Master (Book 5)

by Robert J. Crane

  Cyrus looked at the healer with more than a little shrewdness of his own. “Save one, you say? Where might this one be?”

  “Allow me my aura of mystery, Lord Davidon,” Curatio said, and the smile broadened just slightly. “Suffice to say that Alaric and I are not so far apart in our love of a good secret. I can get you into Reikonos.”

  “I guess you’ll be coming with me, then,” Cyrus said.

  “I’m coming with you, too,” came a voice from behind him, and Cyrus turned to see the spiked armor, bathed in shadow, lingering between two columns that held up the ceiling.

  Vara drew her sword. “Who let you out, traitor?”

  “I could get out any time I wished,” Terian said, boots clanking as he made his way forward. “I lived in this guildhall for more years than I can count, always in the darkness. I know more ways in and out of the dungeons than anyone else save for Alaric.” Cyrus saw his eyes gleam. “Let me come with you.”

  “So you can try and kill him when his back is turned?” Vara asked, sword still exposed.

  Cyrus put out a hand to stay hers; Terian had yet to make a threatening motion. If he could have truly escaped the dungeon at any point … “All right,” he said to Terian. “You can come along.”

  “You—” Vara said, whipsawing around to him.

  “Fool, I know,” Cyrus cut her off. “I’m always a fool, a dunderous moron—whatever.”

  “If you trust him, you are more than that,” she snapped.

  “I trust him,” Cyrus said, realizing it was true. “I don’t think he means to kill me any longer.” He stared at the dark knight. What was it, Terian? What prompted you to let go of that grudge? Somehow I doubt it was anything I said or did … yet the change is within you, as sure as if someone had cast light into the darkness you showed me in Luukessia, as sure as if they had driven it all out.

  “Finally, someone listens,” Terian said under his breath.

  “Finally, he takes leave of his senses once and for all,” Vara muttered.

  “The only way to avoid all betrayal is if we refuse to trust,” Cyrus said, turning to look at her. “To shun all company, to stand alone.” He looked at Terian. “And I still believe that we are none of us alone; or at least that we don’t have to be.”

  “What a stunningly naïve piece of silliness,” Vara said under her breath. “But as you wish; I only hope this does not come back like a thrown gnomish boomerang to clip us solidly in the back of the head.”

  “Gnomish what?” Cyrus asked, befuddled.

  “It’s a wooden device, roughly the size of your thumb and forefinger,” she said. “You throw it and it turns in the air to come back to you. Annoying little thing, especially when you’re caught in a hailstorm of them.”

  He cracked a smile. “So that’s why you don’t like gnomes.”

  “I don’t like you,” she said. “Gnomes I detest.”

  “Guildmaster,” Odellan called from below, drawing Cyrus’s attention to the seal. Neatly ordered rows of ten awaited, with a gap of six in the front. “Your striking force awaits.”

  “Vaste, Vara, Terian, Curatio and … Mendicant,” Cyrus said, jutting a finger at the goblin, who made a startled noise. “Let us away, my friends.”

  “Surely,” Curatio said, taking the lead down the stairs, the hems of his white robes swishing as he descended.

  “Yes, let us hasten unto death,” Vaste said with excess enthusiasm. “Where are we going again?”

  “Reikonos, you fool,” Vara snapped. She eyed Terian. “The heart of treachery and darkness.”

  “No, we’re not going there quite yet,” Terian said. “Maybe later, though.”

  Cyrus caught his look and shook it off as he stepped into his place in the line. “Curatio … where are you taking us in Reikonos?”

  “Oh, I’m not taking you into Reikonos,” Curatio said airily. “Under it, though, that sounds like an idea.”

  “Better question,” Vaste said, “how is a healer going to teleport us anywhere?”

  “I think I still remember the spell,” Curatio said, facing forward, staring at the space above the entry to the Great Hall. He lowered his voice so that only those nearest him—and perhaps some elves in the hall—could hear him. “Probably shouldn’t mention this to anyone, though; technically, as Vaste suggested, it is heresy, after all …”

  “What?” Mendicant’s high-pitched voice squeaked.

  A green light flashed around them, blinding Cyrus, and he felt the world disappear around him as he was swept into a current of magic and taken far, far from where he’d been only a moment before.

  Chapter 71

  The world distended around him, and a darkened, grim chamber that Cyrus was all too familiar with appeared around him with the last of the flash. He blinked the surprise out of his eyes and checked his surroundings with speed, trying to see if there was any foe within proximity. There was not; only the small army of Sanctuary in a tight formation around him.

  “Oh, this place,” Vaste said in disgust.

  Cyrus looked behind him and saw the portal standing tall above them, realizing finally where they were. “This is where you took us to the Realm of Life.”

  “Yes,” Curatio agreed. “I doubt anyone else recalls how to do that, though, so we should be quite safe until the dark elves get bored with their business upon the surface.”

  “So … years?” Terian quipped.

  “What now?” Vara asked, turning a pointed gaze upon Cyrus. The room was dim, but the portal glowed faintly in the dark.

  “No squirrels,” Vaste said. “No chipmunks. Hedgehogs are right out.”

  “Is that an improvement over goats, would you say?” Curatio asked in a musing tone, as though he were genuinely weighing the alternatives.

  “I would not say,” Vaste replied, nonplussed.

  “We need to get to the surface,” Cyrus said, casting his attention to the exit at the far end of the room.

  “There are easier ways,” Curatio said and stepped out of line, walking toward a nearby wall.

  “I hope this involves more heresy,” Vaste said drily. “Because one simply can’t have enough offenses punishable by death chalked up to one’s name in a single day.”

  “Speaking from experience,” Terian said, “after the first few, you start to care less and less.”

  “Thank you for that charming blueprint into the making of a murderous killer,” Vara growled.

  “This way,” Curatio called. A door had appeared beside him, a staircase visible behind it in a lighted passage.

  “How do you know these things?” Vaste called to him as Cyrus started them forward.

  “If you want to know all of a city’s secrets,” Curatio replied, leading the way into the staircase, “it helps to be around when everything is built.”

  They circled in an upward spiral for some time, the smooth rock walls of the staircase chamber glowing a faint, unearthly blue. Curatio led the way, tireless. Cyrus looked up and saw the end approaching, a final spiral that ended upon a stone balcony overlooking the steps.

  “Where now?” Vaste asked as they reached the balcony, a half-circle that jutted out from a blank wall.

  Curatio did not speak, instead walking to the wall and running his fingers over it. Runes lit up with the same glow as the walls, only brighter, highlighting an archway that looked strangely familiar. The wall parted as easily as if it were two doors being slid open, and Cyrus found himself looking into a chamber filled with the dead bodies of human guards.

  “Yay!” Vaste said into the shocked silence. “We’re here!”

  Curatio extended a hand in invitation, and Cyrus stepped through first. He heard the sound of something and saw Curatio with his mace in hand, inch-long spikes deployed from its perfectly circular head. The healer nodded, and Cyrus stepped into a wide chamber that he knew all too well.

  “The Citadel,” Cyrus murmured, looking up. It was the familiar entry to the place, and he had emerged from what had alway
s seemed to him to be nothing but a blank wall, part of the massive, towering structure that had been the defining building of Reikonos for as long as he had been alive—and longer.

  “Indeed,” Curatio said, coming to his elbow. He looked up; the Citadel was some thirty stories tall. “I can hear a war party above us doing their work, and there are at least a few guards stationed outside. “Where shall we go, Guildmaster?”

  Cyrus blinked, thinking it over. “Up, I suppose.”

  Curatio watched him carefully, but his face betrayed a hint of approval. “A wise suggestion, I think. We’ll need to climb.” He gestured to a door on the far end of the room, and they found a staircase beyond, the remains of human guards and government officials strewn all over it.

  The stairs spiraled neatly around the circle that was the Citadel’s outer wall. On every floor they passed an entry door; without exception, it was thrown open and utter slaughter was contained within. Cyrus spared only a cursory glance after the first few floors. Bloodthirsty animals could not have wreaked more havoc, he thought. Though I suppose the dead soldiers of the Sovereign are animals and worse.

  “They’ll sweep their way to the top,” Terian said, only a few steps behind Cyrus. “They’ll have sent their elites up first, trying to catch the Council of Twelve before they can escape. They’ll almost certainly have failed, but they’ll try anyway.”

  “Interesting how you know their strategy, dark knight,” Vara said. “Or at least how these creatures think.”

  Terian answered her with but a shrug. “No more interesting than you not knowing it, white knight. Pure as the winter snow, aren’t you? Never had a dark thought of revenge in your life?”

  “I find myself having a few dark thoughts at this very moment,” Vara said, “specifically about how I’d like to apply that axe of yours to your own genitals from now until dawn.”

  “You clearly don’t have that many dark thoughts,” Terian said with a smirk, “as you’ve already threatened me with that one before.”

  “Silence would be better as we march up to a certain confrontation with the enemy,” Curatio said soothingly. “There will be plenty of time to argue later, I hope.”

  They fell into silence as they continued to make their way in the long, repetitive loop around the Citadel. Their ascent was dizzying, and Cyrus kept his eyes on the blue stones that made up the walls, realizing once more than the lower staircase to the portal had been of almost exactly the same construction.

  “Something on your mind, Guildmaster?” Curatio said to him in a low murmur, as if he could sense the thoughts directed his way.

  “Now that I am the Guildmaster, any chance you want to spill some secrets for me?” Cyrus asked, giving him a glance back.

  Curatio smiled thinly. “I will take it under consideration.”

  “That sounds a lot like your version of ‘in the fullness of time.’”

  “I would suggest you come up with your own particular phrase that expresses those sentiments,” Curatio said, and Cyrus once more found him utterly inscrutable.

  “Why?” Cyrus asked. “I don’t have much in the way of secrets.”

  “That is almost certain to change,” Curatio said. “And the time between now and when it does is not likely very full, to twist Alaric’s preferred phrase.”

  Cyrus started to question him further about that, but they reached the apex of the staircase just as he opened his mouth. They came to a sharp halt just before a door to his left.

  “Not a single visible dark elf on the floors below,” Terian murmured, low. “I guess they’ve finished their business there.”

  “Likely not many people there to torment and terrorize,” Curatio said. “This siege has been going on long enough that the government had probably suspended most of their functions.”

  “Be ready for anything,” Cyrus said and paused before the door.

  “Anything, you say?” Vaste asked. “How about—”

  “Not now,” Vara and Terian chorused.

  “No fun,” Vaste said.

  Cyrus came around the corner of the room with his sword drawn. He saw dark elven armor before him and struck both of his foes down with little in the way of thought or mercy. Bones cracked at the swing of his sword, bodies flew to either side, and Cyrus was left staring into a room where he had been on several occasions before.

  It was almost peaceful within the chamber holding the Council of Twelve’s meeting room. There was a surprising lack of damage, and the dark elven forces within were—

  Not so dark elven. At least, not all of them.

  “Cyrus Davidon,” came the voice of the man who sat in the center chair behind the Council of Twelve’s seat. He was flanked by a few others, each of which Cyrus knew a little too well. But he hung his gaze on that one in the center, stared him down, ignoring the half a hundred soldiers that were scattered throughout the room. “It is a true pleasure to run into you—though of a bit of a surprise to see you in this place, I must admit.” A thin smile stretched over blue lips. “Still, a pleasure.”

  “I wish I could say the same,” Cyrus said, staring at the dark elf playing at being king of Reikonos, “but I can’t … Malpravus.”

  Chapter 72

  “I cannot tell you how much it pleases me to see you again, dear boy,” Malpravus said, thin fingers pressed one against the other just below his skeletal chin. “I was worried that the spy the Sovereign sent to your bed would be the end of you.”

  “It takes more than some snake with a little knife to put the end to me,” Cyrus said, sweeping his gaze over the mighty desk at which Malpravus sat. “As your friends there should know.”

  Cyrus looked at each of them in turn; Orion stood to one side, the ranger still garbed in green, his metal helm covering all but his eyes. Carrack, the wizard, stood directly to Malpravus’s left, gaunt and attired in something that looked like sackcloth. His eyes were sunken, his tattooed chest was displayed through a slit in his clothing, and Cyrus suspected he had been pulled out of prison just moments earlier. Then, to the other side—

  “I knew you were lying sack of shit, Rhane Ermoc,” Cyrus said, looking at the human warrior who stood at Malpravus’s side looking much like a loyal dog sitting at the hand of its master, “but I didn’t go so far as to assume you were treacherous enough to betray the entire Confederation.”

  “Why, dear Rhane here is the reason we sit before you,” Malpravus said, not bothering to conceal his malevolent grin. “He opened one of the gates for us himself.”

  “Bloodlessly, I’m sure,” Cyrus said with a full measure of sarcasm.

  “On our side, yes,” Malpravus said. “I can’t say the same for the poor humans he was forced to gut in the guardroom.”

  “This is a staggering level of treachery,” Vara said.

  “Oh, not to worry,” Malpravus said, “we had other help as well.” He gestured to Terian, forcing Cyrus to look at the dark knight. “For example, your good friend there was responsible for an idea that allowed us to send forth some two thousand armored knights over the wall riding vek’tag.”

  “Is this true?” Vara’s pitch was too high, and Cyrus started to move toward her, albeit slowly.

  “It was my idea,” Terian said neutrally. “I can’t say I knew it would be used in this way, but I certainly bear the blame.”

  Cyrus took a few steps forward, allowing more room for his army to file in behind him. By his reckoning, they had Malpravus’s small group overmatched, but only in numbers. “So now you have the city of Reikonos at your feet.”

  “Dear boy,” Malpravus said, “now we have all of Arkaria at our feet.”

  “You should have joined us, Cyrus,” Orion said. The ranger sounded strangely choked with a glee of his own, muffled beneath the helm. Cyrus cast a withering glare at his armored visage but could not even see a hint of humanity beneath the mask.

  “It is not too late,” Malpravus offered. “Surely you see the direction in which the wind is blowing—”

/>   “And smell it, too,” Vaste said, “because of all the corpses you’ve just left rotting.”

  “—there is no hope for those who stand against us,” Malpravus said. “The Confederation is all but vanquished. With our full armies turned loose, every keep that still stands in the north and the Riverlands will fall within weeks. Soon, the Kingdom of Elves will follow, then one by one the smaller principalities, until all of Arkaria knows but one master.”

  “This has a familiar ring to it,” Cyrus said, shaking his head at Orion. “Sounds like the same line of bullshit he tried to fill my ear with when he sold his soul to the Dragonlord.” Cyrus pointed a finger at Malpravus. “The same line you tried to push on me when you wanted me to betray Sanctuary. ‘Give up all hope; you have no chance.’”

  “You truly don’t,” Malpravus said, and he seemed almost … sad. “There is no possible way to thwart the army that stands before you. You will die trying.”

  Cyrus stared at the necromancer’s dull eyes. “Then I will die trying. I will die as a free man, with a blade in my hand, the master of own damned fate and not some simpering dog that licks the boots of another in hopes he’ll be spared.”

  “It is a poor choice that you make,” Malpravus said, drawing himself up to stand. “Poorer for the fact that your friends shall have to suffer death with you for it.”

  “Oh, let’s face it, we’ve suffered death for worse reasons,” Vaste said.

  “Why would you assume that we would die, Malpravus?” Curatio asked. He was smiling enigmatically.

  “You cannot stand against our power,” Malpravus said. “I hold control over death itself.” He made a motion with his hand and the enemies within the chamber champed their jaws together with a loud clack. Cyrus’s eyes were drawn to the nearest of them; the face was familiar, that of a young lad of Luukessia that had introduced himself to Cyrus on the day of election. What had been his name? Rainey McIlven, Cyrus remembered with a flash of rage. Lost at Leaugarden.

  He turned his eyes on Malpravus.