The Guild (39 page)

“Looks like your left knee is twisted,” one of them said aloud. Immediately her knee throbbed and her leg started limping in response.

Don’t panic—don’t panic—don’t panic!
That frightened thought chased itself in circles, ruining the rhythm of . . .
It
has
a rhythm! Don’t panic, don’t panic, don’t panic, don’t panic . . .
The warding harmonies came back, albeit at a faster, higher, more frantic pitch than usual. The more she concentrated, the clearer her thoughts felt, but at the cost of giving up some of the fight to control her body.
I can do this . . . I can do this. I just need to concentrate . . . stall for time . . . don’t panic, don’t panic, concentrate, stall for time . . .

The words became a mantra, the mantra a melody. Her steps slowed with each fractional gain in her self-control.

“Walk faster,” the man on her right ordered gruffly. Her half-limped steps quickened a little. “Walk
faster
.”

“You twisted the boy’s knee,” the man on the left muttered. “Be thankful we need the limp as an excuse to take him off the streets, should anyone ask.”

It’s okay . . . I have time . . . and . . . and if they’re taking me to the temple, the paper roaches will see me . . . I just have to figure out . . . figure out the weak points in this controlling spell. It’s an amulet, not a collar, which means if I can somehow detach the adhesion spell, I can get rid of it and time my escape . . .

Time wasn’t on her side; the Consulate was not that far from the back door to the temple. Giving up her resistance to the body commands, she focused on trying to feel the resonances, the
vibrations of the spell. Two spells, rather, one to command and one to cling. One tingled all through her body, threatening to turn her flesh numb. The other itched against her skin.

Rexei already had a spell to counteract itching, a useful ward to know when traveling through some of the more bug-infested stretches of the land. With a bit of thought, she started weaving that song into her warding melody, the one that cut down all magic in her immediate vicinity, and tied it into a countermelody to the itch. It was a long shot since she didn’t know if it would work—

Just as they reached the back door and the third man pulled it open, the stone popped off her throat. It dropped into the neckline of her winter coat. She faked a stumble the moment she felt it slithering down between the layers of wool, only to fall for real as all three men overreacted in their opposing efforts to get her steadied. Thankfully, their soft curses and grumblings hid the
clack
of the control stone hitting the paving stones of the alleyway. Rexei was free, yes, but only of the spell’s effects. Elbows and knees bruised, she realized from the way they were grabbing her that physically she would not be able to get away, even if she was magically free.

A scrap of colorful paper caught her eye. Quickly, she passed her hand over the doorsill, scraping the crushed paper roach out of the crack where it had been squished and left behind. She wasn’t sure if she could pull off a repair, but there was a way to transfer a bit of magic from one piece of paper to another . . . such as her brother’s note. At least, she knew the theory of it. Vaguely.

Guildra, help me,
she prayed earnestly as they hauled her back onto her feet and pushed her into the temple’s back corridors. No one noticed the missing stone or the scrap of paper hidden in her hand.

Though the stone no longer forced her body into obeying their commands, she was still trapped. Two men, she could put to sleep with a spell. Three . . . four.
No, five . . . six . . . Gods!
Forcing her
expression into the dulled look of one of the mages who had been collared, Rexei kept her fingers curled around the rumpled paper spy.
All these years, I escaped and escaped and escaped . . . but now that Mekha is gone,
now
is when I get trapped by the priests?

Guildra . . . if this is a joke, it isn’t funny. If it’s a priestly test of my faith,
that
would not be funny, either.

Archbishop Elcarei stepped into view. Moving up to her, he grasped Rexei’s jaw, lifting her head. She tried not to look too self-aware while he peered at her. His brown eyes were distant, almost clinical, then his lips moved. “Bend over and kiss my crotch.”

The only thing that saved her was how her gaze instantly dropped.
Oh Netherhells . . . ! Guildra, you had
better
give me a chance to get free.
Stooping, she puckered up her lips, aiming for a spot below the belt of his blue velvet robes.
There
has
to be a point where they’ll leave me alone . . . I hope . . .

“Stop,” he ordered sharply. Rexei froze, balancing as best she could on her toes. “Straighten up, Longshanks, and walk down to the holding pens. First ring, first door on the right. You remember it, don’t you? The first prisoner you walked out of here? Go there, now. You, go with him. You, go fetch a control collar.”

Yes, if they leave me alone . . .
she thought, turning to walk toward the first set of stairs, the ones that led up to the forbidden door . . .
Gears!
Three
of them are still coming with me? Can’t I get a break?

Hands gripped her elbows. Fingers brushed back her scarf—
No, no, NO!
Panicked, Rexei quickly stepped up the state of her humming. Metal touched her neck, and for a while, the world went away, smothered in a fog of mental wool.

B
oth women alighted gently upon the balcony outside Alonnen’s study, each wrapped in a bubble-shield to keep them from being harmed by either the waters or the magical energies of the Vortex.

Orana looked much the same as ever: a youngish woman in her early twenties, her blonde hair braided and wrapped around her head, with a deep-sleeved robe worn over trousers and a tunic in shades of blue and cut in some foreign but comfortable-looking style. The outer robe was half black and half white, each side marked with a tower keep embroidered in the opposite color; the inner lining, of course, was pitch-black, for it was a Darkhanan Witch-robe, the symbol and possible source of her priestly powers. Alonnen didn’t know and didn’t mind not knowing.

Pelai, on the other hand, had arrived in what she thought was adequate winter clothes, a long-sleeved shirt and vest over a strange, knee-length pleated skirt made from colorfully cross-striped linen.
Wool would have been much better, since she had only sandals to cover the rest of her tattoo-covered legs. Seeing the dark-haired woman shiver, Ora tucked her hands up her sleeves and pulled out a bundle of bluish green fabric.

“Here, Pelai,” she stated, her words delivered in flawless Mekhanan. “The colors will clash with the red, gold, and black of your clothes, but these leggings should keep you warm, and that’s the important part. Master Tall . . . I am pleased to meet you again. The Dark informs me that you now have a priesthood you can trust. Does this priesthood have a Guild Master?”

“Yes, but Guild Master Longshanks is in Heiastowne at the moment,” he admitted, turning his back politely so that the Mendhite could slip out of her sandals and struggle into the leggings with a semblance of privacy. He didn’t think the balcony overlooking the Vortex was all that cold, but then he was dressed for winter, with layers of wool over his linens. The scarf and cap had been set aside, leaving his lower face, throat, and carroty curls bare, but he also hadn’t just come from a country located close to the Sun’s Belt region of the world. “Why do you need to know the location of the head of our new Holy Guild, Orana?”

“I have information for the new high priest and for any followers,” Ora explained. “I used the mirror on Nightfall Isle which connected to the Guardian of Koral-tai—bypassing the Fountainways of Nightfall, which were inaccessible due to the Convocation—and asked the nuns there to look up any holy spells or prayers which a true priest could use to banish and remove demons, plus prayer-spells to cleanse Netherhell-fouled ground. Mother Naima in turn passed along my request to Pelai, here, who has done some research of her own.”

The Mendhite spoke up, grunting a little as she struggled into the leggings. “Stupid . . . too short . . . ah, there. Yes, I have a scroll with several such prayer-spells copied onto it, culled from the
Great Library. It’s in the blue pack, there . . . and I wish I knew more tailoring spells,” she added under her breath. “I need a handspan more of cloth, or I’ll be forced to waddle the moment these things start to slip . . .”

“Sorry, they were made for Sir Niel, my deceased Guide,” Orana apologized, and held up her hand, palm out toward the woman beyond Alonnen’s field of view. “
Basher louzaf cha-nell, k’ko . . .
There, that should do it. I’ve had plenty of time to study Fortunai spellweaving techniques. Niel is tall for an Arbran, but not quite as tall as a Mendhite, I’m afraid.”

A soft sigh of happiness from Pelai made Alonnen curious, but he did not turn around. Instead, he waited until the tanned woman walked around him into his line of sight, looking pleased with her borrowed tights. They did clash a bit, but he knew she would be warmer.

“Welcome to Guildara, formerly Mekhana,” he told her. “And welcome to a rather wet and chilly winter.”

“I’ve seen Mekhana on the maps. You’re not
that
far north,” Pelai stated, folding her arms across her chest. Alonnen had the impression her arms were feeling cold despite the long sleeves of her shirt. “Why
is
it so cold?”

“We’re not as far north as some kingdoms, true,” Orana told the other woman. “This part of Mekhana is only a couple hundred miles from the northernmost point in Sundara. The land extends almost a thousand miles to the north before hitting the North Sea, where it can get quite cold in winter. However, we are high up in elevation, compared to Mendhi, and the higher one goes, the colder things get.”

“Apprentice Pelai,” Alonnen began, intending to return the subject to the reasons why both women were here.

“Doma Pelai,” she corrected him. At his blank look, the Mendhite explained. “I am a Disciplinarian; males are called Domo, females are called Doma. It means ‘controlled one’ and the suffix at the end
indicates gender. My status as a Doma outranks any apprenticeship. Though I suppose, as we are all working together as near equals, you may simply call me Pelai when titles are not needed.”

“. . . Right. Thank you, Pelai, for the courtesy of informality,” Alonnen said. Regathering his thoughts, he returned to the subject at hand. “I’m afraid Master Rexei Longshanks is in Heiastowne at the moment, but if you like, I can call up the Consulate on the talker-box to see if Rexei is done with the morning’s training sessions.”

“Talker-box?” Pelai asked him.

Moving to the glazed doors, Alonnen murmured a command under his breath, waited until the image of the room beyond filled with a trio of people, then pushed the panel out of his way. “It’s an engineering device that transmits silent aether-signals to a similar machine within a day’s journey—Heiastowne lies well within its range. You listen with the cone on the cord held to your ear, and speak into the one on the metal armature, and the other person on the other end of the connection can do the same. I—”

“Master Tall! Thank goodness, you’re back,” Gabria called out to him. “We just saw something awful on one of the spying roaches. We think we saw Master Longshanks in the
temple!
”

Out of the corner of his eye, Alonnen saw Pelai giving Gabria an interested look. Beyond her, Orana merely lifted a brow, apparently not fazed by much despite not knowing what they were talking about, unlike Pelai. Hurrying forward, he reached the spare mirror and took the crystal tablet Gabria held out to him. She pointed over his shoulder, indicating which roach symbol was the one with the recording.

He had to pause and back up the image to find a good shot . . . but it was her. The sight of Rexei in her gray woolen coat, black scarf and cap, and the brown woolen trousers and darker leather boots from this morning was irrefutable. The curve of her cheek, a lock of thumb-length dark brown hair, the shape of her modest
nose . . . and a dull look of horror in her eyes. Dull, that was, until he manipulated the controlling spells in the block of crystal, advancing the magic-captured images painting by painting, and saw her gaze dart around, then flick straight to the roach. She didn’t lift her head, but she did shift her eyes straight to it for two full seconds, before she left its field of view.

That was the roach he had moved to sit in a corner of the curved corridor ceiling on the uppermost of the three imprisonment rings. It was supposed to count the comings and goings of all the temple residents, since it had been relocated from the power room to the hallway and had been angled with a good view of the doorway to the one stairwell that led to the outside. A man Alonnen dimly but imperfectly recognized had his arm tucked around hers, and he seemed to be guiding but not dragging her somewhere.

Orana’s voice, normally smooth and calm, sharpened with anger. “What is that
thing
doing on her neck?”

“What thing?” Alonnen asked. He wasn’t sure how the Darkhanan Witch knew what Rexei’s gender was, until he realized that after two hundred years, he’d probably be very good at spotting such things, too. Orana’s outrage confused him, however. “The scarf?”

“The control collar!” She pointed at the image on the mirror.

He snapped his gaze back to the mirror, reversing the image until he could see for a brief moment the rune-chased metal band clamped around Rexei’s throat. Alonnen suspected he had blinked at just the wrong moment to have missed it before. “Dammit, they’re not allowed to . . . Wait, that’s right—they’re
not
allowed. It’s illegal, now!”

Shoving the tablet back into Gabria’s hands, Alonnen strode for the talker-box attached to his office wall. The other two mages, Jenden and Pioton, gave him worried looks. Like many of their kind, both men had had friends and relatives who had vanished into the hands of Mekha’s priesthood, never to be seen again until
their body emerged in a black woolen bag, drained of all magic, all hope, and all life.

Not this time
, Alonnen silently swore. Setting the resonance level to the one used by the militia, he cranked the handle rapidly and lifted the listening cone to his ear.

“
You’ve reached the Heiastowne Militia Precinct
,” a female voice stated calmly on the line. He recognized it: Marta Grenspun, best friend of his best assistant, Gabria.
“What is your inquiry?”

“Get me the captain, or the leftenant—anyone in charge,” he ordered. He remembered now where he had seen two of those men accompanying Rexei, driving in the caravan of motorcarts yesterday. “Visiting priests from outside the Precinct have kidnapped Guild Master Longshanks with the intent to kill.”

“
Gears and Gods! Leftenant!
” he heard her hollering.
“Leftenant Tallnose!
”
A clatter accompanied the fading of her voice into the background.

Grimacing, Alonnen turned to face the others. “Dammit. I need to be here to help with the Vortex spells . . . and I
need
to go help rescue her. The militia has hand-cannons, but they’re going up against well-trained priests, too many of them to get off more than a single volley before the mages start flinging spells—that’s assuming the militia has the advantage of surprise, but I’ll doubt it. Assuming they can get
inside
, since there’ll be wards . . . but I have to stay here and . . .
Dammit!
”

“Anyone can apply the spells to the Vortex if they have permission to use its energies,” Pelai pointed out calmly. “Appoint a temporary Guardian—under oath so as to ensure they give it back at the appointed time—and then you can go.”

Alonnen gave her a sharp look. He kept the cone cupped to his ear, but he heard nothing other than the slight aetheric hiss that said the talker-box on the other end was still active. Unsure what to make of the foreigner’s request, he lifted a brow.

She lifted her hand palm up in return, gesturing toward the inactive mirror, the one hung sideways instead of vertically. “Have we not seen over the last year how Guardian Serina exchanged places many times with Guardian Naima, the Mother-Superior of the Temple of Koral-Thai? Select your apprentice to handle the matter, and you can go.”

“I don’t have an apprentice,” he dismissed. “Not one within reach. Storshei, Gavros, and I were apprenticed to Guardian Millanei, but Gavros is up in the far north. Storshei normally works locally with the Hydraulics Guild, but
he
was sent to a dam a hundred miles north that was experiencing a problem with the sluice gates freezing shut just when they need to be opened to relieve some of the meltwater backing up in the reservoir up there.” He scowled . . . then focused his gaze on Orana. “You. I trust
you
. I know you’ll hand the Vortex back to me—”

“Whoa!” The Witch-Knight quickly held up both hands. “
Not
me. I was able to shield myself against the energies of the Fountains in order to travel here, but I
cannot
be allowed to touch any singularity. The energy contained is too much for me to handle.”

That confused Alonnen. “But . . . you’re the strongest mage we’ve ever heard of! All the stories passed down through the Mages Guild . . . How can a Fountain be too powerful for you to control?”

The blonde shrugged. “It tries to spill its energy straight into me, like a giant waterskin exploding in my grip—no control and too much for me to hold. I’m not the only one with this problem; Morganen of Nightfall also suffers from it. At most, all I could do would be to channel it for someone else. I cannot use it. I would
also
be of far more use accompanying you to the temple to help rescue Longshanks. There are very, very few spells out there for which I do not know a counter . . . and by myself I am a match for a dozen mages without breaking a sweat.”

“Good.
You
can go,” Gabria muttered, fingers still curled around the edges of the crystal scrying tablet. “I’m not going anywhere near that place—sorry, Alonnen, but I am
not
going anywhere near anything related to a God.”

“It’s okay,” he reassured her. Part of him was disappointed she could not get over her fear, but a larger part did understand. He turned to the Painted Warrior in their midst. “You’re Guardian Tipa’thia’s apprentice. You said you’d swear an oath?”

She nodded her head. “I can have one written up in two minutes for your approval.” Lifting a tanned hand, she tapped the side of her equally browned face, where a set of pale blue lines and swirls had been inked from the base of her throat up to her ear and around her right eye. “I have a translation tattoo which will allow me to write it in the local tongue for you.”