Prince of Magic (10 page)

How had Ariana moved so far away in the short time they'd been separated? Sian threw wizard's light in all directions, searching for the woman. No, searching for the scream. It had been a horrible scream, filled with terror and pain. He hated screams almost as much as he hated tears, not that he'd had occasion to hear many of them.

Finally,
finally
, he saw an arm move into the light he created.

Above, the doorway to this hell opened, and a concerned guard asked, "Is everything all right down there?"

All right. The man was a moron. Nothing was all right, nor would it ever be again. As Sian was about to order the moron to descend and assist, he caught sight of Ariana's face. Thank the gods and goddesses, she was unhurt. In fact, she smiled strangely. Her eyes darted upward, and she whispered, "Tell them to go away."

The woman before him sounded well enough. She sounded very calm, in fact. The problem was, that wasn't Ariana Varden's voice. Not precisely.

The answers they had come here to seek might be right before him. "Everything is fine," he snapped to the guard. "Close the doorway."

The man above obeyed, and Sian stepped toward Ariana… or whoever this woman might be. The smile and the voice were female enough, so he felt safe in assuming whatever was inside Ariana was female.

He saw no need to play games. "I am Sian Sayre Chamblyn, enchanter and tutor to the woman you possess. And you are?"

She walked toward him slowly, not at all afraid. "Once I was empress. My loving husband tossed me down here just because I tried to have him killed. Now I am almost nothing, but not yet nothing. I am pain and sorrow and desperation. I am lost."

"The empresses who were believed to be dead were released at the end of the War of the Beckyts," Sian argued. "Who are you, truly?"

Her mouth, Ariana's mouth, thinned and hardened. "All but
one
was released. All but
one
was rescued. I remained. A piece of me still remains."

"Your name?" There was power in a name, and he might yet need power over this thing before him.

"I was called Diella, for a time."

"What do you want with the woman you possess, Diella?"

The eyes closed, the lips parted sensually. "I want to live again. I want to feel something good. Something… fine and right. I want to experience something besides pain and horror and craving."

"Your time is past." For Ariana's well-being, he should order this ghost, if that's what it was, from her body. But there was more at stake than one woman's well-being, and he could not forget that fact. "I will allow you to remain in that body for a few minutes longer, if you will tell me what I need to know."

"You will
allow
?" she laughed, and there was too much confidence in the laughter. This former empress called herself a piece of something lost, but she still had power. Power, in this dark place.

Sian lifted his hand and whispered a word. Ariana's body froze. Perhaps he could not command the spirit away, but he did have control of the physical.

Even though she was frozen, he saw the anger on Ariana's face. On the Empress Diella's face.

"Yes," Sian said calmly. "I will
allow
." After a few moments, which he knew to be uncomfortable if the woman who had use of Ariana's body experienced physical sensation, Sian released her. She no longer smiled quite so widely.

"What do you want to know?" she asked, her voice throatier than Ariana's, older and angrier.

"Something evil has escaped from this place. What is it?"

Again Diella smiled, stepping forward. By the wizard's light, her face seemed not as pretty as Ariana's, and still… she was Ariana. Ariana and not. Good and evil. Lost and yet to be lost.

"If you do as I request, I will tell you."

He had no intention of giving this creature anything, but he asked, "What do you require?"

She approached him bravely, unafraid and obviously happy to be in possession of Ariana's body. "I want a kiss."

Sian had expected almost anything, but the request surprised him. "A kiss? Why?"

Ariana—the creature Diella who had possession of Ariana's body—all but leaned against him. Her breasts brushed his chest. Her breath, warm and human, touched him. "When I lived, when I was here, I had the use of many men who serviced me as I required. The drug Panwyr causes a mighty surge of need which no man can truly satisfy, but they did try. With their inadequate cocks and their tongues and their fumbling hands, they gave me what I demanded of them. Sometimes I returned the favor when they had such a need. Sometimes I did not." Her voice turned cold. "Sometimes I killed them with my bare hands. More than once I killed for a dose of the drug I came to love better than any man. I would kill for it now, if I had the chance. Does that surprise you, that a woman has the ability to do such a thing?"

"No."

"Good. You should never underestimate the power of a woman. This one is strong, but…"

"But what?" Sian snapped.

Diella closed her eyes and took a long, deep breath that made her breasts swell. "I smell death on her. I smell the promise of the land I have not yet been allowed to pass into. Do you think it will be beautiful there?"

Not for you, I imagine
. "I don't know."

"Neither do I," she whispered. "Sometimes I long for that passage, but at other times I am afraid. I know not what awaits me there. Ah, I've been sidetracked. My kiss. You wonder why, when I have possession of this body and information that you require, I ask for something so insignificant as a kiss."

"Yes."

She rose up on her toes and whispered, "I want to feel again. I'm not talking about the meeting of two bodies. I'm not talking about sweat and invasion and release. Animals mate. Men have been known to take what they want with no consideration for the woman who lies beneath them. But a kiss is special. It's sensation and affection and promise and… and life, all in the meeting of two mouths."

"I have no affection for you," Sian said coldly.

"No, but you do have some affection for this body." She leaned in and whispered. "I saw you watch her. You want her. She wants you, too. I know, because even though I am at the surface at this moment, she is not gone. She's very much here, and I can access the deepest reaches of her mind. Not all, not everywhere, but I can touch much of this woman and I know you make her tremble deep inside. I know she wonders what it would be like if you were lovers, if you came to her bed at night and made her scream. Not the way I made her scream, you understand, but—"

"Do not lie to me, demon woman. Ariana is a demure maiden who would not think of—"

The woman began to laugh before he could finish. "Demure maiden? I thought you knew her, but apparently you do not. She is no maiden, I assure you, and deep down she occasionally thinks of taking a lover to satisfy her womanly needs. In the back of her cluttered mind, she believes that you would do quite nicely."

He did not intend to stand here and discuss Ariana with this thing that had taken control of her body. "Tell me what I want to know."

"Kiss first," she said, and then she grabbed his shirt front and dragged him down, placing her mouth on his and taking the kiss she demanded.

Sian did his best to remain distant and unaffected.

This was simply the price he had to pay for the information he needed. But it was not so easy to remain detached. The creature before him smelled like Ariana. She tasted like Ariana. The body that molded to his was Ariana's. The hand that very boldly grabbed him where a demure maiden would not was Ariana's. Against his wishes, he grew to fill that hand. Still kissing, she laughed, and she squeezed lightly.

He pulled away, and she didn't seem to mind. The kiss was over. "You're going to send her off to die without even a proper bedding. Not very generous of you, enchanter."

He did not want to hurt Ariana, but this creature before him was not his student. She was not the firstborn Fyne child. She was one of the monsters Ariana had been chosen to fight. Sian grabbed her by the throat and held on tight. "Your price has been paid, so speak. What happened here?"

As if immune to the power of his hands, the creature smiled. "The Isen Demon happened here. It was bom from a seed left dormant long ago. It grew strong here. The demon you seek is a stealer of souls and feeds from the dead, a creature from which other creatures hide once it grows as strong as this one."

"How can it be stopped?"

With his hand on her throat constricting her, the empress answered, "It cannot be stopped, enchanter. With every soul that's taken, the Isen Demon becomes stronger. It grows stronger and darker and hungrier with every passing day. You can't stop it. She certainly can't stop it. Perhaps you can make it hurt for a while if you take away the Panwyr, but the demon will find a way to possess what it needs. Souls and the drug that gives it life." Her smile grew wide. "I'm glad I'm already dead. What's to come isn't going to be pleasant." She closed her eyes and took another deep breath, a breath which was ragged, thanks to his grip. "I smell the Land of the Dead on her, but not on you. You'll get to see it all, enchanter. You'll live a long time, as wizards often do, and you'll get to watch everything that matters to you crumble and die."

Sian's hand was on her throat, and she couldn't breathe. She couldn't breathe! Ariana reached out to slap at the man who held her. What had happened? One minute she'd sensed a darkness surrounding her, and then… this.

He didn't seem inclined to let her go. Ariana grabbed his sleeve. Beneath that sleeve was muscle hard as stone, firm and warm and strong. Much stronger than she. He was right; she was not made for fighting.

She lifted her face and looked into his eyes. The wizard's light was a pale, gentle purple, but his eyes were dark and rich. They were enchanter eyes, and even in the dim light she could see the shift of color. Those eyes looked like a vast, deep ocean she could very easily fall into, and they were filled with life and power and pain. She had not seen the pain before, but when their eyes locked, she saw more of her new teacher than she had seen before.

He was not so cold as he pretended to be.

He flinched, and with suddenness he released his hold on her. "Ariana," he said. "You're back."

"I didn't go anywhere," she responded, lifting a soothing hand to her throat.

"Yes, you did," he snapped. "Why on earth didn't you tell me that you're an empath?"

"It's part of the healing. I assumed you'd know—"

"Not all healers are empaths," he interrupted. "Someone with your sensibilities should steer clear of dark places like this one, and you should've known that. You're much too open to influences of all kinds."

Influences like the darkness she had felt. "So I was—"

"Possessed," Sian said sharply. "Yes."

It was frightening to realize not only that another spirit had been in control of her body but that she didn't remember a single moment of the encounter. Ariana was so very grateful that Sian had been here, and that he'd realized she was not herself.

"Did you learn anything?" she asked.

"I'll tell you all about it later." Sian shouted for the guards who waited above, and demanded that the rope be lowered. He then insisted that she climb up first, and she did not argue. She wanted out of this place. She wanted never to see—or feel—Level Thirteen again.

Climbing the rope wasn't as easy as descending it had been, but Ariana managed. Anything to escape Level Thirteen. It was difficult to believe that Aunt Isadora had spent
days
in this place. When she reached the top, the guards assisted her. When she glanced down, Sian—who moved much more quickly than she—was already halfway up the rope. He moved with assurance and anger, as anxious to escape as she had been.

She knew Sian was here only to prepare her for what was to come. He could be a soldier if he so wished, but he had told her with certainty that he would not fight with her when the time came. It was her calling to fight this war, not his.

Sian needed no assistance to bound from the hole in the floor. There was a touch of magic in the way he left Level Thirteen, almost as if he flew—a short distance and just for a moment.

He took her arm and together they walked toward the stairwell. Why did an enchanter have need of such strength? The man had muscles like the finest sentinel. Muscles he hid beneath a loose-fitting shirt. Muscles he had used to grip her throat—which was still sore from his tight hold. Of course, she did understand that at the time he had not been gripping
her
.

"Well?" she asked as they entered the stairwell and left the guards—and Level Twelve—behind. "What did you learn?"

He moved too quickly, all but dragging her up the stairs. "We're in trouble."

Ariana had insisted on ministering to the emperor before Sian informed the man of his discoveries. Emperor Arik, seated by the window and visibly frail, was taken aback by Ariana's unusual state of dress. Sick as he was, and old enough to be her father, Arik eventually smiled weakly and simply watched her. Ariana herself seemed oblivious to the way the emperor's eyes studied her, not as a patient, but as a man.

The demon below had shared Ariana's mind for a few moments. It was possible that she'd lied—those who embraced darkness were not wedded to the truth, after all—but it was also possible that she'd been telling the truth. Could it be that Ariana was no innocent maid? Was there more between her and the emperor than the healing Arik so desperately needed? Not now, certainly, when he was so ill, but in the past, perhaps?

Her hands did not seem hesitant to touch her patient, even though Arik was emperor, a man of the greatest authority. She smiled at him now and then, and the smile seemed kind enough—and also familiar, as if she considered him a friend.

Not that he cared, of course. Ariana was his student in the arena of magic. His job was to prepare her to march to her death. Her sexual liaisons past and future were of no concern to him. So, why did the very idea of her lying with this old man incense him?