The Perilous Sea

by Thomas,Sherry

  He took the emergency bag from her—she had been carrying it all this time—and gave her the vertices of the quasi-vaulter. “I tried it once. That is not fog and it is utterly impenetrable even with fog glasses.”

  They ran toward the entrance of the tunnels that led down. Iolanthe shuddered as she stepped on the strangely spongy ground in the tunnels.

  “Make sure you do not touch anything,” warned Titus.

  She had never used the locale for training, but she had read the story of Briga’s Chasm long ago. Foul creatures lived in the tunnels, not so much guarding them as simply preying on anything or anyone that entered.

  Someone screamed. They stopped for a moment and listened. Probably someone who did not know that one should never touch the walls of the tunnels, which secreted a corrosive substance.

  Something slithered across the ground not far in front. It could be a small snake or a detachable limb of one of the foul pulpwyrms, sent out to scout.

  Another scream came from behind them.

  “Idiots,” Iolanthe muttered beneath her breath, acutely aware injuries and deaths were all too real here. Some Atlantean families would be missing beloved sons and daughters on feast days this year.

  None of them deserved it, to die for the megalomania of a twisted old man.

  A pulpwyrm, with the diameter of a train and almost as long, shot past in a cross tunnel. Iolanthe gripped the prince’s arm and tried to not heave.

  “Something is coming behind us,” he said.

  But the way was still blocked by the slithering monster in front of them. And for all they knew, coming behind them was the exact same creature. They crept as close to the cross tunnel as they dared. Iolanthe didn’t know which one was worse, looking at the enormous hairy, wrinkly tube of flesh sliding past before them, or watching the head with six pairs of multifaceted, reflective eyes rapidly approaching from behind.

  The mouth beneath the eyes opened. There were no teeth inside. Everything was terrifyingly, revoltingly soft—and dripping with what seemed to be bushels of black saliva.

  Iolanthe stared, petrified.

  The prince yanked her into the cross tunnel—the other creature, or perhaps the back end of this very one, had at last passed. But the one behind them, despite traveling at great speed, managed to turn in time into the same tunnel.

  They ran, their boots sinking into the spongy ground.

  Only to see another set of a dozen eyes coming at them.

  This time there were no cross tunnels.

  “Break a wall,” Titus urged her. “You can do it.”

  She did it, though the sound of the wall crumbling was less that of stone cracking than the sickening snap of bone crunching. They raced through to the adjacent tunnel.

  “Black Bastion feels like a luxury resort by comparison, don’t you think?” she somehow managed to say as they ran.

  “The occupants there are certainly much prettier, I will grant you that,” he replied.

  The tunnel led to a clearing of sorts.

  He looked about. “I do not like this. All the tunnels lead up. There should be at least one leading down.”

  She swore: from each of the five tunnels that led into the clearing came one small slithering thing. “I hope this doesn’t mean a big one is following behind each of those.”

  Her hope was dashed as five enormous, monstrous heads entered the clearing at almost the same time.

  She dropped the vertices of the quasi-vaulter to the ground. “We are getting out of here now.”

  Titus did not object, but only took off the satchel on his back and strapped it on her. “In case we become separated.”

  Hands held, they stepped into the quasi-vaulter, just as the nearest creature shot a stream of black saliva at them.

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  CHAPTER ♦33

  The Sahara Desert

  THE MOON HAD RISEN, AN enormous crescent low in the sky. The first group of rebel defenders took to the air, circling overhead, with a couple of small squadrons veering off to investigate the bell jar dome.

  “So you don’t remember me, either?” Kashkari asked as he accepted a nutrition cube from Titus. “All this time you’ve had no idea who I am?”

  “Afraid so,” said Iolanthe, refilling Kashkari’s canteen.

  She tried to keep fear at bay, but she wasn’t sure whether she was succeeding. It was one thing to be hunted by Atlantis, quite another to know that even mages who should be her allies might have designs on her.

  “Followers of Durga Devi,” again came the resonant, golden voice, “give up Iolanthe Seabourne and you need suffer no casualties today.”

  She swallowed.

  “Shut the hell up,” Titus retorted, his tone almost casual. “The only time you will see her is with your cold, dead eyes.”

  “Thank you, Your Highness.” She smiled at him, if a little weakly.

  “For you, my destiny, nothing less.”

  Now she couldn’t help grinning, remembering his earlier avowal to never call her “my destiny.” Grateful for this bit of inside humor, she kissed him on his cheek. “It’s almost better than bad verse.”

  He held her against him for a moment. “Nothing will happen to you, not as long as I can still wield a wand.”

  Kashkari’s canteen was full. She capped it and returned it to him.

  “So . . .” said Kashkari. “You don’t remember anything else, but you remember each other?”

  “No,” Iolanthe replied, “but nothing builds camaraderie like running from—”

  Her head felt strange, and not from the lateness of the hour. She jerked—bright streaks torn across the inside of her skull, like meteors crisscrossing the sky, burning, yet icy at the core.

  She gritted her teeth and clutched her temples.

  Titus had her by the shoulders. “Are you all right?”

  She swayed. The next moment she was on her hands and knees, shaking.

  “Should we take you below, Fairfax?” asked Kashkari urgently. “We have several good, trained physicians.”

  She held up a hand. “I’m—I’m—”

  She was beyond nauseated by the image flashing across her mind, that of a disgustingly large, wormlike creature, dripping black saliva, writhing toward her.

  Lady Wintervale, tears falling down her hollow cheeks.

  Wintervale, lying dead on the ground.

  And then memories rushed back like water past a crumbling dam, in such torrents and deluges she was afraid they would overflow her cranium. But they seem to fit back into her head just fine and already the discomfort was fading, leaving only a faint sensation of disorientation.

  Titus was beside her, his arm around her middle. Kashkari had also crouched down, and was peering at her anxiously. She pushed herself up so that she was sitting on her heels and set her hand for moment on Kashkari’s sleeve. “I remember you.”

  Turning to Titus, she rested her palm on his cheek. “And I remember you. And I’m afraid that for you there is no escaping the shame of writing those overheated words on the strap of my bag—ever.”

  “But why don’t I remember?”

  “It will come back. The precautions that have been put into place for us ensure that we never have to suffer the effects of a memory spell for long—but the exact time will probably vary a little from person to person.”

  Ishana flew up and handed everyone a thin, flexible breathing mask. “Durga Devi wants you to have those, in case Atlantis puts something foul in the air.”

  Iolanthe strapped on her mask, which was much more comfortable than she had anticipated.

  “So what happened to Wintervale?” asked Kashkari, adjusting his own mask.

  “He is no more.” The young mage who would have made a dedicated rebel, and who would have brought joy to all who fought with him—she fought against tears. “I’m so sorry.�
�

  Kashkari passed his hand in front of his face. “I was afraid of that.”

  Iolanthe wiped the corners of her eyes. “Tell me what happened after we left. Is everything at Mrs. Dawlish’s all right?”

  “I waited in the lavatory until the Bane went inside Fairfax’s room,” answered Kashkari. “Then I talked the other boys into a game of association football, senior boys against junior boys—I didn’t want them to be in the house if it was going to collapse, or anything of the sort.

  “We still all had to change before we could play—I was too nervous to remember that everyone was in their Sunday clothes. That was when Lady Wintervale came. I whispered in her ear that her son was the Bane and pointed her to your room. About a minute later, a team of Atlantean agents came up the stairs. Several of them took the Crucible and left immediately. The rest started carting everything out of both your rooms.”

  “In front of you?”

  “In front of everyone. Cooper, bless him, immediately started blabbing about what the prince had said during our bonfire evening on the beach—that some treasonous bastards in Saxe-Limburg were looking to push him off the throne. And of course since you are known to be hisclosest associate among the boys, naturally your room also had to be sifted for evidence for whatever crime with which they were going to charge the prince. And when they started to lug things out of Wintervale’s room, Cooper made the further connection that Wintervale was actually from around the same parts as the prince and must therefore also be involved in those palace intrigues—which was exactly why his mother had suddenly come to Mrs. Dawlish’s, because she knew danger was coming and wanted to warn him to flee.”

  “I cannot tell whether this Cooper is an idiot or a genius,” said the prince.

  “In either case, he was quite determined to travel to Saxe-Limburg someday to make sure that everyone is all right. I told him that even if you were in trouble, you would not be thrown into prison, but be put under house arrest, in a luxurious manor with gardens and a shooting park. I hope he believes me—or he would be in for a frustrating time, trying to find Saxe-Limburg.”

  “And how did you get away?” asked Iolanthe.

  “I was going to wait a few days. But after your rooms—and Wintervale’s—had been cleared out, a man came to Mrs. Dawlish’s and said he was the prince’s valet. He asked to speak with some of your friends. After he was gone, I found a piece of paper inside the pocket of my waistcoat. It could be a message for you, prince. I couldn’t decipher it, but it made me nervous that that he had singled me out.

  “The Atlanteans had also looked into the other boys’ rooms for suspicous items. They took a rug from my floor, a nonmage rug that doesn’t fly anymore than it speaks. But now I wondered whether this man had recognized that my curtain was actually a flying carpet—and whether some agent of Atlantis wouldn’t realize the same thing.

  “That night I bewitched all the seat cushions to fly out of the window of the common room, creating a distraction. While the Atlanteans were preoccupied with that, I slipped away and took the last train out.” Kashkari took a piece of paper out of his inner pocket and gave it to Titus. “And this is that message.”

  Titus called for a small sphere of light, scanned the message and passed it to Iolanthe. “Have a look?”

  The note read: Lady Callista was interrogated under the effect of truth serum at a time coinciding with the resurfacing of certain memories. Apparently she has surrendered information crucial to the potential capture of the elemental mage who can control lightning.

  So Lady Callista had been caught after all. Most likely her memory was protected. So Master Haywood’s spell suppressing all her recollection of Iolanthe was only temporary, and expired at a most inconvenient time.

  And Lady Callista must have been the one who had placed the target of the quasi-vaulter in the Sahara Desert. The memory spell had probably been attached to the activation of the target later, after she realized she had lost track of Iolanthe—a girl who didn’t know her own identity would be easier to deceive and control. And the blood circle had probably been a precautionary measure, so that Iolanthe did not wander off before Lady Callista could find her—as unflattering as her opinion of Lady Callista was, Iolanthe didn’t think the latter actually meant to kill her.

  An illumination much brighter than the blue mage light flickered on the message. Iolanthe raised her head to see a silver-white beacon expanding.

  “Good!” said Kashkari. “Amara is calling back my brother and the others who raided the Atlantean base.”

  Iolanthe felt a leap of excitement. “And isn’t that how you break a bell jar dome? By having allies approach from the outside?”

  But the beacon dissipated as it touched the top of the dome.

  Kashkari groaned. “It needs to rise much higher. Or they won’t see it.”

  Titus gripped her hand. Even with the breathing mask, she could see that he was grimacing. She braced her weight against his just as he stumbled.

  “I—I remember everything now,” he said, leaning into her. “And I have made up my mind: Cooper is undoubtedly an idiot, but an invaluable one.”

  “Should I ever see him again, I will tell him you said he was invaluable.”

  He laughed quietly, and then he raised his wand. A flame-colored beacon flared into existence, well above the bell jar dome.

  “What is it?” Iolanthe asked.

  “It is the war phoenix,” said Titus, “released when the Master of the Domain himself is under attack.”

  “But we are thousands of miles from the Domain.”

  “True, but we are not without friends nearby. The first night we were in the desert, armored chariots were coming too close, so I released two phoenix beacons to distract them, without knowing exactly what I was doing. And one of the beacons was a war phoenix. When that happens, my exact location becomes known to the War Council. Remember I told you that the second night there were riders on pegasi? Atlanteans forces do not make use of pegasi, but we do. And remember the bewitched spears? Guess who has that many bewitched spears?”

  Iolanthe gasped. “Of course! You even said it was like watching a historical reenactment. Titus the Great Memorial Museum has thousands of them for just that purpose.”

  “So we just have to hold out long enough for relief to get here. And then we’ll have you disappear into the crowds of of a nonmage city until the danger is past.”

  “How long do you think it will be before they get here?”

  “The sooner the better,” said Kashkari, his voice tight. “Looking at what’s coming, I’m not sure we can last long.”

  Two more groups of rebel defenders took to the air just then, obscuring Iolanthe’s view of the sky. And then she saw it, coming into the bell jar dome, a mountainous swarm of winged beasts, a rather ominous flamelike sheen to their scales in the light of the war phoenix.

  “Fortune shield me,” she murmured. “Is all of the wyvern battalion here?”

  “The Bane is in the Sahara—where else would the wyvern battalion be?” said Titus, unfolding the carpet that had brought them to the rebel base. “Now, shall we?”

  The wyverns hovered in midair, the beating of their wings like thousands of damp bedsheets being shaken out at once. Even without breathing fire, their presence brought a sulfurous odor to the air, one that was fortunately muted by the breathing mask.

  Titus tapped his wand twice against his palm. The seven diamond-inlaid crowns along the length of the wand began to glow. He handed the wand to Iolanthe. “Take this and give me yours.”

  “But that is Validus.” Iolanthe was flustered by his gesture: Validus had once belonged to Titus the Great. Not to mention, it was one of the last of the blade wands, far more powerful an amplifier of a mage’s power than an ordinary wand.

  “Yes, I know that—I also know which one of us can take on a greater number of wyverns.” He pressed the priceless wand into her hand. “You will make better use of Validus.”

  “T
he Lord High Commander of the Great Realm of New Atlantis hails His Serene Highness, the Master of the Domain,” the sonorous voice came again. “Atlantis and the Domain currently enjoy a peaceful and mutually beneficial association. Surrender. Deliver Iolanthe Seabourne into the care of Atlantis and that friendly diplomatic relationship will continue.”

  “Do you not enjoy how it has been phrased?” Titus said softly.

  “I would like to. But every time that voice speaks, I rather choke on fear.”

  Even the might of Validus in her hand was not sufficient to expel that fear.

  “And I grow ever more incensed that anyone still thinks I am going to give you up.” He murmured a spell. When he spoke again, his voice, though not raised in the least, carried for miles. “The Master of the Domain will consider delivering a cubic mile of elephant excrement into the care of Atlantis, but nothing else. And he extends his warmest greetings to the Lord High Commander. Soon may the Lord High Commander depart for the Void, where he is long overdue.”

  Iolanthe was thunderstruck: Titus had just told the Bane to go to hell. Angry shouts erupted from the wyvern riders. The rebels, like Iolanthe, were overawed.

  The sonorous voice was now both darker and scabbier. “The Master of the Domain is an impetuous child. But the Lord High Commander is willing to overlook the folly of youth for the greater good. Forfeit Iolanthe Seabourne and you may yet keep your throne.”

  “The Master of the Domain is no doubt the stupidest boy who ever lived,” replied Titus. “But he prides himself on not being a vile, old man who practices sacrificial magic, as the Lord High Commander does.”

  Iolanthe might have fallen off the carpet if she hadn’t been strapped in. This time, the Atlanteans were stunned into silence; the rebels cried out in shock.

  “Every word the prince says is true,” rose Kashkari’s voice. “I will vouch for it with my life.”

  What Iolanthe had come to think of as the voice of Atlantis spoke again, and it sounded like stones grinding together. “Atlantis is ever on the side of peace and friendship. But you have brought war upon yourself, Titus of Elberon.”