Jaleigh Johnson - Spider and Stone

“I don’t understand,” Zollgarza said. “Is that a dwarf expression?”

The mistress’s lips pulled back in a sly smile. “You might well think so, but in this case, I’m being quite literal. Mith Barak spends seventy-five years seated on his throne in the form of a mithral statue.”

“If that’s true, he is no ruler.” Zollgarza shook his head in disgust. The ways of stone-shapers and dirt-scrapers made no sense to him. “Why has no one killed him before now?”

Fizzri waved her hand dismissively. “I couldn’t say, but if that is the state you find him in, your task will be simpler.” Again, she flashed that sly smile. “You can manage to swing a hammer, can’t you?”

“Mithral is not so easily destroyed, as you know, and nor do I expect I’ll find the king unguarded in such a state, but I understand your meaning,” Zollgarza said. “His death is all that is required, then?”

“Not quite.” The mistress mother rose from the bench and approached Zollgarza. Her black silk gown trailed behind her like a shimmering stain. She held up her hand, palm out toward him, and spoke a word that sent an electrical charge arcing from one of her rings through the air between them. The snake recoiled, burying itself in the female’s hair.

A silvery-blue sphere appeared in the air above her palm. Inscribed upon the surface of the sphere scrawled writing Zollgarza could not read.

“Beautiful,” he said in that same detached, analytical voice.

“Yes, it is.” With her free hand, Fizzri traced the air around the sphere in a covetous gesture. “Every night when I go to sleep, this object haunts my dreams. It whispers to me.” Her eyes took on a dreamy glaze.

“Is it in the king’s possession?” Zollgarza asked, unnerved by the sudden change in Fizzri’s demeanor.

“Not for long.” Fizzri’s expression hardened. “It is called the Arcane Script Sphere. There is old magic in the city, but none is nearly as powerful as this artifact. See and remember it.” She clenched her fist, and the illusion disappeared. “I want you to kill Mith Barak if possible, but no matter what, you must retrieve this artifact. If it comes down to a choice between slaying the king and retrieving the sphere, you will get the sphere. Is that understood?”

Zollgarza bowed. “May I ask what interest the sphere has for the Spider Queen? Why do we seek a dwarven relic for her glory?”

“It is not and never was a dwarven relic,” Fizzri said. “More than that, I won’t tell you.”

“Then I will leave you,” Zollgarza said. He bowed and turned to go.

Fizzri laid a hand on his arm, her nails digging into his flesh. Zollgarza looked up and met the female’s gaze. Were those hints of silver he saw in her red eyes? He’d never noticed those hints before, and for a moment, he stood frozen, staring into that hypnotic silver light.

“Is that all?” the priestess asked softly. Emotion deepened her voice. Gone was the hissing undertone of the serpent. “So cold you are, Zollgarza. Why do I favor you so? You are less than nothing, a male with neither exceptional skills nor charm enough to make you a novelty. What have you to recommend yourself to the mistress mother?”

“What?” Zollgarza tried to step away, to escape those eyes, which were full silver now, gleaming with anger and frustration. She’d echoed Derzac-Rin’s words exactly. “What are you talking about?”

The female’s grip on his arm tightened, threatened to crush his bones. Zollgarza cried out in pain. Suddenly, her hands were everywhere, pinning his arms, driving him to his knees. He couldn’t move. What was happening? Had she poisoned him, used magic to bind his limbs?

Tell me why she sent you , the mistress mother snarled. Her voice was no longer the husky purr of a drow female. The voice that invaded Zollgarza’s mind was ancient, male, and filled with a shattering power that made him tremble. It had to be more than the sphere, more than my death , the voice cried. What do you want with Iltkazar? What is your power?

Zollgarza screamed. Fizzri’s audience chamber blurred and darkened. A wave of dizziness sickened him, cut off his scream. When his head cleared, he found himself in a small prison cell, his back numb against a cold stone floor. Chains bound him at the hands and feet.

Bent over him was an ancient dwarf, thinner than most creatures of his kind and not so muscular, but his spotted, calloused hands betrayed a strength Zollgarza couldn’t doubt. He gripped Zollgarza’s upper arms with such force that he thought his bones would snap. Between those hands flowed a silver beard that turned yellowish around his thick lips. His face bore the crags of the mountains spoken of in hundreds of dwarven tales, and a scar beneath his left eye made him look just as fierce as those tales portrayed the stout folk.

Those eyes-those silver eyes-Zollgarza felt himself falling into them again, spiraling back into his memories of that day in Guallidurth, when the mistress gave him his mission to infiltrate Iltkazar. Mith Barak-he recognized the dwarf king now-was making him relive the scene, reaming his mind for information.

With an effort, Zollgarza tore his gaze away from those stunning silver orbs. He bit his lip until he tasted blood, hoping the pain would clear his head.

“You’re strong willed,” the dwarf king said. His deep voice washed over Zollgarza, rough and gravelly with age but bearing an underlying power that Zollgarza felt through his whole body. “Do you remember where you are?”

“Iltkazar,” Zollgarza whispered. His throat burned from thirst. He swallowed several times to return moisture to his mouth.

King Mith Barak leaned back and reached for something in a corner of the cell. He brought a ladle of water to Zollgarza’s lips. “Drink,” he commanded, and Zollgarza obeyed without thinking. The king’s influence was strong. Whatever spell he’d used on Zollgarza lingered in him, forcing him to obey.

Mith Barak cast the ladle aside and lifted Zollgarza by the shoulder, forcing him to sit up against the wall. “Do you remember what happened to you?”

“You captured me,” Zollgarza said. “That much I understand.”

“I could have killed you, you know.” The king stood up, crossing his arms. “That’s what you came to do to me. Are you still wondering where the sphere is, Zollgarza?”

“You have the information you wanted,” Zollgarza said. He couldn’t risk looking directly into the king’s eyes again. “Why haven’t you killed me?”

“It’s true your mind is wide open to me, yet there are still … gaps,” Mith Barak said carefully. “What is your family name, Zollgarza?”

The weight of the dwarf’s compulsion flowed through him, but when Zollgarza opened his mouth to speak, no words came. He swallowed, tried again. Nothing.

Grunting, the dwarf scratched his beard. “Who sired you? Where were you born? Who was the last person you killed, before Derzac-Rin?”

The questions pounded in Zollgarza’s mind, strengthened by dwarf magic. He focused on the first, the one that disturbed him most due to his inability to answer it: his family name. Such a small thing, but when he searched for it, there was only blackness, an impenetrable shroud.

“What did you do to me?” he snarled. It had to be the dwarf’s magic that clouded his memories.

The king shook his head. “I did nothing except search your mind for those same answers. They aren’t there,” he said. “Someone has used magic-stronger than any I’ve ever encountered-to wall off parts of your memories. They’ve even denied you access to them. I want to know why.”

Zollgarza heard the threat in the dwarf’s voice, but he paid no attention. More questions swirled in his thoughts. His knowledge of poisons: Where had he learned those skills? Where had he come by the dagger with the spider on the hilt? He served Mistress Mother Fizzri, but what had he done before that? No one knew his place in House Loor’Tchaan.