Laura Resnick - The Purifying Fire

His face was in shadows and his expression guarded, but something about his bland tone infuriated her.

“If you followed me to take me prisoner and drag me back to Kephalai, then you made a big mistake, Gideon!” She threw her hands out to encircle him with a ring of fire…

And nothing happened.

He stood there calmly, not moving a muscle, not reacting physically at all. His voice sounded faintly amused when he said, “Indeed.”

Chandra stared at her hands in bewildered shock, turning them over and studying her palms as if she could read the answer there to her sudden absence of power.

“But I feel much better now,” she muttered. “So what…”

“You may feel better,” Gideon said, “but surely there’s something you don’t feel?”

“I…” She frowned, realizing what he meant. “Mana.” Suddenly, her difficulty in feeling it earlier made sense.

He nodded. “Something’s blocking our access to mana.

She stared at him in surprise. “Blocking mana?”

“It’s not completely effective,” he said. “That’s why you feel something. But it’s effective enough to be a serious problem for us.”

“Us?” She realized the full import of what he was telling her. “You’re without power, too?”

“As much as you are,” he confirmed.

“I noticed it was hard to feel the flow,” she said, thinking back. “Hard to bond. But I thought that was because I was still weak.”

“No.” He shook his head. “If you concentrate long and hard, you can probably call on enough mana here to start a small cooking fire. But that’s about all, while it’s being blocked so well.”

Chandra had never heard of such a thing. “What could do this?”

“I’m not sure. Something very powerful, obviously.”

“Or someone?” She thought of the hungry prince.

Gideon shrugged. “It would take constant focus and a lot of strength. The effort would be enormous. A big drain on just one person.”

“So he probably has help,” she mused.

“He?” Gideon repeated.

“There’s a necromancer named Prince Velrav who rules here.”

“Of course,” Gideon said. “Black mana would be abundant here.”

“Is that why it’s always nighttime here?”

He looked at her sharply. “Always?”

She told him what she had learned from Jurl.

“A goblin,” Gideon mused. “I suppose you couldn’t get any sense from him of whether this phenomenon is recent or has been going on for centuries?”

“No.”

Jurl had been pretty typical of goblins, in Chandra’s experience: neither bright, nor articulate.

Gideon looked up at the night sky. “No clouds. But no stars.”

“I noticed that, too,” she said. “I’ve never seen that before.”

“I doubt that’s the normal night sky here.”

“You think Velrav pulled a…” Chandra shrugged. “A shroud over this plane?”

“That’s one way of putting it,” Gideon said.

“Is that what’s restricting the mana?”

“I don’t know. But I’ve never experienced anything like this, and I’ve never been anywhere where that had happened.” He jerked his chin skyward. “Perpetual night attributed to the local necromancer king…” “Prince.”

“My guess is, the two things are related. What else did your goblin friend tell you?”

“‘Friend’ would be an exaggeration.”

“He led you to water. He didn’t try to kill you. For a goblin, that sounds pretty friendly.”

“Yes,” she said pensively, reflecting on the encounter. Her first impression of Jurl, when she saw him eating his squealing prey alive, was that he was like all other goblins she had encountered-only more so. “He was surprisingly nice to me. I wonder why?”

“I don’t suppose you threatened to set fire to him?” Gideon said dryly.

“Oh, yeah. Maybe that’s why.”

“What else did he tell you about Velrav?”

Chandra recounted Jurl’s vague comments about Velrav’s servants abducting individuals from every race living on Diraden, in order to satisfy the “hunger.” She concluded by describing the encounter with the Bog Wraith.

Gideon said, “So you didn’t kill it and alert Velrav’s entire army to your presence?”

“No,” she said stonily.

“It’s nice to see you’re learning from your mistakes.”

“What do you know about my-”

“Before we go to all the trouble of destroying this… yes, shroud is a good word for it, we should make sure-”

“Hold on, what do you mean ‘we’?” she said. “If you’re determined to meddle in local problems, that’s your choice. Enjoy yourself! But this has nothing to do with me. All I want to do is get the blazes off this creepy plane and…” The full weight of the problem facing them hit Chandra like a physical blow. She swayed a little as she realized exactly what this meant.

“Ah,” Gideon said. “Therein lies the rub.”

“We can’t leave,” she said, appalled by the realization.

“Not until we can establish proper mana bonds. As long as it’s restricted…”

“We’re stuck here.”

Fleeing Kephalai in a weakened state, Chandra had risked dying in the Blind Eternities. And here, without access to any real power, she risked living the rest of her days in perpetual night.

“I’m stranded.” She gazed at her handsome companion in horror. “With you.”

“Well, if you get bored with me,” he said, “there’s always Jurl.”

“I suppose you’re going to suggest that you and I…” She swallowed, so revolted by the idea that she had trouble even saying it. “That we… work together. To get out of here.”

“I can manage alone, if you’d rather just give in and settle down here. But, yes, I-”

“Give in?”

“I imagine it will be easier to escape this plane if both of us are working on the problem.” His lips relaxed momentarily into what might have been a slight smile. “Together.”

She thought it over. “There are certain conditions, if you want my help.”

“By all means, let’s pause to negotiate the terms under which we’ll cooperate.”

“I didn’t ask you to come here,” she reminded him. “Your being here is entirely your own fault. You shouldn’t have followed me. While we’re on the subject, you also shouldn’t have stolen my scroll or helped the Prelate’s soldiers capture me!”

“I think we’re digressing.”

Chandra said, “My conditions are as follows.”

“Go on.”

“I won’t return to Kephalai. You will not take me back there. You will not trick me or manipulate me into going there again.”

“Agreed.”

“Nor will you inform the Prelate, her forces, or any other inhabitants of Kephalai where I go when I leave here.”

“Agreed,” he said.

“You will not betray me to Prince Velrav or his minions in order to secure your own escape, and you will not prevent me from leaving this plane.”

His black brows rose. “You do have a low opinion of me.”

“If you don’t like my terms,” she said, “that’s fine. We don’t have to work together.”

“No, your terms are fine. I agree to them.”

She searched his face to see if she trusted his word on this. His expression gave away little. But she refused to be afraid of him… and she recognized, however reluctantly, that it made more sense for them to cooperate here than to be at odds with each other.

He said, “As long as we’re negotiating our partnership…”

“We’re not partners,” Chandra said sharply. “We’re just… um…”

“I have some conditions, too.”

“Oh?”

“You will-at least, insofar as you are capable of it-think before you act, while we are here.”