by Cindy Dees
Sha’Li continued, “The zinnzari believed Bloodroot to be responsible for inciting Rudath to kill Gawaine. In their grief and rage, they attacked Bloodroot, trapping him in his heartwood and scattering the pieces of him far and wide. For their part, the Night Reavers stole Gawaine’s crown and ring from the field where they fell, sword and shield, and of course, the bow that dealt the fatal wound unto their king.”
Will exclaimed, “So that’s how Gawaine’s crown came to be in the hands of the Boki! They’re the descendants of the Night Reavers, aren’t they?”
“Aye,” Sha’Li answered, looking pleased that he was following her tale.
“Go on,” he said with interest.
“Then followed a time of unrest and fighting with the Night Reavers and Gawaine’s army struggling for power.”
“And the zinnzari?” Rynn asked.
“Bound to Hemlocke and gone away to serve her in return for being allowed to stay close to their fallen king,” Sha’Li answered.
“Bound to Hemlocke how?” Rosana asked.
“I do not know.” Sha’Li picked up her tale once more. “The Night Reavers looked for ways to gain more power and break the stalemate against the elven armies. The leader of the Night Reavers built a portal to the Court of Night—”
Rynn interrupted, exclaiming, “The fae Court of Night?”
“Aye!” Sha’Li snapped. She obviously didn’t like being interrupted in her story. She continued, “The fae Lord of the Black Boar came through the portal and began attacking elven settlements in acts of terror and revenge, hoping to take control of the fane.”
“Fane?” Rosana asked.
“An ancient shrine of significance to the fae, left in this realm when they were ejected from Urth.” She continued, “An elven warrior, Eliassan, set out to find Gawaine’s bow, which was said to enhance the skills of its user. The bronze lizardman I spoke with did not know if Eliassan found Gawaine’s quiver and arrows or not. The arrows were said to take on whatever magical quality was needed to harm their target the most.”
Will was impressed. He’d like to have a weapon that could do such a thing.
Sha’Li was still speaking. “Eliassan supposedly used the bow to vanquish the Lord of the Black Boar and send him back through the portal from whence he came. Unto his passing, Eliassan used the bow to protect the remains of Gandymere.”
Will frowned. “Where exactly was Gandymere?” He recalled hearing the wandrakin landsgrave sing of the place in her song about the Sleeping King, but she hadn’t described where it was.
Rynn answered, “It once spanned most of this continent. Gawaine was the last king of Gandymere.”
“Where’s the bow now?” Will asked.
Sha’Li shrugged. “The lizardmen do not know. An elven secret this is.” She added, “This the lizardman did know. Eliassan was zinnzari, and in the Valelands lies the last known zinnzari fane.”
Will sighed. “It sounds like we need to find some zinnzari and talk to them. Not only do we need them to tell us where Gawaine’s body is, but now we need to know where his bow and quiver are hidden, too.” He looked around the circle at his friends. “Anyone have an idea where we can find some?”
Rynn asked Sha’Li, “Do the lizardmen believe any zinnzari are still alive?”
“They have no idea,” Sha’Li answered.
Will frowned. “If the fane thing that Eliassan protected was in the Valelands, he might have retired close to it in his old age, in case the fae came back for it. Perhaps that is where we should start searching for his bow.”
“What about Raina?” Rosana asked. “Do we wait for her here or move on in search of the bow?”
Will responded, “Did she give anyone an idea how long she might be gone speaking to those mages of hers?”
There were head shakes all around.
Rosana said reluctantly, “She did say not to stop the quest on her account. If we found a lead, we were to continue on. She said she would catch up to us if needed.”
Kendrick suggested, “You can leave word with the local villagers of where you’ve gone. They can relay the information to her, and she can follow you.”
“Why are you in such a hurry to move us along?” Will asked Kendrick, suspicion blooming in his gut. Did Kendrick and Kerryl have secret plans they did not share with the group? Or maybe the pair had other enemies hot on their trail besides Berengar. For all they knew, Berengar would be back to finish what he’d started as soon as he healed from his injuries.
“Time grows short for your quest,” Kendrick said soberly. “I know it will infuriate you to hear me say it, but I cannot tell you why time is short or what comes this way. Merely that it does. If Gawaine is ever to wake, now is the time.”
Will glanced into the dank, moss-festooned forest. A mist was starting to rise in the dark, shadowed and wispy, drifting ghostlike among the black trees.
Rosana asked Kendrick, “Can we leave word with the kindari of the wold of where we’ve gone? They’ll pass the information to Raina?”
“Of course. She’s White Heart. People may live simply out here, but they’re not barbarians. They respect the White Heart.”
Rosana nodded. “All right, then. I’m in agreement if the rest of you wish to go. Let’s head for the Valelands and find Eliassan’s bow.”
CHAPTER
16
During the day, Raina was given a careful guided tour of the mages’ tower. It was an impressive place, sprawling in all directions and on many levels. Were it not for her escorts, she would be hopelessly lost in here. Not once did she spy any hint of natural light, lending credence to the notion that this enclave was underground.
Although it was carefully masked, she glimpsed tiny hints of discord between the factions of mages. In particular, Kadir’s devotees and Elfonse’s had a tendency to snap at one another. More alarming, though, was the smug way in which Elfonse’s people tended to look at her whenever Kadir’s people were not present.
From what she gathered, it was Elfonse and his faction who studied methods of gathering and storing magic, meaning they must be in charge of bottling spirits. As much as she would like to challenge him and his practices, she sensed that he was already hostile enough toward her. No need to kick an already angry hornet’s nest.
Supper was a formal affair that dragged on so long she thought she might fall asleep in her plate of food. At long last, people stopped making speeches and singing dirgelike songs that went on for verse after verse. These guys seriously needed to get out more.
She stumbled back to her room, barely able to keep her eyes open or place one foot in front of the other. She fell across her bed, exhausted, resolved to rest her eyes for just a few minutes before she got ready for bed.
When she blinked awake, she was still lying down, but torches guttered around her, and her bedroom had disappeared, replaced by a circular chamber filled with hooded and cloaked figures. It looked like a scene straight out of her worst nightmares, Mages of Alchizzadon surrounding her, glaring at her in malice.
Wait. She was awake. This was no dream!
She sat up, or tried to, but ran into leather straps across her torso and pinning her arms and legs down. Panic surged through her, but she shoved it down by force of will. They hadn’t bested her before, and they wouldn’t best her now. She looked around the room for the bulk of Kadir’s form. No one of his build was in here. Time. She needed to buy time for someone or something to rescue her.
“Elfonse. Why am I not surprised you’re behind this kidnapping? You couldn’t stand the fact that Albinus gave me his word I would be safe here, could you?”
The mage didn’t respond, but he scowled darkly.
She poked a little harder. “It must gall you to no end to know how much more talented a mage I am than any of you. For longer than anyone has memory, you’ve dreamed of creating an arch-mage, and now that you’ve finally done it, I refuse to be your puppet. The irony is rich, isn’t it?”
That did the tric
k. Elfonse sputtered, “Arrogant, selfish child. After all we’ve done for you—”
“Done for me?” she interrupted. “I can’t wait to hear what you think you’ve done for me.”
Where was Kadir? Justin? Albinus? Had they been drugged, too? For surely that was how these men had been able to remove her from her room and bring her to this chamber of horrors. She silently begged them to rouse from whatever drug had been in their food. It had worn off of her; hopefully, it would wear off soon for them, as well. But would they even realize she was in trouble?
While Elfonse ranted about what a pain in the arse she’d been and how much trouble she’d caused them and how many generations she was going to set back their breeding program, she eyed the walls in dismay. They were made of the same thick stone as the rest of this pile of rocks. No one would hear her outside this room even if she screamed her head off.
She craned her head from side to side and spied thick braided silk ropes lying in a groove in the floor, forming a perfect circle around her. It was a high-magic ritual they had planned for her, then. She spotted a small table with a half dozen recognizable ritual components on it and a few more she didn’t recognize. A major ritual, then, to require so many power sources.
Then she spotted a tall rose-colored glass bottle, wider at the base than a wine bottle, but nearly as tall. It was decorated with jewels and enclosed in a cage of wire. She frowned for a moment, and then it hit her. They were planning to take her spirit from her. All of it. To bottle it and put her in permanent stasis. Oh, this was bad. Very bad, indeed.
* * *
“Your time is up, seer. A day has passed with no deaths. You are summoned into the presence of my father for sentencing and punishment,” Endellian announced in satisfaction.
The Darkadian seer, Vlador Noss, looked up at her, seemingly unconcerned and without even bothering to rise to his feet. The affront of it stole her breath away. “In point of technical fact, the sun will not set for another hour or so. And I did say the death would occur within this sun cycle.”
Laernan and the seer shared an intimate smile. Weren’t those two just getting all kinds of cozy with one another? She logged that bit of information for future use as a weapon against one or both of them.
Vlador sighed. “Princess, you need to stop trying so hard. Relax. Your time will come.”
She gasped at the man’s effrontery.
“I mean no offense, my lady. One day, you and I will work very closely together and, between us, shape an empire even you can be satisfied with. I do not prophesy to anger you but rather to prove to you my usefulness.”
Eyes narrowed, she replied, “First, you must survive your imminent appointment with my father, which will be no mean feat. He is set on putting you to the Flame.” When the Eternal Flame consumed its victims, it sent them to the Void permanently.
“Never fear, my lady of the raven locks.”
She jolted. That was what Tarses used to call her after her long, dark hair, which she often wore loose and flowing around her.
“All will be as I have said, Princess.”
“We shall see about that, dark Child of Fate.”
He laughed aloud at the sobriquet and bowed deeply, with an elaborate sweep of his arms and a saucy grin up at her.
He was impudent, to say the least, but she had to admit she rather enjoyed the verbal sparring. Few at court would dare speak to her so familiarly, and she found it … stimulating.
They paced down a long, broad hallway to the great double doors leading to her father’s trophy room. A pair of guards opened the ironclad portals, and she swept inside, leading the way across the cavernous space crammed with treasures from the length and breadth of the Empire.
She spied her father’s chamberlain standing before the tall golden doors leading into Maximillian’s private throne room, the one he used for conducting official business that did not require open court.
“He is not ready for us yet, I gather?” she asked the fellow.
“The report from Archduke Korovo’s messenger is taking longer than expected.”
She nodded and took a seat in an intricately carved chair once said to be the throne of a fae king. Idly, she studied the Child of Fate, who was studying the Man in Amber beside the entrance to the throne room.
“Who’s this fellow?” Vlador asked no one in particular.
She answered, “Someone who once got in the way of my father. The Emperor had the Amber Mages encase him in amber many centuries ago.”
“And he’s stood here ever since, watching the comings and goings from your father’s throne room?” Vlador added, “The stories he could tell if he lived.”
“I am told he does live,” she replied.
“An apt last reminder to those who are about to enter yon throne room and face the Emperor. Step carefully or end up like this poor sod.”
She had no doubt that was her father’s intent in placing the Man in Amber just outside his door.
The seer reached out to touch the amber, which she knew to feel smooth and warm to the touch. “Ah!” Vlador exclaimed in surprise. “Not only does he live, but he sees and hears, as well.”
Endellian was startled. She’d always thought the amber man’s open eyes looked eerily conscious, but to know the man really was wide awake in his golden prison—
“He must be stark raving mad by now,” she commented.
Vlador laid his palm flat on the amber casing and closed his eyes. After a few moments, he murmured, “Mad is not the word I would use. Maddened with rage is the description that comes to mind. By the Mistress, the power of it…” His voice trailed off.
“Do not touch that!” the chamberlain snapped, swatting away Vlador’s hand from the amber.
The seer grabbed the chamberlain’s wrist and forced the smaller, older man’s hand flat upon the amber. “Feel what you have done to him.” Vlador pressed his hand over the chamberlain’s, holding it in place.
Something happened inside the amber prison. Although the Man in Amber did not—could not—move so much as a muscle, something hot flared in his perpetually open eyes. Awareness. Consciousness. And rage. Layer upon layer of rage, rolling forth from his resin sarcophagus in waves so violent Endellian had to throw up every mental defense she possessed to shield herself from it. The only time she’d ever felt such fury before had been the day Ammertus had killed nearly everyone in the golden throne room over the Prophecy of the End. The prophecy, given some twenty years ago, had forecast the end of both the Kothite Empire and the line of Ammertus.
Something not quite visible—but not quite invisible either—flashed from the Man in Amber, through his prison, into the chamberlain. Immediately, the chamberlain went limp and fell to the floor in a faint.
For his part, Vlador Noss stepped back in satisfaction. “There you have it. My prophecy fulfilled.”
“You killed him?” Endellian demanded in outrage.
“Not me. Him.” Vlador nodded at the Man in Amber. “I merely opened a conduit between his mind and that of the chamberlain. The man in the golden prison did the rest.”
Endellian stared at the Man in Amber in shock. A man who could kill with his mind? Only her father had such power. Who—what—was the Man in Amber?
She gestured her father’s deaf guards forward to tend to the chamberlain. One of them poured a potion down the man’s throat, but nothing happened in response. She strode across the trophy room and poked her head out into the hallway. “Send for a healer, and quickly.”
Within two minutes, a healer wearing the white tabard and red-and-yellow sunburst of the Heart all askew came running into the room. He stopped panting before her and gave a messy bow.
“Heal the chamberlain,” she ordered.
The healer knelt down and announced immediately, “This man is dead. Do I have permission to restore him to life?”
“Do it!” she snapped.
The healer incanted the magic and cast the white light from his hand into the dead cha
mberlain.
Nothing happened.
What was this? The spell failed?
“Do it again,” she ordered.
The healer obliged frantically. Still nothing.
“I am sorry, Your Highness. But this man has already passed beyond the usefulness of a life spell. He will have to resurrect…” The healer trailed off, frowning.
“What?” she demanded.
“If this man has just died, which I gather he has, his spirit should hover close by his physical form for some minutes before moving off toward a Glow in search of renewal, and yet, I do not sense a spirit nearby.”
Vlador spoke up. “That is because he is permanently dead.”
Endellian stepped over to the tall seer and grabbed a fistful of his tunic. She asked in cold fury, “What did you do to him?”
“Truly, my lady, I did nothing but open a mental channel between the chamberlain and the Man in Amber.”
She spun and snapped over her shoulder to a hovering courtier, “Fetch Laernan! Now!”
She glared in silence at the Child of Fate, who took the opportunity to stroll about the trophy room, examining various priceless artifacts, unconcerned. He certainly didn’t act like a man who had just murdered another in cold blood in front of a dozen witnesses.
Laernan swept into the trophy room, looking alarmed. “Is aught amiss, sister?” he asked her quickly.
“Your toy seer has done something to get the chamberlain killed. Yon healer says the spirit has departed already beyond the Veil. Call it back.”
Laernan frowned. “I can force a spirit back into a body if it is nearby and yet wishes to live. I may not be able to help in this case.”
“Try.”
“As you wish.”
Her half brother knelt down beside the chamberlain’s body and laid his hands on either side of the man’s head. He closed his eyes. She felt Laernan’s concentration, his will, reaching out for the spirit to force it back into the chamberlain’s corpse. She didn’t understand her brother’s capacity for reaching beyond veils—the Veil of Time, the Veil of Death—but she knew him to be gifted at it.