Mrs. Erickson looked at the closed door. She then turned to her guests. “I’m sure it must have been wind,” she said, in the least convincing version of certainty Kaylin had ever heard. She turned toward the door, but Teela stepped in front of her, joined by Serralyn.
“I don’t believe the door should be touched,” Teela said, in official Hawk voice.
“Do you think it’s dangerous?”
“I think it could be.”
Mrs. Erickson looked doubtful. “Cookies?” she asked Terrano and Mandoran.
Mandoran smiled. “I’d love some.”
Terrano, however, was now staring at the door. His eyes continued red; his hands became transparent. “I really wish he hadn’t done that,” he said.
Serralyn was pale; her hands were in fists. “I brought him here,” she whispered.
“I think he’s trapped on the outside.”
Kaylin turned to Mrs. Erickson. “I need to open a window.” She hesitated, and then said, “No, Terrano needs to open a window.”
“You want me to tell Bakkon to go home?”
“Immediately, yes.”
“If he asks why?”
“Tell him it’s Starrante’s fault.”
Serralyn’s eyes rounded, which was fine; they reddened instantly, as if all of the small blood vessels had burst at once, which was way more disturbing. But of course they did. She was the student at the Academia, and she was the one who had discussed Azoria’s phantom home with the Wevaran. He had come because of her. And she was part of the cohort; what Terrano knew, they all knew; what he could do, they could—with greater or lesser difficulty—learn.
As if she could hear the thought, Serralyn said, “Don’t worry; my eyes are fine. This is easy. Some of the other stuff Terrano does is...not. He’s always been the most flexible of us—but he can often overfocus. There’s a saying about trees mortals have?”
“He can’t see the forest for the trees?” It was Mrs. Erickson who answered.
“Very much like that, yes. What he sees, he does see—he has a pretty garbage imagination.”
“Hey!”
“But sometimes he doesn’t pick up the nuances of what he sees; he can’t build a bigger picture. Don’t look at me like that, I wasn’t the one who said it first. So I’ve been asked to observe as well. I’m not certain about sending Bakkon home, though.”
“He might be in danger there?”
“It depends. Webs aren’t meant to be spit out and retracted—if they were, we’d call them tongues. But the way a Wevaran moves, the comfort a Wevaran takes in geography, is rooted in the webbing. If he spit something into this space and he can’t immediately sever it, something might be able to crawl along the webbing he’s built, and if they can, they’re going to find both Bakkon and anyone else in his immediate vicinity.”
“You’re worried that Azoria somehow took those long-ago discussions with Starrante and Androsse to heart.”
“Yes.”
Bakkon had been quite upset with Starrante when he heard what Starrante had discussed; Kaylin remembered that much.
“Which means you’re worried that she’s here, somehow.”
“You’re not?”
“I’ve passed beyond worried to terrified.”
Serralyn nodded. “Mrs. Erickson doesn’t seem to be affected by Azoria.”
Mrs. Erickson was listening to the conversation, although she did pay attention to Mandoran’s chipped plate, filling it almost as if gentle hospitality was a habit. “I’m fine,” she said. “I’ve lived here all my life.”
“So have the children,” Kaylin replied. “Where are they?”
“Jamal is probably in the back room. He wasn’t best pleased that I had guests.”
No, of course not.
“He wasn’t terrified of Serralyn, though—not the way he was of the corporal.”
“And Terrano?”
“I don’t think male Barrani invoke the same fear. And Serralyn seems almost human in comportment. Why are you asking about the children?”
“I think it’s important that we keep an eye on them now,” Kaylin replied. She looked at her arms; the marks had begun to glow a steady gold. “I’ll go find them if you want to head into the dining room with everyone else. I think Terrano has opened the window there.”
Terrano had not only opened the window, but was leaning out of the frame. He was conversing with Bakkon. In clicks and gestures. Kaylin blinked. He had sprouted an extra pair of arms in the interim, and was waving them gracefully and somewhat precisely.
Mrs. Erickson blinked and rubbed her eyes as she looked at Terrano’s back. “Well,” she said, voice shaky, “Serralyn did warn me that Terrano was highly unusual. Does he do this all the time?”
“Only when it’s necessary.” Kaylin glanced at Serralyn’s eyes; they were very disturbing. Mrs. Erickson, however, hadn’t noticed them.
Serralyn nodded. She joined Terrano by the window, but didn’t sprout arms or otherwise attempt to speak to the Wevaran in his native tongue. Nor did she speak Barrani; it was as if she was now afraid of what might be listening. The natural Wevaran tongue was less easily translated—although Azoria might have learned it, if anyone else could. Barrani memory was perfect, but recall required a level of concentration; if Azoria listened from somewhere, her attention would be on their discussion.
“Don’t worry,” Serralyn said. “The giant spider won’t hurt anyone.”
Kaylin blinked in surprise, but nodded. She then turned and said, “I’m sorry, I got distracted. I’ll go get the kids.” She turned on her heel.
Severn said, “I’ll go with you.”
She started to answer but forced her mouth to close. You can’t see them.
No. But something changed when Bakkon attempted to test the waters. I’m not sure what Terrano saw or sensed, but the house has changed.
The marks on Kaylin’s arms had ratcheted up in brilliance, but they remained gold. I’m worried about the children, she told him. They wouldn’t enter the room that contains the painting—but it wasn’t just opposition; they became almost catatonic with terror.
Severn nodded as Kaylin reached the room in which Jamal—according to Mrs. Erickson—went to sulk and vent his displeasure.
If something has changed in this house—if the door suddenly slammed shut at someone else’s will—it might affect the children.
How? The question was asked in Severn’s usual pragmatic tone; it held no ridicule or disbelief.
I don’t know. But they were trapped in this house—the figurative door has always existed for them. I don’t think they were killed in this house—but I could be totally wrong. They were lucky, in a fashion: Mrs. Erickson could always see them.
Severn nodded. According to the Arkon—the new Arkon, he added to lessen possible misinterpretation, that is her power.
Do you think Azoria knew? Do you think that’s why she chose Mrs. Erickson?
The house was transferred to her family before she was born. There was nothing that would indicate magical ability to anyone. Azoria may have been able to detect something that we couldn’t detect.
How? Sanabalis strongly implied that there were different tests—and those required the most protected room hidden in the palace. There’s no test she could have made that wouldn’t be seen or remembered—certainly by Mrs. Erickson. Although I hate to admit it, I don’t think the Imperial Mage responsible for dismissing her magical aptitude or potential failed to perform the usual tests.
Good, Severn said, and meant it; she could feel the relief.
Good?
I think there’s a reason that Mrs. Erickson never fell to the possible enchantments Azoria placed in this “normal” home. I was curious about one thing, and I did a full audit of tax and property Records. With permission, he added, as he caught wind of her surprise. The home was transferred to the Swindons—to Mrs. Erickson’s mother—when she was pregnant. Care to guess who sealed the transfer?
Azoria?
Yes. According to the paperwork, she gave a parcel of the lot she owned to the Swindons—and she allowed them to build a house suitable to the lot itself. A small house. Before you ask, no, we have no Records about how the house was constructed, but we do know who owned it. Legally, it now belongs to Mrs. Erickson. In the past, however, it belonged to Azoria.
You think she...approached Mrs. Erickson’s parents?
When they were expecting, yes.
You think she tried to do something to Mrs. Erickson before she was even born?
Severn didn’t answer, which was answer enough.
How did she even meet the Ericksons?
There’s no information in regard to that, and no further legal Records of any kind surrounding them. It’s likely—but not impossible—that Azoria did occupy the house that once stood here, and that she hired human servants to tend to daily tasks. If Mrs. Erickson’s mother was one of those people, she might have offered the land and the small house—in keeping with servant houses historically—as a gift, perhaps a wedding gift. This is entirely conjecture. I haven’t had the chance to ask Mrs. Erickson herself.
No—things have already gone pear-shaped. We can ask her later.
“Jamal? Esme?” No answer. “Callis? Katie?” She looked over her shoulder at her partner. “Either they’re not here or I can no longer see them.”
“Should we ask Mrs. Erickson?”
Kaylin shook her head. “I want Mrs. Erickson to stay by Terrano and Serralyn if at all possible. We should really move her to somewhere safe—but I don’t want to risk opening that door.”
Severn nodded. He, too, thought there was a chance the door would no longer open into Elantra.
It was Mandoran who joined them; Kaylin half expected Terrano. “You haven’t found the kids?”
She shook her head.
“Mrs. Erickson is starting to worry.”
“She can stand in line,” Kaylin snapped, and then instantly felt guilty. “Sorry.”
“You want to feel guilty, you’re going to have to work harder,” was Mandoran’s cheerful reply. “You’ve got nothing on Sedarias.” His wince made clear Sedarias didn’t appreciate the comparison. “She thinks the children were trapped here for a reason. They were afraid of the painting; they couldn’t leave the house. I think any attempt to leave the house might land us someplace we don’t want to be—but Sedarias thinks otherwise.”
“What does she think?”
“She thinks this house is still attached to, still part of, the phantom house you can see with the aid of your familiar. If it’s the house we want to examine, she thinks our only option is to open that door.”
“The windows still opened to the street, though.”
“Yes. Bakkon has decided to remain where he is, which gives us a window: we probably don’t want him standing outside of Mrs. Erickson’s house when the sun rises. Whatever Serralyn was afraid of, he’s considered, and he’s decided that there’s a risk. He also had choice words—according to Terrano—to say about Starrante, so I imagine the Arbiter is going to get what passes for an earful if we manage to escape things unscathed.
“I’m sorry I can’t help you look for the children. I’ve never gotten the hang of the eye shifts. I can shift my entire body in certain ways, but I can’t just shift random parts of it.”
“But you’re...”
“Yes. I can do most of what Terrano can do, and if anything had happened to Terrano, I’d’ve been next in line to carry out our plans. I don’t have to warp my eyes for most things, though.”
“Why does it involve a change of eyes?”
“He could explain it better. Or at all. But it’s a recent addition to his metamorphic stable. I think he picked up the idea from Serralyn’s contacts with the Wevaran. He can see the ghosts here if his eyes go strange. Serralyn can as well—but she sees other things when she does it; she finds it really, really uncomfortable. She’s doing it because she actually likes Mrs. Erickson. And Bakkon. She’s really worried.”
As he spoke, Kaylin headed to the living room—the other room possessed of a window. If a giant spider was present, she would have expected Jamal to be here, staring out through the windows he kept promising not to break again. None of the children were here, either.
Kaylin understood why Serralyn was worried; she was worried herself. Mrs. Erickson had power, but absolutely no knowledge, no way of using that power. Her ability seemed to affect the dead—or the ghosts—but it was entirely without effort on her part.
She could see Severn’s blades in a fashion that even Kaylin couldn’t. She could see Amaldi and Darreno, something Kaylin couldn’t do without the direct intervention of her familiar; even Terrano required intense concentration and physical modifications to do so.
The two had been affected by Azoria’s magic. Azoria had taken a flower—possibly multiple flowers—from the green itself. And the weapon that Severn carried was tied to the green.
Mrs. Erickson hadn’t even been born when Azoria first came into contact with her, through her mother. What had Azoria done? Kaylin couldn’t believe that there was no intent in the gifting of this house to the newly married, newly pregnant mortal. But what? What had her intent been?
If we understand the criminal’s motivations, and we know what their capabilities are, we are far more likely to find the evidence the law requires. Who had said that? Marcus, she thought. Marcus, in the very early days.
But she didn’t understand the motivations. She didn’t understand the capabilities. She didn’t even know if Azoria was truly alive.
Focus on the power, Severn said quietly. It’s like following the money, to the Barrani. If you believe the Consort, Azoria attempted to either absorb or destroy the Lake. There are two possible reasons for that—but the most likely...
She wanted the power. She thought she could somehow absorb the words in the Lake and become more powerful. Kaylin considered Androsse. She could have wanted the power of the Ancestors. Androsse’s ancient kin.
Androsse’s unstable ancient kin, yes.
Her experiments with the Barrani in the portraits appear to have been successful on one front: they were drained of life. I don’t know if that was done before she broke through the protective barriers that surround the Lake, but I think it had to be. There’s no way she would have had the freedom to experiment after she was caught.
Severn nodded.
So she must have had some reason to believe she could do it, that it would work. If she could make it work with individual Barrani, she had no reason to believe it wouldn’t work with the Lake. But there’s something we’re missing. I think she could absorb power from the Barrani—but maybe she couldn’t absorb the actual words. If what she wanted wasn’t simply power via sacrifice... Kaylin headed up the stairs.
If she wanted to be as powerful as Androsse...maybe what she wanted was to take the words and to somehow combine them in her core? She wanted the complicated and intricate True Names of the Ancestors, and believed she understood True Words well enough to somehow build a new name for herself?
“Mandoran, can you run something by Serralyn?”
“Sure. What?”
Kaylin explained the one possible theory that had begun to cohere from all of the disparate bits and pieces of information she’d been given over the last several days.
Mandoran’s normal Barrani eyes darkened. “She’s cursing up a storm—on the inside—and smacking herself in the face.”
“That means she agrees?”
“That means she agrees. She reminds you that the Wevaran develop their name by eating their siblings; the words that become their True Name exist in disparate pieces; they come together to form a whole only when one of the siblings has devoured literally all of the others. I used to think the Lake of Life was a terrible idea, but the more I find out about other racial birthing customs, the more grateful I feel that we have it.”
“You can say that again. Ask Serralyn one other thing. What do mortals—wordless humans—have to do with all of this? How can they fit in? Why did their bodies not die when they...died?”
“She thinks there’s one possible answer. If we consider Azoria’s attempts to capture the actual words at the core of the Barrani a failure, she nonetheless drained them of life, of life force. Power, but not innate power, not intrinsic power; it did nothing to change her base nature. She thinks that if Azoria could have absorbed the Lake and made out of it a new name for herself, she would have been like unto a god.”
“Which god?”
“What?”
“Well, a god. The Barrani don’t really talk about gods much.”
“She asks you not to be ‘so bloody literal’ at a time like this. But...she thinks that if Azoria somehow managed to damage her own name, and she was adept enough not to die, she might be like the ones we call vampires now. If her name cannot sustain her, it is possible the lives of even mortals can, for a time.”
“But this was a century ago. Or more.”
“She has no other guesses, and she hasn’t studied forbidden magics; she can’t tell you what the value of a human life is worth when it comes to Barrani years.” It was a grim thought. If the children had been murdered a century ago, each of their potential lives could cover that time period—but the bodies hadn’t died; the bodies had been executed.
“Serralyn says: being alive is complicated.”
The upstairs yielded no children’s ghosts; the only room Kaylin didn’t thoroughly check was the room in which the painting hung. She did stand in the open doorway, but she didn’t enter. Mandoran cursed, and drifted slightly farther in; his curse wasn’t aimed at the two Hawks he’d been shadowing.
“This place is...really messed up,” he said. “Even looking at it is giving me a headache.”
“Why?”
“It’s like she’s taken a room and sliced it into layers and moved those layers into different planes, while insisting they visually overlap. It is really, really ugly.”
The room didn’t look like that to Kaylin—or Severn. “I’ve stood in that room before.”
“I don’t see how.”
“So did Teela.”
“Then we can assume the room has changed somehow. This would not be a safe place to enter at the moment—at least not for any of us. You might manage; Severn might manage. The scientist in me wants to tell you to give it a try and see what happens.” He winced again. Clearly one of the cohort didn’t find any humor in the suggestion, which strongly implied Sedarias.
“Fine.” Kaylin exhaled. She was worried about the children, which was ridiculous—they were already dead. But the worry had grown much, much stronger as they’d searched. It wasn’t like Jamal—who defined possessive—to be so absent when Mrs. Erickson invited visitors into the house. Esme was usually visible as well, but Katie and Callis were far more timid; had it only been the two missing, she wouldn’t have worried so much.
But Jamal? No.
“The children were terrified of this room; they wouldn’t enter it, but they wouldn’t talk about it, either. They’d just go almost catatonic for a while—according to Mrs. Erickson. She hasn’t said they’ve shown up, has she?”
“No.”
“Can you check?”
“Serralyn can.” Pause. “No. She’s worried. I mean, Mrs. Erickson is worried.”
“Can you ask Serralyn to ask Bakkon how he feels about the front door?”
“He considers it very unwise to touch it.”
She spit out a bit of Leontine. Why was life like this? “Ask him how he feels about us opening the door and leaving through it. I don’t think it’s going to take us outside the house—but I think further in might be our only option.”
“He asks why you consider this wise.”
“We don’t have a lot of choices. I suppose we could try to leave through the window—but Mrs. Erickson isn’t young, and she’s going to find it a lot more difficult than a door. I’m also really worried about the kids. There has to be some reason they’ve never been able to leave.”
The pause was longer. “Bakkon feels that there is a high probability that the front door—for those contained within the building—will not open to the porch; he urges caution. His attempt to portal through the window was a failure, and he is unwilling to try again—he feels that part of the space itself is slightly familiar—but it’s off, it’s tainted.”
Kaylin turned to Hope. “Well?”
The door. His next words surprised her. Bring Mrs. Erickson, if she is willing to take the risk.
Kaylin was not willing to take the risk. “She’s too old to be fighting.”
Not all fights require the vigor of youth, was the acid reply. But I will not argue if you feel her home is somehow safer.
“I hate it when you make a good point.”
Mrs. Erickson’s small front hall wasn’t meant to hold as many people as it now did. Terrano had drawn away from the window. “Bakkon says he can hide himself from the eyes of those who have no magical ability—but he feels it necessary to remain here until more information is forthcoming. The idea that something might traverse his personal webs has given him hives, not that you’d be able to see them given chitin and hair. I think we might be able to see how the Wevaran fought, though.”
“Why?”
“Why do you think? If we all get out of this safely, he’s going to murder Starrante.”
“Can we sic him on Androsse instead?”
Serralyn snorted. “The Arbiters can’t leave the library, and anyone who is stupid enough to attack them in the library deserves whatever they get.”
“You should remain on the Erickson side,” Teela said. “You can speak with Bakkon, and we can—hopefully—maintain that connection.”
“If we can’t, I’ll be on this side. Any research I’ve done won’t be accessible.”
“No. But Terrano is our best scout, for obvious reasons.”
The rest of the discussion was conducted in the cohort group mind.
Mrs. Erickson stepped into the silence. She looked at Kaylin, and held out both of her hands. “I can’t find the children,” she whispered.
Kaylin nodded. “I couldn’t, either. They’re not upstairs. They’re not in the bad room. They don’t seem to be anywhere.”
The old woman’s eyes went to the closed door. “Do you think they’re there?”
Kaylin hesitated. She did, but she didn’t want Mrs. Erickson to panic. “It’s possible—but they couldn’t leave the house, remember?”
“Dear, I’m old, not deaf. Serralyn believes these buildings are connected—the door no longer leads outside.”
“They didn’t open it.”
“They don’t have to open internal doors, either. If they left, I don’t think they left by their own choice—they would have said goodbye.”
Kaylin wanted to argue. She couldn’t. Hope had said she should bring Mrs. Erickson. She hadn’t won that argument, and she knew, given Mrs. Erickson’s expression, that she had even less chance of winning this one.
“Listen to Terrano or Teela. If they shout an order, obey it.”
Mrs. Erickson nodded. “You know that I can see them. You know that I can calm them down if it’s necessary.”
Kaylin nodded, glancing at Teela. She expected Teela to argue in her stead, but Teela nodded. She, too, felt that Mrs. Erickson’s presence would be helpful. Somehow.
No. She doesn’t believe that—but Teela has never been good with children. She’s concerned that if Mrs. Erickson remains she’s in danger. Mrs. Erickson was clearly a target—but we don’t know what Azoria hoped to gain. And no one wanted Azoria—or what was left of Azoria—to gain anything.
She turned to Mrs. Erickson. “We’ll find the children.”
“I hope so,” was the soft reply.
Mrs. Erickson had never lived in a house without ghosts. They were part of the childhood she remembered, part of the childhood no mortal could remember, and part of all the rest of the various events of her life. She’d been worried about leaving them behind when she eventually passed away—but she hadn’t considered that somehow, these stalwart and often annoying companions would leave first, without warning.
There was more nervous bickering, which almost all of the cohort seemed comfortable with, the exception being Teela. It was decided—grudgingly—that Serralyn would remain behind for at least as long as it took to determine whether or not the name bond would hold across the two spaces now separated by one closed door.
Teela glanced at Severn; he nodded. She then gestured. Kaylin’s hair stood on end, but she accepted it without complaint; Teela had chosen to open the door at a relatively safe distance using magic. Kaylin would have done the same had she been skilled enough.
The door opened, and as Bakkon had predicted, it didn’t open onto the porch.
“Why Androsse?” Teela asked, as she approached the door, her movements slow and deliberate. Another wave of magic slapped Kaylin’s skin, and again, she made no complaints; she knew what Teela was now looking for.
“The Ancestors—yours, and couldn’t you guys come up with a better name?—had multiple words at their core. Whole sentences, maybe more. It’s the reason they could fight the way they fought: they can exist in multiple spaces at once,” Kaylin said.
“So can the cohort, and they’re not possessed of multiple words.”
“No, but...”
“But?”
“They were altered by the regalia, as you well know. Look, I’m not certain that what she’s built here has much to do with having sentences instead of single words. But I think she felt Androsse and his people had vastly more power because of the genesis of their life force. I think you guys prove that’s not the case—you practically existed without your names; there was a very, very tenuous link to them.
“Still, I think Androsse imparted the usual arrogant better-than-you-pathetic-descendants garbage, and she bought it. I’m not saying it’s about power, exactly—but the Ancestors were definitely more flexible. They could do things Barrani can’t normally do.
“I think Starrante’s stories of the birth and coming-of-age of his own kin—and the Wevaran do have words, but to be honest, I have no idea how many—possibly suggested a different avenue to gaining them. Her first attempt on the Lake may have been her attempt to turn the Lake into the hunting ground of the immature Wevaran.
“And all of this is just guesswork.”
“It’s good guesswork,” Teela replied, meaning she agreed with it.
“Let me scout ahead,” Terrano said, as Teela reached the doorframe. When Teela glanced over her shoulder, he added, “You know how hard it is to trap or cage me. I’m not sure what we’re going to find—it may be a boring, normal house.”
“Definitely not normal,” Kaylin told him. “And I could use a bit of boring.”
Terrano passed through the frame. Kaylin was half expecting the door to slam shut on his back, but it didn’t. Teela was in the way.
The door didn’t hit her—she was prepared for that; it bounced off an invisible barrier. The doorknob left a small indent in the wall.
Hope squawked. Teela gestured. Light formed in a ball in the Barrani Hawk’s hand; she tightened her fingers around it and then pitched it through the door’s frame. Light instantly flooded the hall.
“Give us a little warning!” Terrano shouted.
The lower lighting in Mrs. Erickson’s hall gave way to much harsher, brighter light. In it, Kaylin could see very Barrani architecture, which confirmed her opinion that Mrs. Erickson’s family home had always been a servant’s home.
Azoria’s front foyer was built of stone and marble; the ceilings couldn’t be seen from the doorway, although a staircase, winding its way toward the heights, was visible. It reminded Kaylin a bit of the West March; the stairs twined around a central pillar. The pillar was of stone, but it was a darker shade than the pale stone used in the High Halls.
If Kaylin had reached this foyer in either the very wealthy parts of town or the High Halls, she wouldn’t have blinked twice—but this building occupied no physical space in what she generally called reality.
“Terrano?”
“I’m here. I’m almost blind, but I’m here. Give me a couple of minutes. Also: don’t touch the door.”
“What do you see?”
“It’s trapped. There are strands woven into the surface on this side in a pattern. So far, only the door seems to be problematic.”
“Yes. It almost slammed shut behind you.”
“I think it’s safe to enter—I can’t promise we can get out the same way. I think the door opens and closes a portal.”
“It’s not a portal,” Kaylin said. “Or not a normal one. I don’t feel anything like portal space. Teela?”
Teela walked into the foyer. “You’re right. There’s no portal.”
That would explain a few things—chief of which was the portrait room that no one, until Kaylin and Teela, had entered for decades. Somehow the buildings remained connected, even when the front door exited onto the porch.
“I’ve got a painting further in,” Terrano said.
“Enchanted?”
“Not in any way I can see. It should be safe to look at. Serralyn can hear me; so can Sedarias, which means I can hear her. Bakkon doesn’t want her to follow, though.”
“Why?”
“He’s afraid the door will close, trapping us all in what he now calls Azoria’s web.”