“Poor fellow. I always feared something of the sort had happened to him,” sighed Nysander. “But what is this about rings and papers?”
“We took Corruth’s rings and some papers to prove what we found,” Alec explained, handing the wizard the heavy Aurënfaie ring. “Micum has the Consort’s seal, but we lost everything else when—” Alec paused with a stricken gasp. “My sword! Oh hell, that went, too, and my black dagger.” These, along with his bow, were chief among the very few material possessions he felt any attachment to; they had been the first things Seregil had outfitted him with at Wolde.
“We shall do our best to recover them, dear boy, and all the rest,” Nysander assured him.
“We have to get back in there, and quickly,” said Seregil, returning to the fire looking haggard but determined. One of the riders held out a cloak and he wrapped himself in it. “She’ll destroy everything, Nysander; she may have already. Even with the ring, our word won’t be enough against her!”
“He’s right,” Thero agreed.
“She’s the head of the serpent, I’m certain of it,” Seregil continued emphatically. “Get her and you get them all! But Klia and the others will never find that room on their own. I’ve got to go back in!”
“Not without me, you’re not!” declared Alec.
Nysander assented with a weary nod. “Sergeant Talmir, please get these men clothing, horses, and weapons.”
Beka stepped forward. “Let me go with them.”
The wizard shook his head firmly. “It is not for me to countermand Commander Klia’s orders. She stationed you here.”
“But—”
“You stay put,” Seregil warned. “It’s worth your commission to leave your post. You haven’t even been invested yet!”
Alec stepped away with his usual modesty to dress, while Seregil threw his cloak off with no thought but haste. As he did so, Alec was dismayed to see that the obscuration spell covering the scar had failed again; the strange scar was clearly visible. Nysander saw it, too, and shook his head slightly at Alec. Fortunately, Seregil pulled on his borrowed tabard before anyone else noticed.
Beka, who’d kindly looked away until Alec had gotten his breeches on, offered him her sword. “Take it,” she urged. “I’ll feel better, knowing you have a blade I trust.”
Alec accepted the sword gratefully, hearing the echo of her father’s words to Seregil when they’d left Watermead.
Clasping hands hastily with her, he said, “It’s one I trust, too.” He hesitated, suddenly awkward; he felt as if he ought to say something more, but he couldn’t think what.
“Take good care of Nysander and Thero,” he said at last, “in case they have to turn us into something else to get us out again.”
She gave him a playful cuff on the arm. “Good thing he didn’t make you into stags and otters that time, eh?”
Outfitted again, Seregil and Alec leapt onto fresh horses and galloped back to the keep.
The main gate stood open now. Looking around, Seregil guessed that their earlier capture had disrupted the usual discipline of the place, and the garrison had been caught off guard by Klia’s attack.
In the courtyard a handful of Guards were standing watch over a knot of captured servants. Stamie huddled miserably among the prisoners and refused to meet Alec’s eye when he attempted to speak to her.
The rest of the raiders had stormed inside. Overhead, flames licked out of a second-floor window.
“Looks like we can go in the front way this time,” Seregil said with a dark grin, pointing to the shattered doors.
Scattered sounds of fighting rang through the halls as they ran for the northeast stairway. Bodies littered the stairs, but the main battle had been pressed back to the third floor.
Coming out in the upper passageway, they could hear Kassarie’s remaining men making a stand at the door to the ruined tower. The halls were impossibly narrow for a pitched battle, and the fighting had spread into side rooms. Passing the open doorways, they caught sight of bodies sagging across costly, overturned furniture. The clash of swords seemed to come from every direction at once. Fresh blood spattered the elegant frescoes and the floor was treacherous with it in places.
They found Micum in the thick of the fight in the southeast corridor.
“Has Kassarie been taken yet?” Seregil shouted, trying to make himself heard over the din.
“Last I heard they were still looking for her,” Micum yelled back.
“There’s a door behind that hanging.” Seregil pointed down the hall at the tapestry. “Pass the word forward; we have to take it!”
A few moments later, Klia’s war cry echoed off the walls as the last of Kassarie’s fighters threw down their weapons and fell to their knees.
Thrusting his way through the confusion, Seregil reached the princess. “Through here,” he called, tearing down the tapestry to expose the door. Trying the handle, he found it locked.
“Braknil, Tomas, get this open!” barked Klia.
Two sturdy Guards threw their shoulders against the door, wrenching it off its hinges, and Seregil and Alec led the way to the trap door. Klia followed with Micum, Myrhini, and several soldiers.
The trap door had been pulled shut again, and the sand smoothed back into place. Seregil found the ring and heaved the door open, then led the way down to the wooden stairs. Careful to avoid the tilting landing, they reached the subterranean corridor to find the final door standing open. The chamber beyond was brightly lit.
Kassarie was waiting for them. She stood by the table at the center of the room, blocking the corpse of Corruth from sight. She held a small lamp in one hand, as if to light their way, and its glow threw her harsh features into imperious relief. The room smelled hotly of wax and oil. Beside him, Alec sniffed the air, frowning.
A prickle of apprehension ran up Seregil’s spine; Kassarie looked like a great serpent poised to strike. How long had she stood waiting there?
“So, you’re back again, are you?” she observed with a bitter smile as he and Alec stepped into view.
Klia moved up between them. Reckless and pretty as she might be under other circumstances, at this moment she was a commander and moved with her mother’s austere assurance.
“Kassarie ä Moirian, I arrest you in the name of Idrilain the Second,” she announced with no trace of emotion. “The charge against you is high treason.”
Kassarie bowed gravely. “Clearly you have the advantage. I yield, Your Highness, with the understanding that it is to your greater strength and not to your misbegotten right.”
“As you will,” replied Klia, stepping toward her.
“You will find all that you seek here.” Kassarie gestured around her. “Perhaps, like Lord Seregil, you would also be interested in meeting your mutual forebear.”
She stepped aside and lifted her lamp with a dramatic flourish. “Allow me to present Lord Corruth í Glamien Yanari Meringil Bôkthersa. Your curs there have already pilfered the body, but I think they will bear out that I speak the truth.”
Too late Seregil realized that he had failed to tell Klia what they’d found. She gave a soft, startled exclamation and stepped closer. Micum and the others were equally taken aback; all eyes were fixed on the grisly sight as Klia bent to study the ravaged face.
All, that is, except Alec’s.
He’d seen more than enough of corpses over the past few weeks. Avoiding the dried husk in the chair, he looked instead at Kassarie, and so was the only one to notice the gloating smile that spread across her face as she lifted the lamp still higher.
That smell. It was too strong to be just lamps.
There was no time to warn Klia. Knocking Seregil aside, he lunged forward into the room as Kassarie dashed the lamp to the floor at Klia’s feet. The room was doused with oil and something else, something far more flammbale.
Searing heat sucked the air from his lungs and scorched his skin. Reaching wildly, he found Klia’s arm and hauled her backward with all his stren
gth. Behind him other hands reached out, yanking him roughly into the blessed coolness of the corridor.
“Get them down!” shouted Micum.
Alec was shoved to the floor and half smothered with cloaks and bodies. Hands pounded down across his back. Somewhere above him, Seregil was cursing frantically.
When they finally uncovered him, Alec saw that they’d dragged him back to the base of the stairs. Heat rolled down the little passage from the open door of the chamber beyond. Inside, solid sheets of flame obscured everything from view. There was no sign of Kassarie.
Klia was lying next to him, her beautiful, heart-shaped face streaked red and black and half her braid singed away.
“You saved my life!” she croaked, reaching for his hand; the back of her own was a welter of angry blisters where oil had splashed.
“While the rest of us had our heads up our arses,” Myrhini glowered, wiping a sleeve across her eyes as she knelt by Klia.
Alec shook his head, half dazed. “That smell—It was familiar but I couldn’t remember what it was.”
Sulfur oil, I think” said Myhini.
The skin on Alec’s back and neck suddenly began to hurt and he grimaced.
“Give me this!” Seregil tugged Alec’s borrowed tabard off over his head. The back of the garment was burned through in places. “You were on fire, you know! And some of your hair is gone in the back.”
Alec raised a hand to the back of his head; it felt rough and his palm came away black.
“Just when we’d gotten you looking presentable, too,” Seregil complained, his voice not quite steady. “Bilairy’s Cods, you smell like a scorched dog!”
41
SCARS
The sun was just climbing above the eastern treetops as Seregil, Alec, and Micum set off for the city with Nysander. Thero had stayed behind to assist in the search for the lost documents and weapons.
“I thought we’d finally run through our luck that time,” Seregil admitted, riding along between Nysander and Alec.
“You damn near did!” sputtered Micum. “Nysander didn’t even know you’d gone down here until I showed up.”
“And when I realized that you were in danger, I could do nothing at such a distance,” added Nysander. “I was not certain if you were dead or alive until after we arrived, and even then I could not fix my attention on you with any accuracy until they had you cornered on the roof. By that point it was too late for any but the most desperate measures.”
“It was a lovely bit of work, though,” Seregil maintained, unabashed. “You haven’t turned me into a bird in years. And never an owl!”
Alec was equally excited. “It was wonderful, at least once I got used to it. But I don’t understand why my mind stayed so clear. That time you turned me into a stag I got all confused.”
“This was a different sort of metamorphosis,” explained Nysander. “The intrinsic nature spell summons an innate magic from the person it is cast upon, and often affects the subject’s mind, as in your case. Changing you to an owl was a metastatic spell. Though it demanded far more of my powers, especially at such a distance, it altered only your outward form, leaving your mind unaffected. My greatest concern was whether you would master your wings in time.”
“He’s a fast learner,” said Seregil, resisting the impulse to clap Alec on the shoulder. He could tell from the way the boy sat his horse that his burns were giving him more pain than he was admitting.
“What you didn’t learn is who the Lerans were planning to replace Idrilain with,” Micum pointed out. “With everything destroyed back there, we’ll never track down the others.”
“That’s not entirely true,” said Seregil, tapping his temple. “I got a look at some of those papers before she burned everything. There’re a few nobles we can go to for answers. It’ll be a start.”
Nysander nodded. “I will set some Watchers to it as soon as we get back. I think you three have had enough excitement for now.”
“I suppose so,” Seregil agreed, stealing another concerned look at Alec riding stiffly beside him.
The day grew brighter as they rode on. They reached a crossroads in sight of the city walls and, bidding them all farewell, Micum turned his horse for home.
“You know where to find me if you need me,” he called, kicking his stallion into a gallop.
“I assume you will be at the Cockerel now?” Nysander asked, reining in while Seregil and Alec pulled up their hoods.
Seregil nodded. “Lord Seregil and Sir Alec will be back in town in time for the Sakor Festival. You’ll keep our names out of the inquest over this business, won’t you?”
“I believe I can. The Queen values the Watchers enough to respect our methods. I must ask you to stop at my tower before you return home, however. There is one last matter to be seen to.”
Catching a questioning glance from Alec, Seregil raised a gloved hand to his chest.
Alec flexed his left hand thoughtfully, looking down at the smooth circle of healed flesh on his own palm.
• • •
At the Orëska House, Nysander insisted on breakfast before anything else. Having fortified himself, he led them into the small casting room and closed the door. Instructing Seregil to remove his shirt, the wizard inspected the troublesome scar closely.
“This ought to have stayed covered,” muttered Nysander.
“This isn’t the first time it’s reappeared,” Seregil reminded him, staring nervously up at the ceiling while the wizard gently pressed and prodded. A sudden thought occured to him and he reached for Nysander’s wrist. “But it didn’t when you changed me into old Dakus.”
Nysander shook his head. “That was a lesser transformation. I simply altered your existing appearance.”
“You mean I could end up looking like that someday?”
“Do be quiet, Seregil! I must concentrate.”
Pressing his hand over the scar, Nysander closed his eyes and waited for any impressions to form. Little came: the streak of a falling star; a flash of the mysterious blue; the faint roar of ocean; the hint of an unfamiliar profile. Then nothing.
“Well?” demanded Seregil.
“Just bits and pieces.” Nysander massaged the bridge of his nose wearily. “Fragments of memories, perhaps, but nothing to suggest any residual power in these marks. It is most curious. How is your hand, Alec?”
“Nothing’s changed,” Alec replied, holding it up for him to see.
“Most curious indeed,” mused Nysander, unruly eyebrows beetling. “The problem must lie in the markings of Seregil’s scar.”
Seregil studied them in a hand mirror. “The side of the wooden disk that burned Alec was smooth, no carving at all. But these of mine are getting clearer instead of fainter. Don’t you sense any magic at all around it?”
“None,” Nysander answered. “So it must somehow be the configuration of the characters themselves, whatever they are.”
Seregil looked up. “And you truly don’t know what they are?”
“I recognize the sigla, as I have said. What lies beneath it is as much a mystery to me as to you. You have my word on that.”
“Then we’re right back where we began,” Alec exclaimed in exasperation.
“Perhaps not,” Nysander said softly, touching Seregil’s scar a last time, then casting another obscuration over it. “It reappeared after Seregil changed bodies with Thero, and again when he changed back from the owl form. There must be some significance to that, though I do not yet know what it means.”
“It means I’m going to spend the rest of my life trotting back to you to get it covered up again,” grumbled Seregil, pulling on his shirt. “I bet Valerius could get it off.”
“You must not do that. Not yet, at least. To destroy it before we understand it could prove most unwise. Bear with it awhile longer, dear boy. Perhaps we may yet solve its riddle. In the meantime, it appears to be doing you no harm.”
“It’s done enough of that already!” Seregil scowled. “Take c
are, Nysander. We’ll be close by if you want us.”
Nysander retired to his sitting room after they’d gone. Sinking wearily into an armchair, he rested his head against its back and summoned up the impressions he’d gotten from the scar—the star, the sea sounds, the flash of blue, the hint of a face—
His head ached. He’d had no rest since the raid and he was exhausted—too exhausted to delve further into the matter. A quick nap here in his chair was called for, he decided. Later, after making the proper preparations, he would meditate further on the matter.
The quiet of the room enfolded him like a thick, comfortable blanket. The warmth of the fire was like summer sunshine on the side of his face—so pleasant, so soft, like the touch of a woman’s lips. As he sank deeper into the welcome languor, he seemed to feel Seregil’s chest beneath his hand again, the tiny ridges of the scar brushing his palm. But now Seregil’s skin was cold, cold as a marble statue—
Nysander stirred uneasily in his chair. A vision is coming, he thought in vague dismay. I am too weary for visions—
But it came anyway.
He was standing in the Orëska’s central atrium. Bright sunshine streamed down through the great dome overhead, warming him deliciously. Other wizards passed by without looking at him. Apprentices and servants hurried past at their daily tasks.
But then the Voice spoke and all the people around him turned into marble statues.
The Voice came from somewhere beneath him, a faint, sinister chuckle vibrating up from the depths below the stone floor. He could feel it in the soles of his feet. Looking down, he noticed for the first time that the mortar of the mosaic had crumbled. Large sections of the design, the proud Dragon of Illior, had been loosened and dislodged, the brilliant tiles trampled to powder.
The Voice came again and he turned, striding through the motionless throng to the museum. Across the shadowed room, beyond the ranks of display cases, the door of the antechamber leading to the vaults stood slightly ajar.
As he approached it, he heard something scuttle away into the darkness ahead. It was a scrabbling, clicking noise utterly unlike rats. Something crackled beneath his foot, a fragment of wood. The case that had held the hands of Tikárie Megraesh was empty; a splintered, fist-sized hole had been clawed through the bottom.