Reign of Ash

by Gail Z. Martin

  “Thank you,” Blaine said. He and the others returned their attention to Quintrel. “You’ve been planning all this,” he said with a gesture to indicate Valshoa.

  “For a while,” Piran said, an edge in his voice. “But you didn’t bother to warn everyone else?”

  Quintrel looked pained. “As the gods are my witnesses, I tried. King Merrill didn’t want to hear me. The court mages saw me as a threat to their power. The army had no use for mages who didn’t want to follow their orders. When I saw that I couldn’t stop a magic strike, I did the only thing in my power: I saved a remnant and retreated to a place where we might survive.”

  “Why did you send your messages with me?” Connor’s voice was sharp and Blaine could hear an edge of resentment. “All those months, because you blacked out my memory, I feared I had betrayed my master.”

  Quintrel grimaced. “I chose you because you served both Penhallow and Garnoc. I knew you had access to court, which Penhallow did not. And I had to flee the outside world to stay out of Reese’s grasp sooner than I had intended. It was the only way I could think of to leave a message behind so that, when the time was right, the right people would know where to come. And you did brilliantly!”

  Connor did not look pleased. “You made me think I’d lost my mind.”

  “And yet, clearly you have not,” Quintrel replied, sweeping his arm in a circle to acknowledge their location.

  From the look on Connor’s face, Blaine guessed that the argument was not settled, but Connor said nothing more.

  “What I want to know is, how did you find Valshoa in the first place?” Piran asked.

  Quintrel drew a deep breath. “I followed the clues left by my ancestor, Archus. He’s the one who stole Valtyr’s maps – and the one who hid them. If it’s any consolation, the first time I made the trip was before magic failed, so there was another level of protection you didn’t have to deal with.”

  “And you just walked up to the front door and knocked?” Piran challenged.

  Quintrel shrugged. “Something like that,” he said, and a look passed between Quintrel and Dolan that gave Blaine to suspect it had not been quite so easy. “I made my case to the Knights. While they owed no allegiance to King Merrill because of his grandfather’s betrayal, their loyalty to Donderath is still quite strong. I convinced them of the imminent danger, and they allowed me sanctuary for my Remnant.”

  “And you brought all your mages and scholars back and forth through the Guardians?” Piran pressed.

  “How I got them here is no concern,” Quintrel replied, growing impatient with Piran’s questions. “What matters is that I succeeded in safeguarding their knowledge.”

  “What’s required to work the ceremony?” Blaine asked. “And what must I do?” He laid out the twelve disks on the large table in the center of the room. “We have all of the disks but one.”

  “Wonderful!” Quintrel grinned and withdrew the thirteenth disk from beneath the folds of his robe. “I kept this disk to assure that the trail would lead you here.”

  “We nearly died at Mirdalur because your clues left a lot to interpretation,” Blaine said.

  Quintrel frowned. “I didn’t expect that. I visited Mirdalur and hoped that you found the journal I left behind. To the best of my ability to determine, its power was scattered, harmless.”

  “‘Harmless’ doesn’t do it justice,” Piran muttered.

  Quintrel gave a sigh. “It was possible, at least, in theory, that you might have been able to raise the power somewhere other than Valshoa. Also unlikely. It requires a place of especially strong power, and few of those spots exist.” He nodded toward the maps Kestel had placed on the table.

  “My ancestor, Archus Quintrel, spent years trying to understand how magic works. He searched for Valtyr’s maps, believing, as Valtyr did, that the null and power places played a crucial role. But even Valtyr didn’t recognize how widely the power varied or how it waxes and wanes over time. Only a few places have the conditions necessary to raise the power at any given time, and even with the right physical conditions, the only way we know to raise the magic still requires a Lord of the Blood,” Quintrel said.

  “Why didn’t the Great Fire destroy Valshoa, if it was so powerful?” Dawe asked skeptically.

  “Valshoa was not one of the places that the Meroven mages targeted.” Carensa met Dawe’s gaze levelly. “And it had protections in place – both physical and magical – that kept it reasonably secure until the magic failed. Even so, the damage was considerable. When you see the valley in daytime, you’ll be able to tell how much destruction was done by the Cataclysm.”

  Blaine rubbed his temples. He’d had a pounding headache since just before sundown, and a growing feeling of uneasiness. Unbidden, he thought of Penhallow and had a blurred image of steel and blood. The moment passed, and he looked at Connor. They met each other’s gaze, and Connor nodded solemnly. More than my imagination, Blaine thought. Is that the kruvgaldur? Just a glimpse, but I’d guess Niklas and Penhallow are under attack. He looked back to Connor, wondering what he had seen.

  “What has to happen tomorrow?” Blaine asked, knowing that if the images were from Penhallow, it was a warning. “We left an armed force outside the mountain pass, but if my suspicions are correct, they’re under attack from Reese’s soldiers. If they can’t hold the pass, we could have company.”

  Quintrel gave a cold smile. “The Guardians have protected the pass for a long time. The Knights of Esthrane also protect it. That should be sufficient for us to work the ritual tomorrow evening. If you’re successful, our magic will prevent Reese from reaching Valshoa, even if he breaches the valley’s protections.”

  “Those are our friends out there,” Piran snapped. “They’re putting themselves in danger to buy time for Blaine to raise the magic. They’re not disposable.”

  “I didn’t mean to imply they were,” Quintrel replied, “merely that we’re unlikely to be interrupted with our effort.” Piran glowered at Quintrel, unconvinced, but remained silent.

  “What about the disks?” Kestel pressed. “Blaine had just one of the disks at Mirdalur, and the ritual failed. We’ve got all thirteen now, but still just one Lord of the Blood. Will it make a difference?”

  “Technically, two Lords of the Blood, although only one with a body of his own,” Zaryae remarked. “Connor carries a bond to the Wraith Lord.”

  Quintrel looked at Connor and his eyes gleamed. “Now that’s something I did not expect. You can speak with the Wraith Lord?”

  Connor looked uncomfortable. “At times. He possesses me when he sees fit. But he’s already said that without blood, the ritual won’t recognize him. He’s more of an adviser than a participant.”

  “We’ll see,” Quintrel said, deep in thought. He roused himself and turned back to Kestel. “The disks? They were focal points, designed to draw – and trap – the wild magic so it could be harnessed.”

  “So you mean that the bloody disks we’ve been lugging all over the kingdom actually attract wild magic?” Piran asked, agape. “And here I thought we just had rotten luck with all the magic storms. Might as well have painted a bull’s-eye on our camp.”

  Quintrel looked up quickly. “If you’ve been dogged by magic storms, that’s a good sign. The disks have retained their ability.”

  “A good sign?” Piran repeated incredulously. “He says it’s a good sign that we’ve nearly been torn limb from limb.”

  “I’m curious,” Connor said, eyeing Quintrel warily. “Penhallow and I gathered more of the disks than Blaine did, but we weren’t hit by an unusual number of storms.”

  Quintrel nodded. “Neither of you is a Lord of the Blood.” He looked at Connor over his spectacles. “We have no idea how the presence of the Wraith Lord may affect the disks. No way to tell until we do the working.”

  Blaine’s headache had dulled, and he gathered his thoughts. “The disks attract the wild magic. This place had more power than usual, so using the disks here will draw
even more magic. But there were also symbols for each family of the Lords of the Blood. We saw them at Mirdalur. What of them?”

  Quintrel looked as if he were about to begin a lecture to one of his classes at the university. “Over the centuries, people who had the ability to act as conduits for magic were drawn to the power and found workings to harness it – temporarily. At Mirdalur – and before then, at other places of power like Valshoa – mages layered working upon working to bind the magic permanently. The disks, the ritual, the symbols, and the blood of someone with a particular sensitivity to magic: Layer them together in a place of power at a time when magic is strongest. And the mages found a way to harness the magic for long periods of time.

  “There are meridians, invisible lines of power that cross the world. The wells of power are places where the meridians intersect. The last time magic was harnessed, it drew upon the meridians that intersected at Mirdalur and anchored the magic at the manors of each of the Lords of the Blood – manors that were built on thirteen separate meridians.”

  “But binding the magic isn’t really permanent, is it?” Kestel said, fingering one of the obsidian disks. “What’s done can be undone.” She met Quintrel’s gaze. “So the ritual tomorrow, if it works, can still be broken. What’s the new anchor?”

  Quintrel sighed. “This valley is another place where meridians cross. Spots where thirteen lines intersect are quite rare, at least on any particular continent. This is one of the few on this continent.”

  “So if we can raise the magic – and that’s not certain,” Blaine said, “it’s going to be more fragile than it was before, because it doesn’t have as many anchors.”

  “A necessary risk.” Everyone turned as General Dolan spoke. The Knight’s voice was deep and resonant. “Given the unrest, it was impossible to find a better site. Prior to Mirdalur, magic had been unbound for a hundred years. There was time to build the manors on lines of power, making it possible to link them together. I doubt anyone would care to prolong the current situation while thirteen fortresses are rebuilt.”

  “So I’m the catalyst,” Blaine said. “Without me, you could try to find a new group of promising ‘conduits,’ as you called them, but it would be trial and error.”

  “Yes.”

  And all the while, the misery goes on, thousands die needlessly, and civilization slips further beyond our grasp. “Tell me what I need to do,” Blaine said. “And let’s hope by all the great and little gods that it works.”

  Quintrel nodded. “Very well. Sundown on the solstice is the most powerful time to do the working. The Valshoans built a large shrine on the nexus of power with the ritual chamber belowground. Its upper building was leveled in the Old Destruction, before Mirdalur. The Great Fire scorched the ruins and opened the ritual chamber to the sky. We’ve removed the rubble, preparing for this opportunity.”

  “And?” Piran asked. “Mick just walks over there and hopes the magic doesn’t kill him?”

  “My people will ready the site. We will arrange the disks and symbols along the meridians. When Blaine takes his place, the power should be drawn to him. My people will speak the word of binding in that moment, and the magic will be harnessed once again,” Quintrel said, clearly anticipating the event.

  “Assuming everything goes as planned,” Kestel said. “And Mick doesn’t die.”

  “I don’t like it.” A candlemark later, Blaine and the others were together in the large room where they would spend the night. Kestel paced, too concerned to eat any of the meal that Quintrel’s people had brought for them. “Mick’s the one with all the risk, while Quintrel and the Knights sit back and watch.”

  “Not completely,” Zaryae said. “Wild magic is unstable. There’s some risk to those who are preparing the ritual space, since the disks and the symbols, in a place of great power, could trigger an unexpected reaction.”

  “All this risk, and if the magic is harnessed, it still won’t be the way it was before,” Dawe observed.

  Verran sat with his chair tipped back against one wall, playing his flute. Piran and Borya played cards near the couch were Desya slept, and from the sounds coming from the game, Piran had met his match at sleight of hand. Zaryae, Kestel, and Dawe had been debating the merits and risks of the venture since dinner. Lowrey had left them before dinner with a mumbled comment about finding some of his former colleagues from the university. Connor stood at the other end of the room, staring out a window into the dark, empty streets. Blaine found that his thoughts were too jumbled to join the conversation, and so he drifted toward the windows.

  “You feel it, too?” he asked quietly when he was beside Connor. “Penhallow?”

  Connor nodded. “Probably more than you do, since the bond’s been in place for longer. I remember when I first began serving Penhallow. The images were very faint, and I thought for a while I was imagining things. Over time, the bond grew stronger. The images became clearer, but still often chaotic.” He sighed. “It’s an imperfect way to communicate, that’s for certain.

  “Penhallow’s worried,” Connor said. “We’d best be about our business quickly, in case they can’t hold out.”

  Blaine’s expression hardened. “Quintrel didn’t seem worried about Reese getting in, but I don’t like how casually he dismissed the possibility.” He paused. “Do you trust Quintrel?”

  Connor gave a harsh laugh. “As much as I trust anyone who kidnaps me, plants memories in my brain without my permission, and then leaves big blank holes to worry me. In other words, no. But I don’t see an alternative.”

  Blaine sighed. “I don’t trust him, either. But I agree – he appears to be our best bet. Gods know, trying it without him didn’t go well.”

  Blaine thought about Carr, taken by madness, and of Kata, killed by the gryps, and Illarion, lost to the Guardians. He remembered the ruined farms and deserted homesteads they had ridden past as they crossed Donderath, and the desolation that had claimed his homeland. If I can bring back the magic, even if it’s not what it used to be, even if it doesn’t last hundreds of years – what choice do I have?

  The door burst open from the corridor, and Lowrey stood in the doorway. He scanned the room and brightened as he saw Blaine. “There you are. The scholars would like a word with you. Come with me.”

  With a sigh, Blaine let Lowrey lead him out of the room and down a long corridor. As they walked, Blaine got a better look at the Valshoan building. Built of blocks of stone that had been cut out of the canyon, the building was solid. The floor was tiled with smooth stones, and along the walls, empty niches and nooks undoubtedly once housed statues or decorations. Blaine had thought that Quillarth Castle and the lyceum seemed old, but the millennia weighed heavily on this building. The floors showed the wear of centuries, and the marble thresholds were marked by the footsteps of countless passersby. Valshoa had survived the Great Fire as well as magic storms and the cataclysms of old, but each had left scars that did not fade with time.

  “Look around you!” Lowrey enthused. “Have you ever seen a more perfect example of early Donderan construction?” He did not wait for Blaine to answer before hurrying on. “There simply are no comparable sites that haven’t gone to total ruin.”

  Lowrey rubbed his hands together gleefully. “Quintrel tells me that although the Knights have been here for quite some time, the original Valshoans died out long ago, and the scholars have had little time for studying the site. The only histories that exist are legends and stories passed down among the Valshoans’ scattered descendants,” he said. “Which means I could be the first to do a comprehensive history of the Valshoan civilization. Think of it!”

  “But the university in Castle Reach is gone,” Blaine protested. “Where would you share your findings – assuming we get out of here alive?”

  “Get out of here? Who’s planning to leave?” Lowrey snorted. “Vigus Quintrel assembled the best scholars and mages of our generation in the Remnant he saved. And he’s invited me to stay as a part of their commu
nity!” Lowrey’s pleasure at the compliment was so great, Blaine did not have the heart to suggest that the invitation was a pleasant form of captivity to assure the valley remained hidden.

  Lowrey may have a reason to stay, but the rest of us intend to go home – if we survive, Blaine thought. Let’s hope Quintrel and the Knights don’t have other plans.

  Lowrey ushered Blaine into a room where a dozen gray-robed scholars awaited them. They eyed Blaine as if he were a particularly interesting specimen to be studied. Blaine guessed this was the Quorum the guards had mentioned.

  “May I present Lord Blaine McFadden, the last Lord of the Blood,” Lowrey announced with proprietary pride.

  One of the scholars, a man who looked a decade or more Lowrey’s senior, looked over Blaine from head to toe. “Can’t say I’m overly confident that the future of the kingdom rests on a McFadden,” he said gruffly.