The Curse in the Gift (The Last Whisper of the Gods Book 2) (18 page)

She felt a sense of quiet, controlled despair. They had walked into a trap - that much was obvious. Someone must have seen them at an earlier time, perhaps while they had been spying on the camp from the hilltop. Damn! She knew they had been too exposed there but she had assumed the others, with their greater experience, understood what they were doing. She recalled a saying of her father’s: “Trusting others is a good thing as long as you choose the right ones to trust.” All the decisions, all the sacrifices had led to this point: captive to an unknown warlord on the doorstep of reaching the portal. She suspected there was little time left before she was executed; she was cognizant of the bounty on her, although she doubted a man with this size of an army would have much use for 100 gold. A sizeable sum for a bandit or mercenary but not as impressive to one who could command a thousand men. Still, it seemed unlikely she would survive this and, if she did, she might wish she hadn’t. She remembered stories about the uses to which captive women were sometimes placed in camps such as this one. The pawing of the man who had captured her would be genteel by comparison. Could she, a virgin, convincingly act the whore to save her life? 

She sensed a change in the mood around her. The hushed, idle conversation stopped altogether. There was the sound of clothing and armor shuffling as men adjusted their positions.

“Why are they still bound?” The voice was gruff but cultured. “This won’t do. What are we, barbarians?”

Instantly, the bonds tying Alicia’s wrists were cut. She folded her arms across her chest and rubbed them. The hood was pulled from her head, allowing her to take a deep breath and see her surroundings. As she surmised, she was in the command tent; it looked bigger from the outside than the inside, however. Everything was fur-lined: the walls, the ceiling, and the floors. The fire pit near the center was filled with red-hot embers and heated stones brought in from outside. A hole in the tent directly above the pit allowed for ventilation. There were few furnishings: only a crude table, three chairs, and a large, iron-bound trunk. Maps were spread out on the table but, from her vantage point near the entrance flap, Alicia couldn’t read them. Seven men faced her, all standing. She noted that Kara and Aiden were here, kneeling to her right and left, respectively. There was no sign of Rexall or the other two from Sussaman.

It wasn’t hard to identify the leader. He was the oldest man in the tent and had the bearing of someone accustomed to being obeyed. He stood nearly six feet tall with broad shoulders and thick legs. He wore boiled leather armor. As was common with old men, his stomach showed a paunch. His face might have been handsome in youth but scars and the ravages of age had given it a cruel cast that was accentuated by sagging jowls. His head was shaved but he sported a short, iron-gray beard and equally well-trimmed mustache. His eyes caught Alicia’s attention most forcefully. There was something eerily familiar about them, almost as if she had gazed into their russet depths before...

Kara’s sharp intake of breath caused Alicia to look in her direction. Her normally impassive face wore an expression of recognition and disbelief. “Maraman,” she whispered.

He laughed. “So good to see you, my dear. I confess, after the last time we spent together, I never thought we’d meet again. But, even with the gods having departed, the fates retain a sense of humor.”

Maraman - Sorial’s father. That explained the eyes. Now that she knew, Alicia could recognize other familiarities, although Sorial’s long-ago broken nose and Maraman’s numerous scars gave their features different contours. Still, Alicia could see that Sorial took after his father more obviously than his mother.

Maraman turned to her and executed a slight bow. “My Lady Alicia, how ironic that we should meet under these circumstances; I’ve been seeking your pretty head for the better part of a season now. It’s fortuitous for us both that you have come to me with that head still attached to your shoulders, although you must be blessed with good luck indeed to have escaped so many bounty hunters. Still, I have more options with you alive than dead.”

He next regarded Aiden curiously. “I know the face but not the name. It tickles the memory. One of Ferguson’s lapdogs, I think. Always running around doing his bidding. There were three others with you. I don’t know any of them. Who are they?”

Alicia remained silent, unwilling to provide even the most meager information to a man who was obviously not friendly. But Kara answered instead. “The red-haired boy is Sorial’s best friend. The other two are good lads from Sussaman, sent to keep me safe on the road and help me find Ibitsal.”

“It would have been better for them had they departed once you found it instead of skulking around in the woods with you. Really, Kara, you should have chosen guides with more experience at avoiding detection. We spotted you before dusk a day ago. As for Sorial’s friend - he might have some value. I’m glad I didn’t summarily execute him.”

“Why are you here?” Kara asked the question foremost in Alicia’s mind, although she suspected she knew the answer.

“It’s long past time I began bonding with our son. You’ve been selfish, my dear. You had him for 17 years. Now it’s my turn. I’ve never had a chance to be a real father to any of our children and now all except one are dead.”

“You need an army to achieve this ‘bonding’?”

Maraman smiled. The expression held no malice and, if not for the scars, it might have made him look grandfatherly. “Not everyone who owes their allegiance to me is here. There’s another portal to watch, after all. My top lieutenant took some of my men down there and set up a fiefdom.”

“You offered a lot of gold for my head,” interjected Alicia. Surprisingly, she felt no fear looking this man in the eyes. Perhaps it had something to do with the numbing effect of the incessant
comecomecome
.

“It’s a queenly sum for a woman who’s more important than any queen. The Bride of the Wizard. My apologies, however. Now that you’re here, I’ll cancel the bounty. How much better to offer my son a living wife than the promise of revenge for a dead one!”

“Sorial won’t fall into this trap.” Alicia said this with absolute conviction.

“Not with the ease you did, I agree. That’s how I knew you weren’t him. In the company of Warburm and Lamanar, he never would have stumbled and bumbled into my hands the way you six did. It’s almost embarrassing. But he wasn’t supposed to be ‘caught’ until he was inside the city. All my best men are in there, waiting by the portal.”

“What do you want with him?” Kara’s voice had a nervous edge.

“His allegiance. Nothing more. The most recent bounties I offered were for him to be delivered alive and in good condition. I want him to join me. I want him to lead my armies. Now, I’m just one man with a moderate force of ill-disciplined rogues. With a wizard at their fore, I could sweep through the North, or strike at Vantok and dislodge Ferguson. Sorial would have been more than happy to throw in his lot with me if he believed your beloved prelate to be responsible for the death of his lover. Or if he knows that by cooperating with me is the surest way to keep her safe. Not to mention his mother and friend.”

“Why the change of heart? A few years ago, you put assassins on his trail. You tried to have him killed!”

“And I pulled them back. True, there was a time when I saw our son as a threat, not an ally. You see, shortly before Ferguson forced me back to Sussaman our final round of couplings, I impregnated an illegitimate daughter of the king of Andel. Foolishly thinking my blood was enough to sire a wizard, I tied all my hopes to the child. In those years, Sorial represented a rival so I acted - shortsightedly I’ll admit - to remove him. Once the portal rejected poor Mikal, I realized that your blood was as important as mine to the formula. It wasn’t enough to fuck a woman and get her with child. I had to fuck the right woman: you. So I changed the conditions of the bounty making it lucrative for Sorial to be delivered to me alive and in good condition.”

“Do you know where he is?” Alicia lacked the stomach to hold a conversation with this man, but if he knew...

“Alas, no. We’ve been camped here awaiting him since Summer. If I was to guess, Sorial is coming to Ibitsal. Considering Ferguson’s affinity for this portal, that’s always been the safe bet. Had his destination been the other portal, he would have arrived there long ago and Langashin would have sent word of his capture. He’d want the 100 gold bounty for Sorial in addition to the glory of capturing him. So we wait, but I don’t think it will be much longer.”

“Oh, Maraman, what’s happened to you?” There was real grief in Kara’s voice. Her expression had softened to one of sorrow.

He smiled again, but this time there was a cruelty to the way his lips twisted. “Ferguson’s self-righteousness. He reneged on every promise he made to me. By fathering ‘the next generation of wizards,’ I was supposed to have a role in what he called ‘the new order,’ but he decided I wasn’t the sort of person he wanted hanging around impressionable wizards in training. I’m sure you remember the tension the last time I was in Sussaman. I was there under duress. There’s something in my past I didn’t want revealed. Ferguson knows the secret and threatened to divulge it to the wrong people if I didn’t relent. Since then, I’ve been planning to take what’s mine by right. Co-opting Sorial and turning him against the prelate is a goal worth pursuing!”

“So this isn’t about Sorial at all. It’s about Ferguson.”

“It’s about getting my due. Ruining Ferguson’s schemes is just a secondary benefit. I’m not an altruist; you should know that about me by now. We spent enough time together in that windowless cabin and not all of it was about making wizard babies. Ferguson needed me because of my blood-link to long-dead Altemiak, otherwise someone else would have been brought in to fuck you. He never really wanted me, just my cock. But to get that, Ferguson had to make certain promises. Now I’m merely finding an alternative way to achieve those goals and that means recruiting our only surviving child - one way or another. It will be wonderful if he agrees to come willingly but, if not, a few hostages should provide adequate incentive. Of course, the problem with hostages is that their long-term viability is questionable.”

Alicia couldn’t credit what she was hearing. Apparently, Sorial’s life of manipulation wasn’t over and now it was his blood-father planning to exploit him. One more time, she was going to be used to force Sorial into doing what another wanted.

Comecomecome
.

As if in answer to the summons, Maraman said, “But come with me. I want to show you the portal. I assume that’s what you’ve come these many, many miles to see. The means of our son’s transformation... or his death.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN: THE PRELATE’S GAMBIT

The portal chamber was a strange place. Unlike the rest of Ibitsal - disordered rubble overgrown by weeds, scrub grass, and thin trees - the tower that housed the portal remained sturdy and unbowed by weather, disuse, and time. The turret, comprised primarily of wood, had long since collapsed but even exposing the inside of the chamber to the elements for centuries had produced little in the way of wear and decay. The roof was now the canopy of the early morning sky, pregnant with clouds. Aside from The Wizardmaker (as Maraman called it), the building was empty. Its sole purpose was to enclose the portal: a high, smooth column of stone with stairs carved into the side, circling up and around the perimeter for close to a hundred feet before reaching the top. According to Maraman, the actual portal was a hole in the apex of the column. It was wide enough for a man to jump into if he was interested in a dramatic end to his life. Since the column was fifteen feet across and the portal only about six feet in diameter, there was space to stand by the opening and look into it. Maraman had done so numerous times and claimed he had never seen a blackness so pure and impenetrable. He once threw a torch in and the light winked out the moment it passed the lip. He never heard it land. For all he knew, it was still falling.

This was where Braddock had been brought to face his fate. Alicia wondered if, as he had made his way up the long, winding stairway, he had been convinced of a future of greatness or if he had felt fear and doubt. It was a functional chamber, not designed to emphasize the grandeur of the portal or to inspire awe, but Alicia felt chills and her flesh broke out in goose pimples. The song of the portal was so forceful it nearly blocked out all else. Holding a conversation was difficult. One look at Kara confirmed that the older woman was having equal difficulty concentrating. The portal was like an all-consuming lover, demanding full and undivided attention. This close, its formerly tender caress was so intimate that it felt like a violation.

They ascended the rough-hewn stairs in single-file; there wasn’t sufficient room for them to climb two abreast. For the visit to the portal, Rexall had joined them. Being anointed “the friend of Sorial” accorded him an exalted position in their party, just behind “The Bride of the Wizard” and “Sorial’s mother.” Aiden had been taken away to join the two others from Sussaman. He hadn’t known Sorial since he was a babe; that limited his value. Alicia wondered if she would see any of them again. Maraman was contemptuous of all three, reflecting an ill-concealed anger directed at anything associated even peripherally with Ferguson. How many such bitter men had the prelate assembled in his wake?

Maraman led the way followed by Kara, a burly guard, Alicia, another guard, Rexall, and one final guard. The staircase circumscribed the column five times resulting in more than 400 steps. By the time they reached the top, Alicia was exhausted, gasping for breath. Of the others, only Rexall appeared a little winded.

Comecomecome
. This close, the urge was almost sexual in nature, not that Alicia had much experience in that area. But she wanted it and it would be so easy. It was so close... She noticed Rexall watching her curiously, almost as if he could read her thoughts. She spared him a nasty glare. The look he returned was speculative. It made her skin crawl.

“This is it,” said Maraman, gesturing grandly toward what looked like a perfectly circular fissure in the top of the column. At first glance, it was unimpressive. “Take a look but don’t get too close. Wouldn’t want someone to lose their balance and cost me a hostage.” He laughed at that, as did one of the guards, but Alicia didn’t find anything funny in the remark.

Alicia moved closer, inching her way toward the opening. She felt like iron being drawn to a lodestone. The surface was like nothing she had ever before seen. It absorbed light, creating a blackness of absolute perfection, deeper and more rich than the darkest corner of a lightless chamber. She was less than a body’s length away; two steps and she would be there. No one would stop her. Kara was to her left, the same faraway expression on her face. Were her thoughts the same? Was the temptation nearly as great for her? Did she yearn for the embrace of the portal, forgetting that it could as easily be a means of death as transformation? Is this why so many people had died at portals in long-ago times - because, so close, they no longer cared? Alicia could sense Rexall behind her, peering over her shoulder for a look from a safer distance. He didn’t feel what she and Kara felt. He was oblivious to the compulsion of
comecomecome
.

“I won’t let you use me against my son.” Kara’s words reached Alicia’s ears as if from far away, scarcely louder than a whisper but infused with a sharp intensity. Then, before anyone could react, she charged forward and leaped into the portal. Maraman, belatedly recognizing her intention, made a grab for her but she was out of his reach. His clutching hand missed her cloak by six inches.

Events unfolded as if in slow motion. The blackness swallowed Kara with infinite gentleness, embracing her body inch-by-inch into its inky stillness. Once her head disappeared beneath the surface, there was a moment of serenity. It might have lasted less than a second or more than a minute. During that brief period as Alicia stared in fascinated horror and the
comecomecome
rang out louder and more demanding than ever, time seemed warped and unstable. Then the portal ejected Kara - the ultimate, final rejection.

Her expulsion was as brutal as her entrance had been tranquil. Her body was tossed into the air above the portal opening like a lifeless doll, rising to a height of perhaps ten feet; the effect was that of a giant mouth spitting out something profoundly distasteful. She spun faster and faster, caught in the grip of a miniature cyclone that none of them could feel but which transformed her into a whirling blur. Then, suddenly and violently, Kara’s remains were ripped apart by winds so powerful that they shredded flesh and bone, dousing everyone with a fine spray of warm blood and liquefied tissue. Complete silence borne of shock ensued; no one moved or spoke.

Alicia began to shake. Whether from fear, exhaustion, or grief, she couldn’t say. The shivering was so bad that her teeth chattered. Her breathing came in great heaves; she couldn’t get enough air. She was on the verge of vomiting, and not just because of the salty, crimson liquid that spotted her face and clothing. In front of her, in that black maw, she no longer sensed quietude. Now, it represented cruelty and malevolence; its song was unwelcome. She recoiled from the portal.

She didn’t expect what happened next and, as a result, she was ill-prepared to defend against it or prevent it.

* * *

Rexall’s first impression of the portal was a letdown. A six-foot wide hole in the top of a column of stone didn’t fit his image how the awe-inspiring Wizardmaker should appear. Still, he could understand why people stepping into it might die. It was a long way to the bottom; he knew he wouldn’t survive a one-hundred foot drop.

He was forced to admit there was something strange about it. When he glanced at the opening askance, it seemed filled to overflowing with a black, viscous liquid. Looking at it directly, however, it gave the impression of a deep, empty well. Any power emanating from the portal was lost to him. He was less concerned, however, with the Wizardmaker than he was with Alicia’s reaction to it.

His orders were specific; this was the primary reason Ferguson had sent him on this mission and this was why he was being paid enough to guarantee years of luxury. No more mucking stables or catering to the needs of drunken riders. He had worked for the Temple in the past, but those had been minor jobs with pay as meager as their consequences: reporting on Sorial’s opinions and activities, taking his friend to places that Ferguson wanted him to visit, promoting his relationship with Alicia while pretending to oppose it. This job was nothing like those. If he failed, he was certain Ferguson wouldn’t let him live long enough to regret it. He wondered if success would ensure a longer life span. That likely depended more on Maraman than Ferguson.

Alicia was transfixed by the portal. Her expression was dreamlike. He had been told to look for this; it was a sign that he could move forward. He almost regretted noticing it. Things would have been simpler if she had reacted with a blasé detachment. He was about to pass a point of no return. Would Sorial forgive him? He cared about that; despite Alicia’s assertion of betrayal, he
was
Sorial’s friend. Their comradeship meant something to him. Everything they had shared during those days of youthful banter, drinking, and whoring had been
real
. If it wasn’t over by now, what he was about to do would finish it, regardless of the outcome. He had known that when he accepted the assignment. The time to demur had been twelve weeks ago when Ferguson offered the proposal. Now, there was only one thing for him to do.

He moved directly behind Alicia. If she had been more aware of her surroundings, she would have noticed that he was closer than was proper. She would have felt his breath on the back of her neck. She would have noted the gentle pressure of his fingers as he rested them on the small of her back.

That was when Kara jumped.

Her action was surprising and the subsequent violence of her death shocked everyone. Rexall expected a more prosaic departure from life - heart stopped, light in her eyes extinguished. As he wiped something warm and sticky from his face that had once been part of Kara, he wondered whether she had been dead before the concentrated windstorm tore her apart. She didn’t scream or, for that matter, make any sound at all after her denunciation of Maraman’s intentions for her. Rexall believed that, despite the thoroughness of her body’s destruction, her demise had been peaceful. But he didn’t know for sure and wasn’t eager to find out. Execution by portal wasn’t his preferred manner of departing this life.

Now was the perfect time. Everyone was so dumbfounded by what they had witnessed that their distraction provided an opportunity. Alicia had taken an involuntary step backward and was pressed against him. Maraman gazed open-mouthed at the portal; as the closest, he had received the most thorough drenching. He looked like a warrior after a savage, bloody battle.

Rexall exhaled and reflexively breathed a silent prayer. Then, with a jerk of his arm, he shoved Alicia, propelling her forward. She staggered and stumbled, lost her balance, teetered momentarily on the edge of the abyss, then toppled gracelessly into it. Even as she fell, she twisted her body, hands reaching in a last, desperate attempt to grab the edge, to find purchase and, in it, salvation. Her face was a mask of incredulity and panic. Her eyes locked on his, flashing with accusation, then she was gone, vanished into the blackness.

“What the fuck!?” Maraman’s voice rang out, breaking the stillness. He whirled to face Rexall, his weathered features red with anger. For the briefest of moments, Rexall thought the older man was going to hurl him into the portal. Then he saw Maraman reaching for a pistol holstered at his hip. It was the first time Rexall had noticed he was armed. So much for his vaunted characteristic of observing details.

Alicia’s return saved his life. Rexall’s attention was so fixed on Maraman that he wasn’t sure how it happened. One moment, she wasn’t there; the next, she was. The portal’s expulsion of her was gentle. He recognized immediately that she hadn’t been rejected. Ferguson had been right - again. A wizard was born.

She was naked but appeared unharmed. The bloodspots from Kara’s dissolution were gone; it was as if her alabaster skin had been scrubbed clean. She was lying on her back with her eyes half-closed, her chest rising and falling evenly.

“Shit,” said Maraman, coming to the same conclusion as Rexall. “This changes things.” He turned to one of the guards. “Knock her out. Do it
gently
. I don’t want her harmed. At least not yet.”

The man, who looked like a street thug in ill-fitting armor, nodded once. He unsheathed a knife and approached Alicia. Oblivious to her surroundings, she rolled onto her stomach and was trying to get to her hands and knees. For a heart-stopping moment, Rexall thought the guard was going to stab her, but he shifted his grip on the weapon and rapped her almost casually on the side of the head with the pommel. She crumpled and lay still.

“I need to think on this,” muttered Maraman. The uncertainty in his tone indicated he didn’t know whether it was a good or bad development. On the one hand, he now had a wizard under his power. On the other hand, it wasn’t his son. He turned to Rexall. “A ‘friend of Sorial,’ eh? Wonder what he’d think of his ‘friend’ pushing his woman into the portal? More like an agent of Ferguson, methinks. I know your type. Hell, at one time I
was
your type. Gotta hand it to you, you planned it well. And I thought I was the one springing the trap.”

“Ain’t a very good plan, since we’re both your prisoners,” said Rexall. He didn’t want to admit that coincidence and fortune, both good and bad, had played a much bigger part in events than planning. His original hope, before they had found Ibitsal surrounded by a small army, had been to lure Alicia to the portal’s edge and convince her it was in Sorial’s best interests for her to step through. Pushing her would have been a last resort. In these circumstances, especially in the face of Kara’s horrific demise, it had become his only recourse.