Wild Magic

› › ‹ ‹

The house under the Iron Bridge was squat and derelict, its thick mud bricks crumbling, the wooden shutters discolored with age and sealed to the frames as if both shutters and frames had turned to stone.

“Careful,” Faan whispered. “Don’t touch iron, not even with your sleeve.” Avoiding the latticed metal, support of the Bridge creaking and groaning overhead, she followed the pinpoint light of the Wild Magic willawis around the building to the back where a door sagged on one hinge.

The house smelled of dust and dead moss, most of all of age, yet the inner walls were in much better shape than the outside, almost as if the crumbling were a kind of camouflage.

Reyna lay naked in a small room near the front of the house, smeared with his own wastes, his body contorted, all the major bones broken, his long slender hands swollen and shapeless, his face sliced into a horror that wasn’t remotely human. In the faint bluish light of the willawis, Faan looked down at him. “Vema,” she said. “That’s that.” She stepped aside so Panote and Charou could get at him.

Faces impassive, the two men lifted Reyna as gently as they could and laid him on the litter without trying to straighten his limbs. Panote tossed an end of the sheet to Charou and they laid the clean linen over him. Panote straightened. “Has to be the Wood Bridge?”

“Diyo.”

As soon as they were out of the house, she sent the willawis away and ran ahead of the men.

Faan stood with her arms folded as Panote and Charou set the litter on the tiles in front of the altar. It was very late by now, long past moonset, and not a breath of air was stirring, even up here. Sound was oddly muffled, as if the heat were layers of felt. She shut her eyes a moment, closed her hands about.the edge of the altar. The price was her soul, her life. She had no choice. None. Reyna… no… best not to think of him. “Pan, go wake the Kassian and tell her to bring candles. lb11 her about Reyna. Tb11 her there’s a bargain I need to make. Then if you want, you can go back to bed.”

“Would it make trouble if I came?”

“Nayo, my friend.” She swallowed. “It won’t be pleasant, I think. Ahsan, Charou, I bless you for your help, but go now. Please.”