The Arcana: Shadow Wars, Codex I

Chapter XXIV

The Message

In which the Handmaiden is balked

Everything was going wrong. The palace’s chief healer had made short work of the lacerations on the protector’s forehead, but what did it matter? Everyone had seen it happen; they’d seen the eagle snatch the diadem. They’d seen the great bird smash the scepter, the protector’s staff of office.

In the great hall Zephyra paced, letting everyone rush around her, to and fro. With great effort she refrained from curling her lip in contempt: they wanted to be seen to be busy, while in fact they were accomplishing nothing.

Nothing at all.

Frustrated, she ground her teeth. Why did this happen to her father? With a deep exhale she reminded herself that the Goddess included a huntress amongst her father’s enemies. And therefore, Zephyra failed him, by failing to account for the abilities of a huntress, and thus the possible moves she might make against Protector Amavand. Beastmasters fell under the domain of the False One called the Huntress, so of course the wicked she-wolf could summon a golden eagle to humiliate and discredit him.

What was it about golden eagles? Their keen sight allowed them to see extraordinary distances—and so, perhaps, a huntress might see her enemy from a distance as well, and thus the trap she set for him. Golden eagles could strike without warning—and so, perhaps, a huntress could strike swiftly, drawing first blood without fear of retribution.

Vividly, she called to remembrance the image the Greatest One showed her, of the Ta-Setian huntress who dared to set herself against Protector Amavand and the Greatest One.

“She will fear me. She started this fight, and I will finish her. She will not kill my father,” Zephyra vowed.

As for the other two she-wolves, where were they? Surely they took part in Roshanak’s festival? It should have been easy to have them seized, then and there. But for the damned stunt with the eagle, they would have been seized. Because the huntress scrambled her plans, Zephyra resorted to ordering the city’s gates closed. No one in or out. The soldiers would have to do door-to-door sweeps, whatever it took to find the Rasena Valentian she-wolves. Surely the innkeepers would turn them out, so they shouldn’t be too hard to find.

If.

If the people of Elamis would cooperate.

None of her plans included making the townspeople her enemy. No, she and her father intended to use the killing of the she-wolves as the opportunity, the opening her father needed to introduce the Elamisi to the Greatest One.

The sound of a tumult reached her, and Zephyra raised her head to see the small crowd of guards gathered by the great door of the palace.

“I must see the king! Am I the last? I must see—” the unseen man’s shouting was cut off by one of the Manticoran guardsmen.

“Where are the others? The ones you were with, where are—”

“Aren’t they here? I have to warn—”

Patiently Zephyra waited. When one of the guards chanced to glance back and see her, she nodded. He gestured, and the others quickly subsided, all turning as one to see her. In the guards’ midst stood one of their own. Pine needles and brambles clung to him, and his boots were caked with mud, as if he had been walking. Disgraceful. Absolutely disgraceful. What happened to his horse? She pointedly let her eyes linger on his filthy boots.

The man flushed, seeing where her gaze went. He bowed, then thought better of it and dropped to one knee.

“Your Eminence,” he said to her, his head down. “I am Nariman, son of Jandal.”

Ostensibly his obeisance honored her, but she suspected he meant to cover his terror by avoiding her eyes.

“What is this warning you claim to have?” she asked, trying to keep her tone neutral. Let him read what he wished to into it. Let his own emotions carry him, not any actions of hers.

“I s-saw her, Your Eminence,” Nariman said, his voice shaking. “Ahem.”

“Her?”

“The huntress you seek. I went with the others. The falconer led us to a mound, where the golden eagle was eating. It refused to come at the call of Marwan. We did not know—we did not guess—we went up on the mound, after Marwan. But it was a trap.”

Zephyra let the words hang there, in the silence. All activity stopped in the hall. Everyone fixed their eyes on her, but she kept her eyes only on the soldier.

“What sort of trap?”

The disgraced soldier swallowed hard, his throat bobbing. Then he squared his shoulders, perhaps gathering his courage.

“Shades appeared, Your Eminence. The shades of those we—those traitors we executed for our protector. They chased us from the hill.”

“And the huntress?” Again she kept her tone neutral, again allowing him to read whatever he liked into it.

Nariman must have read something, for he shuddered. “She cornered me when I attempted to escape. Two men accompanied her, Your Eminence. Huntsmen, I believe. All of them dressed in strange clothes, as people of Lyrcania are said to dress. So it is just as you said—”

“And what did she say?” Zephyra cut in.

“At first she spoke to Hosh. The groundskeeper I executed. He told her things about you. And about your—the Greatest One. They say the dead know much, Your Eminence. And—and he claimed to.” Now he dared to meet her eyes, just once, before looking back at the floor again.

Zephyra said nothing, letting the silence stretch while she contemplated his words.

So.

Lyrcania? The huntress had come a long way, hunting her. Therefore, neither chance nor happenstance accounted for her presence. She must have known about the dryads. And thus sought to avenge them, in the name of her pathetic so-called goddess.

“What did she ask about?” She allowed herself to sound curious.

“Why I killed Hosh. Why you wanted him dead. What the Greatest One seeks. And she called the Greatest One a mere queen. Last she commanded Hosh to give a message to the Greatest One: that Alia Ironwing is coming for her. That is the name of your—our quarry: Alia Ironwing.”

Zephyra raised her eyebrows. What sort of name was Alia Ironwing? Iron? As in a sword? No, the venatori carried daggers. Daggers, as in a pair, though not forged from base iron. More, wing must refer to the golden eagle form the Huntress allegedly assumed. Her priests and sorcerers ranked themselves by raptor breeds. All the same, Alia was the other one, according to what her name meant. So there were at least two venatori to fear, perhaps?

Do not focus so much on the open sword that you miss the hidden dagger.

Such did her father teach her. Here and now, Ironwing represented the open sword, no doubt. Perhaps one of her men was the secret dagger? Did it matter that the Greatest One had not reckoned them in Her vision? This Ironwing did not fear to be in the open, but her partners remained hidden until now. Perhaps she was the other one to fear? Then who was the first?

And what arrogance! To think she would dare set herself against a goddess! The stories were full of such like her, and every last one of them foretold a dreadful fate for this so-called iron woman. In what marvelous way would the Greatest One smite Ironwing? Would She allow Zephyra the pleasure of taking part in punishing her?

“And what did she say of the protector?” Zephyra demanded. “Look at me. I will see your eyes. What did she say about my father?”

Nariman’s head jerked up. He struggled mightily to master himself, and prevailed, answering, “She said nothing of His Majesty. All she commanded of me was to tell you of all she had done this night.”

Oh, did she now? Such an obvious challenge. One Zephyra must answer, of course. Again she felt all eyes on her. Her heart sank, for she realized her blunder too late: she should have talked to Nariman alone. Likely the words he uttered here would spread abroad before even an hour passed. The fantastic nature of his story demanded to be spoken of, whether aloud or by whisper. Why hadn’t he started with Alia’s orders of him? Had he done so, Zephyra might have thought to silence him in time.

Damn. Damn it all.

The eagle attacking Protector Amavand, and how the people would see that attack, presented one problem. A problem not insurmountable for him. Publicly executing Ironwing would overturn the people’s suspicions of her father. Of course, Ironwing would be made to publicly confess to scheming to kill the Protector of Elamis. Which Zephyra would use to further her father’s greater plan of turning the people against the Huntress, the so-called Mother of Dryads.

But the dead returning to avenge themselves? That presented a different problem. Worse, these were the dead whose deaths came at the command of Protector Amavand. Effectively, Ironwing managed to set up a gallows and place a noose around the protector. The people of Elamis would no longer be counted upon to mourn him, or to avenge his death.

A muscle in Zephyra’s cheek twitched. Oh, how she wished to dare to indulge in cursing Alia Ironwing just now. The she-wolf had struck openly, yet from the shadows. That she remained unseen at the moment of her attack, and had made her attack from a distance, would only add to what glamour the people would see in her, when the soldier’s story spread. Instead of properly baying for her blood, the people would see her just as they were taught to see her, thanks to their foolish belief in the False Ones.

“Where did she go?”

Nariman did not know.

“She flew away on her gryphon, Your Eminence. Our horses were frightened by the shades, and some of us were thrown off. So we couldn’t track the huntress. But I think she may still be over the skies over the park.”

Over the park? Was this another trap? Did she intend for Zephyra to come this time? What would happen then? What more would she do to destroy the peoples’ perception of the protector?

There was no time to worry about it. A messenger burst through the door, nearly colliding into the soldier, who used the excuse to break eye contact with Zephyra.

“Your Eminence,” the messenger gasped. He had been stationed in the tower. His presence signaled yet another misfortune for her father.

Abruptly Zephyra spun on her heels, and snapped, “Come with me, and deliver your message to the protector.”

It was the best pretext available to her; better than outright telling the others to clear the room so she could hear the message alone. Instinct warned her the messenger would speak of Alia Ironwing. Worse, he would say something that would further delegitimize the protector.

The messenger struggled to keep up, panting as if he’d run all the way from the tower. So the soldier was truthful in that at least; Alia Ironwing had unhorsed the men.

After the disastrous ceremony the protector had retreated to his apartments. The closer she came to his wing of the palace, the more the servants scurried about. And not just them, the men and women of the court scurried as well.

They avoided her gaze, except for the most sycophantic. No doubt they were eager to affirm their loyalty. After all, the protector wasn’t going anywhere. And for the moment, no would-be usurper emerged to rally them.

But when the huntress became more widely known? What then? When the shahanshah learned of her, and of her actions tonight, what then?

I must kill her quickly.

Every moment Ironwing drew breath, she dismantled Protector Amavand’s works. Yet once Zephyra mounted her head in Ember Square, the people would believe whatever she said about the huntress. If Ironwing were truly a righteous warrior of the Huntress no evil would overcome her, would it? With a grimace, Zephyra forced herself to accept she must allow the Elamisi to continue believing in the Huntress.

Their belief in the so-called Huntress would buy her father time.

Finally Zephyra reached the grand doors of Protector Amavand’s apartments. Straightaway the servants ushered her in, with the messenger at her heels.

As usual, Protector Amavand sat at his desk. It was an heirloom piece, tamarisk wood hand painted with vignettes of folklore, passed to him from his father, who inherited it from his father, and his father before him. Protector Amavand was scratching furiously at his parchment, his imported quill pen flying.

His inner circle clustered about him. Including the chief advisors, they who believed in the Greatest One and had taken the oaths of loyalty. Should she send them away? Then again, why bother? Thanks to her earlier stupidity everyone would soon know about Alia Ironwing. Trying to put that wayward horse back in the stables would only waste time she didn’t have.

At her approach the advisors turned to look at her. Their sudden silence caught Protector Amavand’s attention. Seeing her, he sharply narrowed his eyes.

“Have you word from the Greatest One?”

“Not yet,” Zephyra said swiftly. “I regret to tell you that your men fell into a trap.”

“What?”

Any other time, the coldness of his voice would have frightened her. But this time his anger was not directed at her. In the coming days he would need her more than ever, this much she was certain of.

But only if he lived.

The solstice night was not yet over, and the prophecy hung over her like a sword.

Quickly Zephyra relayed Nariman’s report. And added that he alone returned alive, of the unit sent to hunt the huntress.

“She dares to set herself against the Greatest One?” this from Artostes, her father’s Master of War.

“It appears so,” Zephyra answered. “And now this messenger comes to us, from the tower.”

The others exchanged looks, and Protector Amavand rose from his chair. He stared at the messenger, who like the guard was in utter disarray, not fit to stand before the city’s protector.

But stand he did, though trembling all the while as he told them the shocking news: the dryad, Nalini, had escaped her cell. Worse, she unhorsed the other cataphracti, and sent the horses running—

“Where to?” Zephyra asked, her stomach churning as she awaited the answer. Idly she wondered how the dryad came by the power to effect an escape.

The messenger shook his head. “I am not sure, Your Eminence. They ran into the city, that much I know.”

“Not to the portal?”

“No, Your Eminence.”

Oh by the Goddess. Zephyra closed her eyes, her heart aching for her father.

Only the protector’s best men would ride an armored horse in peacetime. Now the people of Elamis, any who were still outdoors, would see those horses running wildly through the streets, without their riders. They would know something had happened.

Yet another mark against her father; everyone would assume only an agent of the Huntress could have executed such a move. The people would assume that this agent was more powerful than the soldiers of Elamis. More powerful than their protector …

Protector Amavand demanded, “Did the dryad meet the huntress? This Alia Ironwing?”

“No, Your Majesty.” Quickly he explained what happened when Delir, the beastmaster, had set the special jackals against the Rasena Valentian women.

Three fingers lost, Zephyra silently noted, and her heart began to sink.

And the messenger kept talking. He had seen a red glow in the trees beyond the tower, so he returned to his post at the top of the tower. Just in time to witness the guardsmen surround the dryad and the Rasena Valentian women. The women matched Delir’s description of the ones who’d mutilated him.

For the first time Zephyra smiled — finally, some good news — but the messenger kept talking: from out of the trees came the shades of the dead.

Then the dryad seized control, banishing the dead and unhorsing the guards. More, she gave a command to the guardsmen, and they promptly killed the soldiers who rushed from the tower to aid them. Then they brought the dryad and the she-wolves inside.

“They killed our men?” Zephyra gasped. “Their own men? Was Farrokh among them?”

“Yes, Your Eminence. Amongst the killers,” said the messenger, meeting her gaze before quickly looking away. Unfortunately, his eyes met Protector Amavand’s by mistake, and he stepped back at the look he saw there.

“Farrokh has asked for assistance,” the messenger added, without waiting to be prompted. “That is why I have come, and that is all I have to tell you.”

If he had hoped to win dismissal with this sentence, he managed to hide his disappointment well.

“The dryad escaped. How did she do that?” Artostes wondered aloud.

The king dismissed this question with a sharp wave. “This is the solstice. No doubt she was biding her time, to enter Erebossa and emerge here. Perhaps she sensed the huntress, this Alia Ironwing, and waited for her.”

Thunder pulsed behind Zephyra’s eyes, and she rubbed her temples. If her father was right, then no doubt Alia would attempt to free the dryad. Could the dryad call to her, and summon aid? The smugglers who brought the dryads maintained careful procedures in transporting the dryads, precisely to prevent them from calling for aid. But a free and unfettered dryad could call out to any huntsman nearby.

Damn.

The tower seemed an obvious place to trap the huntress. But the festival had been an obvious place to trap her, too, and look how that had turned out?

At the same time, they needed Ironwing dead. They needed Alia Ironwing dead hours ago, and the night was not getting any younger.

Zephyra looked at her father. “The huntress may be at the tower, Father. Where is Murad?”

The scryer could surely observe Ironwing’s movements, especially now that he knew where to look for her.

“Send more men against this she-wolf?” Protector Amavand demanded. “After she has already made fools of best men tonight?”

“We must deal with her ourselves, then,” Artostes said, and the others murmured their agreement. “This she-wolf is so eager to pick a fight with the Greatest One, let her match herself against us. We will teach her to fear the Goddess.”

Or they would step into another snare if they came face to face with the huntress. Annoyed with herself, Zephyra banished the notion. As high priestess of the Greatest One, and daughter of the protector, she did not need to fear some savage agent of a False One.

“Father, I will go,” she volunteered.

Protector Amavand’s eyes blazed. He crossed the room to stand before her. “Why? Why go to her? So she can kill you? Have you forgotten the prophecy? Do not be foolish, girl.”

Hadn’t he taught her to lead by example? It was how he kept the army on his side, not to mention the other factions. In the coming days, the huntress would take on a glamour if they didn’t deal carefully with her. To let it be known, or to be seen cowering at the thought of confronting her, would only make things worse. It would build her up in the eyes of the people, when she needed to be cast down instead. That much Zephyra was certain of.

“Father, I must deal with her. I will not let it be said that we quailed instead of facing her down and cutting her down as she deserves. Let me see to her, Father. I am your Hand, and the Handmaiden of the Greatest One. Let no one ever believe that a False One’s bitch could stand against your Hand, let alone our Greatest One.”

Her father’s gaze softened as he stared down at her. His chest heaved, and Zephyra supposed he was battling sorrow. Of course he must let her go. Either she must go, or he must, and with the prophecy hanging over his head, it would have to be Zephyra. To hold her back would make him look as if he had no faith in the power of the Greatest One to protect Her handmaiden.

“Quickly, my child. Go quickly. If you can take this huntress alive, do so. If not, you may kill her with my blessing.”

With a courtly bow Zephyra answered him. She tapped the sheath beneath the bodice of her dress, reminding her father of the knife he’d given her.

The knife needed blooding again. And no one deserved it more than Alia Ironwing.

The portal delivered Zephyra to the city. At first she planned to come down from the sky, via her fire drake, but she re-considered. Why not take Ironwing unawares? Why announce herself, first? So she came by her own horse, wearing her priestly garments.

Murad had gone blind.

When Zephyra sought him by his scrying pool, she found him instead screaming in pain at something he’d seen. While keeping watch over the events of the tower, something happened within it. Whatever it was, he was beyond telling her. Sheer agony knocked him out.

Shivers went through her at the memory of what became of Murad’s eyes. Somehow they had turned milky white, with no irises, no pupils. Just pure white orbs.

As this was the night of the winter solstice, no healer could now restore his eyes. This terrible fate he must endure, until the summer solstice at the least. Even the sorcerers aligned with the Goddess could not overcome the law that limited the Restorites.

So, the tower must be trapped. Well. Even though Ironwing or the dryad possessed the ability to blind scryers who spied upon them, that did not mean Zephyra need fear them. After all, Murad was not part of the Greatest One’s followers. The fool still believed in Arenavachi, though he was quiet about it these days. Why should the Greatest One exert Herself to protect a believer in a False One from an agent of another False One?

Her horse maintained a steady pace as she approached the park. Rather than armor, her horse simply bore fine dressage. Ostensibly, stealth demanded she eschew armor. While Zephyra would have liked to have the townspeople to witness the protector’s horses striding the streets, the time for being seen was over for the moment. According to the reports, the horses that fled the dryad had fled all the way to the deserts. They trampled the gate guards who had tried to stop them.

What would become of the horses out there Zephyra had no idea, but she had no time to care. Because the noise of an armored horse would give away her approach, she favored stealth. The balance must be stacked to give her every edge possible.

Bitter laughter bubbled up inside her. Stealth? Against someone trained in the very art of hunting? In this matter, Zephyra was fighting a huntress on grounds suitable to a huntress.

Which meant Zephyra needed to shift the battlefield. She clutched the vial around her neck, and smiled a little, triumphant.

Never before did her father entrust the vial to her. Never did he bless her with the nectar of the Goddess. This blessing he reserved to certain others, and said he’d done so because they could not hope to do what she could, as the handmaiden of the Greatest One. All the same, Zephyra had always felt cheated. Even now, he forbade her to drink the nectar, insisting she give it to the men who accompanied her.

“Swear by the Greatest One,” Protector Amavand had demanded of her.

Fury had burned in Zephyra’s heart at those words. Why deny her the nectar of the Goddess? What right did he have to keep that blessing from her? To assert control over her? To ensure that regardless of her status as the Handmaiden, she still needed him, and needed to obey him?

The look in his eyes quelled her desire to argue. Experience told her he would be unyielding. If she wanted to be the one to confront the huntress, she would have to swear the oath.

Swear it she did. But she vowed to herself to have a reckoning with her father when this was over.

However, first he must survive, and ensuring his survival was her job.

Zephyra glanced up at the sky, expecting to see the huntress flitting about on her gryphon. But she only saw stars overhead. Then again, Ironwing may be flying too high for Zephyra to see her. And why not? Gryphons possessed the same sharp eyesight as golden eagles.

But there was something else odd. Given the height of the tower, Zephyra ought to see the top of it peeking over the trees by now. On her first and last visit to the tower, she was able to see its peak minutes before she reached it. Was the huntress using an illusion? Something to conceal it from sight? But why?

“It’s this way,” said Nariman. He led them, knowing the way better than Zephyra did. And, if he should try to flee, he would do so knowing that she was at his back and would strike him down. Although, so far he seemed eager for a chance to redeem himself.

Three other Manticoran guards rode with them. Surreptitiously she studied them. Utterly unremarkable, she concluded. Nothing about them marked them as worthy of the nectar of the Goddess. Nariman especially was unworthy. Perhaps she could forgive him for being captured, but losing his horse? The pride of the protector’s mounts?

A shriek pierced her reverie, coming from a man and his horse. Nariman’s horse shimmied backwards. The soldier placed a hand on the pommel of his sword, then turned back sharply to see her.

“Your Eminence! Stay back!”

The horses all seemed nervous; even Zephyra’s took a step back. Two of the guards struggled forward to join Nariman, but one stayed with Zephyra, positioning himself to get between her and whatever Nariman was facing.

“What is it?” she asked. Her heart pounded in anticipation. Did Ironwing show herself? Again she looked at the vial around her neck. Since she gave it to the men when they first set out, they should be fully under its effects by now.

“Who are you?” Nariman barked.

Confused, Zephyra tried to stand in her saddle. Who are you? Wouldn’t he recognize Ironwing? Ahh, but Ironwing was “the other one.” Perhaps Nariman faced the first one?

“I said who are you?” Nariman put fire into his voice this time, and the men were drawing their spears.

“Move aside. I am not here for thee.”

Zephyra’s eyes widened. The voice sounded sonorous, and filled with great weight and power, the way Zephyra had always imagined a goddess to sound. The voice of her goddess never sounded that way.

But the Goddess spoke to her in dreams. Had She come here in the flesh? Eager, Zephyra urged her horse forward. The men, bless them, were closing ranks, forming a phalanx against the speaker. Trying to protect their Handmaiden.

“Answer me, or be run down, woman!” Nariman thundered.

Now closer to the men, Zephyra peered through the gaps in their phalanx. She drew back, seeing the speaker at last.

A lone woman stood on the path, fearless and regal in her violet gown. Somehow she seemed to look down on the guards, even though she was only on foot and they sat above her on their horses. The lapis stone in the circlet on her brow announced her status as a prophet.

“Hold there, Handmaiden,” said the prophet, her voice inflected with so much icy hauteur that even Zephyra flinched. Even the shahanshah’s emissaries couldn’t have matched her in tone, and they thought the high king was directly appointed by a goddess.

“Let me through,” Zephyra said quietly, and Nariman maneuvered to let her draw even with him.

Now she came face to face with the woman. Was it the starlight that gave the stately woman a soft halo, making her seem quite ethereal, and not quite real? The brightness of the halo prevented Zephyra from looking directly at her, forcing her to avert her eyes.

What was this prophet doing here? A terrible thought jolted Zephyra: maybe the prophet sounded so high and mighty as the shahanshah’s people because she was one of them. How disastrous, if they found out about her father so early.

“What is it—” Zephyra began, but at a contemptuous flick of the prophet’s wrist the words died in her throat. The woman looked at her and through her, as though she thought Zephyra was nothing at all.

When the prophet spoke again, she intrigued Zephyra by using the older form of the language, the kind only used in sacred texts and epic poems.

“Silence! Thou shalt be silent and listen. Thou art surrounded by liars and deceivers all. They will destroy thee. Thou thinkest thou wilt save thy father the pretender, but he will die by the hands of those who are better than he. And they will come for thee, child. When they do, lay down thy weapon and remember that I told thee this would happen.”

Though Zephyra opened her mouth no words came out, so shocked was she.

Pretender? Better than he? Where did this woman get the nerve!

“Lay. Down. Thy. Dagger,” the woman intoned, and at last it dawned on Zephyra that the prophet was speaking of the dagger her father had given her.

Yet, no one else knew of the dagger. In all the frenzy of killing Gira and preparing for the festival she hadn’t time to show it to Friya. Even Gira hadn’t seen it before she killed him. Had the weaponsmith spoken of it?

“Who are you?” Zephyra demanded, unable to restrain her anger any longer. It was either anger or terror, and she refused to be scared.

“When thy protector lies dying in thine arms,” the woman said, without so much as a hint of pity, “ask him to tell thee of the mynah. He will fear to die with a lie upon his lips. Every day thee hast known him is every day he has lied to thee. But ask him of the mynah and he will tell thee the truth. For once.”

Silvery light flashed.

She was gone.

They were all quiet for several moments. While the men murmured, Zephyra tried to regain her bearings mentally. Vanished. The prophet vanished. Which meant her appearance was from a Sending, as the scryers might do. Or … was she a shade, sent by Alia Ironwing to mock her? What was a mynah? And why should her father care about such a thing, and why should Zephyra ask him of it?

“Should we return to the palace?” Nariman asked.

Zephyra shook herself, and sat straighter on her horse. “This was just a distraction,” she said, with a confidence she did not feel. “The Ironwing woman is trying to throw us off her trail. Perhaps she’s wounded and wants us to keep away from the tower. My father is safe in the palace, how would she get to him? Let’s move on.”

They came a little while later to find fallen shrubbery on the road, and swirls of dirt and leaves.

And the bodies of four of the men from the tower, including Ratansha, her apothecary.

“Farrokh will answer for this,” Zephyra hissed.

They turned onto the lane that led to—

Nariman cried out again, jerking back his horse. This time Zephyra held him blameless; her heart stopped entirely at what she saw.

The tower was no more. A heap of rubble lay where it once stood. Gravel. Stone. Pebbles. Iron and glass. The remains of the tower, pulverized somehow, as if a giant or some such had come along and squeezed it to dust in its hands.

No sign of corpses. Did they dissolve when the tower dissolved? Was this what Murad witnessed when he went blind?

Who destroyed the tower? The huntress? Or the dryad? Either way the Greatest One would be furious; the dryad was needed for a midnight ritual, meant to take place an hour from now.

Something glinted in the starlight, at the edge of the gravel, where the door to the tower would have been.

“What is that?” Zephyra asked Nariman.

In silence he dismounted his horse in silence, still looking at the rubble in stark disbelief.

He had only gone a few feet when it happened.

First came a flash of white light. Then Nariman’s knees buckled just as he let out a fierce scream. Zephyra startled, and her horse stepped backward in response.

“What—?”

“Help me! Help me! Help me!” Nariman was on all fours now, screaming and writhing.

Frightened, Zephyra swept her gaze over the area. Nothing. Nothing to explain the strange attack on Nariman —what was happening?

Smoke was rising now from Nariman’s armor. In an instant Zephyra retrieved her glowlight from her saddle bag and raised it up. Its light revealed Nariman’s face, red and blistered. His eyes rolled back in his sockets, and he closed them just once before his face began to shrivel.

His companions were dismounting their horses, clearly intending to go to his aid.

“Don’t!” Zephyra ordered,

But she was too late, and she had to look away from the flash of white. When she looked back, the men had fallen where they stood, and before her eyes they began to meet Nariman’s fate.

As for Nariman, he fell eerily silent. His face blackened, burned to a crisp.

It seemed an eternity before the other two men stopped screaming as well.

In the silence, Zephyra heard only the crackling and hissing of their remains.

Against her will she trembled. Her heart pounded as she surveyed the tower, and what was left of her honor guard, cooked alive in their own armor.

By sheer willpower she stayed calm. Nariman’s horse had skittered back, and Zephyra was dully resigned to the possibility of it running away. However, the horses remained unscathed. Whatever attacked the men did not target horses, apparently.

And she? If she touched the ground, would she remain unscathed, or would she meet the same fate as the Manticoran Guard?

With quick, shallow breaths she glanced back down the lane, half expecting the seer to appear again. But only an empty, dark road greeted her.

Think. Think. Think.

Either the seer was a lie, an illusion sent by Alia Ironwing—or she was real. If she were a lie, then Zephyra better stay on her horse. But if she were real…if she were real, then Zephyra would live to see her father die.

Her stomach roiled, and it took everything she had to keep her food down.

She urged her horse forward. The shiny thing that had drawn her attention proved to be an amulet, hanging from a makeshift sign post. Her glowlight revealed it to be Delir’s golden eagle amulet. An amulet the protector allowed him to wear, for now, because the had not yet come to do away with the ways of the Huntress. Delir’s name was engraved at the bottom of the amulet, below the eagle’s head.

She gingerly reached out to take it, and immediately jerked her fingers back. The metal was hot. By instinct she put her fingers in her mouth to cool them.

For a brief moment, every memory flashed before her eyes, and she let out a small moan of rage and grief. Had she doomed herself?

But no. Zephyra shakily withdrew her fingers from her mouth, and willed herself to look at them.

I only brushed against the medal. Lightly, lightly I brushed against it. Oh Greatest One, surely that saves me?

No other part of her burned, and she exhaled. Again she shone her light on the amulet. This time, she noticed the plank of wood it hung from. A message was seared into the plank.

To whom it may concern:

Delir is no more, for he doomed himself when he broke his oaths to the Huntress.

The tower is no more, for it served as a prison for the daughters of the Huntress.

Protector Amavand shall be no more, for it is he who slew the dryads.

The Huntress requires I claim the life of the protector of Elamis, and claim it I shall.

Someone inscribed a mark at the bottom, with a glyph Zephyra recognized.

The glyph necessary to begin writing Alia.