by Tia Reed
✽ ✽ ✽
Rokan made short work of two more thugs as they hurried through a maze of dim, rocky passages. They ducked into a small cavern and pressed against the rock to avoid four more men heading up. Jordayne started to investigate the far side.
“Wrong way,” Rokan said. “We need to get to the heart of this maze.” He gestured in the direction the thugs had come from. “I’ll need backup.” He was studying Druce as a captain might a new recruit.
She pursed her lips. Her stoic mage was looking strained. Perspiration beaded on his face and his forehead was a furrowed field of wrinkles.
“You’ll get it,” he said, moving a hand to a pocket filled with the drug.
They slipped out of the cavern and ran on. While the tunnels appeared hewn, fissures along the floor and wall spilled into caves with uneven floors of tumbled rock.
“Keep going. They didn’t carve these tunnels for no reason,” Rokan growled.
They turned a corner and almost collided with three more men.
“Not unless you have to,” she said to Druce. They needed him strong for when they found Timak.
One man slashed Rokan’s arm before falling to his sword. Another proved more persistent with his weapon. The third was striding straight at her. Her dagger flew into his stomach before he understood a mere woman might be armed. He pulled it out, feinted towards her and threw it at Druce. Her mage staggered into the wall, missing the dagger by a hand. It struck rock and clattered to the ground at his feet. Her second dagger was out and into the approaching thug’s heart before he laid a finger on her. Rokan’s flashing sword blocked her line to the last. Her efficient sergeant took the last man down.
“Wait,” Drucilamere said. He handed her the first dagger, drew his sword and set it above the man’s chest. “Where’s the boy?”
The thug spat. “Dead. Used, mutilated and dead.”
Drucilamere plunged the sword into his chest, pulled it out and strode on without waiting for them.
“Don’t be a fool,” she said, catching up to him.
He was staring through a doorway built across the opening to a shallow cave. A body lay inside, one eye speared by a sharp fragment of pottery. Other shards littered the floor around a toppled chair. Beside it an ominous, red stain marred the earth. Drucilamere staggered in, staring at a sickening clot of blood. He had turned such a dark puce she thought he might fall from a stroke.
“Druce.”
He did not appear to hear but picked up a cup and sniffed. “Porrin.”
“Then this chaos?” she asked.
“Traces of magic linger.” He threw the cup at the rough wall and stormed out. Rokan had to growl twice before he surrendered the lead.
They found living quarters, furnished with beds and tables banged together out of rough planks, and stores piled with porrin behind locks Drucilamere blew open. Before she could stop him, he had downed more of the drug. The fool. An ordinary man would have been comatose by now.
“Timak.” He stared at nothing, swayed. “He’s close.” He banged his fist against the rock. “He’s close.” His eyes glazed. Timak’s name repeated soft on his lips. “They’re outside,” he said, shaking his head into moderate sobriety, “down, by the water.” He threw himself into the passage, and took the slope at an unsteady run.
They careered into a dead end, retraced their path, and tried a different tunnel. It ended in a chamber. A quick search revealed no other exit and they were forced to backtrack again. Drucilamere took another turn. She followed but stopped as Rokan, bringing up the rear, called her name. He had stationed himself at the entrance to the tunnel, sword levelled at yet another opponent.
“They don’t give up, do they?” she said. She called after Druce, frowning when he staggered on. Perhaps it was just as well; down the tunnel a rotting body plodded, intestines trailing from a gaping wound in its gut.
“Fall back,” she said.
“My lady.” Rokan held his ground.
“That is an order, Sergeant.” He gave a low grunt of dismissal. “Do it now or it will be Mykver fort for you.” He blew out a long breath. She understood his sentiment but this time she was right.
Intoxicated as Druce was, catching him up was easy. That was concerning with the zombie staggering on, dragging the smell of decomposition in its wake. Its outstretched arms looked ready to strangle the first person it caught.
“My lady, it means to attack,” Rokan said with the conviction of one who knew his job.
“Wait.” She pulled Drucilamere into a crude bedchamber with dull blankets on four cots. Rokan planted himself at the entrance, showing great restraint in letting the zombie lurch past, the sensible man. “Follow it. Don’t engage. It will lead us to Prahak.” She thanked the Vae Druce was too high to query that.
Minutes later they emerged from a fissure onto a slither of rocky land at the foot of the cliff. A large figure was rowing a boat away, a small body huddled before him. Undeterred, the zombie waded into the lake.
“Too late,” Rokan murmured.
Drucilamere already had another packet of porrin in his hand.
“You can’t,” she said, grabbing his arm.
He shook her hand off and had the drug in his mouth before she could tell Rokan to restrain him.
“Steady, mage,” the sergeant said, gripping Drucilamere’s arm.
Jordayne held her breath. The oars of the boat were sloshing through a yellow streak of moonlight. The dead man was gaining on it with unnatural speed. The hapless child was doomed. Under the strain of the drug, her mage stood too rigid. An unhealthy sound escaped his throat as he stretched out an arm.
“Tournos.” He twisted his arm. The boat overturned, sending Prahak splashing into the water.
Jordayne gasped. She couldn’t see the boy. Could he even swim?
“Levitos.”
Dear, clever Drucilamere! Timak glided above the lake as the zombie paddled for Prahak. The cruel fiend struck for shore, swimming out and around to avoid the dead man. She glanced at the mage, his face wan in the moonlight. He was oblivious to everything save the boy. His grunt exploded into a cough as he dropped to one knee just as Timak passed over the zombie. The terrified boy jerked down. His foot brushed the zombie’s head. The monster reached up and seized his ankle in a bloated, rotting hand. Druce struggled up and staggered to the edge of the lake. His magic strained against the dead man’s pull. The miserable little boy endured the tug of war in pitiable silence.
Trust Rokan to drop his sword, take off his kurta and dive in. It was just as well the sergeant passed Prahak with a bodylength between them or the fiend might have wrestled him under the water. He was ten strokes from Timak when Druce pulled the boy free. He turned for shore at once, the mindless zombie chasing. Their rotten luck Prahak slapped a hand onto the slippery rocks at the same moment. Jordayne threw her dagger. It missed, hitting the water as the fiend dragged himself out of the lake.
Drucilamere set Timak on the rock and sank down beside him. The shivering boy lay still, his tender hands a bloody mess.
“Surrender,” she said.
Prahak’s hand moved like lightning. Metal flashed. A dagger protruded from Drucilamere’s shoulder. As lightning speared down, the mage keeled forward and splashed into the lake. She threw her second blade while lunging for the water. The shock of the dunking hadn’t sobered her exhausted mage. He was thrashing, unable to grip the smooth rock. She heard her dagger clank against the cliff, heard Prahak laugh.
“Druce!” She flung herself down and reached for him. His hand hit the water, too far from her, from Rokan.
“Timak!” he pleaded.
She looked over. Prahak was hefting Timak over his shoulder. The drug dealer turned to deliver a victorious grin before he entered the caves and was swallowed by the cliff.
“Druce!” Her disoriented mage kept going under, and the zombie was heading straight for him. She wriggled a little further over the rock. “Druce!”
Rokan butted
a shoulder into the creature. It kicked him under. Jordayne stretched for Druce’s hand. His feeble effort to grab missed. A wave broke over him. He slipped under, with Rokan still beneath. The zombie jerked and submerged. Its head reappeared at the same time as Druce, and it pulsed forward, straight for him. Rokan appeared a way behind it, gasping, labouring on. A precarious stretch allowed her to brush fingers with Druce. She squirmed further off the rock and latched onto his wrists as his head lolled, sending his face into the water. The zombie swam on top of him. Its weight forced her to let go and roll. Druce sank as the dead man trod on top of him and lurched onto the rocks. Jordayne shifted from its path. It paid her no heed, stomping for the caves.
Dear Vae, Druce had not resurfaced. She yelled at Rokan, pointing, scrambling.
“Stay there!” Rokan called. He dived, resurfaced, took a breath and went down again. Bubbles streamed to the surface. He came up, shook his head and dived. Jordayne scrambled lower onto the rocks. Forks of lightning revealed a body under the water. Rokan surfaced, dragging Druce. Together they hauled him onto land.
“Wake up,” she said, slapping his face. “For the love of Vae’oeldin, wake up.” She grabbed his shirt and pounded on his chest.
He coughed, spluttered, spat out water. A wave broke over the rocks and washed his feet. The dagger had dislodged from his back. She turned him onto his side and tore his shirt to examine the oozing wound. Thank the Vae it did not appear deep, but he rolled over and lay sprawled on the rocks, just staring at the stars.
A jewel winked green in Dindarin’s light. Rokan hopped over the rocks and retrieved her dagger. She pushed it into her belt.
“We’re not safe here,” Rokan said. “Can you move?”
“Timak.”
“Prahak has him,” Rokan said.
“Timak,” Druce insisted.
Between them, they supported him and followed the zombie into the caves, past the living rooms, the torture chamber and into the howling wind on top of the cliff.
“There!” Druce said.
Prahak was hauling Timak over the cemetery wall. The zombie tottered behind. Rokan ran after them. Jordayne hesitated, but left Druce behind. Ladylike graces abandoned, she negotiated the wall and wove among the tombstones. Her quarry wasn’t hard to track. The moonlight lit Prahak as he darted from one gravestone to another. The zombie made slower progress, striking tomb markers, walking against them before reversing and moving around. She shuddered. Death was learning. As Rokan angled right, aiming to cut Prahak off from the path to the city, she veered left. With luck they might trap him between the cliff and the mindless zombie.
At the white death spires, shining reminders of the perils beyond, Prahak waited until they came into sight. “My offer still stands,” he said.
“My lady,” Rokan warned.
Jordayne approached. “You are in no position to bargain.”
His arm tight around Timak, Prahak flashed a grin and a knife. “You think?”
The boy was as limp and unresponsive as the fast-approaching zombie. Not even a sudden, ear-splitting crack of thunder startled him.
Prahak took a step around, towards Rokan. “I wouldn’t.”
Rokan stopped creeping forward.
“Who’s more important to you, me or the boy?” Prahak eased down the track.
The zombie lurched between them. She launched herself at Prahak as he began the treacherous descent to Mage Cove. One of the zombie’s decaying arms brushed her side. She scrambled out of its fatal path onto the edge of the cliff. Her foot dislodged loose earth, raining dirt on the rock below. She grabbed a tattered bush. The trunk lifted from the ground as the roots fought for anchorage. The zombie turned towards her, reached for her. She leaped for firmer ground.
The crunch of pebbles further down the path turned the zombie to its target. Jordayne dashed past it, onto the ledge. The zombie’s stiff fingers brushed her. She skidded down the slope, gaining on the cautious Prahak. Her foot slipped. She fell onto her hip and slid down, scratching at the rock face with her hands until she came to rest. Her heart pounding, she turned onto her back and stared at the jagged rock below. At the oversized, emerald domes on the mage guild minarets, majestic monuments to honour on a treacherous night. Getting up required agile care. It lost her a good deal of the advantage in distance the slide had created.
Rokan appeared at the top of the ledge. Between them, the zombie plodded on, crushing its own bloated intestines beneath its worn boots. And she was between it and its prey. What had she been thinking, endangering herself for a chance at revenge on this man?
In front of Prahak, Timak whined. She placed a tentative foot forward. It was, if she was honest, the child, the appalling sight of those mutilated hands that had spurred her to give chase. Vae’oenka forbid she was becoming maternal. The boy had better prove himself an able magus or she would have no excuse for her reckless action. She could hear Matisse teasing now. I never took you for a sop, sis. Breaking five bones for a page, and not even a Myklaani one at that.
Timak’s whimpers grew louder. Prahak stopped. She saw him shove his knife arm against Drucilamere’s little apprentice.
“Jump, boy.”
Timak made a sound of terror. Jordayne pulled her dagger out, Trove’s jewelled one she loved so much. Prahak sensed danger because he turned before she could thrust it into him. His hand locked against hers, knife and dagger touching.
“I get what I wanted after all.”
“You cannot escape. The two of us to encumber you, a guard and a mage following, and a zombie on your tail. Give up, Prahak.”
“I should even the odds.” His right hand twisted her wrist. His left punched her in the stomach. He shook her arm until she released the dagger. It clanged onto the ledge. He kicked it to the rocks below. Without a word, he grabbed the boy and hurled him over.
She froze, doubled over. Timak’s scream soured the wine in her stomach. At the head of the path, Drucilamere held out a hand. The strain on his face made him appear ogre-ish. He took a single step forward and fell to his knees, impotent in wake of too much magic under too much porrin.
Chapter 46
The shock numbed. Jordayne peered over the edge of the cliff. The darkness made it impossible to discern if a tortured little boy lay broken on the rocks. The whistling wind drowned any moans. An inconvenient fit of vertigo overtook her. Her dizziness intensified as an unexpected flash of golden light burned her eyes. A glance at her intoxicated mage gave no inkling of what magic he had wrought. Judging from the horror on his face nothing that had saved the boy. Nothing that affected Prahak, either. The despicable, craven fiend was tilting the knife to catch a flash of moonlight, an unnecessary reminder of his boundless cruelty.
“Why?” she cried.
“I now have only one of you to worry about,” he said.
“Why him?”
“He has no use. Not without the genie’s name. As for the mage, he has proven himself ineffectual.” He resumed his descent, steady and surefooted in the buffeting. With the oblivious zombie stomping after him, she was left with no choice but to creep down the crumbling, narrow ledge. Humiliating was a most definite addition to his prolonged, excruciating and very public death.
He was waiting for her at the bottom. She delayed, allowing the zombie to draw as close as she dared, waited for the sickening brush of its cold fingers.
She jumped to the side, landed hard knocking one knee. Gritting her teeth, she clambered over the large rocks. Prahak caught her before she had covered a third of the distance to the guild. He grabbed her elbow and dragged her towards the pier. The moored boat bobbed on the waves. She struggled all the way, twisting an ankle in a crevice, fighting to regain her painful footing. Her efforts succeeded in deepening the spectacular bruise his unrelenting grip was causing.
She braced herself, preparing to dive over the side of the boat. She never got the chance. He whipped her around on the pier and closed his hands over her neck, squeezing, constricting. She sc
ratched his face. Drew blood as the first drops of rain hit her head. Prahak didn’t even flinch. Dear Vae, her head was becoming light. Her lungs could not expand. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the zombie stagger, fall and pick itself up, move on against a backdrop of flashing stars.
✽ ✽ ✽
Timak was falling.
No more pain. It was all he asked of the Vae.
Golden light flashed.
He was standing near a pretty pond. Happy fish plopped in and out of the water beneath a flowering jasmine. Beyond, towering trees sheltered prancing deer, snoozing bears and grooming wolves. A beautiful golden genie was even holding his hand and smiling down at him. Timak sighed. She gave him a strange feeling, all happy and sad at the same time, but he was brave enough to look at her even though her brightness hurt his eyes. It was Tiarasae, the genie queen. He knew because she had a diamond tiara just like in his papa’s tales.
“Am I dead?”
“Not unless you wish to be.” She knelt by the pool and he did too. He saw a solemn little boy reflected in the baby blue water. Her face wasn’t there.
“I shouldn’t be here.”
She smiled again, ruffled his hair just the way his mother used to. “You have earned the right.” She washed her face and hands and he copied her actions. When she was done, she took his hand and placed it across her lap.
“Father,” she called.
A powerful presence descended on the glade. Timak started shaking. He hid his head in his knees.
“Daughter. You have brought the child,” a voice deep as the earth rumbled.
“He has suffered for the sake of one of your own.”
“I am aware.” A soothing breeze swept through the glade. Timak sighed for it. “My child. You will be ever in my heart for your courage.” Large hands lifted him high, past the canopy, past the moons, Daesoa reclining in the crescent, Dindarin pulling his bow. The hands hugged him to a hairy chest, cuddling him, cradling him. Timak snuggled close. He was safe. He was loved. He could stay here for eternity.