Rise of the Seventh Moon: Heirs of Ash, Book 3 (14 page)

L
ady Kairen?” Petra called out. “Lady Kairen, please wait up.”

Norra glared over one shoulder as she marched down the university stairs. Petra stopped, surprised at her angry look.

“It’s Kairel,” Norra said, looking around quickly to make certain they were not overheard. “Not Kairen. I don’t know how you remember every book ever borrowed from your library but you can’t keep my name straight.”

“Sorry,” Petra said sheepishly. “I actually have a horrible memory. That’s why I write everything down.”

“I don’t care,” Norra snapped. “What did you want, Petra? Just use my real name. No one is here to overhear.”

“Those men came again, Norra,” he said. “They were asking about you. They have begun visiting me directly.”

Norra’s face paled, though the enchanted cap that masked her features did not show it. Her face was wrapped in the illusion of a young university student, dark-haired with fair skin and the slightly pointed ears of a half-elf. “Did you tell them anything?” she asked.

“Nothing,” he insisted.

“Are you certain? You are the only person who knows I’ve returned to Sharn.”

“Norra, please,” Petra pleaded. “You know I wouldn’t do
anything to hurt you. If I did, why would I warn you?”

“I’m sorry, Petra,” Norra said. She closed her eyes and rubbed her face with one hand, trying to think. “I feel like such a fool for letting this happen, though I cannot help but think it’s no less than I deserve.” She sat down heavily on the steps, watching the airships as they soared across the skyline.

Petra gave her a quizzical look. He sat down beside her, gingerly arranging his cloak around his ankles. “What do you mean?” he asked.

“I told you I didn’t intend to return from the Frostfell,” she said. “I didn’t tell you what happened afterward. I led my crew to their deaths, Petra. I knew they would die … and I didn’t care.”

Petra blinked at her, eyes wide. “How did you escape?”

“Good fortune,” she said. “Or perhaps the gods whose existence I’ve always denied weren’t quite through with me yet. I ran into an old colleague in pursuit of the same goal, though he was better prepared. He saved my life, helped me complete my quest, and returned me to Khorvaire.”

“What were you doing out there?” Petra asked.

“Believe me, you’re better off not knowing,” Norra said sadly. “This quest has taken everything from me. I think all that is left for me to do is to leave Tristam Xain and the
Mourning Dawn
whatever information I can before they finally catch up to me.”

“Radcul’s thugs?” Petra asked.

“No,” Norra said, smiling bitterly. “The ghosts of the men and women who died following me. Radcul’s thugs are just the instrument of their vengeance. I can’t keep hiding forever.”

“I can help,” Petra said. He clasped her hand. “Let me help, Norra.”

Norra pulled her hand away and stood, turning her back to him. “No, Petra,” she said. “Go back to your library. Treasure your boring life and forget you helped me. You won’t see me
again. I won’t have them trying to get at me through you.”

“No,” Petra said plaintively. “No …”

Norra felt a quiet sense of pity for the lonely librarian. As rudely as she treated him, he had always been patient and kind. Perhaps if things had been different … she remembered the touch of his hand. She had never had time for men; her research had always kept her too busy.

She looked back at Petra, allowing the illusion that concealed her face to fade. “Farewell, Petra,” she said softly. “When Tristam comes, give him Markhelm’s journal.”

“I will, Norra,” Petra said, his voice cracking. A tear seemed to escape the corner of his eye. He quickly covered his face with a handkerchief and pretended to blow his nose. “May Boldrei carry you home.”

Norra smiled at him and whispered a word of command, summoning her disguise again. She continued down the stairs, into the streets surrounding Dalannan Tower, heading for work. She had taken a job cleaning dishes in one of the seedy restaurants that clung to the university. It was a horrible job that barely paid enough to survive, but they didn’t ask any inconvenient questions.

She considered skipping work altogether. If Radcul’s henchmen knew about Petra, it wouldn’t be long until they discovered her. She might be safer exercising discretion and fleeing the city while she could. She could always find Tristam later and tell her what she had learned.

No. Not yet. There was still much to learn at Morgrave and Tristam did not know the library like she did. She had to stay as long as she could. She had to learn more. If what she already knew was true, then their entire conflict with Marth might be a moot point. A much greater danger waited to consume them all.

The sound of glass breaking in an alley to her left drew her
attention. Just as Norra glanced in that direction, a cloaked figure leaped out of the shadows to her right, tackling her to the street. She cried out for help, but an oily gag was looped over her head and drawn tight. Her arms were twisted roughly behind her back and bound with cord. Rough hands seized her by the shoulders and dragged her into the alley, propping her against the wall by her throat.

Norra saw two men. The one that held her was lean and hairy, dressed in oily black leather armor. The other man was tall and thin. He dressed in dark blue silken robes and wore his hair in a finely styled ponytail. From the many reagent pouches that dangled from his belt, Norra guessed he was a wizard of some sort. The wizard studied a scrap of parchment, then looked at Norra’s face with a sour expression.

“It isn’t her, Morg,” he said.

“It is,” the other man said. He leaned close to her. His breath was warm upon her cheek and stank like rancid meat. He touched her face with his free hand, tracing jagged nails gently over her skin. Then he moved suddenly, tearing the cap from her head and removing her illusory disguise.

“A hat of disguise,” the wizard said. “Impressive.”

“I’m keeping this,” Morg said with a pleased growl. He tucked the cap into his belt and cackled in Norra’s face. She groaned through her gag and turned away, nauseated by the stench. Norra noticed that Morg’s ears and canines both came to sharp points. A shifter—savage humanoids who traced their lineage to werewolves and other such beasts. So that was how Radcul’s men had found her. While she used magic to disguise her appearance, they tracked her by scent. What a fool she had been.

“Miss Cais, please calm yourself,” the wizard said. “If you had not gone to such great lengths to avoid me, I would not have been forced to arrange such an abrupt appointment. My name is Silas
Radcul. I believe you owe my uncle some money.”

Norra glared at him. Behind her, she could feel the ropes loosen, if only slightly. The wards woven into her vest were, bit by bit, causing her bonds to come undone.

“Good,” Silas said, as if she had answered him. “Now please hold still while I remove the rest of your magical trinkets.” He whispered a spell and began to concentrate. He took the pouch from her belt, where she kept her potions. He stooped and drew the magic dagger from her boot. He plucked an enchanted earring and then reached into her pocket, frowning curiously as he studied a small tree figurine. “I wonder what this could do.”

Morg looked over curiously, his grip loosening for a moment. Norra seized her chance, pulling her wrists free of the ropes. The two men looked up in surprise. She pulled a bead from her necklace and hurled it into Morg’s chest. It erupted with a fiery explosion, throwing her attackers against the far wall. The shifter struck the bricks hard and fell to the cobbles, his body wreathed in flames.

Silas gasped and shrieked at the dead shifter. Realizing his robes were on fire as well, he flailed about in an attempt to extinguish himself. Norra calmly plucked the tree figurine from the ground, and dropped it on the wizard.

“Tree,” she said.

The tiny tree erupted with sudden growth, its roots burrowing into solid stone. Silas grunted in pain as the full-grown tree’s trunk settled atop his chest, his arms pinned among the still-growing roots.

“You can’t run from us forever,” he said, wheezing.

“Maybe I can,” Norra said, kneeling beside him and leaning close. “Let me make you a deal. I’ll leave town tonight. I’ll make another disguise and I’ll disappear. You’ll never see me again. Tell your uncle you killed me. No one can ever prove otherwise.”

Silas looked up at her, still wincing from the pain of the tree on his chest. “What do I get out of this?” he asked.

“Simple,” Norra said. “I won’t kill you like I killed your friend.” She reached into her vest and drew out another tiny tree figurine. She dangled it between two fingers, holding it over Silas’s head. “Do we have a deal?”

“Yes, yes!” Silas wailed fearfully. “Just let me live.”

Norra smiled, stood, and tucked the token into her pocket. She walked back out of the alley, stepping over the dead shifter with a disgusted grimace and stopping to collect her scattered possessions.

“Wait!” Silas called out. “How am I supposed to get this tree off my chest?”

“Figure something out,” Norra said, and kept walking.

Norra allowed herself a small, satisfied smile. She was not a violent person, but that had been intensely satisfying. It didn’t really matter if Silas upheld his end of the bargain or not. She would be gone from Sharn by the time he recovered. That was, of course, assuming that he ever figured out a way to untangle himself from the tree.

She changed her course, walking instead toward her hovel of an apartment. It was in the poorest section of the plateau, amid the housing where even the poorest students refused to dwell. It suited her well enough. She had nothing of value, so she didn’t fear being robbed. Her wards kept the place safe enough while she slept.

But where would she go next? Perhaps Wroat. Dalan might return to his home there eventually. Assuming Tristam didn’t find the clues she had left for him at Morgrave, she could explain everything to them there.

An uneasy feeling came over her as she reached her apartment door. She traced the doorway and studied the wooden grain. Though the door was unharmed, all of her mystical protections
had been removed. She backed away. Who could have found her home and unraveled every one of her wards? None of her meager possessions were worth finding out. She turned to run, to flee far from Sharn before her pursuers found her.

A small monk in a shimmering copper robe blocked her path.

“Hello, Norra Cais,” the man said. He smiled at her, but there was no joy in his smile. He looked upon her with peculiar metallic eyes. There was something vaguely reptilian about his appearance and demeanor.

Norra pulled another bead from her necklace and hurled it at the man. It exploded in a sphere of searing flame. The monk lunged through the smoke with an irritated snarl. He moved fast, quicker than Norra could avoid. He seized her by the shoulders and thrust her back against the wall so hard that her head cracked the wood.

The monk stepped away and smoothed his robes with one hand as Norra slid to the floor. She touched the back of her head with one hand. Her fingers felt warm and sticky.

“As a teller of tales, there is one thing I disdain,” the monk said. “Do you know what it is?”

“You’re Zamiel,” Norra said, looking up at him in terror. “You’re the one who started all of this.”

“Endings,” Zamiel said, ignoring her. “I abhor endings. In telling a tale, one lives the tale. With each revision it is told over and over in the author’s soul. As you construct it, you see the ending. It is ever-present in the author’s mind. By the time it comes to a conclusion, the ending, to me at least, seems obvious. Redundant even. Bringing that ending to execution is oftentimes rather tedious. Don’t you think?”

“Why did you do this?” she asked, struggling to sit up.

“And yet an ending is required,” Zamiel continued. “Without
it, the rest of the story is for nothing. Without closure, the story lingers forever and ceases to be a story at all. So it is a terrible irony that all who create must, inevitably, destroy their creations. If they do not. then they have created nothing.”

“Stop babbling and answer me,” she said.

Zamiel cocked his head. “Such arrogance. Strange that you should demand answers. You understand more than any of them and still you do not see the truth? I am no player in this game. I
am
the game. Sadly your part in my story is at end, Norra Cais.”

“You’re too late to stop me, Zamiel,” she said defiantly.

The prophet’s eyes hardened.

Norra reached desperately for the dagger in her boot. She had just enough time to watch the blade shatter on the little man’s flesh before he snapped her neck.

E
LEVEN

T
hough they had set out early in the morning, the forest was quite dark. The crowns of the trees were woven so thickly that the area was cast in a perpetual twilight. An unsettling, musty odor hung in the air. Zed’s expression was troubled as he studied a nearby tree.

“What is it?” Eraina asked, moving beside him.