“Did you hear something?” she asked.
Just then the heavy door to the main hall opened, and Ahm poked his head out. “We’re ready below, if you’d care to join us. Have you seen Sanych?” he asked.
“No,” Rhona said. “She might be with Meena, up in Kemsil’s room.”
Ahm nodded, and the three of them returned to the warmth and light of the castle.
~~~
With a faint shimmer of rippling light, Sanych appeared where Rhona had been standing moments before. Her breath came in confused heaves.
She’d come out to the yard to try her latest idea: wrapping her body in a light-bending shield, and using it to slide herself between the shadows. Blinking, she called it, not having learned an official name for it from Curzon. In the few minutes she’d been outside, she’d blinked to the stables, the garden, the castle’s topmost, fern-covered crenellations, and—briefly—back to the cliff top above Curzon’s cave, where most signs of the day’s battle were obscured by falling snow. The thrill of such an incredible feat made her skin tingle with glee.
A moment after she had returned to the yard, Rhona and Ruel had come out, mere feet away, and Sanych’s euphoria had faded. She had stayed inside her invisibility shield and eavesdropped on them, against her better judgment. She had drawn Rhona’s attention when she accidentally dropped her pebble from the hoodoo, and only a quick blink away and Ahm’s timely interruption had kept the pirates none the wiser.
Now, Sanych was alone with her confusion. She’d assumed that the two pirates had been discussing Rhona’s time with Geret aboard the Princeling, and had been prepared to dredge up her old anger and jealousy once more. But at the last moment, Rhona had said Salvor’s name.
Sanych wasn’t sure exactly what Rhona was talking about, but she began to wonder if, in her emotional state, she might have missed a few pertinent facts over the last few days. Where does that leave me, though? she wondered. I know what I heard through the cabin wall…or do I?
Before she could pursue that line of thinking anywhere, the outer door opened once more, and Ahm looked out. “Ah, there you are,” he said. “I’m afraid we’ve no time to waste, Sanych. Come below; the ritual awaits.”
~~~
Oolat paused at the far wall of the black stone chamber. Green torchlight flickered from several sconces behind him. Among the elaborate textual carvings on the wall before him was a large circle devoid of any decoration or inscription whatsoever, as if the words that had once been carved there had been pressed flat by the thumb of an earth god. He slowly placed a hand against the smooth surface, feeling its warmth.
“Yes,” he murmured, heart pounding. “I knew I would be the one who freed you.” He retrieved the key from a magically protected pouch at his belt. “All my life,” he mused, “I have dreamt of this moment. Anticipated it. Bent reality to my own will, shaped the world itself in order to bring me here. I will have my glorious future. Starting now.”
Behind him, the dozen cultists who had survived the descent into the Green Dragon murmured their eagerness. No thought was spared for those who had fallen to the tricks and traps of the ancient stronghold of the Shanallese royalty. All that mattered was witnessing this moment, the ultimate Dzur i’Oth achievement.
Oolat’s mouth salivated as he raised the small, blood-filled orb to the center of the blank spot in the wall. He had such plans; the world had never seen their like. The new, magic-based empire he would bring forth would require slaves, gold, and a sea armada to protect its shores and bring in tribute from far-off lands. He had spent decades refining his fantasies, fine-tuning his plans in intricate detail.
And now he was moments away from making those fantasies into a reality he could share with the world. Everyone would soon see, as he saw, that those with magic gifts were destined to rule the lives of those without them.
He placed the surface of the key against the blank wall. The area around the orb flashed to molten red, then yellow. Oolat jerked his hand back, feeling the burning heat on his fingers. The wall sucked the key from his hand and closed over it.
Oolat stepped back, invoking a thin glassy shield to block the heat. The smooth stone circle on the wall flashed away in a burst of ashy smoke, revealing a cavity that exuded a blue glow. The light and heat faded abruptly. Oolat dispelled his shield and saw a waist-high stone platform within the hole. On it lay the prize that Dzur i’Oth had sought for nearly four hundred cycles.
The Great and Dire Tome of Ages was his to claim.
He reached in, breathless, exhilarated, and picked up the large black-bound book with both hands, feeling ancient scale-marks on the strange, delicate leather.
And froze, as the Tome’s consciousness awakened and uncurled, reaching out and touching his mind. It used no words as it communed with him, just images. Oolat was overwhelmed by the crushing level of detail each image gave him.
FLASH—A blind man in a shadowed corner opens his eyes and sees for the first time. The images that meet his eyes do not make sense, and he craves understanding.
FLASH—A woman arrives on a familiar shore, yet cannot understand the strange city around her. Those around her go about their daily business, appearing familiar yet unknown, and she senses that they are far different than those she remembers.
FLASH—A shepherd stands on a windy hilltop, his staff in hand, shading his eyes against the brightness of the afternoon sun. He strains his eyes over the close-cropped grassy hills, desperately seeking his lost flock!
“You have found us,” Oolat managed to say. His nose began bleeding from contact with the magical juggernaut.
FLASH—A prisoner, unfairly condemned, finds sudden freedom at the hands of a sympathetic soul. Once free, he wishes to wreak revenge on the one who condemned him.
FLASH—A king sits at the head of many lesser rulers. They do not understand that he is their superior, yet he does not know how to communicate his plan for mutual benefit to all; he longs for an ambassador to convey his words to others.
FLASH—A queen, desirous of conquest upon those who do not know their true worth, sends forth a summons, requiring those loyal to her to gather under her leadership, forming her army, her right hand of power.
“We are y-yours to command, Great One,” Oolat gasped, feeling his body breaking within under the strain of the Tome’s communication. His ambitions forgotten, he sought only to survive his encounter with the mystical object he had searched for all of his adult life.
FLASH—Dozens of lesser lives are sacrificed in a village square as their chieftain vows success or death. He will follow his god’s divine path, and nothing shall dissuade him from his goal.
“T-take these that are with me, G-great One,” begged Oolat, collapsing to his knees, the Tome clutched against his chest. “Take them as m-my willing gift.”
Sudden screams reached his ears, and he heard bodies striking the floor behind him. The familiar scent of fresh blood reached his nose. He fell forward into a bow, pushing the Tome ahead of him, leaving his fingertips along its edge as he prostrated himself before it.
“Great One…your servant d-dies…” he gasped, coughing blood onto the dark stone floor.
FLASH—A god reaches down from the clouds, his mighty hand raising up an injured, loyal servant. If the servant is willing to serve a larger role, the god is willing to imbue him with extraordinary powers. But will the servant accept? Or will he choose death?
A spark of greed flashed in Oolat’s dying mind. Power.
“Save me…and I…am yours…”
Cool liquid sensations flowed along his limbs, reaching his torso, filling his head. All his agony washed away, replaced by a warm awareness. He had energy to spare now; he might never tire again! The world would be his after all! Oolat laughed into the puddle of his own blood and raised himself up on his hands, reaching for the Great Tome.
His hand didn’t make it that far.
A violent yellow force wormed itself into his mind, and he was helpless against
its vicious power. It took over his bodily functions and shoved his consciousness into a small dark corner of his skull, where he watched, horrified, as his own arms picked up the Tome and his body got to its feet.
FLASH—The god’s avatar strides forth to do the pure, unadulterated will of the divine; none can stand before him now.
Too late, Oolat realized the trap he had fallen into: distracted by his own agony, he had given the Great Tome the lives of his minions, and the book had used their blood to fuel its possession spell, which it used on Oolat himself.
As the Tome’s avatar began the journey back out of the Green Dragon, Oolat scrabbled and shrieked inside his own mind, frantic to regain control of his body and his dreams of power.
But the Great and Dire Tome of Ages had returned to the world, more sentient and chaotic than at any other time in its millennia-long existence. This time, it would not be so complacent as to submit to the will of a mortal.
Especially not one who had been so foolish as to free it from its prison.
Chapter Thirty
The treasury doors burst open just as Runcan slipped the ring bearing the Magistra’s seal onto Anjoya’s finger. She looked over, feeling the weight of the new tiara nestled in her curls.
Count Aponden led the other Dictat members into the royal treasury room; his face was dark with anger. “There she is; arrest her.”
Runcan, still holding the jeweled box that had contained the Magistra’s ring, stepped forward, closing its lid. “Welcome, gentlemen. May I introduce you to Anjoya Meseer Branbrey, Lady High Magistra of Vint. She will now accept your fealty.”
Anjoya held out the royal ring toward the newcomers.
“Magistra?” echoed Count Thelios, halting in surprise.
“Lies,” said Count n’Hara. “The Magister has been dead for a day.”
Imorlar stepped from the shadows, holding an official marriage license. The Magister’s fox seal was imprinted on the wax at the bottom.
“I assure you,” Anjoya said, “I do not make a habit of marrying the dead. Count Runcan was kind enough to perform the ceremony. In all the recent confusion, we’re just now getting to the formalities.” She wiggled the ring at them.
“Impossible! Guards!” Aponden called, nearly stomping the floor in his rage.
Imorlar, still silent, held out a folded blue cloth, unfolding it to reveal a glass vial. A smear of yellow liquid streaked its inner surface. His nose wrinkled in distaste.
“By all means, call the guards,” Anjoya said. “I’ll be most pleased to tell them how you and Count n’Gida conspired with a certain Lady Mist for the further advancement of your plans for a Vinten empire. You should have destroyed your poison vial rather than simply dropping it in a palace privy. Imorlar’s agents are very thorough.”
Several guards arrived, and in short order they took Aponden and n’Gida into custody and removed them from the treasury, ignoring their protests of entrapment.
Count Rentos turned to Runcan and Anjoya, looking bemused. “After nearly three years, it’s finally over. Did the lady truly marry the Magister before he died?”
Anjoya turned her smile to the wary Counts. “I’m still awaiting your oaths of fealty, gentlemen.”
~~~
Kemsil heard the door open. “Meena!” he said, struggling to sit up. “I was hoping you’d come!”
“Don’t you strain yourself,” she said, striding to his side and pushing him back down. “You’re not healed yet.”
But he resisted. “I’m not an invalid, woman,” he griped.
“Are too. For the moment.”
“Is it too late to help me?” he asked, his eyes lined with pain.
“You don’t look like you’re dead and rotting to me.” She sat on the edge of his bed and put her hands on his arm and chest.
Healing rippled through his body, sealing his wounds. He sighed in relief, slumping with the cessation of pain.
“You’re welcome.” Meena grasped his hand and helped him into a sitting position.
He looked down at his healed stump. “I guess it was too much to hope that it would magically reappear,” he said in a quiet voice.
“Sorry, Kem,” Meena said, shaking her head. “I’m not that good.”
“It’s all right. What can you do?” he asked with a shrug. “My life isn’t fixable. I’m a one-armed man who can never go home, never have children.” He sighed, looking away. “I told Geret I wish he had let me die.”
A slow smile came over Meena’s lips; she looked at him with a secret in her eyes.
“What?” he asked, suspicious.
“There’s something I’ve wanted to do for you for a long time, Kemsil. Now that the Circuit of Sa’qal is destroyed—which I don’t blame you for, so you shouldn’t blame yourself—I have the chance to fulfill my wish. And I’m not taking ‘no’ for an answer,” she added, pressing him back onto the bed.
“What do you intend?” he asked, his hand coming up to rest on hers.
She smiled down at him and took his face in her hands. “Close your eyes.”
He did so.
She leaned over him, pressing her lips to his forehead in a warm kiss. “This is something only I can do for you, and after all you’ve done for me, Kem, you deserve it.”
One hand slid into his long dark hair, grasping it close to the base of his scalp. As he frowned in puzzlement, the hand jerked his head up and to the side, and Meena’s other palm slammed into the side of his chin, wrenching his head around much farther than he’d thought possible. Bursts of white-hot pain exploded within him as his neck broke.
His vision darkened, and he tried to gasp for air. With fading hearing, he detected Meena’s voice. “So sorry. That probably hurt a lot.” She turned his head back to its original position, then placed a hand on his chest, where his heart stuttered its last.
Kemsil Urondarei died.
And awoke a few moments later, shuddering and gasping, limbs trembling. Meena leaned on his shoulders, holding him down, while the spasms passed. He lay panting under her weight, trying to get his eyes to focus on her face. With a wince, he murmured, “I hope that was better for you than it was for me.”
Meena threw back her head and laughed, her rich voice echoing in the stone room. “It can be good for you as well, from now on.” She let him sit up again.
“I don’t understand.” He frowned, still trying to cope with the fact that Meena had just killed him, and that he was capable of putting that thought in the past tense.
“Kemsil,” she said, “the banns constrain you for the rest of your life, but that’s as far as they can reach. I’ve taken you beyond death. I couldn’t kill you while the Circuit was actively hiding us from the cult, but since it was lost, I saw no reason to wait anymore. With your death, the banns have ceased their hold on you. And if Aldib was able to sense their cessation, they all think you just died. So, they won’t be hunting you anymore, either.”
Kemsil blinked, stunned by the sudden gift of a normal life. His mouth opened and closed soundlessly. “I have no words,” he finally managed to say, “that could possibly approach the level of gratitude my heart is brimming with. As long as I live,” he vowed, taking her hand, “I will proudly proclaim the generosity of the Shanallar. I’ll tell this story to my seventeen babies and my ninety-six grandbabies—”
Meena laughed. “You might want to discuss that with Anjoya first!”
“Probably. In the meantime, may I interest you in testing my newfound freedom? Make sure the banns are really gone?”
Meena tsked, eyeing him coyly. “You know that wouldn’t prove anything. I’d survive either way. Stars and darkness, what insatiable lover of women have I unleashed on the world?”
Kemsil grinned at her, subtly raising his eyebrows. “The rarest and best sort: having been resigned to eternal deprivation of female company, even the most casual of touches will seem a god’s boon to me. And no woman will be able to refuse that sort of worship. Not from me, that is.”
<
br /> Meena shook her head with a smile. Switching topics, she said, “Ahm’s taking Sanych down to the lowest level of the castle now; I thought you might like to come watch with me.”
“What’s going on down there? Will there be women?” he asked, leaning forward with suave interest.
Meena rubbed the bridge of her nose and sighed. “Several, I’m sure, though none for you.”
“Alas again.” His expression sobered. “It’s to do with destroying the Dire Tome, isn’t it?”
“Yes. I’m relatively invincible, but Sanych isn’t. To keep her alive long enough to help me destroy the Tome, Ahm will cast a powerful spell on her.” Meena paused, looking caught up in faraway memories.
“Come,” she said, pulling Kemsil to his feet. “Sanych is going to be Oathbound.”
Chapter Thirty-one
Four hundred years ago
Jacasta dashed to the far end of the stone chamber, running up the circular steps of the massive dais in the center of the room, and then down the back side. The book in her arms felt like it was made of lead. The carven words on the walls seemed to speak on a level just below her hearing, making her ears throb. The torch she clutched in one hand threatened to burn her ear.
“Hurry!” Arisson shouted. He created a magic-blocking shield as he entered the chamber behind her, then whirled, swords drawn, to face his attackers. They pelted through the narrow doorway, nearly on his heels.
A blast of fiery magic that would have transformed him into a small pile of cinders slid harmlessly past his shield instead, lighting the entire room for a moment. His sword flicked out, slashing at the Enforcers as they rushed him. Two of them died in seconds, and their sprawling bodies slowed those behind them.
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