The Keeper of Secrets released Raeb’s spirit, and he went hurtling back to his body. The tendrils of the hive assaulted him the entire way, leaving his spirit battered and bruised by the time he returned to the physical world.
Saydee was lying unconscious where she’d been sitting. Raeb was just able to catch a glimpse of her steady breathing before he crumpled to the ground and lay very still.
9
Saydee sat up, clutching her head and gritting her teeth. “What happened?”
Raeb didn’t even try to sit. He lay on his back, keeping his eyes closed against the blazing desert sun. They had to have slept through the night and halfway through the morning for it to be so bloody bright. “The Keeper of Secrets decided to join our party last night.”
She huffed out a pained breath. “What does that mean?”
“The ritual attracted the attention of a man—at least, I think he’s a man—called the Keeper of Secrets. He’s a kind of ambassador between the Entana and their human slaves. He took over your body so we could have a little chat.”
The silence was so deep Raeb dared to crack open an eye. Sunlight lanced into his brain, but after a moment he was able to endure it. He turned his head to see Saydee staring at him, eyes wide and skin ashen. She trembled like a newborn calf.
“How …?”
“It’s probably because of your magic,” Raeb answered. “It must make it easier for someone like the Keeper of Secrets to reach you.”
Saydee still wasn’t responding, so Raeb continued. “The point is, I learned something important. The Entana aren’t what we thought they were. They aren’t a race of independent creatures. They’re one giant creature. Each tendril leads back to a hive that controls everything. Killing one person’s Entana doesn’t affect it.” He sighed, wishing the truth wasn’t so hard to swallow. “We’ll have to kill the entire hive.”
“How could we do that?” she asked. Her voice was still quiet and shaken, but at least she didn’t look like a corpse anymore. If only he could recover as quickly.
“I don’t know. The Entana exist in the spirit world, so the hive isn’t a physical place. I don’t think the connection of your mind would be strong enough to carry me all the way there.”
“And once you’re there, you wouldn’t have a way to destroy it.”
Raeb nodded. The motion made his head pound.
“So what do we do?”
“I don’t know. I need to think.”
Saydee went about making breakfast while Raeb mulled over this new information. The thoughtless action of cooking seemed to restore Saydee’s calm, while reliving his spirit-flight made Raeb more nervous.
It wasn’t until they were packing up their camp that either of them spoke.
“You said the only way to kill the Entana is the Bok’Tarong,” Saydee said.
“That’s right.”
“But if they don’t exist in this world, how does that work?”
“The Bok’Tarong is enchanted. Its blades are both physical and spiritual. When it’s wielded by a Taronese warrior, it kills whatever’s in its path, body or no body.”
“Too bad we can’t use it against the hive.”
Raeb bent over, securing his threadbare blanket to his pack. “Oh, we could, in theory. It’s just getting to the hive and back alive that’s the issue. If I could do that I’d have done it decades ago.”
“Well,” Saydee said, “you have me now.”
The simple words made Raeb’s fingers slip from the straps. The one thing missing from his plans had been a connection to the Entana. Now he had one, in Saydee, if they could avoid another confrontation with the Keeper of Secrets. He could manage that, though. There were still a couple tricks up his sleeve.
But that would mean confronting the Bok’Tarong—the thing he’d been running from for two hundred years—and calling Raeb’s bluff. He wouldn’t have done it decades ago. If there was anything on earth he feared more than the Keeper of Secrets, it was facing the Bok’Tarong and whatever Taronese warrior was bearing it.
Saydee walked over to him, bending to put her face into Raeb’s line of sight. “What’s wrong?”
More than you could possibly comprehend. “We can’t use the Bok’Tarong. It’s too dangerous.”
Saydee straightened. “And casting your spirit out to the Entana hive is safe?”
“You don’t understand.” He cinched the last straps a bit tighter than he should have. He stood, leaving the pack at his feet. He couldn’t risk it revealing how his hands shook. “If we get close to the Bok’Tarong, the Taronese warrior bearing it will kill us before we could even blink.”
“We can find a way around that. We can sneak up on them when they’re asleep, or distract them, or any number of things. It can’t be that hard.”
“It can be. These warriors are trained from the time they can walk, and the Bok’Tarong literally has a mind of its own. These guys aren’t that easy to trick.”
She glanced at him, one eyebrow raised. “How do you know so much about them?”
Raeb hesitated, just for an instant. “When you’ve spent as long as I have running away from them, you learn a lot. Studying your enemies is often the best way to stay alive.” He lifted his pack, wiping a few beads of sweat from his brow. It wasn’t even midday and the heat was already building. “Come on, Saydee. We have to move.”
“Where are we going?”
Where indeed? The last thing he wanted to do was to find the Bok’Tarong. But it was looking like that would be the only way for him to be freed.
No. However promising it may seem, he couldn’t do it. There would be another way. He’d find something. Anything else.
He turned his gaze north. He looked at the mountains, hardly seeing them. His thoughts were cast beyond them, to the forested lands of Arata. The place he’d last seen it. “We’ll go north.”
“Is that where we’ll find the Bok’Tarong?” Saydee asked.
He shrugged. Not if I can help it. “It’s where I’ll find a friend who might give us some more information.”
“Not another friend like the Keeper of Secrets?” she asked. Her attempt at humor was lost in the quiet fear behind the question.
“No. This guy is a friend. As long as he still considers me one, too.”
“Why wouldn’t he?”
“I haven’t seen him for a long time. The last time we parted I didn’t exactly say goodbye.”
Saydee tied the last string of her pack. “How long is a long time?”
“I don’t know. A hundred years, maybe?”
She looked up at him, eyes wide. “And you think he’s still alive?”
Raeb nodded. “He’s a -taken, and one living life to its fullest. The Entana have a never-ending feast of emotions and memories in people who continue to really live after they’re taken. They keep them alive as long as that feast continues.”
“I thought most -taken lived for a few years, if that.”
“Most do. But some aren’t that easy to defeat. This guy and his wife are some of those people.”
A small smile, with just a hint of optimism, lit Saydee’s face.
Camp packed, fire extinguished, Raeb led the way out of the rough desert and toward the road. They had a long way to go. No use making the trip more difficult by trudging through cactus if they didn’t have to. “You got a warm cloak?” he asked.
Saydee shook her head. “No need for one down here.”
Raeb grunted. “We’ll have to get you one before we reach the mountains, then. It’ll be awfully cold through those passes, and not much better once winter settles over Arata. Do you have any coin?”
This time, Saydee nodded. The twinkle in her eyes hinted that she had more than enough to buy herself—and maybe even Raeb—a dozen cloaks.
If she could afford to equip them with good clothes and house them at inns with real food and soft beds every now and then, maybe bringing her along wouldn’t be so bad after all.
They walked in sil
ence for a while, which suited Raeb just fine. But eventually, as he was realizing would probably be the norm, Saydee broke that silence.
“I just thought of something. If we destroy the hive, what will happen to the -taken?”
“What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean,” she said. “These peoples’ thoughts have been eaten away by the Entana. Our thoughts, Raeb. You and me. If you pull them out, what will happen?”
“Does it matter?”
Saydee stopped in mid-step, her jaw hinged open. “How can you say that?”
“I can say it because killing the Entana will mean no one else will have to lose themselves or their families to the Entana. Ever. This will be over, once and for all.”
“But all the people who are -taken now …”
“It doesn’t matter,” he repeated.
“Raeb!”
“What?”
“Just answer my question.” She enunciated each word carefully. “Will destroying the Entana hive kill the -taken?”
Being confronted like that, with such stern disapproval on Saydee’s face, deflated him. “I don’t know.”
“And you’re still going forward with this?”
“It’s our only chance to be rid of the Entana.”
“Can you really sacrifice that many lives? Could you sacrifice mine?”
He didn’t look at her. “To save thousands, even millions more? Yes.”
“To save yourself, you mean.”
He sighed. “I’m a -taken too, Saydee. If this kills them, it kills me.” He sounded calloused and heartless, he knew, but he no longer cared. Maybe he was heartless by now.
She leveled that strange, penetrating gaze at him again. “But that wouldn’t bother you too much, would it?”
He glanced at her, surprised and irritated she’d read him so well. “Look, Saydee, you said it yourself. You’d rather die trying to free yourself than allow the Entana to fully take you.”
“But that’s my decision, and my life. I can’t say the same for every -taken out there, and no one should make a decision like this for them.”
“So what would you have us do? Sit on our thumbs, broiling in this gods-forsaken desert, when we have a chance to destroy the Entana?”
Saydee pursed her lips, but he could see the turmoil in her eyes.
“No matter how much it might cost, we have to take the risk. The Entana are parasites. They’ll sit and feed on humans until there aren’t any of us left.” He paused. “I may have my own reasons for destroying the Entana, but you couldn’t let anyone else suffer your fate if you could stop it.”
He turned and walked away without looking back.
Raeb was confident his words would hit home. Saydee might have dark secrets in her past, but she still seemed to have a heart for other people. Silly girl.
Sure enough, Saydee trotted up beside him after a few steps.
10
Dragana had seen plenty of battles. Her entire life had revolved around them.
Even so, the war-ravaged lands near the border were shocking.
The wide river valley that formed the border between Arata and Halkron was frantic with the autumn harvest this time of year. Miles of fields and farms, stretching north and south for days on end, should be bursting with laborers and families and merchants hauling out wagonloads of produce. It was a time of hard work and harder celebration. Normally.
Dragana stood at the edge of the deep forest, her heart twisting as she looked down into the river valley. Every field in sight had been stripped naked by thousands of hungry soldiers. She counted a handful of civilians, and these were heading her way with loaded packs and families in tow. There was no celebration in their expressions. They were evacuating.
Closer to the river, shantytowns of tents and lean-tos had grown between the farmhouses like a fungus. More organized stands of military encampments lay in the near distance. The closer they got to the Arata-Halkron border, the more crowded and more ravaged the land became.
The atmosphere shifted drastically when they entered the frontlines. Villagers were nonexistent, driven away from the fighting by force or fear. Officers shouted orders from every direction, and soldiers scurried like roaches to carry them out. Cries of pain and moans of approaching death came from a clump of medical tents somewhere to their right.
And through it all, Entana-taken soldiers in strange uniforms strolled as if they hadn’t a care in the world.
Dragana drew the Bok’Tarong from its sheath. She was furious, her entire body shaking with rage. Aeo could feel each time her gaze landed on a -taken. She tensed, letting out a low breath like a snarl, and her grip on his hilt tightened until he feared she would break him in half.
“What in the name of all that is holy is going on here?” she asked between clenched teeth.
Aeo knew she wasn’t looking for an answer. She was looking to rectify the situation. With blood.
Calm down, Dragana. We can’t just start slaughtering everyone in sight.
“I won’t touch anyone who’s innocent. It’s only the -taken I care about.”
Even so. The officers will cut you down before you can kill more than two or three of them.
“Then that will be two or three fewer abominations in the world,” she said, taking a step toward one of the nearby -taken.
Dragana, you can’t do this and you know it. Someone has to find out what’s going on so it can be stopped. That’s us. If you die, it will be for nothing. This will continue to happen and no one will know.
Dragana didn’t continue advancing, but her grip didn’t lessen. Nor did her murder-filled gaze leave the -taken soldier. He noted it, glaring at Dragana with something between terror and hatred, and stalked off.
“I can’t just let them go,” she whispered. It was physically painful for her to pull herself out of the rage.
We have to leave them be for now, Aeo said. Until we find the one responsible.
She released another long, low breath. Aeo felt her push the anger away and force logic to the forefront. It wasn’t an easy battle for her.
Good. Now let’s look and see what’s really going on here.
Aeo stared at the passing -taken. At first he thought they were from the same band he and Dragana had encountered earlier, maybe Halkronian spies. But then he noticed the Aratan crest emblazoned on the uniform’s collar. The king has -taken on his side, too. Has he gone mad?
“Looks like it.”
The Halkron -taken must have driven us to desperation. There’s no other explanation.
“I don’t care why they did it,” Dragana said. “There’s no reason in the world good enough to justify this.”
Dragana’s hand twitched the Bok’Tarong with each -taken she saw. Aeo had no trouble feeling the strain on her willpower it took to leave them unmolested.
“How can people not know these men are -taken?” she muttered.
They know, Aeo replied, noticing the frightened glances or glares of hatred from the normal soldiers. He didn’t know if they understood exactly what these soldiers were, but he knew they had to recognize the Coming Madness. No regular human came within arm’s reach of the -taken soldiers if they could help it. Even if they don’t understand what’s going on, they know.
“Then why don’t they do anything about it?”
This is the military. If you don’t hold a position of authority, you have no right to question the decisions of those who do.
Aeo had tried to keep the bitterness from his voice, but either his tone or the memories he suppressed at the thought reached Dragana. “You were in the army?”
For a time. It didn’t take.
“I was under the impression soldiers couldn’t just leave at will.”
You can if your commanding officer tells you to get out or die on the spot.
“You have a way with people, don’t you?” Dragana asked.
Charming and personable, that’s me.
“Do I even want to ask why you wer
e kicked out the army?” She only paused for a second, not giving Aeo time to answer. “No, I think I know why. Arrogant, defiant, unwilling to work as a team or take orders. Believes he’s always right and takes what he thinks he deserves. Doesn’t give a moment’s thought to the wants or needs of others.”
If she hadn’t spoken each statement as an accusation, Aeo may have laughed. That’s … surprisingly accurate. And it was those traits that got me chosen to be the king’s assassin.
She scoffed and rolled her eyes. Before she could respond, a human soldier approached her. “Lady warrior,” he said, bowing ever so slightly, “I have been instructed to escort you to the Mage General.” He tried—and failed—to keep his eyes away from the Bok’Tarong.
“May I ask why?” Dragana asked.
“Your reputation precedes you. The Mage General wishes to avoid any … unpleasant interactions between you and his soldiers.”
So he knows about the -taken, too, Aeo said. I should have known.
Dragana smiled at the soldier, with more charm than Aeo would have guessed the warrior-woman had at her command. Even the crimson streaks in her brown eyes lost their fiery edge when she wasn’t about to murder the person she looked at.
She motioned to the soldier. “I would be happy to meet with the Mage General.”
Careful, Dragana. You keep that up and people might start mistaking you for an attractive woman.
A string of curses floated through Dragana’s mind.
The atmosphere within this camp was so thick with Entana Aeo choked on the oily darkness. It was hard for him to see through the masses of tangled tendrils. The instinct to kill was overpowering. He wanted to slaughter and watch these Entana sizzle and hiss as his magic destroyed them. The fear that these soldiers may have taken the Entana in willingly just made that impulse stronger. They were choosing to spread death through the world and Aeo wanted—needed—to put an end to them.
“Calm down,” Dragana whispered. “It’s hard enough for me to keep my composure without you riling me up.”
Sorry.
She cracked a smile. “No you aren’t.”
Aeo chuckled. If you lost it and started slashing at all of these -taken, I’d be all too happy to help. But since we need diplomacy here …
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