Magda nodded. “We’ll help hold you up as best we can, but it’s narrow and you’ll have to be strong for a little bit longer. Merritt can carry you once we’re out of the dungeon.”
“Thank you both,” Naja managed between gasps of increasing pain.
Chapter 74
Now that the surge of excitement from being cut down from the chains was wearing off, it was clear that Naja’s strength was flagging. By the twitches of her brow, Magda could see that even though she didn’t complain, she was enduring increasingly serious waves of pain. Her determination was keeping her moving better than Magda would have thought possible.
Naja had difficulty trying to make it out through the small doorway of her cell. It was proving easier to stand than to bend. Merritt held an arm on the outside of the doorway while Magda, still in the inner cell, held her other arm. After Naja was through, Merritt picked the woman up in his arms and carried her across the outer room. He stopped before the outer door, still holding Naja in his arms.
He gestured with a tip of his head. “Check outside,” he whispered to Magda.
Magda carefully stuck her head out of the doorway and peered into the darkness.
“It’s too dark to see,” she told him.
“Take the light. I’ll carry her.”
Magda lifted the heavy glass light sphere from his hand. Merritt rearranged his hold on Naja while Magda stuck the light out into the passageway, checking. She signaled to Merritt that she didn’t see anything.
Naja wrapped her arms around his neck to help hold on as he bent low to pass through the slightly larger outer doorway and follow Magda into the narrow tunnel. Merritt was easily able to carry the woman, but in places it was so narrow that he had to turn sideways and even then it was a tight squeeze.
“How are we going to get her past the guards?” Merritt asked as he followed behind Magda.
Magda looked back over her shoulder without slowing. “I guess we bluff our way out the same way we bluffed our way in.”
Merritt looked more than a little skeptical. “You really think they’ll go for that with us trying to leave with her?”
“I’ll tell them that we have to take her to my soon-to-be new husband because he personally wants to question her.”
Merritt let out a sigh as if to say how unhappy he was with such a sketchy plan, and that he didn’t think for a minute that it was going to work.
“Unless you have a better idea,” she said.
“We can try it. You know my backup plan.”
Magda hadn’t liked his backup plan of killing the guards, but now that she’d seen the condition Naja was in, Merritt’s suggestion that they might have to kill the guards was not sounding like nearly such a bad idea. She still didn’t know, though, if the two guards actually had anything to do with what had happened to Naja. They might be nothing more than they seemed: guards who didn’t know what was really going on.
Before they reached the outer doorway to the dungeon entrance, where the two guards would be waiting, Merritt came to a halt.
“Do you think you can walk?” he asked Naja in a quiet voice. “Just until we get past the two guards? I may need to get at my sword.”
She nodded. “I’m getting some of my strength back. Put me down.”
He set her on her bare feet. For a moment Magda wondered if the woman was going to be able to stand, but she steadied herself and with an effort straightened her back.
“I’ll go first and do the talking,” Magda whispered. “Naja, stay close behind me. We’re going to try to walk you right out of here before they have a chance to argue.”
The three of them made their way silently the remaining distance down the stone tunnel toward the light coming from the outer door. The lamplight from the doorway was a relief, because that meant the heavy iron door was still standing open. Magda hiked up her skirts and boldly stepped over the raised threshold out to the area where the guards waited.
Naja’s hand lightly touched Magda’s back for guidance as she stayed close behind.
The two burly men stood waiting, one a little in front of the other, blocking the iron stairway up out of the dungeon. The big man in front had his thumbs hooked on his belt. The men were close enough that she could smell how badly they stunk.
There wasn’t a lot of room to maneuver. Magda hoped that Merritt had enough room to use his sword if needed. If he did have to go for his sword, Magda intended to pull Naja out of the way and protect her.
“Well, well,” the guard in front said. A depraved grin widened as he spotted Naja in Magda’s shadow. “Look who we have here out in the light.”
“We need to take her for further questioning,” Magda said in an icy voice, not wanting to discuss anything with the man. “Stand aside.”
“Well, the thing is,” the man said, scratching the stubble on his chin and no longer looking the least bit cowed, “you forgot what I told you.”
Magda glared at him. “What are you talking about?”
“I told you that sound carries through these tunnels. We heard what you said. ‘We’re going to try to walk you right out of here before they have a chance to argue,’ I believe is the way you put it. Did I get it right?”
Magda felt a quick touch, a light pressure, at the small of her back. Before she could fully make sense of it, Naja flew past her.
Naja had Magda’s knife.
The woman struck like lightning. The blade slashed the first guard’s throat open from the side of his neck under his right ear clean across his windpipe. Blood erupted in great throbbing gouts from a severed artery at the side of his neck. His open windpipe blew clouds of red mist as he struggled to breathe.
As Naja twisted around, completing the powerful, slashing strike, the second man’s big hand clamped down around her other wrist where the manacle had been.
Without pause, Naja used his hand holding her wrist for leverage to spin herself around. Using his hold on her wrist, she deliberately yanked herself forcefully toward the hulking guard. As she flew toward him, she whipped the knife in her other fist around in an arc and hammered it straight into the his heart.
His eyes opened wide in shock.
The first man hit the floor with a heavy thud. Blood from the severed artery in his neck pumped out into a spreading pool. His last breath gurgled from his lungs. The man with the knife in his chest toppled back. The back of his head hit the stone floor with a loud crack. Blood oozed out from under his greasy hair. He was as still as the stone that had cracked open his head. He stared with wide-open, dead eyes.
It had happened so swiftly that only then did Magda even realize that she’d heard the sound of steel being drawn. Merritt stood with the sword in his hand and rage in his eyes.
Magda had to catch Naja when she stumbled back a few steps. She weakly got her balance and then straightened herself to stand tall and glare down at the bodies at her feet.
In the lamplight Magda could finally see that Naja’s eyes were as blue as the sky on a bright summer day. Her jet black hair and bangs made her blue eyes all the more dazzling.
Now, though, those blue eyes were filled with fiery rage.
“They both took turns having their way with me,” Naja said defiantly. “If I had had the time, I would not have given them the mercy of a swift death.”
Magda couldn’t blame the woman. She would have felt no differently. The surprising strength she had shown reminded Magda again that Naja Moon was not a woman to be trifled with, or underestimated.
“Then you have carried out justice,” Magda told her. “You’ll get no condemnation from me.”
Naja smiled with triumphant satisfaction.
“Well, that simplifies things,” Merritt said under his breath. He slid the sword home into its scabbard. “No one knew we were coming down here. No one else but these two knew that we were in here, or would be aware that we freed Naja, and they aren’t going to do any talking.”
“Right now we’re anonymous,” Magda said. “
Let’s get out of here before someone shows up and identifies us.”
Naja bent and yanked the knife from the man’s chest. She carefully wiped it clean on his pant leg. She flipped the knife and caught it by the point, then offered Magda the hilt. “I apologize for borrowing your weapon without permission. Had my gift worked down here, I would have handled it without needing to use your knife.”
“I don’t blame you. The men got what they deserved,” Magda said as she replaced the knife in its sheath under the slit in her dress at the small of her back. She headed for the iron stairs. “Now let’s get out of here.”
Naja smiled and followed her up.
Chapter 75
Magda carefully slid the flimsy door aside just enough to peek through the small opening. At the moment she didn’t see anyone out in the passageway through the catacombs, but a few minutes earlier she had seen two wizards, deep in conversation, hurry by. Across the way she could see one of the nearly countless chambers filled with the dead. At least this upper area didn’t smell as bad as the lower levels.
She didn’t know how long Merritt was going to take with Naja, but Magda hated to have to spend any time in the small catacombs library near where wizards worked, because it was not all that far from the dungeon. The library was utilitarian, little more than a small space hollowed from the soft rock. It was only large enough for three short rows of simple plank shelves for books. Between two of the shelves sat a simple bench. There was not even any room for a table.
Naja lay on the bench, Merritt kneeling beside her, working as quickly as he could to heal the wounds that required the most urgent attention. He had said that the library was seldom used, but Magda worried that this night someone might come looking for a rare volume and happen upon the three of them. She couldn’t think of a plausible story as to why they were there, who Naja was, and what had happened to her.
They’d had to stop somewhere, though. Merritt wouldn’t have been able to carry Naja far before someone saw them and started asking questions. The small library was the first place they could find that Merritt thought would be somewhat safe for a brief time.
Naja had a number of injuries, including torn muscles in her legs, a few broken bones in her feet, and most concerning, a serious abdominal wound that threatened her life. Killing the two guards might have been satisfying retribution, but it had ruptured her abdominal wound and it needed to be closed.
Before they’d done anything else, though, even before healing her or addressing any of their other problems, as soon as they’d gotten out from the influence of the shields down in the dungeon, Naja had gone to her knees and given the devotion to Lord Rahl. She was so eager to be protected from the dream walkers that she ignored the pain long enough to say the devotion three times and gain the protection of the bond. Magda ached to have the woman healed, but more than anything she had wanted to know that they would be safe from the view of dream walkers.
When they had finished with the devotion, they had immediately turned to the problem of finding a place to tend to her injuries. Merritt had said that healing the sorceress was going to take some time, hours at least, possibly all night. Since they knew that they couldn’t risk staying in the catacombs library that long, he had decided to use the place just long enough to get her out of imminent danger of dying and able to walk on her own so they could get her to a safer place.
Once they were able to move from the little library to a safe place, Merritt would then be able to take the time to heal the rest of her serious injuries without the risk of being interrupted at a critical moment. In the meantime, he would do what he could as quickly as he could.
Magda was nervous, though, about getting caught in the catacomb library. She knew that if someone went down to the dungeons and found the two dead guards, they would raise an alarm and the whole place would soon be crawling with soldiers. They would look in every corner. Magda didn’t know if they would know who Naja was, or be aware that she had been in the dungeon and had escaped, but if Merritt and Magda were discovered in the library healing an injured woman, the soldiers would certainly ask a lot of questions and they would expect answers.
Merritt had worked down in the area on occasion, so he was familiar with this part of the catacombs. He had known of a storage cabinet where wizards and sorceresses kept supplies. There, he’d found a spare sorceress’s robe and some clean rags. The flaxen robes were decorated at the neck with red and yellow beads sewn in the ancient symbols of the profession.
Merritt had then taken them to the little library and stood watch at the door while Magda cleaned Naja up enough so that she wouldn’t draw suspicion if anyone saw her. After using a damp rag to gently wash some of the blood off the face of an only half-conscious Naja, Magda had managed to get the robe onto her. While only partially responsive, Naja had been aware enough to be grateful to have the robe to wear.
After that, Magda had let Merritt hurry and get to work healing the woman while Magda stood watch.
Merritt finally stepped up behind Magda. “Anyone out there?”
“No, not for a while.” Magda looked back and saw Naja standing close behind him. “How are you?” she asked the sorceress.
“Merritt helped me enough for now. He is very talented. I think I will be strong enough to walk to a safer place where he can finish.”
“Your house?” Magda asked Merritt.
He pressed his lips tight as he considered it. He glanced back briefly at Naja.
“I wish we could get there. We’d be secluded and alone. But I really think it needs to be someplace closer. She can walk for a short while, but I’m afraid she wouldn’t make it that far and then we’d be in trouble.”
Naja looked past Magda to peer out the crack in the door. She abruptly stepped back in surprise.
“There are dead people out there.”
Merritt nodded. “This is the catacombs, down under the Keep, where the dead are laid to rest. We’re just a ways above the dungeon where we found you.”
Naja was clearly alarmed. “We need to leave, now.”
“They’re dead,” Merritt said. “They can’t hurt you.”
“Yes they can,” Naja said.
Magda slid the door closed and turned to the woman. “What do you mean?”
“Emperor Sulachan uses the dead.”
Both Merritt and Magda stared. Magda, having fought a dead man, was not all that surprised by Naja’s claim.
“Uses them how?” she asked.
“To serve him.”
“How can the dead serve him?” Merritt asked.
“For Emperor Sulachan, the dead can serve him as well as the living. In some cases, better.”
“Better.” Merritt repeated as he stared at her. “They have no heartbeat. They have no life in them. How can they do anything?”
“Chickens can move and flop for hours after their heads are cut off. They have no heartbeat, either,” Naja said, “and that doesn’t even involve any magic.
“The emperor has rare, gifted people called makers,” she said, leaning in, speaking in a quiet, reverent tone. “I never met any myself, but I do know that makers have remarkable powers of originality. They imagine what others never envisioned before, and through that mechanism are somehow able to create what others never could.”
Magda glanced up at Merritt. “We understand. We have makers as well.”
“Then you understand the wide range of the totally new and unexpected creations they can sometimes come up with. Most people’s minds travel along the same road traveled by everyone else, never straying off the route of conventional wisdom. Makers know no such boundaries. They have a rare ability to make their own roads of thought. Their minds venture through the wilderness of all that exists, combining random bits of knowledge in ways that have never been imagined before.”
“We understand that much of it,” Magda said. “What does this have to do with making the dead walk again?”
“The emperor’s makers have created new
forms of magic, new spells, that function in part by altering the nature of the grace. Through the new forms of power envisioned by the makers, along with the help of the emperor’s many gifted, they have learned to use magic to control the dead.”
“How do you know all of this?” Merritt asked.
“I know because I was one of the gifted who helped them. Though the manipulation of the spirits of the dead in the underworld, and investing powerful magic into the corpses that those spirits came from, the dead are made to respond. That was the secret that the makers unlocked, using the spirits of the dead from the spirit world, linking them back to corpses they came from, using that connection in the Grace, the spark, that runs through creation, life, and into death, connecting it all. With the new spells designed by our makers, the dead are made to serve the wishes of Emperor Sulachan.”
“Against their will, then?” Magda asked.
Naja shook her head. “They have no will. They are dead. They are like a raw material which, through the methods dreamed up by makers, is crafted to serve as the emperor wants.”
“Serve? How do they serve?” Merritt asked. “What purpose would the dead have that could serve Sulachan better than the living?”
“The dead never get weary, they don’t know hunger, or pain, or pity. They don’t need to eat, or sleep, or rest, or stay warm, so they don’t need any supplies. They have no ambition but the one given to them. They have no capacity for fear so they act without hesitation.”
“Act how?” Magda asked. “What do the emperor’s forces use these dead people for?”
“For all those reasons I mentioned, they make perfect assassins.” She gestured beyond the door. “They can be right there, in your midst, and you never know it. You walk by them and never see them for what they are.
“The dead can be animated as needed. They are then given a single-minded purpose. They never stop trying to carry out that purpose.
“For these reasons, they also make the perfect warriors. The dead have their limits of service, though. There are things for which Emperor Sulachan cannot use them.