The Sacred Hunt Duology (80 page)

He lowered himself into the crawl space, wishing for Jewel's height and Jewel's build. As it was, he was uncomfortably close to wall and ceiling, where they were distinct enough to be distinguished; the ground beneath the basement was an odd patchwork of worked bits of stone strewn among rough or jagged surfaces. He crawled, following her closely. Because the space was so limited, and Jewel was in front, wending her way in a darkness that the tunnels—and their unknown visitors—demanded, he had no need to call upon light; indeed, he knew it for a danger here. He slid the crystal into the darkness of heavy cloth and skin and let it go.

Time passed; he scraped his head across low-hanging stone and likewise bruised his knees. In one or two places, the ceiling rose. Jewel did not, and Devon chose to follow her lead. He did not, after all, have much choice.

But at last, when he'd lost any true sense of direction, Jewel stopped. She had started and stopped several times during their navigation of the tunnels, but there was a quality to her lack of motion, a stiffness, that told Devon more than simple words would have done.

Fear had a scent of its own, and it affected different people in different ways. Some found it exciting, some arousing, some disturbing, and some disgusting. Devon did not judge it; he acknowledged it as an element of the landscape through which he might have to fight. But her calf was stiff beneath his hand as he used her body to guide himself into a position where he might be the first to react should reaction be necessary.

He was almost surprised when she reached out and gabbed his shoulder; her grip was hard and surprisingly sure as it sought to hold him in place.

Before he could react—and his reactions were swift—he heard speech; the tunnels carried and distorted it slightly, but the words were clear.

“I said
all
life.”

“It is done, Lord.”

“You are certain?”

“As certain,” the second voice replied, “as I can be.”

“Good. Your existence depends on it. Now, stand out of my way.”

“Lord.” The word was layered with a variety of emotions; Devon wished to see the face of the speaker. He looked into the darkness; there was no light for his vision to adjust to.

And he wanted the light, suddenly; he had an irrational urge to pull it from its safety and let it burn away at the darkness that surrounded him. It was unexpected, the impulse, and strong; he forced it back, and then brought his shoulders in line with Jewel's. She'd told him, as much as she could, to wait. He waited.

As he did, he began to realize that he was wrong. There was light here, but it was slow to grow, slow to find its way to his vision. Jewel, beside him, stopped breathing; he reached out slowly, touching first her shoulder and then the side of her neck, before he brought his fingers up to her face.

Her mouth was wide, her jaw slack.

He knew then that she saw something in the darkness that he could not see. He was not even very surprised. Damn The Terafin anyway, for sending him out—as always—with only half the available facts. He waited, as the light flickered; it was just enough to frustrate, not enough to illuminate.

Jewel leaned into his hands, and then back; her body began to tremble with the tension that held it in place. He did not know how long they sat while she watched in darkness. But he knew when it was over; she shook her head and suddenly started, as if waking; she scrambled back on her knees in panic.

Time to leave.

He caught her, took the risk of whispering one word, and that, her name. Then he pushed her forward, and took the rear. It was hard, of course; he expected this. The possibility that they were being followed, and by enemies who could see in the dark, was high.

Don't let fear make you slow or clumsy; don't let it make you careless.
But of course he couldn't give her this warning; he had to trust her. Devon ATerafin, raised within the patriciate's lower ranks and sponsored into the Astari, had made a career out of trusting no one.

He grimaced, thinking of her fear and of his own, one so visceral and one so . . . intellectual. All of his senses had sharpened; were there light, he would see by it more clearly than either Jewel or their pursuers; he would notice the
variation in shadows, the subtlety of motion, the shifting of expression that warned of imminent attack.

If he had the time to turn and let the light shine.

He followed Jewel's breath, the sound of her knees shuffling against rock, even the sound of a staccato gasp when she hit something that hurt. He was aware of the passage of time, but not aware of whether or not enough of it had gone by. He followed and listened.

Are they demons, Jewel? Are they mages? What did you see?

But at his back, nothing; no sound, no shuffling, no spoken words. He wanted to ask Jewel what she had seen and why she had chosen her moment to leave, but it would wait.

And then she stopped; he could hear her struggle to stand in the enclosed space. Her fingers brushed rock and then something else—the planks. In the silence, their creak sounded like the movement of an old mast on a ship no longer seaworthy.

For the first time, he heard a sound that neither of them made; it was at his back, but how far away or how close, he could not say. He cursed, but wordlessly. Sliding to the side, hands outstretched and flattened, he caught Jewel's knee and then took the weight of her feet. She was surprisingly light.

He followed as quickly as he could—which was very quickly, and then reached into his clothing. His hand closed round the crystal as if it burned; he pulled it out, hand shaking, and lifted a slender finger for only a second.

The pale light washed all color out of Jewel's face; her eyes were wide and seemed completely dark. She stood as if frozen, as if waiting; he caught her hand in his own, locked their fingers together, and then began to run. There was no choice left her but to follow, and that was just as well; there were times when choice was prized too highly.

He let the light flicker as he ran, retracing the steps that they had so quietly and painstakingly taken. Darkness grew behind them; he had seen enough of it to spare no backward glance.

Jewel's cry told him that she had not chosen to do likewise. He did not catch all of what she said, because half of it was wordless, midway between gasp and whimper. Instead of trying to catch a glimpse of what she saw, he ran faster, taking the corner of the junction that would rob any pursuer of immediate line of sight.

Light flared down the stretch of corridor; light and heat, a fierce redness. He forced a scream out of his throat, hoping to buy time; the heat lingered at his back even though he did not stay.

Up ahead, the walls were roughening; there was a pale and indistinct light, a hint of escape. Jewel stumbled, but his grip was so sure she was forced to right herself, forced to follow, half-dragged, where he led.

There. Air burned his throat no matter how even his breaths were. He pulled Jewel round and shoved her up against the rough rock of the half-dug tunnel. She began at once to try to lift the hatch. Cursed, twice, sharply—but her hands remained steady; she was free of the panic that often destroyed deliberate motion.

Light; early evening coming in at a slant from the wagon docks. With a grunt, Devon half-pushed, half-threw her. She was gone; darkness remained, and in it, danger. His hair stood on end with something other than fear—although fear was there, and strongly.

He gripped the edge of the hatch and launched himself in a full circle that would have done an acrobat in a festival troupe proud. Only his hands remained on the lip of the entrance when the fire erupted at the end of the tunnel.

This time, Devon bit back a very real scream and yanked his hands away. They were blackened and bleeding; useless. Tears blurred his vision as he crouched in the basic defensive posture. He almost rolled away from the small hand on his shoulder before he realized that it was Jewel. Fire
hurt.
He knew it, of course, but it was hard to control his momentary reaction to the pain.

Jewel did not grab his hand as he had grabbed hers; she caught his elbow instead. But she ran, just as he had done, pausing only long enough to unwind her sash and wrap it round his hands in several layers. Smart thinking, really; it would stop his blood from becoming a telltale trail that they very much wished to avoid leaving.

• • •

Jewel didn't know the market well, and the crowds had thinned greatly; only a few stalls were still open, but they would not remain so for long; their flaps were slowly folding and their flags were being pulled down from the poles that announced their wares and their presence. There were guards, mostly private, waiting to escort the merchants—and their day's coin—to safety.

Still, if she didn't know the market well, she knew enough about dodging pursuit. It was evening, although it was not yet dark; she wound her way between the stalls, taking care to avoid the overly cautious guardsmen.

Once or twice she paused to look over her shoulder; Devon shook his head tightly and urged her on. She saw nothing following, but she would not stop running until she was safe within her rooms.

It was a long way to the Isle.

T
HE OVERHANG OF CRIMSON
curtains caught the light and held it at bay. Beneath the slight shadows, The Terafin stood, face to the window, back to her study. Although she wore a pale, light turquoise, she looked a shadow, thin and wraithlike—the body, not the woman. Morretz, standing a respectful body length away, bowed quietly. The panes of the window cut his shadow, and the blurred reflection of his body, into precise rectangles. She looked beyond them.

To The Terafin's eyes, there was little movement; the hour was late enough that visitors and gardeners alike had retreated for the day. Only her guards adorned the fences, light flickering off their polished helms; they were so much a part of the manse and the lands that surrounded it that she did not notice their presence.

Ah, the path was being lit; she had been mistaken. There were gardeners yet, working in the new night. There, a torch being lifted to the glass lamps that lined the tiled walk. There were patterns within the tiling that had taken a decade to produce; her contribution to the shrines that quartered the gardens in their quiet simplicity. If one sought solitude, and one's purpose was internal and true to those that one sought, the path brought quiet and peace. Such was the way of pilgrims.

But it was not as a pilgrim that her attention was required. Morretz had been patient; would continue to be patient should she choose to keep him waiting, half-bowed, for the duration of the evening. It was not a kind use of the man she most trusted in Terafin.

She turned.

“Terafin.” He bowed fully, and then rose, showing no sign of discomfort at having had to wait. “Jewel Markess and Devon ATerafin request the privilege of your audience.”

“Granted,” she said at once.

“In the library?”

She nodded. “I will join them momentarily.” Watching him leave, she wondered what training it was that he had undergone, what vows he had taken, what abilities he had hidden to become the domicis of The Terafin. It was not the first time she wondered it; it would not be the last. The domicis were essential to the
running of almost any noble House; she could not think of a member of The Ten, except perhaps the lowest, that did not possess at least one. But there were rules that governed the servant and the master—rules of privacy that she did not choose to breach.

Her predecessor had disliked the domicis—but he was a man who had insisted that control of his own environment be his own, regardless of circumstance. He never said that he distrusted them, but Amarais wondered, privately, if that was his worry.

Had there ever been a case of betrayal? She thought not. But she could not, of course, be certain. If there were one, who better able to carry it out than a trained domicis? He or she would have access to everything—every bit of personal, private, and public information—necessary to insure that discovery would be unlikely at best.

She shook herself, and stared down at the shrines. It was an ill use of time, this meandering, this gloomy imagining. There were far more real threats to worry about.

• • •

Devon was standing when she entered the library. Everything about him, except for the torn and dusty state of his clothing, was strictly formal. The salute he offered, however, was not. His hands were bandaged in a brilliant swath of blue silk; there was a spatter of blood across his shirt, although the color, rust against red, stopped it from being immediately visible. She knew Devon reasonably well—he was in pain. He did not show it.

She nodded her acknowledgment immediately, and watched his knees fold into a sitting position. The chair at his back caught his full weight with a creak. It was not a graceful movement, but it was probably a necessary one.

Jewel, still uncomfortable with the formality of a salute—and painfully uncertain of when to use one—remained seated.

“Terafin,” Devon said, before she could speak.

The Terafin raised a brow, but did not demur; they both knew that her meetings with Jewel were to have been private. “Why have you come?”

“We have news,” Devon answered, and it was clear that Jewel did not even resent the intrusion.

“Then give it.”

“I believe we've uncovered the first evidence of the tunnels that Jewel claimed existed.”

The Terafin raised a dark brow; she straightened her shoulders very slightly, and her eyes narrowed. Again, the shift in expression was slight, subtle; Jewel, watching, did not notice it. But Jewel was tired. “You found the tunnels?”

“No, Terafin.” Devon bowed his head, an admission of failure. But the gesture, while perfect, was empty; the failure was to the letter of her order, not the spirit.
“But today we believe that we've discovered the reason why no entrances to the maze itself have been found.”

“And that is?”

“They are unmaking them.”

“Unmaking?” She sat back in her chair, favoring him with a frown as she brought her hands together. “Speak plainly, Devon.”

Devon's brow rippled. “Would that I could,” he replied, and turned to look at Jewel's profile. Jewel was silent, as if Devon's words hadn't penetrated her musings. Morretz, watching as always, caught The Terafin's eye; The Terafin nodded almost harshly. In the darkness cast by the shelves beneath the oval dome of a window above, Morretz left the room. Devon did not appear to notice, but she knew it for an act; he noticed everything. He continued to speak; recreating the events of the afternoon's search, and ending with the voices in the darkness.

“What do you think they meant by ‘all life'?”

“I don't know. I imagine exactly what they said.”

“What life is in those tunnels?”

Devon shrugged.

“And then?”

“And then, darkness. Silence. I did not see what occurred—but young Jewel did. She has a very keen . . . vision.”

“Jewel?” The Terafin chose not to respond to Devon's comment. She covered the back of her left hand with the palm of her right, but no more.

Jewel shook her head and swallowed. “I couldn't see them,” she said faintly. “I couldn't hear them as well as Devon did. But I saw—I saw the entrance.”

“What do you mean by unmake, then?” The Terafin's voice was gentle.

“There was shadow,” Jewel said, as if she hadn't heard. “And darkness—it was darker than the lack of light. And there was the door, the entrance to the maze. Some of the entrances aren't well kept, and some are bloody dangerous. They—they're old wood and they rot, or the stones fall and try to kill you. But not this one. This was real stone—it was broken because of some accident, I think—but it was pretty solid. It—” She fell silent.

“Yes?”

Swallowed. “It started to—well, the edges of the entrance, they
shimmered.
And then they started to change—to get solid. It was like the air was building rock to replace the stone that had cracked.”

“And you never saw the creature casting this magic?” She didn't ask if it was magic, and Jewel didn't deny it. What else, after all, could it be?

She shook her head: No.

“And then?”

“And the stone got sharper, harder even; it—there was more of it—and then there was cracked and splintered wood—and then just wood. It was a door, and
the stone arched over it like it does in the great hall here.” She closed her eyes. “And on the arch there was writing, at least I think there was—I couldn't read it.”

“And you read.” It wasn't a question.

Jewel nodded.

“And then?”

“And then the door vanished. It just—there was a minute when it seemed to flicker, and then there was nothing there.”

“I believe,” Devon broke in, “that you will discover only dirt there now. It seems almost as if—and I am no mage to judge well—the entrance of which Jewel speaks wasn't destroyed. It was literally unmade.” His gaze darkened.

The Terafin was silent, absorbing the description, the words in which it was cased. At last she favored Devon with a brief smile. “I believe I understand your frustration. But if I had to guess, I would come to the same conclusion that you have: Jewel saw the door's making as if time's sands were running
up
the glass.”

“And that,” another voice said, “is impossible.”

The three turned to face Meralonne APhaniel as he stood in the open door, Morretz at his back.

• • •

Morretz was pale but calm. The Terafin raised a brow in his direction, but it was a tribute to his skill—and his past service—that she showed no sign of anger; that, in fact, she felt none. She did not trust Meralonne, but that distrust was in large part due to Morretz. If Morretz felt that it was best to summon the mage, she would countenance that independence.

What surprised her, as she studied the haggard face of the mage, was the speed with which he'd arrived. The construction necessary to repair the calling room, and the magics necessary to activate it, had not yet been completed—the only way the mage could arrive with such unseemly haste was by his own power.

The Terafin did not know much about mages, but she knew this: It was rumored that in history only a handful of the mage-born had learned to travel great distances in no time with the use of their power. It was also rumored that such travel had killed two.

“Master APhaniel, please. Be seated.” It was not so much an order as a request; the mage's usually pale features were all but white, and his skin shone in the lamplight with the glow that sweat brings.

He nodded almost absently, but he took the chair; she watched him to see whether or not the tremors had set in. But he walked slowly and deliberately, denying her the answer that she half-expected; it was only upon sitting that he seemed to slump with exhaustion. And even that weariness was in body alone; he turned to look at young Jewel as if his eyes had edges.

“What you suggest is impossible,” he repeated flatly.

Jewel, wary, met his gray eyes; they looked silver in the low light. “It wasn't my
suggestion,” she said. She spoke stiffly and kept her chin level; The Terafin thought she was trying not to bristle. It was a brave attempt but not a successful one.

Meralonne raised a brow and then almost smiled. “Very well. It was not your suggestion, but you were the only witness. Tell me, slowly, what you saw. Describe it in detail. I will aid you where I can.”

He lifted his fingers in two complicated circles and then lowered his head; his smooth brow bore the lines of concentration, and his eyes, shut, were a sweep of platinum against alabaster. Before him, clouds formed. They were dark and fell to look upon.

The Terafin disliked them, and Devon shied back—but Jewel did not seem alarmed at all. She had started only once, and at that, before the mage began his motions. Now she stared, as intent as he, at the image that had formed.

“You have the sight,” Meralonne said, his voice low.

Jewel looked askance at him and then turned to look at everyone else in the room. Slowly, her gaze came back to rest upon Meralonne's face.

“No,” he said, as if it were an effort merely to speak, “they do not see as you do. But come. Describe what you saw.”

She did. And as she did, he brought it to life, allowing her to correct him. This time, however, Devon and The Terafin were privy to the vision that Jewel's sight had granted; they saw, unfurling in the clouds, darkness and more; the outline of the crawl space that led to the gaping entrance to the tunnels themselves. That hole became a door, and the door became nothing. It was as Jewel had described it: an unmaking.

“And?”

“And then I knew it was over,” Jewel said, the hush of the words making a monotone of them.

There was silence as everyone absorbed what was said. At last, Meralonne exhaled. “What you described seems much to me as The Terafin supposed it. But it is not possible.”

Jewel said nothing.

The Terafin raised her head. “Meralonne, a question.”

“Ask it, Terafin. I shall endeavor to answer.”

“Why would they wish to destroy all life?”

He froze. “Pardon?”

It was Devon who answered. “There was a short conversation before the spell was cast. We did not hear it all, but one sentence stands out.”

“And that?”

“‘I said
all
life.'”

“Are you certain?”

“That,” Devon said, with a wry and deep inflection, “was what he said next. After the second speaker assured him that it was done.”

“Jewel,” Meralonne said, leaning back into the rest of the chair, and gripping the arms with his hands, “you said there was darkness, and I have captured what I can of it. What did it
feel
like?”

“I—I don't know.”

“You felt nothing?”

“I don't know.”

“What do you mean you don't know?” The edge of irritation that he often showed had crept, unbidden, into the words.

“I—I don't know. I was, I was already nervous.” Her glance slid to The Terafin and then away. The girl, The Terafin realized, had been terrified. That fear lingered in the words and the way she spoke them; Jewel was usually much more aggressive.
But you served me
, The Terafin thought, as she watched Jewel struggle with shame and the need to speak the truth.
You served me well.

“I was frightened. I—the moment we reached the market authority, everything felt wrong. And then, in the tunnels, it grew worse and worse. It wasn't until we reached them that I realized we were going to die.” She swallowed and then reached for a glass of water. Morretz held it, although he had offered no refreshments to anyone else. “The darkness was worse than darkness, and it was cold. I had to watch it; I was afraid to move. That's why I saw—what I saw.”

Meralonne nodded, but there was ice in his gesture. “Yet you managed to escape.”