“She probably never expected the High Halls to rise again,” Kaylin said out loud. “And she probably wanted to see what Mrs. Erickson was capable of before she made her decision.” She turned to Teela. “Do you think she could take over the body by forcing the soul out?”
“You don’t think that’s what she did with the children?” Teela asked.
Kaylin considered the one ghostly woman Mrs. Erickson had recognized. “I think she might have. But if she did, she wasn’t entirely in control, given the way their actual bodies died. The ghosts here—the ones that emanated light—were clearly under her control; she possessed one of the bodies in order to create the painting we found in the sitting room.
“I don’t know if that possession occurred while the woman was alive. But her ghost is here. And the painting was done after the children were killed. I don’t understand, though. If she could possess a living body, as she clearly did the painter’s, couldn’t she have commandeered someone Barrani instead? She’d have the advantage of familiarity and brute strength.”
Teela raised a brow at the word brute. “We don’t have ghosts the way you have ghosts. You’ve met the Barrani version of the undead before; the attempt to delink life from True Name produces them. But the source of life, even separated, still exists; if the name cannot be used to control those who attempted to divest themselves of that weakness, it is nonetheless the source of their half-life. If you destroy the body, the name once again returns to the Lake to await rebirth; if you do not, the name maintains an attenuated connection to that body.
“I do not know what might happen to our infants in the absence of those words; the words are ours; they are part of who we are. Their bodies do not wake; they do not decay. They are almost inert. It is possible she could become the animating force behind an infant—but the parents would know. If the child woke without the blessing of the Lady, it might be considered an abomination or a mutation; I am uncertain the body would survive.
“Nor am I certain that stripped of the animation of the True Name, the adults would survive. To test this, to test what Necromantic control might make of such emptied bodies, we would have to have bodies, and we would have to experiment.”
Kaylin’s mouth flew open, but Teela lifted a hand to stem the obvious outrage that was certain to follow.
“I speak merely of the gaining of precise knowledge, and yes, the Emperor would reduce anyone who attempted to draw conclusions in that fashion to ash.
“This is beyond my areas of expertise and study. Serralyn, however, says—with some urgency—she thinks the hair binding, the flower, the painting—they were made entirely to prepare Mrs. Erickson for possession. Azoria clearly had some success in her possession of mortal bodies before, but that possession was obviously less than perfect. If Mrs. Erickson had the potential power Azoria wished to use or claim, she couldn’t afford that mistake.”
“But how did she know what Mrs. Erickson might be capable of?”
“It’s possible,” Teela said, “that she created it. And if you somehow question the power of it, you have only to consider Lord Sanabalis. Had Mrs. Erickson wanted to, she could have been in control of a Dragon. I admit I am surprised—but not displeased—that she survived that unintended disaster.”
Mrs. Erickson had dealt with the ghosts of children for all of her life; she could easily listen in on multiple simultaneous conversations.
Jamal could clearly hear what was being said; he couldn’t join in the conversation. But he could still speak to Mrs. Erickson. She turned to the door when—Kaylin assumed—Jamal started to speak again.
“I have a question for you,” she then said, turning to face Teela and Kaylin.
Kaylin nodded.
“Is Azoria dead?” Mrs. Erickson’s voice was completely steady. None of the usual softness, the tone that implied her constant, unchanging kindness, adorned the words.
Teela answered. “We were told she was dead; her line was excised. Her family no longer exists. That is as much of an answer as I can give. Barrani died—recently—for investigating her history; I do not believe Azoria responsible for their deaths.
“I’m not sure, at this juncture, how to define dead or alive when it comes to your perceptions. The children are ghosts. Amaldi and Darreno were not. Kaylin only assumed that the latter two weren’t actually dead because of how she could see them. She assumed Jamal and the other children were dead because she could see them without intervention. And because you called them ghosts.
“Amaldi and Darreno weren’t dead. To your eyes, however, there was no difference between them and your children—if one ignores the fact that your children have always been trapped in your house. I believe the answer to your question is a very qualified yes: yes, she is dead. I do not doubt that her body, or perhaps a very, very clever simulacrum, was destroyed.”
“But if it were destroyed, her name...” Kaylin paused. “You don’t think her name returned to the Lake.”
“No. Had it, none of us would be here, having this discussion. If she managed somehow to drain the life out of captive Barrani—and we have no idea how long that might have taken—it’s not a stretch to believe that she did the same to her own name. It may have been inadvertent. From the few stories that have survived, she was very like Terrano when it came to choosing between experimentation and her own physical safety. If she began her experiments long ago—and we have evidence she did in the preserved Berranin suite—we might draw conclusions from what we found.
“Perhaps she understood that she would face execution if her attempt to interfere with the Lake failed; she no doubt hoped to move into a different, but eternal, body.
“She almost certainly attempted possession of Barrani first. Until and unless she removed the names, it was probably impossible. Given the existence of her gallery, I’m almost certain she tried.” Teela’s eyes were narrowed. “Perhaps the destruction of the names at their core wasn’t about gaining power, but about hollowing out the force that made each Barrani victim unique.
“If they were possessed of a name, she might command or control them should she discover that name—but she could not be them.”
“How could she try? The gallery was in place when Berranin was wiped out. It’s been tucked away in the folds of the High Halls. You can’t think that she’d be able to return to it?”
“Before the High Halls rose again? I do. It would have to be subtle, and it would imply a knowledge of the High Halls—at least in its severely hobbled state—that no one would be comfortable with. It would be, if not easy, simpler: she was dead. She was no longer a concern.”
“So...Jamal and the other children were test cases?”
“What do you think? They’re the only ones who are trapped as they’re trapped; the ghosts Mrs. Erickson freed in here are, to her eye, different.”
“Do you think they were experiments and sometime between then and now she perfected the ability to...to kill people, leave their bodies intact, and take over?”
“Yes. Serralyn says yes.”
“And Mrs. Erickson?”
“We don’t know how she gathered the others, but it seems clear to me that Mrs. Erickson was special; the intention when it came to Mrs. Erickson was also special. My guess? Some of the ghosts on this side of the building were servants who ‘quit’; they disappeared. Mrs. Erickson’s mother wasn’t one of them—but she was pregnant. It’s possible that Azoria attempted to influence the...shape of the baby, the baby’s mortality. To imbue it with something extra.”
Kaylin glanced at Mrs. Erickson. “Sorry about this—we talk about people in the third person who are actually right beside us all the time. I think it’s a Hawk thing. Or bad manners.”
Mrs. Erickson shook her head. “The truth often sounds awful—but I did not have an awful life.”
Kaylin doubted that her early life had been good. A child who had literal imaginary friends? A child who could see the echoes of the dead? How many friends wouldn’t be totally creeped out by that? How many would believe her? How many would think it was just a cry for attention?
Your friends are not without intelligence, Hope said. But they are, in my opinion, wrong. Azoria sensed something in the quickening. It was not a certainty. The introduction of the painter was proof, if it were needed, that she had mastered the art of taking human form, human body, well enough that she understood how to use her knowledge and her power in a different form.
“Mrs. Erickson never displayed the power that Azoria was hoping for.”
“Not until our interference, no. I believe Azoria would have been gratified had she accompanied us to the palace. I think her experiments turned toward the unnamed, the mortals who live and breathe without our dependency on True Names.”
“Or eternity.”
“Pardon?”
“You get forever unless you waste it in political Barrani games. There’s no way someone who has eternity is going to surrender it for a few decades of constantly imperfect life.”
“True—if she had a choice. I don’t believe she intended to be accused of treason; I don’t believe she intended to lose the entirety of her family and her line. The rooms in which she did the bulk of her work were sundered from her; if she could visit them again, she could not do it the traditional way—by walking through the doors.” Teela frowned. “Convince Jamal.”
Terrano, however, shook his head. “This is a containment. It’s meant to somehow trap ghosts. I think it’s possible to break it.”
“Or we could just have Jamal give Mrs. Erickson permission.”
“I don’t think that’s the smartest idea. Not if we have alternatives.”
“And I don’t think you should try to break things you don’t understand. Look, to Azoria, the starting point of dead is the freeing of True Names. If you somehow walk into whatever this space is, how do you know you won’t be trapped there as well? We already know that Azoria could somehow leech words of power. You still have your name—did you want to become fuel for whatever it is Azoria has become?”
“Not really, no. But I don’t think it’s that kind of trap.” He moved forward. Teela attempted to grab him by the shoulder and failed; her hand passed through his body.
Kaylin turned to Hope. “Make him stop.”
Hope squawked; Terrano shrugged. Hope then squawked up a storm of screeching syllables.
“Good point,” Terrano replied, grimacing. His body, which looked pretty much the same as it always did, began to shimmer in place; it became a livid green. Terrano at least retained Barrani form. But the color he’d adopted—possibly at Hope’s urging—was familiar for other reasons.
It was the color of the flower in the painting Azoria had created—the flower twined into the braided nest of Mrs. Erickson’s hair.
“Why that color?” she demanded.
Terrano ignored her.
“He can’t hear you in that form.” Or not. Teela was annoyed. “He doesn’t see color. Hope suggested that he ‘stand’ in a slightly different space, and he considered it. He moved. Sedarias is just one side of enraged—the wrong side. I know I wanted to somehow reach these people again—I wanted them to be with me. I cannot for the life of me remember why.”
Mandoran snickered. He was behind Terrano, and Kaylin watched as he—more slowly—shifted into the same shade of green. She realized that Terrano had lost some visual definition by comparison. “Don’t worry about him,” Mandoran said—in words Kaylin could actually hear. “I’ll anchor.” He held out a hand to her.
Kaylin stepped forward and took it.
“Teela?”
Teela nodded. “With your permission, Mrs. Erickson?”
Mrs. Erickson was staring at a very closed door. She nodded, and Teela placed a hand firmly on her shoulder.
Terrano moved toward the door, passing through Mrs. Erickson as if she no longer existed. He lifted a palm. As he’d just walked through Mrs. Erickson, Kaylin had no doubt he’d pass through her in the same way if she was in his path. The door, however, met the flat of his palm and remained there.
“The door exists across most of the planes Terrano has any experience with,” Mandoran explained. “But not all. He thinks he can open it by sliding between two planes and...pushing.”
“Pushing?”
“More or less.”
“Serralyn says less,” Teela told her. “I am almost at the point of agreeing with Mandoran—this would be much easier if you knew our names.”
“You’re just trying to annoy Sedarias enough that she’ll show up.”
“Terrano listens to her more than any of the rest of us—at least when she’s present.” In a quieter voice, she said, “Terrano is reckless. He always has been. Sedarias can keep him anchored in a way that Mandoran can’t.” She made no mention of herself.
Terrano’s livid green arm—Kaylin could swear the color itself was pulsating, like a very bizarre heart—passed through the door.
“He asks us all to step back,” Mandoran said. “Right now.”
Teela pulled Mrs. Erickson away, practically lifting the old woman off her feet.
Hope, however, said, Remain where you are standing.
“What about everyone else?”
Squawk.
Kaylin watched the door through Hope’s wing, her hands becoming fists. She understood why Sedarias was angry. She’d accept anger if it meant that Terrano could free the children. Jamal’s fear was infectious.
The door didn’t open.
Instead, the center of it melted, something that might once have resembled wood dribbling onto the floor, where it pooled just beyond everyone’s feet. Everyone’s but Kaylin’s. Mandoran, green, didn’t seem to be standing on the floor; the melted door passed through the base of his feet without touching them.
“Jamal!” Mrs. Erickson shouted. She tried to pull free of Teela, which was impossible. Kaylin, with better training and far more muscle, couldn’t have managed it.
But Kaylin turned toward what was now a jagged, oval hole in what had appeared to be a door. Jamal was standing on the other side of it, looking out, his eyes wide. He seemed to be afraid to cross the threshold, but when he saw Mrs. Erickson struggling to free herself, he immediately sprang into action.
Teela said, “Don’t. Come over here and bring your friends.”
Kaylin frowned and turned to her fellow Hawk. “You can see him.”
“I can see him now.”
“That can’t be a good sign.”
“No, probably not—but if you consider any of the things that have happened in the past week a good sign, you have deeper problems. Jamal, bring your friends. We need to let that space collapse as soon as possible. If we can leave this place with Mrs. Erickson, we can guarantee her safety—but she won’t leave without you.”
Jamal hesitated, but when Mrs. Erickson nodded, he turned back and shouted an all clear to the other three. Esme came out first, but she was followed quickly by Callis and Katie.
“Terrano, let go.”
“He’s trying,” Mandoran said. “Don’t worry about him. I’ve got him. I’m not letting go.”
Chosen. Kaylin turned to Hope. Call your partner.
Her partner was in the room. She blinked, and then said, “Severn—I think Hope wants you to draw your weapons. Mandoran—come back to where the rest of us are.”
“I can’t—I might lose the idiot.”
“What is he doing?”
Kaylin turned to Teela, who was less likely to offer an explanation that made no sense to people who were safely ensconced in reality.
Teela didn’t answer. Something flew past them all, leaving a strong wind in its wake. Had Hope panicked in any way, Kaylin would have been far more worried; as it was, the familiar rolled his eyes in resigned disgust.
“Was that Sedarias?”
“What do you think?” Teela muttered a Leontine imprecation under her breath—probably because she was too close to Mrs. Erickson and she didn’t want to offend. She relaxed her hold on Mrs. Erickson’s shoulder. “Mandoran is useful as an anchor, but Sedarias has always been best at pulling the idiot back to safety—probably because she’s terrifying when she’s worried. Her worry is far worse than her anger.”
Kaylin could see that, almost literally; while Sedarias wasn’t visible to her eyes—even with Hope’s help—the detritus of her passing, or her presence, lifted anything not bolted down in the room except the people.
Teela moved suddenly, without warning; she gestured and the room’s door—the room they’d first entered—slammed shut. Kaylin felt it as a slap of strong magic.
The windstorm that was Sedarias began to calm, the movement of small bits of furniture—and two chairs—slowing as she did. They fell to the floor in more or less the right orientation, although one teetered on two legs before righting itself.
The Barrani cohort leader then appeared out of the folds of moving air. Her eyes were indigo, and they were glaring murder at Terrano, who appeared at her side, his hand in the pincer grip of hers.
“What?” he said, meeting that glare head-on. “The kids are free and I’m not trapped, either.” He winced as her hand tightened.
“If we had any hope of remaining undetected,” the Barrani Hawk said, “it’s gone.”
Hope squawked.
“I said hope.”
The familiar snorted as Kaylin walked—quickly—to Mrs. Erickson’s side. She was now surrounded by children, only two of whom were crying. To her surprise, one of the two was Jamal.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, repeating the words as if they were a mantra from which he might derive some kind of peace.
Mrs. Erickson shook her head. “It’s all right, Jamal. You’ve been my friend for my entire life. With the exception of broken windows and dishes, you’ve never caused me a moment of pain.”
“You grew up.”
“Yes. And you didn’t. But I still think of you all as my best friends. And maybe the children we never had. I hoped, you know. I hoped that maybe my husband would stay, the way you had all stayed.”
“Don’t hope for that.”
“No, I grew to understand that. People learn new things, even when they’re adults. I’ve learned a lot of new things in the past week. It doesn’t matter whether or not you stayed because you wanted to, or because you had no choice. You kept a very lonely girl company—and you never left me.”
“It does matter,” Katie said. “You’ve been trying to figure out how to get rid of us.”
“No, Katie. I’ve been trying to figure out how to set you free. If I die—and old people do, eventually—I won’t be able to stay with you.”
Katie clearly wanted to say that they’d have each other; she even opened her mouth. But the words wouldn’t come out. She opened her mouth to try again, and this time, her mouth stayed open because this time, the doors Teela had slammed shut shattered.
Sedarias caught the splinters of wood that flew into the room in a whirlwind very similar to the one she’d been moments before. Wood bits hung in air, held by Sedarias in her not-quite-normal form. Nothing followed the shattering of those doors; nothing attempted to enter the room.
But the sound was louder, now—the clicking and moaning very similar to the underpinning of the Wevaran speech with which Kaylin was familiar.
Sedarias allowed all of the debris to drop in one motion; pieces of wood clattered to the floor. She had one hand firmly around Terrano’s; glaring at him, she dropped him as well. Teela had been right. Sedarias could reach Terrano far more efficiently than any of the rest of the cohort—strange, given that they were almost polar opposites when it came to personality.
Beside them both, between Sedarias and Kaylin, Severn finally fully unwound his weapon chain. Mrs. Erickson winced then, and looked away; what she had seen, what she could clearly still see, was too blinding to watch for long.
Mandoran remained green, although the color flickered across his skin as if reflecting very ugly flame. Terrano, green, looked normal, except for his eyes, which were disquietingly large in an otherwise properly proportioned Barrani face.
“It’s nice of her to give us a warning,” Kaylin said.
“Make certain you hold on to your children and your new friends,” Sedarias told Mrs. Erickson, as she turned to face what remained of the door. Azoria Berranin might be dead, but if she was, she’d clearly managed to take some of her power with her.
The moaning, low shriek that had been looming background noise became focused and rougher, the voice almost grating in its texture. In it, Kaylin could hear words, but the words were harshly voiced, the syllables almost breaking in the wrong place.
Terrano’s livid green dimmed into a more natural nausea-induced green as his feet once again touched the same floor as Kaylin’s feet did. “Serralyn says: Bakkon is going to strangle Starrante.”
“How does he think he’s going to find a Wevaran neck?”
“With less difficulty than the rest of us would?”
“Bakkon thinks Azoria’s been where Wevaran start. She’s vocalizing the way Wevaran vocalize,” Teela added.
“He doesn’t think. He knows. He is absolutely certain.” Terrano paused; Kaylin assumed Serralyn was feeding him urgent information. “He thinks she’s been in the darkness for a very long time—she’s not out of it yet. We have an advantage. There are no Wevaran young. No Wevaran clutches.
“If there had been, she’d be responsible for genocide.”
Instead of mass murder.
“So...she wants to somehow eat us?”
“Anyone here who has a name, yes. Bakkon feels that the imperatives of the birthing place drive her now. He’s uncertain that that’s always been the case—but he’s very unhappy at our inclusion.”
“Inclusion?”
“We’re now where she is.”
Kaylin knew almost nothing about Wevaran beyond the superficial appearance. But she had thought that the birthing place, the place where the hatched little spiders ran around in almost mindless hunger, had been like a dark cave. A space empty of anything besides little proto-Wevaran.
“Serralyn says the Wevaran birthing places are extensible, individual to the parents. If you were expecting darkness and caves, you’ve failed to understand that. Bakkon is certain that the space we are now in is one such space. He wants Serralyn out of Mrs. Erickson’s house.”
And she wouldn’t leave. But Kaylin was certain Bakkon—outside of the house—wouldn’t leave, either. Not until he knew what the outcome would be.
“Ask Bakkon—”
“Eat or be eaten.” Teela had clearly asked the first question on Kaylin’s mind.
“How do we eat? And, ummm, are we supposed to consume each other if we want to leave?”
“The good news: no. We just have to make sure that we’re not eaten.”
“What, exactly, constitutes being eaten?”
“Looks like we’re about to find out.”
Hope squawked, his grating angry bird voice much louder than usual. It had to be. The sound that appeared to have shattered the doors became louder as the thing that emitted it finally came fully into view.
“Serralyn says that Azoria isn’t giving us a warning—it’s entirely a Wevaran instinct. The desire to be the best or the strongest, the desire to survive, is what produces the adult that eventually emerges. The clutchlings challenge each other. They do it automatically. They don’t and can’t sneak up on each other; it’s one-on-one combat all the way down to the end.”
Kaylin half nodded; she was staring at Azoria Berranin. An’Berranin. If she’d expected Azoria to look like a mishmash of Barrani and spider, she’d been wrong. Azoria looked like a slightly deranged Barrani woman; she had the same black hair, the same fair skin, the same pronounced cheekbones, jawline, and long, elegant limbs. She wore Barrani clothing—a robe that was both simple and yet reeked wealth.
The only difference Kaylin could see was the eyes: Azoria had a third eye in the center of her forehead, and it was definitely not standard Barrani issue. It was red, and as Azoria stepped foot across the ruined threshold, it rose on a slender stalk.
Ah, no. She had other eyes that Kaylin hadn’t seen at first glance: they rose from the shadows of her hair.
“How dare you intrude upon my domicile?” she said, as the lids of the extra eyes opened, exposing a shining red.
“We’re Imperial Hawks,” Kaylin replied. “And we’re investigating a series of kidnappings and murders. The Eternal Emperor’s Law encompasses all of Elantra—and this house is part of Elantra.”
“Eternal Emperor?” she practically spat. “The Dragon?”
Kaylin nodded. Azoria’s eye stalks were swiveling, but she now faced Kaylin.
“I am no citizen of his accursed Empire,” Azoria hissed, eyes darkening in color. Kaylin looked at her mouth; it remained Barrani in shape and size. If devour was the correct word, it, like the darkness of the birthing place, was clearly metaphorical.
“There are special rules that govern the Barrani,” Kaylin continued, speaking in her official Hawk voice. “If your crimes involve only other Barrani, the High Court in the High Halls has the right of adjudication. If you wish to claim that exemption, you will have to prove that your crimes are uni-racial.
“You must be aware that humans cannot officially be slaves. No sentient race can, by Imperial Law. What you do when it involves other races becomes a crime that the Imperial Hawks must investigate. If you have been judged to have broken the Emperor’s Law, you are subject to the Imperial Court, where you will be tried. But again,” she added, her voice lowering, “you must be well aware of that.” Her hands became fists, and she didn’t bother to force them to relax; she was thinking of the children—the ghosts trapped by Azoria in Mrs. Erickson’s house—and the eventual fate of their bodies.
“I have committed no crimes,” this Azoria said, walking slowly toward Kaylin. “This house is legally mine.”
“This house barely exists in historical Imperial tax Records,” Kaylin replied. “But let’s assume it did. You owe probably eight to ten decades’ worth of taxes on the property—taxes which no doubt have gone unpaid in the interim. Which, while it isn’t as dramatic as kidnapping or murder, is still considered a crime.
“However, as the house doesn’t exist, the deed to the building—and the surrounding property—belongs to the Ericksons, and I assure you they have paid their taxes, without fail, and on time. We’re not standing in your domicile; we’re standing in an extension of Mrs. Erickson’s home. The intruder here is you, and we are empowered to remove you. To remove, in fact, anyone Mrs. Erickson does not consider a guest.”
Azoria’s natural Barrani eyes rounded; her lips thinned. Her normal hands became fists just as tight as Kaylin’s, and just as white-knuckled.
“You will die here.”