A Wizard's Sacrifice Page 2

  “This will end when one of you signs the treaty,” Bethniel announces. Her voice is as icy as her mother’s glare, but inside she’s gibbering in horror.

  “I showed them what their defiance would cost,” Vic said.

  “And carried out retribution against Lornk’s chief interrogator,” Ashel added, his eyes as hard as they’d been that day, when Vic had tortured a woman with wizardry and cowed the Relman Council into acceding to all their demands. Kindness had once been the keystone of her brother’s character, but his ordeal had stripped away mercy. That woman deserved none, Bethniel reminded herself, summoning the cold, bitter rage she’d felt upon learning how badly Ashel had suffered while Lornk’s prisoner. In Lordhome’s dungeons, the guards had burned his hands with the same iron gauntlets Vic had used for retribution—and justice—in the Council chamber.

  “We needed to secure peace,” Bethniel said, “and the surest, quickest way to do it was a direct and undeniable demonstration of Vic’s power.”

  “You used your power openly?” Mother asked.

  “I had to,” Vic replied.

  “The Council was sworn to secrecy as part of the treaty,” Bethniel said, drawing the document out of her satchel and handing it over.

  “An impossible provision to enforce,” Mother grumbled. Her eyes darted over the page. “What is this about a Penance?”

  “There was a village—” Vic began.

  “There were unavoidable casualties,” Bethniel interjected. “We needed to maintain secrecy.”

  “This says three hundred and twelve Lathans shall serve Penance in the Badlands?”

  “It was the one concession I gave the Relmans, and it was an easy one to grant. They didn’t insist that anyone actually involved serve this Penance, only that any Lathan found in the Badlands do it until the number of Lathans matched the number of dead. There’s no reason in the world any of our people would ever go into the nomads’ territory, so I saw no harm in agreeing.”

  “You battled three hundred nomad warriors?” Mother asked Vic.

  “Not just warriors. Elders, nursing mothers, children . . . I killed them.” Vic finished with a whisper, speaking aloud with reverence and regret, in the manner Lathans always spoke of the dead.

  “Elesendar,” Mother swore aloud.

  “It was necessary,” Bethniel asserted, reverting to mindspeech. Lathans only used their voices for formal occasions or when passions reigned. Everyone needed to remain rational, so she spoke silently as one did about ordinary things. “I take full responsibility for it.” She had steeled herself to accept the nomad massacre as a terrible judgment, but one that was inevitable and unchangeable. Her father had always said a ruler should learn from mistakes, but never be crippled by regrets.

  “What else did you do?”

  Vic expelled a long breath. “Three hundred and thirty-seven people, most of them civilians, were crushed when I brought down the mountain palace at Olmlablaire. I blew a breach in the walls around the Relman capital, and of the three thousand Relman soldiers dead in that battle, a lot of those were mine. A lot.”

  “Just how powerful are you?”

  Vic shrugged. “I tore apart a mountain.”

  “The official story is, we used sulfa bombs to blow up Olmlablaire and the wall at Re,” Bethniel said in mindspeech, again trying to restore reason before Vic’s regrets and Mother’s fury dominated the conversation. “And the Relmans lost the Battle of Re because their command collapsed without Lornk Korng to lead them. Fortunately, it was raining that day, with a heavy fog and—”

  “I thought the rumors were gross exaggerations,” Mother said. “Vic, if your powers are undeniably revealed, I will have to exile you. I’ll have no choice.”

  “You sit the throne with the very same power,” Ashel growled aloud. Bethniel’s hands itched to strangle him.

  “I use my power only for small acts of convenience, and never in public. Vic has used hers as a weapon, and the Opposition can seize on that to stir up discord and undermine my government.”

  “You’re never sick,” Vic said. “I’ve been sick since the day I drank the Waters of the Dead, but you never are. Will I get used to it?”

  “I told you when I sent you to save my son, that I was giving you the heaviest burden.”

  “You knew what the Kragnashians would do to me?”

  Mother’s lips curled into a sad smile. “You have the misfortune to be the second woman of renown to bear the name Victoria of Ourtown. The Kragnashians revere that name, and yes, I believed if they met you, they would give you the Waters of the Dead in remembrance of the One who killed Meylnara the Oppressor.” She pressed her lips to Vic’s forehead. “How do you feel? Any sickness or headache?”

  Vic’s fingers grazed a temple. “Better than I’ve felt in months.”

  “The Waters contain a parasite called the Woern, which kills most who consume it. Most of those who survive become wizards, like you and me.”

  “But you’re not sick.”

  “No. My mother traces her family line back to Saelbeneth, leader of the very Council for whom your namesake fought in the war against Meylnara. Saelbeneth was said to be immune to the ill effects of the power. So am I, and I gave you some of my healthy Woern.” She showed Vic the bandaged thumb. “Saelbeneth would do the same to heal her allies of Woernsickness. The Woern can be passed from one wizard to another through sweat, blood, tears, saliva—any fluid of the body. They are also passed from mother to infant in the womb. That was why I sent Bethniel with you—to help you survive.”

  “I’m not a wizard!” Bethniel cried.

  “Your Woern remained dormant,” Mother replied, “which has been a blessing.”

  Bethniel stumbled to the window seat, her skin oozing sweat and pebbled with cold. Outside, stars winked in a deep purple sky. A servant moved along the lane, igniting gas lamps, and snow drifts glittered in pools of yellow light. Vic or Mother could light those lamps with a thought. Bethniel could not fathom doing so. In Kragnash, she had offered to drink the Waters of the Dead in Vic’s stead, but the Center, the leader of all Kragnashians, had refused and told her if she took the Waters, she would die. What could that mean, if she carried these . . . worms . . . already? “Why didn’t you tell me about this before we left? How was I supposed to know I could help Vic if she got sick?”

  “She didn’t want you to know she’d sold you to the Kragnashians,” Ashel spat.

  “Ashel, you were in my womb when I drank the Waters of the Dead, and since semen is, according to legend, a particularly effective means of transmission, you can pass your Woern to Vic rather easier than your sister or I.”

  Ashel’s glare shredded into a flush while Vic looked at the floor, her cheeks almost as red as her hair.

  Mother sighed at the blazing faces. “According to legend, only a very, very few wizards are compatible hosts for the Woern, in which case the relationship is symbiotic rather than parasitic. In every other case, Woern and wizard grow increasingly ill together. The only thing that can save either is an infusion of healthy Woern. Also according to legend, the Woern drive their host to seek out such reservoirs. Vic, I believed if you became a wizard, and then became ill, instinct would guide you to obtain what you needed from my children—especially Ashel. Glad as I am to have my foster-daughter home, I had hoped to welcome a marriage-daughter today. Sadly, I was wrong, or you wouldn’t have had a fit within sight of Narath and dozens of witnesses.”

  “What’s one more disappointment on your list?” Ashel asked.

  “You’re too old for petulance,” Mother snapped. “Vic, when the Healer arrives, you should mention that incident of catatonia from last year, after your accidental encounter with the Relmlord. It will distract him from other possible causes of the seizure. And all of you should rest. We have a full day of victory celebrations tomorrow.”

  She left, and silence pressed like stone. Ashel rocked from foot to foot, his single fist clenc
hed, while Vic hid behind a fall of hair. Bethniel climbed out of her own paralyzing consternation, took their hands, and pressed them together. “You two belong together. Mother’s revelation doesn’t change that; it makes it all the more true.”

  Their fingers slipped apart, and Bethniel couldn’t tell which drew away first. Ashel’s eyes lingered on Vic for a moment, then he mumbled a good night and left.

  Vic rested a tear-stained chin on her knees. “The Center said you’d die if you drank the Waters.”

  “I know.” Bethniel sat, trembling. It didn’t feel like fear—she’d become all too familiar with that sensation over the last half-year. Now she felt something more akin to anticipation, like a cat quivering before it pounced. “When it said I’d die, I thought it meant I’d be like most of the people who drink the Waters, where it kills them.”

  “But you already have these . . . Woern. So what did the Center mean?”

  Drawing a deep breath, she pushed the past into a box and closed the lid. As her father said, don’t be paralyzed by regrets. “We’ll never know. Let’s just be glad it’s over.”

  Her sister squeezed her hand. “I am. And it’s good to be home.”

  The Queen's Secret

  This deep underground, the earth itself rotted. Slipping on a mildewed step, Elekia grabbed her housemarshal’s arm as an oath escaped clenched teeth. Olivet held her elbow until they reached the final landing, where a guard drew back a bolt and passed them into the prison’s most secure corridor. Lamps guttered, the air dank and smoky. Another guard led them past three pairs of doors studded with hard crystal, each with a fist-sized window. At the end of the hall, they stopped.

  “Wait by the stairs,” Olivet ordered.

  The guard retreated, and Olivet drew back the bolt. Frowning his disapproval, he went inside first. Elekia crossed the threshold and signaled him out. “He cannot harm me,” she reminded the housemarshal. Snorting dubiously, he shut the door. The bolt clanged home.

  Eyes watering, she peered into the fetid gloom. A silhouette rose from a cot. “What a pleasant surprise, to receive a visit from my wife.” She tightened her belly, steeling herself, and spun dust and soot into a bouncing orb that cast cold, white light throughout the cell. Lornk Korng, former Lord of Relm, eyed the orb, then rested glacial eyes on her. “You finally have more than yourself to bring to our marriage, Your Majesty.”

  “And you have nothing,” she said coolly. Her most closely guarded secret stood before her, hair lank and garments reeking, yet beneath the filth beckoned a scent that had once drawn her smiling into a bed of soft grass and wildflowers. Among Lathans, a first bedding was a wedding, but Lornk was from a land where marriages were made to grow fortunes, not love. Elekia had never expected him to follow Lathan custom, not for a horsebreeder’s daughter. She, not he, had refused to declare and acknowledge their wedding. Not so soon, she’d said. She’d wanted to earn a status that made her worthy to become First Councilor to the Lord of Relm and matriarch of one of the Knownearth’s wealthiest families. All she’d asked for was time, and a quarter century of betrayal, vengeance, and war had followed his refusal to simply wait. “Are your accommodations suitable? I ordered you be given the same comforts you gave my son.”

  He lunged at her. She stepped back and thickened the air around him, freezing his limbs mid-stride.

  As he teetered on heel and toe, his lips twitched. “I only wanted to properly greet you, darling.”

  “With a kiss or a killing blow? How it must rankle to be defeated by the power you coveted.” She stepped forward, pressing her cheek into an outstretched hand. His fingers softened, and she moved closer, holding him still as a statue. The memory of wildflowers tickled her nose, and she reached up and stroked his ragged beard. “Four months you held Ashel prisoner.” Her hand dove beneath his waistband and began stroking. He glared, jaw bunching. “Three months you kept Vic, when she was hardly more than a child.” Vic was not hers by blood, but Elekia loved her as fiercely as the two children she had borne. Lornk trembled as his cock swelled, short gasps exploding from his lips, but his eyes grew icier. She touched her lips to his, used wizardry to pry his mouth open. The girl in the wildflowers rejoiced to taste him again; the queen in the dungeon gloated over his sour flavor. Elekia was no longer a maiden; she was a queen and a widow, capable of arousing even a man who despised her. Lornk’s tongue entwined with hers, his lips returning pressure as she squeezed and stroked. His trembling intensified, and the short gasps twisted into staccato moans. He reached the verge, and she released him, snapping his smallest finger with wizardry. “You broke them both,” she spat.

  Hunched over the fractured digit, he growled, “Do you think you can break me?”

  She wiped her mouth and fingers with a handkerchief. “I don’t know, and I don’t care, since your life will end within the year. I do want you to suffer as long as you’re alive. Here, a keepsake.” She dropped the soiled linen.

  Lornk wound it round his injured hand. “Victoria belongs to the Kragnashians now. They’ll come for her sooner rather than later, and Elesendar help us if she fails to do what history has prescribed.”

  Knocking for Olivet, she said over her shoulder, “You are a sad, pathetic madman.”

  “My first-born said the same thing.”

  On the other side, the bolt drew back, but Elekia held the door shut, her skin pebbling. “Ashel is not yours.”

  Devilish lips split, revealing perfect teeth. “Isn’t he? I told him, Elekia. About you, and me, and your dear, departed Sashal, and how the pair of you betrayed me. From that seed will grow an ugly hedge between mother and son.” A sinister laugh raised the hairs on her neck. “I planted other seeds as well, which will sprout in places you least expect. I’ll reap what I’ve sown, and you’ll weep—but the world will rejoice.”

  Bile churned in her belly, yet she raised a serene eyebrow. “The wisest decision I ever made was to refuse you.” Olivet opened the door; she extinguished the light globe and sailed down the corridor. Grief wailed in her gut, but Lornk’s threats left no time for tears.

  The Cost of Failure

  Snow sifted from a gray sky, piling into fluted garlands on roofs and fences. Vic’s boots sank in fresh powder, toes clenched against the cold. A blizzard in Latha was like a spring squall on the distant northern tundra where she’d been born, but after six winters here in the south, this gentle snow shower had her hunched into fur, wishing for summer.

  You always want what you don’t have, she thought, stopping in front of a modest peaked cottage. Not the sort of dwelling you’d expect a prince to favor, but Ashel was proud of the little house he’d bought on his minstrel’s salary. In Latha, even royals worked for their bread, and the fact he adored his work was one of the things she loved about him.

  “But you don’t love him,” she muttered. It had been a litany she’d repeated ever since she refused to wed him half a year ago. His proposal had ambushed her, left her reeling in a vortex of hope and shame and fear that had churned for months until it spun out of control in Olmlablaire, leaving three hundred and thirty-seven people crushed under a mountain. And Ashel with half a hand. If she loved him, she would have rescued him before Lornk could butcher his fingers. She could have. She should have. She would have, except she’d been a bloody coward. Shame burning her cheeks, she remembered the root of that terror.

  She sits with knees drawn up, watching the door open. Lornk’s hand on the doorjamb is a hint of the dawn at midnight. Wet heat blossoms in her loins, the blood rising to her skin, the hairs on her arms and thighs and nape standing to attention. Her awareness opens toward him. She smells him, herbs and musk; she feels him, warmth like the sun. The door fully open, he stands against the darkness of the tower stairwell, golden and terrible with eyes darkest blue, his hands large enough to encircle her throat. She rises to her knees, eyes on the floor, eager to meet his demands.

  She’d been only fifteen when Caleisbahn slavers had taken her fro
m her homeland and sold her to Lornk Korng. He had stripped away everything she cared about, had almost succeeded in bending her will entirely to his, but she escaped and found refuge here in Latha. Half a dozen years in the Lathan army had made her hard; the Waters of the Dead had made her powerful, but all that strength had evaporated when she confronted Lornk in his mountain fortress at Olmlablaire. Only Ashel’s willingness to sacrifice his own flesh had saved her. Freed from the worst man in the world, she’d failed the best.

  “Coward.” She forced her hand to lift the gate latch, though her feet itched to turn and flee. “You will go in there, and you will say goodbye.”

  The gate banged shut. Snow crunched, porch boards squeaked, and her heart’s pounding drowned out every step. The door creaked open. Ashel stood there, beaming, and her limbs quivered with the desire to run. To him or away, she wasn’t sure.

  “You’re in town! Come in. How are you feeling?”

  “Fine—much better, thanks.” It had been a week since Elekia had fed Vic her blood—her throat closed on the memory of iron on her tongue when she woke up that evening. The headaches had returned within a day, but they were nothing to what she’d suffered after the Battle of Re. She squeezed between Ashel and a set of traveling cases piled near the door. “I was just down at the Cobblestone, talking with Helara about apprenticing with the Innkeepers.”

  “Vic the Blade—from soldier to chef, is it?”

  “Not that. I’d prefer to avoid killing people from now on, but anybody who survived my cookery might wish they were dead.” She grinned at his chuckle, then went on, “Helara’s going to let me start as a maid and teach me how to manage the books and brewing. Bethniel said you’re leaving.”

  His grin melted. “The Guild’s sending me to Mora.”

  “You’ve chosen the Loremaster’s path after all.”