The Chaos Crystal (63 page)

'Yes.'

'It might already be too late.' 'I don't think so.'

'How can you tell?' Kinta asked, looking almost as worried as Warlock.

'Because,' Declan said, stepping back over the boundary line that marked the edge of where they thought the chamber might be, 'as Brynden so rightly pointed out back in Chelae, my lady, one could assume that given we're standing here discussing it, they probably haven't destroyed the world just yet.'

Warlock bared his teeth silently, shaking his head. He was not the slightest bit amused. 'I'll bet you suzerain just crack each other up when you get together for a few drinks, don't you?'

Before Declan could answer, the trembling suddenly increased. The snow in the centre of their roughly trampled circle began to hiss and pop and steam as if the water trapped here in Jelidia was going straight from frozen to boiling without any liquid state in between. He glanced up at the spires.

The ground trembled even harder. The hissing increased as the snow and ice boiled away. A mist made of steam billowed out from the hole they were making in the ice. Declan still couldn't feel the Tide very well. If anything, he could feel it less than he did a few moments ago, which didn't make sense.

'I just had a thought,' Stellan said.

'Do you think it's working?' Warlock asked.

Declan assumed he was talking to him and not asking Stellan his opinion. 'It's hard to tell.'

Kinta frowned. 'They must be
pouring
the Tide into that hole.'

'Maybe we should help,' Ranee suggested.

Ranee wasn't the only immortal who was thinking that, apparently. All around him, Declan felt the others drawing on the Tide, something that proved incredibly difficult when he tried it. It felt like every drop of the Tide they were able to squeeze out was being sucked down into the vortex below, as if into a sinkhole.

'Tides, it's sucking the life out of me!' he heard Krydence complain.

'Which brings us to my thought,' snapped Stellan a little impatiently.

'What,
Desean?' Declan retorted, a little more harshly than he'd intended. It wasn't that he didn't care what Stellan had to say; it was just with four powerful Tide Lords channelling all the power they could muster at a hole in the ground at High Tide, there didn't seem to be much happening except some melting snow. And the Tide he was trying to channel felt like it was trying to drag him into an abyss. He couldn't imagine what a mortal would have to say at this particular moment that might merit more than his fleeting attention.

'The Chaos Crystal is meant to amplify power, isn't

it?'

'Yes.'

'And it sucks the Tide in, even when it's not doing anything.' 'I suppose.'

Warlock nodded in agreement. 'It does, spymaster. I know that for a fact. It's how they found the crystal in Caelum. Because it sucks in the Tide and they could feel the dead spot.'

'Is there a point to this?' Kinta asked impatiently. Her brow was actually beaded with sweat at the effort it was taking to channel the Tide.

Stellan was looking worried. 'I just have a question for you, Declan, that's all.'

'What,
for pity's sake?'

'What happens when you pour a concentrated stream of the Tide into something that feeds off it? Something that sucks it up like a sponge?'

The immortals within hearing looked at the mortal man oddly for a moment. It was Declan who realised what Stellan was getting at first and the realisation made him ill. He swore savagely and turned to Kinta. 'We have to stop!'

She looked at him in confusion. 'What?'

'We have to make them stop! They're not helping to stop the rift from opening; they're making things worse!'

'The crystal
feeds
on the Tide, my lady,' Warlock explained urgently, as he grasped what Stellan was saying, even if the immortals didn't get it. 'All that power you're channelling into that chamber isn't interrupting Lukys's work; it's probably making it a sure thing.'

Kinta swore then too, abandoned her efforts to summon the Tide and began to run toward the palace. As she passed the immortals she yelled at them to stop and waved her arms frantically at Brynden and the others up on the spires.

But it was too late to stop it now. They couldn't hear her — could barely see her through the cloud of steam — and wouldn't know the effect they were having. Quite the opposite — they were probably channelling more and more into the chamber out of a growing sense of frustration, not comprehending why their strategy wasn't working.

Desperately, Declan turned to Warlock. 'There was only one entrance into the chamber. That's where they must have sealed it
...'

'Which means it's probably the only part of the chamber wall that can be breached manually,' Warlock finished for him with a nod of understanding, confirming Declan's suspicion that this canine was among the smartest creatures Declan had ever encountered. 'Let's go.'

Declan didn't stop to explain what he was going to try to Stellan or the other immortals. They were too busy, anyway, now they realised the danger, trying to catch the attention of the Tide Lords on the spires who, in their ignorance, were powering Lukys's plans, not defeating them.

Declan and Warlock took off for the palace at a run. Declan was terrified by what he might have

unleashed, heartsick at the thought that far from saving his Amyrantha from destruction, he had brought the tools and enough immortals to finish the job.

If Declan couldn't stop this, and stop it soon, his noble attempt to save the world might be the very thing that destroyed it.

CHAPTER 58

Arkady felt nothing.

She was aware. She could hear. She could think. She could even panic. But she couldn't move a muscle. Not even her eyes.

Her world, therefore, was dark. Not black. Not completely. But it was dark and if she concentrated, she could focus on the inside of her eyelids and actually see the blood vessels there, sluggishly moving the blood around her body at a speed barely enough to keep her alive.

She didn't know how she got here. Her last clear memory was of placing the Chaos Crystal on the altar beside Oritha's head. She had a vague recollection of talking with Lukys after that. Of making plans to return to Glaeba
...
Of a sudden bolt of pain shooting through her body followed by a bone-chilling cold. But she wasn't sure about that.

All Arkady knew was that she was cold. And frightened.

And paralysed.

Arkady had listened to the Tide Lords making their plans; heard every word clearly. She figured she was back in the ice chamber, which meant Oritha lay beside her in a similar state, awaiting the new mind Lukys had bred her to accommodate. Her own purpose was to placate Elyssa. Lukys had told Cayal he didn't think the transfer would work. In fact, he said it would probably kill her, making a mockery of Cayal's attempts to save her. Arkady didn't want to

die, any more than she wanted to vacate her body so some half-crazy immortal could inhabit it.

If anybody had thought to ask her, she would have chosen the former.

But nobody had asked her opinion. There was nothing she could do about it. She couldn't lift a finger. She couldn't blink, cough, nor produce any physical sign that might prove she was neither unconscious, nor a willing participant in this hideous experiment.

She heard them sealing the entrance to the cavern; heard the ice crashing down as they collapsed the ceiling over the doorway leading into the chamber, taking away any hope of a last-minute rescue from this place. She heard Cayal's shouted curses as he almost got caught on the wrong side, abandoning his tools as he dived through the collapsing entrance in the nick of time. She could even hear the chittering of a small rodent that occasionally stopped by her ear to sniff her hair.

Although she couldn't see the crystal on the altar beside her head, she sensed a change in it almost as soon as the cavern closed. The crystal's dull red glow was brighter now; so bright that even with her eyes shut, she — who couldn't even sense the Tide — knew the Tide was nearing its peak.

Arkady heard voices. The immortals talking. She'd heard Arryl telling Cayal he didn't have to marry Elyssa, because Lukys had lied to her about the transfer.

That meant a lot to Arkady. Not because she wanted Cayal for herself, but because Lukys apparently didn't mean to waste time trying to extract Elyssa's consciousness from her body and put it anywhere near Arkady's.

That's something, she decided, quite determined death was the only reasonable alternative if there was the slightest chance she would end up on another world, possessed by someone like the Immortal Maiden.

Her relief was short-lived, however, and disappeared when Lukys stepped up to the altar.

'See, the peak is almost here,' he said. He sounded close
...
standing at her feet perhaps. 'It's time to take our places.'

'We have
places?'
Elyssa asked, her voice a little scornful. Arkady couldn't understand why.
You'd
think, given she believes she is about to receive everything she's ever hoped for, she'd be a little more grateful.
'How very organised of you, Lukys.'

'We need one of you in position at all four cardinal points,' he said.

'But we're at the southern pole,' she heard Cayal say. 'Doesn't that make everything north?'

She heard Lukys sigh impatiently. 'At equidistant points then, if you want to split hairs. Maralyce, why don't you go there and, Kentravyon, you take the opposite position? Arryl can take the left and, Taryx, I want you to take the right.'

'What about me?' Cayal asked. He sounded very close. Near her head.

Look down, Cayal! Glance my way and realise I'm
not unconscious. Discover I'm alive and screaming and want no part
of
this!

'And me?' Elyssa added.

'I need Cayal holding the crystal. Elyssa, you need to be here too, but when I tell you to stop, you have to let go of the Tide. That was one of the mistakes we made last time with Coryna. I can't make the transfer if you're drawing on the Tide.'

'That makes sense, 1 suppose.' She sounded a little less snippy this time, a little less sure of herself.

'Where's the Scard?'

Scard? What Scard? What do they need a Scard
for?

'I'm here.'

The little voice that answered was belligerent and uncooperative. And frighteningly familiar.

Tides, that's Tiji. How does she come to be here?

'You must stand at Lord Cayal's side, little one. No matter what happens, you
must
not let that crystal touch the ice once we're channelling the Tide through it. If he falls before we're done, you must hang on to it for dear life. Do you understand?'

'Yes.'

'Why can't I take it from him?' Elyssa asked. 'We don't need a Scard for this, surely?'

'I can't effect the transfer of your mind into a new body if you're channelling the Tide, remember?' When Elyssa seemed to have no argument about that, Lukys addressed Tiji once more. 'The crystal must not touch the ice, remember?'

'You keep saying that, Lukys,' Arkady heard Arryl say. 'Why?'

'Because allowing it to come into contact with anything inanimate while it's amplifying the Tide will stop the flow of energy,' Maralyce explained. 'And that much Tide magic backing up that quickly isn't just dangerous, my dear. It will be catastrophic'

'Just so long as I know
...'
Tiji sounded rebellious, but put up no further argument that Arkady could hear.

She wondered if Oritha was able to hear all of this too. If she was awake beneath the paralysis, was she frightened or excited? Fearing for what she might leave behind or looking forward to what lay ahead?

Had Oritha volunteered for this? Did she know what she was volunteering for? Did she truly comprehend it? Did she understand that if Lukys's plan succeeded, she would no longer be Oritha, but Coryna — Lukys's lover, Maralyce's sister
...?

'You'll need to get rid of your clothes,' Lukys said, interrupting Arkady's thoughts. She wasn't sure who he was addressing until he added, 'Maralyce is right. We can't risk the crystal touching
anything
inanimate, not even cloth.'

'Well, at least we'll have something pretty to look at,' Elyssa said, confirming her suspicion that Lukys had been speaking to Cayal. And even though she sounded a little sarcastic, Elyssa was right about one thing: Cayal naked was something beautiful to behold.

Tides, listen to me. I think I've lost my mind along
with all feeling in the rest
of
my body.

But then Elyssa asked doubtfully, 'Are you sure this is going to work, Lukys? I mean
...
I can barely feel the Tide in here with that damned thing sucking it in, let alone tell if it's peaked or not.'

'Wait until you start channelling,' Kentravyon told her, his voice full of gleeful anticipation. 'Then you'll feel it.'

'So how does this work?'