“Why are they hard to put down?” Merritt asked.
“Because they still have a functioning brain. They can think, plan, scheme, plot, hide, evade, and then attack.”
Merritt let out a sigh. “Great. Just great.”
Naja spread her hands. She was starting to look worse again.
“I hate to sound ungrateful to you both, and I want to help—that’s why I’m here—but I think that you need to get me to a place where you can finish healing me.”
Magda looked up at Merritt. “She’s right. We need to get out of here. We can talk more later.”
Merritt circled an arm around Naja’s waist as she started sagging. “I know just the place.”
Chapter 78
As they passed through the opening off the walkway around the inside of the immense circular stone interior of the great tower and into the sliph’s room, Magda saw Quinn sitting at a table across the room, writing in one of his journals. Dominating the center of the room, under a domed ceiling, sat the sliph’s stone well.
“Merritt!” Quinn called. He leaned over in his chair to peer past Merritt, helping Naja walk into the room. “And Magda!” Quinn skidded the chair back from the table and rushed to meet them. “So good to see you both!”
The young wizard was about Magda’s height, and of average build. His ready smile matched his good nature. But it was his brown eyes that were so riveting. They had a quality well beyond his years, an incisive grasp of all they took in, and despite the intellect behind that astute gaze, the man was always modest when others would have been cocky in their knowledge and accomplishments. They were the eyes of a wise advisor.
“Good to see you, too, Quinn,” Merritt said.
Quinn’s gaze finally settled on Naja. “Who have we here?”
With one arm around Naja’s waist, steadying her, Merritt held his other out in introduction. “Quinn, I’d like you to meet a friend of ours. This is Naja Moon.”
Grinning, staring at the woman for an instant, Quinn remembered his manners and gestured into the room. “Please, Naja, won’t you come in and have a seat. I’m afraid that there is only the one chair, please take it. You look like you may need to sit down. Let me get you some water.”
“She needs more than water,” Merritt said, getting right down to business. “She needs to be healed.”
Quinn regarded the sorceress with a more appraising look. “Yes, I can see that.”
Naja showed a brief smile of greeting to Quinn, but declined the offer to sit.
“To tell you the truth, Merritt, I don’t think any of you look all that good.” Quinn laid a hand on the side of Magda’s shoulder. “What’s wrong. You look ashen. You don’t look well at all. Maybe you had better sit down.”
Magda gently waved off the concern. “Thank you, but we don’t have time for that at the moment.”
“Some things have happened,” Merritt said. “Magda has been healed, but she needs rest to complete the process or she is going to soon go downhill and then she’s going to be in trouble.”
It was more a warning to Magda than an explanation to Quinn. Magda got the point, but it wasn’t really needed. She knew that she was nearing the end of her strength. It was only her worry after what she had learned from Naja that was driving her on at the moment. Her stomach felt like it was in a knot.
“I can see that,” Quinn said, a look of concern creasing his brow as he leaned in toward Magda, looking into her eyes for any sign of the trouble. “What happened? How were you hurt?”
Magda smiled to dispel his concern. “That’s not important at the moment. We have more urgent business right now.” She looked toward Naja, signaling what she meant. Quinn got the message.
Naja had turned, transfixed by the liquid silver hump of the sliph rising up out of the well that contained her. The swelling bulge of what looked like nothing so much as polished, highly reflective, liquid silver began to rise up until it formed into a head with the aspects of a human face.
The quicksilver features resolved fluidly into those of a beautiful woman. A pleasing smile formed in the expression of what looked like nothing so much as a silver statue that was the sliph, except that it always seemed to be moving.
“Do you wish to travel?” the sliph asked, her silvery voice echoing around the round room.
“No,” Magda said in a blunt tone. “We don’t wish to travel.”
“You will be pleased,” the sliph said.
“Thank you, but not now,” Merritt said on his way past as he helped Naja toward the chair.
“I’ve heard rumors of such a creature, but I never imagined she was real,” Naja said as she dragged Merritt to a halt in order to stare at the silver face watching her.
Quinn cast a rather fond look at the creature in the well. “She’s real, there is no doubt of that. She likes to watch me record things in my journals as I watch over her.”
“May I touch you?” Naja asked the sliph as she stepped close to the waist-high stone wall of the sliph’s well.
“If it pleases you,” came the haunting reply.
Naja reached out and carefully touched her fingers to the gently rolling silver surface. The sliph watched. Feeling no ill effects, Naja submerged her entire hand below the surface.
“You have both sides,” the sliph said with a satisfied smile. “You may travel.”
“Thank you, but I don’t wish to travel right now,” Naja said. “Maybe another time.”
“When you are ready, I will take you where it pleases you.”
Naja looked back over her shoulder at Merritt and Magda. “This is remarkable.”
Magda folded her arms. “That’s one way to put it.”
Magda held no favor with the sliph. Not only had the sliph often taken Baraccus away, she took him away as she cooed to him and made gentle promises that he would be pleased.
Baraccus had told Magda that it was just the nature of the sliph, that it didn’t mean anything, and that in any event, there was nothing that could be done about it. Magda still hadn’t liked the manner in which the perfect quicksilver face had spoken so intimately to her husband. Of course, the sliph talked to everyone that way. Baraccus was right, it was her nature. That didn’t make Magda feel any better about it.
The sliph had even talked to Magda the same way when Magda had needed to travel. She wasn’t gifted, as was required, but Baraccus had instilled in Magda some bit of magic that enabled her to travel. Traveling was at once a wildly exhilarating and a terrifying sensation. She hoped never to have to experience it again.
Naja withdrew her hand and stepped away from the well. “No, you don’t understand. What is remarkable is that this creature has been altered in a similar way to the half people. Her soul has been fragmented.”
Quinn swept his sandy blond hair back. “Half people? What are half people? What are you talking about?”
Merritt held a hand up. “Listen, Quinn, we have problems.”
Quinn’s features took on a serious cast. “So then you’ve heard the rumors that Prosecutor Lothain is going to be named First Wizard? Is that the trouble you mean.”
“That’s not the problem I was referring to,” Merritt said.
“And it’s not a rumor,” Magda told him. “It’s true.”
Quinn’s serious expression turned worried. “Is it really going to happen tomorrow, as some say?”
“Tomorrow? I haven’t heard that part of it,” Magda said. “What have you heard?”
“There’s a lot of rush planning going on. Something big is in the works for tomorrow afternoon in the council chambers. I don’t know what, but it only makes sense that it would be the naming of the new First Wizard.” As he gestured to Naja, his eyes again took on that discerning look that Magda knew so well. “Now, what’s this about half people? What are half people?”