War of Shadows (53 page)

“Not if something doesn’t change soon. Our mages are weakening, and Quintrel has the
divi
to draw from. All Quintrel has to do is outlast them, and he wins,” Blaine replied.

Quintrel’s magic punched through the mages’ protective
warding again, cutting down the soldiers in the front lines and slamming into Tormod’s shielding so hard it knocked him from his saddle and felled his horse. The Knights of Esthrane rushed forward to meet the onslaught, along with Gav and what remained of his mages. But Gav’s contingent had taken losses, and even the Knights of Esthrane were showing the strain. Tormod was pale and haggard, as if the level of magic on which he drew was pulling from his own life energy.

Without warning, a streak of green fire flared behind Quintrel, looping and curling like a serpent around his body, snatching at the orb on the strap around his neck. An instant later, an arc of blue light struck Quintrel, too bright to look at for more than an instant.

“Look!” Kestel pointed. Two battered and bloodied figures had crawled from the ruins of the redoubt behind Quintrel. One held a bone as an athame, sending the blue flame against Quintrel, while the other loosed the green-flame serpent from a relic clutched in her hand.

Sweet Esthrane!
Blaine thought.
One of those mages is Carensa
. “Give me your amulet,” Blaine said, his gaze fixed on Quintrel. “If I hit Quintrel while he’s weak, I might be able to take him.”

“Or we’ll roast like chestnuts,” Kestel replied. “Let you charge him alone? Forget it! We go together.”

Quintrel’s power wavered, and Blaine saw his chance. “Now!” he said. He and Kestel took off running.

Quintrel howled in anger, and wheeled to strike at the mages who had betrayed him. He made a slashing movement, and the mage with the bone athame screamed as deep gashes opened up his body from shoulder to hip.

Just like he did to Carr
, Blaine thought, intent on reaching the redoubt before Quintrel could react, praying to the gods for a miracle, that their two amulets might break Quintrel’s power
long enough for Tormod to finish the fight.
Even if it kills me and takes the magic with me to the Sea of Souls
.

Quintrel snapped his left hand toward Carensa, and the
divi
orb flared. Carensa did not lower her arm, and the serpentine power continued to strike at Quintrel, but smokelike wisps began to unravel from her form, pulled toward the power of the
divi
orb, and the orb pulsed brighter with every bit of smoke that entered it, while the green-fire snake dimmed with every breath. The
divi
orb absorbed the smoke wisps, drawing more and more of them from around Carensa and swallowing the smoke into the orb.

Carensa staggered, clearly damaged by the loss of whatever energy was being drained from her, but she never let the green fire waver, and her gaze was fixed on Quintrel with a look of pure hatred. Then her whole body trembled, ashen as a corpse, and as Quintrel’s orb swallowed the last of the smoke wisps, the green serpent light flickered and died. Carensa fell to the ground and did not move again.

Blaine ran for Quintrel, sword in hand. At the last second, Quintrel turned and slashed with his hand, meaning to strike with the same invisible claws that he had used against Carensa. The deflection amulet held, and Blaine felt the power of the attack slide away without damage, though his head ached and pounded.

Quintrel held up the
divi
orb, and Blaine felt its power straining the amulet’s protection, then sliding away before it could drain his soul as it had Carensa’s. From the look on her face, he was certain Kestel felt the attack against her null amulet, but she kept moving forward as if buffeted by a headwind.

Blaine came at Quintrel with a sword in one hand and a knife in the other. Quintrel dodged at the last second, so the strike meant to cleave shoulder to hip only managed to sever
Quintrel’s right arm. Kestel tackled the mage from behind, jamming the null amulet against Quintrel’s back as she grabbed the leather thong of the
divi
orb and used it as a garrotte.

Our amulets were never meant to take on a
divi, Blaine thought.
But if they can buy us just a few seconds more, we might destroy him—or damage him enough that Tormod and the others can finish the job
.

Quintrel bucked against Kestel’s grip on his throat as Blaine buried his knife in the mage’s heart.

“Go to Raka,” Blaine growled. “Torven take your soul.” He twisted the blade, then yanked it free.

Blood bubbled at Quintrel’s mouth, and his body convulsed. Quintrel struggled to mouth a curse, but all that came was a wheezing gasp. In one savage sweep, Blaine severed Quintrel’s head from his body. “That’s for Carr and Carensa,” he muttered.

The small orb burst into fragments, but the larger orb began to flicker wildly.

“We’ve got trouble,” Kestel said, grabbing Blaine and rolling with him over the lip of the redoubt as the large orb flared searingly bright, then exploded into a rain of glass, and the spirit of the
divi
burst forth.

Blaine clawed his way to the top of the embankment and stared at the fire-red spirit, but it was too bright to see clearly, save for the indelible impression of grasping tendrils and an open, hungry maw.

The Knights of Esthrane joined forces with Tormod’s magic. So did Gav, the last of the regular mages still standing. Together, they sent a single, massive lance of power that struck the
divi
in its core. Silvery light suffused the
divi
’s form, driving out the crimson fire, and behind the trapped spirit, Blaine swore he saw a rift in the darkness that was blacker than the night.

Pain lanced through Blaine’s head, threatening to black him out as the massive outpouring of magic overwhelmed the protections of his deflecting amulet. Even the support of the
kruvgaldur
and Kestel’s null amulet seemed tenuous, strained by the maelstrom of power. Blaine clung to consciousness, watching through slitted eyes as blinding silver light pushed the
divi
back into the unnatural darkness.

Perhaps because he was so near to death himself, Blaine saw the ghost mist rise from Quintrel’s corpse, struggling to uncoil itself from his body, twisting free only to be pulled into the
divi
’s grasp. Blaine heard a scream of utter terror, an earsplitting shriek from the
divi
that rent the night, and then both the
divi
and the rift were gone.

Blaine dragged himself over the edge of the embankment and crawled to where the two renegade mages lay. One was a man he did not recognize. Carensa’s body lay next to the dead mage. Blaine turned her over gently, calling her name. Deep, bloody slashes savaged her chest and belly. Her skin was gray and she looked as drawn and gaunt as if she had been fasting, drained of her life by the
divi
. Carensa’s head lolled and her eyes were wide and staring.

“Thank you,” Blaine murmured to Carensa and the other mage as Kestel moved up beside him. The world reeled around Blaine. Blaine’s heart pounded erratically and his head felt ready to explode. Even his
kruvgaldur
bond could not sustain him any longer. Exhausted, grief-stricken, and utterly spent, Blaine fell face forward onto the ground, giving himself up to the darkness.

S
IX DAYS AFTER THE VICTORY AGAINST QUINTREL
and the warlords, thanks to the healers and Penhallow, Blaine was ready to fight another kind of battle. The new Lords of the Blood gathered at Mirdalur for one more attempt to anchor the magic securely. Now, after all the preparation, it was finally time.

“Before you enter, the working demands blood.” Blaine looked up to see Dagur holding a silver chalice and a boline knife. Rikard stood beside him, the sigil-carved wood held in his grip.

Blaine slid back the sleeve of his shirt, baring his left forearm. “Take it,” he said.

Dagur drew the ritual knife across Blaine’s skin, scoring deep enough to raise a thin stream of blood. He harvested it carefully into the chalice, and one by one the others offered an arm for the bloodletting.

When each of the thirteen had been bled, Dagur and Rikard moved to the opening of the labyrinth. Dagur murmured something, and runes appeared in the stone walkway, marking the first step of the maze.

Rikard held the sigil-carved wood over the marked stone. Dagur raised the chalice to each of the four quarters in turn, and then poured out the blood over the sigils. His chant grew louder as the blood spilled over the carved wood, and there was a rush of power, spreading from the first stepping-stone all along the pathway of the labyrinth as power called to power.

When the cup was dry, Rikard fit the carved wooden piece into a depression beside the opening to the labyrinth. He was bloody to the wrists, and the floor was stained crimson.

“Enter,” Rikard said to the thirteen. “Carry the mingled blood on the soles of your feet. The chamber is ready for the ritual.”

As Blaine and his companions wound their way into the labyrinth, Nidhud, Dagur, and the other mages began to chant. The chant was mellifluous, with a second and then a third group of chanters joining in the repetitive phrases like a round until the chamber seemed to swell with plainchant.

Blaine felt the magic rising with the chant, winding around them as they coiled their way into the heart of the labyrinth. The crystals, which had pulsed lazily before, now glowed brightly with amber light. Perhaps it was a trick of the torchlight, but to Blaine’s eyes, the crystals seemed to be pulsing along with the chant.

The obsidian disk hung on a strap around Blaine’s neck, over his heart. It had been cold to the touch when Blaine entered the labyrinth, but it grew warmer the farther along the path he went. Now the disk felt fevered, warmer than Blaine’s skin, and the runes and markings etched into its glossy surface were pulsing with a golden glow from deep inside.

The last time Blaine had worked the ritual at Mirdalur, he had been alone inside the maze. Then, it felt as if the labyrinth was fighting him at every step, turning its magic against him. Perhaps it had been, trying to protect him from what was to
come, from nearly being killed by magic too wild to be completely bound.

This time, among twelve compatriots, the magic of the labyrinth felt completely different. Instead of fighting him, the magic drew him forward, quickening his step so that if he had not been mindful of it, he might have ended up running. From the looks on the faces of his companions, Blaine was certain that at least a few of them could feel the pull of the magic themselves.

Of those he had chosen to become the new Lords of the Blood, most had some level of magic. Blaine’s own magic, before the Great Fire, gave him an edge in battle, augmenting his natural agility and training, and since the ritual at Valshoa, he had felt the battle magic enhance his speed and strength. Since he had made the first anchoring, he had also gained a few seconds of precognition, knowing where the enemy would move and making it easier for Blaine to anticipate and block the strike. His
kruvgaldur
with Penhallow strengthened his endurance and made him harder to kill. And as Kestel had pointed out, awareness of where magic was being worked was a valuable early warning signal.

Blaine had no idea whether this night’s working would allow him to keep those skills, strip him of his limited magic entirely, or change him in some new and unexpected way. The last time the magic was successfully bound, the Lords of the Blood gained new abilities, though it did not make mages of those who had not been mages before, nor had it turned the mages into gods. Blaine thought that he would be content to just live through the working and have it succeed.

Connor was a medium, and the Wraith Lord who possessed him qualified, to Blaine’s thinking, as a magical creature in his wraith state, certainly supernatural. Borya’s magic added to
his acrobatic ability, while Dolan, a Knight of Esthrane, was a mage as well as a warrior and
talishte
.

Niklas had no magic. Neither did Piran, who made it clear that he thought that lack was a good thing. Verran’s magic enabled him to pick locks and gain people’s trust. Dawe’s ability enhanced his talent for metalworking.

Penhallow was
talishte
, supernatural in his essence, and to Blaine’s thinking, the
kruvgaldur
counted as magic, though Penhallow was vague on the matter. Blaine had no idea what magic, if any, Folville, Voss, and Verner possessed, though Tormod Solveig had clearly demonstrated just how powerful his necromancy was.

“Look at the walls,” Niklas murmured.

The paintings of the constellations on the walls had begun to glow. Instead of the flat paintings that had been there a few moments before, the murals now seemed to be windows into the heavens, as if Blaine could reach his arm though the rock and into the cosmos.

The air itself was astir with magic. Perhaps it was a trick of the torchlight, but to Blaine’s eyes, the air shimmered, as if someone had loosed gold dust on the wind.

“Overhead,” Piran said in a low, warning voice. Blaine glanced up, and the dark ceiling of the underground chamber had been replaced by the coruscating colors and brilliance of the Spirit Lights of Edgeland.

One of the mages had begun a steady rhythm on a hand drum. The beat reverberated in the chamber. Censers set around the exterior of the labyrinth burned sage in smoky bundles, adding the candle smoke. Candles glimmered at intervals along the labyrinth, one at each circle reserved for a Lord of the Blood.

Blaine felt disoriented, as if, with the chanting and the
drumming, the glimmering light and the glittering air, power rose and fell with every breath. His head was swimming, his knees felt weak, and it was difficult for him to keep his focus, though he clung to the urgency of his mission.

Blaine inhaled the sweet sage smoke that hung in the air, breathing deeply, letting it fill his head and lungs, clearing his thoughts. His body felt light, as if he were not completely grounded in the world. He dared not turn to see if the others felt the same. Though the chamber was bounded by stone walls and the labyrinth was clearly marked in the rock floor, Blaine knew that if he took his eyes off the place where he must stand, he might lose his way. Time within the labyrinth seemed to move at a different pace.

After what seemed like forever, Blaine reached the spot where he had stood the last time, when the magic nearly killed him. In the paintings of the constellations, he could see the stars moving in their courses, like looking up into the night sky. A rain of falling stars glimmered across one of the portals.
Perhaps the boundaries between land and sky have been weakened by the magic
, Blaine thought.
Or maybe to magic, the boundaries are only in our imagination
.

Blaine glanced toward the others outside the labyrinth. Though the labyrinth was only a few strides across, from where he stood, it seemed as if Kestel, Zaryae, and the mages stood on the far side of a great chasm, farther away than the rock-bound room made possible.

Or else magic alters the space, once the power is invoked, and we are in a place that’s not quite where we set out to go
, he thought.

“Step into your circle,” Dolan said.

Glancing at the others, assuring himself that they were all moving into place, Blaine drew a breath to steady himself, and stepped into the circle appointed for him.

At once, all of their presence-crystals flared with a deep-orange light. The golden runes on his onyx disk glowed brilliantly. From the ceiling of the chamber, the coruscating lights spread, dropping around them like a curtain to separate those within the labyrinth from those on the outside of the circle. Blaine caught a glimpse of Kestel’s face, and saw the fear in her eyes, but there was no turning back.

Dolan had divined a word of power for each of the participants, an ancient word to speak aloud and activate the magic. Once spoken together, the words of power would bind the magic, tethering its wildness with stronger bonds than one man alone could forge. Through the ritual, the magic would be grounded and bound, to each of them and through each of them, altering them and placing a sacred bond and duty upon their eldest sons for all the future. For the
talishte
, the working bound them personally as guardians of the magic.

For a moment, the silence was unbearable. It was as if the cosmos, and not just those within and outside the circle, waited for the words to be spoken. The constellations bore witness, and the shimmering light, the runes, and the crystals all connected in the massing power that Blaine could feel crackling in the air, waiting.

“
Ahanthi!
” Blaine said in a loud, clear voice.

The others spoke their words just a breath after Blaine, each a different word, echoing through the chamber. Together, the syllables rolled like thunder, as if they were not meant to be spoken by mortals.

The many-colored lights curtaining off the circle flared so brightly that Blaine shielded his eyes with his arm. In addition to the sound of the mages’ plainchant and drumming, Blaine swore he could hear the shimmer of bells and hundreds,
perhaps thousands, of voices, an unseen choir of all those who had come before them.

The constellations whirled and spun, dancing in the cosmos, their colors brilliant and fantastic. The air smelled like the tang after a lightning storm. Beautiful, hypnotic, and utterly terrifying, the sounds, smells, and images were intoxicating. Blaine stood transfixed, waiting for what would happen next.

Blue-white bolts of energy rained from the top of the light-dome. Some of the bolts struck along the pathway, but thirteen of the bolts found their targets, striking each of the new Lords of the Blood in the crown of their heads and racing down and through their bodies into the rock beneath their feet.

Blaine’s body was frozen in the arc of light. He expected to smell burning hair and searing flesh, to feel the energy burn him alive, and he readied himself to die.

In that instant, Blaine saw the others transfixed by the brilliant light, held immobile in its glare, eyes wide. Some looked frightened, others angry, some ready to flee if they could. Blaine wondered what they saw when they looked at him.

If the Wraith Lord expected this and didn’t tell me, we’re going to have a chat about this if we all survive
, Blaine thought.

Blaine felt a wordless reassurance deep in his mind, something he had come to recognize as his
kruvgaldur
bond with Penhallow. He had a sense of Penhallow’s presence, an infusion of resilience, and an unspoken certainty that he would be strong enough to endure.

Is that why Connor seems so at ease with all of this?
Blaine wondered.
His bond must be many times stronger than mine, and he’s channeling the Wraith Lord’s spirit. It’s nice to be able to draw on Penhallow’s strength, but will it be enough? What if it isn’t?

The chamber faded from Blaine’s sight, replaced by a vision of
Glenreith. This was the manor as he knew it before his exile, before the Great Fire, when the lands had been prosperous and the great house in good repair. Ian McFadden was beneath one of the trees in the orchard, and though his back was turned, from the way his fist rose and fell, it was clear even at a distance that something had drawn his wrath
.

Blaine saw himself, a half-grown youth, come running down the manor stairs, shouting at his father. Ian did not pause or turn, and Blaine caught a glimpse of the victim of his father’s wrath. Ian held Carr by one arm in an unbreakable grip, while the other large fist landed blow after blow. There was no sound in Blaine’s vision, though the figures were speaking. Blaine did not need to hear them. He remembered
.

In the vision, Blaine came running at Ian’s back, roaring like a bull, and caught his father between the shoulder blades with his own shoulder, shoving him hard enough that Ian stumbled and let go of Carr’s arm. Carr scrambled to his feet and ran off as Ian rounded on Blaine. Blaine had grabbed the nearest weapon he could find, a long, forked branch from a nearby tree, and he used it to keep Ian at a distance. Both exchanged shouts, red in the face with anger, as Ian attempted to dodge around Blaine’s guard and Blaine kept his father far enough away to postpone the beating that was certain to follow
.