by Barb Hendee
Magiere's eyes fixed on the head. Its face, half-covered in clinging snow, still held a frozen hint of outrage.
"Could there be more?" Leesil asked, though he sounded far away in Magiere's ears.
"No," Osha answered in Belaskian. "Our caste not leave them… perform rites for dead. We do it now."
Leesil's voice grew louder. "Not until we find Wynn and Chap!"
Magiere scanned the snow-filled gully. Not far back she spotted a long oblong mound.
She knew the headless body must lie there beneath the snow, and she crouched to pick up the head. Frozen hair crackled in her hands.
"Magiere?" Leesil called.
"What is she doing?" Sgaile asked, voice rising in alarm.
Something she had not done since Bela, and the hunt for an undead who had been murdering nobles. Holding a dead girl's dress, she had accidentally stumbled into Welstiel's footsteps, where he had torn open the girl's throat upon her own doorstep.
Two dead anmaglahk lay here, and she sensed a Noble Dead like no other she'd come across. Instinct and blood told her in part what had happened. And Chap and Wynn were still missing.
Magiere cringed at what she might learn-see-through the undead's eyes by touching its victim. But she had to know. She had to-
"Magiere!" Leesil shouted. "Don't!"
Darkness and the previous night's blizzard swallowed Magiere's world.
She looked down upon an anmaglahk pinned in the snow between her narrow white thighs. Before he swung a long curved blade, she grabbed his face. Her white fingers slid up into his hair as she drove her teeth into his throat.
Skin, muscle, and tendons tore between her jaws. Blood flooded her mouth and seeped into her throat. She arched, whipping her torso back as she tore his head free, and stared at another bloody mass clutched in her other hand.
She felt no hunger to feed upon his life. She was already glutted, constantly fed by something she couldn't see. And suddenly, claws bit into her bare back.
Magiere whirled to find Chap snarling, with hackles raised and teeth bared. He harried her until she backhanded him. Part of Magiere shriveled inside as his body hit the gully wall and slumped motionless into the deep snow.
She wanted to scream. She wanted to run to him.
The small white body she existed within turned toward a figure standing in the chute's opening.
Magiere tried to stop herself, but her delicate white hand latched around Wynn's throat. And then she cringed and shrank away at the sound of Wynn's cry.
She didn't know why the words hurt her, frightened her… and then made her hungry to hear more of them. She ran up through the chute with Wynn gripped in her hand, and Chap's scrambling paws fading behind her.
She crested the chute's top, and something hammered the side of her face.
Hunger erupted in Magiere's belly.
She tumbled back in the snow as someone slapped the frozen head from her hand. Her jaw ached but not from her sharpening teeth. She tasted blood-real blood-
"What are you doing?" Leesil's voice cracked with hysteria. "You think dreams are the only things that mess with your head?"
He crouched over her, one hand pinning her chest and the other still clenched into a fist. Rather than anger, blind panic filled his amber eyes.
Magiere's eyes began to burn. The sky around him was brilliant, but not as bright as his hair around his tan face.
She grabbed the front of his coat, pulling herself up.
"Your eyes…," Leesil whispered, "they're almost pure black!"
Sgaile and Osha stood behind him, wary hardness and fright plain on their faces.
Magiere wanted only to run for the chute.
Resisting the pull within her no longer mattered. It now led to Wynn and Chap-and the creature who had taken them. All her drives led upward. She gripped Leesil's jacket with both hands, tears running from her burning eyes.
"Have… to… go," she snarled, barely understanding her own mangled words. "Now… to Wynn… and Chap."
"What is happening to her?" Sgaile demanded.
Leesil settled his hands on her cheeks, holding her face, and she dropped her forehead against his chest.
She still felt as if she were constantly being fed, as when she'd been inside the monster who had slaughtered these anmaglahk. But it didn't sate her body. She clenched her fingers so tightly they ground upon the rings of Leesil's hauberk beneath his coat.
"Please," she whispered.
"Go," he answered.
Magiere lunged around him, bolting straight for the chute. Sgaile ducked out of her way, but Osha froze. She slammed him aside with her palm and drove up the rock path, fingers clawing the stone walls she climbed.
Somewhere behind her, Leesil shouted, "Follow! And don't lose sight of her! She knows where Wynn and Chap have gone."
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Leesil bolted out of the chute's top and chased after Magiere. They raced on through late afternoon until exhaustion threatened to pull him down.
He couldn't find a trail in the fresh snow that Magiere was following, but her course never wavered. And he was still uneasy about what she'd done with the anmaglahk's severed head.
Magiere had seen-relived-the moment of an undead's kill. She had not tried anything so reckless since Bela, and that had been by accident. It had served a purpose then, and perhaps it did now, but she shouldn't have repeated the experience.
He hadn't even seen her pick up the head until it was too late.
And how could a vampire exist here, with no life to feed on? The only thing clear to Leesil was that Magiere somehow knew how to find Wynn and Chap.
"Is she still sane?" Sgaile panted beside him. "Is she aware of what she does?"
Leesil wished he could answer. It wasn't that simple where Magiere's dhampir nature was concerned.
"Yes," he lied. "Just be quiet and follow."
Leesil hadn't forgotten what they'd found in the gully. Sgaile had questions to answer later. What were other anmaglahk doing here-and why? Sgaile said he didn't know, but was he lying? Or was this more of Brot'an's scheming?
Magiere hit a steep rocky incline where snow thinned. She didn't even slow, but climbed on, with one hand clawing for holds.
"Move faster," Leesil panted. "Before she's out of sight!"
Sgaile passed him on the slope as Osha came up behind. Leesil raised his head, grabbing for holds with both hands. Magiere stopped at the crest and looked down at him.
Her enlarged irises were pitch black in her pallid face. She shifted nervously, head twisting back and forth, and she kept glancing over the ridge's far side.
"Wait!" Leesil called to her. "Don't move!"
Magiere thrashed about, pacing the ridge's narrow top, and an anguished whine escaped her mouth. It turned into a screeching snarl that echoed down the ridge.
Sgaile stopped cold and glanced over his shoulder at Leesil.
"Just get up there," Leesil urged.
Sgaile pushed on, and Leesil noticed a flattened roll of canvas strapped to his back, along with Magiere's sheathed falchion.
The jostle of running had shifted the bundle, and the winged tip of one of Leesil's old punching blades peeked out the bottom. Sgaile crested the ridge, and Leesil scrambled over the top, rising to his feet beside Magiere.
Her breath came in vibrating hisses between clenched teeth. Leesil followed her fixed gaze into the distance and his eyes widened.
A vast plain lay trapped in a ring of distant high mountains. Its snow was a pure blanket of undisturbed white. And resting amid that smooth perfection was the shape of a multitowered castle. Even at a distance, its size seemed impossible, like a gray sentinel guarding the empty quiet of the sunken plateau. The castle itself almost seemed an illusion, sitting in this barren place at the top of the world.
"Is that it?" he asked, finding his voice. "The one you've been seeing?"
"Yes," Magiere hissed. She back-stepped once downslope, watching him in anticipation.
Leesil scanned the plain for any movement, anything out there waiting to intercept them.
"There," Osha said. "Tracks!"
A broken trail led away from the rocky slope's bottom and out across the smooth white snow.
Magiere inched downward, with her eyes still on Leesil.
He flipped the straps on his new winged blades and pulled them.
They didn't yet feel as if they belonged to him. His gloves muted his grip on their handles. But the half-loops of metal, rising partway down the wings, made the blades settle solidly on his forearms.
"Everyone on guard. Whatever took Wynn and Chap"-Leesil glanced sidelong at Sgaile-"and killed your friends… just be ready."
Sgaile made no move to hand Magiere her falchion. He just stood there, watching her.
Leesil wondered if he'd have to put Sgaile down to get the sword back. When he turned to Magiere, her black eyes widened, and they fixed on his chest.
In the waning daylight, Leesil hadn't even noticed. The topaz amulet Magiere had given him was glowing.
He grew worried how the others might respond to this clear warning, but Sgaile didn't even flinch at the amulet's light.
"You told us about the guardian undeads before we left Ghoivne Ajhajhe," Sgaile said, "and something here killed our caste brothers before they could defend themselves." He looked to Magiere. "But I am guardian to your purpose. We will find this artifact you seek-and your friends."
Sgaile's certainty didn't squelch Leesil's worry. He saw nothing but the castle, so what had sparked the stone and Magiere's inner nature from such a distance?
"Go on," he said, and Magiere took off down the slope. "But stay within reach!"
They trudged down and followed the trail of broken snow. The closer they came to the castle, the brighter the amulet glowed. It made Leesil even more nervous, and he tucked it inside his coat collar. He didn't want a beacon announcing their arrival.
They reached a bleached stone wall surrounding the castle grounds.
Leesil hadn't noticed it from the ridge. Magiere turned along it, no longer looking to the trail. Leesil followed farther out from the wall, glancing up over its snow-capped top. The castle loomed in the darkening sky. It looked so old, decrepit and decaying.
Magiere halted before a pair of tall, ornate iron gates. One hung slightly ajar at the bottom from a broken lower hinge, leaving an angled space between them. The snow trail led inward toward a wide rise of stone steps that were strangely free of snow.
"No… birds…," Magiere whispered, and tilted back her head to stare at the high arched peak where the gates joined. "Dif… rent. Wrong… old… broken."
She gripped the rusted iron with both hands and peered through the gates at the castle beyond. Her shoulders hunched, as if she were about to tear the tilting gate from its one remaining hinge. Leesil quickly grabbed her forearm, as Sgaile hissed a warning.
"Do not announce our presence!"
Leesil shook his head. "Whatever is here likely knows someone's coming-it might even have taken Wynn and Chap just to bait us."
Magiere looked expectantly into his eyes, but her gloved hands remained clenched on the gate's bars.
"Push the rage down," Leesil urged. "You got us here… now clear your head."
Magiere's brow wrinkled, almost in a snarl, then smoothed again. She appeared to understand. Her jaw muscles worked, and her tongue passed briefly over her teeth. She inhaled deeply, and her breath hissed out, turning to vapor in the cold air.
"Yes," she whispered, and she straightened up, but her irises remained fully black.
Relieved, Leesil turned to Sgaile. "Welstiel used the term 'old ones, but we don't know how many. Your stilettos won't help. Get out my old blades and give one to Osha."
"No, we have not trained with your weapons," Sgaile answered. He held up his left hand, exposing a garrote's handles, its silvery wire looped about his gloved fingers. "But we can still take heads."
Magiere looked at the wire and nodded in approval. "Good."
Rather than ripping the gate from its hinges, she shoved it, widening the space. Leesil slipped through behind her.
"My sword," Magiere said.
Leesil glanced back, and at Sgaile's hesitation, he growled, "Give it to her!"
Sgaile unstrapped the falchion, and Magiere took it and belted it on. Osha held out the long war dagger before she'd even asked. She slipped it into her belt at the small of her back.
The sun had dipped below the western peaks. Though the sky was still light, deep shadows filled the sunken plateau, enveloping the castle and its grounds. Leesil cursed himself again for losing Wynn in the blizzard. If not for his desperation to find her and Chap, he would insist they all return to camp and wait for dawn before entering this place.
The courtyard's smooth white was broken by massive stones fallen from above ages ago. The first step of the wide stairs sank midway along the seam between two of its stones. They all climbed to the top landing. The large iron doors were etched and discolored-but sound enough to be a problem.
Magiere set her shoulder to one door and shoved. It moved barely an inch.
She was stronger than any of them with her dhampir nature awakened. Through the opening crack, Leesil saw only darkness inside.
"I don't like this," he grumbled. "The door isn't even barred."
"It doesn't have to be," Magiere answered. "Help me."
Sgaile joined Leesil, and they put their own efforts behind Magiere's. And they both flinched at the squeal of rusted metal as the door opened wider. Magiere didn't hesitate to slip through before anyone else.
Leesil followed, with Sgaile and Osha behind, and paused to let his eyes adjust. The temperature was no warmer than outside.
He and Magiere had entered the lairs of Noble Dead before-first Rashed and Teesha's warehouse in Miiska, and then Ratboy's lavish home in Bela. Both times, Leesil had had a sense of something therein, by Teesha's needlepoint and the paintings in Ratboy's townhouse. These false impressions of "life" marked a presence. But as his sight adjusted, he saw no such things here.
Dim twilight slipping through the iron doors offered barely enough illumination for his half-elven eyes. He stood in a long stone corridor wider than the council hall in Bela. Paired rows of pillars the breadth of elven trees stood near to either side wall, and each broadened at the base where it met the floor. The open way between was wide enough for seven armed men to walk freely abreast, and it ran on toward the castle's hidden depths. The walls beyond the pillars were difficult to see, but sections of stone appeared deeply etched by age in random patches.
"You said it looked wrong," he whispered to Magiere. "Do you mean compared to your dreams?"
"Older," she answered. "What I saw was sound and clean, even in the snow and ice."
"Maybe you saw it from the past?" he asked. "Through the eyes of who… whatever guided you here."
Magiere closed on one pillar and sniffed sharply.
"Pull out the amulet," Sgaile whispered.
"It won't be much use for tracking this close," Leesil answered.
"For its light," Sgaile insisted. "There is something wrong with these walls."
Magiere's gaze wandered as she sniffed again, and this time her nose wrinkled.
Leesil pulled the amulet out. "What's wrong?"
She shook her head. "Something familiar but… I'm not sure. Thin- and all around."
Osha watched her intently. "Wynn? Or Chap?"
"No," Magiere answered.
Sgaile tapped Leesil's shoulder. "Come."
He stepped around the first left pillar toward the wall beyond. Leesil followed, and his gaze fell on a patch of stone etched by decay. The amulet's light spilled across it, but the roughened age didn't vanish.
It became a wild patch of worn and faded black writing scattered along the wall.
Some crude implement had been used for the rough strokes, and even so, Leesil couldn't make out what it said. Once or twice he spotted Be
laskian lettering, or something like it, but the characters didn't spell out words he recognized.
"Elven… and some Sumanese, I believe," Sgaile whispered. He crouched low, his fingers tracing a wandering line. "Here… and again, but not words in my people's language."
"More here," Osha called.
Leesil spotted him near the next pillar down the wall. The young elf lifted his gaze up the stone wall.
"More above," Osha whispered, and he looked to a height no person could have reached.
Magiere pushed in beside Leesil, flattening her hand upon the writing. She sniffed again and shuddered in revulsion.
Sgaile watched her. "What are you doing?"
"Magiere?" Leesil whispered.
Her eyes moved across the gibberish on the walls. She pressed her face even closer to the stone and inhaled deeply.
Magiere spun away, choking as she stumbled in the open corridor. She reached for her falchion and cast about, as if looking for a threat.
"Blood," she whispered. "From one of them… written with its blood!"
Osha lunged backward into the open corridor.
"What nonsense do you speak?" Sgaile asked Magiere. "This is not blood."
Leesil grabbed Sgaile's tunic shoulder and pulled him up. "Not from the living-from the dead… undead… the ones we've fought, the vampires, their fluids are black."
Both he and Sgaile backed away.
"I can smell it," Magiere hissed. "Faint… but everywhere."
"Who do such sick writing?" Osha asked.
Leesil remembered that an'Croan were repulsed by any mutilation of the dead. Even he didn't want to imagine how this demented practice had been accomplished.
"Is there harm in touching it?" Sgaile asked.
Leesil shook his head. "Not that we've experienced. But let's move on."
He turned down the long corridor with Magiere close beside him. They stuck to the center between the pillars.
Farther on, they spotted a massive archway straight ahead, shaped in a peaked echo of the iron doors and the outer gates. Its frame stones were rounded and smooth but unadorned, and through the opening lay a wide stone stairway leading to upper floors. As they stepped through the arch, narrow passages stretched into the dark on the left and right.