Wanderer

by Nancy E. Dunne

  Sath swiftly moved between Elysiam and her view of the first floor. “Listen, we are not going to get anywhere toward rescuing Kahzi without tipping off our Lady that we’re here,” he said.

  “Who?” asked Gin, puzzled and trying to block out Sath’s use of a Qatunari nickname for their target. She was certain there was more going on between them than he had told her, and was keeping up every hope that he had not broken his promise not to lie to her.

  “Lady Salynth,” Sath said, whispering the name, wishing he had not used Kazhmere’s nickname.

  “She’s a right nasty one, a dragonkind who holds the lot of them undead here in her thrall.” Teeand said, and then shuddered at the thought.

  “Oh, right, the sorceress,” Gin said, grimacing. “Are we still sure this is a good idea?” She looked up at Sath. “How do we know your Kazhmere is even still alive?”

  “I would know if she wasn’t,” Sath barked at Gin, immediately wishing he had not. The sting of his words was evident in the look on her face. “Sorry. So, plan is we move up to the top floor slowly, yes?” All of them nodded at him. “Right then, everyone stand back, and I will…”

  “Oh keep your stand back,” Elysiam hissed, no longer able to wait before she struck. “That’s my line!” The druid barreled past Sath, almost knocking him to the ground in surprise. “Well, hello, tall dark and smelly!” she called out to a shape in a shadow. “You look a lot like the wyverns back in Bellesea Keep…but I think they actually smell better.” The wyvern gazed down at her, its dark eyes flickering with what appeared to be amusement. That sentiment soon faded as flames exploded from Elysiam’s fingers and set its nearly translucent wings alight. The creature roared and swung at Elysiam who quickly and deftly dodged its blow. “Hey that was…whoa!” The icy floors were the druid’s downfall, quite literally. She lost her footing and slid on her backside right up to the feet of the monster, whose mouth watered as it gazed down at her. “I can still roast you!” she screamed, as the beast tried to get a grip on her to pick her up. “You just set me on my feet and I will ROAST you!”

  “No you won’t!” Hackort shouted. He had dashed in behind her and jumped over her head so that he was between her and the monster…only now he was sliding toward its feet as well. “Curse this icy floor! Elysiam, why don’t you do something USEFUL and roast the floor to melt this ice?”

  From the doorway where she still stood, Gin summoned up healing magic and hurled it in Elysiam’s direction. Spell after spell landed on the druid and the warrior, and finally Gin felt that they were out of mortal danger long enough to summon up another spell that would levitate them above the floor on cushions of air. Elysiam laughed as her feet left the floor and she floated right toward the monster’s nose.

  “That’s the stuff, Gin!” she called out, aiming her scimitar for the monster’s head. Before she could execute the blow, however, the monster swatted her away like an insect, focusing its attention on the tiny warrior now floating at the level of its kneecaps. Hackort rained blows down on the monster’s legs as Teeand rushed up to and behind the monster and began his own assault only slightly higher than Hack’s. Sath hung back from the fray near Gin who was pumping healing magic toward the two warriors and the other druid who had floated up to the level of the monster’s head and was unleashing swarms of magical insects toward its eyes and ears. The monster howled and swatted at the phantom bees as Hackort and Teeand made quick work of him from below. Soon the three of them, plus some well-placed spells from Sath, killed the wyvern and it crumpled to the floor in a heap.

  “Right!” Elysiam shouted, wiping some of the black blood spatter from the beast off her right cheek and tunic. “Next!” Sath swooped in and grabbed Elysiam, pulling her to his chest and holding her tightly.

  “Easy, druid!” he said, chuckling, but his smile did not spread all the way to his eyes. “We will never get anywhere if we have to stop each one of these in that kind of fight. Only Anni, Teeand, and I have any idea of the hordes of undead that are just waiting on the upper floors for a chance to take us down. And all of them won’t hesitate to run to their mistress and let her know we are here, if they haven’t already.”

  “Right, so LET ME GO so we can get started!” Elysiam begged as she struggled against Sath’s strength.

  “Normally I would agree with you, Elys,” Hackort said as he floated over to her, grinning, as he looked her in the eye for a change, “but not this time. We need to sneak by some of them so that we will be ready for the bigger ones upstairs.” Elysiam slumped in Sath’s arms, defeated.

  “Fine. Not that I saw anyone but Hackort and Teeand in there helping me this time, though,” she muttered. Gin inhaled sharply, glaring at Elysiam. “Well, of course, you too, Gin,” she said, frowning. “I’d be dead a thousand times over if you weren’t around.” She beamed a smile at her sister druid, who returned it with a scowl. “I was thinking, though, that the two felines were awfully quiet over there?”

  “I was helping,” Sath snapped. “Your bees weren’t the only insects that beast was fighting off.” Anni looked at the floor. “You can’t hold Anni responsible either; she’s only just a young bard.” At Sath’s comment Anni raised her eyes to meet his, hers burning with indignant anger.

  “Young bard indeed…be glad you’re on my side, Highness,” she hissed. Sath frowned, and then released Elysiam.

  “We need to keep moving,” he said, ignoring Anni’s outburst. “Gin? If you and Elys don’t mind, another bit of cloaking magic would be good right about now.” Gin bit her lip and made eye contact with Elysiam, and then both began the chant at the same time to ward off the undead. Soon the entire group was ready to go and even floated in front of a few skeletons to make sure that they wouldn’t be seen.

  “Great, we’re invisible, now what do we do?” Elysiam snapped. “Has anyone but me noted the serious lack of staircases or anything?” She looked around, clearly annoyed. “Nothing here,” she said, dashing around a corner, the group hot on her heels, “but another stupid door that is locked, I think. Wait…” She dashed at the door before Sath or Tee could stop her and bounced off it, landing in a heap on the floor. They quickly took their places at the entrance to the small corridor while Gin and Hackort rushed to Elysiam’s side. Gin held her tiny hands over her sister druid, whispering words of healing that cancelled out her invisibility magic. She could only focus her energy on one type of magic at a time, it seemed.

  “Hurry, Gin, there are a few skeletons about to poke their bony noses down here that will see you,” Sath said.

  “I’m working on it, Sath, but she’s still out and I’m a bit worn out from the invisibility spell,” Gin hissed back.

  “Perhaps I can be of help,” Anni whispered. She pulled out a small lute from her rucksack and started playing a soft tune. As much as she hated to admit it, Gin felt better and better as the song went on. Anni changed the tune and suddenly she was working in another line of beautiful harmony. Gin felt the music was surrounding her, strengthening her and her magic as she worked on Elysiam. She felt safe, warm, and almost sleepy as she worked, and even found herself smiling up at Anni in thanks. Her gaze landed on Sath, who was watching her over his shoulder as Teeand kept an eye on the skeletons. He shot a toothy grin her way, and Gin smiled back, causing his breath to catch in his throat.

  The music ended suddenly and Gin looked up at Anni, surprised. The bard was glaring at her. “What happened?” Gin asked, getting to her feet and then helping Elysiam join her.

  “That was for you, Gin,” Anni hissed. “That song was meant to replenish your spirit and allow you to help Elysiam there to heal, nothing more.”

  “Isn’t that what happened?” Gin said, confused. “I don’t understand why you’re so upset, Anni?” She rested a hand on Anni’s arm, but the Qatu female yanked her arm free of Gin’s grasp.

  “That was not to help you to try to charm our Sathlir,” Anni said under her breath in Qatunari. Gin stared at her, trying to make the words make sen
se as Anni stalked away, stowing her lute in her haversack.

  “What about our Sathlir?” Gin called after her in halting Qatunari. Sath’s gaze flew to hers and then to Anni, his eyes narrowing. Anni ignored Gin, and kept hunting around in her bag for something. She did not see Sath approaching until he was nearly on top of her.

  “What was that about, Annilanshi?” he whispered, his tone menacing and almost…royal. Anni’s heart dropped into her stomach. “Answer me.”

  “It was nothing your…Sath. I merely misunderstood the druid’s intent was all,” she said, fighting the urge to fall to the floor.

  “It needs to STOP, do you understand me?” Sath said, his teal gaze burning into Anni’s eyes.

  “Yes.” Anni finally found the strength to look away. It was no wonder his mother, the First Wife Savra, had left all that she knew when she had become pregnant with Sath. Anni could only imagine how the Rajah was when he was angry if Sath’s behavior was any indication. Yet Anni could not seem to tear herself away from him. There was something between them, she just knew it, and he had to see that she was a more suitable mate than that wood elf. Imagine! A wood elf, First Wife to the Rajah of Qatu? Anni shuddered in spite of herself, catching Sath’s attention.

  The son of the Rajah shook off his princely demeanor and frowned. “Anni, I’m sorry,” he said, placing a finger under her chin and lifting her face until she again looked him in the eye. “I don’t mean to…I mean, I’m afraid that I…The last thing I want to do is be anything like my father. Just now, in your eyes, I saw the same fear that I saw from many citizens back home when they faced him, and I do not ever want to see that from you. Can we make a deal?” he said, his eyes soft. Anni felt faint.

  “Of course we can, Sath,” she said, musing for a moment that this was the first time she did not have to work to remember to call him Sath rather than Your Highness or even Sathlir. “Whatever you ask.”

  “No.” Sath pulled his hand back from her face, disgust creeping into his expression. “That is not what I want. I want a friend, Anni. I have not seen another of our kind in ages, not since I left Qatu’anari, and I need that. You’re the closest thing I have right now to a sister, and I don’t want you to ever feel afraid of me.”

  Anni’s face fell. A sister? “Sath, I only meant that I will try to remember that at least for now, for here, you and I are on equal footing. Is that what you meant?” she asked, fearing the answer. Sath’s face split into a grin and a purr could be heard behind his words.

  “That is exactly what I meant,” he said, still grinning. Anni thought her heart would burst through her chest at the sight. “But part of the deal is that you…you need to leave the situation between me and Gin alone. It is complicated. She has more reason to hate me than to even like me, let alone love me. Somehow, when she looks up at me with those wide blue eyes and forgives me all my sins, all my time hunting and killing her kind…something in me wakes up. Does that make sense?”

  Anni swallowed a wave of nausea. “Of course it does, Sath. I have felt that way for others in the past. For now, though, we need to keep moving up through the tower. My team got to the fourth floor before everything went wrong so I can get us through this door at least. Let’s keep moving.” She pushed past him, wiping angry tears from her eyes as she approached the magical doorway. A plan was coalescing in her mind; she only had to separate the wood elf from the others and then move as quickly as she could to the top. How could Lady Salynth resist a trade like that?

  Anni approached the door as she had done with her first team. Her heart constricted as she could imagine Kazhmere next to her, leaning in close, excitement written all over her face. “Now,” she said, “Everyone get close and grab onto each other and me. When I pass through the doorway, the magic will permit you to follow me. If you are left I cannot come back for you.” A strange look passed between Teeand and Sath, but Anni ignored it and placed a hand on the door as she slid the key into the lock. As she had expected, her hand disappeared through the no-longer solid door as the enchantment took hold. “Quickly! Grab hold of me and each other!” she cried out as she moved through the doorway, the other five hanging onto her for dear life.

  Again, there was a pile up on the floor on the other side of the doorway, and this time they found themselves in what appeared to be a library. Shelves of books seemed to go back into the huge room as far as they could see, and shades of people reading books and checking the shelves floated here and there. A male shade, dragonkind in size and body but Elvish features, sat at a table to one side of the room, and seemed to be pouring over a book himself.

  “You see, this is what breaks the old heart,” Teeand said. “There is no escape for these poor souls. They are still doing exactly what they were doing when they met their end, and will continue to do so for eternity.”

  “I thought you meant it was sad that they had to read,” Hackort whispered. “I don’t like reading as much as I like killing, so having to spend eternity doing it wouldn’t just be sad, it would be awful. That’s why the only thing I read is my list.” Elysiam elbowed him in the ear. “What? It would be,” he said, stomping on her foot in mock frustration. Elysiam grimaced, but did not cry out.

  “What’s the plan for this floor,” Gin asked, holding up a finger as Anni started to answer her, “Sath?” Anni glared at her but quickly looked away. “You’ve explored here before, haven’t you?”

  “Aye, we both have, haven’t we Tee?” Sath said, grinning as he clapped Teeand on the shoulder. Tee was gripping his axe anxiously. “You’ll have to forgive my old friend, Anni, he doesn’t really care much for magic and this place is loaded with it.”

  “I can’t believe I’m about to say this, Sath, but perhaps we should try to sneak through this one,” Elysiam whispered. Five sets of eyes trained on her in disbelief. “I know! I should feel the overwhelming NEED to dispatch them, but all I feel is…sorry for them.” Hack looked up at her and grinned and she pinched him.

  “I agree with our battle druid,” Teeand said, smiling affectionately at Elysiam as he would at one of his many children. Unwittingly, Teeand had taken on the role of father to the band of adventurers, and he had never been more proud of Elysiam than he was just then. “You’re learning compassion, little hot-head,” he said, pinching her cheek. His hand fell away as her scimitar came up under his chin.

  “You attached to that beard, wee man?” she said, barely able to contain a giggle.

  “Honestly, do you lot ever just do anything or do you stand around and crack jokes all night?” Anni said, exhaling a loud and exasperated sounding sigh as she spoke. “If we’re going to sneak through, we’d best re-cast that invisibility spell. I fear that passing through the magical doorways can cancel magical enchantments.” Her mind flew back to her team’s entrance to a higher floor, her ears filling with the screams of her companions as Salynth’s minions advanced on them and killed them one by one. She was still not sure how she escaped, but felt sure it had something to do with the ragged looking Elvish male that the dragonkind sorceress pulled along by a chain. He had been mouthing something as the ranks of undead advanced; a spell perhaps, as his eyes bored into her. The next thing she knew, she was in the snow at the bottom of the Tower. She shook off that memory quickly. It was probably just another in her legions of undead minions.

  “Shall we move on then?” Gin said sharply, and the others nodded as Anni led the way to the next doorway, past the lost souls that were still engrossed in transparent books.

  Twenty-Eight

  Lady Salynth had been in the Tower for so long that she could not remember being anywhere else. Nor could anyone else that was unlucky enough to find the right door and make it all the way up to the top where she resided. It had not always been that way, however. When the dragons emerged from Orana’s core and their magic created the dragonkind like Salynth from those too close to be able to escape, those new beings that survived the transformation were taken as slaves of the dragons who thought themselves
to be the true children of Orana herself. For centuries, the dragonkind served their beastly masters until, in the midst of the Forest War, there were enough of them to revolt and break free of their enslavement. The dragons, who considered war and battles to be utterly pedestrian anyway, had already set their sights on the ruin of the rest of the races of Orana and seemed to forget about most of the dragonkind who attacked them. Lady Salynth was not so lucky.

  The dragon master that owned her ancestors was the sole frost dragon. He had left the birth land in the Volcanic Mountains and moved southward to the Highlands to find his own empire. In time, he was the only dragon that could command ice and snow, and it was said that he had built the tower by merely breathing its icy walls into existence. Salynth had caught his eye, as happened often between the dragon masters and their dragonkind slaves, and in order to keep her for himself had locked her away in the tower. While she had killed all of the inhabitants that made the tower their home as well as any unlucky adventurers and trapped their souls there, she was just as trapped there as they were. Her dragon master, Lord Kalinth, had woven a spell around her that would instantly end her if she ever set foot outside the tower again. It was no wonder that she took out her frustration on the denizens of her personal prison.

  Her latest pet came in the form of a wizard who unfortunately thought that he could take her on all by himself. He had come in with a hunting party but soon struck out on his own, hiding as the rest of his companions died. Once he saw her in action, however, he tried to make a deal with her similar to the one he had made with a previous dragon foe, but he had soon found Salynth to be a different sort all together from Taanyth, and not because Taanyth was full-blooded dragon and Salynth was only dragonkind. Salynth, made bitter and cruel in her imprisonment in the tower, showed the wizard that he had only scratched the surface of her sadism and had yet to find the key to coming to an agreement with her of any kind. He had sought her as a teacher but she only wanted a slave.