Sword of Dreams (The Reforged Trilogy) (42 page)

"Sleep," Maeve sang again, sternly this time.

The image of Tamlin and the great white Waygate faded back into blank whiteness. Duaal's eyes – the eyes that were not his own – turned to the Mirran in red who crouched in the shadows of the tumbled rocks and dirt from the broken wall.

"We're getting closer. Can you give her more White yet, Hallax? I'm eager to have this done and send her to the pit."

Duaal knew that voice. Gavriel! He wanted to close his eyes, but he was a prisoner in his old master's body.

This isn't real. This can't be real! It's just a dream, a hallucination… It can't be real. I'm just… mixing memories and fears…

Hallax grabbed a handful of Maeve's black hair and examined her glazed eyes. "Not yet," he said. "She needs another hour or two, Lord Gavriel, or it could kill her."

Duaal felt his head tilt in a short nod. "Fine. Go get Xartasia. I need her to help Maeve… focus."

Hallax rose and bowed deeply, then vanished from the room. Gavriel steepled his fingers and peered through them at Maeve. The fairy's head wobbled on her neck and she could not seem to meet Gavriel's gaze.

"You are so close now, sweet princess," Gavriel said softly, comfortingly. "You crafted your own weaknesses, and now you have broken yourself. You will give me the Devourers."

The Devourers? Duaal could not recoil from Gavriel's fantasies of blood and death: Axis in ashes, proud Prian hearts torn from their bodies, dark Zeos consumed by bright fire. Duaal strained without direction, struggling to wake himself from the nightmare.

Duaal opened his eyes and groaned. He was on the ground with his head pillowed in Xia's lap. There was dirt all over his pants. Duaal groaned again.

Everyone gathered around, worry and curiosity on their faces. Ava started to say something to Kemmer, who put his fingers to his lips in an uncharacteristic display of sensitivity to Duaal's aching skull.

"Back off, everyone," Tiberius said.

"Is he all right?" Phillip asked. "What happened, Duaal?"

"We'll let you know when we figure it out," Xia said firmly. "Thank you for the concern."

"Back to work, everyone," Xen called. He clapped his hands together. "Come on!"

Grumbling, the archeologists scattered and turned back toward the Waygate. Panna looked to Xen, who glanced down at the half-assembled spear on the table and twitched his antennae, but said nothing. He followed the rest of the team back to work.

"Does it hurt?" Tiberius asked Duaal.

"Yeah." He sat up slowly, rubbing his head. "I had another one of those hallucinations. I saw Gavriel and Maeve."

"What the hells is wrong with him, Xia?" Tiberius asked in a tight voice.

"I don't know!" she replied. She clenched her silver hands in frustration. "I've run every test, every scan I can think of. There're no tumors, no bleeding, no pressure and no imbalances. There's nothing wrong!"

"It could be Prianus," Coldhand said. He had been so quiet that Duaal had almost forgotten that the bounty hunter was there. "There are things in the air found nowhere else in the core."

"Environmental regulations on Prianus aren't as strict as on other Alliance planets," Tiberius admitted. "But no. This started before we came here."

"But it
did
get worse on Prianus," Xia pointed out. "Maybe some toxin or pollutant is aggravating the problem."

"There does seem to be one common element to these headaches," Panna said slowly. She had perched on the corner of the worktable. "Gavriel. Before, you said that you haven't had headaches like this since you were with him, right?"

Duaal nodded. "You have a theory, don't you?"

"Let's hear it, then," said Tiberius.

Panna thought for a long moment before answering. "There's another theory of quantum physics that I've been studying in relation to Arcadian magic. It's called quantum entanglement."

"Another science lecture? My head hurts enough already," Duaal grumbled. Still, he was curious.

"I'll keep it short. Quantum entanglement says that particles can be linked, connected even across vast distances. If one particle changes its spin, the other one will, too," Panna explained. "Now, this is just a guess, but I think that's what was done to your brain, Duaal."

"How? And why?" asked Xia.

"I think that's how Gavriel used Duaal for his magic. It wouldn't be enough just to tell him what to say. The
exact
thoughts and memories are too important to the magic. So Xartasia quantum-linked your brains, like networking two computers. I can't imagine how complex that must have been." Panna held up her hands. "There's no way to check, though. It's just a theory."

Coldhand gave Duaal a piercing look. "You said you saw Gavriel and Maeve."

"Sort of," Duaal told him hesitantly and shuddered. "I didn't actually see Gavriel. I heard him and felt him, but it was like I was inside of him."

"If your mind was entangled… networked… with Gavriel's, the link may still be intact," the hunter said.

Panna snapped her fingers and jumped down from the table. "These headaches started not long after Stray, after Gavriel took that baby. That was to restore the magic he lost, right?" she said excitedly. "Even though you took Baliend back, he must have succeeded."

"So he's out casting spells again?" Tiberius asked. His jaw clenched. "Why's it hurting Duaal?"

"A part of their brains are quantum-linked, the part responsible for spell casting. The connection is probably only sparked when Gavriel uses that part of his mind," Panna said. "He must be using more magic now."

"For what?" Xia asked.

"Hurting Maeve." Coldhand's tone was icy and intense. "These things aren't hallucinations. He's actually seeing Maeve through Gavriel's eyes."

"I think so," said Panna, surprised. "Yes. Yes, if I'm right."

The bounty hunter turned his pale blue eyes on Duaal. "Tell us exactly what you saw. Every detail."

________

Xartasia stood on the roof. The city of Pylos was quiet under a soft blanket of white snow. Or so it seemed from on high. Pillars of gray-brown smoke rose from chimneys and filled the air with a murky haze. The princess wrinkled her nose as the wind changed and carried the smell of burning to her.

There were sounds on the wind, too. Rough voices and the grinding of vehicle engines… But Xartasia could not hear Maeve. The knowledge of what must be happening to her cousin weighed heavily on the princess. She did not want the girl to suffer, but Maeve was far too strong and stubborn to give in easily.

So I betrayed her. I told Gavriel of her past with these coreworld drugs, her weakness to them.

It was not truly a betrayal, Xartasia told herself. Even Maeve's strength had its limits. The pain and deprivation would have broken her eventually. All Xartasia did was speed the process and save Maeve from days of torment.

Xartasia lifted her chin and took a deep breath. The chill scraped her throat. They were close now. So soon, none of this would matter. The wind whipped her long hair out like spilled ink. An equally dark shadow fell across her. Xartasia smelled old blood and sour-sweet Vanora White.

"Lord Gavriel's summoned you," Hallax said.

Xartasia nodded without looking, but the towering Mirran did not leave.

"Now, Xartasia," he told her. "He wants you to help him with Maeve."

Xartasia did not look up. She studied the long, scree-strewn slope below, ice-cowled Pylos beyond. "He wishes more of me?" she murmured to herself. "When I have given to him my own cousin and the means to ruin her? What more must I give?"

Titania stood in the filth and flickering shadows of Axis' lower levels. She was tired of metal under her feet. She missed the feel of grass and soil, but Titania had gone down as far as she could through the megatropolis of the Alliance's capital and still found only older, darker and more desolate levels. Here, only one in four lights glowed. Even then, the yellow-green illumination was fitful.

Gavriel stood on an overturned crate with his hands raised. He was dressed all in black, in something that looked like it had once been a suit, but which was now so soiled and torn and rumpled that it hung from his body in rags. The human may have looked respectable once, perhaps even had
been
respectable. Not unlike Titania herself, she supposed.

She had heard Gavriel's name and even his voice several times in Axis' lower levels. A few Arcadians gathered around his feet, listening raptly as he praised death, an end to all pain. Dirty wings and dirty faces all turned up as they basked in his promise. Titania waited, watching and listening. He gave them something, a hope that Titania alone could not.

I need him.

Gavriel finished his speech and stepped down from the dais of trash. Titania stepped out from the shadowed doorway. There were some humans following Gavriel, too. They eyed the princess suspiciously as she approached, but the Arcadians caught sight of Titania's black hair and fell to their knees. Gavriel smiled welcomingly.

"Good evening, sister," he greeted Titania.

She hesitated. Was this a good idea? "I am Xartasia," she said at last. "I am a daughter of Cavain. You have offered kindness to my people."

"The Arcadians are a tormented race." Gavriel glanced around at the genuflecting fairies, taking in their reactions and then returning his attention to the princess. "I offer them what I can."

"You have greater designs than this," Xartasia said, warming to her subject. She gestured around the filthy walls of Axis' lower levels. "Greater ambitions. I hear your words, that you desire to spread your faith and your… gift."

"I do." The hunger, the passion in Gavriel's voice was unmistakable.

"I can help you. I can teach you magic, secrets unknown to the coreworld races." All around her, the Arcadians gasped. Xartasia held up her hand, quieting them. "But I am of the House of Cavain. There is etiquette to be observed. You are a leader among your people, but I am a monarch of mine."

"Go on," Gavriel said slowly. He was a younger man then, and not so secure in his power.

"With my magic, you will wield lightning and fire and command the very bodies of those who gather to you," Xartasia told him. "Or those who… who stand against you. But first, you must pay your homages to the line of Cavain. For one Arcadian year – two hundred eighty-eight days – you must show me favor."

"Favor?"

"You will serve me, as I am due. There are places I must go, things that I need to see. You will do these things for me, and then I will teach you."

Gavriel narrowed his eyes at Xartasia. "That's a high price."

"Yes. But I know secrets that no other Arcadian or Jinn or Nnyth know. I will make you the most powerful man in the galaxy. Only give me my year of service."

"I'll think about it," Gavriel said.

He did not have to think about it long. But that year of service was decades over. Xartasia had what she wanted, had learned what she needed to. Now… now Gavriel required things and she had to give them.

"Lord Gavriel will tell you what he wants," Hallax said flatly. "And you'll do it."

Xartasia finally turned to face the Emberguard. "Very well. Take me to him."

________

Deep in the Kayton Mountains, the Waygate's glow rippled and churned.

Panna examined the map of Pylos, downloaded with some difficulty from the city mainstream and displayed on a datadex. She leaned over it with a stylus in her trembling fingers. Logan paced beside the table.

"The dirt in the room doesn't narrow it down very much," she said. "There are all sorts of buildings in Pylos that have collapsed walls. The entire city is built in a valley between tectonically unstable mountains!"

"We could probably get a list of dangerous and condemned structures from the police, but there are going to be a lot of them," Xia noted. "What else did you see, Duaal?"

The young mage chewed his lower lip as he thought. "There was a counter on the right wall, with a hole like there used to be a sink. I think it was an apartment."

All eyes went back to the map. It was several years out of date, according to the file's timestamp, and took no account of the recent quakes.

"There are millions of people living in Pylos," Gripper despaired. "Look at all the houses!"

"But it was dark and full of dirt," Duaal pointed out. "I don't think anyone is living there anymore, except for the Nihilists."

"For how long?" Xia asked him, tapping the datadex. Districts, neighborhoods and buildings were marked out in different colors, with residential areas shaded in blue. "Maybe, if the apartments have been unlivable for a while, they're one of these condemned sections. How long do you think it's been since the apartment's been habitable?"