Taellaneth Complete Series Box Set

by Vanessa Nelson

  Cast everything you know aside. The Preceptor’s famous lecture on entering the second world came to her mind, words clear in her mind as the day he had spoken them. For the first entry into this second realm accept everything you see as the truth. Do not try and reconcile it with what you can see and feel. Simply experience the now. There is no right or wrong way to experience the world.

  Another breath and she let go of her preconceptions. She had no body, no hands to grasp the smoke, the sword at her back had no shape.

  A waver in front of her was her reward and she continued her meditation. There was no body. There was no ground. No shoes, no cloth, no hair to distract her, no harsh breath in her ears.

  The further into the second world she went the clearer the shape in front of her became. An entrance, she thought, the fissure becoming a vertical, wavering shape that reminded her of a cave’s entrance. A concealment in the second world?

  Allowing herself to believe that this was an entrance, she took a careful step forward and into the smoke, letting it cover her completely. Beyond the smoky entrance she could see light and shadow, in different patterns to those around her. Intrigued, she moved further forward, beyond the entrance of the fissure.

  Another realm opened before her eyes. A replica of the first world, she saw, looking around. The contours of the land spread around her, shrouded in shadow. The shadows had texture and life, moving oddly before her wide-open eyes. At first, she thought the world was monochrome, then realised that the shadows held every possible colour. She held up a hand in front of her, surprised to find her own body solid and real in this realm, skin almost parchment white, the power that ran through her veins sparkling silver across her skin, along with faint sparks of amber. At her feet, deep inky-blue and purple shadows gathered, reflecting her position on the ground. She stamped one foot experimentally and had to suck in a breath as the movement jarred her still-sore body.

  Solid, real, and beyond the first and second worlds. The mage had come here, Arrow realised, and she had, all unknowingly, followed him.

  On that thought she spun, eyes searching, and found a cloaked figure bearing down on her, sword lifted, almost ‘kin-like snarl of anger carrying in the air.

  Arrow had her spirit sword in her hand a moment later, the blade shining real and solid in this realm.

  The first clash of swords sent a shock up her arm, reverberating head to toe, and she hissed, stepping sideways, away from the mage. She was moving faster here, she realised, stumbling as the unexpected pace had her feet tangling. She went down on one knee, life saved by clumsiness as the mage’s blade whipped through the air where her head had been.

  “How did you get here?” the mage snarled.

  “I followed you,” Arrow answered honestly, drawing another snarl of rage and another wild swing from the blade. The mage had skill with a sword, she realised, but seemed too angry to remember it. Arrow ducked again, rolling, ignoring the protest from her many bruises, and came to her feet several paces away, the additional speed having carried her further than she had thought possible.

  “Runt.” The word was spat at her.

  “I have been called worse,” she answered evenly, sword held ready before her. At least, she thought the sword was in the ready position; no one had ever thought that the outcast half-breed would require training with actual weapons.

  “Let us see how capable you are, then, runt.” The mage lifted a hand, mage fire boiling star bright in his palm, and flung the fire at Arrow.

  Her personal wards flared, searing bright in this realm, but the shock of the mage fire lifted Arrow off her feet and flung her backwards. She landed awkwardly on her back, breath knocked from her, and lay stunned for a moment, blinking stupidly up at the shadowed sky.

  When she recovered her senses enough to scramble to her knees, anticipating another attack, the mage had gone. Searching about, Arrow could see a slight trail of sparking amber and in the far, far distance there was the faintest shadow that might have been a running mage.

  Spitting a curse, she managed to get to her feet, wobbling. She would not manage to catch the mage today, she realised, catching sight of a fragment of mage fire on her sleeve. Plucking it off between finger and thumb she held it up, the world spinning. The mage fire was familiar. She did indeed know the mage.

  Kallish, the Preceptor, Lord Whintnath, Zachary … her panicked mind presented her with a long and growing list of people who needed to be informed about the mage’s identity.

  Turning a full circle, she realised she could see faint traces, smudges in the world, which might be the cadre of White Guard and shifkin, but they had not followed her through the second world into this one. She needed to go back.

  Panic threatened to overwhelm her again. She had no true idea of how she had come to be here in the first place. Getting back seemed impossible for a long, long moment. Then she remembered the meditative process she had used to bring herself here and reversed it. She had a body, she remembered, boots on her feet, new clothing which was rubbing at her neck, a few pieces of chalk in a pocket, untamed hair driving her to distraction.

  Her limbs weighted, and she took a step forward, into the second world. Coming out of the second world into the first was a familiar act of will and she found herself moments later standing on the uneven ground facing the warehouse, which was much further away than she remembered. There was a large gathering of shifkin and White Guard performing a thorough search, combing the ground, sparks of Erith magic showing the wards that the warriors were maintaining over the group.

  She tried to raise her voice to call out and coughed instead, doubling over as her body seized. She could feel new bruises forming, partly-healed ribs cracked again. Falling to one knee she barely registered the cry of discovery from the searching group, or the rapid footfalls as they came towards her. She found her sword still in her hand and managed to sheath it before she coughed again, throat dry and rasping, eyes watering.

  “Mage.” Kallish had reached her first. “You are injured?”

  “Fell again,” she said, voice hoarse, and coughed, trying to clear her throat. She put a hand on her side to hold her ribs steady and regretted it at once. She thought she could feel bones moving. Another cough and she summoned up the wit to send some healing through her body, reducing the aches to a bearable level. It took Kallish’s hand under her elbow to get her to her feet, though, and she wavered a moment, silently grateful for the warrior’s frowning presence.

  “Are you dying?” the warrior asked, clearly thinking that was a possibility.

  “Not just now,” she answered, throat still rasping.

  “Here.” Orlis held his flask out to her again.

  “My thanks.” She handed the empty flask back moments later, voice evened out.

  “What happened?” Matthias demanded, eyes brilliant with curiosity. “You simply disappeared. Like the mage.” Beyond Matthias was another familiar figure stalking across the ground towards her. Zachary Farraway, returned from Hallveran, and lit for battle if the brilliant power in his gaze was anything to judge by.

  “I found where she went,” Arrow told Matthias, “through a fissure in the second world to another realm.” Her voice died out as she became aware of the silent interest from all around, the utter focus of every one of the White Guard, and Orlis’ wide-eyed stare.

  “Another realm?” The Prime’s scepticism brought her back to reality. “On my lands?” The anger in his voice had all the Erith twitching.

  “Yes, and no. Everywhere, I think.” She sucked in a breath, tangling her fingers in her hair as she shoved it back, trying to think how best to explain her experience. “Beyond this,” she waved her hand to indicate their surroundings, “there is a second world, of energy and spirit. There is nothing really solid in the second world. And it seems that beyond that is another realm, made of up of shadows, where everything is solid.” Not the best explanation, but the only one she had. Expressions of disbelief were on several faces around he
r, ‘kin and Erith alike.

  “You went into another realm?” Matthias scowled, sceptic to his core.

  “I did. Into shadows.” She nodded, wishing she had something stronger than Erith tea.

  “Shadow-walker,” Kallish muttered in Erith, “so that is what it means.”

  “Perhaps,” Arrow answered in Erith, “though I will know more when the Archivists complete their searches.”

  “You followed the mage?” Matthias abandoned the talk of other realms for something more familiar.

  “I did.”

  “You said ‘she’,” Orlis noted, his eyes still wide, red filled with amber sparks.

  “Yes,”

  “Who?” Kallish asked.

  “You know that mage, don’t you?” Zachary pressed.

  “Yes.” Her throat closed and she could say no more. He waited, quiet and still, a predator waiting for a target, green eyes missing nothing as he looked at her. She blinked, finding her face wet, tears unexpected and unwelcome, as was the bitter pain in her chest. “It was Lady Seivella.”

  Silence greeted her words. Followed by vocal outrage from the gathered White Guard, disbelief from Kallish and a quiet grief from Orlis that reflected her own.

  “Who is this lady?” Zachary wanted to know. Arrow shook her head, throat closing.

  “She is the second at the Academy,” Orlis answered, in accented common tongue. He appeared stunned, voice shaking, and reverted to Erith as he went on, “Second only to the Preceptor. O-one of the m-most respected mages and Teaching Mistresses the Erith have ever seen. Arrow, it cannot be true. The lady would not attack you. Or any Erith mage.”

  “It was her.” Arrow rubbed her face with her hands, careless of dirt and snow. “She threw mage fire in the other realm. I know her spell working. The lady often sparred with the students. And she is one of the few mages who can produce sheets of mage fire.”

  “The Preceptor will be heartbroken,” Orlis said, voice cracking.

  Arrow did not answer.

  “You disagree?” Zachary prompted, standing nearby, eyes keen on her face.

  “I think the Preceptor knows a great deal more about the situation than he has told us so far,” Arrow answered, aware of the dark looks that Kallish was sending her, Xeveran hastily translating for his cadre leader.

  “Was she the one who set the spells on the mountain?” the Prime asked, voice hard. Arrow shook her head at once. He lifted a brow, demanding a response.

  “No. I would have known her work. The spells on the mountain, and the summoning in Hallveran were done by a magician I do not know,” Arrow clarified, “and perhaps the same one I was talking to inside.”

  “Inside?” Both his brows were lifted. “Clearly, I’ve missed quite a bit.” He threw Matthias a hard-to-read glance. Matthias shrugged, and the Prime relaxed fractionally.

  “Probably easier if I show you whilst I tell you, Prime,” she said, casting a glance around, “though it would also be useful to search the area to see if the lady left anything behind.”

  “We’ll deal with that,” Zachary promised, glancing at Matthias, who jerked his head to the ‘kin with him, listening to this open discussion of other realms and betrayal in the heart of the Academy. Arrow felt sick. She did not like the lady, nor trust her, but she had her own reasons for that. She did not blame the White Guard or Orlis for their evident disbelief at the lady’s apparent betrayal.

  A rapid exchange of hand signals followed, drawing keen interest from every one of the White Guard, before Zachary turned back to Arrow. “Lead the way, mage.” She nodded and trekked back across the uneven ground to the road, amazed as she walked that she had not fallen once on her rush after Lady Seivella.

  ~

  Kallish left a third outside the warehouse, the rest of the cadre spreading out, plain wards in evidence, as they made their way back through the warehouse, dimly lit by the brightening sky outside, to the tumble of items that the lady had left. Looking at the detached head and the contemptuous word scrawled under it, Arrow frowned. As her sponsor, the lady had been exquisitely careful not to use derogatory terms in Arrow’s hearing, or directly to her. It was a courtesy not shared by the majority of the staff and students. To scrawl such a word so openly was out of character, as had been her use of the word in the other realm. Perhaps the lady had sought to disguise her identity? Arrow’s mind would not provide her with a clear answer, too much new information and too many puzzles chasing in circles.

  Suppressing a sigh, Arrow looked around at the destruction the lady had created and thought that the word was not the only thing out of character. Despite the evidence, she was still struggling with the realisation, and what it might mean.

  Distracted, she narrated her conversation with the corpse to the Prime, with Matthias, Kallish, Xeveran, and Orlis avid listeners.

  “Where was the magic user?” Zachary asked, when she had finished.

  “I am not sure. Not here. Far away, I think.” Frowning, she recalled the sense of distance she had felt when following the thread. “A long way from here,” she said at length, shaking her head, the location she had had nearly so clear in her mind fading away. She needed a quiet place to think about all she had learned but knew that was unlikely.

  “The magic user you were talking to referred to a master,” he remarked, pacing around the corpse, eye taking in every detail.

  “Yes.” She had noted that, too, and knew it would not escape his attention.

  “The lady?” he asked, green eyes bright in the poor light as he held her gaze.

  “No. She is not strong enough,” she answered definitely and saw both Kallish and Orlis stiffen in shock.

  “The lady is one of the most powerful mages in the Erith lands,” Orlis said with a touch of something that might be anger.

  “The magic user who created the spells, who called down and trapped not one but two surjusi is far more powerful than the lady.” Arrow sidestepped the heart of the matter.

  “Power or skill?” Kallish asked, dark eyes watchful. Arrow nodded her head at the excellent question.

  “Both.”

  “Older than the lady, perhaps?” Kallish was clearly keen to attempt a list of likely suspects.

  “Impossible to tell.” Arrow spread her hands. “There are junior students who can craft runes more skilfully than a graduate, and older mages who seem to come into extra power with age.”

  “Gilean says so, too,” Orlis put in, in an effort to be helpful, “and says that there should be a requirement for testing every so often for every mage as matters can develop over time.”

  “But probably older?” Kallish pressed.

  “At a guess, perhaps older, or perhaps a contemporary of the lady. The lady has had her time much occupied with teaching duties, and her other duties to the Court and Academy. She had not the time to hone her skills to that degree.”

  Kallish frowned, seemingly dissatisfied, but did not press her. There was a short silence as the Erith absorbed the information. Zachary, who had been content to observe the by-play, turned his attention back to Arrow.

  “How powerful is the lady?”

  “One of the stronger mages the Erith have,” Arrow conceded, not liking to divulge too much information, loyalties oddly torn, “and also skilled.”

  “A war mage?”

  “No. She has not taken the Trials.”

  “Would she pass them, do you think?” the Prime asked, a predator stalking information.

  “No,” Arrow answered baldly, drawing more shock and protests from Orlis and a quiet, searching look from Kallish. Kallish, she thought, had lived long enough to see beyond the obvious while Orlis had not lived long enough amongst the intrigue of either the Court or the Taellaneth to know to question everything. Popular wisdom at the Academy might be that the lady had not taken the Trials because she disapproved of their brutality, but Arrow was fairly certain that was a rumour started by the lady herself, and the lady, who was wise enough to know her own limitation
s, knew well that she would fail the Trials. Better by far to have the Erith believing she was capable, rather than be proved a failed war mage.

  “Not as powerful as you,” Zachary concluded. It was not a question, so she did not answer, waiting quietly. He was thinking hard, and she was intrigued as to where his thoughts might take them. “And yet she managed to harm you.” That was not a question either, but she stirred herself to answer.

  “Skill and practice,” Kallish put in unexpectedly in the common tongue. “Make up for lack power.” The warrior frowned as she shaped the words, but whether from searching for the right words Arrow could not say. The Prime accepted her assessment with a nod and paced around the corpse again.

  “What have you learned?”

  “Whoever called down the surjusi has at least two powerful mages working for him,” Arrow thought carefully as she spoke, “the lady and another, who has enough power and skill to hold a connection over some distance. The lady …” she paused, worked through her instinctive revulsion at the thought that she would betray the Academy so thoroughly, and continued, “is a woman of intelligence and strong principles. She would not easily become involved in surjusi.”

  “Has she strong family ties, friendships, people who may have an explanation?” he asked.

  “Very little family, and none of it close,” she answered at once, “and the only close friendships I am aware of are the Preceptor and one or two of the teaching staff at the Academy.”

  “We must question the Preceptor,” Orlis said, clearly not looking forward to the prospect.

  “Yes,” Arrow agreed, and looked around again. Whatever power had been here was gone. There was nothing more to learn. “Svegraen,” she turned to Kallish, reverting to Erith, “this place should be burned. None of the bodies can be returned to their families, but I trust identification has taken place?”