The Drowning Dark (The War of Memory Cycle Book 4) Read online

  “You think so?”

  “Well, they were more right than the piking priests, yeah?”

  She eyed him. “You're not a Light-follower?”

  A snort. “I just followed it because it was there. What else was I gonna do? It's like the army. If you enjoy fighting, you gotta join it, because it ate up the competition. —Well, I guess you could run off and join the ogres in Krovichanka, but who wants to fight their homeland?”

  “Those Jernizen,” said the big Amand, Harbett.

  “Yeah, well, Jernizen are all insane. Anyway, Yenasi, I wasn't here for the faith. I was here because I'd lost a piking leg and they promised to fix it. Which I guess they did.” He patted the white armor on his thigh. “Guess I don't get my lieutenancy though. Everything's too foxed.”

  It was a strange feeling, being addressed by the surname she hadn't used in years. Shaking her head, she said, “Look, call me Lark.”

  “Like a sunder lark? Do you sing?”

  “No. I'm not—“ She lowered her voice, eyeing the patches of pilgrims alongside them. “I'm not technically a mage either, I just know some tricks. Don't expect miracles out of me.”

  “Dunno, you've done fine so far.”

  He didn't seem to be teasing, which smoothed her hackles. Mouthy and abrasive but straightforward—she could handle that. The others didn't look perturbed either. “No problems, then?” she checked anyway.

  “Nope. Worked with mages before. Weird, sure, but that's nothing these days.”

  “I just said I'm not—“

  “Keep faking 'til you are, yeah? Anyhow, you're the only mage around. Take advantage of the ignorance.”

  Lark frowned. She disapproved of the phrasing, but the sentiment was sound: no one here knew what she could and couldn't do. If she could summon sunlight, then what other fabulous spells were up her sleeves? Just the threat inherent in her robe had been enough to stand off potential muggers in Finrarden.

  “Plus you kinda made yourself the leader,” Vyslin added, “so better keep it up.”

  She shot him a questioning glance, then realized that the pilgrims around them were keeping pace. Like a larger escort, an entourage...

  A following.

  Her skin prickled. This was too surreal. All she'd done was shout nonsense at the priests, and suddenly there were people at her flanks and heels, watching her, believing her. She wanted to ask them what they were thinking. Were they crazy or just desperate?

  Void's Teeth, I swore I wouldn't be responsible for anyone else, and now this?

  But maybe it was the right thing to do. At the start, Maevor had been more liability than help, but now he drifted along like her shadow, watching her back as if more comfortable in a group where he could easily fade out. Sallos Mendras' tale was distressing but his presence heartening, like a glimpse of home, and the others—even Erevard—made her feel safer in their company. She supposed she wasn't meant to go alone.

  Either that, or fate wanted her to have a man-harem despite her clear disinterest.

  If any of them got touchy with her, she'd suffocate him with Ripple.

  They walked the rest of the tunnel in silence, watching the dark opening grow before them. A knot tightened in Lark's gut; beyond that demarcation lay a long, cold, potentially crumbling road, surrounded on all sides by unknown dangers. Even if she could draw water for her companions, they would still be without food for days—and who knew what awaited them at Keceirnden?

  What if more pilgrims joined them? How long could she fake magic—fake religious philosophy, fake control—before the mob figured her out?

  If real trouble came, would these men protect her?

  At her side, Erevard murmured, “They've stopped walking.”

  She blinked at him, then forward, and realized that a clot had formed just beyond the tunnel's end. White-robed pilgrims filled the space, heads turning as if tracking something. Peering through the tattered lace of the tunnel roof, she glimpsed a light in the east: dim, deep red and long, like a streak of blood on the dark velvet night.

  Her heart lurched as that color raised memories of salt floes and black water, and a small form falling from a cavern roof.

  “We need to get out there,” she said, forcing her stride longer. Ilshenrir's crystal hummed faintly in her hand; she couldn't recall whether it had just started or if it had been doing so for a while. She hadn't been paying attention.

  Shadow, if that's what I think it is...

  Questions rose from her entourage but there was no time to answer. As the crowd condensed, she gritted her teeth and applied elbows and hips to the effort, forcing her way through groups of startled pilgrims. Hands snatched at her robe and braids only to be smacked down by the men behind her.

  Bursting free of the tunnel, she found herself on the wider road, still cluttered with people but less densely. She cut toward its edge and squinted skyward, past the tunnel's holey façade and the towers that shivered in the fitful wind.

  And there, approaching like a bat in the night, was the bloody light: now deep red, now venous purple, now nearly black. By its position and movement, it was high in the air, flying swiftly—

  And huge.

  “What in crap is that?” said Vyslin behind her.

  At first, her numb lips refused to form the name. She saw again the salt-blocks, the gleam of red light off quicksilver and crystal, the shadow-shapes of wolves all around her. Brine filled the back of her throat.

  “Hlacaasteia,” she choked out. “Haelhene flagship.”

  “A what?”

  “It's...” The words dried up again. She didn't know how it could be here. Her last sight of it had been in the hole in Crystal Valley, half-buried after the disastrous fight that had killed Rian and lost them Ilshenrir. Sun-powered, it should have been depleted—yet there it went, sliding easily across the darkness. Across the outskirts of the city, over the dimly-lit heights...

  Toward the Palace.

  “We have to go,” she stammered, backing away without looking. A solid body stopped her—one of the men—and steadied her when she stumbled.

  “Why?” said Vyslin, looking from her to the moving light. “What's a hakastia?”

  “Hlacaasteia. Wraiths, white wraiths. You idiots worked with them but they're dangerous, they make those black swords and experiment on people. They're... They must be claiming the Throne?” It came out confused, because she couldn't fathom why they were here. The residual radiance, maybe. “Taking the energy. Energy is what makes magic.”

  “Really?”

  “No time for details.” She turned and looked down the road, wondering how far they could get before something bad happened, only to see pilgrims staring or changing their course to move back toward the tunnel.

  “Go, you stupid people!” she shouted, feeling the edge of hysteria in her voice. “Get away from this place! Those aren't your friends!”

  “They're the Emperor's allies,” someone piped up nearby. “They must know what's happened.”

  “Of course they know! They're scavenging!” She couldn't pick out the speaker in the crowd; there were too many white robes, too many hoods, too many shadowed faces. She wanted to grab them all and shake them until their teeth rattled, but her legs were wobbly and her stomach empty and she felt tears of exhaustion pricking at the corners of her eyes.

  A hand caught her arm, propelling her toward the road. Glancing back, she saw Maevor, grim-faced. Behind him, the others of her little crew.

  More voices rose in argument, some aimed at her, but she couldn't listen. It was too much. In her mind's eye she saw wraiths emerging from the titanic crystal and sweeping across the sky. To find her, to burn this place to the ground—or call the pilgrims in. Claim the followers that Emperor Aradys IV had just lost.

  And do what with them?

  It didn't bear considering.

  “Girl! Mage girl!” a woman barked nearby. Lark barely looked, but the voice paralleled her—someone following on the other side of her guar
ds. “You know those wraiths?”

  “Fought them,” she snapped. “They're bad. Run away, get away.”

  “When a mage says run, you run!” the woman hollered.

  Lark had no idea who that was, nor did she care. She just moved. All she wanted was to be out of this: away from the city, the swamp, the thrice-cursed Empire.

  Without complaint or further question, the others followed.

  Chapter 4 – Hunting the Hunters

  Mariss Ysara Enkhaelen peered through the scrying window as the Hlacaasteia spire slowly settled toward the earth. There wasn't much to see outside: just ropey whiteness like a mangled spiderweb, painted in shifting hues by the spire itself.

  She was alone in the chamber, no quicksilvers at her sides. Already she missed them. They'd been left behind at Crystal Valley, supposedly because the wraiths wanted the spire whole, not riddled with the chambers and walkways that physical creatures required.

  And yet they'd brought Mariss. They were hunting her father, so she hadn't argued with Master Caernahon, but the gap between words and sense rankled.

  Her hands clenched on the borders of the scrying window. This agonizingly careful descent made her want to open it into a portal and leap through, throw down her tracer spells—get started now! Until a week ago, she had despaired of ever putting her skills to use; it seemed like decades had gone by since the last rumor of her father's whereabouts.

  He'd been hiding, Master Caernahon had said, in a place the haelhene couldn't reach. She'd demanded to know where, like she'd demanded the location of her mother's grave and sword, but had been denied as always; her master would not allow her to run off into danger.

  Wouldn't let her go out at all, really. The only times she'd escaped the spire had been on her yearly trips to nearby human settlements, for such luxuries as human clothing and some practice at blending in.

  She'd wondered, sometimes, whether to trust her master's words. All the haelhene echoed them, and the quicksilver elementals refused to gainsay him; that constant agreement got on her nerves. But she'd had no one else to ask. The humans she'd questioned on her outings were confused by her words, or frightened, and it was tiresome to chase them and so difficult to get the blood off her gowns.

  But now...

  Now it didn't matter, because her father was loose and her mother's sword was in someone else's hands—that stupid human boy! And Master Caernahon had come straight to her, rather than going after them himself as she'd feared he might. He was not cutting her out of her revenge; no, he had pledged whatever support he could give.

  And she was ready.

  A shudder went through the spire's substance, its resonance changing in contact with the ground, and she gritted her teeth as it drew an oppositional vibration from the green crystal blade slung across her back. The scry now showed her the tattered banners of what had once been a vast roof, with rib-like structures curving away and down to define walls, then further to join a weird shifting blackness that might once have been a floor. More of that black stuff hung between the wall-ribs, opening holes into other chambers.

  Another shudder, then a thump that made the crystalline walls ripple like water. The background thrum, pervasive since Master Caernahon's return with the key, suddenly switched to an enervating pull, and the scrying window dissolved.

  She growled under her breath as the weight of the drain settled on her. No matter how many times she asked the wraiths to be considerate of her energies, they never listened. Unless Master Caernahon was around, they did the absolute minimum to accommodate her, and even when he was, they paid no attention to how their resonance interfered with her physiology and spells. She'd appealed to Master Caernahon, but he'd merely smiled and admonished her that true mages did not complain; they learned to compensate for their flaws, lest their enemies take advantage of them.

  That was rational, she supposed, but it still pissed her off.

  Reminded of her temper, she made a conscious effort to straighten, to breathe, and to smooth her long black hair. She hadn't tied it back yet, waiting to figure out where they were so she could pick a nice local style; the silver filaments she'd extruded from her scalp could do the work in moments. She wished she had the same options when it came to dresses, but her trunk had gone down the black-water hole along with the rest of her little home, leaving her with this one sea-green gown and a salt-stiffened pair of boots.

  She'd hoped to find a shop nearby, but from the view outside, it was not to be.

  Abruptly, the draining sensation stilled, the reddish walls of the chamber shimmering with held energy. Then came a pulse—once, twice, three times, the walls dimming with each until they were the same low radiance as they had been in flight.

  Another moment of settling, then a familiar change in pressure: the spire opening itself to the outside world.

  Mariss started for the far wall, already summoning the resonance that let her create internal doors. It jangled her nerves as always; neither metal nor flesh was meant to flow like celestial crystal. Before she got there, she felt a hallway coalesce on the other side, then her touch parted the thick red wall like a curtain.

  A wraith hung there in its robe and mask, beckoning. She obeyed, schooling herself to a brisk, professional stride as it glided ahead down the corkscrewing path like a firefly.

  Their path led without branches to a single exit, cold air swirling in. She stepped through, squinting at the red-washed exterior, and found it much changed already. The blackness had been blasted away, small flecks of it drifting like char in the breeze; exposed beneath was a ruin-scape of white fibers, structural components and scar-like pits. The floor's material had bunched up against the spire like mud around a driven stake, and threads of light ran inward from the far ends of the chamber—a slow flow to feed the crystal's need—while from somewhere far below came a faint mellified radiance all but overridden by Hlacaasteia's ruddy glow. She wondered what it was, but felt no competing resonance even when she stepped down to the tattered floor.

  Master Caernahon was there, surveying the wreckage with a non-expression. He hadn't bothered to dress in his human mien, leaving him clearly haelhene: smooth-featured and translucent, his luminous essence bobbing behind his eye-spots and his mouth reduced to a bare slit. Though he wore the standard white robe and gloves, he'd disdained the mask and hood, allowing his poured-glass hair to move freely as he turned to regard her.

  “My dear,” came his fluting facsimile of a voice. “I am glad to see you prepared. This is your father's last known location. We seek traces of his essence even now.”

  She came to a halt at arm's reach and bowed her head. “Where are we, Master?”

  “The ruins of the Imperial Palace. Once again, he has caused a great catastrophe.”

  Blinking, Mariss looked around. She'd heard of the Empire, enough to know that their home in Crystal Valley was nominally within its borders and that the humans she'd interacted with were its subjects. Master Caernahon had some sort of professional relationship with the Emperor, but it had no impact on life at the spire; she'd asked to visit the court many times but had always been denied.

  And now, it seemed, there was no court left. Someone had blasted a pit in the center of the chamber, into which Hlacaasteia had slotted like a jewel in a setting, and the rest of the place was falling down. Behind and above, she glimpsed the spire's light reflecting off some tall stone structure, but had no clue what it was.

  “Were you here, Master?” she said, trying to keep her voice flat. Accusation never helped with him; he would just send her back into the spire to stew, and maybe even bar her from the hunt. “Could we have prevented this?”

  “I was,” he said, “but no. The assault was unforeseen. There was no time to summon assistance, only to defend against your father's depredations as much as I could. In the end, I was forced to flee.”

  Though she nodded soberly, her chest tightened. That her father could face down Master Caernahon as well as whoever else had defended
this place—that he could make the Master flee!—was a frightening thought. She'd trained among the haelhene for decades but knew she had no chance of besting her Master, nor even stalemating him. Not with magic.

  As if sensing her concern, Caernahon said, “This darkness is his doing, but as it saps my people, so it should also weaken him. You, my dear, are not so shackled. We washed his taint from you as best we could.”

  “I thank you for it,” she said, bowing her head again. “Would that I were entirely my mother's daughter, but if I cannot be, then I will use his legacy against him.”

  “Good, good.” His haelhene features made him more distant than usual, so when he turned away without further comment, she told herself to think nothing of it. This was a momentous and dangerous occasion, not the time for pats on the head or other encouragement.

  No. She was fully grown. She simply needed to prove herself.

  A wink of light made her look up to see a wraith drifting down from the direction of the stone pillar. It made a keening, shivering sound as it neared, and she frowned; she hated when they used their songs instead of speaking. She could differentiate some tones but didn't have the capacity to hear details, or understand more than the basic intent.

  Master Caernahon responded in kind, and she picked up a tinge of displeasure. With a beckon of his gloved hand, he switched to speech. “Your father spent time at the crest of the Needle. We will go and see what he has done.”

  “Climb, or—“

  “Fly, of course.”

  With that, he rose off the ground as if gravity had simply forgotten him, and Mariss triggered the spells that let her do the same—though with less grace. As she floated after him, she saw several other haelhene follow.

  Up they went through the bare ribs of the Palace roof, past the radiant peak of Hlacaasteia, then into the windy night. As the temperature dropped, Mariss sank her metal deeper under her skin; for all that her flesh felt the bite of the cold, silver had it worse, and her magic would keep her warmer the less of it she exposed.