Andrea Höst - Voice of the Lost

The way she and Cor-Ibis were behaving toward each other, as if they had reached some settled accord during her storm of tears, was more than troubling her. She should not allow herself this, not unless she truly believed that she could keep to her resolve.

The enormity of that question was not something she could resolve while trying to invade an enemy castle. The middle of an assassination attempt, and she was focusing on the wrong things. Stopping Estarion, preventing a second wave of wild magic, was the first priority.

"I cannot sense any enchantment in the immediate area," Islantar said, stepping through the gate while Cor-Ibis' attention was on Medair. "But how do we discover snares set without magic?"

"With our eyes," Ileaha said, catching the Kierash’s arm before he took another step and indicating the faint outline of a square in the centre of the passage.

"We will need more light, to catch such subtleties," Cor-Ibis said, turning from Medair to make a short sharp gesture. A further two mageglows burst into existence. He looked at his hand strangely, then walked forward. "If you will lead the way, Ileaha, while Kierash Islantar and I concentrate on our senses?"

"Of course, 'Lukar," Ileaha said, prowling forward. Medair saw the young warrior check, as the two pasts in her mind collided again, but then she continued to glide smoothly down the passageway.

They had not moved more than thirty paces past the gate when Cor-Ibis told Ileaha to hold her position.

"A detect," Islantar said, and Cor-Ibis nodded.

"Nothing to impede us," the Keridahl said. "Merely to inform those above of intruders. It will take some little time for me to disable it without alerting Falcon Black."

Without further ado he lost himself in the opening series of gestures for most common spells. After watching him for a short while, Medair belatedly remembered to share around her supplies. They sat down to eat and wait, all lost in their own thoughts. Islantar was watching her and she wondered if he was not convinced by her assurance that she had no intention of suiciding. That way out now seemed a very pointless thing to do, even if she were no longer a proud Imperial herald, walking confidently down a clear and just path.

"Go through," Cor-Ibis said, the picture of concentration. He waited until they had travelled some distance further before following. Medair’s arcane strength was too limited to allow her to sense the detect, but the power must be costing Cor-Ibis to blind it was enough to make her worry about mages in the castle above.

"The tunnel slopes up," Kel ar Haedrin said, but no-one answered. The quiet was unnerving and Cor-Ibis' plan, necessarily vague in the face of so many unknowns, now seemed wholly inadequate. They were outnumbered, even if the patrol and the guards in the blockhouses were all that remained of Estarion’s forces. And Vorclase.

Recalling that strange premonition, Medair grew ever more uneasy. Who had said that all the rules had changed? And were still changing. Ileaha had been within the shield wall when the Conflagration had swept over them, but wild magic had found and changed her. Medair didn’t want to be reshaped into a different person, even if that person’s life was a more pleasant one.

Could she have already been reshaped, less drastically? Where had that certainty come from? She’d never felt so sure of anything in her life as she was of the fact that Vorclase waited in Falcon Black, but she had absolutely no foundation on which to ground her belief. It seemed far more logical for Vorclase to have perished outside Athere with the rest of Estarion’s forces.

"Light ahead," Kel ar Haedrin said, after they had ascended almost two full circles, climbing the hill from the inside. Cor-Ibis immediately extinguished two of the mageglows and sent the last darting into one of his sleeves.

"Probably a set light," he said, after they had all had the opportunity to study the faint, steady glow creeping around the curve of the passage. "Kel ar Haedrin, if you would go ahead?"

Kel ar Haedrin nodded and slipped away, keeping as close as possible to the inner wall. There were no cries of alarm, and very quickly she was back.

"Another gate, Keridahl. A stair is beyond, and other gates. But no guard. I did not go close enough to sense if there is a trip."

"Very well. Stay here."

He took the remaining mageglow with him, leaving them in darkness. Medair took the jewelled ring from her satchel and summoned another glow.

"Another trip," Cor-Ibis said, voice floating back to them. He was quicker this time, and soon they stood clustered around the base of a stair streaked with moisture. Water dripped from cracks and crevices in the ceiling and there were several other gates, all firmly locked.

Beside two of them were bins which contained a collection of grains and root vegetables. Picking out a withered parsnip, Ileaha moved towards one of the gates, then stopped.

"This seems to lead to the predator which hunted last night," she said, eyeing dark stains on the ground. "The blood traces are old."

"Not recently fed," murmured Kel ar Haedrin, as Ileaha moved to the next gate and peered into the darkness beyond.

"Nothing moving," Ileaha said, tossing the parsnip through the bars so that it lay just within the strips of light cast by their mageglows. She tugged at the bars, and found them firmly seated. "If these were unlocked, escape this way will be difficult."

Cor-Ibis examined the lock to the predator cave, then said a word beneath his breath and watched it melt into uselessness. He repeated the process with the next lock but left the gates which did not obviously lead to an animal lair. Then he sent Kel ar Haedrin and Ileaha on their way up the stairs. Islantar was corralled in the centre of the group, as protected as possible.

The stair doubled back on itself repeatedly, the narrow steps worn and slippery. Medair was last in line, keeping nervously close to the kaschen immediately in front of her. She did not like the darkness nipping at her heels, and directed the mageglow she had summoned to trail rather than lead her.

Just as she reached the first landing, a whining growl, high and vicious, rose out of the dark. Kaschen las Cormar immediately drew his sword and moved to Medair’s side.

"It isn’t the hunting cry," Medair said, not sounding nearly as confident as she would like. "It must be able to smell us, but not get out of its cage."

The kaschen looked up the stair to Cor-Ibis, who nodded once and gestured for them to move on. Medair decided she should take this as a sign that he trusted her judgment. That mattered to her. She wished she could keep her thoughts from the silent question he posed. Far, far too many things had happened in the last day, and until she had a chance to sit down and decide how to feel about it all her heart would continue to trip and stumble and demand she give it thought. And yet the long wait at each obstacle gave her imagination too much opportunity to play with less pleasant futures than one which featured Illukar las Cor-Ibis.

Without doubt all Decia would want her dead, and here she was at its heart, giving them further reason to hate. Off to kill a king because the possible consequences of not doing so were unthinkable. Always, instead of the best, she found herself struggling to make the least-worst decision.

They travelled four flights of slippery steps, then stopped. Medair was too far back to see the problem, and guessed that the extended delay meant they’d encountered another door or trap. Faintly, she could sense magic at work and took a step back to give those above her room to move.

The wait was a long one, and involved several whispered discussions. Finally, there was a too-loud click, then the stair was bathed in the light of day rather than mageglows. Swift movement, and a jingling thud, told Medair the door had been guarded, and that guard had been dispatched.