“They came to Johr’s aid in the Mage Wars. With what we now know, surely they will come to ours.”
“The Elves fought in the Mage Wars, too,” Bel reminded him. “It makes no sense that they would refuse us now.”
Tajik coughed a curse word into his fist and spat on the ground. “Best for all of us, if you ask me. Elves care for nothing except that gods-cursed Dance of theirs.”
Bel arched a brow. “That’s a harsh remark, coming from you, Tajik. I seem to recall some mention of an Elf or two in your family line.”
“Which is why you should believe me when I say we’re better off without them.” The red-haired general tore the remaining leg from the spitted rabbit and warmed it with a Fire-red glow in the palm of his hand. The silence that ensued made him glance up, and he scowled when he found Rain, Ellysetta, and the rest of the quintet looking at him. “What?”
“Nothing,” Rain answered for them. “It’s late. We should all get some sleep.”
A few chimes later, the remains of their dinner vanished in a flash of Earth and Fire. As Rain spun a cushioned pallet from the wheat chaff and covered it with a scarlet Fey travel cloak, Ellysetta felt eyes upon her, and she glanced up to see Gaelen watching her. He didn’t say anything, but then he hadn’t said anything all day either. He was waiting, patiently, for her to do the right thing.
“Come, shei’tani.” Rain grasped her shoulders and bent to press a kiss on the side of her neck. “Your bower awaits.” He smiled and led her to the camp bed.
When she glanced back over her shoulder, Gaelen was busy working with the quintet to spin a five-fold weave around Rain and Ellysetta. His eyes met hers once more, briefly, before he turned away.
“What is it?”
She looked at Rain and forced a smile. “I’m just a little tired.”
“The weaves should protect you from Mage dreams, and the lu’tan will alert us at the first hint of danger.”
She covered his hands with hers. “I know.” Stretching up, she pressed her lips to his and let him bear her back into the soft comfort of their bed. He pulled her close against him, his body spooned against hers, wrapping her in a cocoon of warm protection.
The quintet stretched out in the wheat straw nearby. Each warrior slept with one hand on the hilt of a red Fey’cha. Around the camp, all the lu’tan not standing first watch did the same, and their bodies formed ring after concentric ring around the shei’dalin they’d bloodsworn their souls to protect.
That shei’dalin lay awake long after the warriors had gone to sleep, worried not half so much about what dangers lurked outside the lu’tan’s powerful protective shields as the ones that lurked within. The dangers that lived inside her.
Eld ~ Boura Fell
Melliandra’s visit to the High Mage’s breeding females wasn’t as great a plea sure as she’d hoped, nor particularly informative. She felt Shia’s absence too strongly, and the new women—three shining folk, and one mortal—had shied away from her when she’d approached. She’d tried to speak with them, but either their memories had been completely wiped or they simply had not trusted her enough to converse.
A disappointing half a bell after her arrival, she departed again, but instead of heading to her next workstation, she stopped by the door to Master Maur’s nursery and examined the glowing threads of the ward spells protecting the locked door against intruders. The wards allowed only Master Maur’s most trusted umagi through, and even then only once per week at a time known to no one but Master Maur.
The key to the door Melliandra could likely get, but getting past the wards was a different matter. For that, she needed magical help.
The next morning, when the call came to tend the High Mage’s prisoners on the lowest level of Boura Fell, it was all she could do to conceal her eagerness behind a mask of sullen apathy. A bell later, she was standing, tray in hand, before the shadow-cloaked last door on the lowest level of Boura Fell.
“Food for the prisoner.” Melliandra kept her gaze fixed on the timeworn smoothness of the black stone floor as the guards standing watch outside the cell inspected the unappealing tray of congealed fat and cooked grain.
“Fit for maggots, that is,” one of the guards muttered. His ring of keys rattled and clanked as he unlocked the door and shoved it open. “Go on. Deliver that slop and be quick about it.”
She ducked through the doorway and hurried across the dank, unlit room. The shaft of light from the open doorway illuminated a portion of the seemingly empty barbed sel’dor cage built into the far wall.
“Back again?” a voice, pitched so low as to be barely audible, growled from the shadows.
She turned her head in the direction of the voice and squinted as her eyes adjusted to the darkness. There. Now she could see the faint, almost imperceptible glow of the prisoner sprawled on the floor in the corner.
“Can you feed yourself?” Shannisorran v’En Celay’s silvery light was so dim, she knew the Mage’s brutes had been at him again, and sometimes, after they finished, nearly every bone in his body was shattered.
“Aiyah. Can’t walk or sit, but they left me my arms this time.”
She reached into the pocket sewn within the folds of her ragged skirt and pulled out a small cloth bundle. “Good.” With swift furtiveness, she unwrapped the cloth and dropped its contents into the bowl of gruel before pushing the food through the barbed bars of the cell. “There’s a little cold meat and cheese, wrapped in bread. Take it quickly, before the guards see.”
“Why do you bother? As soon as I heal, they just break me again.” Even as he asked, his fingers reached for the bowl of food and closed around the plump wad of meat, cheese, and bread. He tore off a small bite with his teeth and chewed.
“I bother because I need you to fulfill our bargain, and when the chance comes, you must be ready.” Not long after the High Mage had begun torturing Lord Death’s mate, the Fey warrior had agreed to do what neither she nor any other umagi could: kill the High Mage of Eld. That was the only way she and Shia’s child could ever be free, so she needed to keep Lord Death alive and as healthy as possible until he had the opportunity to prove worthy of his name. She glanced over her shoulder to check on the guards by the door, then lowered her voice even further. “Do you have a hiding spot in there?”
“What would be the point?” His tone was flat. “It’s not as if Maur ever leaves me anything to hide.”
Her eyes narrowed. It was said Fey could not lie, but he hadn’t said no. And he’d been in this same cell for a thousand years. “I was hoping to bring a few things you might find useful. But if you have no place to hide them…” She let her voice trail off.
“What sort of things?” Wariness had crept into his voice. Oh, yes, he had managed to carve out some sort of hiding place in his cell.
“Things you will require to fulfill your bargain. A blade. A Fey crystal.” She knew from eavesdropping on conversations between novice and apprentice Mages that the Fey crystals contained powerful magic. Lord Death would need every advantage if he were to succeed.
Pale hands shot out to grab the cell bars, despite the barbs that dug into his palms, and Lord Death dragged himself over to her. Matted black hair fell into eyes that had begun to glow green as his magic rose. “My sorreisu kiyr? You know where it is?”
“A…sorai zukeer? Is that what you call the Fey crystals?” She filed the piece of information away. “No, not yours. Everything of yours the Mage keeps close to him or locked away in a place only he knows. But you are not the only Fey warrior ever to be a guest in this place, and some of the other Mages are not as careful with their secrets.” She frowned. “You can still use it even though it belonged to another, can’t you?”
“Aiyah, but my own would be better.”
“I can’t get yours. You’ll have to make do with what I can bring,” she told him. No matter how much better his own crystal might be, stealing from the High Mage was suicide. Only a fool would even attempt it, and Melliandra was no fool. La
ying hands on one of the other Mages’ crystals was already risky enough. “There’s something else I need you to do as well.”
“What?”
She took a breath, then plunged onward. “If I showed you one of the Mage’s wards…could you figure out how to undo it?”
“It wouldn’t do you any good. It takes magic to undo magic.”
“But could you?”
He shrugged. “Perhaps. I’d have to see the weave first to know.”
“Hurry up in there!” one of the guards called from the door. “What’s taking so long?”
Melliandra turned halfway towards the door. “He’s weak. I practically have to feed him myself.” To the Fey, she hissed, “Save the bread and meat, but eat the rest quickly. If you don’t, they’ll be suspicious.” She waited for him to scoop the cold, fatted porridge from the bowl with his fingers and force it down. When he was done, she snatched the bowl back and clambered to her feet. “I’ve got to go. I’ll be back when I can.”
Celieria
With all the shields around her, Ellysetta should not have dreamed of darkness. But she did.
She did not dream her usual nightmares of war and destruction or of herself, pitiless and damned, leading the Army of Darkness to destroy the earth. Nei, this time she dreamed of something smaller, more personal, and therefore infinitely more terrifying.
She dreamed of Lillis and Lorelle, huddled together in the dim filth of a black pit, sobbing her name, pleading for her to save them.
Above, standing on a viewing platform two levels above, a shrouded figure in purple robes watched their torment. At his side, Ellysetta saw herself, clad incongruously in a boatnecked gown of rich forest green velvet, her hair unbound and spilling across her shoulders like a fall of flame. She looked more pampered guest than prisoner, except for the chains fastened to the sel’dor bindings locked tight around her neck and wrists. Two large guards stood behind her, holding her chains in their meaty fists.
Hovering overhead, like a soul cast out of its body, she watched the scene unfold. She was an observer, distant and disconnected, yet some part of her remained intimately linked to the people in her dream. She felt each emotion, each terror, each gloating triumph, as if it were her own.
The robed Mage raised an arm, and the sound of rattling chains and cogs welled up from the darkness of the pit. Then came the howling and the rasping scrabble of claw on rock, as slavering darrokken with eyes like red flames rushed towards Lillis and Lorelle.
The girls shrieked in terror and shrank back against the slimy wall of the pit, clutching each other and crying her name. “Ellie! Ellie, help us! Help us!”
Ellysetta lunged against her bonds, crying, “Parei! Stop! I beg you, stop!”
The Mage, his face hidden by the folds of his purple shroud, remained unmoved. “There is only one way to stop this. You know what that is.”
“Please.” Weeping, she fell to her knees. “I beg you. I’ll do whatever you want, only stop this. Let them live. Please let them live.”
Helplessly watching from above, Ellysetta cried a warning to herself: “Nei! Do not!” But the weeping Ellysetta did not hear her.
The Mage’s hands shot out. A sharp blade sliced across the captive Ellysetta’s wrist, and the Mage pressed the wound to his pale, bloodless lips. A hand splayed across her left breast. She threw back her head on a silent wail of despair. Slowly, beneath the Mage’s hand, a sixth black shadow appeared on the skin over her heart and her eyes turned from Fey green to pits of darkness that flickered with red lights.
Ellysetta wept in horror as freezing ice penetrated her soul, robbing her of hope, of Light, of all will to resist.
Darkness fell. She floated there, alone, cold, her senses void.
When light returned, it was a dim red-orange flame that slowly drove back the gloom to reveal a different shadowy cave. Lillis and Lorelle were gone. In the flickering light, she saw Rain, bloodied and broken, his body wrapped in heavy sel’dor chains and pinned to a rough-hewn wall. A man in executioner’s garb stood before him, a sel’dor sword gripped in one gauntleted fist. The purple-shrouded Mage stood in the shadows off to one side. Of herself, there was no sign.
Rain. She whispered his name, and though neither the executioner nor the Mage gave any indication of having heard her, Rain lifted his head. His gaze swept around the cell, eyes narrowed as if to pierce the impenetrable darkness in search of her. I am here! Rain, I am here! For a moment, she thought he could hear her, but then his eyes closed and his head dropped to his chest in weary defeat. He did not look up again, no matter how she called to him.
The Mage lifted his hand in command, and with an abrupt savagery that made her gasp in horror, the executioner drove his sword into Rain’s heart. His beautiful eyes opened wide on a breathless gasp and his body sagged against his chains, head lolling forward against his chest.
The Mage pushed back the robe’s deep cowl, baring hair the color of tairen flame and monstrous black eyes that observed Rain’s death with pitiless detachment.
Nei! Ellysetta screamed a denial. The face beneath that purple cowl was her own, but the heart that beat inside the slender chest was a cold, unfeeling thing, barren of remorse or grief, void of even the tiniest flicker of remembered love.
The executioner yanked his bloody blade from Rain’s chest and raised it high, then glanced at the Mage who wore Ellysetta’s face. At her nod, he brought the sword slashing down against the back of Rain’s exposed neck. Flesh split. Bone severed. Blood sprayed in a scarlet fountain.
She felt the sword as if it fell upon her own neck, and she knew the instant Rain’s soul fled his body, because her own was ripped asunder. Invisible, unheard, Ellysetta screamed and screamed until her voice shattered and the edges of her vision went dim.
The last thing she saw before the world went dark was two small figures darting from the shadows. Lillis and Lorelle, their eyes turned black as death, danced in the shower of blood as if it were a warm summer rain. They opened their mouths to catch scarlet droplets and laughed with chilling childish glee. The air filled with the baying howls of the darrokken and a chorus of voices calling her name.
“Ellysetta! Ellysetta, wake up! Wake up, shei’tani.”
Her eyes flew open, and for a moment she was still locked inside the nightmare, her ears filled with the baying of the Mage’s monstrous hounds, her vision dark and blank. Then the blackness lightened to a starry night sky, and a familiar face, beautiful and beloved, hovered over her, his features drawn with worry.
Rain! Air-starved lungs expanded on a sudden, desperate gasp. With a sob, she sat up and flung trembling arms around him, clutching him tight. She cried his name, but the only sound that passed her lips was a harsh, painful whisper. Her throat felt so raw she couldn’t talk. She babbled on a weave of Spirit, instead. «Shei’tan, shei’tan! You’re alive! It was just a dream. Please, gods, let it just have been a dream.» She pulled back and ran frantic hands across his beloved face, his neck, his chest, searching for wounds, but thankfully—blessedly—finding none. She flung herself back into his arms, clinging to his strength, dragging the warm, sweet, reassuring scent of him into her lungs. «You’re real. You’re unharmed. Tell me you’re real!» She had felt him die, felt it so keenly her soul still ached like an open wound.
Strong arms closed around her. “I am real, shei’tani, alive and unharmed. What ever you saw was just a dream. I am with you.” Again and again, he murmured reassurances, both aloud and across the threads of their bond, while his broad hands stroked her hair and down her back in a steady rhythm until she calmed.
When finally her shivering stopped and her heart slowed to its normal rhythm, he pulled back enough to look into her eyes. He smoothed the wild curls off her face and stroked her cheek tenderly with his thumb. “Talk to me, shei’tani,” he said. “What happened? What did you dream of that frightened you so badly?”
“I—” She tried to speak, but her voice was ruined. «Rain, my throat…I can’t talk.
»
Gentle, worried lavender eyes searched her face. “You screamed, shei’tani. A scream like I’ve never heard before. Your skin went cold as ice and I thought—” He broke off and closed his eyes against a sudden well of emotion. «I thought I’d lost you. You were here in my arms, but I couldn’t feel you. It was as if your soul had fled, and all I held was an empty shell.» Even his Spirit voice broke on that memory, and his arms clenched tight around her. «You frightened me,» he rasped. «You frightened me as I never want to be frightened again.»
There were tears in his eyes, and the sight nearly broke her heart. «Oh, Rain, I’m sorry.»
“Shh.” He put a finger to her lips, then replaced it quickly with a fierce, deep kiss. «Las, shei’tani. You’ve nothing to be sorry for. It is I who should be sorry. I see your torment, and I don’t know what to do. I’m failing you.»
Tears sprang to her eyes. «Nei, Rain. Don’t even think it. You’ve done everything any shei’tan possibly could—and more. I am the one who cannot find a way to complete our bond. I’m the one who’s failing you—failing us.»
«Never.» He tracked kisses from her lips to her ear. «So long as we’re together, there is hope.»
The sound of a clearing throat made her glance up and around, and a blush rose to her cheeks. Her quintet and all the lu’tan were ringed around her and Rain, their eyes fixed upon her. Rain glanced up, too, and promptly spun a quick weave to dry her tears as they got to their feet.
“She’s fine,” he told them. “It was just a bad dream.”
“Bad?” Gil repeated with patent disbelief. “That scream pierced our shields and probably woke every creature from here to Orest.”
“Aiyah, well, she’s had bad ones before,” Rain assured him.
Ellysetta almost told him then. Because he was wrong; this dream was nothing like the others. She’d dreamed of battles and death gruesome and violent enough to make a hardened warrior quail, but never had one of those nightmares disturbed her on such a visceral level. She hadn’t just witnessed her submission to the Mage and Rain’s death—she’d lived them. Every unspeakable moment had felt as real as this moment did now; as if she’d truly been there, as if she’d truly lost her soul, and Rain had truly died.