A dark globe slightly larger than a great helm rested inside the opening. A spike, its broad tapered top larger than her fist, pierced down through the globe’s center. The spike’s pointed tip protruded through the globe’s bottom, showing between the stand’s legs. Both spike and globe appeared formed from a single piece.
As before, when she was near the first orb, Magiere’s hunger faded. That relief came like a curse, for hunger fueled her fury—and fury was her strength.
Another long-forgotten guardian kept another orb ... in another cavern, this time in the heights instead of the depths. The orb they already possessed had led her, and it was the last thing she’d expected and would have ever hoped for.
Magiere wanted to flee this place but couldn’t bring herself to do so.
Qahhar turned his gaze from the pedestal to her—to the thôrhk around her neck.
“Mine is here,” he said. “Always safe. The others did not know how to guard the anchor.”
His last word made no sense, though at a guess he meant the orb. He headed to the walkway across from the one they’d used. At her footsteps, he looked back and smiled.
“Wait here,” he said.
Chap snarled and tried to rush forward. Magiere grabbed him with her free hand. Qahhar looked upon the dog, still snarling at him, and Magiere raised her falchion. The undead appeared confused at her action and shook his head.
“I will remain in your sight ... and return quickly.”
With that, he stepped off along the far bridge.
Magiere watched him carefully. She had to tighten her grip on Chap’s scruff as he tried to assault her with memories of every undead that ever attacked or betrayed them.
“We’re leaving now ... before that thing does something!”
Leesil’s harsh whisper startled Magiere after his long silence. She didn’t obey, and Chap finally settled to an endless rumble of breaths as she watched the guardian.
Qahhar reached the opposite side of the cavern’s ringed ledge and turned to a sidewall near the far tunnel opening. For a moment he appeared to close his eyes, and his lips moved, though Magiere didn’t hear anything.
When he reached toward—into—the wall’s ice, she sucked in a breath and held it. He withdrew his hand, and even from a distance she could tell what he held.
Another thôrhk ... or orb handle.
How he’d hidden it there or why she couldn’t guess, other than the fact that it would be hard for anyone else to find, let alone reach, it. This also meant that Qahhar had skills to be wary of. More than once, Magiere, with Leesil and Chap, had faced an undead that knew magic. It never turned out well.
Returning to the platform, Qahhar held up his thôrhk, identical to the one Li’kän had possessed. He hung it around his neck, and his voice filled with relief.
“In sending you, Beloved has forgiven me.”
Magiere didn’t want to hear that again, but something inside her held on to a suspicion. What she’d done—what she’d felt—to find this place didn’t match the horror in her dreams that had guided her to the first orb.
“I will let no harm come to you,” Qahhar went on, “or those you choose to keep. I will guard you, as precious to me as you are to Beloved. You will stand with me, and neither of us shall ever be alone again ... until Beloved calls for the anchors.”
With that, he reached out as if to touch her face.
Magiere back-stepped, pulling Chap before he lunged, but Leesil dodged around her and stopped barely out of the guardian’s reach.
Confusion spread across Qahhar’s pale face, but Magiere saw the malice on Leesil’s.
She instantly released Chap to grab Leesil’s coat and jerk him back. Chap shifted to her right as she reached behind and under her own coat with her free hand. Magiere felt for the hilt of her Chein’âs dagger at the small of her back.
“Illimasuktok e kisarpok!”
A shout coming from somewhere outside the cavern echoed off the walls. Qahhar’s widening eyes looked toward where they’d all first entered.
“What’s happening?” Leesil asked.
Magiere didn’t know. Qahhar looked at her as if she were suddenly a puzzle. Chap’s snarl rose to a pealing half yowl as a memory erupted in Magiere’s head.
She saw the sled outside with the chest holding the orb they’d brought, and Ti’kwäg standing beside it.
Magiere realized that shout had come from one of Qahhar’s servants. They must have gone outside and spotted the sled. She fought the urge to run for the passage. Leesil sucked a loud breath, and she knew Chap had raised a similar memory for him.
Magiere began to panic again as Leesil backed off to her left.
“Tell him you’ve been sent to guard it ... this orb,” he whispered in Belaskian.
Magiere hoped that wasn’t a language that Qahhar knew.
“Tell him that you’re its guardian now,” Leesil added.
Leesil could bluff his way through a tangle better than anyone she knew, and she guessed at what he was up to. If those servants had gone to the sled, Qahhar might now know they’d arrived with an orb. Would he accept that she was somehow taking both?
Lying wasn’t one of Magiere’s skills, not like it was Leesil’s. She said either nothing or something, and if truth bothered those who heard it, that was their problem. This was different.
She looked Qahhar in the eyes and spoke clearly. “Beloved has forgiven you ... and I have been sent to gather the orbs. There is no more waiting needed.”
Qahhar’s brow slowly wrinkled. “No, my grandchild, you have misunderstood. You are not of the Children.”
Magiere was lost again—children of what?
“Beloved would never accept one such as you as sole guardian,” Qahhar finished.
A memory rose in Magiere of Li’kän in the library of the Pock Peaks. The scribbled writing of her “story” covered all the walls. Chap was feeding Magiere notions, and she guessed at what he wanted her to say.
“Li’kän, Volyno, and Häs’saun gave me their orb,” she said. “Hand over yours, as Beloved wishes.”
She hoped Qahhar had no way to know that Volyno and Häs’saun were long gone, and that Li’kän had been forever locked away in the cavern beneath her castle. Qahhar became very quiet, still watching, and then slowly shook his head.
“If Beloved had you take the anchor of Water from Häs’saun, it was only to bring it to me, to show me that Beloved has forgiven me ... and sent you to me, Grandchild. You will stay, as you are for me.”
“No, she isn’t,” Leesil rasped.
Qahhar fixed on Leesil, and his face drained of all emotion. In a blink, he rushed and struck with his hand for Leesil’s throat. Leesil jerked one arm up almost as quickly as Qahhar could strike. The punching blade barely got in the way. It shielded his throat, but not the arm that held the blade up.
Qahhar’s hardened nails raked across Leesil’s forearm and screeched off the wing of his blade.
Droplets of red spattered away from Leesil’s arm and the undead’s fingers.
Magiere threw herself at Qahhar....
* * *
—Enough!—
Chap stood in the Cloud Queen’s aftcastle doorway, having trailed Magiere up to the deck. At that one memory-word raised in her head, she stiffened upright and looked about until she spotted him.
He had expected to find her with Brot’an and had even hoped to use her to extract more information, but he’d not anticipated finding her telling Brot’an this part of their journey.