half-lich 02 - void weaver (29 page)

“That’s enough,” Isaac said. “Relinquish Sonia and I’ll send you back to be with your kind.”

Nyx cocked an eyebrow and placed a hand on her hip. “And just who are you to make that kind of threat?” she asked.

“Threat? I didn’t think going home was a bad thing.”

“Why, Isaac Moreau… I
am
home, can’t you see?”

“I’m giving you one last chance. The Guardian within that body is fighting you, and it will expel you. And then where will you go, Nyx? I have the power to send you back. To send you home.”

“You don’t have any power over me. You may have power over them, but they’re simple things—barely more than animals.”

“Animals bite, and these animals can be re-trained to bite the hand that feeds them. I’m happy to do that, but I would be happier watching you willingly leave.”

“You know,” Nyx said, flexing her hands and summoning her newfound magic powers again, “I’m getting tired of dueling with you, Isaac.”

“This isn’t a duel,” Isaac said.

“What makes you think that?”

“The Void Weavers didn’t duel your kind; they vanquished them.”

Nyx’s hands jerked up and tiny arcs of violet light came shooting out of her fingertips, but with a wave of his hand Isaac was able to deflect the magic away from him. Sparks of light landed harmlessly on the wet grass. He continued to advance in this way, blocking her attempts at attacking him while the Pain Children circled overhead, deciding whether to get close to him or not.

The praetors were closing in now also, an entourage of mages wearing dark robes and an assortment of items—bangles, rings, amulets, even wands—which were glowing brightly against the dark backdrop. They had stopped focusing on defending themselves and were now coming down on Nyx and her forces with all of their collective power.

When Isaac was close enough to Nyx, he clamped his left hand over his right wrist, put his right hand up, and began drawing lines in the air with his index finger. Before him, symbols Alice recognized were starting to form and glow. The swirl was one she recognized, as was the V with what she called the devils’ tail sticking out from underneath.

The sigils in the air suddenly glowed brilliantly—like a camera flash—and Nyx’s body went stiff and rigid. It was as if an invisible hand had caught her by the chest and had pulled her off the ground about a foot or so. From her throat, Alice saw tendrils and coils of black shadow smoke start to rise, and for a moment it looked like she was about to choke. Alice dashed toward the floating legionnaire. If what he was doing was trying to separate Nyx from Sonia it was working, and she wanted to be there when Nyx was ejected into the night. Nyx would try to escape, but this time Alice would be ready and waiting to catch her.

Sonia’s body suddenly began to convulse as if caught in the throes of a seizure. She hacked and coughed and then screamed, and as she screamed something emerged from her throat. Alice wasn’t sure what it was—a cloud, a shape, a light—but when the essence freed itself from the body it seemed to quickly take on the form of something humanoid; something that towered over the legionnaire’s body. For an instant Alice thought it may have had a bald head, and that it may have been smiling, but the smile was all wrong.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

The creature then swirled into a fine dark mist, and Alice knew whatever it was it wasn’t Nyx.

“No!” Logan said.

For a moment Alice thought he was trying to stop Isaac from freeing Sonia from Nyx’s insidious grip, but he wasn’t going for Isaac; he was bee-lining down the hill at top speed toward Sonia, and the alarm in his eyes suggested he knew something they didn’t. When Sonia’s bangles flashed violet and she disappeared with a
whumph,
causing Isaac’s spell to break and Alice to stop in her tracks, it didn’t take long for her to realize what had happened.

She’s gone
, Alice thought,
she’s teleported out of here.

“Take my hand!” Alice heard the voice distantly. When she looked for the source, she saw Logan reaching for Isaac. Isaac took it. Alice ran toward them, toward Isaac’s outstretched hand, and managed to grab a hold of it just as the world flipped itself inside out and turned to darkness. Alice’s stomach knotted, released, knotted again, and then released. It was like a dishrag, and someone was wringing it out over a sink.

When her feet touched solid ground again, she doubled over and coughed. She would have hurled, but there was nothing in her stomach for her to expel.
Move
, she thought, and despite being groggy, Alice followed the sound of footsteps through a door, into an adjoining corridor, and then through another, tougher, metal door.

The harsh orange light of the Ashwood city streets greeted her like an old friend. Logan and Isaac were there, each looking in a different direction, both somewhat out of breath. A nearby vent kicked steam up into the air, and a cat went scurrying into it.

“Where is she?” Alice asked, but she already knew the answer.

Nyx had, for the second time, disappeared on them—only this time she was in the body of a mage.

CHAPTER 29

Whole Again

Two hours had passed since the incident at the graveyard, and Alice was sitting in a dark marble hall on a shiny marble bench, waiting for the marble double doors in front of her to open. How long had it been now? Ten minutes? Thirty? She had bitten one of her fingernails to exhaustion in the time she had spent waiting, but she had also had enough time to reflect on all that had happened. Nyx was gone again, and she had stolen the body of a mage. But ever since she and her Pain Children cleared the area, there had been no further sign of trouble, or
Void activity
, as Isaac had put it.

Logan had explained that the legionnaires had prepared a teleportation spell ahead of Alice’s arrival, so that they could grab her and get to a designated spot quickly when she was in their custody. That was how Nyx had been able to escape. Alice had seen something come out of her—some
monster
—and Isaac had suggested it was Sonia’s Guardian that had fled the body, but she had already put the spell into motion by the time it had left, which is why the magic had worked.

Had Nyx realized this and gone to ground? If so, where had she gone? Perhaps more importantly, what was she planning? When Nyx first came into the picture, figuring out her motive was easy; she wanted Alice. Alice had stolen part of her power, and Nyx needed it back. But Nyx herself had said she didn’t
need
Alice now that she had taken the body of a mage. Was it true? If so, it meant Alice had no idea what Nyx was going to do next or where she was going to be.

That made things difficult.

Added to that was the fact that she was now sitting
here
, in this marble corridor with glowing torches, gold and silver script engraved into the walls, and all the bells and whistles fit for people who considered themselves kings among men. Isaac had spent a week in custody specifically to avoid her having to ever set foot in these halls, but here she was, waiting to be called in like a witness to the stand—
or the defendant to be sentenced.

The doors finally opened with a loud thud, and the first person she saw was Logan Hodges. His face was low, his red eyes dull and defeated. Alice stood and tugged on her leather jacket. He looked at her, ground his teeth, and looked down. Behind him, Cameron emerged from the courtroom. He had been given a chance to wash under a faucet in a sink, but there was still dried blood on his neck, if not on his face.

“Is everything okay?” Alice asked.

Cameron nodded. “I’m just taking Logan into custody.”

“Custody?”

“For now. The court still has to decide his sentence.”

“Everything I did,” Logan said, “I did for them. Everything. I was wrong, but… it would have been worse for me to have done nothing.”

On some level Alice understood this impulse, to want to get the job done no matter the cost. She had been like that once and, in some ways, still was. She wanted to tell herself she would never do the kinds of things Logan had done to try and get to the bottom of the mystery that had been eating away at his mind, but could she? Would she have done any different?

Alice directed herself to Logan. “Back at the graveyard, you said you knew everything there was to know about your legionnaires. Cut from the same cloth, you said. Did you know your legionnaire would do what she did?”

“What she did was inexcusable. For a mage to willingly defile her soul like that… it’s unforgivable.”

“Something tells me she doesn’t need or want your forgiveness. How was that even possible, anyway? I thought your bonds were sacred.”

“They are. I… don’t know how that was possible.”

“What about the others?”

“What others?” Cameron asked, interjecting.

“The other legionnaires… what’s going to happen to them?”

“They’re being stripped of their titles, like Logan. Sentences pending.”

“So you’re being left with no legionnaires?”

“Not none—they have a new Legio Prime.” Cameron didn’t gloat, but she knew his meaning. He was the new Legio Prime.

Cameron urged Logan down the corridor, and Alice watched them both leave. When Logan was ushered around a corner, he locked eyes with her for a moment, and in them she saw something she wasn’t sure she liked. Sadness. Remorse. Guilt. She wanted to hate him for what he had done to Isaac and Cameron, for what he had done during his time on the police force. But someone close to him had betrayed him in a major way, and she didn’t believe in kicking someone while they were down.

She shook her head, turned to look at the open doors, and nodded at the mage waiting to escort her in.

The room loomed over her like a giant. Columns stretched high into a vaulted, domed ceiling reminiscent of a basilica. The ceiling was made of gold, but it had been painted over with an image of a furious, stormy ocean on which men and women wielding bolts of lightning and swords of light were fighting. The image seemed to swirl at times, and Alice could have sworn she saw flashes of lightning in the painted clouds. Somewhere, she couldn’t determine where, a choir was singing a soft, airy song.

At the head of the circular room was an elevated bench, behind which four cloaked figures sat. She couldn’t see their faces beneath the hoods, but could see their chins and their lips. Around them, a semi-circle of benches stretched out in either direction. There were people sitting on these too, only they weren’t wearing hoods. Behind the four shadowy figures, Alice saw a large chair, black marble maybe, decorated heavily with gold etchings, symbols, and ornaments depicting lions, eagles, and serpents.

Alice felt like she was naked as she walked into the pit where Isaac and Jim were standing, looking at her over their shoulders.

She stood next to Isaac and nodded at him. He nodded back.

“Alice Werner,” said a voice she later traced to one of the female
praetors.

“Yes?” she said.

“Come forward.”

Alice nodded and did as she was told, keeping her hands loose and at her sides. She looked up at the row of dark figures staring down at her. “I’m here,” she said.

“We have wanted to speak with you for some time, even if we didn’t know who you were.”

“So I’m told.”

“Do you understand why you’re here?”

“Not really, although I suspect it has something to do with all the stuff that happened back there.”

“Your magic is unique, but not unknown to us.”

“That’s a first. Until tonight no one’s been able to tell me anything
about
my magic. I kinda just used it, you know? But you knew that, right? I mean, I’ve been hired by mages before.”

“Sometimes one can’t see the forest for the trees.”

“So you didn’t know?”

“Praetors aren’t called upon for assistance on the matter of an individual mage; only on issues that affect the safety of our holdings in Ashwood.”

“Let me guess—now that you know what I am and how I can exist, you want to know more.”

The praetors were silent for a moment. She watched them exchange glances, though with their hoods so low she wondered how any of them could make any expression on their faces another could identify, let alone interpret.

“Under normal circumstances,” the female praetor said, “Yes. But after what has taken place here, and as a sign of respect to you and to Tribune Moreau’s original wishes to respect your privacy, we will not pry.”

Alice looked over her shoulder at Isaac and smiled. She returned her eyes to the bench of praetors. “Thank you.”

“However.”

Of course,
Alice thought.

“Tribune Moreau has agreed to share with us what
he
knows of your abilities. Seeing as you are both close, and due to your actions tonight in assisting the magistrate, we would like to make you an honorary mage.”

“Honorary mage? What does that mean?”

“You would be protected as per our own laws, and you would have the same rights our citizens have.”

“And I would have to play by your rules, right?”

“Of course.”

Alice thought about this. Hard. Being an honorary mage would have protected her before this whole thing began. They wouldn’t have been able to pry into her mind or pick her apart piece by piece even if they had wanted to. Their laws forbade it; Isaac had said as much. But becoming a citizen also meant her activities would be limited, and she would have someone to answer to. This wasn’t exactly something she had ever been comfortable with—it’s why she became a bounty hunter.

“Okay,” Alice said, “Fine. But I’m no legionnaire and I don’t work for you. If you want my help with something, you pay me.”

The praetor nodded. “Very well. Tribune Moreau has also agreed that, together with Librarian Allen’s help, he is going to work to rebuild the stores of information we have on the ancient Order of mages known as the Void Weavers—the intention being to reinstate the Order itself, and determine why they disappeared. After much deliberation, and after tonight’s events, we are convinced there is a general threat to our own wellbeing and the wellbeing of every other inhabitant of this city—whether human or not. We will do what we can to protect them.”