“What do you mean?” Phoran started the long trek back to camp.
“I thought I’d learn something of the magic they used,” she said. “And I did—though nothing that I can use. But it might have given us a clue about the Shadowed.”
They hadn’t gone far before Jes joined them. Without asking, he pulled Phoran’s arm around his shoulder.
“Lean on me,” he said.
Toarsen and Kissel came next.
“They didn’t listen to you either,” Phoran whispered to Seraph.
She laughed. “At least they didn’t bother arguing.”
They set Phoran down upon his bedroll, and Seraph tucked him in with all the expertise that his nurse had had when he was a child younger than Rinnie.
“There now,” she told him. “Go to sleep.”
But he didn’t, he just closed his eyes and listened.
Seraph moved away from Phoran and lowered her voice. “Lehr, Olbeck was Shadowed when you found him attacking Rinnie and Phoran.”
“That’s right,” he agreed. “That’s what Jes says. I told you Akavith said Olbeck killed poor Lukeeth.”
“Lukeeth died the day Tier was stricken,” she said. “As best I can piece it together.”
“What did you find out?” asked Tier, putting a hand on her shoulder.
She held his hand with her own. “Wait,” she said. “Lehr?”
“I don’t remember exactly, but either that day or the day before,” he agreed.
“Tier, do you remember anyone touching you the day we noticed there was something wrong with your Order?”
“I was at the shop all morning, Seraph,” he said. “Of course people touched me.”
“Tell me who,” she said turning around to face him so he could see her urgency. “Tell me. Not everyone you talked to, just the ones who touched you, Tier.” He was a Bard. He could remember them all.
“Alinath and Bandor, of course,” he said slowly. “The Brewmaster came with breadmother to replace the one we lost. The miller brought flour. Ciro and his son. Those were the only ones who touched me—that I remember, anyway.”
“What about at the tavern?”
“Regil touched me when he gave me his lute. I shook Willon’s hand.”
“One of them was the Shadowed,” Seraph said.
Phoran sat up. “The Shadowed is a Rederni? Redern is a very small place, Seraph. Surely someone would notice that one of them wasn’t aging as he should.”
“Willon.” Rinnie’s voice was very soft. “Willon’s store is right below the Temple of the Five. Those tunnels weren’t just below the temple, they were behind his shop. Maybe he found them when they dug his shop deeper into the mountain.”
“Willon was in Taela when I found Tier imprisoned,” said Phoran. “I saw him at his son’s shop.”
“The Shadowed wouldn’t have a son,” said Hennea. “Birth is not one of the Stalker’s powers.”
“Master Emtarig isn’t really Willon’s son,” said Phoran slowly. “I don’t remember who told me, but Willon’s wife died without giving him children, and he adopted one of his apprentices, an orphan.”
“Willon told me about the plague at Colbern,” Tier said, sounding stunned. “They rode past Colbern on the way back from Taela, he said. But surely Lehr or Jes would have noticed if Willon were the Shadowed.”
“They didn’t know what he was until the Memory had stripped him of some of his magics.” Hennea tapped her fingers impatiently. “But if it were Willon, where are the bodies? The Shadowed has to feed upon death.”
“Colbern,” said Lehr.
“He used to leave a couple of times a year,” said Seraph. “He could have been off hunting, then.”
“The temples,” said the Guardian. “I sat outside his temple in Redern and felt the feeding, but I didn’t understand what it was. I didn’t remember enough. The Stalker was not the Lord of Death, but the Lord of Destruction. The Unnamed King did not just feed upon death, but upon the pain and suffering that came before the death. Emotions feed the Shadowed—hatred, envy, the kinds of things that consumed Bandor before Hennea freed him from the taint.”
“Willon came to Redern just after I returned from the wars with Seraph,” Tier said. “He could have followed us after I killed the man who the Path sent for Seraph when her brother died. But I thought the Shadowed wasn’t supposed to age? Willon is older now than he was then.”
Seraph shook her head. “Illusion. He wouldn’t need much, not enough I’d notice anyway. There’s a little bit of magic around Redern all the time.”
“Mehalla,” said Jes, his voice a low throbbing growl that raised the hair on the back of Seraph’s neck.
Seraph felt as if someone had clubbed her. He was right. Oh, sweet Lark, he was right.
“She was so sick,” Tier whispered. “She got sick in the spring and just never got better. She lingered for months and months.”
“She had convulsions,” Lehr said. “I remember watching Mother hold her down so she wouldn’t hurt herself.”
“Who is Mehalla?” Phoran asked.
“My daughter,” whispered Seraph. “My daughter the Lark. She was just a toddler. He must have thought she was easy prey.”
Tier’s arm slid across the front of her shoulders and pulled her back against his chest. “He killed my daughter.”
Tier was behind her, but she saw Phoran meet his gaze.
“My Emperor,” said Tier in a silky-sweet voice. “We will see you freed of your Memory as soon as we return to Redern.”
CHAPTER 15
“The Scholar felt a lot of guilt and despair for something not alive,” said Jes, who had appointed himself escort to Seraph and Hennea, as the three of them walked to the library. Everyone else, including the dog, had gone out exploring together.
“Hinnum created him,” Hennea answered Jes before Seraph could. “He was the greatest of the Colossae wizards. I suppose if he could create the mermori, he could also create an illusion that empaths could feel.”
“Why would he do that to something that exists to help people find information?” Jes asked rather reasonably—for Jes.
“Is that why you insisted on coming today?” asked Seraph. She wasn’t ready to put limits on an illusion created by Hinnum either, but she also found herself agreeing with Jes.
“The Guardian doesn’t trust him because he has no scent,” Jes said with a shrug. “I explained the Scholar is an illusion, but neither the Guardian nor I think that an illusion should be so interested in Hennea.”
The main room of the library was empty when they arrived, but there was a book lying open on one of the tables.
Seraph picked it up. It seemed to be a general treatise of some sort on magic, open to a chapter on the “Aspects of Man”—whatever that meant. However, it had obviously been left out for them, so she started reading.
Hennea hovered briefly over her shoulder, then walked to one of the bookshelves and began perusing titles. Jes paced restlessly back and forth for a while.
Finally, he came to stand in front of Seraph.
“If you want to go out and explore, go do so,” she told him without looking up. “Just be careful. We’ll be fine. It doesn’t look as though the Scholar is going to come out today.”
He sniffed the air. “All right,” he said. “But I’ll be back in a little while.”
She heard his rapid footsteps down the stairs and the click of the outside door as it shut behind him.
“I didn’t finish the story of the Stalker yesterday,” said the Scholar’s voice as soon as Jes was gone.
Seraph looked up from her book to see the illusion standing in front of Hennea.
“Nor did I tell you why the wizards were forced to sacrifice this city,” he said.
“No,” agreed Hennea, reshelving a book she’d taken out. “I wondered why you didn’t.”
The Scholar stared at her with that half smile that seemed more of a mask than an expression. “Make yourself comfortable, and I will tell you.”
Seraph set her book aside and sat down on the other end of the bench where Hennea was sitting down.