The Dagger of Adendigaeth (A Pattern of Shadow & Light) (95 page)

Vindicat
ion…

Whyever did he feel
vindicated
in knowing that Sharpe was meeting his due? He recognized that the feeling had to do with Sharpe’s having put three darts into Fynnlar val Lorian. It was all backwards and wrong, and yet he could not deny the feeling.

As the heavy thumping of the dragon’s wings faded into the distance, the Saldarians emerged from their places of hiding, albeit tentatively, suspiciously. Of the twenty in their company, only Işak
had held his ground.

His prisoners had used the moment to attempt an escape, which he’d quickly thwarted with a net of compulsion cast wide. They writhed in the dirt now, enduring his displeasure. Their untimely break had caused him to muddle his aim of th
e fourth-strand working he’d intended for Sharpe. Işak was fairly sure the bolt of concentrated energy had missed most of him, which meant…

He wasn’t sure what it meant.

The entire encounter baffled him.

Joss finally managed to wriggle out from beneath th
e low ledge he’d hidden under and made his way through the chaos of scattered Saldarians to rejoin Işak. “Bloody ill-luck for Sharpe,” he said heatedly as he neared. “We’re naught but a sprint away from that node.” 

Işak
slowly turned his gaze from the distant sky to look at him. Joss wore a layer of dirt that might’ve been from the dragon’s generated windstorm, or perhaps from having plastered himself beneath the sliver of a ledge. “Round up the men and horses,” he said tightly, still on edge. Işak’s own mount had reared on him the moment the dragon erupted over the mountainside, and with his bad leg, which made riding ever difficult, Işak had abandoned the steed—he’d dared not risk attempting to control a frightened horse amid twenty terrorized men while subduing four prisoners with compulsion
and
fighting a Sundragon. He knew his limitations.

He cast Joss a sideways glance and added darkly, “And hurry up about it.”

“Some of the men are hurt,” Joss grumbled, looking sullen. “Huric might’ve broken his leg. It should be set.”

“Get him on his horse.” Işak speared him with a dangerous look.

“Why?” Joss threw a hand to the sky. “The damnable beast is gone! It’s no doubt making a fine snack of Sharpe as we speak! What’s so bloody pressing?”

Işak drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. What could he tell Joss? That Dore’s paranoia over anyone remotely related to the Fifth Vestal had engendered a need to teach Işak all possible spells to escape the Vestal or any of his liegemen? And that whoever else they may be sworn to, the Sun
dragons were sworn first to Björn van Gelderan?

How could a man like Joss possibly understand the transference of knowledge that came with being bound to Dore Madden, how his insanities and understandings both filtered across the bond? Işak knew, because Dore knew, that a Sundragon would never stop until he had achieved his goal, and especially Şrivas’rhakárakek, which this most likely had been. Dore said Rhakar was almost always sent to do Björn’s work, though why the Fifth Vestal should care about Işak’
s business was anyone’s guess.

“Get the men ready,” Işak repeated, suddenly fearing that they’d already lingered too long. His gaze and tone simultaneously invited challenge and warned against such an ill-advised response.

Joss gave him a look of sour accusation but turned to do as tasked.

Işak looked back to the sky. He didn’t understand why the dragon had come. This more than anything made him uneasy. It hadn’t been to rescue the prisoners—the creature had patently disregarded them—and it hadn’t anything to do with him personally, for the dragon had all but ignored him even seeing he was a wielder. And despite all tales and Joss’s assumption to the contrary, Işak well knew that Sundragons would never feast upon the flesh of men. Thus he could only conclude
that the dragon had come in search of Trell val Lorian.

Trell…
Işak marveled at the mysteries that encircled the prince’s life. He wondered, too, if he would rue the day Trell crossed his path. But one thing was certain: the prince had the favor of a god—Raine’s truth, a god had already rescued him once from sure death in the Fire Sea. What lengths then would this god take to track him down again, and might it perhaps include sending a Sundragon in search?

Nervous now at the possibility, Işak called up a f
irst-strand pattern and cast it upon the currents. It occurred to him, as he began getting tentative readings back from the pattern’s ever-expanding reach, that this was very likely the same pattern the Sundragon had used to find them.

O
h
, he understood more than any man should about Sundragons. Dore had lectured tirelessly and with dreadful insistence about their talents and their weaknesses… especially their weaknesses, which were few enough in Dore’s estimation to count on one hand. But one thing Dore had stressed time and again was that Sundragons could not travel the nodes. If the dragon returned—and Işak’s gut told him it would—he had to buy them time to escape.

Joss was just approaching with Işak’s mount in tow when Işak felt a mental tug, his first-
strand pattern resonating strongly. He’d been right to fear. The dragon was returning.

“Get Waryn to prepare the node for travel,” he hissed in a low voice as he took his reins from Joss. “And tell him he’d better be bloody quick about it!”

Joss looked alarmed. “What’s wrong?”

Işak gave him a black look. “The dragon returns.”

“Belloth’s bloody balls! What do we do?”

“
You
get the men across the node.” Işak looked back to the sky and added grimly, “…I will deal with the dragon.”

“What do you mean you’ll deal with it?” He grabbed Işak’s arm. “Don’t be a fool! No man can fight a Sundragon!”

“I can fight him,” Işak said evenly, holding his gaze.

Joss frowned and released him—he was never comfortable touching Işak anyway. “As you will then,” he said, sounding dubious, his frustration
evident in tone and manner. “But what—?”

“
Just get the men out of here, Joss!
”

Perhaps it was the desperation in Işak’s tone that finally got through to the man, but Joss’s face went slack, and he rushed off shouting orders at high pitch.

Işak looked back to the west. He had a vast repertoire of patterns that Dore had made him learn through threat and torture and pain. Sometimes the patterns themselves had been as painful to learn or work as the punishment being held over him. But outside of the fifth, which Işak could not work, only one pattern was truly effective against a Sundragon, according to Dore, and even then it was only effective once, for afterwards the creature would be alert to it.

Işak made ready with this pattern while his men regained their
horses and lined up to cross the node. They moved single-file, vanishing with a step, the prisoners bound and hooded now to prevent future mishaps.

Işak brought up the rear of the line, backing toward the node, acutely aware of the risk he was taking. And yet, if he failed and the dragon claimed him as he’d surely claimed Sharpe, who could say if such a death might not be preferable to an eternity bound to Dore Madden? Işak pondered this in ill humor while the line of escape seemed to shrink at an alarming
ly slow rate.

Only half the men had crossed when the resonance of Işak’s first-strand pattern grew so painful that he had to release it, knowing the dragon came too near. He kept his eyes pinned on the western hills, sparing only a glance here and there fo
r the agonizingly long line still between him and the node.

Then he saw him.

A man approached from out of the shadows. Walking tall and powerfully built, he wore a greatsword behind one shoulder, its black stone hilt carved in the likeness of a winged dragon. His long raven hair was pulled back from a wide widow’s peak, and his gaze was just as fiery in human form as it had been whilst flying the skies.

Here then was the fearsome Şrivas’rhakárakek
in the flesh!
Dore would’ve pissed himself.

His heart racing, Işak released his pattern.

***

Rhakar saw the Saldarians and their prisoners vanishing one by one, obviously crossing a node. But he let them go, fo
r the man he wanted followed at the end.

This one Rhakar would not harm—unless he must—for now that he’d fixed his attention newly and firmly upon the young wielder, Rhakar saw that he was surely a Player.

Oh
…men rarely knew they played in the First Lord’s game, but Rhakar could always tell. An aura surrounded such men or women. They had an almost indefinable quality to their life patterns that made each one ring with a certain faint chime, a harmonic of the greater chord resonated by the vast pattern that was the First Lord’s game itself.

It changed a man, being part of the First Lord’s game. Whether
he
knew it or not, his pattern was inalterably transformed.

Rhakar fixed his gaze upon the wielder and strode toward him purposefully. He knew the man held
elae
, but clearly he could not work the fifth, so Rhakar spared no inspection for the fourth-strand pattern he held in his mind.

When the wielder released it, Rhakar easily batted it away with a mental sweep, and yet—

Impossible!

A mental cage sizzled into being, powerful bindings spider-webbing in lightning streaks to ensnare his thoughts.

Rhakar staggered beneath the onslaught and fell to one knee, shaking his head as his vision clouded with spiraling pathways. He knew this pattern. It was old…he’d not seen it used in centuries.

The pattern was a trap, of course, a maze that could only be escaped by mentally tracing its endless curves and alleys. Yet to do so itself was deadly, for the more mental energy one put into the maze, the stronger the maze became. The maze likewise required increasing attention—greedily, thirstily, it was an insatiable beast that demanded a man pour in ever more of himself until his mind was entirely devoured within it.

Rhakar regarded the wielder blurring beyond his vision with a new appreciation. How ingenious he’d been. Beneath the puny pattern he’d thrown at Rhakar had lurked one with real bite. A wielder without the fifth might not harm a creature of Rhakar’s ilk—
no
—but he could occupy the dragon’s mind with fourth-strand trickery that was just as incapacitating. Which is exactly what this wielder had done.

Rhakar pushed a hand to the earth to steady himself as he pitched forward yet again. The labyrinth was urging his attention, and it was a hellish battle to deny its will. He looked up and forced himself to focus on the wielder standing ten paces away from him.

The man was staring back.

Rhakar wondered how such a youngling as this had found the pattern of the Labyrinth. To his knowledge, there were few living wielders who recalled it. The man’s hand was well-played though; Rhakar never would’ve imagined him harboring knowledge of such a vicious pattern.

“I’m…sorry,” the wielder said, his voice low and strangely tormented.

Rhakar wondered how gruesome his own expression must’ve been to have elicited such an apology. He knew the man meant it, though, even as he could tell the wielder was himself surprised that he’d offered it.

Then the Labyrinth had him. Rhakar collapsed onto his side, unable to respond lest he lose what tentative hold he had left on his own mind. He watched through a blurred haze as the wielder turned and crossed the node, leaving him alone in the darkening valley.

Twilight had just fallen when Rhakar escaped the Labyrinth, at last breaking the pattern into shards. The maze exploded into bits, its outline reduced to incomprehensible symbols erupting in every direction.
Elae
bled out of them and they dissolved, their meaning lost without ever being understood.

It was never a question that Rhakar would escape the maze. He’d many times fought the Labyrinth—as youths, he and his sister Mithaya had used it relentlessly on each other—but the stronger one’s mind became, the more compelling the maze. Rhakar was pleased that he’d broken it as quickly as he had.

Never mind that Balaji would’ve claimed he should’ve done it in half that time and Ramu would’ve arched a brow and asked why he’d allowed the maze to capture him in the first place. Rhakar thought his two oldest brothers were often impossible in their imperiousness, but he vowed neither of them were as insufferable as the First Lord’s zanthyr.

Shaking off the last vestiges of the pattern, Rhakar sprang to his feet. He walked to where the young wielder last stood and stared down at the stark line where myriad boot prints ended abruptly in the night-pale earth.

There had been a popular rumor passed among the wielders of the Fourth Age, those who’d last walked in the Citadel halls and tested for their rings before the Hundred Mages…the last generation known to have worked the Labyrinth. As he gazed upon the trampled earth, Rhakar wondered if the young wielder had been instructed by such a one.

There
were
a few survivors from the Citadel living outside of T’khendar. While Rhakar would not have allowed such as them to share the air in the same valley lest they sully it, his young wielder
had
worn scars that hinted at a mentor from the Fourth Age.