Queen's Hunt (River of Souls 2)

“Not much farther,” Galena whispered.

“What is that?” Ilse whispered back.

Footsteps rang off the paving stones. A voice called out, “Who goes there?”

A squad of soldiers marched toward them. Galena gave a sharp cry and drew her sword.

We are lost, Ilse thought. She had her own sword ready, but it was nothing against a full squad of trained soldiers. She took Valara by the hand, intending to drag her into the nearest alleyway. They still had a chance—

Ei rûf ane gôtter. Komen de hôchkelte.

Bitter cold and green magic flooded the air. It buzzed against Ilse’s fingers, enveloping her hand, and crawling up her arm. A strange darkness, thicker than night, had dropped over them. She could no longer feel Valara’s hand. She tried to summon the current herself, but her lips refused to work. It was that same otherworldly signature from before. It reminded her of Anderswar, of its alien creatures and the guardian who met her each time she dared to enter.

The magic receded. She blinked. A short distance away stood a dozen still figures. The one in the lead had turned his head to call out orders.

The soldiers.

They did not move. They could not, she realized with a sick feeling. They all remained in the same rigid stance, their swords raised and mouths opened to speak. But their faces had turned gray, and heavy ice weighted their clothing. Even as she watched, water trickled from the ice to run in rivulets over the cobblestones. But the men did not move.

“What did you do?” she asked Valara.

Valara herself appeared stunned. “I am not certain.”

A dull boom sounded. Ilse dropped into a crouch just as a second and third explosion followed. Bright sparks hovered overhead. A sulfurous stink rolled up from the harbor, and a bloodred light bathed the city. More explosions, these from a different quarter, followed by a bright gout of fire that rose toward the sky. Alesso and his distractions.

Galena stared in the direction of the harbor. “Old Josche,” she whispered. “Giann. He killed everyone on the watch. He would have killed me, too.”

“We don’t know that,” Ilse said.

“We do know that. And you wanted me to trust him.”

I warned you about me, Ilse thought. That night you asked for my help.

She reached for Galena’s hand, which felt cold and clammy, in spite of the warm night. “Come with us. My friend can help you, too. You can find another place, without the words on your face, without any pledge.”

Galena shivered, but with another tug from Ilse, she turned away from the terrible spectacle below.

“One moment,” Valara said. “We need to remove the evidence.”

She spoke more words in Erythandran. Again came the scent and image of a fox. Then the frozen bodies of the soldiers shivered into dust. More words erased the spells and all traces of their presence.

Another quarter hour and they gained the old Keep’s ruins. It was Galena who pointed out the entrance, guarded by an old wooden door between two massive blocks of fallen stone. Soon they were inside. Ilse climbed down the stairs first, followed by Valara. Galena came last and shut the door, sinking them into darkness.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

VALARA LEANED AGAINST the damp stone wall of the tunnel’s entryway. Darkness pressed in upon her; a sour smell permeated the air. The other two, the soldier and her friend from the pleasure house, spoke in soft tones. Something about the wisdom of setting a wooden beam across the door. Valara hardly cared. The exhilaration that had carried her from the prison through Osterling’s streets, to that strange confrontation with the soldier and its aftermath, had vanished completely. Her bones were like water and a dull ache centered between her eyes. Hunger, no doubt. Thirst. Later, she might remember to be terrified. Right now it was too much trouble.

The emerald’s voice vibrated deep within her. It sang without words, a stream of notes in a minor key, like a ship’s ropes keening in the wind. Daya, the oldest, the emerald. Rana was the ruby, which Leos Dzavek had reclaimed. She couldn’t recall what the third jewel called itself. In older lives, she had known them all. Known them even longer ago, when the three jewels were one.

Before my brother divided them.

No, that was the life before they were brothers. Leos had told Andrej once about his life dreams. Daya and its siblings had been one, a milk-white jewel, the chief treasure of the empire. He had been a priest charged with safeguarding the imperial treasury.

And I was a queen of Morennioù. And Miro Karasek my beloved.

Daya’s music stopped abruptly,

and Valara realized the woman named Ilse had addressed her.