Chapter 23 #2
It was Relvin. His shoulder-length blond hair was lank and greasy, and a yellowing bruise marred his cheek.
He was imprisoned behind a glowing green barrier with dozens of other people.
Syla recognized some of them, and realized they all had moon-marked hands.
These were the prisoners Fograth had been rounding up.
But hadn’t Relvin been working with the lord?
Not against him? Maybe they’d had a falling out…
“Queen Syla!” several people called in recognition and relief.
“That captain killed Lord Fograth!” Relvin yelled over them. “She ran in and slit his throat before he knew what was going on.”
Syla looked down at Vonla but didn’t hesitate to send healing magic into her.
“To clear the way for you, Your Majesty,” Vonla gasped. “The throne… was meant to be yours.”
Focused on trying to heal her injuries, Syla didn’t respond. There was something wrong with the sword wounds. She sensed a malevolent dark energy about them, almost like an infection. An evil magical infection.
“Fograth was in the way,” Vonla whispered, already sounding weaker. “They all were.”
Distressed, Syla tried to use her power to drive out the taint within the captain. Meanwhile, the two men battled.
The clash of swords and Vorik’s grunts and curses, in contrast to the utter silence of Jhiton, made it hard to concentrate.
Worse, the malevolent magic within Vonla writhed and twisted away from Syla’s attempts to stamp it out.
And it was spreading. There were multiple sword wounds, multiple places that sent the dark energy flowing inward, seeping deeper into Vonla’s body.
A thick trail of it headed toward her heart.
Fear crept into Syla, the fear that, for the first time in a long time, she wouldn’t be able to help a patient. And Vonla had been standing with her since they first met, since before Syla had proven herself to the other officers. All along, she’d had faith in her.
Sweat ran down the sides of Syla’s face. Sweat from the run down here, sweat from panic.
“Fight it, Vonla,” she whispered, though she didn’t know how the captain could.
Footsteps sounded behind Syla, some of her soldiers reaching the laboratory. But the eyes in the statues of the wyverns flashed, and green energy appeared where the tunnel led into the laboratory. It hadn’t been there before, but it was now. A barrier that kept the men from entering.
Again, Syla willed her power into Vonla, trying to push out the magical infection.
Her moon-mark flared silver, and the dragon tattoo hummed with power.
Soon, all of Syla hummed, but it still wasn’t enough.
Jhiton may have delivered the sword blows, but a god had guided him, and a god had infused those swords with angry storm power.
Vonla’s face twisted in pain, and she gasped, then gripped Syla’s arm. “It was worth it, Your Majesty.”
“You shouldn’t die because you helped me,” Syla said with distress, even though she realized that Vonla must have been the one who’d slit all the throats. Even that of Teyla’s father? Had she gone there before heading to the capital? Before Syla and Fel had reached the estate?
“Worth it,” Vonla whispered. “Just… find a way… stop the storm god. Then… rule, my queen.”
Vorik yelled in surprise and pain, and Syla looked up in time to see him fly across the laboratory, black energy crackling in the air around him.
He struck a marble workstation, and a dusty artifact on it flared to life.
Angry purple energy shot out, almost like the lightning bolts outside.
One sizzled past Vorik’s nose as he landed in a crouch; then it slammed into the high ceiling. Rock tumbled down.
His face impassive, save for the eerily glowing eyes, Jhiton strode toward Vorik.
Vorik used his sleeve to dash sweat from his forehead before bracing himself to meet his brother again.
“Free those people, Syla,” he said, glancing over. “Then get out of here. I don’t know how long I can keep him busy.”
More purple bursts shot out from the awakened artifact. One darted across the laboratory and struck Syla in the shoulder before she could shift away. Pain blasted her as the power knocked her backward. She struck a wall as another sizzling lance of purple energy flashed past.
Wreylith, Syla said as she crawled on hands and knees back toward Vonla who lay disturbingly still now. I need a dragon’s help. I need your help.
Yes, Wreylith said, as if she were monitoring the battle. Maybe she could see it through Syla’s eyes.
But they both knew the dragon couldn’t get in.
When Syla confirmed that Vonla had died, tears threatened her eyes, but she made herself hurry to the prisoners.
Vorik was risking his life to buy her time to free them, a thought punctuated by a curse of pain as he went flying again.
Even as she searched for a way to shut down the barrier, a new fear slammed into her.
If Jhiton cut Vorik with the same befouled blades as he’d used on Vonla, he would also be infected by the magical taint that Syla didn’t know how to heal. Didn’t have the power to heal.
“Don’t let him cut you!” Syla shouted, patting along the stone wall and checking the wyvern statues for levers or switches.
“I’m trying!” Vorik groaned as Jhiton strode toward him again.
At least the device hurling purple bolts had stopped. For the moment.
“It’s over there.” Relvin pointed across the laboratory to a workstation with a black dome on it.
Like so much down here, it emanated magic.
“It took a moon-mark to activate it.” Relvin held up his hand.
Was he silently admitting that he’d helped set things up to imprison these people?
Probably. “But it’ll knock you on your ass.
It didn’t like the moon-mark. Any magic might have brought it to life. ”
Syla followed the wall toward the device, giving the battle a wide berth.
Vorik managed to kick Jhiton away, ducking to avoid slashes from the glowing swords, but he bled from several wounds including a gouge in his side.
Syla’s stomach churned with the fear that her warning might have come too late, that Jhiton, powered by a god, was too great a foe for Vorik and had already infected him.
“Syla!” came Teyla’s voice from the tunnel.
She and Fel had made it down and stood with the soldiers, but they couldn’t get in. When Fel swiped at the barrier with his mace, it flashed green and knocked him backward.
As Syla continued to the dome-shaped device, hoping it could bring down both barriers, she also looked around for other artifacts.
There had to be some way to help Vorik. Could she call upon the weapons platform to send a projectile in here?
Without blowing up the cliff and dropping the entire castle into the harbor?
Maybe it would be worth it to kill Jhiton and stop the storm god. But she had to get everyone out of here first.
Bracing herself, she touched her moon-marked hand to the black dome, willing it to bring down the barrier restraining the prisoners. But, as Relvin had warned, a tremendous burst of power came from it, and it flung her backward.
She struck the wall so hard that it knocked the air out of her, and she crumpled to the ground.
Jhiton delivered a similar blow to Vorik, and he flew across the laboratory.
He somersaulted to land on his feet, but he staggered as he did, a pained slump to his shoulders. Blood spattered the floor around him.
Syla cursed. Was she going to be too late?
Groaning, she pushed herself to her feet and returned to the device.
A muffled roar came from a tunnel on the far end of the laboratory, the one that led out to the cliff near the harbor.
Syla sensed Wreylith and Agrevlari near the exit, the spot where Jhiton and all the cursed fog had entered.
Unfortunately, the hole wasn’t large enough for dragons.
Too bad. If they could come in, they could help turn the tides, and there was plenty of room in the laboratory itself for their kind.
Again, she thought of trying to call to the weapons platform to launch projectiles, but dozens of her moon-marked kin might be killed. All those in the castle might also be in danger if the great power weakened the bluff above.
When Syla lifted her finger toward the device again, it hummed angrily at her, and she paused. “Are you sure it was a moon-mark that activated it, Relvin?”
These were the storm god’s artifacts, after all. Why would they respond to magic granted by the other gods?
“It might have been my ring,” Relvin called after a moment. He held up his hand to show an emerald bauble on a gold band. “But I can’t get it to you.”
Dragon roars sounded as swords clanged, Vorik again clashing with his brother.
We are tearing away and attempting to melt the rock to widen the entrance, Wreylith said, but it will take some time.
Thank you. Hurry as best you can.
Once more, Vorik tumbled away from Jhiton, who didn’t hesitate to stride after him. He’d also been injured and wept blood, but Vorik’s blades weren’t infected with evil magic.
We need dragons, Syla added to Wreylith.
Then she blurted, “Oh, dragons,” to herself as realization swept over her.
Syla dropped her left hand onto the dome, the one marked by Wreylith’s tattoo. This time, the device responded to her, flaring green, the same green as that of the barriers.
“Lower those,” she whispered and attempted to telepathically share the order with the device.
A crackle of energy radiated from the dome along with a sense of indignation.
“Lower them, or I’ll hurl you into the sea, and you’ll be forgotten forever,” she growled before she could consider that bribery and cajoling might work better than threats.