[Study 02] - Magic Study Page 21

  Moon Man grinned and the two elders nodded in approval. Confused I watched him replace the scimitar under the mat and settled back into his position. “That is the correct response,” he said.

  “What if I had agreed?”

  “Then we would have sent you away with only a few cryptic remarks to puzzle over.” He laughed. “I must admit I am slightly disappointed. I worked all afternoon on those remarks.”

  “Sit,” the woman ordered. “What do you seek to understand?”

  I chose my words with great care as I sat on the mat. “A beast has been preying on young women throughout Sitia. To date, he has killed ten and injured one. I want to stop him. I seek to understand who he is.”

  “Why come to us?” the woman asked.

  “He has been using a certain substance as a weapon. I’m concerned that he might have stolen it from one of your clan members.” I waited, hoping the word “stolen” would not imply guilt.

  “Ah, yes, this substance,” the old man said. “A blessing and a curse. A package from Esau Liana Sandseed Zaltana arrived at one of our villages near the Daviian Plateau. That village was raided soon after by the Daviian Vermin.” The old man spat on the dirt floor. “Many things were stolen in that raid.”

  His scorn for these Vermin was obvious, but I asked anyway. “Who are these Vermin?”

  The elders tightened their jaws, refusing to reply.

  Frowning, Moon Man explained them to me. “They are young men and women who have rebelled against our traditions. They have broken from the clan and settled on the Plateau. The Plateau does not give up its bounty without a fight. The Vermin prefer to steal from us rather than work to grow their own food.”

  “Could one of them be the monster I seek?”

  “Yes. They have perverted our art of magic weaving. Instead of benefiting the clan, they seek to increase their power, enriching only themselves. Most of them do not have the gift, but there are a few who are very powerful.”

  Moon Man’s fierce expression gave me a mental image of how he would look when swinging his scimitar in battle. I held a picture of Ferde, Tula’s attacker, in my mind.

  “Is he one of them?” I asked. Moon Man’s magic coursed through me.

  Moon Man grunted, then growled deep in his throat. Looking at the elder man, he said, “They are practicing the old evil. We must stop them.”

  Horrified, the man replied, “We will try again to pierce their magic screen. We will find them.” He stood with grace and dignity, bowed once to me, then gestured to the woman. “Come. We must make plans.”

  They left the tent. Moon Man and I remained. “The old evil?” I asked.

  “An ancient horrible ritual of binding a victim’s soul to you, then killing him. When the victim dies, his magic flows into you, increasing your strength. The red markings on that beast are part of the ritual.” Moon Man’s brow furrowed for a moment before his eyes widened with concern. “You said one woman was injured. Where is she now?”

  “In the Magician’s Keep.”

  “Guarded?”

  “Yes. Why?”

  “The one you seek will not be in the Daviian Plateau; he will be in the Keep, waiting for another chance to take her life. He can not bind another soul until she dies.”

  “I must go back.” I jumped up from the small mat intent on leaving.

  Moon Man grabbed my shoulder and turned me to face him. “Do not forget your promise.”

  “I won’t. Tula first, then Leif.”

  He nodded. “May I ask another favor?”

  I hesitated. At least, he didn’t want a promise. “You can ask.”

  “When your training with Master Irys is complete, will you return to me so I may teach you the magical arts of the Sandseeds? It is part of your heritage and of your blood.”

  The proposition sounded appealing, but would be yet another curve in my journey. At this rate, I doubted I would even finish my training. If history served as guidance, my future tended to go in unanticipated directions. “I will try.”

  “Good. Now go!” He bowed to me, then shooed me from the tent.

  A frenzy of activity encompassed the camp. Dismantled tents littered the ground as the clan members prepared to leave. Twilight crept closer as I searched for my pack. I found Kiki instead. She was saddled and ready to go. Her short-haired “mother” offered her reins to me.

  As I took the leather straps, she said, “Do not sit on the saddle. Crouch over it and shift your weight forward. And she will fly home for you.”

  “Thank you.” I bowed.

  She smiled. “You are well matched. I am pleased.” With a final pat to Kiki’s neck, the woman turned to join the clan in their packing efforts.

  I mounted Kiki, and tried to follow her directions. We would lose the light soon. Kiki turned her head to the left, peering at me with a blue eye.

  Catch Topaz? Silk? she asked.

  Yes. Let’s fly!

  Kiki moved. The long grasses blurred past my feet until I could no longer see them in the darkness. I held my position as we traveled over the plains. It felt as if I rode on top of a wind storm rather than a horse.

  When the moon reached its apex, I felt the Sandseed’s magic thin, then disappear. No longer surrounded by their power, I used my magic to search for Irys.

  I’m here, she said in my mind and I saw through her eyes that they had made camp by Blood Rock.

  Wake Cahil, I told her. We have to return to the Keep as fast as we can. Tula’s still in danger.

  She is well guarded.

  He has powerful magic.

  We’re on our way.

  I sent my awareness toward the Keep, hoping to warn them. My mind touched Hayes dozing in his office. He flinched away from me in horror and raised a stronger barrier. The other Master Magicians’ defenses were as well constructed as the towers in which they slept. Growing weary with the effort, I pulled back.

  Kiki overtook Irys and Cahil on the Citadel road just as the sky began to lighten. I had only a moment to wonder how she had managed a two day journey in one night before we sped past the others.

  Need rest? I asked her, glancing behind in time to see Irys and Cahil wave me on.

  No.

  But my legs burned as if they were on fire. I aimed blue cooling thoughts at them, and they numbed.

  We were within sight of the marble gates of the Citadel when all desire to rest fled my mind. A sudden and intense feeling of terrified helplessness pressed on my body. Tula. I launched my awareness toward the Keep, searching for someone, anyone to warn. The guards with Tula didn’t have any magic. While I could read the minds of non-magicians, they had no power to “hear” me. Desperate, I kept hunting.

  My mind found Dax. He was in the middle of a practice bout, learning to parry and lunge with a wooden sword.

  Tula, I screamed in his mind. Danger! Get help!

  He dropped his sword in surprise and was whacked in the ribs by his opponent.

  Yelena? He spun around, looking for me.

  Tula’s in danger! Go. Now, I ordered. Then my connection to him severed. It felt as if someone had drawn a stone curtain down between us.

  Time slowed to drips of molasses as we entered the Citadel and navigated the busy streets. It seemed as if the entire population walked in the streets. Their unhurried pace clogged the roadway.

  The air sparked with the perfect cooling season temperature. And a perfect contrast to the fire in my heart. I wanted to scream at the crowd to move. Kiki, sensing my urgency, stepped up her pace and nudged the dawdlers out of our way.

  A few curses followed us. Kiki startled the guards at the Keep’s entrance when she refused to stop. She headed straight to the infirmary and even climbed the stairs, stopping only when we had reached the door.

  I slid from her saddle. Racing toward Tula’s room, I feared the worst when I spotted her guards lying in the corridor. I jumped over them and burst into her room. The door slammed against the wall. The noise echoed off the cold marble,
but failed to rouse Tula.

  Her lifeless eyes stared at nothing. Her bloodless lips were frozen in a grimace of horror and pain. My fingers sought a pulse; her skin felt icy and stiff. Black bruises ringed her neck.

  Too late, or, was I? I placed my hand on her throat, pulling power to me. In my mind’s eye, I saw her crushed windpipe. She had been strangled. I sent a bubble of power to reinflate it, sending air into her lungs. I focused on her heart, willing it to pump.

  Her heart beat and air filled her lungs, but the dullness refused to leave her eyes. I pushed harder. Her skin warmed and flushed. Her chest rose and fell. Yet, when I stopped, her blood stilled and she failed to take another breath.

  He had stolen her soul. I couldn’t revive her.

  A heavy arm rested on my shoulder. “There is nothing more you can do,” Irys said.

  I glanced around. Behind me stood Cahil, Leif, Dax, Roze and Hayes. They crowded the small room and I hadn’t even noticed their arrival. Tula’s skin cooled under my fingers. I pulled my hand away.

  A sharp, bone-crushing exhaustion settled over me. I dropped to the floor, closed my eyes and rested my head in my hands. My fault. My fault. I should never have left her.

  The room erupted with sound and activity, but I ignored them as tears poured down my face. I wanted to dissolve into the floor, mixing myself with the hard stone. A stone had a single purpose: to be. No complicated promises, no worries and no feelings.

  I lowered my cheek to the smooth marble. The cold stung my fevered skin. Only when the noise in the room faded did I open my eyes. And saw a scrap of paper lying under Tula’s bed. It must have fallen off when I had tried to put life into her body. I reached for it, thinking it had been Tula’s.

  The words written on the paper cut through the fog of my grief like Moon Man’s scimitar.

  The note said: I have Opal. I will exchange Opal for Yelena Zaltana at the next rising of the full moon. Send Tula’s grief flag up First Magician’s tower as a sign of agreement and Opal will not be harmed. More instructions will follow.

  23

  “WE’LL SEND TULA’S grief flag up, but we’re not exchanging Yelena for Opal,” Irys insisted. “We have two weeks until the full moon. That should give us enough time to find Opal.”

  Again, loud arguments echoed through the magician’s meeting room. Zitora had returned from her mission for the Council so all four Master Magicians were there, as well as Tula’s family, Leif, and the Captain of the Keep’s guard.

  Leif had tried to ask me about the Sandseeds before the meeting started, but I cut him off with an angry response. I still couldn’t look at him without seeing his eight-year-old face in the bushes, watching my kidnapping and doing nothing.

  The events that had occurred after I discovered the ransom note felt as if they happened in a dream. Once everyone settled down, the killer’s movements prior to attacking Tula were uncovered.

  He obtained a position with the Keep’s gardeners. Unfortunately, the people he worked with couldn’t agree on his facial features and Bain had drawn four completely different men from their descriptions. They also failed to remember his name.

  With ten magical souls, Ferde obtained enough power to equal a Master Magician. He concealed his presence in the Keep with ease and confused those he worked with.

  Tula’s guards were shot with tiny darts dipped in Curare. They could only recall seeing one of the gardeners delivering some medicinal plants to Hayes before their muscles froze. The fact that Ferde had infiltrated the Keep had put the Keep’s guards in serious trouble.

  “He was living in the Keep and we had no clue,” Roze said. Her powerful voice rose over the din. “What makes you think we can find him now?”

  Tula’s mother and father drew in horrified breaths. They had arrived the day before. The news of her passing had shocked them to their core. I could see in their drawn faces and in their haunted gazes that knowing the same man held Opal made their lives a living nightmare. Just like mine.

  “Give him Yelena,” Roze said into the now quiet room. “She was able to animate Tula. She has the power to handle this killer.”

  “We don’t want anyone else harmed,” said Tula’s father. He wore a simple brown tunic and pants. His large hands were rough with calluses and burn scars; evidence of a lifetime of working with molten glass.

  “No, Roze,” Irys admonished. “She doesn’t have full control of her magic yet. Probably the main reason he wants her. If he stole her magic, think how powerful he would then be.”

  Bain, who had translated the markings on the killer’s skin, told the group in the meeting room that the purpose of the man’s quest was written in his tattoos. Bain’s information matched what Moon Man had told me.

  Ferde performed an ancient Efe binding ritual that used intimidation and torture to turn a victim into a willing slave. When all free will had been surrendered, the victim was murdered and her soul’s magic was directed into Ferde, increasing his own power. He had targeted fifteen-and sixteen-year-old girls because their magic potential was just beginning.

  Sour bile churned in my stomach as I listened to Bain’s explanation. Reyad and Mogkan’s tactics in Ixia to increase Mogkan’s magic had been sickeningly familiar. Although, they hadn’t raped or killed their thirty-two victims, they tortured their souls from them, leaving them mindless. Just as horrible.

  Ferde had gained eleven souls. According to the ritual, the twelfth soul must go to him willingly. No kidnapping for the final ritual, which, when completed, would give him almost unlimited power.

  Debate on why Tula survived the initial attack led to a guess that Ferde had been close to being discovered and fled before finishing the ritual.

  “Yelena should be protected at all times,” Irys said. Her words brought me back to the meeting. “If we can’t find him, we’ll set up an ambush near the exchange site and apprehend him that way.”

  The magicians continued to argue. It seemed as if I would have no say in the plans. It didn’t matter. I would either find Ferde or be at that exchange site. I had failed Tula; I wasn’t going to let Opal suffer the same fate.

  A messenger from the Council arrived as the meeting ended. He handed Roze a scroll. She read it then thrust the paper at Irys in what appeared to be disgust. Irys’s shoulders drooped when she scanned the document.

  What else has gone wrong? I asked her.

  Another situation to deal with. This one is not life threatening, though, just bad timing, she said. At least this will be another chance for you to practice your diplomacy.

  How?

  An Ixian delegation is expected to arrive in six days.

  So soon? I had thought the messenger with the Council’s reply had just left.

  Yelena, it’s been five days. It’s a two-day ride to the Ixian border and a half a day to the Commander’s castle.

  Five days? So much had happened in those five days that I felt as if I lived one endless day. Difficult, too, to believe I had been living in Sitia for only two and a half seasons. Almost half a year gone in what seemed like a fortnight. My ache for Valek hadn’t dulled, and I wondered if meeting the northern delegation would cause me to miss him more.

  I followed the others from the room. In the hallway outside, Zitora linked her arm in mine.

  “I need some help,” she said, guiding me from the Keep’s administration building, and toward her tower.

  “But I need to—”

  “Get some rest. And not go searching the Citadel for Opal,” Zitora said.

  “I will, anyway. You know that.”

  She nodded. “But not tonight.”

  “What do you need?”

  A sad smile touched her face. “Help with Tula’s flag. I believe asking her parents would only increase their grief.”

  We entered her tower and climbed two flights of stairs to her workroom. Comfortable chairs and tables littered with sewing and art supplies filled the large chamber.

  “My seamstress skills are limited,” Z
itora said. She moved around the room, adding fabric and thread to the one empty table near the chairs. “But not for the lack of practice. I can sew and embroider, but I’m better at drawing. When I have the time, I’ve been experimenting with painting on silk.”

  Satisfied with her collection, Zitora dug through another pile of cloth and pulled out a sheet of white silk. She measured and cut off a five-foot-by-three-foot rectangle.

  “The background will be white for Tula’s purity and innocence,” Zitora said. “Yelena, what should I put in the foreground?” When she saw my confusion, she explained, “A grief flag is our way of honoring the dead. It’s a representation of the person. We decorate it with the things that made up a person’s life, and when we raise the flag high, it releases their spirit into the sky. So what would best represent Tula?”

  My thoughts went immediately to Ferde. A poisonous snake, red flames for pain and a jar of Curare all came to mind. I scowled, unable to imagine Tula’s spirit free. She had been trapped in the blackness of Ferde’s soul because of my stupidity.

  “He’s a cunning demon, isn’t he?” Zitora asked, as if reading my mind. “To have the boldness to live in the Keep, to have the skill to kill under our roof and to have you blame yourself for it. A masterful trick, I’d say.”

  “You’re starting to sound like a certain Story Weaver I know,” I said.

  “I’ll take that as a compliment,” Zitora replied. She sorted through colorful squares of silk. “Let’s see. If you had listened to Irys and remained behind, the killer would have gotten Tula and you.”

  “But I had gotten my energy back,” I said. Irys had thought it best not to mention Valek’s help.

  “Only because you wanted to follow Irys.” Zitora raised a thin eyebrow.

  “But I wouldn’t have gone with Ferde willingly.”

  “Truly? What if he had promised not to kill Tula in exchange for you?”

  I opened my mouth, then closed it, considering. She had a point.

  “Once you say the words or move with intent, it’s done. What follows after will not change that, and he would have killed Tula anyway,” Zitora said. She lined the colored squares along the table’s edge. “If you had stayed behind, you would both be gone, and we wouldn’t have the information from the Sandseeds.”