing himself up higher and deeper into the alcove. The creature growled and reached again. Its persistence allowed it to press in a few inches closer, and it was rewarded for such tenacity. The tips of its claws slid down the side of Quinn’s leg, cutting into the leather of his boot. He winced and scrambled back, his head smacking against the stone behind him. The alcove was deep, but it did indeed end, and there was nowhere else to go.
The black beast continued to harass him, its long arm slapping side to side, grasping desperately at anything it could reach. Quinn’s arms weren’t as long, and he had to pull himself up into a tight ball to stay out of the monster’s range.
Unbuckling his scabbard from his belt, he flipped it over and let his long sword slide out.
“Swallow that,” he said as the weapon came free. Then he jammed the blade in the beast’s face.
With so little room, there was no place for it to dodge, and the tip of the sword plunged past the creature’s huge fangs and into its open, salivating mouth. Putting his foot on the hilt, Quinn stomped it into the creature’s brain.
The black beast convulsed once, choking on the sharpened steel. Thrashing mightily, it died on the sword, its body jammed against the other dead creature. Together they blocked out the orange light from below.
For now, their corpses clogged the opening, a temporary blockade against the hundreds of other beasts. Quinn could hear the rest of Xeries’s monstrosities clamoring into the bottom of the alcove. It wouldn’t be long before they simply managed to dig through the dead flesh and mount a new attack.
Reaching behind him, Quinn pressed his hands against the wall that had smacked his head. It w
as smooth, just like all the other exposed obsidian, except in the center. The stone had a large crack, an opening of crumbled rock that lead all the way down the wall toward the floor below.
“Mariko’s shout,” whispered Quinn. The spell the princess cast had damaged the stone in the lower chamber, but it must have reverberated up into this alcove as well.
“As you wish, Princess Mariko.” His palm lit up, and he peered into the cracked obsidian.
The wall behind him wasn’t very thick—just enough to close the alcove off from a much larger space behind. Rolling backward, Quinn braced his shoulders against the beasts he had just killed and slammed his boots against the broken stone.
The bodies slipped down with the blow, threatening to dislodge and clear the passage. Quinn slid along with them, that much closer to the hungry monsters below. Bits of broken stone rained down as well, a large chuck tumbling against the wall and smacking Quinn in the face.
He kicked and kicked again. More stone came away, a small hole opening in the wall. Obsidian shards fell on his head, and with one final kick, he broke the crack open wide.
His effort was successful, but the blow finally knocked the dead beasts free. Their bodies slid away, pulled out of the space by the killers who wanted in. More of the creatures climbed into the alcove, reaching for Quinn.
Their claws scraped at a frantic pace. The waiting had whipped them into a rabid frenzy, and they came for him with a renewed desperation. Shoving and clawing at each other, each seemingly bent on being the first to devour the interloper, each one driven to finish what the others could not.
Upside down, his face covered in splinters of obsidian, Quinn rolled backward until his feet hit the back of Xeries’s statue—the beasts grabbing at his heels. With all of his might, he leaped for the opening at the opposite end. His fingers just touched the edge of the torn, jagged stone, but it was enough. Scrambling up, he squeezed through the hole in the wall and tumbled down into the unknown—Xeries’s angry minions reaching through the gap, but too big to follow.
In the space behind, Quinn rolled down a short incline, tumbling nearly out of control. Flopping over onto his back, his feet hit the ground with a thud, and he came to a stop in the bottom of a wide, rough-hewn passage, not unlike the ones he’d traversed in the Cellar. He forced himself through the tiny hole so quickly that the broken obsidian gouged large cuts in both of his arms and down the side of his ribs.
Getting to his feet, he examined the passageway.
“Shortcut,” he said quietly.
Wiping the blood from his exposed skin as best as he could, he turned and headed deeper into the citadel.
chapter thirty
Xeries materialized out of the obsidian wall, a woman in each hand.
“Who does your king think he’s dealing with?” his voice echoing as he dragged Mariko and Evelyne across the floor. “I was perfectly clear about the consequences. Yet he disobeyed me.”
“You got what you wanted,” said Mariko, struggling against his grip. She was going to enjoy killing him.
Xeries stood as straight as he could, taking a deep breath. “Yes, I suppose I did.” He released the two women, and put his hands to the side of his head, rubbing his temples. “Though I had not counted on you having such a piercing voice.”
With a wave of his hand, a shower of black sparks appeared in midair. They drifted down onto the princess and Evelyne. “That’ll keep you from shouting.”
Mariko tried to dodge them, but there were too many, and they seemed to follow her wherever she moved. As soon as the first spark touched her skin, she could feel her throat constrict.
She opened her mouth, a scathing retort ready for the arch magus, but nothing came out. She tried again. Still nothing. Mariko tried to scream, rattling her vocal cords and raising her voice. She spat insults and tried to invoke her spells, but it was no use. She had been silenced.
Xeries pointed at Evelyne, looking at her as if he had just realized she was there. “I did not ask for you.” He waved his hand. “Take her from here.”
A dozen of the arch magus’s servants descended on Evelyne, lifting her from her feet and carrying her away. She struggled, her mouth open and moving, likely trying to spit obscenities at her captors. But like Mariko, she too had been silenced, and she disappeared from the room without a sound.
“That’s much better,” said the arch magus. Ambling over to his throne, Xeries retrieved a large pouch with something heavy inside. “I hope that as we get better acquainted this sort of thing won’t be necessary.”
Returning to the princess, he reached inside the sack and pulled out a small, furry animal. It looked like a cross between a hedgehog and a feline—small, round, chubby, covered in fur, and curious. The little creature didn’t move much, but it sniffed the air, pointing its beady little eyes first at Xeries then at Mariko.
“This is one of my own personal creations—the mimmio,” said Xeries. “It’ll allow you to converse with me until I remove your magical gag. You need do nothing more than hold it in your hands. The mimmio can hear your thoughts, and it will repeat them for me to hear.” He stroked its fur with his deformed fingers. “Watch.”
There was a short pause while the creature listened, then it opened its mouth and began to translate. The words it spoke were oddly deep for such a small creature, a contrast to Xeries high-pitched echoing.
“The mimmio will be your voice until I am sure you will behave yourself,” said Xeries through the creature. He handed the rodent to Mariko. “You try.”
The princess accepted it, cradling the squirming ball of fur in her open palms.
“I want to kill you,” the mimmio said. Mariko shrunk back, not prepared for the creature to be so blunt.
Xeries laughed, sounding like a young couple giggling together. “You must be careful what you think. There is no filter. The creature will say whatever it reads from your mind.”
“I hate you. What do you want from me?”
Xeries smiled, steepling his fingers under his chin. “I want you to be my bride.”
“Your bride?” The mimmio repeated her thoughts as soon as she had them.
The arch magus nodded.
“Why me? You know nothing about me.” Mariko tried to calm her mind, control her thoughts, but it was difficult.
“Ah, but I do.” Xeries poured himself a goblet full of wine. “I know that you are from a very good bloodline. I know that you were born in Eleint, what you now call Erlkazar, and that you are a descendant of my first wife’s charming sister.”
“You want me because I’m a relative of your wife? That’s sick.”
“Not exactly.” Xeries took a sip of his wine, rolling it back and forth in his mouth before swallowing, then he continued. “You see, I have lived for more than twenty of your lifetimes—”
“Twenty?” interrupted the princess through the mimmio. “Are you some kind of immortal?”
Xeries nodded, seemingly unfazed by the abruptness of the unfiltered conversation. “In a sense, yes. My first wife and I created a spell—one that would prolong our lives and allow us to live together forever.”
“Then why do you want me? Get bored with your wife?” Mariko smirked. There was a certain amount of freedom in not having to choose her words carefully—or indeed, be able to choose them at all.
The topic did not please Xeries, and he scowled at the princess. “She died during the spell.”
“Died?”
Xeries’s scowl deepened. “Yes. And now I need to have a new bride every hundred years, or else I will lose the benefits of the spell.”
“You killed her?”
Xeries grit his teeth. “My wife died during the spell,” he repeated, “but I have found a way to get the immortality that we both so desired. In her memory, I live on, the way she would have wanted. But the spell requires that I always have a bride. One from the same bloodline. That is all you need to know.”
The doors to the small chamber leading off of Xerie
s throne room ground open, and a woman in long flowing robes, a veil over her face, came into the chamber. She hobbled toward them, clearly having a hard time moving.
“Is this her?” said a cracked and raspy voice.
“Yes, my dear,” replied Xeries, putting down his goblet and going to the woman’s side.
“Do you think she is as pretty as I was, all those years ago?”
Xeries looked at Mariko, then back to the woman. “She is very pretty,” he said. “But so were you.”
The woman grabbed hold of the arch magus with both hands, holding herself up by clinging to his robes. “You have killed me, Xeries. I blame you.”
Her grip went limp, and she slowly slipped to the floor. Xeries held her weight in his grotesque hands, gently lowering her to the ground. He carefully arranged her dress around her body and lifted her veil. The face beneath was nothing but wrinkled gray-brown flesh, clinging tightly to her narrow skull.
Xeries bent down and kissed her lips. “Rest well, my dear. I will put you in your place in short order.”
“Is this what happens to your brides?” asked Mariko. “You use them up?”
“It is a fair trade,” replied Xeries, his echoed voice sounding somehow saddened. “I give them wealth and power, and they give me their life-force.”
“You take their souls.”
The arch magus shook his head slowly, still fussing with the fringes of his wife’s dress. “I don’t like to look at it that way. I prefer to think they die for my love.”
“That’s sick.”
“Love always is.” Xeries returned the veil over his wife’s face. “Always is.”
The long, dark hallway wound deep into the Obsidian Ridge. Along the floor, four sentries patrolled. Long, lithe, dangerous killing machines, like all of Xeries’s other creations, they were on a mission. In their heads, they could hear their orders repeated, then repeated again, Find-find the-the intruder-intruder.
From above, a figure watched their movements. It paced them, waiting for the right moment.
The sentries reached the end of a hallway. They sniffed the air. They pawed at the walls. They examined everything.