James Wyatt - In the Claws of the Tiger

“Sorry about this, Janik,” she had said, not sounding sorry at all, “but when the opportunity for something bigger and better comes along, you need to take it.”

Dania fell into silence and no one else said anything. Janik was lost in his memories-remembering that a sardonic edge had crept into Maija’s voice before they left the ruins. Mathas had asked in the airship approaching Sharn whether something had happened in the ruins, and now Janik realized that something had. He couldn’t identify what it was or when it happened, but Maija had said several things that had irritated him as they departed the ruins. At the time, he blamed the strain of travel and the stress of their days exploring Mel-Aqat. But she had always been the one who bore up the best under pressure-she would soothe their frayed nerves with inspiration and comfort that sometimes seemed to come straight from the Sovereign Host-from Olladra’s hearth or Boldrei’s embracing arms.

A now-familiar ache seized Janik’s chest as he remembered lying in her arms in the ruins at night. The touch of her hands always seemed to soothe away the aches and bruises and hurts of the day even more than her spells of healing did. Her love for him had always felt like tangible proof of the Sovereigns and their divine love. She had been his priest in a very real sense-standing between him and the Host, bringing his prayers to them and delivering their responses, whether in the form of divine magical power or in the soft words she whispered to him at night.

And he had lost that. Their last night in the ruins, she had held him, but her hands had no comfort and her words were biting. Instead of soothing away his worries and fears, she had mocked them-gently, but the words had stung when he needed reassurance and consolation.

“A wave of death,” he said into the silence, echoing Dania’s words. “Why does that sound like an omen of things to come?”

“Well, thank you for that cheerful thought,” Dania said.

“If it’s an omen,” Mathas said, “perhaps it’s a warning of the consequences of failure. If we released something from Mel-Aqat, perhaps that something is the reason that Maija and Krael were looking for the Tablet of Shummarak. Maybe the thing we released is seeking to release something greater. If one fiend-lord were released from its prison, waves of death might be a very accurate description of what would come next. If they were all released …”

“They won’t be,” Dania said firmly. “We’re here to make sure of that. I seem to have steered this conversation toward predictions of doom, and I’m sorry. Gered’s death was terrible, and Maija will pay for it, but her evil spell is not a portent of our future or the world’s. The Silver Flame has called me to this work and empowered me for it, and I will not fail.” She slammed her fist on the table, a little harder than she intended, and Auftane started in surprise.

“Of course we won’t,” the dwarf said. “You think it’s safe to head to the restaurant now?” Dania and Mathas laughed.

Janik stood up, his face grim. “I’m not hungry. I’ll see you all in the morning.” He turned and walked out of the tavern, his companions too surprised to call after him.

“Mathas, did I say something out of line?” Dania asked.

“No, no,” Mathas said, patting her hand. “You just have to understand that Maija is still a fresh wound for Janik.”

“It’s been three years!”

“Well, then an open, festering wound. He has never bandaged it or treated it-he’s like an animal who keeps biting at a wound so it can’t heal. Maija was his healer, caring for his body and soul. Without her, he doesn’t know how to heal the wound in his heart.”

“I worry about his soul,” Dania said softly.

“So do I,” Mathas said. “Losing Maija seems to have driven him away from the Sovereign Host.”

“And he seems quite uncomfortable every time I mention the Silver Flame.”

“Yes, though I suspect that has as much to do with his experience of your church in Sharn as it does with the overall state of his soul.”

“The church in Sharn is hardly a fair representative of the church as a whole. I mean, it has its share of corrupt patriarchs-”

“And pompous asses,” Auftane interjected.

“And people like Kophran, yes,” Dania said. “But I am convinced there is no greater force for good at work in the world. Mathas, when I went to Karrnath, I was as ruined as Janik is. My past felt like an enormous weight on my shoulders. We were hunting these vampires, and for a while I was convinced that I was as bad as they were. I couldn’t stop thinking of all the people I killed during the war. Kophran didn’t help that, of course-he treated me as though I were not quite a person. But there were two things that got me out of that. One was the realization of what vampires are-they’re warped by pure evil stronger than anything that grows in human hearts. And the other was my taste of the Silver Flame, my experience of pure good. I felt it wash over me when Kophran drove Krael away.”

“So how do you account for the evil you say has grown in Maija’s heart?” Mathas said. “You said she was not a vampire.”

“No, but I am not convinced that she is human any more.”

“What do you mean?” Mathas’s brow furrowed, spreading deep wrinkles over his face.

“I’m not sure. It’s possible that she has made a pact with some demon, or one of the Dark Six. Perhaps it is her use of evil magic that has so deeply corrupted her. Maybe both, and those two things could certainly be related.”

“But not human?”

“I don’t know, Mathas. She’s not a vampire. She’s still alive, near as I can tell, but she’s more evil than anyone I’ve encountered since. She’s the only living person whose evil was almost tangible like that-like what I could feel from the vampires. That’s what I mean.”

Dania looked at the dwarf beside her, who had been sitting quietly through most of her conversation with Mathas. “I’m sorry, Auftane,” she said. “We seem to spend a lot of time talking about the past.”

“I suppose it’s a good thing I find such topics interesting,” Auftane replied with a smile.

“Damn it, why do we spend so much time talking about Maija?” Dania threw her hands in the air. “It’s been three years since she walked out on us.”

“The topic of Krael, at least, seems relevant to our current expedition,” Auftane said.

“True, and it is hard to separate one from the other,” Mathas observed. “They left Mel-Aqat together, and you encountered them together in Karrnath, Dania. I’m not sure that Maija is completely irrelevant, either. Perhaps it was only by chance that we did not meet her on the street tonight.”

“That would have been ugly,” Dania said. “Janik was bad enough after seeing Krael.”

Janik strode along the darkened streets of Stormreach toward the inn. Half of him hoped he would run into Krael again, while the other half knew it would mean almost certain death, at least if Krael was still with Sever and Tierese and his other half-dozen allies. One on one, Janik figured it would be an even match, vampire or no vampire.

Like his friends, Janik wondered if Maija were here as well. But he kept coming back to Krael’s scornful comment, “Her, you can have back, as far as I’m concerned.” So it seemed likely that Maija was not here with him. But Krael had said he was here for revenge-and not against Janik. Was he looking for Maija to take revenge against her? Had she turned on Krael as well? In that case, perhaps she was here on her own. Perhaps she had taken the Tablet of Shummarak from Krael and brought it to Xen’drik, hoping to release a demon lord. Perhaps she was taking it to Mel-Aqat, the Place of Imprisonment.