Bookworm III (13 page)

The Witch-King had to be behind everything, she was sure. Vlad Deferens would never have sat on the Golden Throne unless he’d
known
it was safe – and only the Witch-King could have ensured he knew. And then, Deferens hadn’t surrounded himself with naked and submissive women, in the belief that it was all they were good for, but had put them to work. Elaine had never thought she would see the day when
not
acting like a misogynist would seem a bad sign, yet it was now. It spoke of someone else pulling the strings, keeping his eye on the prize. And who knew what the Witch-King really wanted ...?

How does he do it?
she asked herself, not for the first time.
How does he influence so many at such a distance
?

The thought had nagged at her mind ever since she’d first deduced his existence. There was no shortage of compulsion spells; some blunt tools that could be resisted, while others were so subtle that few could realise they had ever been influenced at all. And yet, they all required someone to either cast the spell directly or leave the spell hidden for the victim to find and activate. The idea of long-range control was unthinkable ... and if it was some form of long-distance control, the Witch-King should have won by now. There was something about the method that made it work, but added limits. But what was it?

He left a book for some of his slaves to find
, she thought. Some of the spells in it had been nasty, others might have tilted the user towards insanity, weakening their defences.
But how did he get it into their hands?

She sensed the spell holding her rubbing against her defences, just long enough to bring her mind back to the here and now. Cursing mentally, she tightened her defences once again, then opened her eyes and looked around the chamber. There was nothing she could use, either to escape or to kill herself. The only option for the latter was a spell that caused instant brain death, leaving her thoughts so fragmented that no one, not even a necromancer, could summon her ghost back from the realm of the dead. But would she be able to shape and cast it before the compulsion spell overwhelmed her? The timing would be very fraught. She couldn’t afford even the smallest mistake.

Despair threatened to overwhelm her as she stood and started to pace, testing the limits of her bonds again and again. There was no hope of escape unless she broke the spell, yet the mere act of
trying
to break the spell was dangerous in itself ... her thoughts raced around, time and time again, going back to the simple point that there was no other way out. But would she have the time to break the spell?

And then she felt a presence pushing up against her mind. No,
inside
her mind. She almost panicked, then reached out, understanding in sudden wonder that the apprenticeship bond was finally working. Johan’s mind was touching hers, a level of intimacy she hadn’t enjoyed with anyone, even her first lover. The mere touch sent her reeling; hastily, she checked and rechecked her defences, then tried to send a thought back down the link. But there was no sense Johan had heard her.

Concentrate
, she told herself, firmly. It had been years since she’d had any classes in mental communication – the bond should have formed naturally, if it had been normal – but she knew the basics.
Focus your mind.

She gritted her teeth. Johan hadn’t broken her defences. The bond was already present within her mind, allowing Johan to contact her. All she had to do –
all
– was make contact in return. She held her defences in place with part of her mind, then reached through the bond with the rest of her attention. There was a flurry of confusing images – Daria in wolf form, Daria naked as the day she was born, a blonde-haired girl who looked oddly familiar – and then an overwhelming sense of him pressing his mind against hers. She shrank back from the contact – it wasn’t painful, but it was powerful – and tried to warn him to moderate his voice. The barrage of thoughts were coming at her so fast she couldn’t separate them out into individual, understandable concepts.

“Slow down,” she said, or thought. She honestly wasn’t sure. Some of the books in her head insisted that some mentalists preferred to vocalise their thoughts, but she was all-too-aware that someone might be spying on the holding cell. “I can’t understand you.”

The jabbering grew louder for a long moment, then faded. “Elaine,” Johan said. She heard his voice in her mind. “Where are you?”

“In the Imperial Palace, a prisoner,” Elaine muttered, too low for anyone to overhear. It was important to get that piece of information out first, although she wasn’t sure what Johan could do with it. At least he would know to remain hidden. “How did you make contact with me?”

“There’s an Inquisitor – ex-Inquisitor – here,” Johan said. “She boosted the link.”

Elaine felt a sudden flush of overwhelming
pride
. She had never thought of asking another magician to help, if only because it would have exposed her thoughts – and Johan’s – to outside scrutiny. Her mental privacy had been important to her even before she’d absorbed the contents of the Great Library. It had been the only privacy she’d enjoyed at the orphanage, then at the Peerless School. The idea of private rooms had been laughable.

But Johan, who had been abused far worse than her, had opened his mind to another, just to contact Elaine.

“Then you need to listen,” Elaine said. She briefly outlined the spell holding her and what she’d done to hold it back. “You have to break the link completely.”

“No,” Johan said. “I won’t.”

There was a sudden sense of ...
expansion
, as a third person joined the conversation. “I know the spell,” Cass said. The sense of her identity flooded through Elaine’s mind as she spoke, bringing with it an awareness of power and confidence that left her feeling envious and afraid at the same time. “It’s astonishing you’ve held out as long as you have.”

Johan coughed. “Why?”

“The spell is known only to Inquisitors,” Cass explained. “Unlike most compulsion spells, it absorbs magic and strengthens itself by attacking the target’s defences. The standard response to any compulsion spell will merely make the spell stronger, while it burns through the victim’s mind. It isn’t used unless you don’t care about your target walking away with real damage. Even the merest use of the spell can leave someone in deep trouble.”

She paused. “Elaine has held out very well.”

“Not well enough,” Elaine said. She knew something about escaping ordinary compulsion spells – Millicent had given her more than enough practice, while they’d been at school together – but this was different. “My body is under their control.”

“That sounds like a bad romance novel,” Cass observed flippantly. “Or a line from a worse play.”

Elaine tried to bite down on the anger surging through her mind. Emotion, no matter the cause, would only weaken her defences. Cass was right; there were no shortage of plays about women – and sometimes men – who had married someone they hated, merely to carry on the family line. The heroines always talked about surrendering their bodies, but never their minds. Elaine had always hated those plays with a white-hot passion.

Johan tried to pour oil on troubled waters. “Can you break the spell?”

“Not from here,” Cass said. “I’d have to do it in person and ... and there would be no guarantee it wouldn’t leave traces in her mind.”

Elaine shuddered, knowing that both of them would feel her horror. There was no shortage of people who took damage from using the wrong kind of spell. Light Spinner, as horrific as it seemed, had maintained her sanity. Others had gone mad, or lost their confidence, or simply killed themselves as soon as they could. Who knew what
this
spell would do to her if it had enough time to leave its hooks in her mind?

“Then we have to rescue her,” Johan said. “Is there a way into the Imperial Palace?”

“A couple,” Cass said. “But we shouldn’t be talking about them through the bond.”

“She needs to know we’re coming for her,” Johan said. “We should tell her ...”

“No,” Elaine said. She was touched – more than touched – by Johan’s loyalty. Even if she had been the first person to treat him with a modicum of human decency, his loyalty was still astonishing. Or perhaps it was a function of their bond. “What I know, they can make me tell.”

“She’s right,” Cass said. “The more that damned spell tightens its grip on her mind, the more they can control her and force her to talk.”

Johan’s horror was easy to feel through the link, but he held his peace.

“We will come,” Cass said. “I promise. The city may be under occupation, but we will have a way through if we’re careful.”

“I may have to try to remove the spell earlier,” Elaine warned. “If it starts to break through my innermost defences, I won’t have a choice.”

“I understand,” Cass said. “Just be careful.”

The link broke. Elaine staggered as the presences withdrew from her mind, leaving her completely alone. For a moment, she almost started to cry, knowing that they were gone. And then she gathered herself and held back the tidal wave of despair. She wasn’t alone, not really. Her friends were on their way.

But it might be a trap ...

She cursed herself for not considering the possibility while she was in contact with Johan and Cass. Light Spinner had told the Privy Council that Johan was dead, but Dread might well know better. Elaine had lied to his face, but Dread was good at sniffing out lies ... and he was an Inquisitor, his loyalty sworn to the Golden Throne. If Deferens asked, Dread would have no choice but to admit that Johan was still alive. And then Deferens would set a trap.

Had Deferens thought to ask? There was no way to know. She hastily reviewed all the knowledge in her head on Inquisitor oaths, but it wasn’t clear if Dread would feel compelled to volunteer the information or not. They were sworn to uphold the Throne, she knew, yet Dread had never liked Deferens. He could do precisely as he was told, without volunteering any information he wasn’t specifically asked to volunteer. She knew Dread well enough to know he might well try to keep it to himself ...

... And yet, there was still no way to know.

She cursed under her breath, then closed her eyes and started to concentrate on strengthening her defences once again. The spell hadn’t remained dormant; it had taken advantage of her distraction to start breaking through wards that should have stopped any normal spell in its tracks. Elaine shuddered in horror, then rebuilt her defences once again, knowing she was fast running out of magic. Indeed, if she hadn’t known how to angle her defences just right, she would be overwhelmed by now. But it was only a matter of time.

No wonder Deferens didn’t bother to try to force me to swear an oath
, she thought, savagely. He – and his master – had been stung by Elaine before. They probably preferred her to be a useless vegetable, a repository of knowledge, rather than a thinking human being. She would be so useful to them, without the intelligence or willpower to seek loopholes in their command and use them as a weapon, or just a way to escape.
The bastard wants me ruined completely
.

She opened her eyes, then started to pace the room again. Cass wouldn’t have hesitated, she was sure; Cass would have jumped right into the spell, counting on her prowess with magic to ensure that nothing went seriously wrong.
Elaine
knew she was skilled, yet she also knew just how many things could go wrong. She cursed the spell’s inventor, once again, as she stopped in front of the mirror and eyed her reflection. There was no disputing the fact she looked a mess. Her hair was sweaty and damp, while her face was pale and her eyes were sleepless. The glamour that concealed her eyes had vanished, leaving red light glaring out of her face. She yawned, as if the sight had reminded her that she really needed some sleep, but she knew she couldn’t allow herself to rest. When she opened her eyes, her free will would be gone.

There’s no more time to waste
, she thought, as she walked back to the sofa, stopping just before she sat down. Instead, she knelt down on the floor, feeling her body ache in protest as she rocked back on her haunches. It was uncomfortable, which would keep her from falling asleep before she had finished, one way or the other.
I have to get rid of the spell now
.

She focused her mind, pushing aside all thoughts of Johan, Daria or any of the handful of other friends she had made along the way. There weren’t many; she had never been a sociable person, and the isolation had only been made worse by her being Millicent’s favourite victim at the Peerless School. It was funny, she reflected savagely, just how many of her old acquaintances had come crawling out of the woodwork when she’d been appointed to the Privy Council. They had all believed she could help their careers with a single word. And instead, she’d told them to go away.

But now ... she half-wished she’d done more with her life. Daria had tried to take her out dancing – and she had met a few men – but none of them had stayed. Perhaps there was something wrong with her; Daria had a different man every day, while Elaine had half-hoped for a true love she suspected she wasn’t going to find. The red light in her eyes would see to that, she knew all too well. Even a mundane would find them more than a little creepy.

You’re not going to die
, she told herself firmly, as she gathered what remained of her strength.
You’re going to live
.

And then she closed her eyes, undid her defences and plunged into the maelstrom surrounding her mind.

Chapter Eleven

“You actually have a way into the Imperial Palace?”

“Several, actually,” Cass answered. “Unfortunately, most of them require an Inquisitor’s Ring.”

Johan rubbed his forehead. His head was pounding and he wanted nothing more than to go and lie down, but Elaine needed him. “And is there a way in we can use?”

“Of course,” Cass said. “You just need to be careful.”

Daria leant forward. “And you know where to find it?”

“Yes,” Cass said.