The Blood Sigil (The Sigilord Chronicles Book 2) (25 page)

"They're going to burn him," Ferret said, stirring Goodwyn from his thoughts.

"What?" Goodwyn asked, his mind finally returning to the present.

"That's what they do to heretics," Owl said. "They say burning them purges the evil and sends it back to hell. Scarabs believe in just one hell and worship just one god."

"The scarabs and this city have far bigger problems than a few heretics from the desert," Goodwyn said.

"What do you mean?" Owl asked.

"I know my visions didn't help you tonight, but they're real, and they come true. I've been having a vision of this city burning, under siege by…something terrible. I think that's what's on Findanar now. That's why it's so urgent we find our commander and get to Jols to warn him and his men."

Owl started to say something but decided against it.

Goodwyn strapped his pack onto his back and helped Therren on with his. Then they ducked out of the room and stalked down the stairs, the band of thieves traipsing after them. Unbelievably, the hotel's proprietor and staff remained. There was no way the proprietor hadn't known about the scarabs lying in wait. He'd probably seen everything that happened to Aegaz as well.

As the others spilled out of the inn, Goodwyn grabbed the proprietor and squeezed a pressure point in his shoulder. As expected, the man doubled over, howling in pain.

"How long ago did the scarabs leave with our commander?" Goodwyn asked.

The owner of the Maelstrom Inn shook his head and said nothing. Goodwyn pressed harder, the man's pain now so intense he crumpled to his knees.

"Answer me."
 

"An hour," the proprietor sputtered. "No more."

Goodwyn thrust the man aside and left the inn.
 

"What are you going to do?" Owl asked as he emerged. "Are you going to stop whatever's on the island?"

"For all the help this city has been to us," Therren said, his face clenched in a scowl. "We should turn back for Waldron now and let this place burn."

Goodwyn stared at Therren, amazed that he could say such a thing.

"But—" Owl started.

"But we're not leaving," Goodwyn said. "If we leave then we'll just be fueling the terrible stories they tell about us here. We're going to get our commander, and then we're going to go out to that island, with or without the city's help, and deal with whatever's out there."

Therren paced for a moment, gnashing his teeth and arguing with himself. Finally he turned to the children and asked, "Where would they have taken Commander Aegaz?"

"If they're going to burn him," Ferret answered, "then he'll be awaiting his trial in the church prison. It's underneath the big church the scarabs came out of when they chased us. Folks around here call it the beetle mound."

Therren gave a derisive snort. "They're going to burn him, but they still call it a trial?"

Owl and Ferret nodded. Spider seemed lost in thought, his eyes distant and unfocused.
 

That poor boy
, Goodwyn thought.
I've failed him, just like almost everyone else in his life. I will make it up to him, somehow. Someday.

Goodwyn turned to Owl and Ferret and said, "How good are you at breaking into prisons?"

Chapter Sixteen

"You're an idiot," Luse said as soon as Urus opened his eyes.

He lay on his back on a firm cot, gazing up at Luse's black hair and mesmerizing jade eyes. He hoped she might have been joking, but those eyes betrayed no humor or mirth. She was genuinely upset.

Urus attempted to speak but a dry soreness in his throat held his words in check. It wouldn't have mattered, as Luse stood up and began her diatribe.

"We were only there by chance," she said, pacing, but still making sure Urus could see her lips. Of all the lips he had been forced to stare at over the years, he enjoyed reading hers the most. "Out of our own goodness, we thought to check on them, to see if they needed aid. And they call us trespassers!"

Urus managed to sit upright and inspect the damage inflicted by Battlemaster Guren. Despite the bruising, his ribs seemed to have mended, as had his face and arms. As Luse paused to take a deep breath before continuing, like knocking another arrow into a crossbow, Urus noticed the sigils on the walls. Etched low on the walls, just above the cots, a few of them still pulsed with the green of Luse's power. He recognized the ancient stone that played host to the symbols.

A sigilord infirmary?
Luse must have transported them to Vultura, he realized.

"Trespassers!" she shouted. "The nerve! The outright nerve of that backward, arrogant, pig-headed man!"

"It is their way," Urus managed to say, the words scratching at his throat as they made their way out.

"Their way is absurd!" Luse spun to face him with her hands planted on her hips. "Who lives like that? Who believes strength is the only measure of a person?"

"I did," Urus said, meeting her gaze. He winced in pain as he swung his legs off the cot to sit up.

"Oh my goodness, I'm so sorry," Luse said, pulling another cot close and sitting before him. "I…I got…well, they just upset me so much!"

"Why am I an idiot?" Urus asked.

"I would've gotten to that, eventually. You let that man insult you. You let him beat you, in front of all your people. I saw the blue on your fingertips…you could have killed him. You could have overcome him, humiliated him in front of all the Kestians. They would have respected you for defeating him."

"But they respect me more now for not beating him," Urus said.

"Is that why you did it? To teach them a lesson?"

Urus thought about it for a moment. He could lie; he could tell her that his motives were altruistic and he was trying to show his people the error of their ways. But the truth was, dying at the hands of the man who had branded him culled seemed fitting.
 

Urus wished Goodwyn were there. Goodwyn would have known what to do.
People who trust each other don't lie to each other
, was what Goodwyn used to say.
 

"No," Urus said. He took a deep breath, grimacing as pain jabbed at him behind the ribs on his left side. "The truth is…the truth is I wanted to die. I wanted Guren to kill me. The fact that the Kestians saved me was an accident. I didn't expect that."

Luse rose, as though to leave. Then she sat back down and rested her hands on Urus's.

"Oh, little bull, I…I had no idea," she said.
 

I shouldn't have said anything
, Urus thought.
She doesn't need to be burdened by my problems. Now I've gone and made her sad.

Awkward, silent moments passed between them until Luse's face lit up and her mouth parted in a grin.

"Well you can't go doing that," she said, her smile a near perfect forgery, a tear forming in each eye. "We've got too much to do, and besides, I'm hungry. Let's go see if the others have found any food."

She helped him up, and things seemed to be going well until he put weight on his left knee, which buckled instantly.
 

"The healing sigils in the walls are good," Luse said, again slipping under his armpit and propping him up. "But not perfect. The knees always come out the worst. By the founders, you weigh more than stone!"
 

After a few steps Urus tried walking on his own and found that he could, if he limped. The pain in his left leg was excruciating, like a hammer smashing his kneecap every time he stepped, but he wasn't about to be more of a burden than he already was, so he kept moving.

"Urus, wait," Lu said, turning to him before they left the infirmary.

"What is it?"

"It's just…I…it's so hard when I have to look at you to talk," she said, glancing between him and the floor. "I've outlived more people than I can count, little bull. Friends, loved ones, enemies…I've outlived them all. I've watched so many people die that I got used to it. Do you know what that means? Moving on while everyone else died was normal for me.

"Urus, I just can't do it. I can't watch anyone else die," she said, her tears finally escaping her iron grip. "Promise me you're not going to die."

"I—" Urus began, but she cut him off.

"Promise me," she urged. "I don't care if you lie, but I need to hear you say it."

Urus took a deep, painful breath, gripped her shoulders, and stared deep into her eyes, eyes that had lived a thousand lifetimes.

"I'm not going to die," he said. "I promise."

At that moment something deep within him unraveled. A lifetime of keeping his innermost feelings and thoughts hidden, for fear of reprisal or condemnation, washed away in a flash. The cage he had erected around his feelings swung wide open. A part of him he had been hiding from the world, the softest and most vulnerable part of his soul, had been set free, and part of it now belonged to Luse Lingxiu.

Her eyes widened, as if she had somehow seen the change within him, but then she simply smiled—for real this time—slipped under his shoulder, and helped him outside.
 

"Home," Lu said, taking in the view as they stepped out into the open square near the heart of Vultara.

"Does it look like the place you remember?" Urus asked.

"Yes and no," said Lu. "I lived here when it was above water. I remember hating the crowds, and how many people lived here. I used to have to try to find hiding places to get some peace and quiet. I spent my childhood complaining about this place. It's sad how we always take for granted what you have, until it's gone."

Urus read her lips and let her reminisce and relive her childhood memories.

"Now look at it," she said finally, gesturing at the old buildings. "It's abandoned. Empty. There's nobody left; nobody but us."

Urus watched the grief creep over her face, her smile fading. The light with which she normally shone faded a little, smothered by the weight of memories.

"There's us," added Tol as the radixes joined them in the square. "We're here."

"So what's next?" Urus asked. "How do we find Autar? He could be anywhere in the world except Kest."

"Unless it's been looted, the central library should still hold the tome of sigils," Lu said. "The book is a catalogue of every known sigil in sigilcraft and how to use it. If there is a sigil we can use to find our brother in need, it'll be there."

Urus's breath fled his lungs. His whole body shook with anticipation.
Answers
, he thought.
Answers to everything
. At that moment there was nothing he wanted more in life than to find and read that book.

"Look at that smile," Lu said with a wide grin. "Maybe I should call you little bookworm instead of little bull."

"You have no idea…" Urus stammered, struggling to put words to the flood of excitement that overwhelmed him. "The Kestians you saw, think of how much they love fighting. That's how much I loved books and puzzles. I had books of stories and riddles that I cherished more than any blade or bow."

Books kept me company at night when Uncle Aegaz was gone
, Urus thought, unable to add that aloud in front of the radixes.

"No wonder you couldn't beat that fool battlemaster," said Tol. "A sigilord who'd rather nose into a book than swing a blade? What a waste of power."

Luse gave Tol an angry look but said nothing. Urus felt the hard stares of the radixes and tried to find something interesting to look at in another direction. Tol was smaller than his commander, Choein, but had the scars and the bearing of a man who had spent years winning battles, at any cost.

"What?" Tol shrugged. "I'm not the only one thinking it."

"The central library is over here," Lu said, diffusing the tension.

They made their way up the steps between massive columns and in through a crack in the ruins of the front door. Most of the radixes went through first to clear the room. Luse preceded Urus.

As Urus entered the library, Tol blocked his path.

"You stepped into your power the way a blind man steps into a pile of manure," he said. "You may have Choein and the others won over, but don't expect me to treat you like some great and powerful warrior. I know what you are."

"I don't expect anything of you, or anyone else," Urus replied, forcing himself to stand his ground and not let Tol intimidate him. "No one is ordering you to help us find the other sigilord."

Tol appraised Urus anew, scanning him from head to toe. Urus returned the favor. The few gray hairs poking out of his short beard belied his true age, which was just as nebulous as Luse's. Though Urus was considerably stronger, he had no doubt that Tol had Goodwyn's quickness and agility.

 
"Fine, then. As long as we understand each other," Tol said, then turned and rejoined the others.

Thankful to be the last one into the library, Urus clenched his teeth through each step as he did his best to conceal his limp.

"Well, my lady," said Enoch. "Where do we find this book of answers?"

"This is not the real library," answered Lu. "It's the decoy. You don't think we would leave the truly important objects just lying around so people like Draegon could steal them, do you?"