Dawn’s arrival had been muted, for a storm sprang up. Vannek and his companions headed into it as they neared the border. So far they’d only felt occasional raindrops, but whirls of circling blue-and-white lightning crackled in the ebon skies and to either side of a narrow trail of white sand stretching into the blackness until it was lost to sight in the starry void. They’d followed the same track, left by the passage of the Goddess, across the land to this edge.
While they stood in contemplation of the alarming road, their mounts and baggage animals cropped grass behind them.
A flash of lightning threw a long shadow behind Varama as she stepped apart, and wind whipped the edges of her khalat.
“What’s that alten doing now?” Vannek asked.
Muragan answered softly. “Looking through the magic world.”
After a night in the ludicrously comfortable grass, Vannek had wakened in pain, both in places he’d known about and others he hadn’t noticed the previous day. In addition, he felt weak and flushed. He’d walked for hours without mention of his discomfort and did not mean to begin complaining now, although he hadn’t objected to the chance to dismount and rest against a hillside. It, like all land in this strange realm, was rich with fragrant flowers. This particular patch had yellow blooms, edged with white, and smelled faintly of a Dendressi dessert he’d sampled in Alantris.
Muragan sank down beside him. “How’s your arm? You look feverish.”
“I’m fine, old man.”
Muragan chuckled without mirth. “Fever is the sign that your body spirit fights demons of injury. It doesn’t mean you’re weak, it just means some of your strength is diverted for an inner fight.”
“We can’t delay for me to rest,” Vannek said, “so there’s no point in talking about it.” He jerked his chin to indicate the woman. “What’s she thinking about?”
“I don’t think she likes that storm,” Muragan said.
Vannek grunted his assent. “She’d be a fool to like it. Tell me this. If we do find the others, what then? Swords won’t be any use against the Dendressi demon goddess.”
“Sorcerers might. If we get enough of them, together, in one place. Maybe even blood mages.”
Vannek looked sidelong at him. “You think other blood mages will help us?”
“What do you think we should do, General?” Muragan asked instead.
He was saved from having to answer when Varama walked back to them.
“I’m going to venture onto the white road,” she said. “I won’t attempt opening a portal until the storm blows out.”
“What if the storm doesn’t blow out?” Vannek asked.
“Then I’ll attempt it despite the hazards,” Varama replied irritably.
Vannek pushed to his feet. “We will go with you.”
The alten mounted her animal. Vannek climbed with some difficulty into saddle and followed. Muragan brought up the rear, leading the pack animals.
The storm flashed and boomed all about them as they headed onto the road. On either side nothing but black emptiness shot with lightning stretched on forever. It was as though the white sand was an endless bridge, hung upon invisible arches across the night. What, Vannek thought, would happen if he were to ride from its edge? Would he fall, forever, or would the hungry lightning burn him?
It flashed again and again, sometimes near, sometimes far, but it never struck the road itself.
Once, Vannek looked back, and saw the realm where they’d battled the queen hanging in sunlight and worried their departure was folly. Almost he asked why the woman didn’t chance working her magics. And then he thought about Varama’s relentless determination throughout the course of the Alantran siege. She certainly had no lack of courage. If the alten thought there was a certain way to open an escape portal, cowardice wasn’t holding her back.
As they traveled it grew clear that the road itself projected a kind of dim radiance, for the darkness never completely closed upon them. No matter the storm, and the lack of sun or moon, theirs was a twilight journey.
Eventually Varama called a halt, and they climbed from their saddles. Varama shared out grasses they’d gathered for the horses, and then while the animals ate, the three of them sat for their own repast. Lightning flashed through the darkness, near and far, usually white or yellow, though sometimes it bore a bluish cast.
Varama leaned against her pack and watched the endless storm, and Vannek watched her. From far away he thought he heard the happy laughter of children at play, but there was no possible place from which that sound could have come.
“I didn’t know the shifts could extend so far,” Muragan said. “Where are we?”
“We are under,” Varama said, but didn’t explain further. That rudeness was the push Vannek hadn’t known he was waiting for.
“I don’t understand you,” he said. “You always make us fight you for details.”
“I have provided what information is necessary, but perhaps I overestimate my audience. What other answers do you require?”
Her reply was another irritant. “You’re saying I’m a stupid Naor,” Vannek said. “That Muragan is stupid.”
Varama pushed away from her pack. Vannek noticed a vein pulsing along her light blue forehead. “I assure you, you aren’t the only person frustrated by our circumstance.”
“It’s not the circumstances I’m frustrated with.” Vannek heard Muragan softly suggest dropping the challenge, but ignored him. “I’m just tired of your attitude. You give us one-word answers. You’re rude.”
“Rude,” Varama repeated flatly. “After practicing enslavement and extermination while you occupied Alantris, you concern yourself with conversational reticence you perceive as a personal slight?”
“If you hadn’t resisted, your people would not have suffered—”
“Are you saying none would have been raped, tortured for amusement, or worked to disability if only we’d submitted to your theft and wanton destruction?” Varama asked caustically.
“Not so many would have died.”
The alten had apparently been holding back, for this time, when she answered, there was fire in her eyes. “No, they’d just have had to live for your whims. No matter how dark, or selfish. Or do you not count the deeds you facilitated? How many did you murder? You killed my squire, but how many more loved and skilled protectors did you personally slay?”
“Your squire,” Vannek repeated, wondering which one the woman meant.
“Her name was Sansyra. You fled from her on dragon back.”
“That one.” Vannek’s lips curled. “She killed my … She killed my mage.”
“You speak of him like he was a possession.”
“He was more than that.”
“I see.”
“You see nothing,” Vannek said.
“I think she sees quite a lot,” Muragan said. “We fought on opposite sides; hers won. There’s no point in this quarreling. Now we have to work together.”
“We’re not working together,” Vannek said. “She’s not telling us anything. Why are we still here, on this road? She said she’d try opening a portal if the storm didn’t stop. Well, it hasn’t stopped, so why hasn’t she opened a portal?”
The alten answered in a tightly controlled tone. “You want to know why we’re still here? I lack a hearthstone. All I have to open a portal are a few memory crystals, which hold a fraction of the power of the smallest hearthstone shard. And I must employ that power to attempt a procedure for the first time, a magic I barely comprehend. I do not wish to undertake this experiment where the threads I wield could be interrupted at any time by the chaotic energies of the storm that surrounds us and has strengthened rather than waned as we seek a calmer surround.”
As if to punctuate the challenge, a blast of blue lightning forked in the sky to the right.
“Liar,” Vannek announced triumphantly. “I’ve seen your hearthstone. You pull it out of your inner pocket, where you keep it in some kind of shining bag.”
Varama didn’t like having been called out, for her nostrils flared.
Once again the blood mage tried to ease tensions. “I don’t think it’s a hearthstone shard, Lord General,” he said quickly. “It doesn’t have nearly as much energy. But I’ve seen it too. What is it, Alten?”
“It is a shard, but one I cannot use to power a portal. When I investigated the queen’s chambers, and those of the exalts, I discovered a number of experiments. Few were successful, but one of them was the pouch in which I keep this shard.” She patted her uniform, where Vannek had seen Varama store the thing in an inner pocket. “It effectively blocks magical energies. I keep the shard there not because I’m hiding it, but because I mean to shield its effects, which are detrimental to the commander.”
“Commander N’lahr?” Vannek laughed without humor. “He’s nowhere near us.”
“Proximity doesn’t matter. Whenever I open this shard, I am linked with him. I dare not do so for long, because its mere existence appears to be injurious to him.”
Vannek wasn’t entirely sure he understood the shard’s threat to N’lahr, but that was secondary to the rest of Varama’s admission. “Wait. So you’ve been communicating with your general?”
“Yes. I informed him of our condition, and he has informed me of his, and we’ve made plans.”
“You know how my people are?” Vannek’s voice lifted in anger. “And you didn’t say anything?”
“I didn’t wish to alarm you. Your mood is foul enough already.”
Rarely had Vannek been so eager to hit someone. He barely held back. “Are they all right, or aren’t they? Where are they?”
“They are in a fortress controlled by one of our erstwhile comrades, an alten and mage named Cerai whom I trust far less than you. Your soldiers are following the orders of Anzat, who seems likely to support Cerai’s aim for utter domination rather than Commander N’lahr.”
“Why didn’t you say something?” Vannek climbed to his feet, but Varama was there faster. The general was reminded of something he’d forgotten as the alten’s aspect changed. While Varama usually presented as distracted and aloof, in a moment she had transformed from a gangly woman with frizzy hair and an irritated manner into a dangerous combatant.
“I have said all that was necessary.” Varama’s voice was thin. “You waste your energy, and my own.”
Muragan drew to Vannek’s side, and came very close to putting a hand on his arm. He seemed to decide at the last moment not to, which was fortunate, because Vannek was fairly sure he would have struck him. The blood mage addressed Varama. “You should have told us you were in touch with Commander N’lahr. I don’t think the Lord General would be as upset if you’d done that.”
Vannek wasn’t entirely sure that was true, but that simple declaration from Muragan apparently hit home, for Varama looked thoughtful.
“You’re right,” she said at last. “I was reluctant to reveal the commander had a weakness, but given the circumstances, it might have been an injudicious course.”
“Thank you,” Muragan said. He glanced to Vannek, then continued: “And it must be said that your manner overall hasn’t been entirely welcoming.”
“Lessons in courtesy from a blood mage,” Varama said slowly, as if to herself, as if she could not quite believe it. But before Vannek could muster the insult forming on his lips, the alten replied: “Perhaps I have been brusque. My worries have me preoccupied, but there is no benefit in behaving more impolitely than I intend. I apologize that my manner was discourteous.”
“We thank you,” Muragan said.
Vannek decided not to reprimand him for speaking for them both. “You said you and Commander N’lahr were working on a plan,” he said with icy courtesy. “Would you share the details?”
“There are many moving pieces, but in short, the Goddess has been stopped before. Elenai and Kyrkenall are seeking a weapon once used to successfully oppose her, and Rylin and Thelar are seeking another of proven worth against her. We are to obtain certain tools in Darassus, then join them.”
“Do my men in Darassus know what’s happened?” Vannek asked.
“No one in Darassus is likely to have learned anything about the battle. Anzat will not have been able to usurp your authority over the soldiers there.”
Varama had bluntly gotten right to Vannek’s chief concern. Before he could ask more, the alten turned to stare at the horizon as a landscape flickered into existence for the length of several breaths, one where the heights of trees were storm tossed and dark clouds rolled. It vanished.
“Is that good, or bad?” Muragan asked.
“Good,” Varama answered. “Natural order may be fighting to reassert itself.” When the landscape failed to reappear, the alten frowned. “It does not appear to be winning, yet.”
“Would it help to use blood magic to open a portal?” Vannek asked. “We might use one, or several, of the horses.”
“An interesting idea,” Varama said. “But I don’t know how to wield blood magic, and it delivers tiny results for great expenditure. Also, Muragan knows nothing of the complex theory of portal magic, so he himself is poorly suited to attempt what you suggest. Additionally, the thought of murdering these well-trained, loyal Altenerai mounts is abhorrent to me.”
“I don’t think blood magic could be woven together with what she’s doing, anyway,” Muragan said. “Perhaps I could be of assistance without the blood. I’ve studied some Dendressi sorceries.”
“Studied and deployed them in battle,” Varama said, and at Muragan’s surprised look, she added, “I am aware of your reputation and skills, Muragan. You are quite talented. But I barely understand portal theory myself, and it would be dangerous to involve you in its workings. We might as well get moving.” With that, Varama walked back to her mount and began to restore its pack.
Muragan eyed Vannek doubtfully.
“You shouldn’t have spoken for me,” Vannek told him.
“Sometimes you shouldn’t speak for yourself. What was your goal? Why were you testing her?”
“My goal was to have her treat us with courtesy.”
“You chose a dangerous way to do it,” Muragan said, and before Vannek decided how to respond, he’d stepped to his own horse. Almost he asked the man what Dendressi magics he had mastered, but decided silence was the better course.
Soon, Vannek joined them, and then, together, they rode off along the impossible white road, the lightning dancing in company.