His Cure For Magic (Book 2) (27 page)

What was he?

"Eryn." He saw her face. Her short brown hair. Her long, thin limbs, strong from spending so much time at her adopted father's forge. He smiled when he remembered their time spent training together, the laughter and joking amidst the seriousness of their duty.
 

He remembered Aren. He remembered Feng, and Overlord Iolas.
 

He remembered Alyssa.

Murderer.

He remembered that, too.

The boy kneeling in front of him was a Mediator. Where had he come from?

"Who are you?" he asked.

"My name is Wilem, I'm a friend of Eryn's. We met at Waverly's."

"Waverly's?" He stared at Wilem. "This is the Dark? Genesia is the Dark?"

"Silas, what is Genesia? What is this place?"

He wanted to answer. He thought he knew, but the memories were fading from him. "I'm losing it," he said. "Losing the memories. As if, the more I remember of the recent past, the more I lose of the distant." He stood up. "Wilem, come with me, quickly."

They ran back the way they had come.

"Where are we going?" Wilem asked.

"Rossum. We need to speak to Rossum. Remember that, in case I forget it."

They passed through the living quarters, winding through a maze of passages and corridors until they were back where he had woken. He was still there, standing motionless in the corner.

"Rossum," Silas said. The man didn't move. "Rossum!" He walked over to him, put his hands on his shoulders, and shook him.

Rossum's head tilted to the side. "If Talon has returned, then he has not made his report."

"No, I haven't made my report. Something is going on here. I need you to tell what it is."

"If Talon does not make his report, then Talon is broken. If Talon is broken, then Talon will not make his report. If Talon will not make his report, then Talon has broken the promise. If Talon has broken the promise, then the event will recurse."

"I don't know what you're saying."
 

"If the event will recurse, then he must be warned. If he must be warned, then-"

Silas curled his hand into a fist, and punched the other man. His head rocked to the side, and then straightened.
 

"Rossum was a wizard," Wilem said. "He was Jeremiah's assistant. I don't understand how he can be here. Silas, this man would be over four hundred years old." His expression changed. "If he's that old, and you know him..."

Silas looked back at Wilem. "It's been more than four hundred years." He grabbed Rossum's robe, pulling their faces close. "How is that possible?" he asked.

The other man was silent. His dead eyes stared straight ahead.

"There's something odd about him, too," Wilem said. "The way he speaks."

The memories were there, just out of his reach. They were riding the edge of his mind, and he fought to catch them. Every time he drew close, they slipped away.
 

He remembered Rossum though, and Genesia. He was sure he wasn't supposed to. He was certain if he had made his report, he would have been ordered from this place, and by the time he left he would never recall having been here. What had
he
done to him?

Footfalls echoed in the corridor. Silas let go of Rossum and turned towards the door. He noticed Wilem as he did. The Mediator looked frightened.

"An ircidium man," he said. "Silas, we have to get out of here."

"If Talon has broken the promise, then Talon must be destroyed," Rossum said. "If Talon must be destroyed, then the juggernaut must destroy Talon."

Silas drew his sword. The sound of scraping metal echoed through the passage. Heavy feet vibrated the floor.

"Silas, we have to go," Wilem said.

Silas looked back at him. "No. I'm the First of Nine. I don't fear the juggernauts. The juggernauts fear me."
 

He crouched, his sword up over his head. As soon as the juggernaut came into view, he leaped forward, high into the air. He tucked his legs up tight as the metal man's huge sword cut through the air beneath them. His ircidium blade took a wide arc and powered into the thing's neck, severing its head in one lightning fast stroke. The body fell forward with a loud clank, and the thick black blood poured from severed tubes.

He landed behind it, then walked across its back to where Rossum stood. "Tell them if they come, they'll be destroyed. All of them.
He
doesn't control me anymore.
He
doesn't own me."

At first, there was no motion, no acknowledgement. Then Rossum's hand whipped out and grabbed Silas' wrist. The pupils of his eyes dilated, and then focused, as though he had only now come to life.
 

"You made a promise, Talon Rast. You made a promise to
him
, to fight for
him
until your final breath. You above all must keep your promise. You above all must remain loyal. You don't remember the reasons, I know. Please, trust in me that they are sound. All of us have suffered, and all of us have lost. We have made the hard choices, not out of malice but out of need. Go and make your report. Go and fulfill your promise. Genesia is supposed to be forgotten. Leave it that way. Let it be the lost symbol of a dead civilization."

Silas shook his head. "No. I can't. Something took Eryn. Something took my granddaughter. If I make the report, I'll forget everything. I'll be a slave again."

Rossum smiled, a sad, comforting smile, letting go of his wrist. "Ahh, Talon. You aren't a slave. You knew what you were agreeing to. You knew the price. We had to pay it. We all had to pay it. We made a promise to right what we had done wrong."

"I never would have promised to kill innocent people. I never would have promised to give the order to murder my own son."

"Talon, you don't have a son. You can't have a son. It isn't possible."

"I had two sons, by Heden. Two sons, and a wife. I remember them all."

"You should have made your report. There's still time. I don't want to see you destroyed. Not you."

Silas stared into the man's eyes. He could almost see the truth hiding inside of them, laughing at him for his inability to understand. He shook his head. He didn't need to understand the past. He had been different then. He had been a monster.

A murderer.

"Who am I?" he asked. "Who is
he
? Tell me. Please."

"I can't. I'm sorry, Talon. I made a promise, too. One that I won't ever break, even though it means a cold existence in this place, locked inside myself for all of eternity, waiting to fix the Nine when they return. Six, now, I suppose. I don't have the materials to fix you again. Your strength and courage have returned you to me more times than any of the others. That's why
he
didn't have you killed. You should be grateful."

Silas watched the past in Rossum's eyes. What he saw was selfishness, greed, pain, suffering, and control. Whatever had been done to him, it had been done to Rossum, too. How else could he still be here after nearly a thousand years?
 

"Six brothers," Silas said. "I couldn't convince Feng. I couldn't convince Clau."

"They remember they made a promise. They are loyal."

Silas licked his lips. "Maybe they remember they made a promise, but this could not be the promise they made. To protect a tyrant, a murderer, a cold-blooded killer who oppresses innocents to maintain
his
grip on control? Everything about
his
Empire is a lie. How can you base loyalty on a lie?
He
made me kill my son!" The walls shook with the effort of his anger, his raised voice echoing around them.

Rossum was calm. "Talon, you are wrong. You don't have a son."

The fury grew in him, turning from explosive heat to dense cold. "How can you tell me that? I remember him. I remember the day he was born. I remember watching him grow."

"No. Talon, if you won't report, you will be destroyed. The Six will hunt you to the ends of the earth. They won't have a choice. If you break the promise, you threaten everything we have worked to build. A thousand years of effort. Open your eyes. I'm telling you the truth. I have nothing to gain by lying to you, and you are the last person I would ever lie to. You can't have a son, Talon. We aren't human. Not anymore. Not in a thousand years."

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Eryn

Eryn rolled over onto her back, her sleep interrupted by nightmares of monsters, fire, and death. She lay in the dark, her body wracked with pain, her mind becoming... what?
 

She let out a soft moan, a desperate whimper, and opened her eyes. What were they doing to her?

The creature had called her 'the daughter'. It had carried her from the platform overlooking the ebocite to a small, dark corner of a much larger room. This room had a complex system of ircidium gears and pumps and pulleys all clattering and clacking and speaking some strange machine language, and venting off immense amounts of smoke, easily recognized as the heavy mist that filled the valley. The original path of the steam had been altered, the ircidium tubing that carried it redirected. By the monsters? Or by someone else?

My name is Eryn Albion. Daughter of Jaerl and Pash, daughter of Aren and Kaelyn. I came here with Wilem. Wilem is here. Wilem will save me. If he can. If anyone can.

They were changing her into one of them. She was sure of it. She would lose her mind, lose her self, and want only to die.
 

It's the ebocite, isn't it? The magic is drawn to it. It feeds on it. It's doing more than living inside of me.

Was that what had happened to Malik? She hadn't known to look for ebocite in his cave, and she had been too scared and inexperienced to understand any signals her own magic had been sending her. Could he have been poisoned by it, too?

She doubled over, clutching at her stomach. The pain had spread from her thigh, and when she lifted her shirt she could see the gray scales bunching and growing along her skin.
 

The creature had been surprised to find her. It seemed to think she was special in some way. It had called her 'the daughter'. It had called her 'queen'. It had been gentle with her, so gentle, placing her here in the corner on a large mattress. It had sat with her while she cried. It had stroked her hair.
 

She shuddered from the thought. It was a monster, and wanted her to be a monster, too.
 

She looked around the room in search of it, or its brethren. Not seeing either, she pushed herself onto her hands and knees and started crawling. She moved from the shadows, and leaned forward to see the length of the room.
 

It was empty.

She got to her feet, strengthening her resolve against the pain that spiked from her thigh and abdomen. The creature had dropped her off like a sack of wheat, expecting her to just lay there until it returned. It would be in for a surprise when it came back.
 

She started walking, slowly at first, but with increasing confidence as each step forward distracted her and lessened the pain.
 

One of the creatures appeared in the doorway at the far side of the room, carrying a water skin. It lumbered towards her, its long legs causing it to move with an exaggerated rocking motion.
 

Eryn slipped into the shadow of a huge ircidium piston and looked back at the mattress. She had gone too far to get back in time. She scanned her surroundings. There was nowhere to hide.
 

Wizards are never unarmed
.

She smiled at the thought, and took a deep breath. She could feel the magic responding, coming to her call. She was weak from the change, but she wasn't powerless. If she was going to succumb to the Curse anyway, there was no reason to hold back.

It must have felt her power building. Its head turned to where she was standing in the shadows.

"Ignatus," she said, throwing her hand forward. A pair of small, bright bolts of energy formed there and shot ahead, launching towards the creature, sliding and curving like a snake. The monster tried to cry out, but it was too late. Both of the bolts struck it in the chest and traveled beyond. It fell to its knees and clutched at the burning holes, never even noticing the bolts doubling back. They struck it in the head, and exploded in a flash of light and blood.

I'll save myself.

She stepped out from the shadows and kept walking. She could hear the throbbing of the ebocite in her head. She could feel the gnawing of the magic in her body. If the missiles had weakened her, she didn't notice. She was going to get out of there, she was going to find Wilem, and she was going to tell him how she felt while he gave her the cure, and saved her from what she might become.

Amman help them if he is dead.

They must have heard the commotion, because two more of the creatures appeared in the doorway. They chittered at one another when they saw her, and then bunched their legs and sprang towards her.

Eryn brought her hands together, and then slowly spread them wide. "Firenze," she said. A wall of fire grew from the ground in front of her, rising ten feet into the air. The monsters' leap carried them right into its path and they fell on either side of her, burned and dead.

She dropped to a knee and put her hand down to steady herself. Her heart pounded, her muscles ached. She focused her energy, her anger, and got back up.

"Litmus," she said. A gust of power swept up behind her, catching her and lifting her, propelling her forward much faster than she could walk. She flew through the air, landing at the doorway out of the room. She steadied herself against the frame and leaned forward. The room was attached to a split corridor, and she turned her head to the left and right.
 

She was alone.

"
The daughter is all I have expected.
"
 

She felt the distortion field overcome her. It was there, and it placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. As soon as it did, she was able to move.

She spun quickly, dropping low and throwing a fist into the creature's abdomen. Her hand scraped against thick skin, her own flesh torn open by the friction.