Beyond the Boundary Stones (The Chronicles of Tevenar Book 3) (11 page)

“What are you doing?” she demanded through the muffling folds of cloth. “My father will have you arrested and executed! The Matriarch—”

Rough hands seized and lifted her. “Be quiet, and neither you nor your little pet will get hurt.” She was deposited, then pressed to sit in a small space with hard walls all around. One of her captors shoved her head down, and darkness engulfed her. Her head knocked against a curved surface. The lid of her trunk? They must have dumped her dresses out and shut her inside.

A sickening lurch told her they’d raised the trunk. It swayed, bumping her from side to side until she braced herself with her legs and bound hands. She drew a deep breath and screamed as loudly as she could.

“None of that, now,” a muffled voice barked. “Fiv!”

Nina shrieked in her mind and faintly in her ears, real pain this time. Kevessa clamped her mouth shut.

“They want the beast alive, but they don’t care if it’s damaged. It won’t miss a few toes or a bit of that fluffy tail, so I suggest you cooperate.”

Dear Mother, Nina, what did he do to you?

Her familiar’s thoughts were shaky, but at least she wasn’t screaming any more.
Twisted my leg. I don’t think it’s broken.

I’m sorry! I’ll stay quiet.

Nina’s mental voice was fierce.
Scream away, if you think someone will hear and rescue you. I don’t care what they do to me.

I don’t have any way to tell if someone’s near enough
. Even if she could, Kevessa couldn’t bear to buy her safety at Nina’s expense. Their captors seemed to want her alive as well as Nina.
Can you chew a hole in your bag?

I’m trying.
Kevessa heard a squawk and a muffled thump.
Smash it, they just closed me in a box.
A pause.
Thick wood. It will take hours to chew through.

Silence in her mind told her that Nina was applying her formidable incisors to the task. Kevessa dropped her head to her knees, fighting despair.
Dear Mother, help us. Keep us safe. Or Nina, at least. Please…

The lurching, swaying motion continued for a while. From beyond the wooden walls of the trunk, Kevessa heard the noises of the busy docks. Shortly thereafter she was dropped with a thud onto some solid surface. Someone shouted. A different motion began, jerky vibrations, accompanied by the rumble of wheels on cobblestone. They must have put her aboard a wagon. Where were they taking her? Would the trunk open to reveal some profane shrine of the Dualists or one of the Purifiers’ stark temples? Or somewhere even more daunting?

Kevessa twisted her wrists against the binding ropes, little by little working them loose. Nina was clever and agile. A single moment of carelessness from their captors would be enough for her to free herself. Kevessa had to be ready. Once they touched, nothing could stop them escaping.

* * *

Gevan was concluding his business with the Matriarch’s steward when one of the sailors hurried up. “Excuse me, Ambassador, but a man just brought this message to the ship and asked me to give it to you.” The sailor extended a sheet of thick, high quality paper, folded in thirds and sealed with a blob of red wax. Gevan’s name was written in elegant script above the seal.

Gevan’s stomach lurched as he took it. In the light of the ship’s lanterns he could see the wax was imprinted with the personal seal of Yoran Lirolla, leader of the Purifiers in Ramunna. His last encounter with the man had involved threats and a knife at Gevan’s throat. He broke the seal with clumsy fingers.

Your daughter is safe in my keeping. Tell no one. Give others a plausible excuse for her absence. Come alone to my temple tomorrow one hour after sunset and we will discuss matters. As long as you cooperate, no harm will befall Kevessa.

The Purifier’s signature was inscribed at the end of the note. Gevan’s fingers tightened on the paper until it crumpled in his grasp. The man was bold, to attach his name to such a blatant threat. If Gevan presented this message to the Matriarch, she’d have all the evidence she needed to arrest Yoran and depose him, perhaps even execute him.

But he wouldn’t, and Yoran knew it. Kevessa was in the Purifier’s power, and Yoran could maim or kill her long before Gevan could bring official action against him. The Purifiers had spies in the palace that would inform Yoran if Gevan deviated from his instructions. For all he knew, spies were watching him right now, waiting to see how he reacted. His only hope to get Kevessa back alive and unharmed was to follow Yoran’s instructions to the letter.

That wouldn’t be enough, of course. Gevan was sure Yoran would demand more of him when he reported as ordered tomorrow. Probably he would want Gevan to act against Elkan and Josiah. Gevan had defied him once by failing to prevent them coming to Ramunna. This time Yoran would be careful not to surrender his leverage against Gevan until the desired deed was done.

He hated the thought of betraying the people who’d become his friends. But what choice did he have? If the Purifiers had captured Kevessa, they must have managed to separate her from Nina somehow. Without her familiar she’d be helpless. Only Gevan could save her.

The steward looked at him curiously. “Bad news?”

Gevan took a deep breath and forced his fingers to relax. “No. Just a note from my daughter. She decided to return home tonight instead of staying with me at the palace. She lives with my sister, you know. I guess she missed her aunt and uncle and cousins and couldn’t wait until tomorrow to see them again.”

“Oh, that’s nice.” The steward smiled vaguely as Gevan folded the message and tucked it into his pocket. He shuffled his sheaf of papers and extended it toward Gevan. “If you’ll sign off on the final arrangements, I’ll get to work first thing in the morning having the ships loaded. They’ll be ready to sail before the week’s out.”

Gevan took the papers and blindly scrawled his name where the man pointed. “I’m glad to hear it.” At least the food for Tevenar would be sent without any further effort on his part. He doubted Yoran would care about the shipments that would save innocent thousands from starvation. His target was the wizards, and the Matriarch’s child who must never be born.

Six

V
igorre rubbed his eyes, straightened his shoulders, and rapped on the door of the temple where Yoran Lirolla served. He’d spent a nearly sleepless night, deep in thought and prayer, but when he rose he’d consumed several cups of stimulating Girodan tea. Hopefully that would be sufficient to keep him from nodding off in the middle of this meeting.

He tested the resolve he’d reached in the darkest hour of the night, that had finally allowed him to rest while gray dawn lightened his window. It held firm.

He was ready to swear himself to the Purifiers.

After conducting Nirel safely to her home, he’d returned to the city. He’d expected the wizards to be ensconced in the Matriarch’s palace by then, enjoying the luxuries she’d surely heap on them. But rumors ran wild of how the man and boy and their animals had stopped in the Beggars’ Quarter and offered their power to those in need.

He couldn’t stay away. It was exactly what he’d expect real wizards, wizards truly blessed with the Mother’s power, to do. How many hours had he spent in the Beggars’ Quarter, helping in what small ways he could, seething with frustration over what he should have been able to do, but couldn’t? How many times had he begged the Mother to grant him a tiny portion of her power, just enough to save a dying child or ease a man’s pain or soothe a woman’s grief? His fellow acolytes had either mocked him mercilessly or considered him near sainthood for his devotion to the poor, but none of them knew the real reason for it.

It was anger. Anger at the Matriarch for allowing her subjects to suffer. Anger at his father and the other Keepers for ignoring the problem. And most of all, anger at the Mother, who had the power to end her children’s suffering and had taken it away from them.

He could quote the sacred scriptures that gave the orthodox explanation for her actions. He had read everything the holy Yashonna had written on the subject, every account of what the prophet Guron had said. And it wasn’t enough. No matter what abuses of the Mother’s power the ancient wizards had perpetrated, they couldn’t have caused worse misery than what he saw in the Beggars’ Quarter daily.

Then, a few months ago, the first travelers from Tevenar had arrived with news of present-day wizards wielding the Mother’s power just as the ancients had. His first, instinctive reaction had been wild, elated hope. Finally his prayers had been answered, and the Mother’s power would sweep Ramunna, wiping away the sickness and pain and death he hated.

But close on its heels came horror. If the travelers’ tales were true, for a thousand years the Mother had favored a few of her children while she abandoned the rest.

He couldn’t serve such a deity. He wouldn’t. Even though he’d wanted to follow his father as a Keeper his whole life, he’d prepared to resign his position as acolyte. He’d find some physician to apprentice with. Their pills and potions weren’t very effective, but they were better than nothing. Better than begging at the feet of a cruel, capricious being who doled out life and death on a casual whim.

But still, a part of him had wondered, had longed. What if the Mother had a good reason for what she’d done? What if now was the time for her favoritism to end and her power to return to Ravanetha? What if she was looking for servants eager to pour out her power on those who needed it most? Maybe she would read his heart and see how deeply he desired to work her will.

That part of him had leapt to life as he lurked at the edge of the crowd and watched golden light pour from the wizards’ hands exactly the way he’d always imagined. People lying on the verge of death had stood up and walked away well. Pale cheeks had flushed with health. Hollow, empty eyes had burned with hope. With his whole being Vigorre had wanted it to be real.

He’d ruthlessly driven the longing from his heart.

It was all a lie. Nirel had told him the truth. She’d grown up in Tevenar, under the wizards’ rule. Most of the people there believed the charade. But Nirel, with her father and the rest of Ozor’s band, had fallen afoul of the wizards’ wrath, and on one horrible night they’d witnessed the reality behind the benign mask.

Vigorre shuddered, remembering Nirel’s trembling body and breaking voice as she’d told him what she’d seen. Slaves kneeling before their red-eyed demon masters. Chants of homage raised to their unholy lord. A man devoured alive in gruesome sacrifice to the power that opposed everything the Mother stood for.

He’d wanted nothing more than to wrap her in his arms and kiss away her terror. The more time they spent together, the closer he grew to her, the stronger that desire became. If only his love had the power to banish those hideous memories! But part of what he admired so much about her was the courage with which she faced them, the strength it had taken to share them, even though that meant reliving the horror. He treasured the trust that had let her be honest with him. He would strive to be worthy of it.

It had been hard to reconcile her story with what he’d seen yesterday in the square. The demons’ imitation of the Mother’s power had been so convincing he surely would have been fooled if he hadn’t been warned. But gradually the truth had become clear.

It was all a show to win the people’s devotion, and it had worked beautifully. By the end of the afternoon every resident of the Beggars’ Quarter would have gladly signed over their soul to the demons in return for a taste of their power.

What he’d witnessed had been the first battle in a war of conquest, and Ramunna had surrendered without a fight. Only the Purifiers were prepared to resist the demons’ invasion. Vigorre’s night of soul-searching had shown him that he had no choice but to set aside whatever differences he had with the sect and commit himself wholeheartedly to their cause.

The door swung open. Yoran Lirolla regarded him with a warm smile. “Vigorre! How good to see you. I didn’t expect you so soon. But come in, and welcome. I always have time to discuss the Mother’s business with a fellow Keeper.”

Vigorre strode through the door in response to Yoran’s gesture. “Thank you, Keeper Yoran.”

The temple was the first in Ramunna that had converted to the Purifiers’ doctrines. All the rich decorations had been stripped away, save for a single depiction of the Mother’s cupped hands over the dais. Dark wooden chairs stood in stark rows in the plain white space. Outside, the dome’s gilding had been removed, the gold going to finance the Purifiers’ various concerns. Vigorre would have preferred it if a greater percentage had gone to the handful of mercy houses the Purifiers operated, but at least some had. That was more than could be said of his father’s temple. Its dome shone so brightly sailors could see it from twenty miles out on a sunny day.

Yoran led him across the temple and through a door into a small, neat office. He seated himself behind a desk and gestured for Vigorre to take a seat in one of the chairs facing it. “You’re ready to learn more about Purifier doctrine, Keeper Vigorre? I’m happy to answer any questions you may have.”

“More than that.” Vigorre leaned forward and clasped his hands in his lap. “I’m ready to take the Purifier vows.”

Yoran blinked at him. “I must admit I’m surprised. Yesterday I got the impression you still had doubts about which path the Mother was calling you to follow.”

“I did. But no more.” Vigorre twisted his hands together, staring at them. He couldn’t give Yoran the full reason for his change of heart. He’d promised Nirel to tell no one but his father about the secret she’d shared with him. But he could convey the essential truth. “I watched the wizards from Tevenar in the Beggars’ Quarter yesterday afternoon. I saw them healing people.”

Yoran regarded him shrewdly. “I would have thought that might have swayed you away from us, not toward us.”

Vigorre balled his hands into fists and met Yoran’s eyes. “Their power is not from the Mother,” he said flatly. “I could tell. It’s too… perfect. Too showy. Too much exactly what the people of Ramunna want. It’s designed to buy their hearts, their souls. Not to truly serve them.”