"A sunken garden?" Samarin asked, but nodded as he said it. "The other buildings have far more fallen stone—and there’s no sign that anyone has been here to salvage it. Nor any hint of movement beyond the glass constructs."
Kendall had spotted one of the mages. Or a person-shaped lump, at least, in the room directly beneath them. That was an ear, and there a hand. She traced the bumps on the walls, struggling to see clearly through the stone grid, and decided there were six. Six people, just below her, with roots burrowing beneath their skin, and spikes in their backs.
"The flowers only grow where people are," she said, in a voice almost as thin and thready as Sukata’s. "And they’re the wrong sort of flowers for ivy anyway—ivy gets tiny green nubby sorts of flowers, not blowsy big orange ones."
"I still see only two patrols of the constructs," Sukata added. "They do not appear to enter the room below us—perhaps not any of the rooms containing mages."
"Except to put them on the walls, and respond to disturbances," Rennyn agreed, and then no-one spoke for a while because one of the little swarms of glass…caterpillar-ants was moving in their direction.
In a way they were almost pretty, all blue or blue-green, like a collection of glass vases that had been stacked together. With legs and little waving antenna. There weren’t any spikes or barbs or teeth or anything that looked like a weapon, but if they’d fought Rennyn’s monster uncle and won, they were nothing to sniff at.
Once the patrol had moved away, Darian Faille pointed to the scouting party’s left. "They enter this room, even though it appears identical to the one directly below us—with a ceiling grid and a stone door."
"Not yet occupied," Lieutenant Meniar muttered. He was looking a bit sick—probably because he was the healer mage who was going to have to figure out how to get a couple of dozen people unpinned without killing them.
"They also groom the ivy of dead leaves," Dezart Samarin said. "Gardeners, guards or both? In either case, a limited range of function, and clearly not much scope for reacting to events outside their area of duty."
"I would like to see how they respond to a shield across the door of a room," Captain Faille said.
"You think they could simply be bottled up?" Samarin moved a little further along the wall. "Is it a shield that can be cast through? I can’t tell."
A little surge of magic from Rennyn was all of her response, and the stone blocking the doorway of the room below rolled to one side. They waited, tense, but no swarm of glass guardians responded, and Kendall couldn’t feel any change to the thrum of set casting.
"Block the guards off, break the shield, rescue the mages?" Lieutenant Meniar suggested.
"I can’t break this shield," Rennyn said. "Perhaps with my focus, but not otherwise. I could create a temporary door, as my Wicked Uncle did, but then I would go to sleep. I am going to have to compose a Sigillic that one of you can cast…and can’t quite see a method to use. I’ll need to think it over."
"There is no guarantee that these patrols are the only defenders," Captain Faille said. "I would like a view of the central courtyard: it seems larger than the others."
"Block the guards, open a door, investigate the centre," Dezart Samarin said. "There is no point rescuing the mages only to have them stolen again in a month’s time."
"We could risk a short flight over the top," Rennyn said, but only shrugged when no-one else seemed to think this a sensible idea, and suggested instead they find a spot to sit for a while so that she could concentrate on untangling the layers of magic.
Captain Faille found a rock near the cellar and sat with Rennyn on his lap. Kendall could see that Lieutenant Meniar and Sukata were also concentrating hard, trying to work out how all the enchantments had been constructed by listening to the vibrations they made. It was all just humming to Kendall, so she stuck with trying to spot the Mystery Mage behind it all. The Pest, though, sat down and went to sleep. Maybe he was trying to see something with the enchantment he could use while sleeping, but if that was the case he mustn’t have found anything, since he only looked vaguely disappointed when he woke up right after Rennyn had finally had enough and said they could go.
They continued on around the strange cellar, trying to confirm the number of glass constructs and spot all the lumps concealing mages, all while discussing ways of getting them unpinned alive. Then it was Rennyn’s turn to fall asleep, almost mid-sentence. Lieutenant Meniar shook his head over her and said that the cuts meant she’d need even more rest than usual for a few days.
Walking back, Kendall decided that Rennyn’s good mood was not just because she thought she’d taken care of her uncle, but also because she’d postponed having to probably kill the Ten. But she wouldn’t manage to stay cheery next time she dropped a cup of soup down her front.
Lagging at the end of the scouting party with Sukata, Kendall muttered: "She’s swapped that monster’s life for hers—but the wrong way around."
The squinch of Sukata’s mouth told Kendall that was exactly what Sukata thought as well. But then the Kellian girl said: "Would you have killed him?"
Kendall was about to say of course!, but hesitated, thinking about what it would be like to kill anyone.
"He enjoyed hurting Rennyn so much."
"I know. And to have to deal with him for the sake of survival…that is not a decision I would have enjoyed. But the Duchess' reasoning is true. What Prince Helecho did in Tyrland—excepting the injury to the Duchess herself—was at the orders of Queen Solace. Very probably controlled almost as much as we."
Sukata’s voice, already barely audible, slipped away, and Kendall gripped her hand, knowing her friend was remembering being pressed to the back of her own head, her body used as a tool by someone who didn’t care one speck about her. Kendall needed to remember that Sukata—like all the Kellian—had had a horrible experience only a few months ago. Just because she was always so quiet and prepared didn’t mean the aftermath of the Black Queen’s return had been any easier for her than it had been for Rennyn with her more obvious injuries.
Glancing up, Kendall saw that the Imperial Smugness was watching, and without even meaning to, she dropped Sukata’s hand. Then, trying to look only at her feet, Kendall saw from the corner of her eye Sukata’s long, pointed fingers curl and then straighten. And hated herself.
Every time she thought they had worked their way back to a comfortable place, Samarin’s stupid questions would pop into her head, and Kendall would do something to make everything even more awkward and wrong. How could she put them out of her thoughts, or find an answer that could begin to be believable? How could she stop hurting the best person she’d ever known?
Chapter Twenty-Seven
After the scouting trip, the remainder of the morning was spent on practicalities. Shelter first and foremost, utilising the foundation of one of the ruined buildings, with a combination of Sigillics and Kellian strength compensating for their lack of useful tools. A little basic, but enough to fit all inside, and keep out wind and rain.
Fallon was groggy-headed from his nap by the cellar, but since he wanted to be able to sleep as soon as the Duchess woke up, he freely expended his energy, while struggling to clamp down on his expectations. There would be no miracle solutions. The Duchess was going to sit with him, and they would take the first step on what would undoubtedly be a long road.
But she knew! She knew! SHE KNEW! The foremost expert on the Eferum in all the world would guide Auri out of wherever it was that she was trapped, and Fallon would finally be able sleep without watching his sister in the Dream, and would wake up rested and without any need to worry.