Child of a Dead God

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Welstiel scried for Magiere two or three times a night. Keeping his group close to hers yet remaining undetected proved a tedious balance. He glanced east, away from the peaks. Dawn was still a way off, but throughout the night, the snowfall had increased to a blizzard. Welstiel tired of fighting the weather.

"We stop," he called out.

Chane said nothing as he searched for a place to set up their shelter. Since entering these mountains, he had almost ceased speaking at all. Welstiel did not care-conversation was wasted effort. He waited for Chane to finish setting the tent around a hollow dug in the snow, then stepped in and pulled out the heavy steel circlet.

With a brief trace of his fingertips and a thrumming chant, Welstiel evoked the circlet's power to conjure fire, but only at the lowest level. Its marks glowed and slowly filled the tent with warmth. The monks huddled close, their mad faces dull with relief. Chane crawled in last and reached his hands toward the circlet as Welstiel turned to leave.

"I will scout," he said, his voice nearly as raspy as Chane's. "And see how far ahead she is."

Without waiting for a reply, Welstiel slipped out and trudged upslope through the wind.

When the time came, he hoped his ferals would be as useful as expected, but a part of him missed the simplicity of traveling with only one companion. As long as Chane stayed close enough to touch, Welstiel's ring of nothing could hide them both-a much more convenient arrangement. But lately Chane's seething glances raised other concerns for Welstiel.

Hopefully all this would soon be finished, including the growing problem of Chane.

Welstiel tried to gauge how much night remained. His last effort to scry had given him a clear direction for Magiere's location, but he caught no whiff of life until he heard voices in the night. Slowing with his senses opened wide, he spotted a dim glow at the bottom of a sheer rock face. He crouched behind an outcrop.

Light filtered dimly through a snow-crusted canvas strung over the rock's surface. Why were Magiere and her companions still awake? Or had they risen for an early start?

Magiere stepped out around the canvas's edge, and Leesil followed, grabbing her arm before she headed off.

"Not yet," he said, voice strained. "The moment we have light."

A tall male elf in a brown cloak stepped out as well. "Back inside," he said. "We leave soon, so do not waste body heat by standing in the cold."

Another younger elf peered around the canvas behind the first.

Welstiel focused his senses and all his awareness. It was difficult, with so many close together, but he sensed no other life within the shelter. Nor did he catch the scent of a canine. Where were Wynn and Chap?

Leesil did not acknowledge the first elf, and Magiere crouched, staring across the snow, as if searching for something. Welstiel realized why they were up before dawn and yet had not broken camp. Two of their group had gone missing.

The sky began to lighten, and Welstiel scowled, unable to remain and learn more. The last thing he wanted was for Magiere to be diverted by another distraction. He turned away, slow and quiet until he was beyond earshot, and then hurried for his own camp.

Chap ran as fast as the snow and his injuries allowed. He tried to follow the tracks before the blizzard buried them. But as the sky lightened and the snowfall died, he spotted the white woman and Wynn far ahead.

He did nothing to hide his approach, but the undead never looked back. She slowed at a rocky split between two peaks rising into the clouded sky.

The incline was so steep that she used her free hand to climb-her other remained clamped around Wynn's wrist. The sage stumbled in exhaustion, and when she fell, the undead dragged her without breaking pace. They crested the narrow space between the peaks and vanished over the far side.

Chap scrambled upward and emerged at the top. He looked out over a pristine white plateau resting between high mountains all around in the distance. The snow appeared untouched by any footfall in centuries, except for one vague trail leading into the distance-to a six-towered castle, as in Magiere's dreams.

Down the broken slope, the undead had already reached the plateau. She ran effortlessly across the snow, carrying Wynn over one shoulder.

Chap stumbled down and out onto the plain. Fresh snow and older undercrust shattered beneath his paws. He sank and floundered with each step as the white woman and Wynn grew smaller in the distance.

He kept going, and the closer he came, the larger the castle loomed, until it was greater in size than any fortification he had ever seen. Its towers dwarfed those of Darmouth's war keep, or even the spires of Bela's royal castle. Curtains of ice hung from each conical cap. But as Chap neared the outer wall and the peaked iron gates, he saw that it was not the perfection it appeared to be within Magiere's dream.

The gates' curling scrollwork was deeply rusted. One side hung a-kilter, its bottom hinge decayed beyond use. At the top where their curved points joined into a peaked arch, the two ravens gazed down at him, now whole and no longer translucent. The trail of the undead's light footfalls passed between the gates, straight to the high steps leading to the iron doors.

There she stood upon the top landing.

She threw her lithe body against one massive door. It seemed impossible that she could open it alone, especially while still gripping the crumpled sage.

The hinges of the great door squealed.

Chap slipped through the space between the gates and plowed across the inner courtyard's snow. He had to reach the doors before she could shut him out, and he caught only glimpses of the castle in his rush.

Half the stones of the arch framing the great doors were cracked. Here and there, corners of the blocks had broken off and fallen away. The wide staircase was just as deeply aged and worn, and its first step sagged midway along the seam between two of its stones. Glass panes in the high tower windows, which had been clearer in Magiere's dream, were opaque with age and frost.

The iron door's hinges screeched again.

Chap's forepaws hit the sunken bottom step. He tried to howl, but his voice failed in his dry throat.

The door's noise ceased.

He slowed, panting hard, to find the woman watching him with intense fascination from around the door's edge.

Long black tresses fell back over her perfect white shoulders, and for the first time, Chap saw the burnished metal hoop hanging around her naked throat. He looked more closely at its open ends resting below her collarbone. Each had a knob-exactly like those of the thorhk that Magiere carried.

Chap slunk to the top landing and paused before the white undead.

Wynn… are you all right?

"Chap?" she called out. Her frightened voice echoed out of the narrow space between the iron doors.

The woman flinched at the sage's words.

"I am… all right… I think. Only bruised and cold."

The white undead cocked her head.

"Who is she?" Wynn called. "Why did she kill those elves… and not me?"

Chap had no certain answer, and no time to ponder this creature's reaction to the sage's spoken words-nor what anmaglahk were doing out here in the middle of nowhere.

This undead was hardly predictable or stable. There was no telling what might cause her to turn lethal again, and little Chap might do to stop her.

She just stared at him and then pressed her porcelain face against the door's edge.

Chap saw only one crystalline eye as the visible half of her expression wrinkled in a snarl.

She shoved the door, and it lurched with a moan of rusted metal.

Chap stopped breathing, but the door moved only an inch.

Her one eye watched him, daring him to enter, and only waited so long to see if he would.

Even if this undead allowed Wynn to live, let alone leave, the small sage would never survive the trip back. Neither might he.

Chap slunk forward. When his nose breached the narrow entrance, he darted in.

Wynn felt only a flicker of relief as Chap rushed in. Then the naked woman slammed the door shut, and they were all enveloped by darkness. Wynn fumbled quickly for her crystal.

When its light erupted between her rubbing hands, the white woman still stood before the iron doors. Wynn cowered under her cold gaze and scooted in retreat until her back collided with stone.

She turned to see two rows of massive columns along a wide corridor leading into the castle's dark interior. The darkness behind the pillars began to move.

Pieces curled out into the edges of her crystal's light and undulated like black smoke. Instead of rising into the heights, the wisps turned and twisted, almost willfully. One trailed out behind the pillar Wynn leaned upon, then snaked down to splash upon the stone floor.

Some of the smoke coalesced to form a wide paw of shadow. From around the pillar, the lanky silhouette of a wolf stepped out into the crystal's light.

Chap snarled and bit into the bottom of Wynn's coat. He dragged her to the wide corridor's center, still growling, as more shadows shifted beyond the pillars.

More forms appeared in the dark. Another black translucent wolf stepped out across the corridor, and its rumble rolled around the stone walls. It lunged and snapped before Chap could dart into its way.

Sooty jaws passed straight through Wynn's ankle.

She screamed as frigid cold knifed deep into her bones.

Get up! Chap ordered.

He charged the shadow wolf, snapping his jaws over its muzzle- through its muzzle.

Chap's yelp echoed down the corridor as he lunged away with a shudder.

Wynn scrambled up, limping from the cold ache in her ankle. Smaller indistinct forms slithered in the dark around the white woman's leg-and she advanced.

Keep away from her!

Wynn retreated as Chap's warning filled her head.

The shadows came no closer. They only shifted behind the pillars as the white woman stepped slowly forward. Wynn and Chap backed along the corridor as she herded them.

Wynn barely noticed when the row of pillars ended and lost track of the twists and turns along the way. As they turned into a passage no wider than a common cottage, a shadow wolf appeared in their way.

The only path left was a doorless opening on the right, leading into a room. No one-and nothing-followed them inside. Chap whirled to block the entrance as Wynn slumped to the floor in chilled exhaustion.

The rest of the night was horrible for Magiere, listening to Leesil's tale of how she'd run off in her sleep and the others had gone looking for her.

"I told Wynn to stay!" he finished, and Sgaile's amber eyes echoed Leesil's frustration.

Neither of them blamed Magiere for Wynn getting lost. Indeed, they were both concerned for her state of mind. But it wasn't hard to see that each wrestled with heavy guilt.

Osha sat near the canvas, often peering out into the night. Once, Sgaile had to stop him from leaving on his own.

"Chap will find her!" Leesil said harshly. "But we won't find either of them in the dark. Chap will hole up with Wynn somewhere until morning and wait for us."

Osha just kept peering around the canvas' edge.

Magiere couldn't bear the sight and lowered her eyes. No matter what Leesil or Sgaile said, this was her fault.

Something had taken her in sleep, in dream, until she couldn't tell what was real anymore. She'd put everyone at further risk after dragging them into this world of snow and ice. For all Leesil's assurances, Wynn might not survive long enough for Chap to find her. The thought of continuing without Wynn made Magiere want to weep, but she couldn't.

"Don't let me sleep," she whispered.

Leesil glanced over with a puzzled expression. Sgaile lifted his head and then sighed-he knew what she meant.

"I can't…," Magiere whispered, biting down anger. "I can't take any more dreams. Not if I can't tell what's real anymore."

Her sheathed falchion was still leaning against the depression's back wall. She snatched it up and tossed it to Sgaile. He caught the blade with a look of puzzlement on his dark face.

"Don't give it back… unless I need it," she warned.

Before Leesil could explode, Magiere put her fingers over his lips.

"I remember… barely seeing Chap standing on me," she said. "The way he looked… he wouldn't have come at me, if I hadn't done something that scared him… unless you were in danger."

Leesil sighed sharply in anger. "I should keep your-"

"No," she cut in, and looked to Sgaile. "If I lose myself again, I might only recognize Leesil or Chap. Either way, I don't want them near me and carrying anything I might see as my own weapon, or I might try to take it and…"

Sgaile understood, and closed both hands tightly around the falchion's sheath. He nodded. Not his usual curt bob, but slow and slight and all too resolute.

Even Osha had turned to listen. The worried look on his long face suggested he understood most of her words.

"Magiere… the dagger?" Sgaile said softly.

She went cold, remembering she still carried it tucked in the back of her belt. If she'd thought of it out there in the dark, when Leesil and Chap came for her…

Magiere reached quickly around her back, but the blade wasn't there.

"It's under your pack," Leesil said.

Sgaile pivoted over on one knee, retrieving the white-metal blade. He held it out to Osha, and Magiere sat upright in alarm. Osha could not stop her if she wanted it.

"Better to divide your arms," Sgaile explained, "in case you try to come for them. I will keep your sword upon my back… for when you truly need it."

Osha took the long war dagger with a nod to Magiere, but his assurance didn't squelch her doubt. He slipped it into the back of his belt beneath his cloak.

Magiere slumped against the depression's wall, resting her head upon Leesil's shoulder. No one spoke, and morning was a long time coming.

Finally, Osha glanced back at everyone. His jaw clenched and his brow lined determinedly. He jerked the canvas aside.

The sky was tinted light gray, and the storm had died down.

"Yes," Sgaile said, rising.

Osha was out before the word finished.

Sgaile strapped the falchion over his back, its hilt rising above his left shoulder. Then he pointed to the depression's back.

"Take your new blades," he told Leesil.

Magiere clenched up, anticipating Leesil's angry denial, but she glanced where Sgaile pointed.

He had cut away the sheaths' bottom ends to make room for the gifted blades' longer tips. Halfway up each sheath's side, where the wings settled, were now small hollows to accommodate the half-circle bars that would brace outside of Leesil's forearms. Not the safest way to carry them, with those long points sticking out, but they were better than no sheaths at all.

To Magiere's relief, Leesil gathered them without a word.

She began to pack up and saw the metal circlet among her scant belongings. She hesitated and then slowly picked it up. She didn't want or need it but didn't care to leave it unattended. So she hung it around her neck over her wool pullover and hauberk, as this seemed the easiest way to carry it without a pack. Leesil watched her in puzzlement but didn't ask.

With everyone geared for speed, they stepped out to find Osha waiting anxiously.

"We together," Osha said in broken Belaskian. "No parting."

Leesil pointed up and left. "If Wynn tried to follow me and Chap, she'd have gone that way."

Osha took off in the lead.

The going was slow in the blizzard's fresh snowfall. Osha did his best to plow a path for everyone else to follow. After a while, Sgaile took his place, and Osha fell back to the rear of their line. Later, when Sgaile paused, bending to catch his breath, Leesil moved up to take over, but then he stood there a while, just looking about.

"Chap and I came this way," he said, pointing. "But I don't know how long or far Wynn followed before getting lost."

"Then head toward where you found me," Magiere suggested. "We'll call out from there. If Chap is anywhere nearby, he'll hear us."

Sgaile moved to the rear as Leesil pressed on. But when Magiere stepped forward, the first clear impression of what she'd felt the night before surfaced in her mind.

Running… the need to go higher… to climb straight up through the cragged mountainside.

She pushed that returning urge aside. Only the search for Wynn mattered.

When they reached the boxed gully where she'd been found, they turned aside onto other paths. Sunlight broke through the clouds now and then, making the white snow too bright. They searched until the sun crested the sky and began its downward path west, toward the peaks upslope.

Osha walked back along the base of an overhanging ridge.

"Wynn!" he called.

They kept in sight of each other as they spread out and began calling, but no one answered. Magiere returned to their central starting point as Leesil came jogging back, hopping across exposed rocks to avoid wading in the drifts.

"This is no good," he said. "We need to backtrack and look for a different path up. I don't think she made it this far."

Once the sun passed beyond the peaks above them, the slopes would be swallowed in false twilight by midafternoon. And they were no closer to finding Wynn and Chap.

Sgaile returned as well, but when Leesil repeated his suggestion, Osha spit an angry string of Elvish. Instead of a sharp rebuke, this time Sgaile only frowned and shook his head at the young elf. They all headed downward, still searching for side paths. Osha often ranged too far, forcing them to wait on him before they could move on.

A strange sensation flowed through Magiere, and she stopped.

"Here?" she said to herself, turning around.

Osha came running back to them from that same direction, his face flushed as he pointed back the way he'd come.

"Look!" he panted, waving them to follow.

They all trudged along through the broken snow of his path.

"Fork here," he said. "This way go your path"-and he tipped his chin at Leesil. "Wynn may follow other!"

Sgaile looked both ways separating around the point of a high-rising cliff. Even Leesil seemed doubtful and uncertain. Magiere studied the separate paths, but the one Osha chose made her feel warm inside.

Was it just the pull within her, playing on her again… or was it hunger?

No-there couldn't be an undead out here in broad daylight. And then the heat in Magiere turned sharply cold. Her stomach knotted as the chill spread.

"Yes," she whispered.

Magiere only realized she'd spoken aloud when Leesil stepped before her, watching her in wary concern. Osha's intense eyes were locked on her as well, and when she nodded slowly toward the path he'd chosen, he took off down the fork. Magiere lunged after him.

Leesil and Sgaile followed in silence. Magiere looked back once at Leesil's chest, but the amulet hanging over his coat wasn't glowing.

"What's wrong?" he demanded.

She didn't answer-didn't know how-and tugged him forward by the sleeve as she hurried to catch up with Osha. She was right on top of the young anmaglahk when they crested a snow-choked saddle and clambered down into yet another dead end.

"Magiere!" Leesil shouted, panting as he came up behind her. "Slow down!"

She hadn't slept or eaten since the night before. None of them had. Perhaps she just wasn't thinking right, and the spreading chill was nothing more than fatigue.

The world brightened sharply in her eyes.

Tears slid instantly down her cheeks. Her mouth began to ache as she spotted a tall, wide crack farther along the gully wall.

Leesil came around her side, and his eyes widened. She knew her irises had expanded and blackened.

"What is it?" he whispered, following her gaze along the gully wall.

Osha had already jogged ahead, but he came to a sudden halt. He stood there just short of the chute's opening, staring into it, and Sgaile appeared at Magiere's other side.

Nothing marred the snow, but Magiere knew the blizzard had covered what had happened in this place. Osha turned, looking back at them in anguish.

"It's blood," Magiere whispered to Leesil. "Just barely… I can smell it." Hkuan'duv sat in the tent as dawn broke.

"Greimasg'ah?" Danvarfij said hesitantly.

She crouched before the tent's opening, but he did not look up. He kept trying to understand what had happened in the night and the sudden deaths of Kurhkage and A'harhk'nis. This was no time to grieve or face his shame for leaving their bodies.

"Hkuan'duv!" Danvarfij insisted. "Sgailsheilleache's group is on the move, but they did not break camp. They may still search for the small human, but we must know for certain."

He breathed deeply, and she backed away as he crawled from the tent.

After his return and the tale of what had happened, she had acted as both night watch and scout while he rested. But like Hkuan'duv, she was keeping grief locked away until their purpose was fulfilled.

In truth, he had needed time alone, though it brought him no revelations. The white woman had taken two of his caste and disabled him-all before she could be struck even once. Her frail form was a deception, hiding startling speed and strength.

Hkuan'duv stood up, facing the white, rocky world around him. Wind and snowfall had ceased by dawn. He ran a hand through his short, spiky hair, secured his face wrap, and pulled up his hood. Without a word, he and Danvarfij slipped along the white landscape and crouched to peer at Sgailsheilleache's abandoned camp.

"When did they leave?" he finally asked.

"At first light."

He could not decide whether to wait or to follow their clear trail. "They must be searching for the small human and the majay-hi."

"Both were alive when you escaped?" she asked.

"Yes, but the majay-hi charged the… white woman. He could not have survived long, and the human would have died quickly after. We have only to wait until Sgailsheilleache discovers their bodies and returns to camp."

"And the bodies of our fallen," Danvarfij added. "Sgailsheilleache will know his caste is following him."

She was not blaming him for leaving their companions behind, but shame slipped past Hkuan'duv's guard just the same. It sickened him that he had left Kurhkage and A'harhk'nis where they lay, without even a hurried ceremonial call to the ancestors to come for their spirits.

"They were lost," Danvarfij said, "and you were not. I would have done the same."

"Your sympathy does not serve our purpose," he replied.

Greater concerns plagued him. Two more members of his caste now searched the land where this savage white woman ranged. Sgailsheilleache and Osha had no idea what was waiting up there. His first instinct was to warn them, but he could not do so without exposing his presence.

"Fulfilling our purpose will be more difficult," Danvarfij said. "A'harhk'nis was wilderness-wise, but so are you. Perhaps we should monitor the search?"

"Not yet," he said. "We wait. Whether they find the bodies or not, they have to return. There is no point in risking ourselves."

Danvarfij shifted closer beside Hkuan'duv to share warmth.

Wynn stirred, memories of the past night flooding back-the slaughtered anmaglahk, Chap falling as if dead, and the white woman with black hair. She sat up in panic, opening her eyes.

A dull orange glimmer dimly lit marred stone walls, but Wynn could not remember where she was.

I am here.

She spotted Chap across the room, staring out the entrance. Only remnants of hinges showed that there had once been a door.

The orange light came from a wide and shallow tripod brazier sitting on the stone floor to one side. It had not been there when she collapsed to the floor, but the brazier did not hold fire.

Instead, a pile of fist-sized crystals glowed like coals in its black iron depression. These filled the small room with more heat than light, raising the temperature above freezing.

"How long have I been asleep?" she asked.

Chap kept his gaze fixed outside of the opening. Day has come… I have seen traces of sunlight down the corridor outside.

Wynn's stomach rolled slightly at his words. Her right leg throbbed painfully, but she could feel her toes again. She crawled over to where Chap sat vigil, remembering translucent wolves, ravens, and swirling dark forms.

"Are they still out there?" she asked.

They appear and vanish… but they are there, always.

"What are they?" she whispered.

Chap remained silent for a long moment. Undead… though I have never heard of animals as such… let alone ones like shadow and yet not.

She rose up on her knees to peer over Chap. Nothing distinct met her gaze-but something like shifting soot moved in the dark spaces across the corridor outside.

"We are prisoners," she whispered. "But why does she keep us alive?"

Chap did not answer, and Wynn wondered where the white undead might be. She dug out the cold lamp crystal and rubbed it quickly.

The room was perhaps twelve by fourteen paces with no other openings. Its old stone walls seemed deeply marred in places by wild swirls of tangled scratches. A decayed desk near the back wall had collapsed on one side, and its slanted top had long ago spilled its contents on the floor. Iron brackets supporting shelves were mounted on the right wall, but the lowest wooden board lay in pieces on the floor amid scattered papers and books grown brittle and tattered with age.

"Where are we?"

Chap growled at the doorless opening but did not answer.

"Last night…," she said, "you kept looking, until you found me."

He turned his head and quickly licked her hand.

Wynn was thirsty, but she saw no sign of food or water. Then she spotted two small bottles among items near the broken desk. She crawled over and picked one up. Remnants of dried black stains flaked off its open mouth, and she realized it once had held ink. Quills lying in the mess were nothing but stems, the feathers rotted completely away.

"We're in an abandoned study," she said, and went to inspect the shelves.

A few books were so old that their covers were damaged with mold. They looked so weak and brittle she was afraid to pick one up.

Another shelf held rolls of rough wood-pulp paper and animal skins stripped clean of fur. She knew enough about old archives not to touch them just yet, lest they crumble and break in her hands. Down another shelf she found stacks of old bark with markings on their inner sides.

Other works were bound in sheaves between hardened slats of leather or roughly finished wood panels. One was sandwiched between what looked like scavenged squares of iron the size of a draught board.

"Chap… come and look at these."

Look to the walls first.

Wynn glanced at him, but he had not turned around. What would she want with decaying walls? She stepped closer, holding the crystal high.

The marks on the walls were not the etchings of age.

The crystal's light spilled over a mass of faded black writing. Patches of words, sentences, and strange symbols covered the stones. They ran in wild courses, sometimes overlapping and tangling in each other. Wynn tried to trace one long phrase.

It might have been a sentence, if she could have read it-but it seemed to go on without end. And the words were not all in the same language. Even the symbol sets differed, and some had faded, becoming illegible.

One word was composed of Heiltak letters, a forerunner of Wynn's native Numanese, but the letters were used to spell out words in a different tongue, one that she did not recognize. A piece of old Sumanese was followed by an unknown ideogram, and then a set of odd strokes tangled with short marks. She found one possible Dwarvish rune, but it was so worn she could not be certain.

The passages were in scattered patches, as if the author had run out of paper or hide, or anything else to write upon. Over time, driven by some desperation, this disjointed and manic record had been made on any surface available. But what had the author used for ink that would adhere to stone for so long?

Wynn shifted back, until all the lines and marks became tangled chaos.

Like reading madness itself recorded on forgotten walls.

Now… look next to the archway.

Chap's words startled her. Obviously he had been nosing about before she awoke. Stepping toward the doorless opening, she found a column of single… words? It seemed so, though again the languages and symbol sets varied.

The highest lines were too faded, as if the words had been rewritten in a downward progression over many years or decades. Midway to the floor, Wynn recognized what seemed to be ancient Elvish by its accent marks, written in the rare edan script. Further on was more roughly scripted old Sumanese. Near the bottom, almost to the floor was… was it some form of Belaskian?

And each line was only one word.

The symbols differed, yet they always recorded two syllables or sounds.

"Li… kun…," she sounded out, and glanced at Chap. "Do you know this term?"

More than a word, I think…

Wynn studied the repeating column of the word. "A name?"

Chap slowly turned his head. He scanned the column once before looking back out into the dim corridor.

I think it is her.

Wynn gazed out the archway, suddenly fearful that the white woman might appear as if called.

"If those shadow animals have not entered by now, perhaps they will not."

No, they only keep us in. Chap stood up and padded across the room, studying the walls. Can you read any of it?

"Not truly. I know some of the languages, and some of the symbol sets are familiar. But many do not match the language they are used for."

She rubbed the crystal harder, and held it close to the patch beside the shelves.

"Old pre-Numanese tongues… and edan, an older Elvish system," she whispered.

Can you read it? Chap repeated, his tone impatient in her head.

"I told you no!" Wynn answered, but her brief anger was born of fright. "All I can make out is gibberish… between words that have already faded."

Try another wall.

She looked about and spotted smaller writings above the desk's remains. As she crossed, she tried not to step on the old parchments stuck to the floor by years of dried humidity. Holding the crystal close, she traced lines of marks, careful not to touch them.

"This word… looks like tribal Iyindu-old Sumanese-and part of it is in the correct letters."

What does it say?

"Give me a moment!" Wynn snapped. "It is nearly a dead dialect."

She struggled to sound it out in her head. The middle characters were too faint. She sighed in frustration. But the beginning and end caught in her mind, and the sound was familiar somehow. She thought she remembered it written somewhere else in other letters.

Wynn hurried back to rescan the tangled passage beside the shelves. She came to one word written in edan-Elvish, but it spelled out the same beginning and ending as the Iyindu-Sumanese-and its middle was clear to read.

"Il'Samar!" Wynn whispered.

What? Chap shoved in beside her. Where do you see this?

Wynn pointed.

"Samar" was obscure, meaning something like "conversation in the dark." And "il" was a common prefix for a proper noun, sometimes used for titles as well as predecessors in a person's lineage. The old necromancer Ubad had cried out this name as Magiere and Chap closed in upon him in Droevinka.

Wynn hurried back to the wall above the desk, forgetting to watch her footing, and brittle parchment shredded beneath her feet.

Now she understood the word with the faded middle, and she went over and over that sentence, trying to pick out more, but it was so badly worn.

" 'Guardian'… no, 'guardians for'… something that is 'unmaking'… and then il'Samar."

Wynn slumped in exasperation.

"That is all I can follow. Is she… this woman, one of these? Welstiel spoke of ancient ones guarding whatever treasure he sought. By the look of her, she is undead, but that would mean…"

All the wall writings appeared to be in the same hand, though Wynn was not certain, considering the rough surface. But she had read mention of more than one "guardian."

She scanned among the shelves' contents, finally reaching for the bottom iron-bound sheaf, which looked relatively sound. It weighed more than she expected, and she knelt awkwardly, trying to set it down. The old leather binding strap had turned as hard as wood.

"Bite this open for me."

Chap began gnawing the hardened hide strip. What are you looking for?

"Other writing… in other hands."

The leather tie cracked in Chap's teeth, and Wynn lifted the top iron plate with effort.

The inner sheets were made from squared hide stretched thin and had withstood time better than parchment or paper. They were now as hard as bone, and their inked lettering was difficult to read on the dark squares. Wynn lifted multiple sheets at once, watching for changes in handwriting.

And she saw them.

At least three different people had recorded entire pages in this volume. Unlike the wall writings, these passages were coherently scripted in one matching language and letter system at a time. How old was this sheaf?

"There are other guardians," she whispered, growing frightened again. "Perhaps two or three. How long have they been here?"

No… she is now the only one.

Wynn raised her eyes. "We have seen no more than the corridor and this room. But at least three different hands have written these pages."

I sense only her… I cannot even sense her shadow servants… only her.

Wynn glanced toward the archway, and then to the mad writing surrounding this old, decayed room.

She has been alone… for longer than we can measure. And even before the others were gone… I would guess she has been here since…

"Since the war," Wynn finished in a whisper. "Since the Forgotten History and the war that erased it."

Wynn shivered in her coat, though the room was nearly warm from the brazier's strange crystals.

How many languages can you read?

She squinted, making a mental count. "Well, my own tongue, Numanese, and some of its earlier predecessors… um… classical Stravinan, Belaskian of course, and the Begaine syllabary of my guild… general Dwarvish and one of its formal variants… Elvish-modern and ancient scripts, including the edan, though I have not fully grasped the variation used by the an'Croan. Some Sumanese, but not much of its older derivations or the desert-"

Wynn! Chap lowered his head, snout pointing to the hide pages. What is written here?

She held the crystal closer. "This page is very old Sumanese-Iyindu, I think-and the handwriting does not match what is written on the walls. I learned a bit of the modern dialect, but I have little grasp of the lesser-known desert dialects."

Wynn placed a hand on Chap's shoulder. "The passages are not signed, but this one mentions a name. 'Volyno, in the past tense, so I would guess he was no longer present when it was written. Wait… here is another… a Sumanese name-'Has'saun. Perhaps the author of this passage, but I could be mistaken."

She sat back, lowering the crystal into her lap, and Chap huffed, wrinkling his snout in frustration. A flicker in the archway drew their attention.

The translucent outline of a shadow wolf showed against the lighter dark in the corridor. The entire animal was soot black, even its eyes. All thoughts of language fled from Wynn's mind.

The wolf remained in the doorway, but something pale approached behind it-and walked straight through the beast into the small chamber.

Wynn clutched the fur between Chap's shoulders at the sight of their returned captor.

Slender as a willow and barely taller than Wynn herself, the woman's white body was lightly tinged with orange from the brazier's glow. Shining hair hung like wild black corn silk across her shoulders and down over her small breasts. And where Wynn had sometimes seen a trace of brown in Chane's eyes, she now looked into irises like hard quartz. Even the woman's small mouth was as pale and colorless as her skin.

Wynn's gaze caught on the tips of metal around her neck. They peeked out through the separation of her hair.

"Chap, those knobs and the metal," Wynn whispered. "It looks just like Magiere's thorhk."

The woman lunged a step at these words, and Wynn ducked behind Chap as he rumbled in warning.

The deceptively frail undead stared at Wynn. She traced her own lips with narrow fingertips, never looking at Chap. Then her gaze dropped to the pile of hide sheets opened on the floor.

Her strangely shaped eyes narrowed, and her lips parted in a silent snarl over clenched teeth. She began to shake as her fingers hooked like claws.

Say the name! Chap shouted into Wynn's head. Her name!

Wynn floundered in panic, not knowing what he meant.

From the column of words beside the door!

"Li… kun…," Wynn whispered.

The woman froze, and her feral expression softened.

Wynn tried to find her voice. "Li-kun!"

The woman's eyes opened fully. Confusion washed anger from her face.

Her gaze flitted over the walls, wandering among patches of black scribbles, until she appeared to grow dizzy and stumbled. When she turned fully around, her back to Wynn, she stopped-and threw herself at the wall beside the door.

She crumpled, her delicate hands dragging down the column of a name written so many times. When she reached the floor, she twisted about to squat with her knees pulled up against her bare chest.

Do not move, Chap warned. Do nothing to disturb her for the moment.

Wynn flinched as the woman began weakly hammering at her head with limp fists, like someone trying to dislodge a forgotten memory. She sucked in air over and over. But undead did not need to breathe, and the corners of her mouth kept twisting, stretching.

Was she trying to speak? If so, her voice did not come.

"Volyno?" Wynn whispered. "Has'saun?"

Enough! Chap warned.

Strands of black hair tangled over the woman's face as she lowered her head. Her crystal irises fixed upon Wynn.

In their frightening depths, Wynn saw anguished hunger for… something.

Chap remained poised before Wynn.

In this castle of Magiere's dreams, he had hoped to learn more concerning what memories the Fay had stolen from him, and why they had done so. He also believed he might find answers to questions concerning Leesil and Magiere, and their future-and the forgotten conflict and an enemy of many names.

Now all he could do was watch this ancient monster crumple into her insanity.

This place was old-older perhaps than any stronghold in the world. He felt how devoid of life these walls had been for centuries or longer. And this white thing might be older still.

No longer trying to speak, the woman watched Wynn.

Your voice… spoken words shocked her, he told Wynn. Perhaps that is why she did not kill you.

Wynn looked down at him.

He was only guessing, and yet he loathed the notion of dipping into the crazed thing's memories.

She has been alone for so long that she had forgotten the sound of words. It seems she knows only what is written.

Wynn's face brushed his ear as she whispered, "What now?"

Talk to her… and I will try to catch any of her memories.

"Are you sure?"

Do it… while she remains sedate.

Wynn inched forward on her knees and pointed to herself.

"Wynn," she said. "And you are… Li-kun?"

The woman tilted her head like a crow, or perhaps more like a hawk.

Chap cautiously slipped into her mind. He saw nothing, as if she had no memories at all to rise in her thoughts.

Try the other names again.

"Who is Volyno… or Has'saun?"

At the second name, a wild barrage of broken images erupted in the woman's head.

Flickering white faces passed among other sights-cold peaks, an endless desert, a cowering goblin hammering at stone, massive iron doors, a pale headless corpse on a stone floor… the maelstrom made Chap sick.

Her name… again!

Wynn pointed to the woman. "Li-kun… is this your name?"

The woman's mouth gaped. She lunged forward onto all fours, and her black hair dangled with stray ends brushing the floor. A hoarse rasp issued from her throat. Something in the sound mimicked the way Wynn had pronounced the name.

"Li'kan?" Wynn tried, altering her pronunciation.

The undead studied the sage in fascination and crept forward across the floor.

Chap shifted, ready to lunge into the woman's face, but she slowed, hesitating. She lifted one hand and reached out to Wynn. Chap trembled.

The undead stretched out one narrow finger, the digit slipping through the side of Wynn's wispy brown hair.

To the sage's credit, she did not flinch, remaining frozen in place- even as the finger pulled down over her lips. When it passed her chin and retracted, Wynn swallowed hard and turned toward the wall beside the shelves.

"Are these your writings?"

Calm sanity vanished once more from Li'kan's face.

She clutched her own arms, scratching herself with hardened white nails. The wounds closed so quickly that barely any black fluids seeped out. Harsh, rapid hisses poured from her throat. But no matter how fast her small mouth moved, her voice would not come. Chap could not make out what she tried to say.

Li'kan thrashed in frustration, turning circles on all fours like a dog.

Wynn shrank back, but Chap stood his ground.

He feared the undead no longer possessed real memories, or that after so long alone, they had faded beyond her mind's reach.

Chap steeled himself and slipped again into Li'kan's mind.

Wild blurs of images, lacking any sound, passed through a mind that was no longer rational. Then a flash of something massive, with coils of black scales, rolled and slid in a dark place. Behind it, he saw a brief glimpse of natural stone, as in an underground space. Then the image vanished, replaced by one of Chap himself.

No, a large wolf-but it had the strange crystal sky-blue eyes of a majay-hi.

An ancestor of the breed from long ago, exactly like those Chap had seen in Most Aged Father's memory. Li'kan remembered one of the original born-Fay, who had come into the world during the forgotten war.

"Il… sa… mar…," she rasped, and then her grating hiss trailed on.

Il'Samar-the only word of her voiceless gibberish that Chap could catch.

Why would she think of born-Fay-or any Fay-and then the enemy of many names?

Chap recoiled, pulling from the undead's mind, but he still wondered that she had no memory of anyone speaking-until Wynn.

Li'kan, this walking shell of death, could write, though not coherently. But spoken language had been lost to her for so long that she had forgotten even the sound of her own name.

Magiere felt an undead's presence all around her, but not like ever before. It seeped from the rocks and snow and air, with no origin she could fix upon-and the pull within her pressed her to go on, upward.

She smelled blood in the cold air's light breeze.

Osha leaned into the black space in the cliff's wall and cried out, "Sgailsheilleache!"

Sgaile ran past Magiere. She took off on his heels with Leesil close behind. Before they reached Osha, he collapsed, his knees sinking in the snow.

A rocky chute rose up through the gully's stone wall, and at its bottom lay a still form slumped against one side.

"Kurhkage!" Sgaile whispered.

The corpse of the tall elf had only scar tissue for one eye, and the other was still open wide. A light scattering of snow had collected on his tan face, and a white cloth partially covered his open green-gray cloak. But the chest of his tunic was dark with frozen blood around a gaping hole where the ends of shattered ribs protruded.

Leesil hissed something under his breath, and Magiere spun about.

He'd stopped short on the gully's open floor, and the trail he'd broken in the snow ended where he stood. But something more had rolled ahead of his feet, something that he'd accidentally kicked from under the snowfall.

Blood on the head's ragged neck stump had frozen into red ice crust from the clinging snow.

"A'harhk'nis!" Sgaile exhaled the name and shook his head in disbelief.

"How?" Osha moaned, and then slipped into Elvish.

Sgaile weakly waved him into silence.

Magiere barely noted their shock and grief. She was too focused on keeping her dhampir half from rising. If she went near Sgaile, she'd try to force answers from him. Why were other anmaglahk in these mountains, so close to her destination?

Leesil joined Sgaile, and his expression was hard to read. "You knew them?"

"Yes," Sgaile whispered. "Kurhkage spoke for Osha when he first requested acceptance to our caste."

Osha stared at the corpse's one eye and didn't blink until his own eyes began to water.

"What were they doing up here?" Leesil demanded.

The low threat in his voice made Magiere's own anger quicken. Shock faded from Sgaile's face, replaced by wariness.

"I do not know."

"Then guess!" Leesil snapped. "How is this connected to us?"

Sgaile turned on him. "What are you suggesting?"

Leesil didn't answer. He just stood there, glancing back at the head lying in the snow.

The scent of blood sharpened in Magiere's nostrils.

"I swear, I do not know," Sgaile insisted and looked away. "I know nothing of this. Kurhkage's hands… he did not even pull a weapon."

Leesil pushed past Osha and crouched before the dead anmaglahk.

Magiere's eyes fixed on the head. Its face, half-covered in clinging snow, still held a frozen hint of outrage.

"Could there be more?" Leesil asked, though he sounded far away in Magiere's ears.

"No," Osha answered in Belaskian. "Our caste not leave them… perform rites for dead. We do it now."

Leesil's voice grew louder. "Not until we find Wynn and Chap!"

Magiere scanned the snow-filled gully. Not far back she spotted a long oblong mound.

She knew the headless body must lie there beneath the snow, and she crouched to pick up the head. Frozen hair crackled in her hands.

"Magiere?" Leesil called.

"What is she doing?" Sgaile asked, voice rising in alarm.

Something she had not done since Bela, and the hunt for an undead who had been murdering nobles. Holding a dead girl's dress, she had accidentally stumbled into Welstiel's footsteps, where he had torn open the girl's throat upon her own doorstep.

Two dead anmaglahk lay here, and she sensed a Noble Dead like no other she'd come across. Instinct and blood told her in part what had happened. And Chap and Wynn were still missing.

Magiere cringed at what she might learn-see-through the undead's eyes by touching its victim. But she had to know. She had to-

"Magiere!" Leesil shouted. "Don't!"

Darkness and the previous night's blizzard swallowed Magiere's world.

She looked down upon an anmaglahk pinned in the snow between her narrow white thighs. Before he swung a long curved blade, she grabbed his face. Her white fingers slid up into his hair as she drove her teeth into his throat.

Skin, muscle, and tendons tore between her jaws. Blood flooded her mouth and seeped into her throat. She arched, whipping her torso back as she tore his head free, and stared at another bloody mass clutched in her other hand.

She felt no hunger to feed upon his life. She was already glutted, constantly fed by something she couldn't see. And suddenly, claws bit into her bare back.

Magiere whirled to find Chap snarling, with hackles raised and teeth bared. He harried her until she backhanded him. Part of Magiere shriveled inside as his body hit the gully wall and slumped motionless into the deep snow.

She wanted to scream. She wanted to run to him.

The small white body she existed within turned toward a figure standing in the chute's opening.

Magiere tried to stop herself, but her delicate white hand latched around Wynn's throat. And then she cringed and shrank away at the sound of Wynn's cry.

She didn't know why the words hurt her, frightened her… and then made her hungry to hear more of them. She ran up through the chute with Wynn gripped in her hand, and Chap's scrambling paws fading behind her.

She crested the chute's top, and something hammered the side of her face.

Hunger erupted in Magiere's belly.

She tumbled back in the snow as someone slapped the frozen head from her hand. Her jaw ached but not from her sharpening teeth. She tasted blood-real blood-

"What are you doing?" Leesil's voice cracked with hysteria. "You think dreams are the only things that mess with your head?"

He crouched over her, one hand pinning her chest and the other still clenched into a fist. Rather than anger, blind panic filled his amber eyes.

Magiere's eyes began to burn. The sky around him was brilliant, but not as bright as his hair around his tan face.

She grabbed the front of his coat, pulling herself up.

"Your eyes…," Leesil whispered, "they're almost pure black!"

Sgaile and Osha stood behind him, wary hardness and fright plain on their faces.

Magiere wanted only to run for the chute.

Resisting the pull within her no longer mattered. It now led to Wynn and Chap-and the creature who had taken them. All her drives led upward. She gripped Leesil's jacket with both hands, tears running from her burning eyes.

"Have… to… go," she snarled, barely understanding her own mangled words. "Now… to Wynn… and Chap."

"What is happening to her?" Sgaile demanded.

Leesil settled his hands on her cheeks, holding her face, and she dropped her forehead against his chest.

She still felt as if she were constantly being fed, as when she'd been inside the monster who had slaughtered these anmaglahk. But it didn't sate her body. She clenched her fingers so tightly they ground upon the rings of Leesil's hauberk beneath his coat.

"Please," she whispered.

"Go," he answered.

Magiere lunged around him, bolting straight for the chute. Sgaile ducked out of her way, but Osha froze. She slammed him aside with her palm and drove up the rock path, fingers clawing the stone walls she climbed.

Somewhere behind her, Leesil shouted, "Follow! And don't lose sight of her! She knows where Wynn and Chap have gone."