City of Light (The Traveler's Gate Trilogy) (6 page)

He had seen a few glimpses of Helgard, but only the parts most occupied by Damasca. Supposedly there were dozens of floors in the Tower of Winter that Simon had never seen, but he couldn't imagine this place among them. Then again, if it wasn’t Helgard, where else could it be? There was no way a Helgard Incarnation could open a Gate to another Territory.

The Incarnation reached up and grabbed the end of the dark, frozen bar in one hand, plucking it out of the air. She swung it like a club, striking with supernatural speed and strength against Indirial's blade. The Overlord caught the blow with both hands, but the force still knocked him a few paces backwards.

Helgard stepped through the red-lined circular portal, turning to watch Simon as the Gate closed around her.

“Don't let her leave!” Leah shouted, loud enough to be heard over the wind and the sounds of battle. The Helgard Travelers cast giant, razor-sharp snowflakes, clusters of snow, and summoned beasts at the portal. Leah held both hands out as if she were straining, but the Gate didn't slow as far as Simon could tell. In seconds, it imploded into a brief flash of red light.

“Did she trap herself?” Simon called.

Leah shook her head, eyes burning with anger.

“That wasn't Helgard,” Indirial said. Somehow, during the fight, he had found the time to push his shirtsleeves up past his elbows, baring forearms marked with shadowy chains.

Simon didn't bother asking which Territory it had been. They would tell him eventually. He looked up to Leah.

After a moment, she reluctantly spoke. “Ragnarus,” she said. “That was the door to the Crimson Vault.”

Gloria sighed.
Oh, dear.

C
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When Leah tried to tear the Ragnarus Gate back open, nothing happened.

It shocked her, at first. A shiver passed through her that had nothing to do with the sharp wind or the ankle-deep snow. Opening the Crimson Vault was her birthright, guaranteed by her blood, the proof of her connection to her ancestors…and now she couldn’t forge a Gate to her own Territory. Had the power abandoned her?

She summoned and banished the Lightning Spear three or four times before she was satisfied that she could still count on herself as a Traveler of Ragnarus. But now, a more troubling problem remained.

Indirial’s left hand was covered by the Valinhall gatecrawler: a spiked black gauntlet. He'd grabbed the spot where the Gate had vanished, trying to tear it open, but red light flared and he couldn’t get a grip.

They tried for almost an hour before they returned through Helgard to their camp, only a mile or so outside the shining red city of Cana. The others had all left her—the Helgard Travelers to their assignments, Indirial to his work, and Simon to the House—abandoning her to consider the most troubling question of all.

Who had let the Helgard Incarnation into Ragnarus?

She was one of the few people alive who could open a Ragnarus Gate at all. Only she and her two sisters—one insane, the other imprisoned in Lirial—could enter the Crimson Vault, according to Queen Cynara's ancient pact. So how had the Helgard Incarnation done it?

Leah could come up with a few theories. Helgard collected and stored information, and it wasn't beyond reason that the Incarnation of that Territory would have been able to find an old artifact of Ragnarus, pay its price, and figure out how to activate it. Several Ragnarus weapons had been lost over the years, and it was entirely possible that one of them had the ability to open the Vault. It could be that simple.

Less likely, there was the possibility that the Helgard Incarnation was some ancestor of Leah's. Perhaps she had inherited the right to enter Ragnarus like every member of the Damascan royal family. That was an uncomfortable idea for several reasons, and Leah couldn't bring herself to believe it. For one thing, she doubted that the transformation process left much human inside the Incarnations. Would she still be able to open a Gate to Ragnarus after becoming the embodiment of a different Territory? Leah wasn't sure, but she didn't think so.

That left the final possibility, the most likely, and the one that Leah least wanted to consider.

Another Ragnarus Traveler had let the Incarnation in.

For the past six months, the Damascan capital of Cana had been sealed within a barrier of crimson power. All travel in and out, both physically and via Territory, had completely halted. If Helgard and Ragnarus were working together now, that was bad enough—two Incarnations united would be almost impossible to defeat in open battle. And if there was an ordinary Ragnarus Traveler involved…

Leah leaned an elbow against her desk, which wobbled and almost pitched over, and rested her head in her hand. They had returned to camp via Helgard after their battle with the Incarnation, then Simon and Indirial had gone back to their House to heal up. Leah had been forced to explain to Overlord Yaleina that the mission to stop the Helgard Incarnation had been a failure. She had even endured a lecture from the Overlord on the dangers of Helgard. An Overlord, lecturing a royal! The reigning Queen, no less!

That confrontation had done nothing to add to Leah's mood, though she was most disturbed by the implications of an Incarnation entering Ragnarus. It brought to mind suspicions that she had pushed to the back of her mind for months.

On a whim, Leah tore open a Gate to Ragnarus there in her tent. The red-edged portal swirled open, a circular entry to the cave outside the Vault itself. One edge of the portal brushed against her camp cot, and the top scraped the tent fabric overhead, but she had enough space to make it work.

She surveyed the familiar sights: the silver double doors carved with the one-eyed king, the two crimson torches to either side. If she wanted to enter, she would have to press a drop of her blood against the doors, but she left the Vault shut. She couldn’t even bring herself to walk through the Gate.

A vague sensation had bothered her for two seasons, ever since her father's death. She couldn't quite pin it down, but something had changed in Ragnarus. Leah held a Traveler's bond with two different Territories—the Crystal Fields of Lirial and Ragnarus, the Crimson Vault—and their powers felt very different from one another. Drawing on Lirial felt dusty and cool, like a draft of air blowing from a crypt or a library. Ragnarus, on the other hand, was warm and hungry, as though it begged to be used.

Seizing Ragnarus for the past six months had felt like clenching a fist around a still-beating heart. It throbbed and moved, as though the entire Territory was dancing to a will other than hers. More tangibly, something was wrong in the Territory itself, physically. She had never seen a living creature native to Ragnarus, but she could hear them often. In the cavern behind her Gate, outside the silver doors of the Vault, one could always hear the sounds: shuffling, hissing, distant growling, occasionally even screams.

Now? Perfect silence. The one-eyed old man stared at her from his silver doors, and Leah thought she saw the beginnings of a smirk on his frozen lips.

She had never been comfortable here, but this Territory was
hers
, in a personal way that Lirial couldn't match. She was one of only a few others who had ever been able to Travel here, and she would never have to worry about being interrupted by someone outside her family. Now, Leah didn't even walk inside. She was too afraid to open the doors. Nothing had ever happened to her in there—she never saw anything unusual—but she sensed something. A quiet amusement, as though the Crimson Vault was laughing at her.

And now the Helgard Incarnation had escaped into Ragnarus. That suggested that matters were about to get worse. Worse even than six months of hunting down Incarnations that had killed thousands of her people.

Leah closed her eyes and pressed her hand harder against her forehead. She felt another headache coming on.

“Knock knock,” a woman's voice came from the tent entrance.

Seven stones, there's my headache now,
Leah thought.
Right on time.

She opened her eyes and summoned a polite smile. “Overlord Feiora, I apologize. I was lost in thought. Please, come in.”

Overlord Feiora Torannus was a strong-looking woman with a heavy jaw, very short hair, and piercing dark eyes. She walked into the tent as though she meant to fight someone within, and sat in one of Leah's folding camp chairs as though it had personally offended her and she meant to crush it in retaliation.
 

Feiora didn't wear the typical buckskin and feathers of her Territory. Leah had never seen her do so. Instead, she wore black pants and shirt, plain and unadorned, with a single bronze-and-pearl pin on her breast to mark her as an Avernus Traveler. Unlike her brother, Lysander, she rarely spent time with other Avernus Travelers. However, that didn't mean she had broken all ties to her Territory: a large raven perched on her shoulder. It made no noise, staring Leah straight in the eyes and remaining completely silent.

Feiora found Travelers too unpredictable to make valuable allies. She preferred to cultivate contacts among the royal family, other Overlords, and influential citizens. As a result, she was well-liked in certain circles high up in Damascan society. Circles that Leah could not afford to offend.

Therefore, Leah had no choice but to maintain her alliance with this woman, no matter how much she would rather appoint someone else as an Overlord of Eltarim.
The position was typically taken by an Endross Traveler, anyway; Feiora had won the seat through her political connections and sheer determination. No matter Leah's personal feelings about her, Overlord Feiora was an impressive woman. And Leah had sealed her little brother in a coffin of Lirial crystal.

Leah regretted that more and more each day. She should have killed the man.

“I hear the mission to neutralize the Helgard Incarnation was a dismal failure,” Feiora said, her tone polite, and her words anything but.

“I wouldn't say that,” Leah said casually, as though she had overlooked Feiora's complete lack of respect. And basic manners. “We retrieved some critical information, and the Helgard Incarnation is certainly not in play, at least for a short time. We have a reprieve.”

Feiora's eyebrows raised. “A reprieve? Maybe. I have good news: the second Endross Incarnation has gone quiet.”

The Overlord certainly didn't sound as if she were delivering good news, and Leah understood why. Sealing Endross back in its Territory would have been cause for celebration, and killing it would still be good news. But this Incarnation had vanished. If it wasn't causing chaos anymore, where had it gone?

Simon, Indirial, and a contingent of other Travelers led by Leah had taken down the first Endross Incarnation months ago. It had been replaced almost immediately by a second Endross Traveler, almost all of whom were crazy enough to make wonderful Incarnations.

“How many does that make now?” Leah asked quietly.

“That depends. If you only consider the ones we saw firsthand, and then vanished afterwards, then at least five.”

“And if you count all the Incarnations whose whereabouts are currently unknown?”

“Including Helgard? Eight.”

Leah's head pounded. She had spent the past six months trying to take care of the Incarnations, and matters had moved much more quickly since she recruited Simon and the other Valinhall Travelers. However, in all that time, she had only successfully sealed the Avernus Incarnation back into its Territory. They had killed the Endross Incarnation, but it was quickly replaced, and they had defeated the Tartarus Incarnation in battle, but it had escaped. No one had heard from it in two months.

Several others had vanished as Leah was preparing to attack them. The Helgard Incarnation, for instance, had seemed to expect an attack. The Asphodel Incarnation had simply not been there when Leah and her Travelers had arrived. The citizens were highly encouraged by her apparent success rate—they seemed to think that she had driven the Incarnations off singlehandedly. The truth was much worse.

She had no idea where the Incarnations were.

Evidence suggested that the Naraka Incarnation had burned much of Bel Calem and Myria, as well as most of the land in between. When the Damascan Travelers had arrived in Myria, the Naraka Incarnation was gone. Several villagers had stories of strange monsters and gold-armored warriors, but their accounts were confused. They seemed to have witnessed a battle between the Naraka Incarnation and dozens of Travelers, but Leah had certainly authorized no such battle. And Enosh would never have mobilized to oppose the Incarnations; it was their fault that the creatures were released in the first place.

The fact remained, however, that the Naraka Incarnation had been the first to vanish. Then the others, one by one. The Ragnarus Incarnation was presumably still in Cana, since the city was isolated by a barrier of crimson light, but Leah had never seen the creature.

So all the Incarnations that had been sealed underneath the Hanging Trees, with the sole exception of Avernus, were now missing in action. And Helgard was last seen opening a Gate to Ragnarus.
 

Leah didn't like what that suggested.

“Thank you for the information, Overlord,” Leah said at last. “Return to Eltarim and do what you can to rebuild. I will let you know when we have found a way to return to Cana.”

Feiora glanced at the black bird on her shoulder. “I think I would be more useful here.”

Leah rubbed her head, the old frustration rising. Did the woman think she was making a suggestion? “Return to your post, Overlord Feiora,” Leah said firmly.

“We're already shorthanded here,” Feiora responded. “We have to find those Incarnations. You don't have anyone else to unify the Avernus Travelers, so I'll have to take that role myself.”

“Yes, if only we had another loyal Avernus Overlord here. In his absence, I suppose I will allow you to stay here and perform his duties.” Leah kept her expression clear, but inside she was seething. At least she had managed to remind Feiora about what had happened to her brother.