Bloodring

Chapter 21

I half crawled off the cairn, watching the booby traps. They slid slightly to one side for my feet. A wonderful conjure. I would have carried some with me, but I didn't know how they worked and didn't feel like exploding if I moved wrong.
When I stepped on the earth, the backlash of energies from the broken charmed circle snapped up my calves like static electricity, stinging. In the distance, I heard voices. Fear skittered up my spine. I ran to Homer, who stood dozing, safe beneath the shield. I broke it and tightened his girth before leading him to a sturdy branch. Climbing the limb, I jumped into the saddle and guided the Friesian uphill through the dusk.
Only when night fell did I look back. The voices had vanished. No lights were visible. If they had found my trail, they had lost me in the gloom. No sane human would spend a night on the Trine. They had gone back to town.
Feeling me shift in the saddle, Homer stopped and stubbornly set his feet at the edge of a clear, ice-rimmed pool that glowed sickly of air and water to my mage-sight. The big horse didn't like walking without a path, up an unknown mountain, after dark, navigating by moonlight. And though he trusted me, he didn't know I could see in the dark. I kicked his sides. He looked back at me, the white of one eye showing, clearly saying, I ain't walking in the dark, lady. Homer had a sense of humor, but bad timing. I kicked him again. He huffed a breath and bent to drink.
"Oh, all right," I said, hungry, feeling the cold wind through my cloak. "How's this?" Quickly, I threaded two tiny quartz rings to a saddle thong, thumped them on, and hung them down along Homer's legs. They brightened the ground enough that he gave a chest-heaving sigh and started uphill, his ground-covering pace faster than I could have walked for any length of time. I patted his massive shoulder. "Thanks," I whispered.
* * * * *
Two hours later, I caught a whiff of distant brimstone and sulfur. I opened my mage-sight and spotted the origin of the stink, still far uphill, the trail across broken ice. We had reached the ice cap and Homer had gone as far as he could.
I had discovered several things on the long ride. The silk-lined, padded leather cloak wasn't insulated enough for temps near the ice cap at night. A battle dobok wasn't comfortable riding gear, and battle boots didn't stay in stirrups well. I had blisters on my backside and my ankles hurt from being held at an unaccustomed angle. And I had been really, really stupid to have neglected to bring food for Homer and me. I was frozen through, thirsty, and hungry.
I let the Friesian drink icy water from a small creek, his haunches at a thirty-degree angle lower than his head. "This is it for you, old boy," I said, patting his shoulder and sliding to the ground. "I wish I had thought to bring you some feed. The water should hold you for a while, though."
I led him to a spot that was nearly flat and pulled the bit from his mouth. Looping the reins once around a twig, I loosened his girth and pulled an amulet containing a shield of protection. Spawn never turned down a free meal - they would stop and eat even in the midst of a major campaign. If they hunted tonight, I wanted them to bypass Homer.
"When you get hungry, pull the reins free and head home," I said to Homer. "You can break the shield anytime you want from the inside." Almost as if he understood me, Homer took a deep breath, relaxed onto three legs, letting his left hip go lax, and closed his eyes. I chuckled, the sound sad. "Hope you get to enjoy the nap." I lay my head on his warm shoulder and ran my hand along his side, fixing his scent and form in my mind. Tears stung, but I blinked them away. Leaning into him, I silently reviewed the last-ditch incantation I had come up with while on the ride.
There was nothing else to keep me with Homer. I secured all my weapons and draped myself in every amulet and charged stone I owned, emptying the jewelry bag, sliding the three crucifixes over my head for the help they might give. I patted the amethyst piece inside my dobok shirt, near my heart. Thumbing the shield over Homer, I pulled my leather cloak tightly around me, turned, and took the first steps uphill, north, toward hell.
It was near dawn and colder than winter when I reached the opening in the left peak of the Trine. Below me, Mineral City was invisible. Above, only a few stars still dotted the sky with hope. In front, the opening in the earth glowed a foul reddish shimmer visible only to mage-sight. The smells were sulfur, blood, old death, and brimstone. There were no sounds except the cracking and groaning of tortured, softening ice and the whistling wind.
Bracing myself on the lip of the pit, I stared inside and down. The ground near the opening was marked with the prints of many kinds of feet. The smell of death grew stronger as my gaze traveled in and down.
Old fears, kept at bay on the trek uphill, when every thought and sense was focused on the half-frozen ground and melting ice at my feet, reared their heads. I had been in a place like this. Four years old? Three? Too young to fight. Too small to get away. Weaponless. Bleeding. Lost in the dark.
Horror rippled over my flesh. The memory of spawn claws, tearing my skin. The smell of my blood. Under my dobok, my scars flared with white-hot pain and light, a tracery of old agony.
I remembered the sound of licking lips and gibbering, echoing off the rock all around me. Memories I had buried for decades arose, bombarding me. Standing in front of the entrance to a hellhole, I shivered uncontrollably.
I didn't have to do this. I could mount Homer and move laterally across the Trine and through the gap in the peaks. Ciana had a seraph amulet. She'd be safe. If she had time to call for help. If a seraph was nearby and heard her. If... But even if they were close by and answered in a heartbeat, she would likely be injured, and certainly terrified. And humans seldom survived a spawn attack.
I knelt and drank from a runnel, splashing my face in snowmelt. There was a time that would have drained me. Now I felt nothing - except the icy certainty of failure and death. Even with the amethyst to supplement my energies, I wouldn't win here. Not alone. And this time, whether help came or not, there would be no respite, no mercy. This time when I called "mage in dire," I would probably die, whether fighting alongside answering seraphs, or after, in Enclave. If they answered. If they heard me from the pit.
When I tried to stand, vertigo gripped me. Suddenly I was underground, in a hellhole, trapped in the blackness of eternal night, in the past. Something held me there, as if I were pierced by a massive claw on a corkboard of dark threads. The cold stone had been rough at my back, a measure of safety in the fissure of rock. Help me, I prayed, hearing my child-voice. Help me. Seraphs of the High Host. Seraphs of stone. Help me.
The spawn passing by in the dark had laughed. My thirst grew, and my pain. I slept and waked and slept again. I called on the High Host, over and over, even as my voice gave out and hope died.
A bright light speared me, glaring through the tears in my eyes. "Revealer of the rock," a voice said, a voice like bells and wind chimes, tender and full of love. "I am here, little mage." And then I was free, on the surface. In the healing hands of Lolo. That was all I remembered of the time underground, a prisoner. All that I remembered of my rescue. Except this time there was one more line, one new canto in the old memory. Revealer of the rock. I had heard that phrase before, recently, but I was too tired to remember where.
The dark and fear and horror had branded my entire life. I would do anything to save Ciana from that.
With the heel of my boot, I drew a small circle in the frozen mess of the pit entrance. Settling my cloak, I sat on a flat stone in the center of the conjuring circle. I placed the hunk of amethyst on the stone between my knees and the charged stones in a ring around it. I removed the necklace of amulets, laid them in the ring, and upended the walking stick, tip to the sky, with the bloodstone touching the mended prime.
With a finger, I closed the circle. Mage-sight opened. The stench of evil intensified. The peak glowed the ailing greenish yellow of snow, overlaid with the red and black of Darkness. Though I had never been to war, I had been taught how to prepare. I closed my eyes.
Swallowing, my throat still rough from retching, I began the ancient chant. "Stone and fire, water and air, blood and kin prevail. Wings and shield, dagger and sword, blood and kin prevail." Calm descended on me, as soft and gentle as the down beneath Raziel's wings. I chanted, breathing, feeling my heart beat, my blood pulse. I centered myself. Preparing for death.
The stone under my thighs dried and warmed, offering its strength to me. The stones and the amulets in the pile soaked up the strength of the mountain. Nothing came from the deeps to hunt. Nothing disturbed me. The last hours of the night passed.
* * * * *
The time in the circle with stone had restored me. Strength thrummed through me, almost as if I hadn't spent the night in the saddle. Almost as if I had rested the night before. Almost as if I had eaten. Almost as if I weren't terrified. I paced toward the opening to the pit, nimble as a dancer, muscles moving smoothly. I knew it wouldn't last. If the seraphs didn't hear me when I called "mage in dire," if they didn't come, I'd die. But right now, power slammed into me, coursed through my veins, and with blades held in a perfect lion rampant, one blade vertical, one horizontal, I entered the hellhole.
In mage-sight the lair of Darkness was bright with scintillating energies, red, the dull yellow of lichen beneath the glow of small crawling things. I moved down, into the heart of the pit. The smell of sulfur grew stronger, the air more dense. I coughed. And heard a soft click just ahead. Followed by the skittering of padded feet on stone. Outside, though the sky was bright gray with dawn, the sun was still below the horizon. Spawn were still awake. Now or never...
I sang out a battle challenge as I advanced, placing my feet carefully on the downward-leaning stone floor. "I, the mage which goeth to war, I, yes I, the stone mage, I join battle with Darkness! Battle in the mount of the Trine! Battle which the Lord commanded!"
Three spawn appeared in the tunnel before me, reddish Darkness with heads like insects, fanged and pincer-clawed, bodies like moles, human-shaped hands but mailed with scales and six-inch claws, three-toed feet. One sniffed, a wide smile breaking across his maw. "Mage," it mangled through its many teeth. They all sniffed. And attacked, howling, screeching, piercing cries for blood.
I lifted both arms in the swan, slicing, blades in clean arcs. A forearm reached for me and I drew first blood. Spawn bones jarred the blade, but the hand fell, twitching to the tunnel floor. With the longsword, I cut higher, prepared this time for the bone jolt. The spawn fell, head rolling, spine severed. Another, his blood a spurting geyser. The third, bodies left writhing like snakes, all beheaded. Darkness could heal of anything except beheading.
Dozens more replaced them. Hundreds screamed from the deeps. Sword and blade slicing and hacking, I moved down into the pit. It was a simple plan. Fight until they wounded me enough for me to call "mage in dire," close enough to need help, and yet far enough from death for me to survive. A dicey position. I laughed, and the sound echoed off the limestone, louder, more harsh than the yowls of spawn. The hoard paused, shifted, as if the laughter frightened them far more than the battle challenge I had issued. So I laughed again. And beheaded two with a single strike.
Ichor splattered, burning my face. My gloves were slippery with spawn blood, reeking of death and battle. It tried to eat through the leather to my skin. But the dobok and leather were mage-touched, conjured against their spawn fluid.
The smallest, braver and more stupid than the others, ducked in under my blades and bit into my thigh. Its teeth ripped through the cloth and the flesh above my knee. With a single swipe, I cut it in two. It fell at my feet. The dobok stopped its saliva, but the scent of my blood filled the channel as it trickled down my leg. Spawn licked their chops and chattered with hunger. I cut off the leg of one who leaned too close. When I danced back, the spawn nearest tore into it with ravenous teeth, blocking the tunnel for an instant. Until now, I hadn't noticed, but they were eating their own fallen. The smell of blood was too much an invitation for them to resist.
Ahead, the tunnel forked and I recognized the one to the left. It was where they had taken Lucas. I shouted and spun, racing to rescue my ex-husband, the man who had betrayed me. The father of the child of my heart. A Stanhope the seraphs owed a blood debt. His scent was on the air, remembered, beloved. An ache started in my chest. The amethyst throbbed in time with the pain.
Spawn chased behind me, their breath foul on my neck. From a junction of tunnels, more spawn poured. I took a blow to my left arm, and only the thong around my wrist let me keep the kris as it dangled free from my numbed fingers.
Cutting, slashing, a revenger of blood, I cleared a swath before me. Passageways opened left and right and ahead. I sensed Lucas, one level below me. With his cell fixed in my mind, I turned left and down. Teeth and claws lacerated me. Sulfur and acid filled the air. My lungs burned. My cloak smoldered. My exposed flesh seared. I cut and sliced and hacked. My left hand tingled as feeling returned to it.
I veered again, forced right by hoards of spawn, my left arm held to my waist. The scent of Lucas faded. The battle entered more narrow burrows. My left hand ached but I lifted the blade, removing a spawn's arms with a single strike. I had lost my way, off course in the smoke and dark. Ahead, a form took shape. I knew him, even in the night of underground, knew him by the smell of his spelled blood. The half-breed who had attacked Rupert.
"Mage," he said. "You take my blood and enter the deeps. I claim you."
Without a word I met his blade, knowing that only speed would save me. Remembering his strength from the alley, I twisted and brought both blades down as if to scissor his torso.
As his weapons swept up in defense, I pivoted on my left heel and ducked under his arm. I stabbed between the third and fourth ribs, aiming for his heart. But the blade slid along his rib cage, and he was suddenly behind me. His boot caught the back of my heel and swept up. I was falling.
I hit the ground with a whump that blasted the air from my lungs, leaving me breathless, stunned. The half-breed laughed, standing over me, feet to either side of my waist, staring down at me, his blades poised over my heart. "You're sloppy, light mage.
"Back!" he shouted when a spawn dashed in, teeth gnashing down. His sword took off its head and the others pulled it back to feast.
I found a breath - blessed, wonderful air. It scoured my tormented throat, filling my lungs with life. In the millisecond his attention wasn't fully focused on me, I shifted my grip on the shortsword. I might have a -
His eyes met mine and he touched the point of his sword to my throat. In what sounded like a sloppy holiday-card poem, he chanted quickly, "Blood for blood and life for life. Yours belongs to my battle knife." He thrust down. I spasmed beneath him, shock tightening my entire body in a single contraction. My blood gushed from the wound I didn't yet feel. But I was still breathing, still seeing. Still -
The half-breed bent and collected my blood in a small cup. Demon-silver burned my flesh. I arched to the side, mage-fast, and brought my blade up between his legs, cutting through, cutting deep. The blade stopped, buried in bone. He howled and fell back.
The spawn scattered as he fell, cursing. I stepped over him and killed a human raising a sword behind him. The spawn raced away, squealing. The human fell. The half-breed was gone in a trail of blood.
For a moment, I was alone. I rested against the wall of a tunnel, sucking in deep breaths, wishing I had a gallon of water. Wishing I could call a seraph, tasting blood in my mouth. Feeling it running down my leg. Knowing it wasn't enough to call "mage in dire." The lost little girl I had once been whimpered deep in my mind, sapping my strength. I forced the sounds of her - my - fear and pain away.
In the harsh atmosphere, my throat was raw, my voice gone. The rush of energy from the time in the circle had faded and my arms were heavy, the strength drain far more intense than I had projected. Or had I been underground far longer than I thought? The recent past was already half forgotten, blurred with blood and pain and fear. My sword blades dropped, no longer a fast swish of mage-brawn. They touched the ground at my feet.
Something bit my shoulder through my cloak, teeth snagging on the leather. I knew it happened, but I felt no pain. I felt nothing. With a backhanded fist, I knocked the thing loose and spun to take its head. The horde had rallied and swarmed at my back. I killed two. Three. The bodies were dragged back, but now the swarm kept coming. I heard whimpering with each sword thrust, nightmare whimpers, my own whimpers, remembered from so long ago. I clamped down on my vocal cords to stop the sound.
Spawn sniggered and slashed with claws and teeth. None of the cuts were deep, but I was losing blood from each shallow wound. My old scars ached. Fear had grown and solidified. And still I fought. What else could I do?
I lost track of time. I was hopelessly off course, Lucas' prison cell entrance somewhere behind me, below me, in the earth. Maybe. Surely I hadn't moved lower than his prison. I killed another human, his eyes glowing red with willing possession, a Dark human, bred in this hellhole. As he died, a black cloud poured out with his blood, gathered, and drifted away along the floor.
Again, the spawn paused and withdrew. My blades dipped, points grinding on the stony ground, slippery with spawn blood, human blood, my blood. I panted, heart racing. Sweat and blood had mixed into a noxious mire on my skin. My battle lust was used up. The bloodlust, dead.
Spawn giggled at my side and I lifted the short blade, cutting off a clawed hand. Without the lust, I slung the blades without grace, a slowing metronome. I killed another. Killed a half-breed. Killed another human, stepping over his body as if he counted as nothing. Once more, I found myself alone, uncertain where I was or how I had gotten there.
I had taken a cut right through the cloak to my left arm, up high on the deltoid. Fresh blood caked my clothes and flesh. I was gasping for breath and stumbled hard. One knee hit the stony earth. I had lost blood. A lot of it. Enough of it. I managed a cold smile. Forcing myself back to my feet, I took a breath that ached and lifted my arms and began calling, "Mage in battle, mage in dire; seraphs, come with holy fire."
The spawn went mad, attacking in such great numbers, I was forced into a crevice to protect my back and sides. Chanting the lines of calling, I beat back the attack, severing limbs. I took another wound, this one along my right forearm. Long minutes passed. I had no breath to continue the chant and fell silent. Seraphs hadn't come. They weren't coming. But I was too stubborn to just stop and let the spawn kill me. I hacked and cut, breath heavy.
Sometime later, they withdrew. I smelled Lucas' scent, the reek of blood and sickness, yet cleaner than the gore-tainted air. A glimmer of an idea sparked in my mind. Drawing on my prime amulet, I spun from the fissure and around a corner toward Lucas. He was close. And he was a Stanhope, whose blood was precious to the High Host.
As if they knew what I planned, the spawn returned, enraged. With the strength of hope, I fought on. Twice my shortsword caught on bone and I paused to pull it free. Each time teeth shredded my body, but I used the instant of time to draw and loose throwing blades. When I reached the fallen spawn, I retrieved the blades, but they weren't going to be enough to save Lucas. Not alone. I was going to die here. Torn apart by spawn. Eaten. As glorious deaths went, this one sucked Habbiel's pearly, scabrous toes.
A whirlwind knocked me down, into the pit wall, bruising my shoulder, scraping my palm. I landed on my knees. Blinked to clear my eyes and head.
Wings, long feathers of white and purple, soft down a pale lavender, swept past. The nervure along the underwing was a purple so bright, it glowed to my mage-sight. Seraph... Wrath of angels, it was a seraph. The wind and dust of his passing beat at me, filled the channel with the scent of pepper and mint. In his wake were left spawn bodies, smoldering into ash. Hoarse, I coughed, covering my eyes, hearing wings beating, a sword clashing from deep in the pit. I was the only living thing in the underground corridor.
The noise of war and death rose to me. The screams of spawn swirled on the air. His name came to me as I clawed my way up the pit wall to my feet. Zadkiel, the righteousness of God, the seraph of transmutation, the seraph of solace and gentleness, the right hand of Michael, had come to do battle. I laughed, the tone more croaking sob than joy.
The scent of holy fire and demon-blood filled the air, a mix of flowers blooming and spring winds, and a sulfurous stench, acidic and burning as if the odors themselves fought. Brimstone and smoke were carried on a swirling spring breeze, the smell of death, rank and moldering, and bright like copper and pepper.
I could sense the opening to the pit behind me, but I couldn't see anything in the smoke and the dark. Minutes passed as I rested against the wall of the tunnel. The sounds of battle changed, growing intense and fierce. Triumphant calls, like deep bells, resonated through the rock and the air. I rolled so my back was to the wall and gulped what air there was, though my throat ached with the effort and the passage of smoke in my lungs.
"Little mage," a voice tinkled in my mind. "Fight. Call for mage in dire yet again."
"Why?" I gasped to the voice. "The seraph who fought next to ArchSeraph Michael is in here, fighting."
"He is wounded," the voice breathed, a susurration of silk and melodious brass bells. The voice of Malashe-el's Mistress? A trap. Call mage in dire.
The High Host had to be getting tired of hearing from me. How many times could one unlicensed witchy-woman call for help? Was there a limit? I chuckled, the sound counterfeit, but tougher, stronger than I would have thought. My amulets throbbed once, renewed with lavender light, though dull in comparison to their original strength.
Sounds of scuttling raced toward me. Spawn. Seraph stones...
Energy seeped through me, burning life in veins blistered by war. Power, strength from the Mistress, though she had hardly any left to share, hoarded strength she gave to me. I pushed away from the wall where Zadkiel had tossed me, and called a battle cry, a croaking challenge. On legs like rubber, I ran through the dark to meet them, toward Lucas, chanting, "Mage in battle, mage in dire; seraphs, come with holy fire."
The words made me laugh, and in some small part of my brain, I knew toxic fumes were making me crazy. Nothing happened in response to my plea except that spawn surrounded me, this time forming a ring just outside my sword's reach. One darted in behind, and I swiveled, blade just missing him. He cackled as he scurried back to safety. "Devious little buggers have figured out how to stay alive, haven't you?" The only reply was the red eyes that watched me, hungry.
"Use the mountain," the voice said.
"What mountain?" I asked. And then I knew and laughed again at my own blind stupidity. I was underground, under tons of rock - my element to call. Lost in battle lust, linked to the stone against my chest, I hadn't had a brain to think with; trapped in fear and memory nightmares, I hadn't recalled what I had become since that time as a child, when I was prisoner and alone in the dark. "I've never done this before," I croaked aloud to the unknown voice in my head.
"Call..."
I spun in the whirlwind figure, my cloak flaring out, blades slashing, slowed from injuries. It was a fancy move, seldom useful except to gain time against numerous opponents. To make them pause. The spawn jumped back. Planting my feet firmly, I crossed the swords at my torso with a soft clink. Pressed the bloodstone handle of the walking stick into the blood caked on my thigh.
I threw open my senses, mage-sight, and mind-skim, and that something else, that otherness I hadn't known I possessed, the sense I couldn't name that was part of the blended scan. With it, I drew on the power of stone. Tons of stone, the entire bloody freaking heart of the Trine.
Colors detonated in my mind and I stumbled to my knees. Smells of Light and Dark blasted their way through my head and lungs. Strength exploded through me. As teeth tore into me, I called again, a sending with all the power of a stone mountain at my disposal. "Mage in battle, mage in dire, seraphs, come with holy fire."
The clash of wings and steel and the screech of dying spawn were instantaneous. Scarlet plumage and golden battle armor flashed past. Reddish irises locked to mine a bare moment. A sword rose and a hand shoved me against the wall, out of the way. Raziel.
Behind him were other feathered forms, armor glowing with Light. Winged warriors, swords held high. Screams ripped through the air, and a wind like a tornado, a gale that smelled of lilies and honey and chocolate and roses, an explosion of Light in all the hues of the rainbow. The smell and might of seraphs, many seraphs, filled the passage and dropped me again to my knees. Mage-heat called to me.
"Go, little mage," Raziel called, his voice a caress on the air. "The sun is high. Back to the surface. To safety. I have lighted the way."
Voice nothing more than a grinding whisper, I said, "Lucas Stanhope, the progeny of Mole Man, an unwilling mage, and other beings of Light are here, prisoners." Raziel screamed, a sound of challenge, demand, and death to his enemies. In an instant, he vanished.
Blinking slowly, my eyes gritty and aching, I looked around. The spawn were gone, even the blistered corpses that had littered the floor of the cavern. The scent of sulfur was a faint taint, the air blowing with spring and bakeries and candy. The mage-heat that had waked at the presence of so many seraphs wilted and died, along with the last of my borrowed energy.
To my right, a trail of blue mist rested on the floor, coiling slowly as if contained in an invisible tube. I lowered my weapons, too tired to sheathe them. My hands had gripped the hilts so long, they were cramped closed, skin of knuckles showing white through torn gloves, soot, and dried blood.
Every skin cell, every strand of muscle, every tooth, nail, ligament, and sinew hurt. My bones ached. My nerves thrummed with exhaustion. My pulse slowed to a dull, despondent, irregular beat. Each breath I took burned. Each wound throbbed. I looked down at myself, mage-sight showing me the dull glow of my own blood and devil-spawn blood, and dried daywalker blood and human blood and half-breed blood. Blood everywhere.
My hair hung in straggles, caked with it. My dobok was a burned and slashed tatter, my skin showing through the scorched places, a fiery blistered red.
I sighed, and from somewhere, some deep inner spring of resiliency, found the strength to lift my right foot and take a step. After that, I took another, and another, all uphill, following the blue marker back to the surface.