The Pleasure of Memory (14 page)

He backed away with his candlestick held firmly in the air between them. His heart was trying to beat its way out of his chest. He needed to make it to the window behind him. He was smaller than the soldier or the warriors who’d have to go back to the door and come around the house after him. It might give him just enough time to—

“Such thoughts are your enemy, young lord,” the man said, “There’ll be no reward in resistance. Besides, you’ll almost certainly cut yourself.” Then the man looked back at the warrior standing just behind and to his right, and he nodded.

The warrior easily overtook Luren and cast the candlestick away before Luren even had time to brace himself. The candlestick bounced off the stone hearth with a disheartening clang before landing on the floor beside the thrown stool. The Vaemyn grabbed him by the hair and threw him down on the desk, pinning his face and chest firmly against the pages of the great book.

Peering under the imprisoning arm, Luren saw the tall intruder casually testing the sharpness of the blade against his silver-gloved fingers. “What are you doing?” he yelled at the man, “I’ve done you no harm! You need to let me go!”

The man walked out of his sight behind him. Luren felt the cold pressure of steel fingers probing the back of his neck. An instant later, he felt the sharp edge of the knife press into the skin behind his head, and the horrible reality of it seized him completely. He was going to die! By this time tomorrow, Chance would find his cold body slumped over the desk and his life would become just another paragraph lost in the endless timeline of the great book. He couldn’t believe it. This couldn’t possibly be his destiny. It couldn’t be!

“All right!” he shouted into the torn book page, “Stop! Please, stop! Just tell me what you want! I’ll do whatever you say.”

But it was too late. Luren felt the motion of the blade and braced himself for the pain and the oblivion that was surely about to follow. In one smooth motion, the blade slid up the back of his skull. Wisps of hair tickled his cheek as they slipped to the paper beside his face.

Then, to his great surprise, the man withdrew the knife from his neck.

He was still alive. He didn’t understand. It felt almost anticlimactic. Then he felt the steely fingertips glide over the newly bald stripe running up his neck. They stopped at the point where a pea-sized lump formed beneath the skin just at the base of his skull. He felt the man spread the skin taut over the lump.

“Well, this is most odd,” the soldier said with another strange laugh, “What have we here,
Milaas
?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Luren lied into the page. In truth, he knew full well what the man was looking at: A translucent blue glow just beneath the skin at the very base of his skull. It was his Bloodlink, the Water Caeyl sliver embedded in his brain.

“Why, you seem to have developed an odd growth right here on the back of your head. Perhaps you’d like me to remove it for you?”

“No!” Luren said, “No, just tell me what you want. Please!”

“I’d think that would be fairly obvious, especially to a bearer of the Birthsight,” the man said seriously, “And even more especially to one with his own caeyl Bloodlink.” He snapped a finger against the lump.

Luren winced as the pain of the snap burned through his skull and sizzled down his spine. “Stop that!” he yelled up at the man, “Please! Please, just tell me what you want!”

“I think you know, little sire.”

“I don’t! I swear it!”

A steel fist slammed the desktop before Luren’s face. “I want your master!” the man snarled, “I want Chance Gnoman.”

“I don’t know where he is!”

The hood swooped down into his face, blocking the world with darkness. “I believe you do,” the man hissed, “And sooner than later, I believe you’ll be quite happy to tell me.”

The man’s breath was sickening with the reek of hot tar. For just an instant, Luren was sure he was going to vomit. Then the hood mercifully withdrew and the warrior locking him against the desk wrenched him back to his feet.

“What do we do with him, sir?” the warrior asked in Vaemysh.

The soldier was already walking toward the door. He didn’t turn back, but simply said, “We take him to Lord Prae, of course. This is a mouse I’m quite confident he’d enjoy batting around a bit.”

The warrior seized a wad of Luren’s hair and shoved him forward. And as the Vaemyn warriors brutally dragged him from the house, Luren knew he would never see his home or Chance again.

VII

SABOTAGE

HANCE TRIPPED OVER THE FINAL STEP OF THE PATH AND SPRAWLED FACE FIRST INTO THE DIRT.

He’d never made that terrible climb up from the road in such short order, and his legs and lungs were rioting from the effort. His terror had carried him this far well enough, but somewhere in the last hundred yards, his reserves had cruelly abandoned him.

He pushed himself up to his knees and leaned sidelong into the red stone chair rising beside him. Was it really just this morning that he’d rested in that very spot, basking and napping in the morning sun? It didn’t seem possible. The memory felt old and washed out, like an image from an old dream.

He took his staff from the dirt and stood it beside him, then braced himself on the chair and climbed to his feet. Standing there, he took a moment to study the yard. Even without the forewarning, he’d have sensed something was wrong. The yard was suffocating in the late afternoon shadows. The birds were silent. There were no squirrels scrounging through the undergrowth. Even the relentless drone of the cicadas was missing. The yard was a dark, silent void, and his house rose up from the midst of it as still and lifeless as a crypt.

He lowered the leather-bound head of his staff and held it like a pike. He readjusted his wet grip, steeled himself against his fear, and began moving toward the unknown.

The front door was ajar, though that in itself wasn’t unusual. They often left it open to allow in the fresh morning air. Luren was probably trying to clear out the smell of the back-drafting chimney.

He climbed cautiously up the porch stairs, wincing at each whine of the old, timeworn boards. A cricket chirruped from somewhere deep in the shadows of the great room. It was the first sign of life he’d detected since cresting the hill. He hoped it signaled optimism.

He nudged the door wider with his staff. Ancient iron hinges creaked tiredly as the door gave way. The room was as dark and silent as a tomb. Even the lonely cricket abruptly abandoned him. The anemic light sifting through the windows only made the shadows that much murkier.

“Luren?” he called, softly.

There was no reply.

He stepped into the room. “Luren?” he called again, louder now, “Where are you?”

A batch of fresh wine bottles stood at attention along the wall beside the fireplace. A basket of recently darned socks sat beside his chair. Newly dipped candles hung from a rope above the hearth like a string of pale bats. Everything was exactly as he’d left it. The only exception was his desk, where his latest treatise on the history of Calevia lay open. Luren was fond of reading that tome and had likely spent some time with it after their conversation on the road that morning.

A quick search of the back rooms revealed nothing. He returned to the great room and glanced up at the shallow loft. Unless someone was lying up there on the floor in the back, it was as empty as the other rooms. Then he spied the stool lying like a corpse before the hearth. A dropped candlestick rested a few feet away like a discarded murder weapon. As he moved toward them, he noticed a white scar on one of the stones above the fireplace.

He rolled the candlestick over with his toe. One side of the iron base had an ugly scrape. Someone had thrown it across the room. His stomach soured at the revelation.

As he walked back to his desk, he spied something yellow scattered about in the shadows beneath it. He squatted down and pick a bit of it up. It was hair. It was Luren’s hair!

He grabbed the ledge of the desk to steady himself. His heart sank as he realized he was too late! They’d already been here. He’d failed. He’d failed Luren. He’d—

No!

He slapped the edge of the desk.

No, he told himself, there’s no time for defeatism! Not now! Not yet! He had to find out what happened. He had to remain strong. He had to find Luren!

Still squatting, he reached back and touched the base of his skull precisely at the junction of his neck. His fingers dug up into that hollow flesh until they found a small bump that marked the point where his caeyl sliver entered his skull. This was his Bloodlink, the point of articulation between his caeyl, the caeylsphere, and his mind. He closed his eyes and summoned the energy.

There was the usual kick of nausea as his thoughts merged with the caeyl, though the discomfort quickly passed as his thoughts swelled beyond the boundaries of his flesh. He pushed harder, driving his essence out into the caeylsphere. Within seconds, he sensed Luren’s essence, and the rush of relief was nearly incapacitating. Luren was still alive.

He probed further, tried to achieve deeper contact with the metaphysical cord that bound them together, but the mind-link wouldn’t form. Something was blocking him, corrupting the bond between his and the boy’s caeyls. He pushed harder, but quickly realized it was useless. A foreign energy was blocking his efforts. Prae’s energy! It had to be.

He opened his eyes. A surge of anger threatened him, but he willed it back. For now, he’d just have to be satisfied with the knowledge that the boy was at least still alive. This was no time for anger. Anger would only slow him down. He could deal with his anger later. Bracing himself with the desk, he stood up.

The book on the desk was open to a chapter detailing the Divinic War. Chance wondered why Luren would have an urge to read that section. Given the news from the sentry, he thought it more logical the boy would explore the Fifty Year War rather than something that occurred during the Faelwyth Epoch nearly a thousand years earlier. Then he saw it. Lying in the middle of the torn page was a small lock of yellow hair neatly tied by one longer strand. He reached for it, but stopped short of picking it up. It lay horizontally on the page, its position too perfect to be accidental. Someone had placed it there deliberately. It was a marker.

He steadied himself. Then he nudged the hair to the side and read the passage above it:

“
Each time a warrior fell to death in battle, Ja’an’s wyrlaerds used their unholy power to channel another demon into the lifeless shell. Short of decapitation or dismemberment, these deathmarch warriors could not be made to fall in battle again.
”

Chance idly rolled the lock of hair back and forth beneath his finger as he thought about the passage. Why would Luren be reading about a war of demons that occurred a thousand years ago? He picked up the hair and studied it. No, he thought as he examined it, Luren hadn’t been reading that passage at all. Someone else placed the lock there with the intention that he find it.

Prae! He’d been here. He’d been right here inside the house. The vile bastard had not only tampered with his caeyl energy, he’d trespassed all the way into Chance’s home.

Chance closed his eyes and once again wrestled back the threatening rage. He could not let it drive him, not now. He needed composure now more than he’d ever needed it before. It was a time for the mind, not the heart. He slipped the lock of hair into the pocket of his robe, then turned and inspected the room again. He again went into the back rooms, which were exactly as empty as he’d left them. There was nothing else to be found here in the house. It was time to explore the yard.

He passed through the front door, stepped down off the porch, and slipped to the right along the front of the house toward the side yard with his staff leveled and the hooded head out before him and ready. He crept around a fat rain barrel and eased his way to the corner of the house where he paused and listened. The world beyond the corner was as still as a plague field. Until a loud bellow erupted behind him.

Chance wheeled toward the noise. A bolt of blue light exploded from the wrapped head of his staff. He barely willed the sizzling caeyl energy away from the offending goose in time to avoid cooking him. The energy veered into the rain barrel, which instantly exploded. A rollicking wave of water and wood splinters rushed violently out into the grass before the house.

The old goose raced away, screeching most sincerely, followed by a small herd of squawking red chickens.

Chance fell back against the log house and tried to breathe. He stared at the sizzling skeleton of the old barrel. Water sloshed anxiously over the charred planks still holding the base of the barrel together. Rivulets of water snaked through the grass like quicksilver making its escape in the fading sunlight. The leather hood on his staff was smoking, but remained more or less intact. He hoped his heart fared as well.

The neurotic goose was on the opposite side of the yard now, though still bellowing raucously. The chickens, being a few steps stupider on the food chain, had already found their calm and were scratching through the grass just beyond the porch. Stealth was useless now. Anyone within earshot would know he was coming. It left him no more reason to hide. He took a few steadying breaths, and then brought his staff back to its offensive position before slipping around the corner into the side yard.