The Killing Song: The Dragon Below Book III (41 page)

And Singe had plunged down with her, screaming his way into darkness.

The fever had broken at night. His first coherent memory had been of stars and moons and of the Ring of Siberys, shining in the southern sky as bright as he’d ever seen it. Except that he hadn’t been able to see all of the familiar dusty band at once. He’d had to turn his head to take it all in.

His mind had done him a mercy by slipping into deep sleep before he remembered why that was.

He’d remembered when he woke the next day, though. And he’d discovered that his fevered visions of the ship’s deck, of Vennet and Dah’mir, hadn’t been delirium after all. The elemental ring that encircled
Mayret’s Envy
burned in a constant, fiery arc above him. He’d been bound on the airship’s deck, his wrists tied behind him, the rope run through a ring driven deep into the wood.

At first Vennet had taunted him. The half-elf seemed animated by a manic energy, though his face was strained. He had stood at the wheel of the airship with his chest bare to the wind and threatened Singe with the power of his “Siberys mark.”

He had no Siberys mark. There could be no pretending that he did. In Tzaryan Keep, Singe had glimpsed Vennet’s naked skin and the dragonmark that spread across his shoulders had been red and inflamed as if Vennet had been scratching it. The inflammation had grown. From shoulder to wrist, across his chest, and along his side, Vennet’s skin was scratched and raw. Wounds oozed clear liquid and yellow-green pus.

No trace remained of the bright pattern that had once crossed Vennet’s shoulders. His back looked like it had been flayed. Vennet had apparently mistaken Singe’s twitch of disgust for awe-struck fear and had ranted that “the powers of the Dragon Below rewarded those who served them.” Singe, he’d promised, would witness the blossoming of his Siberys mark when the dark lords of Khyber were presented with their new servants.

Dah’mir—in heron shape and perched on a rail, just as he had seen in his delirium—had finally silenced him with an impatient hiss.

There was no food. A bucket of clear water had been left within the limited freedom allowed by Singe’s bonds, set out as if for a dog. Singe had crawled to it and stared at his reflection in the water.

His cheeks showed the growth of three days worth of whiskers. The left side of his face was swollen and red. His eye was crusted and sealed with blood. With nothing behind to plump it out, the eyelid seemed loose and sunken. It hurt to smile or frown or turn his head, but it looked like the wound was healing without infection.

Have a good sniff when a battle’s over, and remember that
no matter how bad things smell, you’re still breathing.

With a determination that would have done Dandra proud, Singe stuck his face in the bucket and drank.

The hollow in his belly actually seemed to make his thinking sharper—and there wasn’t anything to do besides think. Vennet stayed at the wheel almost constantly, alternating between sullen silence and an animated conversation, apparently with the wind. Dah’mir scarcely moved from his perch on the rail. His feathered face and form were stiff with concentration, as if Dah’mir focused on something unseen. Maybe he did. Singe hadn’t seen him show any difficulty in throwing his domination over Dandra, but there were seventeen kalashtar on board
Mayret’s Envy
. Even for a dragon, it must have taken some effort to hold all of those minds captive.

Of the kalashtar, there was no sign. Singe presumed that they remained in the hold where he had last seen them. There was no further sign of Virikhad’s presence either, but then he had what he wanted, didn’t he? Dah’mir had succeeded in Sharn.

He dismissed thoughts of escape almost at once. His bonds allowed him enough movement to stand and peer over the ship’s rail.
Mayret’s Envy
passed above land, not water. They flew west, and from the desolation of the wilderness beneath them, Singe guessed that they were somewhere over Droaam. Even if he had been able to get free, where would he have gone? Dandra might have been able to reach the ground, but he couldn’t. And even if he had been able to, he didn’t like his chance of surviving the wastes of Droaam.

Better to conserve his strength and what spells remained to him and try to escape once they were on the ground. After all, he thought he knew where they were going—and when the wastes of Droaam gave way to the wetlands of the Shadow Marches, he was certain of it.

Back to the Bonetree mound. Back to the ancient prison of the Master of Silence.

Singe knew that the idea should have terrified him. Somehow, it didn’t. It only roused a new anger in him and made his thoughts seem even sharper

Late in the afternoon of the second day after
Mayret’s Envy
had passed into the Shadow Marches—the eighth day by Singe’s reckoning since the night of Thronehold in Sharn—Dah’mir shook himself and shifted on his perch.

Singe glanced at him, then quickly dropped his gaze and watched the heron from under his eyelid. The ruffling of feathers was more movement than Dah’mir had made in days, and he didn’t seem to be finished. A short while later, his head ducked under his wing and his beak poked among his feathers. If Singe had been looking at a human, he would have said Dah’mir was fidgeting with excitement. He felt an urge to peer over the ship’s rail and search the landscape below for landmarks he recognized. They must have been getting close to the mound.

He forced himself to remain still and watch Dah’mir. Until they were actually on the ground, it didn’t matter how close to the mound they were.

When Dah’mir straightened his long neck again, acid-green eyes that had been dim with concentration flashed bright once more. “Vennet!” he said. “It is time.”

Vennet broke off a one-sided conversation in praise of his own growing power and stared at the bird. “Now, master?”

“Now.” Dah’mir stalked along the rail like a pacing general. “The instant we land, I want to be able to take my master’s new servants to him.”

“But I can’t—” Vennet began to protest.

Dah’mir whirled on him, eyes blazing, and as strange as the image of a heron menacing a man might have seemed, even Singe shrank back in spite of himself.

Vennet flinched. “Master, I’m flying! There was a reason we planned to do this
after
we landed!”

“Plans change, Vennet. I want no delay.”

“If I leave the wheel, there
will
be a delay.”

Dah’mir’s wings beat the air. “You are my hands, Vennet! My master commanded that it would be so and you offered yourself to me. Perhaps if you hadn’t thrown our spare pilot overboard you would have had someone to take your place.
Now be my hands!”

A dragon’s voice rolled out of the heron’s throat, but Vennet still managed to withstand it, though his voice sounded thin and weak by comparison. “Let Singe do it!” he said.

Dah’mir turned to look at Singe. The wizard felt like he wanted to shrink back even further than he had before. His plans for escape, concocted in the stillness of hours on the airship, were suddenly very far from his mind. Dah’mir nodded slowly, and Singe had a feeling that although his beak couldn’t have managed it, the heron was smiling.

“Yes,” Dah’mir said. “I like that idea. Free him.”

Quick as a leaping flame, Vennet was down from helm and standing over Singe. The half-elf had two swords hanging around his waist. One was his own cutlass; the other was Singe’s rapier. Vennet drew the rapier and pulled Singe to his feet. “Don’t try anything,” he said, “or I’ll make sure you can’t see anything at all.”

Singe held very still as Vennet slid the thin blade of the rapier among the knotted bonds at his wrists. It took him a couple of hard jerks to cut through, but the ropes fell away and Singe’s arms swung free. For a moment, they just hung at his side, numb and useless after being tied for so long. Vennet laughed and swatted at one of them.

Singe turned around and glowered at him. Vennet, in response, punched him hard across the mouth. The blow sent bright pain sparking across Singe’s face and through his still healing eye socket. He staggered, gasping at the intensity of the pain. The sound of a flurry of wings brought him upright again. Vennet was already returning to the helm, the rapier thrust back into his belt, and Dah’mir was settling onto the rail beside Singe.

“Vennet has made it clear what you have to lose, I think,” the heron said with cool indifference to his pain. “I may not have hands, but I could pluck out your remaining eye with ease.”

Singe’s lips pressed tight together for a moment as he tried to shake feeling back into his arms, then he said, “You can’t become human again, can you? We haven’t seen you in your human shape since Geth saw you on the waterfront at Zarash’ak. That was before you went back upriver with Vennet. You were still injured, then. The next time were saw you, you were healed.
Was the price of your healing the loss of your human shape?”

Dah’mir blinked. “You’re a clever man, Singe. Too clever.”

“I’ve had a lot of time to think lately, thanks to you.”

“No thanks to me. Vennet is the one who begged to keep you alive. You should have been the one to go over the side.” His wings rustled. “But I will have my full power back, and you’ll play a part in it. Go to the forward hatch. We’re going down into the hold.”

A dark fear grew in Singe. “Why?”

“You’re clever,” said Dah’mir. “You’ll figure it out.” He hopped down onto the deck, and his beak darted at Singe’s leg. The sudden pain sent Singe stumbling across the deck. Dah’mir stalked along behind him, pecking and jabbing until Singe ran to keep ahead of him.

There was dried blood on the stairs. Singe felt sure that most of it was his. There was also a lingering odor of rotting flesh below deck, and he remembered the sounds of violence as Vennet murdered one of Biish’s people before the ship rose from the Gathering Light. He had a feeling that whatever role Biish and his gang had been meant to play in the kidnap of the kalashtar, it had not been what Biish had expected.

There was another odor below deck as well, though. It was rank and foul, and Singe had once smelled the same odor on boarding a ship that had been used by slavers. Sweat. Excrement. The stench of people left shackled and unable to fend for themselves.

The everbright lantern that Vennet had opened in the hold of
Mayret’s Envy
remained unshuttered. Singe saw all of the kalashtar turn their heads as he and Dah’mir entered. They still sat or stood or lay where Singe had last seen them. The only shackles that they bore were shackles of the mind.

Dah’mir spread his wings and flapped up to settle on top of a familiar metal box. Kalashtar eyes followed him. He ignored them. “You know what’s in here,” he said to Singe. “You’re going to use them.”

The bracers. The binding stones. Singe’s throat constricted. “No,” he croaked.

His defiance seemed to amuse Dah’mir. The heron let out
a hissing little laugh. “You don’t have a choice,” he said. His acid-green eyes focused on Singe. “Put the bracers on my master’s servants.”

Singe tried to resist the command, but it was like trying to hold back waves with a castle of sand. Dah’mir’s will washed over his. He stepped forward and, as Dah’mir shifted aside, opened the metal box. The nestled bracers within shone up at him, gold plates and wires, pale crystals—and the dark blue-black beauty of the Khyber shards that Taruuzh of Dhakaan had fashioned into prisons for psionic minds so many millennia ago.

“Pick one up,” urged Dah’mir and he did. Dah’mir nodded his head toward one of the kalashtar. “Her first,” he said.

The kalashtar he indicated was an old woman with a face that might have been stern if it hadn’t been slack from Dah’mir’s control. Singe thought he recognized her from Dandra’s description of the kalashtar elders—Shelsatori. His hands trembling, he approached her.

“Find her psicrystal first,” said Dah’mir. “I believe she wears it around her neck.”

He found the crystal. It was blue and beautiful and it seemed to glow with a softness that Shelsatori lacked. It was set in a fine cage of silver, much as Dandra’s psicrystal had been set in a cage of bronze. He wondered if Shelsatori’s crystal had a name.