All Spell Breaks Loose

Chapter 17

I landed hard in something soft—and squirmy.

“Dammit, girl,” Kesyn wheezed, “you could kill a man with that bony ass of yours. Ever think about eating?”

I half rolled, but mostly fell off of Kesyn and onto what should have been a floor. However, any floor I’d ever walked, landed, or fell on hadn’t been spongy.

I was panting and shaking. I swallowed and panted some more. “What the hell was that?”

Kesyn heaved himself to his feet. “Other than a trapdoor, it’s proof Sarad was expecting us.”

I scrabbled to stand up, falling twice before I could get my feet steady on the whatever-it-was we’d landed on. It wasn’t breathing; at least I didn’t think it was. Wherever we were was dark and damp, and from the way our voices bounced off the walls I couldn’t see, we were in a room only marginally larger than a closet. Frantically I looked up. No seam of light showed where that trapdoor was, and no sound came from beyond it.

“Can you see anything?” I asked Kesyn.

“Enough to see that no one else is going to be coming down the way we did. I heard the snap after I fell in.”

What the hell was he talking about? “Snap?”

“Trapdoor like that has to be reset before it’ll open again. I don’t know who Sarad was fishing for, but I think the boy will be tickled pink when he sees what he got on the end of his hook.”

Us. I didn’t want to ponder the image that Sarad Nukpana catching us on a hook conjured. Nor was tickled an emotion I could imagine Sarad Nukpana having. Though if he saw me, he might come close.

I desperately wanted to call out to Mychael, to let him know I was down here.

Raine, he knows exactly where you are—down a hole. If you open your big mouth and yell, you’ll let anything down here know you’re down here, too. Nukpana could have just as easily rigged his trap to catch food for the nice dragon family downstairs in this godforsaken house of horrors.

“Those prisoners just set foot out of that cell only to get captured again,” I muttered.

From the brushing sounds, I assumed that Kesyn was straightening his layers of robes and whatnot. “We don’t know that,” he said. “All we know for sure is that we’ve been caught. By who is an assumption, but since we’re in the Khrynsani temple, and Sarad’s in the temple, it’s safe to assume that Sarad’s on his way here.”

Our assumption was all that was safe right now; we sure weren’t.

Kesyn just stood there, listening to me panic. “Would you like some light?” he eventually asked.

“That would be helpful.”

I waited. No light.

“Well, basilisk balls,” Kesyn said mildly.

I tensed. “What is it? Or what isn’t it?”

“Magic doesn’t work. Must be a dampening ward around this cell.” He paused. “Nice job, actually.”

“Glad you’re impressed with their work ethic.” My voice was starting to shake right along with the rest of me.

I heard Kesyn fumbling around in his robes.

“If you have to take another whiz, old man, get away from me.”

“Nope, saving that for a special occasion.” More fumbling. “Let’s see if I still have… Yes, I always carry spares.”

I snorted. “A flask?” Though I wouldn’t mind a stiff belt right now.

“That, too.”

A spark flared to life in front of me, moving vigorously up and down. It was one of Kesyn’s light marbles, activated by shaking, which was what he was doing to it. The light confirmed what my hands had already told me: small cell, high ceiling that was mostly a hole soaring up into darkness, and no apparent door in any of the four walls. There had to be one. Why go to the trouble to bait a trapdoor without any way to extract your prize? That was what the two of us would be. Prizes.

Kesyn moved to the center of the cell and tossed the small green light up into the shaft. A sharp pop and sizzle later, we were dusted with glowing green remains of a destroyed light marble.

Kesyn gave a low whistle. “Nasty ass wards.”

I couldn’t see the old goblin take a bite out of his never-ending chunk of cheese, but I sure smelled it.

“Well, we won’t be climbing out the same way we fell in,” he noted. “That’s okay; I’ve got more.” He found another light marble in his pocket and shook it up.

Silence. Still no shouts from above. If Mychael and Tam were trying to blast or pound their way through that floor to get to us, I couldn’t hear it. Unless they were too busy fighting for their lives against whoever had been wearing those boots running after Kesyn.

“Who was chasing you?” I asked.

“Temple guards.”

“And?”

“Some black mages.”

“How many are ‘some’?”

“More than a few.”

Damnation.

Mychael and Tam could fight more than a few, and hopefully the mages among the prisoners they’d just freed would still be able to put up a decent fight after being in that cell for who knew how long.

“Could you tell how strong those Khrynsani mages were?”

“You don’t get to be a black mage by being a magical ninety-pound weakling,” Kesyn snapped. “I didn’t stop and ask for their qualifications.”

I blew out the first decent breath I’d managed to get. “Sorry.”

Kesyn grunted. I took that as manspeak for “no problem.”

“Where do you think we are?” I asked. “Besides up shit creek without a paddle?”

“This is the Khrynsani temple. This whole place is shit creek. Up, down, doesn’t matter where. I’d say we’re in a cell.”

“No kidding.”

“Judging from the padded floor, they wanted whoever tripped that trap up there to live, at least for a while.”

I did a quick exploration. The cell was as small as our voices made it sound, only five paces in any direction. The walls were rough-hewn rock. I reached as far as I could over my head and didn’t feel anything other than air, though we knew only too well that there was a hole big enough for us to have fallen through and not have left bits and pieces of ourselves along the way.

I moved in close to the old guy and tried to ignore the stinky cheese. I kept my voice to a bare whisper and counted on Kesyn’s goblin ears to hear me. “If Sarad Nukpana had set the trap, he knew only a null could trip it. We got caught. He knows you pack plenty of magical mojo, but I was the one on the floor, picking at the insides of that gearbox—”

Kesyn was shaking his head while chewing cheese; I was trying to breathe through my mouth. “Sarad couldn’t have known we were here until you kids attacked the guard desk on the first level. Cyran Nathrach had to have been moved before that; the same time that trap would have been set.”

“Then who was Tam’s dad bait for?”

Kesyn gave me a meaningful look. “Who indeed?”

I froze. “Deidre?”

“Or Nath. Or both. Neither have any magic, and both would risk themselves to free Cyran.”

“If so, that means they’re in the temple,” I said. “And from what I could see, they weren’t in that cell with Cyran and the others.” I didn’t exactly feel a spark of hope, more like a damp sputter, but Deidre did strike me as the kind of woman who would finish anything she started. She’d shot one hole in Sarad Nukpana tonight already. Perhaps she and Nath were lurking around here thinking that the second time would be the charm.

I grinned. Oh yeah, that’d be charming as hell. Maybe I could get a better seat for the show this time.

“Regardless of who that hole in the floor was meant for,” Kesyn said, “thanks to you, Cyran Nathrach is out of that hellhole and so are some of our best mages and fighters. Better still, those boys and girls didn’t look happy. And Mychael, Tam, and that scrawny elf cadet of yours are plenty pissed now that you’re down here and they’re up there. I wouldn’t want to be in the first pack of Khrynsani to run into them.” He started running his hands along the walls. “No wards here. They’re probably outside wherever the door to this box is.”

I hoped Mychael and Tam weren’t wasting any time hunting for us. With those prisoners freed, they could get up to the temple altar and get the job done. That was all that mattered. Save yourselves. Destroy the rock.

Then I remembered something.

I frantically patted myself down. When I felt the Scythe of Nen still nestled near my waist, I froze in horror. “I’ve still got it.”

“Got what?”

I scurried over to him and hissed in a whisper, “I have the freaking dagger.”

“What freaking dagger?”

“The freaking dagger.”

“Oh.” Kesyn’s eyes widened as realization sunk in. “Oh. Well, shit.”

“Mychael’s the only one left free to destroy the Saghred,” I said in a strangled whisper. “Now he can’t.”

And I’d asked him to give it to me, insisted actually. Because I wanted to be useful; I wanted to free myself. Great job I was doing of that. I viciously kicked at whatever the damned floor was made of. I couldn’t be any more useless than I was right now. Mychael hadn’t just gotten himself captured by Sarad Nukpana—at least I hoped not. I had. Here I stood, caught, caged, and probably about to have my weapons confiscated. The Scythe of Nen wasn’t big, but it wasn’t small, either. And without it, our mission was history—and so were we.

Kesyn leaned over to whisper in my ear. “Certain ladies in our secret service have often made good use of a hidden pocket in the front of their armor, right about here.” He tapped his fingers over his heart and grinned.

I looked down to where that would be on me. Right over my left breast.

I just looked at him. “And you know this how?”

Kesyn winked at me. “Extensive research and exploration in my younger days.”

I fumbled around in the inside of the quilted leather doublet where Kesyn had indicated, and sure enough, there it was. Hopefully, no lady agents had ever let Sarad Nukpana go exploring in their chest armor. I tucked the dagger in with even a little room to spare. “Well, this lovely turn of events changes our plan,” I muttered bitterly.

“Considerably. However, the best plans can be executed many ways.”

“Could you use something besides ‘executed’? It’s not my favorite word right now.”

“The point is our goal remains the same; the approach has merely changed. Stay flexible, play it by ear, and when you see a chance, jump on it.”

“You mean if I see a chance.”

“I always say what I mean. When you see a chance. If you’re looking close like you’re supposed to, you’ll see it. At least one chance is always there.”

I’d rather jump on Sarad Nukpana with a sharp knife, or the Saghred with the Scythe of Nen. Preferably both. Now it didn’t look like I’d get a chance to do either.

“Are you armed?” I asked him.

Kesyn took another bite of cheese, his eyes glittering in the dim, green light; an old man with a secret. “Don’t worry about me. I’m plenty armed and dangerous. I may have taught Sarad Nukpana a lot of what he knows.” Kesyn’s smile broadened into a devilish grin. “However, I didn’t teach him everything I know.”

“Your magic doesn’t work down here.” I almost added “either,” but swallowed the word in time.

Kesyn’s eyes narrowed. “You’re awfully impressed with hocus-pocus, girl.”

“Not impressed. I just like having my odds more even.”

“No magic is the best magic, Raine.” Kesyn’s expression turned grim and his words came fast and fierce. “You need to get that through your pretty little head right now. You don’t have time to worry about what you don’t have; concentrate on what you do have. What if Sarad was just a man? What would you do?” Kesyn got in my face. “Let’s hear it! What would you do?”

“Kick his ass to the Lower Hells,” I snarled back. I blinked. I hadn’t hesitated. Just a good old-fashioned ass kicking, ending in death, of course. His. “Like that’s going to happen.”

Kesyn didn’t back down. “Why not?”

“Because he—”

“Has more magic than you do?” The old goblin barked a laugh. “From what I hear, until a couple of months ago, damned near everyone had more magic than you. You ever let that stop you before?”

I stopped in sudden realization. I hadn’t. I’d snuck my way into goblin prisons, freed who I’d come to get, then conned and/or fought my way out. As a seeker, I found people and saved lives. Sure, I’d used my seeking skills and magic to locate them, but after that, more often than not, I’d ended up doing everything else with…

No magic.

None. Just me.

Kesyn was smiling. “Have you ever let that stop you before?” he repeated, quietly.

“No. No, I haven’t.”

“Then don’t let it stop you now. Find chances; and when you see them, take them. You need to remember something that I always told Tam—very often a man’s greatest strength is also his biggest weakness. Know when to use both to your advantage.”

A section of the wall creaked open. A red ward crisscrossed in front of the opening, but I could see through it just fine.

So could all of the Khrynsani mages and guards who were waiting just on the other side. Saying that we were outnumbered would be an absurd understatement. At an unspoken command, the Khrynsani deferentially stepped aside to allow someone to pass through.

Carnades Silvanus.

Wearing Khrynsani black mage robes.

Words completely failed me.

“So it is true,” Carnades murmured to me. “Imagine my surprise when I was told that you had dropped into our trap.”

“Our trap?”

“I might have mentioned to Sarad that you and your friends would be paying him a visit, so he was wise and planned accordingly.”

Carnades Silvanus and Sarad Nukpana working together. Hell had officially frozen over, and demons were serving flavored ice.

Kesyn popped the rest of the cheese in his mouth with a flourish. “Remember me?” he asked while chewing.

Carnades looked him up and down with obvious distaste. “Is there a reason why I should?”

The old goblin shrugged. “I guess not. I saw no reason to introduce myself back then. I was on my way out at court during your assignment as Conclave ambassador.” He chuckled darkly. “Justinius Valerian probably gave you the job hoping that mouth of yours would earn you a knife in the back.” Kesyn reached out and patted Carnades twice on the shoulder in consolation. “I’m sure it wasn’t for lack of trying. You must not have been here long enough.” He grinned. “You here to give it another go?”

Carnades’s blue eyes flashed with murder. “You must be Sarad’s ex-teacher.”

“Yeah, I guess I must be.” Kesyn finished chewing the cheese and belched in Carnades’s general direction. The elf flinched at the smell.

Khrynsani guards stepped forward and clapped magic-sapping manacles on both of us.

Now it was Carnades’s turn to smile. “A mere formality for you, Raine, since you’ve lost your magic.”

“Not lost.” I met his smile and raised him a smirk. “I know exactly where it is. And now I’ll make sure you’re the first one to know when I get it back.” It was an empty threat, but sowing uncertainty in an enemy was never a bad idea.

Carnades indicated Kesyn. “Search him and be careful about it. Sarad said that his former teacher has many unpleasant surprises hidden in those robes.” He turned to me and smiled slowly. “I’ll search Raine myself.”

Carnades Silvanus searched and he found every single weapon I had.

Including the Scythe of Nen.

Apparently Kesyn wasn’t the only one who had had intimate knowledge of secret service armor. I couldn’t imagine Imala having an agent who would have willingly let Carnades grope her. Though Carnades did an entirely too thorough job of searching me, and would have found the demonic dagger regardless.

“This was stolen from a collection in my home,” Carnades noted. “I always thought you were behind it; you and that pirate cousin of yours.”

“The demons that ransacked your house and slaughtered your staff stole that dagger. Me and that pirate cousin of mine followed those demons and saved your miserable life. I’ve heard you should make sure you don’t have any regrets when you die. I regret the hell out of saving your life—that time and all the others.” I looked him up and down. “However, it appears Nukpana thinks you’re good for something besides Saghred fodder. For now. So what did you have to do to buy yourself more breathing time?”

“Nothing that offended my sensibilities.”

“You have those?”

“While we have many fundamental differences, Sarad Nukpana and I have agreed to put them aside for our mutual benefit. The new goblin king recognizes my worth.” Carnades’s eyes glittered. “Unlike my own government, who are fighting like a pack of mange-ridden curs with the Conclave over who will put me on trial first. With Sarad’s help and that of his new goblin government, the changes I have worked tirelessly for all these years will soon come to pass.” He gripped my upper arm. “Time for your tour of the temple, Raine.”

I walked, and my mind was racing. Carnades’s idea of change included killing Justinius Valerian, becoming archmagus and undisputed head of all magic users in the seven kingdoms, with the Guardians reduced to his personal enforcers. Carnades hadn’t been able to accomplish any of them by himself, but with Sarad Nukpana at his back wielding the Saghred? There wasn’t anything he couldn’t do, absolutely nothing he couldn’t have.

But Sarad Nukpana didn’t give anyone anything—especially not an elf—unless he’d been well compensated in return. Letting him know that I didn’t have my magic wouldn’t have been nearly enough. So what else did Carnades Silvanus have that Sarad Nukpana wanted—or needed? Nukpana might have told him one thing, but the real reason would be something else entirely, something Carnades had no clue about. One thing I did know: whatever Sarad had promised Carnades wasn’t what he’d eventually get—betrayal and painful death.

I tried to keep my breathing steady and my words even. “So you’re finally going to get the Isle of Mid. Nukpana going to tie a big bow around it for you?”

Carnades laughed, an ugly sound. “Why would I want an empty, barren rock? The students and most of the mages have been evacuated.” He gave me a humorless smile. “However, as a member of the Seat of Twelve for many years, I know the Conclave’s evacuation routes and destinations.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, even from Carnades. “You sold out those children.”

“They knew when they came to Mid that the profession they chose was dangerous. This is one of those dangers. Sarad is well aware of where your uncle and cousin are taking them. He has a squadron off the coast of Mylora sailing to intercept them as we speak, with orders to take all prisoners alive. Dead mages and magelings are worthless to him.”

My upper lip pulled away from my teeth in a snarl. “You’ve betrayed children—and your own people—to that monster.”

“The Conclave are not ‘my people.’ They still are what they have always been—a means to an end.”

“Did your new best friend happen to tell you that the elves are the first people he’s going to attack using that Gate he’s building?”

“I’m well aware of the Gate, and his intentions for it. I told Sarad the locations and strengths of all of the elven defenses. Precision strikes will significantly simplify and expedite the cleansing process.”

Cleansing.

I felt sick. I knew what Carnades Silvanus wanted. I knew what he was going to do.

“My allies in the elven military and intelligence service have been imprisoned,” he said, “but their incarceration will be brief—as will the rule of our shortsighted government. For far too long we have been passed over while those from polluted bloodlines have risen in positions of power. I won’t have to settle for being the power behind the throne. I will be the king of our new and reborn people. My long-suffering allies and I will be the elven government—free to reestablish the purity of our ancient race. The elves have become mongrelized by the mixing of races, the tainting and degradation of our noble bloodlines.” Carnades looked like it took every ounce of restraint he had not to spit on me.

“You handed Sarad Nukpana our people on a silver platter.”

“Not mine. Yours. Elves with certain desirable physical characteristics will be spared.”

“And you will be Sarad Nukpana’s puppet, to dispose of as he pleases.”

Carnades’s grip on my arm tightened to the point of pain. “I will have everything I have ever wanted,” he spat. “Everything I deserve. And unlike you—I will be alive.”

“To bow and scrape to a goblin. What will your pure-blooded henchmen have to say about that?”

Carnades quickly regained his calm. “A temporary sacrifice of my dignity for the ultimate good of the elven race. History will see me as the savior of my true people.”

Then his expression changed. His face became suffused with twisted joy; his pale blue eyes glittered. It was the face of a fanatic. He honestly believed what he was saying. Carnades Silvanus would do whatever he had to do to make his warped and perverted worldview a reality, even if he built it on the corpses of tens of thousands of elves—men, women, and children—who didn’t meet his standards of elven purity.

“I’ve dreamed of this,” he said, “but thought I would have to content myself with the changes that I, as only one man, could make. Yes, Sarad Nukpana is using me to get what he wants; but I am using him to get what the elven race needs. The Saghred is evil, but out of evil can come great good. There is nothing that I won’t do, no man or woman I won’t kill who dares to stand in my way.”

“Sarad Nukpana will stand in your way,” I snarled. “All you’ll be is a king of cattle. The Saghred doesn’t care what kind of blood runs in your veins, and Nukpana doesn’t give a damn about your purity. You’ll be raising prime beef for his altar. You may have delayed your slaughter, but you’ll never escape.”

“Little seeker, are you annoying my new partner?” said a smooth, cool voice.

Sarad Nukpana didn’t look like a man who’d taken a crossbow bolt through the shoulder only hours ago, and who had his hands and forearms literally cooked inside armored gauntlets the day before. His unmarked hands were visible from beneath the sleeves of his simple black robe, and he wasn’t wearing a sling to take the weight of an arm off of a wounded shoulder.

The Saghred had completely healed him.

He was studying me as well, his dark eyes shining. “You are a constant source of surprises, little seeker. Or since you seem to have lost the use of your magic, that title is no longer appropriate.” He cast an amused glance at Kesyn. “And my revered teacher, who endlessly professed that the best magic was no magic. How is that working for you, sir?” Nukpana stepped aside and, with a courtly bow, gestured for me to precede him. “Shall we?”

I was looking for a way out, any way out.

Not that it was easy to see where I was and where I was going while surrounded by a ridiculously large and heavily armed escort. We were going up a lot of stairs, which I took to mean up into the main part of the temple.

“It’s not like I can go anywhere,” I told Nukpana, indicating the guards.

“You should be flattered, Raine. Not every guest of mine warrants such careful attention.”

I raised my manacled hands. “Or this much magic-sapping steel.”

All traces of humor vanished. “I have not reached this night by taking chances. You have talents beyond magic. I am merely guarding against any and all of them.”

The main level of the temple was full of robed Khrynsani—robed and silent. They moved quickly and with purpose. Their boss had a big night planned.

These Khrynsani were different from any I’d seen before. Each of them—whether mages or guards—wore a long silver chain with a red, glowing gem. Down the long and wide corridor, the black-garbed goblins blended with the shadows. The only way I could tell that some of them were there was that the gems glowed like mutant fireflies. Carnades was sporting one exactly like them.

Nukpana noticed where I was looking. “My brethren all wear lifestones when inside the temple. Each is calibrated to that individual to ensure their safe passage through the areas they are permitted to enter, and to deny entrance where they are not authorized to go.”

“So you don’t trust Carnades here enough to give him the run of the place?”

“It is for his own protection,” Nukpana replied mildly. “He is unfamiliar with our temple; it is merely a preventative measure to keep him from dangerous areas.”

“And if he does go astray, he gets a chastising zap?”

“My other mages would be alerted to his location, and would politely redirect his steps. Magus Silvanus has not and will not abuse my hospitality. He has been a most generous and accommodating guest.”

“So I hear.” I paused. “So, how does it feel to be on the verge of getting everything you want? Carnades has already told me his feelings.”

If Nukpana had been a cat, he’d have been purring. “It’s a sensation I most highly recommend. It’s a pity you won’t be experiencing it.”

“I’ll just have to live vicariously.”

A pair of armed Khrynsani standing guard on either side of an open doorway spotted Sarad Nukpana and instantly snapped to attention as we approached. I casually glanced in just in case it was a way out.

It wasn’t.

No. Oh no.

Deidre Nathrach stood just inside the room; Nath was beside her. It was a cell, empty except for a bench bolted to the far wall. Barrett was sitting on the bench. All of them were wearing long, pristinely white robes. Sarad Nukpana was a fastidious psycho; he’d want his sacrifices neat and tidy.

Sacrifices. He was going to kill Tam’s mother and brother first, then the elderly butler Tam thought of, and loved, as family.

I stopped breathing, paralyzed with a dread so sharp that it staked me to the stone where I stood.

Nath saw me and ran for the door, stopping short of the opening. There must have been a ward. When he spotted Nukpana, his lips pulled back from his fangs in a feral snarl. I knew Nath, and I still had to force myself not to reach for a weapon.

A weapon I no longer had.

No sound could escape that cell and neither could they.

Sarad Nukpana stood impassively as Nath followed his snarl by screaming a few physically impossible and fatal things he wanted to inflict upon Nukpana’s person. I couldn’t hear him through the ward, but no sound was needed. It was in Goblin, it was emphatic, and all of it was perfectly clear.

Sarad Nukpana’s hand against the small of my back pushed me forward again, but not before Deidre and I locked eyes.

Her large, dark eyes said it all. If I had been captured, then so had Tam, or he would be soon. Her entire family was in the hands of a madman. Her only consolation was that she wouldn’t have to watch them die. She would be the first to fall under Sarad Nukpana’s sacrificial knife. Deidre Nathrach wasn’t chained, just caged, but just as helpless to do anything about it. We were her last hope, and now her hope had failed her.

Nukpana’s voice was crisp and formal. “We prefer to give our sacrifices as much freedom as possible in the time remaining to them, hence the lack of restraints and an unobstructed view of open spaces.”

A dimly lit corridor, lined in light-sucking black granite, would be their last view, before the altar and Sarad Nukpana’s face, as his hand brought the dagger down.

“My first official act as king will be to execute the assassin of my honored predecessor,” he continued.

“And the mother of your lifelong nemesis,” Kesyn called from behind us where he was surrounded by his own guards. “Come, now, boy. At least admit the real reason.”

“Merely taking the opportunity given to me to settle scores. An opportunity passed is an opportunity wasted. You taught me that, and I learned it well. Uncommonly wise words, sir.”

“And you always twisted my words to suit your own purpose.”

Nukpana’s lips curled in a smirk. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“You don’t want an opportunity,” Kesyn spat. “You want an excuse.”

“After tonight I’ll no longer need either.” Nukpana’s smile was relaxed and genuinely happy. It was creepy as hell. “You’re an old man who is content to live in the past and reject progress. Both are burdens you will not have to bear for much longer.” His smile grew. “Guards, prepare him for the altar.”

I didn’t scream or struggle. Instead I viciously embedded my elbow as far as I could in Sarad Nukpana’s gut. I gave it everything I had, and a lot that I didn’t. I was a dead woman walking anyway, and I’d be damned if I wasn’t going to take as many pieces of Nukpana as I could with me. The Khrynsani guards had been careless enough to chain my hands in front of me and I was only too glad to make their leader pay.

My elbow earned me the reward of a pained gasp from the goblin.

An instant later, I was on the bottom of a pile of Khrynsani. Now I couldn’t breathe, either, but knocking some of the hot air out of a baby demigod was worth it.

Nukpana wouldn’t kill me. Not yet. He also wouldn’t let his goons beat the crap out of me. Hopefully. He wanted me able to stand up next to that altar, or chained to it, and he wanted me fully aware and whole when it happened. Then he’d carve my heart out with a spoon. But until then, he wouldn’t want a mark on me.

“Raine, no!”

It was Kesyn.

“When you see it—” The old goblin’s last word was stopped by a fist. Nukpana wouldn’t care if his teacher got roughed up before his turn on the altar.

I knew what he’d tried to say. A chance. When I see it, take it. I hadn’t forgotten. I didn’t have either the breath or a lack of sense to respond. Kesyn knew I’d heard him. Though Deidre had taken a chance when she saw it, and look what it’d gotten her.

Nukpana straightened up with a ragged hiss. “Take her to my quarters.”

One of the guards in the pile decided clubbing me on the head was an appropriate response to that order.

Everything went black.