Dark Moon (10 page)

Dismissing the captains, Sirano gestured for Karis to remain. Rising from the table, he moved to a beautifully crafted cabinet at the window wall of the large study, removing a cut-glass decanter. Half filling two crystal globe glasses he passed one to Karis.

‘My congratulations, Karis. Your raid was an exemplary lesson in tactics.’

Karis gave a short bow, her large dark eyes holding to his own. ‘This is what you wished to discuss?’ she asked him.

‘I have nothing to discuss,’ he said, ‘but I enjoy your company. Sit for a while.’ Karis stretched out on a couch, leaving no room for the Duke to join her. But she lay back with one foot on the floor, the other leg straight, and Sirano did not try to stop his gaze from dwelling on her open legs and the cut of her blue silk leggings. Resisting the urge to run his hand along her thigh, he drew up a chair close to her and sat, sipping his brandy. Karis smiled at him, her expression cat-like.

‘I hear you have a new mistress,’ said Karis. ‘Is she sweet?’

‘Indeed she is,’ he told her. ‘She even tells me she loves me.’

‘And does she?’

‘Who can say? I am rich, and I am powerful. Many women would find that attractive in itself.’

‘So modest, Saro,’ she chided him. ‘You are also handsome and witty. I don’t doubt that you provide your partners with great physical joy.’

‘How kind,’ he said. ‘Are you still cavorting with that mercenary lieutenant … Giriak?’

She nodded, then sat up and drained her brandy. ‘He is young and strong.’

‘And has he fallen in love with you?’

She shrugged. ‘He uses the words wonderfully, with exquisite timing. I think that might be the same thing, don’t you?’

‘It certainly is for me,’ he conceded. ‘But then I am not entirely sure I know what love is. Neither do you, dear heart … unless of course we are talking of your first love, battle.’

Her eyes narrowed. ‘You misread me, Sirano.’

He chuckled with genuine humour. ‘I do not believe that I do. There are many in all the Duchies who wish for this war to be ended, but you are not among them. War is life to you. The day peace comes – and come it will one day when I win – you will know panic.’

‘I think not. Panic is alien to me. However, this conversation is entirely hypothetical. The forces are too even for there to be a decisive end to the conflict. Added to which there are the mercenary armies; they follow only gold. When you Dukes seek to end the battles, what do you think will become of them? Will they lay down their arms and return to the land? No, Saro. You and your noble friends and enemies have loosed the wolves. You will not round them up easily.’

He shrugged. ‘These are problems for another day.’ His gaze returned to her silk-clad limbs. ‘You really are very attractive,’ he said. ‘One day we should get to know one another a little better.’

‘One day,’ she agreed. For a moment neither of them spoke, then Karis rose and refilled her brandy glass. ‘Have you unlocked the secrets of the Pearl?’ she asked him.

‘I think we are close,’ he said. ‘I believe it to be a power source of some kind.’

‘You said the same thing two months ago,’ she reminded him.

‘Patience is one of my virtues,’ he replied. ‘So far we have tried probe spells of increasing power. Nothing pierces the Pearl. Yet even as we speak my sorcerers are preparing themselves for the ritual of Aveas. I think we will have answers today. It is one of the reasons I asked you to wait with me.’

Karis sipped her brandy, then returned to the couch. This time she did not stretch herself out, but sat on the edge of the seat. ‘I am not a magicker, Saro, but do the spells of Aveas not require a death?’

‘I am afraid that they do. But needs must when demons threaten, as they say.’

‘And what will it achieve, this murder?’ she asked him.

‘That is hard to say. I tend to think that when wizards talk of human sacrifice they are at their wits’ end. But I have studied enough to know that great magic can be conjured from terror. And there is nothing more terrifying than to be chained to an altar, with a knife raised above your heart.’

Before she could answer, there came a knock at the study door. ‘Enter!’ he called.

A tall, thin man wearing long robes of blue velvet entered and bowed. He was bald, the skin of his face stretched tight around a large skull. ‘It would be good,’ Sirano told him, ‘if you have brought me welcome news.’

‘Something of interest has occurred, lord,’ answered the man, his voice low and deep. ‘It is something I think you should witness for yourself.’

‘We will join you presently,’ said Sirano, waving his hand and dismissing the wizard. After he had left, Karis rose to leave. ‘Wait!’ Sirano ordered.

‘I do not wish to see it,’ she said. ‘Human sacrifice does not interest me.’

‘Nor me,’ he agreed. ‘Come with me anyway.’

‘Do you order it, lord?’ she asked him, her tone faintly mocking.

‘Indeed I do, Captain,’ he said, moving alongside her and laying his hand on her shoulder. Leaning towards her he tenderly kissed her cheek. ‘I adore the perfume of your hair,’ he whispered.

Together they walked the long corridor, descending the circular stairs to the lower levels. Torches shone on the bare stone walls and a sleek, fat rat ran across their path as they moved towards two double doors. Sirano paused. ‘That rat was altogether too well-fed for my liking,’ he said. ‘Remind me to send for the quartermaster when we are finished here.’

‘Perhaps the rat is a pet,’ she said, with a grin.

‘Perhaps. More likely the vermin have found a way into the grain store, which I ordered sealed tight.’

Sirano pushed open the double doors and they entered a large circular room, ablaze with the light of twenty lanterns. Three sorcerers in robes of velvet stood around a flat table to which a naked young girl was strapped by her arms and legs. Just beyond the altar, set on an upturned eagle’s claw of bronze, rested the Eldarin Pearl. Karis had never seen the jewel, and was stunned by its beauty. It seemed to pulse with living colour, and she could feel warmth emanating from it.

‘Oh, please, my lord, save me!’ wailed the girl tied to the altar table. Karis swung to look at her. She was no more than fourteen.

‘Be silent, child,’ ordered Sirano. Swinging to the tall bald sorcerer, he asked, ‘Why has the ritual not yet been completed?’

‘It has, my lord. That is, what is of interest.’

‘Spare me the riddles, Calizar.’

‘Observe, lord.’ The tall man raised his left hand and began to chant. Red smoke flowed from his fingers, oozing out towards the milky beauty of the Pearl. As it came closer the smoke shifted, forming what appeared to Karis to be a large four-taloned claw which descended towards the Pearl. Just as the red smoke was about to touch the globe, a jagged spark of lightning lanced up. Blue fire exploded within the smoke, flaring in an intricate web of light. The red claw disappeared.

As the smoke faded, the sorcerer raised his right hand. The curved dagger he held flashed down, plunging into the young girl’s heart. Her slender body arched up, and a strangled cry was torn from her lips. Calizar dragged the knife clear. A white cloud billowed from the Pearl and swept out over the murdered girl, masking her completely. The huge room filled with the scent of roses. Sirano watched with interest. Karis stood by, her distaste for the attempted sacrifice washed away by a sudden feeling of prescience as she stared intently at the child on the altar.

After several seconds, the white cloud rose from the girl and flowed back into the Pearl.

‘No more, please!’ wailed the child. Sirano stepped in close, his hand pressing down on the white flesh of her small breasts. There was not a mark, nor a speck of blood to show where the knife tore into her heart.

‘How many times has this happened?’ asked Sirano.

‘This was the fourth, my lord. The Pearl will not, it seems, allow a human sacrifice.’

‘Fascinating! What do you make of it, Calizar?’

‘It is quite beyond me, Lord Sirano.’

‘Give me the dagger and cast the talon-smoke.’ Calizar handed him the blade, then began to chant. The girl on the altar started to cry. Sirano smiled at her, and stroked her hair.

‘Don’t hurt me!’ she begged him.

He did not reply. The red smoke closed around the Pearl, lightning and blue sparks came out once more in response.

‘Now!’ whispered Calizar.

Sirano turned … and slammed the dagger into the wizard’s chest, driving in the blade up to the hilt. Calizar staggered back and then fell to his knees, his long upper body slumping forward until his brow thudded against the cold stone of the floor.

The white cloud issued from the Pearl, sweeping over the wizard. But as it touched him it recoiled and returned instantly to the globe, seeping through the multicoloured outer layer.

Sirano knelt by the corpse and pushed it to its back. ‘I have no time’, he said, ‘for wizards who find new magic beyond them.’ Rising, he turned to the other two sorcerers. ‘Do you find this utterly beyond you?’

‘Not at all, my lord. But it will require a great deal of study,’ replied the first. His colleague nodded agreement.

‘Good,’ said Sirano. ‘So what have we learned today?’

‘The Pearl is sentient,’ said the first sorcerer, a small man with close-set eyes and a long pointed beard.

‘What else?’

‘That we can establish some kind of control over it. We made it heal the child. But if you will forgive me for saying so, lord, I do not – yet,’ he added swiftly, ‘understand why it brought the girl back to life and not my brother Calizar.’

‘Ah, but I do,’ said Sirano. ‘Continue your work.’

‘What about the girl, lord?’

‘No more sacrifices for the moment. Give her ten gold crowns and send her home.’

Swinging away from them he led Karis back to the upper study.

‘Well?’ she asked him. ‘Are you going to tell me why it saved the girl.’

‘She was innocent,’ he said.

‘How does that help you unlock the Pearl’s secrets?’

‘It made a choice, my beauty. Don’t you see? It is sentient. So we will offer it more choices. And very soon I will have more power than any man who ever walked this land.’

For six days Karis saw no sign of Sirano. At midnight on the seventh day a tremor ran through the castle. Karis, who was lying in bed nursing a goblet of wine in her hands, leapt to her feet and ran to the balcony. Bright lights were blazing from the highest rooms of the keep, and lightning forked up from the top turret. Blocks of stone cascaded down to the courtyard below, some smashing through the stable roof.

The naked man who moments before had been lying alongside Karis moved out onto the balcony. ‘His magic will kill us all,’ he said, gripping the bronze balcony rail. Darkly handsome, his strong face now showed signs of fear. It was not an attractive sight, thought Karis.

‘He says he is close to the secrets of the Pearl,’ Karis told him.

Giriak swore. ‘You told me that a week ago. Yesterday a section of the main wall came crashing down – killed three of my men. He’ll wreck the entire city if this goes on much longer. Have you seen the columns of refugees? They’re leaving the city in droves.’

Karis shrugged. ‘What do you care?’ she asked him. ‘He gives you gold.’

‘I’d like to live to spend it.’

Another tremor struck, and a small crack appeared on the facing wall of the balcony. ‘Son of a whore!’ hissed Giriak, leaping back into the main room. Karis grinned as she turned to face him. Holding out her arms, she gestured to him.

‘Come!’ she called. ‘Make love to me on the balcony, before it falls.’

‘Don’t be foolish,’ he urged her. Karis let fall the green robe she wore, her naked body glistening in the moonlight. Another tremor struck and the crack in the stone opened wider, tracing a thick black line all the way to the wall. ‘Come in!’ yelled Giriak.

‘Come out,’ she taunted. ‘Show me you are a man.’

‘You are mad, woman! Do you want to die?’

‘Collect your clothes and get out,’ she said, contemptuously turning from him and climbing to the bronze rail. Balanced delicately, she walked along it, feeling the cold, smooth metal beneath her feet. One more tremor and she would fall. She knew it, and a delicious sense of excitement swept through her. This was life! For some moments she stood there with arms raised.

Lightning swept up from the turret, followed by a clap of thunder that shook the foundations of the building. Karis lost her balance, then spun and launched herself back into the bedchamber, landing on her shoulder and rolling to her feet. Behind her the balcony sheared away and crashed to the courtyard below.

Karis shivered, then glanced around the room. Giriak had gone.

Gathering the wine jug and a goblet, she sat down on the round embroidered rug at the centre of the room. Giriak was a disappointment. Like all the men she had known. Is it a fault in men themselves, she wondered, or merely a flaw in the kind of men I find exciting? Indeed, is the flaw in me?

Her father had maintained that it was. He claimed she was devil-possessed, and tried for years to thrash the devil from her. He would drag her from the cabin and tie her to a post in the barn. The words that followed were always the same. ‘Recant! Open your heart to the Source. Beg for forgiveness.’ Karis had tried all that, but it made no difference. If she proclaimed her innocence, he would beat her. If she admitted guilt and called upon the Source to forgive her, her father’s rage would grow incandescent. ‘You lie and mock me!’ he would shout. Then he would beat her legs and buttocks with the birch until she bled. So she learned to stay silent through it all, head twisted, her deep brown eyes holding to his insane gaze.

There was no knight at hand to rescue the child, no hero to stride through the forest and pluck her away. Just her and her world-weary mother, a woman old before her time, beaten down by the years and the cold fists of her husband.

‘One day I will go back and kill him,’ she thought, swilling down the last of the wine. Lying on her back, she stared up at the ornate, painted ceiling. Cracks were showing here too. Giriak was right, Sirano was destroying his own city. ‘It is nothing to me,’ she said.