The Turquoise Tower (Revenant Wyrd Book 6) (5 page)

“Look at this one, Rose,” Dalah said. She held up a long green dress sewn in a way that would make the entire body look wrapped in cloth.

“Oh, that’s rather nice,” Rosalee said, winding her fingers through the silk material. Here and there were studs of gems woven so intricately and expertly into the material that Rosalee didn’t even notice them until they glinted in the sunlight of the bazaar. They had only made it to the opening of the covered mall when they found this stall offering “fashion from around the realms” as the sign said.

“That one comes all the way from the Realm of Air,” the shopkeeper told them. She was a slender old lady, with missing teeth and most likely a balding head under the dirty scarf she kept pulled tight over her scalp.

“It is rather nice,” Rosalee said. “How much are you asking for it?”

“Twenty silver,” the lady said.

“Oh,” Rosalee said, letting the fabric swing out of her fingers, and turned instead to a rack of jewelry. “If I’m spending twenty silver on anything, I want it to be from the Realm of Fire. Maybe something in soapstone.”

“Soapstone rings here.” The lady pulled out a flat box lined with various rings of silver, gold, green soapstone, and some other red stone Rosalee didn’t recognize.

Rosalee pushed a lock of graying red hair away from her face and started thumbing through the rings. “How much for this one?” she asked, finding a band of green soapstone she particularly liked.

“Five silver,” the woman said.

Rose chewed on the side of her mouth, considering. In the end she purchased the ring without haggling.

“You didn’t like the dress?” Dalah asked as they left the stall and headed into the shadowed tunnel used to house other storefronts. Some of the stores were permanent, built into cubicles in the tunnel, while others were booths set up in various places along the way.

“I did, I just think it was a little pricey is all,” Rosalee said. “The Realm of Air isn’t all that far away, and isn’t all that different from here. If I’m going to spend that kind of money, I just want something more foreign, I guess.” Rose sniffed, and though it was in contempt, she caught the whiff of cooking sausages and onions. Her stomach growled.

“I hear that,” Dalah said. “How about we grab something to eat and go sit by the basin?” She gestured vaguely toward the Falls of Nependier, which Rosalee could hear, but not see, from where they were.

It was a place Rosalee had wanted to visit for so long, but she’d never made her way to the lake that the falls emptied into. She looked up, but she couldn’t see the mountains from their vantage point. She hadn’t even bothered to look around when they came through the portal to see anything more than the destruction of the Ivory City. It was depressing that she hadn’t, but now that her mind was clearer and she was spending a relaxing day in the company of her friend, it would make their lunch even more special. A small respite from the horror that was slowly becoming their lives.

They followed their noses to a restaurant built into the wall of the tunnel. Behind the counter a man toiled away frying sausages on a hot grill, fire licking up around the links of meat. They placed their orders for sausages with the works, which came with peppers, onions, and mushrooms on a bun.

In moments the man had their food ready; they paid and were on their way, wrapping the tops of their sandwiches to keep dirt from them. Just the smell of the meat in her hands made Rose’s stomach growl.

The basin of the waterfall wasn’t far from the tunnel, and when they made their way out of the bazaar and into the sunlight once more, Rosalee looked up to the peaks of the mountains. Snow covered all of them, and though it hadn’t started to fall yet in the Ivory City, Rose knew it wouldn’t be long before winter hit this more southern location.

The roar of the waterfall drowned out most of the noise of the surrounding city, and Dalah led Rose to a place where they could watch the cold, silvery water empty into the basin. When they sat down on the cold bench, Rosalee noticed the noise of the waterfall wasn’t so loud that they couldn’t talk.

They chatted and ate their lunches, basking in the warmth of the sun, which contrasted with the coldness of the air. When they grew too cold to sit out any longer, they made their way back to the busy bazaar.

“Does it feel colder here?” Rosalee asked. She remembered the warmth from a few moments before caused by cook fires and the closeness of bodies.

“The fires have probably burned down some.”

But Rose wasn’t sure, because as her eyes drifted over the silhouette of a woman further down in the bazaar, her stomach churned. She stopped, pressed her hand to her abdomen, and made a slight noise.

“What is it?” Dalah asked.

Rose shook her head, but that only made the tunnel spin. She stumbled to the wall and held on as the ground kept spinning. She tried not looking at the woman again, but she couldn’t help it. Her eyes fluttered back up to the black-haired woman.

She stood still, like a shadow. Most people ignored her or acted like they didn’t see her, but those who did see her quickly made their way away from her. She stood with her hands folded before her, her eyes closed, and a slight smile on her ruby-red lips.

Rosalee had the distinct feeling that she didn’t want this woman to find her. This woman, this thing darkening the other end of the tunnel with a miasma of power, was very much a predator, and Rose knew that humans were her prey.

“I don’t know,” Rosalee said, but she did know. The voices in her head knew too. “Alarist,” she whispered.

But that wasn’t right either. Now the woman was looking at her, coal eyes staring out of the whiteness of her face.

“Goddess, what is she?” Rosalee asked.

“Who?” Dalah asked.

“That woman there,” Rose nodded down the bazaar. “At the dress shop.”

Dalah looked, and when she saw the woman she hissed.

“Is she an alarist?” Rosalee asked. When she said it the word felt wrong on her tongue, like she knew it wasn’t an alarist at all.

“I don’t know,” Dalah said. “What’s wrong with her back?”

Rosalee hadn’t noticed it before, but her back was hunched, like she wore her travel pack underneath her cloak. No sooner had Rose seen it than her cloak started to move.

Great black wings snapped open from her back with such a thunderous noise that it drew the attention of everyone in the bazaar. The black cloak whispered to the ground as all talking and movement ceased. A chill filled the air. Along the tunnel, the flames of the torches guttered in a wind none of them could feel.

From her wings glowed an eerie light, a darklight, as if the night itself was shining forth from the feathers of her wings. The woman raised her hands and bent them into claws. Thunder shuddered through the air, bringing with it the sound of hundreds of voices screaming in despair into the minds of everyone within the mall.

And then it was mayhem. People were screaming and running from the woman, and though Dalah was tugging at Rosalee, the chaos pumping through the air was felt more keenly by the seer. Rosalee was lost in a wash of chaotic power, her mind turning in on her. The pure energy of her faith in the Goddess warred with the chaos that flowed through her veins.

“I have a message for the Realm Guardian,” the raven-haired woman said, her blood-red lips parting in a smile. “She’s too late. Lytoria will be laid to waste before she can mount a defense.”

“Over my dead body,” Dalah whispered, and a clash of yellow lightning blasted from her hands, sizzling the air and tingling Rose’s senses. The yellow wyrd struck the shielding of the fallen angel, bouncing off the wyrded force-field in a shower of sparks.

“So faithful,” she said. “You would be a nice little snack.” The woman stepped closer. “Blind faith makes the flesh sweeter.”

Dalah twisted her wyrd, channeled it through her body, and released it with a stomp. The ground began to ripple toward the angel. The fallen flapped her wings once and lifted into the air. Her focus was on Dalah, and that meant the chaos in the tunnel was starting to leave Rosalee. She could see the attack before it came.

“Dalah, run!” Rosalee said. But it was too late. A rumble shivered through the walls of the tunnel, growing in strength until the ground beneath their feet rippled like water. Dalah and Rosalee tried running, but they couldn’t make it in time.

A group of people stood outside the tunnel, watching the two older women struggle across the shifting ground, making their way to the end of the tunnel. No one helped them; they were too afraid of the black-winged creature within. The energy of the woman whispered to their minds.

And then, in a rush of dust and debris, the tunnel collapsed, blocking the women from sight. Wagons on the road above the bazaar fell into the gap opening underneath them. Their wheels were dashed against the stones, and their horses were quickly swallowed in the destruction.

Abagail stood with her husband, Mark, looking out on the paddy field where they grew their rice each year. They were a smaller farm in the northern parts of the Realm of Water, so there wasn’t much need for farmhands and help. It was a local crop that the people in surrounding townships enjoyed, but nothing like some of the other farms.

But still, it was theirs, and they both enjoyed the growing and farming of the rice. It made them a small living, affording them enough money that they didn’t need to find other employment, but not so much that they could travel as some of their neighbors liked to do when winter settled in.

And winter was about to settle in. Abagail could nearly taste the snow in the air. To the north the peaks of the Barrier Mountains were already painted in white powder. With each passing day the snow crept lower and lower from the peaks, signaling that soon, the lower-level Realm of Water would be plunged into a sloppy, wintery jumble.

How she longed sometimes to live in a place just slightly colder, where the water of the surrounding marshes would freeze, or in a place where there
weren’t
any surrounding marshes to create a muddy, soupy mess when the snows rolled in.

But her family had always been rice farmers, and she was carrying on the tradition. Mark’s family hadn’t farmed a day in their lives. He was from the Realm of Air, and his light features and fair hair were in stark contrast to her darker ones. She rubbed his back, smiling at the way his eyes delighted in the paddies that were their legacy.

“It’s getting colder,” Abagail told him. “We should get back to the yurt before it gets completely dark.”

Mark sighed, a sentiment she felt mirrored in her soul. The nights were getting deeper, and coming on sooner. She hated the winter months, when the sun seemed to forsake them all at such an earlier time. It was one of the only times she wished to have more money. The long winter locked up in the yurt, with nothing to do but read and upkeep the house, were almost more than she could bear, especially after coming from such active months.

“What are we doing for dinner?” he asked as they turned away from the paddies and back to their large yurt. The sun was setting in the west, creating a nimbus of pink light above the tarp peak of the round abode.

“I thought maybe some lamb,” she said, wrapping her arm around him as they walked.

“What’s that?” Mark pointed to the south-west, his eye squinting to see better.

“What’s what?” Abagail asked, following his outstretched finger to where he indicated. At first she didn’t see anything, and she was going to tell him as much, but just as she opened her mouth to speak she saw the faint silhouettes of two approaching figures, and something else with them. “Looks like a couple travelers, and probably a pack mule.”