Darkrise

by M. L. Spencer

  With the slightest dribble of magic, Quin focused all his will into that one crystal through the instrument in his hand. He watched it slowly rotate into position, sliding into place. He held his breath. When the crystal settled fully into the pattern, he let out a protracted sigh.

  The flaw was fixed. Only, the crystal above had been pushed out of alignment.

  Quin scooted his spectacles up and rubbed his eyes. He knew it wouldn’t be that simple. Nothing was. Propping his elbow on the desk, he squinted harder and sank the probe back into the stone to reconfigure the next crystal in the pattern, pushing it back into position. Which knocked aside the next crystal above it.

  A bead of sweat dripped from his forehead, dropping onto the desk. Quin wiped his face with his sleeve. Then he forced his mind to concentrate as he gazed into the deep black depths of the Soulstone, pushing the next crystal back into place. And the next. And the next, as the hours sped by and the nighttime waned…

  Quin jolted awake at the sound of a piercing scream.

  “What?!” he shouted, dropping the instrument he was holding as he jerked his head up off the desk. He stared blearily into Naia’s ghost-pale face. Her eyes were wide, her mouth gaping at him in horror.

  He wiped the slobber from the corner of his mouth, righting himself in his seat. His eyes scanned over the room, desperately seeking the source of the threat. But there was just Naia and himself. They were alone.

  He frowned up at her with a vacuous look on his face.

  “You’re … alive…?” she gasped, taking a step toward him.

  Quin frowned even harder. “Well, not precisely alive, but I take it that’s not your point. By the way … why do you ask?”

  She shook her head slowly, her hair swaying into her face. She pointed to the desk. Glancing down, he saw the Soulstone. And almost screamed himself.

  The medallion was glowing red, full of a lively, scintillating light.

  Full of a mage’s gift.

  “Who…?” Naia gasped. Then her face wrinkled in a look of disgust. “Did you kill Tsula?”

  “No!”

  “Then who?”

  Quin ignored the question, scooping the Soulstone up in his hand. He donned the wire spectacles, flipping quickly through the lenses, staring deep into the perfect latticework of glowing crystals. Somehow, it was fully charged. Each crystal vibrated with radiant energy.

  “Then why is it glowing? What’s filling it?” Naia demanded

  “The air,” Quin gasped, not quite believing it himself. It wasn’t possible … but it was the only explanation. It couldn’t have sucked the gift out of him. He was not a living mage. He had no gift left in him.

  “How?” Naia pressed.

  “I don’t know.” Quin shook his head. “I was working on it last night. Just tinkering. I was trying to fix the flaw. I must have done something…”

  He squinted harder, staring into the glowing depths of the jewel, at the charged crystals pulsating with life. There was no sign of the flaw. Every crystal was perfectly aligned. He’d made certain of that before falling asleep.

  “I wonder…” he whispered. Removing the spectacles, he set them down on the desktop. Then, before he could change his mind, he wrapped the silver bands of the collar around his neck. With a click, the clasp snapped closed.

  “No!” Naia lurched forward.

  The stunning power that surged into him took his breath away. Quin’s muscles locked rigid, his back arching in the chair as a gush of energy flooded through every fiber of his being. It was like a lightning strike that hit every nerve, a torrent of colors and sounds and feelings. The power was exhilarating, thrilling him completely.

  The flow of energy stopped, his body going limp. He sat back in the chair, panting, sweating, every muscle quivering. He could still fill it, the stirring of power that moved within, pulsating quietly in the back of his mind. Greater and more fulfilling than ever he remembered. And it hadn’t hurt one bit.

  “What did you do…?” Naia gasped.

  Quin reached up behind his neck, opening the silver clasp. The Soulstone, now dark, slid down his chest into his lap. He fingered it, nudging the medallion slightly. He looked up at Naia. Then he closed his eyes.

  With his mind, he tugged at the magic field. Not through the Onslaught. This time, he touched it directly. He let it seep into him, feeling its soothing cadence, the rhythmic pulse of power he had known all his life. He did the simplest thing he could think of: he willed a mist of magelight into being.

  The sound of Naia’s gasp told him that his attempt had been successful. When he opened his eyes, he was surrounded by a mist of glaring white light. Quin flinched, pushing his seat back. He rose to stand, argent strands of mist weaving between his feet. He gaped down at it, unable to explain the nature of the color. Before, his signature had been dark red, the hue of spilled blood. The color of the legacy he’d inherited from his predecessor.

  But this…

  He looked down at the Soulstone in his hand as the explanation became clear to him. The gift inside him now wasn’t the same legacy he’d inherited from his master. It wasn’t even a legacy, not something handed down. It was the beginning of something new. Staring down at the Soulstone, Quin gave a mirthless laugh.

  “What is it? What happened?” Naia demanded, confusion paling her face.

  “I have the gift in me again,” Quin said with a euphoric grin. “I feel it inside me. Ha! Do you know what this means?”

  “No. I don’t.” She shook her head.

  Quin whirled toward her, clutching the medallion against his chest. “It means I don’t need the Hellpower anymore! I can reach through to the magic field on my own!” His eyes widened as the implications sank in. “Naia … I’m alive.”

  24

  Cruel Choices

  Kyel stared at the long line of prisoners being escorted into the practice yard below Greystone Keep. There, the captured men were lined up in rows and made to kneel, their hands secured behind their backs. Crackling bonfires blazed at the edges of the yard, casting a contortionist’s dance of light across the faces of the captives.

  Kyel couldn’t help but stare, disturbed by the silence the warriors observed, even in the face of defeat. No one spoke a word. Their faces were grim and stern, staring straight ahead. Their expressions never wavered, even as more gray-cloaked soldiers poured into the yard.

  At an order from a captain, one of the prisoners was dragged forward and forced to his knees in front of a wooden block. There were many blocks along the wall of the practice yard, Kyel realized. They’d appeared there overnight without him realizing.

  A Greystone soldier came forward, hoisting a massive sword.

  “What’s this?” Kyel gasped to Meiran. “This isn’t part of the agreement!”

  The Prime Warden cast a troubled stare his way. “The agreement has been modified.”

  The burly soldier brought the weapon around, laying the blade across the prisoner’s neck. He adjusted his grip. Then he lifted the sword up and brought it swiftly down. The corpse slumped sideways to the ground. The executioner kicked the severed head away.

  No one moved. Not one man made so much as a sound. The prisoners knelt in perfect lines across the yard, heads held high, backs straight. Four more men were dragged forward to their deaths.

  Kyel turned away from the gruesome scene. There were a thousand captives. Did they intend to behead them all? He heard the dull thud of a sword striking off another head. Then another.

  “Why are you doing this?” he demanded.

  Meiran’s face was sad but resolute. She was still pale, dark circles lingering beneath her eyes. He suspected they arose from lack of sleep over the decisions she’d been forced to make. Decisions he’d not been party to. He understood why. He would never have condoned any of this.

  “We can’t take any chances,” she said evenly. She held her hands clasped in front of her, taking in the grisly scene. She flinched slightly as another sword reaped its harve
st of blood.

  Kyel couldn’t watch; he kept his back to it all. “Why?” he demanded. “They surrendered. They came willingly!”

  Her eyes shot toward him. “Why did they come willingly? Have you asked yourself that? Why would they surrender? Why take such a chance? Because they had a plan, that’s why—a plan that we foiled.”

  Another thump, this one followed by an agonized scream. One of the headsmen had missed his mark. Kyel closed his eyes against the impulse to turn and take in the carnage. Another dull thud ended the victim’s pain.

  “So you’re just going to kill them all?” Kyel spun away from her, casting a frantic glance back down the rows of prisoners awaiting their turns to die. No one begged for mercy or wailed against their fortune. It was the eeriest sight he’d ever seen, these soldiers patiently awaiting calamity, watching their own impending fate enacted over and over before their eyes.

  Then he thought of the people of the Black Lands whose very existence depended on this broken treaty. Kyel’s stomach soured, his joints stiffening. His heart staggered under the weight of guilt. He’d been a fool. He should have seen this coming.

  “What about Darien?” he whispered, though he thought he already knew the answer. One look in Meiran’s eyes confirmed it.

  “He’s too dangerous.”

  He couldn’t keep the shock off his face. Meiran saw it and offered him a look of sympathy.

  “I’m sorry, Kyel. It pains me too.”

  He looked at her as if she were a stranger, unable to understand how she could so betray a man she had once loved. A man who had sacrificed his soul to save her own. It went beyond dishonor. Kyel peered into her eyes, trying to get a sense of the emotions living there. Meiran’s eyes reflected the flames of the bonfires. But there was sadness there, as well. She had not made this decision lightly. But neither did she regret it.

  “They are demons, Kyel,” she reminded him. “We’re just sending them back to where they came from. That’s all. They don’t belong here.”

  The logic of her words was lost on him. He wanted no part of it. “So this was all just a trap from the beginning?” He waved his arm in the direction of the prisoners being slaughtered behind him. “What about the rest of their people? What about the children?”

  “They’re the Enemy,” Meiran pronounced.

  Kyel stared at her, horrified. How could she justify any of this? He couldn’t believe she could be so callous, that any of them could. It went against every principle of honor he’d ever been taught. “How can you…? We gave them our word!”

  Meiran looked at him in pity. “Kyel. You’re the last Sentinel we have left. What do you suppose our chances were before this? We had no choice.”

  “No,” he disagreed. “We did have a choice—but you just made the wrong one!”

  With that, he turned and stormed away, leaving Meiran to reap the fruits of her deception.

  Darien’s body shivered, but not from cold. His arms trembled violently, quaking the chains that held them. He couldn’t help it. It was an effect of the drug they’d given him. His eyes stared blearily into the shadows, making very little out of nothing. Another harsh chill wracked his muscles. He clenched his fists against the awful feel of it.

  “I’m sorry…”

  He recognized the voice that whispered toward him through the darkness. It spoke to him from the past, from out of his memory. The sound of that voice was comforting. He struggled to force his eyes open, but his lids were heavy and kept sliding closed again. Blinking, he fought to put a face with the voice. But the features were blurry, unrefined. He couldn’t keep focus. Behind, a torch dripped buttery light into the shadows. He heard another soft noise echoing toward him from the darkness, like the sound of distant weeping.

  He squinted, peering, his body quaking in shuddering spasms. He squinted harder, willing the features in front of him to resolve. They finally squirmed into a blurry image of Kyel Archer’s distorted face. His former acolyte sat in a chair beside him, hands clutched together in his lap. The look in Kyel’s eyes spoke volumes of shame.

  “What?” Darien shivered through clenched teeth. They had him tied down to a table of some kind. He was in a dungeon. The infernal manacles the priest had placed on him still encircled his wrists, cutting him off from the Onslaught.

  Cutting him off from hope.

  “They’re going to burn you,” Kyel said, his face pale.

  Anger gripped Darien. He’d suspected treachery, but nothing this decisive. His mind leapt immediately to the men he’d brought with him.

  Kyel went on, “I tried talking them out of it. They won’t listen.”

  “What about the treaty?” Darien whispered hoarsely, struggling in vain against the arcane shackles that held the Onslaught in check. He pumped his wrists against them until his flesh tore open.

  “There’s no treaty. It was all just a trap. I didn’t know—” Kyel’s voice lurched. “I didn’t know. I’m sorry…”

  Darien’s mind struggled to grapple with the implications. The men he’d surrendered, the armies that followed in their wake. The clans. His people … his wife. Nothing was safe. Everything was in jeopardy. And his one asset, the Onslaught, was denied him. He trembled harder.

  “My men—”

  Kyel shook his head. “All dead. Every last one of them.”

  Darien squeezed his eyes shut against the fury brought on by that knowledge. He wrenched against the manacles until blood flowed freely down his hands. He had to get out, had to warn them—

  “Kyel. I need you to help me—”

  “I can’t.” Kyel shook his head, eyes filling with regret.

  Darien gasped for breath, shuddering as he fought against the death grip of the iron bands. “Just get these damned things off me!”

  “I can’t. I’m sorry, Darien. I have to go now.”

  He wanted to scream. Thousands of lives depended on him. Tens of thousands. If he could just get out of the dungeon—

  “Kyel…”

  “I’m sorry.” His former acolyte rose from his chair and, reaching down, patted Darien’s arm.

  Darien locked eyes with him, capturing him and holding him there. “You can stop this! Kyel, you can stop it!”

  Kyel shook his head. “I can’t.”

  “You swore an oath to defend this land and its people!”

  “That’s what I’m doing.”

  “It’s not!” Darien shouted, choking on desperation. “You’re the last of us, Kyel! You can’t pick sides—you don’t have that luxury! These are people! People of this land who need you! Who are going to die without you! Think, Kyel! You’ve got to be stronger than those chains!”

  Kyel glanced down at the emblems on his wrists. He took a deep, lingering, breath. He seemed to be struggling with his conscience. When he looked back up again, his eyes were moist. “I’m sorry, Darien. I wish I could help you.” He turned and left, his long strides carrying him swiftly out of the room.

  Darien sagged in his restraints. The last of his hope faded with the sound of Kyel’s footsteps. He would get no clemency from Devlin Craig.

  “Myria!” he yelled at the ceiling, wondering if she was even still alive.

  “I’m here, Darien.” Her voice sounded just as dismal as his own.

  He craned his head to the side, looking back over his shoulder. They had her in an iron cage across the room from him. She stood watching him, gripping the bars. She caught his eyes and shared a look that told him everything there was to say. Darien looked away, grimacing. He could do nothing for her. He’d condemned them both.

  Silence lingered in the dungeon. Silence and shadow. For a long time, he lay there, just listening. The flickering flames of the torches snaked their dance, holding back the darkness by only a fraction. Eventually, the drug cleared enough from his system that his body stopped shivering. He lay there in the darkness, listening to the quiet sounds made by Myria in her cage. It sounded to him as if she’d accepted her fate, just as he had. There wa
s nothing else either of them could do.

  He heard the echoing sounds of footsteps approaching from the corridor outside.

  Darien stared across the room into the blackness of the doorway. Craig entered the dungeon followed by the priest. They paused in the doorway as Myria fled to the other side of her cage, pressing her body back against the iron bars. The sight of Devlin Craig made Darien stiffen. His bloodied hands clenched into fists. He seethed with feelings he didn’t understand: a fierce mixture of hatred and sorrow, desperation and fury, all churning together in a quagmire of emotion.

  Craig glanced at the priest. “I want a word with him, first.”

  “Of course.” The oily haired man flashed a wan smile, stepping to the side.

  Darien finally recognized the unfamiliar gray robes: this was a priest of Deshari, the Goddess of Grief. The people of the Rhen considered Xerys evil. But in Darien’s opinion, the goddess Deshari was far more deserving of their terror. Deshari’s adherents embraced pain, yearned for heartache and trauma. They viewed agony as a catalyst of transformation.

  It was a despicable cult. Their practices went beyond the immoral, and for no clear benefit to society. He considered Deshari far worse than Xerys, the same way a murderer was different from an executioner. At least his own dark god seemed justified for the evils He perpetrated. For the worshippers of Deshari, evil was both ends and means.

  The gray-robed priest peered at him, an eager smile on his lips. In his eyes lingered a promise of pain.

  Craig started forward, glancing at Myria as he rounded the corner of her cage. He strode up to the table Darien was strapped to, pausing to linger at his side. Seeing the look on his old friend’s face spiked Darien’s rage.

  “Spare my people, Craig.” It took everything he had just to get the words out. To swallow his anger and embrace humility. There was nothing else to do.

  Devlin Craig gazed down at him with eyes that contained a mixture of disgust and pity. He shook his head in obvious confusion. “They’re not your people, Darien.”