Well of the Damned (45 page)

Unarmed
and unnoticed, Cirang watched with horror as the king, bleeding from
his arm, nose and ears, collapsed. She had no defense against a
magical attack, but she had to do something. Saving the king would be
a step towards redemption. She ran around to the rear of the temple
and yanked open the back door. She entered the nave and saw the three
battlers at the main entrance, pounding on the doors, trying to get
out. Their cleric prisoners were seated in pews, cursing them with
the wrath of the Almighty Savior Asti-nayas. She rounded the altar
and ran up the steps onto the dais. There she found a tray of
porcelain cups, the same cups she’d used to serve the tainted
water to the queen. She took one and dipped it into the font, and
then walked as quickly as she could without spilling the water.

“Cirang?”
Brawna said behind her. “Stop! What are you doing?”

Footsteps
pounded the floor behind has as the battlers gave chase. She raced
through the store room and outside, then around to the front of the
building. The mage was squatting over Gavin. Standing a few feet away
was the mage’s twin, the one without magic power. Cirang
circled around and approached from behind. With her left arm, she
reached around the woman and grabbed her by the face, pinching her
nose shut with her thumb and forefinger and tilting her head back,
which forced her mouth open. In her other hand, she held the cup with
her palm over its lip to keep from spilling the water.

“Help!
Fabrice!” the twin cried, trapped against Cirang’s body,
arms flailing. As a battler, Cirang knew how to get out of such a
hold, but she was counting on this woman’s lack of hand-to-hand
combat training.

The
mage turned with fury in her eyes. “Release her!”

“Get
away from him,” Cirang said, “or this water goes down
your sister’s throat.” She heard the sounds of banging
and shouting at the back door of the temple through which she’d
just come.
They truly are trapped,
she thought.

Fabrice
smiled haughtily. “Blessed water, is it? We don’t believe
in the power of your little god.”

“This
water’s been tainted with water from the Well of the
Enlightened, though I think a more apt name would be Well of the
Damned. Once she drinks this, she’ll loathe you, maybe even try
to kill you in your sleep, and there’s nothing you can do to
change her back.”

The
twin stopped struggling. “Do as she says, Fabrice.”

Fear
flickered in the mage’s eyes, but she took a step towards
Cirang and away from Gavin. “You wouldn’t.”

“I
served this water to the queen, four of Kinshield’s First Royal
Guards, and about a hundred worshipers. What makes you think I
won’t?”

A
few moments passed in silence while Fabrice considered the situation.

Daia
gasped and opened her eyes. “By Yrys! Gavin...” She
crawled over to where he lay, his eyes open and staring, his
outstretched hand inches from his sword. “What have you done to
him?”

“He’ll
awaken,” the twin said. “Let me go.”

“I
need assurance,” Cirang said. “Open the temple doors.”

When
Fabrice hesitated, Cirang tilted the cup over the twin’s open
mouth. The mage gestured in the air and whispered a word. The doors
flew open with the force of three battlers pushing it from the
inside.

“Now
go inside,” Cirang said. “You won’t be able to
attack the king in the temple. Not with magic, anyway.”

“I’ll
do as you say. Release her.” Fabrice backed into the temple.
Once she’d stepped over the threshold, Brawna and Calinor each
pointed weapons at her and forced her farther inside. Cirang released
the twin, who ran to her sister. They tearfully embraced, and Fabrice
stroked her hair.

Cirang
threw the contents of the cup onto the ground, where it mixed with
rain that continued to fall.

Gavin’s entire body burned
from the inside while all around him was nothing but fluttering
whiteness he’d come to recognize as his healing magic. Words
echoed in his mind, words that made no sense.
Why would she help
us? Perhaps Gavin’s right. Perhaps she truly has changed.

They
were thoughts, but not his own.
Who’s thinking in my head,
damn it?

“Gavin?
Can you hear me?” It was Daia’s voice, far away.

I
thought it was a dream.

When
the white fluttering sensation stopped, he opened his eyes to find
Daia’s light-blue ones gazing down at him. A lock of her
dark-auburn hair had escaped its braid and tickled his face. “Thank
Yrys,” she said. “You had me worried.”

“You
gave us a fright, my liege,” Tennara said. Her forehead was
crinkled with concern.

“Damn
that hurt.” His tongue felt heavy in his mouth. His muscles
trembled, and he struggled to sit up. Tennara grasped his arm to
help. Cirang helped Daia to her feet.

Brawna
stood on the other side of the threshold, propping open one of the
temple doors with a foot and holding Aldras Gar as if it were made of
glass. Calinor kept his sword pointed at the mage and her twin. Gavin
let Tennara help him to one of the benches in the temple, where he
leaned heavily against the wall. He felt groggy, as though he’d
been awoken from a sound sleep, and had trouble focusing his eyes.

Daia
sat beside him. Her hand trembled as she raised a waterskin to her
lips. Her forearm was marked with a red welt in the shape of a tree
branch. Then he noticed his own were similarly marked.

The
welts started under the sleeves of his tunic and went all the way to
his fingertips. His fingernails were blackened. “By the seven
hells. Would you look at this?” He pulled up his sleeves to
reveal the marks just under the surface of his skin, like red veins.

Daia
gestured at his face with one finger. “Your face has it too.”
She handed him the skin.

He
drank deeply and wiped the stray droplets from his chin. “Damn.
There goes my dashing good looks.” Daia’s face and neck
were unmarked. Apparently she’d received a smaller dose of the
lightning than he had.

“Let’s
sit and have a courteous conversation, shall we?” Tennara said,
pushing down on the mage’s shoulders to force her to sit on one
of the pews, facing Gavin. “You don’t simply attack the
king when you imagine some slight or injustice.”

“He’s
not the rightful king,” Fabrice replied.

“Let’s
start at the beginning,” Tennara said. “Who are you?”

“Fabrice
Canton, mother of Brodas Canton, though you would know him better by
his epithet, Ravenkind. This is my sister, Cabrice Dartillyn. Her son
is Brodas’s cousin, dearest friend, and confidant.”

The
other woman said, “Warrick Dartillyn, who took the epithet
Darktalon.”

“Where
are you holding our sons?” Brodas’s mother demanded. A
tear trickled from her eye, and she hastily wiped it away. “We
want them released immediately. My son is heir to the throne. The
rain shall not stop until you restore what you’ve taken.”

“Brodas
is dead.” Gavin didn’t mean to blurt it so bluntly, and
certainly not slurred like a drunken lout. “I’m sorry to
have to tell you.” He pushed himself more upright.

The
mage stared at him, her face twisted in horror and grief. “That
can’t be. No.”

Gavin
wrestled with how much information to give Ravenkind’s mother.
He had no reason to believe she was anything but a mother who loved
her son. “I wasn’t there to witness it,” he
explained, speaking more slowly, “but Daia and Cirang were. He
was attacked by the demon that was trapped in the palace. His magic
wasn’t strong enough to defeat his enemy, and the demon took
his life. I arrived too late to save him.”

Fabrice
burst into tears and embraced her sister for comfort.

“Judging
by his injuries, I don’t think he suffered.” Gavin tried
not to let his own feelings about Ravenkind interfere with the
delivery of the news that devastated these two women. He’d have
sung joyously of his nemesis’s death to anyone else but the
man’s own mother. He was glad the wizard was dead, but he
wasn’t a heartless bastard. A parent’s love was blind to
a child’s failings.

“And what of my son?”
Cabrice asked through her tears. “Do you know what has become
of him?”

Gavin
nodded. “I’m sorry. Warrick never left Brodas’s
side. He was loyal to a fault.”

The
two women cried in each other’s arms for a minute. At last
Fabrice looked up and tearfully asked, “Where are they buried?”

Four
bodies had been collected from the cottage that fateful day. The two
dead Viragon Sisters had been taken to the cemetery and buried. Gavin
had instructed the city custodian to burn the other two —
Brodas Ravenkind and his henchman, Red. Daia had left Warrick’s
dead body in the alley behind an inn in Sohan, but there was no
reason to torture his mother with that detail. “Their bodies
were cremated in Tern. Talk to the city custodian. Maybe he still has
their ashes. You can take them, if that’s your wish.”

“Then
I suppose the right to rule is mine,” Fabrice said quietly.

“I’m
afraid not,” Gavin said. “It was never yours to claim or
abdicate.” She drew back with an expression of shock and
indignation. Gavin didn’t want to belittle the woman, but
neither did he want her to continue spreading falsehoods about his
claim. “I know the story of Oriann Engtury. She would never
have inherited the crown, and therefore she couldn’t have
passed it down to you or to Brodas.”

She
shook a finger at him. “You know nothing!”

“I
know she was the illegitimate child of an incestuous rape. King Arek
told me that himself, during my travels backwards in time.”

“Your
ancestor conspired with the Lordover Tern to conceal the truth.”

“I
know King Arek named Ronor Kinshield as his successor, and as you
say, I’m his descendant. I also know the Lordover Tern acted
within his rights as the Supreme Councilor o’State to decide
the next king after Ronor died. I’m sorry for your loss, Lady
Canton, truly, but I’m the rightful king, and my child will
succeed me. Take your sons’ ashes and give them a proper
burial. You can trust me to lead Thendylath. It’s what I was
meant to do.”

Fabrice
glared at him a moment, but then her eyes began to soften. “I
suppose I haven’t any choice now. My only son is dead.”
She drew herself up taller and squared her shoulders. “I,
Fabrice Canton, descendant of King Ivam and rightful heir to the
throne of Thendylath, do hereby abdicate my rule to Gavin Kinshield
as these witnesses will attest.”

Gavin
said nothing but did incline his head. The woman was acquiescing. He
didn’t want to argue with her about how it should be done.

“Do
you know what’s become of Brodas’s journals.”

Gavin’s
battlers had recovered several journals from Ravenkind’s manor
in Sohan. He’d skimmed a few, mostly complaints about lordovers
and rambling professings of his own royal blood and statements of
lust for the King’s Bloodstone. Some had details of the brutal
attacks Ravenkind had waged upon the innocent families of men he
thought had wronged him, including Gavin’s own. Very little in
those journals had any value to Gavin, but the one written by Crigoth
Sevae would remain in his possession, as would the copy Ravenkind had
made of it. “I have some of them,” he told her. “If
you want them, they’re yours.”

Fabrice’s
eyes lit up. “Yes, give them to me. He was always such an
articulate man. I would very much like to read his adventures.”

Gavin
thought she would be disappointed, but that was for her to decide.
“They’re in Tern, of course. Give me your address and
I’ll have them sent to you.”

She
nodded. “Thank you. They’re not much, but... Brodas
mentioned two other journals, not his own but old books he was most
interested in acquiring. Their spiteful owner had promised to sell
them to him but after selling the first, he went back on his word. A
Nilmarion man, I believe, and longtime business associate of my
son’s. Might you have that one as well? I should very much like
to see what he was so eager to obtain.”