CHAPTER
31

Aunn gaped, trying to see past the deathless guard and up the stairs. Silence had fallen over the temple, and he was desperate to know what was happening on the upper floor. Why had Gaven killed an Aereni priestess? What was he doing here at all?

“You had better come with me,” the soldier said, clutching Aunn’s arm in his shriveled hand. His touch was ice cold and seemed to sap the strength from Aunn’s muscles.

Without thinking, Aunn wrenched his arm from the deathless soldier’s grip and bolted past him up the stairs.

The soldier shouted, “Stop!” and then something in Elven.

Revulsion and terror impelled Aunn up the stairs. He leaped out of the path of the guard’s poleaxe as it swung at his feet, vaulting up a few more steps to the first landing. The guard was still shouting in Elven as he scrambled up the stairs behind him, jabbing his spear at Aunn’s feet.

A few more guards stood at the top of the stairs. Mostly their attention was focused upward, looking at something on the next flight, though one woman was drawing a curved sword and shifting to block Aunn’s way. Aunn hesitated, but a clatter on the stairs at his feet warned him just in time—he hopped up as the other soldier’s poleaxe swept under him, and kicked down, trapping the weapon against the stairs. The haft broke with a loud crack, drawing a string of Elven curses from the guard.

The guard at the top of the stairs barked something to her companions, but whatever was happening on the stairs above them must have been riveting—they barely gave Aunn a glance before looking back up. The soldier below him shook the axe head free of the splintered haft and repeated the eerie growl he’d made before. Aunn still hadn’t drawn his weapon—he didn’t want to kill any of the guards, but he was starting to wonder, as rational thought reasserted itself, how he could get out of this mess without the use of his mace. Not giving those thoughts a chance to settle in, he charged up the rest of the stairs, keeping a wary eye on the curved blade of the guard above him.

Instead of blocking his path, the guard fell back from his charge, and Aunn saw the other soldiers around her fall to their knees, heedless of any danger. He cleared the stairs, put his back to the wall, and looked past them.

An elf woman draped in a simple gown descended the last few stairs, carrying Gaven’s unconscious form in her slender arms without apparent effort. Her face was a mask of death, tattooed to resemble a stylized skull, but her eyes were green flames. The other elves had their faces to the ground, ignoring him, and he decided to follow their example rather than draw the ire of this being. She reminded him of Senya’s ancestor in the City of the Dead.

Senya!

Aunn looked up, and the elf’s fiery eyes burned into his. Her head was shaven clean, the skull tattoo obscured her features, and her eyes were not the sapphire blue they had been, but this was unmistakably Senya.

“I know you,” she said. Her voice was not Senya’s husky purr, but a cool, clear song.

How could she know him? Senya had never known what he was, as far as he knew.

“You were with this one and my daughter Senya in Shae Mordai.”

The terror that had gripped him through their entire stay in the City of the Dead returned, a cold hand on his heart. As frightening as the haunted City of Night had been, years ago, to a young spy on his first mission, Shae Mordai had been far worse, a place where the undead walked openly among the living. Senya’s ancestor had been the most terrifying part of a truly horrible day, for in the brief moment when the burning eyes in her empty sockets had met his gaze, he had felt himself utterly exposed to her. It appeared that, somehow, he was facing Senya’s ancestor again—enshrined in Senya’s body.

“Senya?” he said quietly.

“My daughter is dying.” She looked down at Gaven’s limp form in her arms, as if suddenly remembering what she was doing. “You will help me. Come.”

“Revered One,” the deathless soldier behind Aunn said, “these men are intruders into the sanctity of your temple.”

“Do you presume to bind what I have chosen to loose? You may assist us if you wish, but you will not stand in the way any longer.”

Senya strode forward and started down the stairs. Aunn followed close behind her, giving the deathless soldier a wide berth. The soldier glared at him, clutching the haft of his broken poleaxe, but he obeyed Senya and stayed out of Aunn’s way. Senya seemed to float down the stairs, still showing no sign that carrying Gaven’s heavy body was the least bit difficult. Indeed, each step she descended—each step that brought her closer to the sanctuary at the heart of the temple building—seemed to increase the sense of power or presence that emanated from her.

The entry area at the bottom of the stairs was deserted and deathly still. Aunn wondered where the dozens of elves who had been there a moment before had gone, but then he saw them all gathered in the sanctuary, kneeling on the floor in silent prayer or contemplation. Senya walked directly to the sanctuary, but Aunn hesitated.

“Stay with me,” Senya said, not looking back at him. “I need your help.”

What is going on? Aunn wondered, hurrying to catch up.

In Shae Mordai, Senya’s ancestor had been imperious, angry with her wayward descendant, and uncooperative. Now she was imploring him for help. Was Senya engaged in some elaborate hoax, pretending to be a representative of her ancestor in order to swindle her distant relatives? It didn’t seem likely—Senya was a mercenary, not a thief. She could be manipulative, but she usually preyed on men’s desire rather than their piety. And if all this was an act, it was a very convincing one.

The elves gathered in the sanctuary had left a path open from the door to a raised area at the far end of the room, flanked by smoldering braziers that breathed billowing clouds of perfumed smoke. Senya drifted between the kneeling crowds, an almost palpable aura of holy power surrounding her now that she was in her sacred place. The elves pressed their faces to the floor, and Aunn stumbled along behind her, not sure what to do but unwilling to be separated from the one person who accepted his presence in the temple.

Senya dropped to one knee and laid Gaven on the floor between the braziers. Aunn hurried to his friend’s side. He hadn’t noticed upstairs how ashen Gaven’s face was, or the cut across his upper arm. Gaven was still breathing, but slowly. Aunn pulled Gaven’s broken armor out of the way and examined the wound. Its blackened edges suggested the work of a poisoned blade.

“What happened?” he asked Senya. “Who did this?”

“I do not know,” Senya said. “There was another body on the floor.”

Aunn glanced at the door, and saw two elf soldiers carrying a body between them. Wisps of smoke still rose from the figure they carried. Elves kneeling near the door turned to look and wrinkled their noses.

An assassin? he wondered. Here? Why did Gaven come here at all, and how had an assassin found him here?

“You asked for my help, lady,” he said softly. “What would you have me do?”

“Save Gaven.”

Aunn pressed his fingers to Gaven’s neck to feel his pulse. It was an excruciating moment before he felt a single beat. “Have you no power to aid him?”

“First I must heal this body. That will require time that Gaven does not have.”

Aunn slid his healing wands from his pouch and chose the most potent of the three—the one he had once told Dania could bring her back from death’s door. Remembering Dania’s face and Tira’s holy kiss, he breathed a silent prayer that its magic could help Gaven. He felt the wand tingle in his hand, and power coursed through his other hand where it rested on Gaven’s chest. A blush of color spread at once across Gaven’s face, and he drew a deep, shuddering breath.

Aunn sighed with relief and slid the wand back into his pouch. The wound on Gaven’s arm had closed, and the blackened flesh was slowly regaining its normal color as the healing magic continued its work.

*  *  *  *  *

Gaven heard the sound of a great kettle drum, a single beat that echoed once, like distant thunder. He was walking on a stone floor between two rows of round columns. Shadows flitted behind the columns, hazy memories and indistinct visions that refused to resolve into defined shapes, sliding away from his gaze. He had a vague sense that his father was nearby, but his voice and his footsteps echoed in the great stone hall and drew no answer.

Another beat of the drum, louder, startled him. There wasn’t supposed to be another beat, he felt, though he couldn’t quite understand why he believed that. He stopped walking and looked around, behind him, and up past the towering columns to a star-filled sky, and another beat came.

The next beat was softer, as though Gaven was soaring up and away from the great drum, but now it was a steady pulse, and he could feel it in his chest even after he could no longer hear it. He opened his eyes.

He lay on his back on a cold, hard stone floor. Someone or something was kneeling beside him, leaning over to peer at his face with blank white eyes. The creature had no face, just an expanse of gray skin with the merest hint of a nose and a lipless gash for a mouth, all surrounded by wild shocks of white hair. His first thought was that this was some sort of wraith whose task was to receive him into the land of the dead, for the room he was in seemed fitting for the marble halls of Dolurrh, the shadowy realm where souls were said to pass when their mortal life had ended.

But no, he felt quite alive, his heart beating strong and steady in his chest. And the faceless thing had broken into a smile with surprising warmth, which made its white eyes sparkle. “Gaven!” it said. “Welcome back to the land of the living. How do you feel?”

The voice was familiar, but …

“Who are you?” Gaven asked.

“Oh!” The face pulled back, and it seemed to take on more definition, fleeting through vague hints of a few other familiar faces. “I’m Aunn.”

“Aunn?” The assertion made no sense at first. He knew at least three different faces that Aunn had worn—Darraun’s, the one he had called Aunn, and Kelas’s. Was this what a changeling looked like when he wasn’t … changed?

“This is my real face,” Aunn said. “I don’t want to hide it any more.”

Gaven’s mind was beginning to clear, and memories washed over him. “What happened? Where’s Senya?”

“Senya’s right here.” Aunn jerked his head behind him.

Gaven lifted his head and saw her, kneeling on the floor behind Aunn, her back turned toward him. Then he saw what she was facing—a temple full of elves!

“Thunder!” he breathed. “What are all these people doing here?”

“I think they came for the same reason I did,” Aunn said. “They heard thunder in their temple.”

“Phaine attacked me in Senya’s room.”

“Phaine?” A look of alarm transformed Aunn’s face, and he turned to look toward the temple doors. “I think you killed him, Gaven.”

“Finally.” The memory of Phaine torturing him at the Dragon Forge was still fresh.

“I wouldn’t be so dismissive if I were you,” Aunn whispered. “The death of a dragonmarked heir is going to be investigated, even if he was an assassin. That’s attention you can’t afford, and there are a lot of witnesses here.”

Gaven sat up. He still wasn’t sure why he’d been lying on the floor of the Aereni temple, but he felt healthy and strong—almost as good as he’d felt just before Phaine attacked him. “You’re right,” he said. “Time to run again. And I’m guessing you don’t have traveling papers for me.”

“I’m sorry. But even if I did, they wouldn’t do you much good after this.”

Senya still knelt with her back to him. Was she angry with him? And why were they here in front of this silent assembly of somber-looking elves?

“Senya?” he called.

Aunn shifted between them. “Uh, Gaven—”

Senya stood slowly and spread her arms to the assembled elves. Her skin had an unhealthy pallor he didn’t like, and he started to his feet behind her, but Aunn pulled him back down.

“She’s not well,” Gaven whispered.

Aunn shook his head.

“Sons and daughters of Aerenal,” Senya said—but it wasn’t Senya speaking, it was her ancestor’s voice, speaking in clear Elven. She was channeling the spirit of her ancestor again, as she had the night before. “I thank you for your concern for this temple of your ancestors and for your priestess, my daughter Senya. I am sorry to inform you that Senya Alvena Arrathinen is dead.”

Gaven bolted to his feet. “Dead?”

Aunn took his arm and pulled him back to his knees. “It appears you killed her as well.”