“It grows in the telling?”
“Because of wishful thinking.”
“Does Varthlokkur know? There have been so many Unborn sightings. That makes me nervous.”
“Which would be the point. Varthlokkur and Bragi had a falling out but that didn’t end the wizard’s interest in Kavelin.”
Kristen was sure Kavelin would hear directly from the wizard soon.
…
Babeltausque slipped into the abandoned house, quivering with anticipation. He paused in the darkness, looked back into the moonlight. Eager though he was, he did not move for minutes. He dared not be tracked by Inger’s enemies.
He sensed watchers every time he left the castle. He did nothing to confound them by day but for these nocturnal ventures he used every trick available.
Satisfied that he had arrived unnoticed, he drifted into the interior. Ghost fire revealed the damage done by treasure hunters.
For a long time every hunter started with the house, but no longer. A hundred visitations had produced only a few random copper coins from beneath furniture or, in one case, wedged between floorboards.
There was an intimidation factor, too. The owner had left numerous booby traps. Men had died. No trap had yet been found actually guarding anything. They were not based on western magic so they antedated the night the treasury disappeared.
Once he became the Queen’s own sorcerer Babeltausque spawned rumors that bigger and more deadly traps had yet to be sprung. He then installed a few of those himself.
At first he wanted the house shunned because he suspected the treasury might actually be there, despite repeated failures to find it. Then he had come to appreciate the place for its more arcane possibilities.
He had yet to explore it all. There were areas where the residual sorcery was so brawny it frightened him, left him feeling like he was sliding through a canebrake of spells. He never stopped turning up new facets of the most magically active site in Kavelin. Still, he had yet to make an effort to chart its defenses or uncover what it was hiding.
Because it was shunned it was now the place he went when he wanted to be alone, to relax, to enjoy.
He had been conquered by his need. He had begun to indulge it. Here.
He could wait no longer. He must run to his beloved.
Chapter Sixteen:
Year 1017 AFE:
The East
M ist took every precaution testing the portals into Kavelin. Tang Shan’s skills had been sufficient to establish connections with each, but there was no way to know what lay beyond without going to look.
She chose to go herself, despite the protests of her lifeguards. She did indulge in one old-time, non-magical safety technique. She tied a rope around her waist before she stepped through. Her bodyguards could drag her back.
They could have overruled her. They had that right. But to do so could mean loss of place or even exile should the Empress be sufficiently irked.
Her first crossing took her into the caverns behind Maisak. She stepped into utter darkness. The air was still, dry, and carried a taint of old death. She withdrew immediately. “I need a lantern.”
The lantern helped only a little.
She was in a large, empty space once used to receive transferring troops. Dead portals stretched away to either hand.
Lifting her lantern overhead, Mist could just make out a sprawled skeleton.
Those bones were not human.
Something moved behind her. She gave up a startled squeak. A lifeguard joined her, bringing another lantern. He said nothing. He followed when she moved toward the bones.
The Captal of Savernake, once master of Maisak, had enjoyed the friendship of many nonhuman creatures, mostly products of his own sorcery. Mist had met some in those dark old days. They had been gentle, timid creatures who loved their creator too well. They were all gone now. The world was poorer for it.
From her vantage over the bones Mist could see three more skeletons, all human.
Her bodyguard said, “We are not alone. Return to the portal.”
She felt it, too. Somehow. She neither saw, heard, nor smelled anything, but something was watching. This was a moment when she was not the paramount will of Shinsan. She moved.
The lifeguard’s sword sang as it cleared its scabbard.
From the darkness came a long, sad sigh that turned into a desperate moan.
Mist stepped across to safety. Her bodyguard followed. She asked, “What was it?”
He snapped, “Seal it! Shut it down!” at the operators.
Something as pale as a grub began to emerge from the portal.
The operators ended the session.
Three quarters of a man fell to the floor. He left behind parts of his right leg and right arm. He did not bleed. He did not speak. His eyes blazed with a desperate, hungry madness. He was a wild, nasty mass of filth, unkempt hair, and rags.
Mist said, “He’s wearing Imperial… He’s been trapped there since…”
Despite his injuries, the man crawled forward, toward humanity.
The enormity of what he must have suffered hit Mist like a fist in the gut. She threw up.
“I’m all right. Get me something to rinse my mouth with. Let me get cleaned up. Tang Shan. Send a task group to find out if more of our people are trapped in there.”
“Any who are will be quite insane.”
“Even so. They’re ours.”
“As you will, so shall it be.”
“Good. Where to next?”
Her bodyguards and the portal specialists alike looked at her askance. “I’m fine. Just bring me some water. Let’s get on with it.”
Tang Shan said, “I would recommend the mausoleum of the Kaveliner queen. Lord Yuan is not yet entirely confident of the connection with the other portal. Nor am I.”
Mist frowned. Tang Shan remained cautiously neutral always but she suspected him of traditional convictions. The Imperial throne should not be occupied by a girl.
She said, “I’m ready.”
A lifeguard said, “This time I go first.”
“Of course.” Though what danger was likely to be lurking in a mausoleum?
Ghouls? Hungry ghosts?
All right. Danger might be sleeping with the dead.
She got squatters.
They were a Siluro family of six who had not emigrated. They belonged to the smallest and least loved ethnic group in Kavelin.
Mist did not ask for their sad story.
Any couple with four sprats under six, driven to take refuge with the revered dead, would tell a sad tale indeed.
Her charity went only so far as to flush them out rather than compel them to join the occupant of the mausoleum.
The lifeguard did not approve. They might carry tales.
“Ghost stories, perhaps.”
She paused to consider the dead queen. “The wizard did wonders with this one.”
Fiana looked like a girl asleep, awaiting the wakening kiss of her prince. She remained as colorful and fresh as she had in life.
Her glass-topped casket was filled with a gentle light that remained active after all these years. It made her look younger and more beautiful than she had at her passing. The long agony of birthing Radeachar had been massaged out of face and body.
Bragi’s last gift to his love, begged from Varthlokkur.
“Extreme caution is necessary,” the lifeguard said. “This place hasn’t been plundered or vandalized.”
“The homeless lived here unharmed.”
The beauty in the box had been the best loved of Kavelin’s recent monarchs. That was why no evil had taken place.
“Let’s go outside.” It had been a long time since she had looked into Kavelin’s skies. She had fond memories of a less harried life here. Her children had been conceived and born here. The only man she ever loved was buried here.
It was nighttime. No clouds masked the shoals of stars. There was no moon. Only a few tiny lights marked the location of Vorgreberg.
The bodyguards said, “To the north. The woods.”