Chapter 18
It was a crisp, cool night. The stars were out and shining brightly, and though only one moon, the Red Moon Vala, was high in the sky, the Skybands provided more than enough light for those on the ground to see. They were Sha'Kar, returning home after a party held by one of the most prominent women on the island, a party that had been attended by nearly half of the island's inhabitants. They walked along in a good mood, many of them flushed with wine and drug, talking animatedly about nothing of importance, rumors and gossip and whispered promises of the delights to be indulged once they returned to their estates. They moved in boisterous security, assured of their safety by the nature of their island and centuries of established habits.
They had no idea they were being watched.
Tarrin squatted on the corner of a roof of one of the estate houses near to the central estate, the estate of the Grand, with Sapphire perched on his shoulder. He had been stationed there for nearly two hours now, waiting for the party to break up, waiting patiently. They could not move until the Sha'Kar were off the streets, until they had returned to either their own estates or a companion's and either went to bed or engaged in other forms of entertainment.
Everything was planned. They had gathered and talked about things a very long time, and after interviewing Auli, Allyn, and Iselde, a plan had been formed. Not that it had been easy. The first thing to overcome had been the disbelief of the two Sha'Kar siblings. They didn't want to believe what they were told, and in a way, he empathized and understood that. They had just learned that the very people they respected the most were responsible for using the vilest forms of mind control on them, and had murdered over three hundred of their own. It had shocked and horrified them, and much of the long session had been devoted to nursing to two of them out of their stupor and learning from them the patterns of the Sha'Kar, and most importantly, their uncle Arlan. Arlan was the wild card in the plan, for if he noticed all his guests were missing during the night, the Council was going to know something was going on. Tarrin, Keritanima, and Dolanna had sat down and devised a means to prevent Sha'Kar from spying on them from the Weave, a spell that would attack lurkers from them in the form of their connection to their bodies. It was a hastily engineered spell, but it worked. When woven, it forced a lurker to return to his or her body. They would cast it over and over again before anyone left the house, sweeping the house clean of spies, and then, after they gave up trying, they'd start to move.
Most of the others weren't moving yet, but they would soon. Tarrin had a very important task in their very delicate plan, and that was rather simple. There were some Sha'Kar who were very old and very strong. Tarrin would visit them during the night, while they were sleeping, and defeat the control that their amulets put over them. He wouldn't have time to do it for all of them before sunrise, but he knew which ones to visit first. Auli, Iselde, and Allyn had given them a complete list of the strongest Sorcerers, and Keritanima had compiled it with Auli's help into a list in descending order of ability. The very first woman on that list was Auli's mother, regarded as the strongest and most skilled Sorceress on the island outside the Council. He had his list in his pocket, complete with where their estates were, who they were known to associate with, and what times they commonly went to bed. That was the information that Keritanima wanted from the Sha'Kar, a very detailed itinerary of the patterns Tarrin's targets. Between Auli and Iselde, there was very little that they didn't know about the habits of the other Sha'Kar. They were prominent gossipers, and such things always ended up in gossip. Using that information, Tarrin would find them, either in their own beds or someone else's, find them and defeat the control the amulets had over them.
Keritanima's target number was fifty. She wanted him to free at least fifty before sunrise. Fifty of the strongest of the Sha'Kar. Keritanima reasoned that that many would be more than capable of fending off the rest if it came down to a fight, especially since if it did come to a fight, the Council wouldn't be in it helping the others. They'd have their hands full with Tarrin.
A trickier problem had been with the humans. The Sha'Kar couldn't control them as they had their own, so that meant that some of them were working for the Council. Tarrin doubted that they all were, and he suspected a similar pattern. A few humans were free and working with the Council, but the rest were under the effects of mental control. The key was to find out which were willing and which were not, and that also hinged as one of the cornerstones of the plan. Without the humans to help them, the Sha'Kar would be limited to seven in a circle. So to prevent them from building up a Circle that could wipe them out, they had to eliminate the humans as an asset to the Council.
That enviable task had fallen to Dar, Dolanna, and Keritanima, with Binter along to defend the queen. It wasn't going to be easy, and they only had one night. They had left first, going to a party that the humans had thrown for themselves, since they tended to not be welcome at the Sha'Kar parties. Keritanima had gone along to help the two humans as they would try somehow to work their way into a position where they could check amulets for signs of mental control. Tarrin had shown them specifically what to look for, and armed with that knowledge, they would be able to detect the weave that sought to keep everything else hidden, including itself. They would attend the party, try to discern just who was under control and who was not, then move to break that control in the same manner that Tarrin was with the Sha'Kar. Keritanima didn't need all the Sha'Kar to be freed for the plan to work, but it was absolutely imperative that all the humans were taken out of the equation. To the point where Keritanima told them that the humans may have to be physically removed if necessary. Dolanna assured her that she knew a way to put all the humans out without hurting them, and Keritanima acceded to Dolanna's idea. A simple mind weave that induced sleep was easy to cast, and it could be set to linger for hours and hours. So long as the effect lingered, it would be virtually impossible to wake the victim up.
There were other tasks, important ones. Kimmie and Phandebrass were already hard at work trying to find or create a spell that would summon a Demon. Tarrin had one specific Demon in mind, and that was Shiika. If they could get Shiika onto the island, the Succubus could run wild all over the Sha'Kar. They wouldn't be able to do anything to her, and she could put them down without much effort with her powerful mind-affecting magic. Without Shiika's True Name, Phandebrass admitted to Tarrin that it was going to be very difficult. Between the limitations of Wizardry and the Ward around the island, they may not be successful. But it was a worthwhile gamble, and they all agreed to that. Shiika by herself could all but guarantee victory for them. If she did hear their summons, there was intense speculation as to whether or not she could penetrate the Ward. The Ward was a creation of magic native to this world, and as such Shiika would be absolutely immune to it. But it was also a creation of the gods, and that may give it the power to hinder her. They were split as to whether or not Shiika could breach the Ward, but they all agreed that it was still worth their time to try. As they all knew, Shiika could take the Sha'Kar and put them in the palm of her hand with very little opposition. Shiika's powers were not flashy or destructive as they were with most Demons, but in truth, hers were the most powerful. She was no warrior or magical powerhouse, and in a fight, she would quickly lose to one. But she controlled those who were much stronger than she, and that gave her more power than those who thought that they were above her. The Council had shown Tarrin the incredible power of being able to control others, and there was no being on Sennadar more effective at controlling others than Shiika.
Azakar, Camara Tal, Sisska, and Miranda also had a task, but it was one which they were not happy to accept. They remained behind in the estate, and in their guard was placed Zarina, Auli, Iselde, Allyn, and the redheaded girl that Tarrin had claimed earlier that night, whose name was Liza. Liza didn't know she was being guarded, only knowing that the honored one himself had asked her to come to the room and act as a personal servant and maid to the group while they were there. The presence of the three Sha'Kar didn't make that an unusual request.
The planning had a specific goal. To break enough of the Council's hold over the Sha'Kar so that tomorrow, the Sha'Kar would not cause them any serious problems once the Council was dethroned as the ruling body of Sha'Kari. That would take place at sunrise, and that plan, another of Keritanima's, was absolutely brilliant in its elegant simplicity. Tarrin would simply call the Council together and announce he was taking over. Sha'Kar society and culture recognized him, a sui'kun, as a ruler. The seven sui'kun were the seven Keepers of the towers before the Breaking. That was why they called him honored one, and Auli had demonstrated the deep-seated impulse the Sha'Kar had to obeying those above them. If that was one of the functions of the amulets, Keritanima saw no reason to use it against the Council. And the Council would have no real reason to deny him his rightful place. It would go against Sha'Kar tradition, and that was one of the traditions the Council had kept alive, so as to retain a sense of continuity among the Sha'Kar and also use as a tool to help keep the rest of their people under the Council's control. Keritanima could think of no rational reason the Council could give to him or their own people as to why Tarrin should not replace the Grand and lead the Council. The Council had created the tenets of the society they controlled, and Keritanima intended to use it as a weapon against them.
That was the plan, and it seemed to Tarrin to be a good one. It wasn't exhaustively complicated, addressing the main obstacles to taking down the Council and allowing them to do so with a minimum of bloodshed. That was very important to all of them, because as far as they were concerned, the only guilty parties on the island were the Council, the Grand, and the humans that were willingly working with them. They didn't want to have to be forced to fight people who were fighting them because they were being magically controlled. That could very well happen if the Council got wind of what they were doing before they finished, or they moved to protect themselves when Tarrin came to pay them a call. If things worked as they all hoped they would, Tarrin would simply walk in, take over the rulership of the Council, and then dissolve it. Then he'd turn around and kill them all.
After all, there was no way he was going to allow them to live, after what he'd seen what they were capable of. He hadn't told Keritanima that yet, but she'd find out once he started slaughtering them.
Another advantage of the plan was that all of it didn't have to succeed in order for the plan itself to be successful. Tarrin could fail to get fifty, Dar, Keritanima, and Dolanna could fail to discover who was controlling the humans, and Phandebrass and Kimmie could fail to Summon Shiika. The main core of the plan was Tarrin's hostile takeover of the Council. The freeing of the Sha'Kar and the containment of the humans were conditional actions they needed to take in case the Council refused and attempted to turn all the Sha'Kar against them. And that wasn't even an absolute, because even Keritanima wasn't sure what the Sha'Kar would do if the Council ordered them to attack the honored one. That may take things too far even for them, control or no control. But being wise, none of them were going to assume that the Sha'Kar would not turn hostile if they were commanded to do so.
"They're thinning out," Sapphire said in a low whisper from his shoulder. " How much longer?"
"As soon as they're all off the streets," he answered in a quiet tone, surveying things. There were only a few scattered pockets of slowly ambling Sha'Kar, probably the most drunken ones.
"Where do we go first?" she asked.
Tarrin pointed to an estate on the southwest edge of the town. "That one," he answered.
"Do you want me to go scout it for you?"
"No, let's both stay out of sight," he told her. "Thanks for the offer."
"I'd rather check things out before you go. I don't want to see you get hurt," she told him.
"I love you too, little one," he said absently yet sincerely, reaching up and patting her forepaws fondly. "But I'll be fine. These Sha'Kar aren't very alert, especially now that half of them are drunk and the other half either asleep or very distracted. They don't post guards. Goddess, they don't even lock their doors. They'll never see us."
"I hope so."
"Me too."
They waited in silence for about ten more minutes, until the last pack of Sha'Kar, a large family, finally piled into their estate. Tarrin silently climbed down the wall of the manor home on which he was perched, then ran across the lawn and jumped the fence in utter silence, his black fur and clothing blending in with the dark shadows, making him all but invisible. His instinctual understanding of stalking and moving without detection made him little more than a ghost, and he could have literally ran right in front of a Sha'Kar, and they would not have noticed him, so silently and stealthily he moved. He covered the ground to Auli's estate in a tenth of the time it took the Sha'Kar, moving with speed of purpose along the winding white stone pathways. He vaulted the fence without breaking his stride, and covered the considerable distance between the fence and the main manor house very quickly. Auli had described her home to him fully, and he knew that a servant's entrance on the east side of the house would give him the fastest and most direct route from the outside to her mother's bedchamber. That was where he moved, skirting around the house and skulking up to the door, which was remarkably plain. Tarrin put his ear to the door and listened, for the kitchen was on the far side and Auli warned him that one of the servants may be in the kitchen that time of night, for one of her sisters and one of her uncles both liked meals just before bed. And of course, the servants prepared and delivered them. But there was no sound coming from inside, meaning that the coast was clear.
Tarrin opened the door quickly and slipped inside, then closed it behind him. He was indeed in a kitchen, a huge chamber of a kitchen with two firepits, three stoves, and four ovens dispersed between countertop after countertop and pantry after pantry. It looked like a barracks kitchen responsible for feeding hundreds of men, not a kitchen to prepare meals for sixteen Sha'Kar. That was Auli's extended family, the population of the estate. Tarrin took stock of his surroundings, pausing to sniff at a few stoves, and could tell that it had been a while since the last meal had been prepared. He must have gotten there before those late eaters ordered their nightly dinners from the servants. There had been a couple of female servants in the kitchen not long ago, but their scents had them leaving towards the two rooms that the eight human female maids were allotted in the main house, down a small side passage off the kitchen.
With a nudge at Sapphire to get her off his shoulder, Tarrin shapeshifted into his cat form, the kitchen blurring and then taking on another perspective, as he looked up at everything rather than down. His cat form was a lot less conspicuous, and there was always a chance someone was going to come out a door while he was walking past. With sixteen Sha'Kar and the Goddess knows how many guests they had tonight, the chances were quite good. Sapphire landed on the ground beside him and nodded, folding up her wings. She'd seen him shapeshift before, but since he'd had mates in his beds lately, he saw little reason to shapeshift anymore. But this was one of those times when it was very useful. After a quick moment of negotiation as the Cat came more fully into the forefront of his mind, he padded towards the passageway that Auli had described. Her mother's chamber was at the end of that passage, a huge double door set at the end of the hall, and Auli warned him that the passageway traversed almost the entirety of the manor. Auli's mother preferred living on the ground floor, so she wouldn't have to climb any steps. It was very unlike Arlan's room, which was on the third floor of his estate.
Tarrin and Sapphire padded into the hallway, and moved both quickly and carefully. Tarrin put his nose to the floor and checked for recent scents, and found none. None at all, except for a few servants. That struck him as odd. There were eight bedrooms along that passage. None of them had returned to them yet? As often as the Sha'Kar slept over at another estate, that was a possibility. Auli admitted that she slept in her own room about one night in six, and even then she usually wasn't alone.
They encountered no one along the long walk to the end of the passage, where a huge set of double doors with massive crystal handles rested, the house name chased in silver on doors that looked to be sheathed in beaten gold. There were little clear crystals also embedded in the gold, making the whole thing shimmer as the light that radiated steadily from the walls caught in the crystals and was refracted. It was, by far, the gaudiest display he'd seen from the Sha'Kar so far. Most Sha'Kar decorations weren't half as loud as this one. Auli said her mother was a little eccentric. These doors tended to agree with that observation.
It was the place, however. With a quick look around, Tarrin shapeshifted back into his humanoid form, and then put his ear and his paw against the door. There was no sound from within, a good sign. Auli said her mother was an early sleeper, and tended to wake up earlier than most other Sha'Kar. Tarrin grabbed the pull ring and opened the door, doing it slowly, so its weight didn't make the door squeak on the hinges.
The room beyond was absolutely palatial. It was much larger than Arlan's chamber, and was almost spartanly decorated. There was only one sculpture, on the far side of the room, near the raised dais upon which the bed sat. There were five paintings and two tapestries, and there was also an ancient shield hanging from the wall, that had a coat of arms of some sort on it. It looked to be thousands of years old, from the archaic design of the shield. There were a couple of bookshelves near a trio of bureaus near the bed as well, and there was a whole lot of empty space between the chamber door and the nearest chair. There were about five chairs and a divan sitting on the far side of the room, probably where the woman received visitors, and there was a very large, ornate desk with a padded chair before it against the back wall. There were strange little cabinets to each side of that desk, probably for holding papers. Each had several small drawers. Arlan did his family paperwork in a study down the hall from his bedchamber. It looked like Auli's mother preferred to do it from her room. On the far wall were three other doors set closely together, probably closets, and an archway in the corner that opened into a bathing room that held a pool that, from that distance, looked to be the size of a large pond.
In the bed, Tarrin could see a single figure, laying still. The blankets were pulled up around it, so he couldn't get a good look, but the very faint scent told him it was a female Sha'Kar. Auli said she'd probably be alone. She preferred her male company in the morning and afternoon, saying that night time was for sleeping, not fooling around.
Quietly closing the door behind him, Tarrin motioned for Sapphire to stay put, standing on the floor next to the door, and padded quietly towards the woman. He wasn't sure how lightly Sha'Kar slept, but he was pretty sure he could get close enough to her without waking her up. He didn't need to see her amulet to weave that counterspell into it, but the proximity would make it much easier. The closer he got, the easier it would be.
Tarrin padded closer and closer to the woman, and then his ears picked up. Something wasn't right. He was getting closer, but the smell of her wasn't getting any closer. He should be able to scent her much more strongly now, but there was still nothing but that faint scent. Tarrin stopped about ten paces from the closest chair, looking carefully at the woman that was still about thirty spans away from him. She wasn't moving and she was laying on her side, so he couldn't get a good look at her, but the braided blond hair marked her as Auli's mother, all right. Auli had described her to him. Long blond hair, and she'd have it in a braid so she could sleep comfortably. He was only thirty spans away. Why hadn't her scent become stronger?
Tarrin hunkered down on all fours and carefully checked the floor, but there was no scent there. He rose up again and thoroughly tested the air, and realized that the scent was faint because it was old. Not very old, but there was no fresh smell of the woman in the room. And yet, there she lay.
That wasn't just not right, that was downright suspicious. He took a very cautious step back, away from the bed, not turning around so as not to turn his back on a potential enemy. His eyes scanned the room quickly as he crushed all his wild speculations on why things were wrong, what had happened. He'd think about what the hell was going on once he got out of the room, got to safety. He couldn't see or smell or hear or even sense any threats to him in the room, but the lack of congruency about this situation made him nervous and alert. He reached out with his senses and checked the woman on the bed, and to his shock, he realized that it was nothing but an Illusion. That was why she had no scent!
It came so quickly that it honestly took him by surprise. Absolutely out of nowhere, Tarrin felt a very strong power in Sorcery. By the time he felt it, registered its presence, he felt that power surround him, enclose him, seek to smother his magical self beneath it. Tarrin instinctively understood that that was what he did to that male Sha'Kar to cut him off from the Weave, that he was experiencing it from the wrong side. Tarrin struck back, blasting his will against that power in an attempt to break through it and reach the Weave, but the power was too heavily reinforced, too well created for him to be able to break it with brute force.
Tarrin realized what had happened immediately. Only a Circle could cut him off from the Weave, and there was only one Circle that would have reason to try!
The Council knew what he was doing!
Shock and betrayal raging through him, Tarrin turned on the sense of that power. The shield they had put around him didn't interfere with his sense of the magic, it only stopped him from using his power. They were behind him. Inside the room!
They were there. All nine of them, and seven were joined in a Circle. They had been standing in the room the whole time, and Tarrin hadn't seen them, heard them, or even smelled them! He still couldn't smell them! They must have used some kind of magical Ward to prevent him from sensing their presence! Sapphire, startled by their miraculous appearance, vaulted into the air flew over to land on Tarrin's shoulder, hissing at them dangerously from her perch.
They looked smug. How did they know? They had swept out all the spies. Had they missed someone? Had they managed to get eyes and ears into their war council? They must have, for they had no other reason to be here. Tarrin fought back a wild fury, and also an almost overpowering fear. They had him cut off from the Weave. They had him partially under their control, and the Cat was raging against that. It wanted to attack them, destroy them, do anything it had to do to regain its complete freedom. Tarrin had to fight a desperate, furious battle inside himself to retain control. If he tried to charge the Council, the two not busy holding him powerless would be free to attack him. And besides, he reminded the Cat, he could kill that shield with his Druidic power whenever it pleased him to do so. No, they thought they had him in the corner. He wanted to see what they were going to do with him. If he didn't like what he heard, he'd take them down.
"So, we meet again, honored one," Grand Syllis said in a light, conversational tone. He was holding a silvered dagger in his hand. "It's fortunate that this will be the last time under these circumstances."
Tarrin almost went wild at the sight of that dagger, but gritted his teeth and remained calm. If he wanted to talk, then Tarrin would make him talk. He may get them to say something useful. Besides, Syllis would be a maniac for trying to get close enough to use that dagger on him. "If you think your little spell can hold me back, think again," he said in a dangerous tone, his eyes narrowing dangerously as they exploded from within with that unholy greenish radiance that marked his anger. "You were complete fools to come into this room with me alone. I can slaughter the lot of you and nobody will ever know what really happened. As far as they'll be concerned, all nine of you failed the ceremony of Ascension." He glared at them. "I'll even bury you with the others, just so it feels more proper."
"Oh, we've taken all the necessary precautions, honored one," he said with a smile. They all seemed to step aside, as if on cue, and Tarrin very nearly did go wild at what he saw behind them.
Kimmie, stripped naked, unconscious, laying limply on the floor with her hands and feet bound by very sturdy-looking chains. He couldn't smell her. Why couldn't he smell her! But it was her. It was no Illusion, he could sense that. She had the Wizard-sense that permeated his mate, and there was no way they could fake that.
Tarrin took an involuntary step forward, then caught himself. Clenching his fists as Sapphire yowled at them in indignant fury, sparks starting to emanate from her body, Tarrin fought another furious battle to remain calm. Charging over there was only going to get Kimmie killed! That dagger wasn't meant for him, it was meant for Kimmie!
Grand Syllis made a gesture, and Kimmie raised off the floor as if held by an invisible hand. She floated over to him, her feet dragging the ground as she was lowered to the Grand's level, and he set the dagger against her naked breast lightly. "If only you would have left, honored one," he sighed. Tarrin bit his tongue when Syllis drew the dagger across Kimmie's smooth skin, leaving behind a thin red line of blood as the silver cut her. Proving to him that it could. "We had no intention of doing this, but you left us little choice."
Now they'd gone too far. It was time to end this! Tarrin reached within, through the Cat, reaching for the endless, boundless energy of the All. All he had to do was kill their shield and then—
"Don't bother trying to use your Druidic powers," Syllis warned quickly. "That takes time, and we'll sense it through the shield. Not even Druidic power can go unnoticed, honored one. If we sense that rise up in you, your mate will lose her throat."
Tarrin almost wanted to howl in impotent fury. He knew that Sorcerers couldn't sense Druidic magic in use, but there were too many uncertainties here. These were Ancients, and they already had the shield over him. If it could detect him drawing on the All, Syllis could plunge that dagger into Kimmie's throat before he could release the energy of the spell. He couldn't break their shield, he couldn't use Druidic magic against them, and they were too far away for him to reach them before they could kill his mate.
With a murderous glare, Tarrin put his paws down at his sides, fists still clenched so tightly that blood was starting to drip from where his claws had punched into his palms. Sapphire still hissed and growled, still had electricity dancing around her, but she too seemed to understand that for the moment, they were at a severe disadvantage.
"Ah, I see you've accepted the inevitable. I'm sure you're wondering how we came to be in this sticky situation. Would you like to know?"
Tarrin said nothing. He just glared death at Grand Syllis.
"Ah, I see you've lost your sense of humor," he said with a wicked grin. He nodded towards one of the other Sha'Kar, and the male—he couldn't remember which one that was—stepped over and opened the door to the chamber.
Dolanna was standing behind it.
She walked into the room, not even looking at Tarrin, and then curtsied before Grand Syllis deeply. He nodded to her, and she stood just beside him with her eyes on the floor. "You were on the right trail, honored one, but you checked the wrong woman. The work we did on your Allia was just a diversion. Dolanna was our true eyes and ears. Weren't you, my dear?"
"Yes, Grand Syllis," she replied in a wooden tone.
Tarrin was absolutely furious with himself. Damn them! They had read him like a book! With Allia under their control, it consumed all his attention. Dolanna and Keritanima had acted normally after Tarrin confronted the group with what he'd learned about the Sha'Kar, where Allia had not. And that caused all of them to drop their guard. Tarrin had never even considered the possibility that they could control Dolanna, because she was human. Too late he learned that some of the human Sorcerers were working for the Council… and he hadn't pieced those two important clues together!
"So, as you may realize, we've already rounded up all your companions. The humans, the Selani, and the Wikuni will make fine additions to our happy family here on the island. They are descendants of our race, so we can affect them, make them see reason. But you and those lizard creatures… well, I'm afraid there's little we can do about you."
"If you kill Kimmie, they won't find enough left of you to put in a thimble," Tarrin warned in a very deadly cold, ominous tone.
"Yes, yes, we know. Dolanna told us. She's carrying your child, and you have those fairly nasty Were instincts. You may even find the power to break our shield if we enraged you to that degree. But we're not that foolish, honored one. This one will live," he motioned at Kimmie with the dagger, "but the rest of you, I'm afraid, you'll have to sleep until we reawaken you. It won't be long, I can assure you of that. As soon as we get the Firestaff and I use it to take my rightful place among the gods, I'll restore you and the Vendari and all the children we had to put to sleep, and you can worship me for my kindness and generosity."
That made Tarrin's blood cold. Syllis wanted to use the Firestaff. He wanted to be a god.
No wonder he killed the Sha'Kar who opposed him. He sounded like he was a Sha'Kar in that regard, sounded like he truly regretted killing, but to him, it was just temporary. As soon as he was a god, he could bring all the Sha'Kar he had murdered back, as if nothing had happened.
"That's why we saved their bodies," he noted, as if he knew what Tarrin was thinking. "It pained us to have to go to those extremes, but they just didn't understand. I will be the new god of the Sha'Kar. Why was that so hard for them to accept?"
"You are mad," Tarrin said in a grim voice, a voice full of barely contained fury.
"One man's madness is another man's genius," he shrugged. "But we digress, honored one. That is my offer. Accept your sleep willingly, and your mate and unborn child will not be forced to sleep with you. The woman will survive the sleep, but the child… I'm afraid it won't be so lucky. You can save both, or certainly lose at least one. The choice is yours."
"You can't get the Firestaff," Tarrin said in a savage growl. "Your offer lacks backing."
"Oh, but we can, thanks to you," he grinned. "We had the Wizard and the Priest and the Sorcerer, but we couldn't find the Druid. But you pointed her out to us. That was very thoughtful of you, honored one."
"What are you talking about?" Tarrin demanded.
"The spell blocking entry into the volcano requires that all four orders of magic be there to bring it down. We keep one human Priest and one Wizard trained so they can serve. But we were missing the Druid. Now we have your Zarina and Liza, and we should be able to train one of them enough to serve our purposes. We were afraid we'd have to use you," he admitted with a smile. "That would have been very, very difficult. At first, we were afraid you'd discovered that secret, when you addressed us at the Council. It was before we'd had the time to fully learn about you from Dolanna. But when you told us why the Druids were so important to you, we realized that you hadn't yet figured things out."
That fit. They'd about had a heart attack when he brought up the Druids, then Syllis calmed right down after Tarrin told him that he was taking them back with him. He'd inadvertently revealed the last piece of the puzzle that Syllis and the Council needed. They weren't afraid of the Druids, they were afraid of what Tarrin might know! And they'd asked Kimmie if she was a Druid when they first met her, to see if she was the one they needed!
"So, honored one, now you know that I'm not offering a false bargain. Save both or save one. The choice is yours. I'd appreciate it if you'd make it, for we need to get you to sleep and safe and turn our attentions to finally recovering the Firestaff."
Tarrin stared at Syllis in barely contained fury. What was he going to do? He couldn't attack Syllis, or he'd kill Kimmie. But there was no way he believed that Syllis really intended to resurrect him from the dead. And yet, he could see no other way but to agree to his demand.
You must be able to make the decisions that must be made.
Tarrin cringed at that memory. Not this. No, not this! He wouldn't have to be forced to allow his own mate to die! She was his life, as much as Jesmind was, and his every instinct screamed at him to protect her, to protect his unborn child. He just couldn't abandon them!
No, he wouldn't. He couldn't kill Kimmie. He would not lose another friend. Faalken would not have company. If he agreed, then maybe one of the others could escape and get the Firestaff first—
You must be able to make the decisions that must be made.
Tarrin remembered Jesmind and Jasana, his precious mate and cub. What would become of them if he let Syllis get the Firestaff and then the gods destroyed the world trying to destroy him? What would become of his parents, his sister, his friends, of his little mother? Was Kimmie's life, the life of his unborn child, were they equal to the rest of his family? Were their lives worth destroying the entire world?
Tarrin struggled in silent agony for a long moment, but in the end, there was only one decision he could make.
Taking in a deep breath, a single tear escaping the corner of his eye, Tarrin reached within, through the Cat, reaching for the golden power, the boundless energy of the All.
Forgive me, my sweet mate, Tarrin thought in anguish. Mother, forgive me!
"Master, he's trying to use his Druidic magic!" one of the Council gasped.
"I'm sorry you couldn't see things my way," Syllis said sadly, moving to slit Kimmie's throat.
It happened in a flash, and it startled Tarrin so badly he almost forgot what he was doing. Docile, demure, obedient Dolanna, who had been standing there as still and quiet as one pleased, suddenly clasped her hands together, turned, and struck Syllis in the chest with every ounce of strength her diminutive little body could exert. Dolanna was small, but she was an active, well-traveled woman, and that gave her slender frame some impressive power. Dolanna's physical assault caught Syllis squarely in the chest, knocking the hand with the dagger wide of Kimmie and staggering him back with an explosive release of breath, his eyes agog with shock and dismay.
Tarrin watched in stunned horror as Kimmie's body dropped lifelessly to the ground, Grand Syllis' concentration broken and the spell holding her up disrupted.
"Tarrin, NOW!" Dolanna screamed with all her might as lightning crackled around her clasped hands, as she quickly wove a spell together while the Council seemed stunned into momentary paralysis by Dolanna's sudden attack. Dolanna sent that lightning into the Council, raking it across them, but one of the members not in the Circle managed to deflect the lightning with some kind of counterspell.
The shield around him began to weaken, falter. The Circle was taken aback by the little human Sorceress' gutsy, almost insane attack on them, willing to fight vastly superior numbers of Sorcerers who were vastly stronger than she. Tarrin managed to reach the All after redoubling his efforts, and when it touched him, it saw the image and read the intent in his mind. Tarrin's intent was to disrupt Sorcery, all Sorcery, within the bounds of the room.
Without their powers, the Council members were nothing more than defenseless mice. And the Cat was hungry.
Just like that, the shield around Tarrin vanished. The lightning raking the defensive shield protecting the Council vanished, as did the shield itself.
With a howl of utter fury, Tarrin allowed the Cat to take him, and he flew into a rage. Claws out, he threw himself at the suddenly terrified Council, who were turning and trying to flee from him. Blood pounded in his ears, shivered his eyesight as the outraged and utterly infuriated Were-cat displaced his drake companion and covered the distance between him and the Council before the first of them could even reach the door.
Dolanna flung herself at Grand Syllis and punched him dead in the nose, her weight crashing him to the floor with her as Tarrin reached the scrambling Council. They had all been running for the door, but then scattered in every direction when they realized that Tarrin was going to beat them to it. Two of them tried anyway, and he managed to reach them just as the tall female put her hand on the door. She almost made it. The enraged Were-cat grabbed her by the back of the neck and crushed it, then picked her up and used the body like a club, smashing it into the second one, a short male. He struck the male so hard that he was smashed into the door behind him, leaving a gruesome bloodstain where his head hit the beaten gold. The impact of the blow tore the head off the female's body, the body bouncing to the floor as the head came off in the Were-cat's paw, separated by the grip he had on the neck. He threw that head aside contemptuously and charged off after the next closest fleeing figure as Sapphire unloaded her full charge of lightning on two Council members who were fleeing towards the archway leading to the pool. Both of them shrieked in agony as the lightning blasted into them, and though the heat of it could do no damage, the electric current most certainly did, destroying their nervous systems. The power of her lightning dropped them both stone dead to the floor, twitching and jerking spasmodically. Sapphire's powers had grown much stronger since the birth of the sixth sui'kun.
Tarrin reached his prey and drove it to the floor, then killed it with a claw slash to the neck as the Sha'Kar screamed in terror and tried to put up his hands in defense. The Were-cat simply swept those hands aside with the fatal blow. He looked up and saw the last three, one of them running into the pool room, another trying to get a closet door open but unable to find the strength of coordination to work the handle, and the third dashing towards the bed. Sapphire was airborne, and he saw her discharge what lightning she had left into the one that was running towards the bed, dropping the female but not killing her. Dolanna was straddling Grand Syllis, a look of utter hatred on her face as she punched the Sha'Kar repeatedly with her little fists. Even in his fury, that image both surprised and amused the Were-cat. Little Dolanna, beating down a man much taller and stronger than she with pure savage hatred boiling in her veins. Dolanna had found her own rage.
The Were-cat dispatched the one Sapphire had shocked with a kick to the head, more than strong enough to snap the neck, then vaulted into the air just as the one at the closet door managed to get it open. He screamed in terror when Tarrin's paw shut the door on him, then his other paw grabbed him by the back of the neck, picked him up, and slammed him into the door with enough force to punch a hole the polished dark wood. The blow crushed the Sha'Kar's skull, sending a gory spray of blood and brains into the small closet along with the shards of bloody wood. The body hung limply from the hole in the door that his head had made, and Tarrin left it there, vaulted up and then down the platform of the bed, and met Sapphire in the archway as the pair of them went after the last Sha'Kar.
They found him floating in the bathing pool, face down and not moving, with a cloud of pink surrounding him. Tarrin reached in and grabbed the body by the foot and hauled it out of the water, regarding it hanging upside down from his grasp as his rage began to ease. The male was dead, and from the looks of it, he had taken his own life with a dagger to the heart rather than suffer death at Tarrin's paws.
Tarrin dropped the body back into the water as the Cat retreated from the forefront of his mind, and he came down out of his rage. He blinked and felt a bit scattered, and the actions he took during the rage seemed a little fuzzy and indistinct. He knew that the Council was dead, and he felt a little dark thrill go through him at that wonderful thought. Kimmie was virtually unharmed, with only a shallow nick, as well as whatever they'd done to her to knock her out. Dolanna had taken down Syllis, and was still fighting with him.
Syllis. He was still alive! Tarrin snarled and felt the Cat rise up in him, but then the rational part of him realized that it would be best to keep him alive, at least for the moment, so the Sha'Kar could hear of his horrible acts from his own mouth.
"Are you well, friend?" Sapphire asked, panting a little as she landed on his shoulder.
"Yes, thank you. That was good work. I didn't think you had three in you."
"I only had two and a half in me," she said breathlessly. "It drained me."
"Let's go pull Dolanna off the Grand before she kills him," he told her. "We'll need him alive, at least for now."
Dolanna was still beating on Grand Syllis when Tarrin arrived. He grabbed her by the scruff of the neck and hauled her off of him. Spitting and screaming, she tried to kick at the senseless Sha'Kar, managing to land a good one right in his side, which drew a gasping "oomph" from the dazed male.
"Easy, tiger," Tarrin chided. "Going crazy is my job."
"How dare he violate me so!" she screamed in fury. "I'll tear out his eyes!"
"Dolanna, I can't check Kimmie with you going nuts, and I really want to check my mate," he warned sternly. "Calm down, and watch him. The spell I used to cancel Sorcery is going to end any minute now. Don't let him touch the Weave."
Panting laboriously for a moment, Dolanna pulled herself free of his grasp, a bit more aggressively than he'd hoped, but she made no move to continue pummeling on him. "I am alright now," she said in a more composed tone, in Sulasian.
Tarrin quickly knelt down by Kimmie and pulled her up into his arms. She had been struck by something, the blunt force knocking her out. Tarrin's Druidic intervention faded, and he wove a quick spell and sent it into her to make sure that what he'd seen was indeed the truth. His searching spell found no other signs of injury, just a concussion suffered by whatever had struck her. That kind of trauma was one of the few things that a Were-cat's regeneration couldn't heal immediately. It was going to take her body time to recover from it.
Tarrin used a weave of Earth to break the locks holding the chains on her, then threw them aside. She'd make sure she never woke up to that horror. Kimmie was a mild, calm, sedate, very friendly Were-cat. Tarrin would make sure she never suffered with the ordeal of being feral.
"Is she well?" Dolanna asked.
"Concussion," he replied. "It's going to take her a while to wake up."
"Probably," she agreed.
"Alright, Dolanna," he said grimly, collecting his precious mate in his arms and standing up. "What just happened?"
"A terrible risk," she answered.
"What do you mean?"
Dolanna sighed, and shuddered slightly. "Keritanima made the very connection Syllis taunted you about not making," she explained in Sharadi. "But it was too late to stop what was happening. She thought to check me just before we reached the party, when I guess I acted too strangely for her. When she found it, she freed me, and I was able to tell her that I'd already told the Council about the plan using a spell they taught me. At that point, me and Keritanima decided to take a very serious risk. We couldn't stop what we'd set in motion, because they had used magic to summon me to Auli's house. We knew it was too late to try to contact you by then, so Keritanima showed Dar how to make it seem that I was still under their control. We hoped that I'd be placed in a position to thwart the Council, because they had summoned me to join them. Keritanima felt that Syllis would be the kind to bring me before you and taunt you with me. She was right."
Tarrin stared at her for a long time. What a risk to take! But Keritanima, who was so good at predicting the actions of others, had made the right decision. He was a little angry with them for putting him and his mate is such danger, but part of them thanked them for it. If they had tried to pull him out, Kimmie may have suffered at their hands, even been killed because she had already been captured. He held his precious mate close to him, just thankful that she was alright. The fact that they'd just wiped out the Council and captured Syllis meant nothing to him compared to that.
"We gained much more than I thought we would," Dolanna said with a release of breath. "Syllis was kind for explaining what we need to do to get past the barrier. We already have the necessary people. Tarrin, we can go after the Firestaff any time we want."
"We can," he said, finding that that thought both made his blood run cold, and filled him with a kind of grim excitement. There was still that guardian to deal with, but at least there were no other obstacles to defeat now.
The way was clear.
There were some loose ends, however. He wanted to make sure the Sha'Kar wouldn't attack them when they came back. He'd just killed the majority of their ruling body. That was going to cause some serious problems. But then again, they had Syllis, and they had him alive. Tarrin could free the nine strongest Sorcerers on the island from his control and bring them to him, let them see and hear the truth for themselves. They could be the new Council and Grand, and he'd show them how to release the others from their magical control. Tarrin had hated the Sha'Kar for their behavior, but now that he knew that it wasn't their fault, he found no animosity towards them. He knew what it was like to be enslaved to the will of another. He felt their pain. If anything, he felt an overpowering need to watch over them, almost as if they were children.
Tarrin nuzzled his unconscious mate for a moment, then put a paw to the thin cut on her chest and wove a spell of healing. The cut sealed over, leaving no scar, and he collected her spilled blood carefully and Transmuted it into pure water. He would leave no chance of an accidental turning in this room.
Kimmie's eyes fluttered a moment under her eyelids, then they opened to reveal her beautiful blue eyes. They were unfocused, woozy, and they regarded Tarrin for a moment as if he were a stranger. Her regenerative powers were starting to reverse the injury of her concussion. "Mmm, good morning," she said in a distant voice.
Tarrin held her close. He'd come so close to losing her. It would have destroyed him to watch them kill her, but even she would have made the same decision, would have told him what he had to do. The whole world was not worth two lives. Had Tarrin not had others he loved, he may have chosen differently. But to protect them, he would have been forced to sacrifice his mate. She put her arms around him weakly, and she looked a little startled when she saw the tears in his eyes after she pushed him away. "What's the matter, love?" she asked. "Where are we? Why are you crying?"
"He nearly lost you, Kimmie," Dolanna answered for him. "Had not blind luck and the Goddess been smiling down on us, we would have lost you."
"Lost me? What happened?" she asked, her voice more focused as the effects of her concussion were swiftly healed away. "Where are we? This isn't the library."
"Someone hit you in the back of the head," he told her.
"The Council used you as a hostage to try to make us cooperate," Sapphire added from his shoulder.
She looked at him, and it dawned in her eyes. "Oh, I see. Well, I hope you told them to go to hell, my love," she said sternly.
"I didn't have to, Kimmie," he said with a loving smile. "Dolanna beat the stuffing out of Grand Syllis with her bare hands, and I killed the rest of them. Dolanna saved me from having to make that choice."
She'd never know he had made that choice. He would never tell her how close she'd come to losing her life, and losing it because of his decision. She put her paws on his face and kissed him tenderly, lingeringly. "I think I can stand now, Tarrin," she told him.
"Dolanna hit the leader of them in the stomach, and that surprised the rest long enough for us to attack them without them hurting you," Sapphire told her.
He set her on her feet, but kept a paw on her as a precaution. She looked down at herself and gave a rueful chuckle. "How do I keep ending up losing my clothes?" she fretted with a smile. "And I didn't even shapeshift!"
"They know you are a Wizard, Kimmie," Dolanna answered. "Stripping you would be the most effective means to ensure you are not hiding any spell components."
"True," she admitted. "Would you Conjure me a dress, love? I feel a little out of place here. Nudity isn't something you practice alone when in company," she added with a darling smile.
Tarrin Conjured one of her dresses for her, and she seemed stable enough as she pulled it over her head. "That's better," she said, patting her belly. "Though it is a bit tight in the middle now." Tarrin relaxed the wool for her, and she kissed him on the cheek in thanks. "Alright, someone tell me what happened. And we'd better clean this place up. It's a mess."
Dolanna explained what had happened with a self-blaming tone in her voice, but Kimmie tutted her with a wave of her hand. "You can't be responsible for what you do when you're under someone else's control," she said dismissively. "Don't blame yourself for what happened. Instead, be happy that things turned out the way they did."
"That is hard when it is you who was the cause of it," Dolanna sighed.
"Talk to Tarrin. He has a lot of experience with that kind of thing. He can help you get over it. I'll bet it was Phandebrass that hit me in the head," she mused. "I didn't smell anyone else in the room, and they would have put their control over all the others rather than try to wrestle with them."
"It is a possibility."
Sapphire nuzzled Kimmie lovingly, jumping onto her shoulder, and the Were-cat female laughed. "I'm alright, little one," she assured her. "I'm glad you were here."
"She killed three of them herself," Tarrin said proudly.
"Two, and I shocked a third well enough to let Tarrin finish it off," she amended.
"Did anyone ever tell you you're a very handy drake to have around, Sapphire?" Kimmie laughed.
"You are family. I can't just let you run around without watching over you. You bipeds get into too much trouble on your own."
Kimmie laughed and hugged the little drake to her, and Sapphire rubbed her head against Kimmie's shoulder in reply.
"Let us get the others and free them of the control," Dolanna prompted. "And work out what we are going to do now. We cannot leave this issue as it is, the Sha'Kar may very well turn on us."
"Just don't show them this room," Kimmie said, looking at the bodies. "At least it's a lot neater than what I would have expected. No guts hanging off the walls or anything."
"I didn't have time to deal with him the way they needed dealt with," Tarrin said calmly. "I was a bit pressed for time."
"Hey, at least we don't need a chisel this time," she said with a wink, looking back towards the door. "Woops, I spoke too soon. You did dismember one of them, I see. What is it with you and heads, Tarrin? Do you always have to pull them off that way?"
"It was an accident. If she had sturdier neck, she wouldn't have lost her head."
Kimmie laughed, but Dolanna shuddered a little at the graphic exchange. "Let us pick up the pieces, dear ones," she prompted. "We need to be ready to move before the Sha'Kar wake tomorrow. So we have some planning to do."
The demise of the Council didn't surprise the others very much, at least after they'd been gathered. But things weren't quite as bad as Grand Syllis had led Tarrin to believe. They had taken control of Phandebrass, but it turned out that he was the only one they had managed to get. Keritanima defended Dar at the party, for as long as they were there before they scrambled back to their hosts' estate, where they found four dead human Sorcerers piled up just inside a barricaded door. Sisska, who had been watching over the rest of the humans, turned out to be the heroine in that little scuffle. The Sorcerers came in and attempted to cast Mind weaves on the humans, but the one that had been assigned to incapacitate the female Vendari with Sorcery had not been educated as to the nature of the Vendari race. They were a creation of magic, and in that creation they had gained a powerful resistance to magical forces and influences. The same resistance that allowed them to rebel against the Zakkites allowed Sisska to come right through the binding magic that the Sorcerer had tried to use against her. She slaughtered the attackers so quickly that the ones trying to take control of the humans with Sorcery nearly didn't realize she was there. They never dreamed something so massive could move with such blazing speed. Sisska killed the Sorcerers, then they barricaded themselves in Tarrin's room, safe behind the Ward he had erected to prevent anyone from finding out what happened to the Sorcerers that came to take them until someone noticed that they hadn't completed their task. They had been noticed, and Sorcerers sent by the Council had tried three times to get into the room and take them, even resorting to Illusions and magically-generated fake voices to try to trick Sisska into letting them in. But the Vendari, highly trained and very protective, would not back down, not for anyone or anything.
It took some pretty serious negotiations to get Sisska to take down the barricade. Tarrin tried, Keritanima tried, even Allia tried, but it was Binter who finally convinced her that they weren't another trick, hissing at her in the Vendari's native tongue and probably telling her things that only the two of them would know. After they proved their identities, Sisska cleared the obstacles blocking the door and allowed them inside.
After they got Sisska calmed down and the furniture more or less righted but not bothering to put it back where it belonged, they sat down on chairs and couches that Tarrin Conjured for everyone, and Tarrin told them what happened in detail. He left out the part where he was forced to decide between Kimmie and his mission. That dark secret would never leave his lips. "We sealed off the room and left the bodies where they were," Tarrin said, pointing at an unconscious Grand Syllis, who was trussed up and laying on the floor with Binter and Sisska watching him very carefully. "Dolanna managed to take down Syllis, with a punch to the stomach. I think her attacking him with physical violence was the last thing he ever expected."
Phandebrass laughed. "I say, I think your Goddess as watching over her children today," he said.
"I'm just so glad it worked," Keritanima said with an explosive sigh. "They knew what was going on, and it was too late to try to stop it. It was the only thing we could think of on such short notice. We were a bit harried at that point."
"It worked. That's all that matters," Camara Tal told her.
"I am sorry I brought us to this," Dolanna said glumly.
"You are not the only one to blame, Dolanna," Allia said in a steady voice. "I have my own shame in it."
"How do you think we feel?" Iselde asked miserably. "They've been doing that to us since we were born! They killed our parents! How could they?"
"Syllis wanted the Firestaff," Tarrin told her. "He was mad for power, and men like that do monstrous things."
"They made all of us monsters," Allyn said soberly. "They made us reduce our human friends to nothing better than sheep," he said, looking at Zarina and Liza, who sat off to one side, almost clutching one another. They were both still quite afraid of everything that was going on. "They twisted our desires in the worst possible way."
"How do you think I feel, Allyn?" Auli asked tartly. "I've slept with just about every man on the island! Not that it wasn't fun, but I feel… violated," she amended.
Tarrin had to chuckle. Control or no control, Auli was Auli.
"The question is, what do we do now?" Dolanna said, still looking quite abashed at how she had betrayed them.
"That's easy," Auli said. "We find my mother. Then we free her of their control and let her hear it from his lips personally," she continued, pointing at the unconscious Syllis. "My mother's very respected. If she says it's truth, then she'll be believed."
"That's a start," Keritanima said. "Can she talk down the rest of the Sha'Kar?"
"If there's no Council here and no Grand to give us orders, who do you think they'll listen to?"
"She has a point," Dolanna agreed.
"It's a start," Keritanima said again. "Allyn? Iselde? Any ideas?"
"Actually, I think Auli's right, but we'll need more than her mother," Allyn said. "If we get the ten most respected Sha'Kar and bring them here and explain what they did to us, they can take care of things. With the Council dead, we'll need a new one, and they'd be its members anyway."
"Did you have to kill them, honored one?" Iselde asked.
"Yes," he said flatly. "After what they did to you and to the humans, they deserved nothing less. What happened to Zarina was more than enough reason. Because of what happened to her, I nearly decided to kill all of you."
They paled a little at that, but they could see that he wasn't joking. Zarina flushed furiously and sat a little closer to Liza, who had had a doe-like, thunderstruck look about her ever since they'd dragged her out of her daily life.
"I'm not like your people, Iselde," he reminded her. "In many ways, I'm probably just as ruthless as the Council was. But at least you know where I stand. I don't hide things the way they did."
"Small favors," Miranda grinned at him.
"This is second hand to the more important issue," Dolanna told them. "Thanks to Syllis' talkative bent, he has told us everything we need to know. We can get the Firestaff now, any time we so wish."
"You mean we can try," Allia warned. "Remember, there is still one more obstacle. The Guardian the legends speak of."
"I'm not sure it's there anymore," Camara Tal said. "It's been sealed in a cave for five thousand years! If it was a living thing, how could it go that long without food?"
"Don't put anything past magic, Camara," Keritanima said. "Until we see otherwise, let's assume that there's a nasty monster or something guarding the Firestaff. Since the Council never got into the volcano, we know that they didn't conveniently kill it for us."
"We know where it is and how to get to it. The only question now is when," Dolanna said calmly.
"We go tomorrow," Tarrin said. "As soon as we can. We'll let Iselde, Allyn, and Auli work things out with Auli's mother and the other Sha'Kar. They know the truth, and they can tell them what happened. As for me, I'm not waiting another day. We've spent too long searching for that damned thing to just let it sit out there for anyone to get. I won't be happy until I have it in my paws."
"Why not go now?" Dar asked.
"Because some of us are tired," Dolanna replied. "And I think Tarrin would like a little time to prepare."
"I'm ready now, Dolanna," he snorted. "If anything, my exercise with the Council warmed me up. I feel ready to fight with something. But Kimmie's recovering from an injury, and I won't leave her until I'm sure she's completely well."
"Leave me? Who said you were leaving me behind?" she scoffed.
"I did," he said, giving her a flat look. "I will not risk you and the cub, Kimmie. Not under any circumstances. If you want to fight about it, that's fine. I'll leave here with you chained to the bed and Sisska standing guard over you."
"That's dirty pool, love," Kimmie frowned.
"I may not think you're an invalid, but I'm not going to let you risk both your life and our baby's like that," he told her. "Not when we have no idea what we'll be facing."
"I think you're being completely unfair," she accused.
"You're right. I am. Can you do anything about it?" he asked in a dangerous tone.
"No," she sulked.
"Then live with it," he told her.
"That goes for you two as well," he said, pointing at Zarina and Liza. "You two are too important to risk. And that means that someone is going to have to stay behind to watch over them. Kimmie will be one, but we'll need one more. Who wants to do it?" He looked around. "None of us are going to think any less of you, because you'll be doing something important."
"Dar," Dolanna said to him, "I want you to stay. You are young yet, and have great potential. But your potential is not fully realized. If there is any one person I would wish to survive on if we fail, it is you."
"You make it sound like you're not coming back," Dar said fearfully.
"My friend, there is a good chance of that," she said grimly. "We were warned repeatedly of the great, fearsome guardian of the Firestaff. We cannot just happily assume that we will all stroll in and claim it without suffering casualties." She looked around at them. "There is a good chance that some of us may not return."
Tarrin did not like the way that sounded, but he couldn't refute Dolanna's statement. If this guardian really was that dangerous, then there was a good chance that it was going to kill someone. Part of him refused to accept that. He had kept all of them alive since they lost Faalken, and he vowed not to lose another friend on this mad quest. If anyone was going to die, it was going to be him. He wouldn't allow anyone else to die. Not if he could help it. Even if he had to die for it, he wouldn't lose anyone else.
"Miranda, you're staying," Keritanima ordered. "Binter, Sisska, so are you."
"No, your Majesty," Binter said bluntly. "Our place is with you."
"I won't split you up like that," Keritanima said. "If Miranda stays, then—"
"You are our primary task, your Majesty," Sisska told her. "If Miranda stays, she will stay. But we will not abandon you. You may need us."
"I'll be fine by myself, Kerri," Miranda told her. "Kimmie and Dar will be here. I think Sisska won't mind if they watch over me in her place."
"I'm going," Camara Tal declared bluntly.
"We need you," Dolanna told her. "You nave no choice."
"I'm going," Azakar declared. "Between me, Tarrin, Binter, and Sisska, we should have enough muscle to handle almost anything, and you could always use an extra sword. There aren't enough of them in this group as it is." He looked to Dolanna. "Would you object if I asked if I could take Faalken's place by your side, Dolanna?" he asked in a sincere tone. "I know I'll never be able to replace him, but you've gone long enough without a Knight to protect you."
"My dear one, I will accept you happily," she told him with a warm smile. "Faalken would have wanted you to take his place. You were one of the few he respected enough to entrust with my life."
Tarrin couldn't help but feel very happy about that. Azakar had never asked that of her, probably out of respect for his friend and the close bond Dolanna and Faalken had shared. They had been good friends as well as Knight and Sorceress. Dolanna couldn't have gotten a better Knight. Azakar was young, but he had been trained by the best warriors in the world. She could do no better than him.
Phandebrass, who had seemed strangely muted by having had himself taken over, finally spoke. "I say, I'd like you two to watch my drakes. They're getting very restless, they are, being locked up in my room and all. They're lonely and they need some company, they do."
"Sapphire, I know it's asking a lot, but would you stay with Kimmie?" he asked her. "I'll feel much better knowing that you're watching over her. If anything, you've proven yourself in that respect."
"I will protect her, dear friend," she told him with her usual dignified air.
"That makes me feel a lot better," Tarrin said. "Well, I think we're about done here."
"Agreed," Dolanna nodded. "I will go with Kerri and Auli and try to find Auli's mother. Iselde, Allyn, choose the nine strongest Sha'Kar and please ask them to come. We have much to tell them. Dar, please go with them. Tarrin, if you do not mind, could you watch the Grand for us? He may wake up soon, and we will need your power here to prevent him from using his."
"I'll keep an eye on him," he agreed.
"The rest of you should remain here with Tarrin until we return with the Sha'Kar. Then we will explain things to them and then allow them to question the Grand. When we are certain they understand the situation, we will get some rest. Remember, we will have a very, very busy day tomorrow."
"That's an understatement," Camara Tal grunted, summing up the very thing Tarrin had been thinking.
Tomorrow was it. The day, the day he'd worked and labored and suffered for over two years to reach. Tomorrow, if luck was with him, by sunset, he would finally have the Firestaff.
His only worry was for the dreadful toll it may exact from his friends.
Auli's simple idea worked, and it worked perfectly. They assembled the ten most austere members of Sha'Kar society, and after Tarrin defeated the control that had been placed over them and gave them a moment to recover, they brought out Grand Syllis. They'd been outraged by his appearance and their treatment of him at first, but that outrage turned against him when Tarrin and Dolanna explained what had been going on. Tarrin killed the hiding spell in Auli's mother's amulet, a tall, handsome woman with blond hair and a serious demeanor named Ianelle, and she saw exactly what had been in her amulet the entire time. Their outrage reached a fever pitch, to much so that Tarrin feared they would kill Syllis when he told them about the bodies, and how the Council had been killing anyone that escaped from their control.
Then it was Syllis' turn to talk. Ianelle took Syllis's face in her hands and wove the most powerful Mind weave Tarrin had ever seen, a weave that absolutely dominated the Grand's mind and turned him into little more than a puppet. The ten Sha'Kar questioned the Grand extensively, hearing from his own lips what he and the others had done.
It was a chilling story. After the plague began killing the humans, Syllis and the Council had been seeking some way to cure it. They stumbled on the buried information about the Firestaff during their frantic search for an answer, and though it could not help them, Syllis became progressively more and more obsessed with the artifact, and the promise of godhood for the one who possessed it. It was little more than a dream to him until the Sha'Kar sculptors that had been making the figures on the volcano excavated the tunnel opening, and the spell that protected. That was when Syllis realized that getting the Firestaff was a viable dream, and his want for it completely dominated him. He became absolutely consumed with trying to claim the Firestaff, but he knew that the Sha'Kar would not permit him to do such a thing. They became an obstacle to him, and so he devised a way to make them more tractable.
Syllis was an expert in Mind weaves, and devised the weaves in the amulets himself. He did his first work with his lover in the Council, taking her amulet and casting the spells into it to make her utterly obey him without question, and waiting to see what happened. She became completely under his control, the Mind weaves making her accept anything he said as the truth and as the best thing. She all but worshipped him, and Syllis found it extremely satisfying. So with her help, he carefully managed to enslave the rest of the Council without arousing the suspicions of the others, who had been so preoccupied with trying to find a cure for the disease. As they knew it had, he succeeded, and had complete control of the Council.
But he decided not to use the same weaves on the general population, because such dominating control would eventually be broken. Syllis found that he had to renew his controlling weaves every few rides, as the minds of the Council began to shrug the effects off. He knew that there were Sorcerers out there, like Ianelle, that would be strong enough to break its control much more quickly than the Council, and he'd eventually face a rebellion. So he devised an alternative, the sinister, cunning weaves that he had used against the others, weaves that rewired the mind of the victim to make them seek out only pleasure. Syllis was a master of Mind weaves, and understood the mind better than most. Such an means of attack would be very hard to detect and even harder to resist, for blocking pleasure was almost impossible, where blocking pain was not.
Infecting the rest of the population with the weave was a simple matter. The Council announced they thought they had a cure, and asked the Sha'Kar to come in, one by one, to be treated. And while they were there, their defenses down, the Grand and the Council set the weaves.
What to do with the humans was another problem, one that had no quick solution. Only a handful of humans survived the plague, and some of them, seeing the drastic change in the Sha'Kar, tried to find out what was going on. Syllis had them quietly killed, sacrificing the humans he couldn't control for a more sinister solution to the human problem.
That was training. The human children born after the plague that showed potential were taken aside and conditioned from infancy to obey the Council without question. It took some trial and error, but the Council eventually found a raising regimen that made the humans that would grow up to be Sorcerers just as decadent and hedonistic as the Sha'Kar had suddenly become, so as not to stand out too greatly in their society, and completely under the Council's control. They did the Council's bidding, and they did it willingly. To keep the humans and Sha'Kar from interfering with one another too greatly, since they had to use different techniques of control on them, they instituted the caste society they had today, where humans were second class citizens, and humans with no talent for Sorcery were slaves. The human Sorcerers accepted it willingly, since it was the Council's bidding, and they also preferred being second class citizens to slaves.
The new children of the Sha'Kar received a similar treatment. As Auli had shown them, among the younger Sha'Kar, it was as much a function of how they were raised as much as it was the control the Grand had over them. They had been raised to believe that everything they did was good and proper, and like the humans, they were going to have to be retrained to think for themselves and function in a new society. Auli was a very good example of that. She had lost her magic-influenced sex drive, but her upbringing made her see no shame in it, and she would probably remain very loose with her favors even after the control had been removed, because she was raised to believe that it was alright to be promiscuous. It would be the same for all the children that had been raised on the island, who had been brought up in the decadence.
The volcanic eruption that had destroyed the city had not been an eruption at all. The Grand wanted to reorganize things, draw the Sha'Kar closer together so he could keep a better eye on them as they settled into their altered routines without risking them finding out what he'd done to them, so when the volcano started smoking more than usual and a little lava appeared at the top, he burned the city and blamed it on embers from the volcano. It gave him an excuse for it that wouldn't seem so out of place that the Sha'Kar would begin to suspect that they were being influenced.
But some did. Every once in a while, a Sha'Kar would break free of the control, and attempt to expose Syllis and the Council. Those, they regretfully put down and buried, so their bodies would be near so Syllis could resurrect them after he became a god.
The society endured like that, and as Tarrin listened to Syllis describe the years roll by without any success in breaching the spell defending the tunnel, he realized that Syllis was truly mad. He all but believed himself a god already, and carried on as if what he'd done was for the best for all. Ianelle seemed to understand that as well, and asked a series of very personal questions that confirmed that Syllis was indeed completely insane. But that insanity hadn't affected his reasoning or his cunning, and that was what had made him so dangerous. The society he built was, to him, absolutely perfect, where everyone was happy. He saw the debauchery and decadence as pinnacles of societal evolution, seeing absolutely nothing wrong with anything that went on the island. As long as no Sha'Kar were hurt and they found pleasure in it. The fortune and fates of the humans meant nothing to him. He saw the Sha'Kar as the greatest race on the world, and all other races existed to serve and give pleasure to them.
"We do not condone you killing the members of the Council," Ianelle told Tarrin sternly. "There is nothing so severe that requires the use of violence. But given the circumstances, we can understand why someone with your instincts would do what you did. We may not condone it, but we understand that you felt it was necessary, honored one. Those Sha'Kar were slaves as much as we were. It pains me that they had to die for crimes they weren't responsible for committing, but there was little choice in the matter."
"I'm sorry you feel that way," Tarrin told her. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry."
"We will mourn and move on," she sighed. "But for this one," she said, looking at Syllis, "his insanity is so advanced that we may not be able to cure it. For him, death may be the only solution. We obviously can't let him loose, not with his power and his past record. If that decision is made, we would ask you to do it. We cannot take his life, honored one. It goes against everything we stand for. We cannot do violence unless actively defending ourselves. But we know that you have no such restrictions."
"If you ask it of me, I'll do it, Ianelle," he said. "I'm sure you'll do what's best. I think the Sha'Kar would do well to have you as their new Grand."
"No," she said flatly. "The concept of the Grand obviously failed. Da'shar just aren't meant to stand in the place of the sui'kun. The temptations of power are just too great for us. So then, we accept your authority over us, honored one," she said with a curtsy. "You are the chosen one. We are yours."
"I'm not going to have time to be your leader, Ianelle," he protested. "What if I just told you to act in my place? That way you're getting your orders from a sui'kun, and this time, it's all legal since I ordered it?"
"It will not do," another Sha'Kar, a short male with rare red hair named Endelian, stated. "We have decided to form the new Council as ten. None other than the sui'kun can lead us. Ianelle can act as First among us, but you are the one closest to the Goddess. That place is yours, and no one else's."
"I just don't have time—"
Keritanima cut him off. "I'm sure the honored one just needs a little time to accept that," she said, stepping on his foot. "As you've noticed, he wasn't raised to command people. I'm sure the idea of him being your ruler is a little frightening to him."
"We aren't that difficult to rule, honored one," Ianelle said with a smile. "Our society and custom teaches us our place. The youngest of us are going to have to be retrained in the proper ways," she said, putting a steely eye on Auli, "for they were raised in the perverted system instituted by Syllis. It will fall to the elders among us to teach our children our true ways."
"I'm sure you know why I'm here, Ianelle," Tarrin told her. "I intend to finish my task tomorrow. I came for the Firestaff, and I mean to take it. When I have it, I'll be leaving."
"Then we will go with you," she said calmly. "You can breach the Ward, or you would never have gotten in. This island will be too much of a reminder for our children of the ways they first learned. We need to teach them properly, teach them the truth, and that will be hard here, with these ridiculously lavish homes and the servants and the lack of contact with others. These are not our ways. I feel lost in this room as it is," she admitted, and the other nine Sha'Kar nodded in agreement.
"We don't have room for you on our ship," he warned.
"Why would we travel by means of such an antiquated contraption?" she asked. "Get us outside the Ward, honored one. We can bring all of us home within minutes. Sha'Kar, humans, and your people all."
Keritanima looked at her. "How are you going to do that?"
"Why, Teleport, of course," another Sha'Kar said, a flat-chested—which was quite remarkable among the buxom Sha'Kar—white-haired woman named Riana. "With the help of the honored one and the humans, we can build a Circle large enough to transport all of us, as well as your vessel. How else would we travel?"
All the magic-users in Tarrin's party stared at the woman in shock. "I didn't know we could do that!" Dar gasped, breaking the silence.
"You couldn't do it, young student," Ianelle told him bluntly. "It is da'shar magic. When you have grown into your full power, the world will be open to you. But not until then."
"Nuts," Dar growled.
"Patience, pupil," Ianelle said with a smile. "With patience, diligence, and devotion, all things will be open to you. But you must work for them."
"How is it that you didn't know?" Riana asked, looking scandalized.
"Most of what the Ancients—what you know was lost after the Breaking," Dolanna said. "The only ones left alive afterward were the youngest Sorcerers, those without an intimate enough contact with the Weave to kill them. After the Breaking, there seemed to be no one left that could read Sha'Kar, so the history of the katzh-dashi was reduced to what the survivors could remember, and most of them had been but novices, with only the most basic understanding of the Weave. Without written descriptions of the old powers, we became trapped on a plateau of ability that has held us where we are for five hundred years."
"I am shocked," Ianelle said with a sincere expression. "When we saw the honored one, and saw his power, we assumed that our written lore had been regained, and the new katzh-dashi would have used the lore left behind to rediscover the old powers."
"Most of those powers would be useless to us," Dolanna told her. "There have been no new da'shar since the Breaking. At least not on the outside," she amended. "The new katzh-dashi developed a great fear of the very thing needed to become da'shar, and those that did find themselves being Consumed died before crossing over. They were not ready."
"I see," Ianelle mused. "Well, fear not, Dolanna. We will return with you and bring truth back to the towers. We will be stretched very thin among the seven of them, but we will manage."
"There are only two towers left," Tarrin told her. "The one in Suld, and the one in Sharadar."
That made all the Sha'Kar elders wince, and they all looked profoundly saddened. "Such a pity," Ianelle said with a somber expression. "The symbols of our order, and only two remain. Such loss."
"With your people back, maybe we can rebuild what was destroyed," Tarrin told her.
"I hope so, but it will take time," she said with a brusque smile. "We have much to do, and from the sound of things, so do you. You may take the Firestaff with our blessing, honored one. After all, you are sui'kun. It's not our place to order you around."
"And when you have it, may we return home," Riana said hopefully.
"May the Goddess make it so," several of the Sha'Kar repeated.
It was the last night.
Tarrin couldn't help but feel like that over and over. Dolanna's words haunted his attempts to sleep, made him toss and turn, and filled him with worry and anxiety. There is a good chance that some of us may not return echoed over and over in his mind. He couldn't accept that. He just couldn't. He wouldn't. He vowed that no one else would die, and he was a Were-cat. He honored his promises, kept his vows. He would not allow anyone else to die. Not so long as he lived and breathed, he would not let anyone else die.
It was hard to rest, hard to relax. Kimmie did everything she could to distract him, from blowing in his ear to threatening to brain him if he didn't lay still, but he was just too wound up. She did seem to understand his fear and worry, but this time, she couldn't talk him down. Nothing could.
The weight of it crushed him. It was the last night where things would be as they were. He could feel that tomorrow night, everything was going to be different, one way or another. He would have the Firestaff, the focus of the last few years of his life. Some of them may not be there to celebrate that happy day. He was torn between his eagerness to fulfill his promise to the Goddess to get the Firestaff and the sorrow and pain he'd feel if someone else died in the course of trying to claim it. It was the last night where they were all there, all together, all friends, all unified in their common interest. Tomorrow, they would be done. Camara Tal would have no reason to remain, and would go home. Keritanima would have too many duties in Wikuna, and would return home. Allia would probably abduct Allyn and take him back to the desert, returning home. Tarrin… well, he would defend the Firestaff. He was sure that the Goddess already had a plan for what he should do with it. As soon as they were outside the Ward, she would tell him what she wanted to do. For him, it wouldn't be over until the day when the Firestaff activated came and went.
Whenever that may be.
That was all assuming they survived the final challenge. Dreams of the future could not hurdle the obstacle laying in his path, and he did not take it lightly. Whatever it was defending the Firestaff had to be incredibly powerful, or it wouldn't have been chosen for the task. It could be some mythical beast or some kind of magical creation, or maybe even someone like Spyder, a mortal of godlike power that would be summoned to defend the artifact. Or perhaps a god himself, whose sole reason to exist was to defend that ancient relic. There was no telling what it was, or even if it was still there. But no matter what, Tarrin felt that he was ready to face it. He was at the pinnacle of his power, and his friends and sisters were utterly dependable.
But this night, this last night, it was all he had, all he was trying to concentrate on. Kimmie's concussion completely faded not long after they all went to bed, leaving her frisky and attentive, but he had been too worried and nervous to take her up on her carnal invitations. He knew she was luring him just to try to take his mind off things, and he could appreciate her for it. But he found just holding her close and taking in her scent to be just as good as losing himself in the delights she offered. She was his mate, one of the two women he loved, and inside her belly there was a new life, his child, his legacy. He was glad she was staying behind. He wouldn't be able to think straight if she was there, if she was in danger.
The night was an eternity that didn't last nearly long enough. Tarrin got no sleep that night, but the knowledge that the day would change everything worried him as much as he looked forward to it. The time seemed to drag by, but when one of Arlan's servant girls opened the door and politely called that it was just before dawn, when Tarrin wanted to be fetched, he couldn't figure out where all the time went. Kimmie was asleep, having succumbed to her need to rest after her injury half a night ago, and he laid over her, beside her, just looking down at her while she was sleeping, marveling at her and the new life inside her. No matter what happened to him, no matter what people remembered, the best things of him lived on in his children. He could only hope that Kimmie would go on in case he failed this last challenge. But she was a strong woman, much stronger than any of the other Were-cats imagined.
Tarrin got up and dressed, maybe for the last time. His old leather breeches were starting to show their wear again, the ankles tattering from the claws on his feet. His black leather vest was much nicer looking, but was starting to get a little shiny from wear. They were simple clothes for a simple Were-cat, serviceable, utilitarian garments that served him well. He put a paw over his black steel amulet, feeling its presence on his neck for the first time in over a year, it had grown to be so much a part of him. But he could feel its weight now, the weight of the duty that had been laid across his shoulders. The amulet pulled on the back of his neck, a reminder of the bond between him and the Goddess, a warning that his service to her was about to enter its most dangerous phase.
The last night was over. Now, the changes would come.
Tarrin debated furiously whether or not to wake up Kimmie. He didn't want to say goodbye to her. He wanted her to be there when he came back, flushed with victory over having claimed the Firestaff. But she would never forgive him if he did that, even if he did come back without a scratch.
He put a paw on her shoulder and shook her very gently. "Kimmie," he called in barely more than a whisper.
Her eyes snapped open almost immediately. She rolled over and looked up at him, her expression sober. "It's already time?" she asked.
He nodded. "I had one of the serving girls come get me before dawn," he told her. "I want us to be out of the city before it gets light, so the Sha'Kar won't have as good a chance to notice us."
"Let me get dressed," she said, sitting up.
"No," he said, sitting down on the bed beside her. "I, I want us to say goodbye here, Kimmie. Where the others can't see us. I don't want them to see me like this," he said, looking at her with his heart in his eyes.
Her eyes softened, and she put her arms around him and almost crushed him in a fierce embrace. He took in her scent, let it brand itself forever into his memory, felt her touch, just reveled in the closeness of her. "I love you, Tarrin," she said fiercely, in a low tone. He closed his eyes and put his cheek against hers, then she grabbed his head in her paws and kissed him with a fierce passion that curled his toes. "I put too much into trying to win your heart to lose you now!" she said with shining eyes, full of tears. "Don't do anything stupid, my love! Remember that your women are waiting for you. Don't forget about us. Come back to us. Come back to me!"
"I'll find a way," he promised, holding her close again. "I love you, Kimmie." He held her out so he could see her again, paws on her shoulders. "And if I can't find a way," he said, his eyes somber, "tell Jesmind I love her. Tell her I'm sorry I broke my promise, but we can't always keep our word."
"I won't have to," she said petulantly. "Because nothing is going to happen to you!"
"I hope you're right," he said emphatically, kissing her one more time before he stood up. She took hold of his paw, her teary eyes staring up at him from a worried, anxious face, almost refusing to let him go. "Watch over the Druids for me, love," he said, gripping her fingers in his paw, then slowly, almost forcefully, pulling his paw free of her. She wouldn't let go, making him slide his paw out of her grip, and when he finally did pull free of her, her paw opened as her fingers sought to close over his once more.
"I'll see you tonight, Kimmie," he said forcefully, trying to be strong. But wasn't easy.
"Be careful!" she said with tremendous effort to make him listen to her, understand her.
He stood there, looking down at her, imprinting her in his memory just like that. Nude, covers in her lap, staring up at him with such tremendous love that it nearly broke his heart to leave her, to put her through the inevitable worrying that would come while he was gone. But there was no other choice. He had been forced to take actions that would have killed her, and he would never let her know that had happened. But leaving her felt like it would kill him
He only hoped she knew how much she meant to him. She knew he loved Jesmind, and that his obligations to her took precedence in things. He just hoped she knew how much he loved her.
Forcing himself, he turned his foot, and then turned around, made the last act to separate them. He turned his back to her. He strode from the dais quickly, before he changed his mind, and padded across the room. Sapphire was still sleeping in her bed, but he didn't wake her. To delay now to say goodbye would break his resolve. He had to get out of Kimmie's presence quickly, before he turned back around. He reached the door, opened, it, then stepped through and closed it behind him.
Then he leaned against it, wiping a tear from his eyes. Leaving Jesmind hadn't been half as hard as that. But then again, when he left Jesmind, the possibility of his death hadn't been so tangible in the air. If it had been, then he was sure it would have been even more emotional, with him having to physical pull himself free of her as she refused to allow him to go off into danger.
They were to meet in the entrance hall. Tarrin was first there, taking a pastry from a tray that the serving girls had set out for them, a light meal to prepare them for the ordeal to come. He was there only a moment before Keritanima, Allia, Binter, and Sisska arrived. Keritanima was wearing a red dress that blended well with her fur, a very simple one with no frills or accessories. A traveling dress for a woman about to exert herself. Keritanima looked somber, but very determined. Allia was dressed in her desert garb, the color of sand, its baggy volume concealing her form. The turban-like headgear was atop her head, the veil hanging loosely from the side of her face. She looked very intense, very focused, very ready. Binter and Sisska looked as they always looked, wearing the same kilts and bandoliers, carrying their huge weapons, hovering just behind their queen and ready to defend her life at a second's notice.
Dolanna, and Azakar arrived just behind Keritanima. Dolanna wore her favorite blue silk dress, the very one she'd worn the day he met her. She looked calm, but with Dolanna, one could never really tell how calm she actually was. Azakar was wearing his full plate armor, which had been laboriously cleaned, polished, and readied for the day's activities, with his shield strapped to his back and his huge sword hanging from his wide belt loosely. Just behind him was Camara Tal, wearing her red tripa and her breastplate that had the hawk etched into its front, stretching its wings across her breasts. Her sword, the magical sword that Tarrin had given her, the one that had belonged to Faalken, rested comfortably at her side. Tarrin couldn't look at that sword without a pang of guilt and pain over the loss that it represented, the loss of a good friend, the one that was no longer with them.
Nothing was said. They were all reserved, somber. They all knew the importance of their task, and they all seemed afraid to break the silence. Tarrin thought that they had been pondering Dolanna's warning the night before as well, fully aware that they all may not live to see the sunset. Tarrin put Allia's hand in one paw and Keritanima's in the other, but that was the only act any of them took in greeting.
Phandebrass prattled in, wearing the same gray robe he'd been wearing since they arrived on the island, though he had magically cleaned and pressed it the night before. His belt with its many pouches and little cases was around his waist, and he still wore that ridiculous conical hat. The mage seemed completely unaffected by the importance of the day, lively and talkative, greeting them all in an excited voice. "Morning, morning, morning!" he said breathlessly. "Busy day, busy day today! I say, I can't wait to see the Firestaff, I can't! I really must study it!"
That seemed to break the ice. "You would," Camara Tal accused.
"I say, who's missing?" he asked, looking around. "We have to go, we do! We can't dawdle around here, not today of all days!"
Tarrin looked around, slowly, deliberately, looking at them one by one and taking in how they looked one final time. Allia. Keritanima. Dolanna. Camara Tal. Phandebrass. Binter. Sisska. Azakar. Kimmie, Dar, Miranda, and Sapphire were left behind to watch over the two Druid girls, Zarina and Liza.
"We're all here," Camara Tal told him. "We just need to know where we're going."
"Allyn showed me that carving," Allia told her. "I can find it. It should not be hard for us to find the path leading to the cave entrance."
"Then we have nothing holding us behind. Is everyone ready?" Dolanna asked.
Nobody said a word.
"Then let us go. The sooner we begin, the sooner we finish."
Phandebrass wolfed down a few of the pastries. "Yes, I say, let's!" he said excitedly. "Imagine all the wondrous and amazing things we may see today! Why, I'm all aflutter with anticipation, I am!"
"You'd be excited to go to your own funeral," Camara Tal said sourly, her hand drifting to her sword reflexively, as if to make sure it was still there.
"Let us not fight now," Dolanna said. "If no one has anything to do or say, then we should begin."
"Let's go," Keritanima said.
"Before I change my mind," Azakar admitted.
"Fear is a good thing, as long as it does not control you," Binter told him in a calm voice. "I find the prospect of battle exciting, but the unknown nature of the foe concerns me."
Concern in a Vendari was about as close to fear as one would ever get.
"Whatever it is, we'll find out, we will," Phandebrass said happily, patting his many pouches. "I say, I think I forgot my powdered manticore tail spikes. That will never do, it won't. I say, how will I cast Azak-Kazim's Flying Spike Barrage? Oh, nevermind, here it is!" he said, patting a pouch.
"Well then, let us go before Phandebrass forgets something else he has with him," Dolanna said with a light smile.
"Or we'll be here all day as he takes inventory," Camara Tal snorted.
"I say, inventory. What a good idea," he prattled. "Now, where did I put that checklist of components?" he asked himself, starting to pat his pouches and satchels again.
Camara Tal grabbed him by the upper arm and started dragging him towards the door.
Phandebrass' humorous nature did more than break the ice. They were all talking, albeit in very hushed tones, as Allia led them through the strange Sha'Kar city. The talk was focused on possible guardians, as Phandebrass rattled off a long list of creatures Tarrin had never heard of. And considering he was Fae-da'Nar and had been educated in various kinds of exotic creatures, that was no mean feat. "I say, I hope it's a Catoblepas," Phandebrass said expectantly. "I've always wanted to see one."
"What kind of creature is that?" Allia asked him.
"It's an ugly brute that looks like a big fat lizard with a warthog's head on a long neck. It's said that any who meets its gaze dies instantly."
"If it can kill you on sight, why would you want to look at one?" Azakar asked with elegant simplicity.
"Well, it would be one way to find out of the myth is true, isn't it?" he asked with a smile.
"A very short way," Camara Tal snorted. "And it wouldn't be like you could tell anyone after you found out."
"I say, you have a point there," Phandebrass said with a thoughtful frown. "Hmm, how would I get around that?"
"Well, your dead body would certainly let the rest of us know it's not a myth," Keritanima told him with a glance. "So we'll let you go first."
"I say, that would work," he said in all seriousness.
They quieted again as Allia led them into the forest in the foothills, closer and closer to the volcano. Tarrin concentrated on listening to Phandebrass, Camara Tal, and Keritanima banter back and forth, the two females ganging up on the mage to shoot down all his wild, hair-brained ideas and schemes about what they'd do when they found out what they were facing. He got so caught up in it that he barely noticed it when Allia led them out of the woods and started up the slope of the volcano on a very steep path that had sheer rock on one side and a cliff on the other. "I saw this when Allyn brought me out here," Allia told him in Selani. "I didn't see the cave entrance, but I think it's because my eyes were filled with the carving. This trail will lead to the base of it. We'll circle around the edge of the volcano and come up under it in a little while."
"Not a very friendly path," Dolanna noted, stepping carefully in one rather narrow section of it. She looked down the hundred span sheer incline, virtually a cliff, to the trees below them, which grew up to the edge of the very steep cone of the volcano. "And an even less friendly result should one misstep."
"They just want to keep us on our toes, Dolanna," Keritanima told her lightly.
"Literally," Azakar grunted.
The light mood evaporated when they reached the landing that Auli described. A massive bulge that resembled the bottom of a foot jutted out over them in the dawn's light, and they stood on the inside edge of the rock cleared away to form the relief which contrasted the sculpture over their heads At the center of the relief, where a bit of volcanic rock jutted out to form a very wide ledge with a few boulders resting upon it, was the dark shape of a cave entrance. As they approached, they saw that it was the entrance, a black hole in the side of the dark stone, about fifteen spans wide and ten spans high. There was no evidence of a magical barrier protecting it, at least to mundane eyes, but Tarrin could see the powerful barrier stretched across the entrance of the tunnel about ten spans into it, on the far side of the four symbols etched into the wall, just inside the tunnel entrance. A star that remarkably resembled the star in the center of a shaeram, resting a span from a staff. On the other side there was engraved a pair of hands clasped together, and beyond it an image of a three-petalled flower. Representations of the four orders of magic. Sorcery, Wizardry, Priest magic, and Druidic magic. They all glowed in the darkness of the tunnel mouth, shining white against the dark stone from the glow of their magical power.
They had arrived.
"According to Syllis, we must only touch the symbols," Dolanna told them gravely. "Each to his own order. Then the spell will be lowered and allow us to pass."
With sure dignity, the four magicians moved just inside the tunnel's entrance. Dolanna put her hand on the image of the star, and its faint illumination turned brilliant. Phandebrass laid his hand on the image of the staff, and it too brightened. Camara Tal set her hand against the image of his clasped hands, and that image also flared to brilliance.
Without hesitation, Tarrin put his paw on the image of the flower. It flared as well, and then there was a shimmering in the air further down the tunnel as the magical barrier erupted into visibility. The sound of that magic became louder and louder as the barrier glowed more and more brightly, and then it changed from an angry red to a brilliant white-blue.
And, to Tarrin's surprise, a disembodied voice called from the tunnel, from the barrier itself, speaking in stately cadence as it performed its task:
The four become one, the four unite;
Beyond this portal, beyond the night.
Four join as one to unlock the door;
But only one passes to enter the bore.
Sorcery, Wizardry, Devotion, and Nature;
Choose wisely which holds the power most sure.
Four did begin, but one may walk past;
To face this challenge, most dreadful, held last.
Make your decision, choose and be timely;
Choose which of you, and choose very wisely.
Beyond, if successful, it carries a price.
To gain what you seek, you must sacrifice.
All that defines you, all you have been;
That which defines you shall be taken.
All that defines you, all you shall be;
Success will cost you all of those three.
Choose now between you, and choose anon;
Choose now the Champion to challenge beyond.
Choose with great caution, and choose with great care;
For the one chosen will surrender all there.
Make your decision, step forward most sure;
Make your decision, the heart that beats pure.
Make your decision, a choice without gaffe.
Only one champion may lay hands on the staff.
They were all silent for a very long moment, as the blue light of the visible barrier continued to pulsate and undulate over them.
Only one could pass, and that one, the poem stated, had to be willing to sacrifice everything. To face death in the face, to die to further the goal.
It's not something I would ask lightly, my sweet child. It will be a dangerous road, and its outcome is uncertain. There is a very good chance that you won't live to see the end of it. The Goddess said those words to him, so very long ago. Right before he agreed to be her champion.
Is this what it meant? Was he to walk down that passage and die? And do it willingly? No! Not now. Not when he had so much to live for! Jesmind and Jasana, Kimmie and their unborn child, Mist's son Eron. The family he wanted, the life he wanted. They were within his grasp! Were they all nothing but fantasies, paper dreams meant to give him what little comfort they could before the end? Not now! He couldn't throw his life away, when he was so happy!
Or would he be throwing it away? The poem said that only one could lay hands on the staff, and all through this mad quest, he'd been told over and over again that he was the chosen one. To lay paws on the staff, he'd have to survive to reach it. And that meant that he'd live, since he wouldn't be touching it until the guardian was eliminated.
If that made any sense.
There was little he could do. He had a duty to the Goddess. He made her a promise to find the Firestaff and take it, and he had to do it. She was depending on him. His children were depending on him, Jesmind and Kimmie and Mist were depending on him, his little mother was depending on him. They needed him to get the Firestaff. They needed him to protect their world, the world they would inherit. No matter what it cost him, what they needed of him mattered more to him than anything else in the world. He would kill to protect them, and he would die to protect them. They were everything to him.
So what if he died? All that mattered was that the Firestaff could not be used. What happened to him… it just didn't matter.
Duty is honor, and the price of that honor is blood. Honor and blood.
And after all, the outcome wasn't set in stone. Nothing was.
He'd better make his intention clear before Phandebrass had a wild notion to try to choose himself. Knowing him, he'd do it.
Tarrin took his paw off the symbol, certain of his choice, and the light of the symbols and of the barrier itself changed from white-blue to an emerald green.
The others looked at him, expressions of shock and fear and worry and anxiety, but they did not interfere. They all knew that if only one had to go, then it had to be Tarrin. He was the strongest magician of them all, and he had physical qualities that the rest of them lacked, qualities that would allow him to survive. He was the only choice.
The poem said to step quickly and with certainty, so he did so, moving towards the barrier with long strides and suppressing his fear and uncertainty under a steely resolve. It had to be him. He had to do it. The others wouldn't be able to do it alone! He let the Cat come up a little into his mind, using its powerful instincts to live in the moment, to ignore the very real fear he felt at what he was doing, to be calm and strong and sure of himself. Closing his eyes just before he would make contact with it, Tarrin walked deliberately right into and through the barrier. He felt its power seep into him, through him, infuse him. But it did not hinder him. He felt himself pass through it, and when he did, he suddenly became aware of intense, lethal heat. The air in the passageway had to be hot enough to boil water, but the barrier blocked it from escaping. Tarrin sighed in relief. Had anyone but Dolanna or himself passed through, they would have died almost immediately. The air smelled heavily of sulfur and brimstone, assaulting his nose and burning it, and burning slightly at his eyes.
The light of the barrier vanished. Tarrin turned to look and saw all his friends, his sisters, their mouths moving but no sound coming from them. The barrier stopped sound as well as heat, he realized. —I can't hear you,— he told Allia in the hand code of the Selani. —The magic wall is blocking sound.—
—Be careful, my brother!— Allia said with her urgency showing in her hands, her expression.
—Tell the others to be careful, and to get away from the opening. It's hot enough on this side to kill you in a matter of seconds. If the barrier comes down, the heat will wash over you and kill you.—
—We'll move away as soon as you start down the tunnel. Be careful!—
—I'll try. Wait for me, sister. Pray for me.—
—May the winds ever blow at your back, and may the Holy Mother guide your steps through the holy land,— she told him, one of the most solemn and intimate of Selani farewells. He looked into her eyes and saw her love in them, as well as in Keritanima's and Dolanna's. He saw the solemn worry in Camara Tal's eyes, the look of grim pride in Azakar's, and the look of slight disappointment in Phandebrass' that he hadn't thought to choose himself first. Binter and Sisska nodded to him gravely, a recognition of his impending challenge. For Vendari, that was a wish for good luck.
—I'll be back in a while. Save me a spot at the table,— he said with nonchalance in his movements and a forced smile on his lips. But they could see the intense concentration in his eyes.
Go, Dolanna's mouth said, he could make it out. She pointed down the tunnel, behind him. Go. Then she put her hand on her amulet and did something he never thought he'd see her do.
She curtsied to him.
Had it not been such a serious situation, he would have laughed. But he understood it for what it was, a salute to him, and a reminder of who and what he was.
He was sui'kun. He was a being with magical powers among the strongest of any on the planet. Whatever was down that passage, it had better be ready for a serious fight. Because Tarrin wasn't about to lay down and die for it. If it was going to protect the Firestaff, then Tarrin swore it was going to have to work like mad to earn its daily wage this day.
Tarrin nodded to her, his expression one of complete seriousness, all fear and anxiety melting away. If he had to go alone, then so be it. If he had to sacrifice, then so be it. One way or another, he was coming back down this passage with the Firestaff.
And woe be to anything that tried to stand in his way.
Tarrin turned his back to his friends and moved with careful deliberate slowness down the hellishly hot passage, towards the dimmest of faint lights far down the tunnel. Towards his date with the legendary guardian of the Firestaff, towards his date with his destiny.
Moving towards the end of it.