The Labyrinth of Flame: The Shattered Sigil, #3

By Courtney Schafer

The epic conclusion to the Shattered Sigil Trilogy--a tale of blood magic, spies, and wilderness adventure. 

Dev's never been a man afraid of a challenge. Not only has he kept his vow to his dead mentor, rescuing a child in the face of impossible odds, but he's freed his mage friend Kiran from both the sadistic master who seeks to enslave him and the foreign Council that wants to kill him. 

But Kiran's master Ruslan is planning a brutal revenge, one that will raze an entire country to blood and ashes. Kiran is the key to stopping Ruslan; yet Kiran is dying by inches, victim of the Alathian Council's attempt to chain him. Worse yet, Dev and Kiran have drawn the attention of demons from the darkest of ancient legends. Demons whose power Dev knows is all too real, and that he has every reason to fear. 

A fear that grows, as he and Kiran struggle to outmaneuver Ruslan and uncover the secrets locked in Kiran's forgotten childhood. For the demons are playing their own deadly game--and the price of survival may be too terrible to bear.

• Language: English
• Publisher: North Col
• Release date: Dec 1, 2015
• ISBN: 9780990789918

Book preview

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Chapter One

(Dev)

You want water, boys? It’ll cost you. The clansman bared yellowed teeth at me and Kiran in a shrewd, fierce grin. A rat’s nest of graying curls threaded with agate chips and bits of carved bone framed his sun-wizened face. Both his rough-woven clothes and leathery skin were the same deep, rusty copper as the sandstone of the natural rock bowl surrounding us. The bowl itself was hundreds of yards wide, its smooth sweep of stone broken by patches of crusted sand choked with spinebrush and pear cactus. Giant boulders loomed at the bowl’s lip. Their shapes were oddly sinuous, like humped, drowsing beasts.

We’ve goods to bargain, I assured the clansman. Another hulking boulder nearby bore a series of scratched symbols to signify this was a trading ground for the fiercely territorial clans who haunted the borderlands between Arkennland and Varkevia. The trade ground hadn’t been easy to find. We were in untracked terrain here, far distant from the regular routes traveled by merchant house convoys. I hadn’t even been sure any clanfolk would show when I blew on the cracked bone flute Kiran had found tucked inside a hole beneath the boulder’s symbols. I’d been relieved beyond the telling when this oldster ghosted out of the rocks in response to the flute’s eerie wail. Kiran and I had mere dregs left in our waterskins, and at least fifty miles yet to go across this barren maze of buttes and canyons to reach the border city of Prosul Akheba.

A destination we had to reach fast. Otherwise, Kiran was a dead man. We had only a scant supply left of the drug that was keeping him alive and no way of making more. The famed scholars of Prosul Akheba’s collegium were our best hope, and I’d do a hell of a lot worse than risk a shortcut across barren desert to make sure Kiran survived. Without Kiran’s help, I’d never stop his master Ruslan from sending demons from the darkest of legends to rip me and everyone I loved to bloody, screaming shreds.

Show me what you have to trade. The clansman’s sharp black eyes shifted from me to Kiran, who was crouched beside our packs with his night-dark hair obscuring his grimy face. You’d best not stint, either. From the looks of those... The clansman twitched a contemptuous finger at our pile of flaccid waterskins. Without my aid, you’ll soon be visiting Shaikar’s hells. Unless you boys are mages powerful enough to conjure water from stone. He chuckled, a dry, hissing sound like a snake slithering through sand.

Kiran raised his head. His blue eyes met mine, full of bitter amusement.

Yeah, if this oldster knew the truth, he wouldn’t be laughing. Looking at Kiran, all he saw was a weary, travel-stained youth so skinny a strong blow might snap him in two. He’d never guess Kiran was a blood mage, trained to fuel spells with torture and murder, capable of snuffing out a life with a single touch...or conjuring enough water to drown this clansman where he stood.

I sighed. Too bad Kiran couldn’t cast even a wisp of a spell here in Arkennland without bringing his sadistic viper of a master down on our heads.

Go on, I said to Kiran, with a sardonic lift of my brows. Show him a stone.

Kiran rummaged in his battered pack and produced a crimson carcabon stone the size of his thumb. We’d chipped a handful of stones that large as we’d descended the cliffs of the Whitefires’ southern peaks, which stabbed skyward like bared fangs above the boulders. This late in the summer, no snow lined those stark granite pinnacles, which meant we hadn’t seen water since we crossed the range’s crest. The red-rock desert surrounding us wasn’t quite as arid as the alkali flats of the Painted Valley some two hundred miles to the north, where my home city of Ninavel depended entirely upon mages’ spellcasting for water. Here seeps lay hidden deep in caves and canyons, but their exact locations were jealously guarded secrets.

Which left us at one hell of a disadvantage in this trade, but I’d make it work. I had to.

The clansman squinted at the carcabon. A promising start, but far from enough. How many gems this size do you have?

Apparently he thought us such idiots we might blurt out the full extent of our stash. Enough to give you two stones per filled waterskin.

The clansman’s smile sharpened. I crossed my arms, letting the warding charms banding my wrists catch the light of the afternoon sun. A warning: we were no easy prey, although not for the reason he’d think. The charms I wore were Alathian-made, stolen from the mages of the Council’s Watch before Kiran and I escaped through their warded eastern border into the Whitefires, and the magic bound within the rune-marked silver met the ridiculously strict Alathian legal standards. The wards would stop a blade, maybe even a dragonclaw charm, but they wouldn’t so much as singe an attacker’s hand. The runes looked close enough to those seen on far nastier charms made in Ninavel that I hoped the clansman wouldn’t know the difference. Alathians didn’t often cross the mountains.

Two stones, you say? I say your lives are worth far more. The clansman pursed his lips. Ten stones per skin.

We didn’t have anywhere near so many gems. Kiran and I exchanged another swift, speaking glance; his dark with worry, mine a reassurance: Take it easy. I’ve got this.

Khalmet wasn’t so kind to a pair of footsore prospectors this trip, I said. Kiran bowed his head again. I couldn’t see his eyes anymore, hidden as they were by his hair, but irony was plain in the slant of his mouth. Yeah, not so kind was quite the understatement. These last months, I’d begun to suspect the god of luck’s skeletal bad hand was permanently fixed to my shoulder, dooming me to disaster—and I hadn’t endured half of what Kiran had suffered.

I said, Most I can give is three stones per waterskin, but every stone is top quality. Plus I’ll throw in a bonemender charm, the best you’ve ever sparked. The bit about the bonemender wasn’t even a lie. The Alathian Council wasn’t half so tight-assed about healing spells as they were about every other kind of magic.

The clansman’s black eyes glittered. Give me those warding charms on your wrists along with the bonemender, boy, and you’ll have a deal.

I snorted. Do we look like soft-headed merchanter marks to you? Fuck if I’ll hand over my protection so you can jump us the moment we turn our backs.

The clansman released another hissing chuckle. No need for fighting, not here in Shaikar’s furnace. You’d best take my terms, or all I need do is wait and take gems and charms alike from your parched corpses.

Kiran tensed, and I willed him not to raise his head again. I didn’t want the clansman to get too good a look at him. I’d have left Kiran hidden in the rocks, but tales I’d heard in my convoy days had left me leery of that idea. Supposedly clanfolk never came to a bargain alone, and they didn’t take well to the suggestion of ambush.

I said, Leave us to die of thirst, and we’ll see you get nothing. Pound the carcabon to powder and slag our charms. You want to profit from us, you’ve got to trade for it.

You have a ringtail’s boldness, the clansman said with a yellowed smirk. Yet I am no fool. Men do not avoid the trade road and risk dying waterless without reason. Such travelers had best offer enough to buy my clan’s silence as well as our water.

Great. If I gave into his arm-twisting, I’d only confirm we had something to hide—and I sure as hell didn’t trust we could purchase his silence.

Reason? I kicked Kiran’s pack, sourly. It slumped over onto the sandstone without any clinking of gems or ingots. Only thing to do with a prospecting trip as Khalmet-cursed as this one is to end it fast. Plodding all the way out Firestrike Canyon to the convoy route wastes weeks. We shortcut across the desert and resupply in Prosul Akheba quick enough, we can gem-hunt in a different mountain cirque before the snows come. Otherwise, we’ll be starving this winter. Avoiding that is worth a little risk, and I don’t give a damn who knows it.

Kiran muttered in agreement, sounding properly glum about it. He’d gotten a lot better at playacting since I first met him. Helpful as it was right now, I wasn’t so sure it was a good change.

The clansman’s weathered face gave me no clues about whether he was buying my little tale. Might be starving sooner, he said. The Akhebans are jumpy these days. Doubt they’ll let a pair of convoy-less stragglers inside the city’s wards without good reason.

Was he lying, hoping to suss out if we were truly destitute or not? Suliyya grant he was lying! We couldn’t afford any delays in reaching the collegium.

What’s got the Akhebans so spooked?

The clansman twisted a hand in a gesture I couldn’t read. Fading blue tattoos covered his bony knuckles and spiraled up his wrists. New demon cult’s on the rise.

The word demon set my heart hammering; beside me, Kiran had frozen into utter stillness.

Damn it, this news might have nothing to do with us. I’d heard enough tales from convoy drovers to know that cults continuously bloomed and faded in Varkevian cities, as disciples of each new doctrinal craze fought to gain power and sweep aside the old. Sounded crazy to me, but the Varkevian-born drovers I’d known panted after every bit of cult-related news with all the passion of streetside gamblers watching a snakefight. They did love their stories of gods and demons.

Yet certain of those stories contained cold, hard truth. I couldn’t stop a glance at Kiran, who remained rigid as stone.

The clansman was watching Kiran too. Unease rippled through me.

Cityfolk chase after nonsense, but we black-daggers know the truth. A sudden, dark fervor colored the clansman’s voice, and his guttural accent grew thicker. Shaikar is master over all, and rare are the mortals blessed with a chance to gain his favor.

The oldster looked as Varkevian as they came, but I’d heard some clanfolk claimed descent from the infamous black-dagger Kaithans, who’d long ago been exiled from the tribelands beyond the southern blight. The other Kaithan tribes hadn’t taken too well to the black-daggers’ insistence that Shaikar, lord and guardian of the deathless hells, wasn’t merely the brother of all the other gods in the southern pantheon but their creator and master.

I shrugged, carefully noncommittal. All I know about the gods is that right now they don’t like me. So trade us water, and let a pair of Khalmet-touched prospectors cross out of your clan’s territory before our misfortune spills over onto you.

The clansman’s gaze still rested on Kiran, and his eyes had gone opaque in a way I didn’t much like. Bad enough that Kiran’s bone-pale skin marked him as foreign in ancestry. But his pallor hadn’t changed a whit even after a solid month of traveling under the ferocious blaze of a high altitude sun. Pasty-skinned immigrants from the far north often wore sun-shroud charms to stop themselves from burning and blistering, but no sun-shroud was so strong as to prevent them from tanning entirely. I’d made Kiran grime his face, neck, and hands with coppery dirt to hide their lack of color, and clothe every inch of the rest of his skin despite the heat, but still. The last thing I wanted was for some tale of a bizarrely pallid young prospector to reach Ninavel.

The clansman spoke. True enough that we want none of strangers’ misfortune. His eyes flicked back to me. What other healing charms have you?

Not many. Some skinseal charms, a lone bloodfreeze...no, I wasn’t going to give up the one charm we had that could stop serious bleeding, and skinseals were common as sand, hardly worth ten decets. I did have one other charm that might work as a bargaining token.

I’ve a frostflower I’m willing to trade. Weak like most Alathian charms, its magic likely to fade within an hour of being sparked, but it could save a man from death by heatstroke. I didn’t much like trading the frostflower before we finished traveling the desert, but the charm wasn’t half so vital as my warding bracelets.

The clansman grunted in grudging approval. Give me frostflower, bonemender, and the gemstones, and you’ll have your water.

Done, I said. So long as you give us the water first.

The clansman spat on a palm and held it up—a gesture I’d seen Varkevian drovers use to mean a pact sealed. Don’t worry, young ringtail. We black-daggers hold to our bargains. Give me your waterskins and wait here.

How long? I asked.

Not long, the clansman said. Certain of my kin are close. They carry enough water to fill your skins.

By close he probably meant watching from the rocks, ready to gut you if I order it. I surveyed the humped wall of boulders again and saw nothing. It didn’t stop the itch of my nerves.

I shook the last few drops from my three waterskins into my mouth. Kiran had enough remaining in his skins to manage several gulping swallows before we handed the lot over. The brief taste of wetness on my tongue only made my parched throat cry out for more.

The clansman took our waterskins and slipped back into the boulders. Kiran stood, raking his hair off his face. His eyes looked eerily blue against the dirt darkening his skin.

You look worried, he said quietly.

He rolled over awfully easy at the end. I kept my voice just as low and my eyes on the rocks above. Damn, but I wished I had a proper weapon, like a boneshatter charm, or a heart-rot. All I had besides the warding charms on my wrists was the knife at my belt—a simple, short blade meant for camp chores. I was a mountain outrider by trade, far better at scaling crags and icefields than fighting.

You think his clan is so superstitious they might decide to avoid any supposed misfortune by killing us instead of trading? Kiran glanced around at the silent desert. One hand drifted up to his chest. I knew he was thinking of the amulet that lay hidden beneath his tightly laced shirt. The one powerful charm we possessed—it kept us hidden from the strongest of seeking spells and blocked Kiran’s mental bond with his master Ruslan. But it could only conceal Kiran so long as he didn’t cast, and the charm wouldn’t do a damn thing to help us in a physical fight.

I don’t know how clansmen think. I’d never been so far south before. Wish Cara was here. She’s worked all the desert routes; she might’ve had dealings with clanfolk.

"I wish we were with her, Kiran said with a wry ghost of a grin. Traveling in the cool air of the mountains. Preferably wading along a stream, drinking whenever we felt like it." He licked cracked lips and sighed.

I heaved a sigh of my own, but not out of desire for snowmelt streams. Lover, climbing partner, the one friend in the world I’d learned to trust without reservation...it’d been two weeks now since Cara left us to head north, and the ache of her absence gnawed deeper with each passing day.

She’d left for good reason, shepherding two orphaned kids to safety. One of those kids was a girl I’d vowed on my life to protect, the daughter of the outrider who not only had taught me everything I knew of the mountains but saved me in every possible sense of the word. I’d do damn near anything to keep Melly safe—a truth Ruslan had used against me before. Logic said Cara taking Melly out of reach of our enemies while I kept on with Kiran was the smart move. Cara meant to rejoin us after she got Melly and Janek settled with her kin in the Tarnspike Mountains up in Arkennland’s northern wilds.

But any reunion would be months away, and I didn’t know if any of us would survive to see it.

I turned to Kiran. Can you sense how many clanfolk might be skulking in those rocks?

Kiran gave a hollow laugh. Right now I can barely sense you. If I dared drop my barriers... Yearning flashed across his face.

Never mind, I said hastily. One hint to Ruslan that Kiran was no longer captive in Alathia, and we’d be fucked. I knelt beside my pack and beckoned Kiran to crouch with me as if we were checking over the pack’s contents in preparation for the trade.

Moving my mouth as little as possible, I muttered, You’re carrying the drug vial on you, not in your pack, I hope?

Kiran nodded, touching the sash bound tight around his waist.

If this trade goes bad, ditch your pack. See those two rock slabs with the purplish streaks? I jerked my chin at the rocks poking skyward on the bowl’s far side like a giant stack of broken plates turned on end. Two of the slabs midway along the line had purple layers of azemite slashing across their ruddy sandstone surface. Run for the crevice between them.

Before ever blowing that bone flute, I’d scouted an escape route through and over the slabs. Clanfolk must have some skill at climbing, living as they did in this wilderness of stone, so I couldn’t count on us simply spidering up to safety. But in a slot as tight as that crevice, any attackers would be forced to come after us one at a time. If we stemmed up the walls quickly enough, we could kick rocks down on pursuers’ heads, then climb out and over the slab’s back side to escape into the maze of stone fins and canyons behind it.

Assuming I could get Kiran up any difficult climbs fast enough. After a month spent scrambling over the Whitefires’ ridges and couloirs, he’d gotten a lot more agile, but he was still far from an expert. I resettled my pack’s contents so our coil of makeshift rope sat right on top, ready for quick access.

Eyeing the rope, Kiran shook his head. If it comes to a fight, you run. I only have to touch any attackers to stop them. Then we might at least gain any water they carry.

Touch them and rip the life straight out of them. Memories of blackened trees and dead drovers flashed through my head. Awfully risky, don’t you think? What if Ruslan feels you do it?

He won’t, Kiran said, all cool assurance. "It’s not spellcasting. Ikilhia drawn by touch causes no traces in the aether, and I don’t have to drop my barriers to take it. So long as I wear the amulet and my barriers remain in place—"

Yeah, yeah, Ruslan can’t find you. You said that last time. Next thing we knew, Ruslan was seeing through your eyes, about to tear straight through your amulet’s warding.

Kiran’s gaze dropped from mine. I knew he didn’t remember it, not directly. During our unwilling visit to Ninavel last month, Ruslan had burned away years’ worth of Kiran’s memories, including those of our first desperate flight through the Whitefires earlier this year. But Kiran had seen my own memories of that trip—hell, he’d scrutinized them so hard and so long, seeking some sign they were false, he probably knew them better than I did. So why would he be so cavalier about the risk?

Kiran said, Last time, Ruslan was actively seeking me—or pretending to, anyway. He isn’t now. Since he believes me a prisoner in Alathia, unreachable behind their border wards, his attention will be on...other matters.

Like the demons of legend. Specifically, how to find them and convince them to raze all of Alathia to blood and ashes. Not to mention savaging Cara and Melly, since Ruslan hated me almost as much as he hated the Alathians. He wanted us all to pay for helping Kiran escape him, but he couldn’t take revenge in person. He’d made a blood vow never to cast against either me or Alathia in exchange for getting his hands on Kiran when the Alathians dragged us to Ninavel last month. If he broke the vow, he’d burn. But a man as viciously clever and determined as Ruslan wasn’t about to let a vow stop him, especially after an Alathian mage had forced him into giving Kiran back.

So Kiran and I had to stop him. A task so difficult as to approach impossibility, but I had to believe that we could pull it off. The alternative was too terrible.

Kiran’s eyes had darkened, the bruised shadows beneath them all the more pronounced. Not hard to guess his thoughts had followed paths as grim as mine.

I said, Just tell me you’re being honest in weighing the risk. That you won’t get sloppy because part of you still thinks the solution is to turn yourself over to him. While captive in Alathia, Kiran had insisted he could talk Ruslan out of bargaining with demons. As if Ruslan would listen to a word he said, rather than use the mark-bond to fuck with his mind until he became the devoted, willing tool that Ruslan wanted.

I’d promised Kiran we’d find a better way, one that wouldn’t condemn him to life as Ruslan’s lapdog. Yet I had the uncomfortable suspicion that I hadn’t done as good a job of changing Kiran’s mind as I’d hoped.

That’s not why! Kiran protested. At my sharp gesture, he lowered his voice back to a near-whisper. I would never reveal myself to Ruslan, not while I travel with you. I wouldn’t risk you that way.

Not while I travel with you. Oh yeah, he was still thinking about it. I swallowed harsh words; now wasn’t the time for an argument. He sounded sincere enough in his concern for me—a damn good thing, since if Ruslan got hold of Kiran through the mark-bond, the very first thing he’d do was compel Kiran to slit my throat. The blood oath prevented Ruslan from casting against me, but it didn’t prevent him from killing me by physical means.

Yet for all Kiran’s evident concern for my survival, I still felt unsettled. The Kiran I’d known before Ruslan took his memories wouldn’t have so readily suggested draining men’s lives with magic. This Kiran...I suffered another flash of memory: Kiran with his head thrown back in ecstasy, his knife buried in the heart of Stevannes, an Alathian mage who’d been our ally.

He’d killed Stevan to spare Melly from dying at Ruslan’s hand, and he’d used the death-born power to save all of Ninavel. I couldn’t fault his reasons. How could I, when he’d saved everyone I loved? I wasn’t so blindly prejudiced as the Alathian Council, who saw only that he’d murdered their top arcanist and cast the very sort of magic they loathed Ninavel for tolerating. Yet these last weeks I’d suffered far too many nightmares in which Kiran licked blood off a blade and looked at me with Ruslan’s cold, cruel smile.

I said, Look, how about you try running first? Save the...other thing...for if that fails. Safer if we can double back on any pursuers and track them to water. Assuming we need to do anything at all. Chances are the trade’ll go just fine.

Because things always go so well for us. Kiran gave me a crooked little smile. I’ll run if that’s what you want. But Dev, if you trust me in anything, trust this: I’d never do anything to harm you.

Well, yeah. You said Ruslan bound you. Ruslan’s vow not to cast against me had been made on behalf of his apprentices as well. To make sure Kiran and his mage-brother Mikail didn’t cast anything that’d result in all three of them burning to ash, Ruslan had done something to their minds so they couldn’t even consider hurting me with magic. Not deliberately, anyway, as Ruslan had vowed never to knowingly cast to harm me. Which left a boulder-sized loophole that Ruslan was all too happy to exploit.

I don’t just mean by casting. Kiran’s eyes on mine were dead serious and his shoulders tight with strain. He knew the Alathians weren’t the only ones upset by his killing Stevan.

Glad to hear it. Did I trust him? I wanted to. The old Kiran I would’ve, no question. But Stevan’s death wasn’t the only dismaying decision I’d seen Kiran make in Ninavel.

Kiran added, lower yet, "If I ever must take ikilhia, I promise you I’ll take as little as I can. Enough to stop an attacker, but not to kill."

Slowly, I nodded. Might be safer in the long run to kill anyone that threatened us, but I couldn’t help feeling relieved at his words.

Silence fell. Sweat trickled down my sides. Not long, the clansman had said, but it already felt an eternity. The way he’d stared at Kiran kept nagging at me. What had he seen? I squinted at Kiran again. His shirt was laced tight, hiding his amulet, and I didn’t see anywhere the dirt had rubbed off his skin.

Kiran gave me a quizzical glance. What?

Nothing. I hadn’t ever asked Kiran why he stayed so freakishly pale, but I had my suspicions. The demon we’d faced in the Cirque of the Knives had had hair as black as Kiran’s—if the demon’s snaky, subtly moving braids were truly hair—and skin the stark, inhuman white of moonlit ice. The demon had said of Kiran that he was molded in our image.

A gust of wind skirled through the rock bowl, stinging my skin with sand. I blinked away grit and caught movement in the rocks above. I hissed at Kiran in warning. He stood, his face taut with worry.

The clansman eeled around a boulder with fat, sloshing waterskins dangling from his hands. To my surprise he wasn’t alone; a young woman stalked right behind him. Her trousers and tunic were of the same coarse cloth as his, but her skin was ordinary Arkennlander brown like mine, without the coppery hue that spoke of Varkevian descent. She looked whipcord-tough, with a lean, rangy build, a fox-sharp chin, and prominent cheekbones. Her dark hair was caught up in a thick topknot bound by rune-marked jade, and a bronze amulet hung from a chain around her neck. The amulet’s spiked, interlocking loops reminded me of the useless little devil-ward charms that superstitious streetsiders wore in Ninavel, but this amulet was far larger and more complex than any devil-ward I’d ever seen.

She couldn’t be any older than I was, early twenties at the most, but she moved with all the arrogant confidence of the wealthiest of Ninavel highsiders.

Or Ninavel’s mages. Oh, hell! Kiran had told me a mage’s soul burned so brightly there was no hiding it from another, not this close. The gods only knew what would happen if she sensed the truth of him. I caught Kiran’s gaze, my brows raised in urgent question.

He shook his head minutely. She wasn’t a mage? Thank Khalmet. But still...

Who’s this? I demanded of the clansman.

He halted some twenty paces away. Our godspeaker wished to see you. To determine if you are touched by Khalmet as you said.

I was beginning to wish I’d come up with some other story. Any other story. I racked my brain for any mention of a godspeaker in tales I’d heard from convoy drovers, and came up with nothing. Maybe the clansman meant to squeeze more profit out of us by claiming this godspeaker could lift our misfortune.

She stalked around us in a wide circle, moving with a sandcat’s lithe, predatory grace, and her piercing black gaze never once left us. Could Kiran be wrong about her? She sure acted like a mage. A cold pit yawned open in my stomach.

Thought we had a bargain, I said.

We do. The clansman held out the waterskins. Full as they’ll hold. Give over the price.

I approached warily and first sniffed, then tasted the water in each skin. No warning bitterness or other hint of contamination. Safer to check for poison or foulness with a sweetwater charm, but we didn’t have one. In the end, I gestured to Kiran, all too aware of the godspeaker still circling at my back.

Kiran tossed an oilskin packet containing gems and charms to the clansman. I slung one waterskin over my shoulder and retreated to tie the others to our packs, moving as fast as I dared. The godspeaker prowled back around to the clansman’s side. He asked her a soft question in what sounded like oddly inflected Varkevian.

The godspeaker grinned wide. My dream spoke truth, she said in a high, clear voice pitched far too loud to be for his ears alone. "Today we are Shaikar’s hands and will earn his favor. Khadijjah ashtok meit vas!"

She stabbed a slender finger straight at us, and a horde of yelling, knife-wielding clanfolk boiled out of the rocks.

Chapter Two

(Kiran)

The clanfolk howled in savage chorus as they rushed down the sandstone. Kiran froze, power flaring from his ikilhia in instinctive defense. The urge to release his mental barriers and strike was overwhelming. But he must not cast—he must not. He struggled to rein in wild magic and hold his barriers firm, lost to all else.

A violent yank on his wrist sent him staggering. Run, damn you! Dev’s green eyes were white-rimmed in his mahogany face, his teeth bared in a snarl. The godspeaker howled in concert with her oncoming kin, her head tipped to the sky and her slender arms thrown wide. The wizened trader remained in a defensive stance at her side, with a knife in one tattooed hand and the bag of gems and charms still clutched in the other.

Kiran lurched away in a stumbling run. The very air seemed to resist his progress, as if he ran through thickened syrup. Sweat coursed into his eyes, his lungs laboring. The dark line of the crevice between the purple-streaked slabs looked impossibly distant across the open expanse of the bowl.

Dev overtook him, darting past with agile speed despite his shorter legs and the bulky packs clutched under each arm. Eager yells sounded close behind. Kiran strove to run faster.

Something struck his legs. He crashed down onto sun-heated stone, releasing an inarticulate shout. Ahead, Dev skidded to a halt, calling to him. Kiran struggled to rise, but his legs wouldn’t move. A leather strap weighted by two rocks was wound tight around them.

The frontrunning clansmen were closing fast. Kiran snatched up his belt knife and hacked through the leather binding his legs. He kicked free of the strap and jumped to his feet. Thoughts tumbled through his head in a frantic, quicksilver rush.

Futile to run with his pursuers so close. But to fight so many—when he’d spoken so confidently to Dev of taking ikilhia, he’d imagined facing a few men, not an entire army. He could take power by touch without alerting Ruslan, but if he drew too much into his own ikilhia and did not release it in a spellcasting, his barriers would fail under the pressure. Or if the clansmen used the knives gleaming in their dusty hands, if they hurt Kiran too badly before he could stop them—his barriers would likewise crumble, his body reaching blindly for the power needed to heal. Either way, Ruslan would know instantly the truth of Kiran’s location.

Temptation rose in a sick, terrible wave. If discovery was inevitable, why not fight properly? Throw the gates of his ikilhia wide, and let a glorious cataract of power blaze through his blood. One lash of magefire, and his attackers would be charred stains on the stone. An outcome Ruslan would applaud. He’d come to reclaim Kiran, take him back to Ninavel and the embrace of his mage-family, and when he did...Kiran knew exactly what he might offer Ruslan that would turn him aside from his search for demonkind. An offer that would save countless lives, including Dev’s.

No! A voice deep within screamed in furious denial. The price of that salvation was far too high. How could he even consider surrender? There might still be a chance to prevail. The clanfolk were surely ignorant of the danger they faced in attacking him. If he could shock them, frighten them enough to inspire a retreat—

For that, he’d need to do more than take mere sips of ikilhia. Vivid and jagged as lightning, the memory of the soul-consuming joy he’d felt in killing Stevannes lanced through him. Kiran cast a wild glance over his shoulder at Dev, who had tossed aside the packs and was racing toward him.

Stay back! Kiran shouted. No time to see if Dev heeded the warning. Kiran sheathed his knife to free his hands, and faced the onrushing clanfolk.

The first to reach him was a young man who bounded over the sandstone with a swift energy terribly reminiscent of Dev’s. Sweat sheened the corded muscles of his bare arms, and his dark eyes were alight with the keen anticipation of a hunter who sees his prey falter. He leaped at Kiran, metal glinting in his hand—not a knife, but some type of charm.

Charms, Kiran didn’t fear. He grabbed for one ruddy brown arm.

The young man twisted aside with astonishing agility. A blow slammed Kiran face-down onto stone. Crude magic crawled over his barriers, seeking. The amulet flared hot against his chest in protective response, even as hands wrenched his arms behind his back. More hands gripped him, feet crowding all around, ululating cries of triumph ringing out—somewhere, Dev was shouting, the words lost in the clamor—

Kiran focused on the hands pinning his limbs and sought through the contact. Multiple dim coals of ikilhia flickered in his inner vision. He pulled savagely at the coals, taking every spark of life he could reach.

The victorious yells above turned to agonized screams. Power poured into Kiran, the separate small coals of life merging into one intoxicating blaze. Not as strong as what he’d channeled from Stevannes’s rich fount of ikilhia—that inferno, Kiran could never have contained within his barriers—but oh, so sweet a fire after long weeks without a single spark!

The hands slackened and fell away. Kiran rolled and saw crumpled, lifeless bodies. Beyond, clansmen scrabbled back from him with panicked cries, their faces sallow with shock.

Kiran rose to his feet, buoyed by a swell of hectic satisfaction. A tide of power surged with every beat of his heart, the sensation so deliriously intense he wanted to shout for the joy of it. Dizziness swept over him, his vision blurring.

He must not betray weakness. Already the song in his blood made it desperately hard to maintain his focus. If he took in any more ikilhia, he’d never succeed in holding his barriers.

He glanced back. Dev was crouched over their packs amid a sparse ring of clansmen, all of whom had twisted to gape at Kiran. The charms on Dev’s wrists glimmered with fading fire, and his chest heaved in harsh, rapid breaths. He too was staring at Kiran, his expression a tangled mixture of relief and dismay. He’d lost his little belt knife; the largest of the clansmen held it. Red streaked the blade, a sight that sent worry lancing through Kiran’s giddy intoxication. But another of the clansmen had a hand clamped over a forearm, blood trickling through his fingers, while Dev showed no sign of wounds.

The clansmen were turning back to Dev, their shock fading into grim resolve. Kiran yelled, Touch him, and you die like your kin.

The men froze, darting nervous glances at the sprawled bodies around Kiran. Five dead, he realized; all men in their prime, including that first eager young hunter. Their palms were blackened and charred where they’d once gripped him, and their mouths hung open in airless screams. Yet the beautiful, seductive fire that leaped behind his eyes left no room for horror or regret.

Eight men surrounded Dev, and at least another thirty clanfolk faced Kiran at a wary distance. These were a mixture of ages, from lanky youths up to grizzled, hard-eyed elders, and included a scattering of women, wiry and muscled as the men. Most of the crowd flinched from his gaze, but some few—close kin, perhaps, to those he’d killed—glared back at him, fingering their knives with hatred hot in their eyes.

Kiran shouted at them, I am the bearer of Shaikar’s favor, not you. Ruslan had always dismissed gods as fables for the weak-minded, saying that akheli—blood mages, as the untalented called them—were the closest thing to gods that humankind would ever know. The creatures known as demons had proved to be real, but Kiran had seen no evidence of the divine. Yet if these nathahlen had such faith in Shaikar, he would use it.

Go, Kiran ordered the clanfolk. Now! Or every one of you will feel Shaikar’s wrath.

The ring of space around him widened. Men and women alike edged back up the slope toward the rocks. But a high voice rang out, biting as a blade.

Oh, you are favored of Shaikar. I do not deny it.

Silently, the sallow-faced crowd flowed apart to reveal the young godspeaker. She held a long, curved knife as black as obsidian, and unlike her kin, she didn’t look at all afraid. Only dismayingly resolute.

She called to Kiran: Why else should the keepers of the sacred fire yearn for you so deeply that their desire touched my dreams? Her gaze flicked to the corpses, and her teeth showed briefly in an expression far from a smile. A viper in the guise of a lamb. That, the flame did not see fit to show me. Yet I shall not turn aside from the hunt.

The only part he fully understood was the last, but that threat was clear enough. You’ll gain only death, Kiran warned. Curse the woman! If he felled her as he had the others, his barriers were certain to fail.

The wizened trader muttered something to the godspeaker. She shook her head in dismissal and laughed, bright and wild. Favor comes only to those bold enough to seize it. So, come. She stared straight into Kiran’s eyes and spread her arms in invitation. If my dream was false—if you already act in Shaikar’s name, and he does not wish you returned to his sanctum—then strike me down.

The clanfolk tensed, looking from her to Kiran. Surprise scattered Kiran’s thoughts. Returned to...? Did she speak of Ruslan? The power seething inside him pressed all the harder against his barriers. Light sparked in his vision, his dizziness growing. It would be so easy to do as she challenged him.

"For fuck’s sake, stop goading him." The voice was Dev’s, coldly furious. Do you love Shaikar so much you want your entire clan consigned to his hells? My friend is trying to show you idiots a little mercy. Trust me, you should run while you still can.

The godspeaker raised her black brows and put a slim hand to the charm at her throat. Is it mercy he shows? Or weakness? She looked at Kiran. If you had the power to strike us all down, I think you would have wielded it at the first. There is more than one way to offer you to the flame.

She charged straight at Kiran. Caught off guard, he barely managed to dodge the first slash of her knife. Scrambling backward, he tripped over a corpse and fell. She sprang forward and stabbed again, so swiftly he could hardly see the blur of the blade. He rolled the only way he could, toward her.

She danced aside with a hiss. She’d guessed enough to fear his touch, but she didn’t know his handicap.

Beyond the siren song of the power in his head, Kiran sensed a faint, contained pulse of magic. A spell, bound in the godspeaker’s blade. His barriers were barely holding against the fire inside him. If they were put under more strain by resisting a spell, failure was all the more certain. He had to dampen the blaze inside him. But how, without casting?

A chorus of yells, and Dev hurtled past to slam into the godspeaker. They crashed to the stone in a tangle of limbs. Dev grabbed the godspeaker’s knife hand and hammered it against the rock, but she wrenched free of his grip and rolled to her feet. Before Dev could regain his own footing, she kicked him hard in the ribs. Dev’s charms flared silver, their magic warding his flesh from harm, but the force of the blow sent him sprawling. The godspeaker leaped at Kiran.

The brief respite had given him a vital instant to think. There was indeed a way to use up the power burning in his blood without spellcasting. The risk was frighteningly high, but he must take it.

The godspeaker struck with her spelled blade. This time, Kiran didn’t dodge. He stepped straight into her thrust.

Her knife bit deep into his side. Pain stole his breath, but he ignored it, throwing every scrap of will and concentration into holding his barriers. She yanked the blade out—and the magic trapped within him leapt to answer his body’s scream of need. Flesh and muscle knit back together in a silent, secret conflagration of power. His barriers wavered, thinning. Through sheer force of will, Kiran held them solid. A grating ache grew in his head, warning of overstrain, even as the sharper physical pain vanished from his side. Only a guttering glow remained of the former blaze in his blood, and his barriers remained safely in place.

Blackness bloomed at the edges of his vision. He lunged, desperate, snatching for the godspeaker. He had to take her life before she stabbed him again. He had no reserves left to heal a second wound. His barriers would fall and expose him to Ruslan.

She was too fast. She darted out of his reach, the obsidian knife held high, the blade scarlet with his blood. Beyond, Dev had disappeared in a heaving knot of clansmen. Faint, brief flashes of power struck Kiran’s barriers—Dev’s defensive charms, warding off impacts. How much longer before the charms failed, all their stored magic expended? Kiran had to end this, now.

He straightened so the rent in his shirt showed clean, unmarked skin, and beckoned the godspeaker with all the infuriating arrogance he could muster. Care to try again?

She only retreated farther, a savage grin on her pointed face. A wash of indigo shimmered over her knife. His blood soaked into the blade and disappeared, leaving the surface once more an unmarked, glossy black. She whirled and yelled a string of incomprehensible words.

Every one of the clanfolk turned and ran. They retreated in a silent rush back into the boulders, and the godspeaker with them. Within moments, the rock bowl was empty but for Kiran, a scattering of corpses, and a disheveled, wild-eyed Dev.

What the fuck did you do to them? Dev shouted at him. Tell me you didn’t cast!

No! Kiran shook off his own stunned incredulity. She stabbed me and I healed it, but I used only the power I already held within me. I cast nothing outside my barriers.

Dev let out a ragged breath, his eyes closing briefly.

Kiran took an unsteady step toward him. You’re all right? They didn’t...?

Oh, I’m terrific. Dev made a noise too ugly to be a laugh. Whatever inspired that Shaikar-loving bitch and her crew to take off instead of pounding us to slag, I say we seize the chance to get the hell out of here. But first... He knelt and ran his hands over a corpse in a rough, hasty search. I need to see if they carried anything useful.

Kiran looked away from the dead man’s staring eyes. He fumbled at the sash around his waist. The godspeaker’s blade had a containment charm. To hold and preserve an enemy’s blood. Blood was the best key for targeting spells, whether the spell was charm-bound or mage-cast.

You think she means to spark some charm against you from a nice safe distance? Your amulet should stop any spells from reaching us—right? At Kiran’s nod, Dev gave a relieved grunt and hurried to search the next corpse. Speaking of spells, you’re absolutely certain Ruslan didn’t feel you heal that knife wound. Or kill these men. He glanced at the other bodies, his mouth a hard line.

He didn’t say, so much for your promise, but Kiran heard the accusation hanging in the desert silence.

No, I...I held my barriers, but... He couldn’t get the sash untied. The sunlight seared his vision. His knees gave way, a dangerous trembling growing in his muscles. Dev. The drug—I need—

Kiran! Strong hands caught his shoulders, and concerned eyes peered into his own. All that magic, of course. Here...

Deft fingers pulled his sash free and rescued the warded vial from the pouch sewn inside his shirt. Liquid dripped onto his tongue, the familiar, subtly sour taste. Kiran swallowed, reaching to grip the vial, but Dev pulled it away.

No more. Gods, Kiran, we have so little left...come on, get up. Not safe to stay here.

With Dev’s aid, Kiran staggered upright. His head still throbbed, the glow of his ikilhia frighteningly erratic, but at least he no longer felt at risk of a seizure. Still, to come so close to collapse after so small a use of power was deeply dismaying. He’d hoped that after long weeks of avoiding the least hint of magic and dutifully taking regular drug doses, his body and ikilhia would have returned to some semblance of proper balance. In Ninavel, he’d spellcast repeatedly for days without the drug and suffered no worse than increasing nausea and dizziness. It hadn’t been until he helped Ruslan cast channeled magic in the Cirque of the Knives that his ikilhia became so disrupted as to send him into convulsions. But then, in Ninavel he’d started out wholly healthy, not struggling to recover from an imbalance so great he’d nearly died.

Not for the first time, he cursed the cleverness of the Alathians. They’d known about the irrevocable link Ruslan had forged between Kiran’s body and magic. Ruslan had meant to ensure instinctive healing, yet the Alathians had found a way to twist that very protection into the instrument of Kiran’s death. Without the drug, his bodily humors slid out of balance such that the touch of magic drove his ikilhia toward dissolution. But Kiran couldn’t stop his body from drawing on his magic in an attempt to restore balance, hastening the very death it sought to prevent.

Dev left his side to snatch up their abandoned packs. Kiran glanced back at the ring of corpses. An echo of the heady joy he’d felt while their lives coursed in his veins rolled through him. Kiran swallowed, nauseated. Dev had seen his exhilaration. That flinty look in his eyes afterward...

Kiran stumbled closer to Dev. I had to kill those men. I had to frighten the rest badly enough they’d retreat and leave us alone. Even if they only intended to take us captive, we couldn’t afford the delay.

Yet as he spoke, doubt crept in. If he’d taken only enough ikilhia from the first men to render them unconscious, he would have had the capacity to take from the godspeaker without needing her to stab him first. More, the clanfolk might have believed their kin’s collapse merely the effect of a powerful defensive charm. Instead, he had revealed himself beyond a doubt as a mage, and further diminished his scant supply of the drug.

You did what you had to. Yet the line of Dev’s jaw tightened, as if he shared Kiran’s doubt. His stride quickened. We need to discuss what exactly they meant to do and why. Later, when we’re not in the open.

Of course, yes. Foolish to waste time worrying over Dev’s reaction and second-guessing a decision impossible to change. Better to puzzle over the godspeaker’s words and actions, but between the ache in his head and the lingering sense of disconnection, it was so difficult to think properly. Kiran needed all his concentration to walk in something approximating a straight line. His legs still wanted to fold beneath him.

He couldn’t get the sight of the bodies out of his head. Curse it, the dead men had attacked him. He need not feel ashamed of fighting back.

He tried to banish the empty-eyed corpses by picturing Lena, standing slim and straight-backed in her Alathian uniform in the cabin that’d been his temporary prison after they defeated Ninavel’s enemy. The Council believes you have proved yourself too dangerous to live. I believe you are our best hope of stopping Ruslan. Yet I would not break my oaths and help you escape if I did not also believe you have the strength of soul to choose a different path than the one he taught you.

But what chance did he have of stopping Ruslan without magic? Kiran had no experience with more innocent methods of casting. He couldn’t think of Lena without hearing her scream of pain as he’d burned away the memories that would have branded her a traitor. He’d destroyed them at her request, but that didn’t make the memory of her agony at his hands any less terrible.

More disturbing yet was the fear that if she saw his soul now, she’d regret ever freeing him. It wasn’t remorse for the clansmen’s deaths that left Kiran hollow and cold despite the heat baking off the sandstone underfoot. No; what haunted him was how easy it had been to take their lives.

That, and how badly he longed to taste that fire again.

* * *

(Dev)

I hustled Kiran toward the dark slash of the crevice. This close, the slabs were towering bulwarks of rust-red rock that appeared as formidable as anything we’d climbed in the Whitefires. Thank Khalmet, Kiran’s stride had steadied into a reasonable pace as opposed to his initial turtle-slow stagger. The drug was doing its job, then. I’d worried that I hadn’t given him a big enough dose, and we’d have to use up still more of our fast-vanishing supply. I already wasn’t sure we had enough remaining to last until we reached Prosul Akheba.

I glanced at the boulders lining the opposite side of the bowl. Nothing. The desert was so silent and still, you’d think the clanfolk had vanished straight into Shaikar’s hells.

If only. Whatever the clan’s reason for running off—something that still made little sense to me—the godspeaker must’ve left scouts watching from the rocks. Thankfully, spying on us was about to get a lot more difficult.

I slung off my pack. The crevice ahead was so narrow I’d get stuck fast, otherwise. I’d have to carry both our packs by their straps.

Kiran reached to take his pack, but I shook my head. Save your strength. You’ll need it. I can haul both. He might be moving faster, but his cheeks were sunken beneath the sharp lines of his cheekbones, his hands trembled, and he was squinting like he had a skull-buster of a headache.

A far cry from the savage joy he’d displayed as he uncoiled from a pile of dead clansmen, wearing a grin as vicious as any I’d seen on Ruslan. I had to admit the godspeaker had guts, taking Kiran on. I’d wanted to run, and he was on my side.

But then, unlike the clanfolk, I knew what magic Kiran was really capable of if he ever abandoned his conscience. I was supposed to keep him from that, or so Lena had asked of me in return for helping us escape Alathia. Terrific job I was doing so far. We hadn’t even reached civilization yet, and he’d stolen the lives of five men. Not that I minded the clansmen dying. Hell, I’d have killed them myself if I was able. It was Kiran’s delight in the taking that set my skin crawling.

Did you find anything on the bodies? Kiran’s head stayed bent, his shoulders hunched. Out of simple exhaustion, or was it guilt? I couldn’t deny I hoped for the latter.

Not much. Just some knives, and one had a sleepfast charm. More’s the pity. I’d known the chances were slim I’d discover any clue as to the godspeaker’s intentions, but it would’ve been nice to recoup the worth of the charms and gems I’d given that snake-tongued oldster.

At least we had the water. I took a quick swig from a skin. I might not be as bad off as Kiran, but I felt far from fine. The magic in the warding charms had started to fail while the clansmen were doing their best to stomp me into jelly, and I had the bruises to prove it.

I offered the skin to Kiran, but he waved it aside. Lena told me the drug works best if I don’t eat or drink for some time after taking a dose. I had enough water from emptying my skins before the trade that I can wait.

Don’t wait too long, I warned. Push too hard in the desert without water and salt, and sun sickness sneaks up on you quick. In which case, I was guessing his body would draw on his magic to recover, and I’d end up pouring yet more of our dwindling drug supply down his throat.

The first part of the route is in shadow. I can wait a little more. Kiran was wan but resolute.

Well, his call to make. I hefted our packs and slid into the slot. Right away we had to pass a succession of rocks lodged between the slot walls. Some could be squeezed under, others we had to clamber over. I tossed packs where I couldn’t haul them, setting my teeth against the protests of bruised muscles, and showed Kiran how to brace his back against one wall, his feet against the other, and shuffle his way up and over obstacles. He tackled it all with the same stubborn determination I remembered from our first trip through the Whitefires.

When the slot pinched into a crack so narrow only an ant could continue, I led a precarious ascent up the slanted sidewall to reach the slab’s vertical back side. Beyond was an undulating expanse formed of broad ribs and fluted fins of rock, split by deep, yawning crevices, as if the rock had been scored by the talons of some immense storybook dragon.

Do you see...any sign of...clanfolk? Kiran was panting so hard from the effort of climbing that I feared he might tumble off the ledge. I gripped the rope still knotted around his waist and steadied him.

Not so far. I saw no sign of movement anywhere, only stone and sky. I thrust a waterskin at Kiran. Drink, for Khalmet’s sake. Before you keel over.

Kiran obeyed. By the time he stoppered the skin again, his breathing had calmed down enough I felt safe in letting go of him.

I said, Don’t suppose you’ve thought up any ideas on why the clanfolk ran. Or why they attacked in the first place.

Kiran’s expression darkened. "I’ve no idea why they ran. As for the attack, Ruslan could have cast to send a vision of me to that godspeaker. But if he’s learned of my escape from Alathia, why wouldn’t he simply seek to break the amulet’s warding and reclaim me that way? It’s not like him to trust a task to nathahlen."

Yeah, I’d seen Ruslan’s utter contempt for the untalented, not to mention his monumental confidence in his own skill. I had my own theory on the godspeaker’s motive, but it was one I wanted to consider more before mentioning to Kiran, especially with him in such rough shape. The slab’s back side was formed of stacked, jutting layers of sandstone that provided excellent holds for a downclimb, but the descent to the nearest rock rib would still tax Kiran’s concentration. I wanted him focused, not distracted and upset.

Only thing I’m certain of is that bloodthirsty bitch isn’t done with us yet, I said. The more ground we can cover before sundown, the better. You ready to press on?

He squared his shoulders and nodded.

I looped a bight of rope around a protruding knob of rock in preparation for belaying his downclimb. Once we’re on those fingers of rock, walking along the crests shouldn’t be too hard, but we’ll have some excitement when we have to cross between them.

Kiran groaned. What you call ‘exciting’ makes sane men want to run away screaming.

I grinned at him, and for a brief, blessed moment, the shadow that lay between us melted away. He was once again the friend I remembered, not the mage I feared. Oh, quit whining. This’ll be nothing compared to what we survived last week. Remember that ten-pitch overhang on the ascent up to Jade Col?

Kiran shuddered. Don’t remind me. I see it enough in my nightmares.

I chuckled; that overhang had been the first time I’d ever heard him curse. Awkwardly but fervently, with epithets so colorful I knew he’d learned them from me.

This won’t be half so nasty, I promised. He gave me a disbelieving look, but faced the rock in preparation to climb.

Sadly, once we made it off the slab, I found my promise had been far too optimistic. The crevices between rock ribs were so deep their bottoms were lost in ominous darkness, and only a few gaps were narrow enough to step over. Crossing between the humped ridges of rock meant traversing in search of a spot possible to jump. Not easy jumps, either. I had to tie into the rope, run to gain momentum, and fling myself across a chasm while Kiran braced himself as best he could with the rest of the rope in case I missed the landing. Following me, Kiran all too often did botch the landing, sliding and scraping down the crevice wall until the rope caught him short and I could haul him back up.

All of it was strenuous, sweaty work that left my abused muscles screaming. I constantly scanned the barren stonescape for movement, and strained my ears for the telltale scrape of footsteps. I saw only skittering lizards, heard only the occasional croaking call of a raven. At least, I hoped it was a raven and not some clever, hard-climbing clansman signaling his kin.

Shadows lengthened and merged. The hue of the rocks changed from copper to a lambent, burning orange in the rich light of approaching sunset. I stopped at the edge of a great gash in the stone, where a thirty-foot overhang dropped into a proper gorge instead of a narrowing chasm. Along the bottom, smooth swells of stone alternated with drifted dunes. The