It seemed to do no good; ever more of the twisting tentacles came at him from out of the darkness. It was like finding himself at the bottom of a dark pit full of angry vipers. Richard fought on with all his strength, cutting, stabbing, slashing. His arms ached with the effort. Nicci grappled with the thick tentacles with one hand, her other arm still refusing to let him go. He could tell by the way she arched and twisted that she was in agony. Richard abandoned the coils around himself and with all his fury hacked at the arms of the beast hurting Nicci as they tried to pull her away from him.
But then she was violently torn away from him.
Richard was suddenly alone in the middle of nowhere with a glassy, slippery, powerful creature trying to wrestle him in toward its center, toward something he could hear snarling, snapping, clacking.
There was no way to fight such a thing, no way to get an advantage over its power, no way to escape its multi-armed grasp. Ever more of the arms whipped in to capture him.
With all his strength, before his arm was captured, he thrust the knife toward the center mass that he couldn’t clearly see.
He made solid contact. The beast howled with a sound that hurt his ears. The arms loosened just a bit—not letting go of him, but loosed just enough for Richard to give a mighty twist of his body that succeeded in spinning him out of the creature’s grip. It an instant, like a pumpkin seed squeezed between wet fingers, he squirted away from the deadly grip.
Richard tried to swim away, to somehow escape the thrashing, translucent arms coming for him, but it was faster than he was, more powerful, and tireless.
“Here!” Six urged as she rapped her knuckles against the center of an emblem.
Violet raced with the chalk to the spot her advisor was urging her toward. Her fingers flew with swift and sure movements. With the back of her other hand, Violet swiped sweat off her face, then with her fingers wiped it from her eyes. Rachel had never seen Violet work so hard, or so fast.
Rachel didn’t know what was happening, but it was obvious that something was not going the way Six had expected. She was in a state balancing precariously between panic and rage. Rachel feared whichever way it fell.
While Violet swiftly completed links, switching chalk and moving to each successive point, Six went back to softly chanting her incantations. The corrosive sound of those whispered words felt as if they were searing Rachel’s soul. While she could not understand the words or their meaning, they were spoken with a sinister intent that terrified her.
She glanced toward the distant cave entrance, but with it being dark outside, Rachel couldn’t see anything. She wanted to run but dared not. She knew that if she caused Violet or Six to have to stop what they were doing and come after her, it would go very badly for her.
Chase had taught her to bridle her impulses, as he’d called it, and to watch for true openings. He had cautioned her that if she wasn’t in immediate mortal danger, she should act only when she had a deliberate plan that she had thought out ahead of time. He said that she shouldn’t act out of blind fear, but work to find ways to increase the odds of success.
Despite how busy the other two were, Rachel knew that with both of them together and both in such a frantic state, they both would react to any misdeed by Rachel with swift and unrestrained violence. This was not the
right opportunity; getting up right then and running was not a good plan, and she knew it.
As Rachel sat still and quiet, trying to keep from being noticed, Six gently tapped the side of her fist against several of the flaring nodes in the links Violet had already drawn. Each bright circle she tapped went dark with a low growling sound that ran a shiver up Rachel’s spine. The cave seemed to hum with the rise and fall of Six’s rhythmic conjuring.
Violet, drawing with bold, slashing strokes, glanced to the side, checking on Six’s progress. Six, extinguishing the beacons in sequence, was catching the queen. Violet, as if in a trance, drew faster. The chalk made a clack, clack, clacking sound with each line that Violet threw down against the stone. The sound of the chalk matched the rhythm of Six’s chant.
All around the figure of Richard, Six, conjuring with murmured verses spoken in a rising, singsong chant that gradually brought a howling wind swirling down into the cave, rapped the side of her fist against points in the links Violet had been drawing without pause for hours. Rachel had thought that Violet might soon collapse from exhaustion but, far from it, she seemed to be working herself into a fever pitch of effort trying to stay ahead of Six. Despite how swiftly her hand moved, each line Violet drew looked true, each intersection met accurately and completely. Six had made Violet practice endlessly drawing the symbols and now it seemed to be paying off.
The drawing of Richard was almost completely encased in the web of symbols and connecting lines.
With a strange word, shouted in order to be heard over the howling wind, Six extinguished the final beacon around the figure of Richard. The wind abruptly died. Little pieces of leaves and other debris fluttered down through the abruptly still air.
Six paused in her chanting. Her brow twitched. With her fingertips she touched several of the symbols, as if feeling their pulse. Shimmers of colored light flickered through the cave.
“It has him,” Six whispered to herself.
Violet paused, swallowing as she caught her breath. “What?”
“Apogee to inferior apex.” She turned a venomous look on a startled Violet. “Do it!”
Without hesitation Violet turned back to the wall and reached up, drawing coiled lines downward from one of the central elements above Richard’s head.
Six lifted a hand. “Be ready, but don’t touch the primary invocation points until I tell you.”
Violet nodded. Six’s eyes rolled back in her head as she leaned in on her fingertips over the figure of Richard. As Violet and Rachel watched, Six breathed a low murmur of strange words.
Nicci broke above the quicksilver surface of the sliph. The weight of the leaden liquid rolled from her hair and face. Colors and light seemed to explode out of the quiet, mellow darkness.
Breathe.
With all her effort Nicci immediately forced the silver fluid from her lungs.
Breathe.
With her need overwhelming her dread, she gasped a desperate breath. It burned like drawing in acidic vapors.
The room spun sickeningly in her vision. Nicci saw a smear of red. She floundered woodenly as she again gasped. She managed to reach the edge and throw an arm over the sliph’s stone wall to hold herself up. Panic threatened to swamp her.
A hand seized her arm. Nicci managed to heave her pack up and over the wall. Another hand reached down and helped to haul her up enough for her to get both arms over the wall of the sliph. The red she had seen was Cara.
“Where’s Lord Rahl!”
Nicci blinked up at the Mord-Sith’s intense blue eyes. She had never known blue to hurt so much. She closed her eyes and shook her head, still trying to clear her mind of the experience, of the confusion, of the ringing sound of Cara’s voice echoing through the marrow of her bones.
“Richard…”
If felt as if her insides twisted with the anguish of wanting nothing so much as to help him.
“Richard…”
Cara grunted with the effort of lifting Nicci’s dead weight and pulling the top half of her body the rest of the way up and out of the well. Nicci, feeling like the survivor of a shipwreck in a stormy sea, slid out over the top of the stone wall, unable to do much to contribute to her own rescue. Cara put one knee to the floor, catching Nicci before her limp body hit the stone.
Once Cara had lowered her down onto the stone floor, Nicci gathered all her strength and pushed herself up on trembling arms. She couldn’t seem to muster her usual strength. It was a frightful feeling, not being able to make her body do her bidding. With great effort she finally managed to tip herself upright and sit heavily back against the wall of the sliph’s well. She still gasped, trying to catch her breath. She still hurt everywhere. For a moment she slumped against the stone well, trying to gather her strength.
Cara seized her by the collar of her dress and shook her.
“Nicci—where’s Lord Rahl?”
Nicci blinked, looking around, trying to make sense of everything. She hurt so much. The pain reminded her of one of Jagang’s beatings, the way during his rage she would start to feel the pain through a half-numb fog of confusion. But this had not been the emperor’s doing. This was pain from something that had happened in the sliph. Traveling had never hurt before. It had never been a painful experience.
“Where’s Lord Rahl!”
Nicci winced at the ache of the shout echoing around the room. She swallowed past the raw pain in her throat.
“I don’t know.” She put her elbows on her knees and ran her fingers back into her hair, holding her pounding head in both hands. “Dear spirits, I don’t know.”
Cara leaned over the well so fast and so hard that Nicci thought she might topple in. Instinctively, she reached out to catch the Mord-Sith’s legs, thinking that she would surely fall in, but she didn’t.
“Sliph!” Cara’s shout again echoed around the ancient, dusty stone room. Nicci shared the emotion, but knew that the intensity would not accomplish anything.
Ignoring the searing pain in her joints, she staggered to her feet. The spinning feeling was slowing a little. She saw the quicksilver form of the sliph’s face partly emerge from the well, her features forming in the glossy surface to look up at them.
“Where’s Lord Rahl?” Cara asked.
The sliph chose to ignore Cara’s question. Instead she peered over at Nicci.
“You must not ever do that when you are within me.” The eerie voice echoed softly around the room.
“You mean magic?” Nicci guessed.
“I have great difficulty being able to endure such power being unleashed within me, but such a thing could be worse for you and anyone else traveling at the same time. You must not ever try to use your ability when you travel. It will make you sick at the least. It could easily turn out far worse. It is dangerous to all.”
“She’s right about that,” Cara said, confidentially. “When you started doing that it hurt like an Agiel was being used on me. My legs still don’t work right.”
“Mine either,” Nicci admitted. “But I couldn’t very well just let the beast have Richard without trying to protect him, now, could I?”
Ill at ease for even giving the hint of an impression that she wouldn’t have done anything to protect Richard, Cara shook her head. “I would have taken far worse than that to protect Lord Rahl. You did the right thing—I don’t care what the sliph says.”
“Me too,” Nicci said. At that moment, though, she wasn’t concerned about herself or Cara. She turned to the sliph. “Where is Richard? What happened to him? Where is he?”
“I cannot—”
Cara’s patience, if she’d had any, was gone. She lunged for the sliph as if she was going to try to strangle the silver neck. “Where is he!”
The face glided out of reach. Nicci snatched Cara’s outfit and pulled the woman back, standing her up on the floor beside her. Her face, red with rage, nearly matched her leather outfit.
“Sliph, this is vital,” Nicci said, trying to sound reasonable. “We were with Richard—with Lord Rahl, your master—when we were attacked. That’s why I had to use my power. I was trying to protect him. That beast is extremely dangerous.”
The flawless silver face distorted into a fearful cast. “I know, it hurt me.”
Nicci paused in astonishment. “The beast hurt you?”
The sliph nodded. Reflections of the room bent and flowed in twisting shapes over the smooth contours of the statuesque, silver features. Nicci stared in wonder as shimmering quicksilver tears formed along the lower lid of the sliph’s eyes and rolled down the glossy surface of her cheeks.
“It hurt. It did not want to travel.” The silver brow wrinkled with what looked like indignation layered atop torment. “It had no right to use me in that way. It hurt me.”
Nicci shared a look with Cara.
Cara may have looked surprised, but she did not look sympathetic. The truth be told, at that moment Nicci’s worry for Richard took precedence over any other concern.
“Sliph, I’m sorry,” Nicci said, “but—”
“Where is he?” Cara growled. “Just tell us where Lord Rahl is.”
The sliph hesitated. “He no longer travels.”
“Where is he, then?” Cara repeated.
The sliph’s voice turned cold and distant. “I never reveal information about others who have been with me.”
“He’s not just a traveler!” Cara screamed in rage. “It’s Lord Rahl!”
The sliph backed to the far wall of her well.
Nicci held a hand up toward Cara, urging a little restraint and for her to be quiet a moment. “We were attacked by something evil when we were traveling together. You know that.” Nicci tried to calm some of the menace in her voice. She knew, though, that she wasn’t being altogether successful. Her rising panic about Richard was making it difficult to think—that and Jebra’s frantic warning that they must not allow Richard to be alone, even for an instant. “Sliph, that evil thing was after your master, after Richard. We’re Richard’s friends—you know that, too. He needs our help.”
“Lord Rahl may be hurt,” Cara added.
Nicci nodded her confirmation to Cara’s words. “We need to get to him.”
The quiet in the stone room felt painful. Nicci was still trying to accustom herself to being back, still struggling to suppress the agony of pain twisting through her while trying to think what to do next.
“We need to get to Richard,” she repeated.
The silver face rose up a little farther, drawing a neck of silver fluid up out of the well with it. The sliph puzzled at Nicci.
“You wish to travel?”
Nicci kept a tight rein on her rage. “Yes. That’s right. We wish to travel.”
Cara, taking the cue from Nicci, gestured down into the well. “Yes, that’s right. We wish to travel.”
“I won’t use my magic in you again, I promise.” Nicci motioned the sliph closer. “We wish to travel—right away. Right now.”
The sliph brightened, as if all was forgiven. “You will be pleased.” She seemed eager to satisfy. “Come, we will travel.”
Nicci put a knee up on the wall. Her thighs ached with the effort. She ignored the fiery agony burning through her muscles and joints and
worked to climb up atop the broad stone wall. She was relieved that they had at last found a way to get the sliph to comply—if not by telling them where Richard was, then by taking them to him.
“Yes, we will travel,” Nicci said, still trying to catch her breath.
The sliph formed an arm, slipping it around Nicci’s waist, helping to pull her up onto the wall. “Come, then. Where do you wish to travel?”
“To where Lord Rahl is.” Cara clambered up onto the wall beside Nicci. “Take us there,” she said, putting on a smile for the sliph’s benefit, “and we will be pleased.”
The sliph paused and gazed at her. The arm drew back, melting into the slowly sloshing surface. The silver face looked suddenly impersonal, even forbidding.
“I cannot reveal information about other clients.”
Nicci fisted her hands. “He’s not just any client! He’s your master and he’s in trouble! He’s our friend! You have to take us to him!”
The sliph’s reflective face moved away. “I cannot do such a thing.”
Nicci and Cara stood mute for a moment, both at their wits’ end, unable to think of how to convince the sliph to cooperate. Nicci felt like screaming, or crying, or unleashing enough magic to boil the sliph into talking.
“If you don’t help us,” she finally said in an even tone, “then you will feel more pain than you did from the beast. I will see to that. Please don’t make me resort to that. We know you want to protect Richard. That’s what we’re trying to do, too.”
The sliph stared in silence, like a silver statue, as if trying to assess the threat.
Cara pressed her fingers to her temples. “It’s like trying to reason with a bucket of water,” she muttered.
Nicci glared at the sliph. “You will take us to your master. That’s an order.”
“You’d better do as she says,” Cara said, “or when she’s done with you, then you will have to answer to me.”
The Mord-Sith spun her Agiel up into her fist to make her point.
But when she did she suddenly froze stiff, staring at the weapon. The blood drained from her face. Even her hands stood out white against the red leather of her outfit.
Nicci leaned closer and laid a hand on Cara’s shoulder. “What’s wrong?”
Cara’s hanging jaw finally moved. “It’s dead.”
“What are you talking about?”
Cara’s blue eyes were filled with unbridled panic. “My Agiel is dead in my hand. I can’t feel it.”
While Nicci could clearly read the startled dismay in the Mord-Sith’s voice, she didn’t understand its source. Having an Agiel not give her pain hardly seemed like cause for panic. Even so, such naked terror was infectious.
“Does that mean something?” Nicci asked, fearing the answer.
The sliph watched from the far side of the well.
“The Agiel is powered through our bond to Lord Rahl—by his gift.” She held the weapon out, as if in evidence. “If the Agiel is dead, then so is the Lord Rahl.”
“Listen, I’ll use my power if I have to to make the sliph take us to him. But Cara, don’t start jumping to conclusions. We can’t know—”
“He’s not there.”
“He’s not where?”
“Anywhere.” Still, Cara stared at her slender weapon held up in her trembling fingers. “I can no longer feel the bond.” Her liquid blue-eyed gaze turned up to Nicci. “The bond always tells us where the Lord Rahl is. I no longer can feel him. I no longer feel where he is. He’s not there. He’s not anywhere.”
A wave of nausea washed through Nicci. She felt faint. Her fingers and toes were going numb.
She turned back to the sliph.
It was gone.
Nicci leaned over the wall, peering down into the well. In the darkness below she saw a faint silver glimmer just as it vanished, leaving behind only blackness.
She turned back to Cara and seized a fistful of leather at her shoulder. She hopped down off the wall, pulling Cara with her.
“Come on. I know someone who can tell us where Richard is.”