Authors: Lisa Tawn Bergren
Vidar laughed. “We only lasted a day. Apparently, they didn't take kindly to Remnants
in the household.”
The two men shared a brief look. “You're lucky you lived to tell about it,” said
Gregor. “Such appearances so close to danger only fuel the stories about you. Everyone
wants to know more.”
“The Community, deep underground at Castle Vega, and more apparent at Georgii Post,
is growing,” Deshaun added. “Ever since you stayed in Georgii and helped that family
escape, the numbers there swell. Many are hoping you will return. What Asher began,
others have grown with the orphans and more, despite the Pacificans' efforts to crack
down on them.”
“When someone threatens to take something from you,” Killian said, tossing us each
a towel before we disrobed and went into the sauna, “you're more likely to consider
the value. So the Pacificans'
efforts . . .” he said, tossing his dreadlocks over
his shoulder with a cheeky grin, “only aid our own.”
“It's true!” said Deshaun. “The more they try and quiet talk of the Way, or squelch
people from repeating some of the Sacred Words, the more others whisper of it.”
We followed Killian into the sauna and took seats on the benches hewn from the cavern
walls. I reached forward and dumped bucket after bucket of water on the heated rocks
at the center. Steam immediately billowed up and around us. I leaned back against
the wall, closing my eyes and feeling my lack of sleep catch up with me. Maybe after
this bath I'd go and find Dri and apologize for that nonsense with Niero.
“So, what's with the necklaces?” Vidar asked, pointing to the nearest man's chest.
We hadn't known they wore the same ones as the women had, and I hadn't noticed them
coming in. “Is that a form of matrimonial symbol or something?”
“This?” said Deshaun, lifting it between thumb and forefinger and gazing down at
it. “No. It's just something they gave us a week ago. Some sort of further symbol
of âsolidarity' that every servant is supposed to wear. It's forged in platinum,
or I would've burned it with that uniform over there,” he added, gesturing with his
head back to where we'd changed. I'd seen a fresh, clean stack of clothing awaiting
each of them after our bath. “We're wondering if we can sell them, or melt them down
and use the money to get our new start here.” He let the necklace drop to his bare
chest.
I rose, moving tentatively toward him. “May I?” I asked, reaching toward it.
“Sure,” he said amiably as I lifted it in my hand. “Or you can have it,” he said.
“We owe you our lives. Perhaps it will be of some use to the Community?” He slipped
the leather strap from around his neck, and I remembered one of the women offering
hers to Dri
as we left, and Dri slipping it over her head. I lifted it to the light,
studying the gleam of polished metal and the tiny, round globe of iridescent glass
at the center. It reminded me of the center of the abalone shells that some Aravander
children gathered, and I marveled at the rainbow of color . . . but then stilled.
I turned my fingers a fraction. And froze.
A tiny, perfect square was visible within the iridescent dome.
A camera.
“Spies!” I smashed the necklace to the ground, ignoring the cries of the newcomers.
Then I went to the other man, savagely ripping his pendant from his neck, and smashed
it to the ground. Killian was already lunging toward the first, hands outstretched
for his throat, all too clear about what alarmed me so. He drove Gregor to the wall.
“We . . . are . . . not . . . spies . . .” Gregor choked out, even as I grabbed Deshaun's
wrist, twisting it behind him.
“We're not!” cried Deshaun. “I swear it! We had no idea! You must believe us!”
And I did. They were innocent. Pawns.
Used by players who now had likely seen the inner chasms and chambers and hallways
of the Citadel, who were mapping it even now.
As they followed every person who yet wore one.
Which led me to . . . Dri.
ANDRIANA
I
stood looking out from one of the few small, northern balconies in the Citadel;
the
sheer
face of the mountain below kept it from being a way in for intruders.
No one but
Niero would be able to get through here,
I thought,
and he has wings.
“Ah,
there
you are,” Ronan said with relief when he saw me. “When I returned to our
chambers and you weren't there . . .”
I gave him a coy smile over my shoulder. “There are only so many places I could go.
Tonight . . . I wanted to see out. As much as I appreciate the Citadel, I like far
less stone between me and what the Maker has made.”
He came up behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist. I sank into his embrace,
grateful that he seemed to have moved beyond the incident with Niero.
“How did it go?” I asked. “With the newcomers?”
“Fine, fine,” he said, kissing the side of my head. “Dri . . .” he said, a bit too
casually, “do you happen to have the pendant the Pacifican girl offered to you?”
I turned in his arms to look into his face, deeply shadowed with the torch behind
him. But it did not take my eyes to sense the alarm in him. “Why?”
“Dri,” he said, “the pendant. What did you do with it?”
“I . . . I threw it out there,” I said, gesturing behind me to the balustrade and
the steep cliff beyond with one hand, feeling the quick pulse in his arm with the
other. “The girl meant it as a gift, but I couldn't help feeling that it was anything
but. It reminded me too much of ⦠Pacifica.”
He stilled and heaved a sigh of relief. “Right. Of course you did,” he said, lifting
a hand to caress my cheek and smiling. “Such a wise,
wise
girl.” He leaned close
and kissed my nose, then turned to walk away, bent on some new mission.
“Ronan?” I said, chasing after him. “What's wrong?”
He stilled and looked back at me. “The enemy infiltrated the Citadel tonight,” he
said.
My stomach tightened in terror. “What?”
“Those necklaces,” he said, glancing toward my chest, “they were like mini-drones.
Tiny cameras, disguised in jewelry.”
“
What
?” I repeated, striding toward him, with each step understanding better why
I'd felt the urge to throw the pendant to the rocks below.
He rested his hands on my hips and stared into my eyes. “They've been eradicated.
Every one. The other woman's. The two the men carried. The Pacificans . . . KeallachӉhe
shrugged slightlyâ“Sethos . . . who knows who is behind it. They've figured out that
the power of the Way is growing. And the only way in is through those who are drawn
to it.”
“So they used them,” I said, my eyes and thoughts distant, wandering toward the window
and balustrade. “Allowed them to leave, to come here. As a method of entry. When
they had no other methods.”
“Yes,” he said. “And now they've seen at least a portion of our fortress, our defenses.”
I swallowed hard, thinking about taking that necklace, where I'd walked, what I'd
done before I threw it away. “Do you think they could only see? Or might they have
heard as well?”
“Why?” he said, his fingers tightening at my waist. “Did you say something that might
have compromised our security?”
“No,” I said, shaking my head miserably. “I didn't say anything. I just helped them
see the way to our very own quarters.” The thought of Sethos seeing me here, in
the heart of our Citadel . . . I wrenched away and walked back to the tiny balustrade,
looking out and over our Valley, so peaceful this night. So pristine. So . . . holy.
Our sanctuary.
Yet, I felt invaded.
Ronan came up behind me and, sensing my tension, laid gentle hands at either hip,
then waited.
After a moment, I took a deep breath and said, “You're certain they had no idea what
they wore?”
“No. Vidar would've known if they were truly spies. And you would've detected something
within them too, would you have not?”
I considered that, and then finally, reluctantly nodded. I realized that I wanted
someone to hold accountable.
“No,” I said. “I wish there was someone besides myself to blame, but there is not.
Pacifica entered our gates, an invited guest for all intents and purposes. And now,
we'll have to live with the consequences.”
KEALLACH
I
rewound the tape and stared at the footage from the necklace that had briefly been
around
Andriana's
neck. Still no sound. Only grainy images.
But she was there. In the Citadel.
Walking down the hall to her quartersâclearly shared with Ronan, judging by the masculine
sweater cast over the corner of one of their beds, and the sword tipped beside the
doorwayâand then to the cliff face, where she stared at the pendant for a long moment,
and then cast it away.
I watched every second of the footage again and again, searching for each detail
I could find, of the Citadel for certain, but moreover, of her.
She looked well. Somewhat rested. Healed. Whole. Hopeful in one step, pensive in
another. Curious and wondering as she peered down at the pendant and then pulled
it from around her neck. I froze the frame just before she decided to toss it away,
down into the abyss below, where the camera's lens no doubt cracked into a thousand
pieces. I stared at her face and recognized that look of curiosity and wondering
and hope . . . until just before the moment I knew it dissolved into distaste and
fear. It was a transition in her expression that I'd witnessed firsthand.
And it was one that I'd hoped to see eradicated from her memory forever.
It was wrong, so wrong, to see it in my beloved's face.
She was to know only love, and peace, and security. This was my Call, from deep within.
To make certain that all of my brothers and sisters felt nothing but those things.
And yet it went beyond that when it came to Andriana. And Kapriel. To them, first,
was I bound.
Whoever followed us, followed.
Or did not.
Andriana and my brother were everything to me. The last, true, possible links to
the One that had ushered me into life and waited to walk beside me in the future.
Without them, I was alone. Yes,
yes
, surrounded by many. Always so many. But yet
still alone.
I needed them. Had to have them by my side. One way or another.
It plagued me that because of something Pacifica had sent, because of something that
she had received, Dri knew anything but peace and joy. She had sensed distaste and
a fear that drove her to toss the pendant from the cliff. And yet, if it took some
pain, some discomfort, to bring her back to me, and behind her, my brother . . .
So be it.
Maximillian appeared in my doorway, silently awaiting orders.
“Now that our plan has been discovered,” I said with a sigh, “any element of surprise
is lost to us.”
“Yes, but the footage is of use to us, Majesty. We've mapped much of the main floor
of the Citadel.”
“And we know where Andriana's quarters are,” I mused, reaching out to touch the screen.
“Indeed.”
“You've seen that things are in order for our new plan?”
“Yes, Keallach,” he said, coming to stand beside me, looking down at the screen.
“All is in order.”
“Good,” I said, switching off the monitor. “Be ready at a moment's notice. As soon
as we find an opening, we move.”
ANDRIANA
N
iero and Cornelius bade us to forget what we'd learned of the pendants and the possible
breach
of
security.
“Long has the Maker seen us here, in the Valley,” said Cornelius, laying a fragile,
age-spotted hand upon my shoulder, “and long has he seen our enemies rise in the
west. What will come, will come,” he said with shrug, willing courage to me that
I felt. “We trust in his providence and what will transpire.”
“Even within the walls of Zanzibar,” I said, pulling one of the heavy shoulder straps
of my pack up higher with one hand. As if saying it one more time would make it seem
more reasonable. My eyes shifted to Tressa, who looked a bit wan, and to her grim-faced
Knight, Killian. Even our handfasting and tattoos didn't make this mission anything
close to a tolerable risk. The Lord of Zanzibar would want our heads. And there
were
many other enemies within those towering walls. But Tressa also knew there was someone
there she was to heal. We were counting on one lone person to somehow make a way
for us to not only survive, but to turn some of the populace of the ancient, teeming
city to followers of the Way.
Every time I thought about it, I knew it to be the Maker's design. He wanted us to
know that this wasn't about us and what we could do . . . but what he could do through
us if we totally submitted to his will. Clearly, we'd all felt this was his will
for some time. In ways, it was a relief to finally be stepping into it, rather than
thinking about it and worrying about it.
“Zanzibar,” he said, lifting one gray brow and quirking a sly smile. “If he sends
you to such a place, then clearly those of us left behind have far less to be concerned
about.”
“And yet
that
is not exactly the assurance we seek, Father,” Vidar cracked, walking
past. “But thanks for the effort.”
I kissed Mom and Dad good-bye, focusing on the pride they felt as they looked upon
me, rather than on their fear. We headed out and spent that first night with Tonna,
and then we carried on toward Zanzibar in the morning. There were ten of usâRonan
and me, Niero and Azarel, Killian and Tressa, Chaza'el, Vidar and Bellona, and Kaprielâbut
we planned to enter the city in groups of three in order to be less conspicuous.
We'd discussed leaving Kapriel behindâthose in power in Zanzibar might note his mirror
image of Keallach, ruining our ability to hideâbut in the end, we figured our time
in hiding would be limited. And where the Remnants had been called, we were convinced
we had to go together.