The Blood King (5 page)

“I can teach you to counter that pain spell—and some other nasties that you might encounter.” She chuckled mirthlessly. “You may not choose to use them on someone else, but it can be damn handy-knowing how to deflect them. And we’ve got to build up your tolerance for wormroot.” “Build up a tolerance!”

Carina exclaimed angrily. “We know Arontala uses it on other mages. As a vayash moru, it has no effect on Arontala himself. It’s likely he and Jared will take some kind of pre-cautions, and wormroot could be part of them.” She gave Tris a crooked grin. “It’s going to get worse before it gets better.”

Tris swallowed hard and nodded. “I thought you might say that,” he said, surprised at how spent his own voice sounded.

Theron spared a glance at his bandages. “Looks like Carina’s got you patched up.”

“Even with deep healing, he’s not going to be good as new overnight,” Carina replied tersely.

Theron met her eyes. “Whatever he’s got will have to do,” she said matter-of-factly. “We don’t have time to wait.” She looked down at Tris. “See you at the salle tomorrow morning. We’ll work on that kick.” Without another word, Theron turned away. Carina followed her to the door and might have said something more to Tris, but as the healer closed the door behind Theron, Tris felt the world waver around him. He closed his eyes as conscious-ness once again slipped out of his grasp.

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“You HELD YOUR own today.” Sister Theron offered Tris a hand up from where he lay on his back in the salle floor. He smiled ruefully and accepted her offer.

“If you mean that I managed to stay on my feet longer and I didn’t lose my breakfast right away, then thank you.” He steadied himself, fresh from a dosing of wormroot and a bad gash on his shoulder. Warm blood trickled down his arm underneath his sleeve, and the leather cuirass he wore seemed to weigh him down as he fought the poison in his sys-tem. His right leg throbbed from a bad wrenching after Theron pushed him to practice his Eastmark kick. In all, Tris could not recall ever feeling worse.

Theron seemed to guess his thoughts. “Your kick is getting cleaner,” she said.

“For a prince, you’ve picked up some interesting street fighting tech-niques.”

Tris managed a chuckle. “Thank Vahanian.” He tried to take a step and staggered. Theron caught him, getting under his left arm for support and draping it across her shoulders as he limped toward the door.

“I know you won’t believe me, but you’re learn-ing to handle the wormroot,”

she said. Nothing about Theron was coddling. Tris knew that any praise he wrested from the skilled fighter was hard won.

“It’s hard to remember that when I’m puking my guts out.” Tris was leaning far more heavily on Theron than he wanted to admit.

“I don’t think you understand,” she said as they made their way toward the salle door. “A mage of middling power would be unconscious from the dosing you’ve had. Many strong mages take longer to recover their power after they’ve been poisoned. In between dosings, your power came back at full strength. And you’ve hung on to more control for longer each time.”

“I still feel like shit,” Tris muttered as they began the painful climb to the top of the spiral stairs.

When they reached the upper floors, a brown-robed sister ran past them, sobbing. A knot of robed mages huddled in conversation along one wall, and a small crowd had gathered around the doorway to one of the bedrooms. Tris and Theron exchanged worried glances.

“Go ahead,” he said, leaning against the wall as she removed his support. “I’ll get there. Looks like something big is going on.”

Theron nodded and made her way through the crowd. Tris limped behind her through the cluster of Sisters, some of whom were weeping. At the doorway he saw that Carina and Taru were both already in the room, which was a bedchamber. With a shock he recognized Elam slumped at a table near the fire.

Carina ran to him. He waved off her assistance, finding that he could stand if he leaned against the wall. “What happened?” he asked, trying to take in the scene through a throbbing reaction headache.

“Elam’s dead.” There was a catch in Carina’s voice. “Her heart—” She shook her head. “She was almost seventy years old.” Carina moved past him to close the door, bolting the door to assure their privacy.

Landis was already in the room. Alaine was cleaning up Elam’s spilled tea.

Landis and Taru were deep in conversation. From their expressions, Tris could see that the two Sisters were not in com-plete agreement.

Something familiar tugged at the frayed edges of his power and Tris closed his eyes, struggling to control his magic through the fatigue and the poi-son. Carina laid a hand on his arm, but he shook his head, focusing all his will on the spirit that was trying to reach him through his fogged mage sense.

He opened his eyes. “It’s Elam,” he said, and the others in the room turned to look at him. “She’s quite insistent—but the wormroot is making this difficult…”

He closed his eyes again, willing his power past the poison in his veins. What should have been a simple working took all of his concen-tration, but he brought the spirit closer, and then, with effort, made the revenant visible to the others.

Carina gasped. Elam’s ghost stood before them.

“I was murdered,” the spirit said in a voice audi-ble to all. “We have a traitor within the Sisterhood.”

Taru stepped forward. “Elam—who did this?”

“I don’t know. Something I picked up had a trig-gering spell. It stopped my heart. Every mage in this citadel has the power for such a spell. And many had the access to place the trigger.” Elam looked at Tris. “Someone does not wish you to succeed in your training.”

The image of the spirit wavered as Tris felt the wormroot unravel his control.

Theron pushed a chair under him as he began to fall. Tris’s power slipped beyond his grasp, and the visible image of Elam’s ghost disappeared. In his mage sight, Tris could see Elam standing at a distance, her expres-sion serious.

“Beware the avatars,” she warned in a voice that only he could hear. “Whoever killed me will come for you next.” Her spirit faded completely as the wormroot pushed even mage sight beyond his con-trol.

Tris opened his eyes and took a deep breath, will-ing himself not to pass out.

Landis crossed the room and stood before him, her arms folded. Carina took a half step forward protectively, putting herself between Landis and Tris. Landis, easily ten years Elam’s junior, looked haggard, and her eyes were tired.

“Elam and I often disagreed,” Landis said quiet-ly, “but I respected her. This is a great loss.”

Alaine stood quietly near the fireplace, awaiting Landis’s instruction. Taru walked back to where Tris sat and looked at Landis.

“What now?” Tris knew that it was his training, and not the future of the Sisterhood, which was uppermost in Taru’s mind.

Landis drew a deep breath. “We will complete what Elam began.” Her sharp gaze fixed on Tris. “Before you came to us, I found the stories difficult to believe—that a mage so young and untrained could survive the spirits of the Ruune Videya, let alone dispel them. Elam was correct in sensing the promise—and the danger—in that power.”

“How can he train here?” Carina gasped. “He’s not safe.”

“I wasn’t exactly ‘safe’ here before.” Tris let his head rest against the wall; the room swam danger-ously if he tried to sit upright. “Continue my training and you’ll find your traitor.”

“You offer yourself as bait?” Landis asked with a raised brow.

“I have no choice. There isn’t time to delay the training. Elam believed that whoever killed her did it to stop me. So train me. The killer will have to strike.”

“It’s too dangerous,” Carina protested. “Bringing down Jared and Arontala are more important—and if you don’t survive your training, there’s no one else to do it.”

“Elam was right,” Tris said quietly. “If I can’t hold my own here, I won’t defeat Arontala, either. And if I can’t do that—the Winter Kingdoms are better off with me dead.”

Landis looked at Tris in silence for a moment, and he thought he saw approval in her hard gaze. “All right. Say nothing of this to anyone else. If the killer doesn’t know we’ve heard from Elam, she may be overconfident. Let Taru and Carina help you back to your rooms before you need a stretcher. I will see to making Elam’s arrangements.”

BACK IN THEIR suite of rooms, Tris waved off fur-ther assistance, refusing to go to bed.

“I’ve been flat on my back for half of the last week,” he grumbled. “I’m tired of passing out and I’m tired of retching and I’m tired of feeling like shit.”

Carina went to the hearth for a pot of hot water, from which she poured both of them each a cup of healing tea. She rummaged through her bag, cajol-ing Tris to sit forward so that she could bind up the gash on his arm. She was unusually quiet, and Tris knew she was upset.

“You haven’t been yourself since we arrived at the Sisterhood,” Tris said quietly.

“It’s not important.”

“It’s important to me.”

Carina was silent.

“There’s something bothering you,” Tris ven-tured, “and I don’t think it has to do with my training.”

Carina let out a deep breath and nodded. “Do you remember when we were captured as we entered Principality City?” Although it had been lit-tle more than a week ago, so much had happened that it seemed like forever.

“Of course.”

Carina looked down at her hands. “The general who took us prisoner was the older brother of a man I was engaged to marry, almost seven years ago. Ric and Gregor were mercenaries, running one

of the most successful merc companies in Principality.” She bit her lip.

“I was sixteen when Cam and I hired in. The next year, Ric and I fell in love.”

Carina spoke just above a whisper, and her eyes filled with tears. “Before we could marry, Ric was injured in battle—run through, like Jonmarc was back with the slavers. I didn’t have anyone to help me with the healing, and I went too deep, hung on too long. When he died, I couldn’t pull back.” A tear streaked down her cheek.

“Cam told me later what happened. When he found me, he couldn’t get me to wake up. He pan-icked. He took me to the Sisterhood—here in Principality City—because he didn’t know what else to do. They told him to leave me here, that they would find him if I recovered.

“Cam knew we were distantly related to King Donelan. He was so panicked that he rode to Isencroft. Kiara says he practically burst in on the throne room.

Donelan took him in, and in a year, the Sisterhood sent for him.” Her eyes were dark with old memories. “They brought me back from the arms of the Lady. I don’t remember much about what happened, only that Ric was gone.” She bowed her head, and Tris reached out to take her hand.

“I never wanted to come back to Principality City,” Carina murmured. “I know that what we’re doing is more important, but by the Dark Lady! I never want-ed to remember those days. It’s been on my mind since we crossed the border. In another two months, it will be seven years since Ric died. Being back here just makes it all much harder to forget.”

“I’m sorry,” Tris said. He had wondered about Cam’s skill with weapons and Carina’s knowledge of mercs. Now it all made sense. It also explained Carina’s skittishness around Vahanian, Tris thought, and why she fought the attraction that was so apparent to everyone else.

Carina wiped away her tears with the back of her hand. “It doesn’t matter. We have a job to do,” she said, swallowing hard. “And you’re the one in real danger.”

She dug into her bag again, pulling out a small velvet pouch. “I almost forgot.”

She handed the pouch to Tris, and managed a smile. “Carroway let slip to Kiara that it would be your birthday on the first of the Crone Moon. Kiara wanted me to give that to you.”

Tris shook the bag over his palm. A silver pendant on a chain poured like liquid moonlight into his hand. Two stones, one fiery red and the other a shiny black, were set into the symbol of the Lady.

“Berry sent them with a servant yesterday,” Carina said as Tris turned the piece in the light. “The note said it was Isencroft silver. The stones are onyx to speed healing and purge poisons, and gar-net for safe journey—and love.” She pulled out a sealed envelope and passed it to Tris. “That’s from Kiara, too,” she said with a grin. “I’ll let you read it in private.”

Tris closed his hand around the talisman. “I never thought I’d be in exile for my twentieth birthday,” he said quietly. “Mother wanted me to joust this year at the Winterstide tournaments. Kait was going to fly her falcons. Now everything’s turned upside down. And if I don’t make it through the Sisterhood’s trials at the end of this week, I won’t see Winterstide this year.”

“Don’t say that. You’ve got three days to recover. No more training until then—and no wormroot. You’ll be back at full power—like you were in the Ruune Videya, only stronger.”

“I don’t know if it’s enough.”

Carina laid a hand on his forearm. “You can do this, Tris.”

He opened his hand to look at the pendant. “I’ve got one more reason to make it back, don’t I?”

“Kiara’s counting on you,” Carina replied. “We all are.”

ALL TRIS’S PREPARATION could not dispel his nerv-ousness three days later as he and Theron made their way into the lowest levels beneath the citadel. The last traces of wormroot were gone, and a few days’ rest had done much to restore his strength. His hand fell to the pommel of his sword. Mageslayer tingled at the edge of his senses, not quite sentient, but no mere steel, imbued with a power of its own. Neither he nor Theron spoke as they descended the steps to the maze of rooms where the trial battle would take place.

If he survived this encounter, Tris’s battles would be fought alone against the avatars. Now Theron came with him, and he was grateful for her support. They would face one or more avatars whose motions—and magic—would be controlled by other Sisters outside of the encounter room. Taru promised Tris that this battle was not warded to the death as future trials would be. Those battles would come after Winterstide—if he survived.

They entered the chamber, and Tris stifled a gasp. The chamber’s appearance had been magically altered to resemble the great room at his home in the palace Shekerishet, its details exact in every way. The tapestries along the walls, the carving in the mantle of the huge stone fireplace and the inlay in the furniture around the edges of the room were perfect. Tris wondered who among the Sisters was so well acquainted with Shekerishet, and he fought down his emotions at being back in the familiar sur-roundings of home.