The Lodestone Trilogy (Limited Edition) (The Lodestone Series) (102 page)

Lyall wiped the smile from his face. “Nothing. I wouldn’t worry about it. Now, what’s all this about?”

Sounds of a full-blown altercation drifted towards them. Keris turned back, opened a fist and held out her hand to Lyall. “Do you know what this is?” Sitting in her palm was what appeared to be two halves of a flat, silver coloured ring.

Lyall picked up one half, examined it briefly and then put it back. “I’m sorry, no.”

Keris sighed. “I wondered whether they might date from after your time at the keep. They are known as ‘eavesdroppers’ or ‘eaves’. They are a type of lodestone listening device, based on the same principle as the Speaker Rings. The Keltar used to use them, although I haven’t seen one in many turns.”

“Where did you find it?” Rael asked.

Keris pointed to her feet. “Right here.” There was silence as both of them digested the implications. “I destroyed this one deliberately, so it should be safe to talk on this section of the Dais. However, I thought it best to set up a noisy distraction, just to be sure. I have counted eighteen more of these devices, set into the platform at regular intervals.”

Lyall stroked his chin. “Someone has been spying on us.”

“Correct,” she said.

Rael shook his head. “That doesn’t make any sense. Those things would have to have been installed before we got here. How did someone know we were coming?”

Keris looked thoughtful. “We made no effort to keep our destination a secret. They could have overheard our plans in Kieroth and then travelled here ahead of us.”

“But who are they?” Rael demanded. “Who would want to spy on us like this?”

“Now that may be a more interesting question than you realise.” Keris pressed her lips together. “Eaves were introduced as standard issue equipment for Keltar about twelve turns ago, but were withdrawn not long after. There were…problems.”

“How do you mean?” Lyall asked.

“The keep has a complex political structure. There are factions, power struggles, intense rivalries. There were a number of bloody incidents. Soon afterwards, the devices were outlawed.”

“They used them to spy on each other, didn’t they?” Lyall concluded.

“Yes,” Keris said. “But the intriguing question is, who would have access to forbidden devices?”

“If we know what and where they are, why can’t we just smash them all?” Rael suggested.

“I think that would be unwise. Right now we have an advantage in that our friend doesn’t know he has been discovered.” She held up one of the broken pieces between thumb and forefinger and stared at it, as if willing it to give up its secrets. “He may readily believe that one of his devices could have accidentally malfunctioned, but any more than that and he will grow suspicious. Destroying any more of them would tip our hand, and we would lose the advantage.”

“You’re assuming it’s one person.” Rael remarked.

“Missions like this one depend absolutely on concealment. The more people there are involved, the greater the chance of discovery. I would be most surprised if there are more than two operatives. One is much more likely.”

Lyall’s expression had become grave. “Anything said during our stay here would have been overheard.”

“We must assume so, yes.” Keris’ eyes narrowed. “There’s something you haven’t told me, isn’t there?”

“Rael believes he has discovered what it is about the instrument Annata concealed here that is so dangerous. I was intending to tell all of you later–when the trials were complete.”

Her voice was like the edge of her blade, “I would suggest that now might be a good time.”

Rael opened his mouth, but Lyall waved him to silence. “Suffice it to say that if anyone were to gain control of the four components, then no power would be able to stand before them.”

“Then our spy cannot be allowed to escape with that information.” Keris’ eyes became unfocussed. “Right now we have the element of surprise. We also have a window of opportunity. Whatever our friend is planning, he must wait until we have gained possession of the components. Our best option is to act quickly to forestall him.”

Lyall nodded. “A pre-emptive strike.”

“Precisely,” she said.

“But…where can he be?” Rael asked.

Keris turned slowly, taking in the starlit landscape of Akalon. All around were indistinct shapes and tenebrous shadows.
How can she possibly make anything out?
Suddenly, Keris pointed decisively. “There.” She was pointing directly at the tower that loomed over the brooding plains, occluding the stars behind it.

“Are you certain?” Lyall probed.

“Somewhere reasonably close by, yet offering total concealment. It’s the only possibility,” she declared. “He’s there.”

“The tower has been sealed since before the Goratha,” Rael pointed out. “There’s no way in.”

“Annata showed us how to gain access to the towers,” Keris said. “As for our friend, most likely he piloted one of your avionics to the open platform at the top. If we enter at ground level and go up through the floors, we should catch him unawares.”

Lyall nodded his assent. “Whom do you want to take with you?”

“Stealth and speed, those are the necessary qualities. That means the cloak and staff. Alondo and Patris are not trained in their use. I gather that the girl has given Rael here a couple of lessons, but he has nowhere near the skill and experience required to undertake a mission such as this. You have to undergo the trial shortly, so you cannot come. That leaves the girl and me.”

The corners of Rael’s mouth turned down. “She is still in a bad way after her experience. I don’t think…”

“You don’t think she will agree to come with me,” Keris finished.

“I wasn’t going to say that,” Rael maintained.

Keris raised a placating hand. “It’s all right. I know she has issues with me. I don’t pretend to understand it. I will go on my own if I have to, but the girl is quick and capable. We would stand a better chance working together.”

“I’ll have a word with her,” Lyall said.

Keris turned and led the way to the tents. “I’m going to gather my things. You will be required to undergo your trial soon, so we don’t have long. If all goes well, then we will dispose of the spy, you will become the last component carrier and we will finally be able to leave this dreadful place.”

~

Alondo sat with Rael and Patris on the flat metal surface of the Dais. Mostly full bowls of vegetable and grain stew lay scattered amid discarded utensils. Even hunger had fled from them.

Waiting. It was never something Alondo had been very good at. Whenever circumstances required sitting around and waiting for something to happen or someone to do something, Alondo was accustomed to filling the moments in between with a song or a story or an anecdote or two. Yet for once, his heart was empty.

Overhead, a magnificent procession of stars wheeled. Deep inside the dome of grey mist, Lyall was undergoing the final trial, being made to confront his worst nightmares. Far off at the tower, Keris and Shann were locked in battle with an unknown enemy. None of them could afford to lose.

“I suppose it no longer matters.” Alondo and Patris both looked up from their inner deliberations. Rael seemed taken aback by his own outburst. “Ah…what I mean is, I suppose it no longer matters if we discuss our experiences in there. We can no longer influence any of the results.” The other two men went back to staring at the floor. “Can I ask,” he pressed on, “did either of you encounter…another member of our expedition?”

Patris was tracing a pattern on the metal surface. “I’d rather not talk about it, if you don’t mind.”

“I did,” Alondo heard himself say.

“Whom did you see?” Rael asked.

Alondo felt as if he were allowing himself to be dragged over a precipice. “I saw Shann. And…I saw Oliah as well.”

“That must have been difficult,” Rael sympathised.

“Yes…yes it was. How about you?”

Rael swallowed. “I saw Shann too. But she was…different.”

“Different how?” Alondo queried.

Rael’s eyes fell and his face grew pale. “I don’t know. She was more…affectionate.”

Alondo raised an eyebrow. “Really. Was that how you got roughed up?”

“No, of course not.” The boy’s panicked expression melted as he caught the twinkle in Alondo’s eye. “Look, it was nothing like that. I saw her twice. The first time she was…well, friendly. The next…”

“The next, what?” Alondo pressed.

“The next she was…killed.”

Alondo’s throat constricted. “I’m sorry.”

The following days were clearly going to be painful for each of them. It was as if a dark hand had reached down and touched their soul to the very core. The emotional wounds were plain to see: in their speech, the way they walked, the way they sat, the way they avoided eye contact, the way they snatched glances when they thought the other was not looking.
Lyall is right.
We have to support each other, help each other to heal. It will take time, but–

There was a shout from beyond the tents where the drach were keeping watch. Alondo jumped to his feet, followed by the other two. Together they hurried over the Dais towards the sound. “Look. The tower,” one of them was saying. As they gazed out across the shadowy plain to the Tower of Akalon, they could see sparks cutting through the night air. A great silver globe was rising from the top of the tower. Blue lightning crackled all around it, lighting up the parapet.

Rael’s eyes were wide. His arms moved in agitated fashion. “The tower. It’s been activated.”

“What does that mean?” Patris demanded.

“It means,” Alondo said, “that either someone is arriving or someone is leaving.”

Patris turned to him. “But that wasn’t part of the plan.”

“No. No, it wasn’t.” Alondo felt a gathering sense of unease as he watched the fulgurant display.
What is going on over there?

<><><><><>

Chapter 38

Shann flew across the darkling plain in great leaps, keeping pace with the tall dark shadow that was Keris, making straight for the Tower of Akalon. Cold anger sat in the pit of her stomach like a coiled serpent.

When Lyall had first entered her tent earlier that evening, she had felt like telling him to get out. She wanted to rail at him, to pour forth her bitterness over Keris. Instead, she turned her face away and nursed her pain in silence.
You will uncover a truth you would prefer not to have known.

Lyall sat watching her back. It was as if he was communing with her in the silence. A silence that said, ‘I feel your pain. I am here’. At length, she turned back to face him. His soft blue eyes were reminders of the trust they had built between them. She felt a calm come over her.

“We need your help, if you are well enough,” he began.

She sat up and rubbed her puffy eyes. “What do you need me to do?”

For once, his eyes could not meet hers. He looked more nervous than she had ever seen him. There was a problem that had to be taken care of–a problem that could threaten them all. Keris had agreed to handle it. She had asked for Shann to go along with her.

“You do not have to do this, Shann. If you refuse, no-one will think any less of you.”

As she listened to his appeal, Shann had a curious sensation. It was as if she was looking at herself from outside.
A pathetic, crying wreck–that’s what she has reduced me to. What are you going to do, Shann? Are you going to give up–to just lie here and die? Are you going to acknowledge that you are powerless and that she has won? Are you just going to let her get away with destroying your parents and now you? Or are you going to get up and fight back?

Shann rubbed her face again, got up and hastily rearranged her clothing. “I will go.”

As the tower grew in her vision, it mirrored her growing sense of foreboding. At its top sat a creature that had been listening to their deliberations and now knew the terrible secret of Annata’s instrument. After the drach had set them on the ground below the Dais and promised to wait for their return, Keris had explained fully to Shann the reasons for Lyall’s request and the dire threat that now faced them. The spy, whoever he was, could not be allowed to escape with that information. Shann nodded gravely, accepting the weight of the responsibility now on her shoulders. In spite of her desire for justice, she was not about to let the others down. Her personal agenda and the other woman’s moment of reckoning would have to wait until their enemy had been dealt with and Keris had fulfilled her role as controller of one of the four components. Only then…