Obsidian Ridge (12 page)

“Do you think I would invite you into my private chambers if I did?”

She shook her head. “No. I do not think you would.” Turning away from the king, she strolled to the other side of the room—to the other doors that led out to the private terrace. Throwing them open, she looked out at the forest and the roads beyond, leading south.

Korox watched her as she moved. “But now I have a question for you.”

“And what is that?”

“Do you think it is too soon?”

The senator looked back at the king. “Too soon for what?”

“Too soon for us?” he said. “The queen has been gone for less than a year. I don’t wish to betray her memory.”

“I think the queen would not want you to be alone,” replied JDivian. “I like to think she would approve—that she would have picked me to look after you in the event of her death.”

“Do I really need that much looking after?” he said, chuckling.

The senator turned back to the view, nodding. “Oh yes. More than you know.”

The king came up behind and placed his arms around her. “From here you can’t even see the Obsidian Ridge. If only this were the case in every window of the palace.”

“Have you thought about what you are going to do?” she asked. “When you find Princess Mariko?”

The king sighed. “You mean if I find Princess Mariko,” he said. “It’s been two days, and still not a sign of her.”

The senator continued to look out at the view, talking

over her shoulder. “Either way, if you’re not going to give this Magus Xeries what he wants, then we need to prepare our alternatives.” She turned around.

“And what do you think those are?” He curled up his fist, unfurling one finger. “Fight? Our army is useless against such a foe.” He unfurled a second. “Flee? The evacuation plans are progressing as fast as they can. Still, I’m not even Sure we can move everyone far enough away to avoid his wrath.” The king lifted a third finger. “We’ve already tried negotiating.” He threw both hands in the air. “What else is there?”

“Magic,” she replied.

The king shook his head. “We don’t even know the true extent of this man’s power yet. For all we know, he’s not even cast his first spell.”

“Perhaps,” she replied. “But I’ve been thinking. What if all of this is just parlor tricks meant to scare us into submission?”

The king gave her a forced smiled. “I know what you are trying to do.” He touched Divian on the shoulder and let his fingers slide down her arm. “But while downplaying the power of the Obsidian Ridge may comfort me in the short term, the simple fact of the matter is that we both know Xeries means what he says. You yourself said there are powerful wards protecting the black mountain from magical spying and infiltration. If you can’t break through, then I’m afraid there is no one in Erlkazar who can.”

Divian squeezed his hand, trying to smile back. “Yes, there is powerful magic surrounding that place. But what we do not know is if Xeries put them there himself, or if they are the result of artifacts he possesses.”

The king tilted his head. “Even so, just to possess such things must mean he has some power. At the very least he is tremendously resourceful.”

“True,” said Divian. “But so far, all we’ve seen him do is make a stone obelisk appear out of thin air. An apprentice wizard could do that.”

The king shook his head. “Divian, you can give up on this now. Your effort is appreciated, but I know you don’t believe that. It would be foolish to underestimate this man—if he is indeed a man—after what we saw happen to that unit of soldiers. And you are not fool.”

“I am just worried about you. That’s all,” she replied. “Even kings need hope.”

“Yes, we do. And I thank you for recognizing that,” replied Korox. “But to muster enough magical force to drive Xeries out of here, even if he isn’t as powerful as we think… it would require us to gather nearly every mage in Llorbauth, and then some. We’d be dealing with magical forces that quite frankly haven’t been mustered since the Time of Troubles.”

“While I will admit that I did come here to lift your spirits, I am not entirely convinced that my idea is without merit.” She slipped her hand around his waist again. “Gathering the spellcasters—a convocation of mages—is not a bad plan. Besides, what other choice do you have?”

+

The burlap sack slipped from Princess Mariko’s head. A dim corridor, lit by fading mage-lit stones, came into view. The walls and floor were slick and damp, and the air smelled of mold and dry blood.

Finally managing to chew through the cloth gag her captors had tied around her mouth, the princess spat the remnants to the floor.

“You’ll never get away with this,” she growled. Her hands were tied at the wrist behind her back. Greasy lowlifes surrounded her on all sides, their sickly complexions looking jaundiced from the glow of the torches they carried. Though she didn’t know the names of these people, she recognized their faces from her nighttime visits to the docks.

“Oh, no?” said the man leading the way through the dingy hall.

“No,” she snarled. Mariko did, however, know the name of the man who led them—Jallal Tasca. “And aren’t you supposed to be dead?”

Jallal stopped and spun on his hooves. Pushing his way through his guards, he put his face right in front of hers; so close Mariko could smell the boiled ham on his breath, pieces still stuck between his sharpened teeth.

“And where’d you learn that?” Jallal balled up his hairy fists, biting off each word as it rolled out of his mouth. “From

your lover perhaps? Did the Claw tell you that?”

Mariko was momentarily stunned. “What are you talking about?” Her words were unconvincing, even to herself.

Jallal smiled. “Surprised that we know about your little romance? Did you think you could keep it a secret forever?”

A large rat scurried through the rubbish littering the hallway. It squeaked as it traversed the long, pockmarked wall, sniffing everything twice as it passed but finding nothing worth its time in the piles of discarded refuse. It disappeared around a long, curving corner.

The princess watched the rat until it slipped out of view, then she looked back at Jallal. She pointed toward the rat with her chin. “Friend of yours?”

“Laugh it up, Princess.” Jallal turned away and resumed leading his group down the hall. “You don’t have long to live anyway. Might as well enjoy what little time you have left.”

The group started to move again, and one of the guards behind the princess prodded her forward with the flat edge of his sword. She stumbled a bit, not ready for the shove, but quickly caught her balance.

“You’re going to pay for this, Jallal,” she said. “I’m going to get out of here.”

“I’m sure you are, Princess. I’m sure you are.” Jallal’s words dripped with sarcasm.

The princess tugged on her bonds as she walked. They were tight, and she couldn’t budge. “And when I do, I’m going to hunt you down like the mongrel you are.” As her frustration rose, she spoke through her teeth, each word growing louder and more intense. “And I’m going to personally flay the skin from your body, piece by piece.”

This last bit made everyone cringe.

“So un-princess like,” taunted Jallal. “And who’s going to get you out of here? Hmm? Is the Claw going to come to your rescue?”

“I don’t need anyone to rescue me,” she said. “I’ll get myself out.” She struggled with her bonds, feeling the rope

loosen a bit with her repeated movements. “Besides, if you think you can catch the Claw by using me as bait, then you’ve sorely underestimated both of us.”

Jallal chuckled. “I hate to damage your self image, Princess. But you’re just one small piece of the puzzle.”

The hallway took a long, sloping curve to the right and headed downward. The group came upon the rat, still searching through the refuse on the ground. Its little nose bobbed up and down, as it sniffed its surroundings. Then suddenly, it stopped, sitting back onto its hind legs and clawing at the air.

“What’s its problem?” said the guard behind Princess Mariko.

A large dark splotch suddenly peeled away from the wall and fell to the ground. The dimly lit hallway made it difficult to determine what was happening, and at first, Mariko thought it was just a piece of loose stone or a large patch of moss on the damp rock that had lost its grip and was sloughing off onto the floor. Then that piece of moss unfolded to twice its original size, and snapped tight, wrapping itself around the rat like a thick rug.

“Cloakers!” shouted one of the guards.

The ceiling and walls seemed to melt. What had appeared as only shadows in the dark corridor, dripped away from the stone, unfurling and falling on the group.

The cloakers looked like huge bats, but instead of little ratlike bodies with ears, claws, and tails, they were all wing and teeth. Unfurled, some were easily twice the size of a man, and they descended on the hallway, blanketing anything they touched and wrapping it up.

Princess Mariko dropped to her knees, ducking under the huge wings of one of these beasts. The guard behind her was not as quick, and he disappeared underneath the creature’s embrace.

“Get it off me! Get it off me!” The man squealed as he struggled to get free. The cloakers black body stretched around

the guard, distending with each punch and elbow the man threw.

Two of the other guards had been wrapped up in similar fashion. One had been caught around the legs, and she swung on the creature, a dagger in each hand, slicing into the beast’s flesh but seemingly making no progress in getting it to let her go. The second was completely consumed by the cloaker, his muffled screams indicating that he wasn’t faring well either.

Jallal and three of his henchmen had managed to avoid being caught. They were free but preoccupied with trying to stay that way as four other cloakers flapped around them in the hallway.

Mariko didn’t wait around to see how it turned out. Not even bothering to get up, the princess somersaulted forward, hugging the wall and tumbling right past the fight. Coming up on her feet, she didn’t look back, dropping her head and sprinting down the corridor.

“After her!” Mariko heard Jallal scream as she disappeared deeper down the hall.

His words were like a gust of wind, pushing her along with their urgency. Mariko picked up speed as she ran the gently downward sloping passage. Her lungs burned and her legs ached, but she kept going, knowing that every step took her farther from her captors and that much nearer to escape. The walls drew in closer as the hallway spiraled down, and the light grew dimmer—the mage-lit stones were fewer and farther between here, and in several places it looked as if they had burned out or broken, leaving long sections of near-complete blackness.

Each time she hit one of these dark patches, the princess cringed and silently prayed to Helm to keep her safe. If she were to run into another hive of cloakers there would be little she could do to defend herself. Her hands were still tied behind her back, and though she could probably cast a spell, she would have to do it without looking. She really didn’t want to have to fight a cloaker by turning her back on it.

Coming around the next corner, the passage straightened out and widened into sort of a crossroads—four passages heading off in opposite directions. Without even thinking, Mariko took a hard left and ran down another short hall, then into a much larger room. Dozens of square pillars, each a few paces apart, held up the high ceiling.

Dashing into the corner, Princess Mariko dropped into a crouch and stopped to catch her breath. The room was quite dark. What little light there was-—weak and purple—seemed to come from a long, sprawling crack in the ceiling, maybe twenty or thirty feet up. The pillars cast shadows across each other, filling the space with a crisscross of long, jagged shapes.

There was a strange feeling in this place. It was a sort of hopelessness, punctuated by a burning anxiety that it might be worse to live in a place like this than to simply die here. There had been a burlap sack over her head ever since she had woken up from that night in the slaughterhouse. But she knew when they had brought her to this place—wherever it was—because she had been filled with that terrible feeling the moment she arrived.

Leaning her back against the wall, Mariko took several large breaths, trying to calm and quiet herself. She tugged against the rope holding her hands together. It was loosening, but not enough to get her hands free. She was going to need something to cut through her bonds. Letting herself slip to the ground, she felt around and found a small stone. Gripping it in one hand, she touched it with the fingers of her other.

Closing her eyes, she spoke a few words, quietly, under her breath. Getting back to her feet, she tossed the stone to the ground. It glowed brightly where she dropped it, and the corner filled with a yellow-orange light.

The flagstones and bricks were worn and pockmarked. The surface of one whole wall was marred by long, irregular grooves. They looked as if they were scratch marks—the last remaining evidence of some clawed beast that had been

cornered here and had tried to dig its way out. “Just what I needed.”

The jagged bits of stone that had been torn away from the wall lay in dusty piles in the corner, and Mariko kicked at them, looking for one she could use. Finding one to her liking, she pushed the sharp chunk away from the others and sat down next to it, so she could reach. Then she went to work, sawing away the hemp that held her wrists together.

As she worked, a series of light tapping sounds began on the far side of the room. They came in irregular patterns, slower at first, then quicker and more frequently. The noises echoed off the walls, bouncing around between the pillars. Mariko couldn’t be sure exactly where the sounds originated, but wherever they were, they were in the room with her.

Quickening her sawing motion, she gave her bonds another yank. The fibers that held her wrists slipped, and the rope snapped. Her hands were free, and Princess Mariko hopped to her feet, grabbing up the magically lit stone as she did.

Stepping out of the corner, she put her back to the closest pillar, taking cover from whatever was making the clicking noises. Peeking out from around the edge, Princess Mariko tossed the stone into the middle of the room. The glowing rock bounced to a stop atop a huge circular flagstone. The darkness peeled back from where it landed, revealing the rest of the chamber. The pillars radiated out from this single large stone, reaching for the walls and corners as they lined up across the room. Other piles of dusty stone littered the ground—each at the base of a pillar.