Avondale V (23 page)

Chapter 41

Lexi

Leading Leonosis through the city was not difficult. The route wasn’t straight, but there was no straight way down to the lower levels. The broad, main avenue around the top level of Avondale was neat and clean, but each level below that became more crowded, the buildings less impressive, the waste and trash of a crowded city much more evident.

When she had set out to find the demented king, she had no idea where to look and simply made her way toward the palace in her usual fashion. After years of traveling through the city in a way that would appear to most people like aimless wandering, she could cover a lot of ground rather quickly and without drawing attention to herself.

She’d seen a few terrified faces hiding in buildings on the upper level, but for the most part, the city seemed deserted. She could hear the commotion near the palace, and then when the war ship launched the fire bombs toward the palace, she correctly guessed that, if she moved toward the ship, she would find Leonosis. Nearly running over him hadn’t been the plan, and she was shocked by the way the earl’s eldest son looked.

Leonosis had always been a handsome man, fastidious about his appearance, but the man she met in the street was almost the exact opposite. He was wearing silky garments and the softest leather pants and boots, but his body could only be described as skeletal. His hair was thinning so much that his scalp was visible through the wisps of greasy hair. The skin on his face was pulled so tight that his skull seemed to show through the almost translucent skin. His gums were bleeding, his eyes bloodshot, and his body smelled of sickness.

Lexi had no idea what had happened to Leonosis, and she had not known him before her adventures with Tiberius began. She had seen him in the city, but always from a distance, and they had never spoken. Yet she was certain that something had taken over his mind. She wasn’t sure if was some type of sickness or if he was actually possessed by an evil spirit.

She didn’t even know that she believed in spirits. Growing up alone, she had overcome her fear of the supernatural at a young age. She had heard sermons from the priests of Addoni where angels and demons played a part in the lives of the people in their scriptures, but her concerns were surviving all alone on the streets of Avondale’s lower levels, not discerning the spirits of people long dead.

Still, there was something about Leonosis that made her feel afraid. Tiberius and Rafe had talked about Olyva’s father being an animated corpse, controlled by some sinister force. It had been hard for Lexi to imagine it when they explained their struggle in Hamill Keep, but now she understood all too well.

At first she’d been afraid that Leonosis wouldn’t believe her. After nearly running into him, she dropped to the ground, bowing before him. He could have struck her down, but when she looked up and asked for gold in return for betraying Tiberius, she saw that he believed her. Experience had taught her that having all the right answers wasn’t nearly as convincing as fulfilling people’s expectations of her. She was a young girl from the streets—poor, alone, and desperate for money. That’s what people thought of her, and when she played the part, she was utterly believable.

She moved at a brisk pace through the narrow streets and down alleys that were barely wide enough for one person to walk through without turning sideways. She stopped occasionally, looking back to ensure that she wasn’t getting too far ahead of Leonosis. He looked so ill she was amazed he was even able to stay on his feet, but otherwise he showed no signs of having trouble keeping up with her.

They were almost on the lowest level when she decided to make a run for it. She had gotten Leonosis away from the palace and given Tiberius the time he needed to help Olyva and the earl’s war band escape the city, but now she wanted out, too. She recognized an alley that had a hidden entrance, and she sped up.

“Slow down,” Leonosis ordered her, but she ignored him.

As soon as she turned the corner into the alley, she sprinted ahead, ducking into the hidden door, which was covered with fake stones so that it looked exactly like the walls of the alley. The door was held closed with a spring, so that all Lexi had to do was push on the right place and the door opened. She slipped inside and let the door close, then she ran through the darkened interior.

The owner of the building was not a criminal, but he had no love for the paladins and so allowed people to use the secret entrance to avoid trouble. Just inside the doorway was a long hall that led to a spiral staircase. Lexi hurried up the stairs, her heart pounding. She expected Leonosis to find the secret entrance at any moment and to come sprinting after her, but she reached the landing to the stairs without being followed.

She was now in a small room with a sturdy-looking door that led out to the street one level higher than the alley she had ducked into. Lexi threw open the door and ran out. She was barely out the door when the entire building suddenly collapsed behind her. The sound made her jump, but she didn’t scream. Years of living on the streets had taught her that screaming when she was frightened would give her position away. A huge cloud of dust and debris billowed up, and Lexi ducked into another alley. The walls of the alley were narrow, and the claustrophobic space dead-ended against the side of the mountain’s concave volcanic cone. Lexi went to the end, spread her arms and legs, bracing them on the stone sides of the two buildings, and shimmied her way up the next level of the city.

Getting to the upper level was not difficult, but on the main street of Avondale, things became much more complicated. There were soldiers everywhere—some were wounded, and others were simply desperate for a way out of the city. The smoke billowing from the center of the volcano’s cone was getting thicker and more ominous. Lexi hurried around the curving street, staying close to the buildings and out of the way of the soldiers. If any had attacked, she would have had to fight for her life, but they ignored her. Most were going the opposite way, and they didn’t give her a second glance.

The king’s soldiers knew of only one way out of the city, and that was the way they had come in. The city gates were closed and reinforced, but their mad king had managed to bring the wall down somehow. Unfortunately that part of the wall was on the far side of the city, but they were determined to get there anyway.

Lexi wanted to warn them, but she dared not speak. Her main concern was surviving, and she was a master of going unnoticed. The first rule of survival on the streets was to never attract attention, and she followed that rule until she came to the narrow corridor where the earl’s war band was making their escape.

She waited, deciding it might not be a good idea to try and squeeze into the narrow alley with the armed and armored soldiers. They might hurt her without meaning to, and even though she didn’t want to stay in Avondale any longer than she had to, she didn’t want to get hurt being hasty either. She stood waiting, watching the soldiers and glancing back at the roiling black smoke spewing from the mountain.

“Lexi!” Rafe shouted at her.

He was leading Earl Ageus and a group of the earl’s guards. Most of the earl’s war band had stepped aside to let the earl go on in front of them. He, for one, looked distressed to be fleeing, but Lexi knew the city was lost. Even if she hadn’t felt the tremors and seen the smoke rising from what had once been the lake at the center of the city, she trusted Olyva. Her noble-born friend had said the mountain would erupt, and Lexi believed it would.

“Come on!” Rafe shouted to her.

She dashed forward, and he placed one arm around her shoulders in a protective gesture that she appreciated. They hurried through the alley and then across the hole that Tiberius had fashioned in the wall. The strangely shaped tunnel was still hot, and Lexi knew that if she reached out and touched the stone, it would probably burn her. Only the thick soles of her boots kept her from the heat of the stone. Then they were outside. The air seemed more clear than inside the city, even though one glance up revealed the spreading darkness of the volcanic smoke.

“Where’s Olyva?” Lexi asked.

“She’s leading everyone down the mountain,” Rafe said. “Where’s Ti?”

Lexi saw the earl look back at her, wanting to hear her reply, and she wished she could say more, but she honestly didn’t know what Tiberius was doing or where he was. He might have left the city after making the tunnel in the wall, but Lexi doubted that. She guessed he was going after his brother, hoping to end things before they got worse.

“I don’t know,” Lexi said.

“Did you find the stone?” Rafe asked.

Lexi nodded. “But it has no power.”

“Is Ti in the city?”

“I think so,” she said, trying to keep the worry out of her voice but failing. “I think he’s going to face Leonosis.”

Chapter 42

Tiberius

As soon as he stepped out of the alley, he saw soldiers. Most looked terrified and were running for their lives, but Ti decided it was better not to take unnecessary chances. He stepped back into the alley and cast a spell.

“
Abdidi Incantatio
,” he said.

The cloaking spell fell over him, like the most delicate fabric covering him from head to toe. He stepped back out into the wide street and began searching for Lexi and for Leonosis. He found a staircase leading down to the second level and made his way quickly down the steps. He knew instinctively that Lexi would take Leonosis to the lower levels, where she was most familiar and where she would be able to slip away from him and escape, so he made his way down as quickly as possible.

When he saw Lexi, she was coming up a set of worn stone steps, hurrying. She didn’t see him, and as much as he wanted to call out to her, he knew that if he did, she wouldn’t leave his side. He watched her go, hoping he wasn’t making a huge mistake.

He had to go down two more levels before he saw his brother. Leonosis looked horrible, and there was blood seeping from a wound in his side. Leo’s finger was still jammed in the wound, but he seemed oblivious to it, and the realization that he was facing something other than his brother made him shudder. He couldn’t tell if Leonosis was dead or alive. He might have been like Olyva’s father in Hamill Keep, merely a puppet of some horrible power that was controlling his body, but at least the blood staining his clothes was red and not black the way Earl Marcus’ had been.

Tiberius let the cloaking spell fall away, and he saw Leonosis’ eyes snap onto him. Then a grin crossed his brother’s nightmarish face.

“Tiberius,” he said, his voice almost unnaturally high. “At last we meet.”

“Leo, tell me you’re still in there somewhere,” Tiberius said.

Leonosis laughed. They were in a small space where the narrow road opened up a little so that there was room all around them. Leonosis began to circle Tiberius, forcing Ti to turn in order to keep facing his brother.

“Oh, he’s still around. I need a plaything to keep me entertained. I get bored so easily.”

“Who am I dealing with?” Tiberius said.

“You shall know my name soon enough, wizard. The entire realm will know my name and tremble at the thought of it. But it shall not cross your filthy lips, not if you want to live.”

“You have no place here.”

“I have only just begun to carve a place for myself in your world, boy.”

“Leo, you have to fight. Don’t give in to this creature.”

Draggah laughed again. “You cannot fight me, child. Oh, your ilk have tried. But my power far exceeds your own paltry skills.”

“Why then do you search so frantically for the Balestone?”

Tiberius saw the desire flash in his brother’s eyes. Something he said carried weight with whatever creature had control of Leonosis. Now, he only needed to carefully lay the trap, so that the creature fell into it and Tiberius could get safely off the mountain.

“Why don’t we dispense with the games?” Leonosis said. “Give me the stone, and I will let you live.”

“No,” Tiberius said. “You leave my brother, and I’ll tell you where the stone is hidden.”

“Ah, a trade. How novel. You know, I don’t think I trust you.”

“You don’t have to trust me,” Tiberius said. “The proof is all around you.”

Tiberius saw Leonosis glancing around but trying not to be obvious about it. He was curious, and Ti only needed to coax the creature a little more to defeat him.

“I’ll tell you where the stone is, once you release my brother,” Tiberius said. “If you don’t believe me, or if I’m trying to trick you, I’m sure you’ll know it. Besides, he doesn’t look as if he’s holding up to your presence very well. If I’m lying, you can take me instead.”

The thought of being possessed by some foul spirit was terrifying to Tiberius. He had studied the scriptures in his training to be a paladin to know that when spirit beings took root in a person, they were hard to remove. The scriptures recorded that people possessed by spirits often had fits or tried to harm themselves. Some had supernatural strength or knowledge they couldn’t have possessed normally, but never were the possessions beneficial to the host.

“You make an interesting bargain,” said Leonosis. “I’m tempted. Not by your words, but because I feel the stone’s power. It calls to me, even now. The voices of those beings trapped by your forebears and sealed in the stone. They call to me.”

“So answer them,” Tiberius said. “I won’t try to stop you.”

“You would fail if you did.”

“So what do you have to lose?”

Tiberius let the question hang in the air. His body was tense; his desire to run for his life was almost overwhelming. Just being near the creature in control of his brother made Tiberius’ skin crawl, but this was what he’d returned for Avondale for. To confront the evil that was pulling the kingdom down around them, threatening to engulf everything that Tiberius loved. He couldn’t run now, couldn’t back down. He was so close to his goal, and all he had to do was keep his nerve.

“So be it,” Leonosis said.

Then he fell on the ground, his body shaking violently. Tiberius wanted to run to him, to help him somehow, but he didn’t dare. The demon was leaving the body, and Tiberius didn’t know if the exorcism might kill Leonosis, but it was a chance they had to take.

The afternoon sunlight was slowly being smothered by the smoke from the volcano, but Tiberius saw the spirit being when it finally released Leonosis. It was a dark and twisted creature, with what looked like flames clinging to various parts of what appeared to be a grotesquely deformed human body. Horns rose from the forehead and curved back over a scalp that looked blistered and scarred. The eyes were dark, just black holes in an otherwise featureless face, yet they seemed to stare into Tiberius’ soul. And when the demon spoke, his voice was so deep and powerful, it was almost like the sound of distant thunder.

“Where is the Balestone?” the demon demanded.

“I dropped it in the lake,” Tiberius said. “There.”

He pointed out across the terraced fields and the evergreen forest, toward the billowing smoke. The demon’s head tilted as it looked at Tiberius, as if it was trying to decide if Ti were telling the truth. He had revealed the bait; now he had to spring the trap and escape.

“I’ve heard the voices, too,” Tiberius said. “They hunger for power. Brutas found the stone and used it to bend the will of the earl’s war band to his own. He foolishly tried to harm me with it, but for some reason the stone was drawn to me. It took root in my flesh.”

Tiberius held up the back of his tunic and turned so that the demon could see the scar. Turning his back on the heinous creature was the most terrifying thing Tiberius had ever done. It made facing the pack of graypees to save Rafe seem like child’s play.

“It didn’t want to leave, so I had it cut out of me,” Tiberius said. “Then, I dropped it in the center of the lake. It seems the mountain doesn’t want it either.”

The demon looked doubtful, the eyes boring deep into Tiberius’. The urge to turn and flee was stronger in that moment than ever before, but he forced his body not to move. Keeping eye contact with the creature took all his strength and willpower, but Tiberius did it.

“You lie,” the demon hissed. “No one can give up such power.”

“The Balestone doesn’t give you power,” Ti replied. “Only madness. If you want it, go and get it … before it’s too late.”

The demon stared hard for another moment, then, with a swirl of ghostly smoke, it shot away, skimming above the ground and racing toward the volcano’s center. Tiberius felt weak and shaky, but he grabbed Leonosis, who was surprisingly light, and heaved him over one shoulder. Then, as fast as his legs could go, he hurried back toward the upper levels of the city.

The climb was difficult, and Tiberius was nearly at the end of his strength when he finally reached the top level of the city. Leonosis was still breathing, but his body was completely limp. Tiberius was pressing hard against the wound, which he could have healed easily if he wasn’t racing to escape the volcano. Tiberius had just found the alley and the tunnel through the wall he’d made, when the eruption occurred.

The sound of the explosion was like being pummeled by thunder. The ground shook hard, and Tiberius fell. Buildings all around the city collapsed, and one glance over his shoulder showed Tiberius that a huge wave of smoke and ash was racing out in every direction from the center of the volcano’s cone. It was shooting up the bowl-shaped mountaintop at such speed that Tiberius didn’t have time to think. He grabbed Leonosis and dragged him through the tunnel. As soon as Tiberius was out of the wall, he turned and moved as far away from the opening he’d made as possible. It only took the wave of ash and smoke a few seconds to reach the wall. The sound it made was like a raging winter storm. Tiberius dropped on top of Leonosis and shouted his spell.

“
Scuti Incantatio
!”

The magical shield covered him, sealing with the wall and the ground around his body. Then the ash fell. Tiberius could feel the heat, as if a blizzard of ashes had been dumped on him straight from the fire pit. The shielding spell kept them from being smothered by the ash, which was hot, but not enough to burn them. The entire mountaintop was engulfed in smoke. The ground shook hard, and Tiberius could hear the city buildings crashing as they fell. The wall beside them shook, and Tiberius was certain that it collapsed in places, but it held fast over him, protecting Ti and Leonosis from the worst of the eruption.

There was nothing to do but wait. So while the mountain shook and roared, spewing flames, smoke, and molten lava, Tiberius healed his brother’s wounds.

“
Sano Sarcio Acies Deprimo Abscido
,” Tiberius chanted.

The magic seemed unaffected by the volcano’s eruption and flowed freely around the young wizard. He focused his mind on his brother, pouring the healing power into the atrophied body. Soon, a hot pain flared into Tiberius’ side, mimicking the pain his brother was suffering. Tiberius’ breath caught in his lungs, and his body stiffened as he endured the
Corporeus Adfectus
, but the pain soon eased. There was no internal bleeding, no broken bones or burns, just severe malnourishment and dehydration.

Once the wound in Leonosis’ side was completely healed, Tiberius sat up. He pushed on the shield that was protecting them and expanded the bubble, but the weight of the hot ash was surprising. He couldn’t see anything through the thick gray powder that fell in large, fragile chunks. It was like being in a gray blizzard, and Tiberius knew that the only thing keeping them alive was the magical shield around them.

He sat down next to Leonosis, his back against the stone wall. The stone was warm, as if it had been sitting out in the summer sun all day. A wave of drowsiness came over Tiberius. He wanted to close his eyes and sleep, but he knew that if he did that, the shield spell would break, and the weight of the ash would smother them. He might be able to survive, but Leonosis was still unconscious; the chances that he could save his brother were slim if the shield failed. So Tiberius stayed awake, trying not to think about the fact that he didn’t have any food or water.

Instead, he thought about his friends. He was confident they made it out of the city, but he had no idea if they made it down the mountain or not. If the ash was falling on them the same way that it fell on the ruins of Avondale, they wouldn’t be able to keep moving. And if they stopped moving, they would die.