The Night Voice (27 page)

He already knew what Wynn and Chap were doing.

They'd spoken to him before tonight. It all made sense, and still he had
instinctively argued. No matter that he couldn't get around them and why things had to be this way.

Magiere could never go near the Enemy, for that was what it appeared to want.

The tent's flap was pulled outward, and Leesil tensed all over. Whether it was Magiere coming at him, now that she knew, or Ghassan with more arguments, Leesil was in no mood for either.

To his surprise, neither of them crouched in the opening.

Instead, Chane peered in. “May I enter for a moment?”

Leesil didn't know what to say. Chane was the last one he'd expected.

“What do you want?” Leesil asked.

Chane dropped to his right knee and pivoted in to close the flap. He then turned about and hesitated. Did he actually take a deep breath and let it out slowly?

“We all know the Enemy can reach for and call its own anywhere,” Chane said quietly. “It can control them, though with differing influence. You saw as much with two of its Children that you faced. And I—and Wynn—saw hints of the same with Sau'ilahk, the wraith.”

Leesil didn't respond, though he already suspected where Chane was going with this. It was something that had terrified him for too long.

“What if the Enemy seizes control of Magiere?” Chane asked.

Leesil's first instinct was to snarl denial, but he couldn't. This time, there was no doubt that Chane took a labored breath and let it out before raising a hand, its back side toward Leesil, and spreading his fingers.

“This could protect Magiere . . . while out there facing the horde,” Chane said.

Leesil's confusion passed in a blink, for on the middle finger of the undead's hand was a brass ring. Once or twice, he'd heard it called the “ring of nothing.”

What was Chane really up to?

“We both have a woman we wish to protect,” Chane continued, “but neither of us can do so in what is coming. This ring might keep Magiere from being used, though that has another risk.”

It didn't take long for Leesil to work that out. If that ring hid Chane's undead nature and also hid him from the Enemy, would it affect Magiere's chance at controlling or at least calling out the undead? Would it hide too much of her nature?

Of course this wasn't really about Magiere but about Wynn. If Magiere couldn't influence the undead among the horde, both Magiere and Wynn stood even less chance of surviving.

“You see the catch,” Chane said, “so I came to you before her. This is not just my decision, though I would have preferred it so.”

Leesil eyed Chane and then the ring. There was even more to it. If Magiere failed to draw off even part of the forces below, there would be little chance of gaining the mountain without being seen. And as important . . .

“Yes, I would be detectable without the ring,” Chane finished in response to Leesil's thought.

He was weary of choices like this, and it was so strange that this monster even asked. Then again, was there a difference for how much blood Chane had spilled in his youth versus what Leesil had spilled? Yes, for he hadn't killed for pleasure. Still, strangely, Chane had asked only him.

“No,” Leesil finally answered.

Chane's eyes widened slightly.

“Magiere's not the only one who might be controlled,” Leesil added. That was the true catch for when—if—they got close to the Enemy. For that, it wouldn't matter if Magiere succumbed or not. They would be ruined if Chane and not Magiere fell under the Enemy's influence.

Chane lowered his eyes and nodded. Pivoting on that one knee, he pulled aside the tent's flap.

“Chane,” Leesil whispered.

And Chane froze, turning his head but not fully looking back.

“If something does happen to us in there,” Leesil began, “and you're the only one who can't be influenced . . .”

Chane turned more and looked directly at Leesil. Nothing more needed to be said, and Chane nodded once. He was gone faster than he'd entered, leaving Leesil alone with his doubts and fears.

He knew Magiere would be coming to him soon.

• • •

“I don't like lying to our friends,” Wynn whispered after Magiere was gone.

Chap looked up.

—
We have not—

“Don't,” Wynn cut in
.
“I do not need lies to comfort me.”

—We simply told each only what they need to know. Some things cannot be shared with the others, for the safety of all—

Wynn got up and headed off. “That's a lie as well. And how much have you not told me?”

Chap followed at her side but didn't answer.

When they returned to camp, neither Magiere nor Leesil was in sight. Wynn looked to one tent and knew they were both in there. She couldn't imagine what they might say to each other, but more than likely Magiere was going at Leesil for his part in what she hadn't been told until too late.

Chap stared off between the tents at the chests now covered by a tarp. And when Wynn looked away, she caught Chane watching her.

He stood as if he were in quiet talk with Ore-Locks, though the young stonewalker appeared to be doing all of the talking. At a sharp word from Ore-Locks, perhaps for being ignored, Chane started slightly.

As to Ghassan and Brot'an, both were off to either side on their own, one pacing and the other settled cross-legged on the ground as if this were any other night.

Wynn looked down and found Chap still studying the tarped chests—the orbs. She had no idea what he was thinking, and she knew he'd never tell even if she asked.

“I'm going for a rest in another tent. Call me when Magiere finishes with Leesil . . . or the other way. And then we will all finish any more talking and planning.”

She headed off for Chane and Ore-Locks's tent to be alone, wondering if she even had the strength for more planning after facing down Magiere. Then she heard footsteps come closer outside the tent.

“Wynn?”

She closed her eyes. She wasn't up to a fight with Chane either.

“What is it?” she asked tiredly.

Without invitation, he entered, crawling in to sit beside her. She didn't look over until she heard him fiddling with a pack. It was the second one, the one he never let anyone touch. Whatever he was checking for, he didn't pull it out.

“Please don't start,” she said.

“What did you and Chap say to Magiere?”

“We convinced her that she can hold back the horde.”

“Can she?”

Wynn didn't have an answer for that.

“And you still wish me to go with the team infiltrating the peak?” he asked.

Wynn's thoughts turned back to the first time she'd ever seen him at the guild's annex in Bela, now on the other side of the world. She hadn't known then what he was and had seen only a handsome, somewhat dour young nobleman hungry for scholarly pursuits. Had she started to fall in love with him even then? Or had it been just a naive infatuation with his attention in a faraway land?

“I know you would die for me,” she whispered, “but your dying, again, won't help anything, not even me. So you know the answer, after all the
time we've been together. We cannot fail now, or nothing else comes after . . . for any of us.”

Chane remained silent.

Wynn had a strange feeling his question was only half earnest. Yes, he wanted to stay at her side, but somehow he must have known the answer before he'd asked.

“Leesil needs your strength,” she added, “and Magiere needs my skills and my staff.” She hung her head, exhausted and drained and desperate.

Chane still said nothing.

“I love you,” she whispered.

When she finally raised her head again, he was staring at her without blinking. Then he suddenly twisted away, jerked open that same pack, and wrenched something out.

In his hand was a widemouthed bottle with a wax-sealed stopper.

Wynn could smell something familiar, and before she could ask . . .

“This is a healing elixir,” he said. “I made it from the white
Anamgiah
petals. Take it with you for whatever you need, for . . . anyone whose life is in immediate danger.” He hesitated. “But do not try it with Magiere. Because of her nature, the part like me, it would be harmful.”

Wynn shook her head in puzzlement and looked up at Chane. Those going with him might need this as much as she or those with her did.

“If I cannot protect you myself,” he whispered, “then I will do so in any other way possible.”

Not knowing what to say, she reached out for the bottle. Instead, she wrapped her small hand across his larger one holding the vessel. And after a moment . . .

“We need to go out and finish planning.”

• • •

The following midafternoon, Chuillyon planned a brief trip back to the desert. He had traveled with Wynn's group long enough to know that they
would sleep during the day's worst heat. Still, he had no idea where he might arrive and was relieved to reappear inside a tent.

Magiere, Leesil, Chap, and Wynn were all sound asleep at his feet where he crouched with his hand touching the branch of Roise Chârmune. Wynn had earlier agreed to leave the branch out all day and into the night, just in case.

Chuillyon gently touched her shoulder. Her eyes fluttered sleepily and then widened at the sight of him. He quickly put one finger over his lips and then pointed to the tent flap. Slow and silent, they both crawled out of the tent, leaving the others asleep.

“Is everything arranged as Chap instructed?” Wynn whispered in a half panic.

He smiled and nodded once. “Either I have not lost my persuasive way, or mention of your name holds more sway than I realized.”

She did not smile back. “So it's all set?”

“Almost.” Reaching into his robe's pocket, he drew out the new sprout cut from Chârmun. “This is a little something extra.”

“That's . . . is that . . . ?”

“Oh, stop stammering. I will go into the hills between the range and peak and hide it somewhere. From there I can use it to return home—and then back later. But you will not see me again until you and yours act. The timing of this is the real reason I came to you.”

Her eyes were still on the sprout as she answered, “Tonight at dusk.”

Chuillyon stalled in a frown; that was sooner than expected.

“All will be ready,” he replied. “And Leesil has agreed to lead those heading for the peak?”

“Yes.”

He leaned down closer to Wynn. “Tell him to keep the branch on him at all times, no matter what else happens. Only in that will I be able to reach him and the others, should escape or assistance be needed.”

Wynn nodded, though the notion brought no relief to her expression.

Chuillyon smiled wryly one last time, and turning away, he added, “Until tonight, young Wynn.”

• • •

That evening, Wynn helped with final preparations. After the orbs in their chests were rigged on tent poles, so that two at least could be carried efficiently by pairs of those going with Leesil, Wynn distributed the orb keys—or thôrhks. Though there were five orbs, only three keys had been recovered whole.

Wynn gave one each to Ore-Locks, Ghassan, and Chane. Each man hung the thôrhk around his neck. Brot'an received none and did not argue or appear to expect one. Chane had hidden both his packs and his cloak, though who knew if he had stashed anything from those somewhere on himself. He wore only a dark shirt, pants, boots, both his swords, and a coil of rope over one shoulder. Ore-Locks had stripped down to pants, boots, and shirt as well, but he wore his stonewalker daggers in his belt and the sword with a width nearly twice that of Chane's longer one. Ghassan appeared much the same as always, though he too wore a coil of rope.

And there was yet one more orb key unlike all the others.

Leesil was to be given Magiere's more singular one.

Back on the eastern continent, Magiere and Leesil had been taken down to the fiery home of the Chein'âs before even finding the first orb. That subterranean race that lived in a realm of Fire made all the weapons and tools for the Anmaglâhk. They gifted Magiere a dagger of white metal and a thôrhk to match, the only other thôrhk in the world that would open an orb.

Magiere now stood before her husband, wearing her studded leather hauberk. With her falchion belted on her hip, the white metal dagger was once again strapped inverted beneath the back flap of her hauberk. She had pulled her hair into a single thong-lashed tail.

Carefully, she fit her thôrhk around Leesil's neck.

“Bring it back to me,” she said.

He nodded. He wore his ringed hauberk. His muslin cloth was gone, and his hair was pulled back at the nape of his neck. He had a long rope in a coil loosely over one shoulder and across his chest. Both winged blades were strapped to his thighs, and Wynn knew he had at least one white metal stiletto up his left sleeve.

Finally, Leesil took the last step that he had prepared for himself and those with him. Soot from the dead campfire had been mixed with a bit of oil and water. This he smeared over his face and neck, having all others going with him do the same, especially Chane with his extra-pale skin.

When Leesil rose again, Wynn stepped toward him with the branch from Roise Chârmune. She didn't even ask and grabbed his right wrist, placing the branch on his forearm and lashing it there with bits of leather thongs.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“This way you will not lose it and always have it ready.”

He scowled at her. “So what are you not telling me this time?”

“Just keep it there.” She dipped some muck by the dead fire to spread over the branch.

Leesil sighed, probably tired of so many secrets, but what he did not know could not be taken from him. That branch might be the last way to get to him and the others . . . if anyone else was left alive and the worst came about.