“What?” he whispered.
“The Ferrin have an almost obsessive need to antagonize any Yellowtooth they encounter,” she murmured. “A journey such as this is not the place for such behavior.” Then she turned back to Tal and the envoy.
Jason looked at Seerka again, and was surprised to see the warrior staring back, both ears pointed directly at him and Lenai. Great, Jason thought, I forgot about the ears. Seerka’s grin spread, and he gave Jason a wink. Yep. Definitely not good. He just hoped Seerka’s need to mess with the Yellowtooth didn’t get them all killed.
“Well,” the High One looked at Gatlor, who, in Jason’s opinion, looked less than enthusiastic, “while I have no objections, that decision is ultimately up to Captain Gatlor. He and his team will be undertaking the quest.”
Gatlor stood. “We go into the unknown,” he said to Nekoor. “We do not know what perils we may face. You may wish to reconsider your request.”
“I am not unfamiliar with peril, Captain,” Nekoor replied. “I am a seasoned warrior just as you are. If you expect to face unknown dangers, surely an extra weapon and the arm to wield it would not be unwelcome?”
“You should also know,” Gatlor continued, “we will be accompanied by a Ferrin.” He motioned to the cat-man. “Seerka is a valued member of my team.”
A sound somewhere between a bark and a chuckle came from Nekoor’s throat. “For a chance to see one of the ancient cities, I would endure an entire village of Ferrin.”
“Your forbearance is greatly appreciated,” Seerka said, rising and bowing slightly. “And your presence will be most welcome.”
“Of that, I am certain,” Nekoor answered.
Jason glanced at Calador, and managed to force a laugh into a not-so-subtle cough as the big warrior rolled his eyes at him.
“Very well,” Gatlor said, ignoring their exchange. “The faith and ferocity of the Yellowtooth is well known. You are welcome to join us.”
“Excellent,” Tal said. “Then it is settled. Captain Gatlor, how long will it take you and your warriors to prepare?”
“Not long, High One. We should be ready to depart after Secondmeal.”
Tal nodded. “Then, unless there is something else to discuss, this meeting is adjourned. Good fortune to you and your team, Captain.”
New Places, Old Faces
After Secondmeal, they gathered in the courtyard of the keep. Nyala was already there waiting for them, and three additional Warders followed Gatlor as he joined the group. Sharr was there as well, even though it had sounded to Jason as if only Nekoor was going with them.
Gatlor apparently had the same thought. He approached the two Yellowtooth and said, “I did not realize you would both be coming.”
Sharr stepped forward. “I merely stand witness to Nekoor embarking on this glorious mission to rid us of the Altered. They have no place in Teleria. They should go back to where they came from and leave us alone.”
Jason’s eyes widened as he turned to look at Nyala. He noticed some of the others glancing at her as well. For her part, she seemed unaffected. “I agree,” she said. “But before we go, you should know I am one of the Altered.”
“I find that hard to believe,” Nekoor said. “We bore the weight of Ekim’s rule, and we have heard the description of the other Altered. None look like humans.”
A faint smile crossed Nyala’s face as she stepped forward. “Perhaps one of them looks like this?” Her body became a mass of shimmering sparks, throwing a glare across the faces of the Yellowtooth.
The envoys jumped back, their hands grabbing for their weapons.
“Hold!” Gatlor stepped between Nyala and the Yellowtooth. “Nyala works with us against the other Altered. Her son, Nivek, also an Altered, stands with us as well. Stay your weapons.”
Sharr growled and said, “We are simply to believe she fights against her own kind? Why should we?”
“It’s true,” Jason said. “She helped me against Regor, the Shadow Lord. He wanted to kill me, but she protected me. And then Nyala and Nivek fought against Regor and Airam. They’re on our side.”
“The Altered have their differences just as any other race,” Calador added. “Nyala and Nivek feel as we do, that the Altered should not intervene in the affairs of Teleria.”
“Or so they would have you believe,” Sharr said. “Perhaps once the other Altered are gone, these two will take control.”
Nyala shook her head. “I have no desire to rule Teleria. In fact, I would rather not be Altered at all.”
Sharr’s lip curled, baring sharp teeth. “So you say. But what—”
“Enough,” Nekoor said, putting the mace away. “Nothing is gained by this. Sheathe your sword.”
Sharr turned to Nekoor. “How can you stan—”
“I said enough!” Now Nekoor’s teeth were bared. “Question me again and I will see that you never sire offspring. Do you understand?”
Sire. Okay, so Sharr’s a guy, Jason thought. That was one mystery solved. Now to figure out which Nekoor was.
Sharr’s ears laid back as he ducked his head, and a little whimper escaped from his lips. “Of course. Forgive me.”
“So you believe us?” Jason asked.
“No,” Nekoor answered, “but neither do I disbelieve you. It remains to be seen whether or not she speaks truth. However, as an Altered, there is little we can do to prevent her from doing whatever it is she may be planning. Perhaps it is as Sharr believes, and she and her son are merely waiting until they can assume control of Teleria unopposed by the rest of the Altered. If that is her intent, we cannot stop her, but two Altered instead of seven is still an improvement. Only time will reveal the truth.” Nekoor turned to Nyala. “Therefore, I will join this mission and hope that you are honorable, although our own experience with the Altered would suggest otherwise.”
“If you have dealt with other Altered, I can understand your apprehension,” she said. She resumed her human appearance. “I hope, in time, you will come to see that I am telling you the truth.”
“As do I,” Nekoor said, and then turned to Sharr. “Report what you have seen, and have our people continue their preparations. Regardless whether this Altered speaks truth or not, our aid is pledged to the Circle, not to her.”
Sharr nodded once and backed away from the group as Gatlor stepped forward.
“Very well,” Gatlor said. “It is time we are on our way.” He looked at Nyala. “What do you require of us?”
“A moment,” a female voice said.
Jason turned and saw Seryn and the dark-haired girl he had spoken to in the dining hall when he was trying to figure out what the auras meant. He searched his memory. Meryl. That was her name.
“I have spoken with the High One,” Seryn said, “and he agrees that you should take a healer with you. I must remain here at Lore’s Haven, but Meryl will accompany you. She is quite capable, and should suffice for any needs.” She looked at Jason. “I know you are also capable of healing,” she said, “but Meryl may be more knowledgeable on the finer points.”
“No argument here,” Jason said.
Gatlor inclined his head to Seryn and Meryl. “I hope your services will not be needed,” he said, “but it is always best to be prepared.” He nodded to Nyala. “Now we are ready.”
“Gather around me, and I will take us to Ishadon.” She turned to Jason. “Because the Riftlands are between us and Ishadon, we can’t go there directly. Our journey will be in three stages, going around the Riftlands. Each place we stop, you need to use your power and inscribe a symbol on a slab of rock that I will place there. On your return, you’ll need to visualize these symbols in reverse order, coming back in three stages, just like we’re going.”
“On our return?” Jason said. “You’re not going to wait for us?”
“No. I don’t want to leave Nivek, or the Circle, for too long. The longer I’m gone, the more likely it is that Regor or Airam may make a move. If they show up while I’m away, no one here ca
n stand against them, not even Nivek. I will take you, tell you where to find the diamond, and then return here.”
Although he didn’t really like the idea, Jason understood why Nyala wanted to come right back. Hopefully they could find the diamond and get back quickly.
“All right,” he said. “Let’s go.”
*****
Delani raised her head with effort. Her neck felt as if it were made of wood; she almost thought she heard it creak in protest as it moved. She could tell she was in an upright position, but did not know what was keeping her that way. Twin spikes of pain burned in the back of her right shoulder. Although her thoughts were foggy, she remembered feeling sharp fangs pierce her flesh after being yanked into the trees. After that, she remembered nothing. She forced sticky eyelids apart and looked around as well as her stiff neck would allow. In the gloomy half-light everything was a blur, and sandy grit felt like it was trying to burrow into her eyes. She blinked again and again, until her surroundings slowly came into focus. She was pressed up against the wall of a cave; what little light there was came from around a bend in a passageway on the other side of the chamber. A pungent, nauseating smell of decay filled the air, invading her mouth and nose. She tried to take shallow breaths, but the odor was inescapable.
She looked down to see what was holding her up, and gasped as her gaze swept across a figure sprawled in the dirt in the center of the cavern. It was one of the Warders, or what was left of him. He looked like nothing more than leathery skin stretched over a contorted skeleton. His lips stretched back from his teeth as if in a final, terrible grin to greet his approaching death. Pairs of holes, the cloth around them stained a muddy crimson, marked his body in several places. Clearly, the creatures had fed upon him. Equally clear was that this was the source of the smell. Their bags and weapons lay scattered on the floor around the body. She saw no sign of the other three Warders.
“You are awake.”
She jerked her head around toward the voice, and gasped at the flare of pain the sudden movement brought with it. As the pain subsided, she saw Brin, hanging on the wall of the cavern beside her, held there by a thick layer of trapsilk. Borin hung on his other side, still unconscious. She looked down to see a similar blanket of silk holding her against the rock.
“Are you well?” Brin asked.
Had their circumstances not been so dire, she might have laughed at such a question. As it was, she merely nodded. “My head is foggy, my neck is stiff as chola wood, my shoulder still burns from being bitten, and I am being held against a cave wall by Manarach trapsilk. But if by ‘well’ you mean am I still breathing and is my mind still functioning, then yes, I am well.”
The corner of his mouth crooked slightly. “That is good.”
“We must get free,” she said. She called up her power, intending to incinerate the silk, but, other than a slight purple glow shining through the entrapping web near her hands, nothing happened.
She looked back at Brin. “The silk is impervious to dimsai?”
He shook his head. “I thought so at first as well. But look around at the walls of this cave. See the dark streaks running through the rock?” She could barely make out the darker strips, but they were there. “Blood Iron,” he said. “It is in the wall behind us as well. Our power is absorbed as soon as we call upon it.”
“Then we must devise another way.” She struggled against the silk, but it held her fast against the rock. The only part of her covered by the webbing that could move even slightly was her fingers, and they would not be enough to free the rest of her. “We cannot simply hang here awaiting whatever fate the creatures have planned for us.”
“I agree,” Brin said,” but unless you can fathom some option that I have missed, an escape seems unlikely.”
“We must simply ke—” She stopped as a shadow blocked the light momentarily.
The Manarach queen entered the cavern, approaching them slowly, her head cocking from side to side as she examined her captives. She stepped over the Warder’s body, each hairy spider leg rising and falling very deliberately as she moved.
“You are awake,” she finally said. “Iz good. Waz feared you would mizz great event.”
“What great event?” Delani felt like spitting at the creature, but it was more important that they learn as much as possible about their situation. Anything might give them some clue as to their captors’ intentions, and perhaps even a way to free themselves.
“Very big zhing,” the queen said, waving her human hands in the air, their motions mirrored by the first pair of legs. “You will zee zhree tribe come togezher for firzt time ever in hiztory of Manarach. Zhree tribe togezher. Our ztrength will be great.” She took a step closer. “And we have you to zhank for zhiz.”
“Us?” Brin asked. “In what way?”
“Wait.” The queen moved over to Borin, whose head still hung limply from its silken cradle. She grabbed his face, shaking it back and forth. “Wake, humanz! Time for zleep to ztop!”
Borin groaned, and then blinked his eyes open. He cried out, slamming his head back against the rock when he saw the queen’s black, orb-like eyes peering into his. Delani could see him struggling under the silk, his breath coming in sharp, whimpering gasps as he tried to get away from the creature.
When she saw he was awake, the queen moved back into the center of the chamber. “Now zhat all are awake, I will tell. I zend mezzage to two ozher queen. Our tribez fight for land. Fight for prey. No more. I invite zhem here. Offer each of zhem one of you.” She nodded as she spoke, and Delani could see the fangs under her chin moving restlessly, as if eager to taste their blood. “Tomorrow, when zun is highezt in zky,” the queen continued, “zhen we will feed. Togezher, queenz will feed upon you. Zhen we will have your powerz. We will be ztrong. We will join our tribez and go to humanz landz. We will deztroy zhe Zircle and will rule in zheir plaze.”
Delani’s thoughts were racing as she heard the queen’s plans. Whatever they were going to do, they needed to do it fast. But she had no idea what that was going to be.
*****
From the hilltop where she had brought them, Nyala watched the party as they began their trek to Ishadon, lying in the distance along the overgrown roadway. Many of the towers of the city had fallen, but many also still stood, beckoning to her, calling her to come home. If only that were possible. Although they couldn’t be seen from this distance, she knew the streets would be overrun by nature and the elements after so long. It was a testament to their technology that the city was still even recognizable. The highest of the spires, above the reach of the vegetation below, still reflected sparks of sunlight, like fiery beacons shining through the shadows of uncounted yesterdays. This was the first time she’d been this close in centuries. She rarely came here because of the memories the sight dredged up. Not only of almost being killed by the Blood Iron absorbing her dimsai, but also of the times before the war. Times, good and bad, forever buried in the dust of days gone by. Sometimes she felt the full impact of the fifteen centuries between now and then, and the memories almost seemed like they belonged to someone else, or were something she’d read somewhere. At other times, it seemed like it had only been yesterday. Those were the hardest days to get through.
She remembered the elation she’d felt when she discovered she could go into the past. She hadn’t told any of the others, and, as far as she knew, she was the only one who had the ability. By that time, the power had already started going to their heads. Their delusions of godhood had firmly taken root; they would not want her doing anything to change things. But she knew if she could just get a message to her younger self, stop that Alayn from developing the protophasic technology, none of this would have ever happened.
She also remembered the bitterness when she found she could only go back to the day the dimsai entered Teleria. By then, Teleria’s fate, and hers, was already sealed. It had taken her a very long time to get over that.
The group was growing smaller with each step the
y took along the road. It would take them some time to reach the city, but even from this distance, she thought she could feel a faint pull from the Blood Iron in the structures. Then again, it was probably just her imagination. Nothing more than a memory of what had happened when she’d first tried to return to her home after becoming Altered. If the Blood Iron really was strong enough to affect her from this distance, she never would have made it out at all. Still, she hadn’t wanted to get too close, so they would just have to walk for a while.
She knew she should get back to Lore’s Haven, but she lingered, gazing at the spires and towers in the distance. She had given the group explicit directions to the building that housed her research laboratory. It shouldn’t be hard for them to find. She knew they would only see overgrown roads, broken buildings, and crumbling architecture. In her mind, however, she could still picture, with absolute clarity, how each road and street looked, the glistening facades of each building, the towering structures gleaming in the sunlight. The streets had bustled with multitudes of people going here and there on whatever personal business they may have had. All of it nothing but empty ruins now, thanks to her. The multitudes long since crumbled to dust.
The protophasic devices had proven to be the perfect weapons, destroying all living organic matter and leaving inorganic matter untouched. Fire off a couple of protophasic missiles toward a city, wait for the energy wave to disintegrate the population, and then move right in. No messy clean up, no residual radiation. Perfect. That hadn’t been her intention, of course. She’d only been trying to find a way to break matter down into its separate components. The ultimate recycling technology. The High Command, however, had other ideas, saw other possibilities. She’d tried to destroy her work as soon as she learned of the military’s plans, but she’d found out about the High Command’s intentions too late. All of her work, all of her research, had been seized and used to create the horrific weapons that nearly wiped out her world, and changed her and her one-time friends into beings with more power than anyone had a right to possess.
Soul of Power Page 3