39. The Amulet
The Amulet
He was already in the hut when I arrived.
The vial was on the table. I sat down and picked it up and drank it without being asked. He noticed and said nothing.
"Tell me about the amulet," I said. "The one your sister is so obsessed with. And why."
He looked at me. Then he told me.
His mother made it. Toritha, Queen of Sarenal. She built it for one purpose, to bring him home. That was its true function, to pull him back to Sarenal.
But, like many Sarenal artifacts, it had additional benefits. It could do more than simply return him to Sarenal. It could open other wards, perhaps seal them too.
"Only a Siren can wield it safely," Eravic said. "Anyone else who tries dies. The magic is too old and too specific."
"And if Dali gets it?"
He looked at the fire. "If any of Toritha's bloodline wears it, Dali, Maridale, or me, it sends me to Sarenal before doing anything else.”
“Why you?” I couldn’t help myself.
“Because I’m the heir.”
“How do you know it wouldn’t pull Maridale or Dali in simultaneously? She is your sister after all.”
“I do not know, and that is part of the problem.” He paused.
“Whatever it is meant to do, Maridale would not survive it."
I sat with that.
"And if Orsin gets it?"
“I do not know, I simply know that if he has any control over any of the wards it will be more than just Sarenal creatures that are concern. It will be his ability to siphon all of that power.”
“Why does Dali want it, then?”
“I do not know. At first I thought it was because she wants the ability to live in Sarenal, perhaps reunite with our mother. Then I thought she had some altruistic desire to free the Sarenal creatures trapped here in Morrath.”
I almost laughed at the idea of the words altruistic and Dali being in the same sentence.
“But I think it is worse. I think it has to do with revenge.”
I did not probe further. If it was a revenge plot involving against my father, I could not entirely blame her, even if I did not agree with the approach.
"Then we cannot let either of them have it,” I said.
"No," he said. "We cannot.”
"You said I am the workaround."
"Yes." He held my eyes. "The Arrolyn made you the exception. It gave you just enough of that magic to survive it. But you are not of Toritha's bloodline, so the amulet cannot compel me back to Sarenal through you."
I nodded slowly. “So I could fix everything without harming you.”
He looked up at me. “Perhaps. But it is unlikely that you could fix everything without harming yourself.”
I thought of my mother. Loyalty and selfishness.
Neither of us said anything after that.
Eventually I stood and pulled my cloak around my shoulders.
"Same time tomorrow?" I said.
"Aye," he said quietly.
I left him with the dying fire and walked back through the dark toward the tunnels and Colsar waiting on the other side of them.
The tunnels were quiet tonight.
I moved through them quickly, my legs steady, the treatment doing what it had been doing all week. By the time I reached the ward the lamp on the other side was still lit.
He was awake.
He was sitting at the small table he had brought in, not eating, just sitting with his hands flat on the table looking at nothing in particular. When I came through the ward he looked up and the expression on his face lasted only a second before he put it away.
"You went to see him,” he said.
Not an accusation. Just a fact he was naming.
"Yes," I said.
He nodded once and looked back at the table.
I sat across from him. "He told me about the amulet. What it does. What happens if the wrong person gets it." I paused. "I needed to know before I came to you."
He was quiet.
"Colsar."
"I know," he said. "I know why you went. I know what he is doing for you and I know what it costs him and I—" He stopped. His jaw worked. "I know."
"Then say what you actually want to say."
He looked at me. "I do not like it."
"I know you do not."
"He is in love with you."
"You have said that."
"It bears repeating."
I reached across the table and put my hand over his. He looked down at it.
"I am here," I said. "I came through the ward and I am sitting across from you and I am telling you everything he told me because there are no secrets between us. There have never been secrets between us." I paused. "That is not nothing."
He turned his hand over and closed his fingers around mine.
"No," he said quietly. "It is not nothing."
We sat like that for a long time. The lamp burned low between us. Outside the room the children slept in their bassinets and Saurin dozed in her chair and the world was very small and very quiet and entirely ours.
"The amulet," I said finally. “Dali plans to take it, and I won’t be able to stop her. But once she has it, we cannot let her keep it.”
I drew in a breath. “Another thing. Taking the amulet apparently may destabilize the magic here in Morrath. I do not think Aviaryn should be here when it happens.”
“Asharin, Morrath is her home, you yourself told me she seems to relate to the creatures—”
“She is my niece.” My voice was sharper than I intended.
He nodded, then frowned. “She likely could just…stay here. In this room.”
“How? The wards—”
“She stepped right through them like it was nothing when I first met her.”
I stared at him. “Are you certain?”
“Very.”
The whole idea was strange, if Aviaryn could leave Morrath and live elsewhere, then why was Nox keeping her here?
None of it made sense.
Colsar interrupted my thoughts. “She is your blood, and she will be safe. She will be here with me whenever it happens, so long as we know when it will happen.”
I sighed. “There are so many plans, so many secrets, so many moving parts.”
He looked at me. "Tell me everything."
So I did.