I knew it would not matter if I was not. Donal intended to go inside.
I understood. I understood the need to hurry. I understood why we had no time to second-guess this. I knew Donal understood these things even better than I did.
I could feel a harder, more specific worry on him still, and it amplified my own fears, making it difficult to stay quiet. A part of me wanted to ask him what bothered him, what he continued to hide from me. That same part didn’t want to wait for those explanations until after this was over. It wanted to know now, although I knew how irrational that was.
We hadn’t time for any more talk. We had to act.
Before I got any further in that train of thought...
Donal opened the door.
Chapter 10
TEMPLE OF FIRE
DONAL, MYSELF, AND the dark, cold room behind us at once became flooded with orange light. Rather than damp and cold, the air on the other side of that door was hot and wet. It slammed into me like dragon’s breath, smelling vaguely of metals, sulfur and sweat.
I could scarcely breathe through it. It was too dense to even see through at first.
It felt like breathing underwater inside a hot mineral spring.
Eventually, I made out shapes in that tropical fog.
The light didn’t come from candlelight or torches––high flames dancing sideways shadows against black-stone walls, too tall to be either. Wet air clouded the stone in bursts but the surface was so hot the steam evaporated, or ran down the walls in long, clear streams. Even with all the water, the stone was hot enough that mirages formed from the heat in some places on the mirrored surfaces, making them ripple like molten metal.
I thought fire and water had blackened those stones, but after blinking a few times at the smooth, midnight-black walls, I realized the chamber wasn’t constructed of regular granite or even marble. Volcanic glass lined the walls on all sides of us, slick with water.
It was the same material Donal’s eyes reminded me of, from the first time I saw him.
Like his eyes, the surfaces shone so smooth and deep, they acted like mirrors where they weren’t warped by water or clouded by steam.
Between that and the clouds filling the chamber, it was difficult to assess the dimensions of the room. I figured out the rough shape by looking at the floor, where a canal ran around the edges of the room, defining the perimeter.
Despite the relatively narrow width, the canal looked deep, filled with water that appeared alternately black and red, depending on the reflections. It seemed to run swiftly of its own current, in a clockwise motion around us.
Once I noticed that motion, it dizzied me.
I didn’t understand the speed of it, how it was even possible, but I felt strongly it must be magic powering it.
I stared around from where we stood for what felt like a long time between breaths. I watched the gusts of hot steam, the dripping black walls, the faint rushing sound of the canal’s current, the shadows from the flames...
Then the image righted itself, clicking into place with force.
We weren’t alone.
On the far side of the room I counted ten... no twelve... people sitting cross-legged on the floor. They sat directly on the black, glass-like surface, all wearing identical black pajamas, which is why I hadn’t seen them when the door first opened. They did not appear to sweat. Water from the air coated their hair in a fine mist, but their clothes were scarcely damp.
They sat eerily still, like statues more than living beings.
In the center of their circle stood an enormous brazier, the source of the leaping flames. The tunnel of fire danced high above their heads even now, licking the ceiling around a hole cut in the black stone above the round top of the brazier, some fifteen feet from the floor.
None of the black-clad figures turned at the opening of the door.
None made a sound... nor moved at all, from what I could perceive.
Bare seconds had passed, although something felt timeless about those few breaths and the way those figures sat on the floor. It crossed my mind this must be magic I felt, but it was nothing like the white magic I’d been raised with.
The longer I thought it, the more tangible the realization grew.
This magic didn’t drift down like white particles in the air above my head. Rather, it seemed to seep up into me from below, through my feet and from under the floor. I didn’t feel any of those strange feathery or crackling sensations over my head at all, what I’d grown accustomed to in the wats and inside the palace walls.
There was something... decadent... about this magic.
Water and black stone, fire and hot breath.
I felt it like liquid fire in my belly, heating my chest and heart.
I was still trying to wrap my head around the differences, when Donal took my hand. I glanced up at him, startled, having forgotten him in those few seconds. He was breathing harder too, his face flushed, his dark hair already misted with water from the air. Under that flush, I saw a sharper glint in his eyes, what looked closest to relief, or maybe some form of arousal.
Whatever it was, it flustered me.
Maybe to avoid going any deeper into his expression, I glanced behind him.
He’d shut the door.
From the inside, no latch existed, nor any type of lock––magical, human or otherwise. I saw no handle nor other means by which to open the door, either. The inside panel was nothing but smooth, black rock, affixed somehow to the plain wood and iron of the other side.
With it closed, I struggled to even see a seam outlining the door from the wall.
When I turned back towards the circle of black-robed figures on the floor, they remained in exactly the same places and positions I remembered.
Donal and I exchanged glances.
That time, he frowned.
I could see his whole face in the brighter light. His features stood out more dramatically than they had on the roof, wild with reflections from the red, orange and gold flames. Lighter shadows danced alongside as the flames morphed, but his eyes shone black as the stone floors and walls. When I continued to stare he looked at me.
Without either of us speaking, the two of us began to walk.
I watched the robed figures minutely, but still saw no indication they’d noticed us at all. We crossed the stone floor until we stood directly over their circle. Donal was so close to the one nearest him, he could have touched him with a hand––or kicked him with a foot.
Before I could decide what to do, Donal spoke aloud.
His accent came out thicker than I’d ever heard it, almost difficult to understand.
“Hallo?” he said. “Hallo, friends. We’re o’ yer kin. Be red witches... like yourn. Friendly. Come ta bring youn ou’ o’ this dark place.”
His words and accent startled me enough that I looked at him, but only for a second. As soon as he finished, I jerked my gaze back towards the figures in black robes, looking for their reactions.
None of them moved.
All of their eyes were open, something I hadn’t noticed from the other side of the room. Their eyes remained open and unblinking, despite the disorienting wet air and heat and that liquid magic that still roiled in my belly and chest, reaching into my throat. The heat was so intense now that we stood closer to the flames, I struggled to breathe all over again.
None of the seated figures seemed to notice the heat at all.
They stared, as one, into the gold and orange fire.
It stretched from an opening in the black stone floor all the way up to that hole in the ceiling, ignited by I knew not what.
The longer I stared, the more odd things I noticed about that fire. It was too brightly gold in color, for one thing, as if illuminated twice, yet the light grew significantly dimmer outside the circle of those seated bodies. The fire didn’t spill at all out of the gaps in the iron brazier. It was as if something propelled that flame with force through the hole in the floor.
; I had to assume these things were magic, too.
“Brothers! Sisters!” Donal said, raising his voice. “We come ‘ere to bring yourn out of this place! We risk’d it in this dung’n. To help yourn. Bring all o’ us t’ freedom... as one! Come with us! We’re beggin’ ye, come to yourn kin...”
His voice trailed towards the end, holding bewilderment now.
“Yourn not spea’ with we?” he said, sounding closer to angry. “Not a one o’ ye?”
Even now, none of them turned, nor acknowledged us in any way.
I spoke to Donal, raising my voice. “Is your sister here?”
Donal’s lips firmed at my question.
He walked purposefully around the circle, leaning down to stare into the faces of each of the black-pajama-clad figures, even those who were obviously male. He studied each face with great care, one by one.
Eventually he made his way back to me.
“No,” he said once he reached me, speaking more or less in his normal voice. “I don’t know a one of them,” he added, his voice confused. “I don’t understand this. I expected fear. I expected them to foresee a trick of some kind... or perhaps believe us traitors. I did not expect this. How would we even begin to get them out of here, with them like this?”
He glanced around the space, as if assessing the dimensions.
“They must be keeping more of our kin somewhere,” he added. “They cannot possibly sleep and eat in this space alone, no matter how cruel their masters. Did we walk far enough to be under the temple you spoke of, do ye think?”
He’d gone back to speaking more or less Regent’s tongue, with the same accent I remembered from before. It struck me suddenly that perhaps he was more educated than the average slave. That, or maybe red witches and warlocks had a different dialect they used with one another as compared to everyone else.
I shook my head. “No,” I said. “Unless there is some spell, we did not walk far enough to be under the temple. We walked down much further than we walked in any other direction. We might be in the middle of the lawn. Or one of the gardens, perhaps. Maybe even the one we passed over to reach my mother’s––” I cut off my words, amending them. “––the residence of the Regent’s Blood,” I finished lamely.
Donal frowned delicately, looking close to annoyed. “I know who you are, Maia... we covered this already.”
I nodded, not meeting his gaze. “I know.”
That heat swirling in my belly and chest rose in a hotter flush, all the way up to my neck and face. I didn’t know why I changed my words, but it hadn’t really been for Donal. Maybe I just didn’t want to think about my mother yet, not until we were away from here. Either way, it felt strange to think of her down here, with us in this place.
This kind of magic felt wholly antithetical to my mother’s way of being.
Donal didn’t push me for more of an answer.
He left the immediate area of the circle, walking up to the walls. Leaning over the rushing waters of the canal, he began feeling over the stone surfaces with his bare hands. Realizing what he was doing, I joined him, working my way down the wall to his other side.
“Do you feel one?” he said, after we were most of the way around the circumference of the room, and almost back to the old door. “Anything at all?”
“No.” I shook my head. “Nothing.”
We continued in relative silence to make our way around the room, looking for a way out. We got back to the section of wall through which we’d originally entered and I tried to first see, then feel, the edges of the one door we knew to exist.
I could feel nothing. The panel looked to be unbroken black glass, just like the rest.
Something occurred to me, and I looked down at the canal.
“The water didn’t flow here before, did it?” I said, staring at the rushing current. The canal was unbroken there, the same as it was around the rest of the room. I was very certain I hadn’t stepped over it to enter this space, however.
“No,” Donal said, shaking his head at once. “Did you not feel it, when we broke the seal?”
I turned, looking at him. “No.”
He exhaled. “I forget you are not accustomed to red magics. This room is thick with them. We walked in, and it paused their ceremony... ritual, I guess you would say. When I closed the door, the ritual resumed. Did you not hear the water begin to move, as soon as the door had shut? I thought surely you had, since you looked at it.”
I swallowed, but didn’t answer.
I hadn’t seen or noticed any of that. He must have shut the door before I thought to look down at the floor, or noticed the people in the center of the room. He was likely right; I’d probably heard the water first, then seen it.
“Can you feel the door at all, Maia?”
I shook my head. “No.”
I saw nothing with my eyes. I felt nothing with my hands.
Donal took over after I gave up. He couldn’t find the door, either.
Eventually we were forced to stop.
Both of us were sweating by then.
My hair was stuck to my face and the back of my neck, and Donal’s was too. Despite the wetness of the air I was thirsty enough by then to feel almost desperate with it, and we’d scarce been inside the room for more than twenty minutes.
I couldn’t imagine how we might feel after a few hours inside this tropical oven.
“An illusion?” Donal said. His voice was frustrated now, and once more thick with accent. “Is this whole thing an illusion, do ye think? The fire an’ the robed ones... are they even real? Perhaps the ritual’s occurring elsewhere. Below us, maybe? Where the fire comes from?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. You would know more than me.”
The dress I wore stuck to my skin, heavy and uncomfortable. I tugged at the collar by my throat, swallowing with an effort as I began to feel smothered.
“We need to wake them up,” I told him. “Try, anyway.” A thought struck me. “You said opening the door disrupted the ritual?” At his nod, I looked back at the brazier. “Perhaps we didn’t disrupt it for long enough. Maybe if we stop the ritual, the doors will reappear?”
Donal followed my gaze to the fire.
He seemed to be following my train of thought.
After a decisive nod, he turned on his heel, stalking towards the circle of black-clad figures on the floor. Without preamble, he grabbed the closest one and began dragging him bodily away from the circle around the brazier.
The instant he yanked the black-pajama-clad monk out of his position in the circle, the man began to flail violently, pinwheeling his arms and kicking out with his legs to resist Donal’s attempts to break the circle. The monk’s mouth fell open in a silent scream. Blue eyes went wide in his face, contrasting their strong almond shape and his midnight-black hair.
Swinging wildly, the man punched Donal in the throat, causing the latter to choke, then gasp for breath. Yet somehow Donal managed to retain his grip. When the monk continued to swing at him, Donal protected his head with his free hand, refusing to let go of the other’s arm.
He resumed dragging the black-clad monk away from the others, but the monk threw his head backwards in a head butt. That time, the blow caught Donal off guard.
His fingers loosened.
The monk jerked so violently and wildly, he managed to get free. Without the slightest pause, he dove for the circle to resume his place, while I ran to Donal’s side.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” Donal growled, holding his bleeding nose. “Help me with him!”
Together we each grabbed one of the monk’s arms.
The person––or creature, my mind couldn’t help thinking––grew even more violent when both of us restrained him. His mouth opened like a fish as he jerked and writhed in our hands, kicking out with his legs. I was still staring down at him when frustration and fear reached a crescendo in my own heart.
Then a sudden, hotter impatience flooded through my limbs.<
br />
Before I knew I intended it, I shook him. That heat flooded up from my belly and through my chest, reaching my voice.
“STOP IT! BE STILL! RIGHT NOW! I COMMAND IT!”
The monk went limp in our hands.
The change was so sudden and dramatic, I nearly dropped him. So did Donal.
Donal stared down at the man’s face, his eyes incredulous.
Then he looked at me. I watched his face change into an open shock, his black eyes grow round. He seemed about to speak, but must have thought better of it, since he looked down at the monk’s face. Before he could speak to the monk directly, however, another voice broke the silence.
That time, it came from the circle itself.
“Let go of him,” a hard, male voice snarled. “Right now! Or we’ll kill you both.”
Chapter 11
THE DOOR OPENS
THE LIGHTS CAME on around us.
The water rushing in the canal rimming the room––a noise I’d scarcely remembered to notice or realize the volume of until it ceased to make sound––stopped.
In the seconds that followed, water sloshed violently against the stone sides of the canal basin. It was as if somehow, something had put the brakes on that motion altogether, rather than ceasing to propel it forward, where it might have gradually slowed.
Rivers ran down the walls in sheets as the remaining hot clouds impacted the stone, transforming immediately back into pure water. The fire in the iron brazier stopped, disappearing down into the hole in the floor.
I found myself staring as that hole evaporated, melting back into smooth, black stone right before my very eyes. The monks in their black pajamas stood up, one by one, blinking and backing away from Donal and me with frightened expressions on their faces.
This was closer to the reaction Donal said he had expected.
Looking at them, I couldn’t tell which of them had spoken to us first. I guessed it was one of the angrier faces staring back at us, including one man who glared at me openly, his dark brown eyes gleaming with an inner fire I could not mistake.
Now that we were faced with it, I found the intense emotionality of those faces more disconcerting than the weird trance that preceded it.
Red Magic: an Adult Dystopian Paranormal Romance: Sector 6 (The Othala Witch Collection) Page 12