Penrys scanned for Zandaril within the building but didn’t find him. Must be out with Dzangabtig again. Hope he’s successful.
This time she would be satisfied with her room where at least she couldn’t be surprised by anyone.
She peeked into Zandaril’s room, just in case he was there after all. It was bare of life, the bed used only to support their packs and to lay out their clothing.
So, they’ve been through our packs. Well, that’s no surprise.
Veneshjug was a surprise, though, and a nasty one. He made her flesh creep. He had plans, and she didn’t understand what they were. The two of them had walked into his hands in the belief that a common enemy would ensure their safety, at least for a while. They were wrong. Maybe very wrong. And the Rasesni knew a lot more about them now. What did it mean that this temple school was dedicated to Veneshjug’s god Venesh?
Where was Zandaril? He had to hear this.
She lay out flat on her bed with her hands behind her head and tried waiting for him, but she couldn’t shake her sense of alarm.
Maybe we should leave tonight, when he gets back. Drunk or not.
She pulled herself off the bed and went back to his room. It only took a few minutes to load her pack with everything. When she was done, she tried scanning for Zandaril again, but he still wasn’t in the building and she was reluctant to reach further for fear of alerting Veneshjug or anyone else who might be watching her. She didn’t want them to find her actions suspicious in any way, not now.
I’ll do his pack, too—save time when he gets back.
He was tidy, a lifetime of nomadic habits, and the pack was still half-full. She left his spare robe for last, as padding for the top of the pack. When she lifted it up and started to fold it, she couldn’t resist holding it up to her nose and breathing the residual scent in deeply. Suddenly she missed him, terribly, though he’d only been gone a couple of hours. Where is he?
A knock at her own door interrupted her thoughts. Is that him?
Her mind-scan revealed Isven, her mind nervous. Penrys had thought little of her since their first encounter, and she was one of the weakest of the students. She’s been scared of us the whole time.
She opened the door, and Isven bobbed her head briefly.
“Brudigna, brudigdo Zandaril sent me. He says he’s got something he has to show you, out at the stables.”
Zandaril! That’s a relief. Why wouldn’t he just bespeak me? Maybe he’s worried about being overheard, too.
Too bad he couldn’t find a better messenger. She feels scared half to death.
“Thank you, Isven. Shall I come with you?”
“Oh, no,” she babbled, “He doesn’t want me back. He said so.” She backed out of the doorway into the corridor and hastened away, turning her head back once to stare at Penrys, who was watching her.
Must be important, if he had to reach me so badly he used her. Or maybe he’s just a bit the worse for drink.
She suppressed a smile, then stepped out and closed the door behind her. I better be careful approaching the stables, just in case.
She retraced her steps from their arrival a couple of days ago. As before, the corridors at the back of the building were empty of students or teachers, and in the noisy kitchens, still cleaning up from dinner, the staff paid no attention to her as she made her way to the rear entrance.
On the threshold, she paused to remind herself just where the stables were situated, out in the inner yard. Then she laid her hand on the door handle and pulled it open.
There was a flash of movement, then nothing.
Voices woke her, voices she knew and now dreaded. She kept her eyes shut and her mind as calm as she could.
Her head throbbed where something had hit her, and there was a foul taste in her mouth. What had they given her while she was unconscious? What did it do?
Veneshjug was arguing with the rest of the mage council, and his voice echoed off the walls. Were they underground somewhere?
“Why would she stay behind once she sent Zandaril back to her master?”
That was Zongchas.
She was lying on something like a bench or a low table, off the ground. She could feel the rough surface against her fingertips, but her fingers wouldn’t move.
“Good riddance,” Dhumkedbhod’s voice announced. “You know what the Zannib are—zhabbyedum, way-less heathens! Worse than the Kigaliwen.”
“We all agree,” Veneshjug’s cool voice soothed.
“There’s no turning back now,” Zongchas complained. “I hope you’re right.”
“It’s the only way we can be sure,” Veneshjug said.
He paused, and announced, “And she’s awake now.”
At that, Penrys threw off her pretense. Before she even opened her eyes she pulled up her shield and probed the people in the room. Or, rather she tried to—no shield, no scan. She couldn’t feel them at all. When she broadened her reach, she felt nothing at any distance, no mind-glows.
Despite herself she felt panic accelerate her heartbeat, and over the roaring in her ears Veneshjug’s sneering voice penetrated. “Didn’t know about the sedchabke, the mind-block drugs, did you? Should’ve spent more time in the library.”
The expression on her face, whatever it was, sent Zongchas a few steps back. The rest of them stayed in place, Dhumkedbhod excited and exultant, Nyagchos speculative.
Vladzan was just curious. “I’ve never seen the sedchabke used. Mind and body both, I see. How long does it last?”
“We have all night,” Veneshjug said, “and tomorrow, too. There’s no hurry.”
“When we’re done here,” Vladzan said, diffidently, “would you mind if I… tried a few things?”
Calm yourself. Ignore the stupidity that delivered you to your enemies. That’s in the past, it can’t be changed.
She slowed her breathing to try and regain some control. It was only her limbs that seemed to be inert—she could still swallow and open her eyes.
Concentrate on getting through the present. There’s no point thinking about what Vladzan just said—after all, you might be dead by then.
Another slow breath. And another.
Moment by moment. Endure it, use it, prepare for the next. That’s all that matters. If they kill you, they kill you. Don’t give them the satisfaction of fear.
And above all, don’t think about what’s happened to Zandaril.
She worked on her breathing and glared at Veneshjug, who smiled back at her, pleased.
“Shall we get started, then?” he said.
At Zongchas’s nervous nod, Veneshjug turned her resistless head so that he could shove his fingers between the chain and the side of her neck. There was no spare room, and his knuckles poked painfully against her throat when he tightened his grasp. When he pulled at the chain, she choked.
She felt nothing of the chain’s power, but neither, apparently did he.
“We need to take it off, first,” he said, releasing his grip.
For the next several minutes, Veneshjug with the assistance of Vladzan mauled her neck, pulling at the chain and looking for a catch of some sort. Penrys felt the trickle of warm blood.
“Look how that cut closes up,” Vladzan said. “What happens if…”
He picked up her powerless left hand and turned it palm up, then with the knife from his belt, he carved a firm line across the fleshy base of her thumb and watched the blood well up. Her hand didn’t so much as twitch under the assault. She could feel the sting of the injury, but not see it, since it was out of her line of sight.
“Observe. Let me wipe the blood away.” She felt the passage of a cloth. “Look how the ends knit, almost visibly. In a few hours, I imagine, there would be no trace left.”
“Convenient,” Veneshjug remarked. “She’ll last longer under questioning that way.”
What would happen if they manage to get the chain off? What kind of life would that leave me?
Silly question—I won’t be around to find out. Especially not if they have to take my head off, first.
What will my makers do with a new owner?
She took another steady breath.
Are they already looking for me? Can they tell someone’s trying to get a hold of the chain?
Nyagchos intervened. “We all understand the only way this can end. But not until we get some answers, if you please.”
“What message did she give Zandaril for her master?” Zongchas asked.
Dhumkedbhod said, “No, find out where she comes from and who sent her, the way she showed you. See what she’s hiding.”
Veneshjug glanced at Penrys’s face. “Ah, another surprise. You taught some of us how to follow along with someone’s recollection, in that first report. Very useful it is, and we give you our thanks. Now it’s our turn.”
Nyagchos organized them. She had no defenses against them, as though she had no core power at all, and they met with no resistance as they pushed against her past recollections.
She watched herself stand in the catalogue room at the Collegium, and the group voice, led by Veneshjug, told her, *Further*.
A meal in Vylkar’s hunting lodge up in the hills, and she was painfully lashed with *Further*.
Her awakening in the snow at night, cold and naked, and the torches and men and horses standing around her.
Dhumkedbhod said out loud, “Now we’re getting somewhere.”
*Further*.
She resisted, and they tore through her efforts and thrust her back down again.
And helplessly she fell, dropping into a narrow black hole like an bottomless well, leaving them peering down after her, unable to follow her into blackness.
She flung out her virtual hands to try and slow her passage, but felt nothing.
There’s nothing here! It’s empty! Can I fall forever?
Is this death?
She felt her chest panting and her heart racing.
I’m still alive. ‘What the body knows.’ Zandaril—he was right. It can’t be empty, m’body knows things, from before. I just can’t see them.
This is an illusion. It must be. If I can have the illusion of falling, why not the illusion of flight?
She stretched out virtual wings and caught the illusion of air beneath them, then pulled herself upward against it. Above her was a tiny, shrinking hole, a dim point of light against the utter blackness that expanded in all directions around her. She pumped her wings again, and again, straining her illusory muscles and trying to make the small circle of light larger.
It took forever to pull herself upward, much longer than the endless fall. She barely breathed, saving her concentration for the exhausting effort. How can an exercise of the mind hurt so much?
When she finally reached the top of the well, the moment before her memory of snow and torches, she clung there like a bat, and waited.
The wizards were no longer there in her mind, combined in assault, watching. They had withdrawn.
“That’s it then.” She heard the disappointment in Vladzan’s voice. “Two hours, no change in the shallow breathing. Perhaps she isn’t coming back.”
“It was always a risk,” Veneshjug said.
“You promised us answers, Vejug,” Zongchas complained. “Now we have nothing.”
“We have the chain,” Veneshjug said, briskly, “and tomorrow we’ll harvest it, after I’ve prepared a few things. Until then, go get some sleep.”
The footsteps of several people receded and a door closed.
Two of them had stayed behind. Veneshjug said, “Vladzan, you’ve got the watch for the rest of the night.”
“Did you see how filling all those power-stones didn’t seem to weaken her?” Vladzan mused.
“She came thousands of miles and still had enough power to hold shields against me, in the mirror. I want that chain, and I want her conscious for it.”
“Surdo was not pleased with you, letting the Kigali block him at the Gates.” Vladzan’s soft tone had a sting in it.
“You’re no better off—your note about enslavement didn’t quite work, either.”
Penrys heard a rasping sound, as if Veneshjug were rubbing his hands together. “I won’t care what the Voice thinks, if I can get my hands on that chain.”
His footsteps moved towards the door. “Try not to let her condition deteriorate further—I want to find her in the same shape in the morning.”
The door opened, and closed again.
“Pity,” Vladzan’s voice murmured. “Still, there must be something I can learn. The signs should be gone in a few hours.”
Pump the heart. Breathe. Circulate the blood. Liquor burns off quickly. It’s been hours since they fed me the drugs.
She clung to her hiding place and ignored the outer sensations of the body, the cuts and stings and probes, the touches and grasps, the warm stickiness of drying blood. It isn’t real, it doesn’t exist. Only the heart beating and the breath supporting it mattered.
Push the blood, use up the drug, clean it out.
Pump the heart. Breathe.
