Chains of Legacy (The Chaos Cycle Book 2) Read online

  Gil noticed one of his Battlemages standing off to the side, watching the goings on intently but doing nothing to help. He changed his course, sprinting across the square toward the man.

  “What’s going on?” Gil demanded as soon as he reached him.

  The Battlemage, Caston, nodded in the direction of the gate. “They’re bringing up a battering ram, just moving it into position.”

  Gil grimaced. Naia’s order to arrest Ashra couldn’t have come at a worse time. Not only would she be surrounded by militant defenders, but her removal was likely to destabilize the entire Malikari command structure. He thought about delaying or even flat-out ignoring the command. But in the end, he decided leaving Ashra in place was the more dangerous course. They couldn’t afford the risk that magic might be wielded as a weapon against soldiers of the Kingdoms. Gritting his teeth, Gil clapped Caston on the shoulder and moved around him, making for the tower stairs.

  Taking the steps two at a time, he arrived at the top of the tower and stepped into the middle of a commotion. Fires had been lit along the walls, and archers stood ready in defense of the gate, with sheaths of arrows laid out ready for their use. A line of men had formed a human chain, hefting stones from crumbled areas of the wall and depositing them in a growing pile at the corner of the tower, most likely to rain down on the men tending the battering ram when it arrived.

  Despite the turmoil, it wasn’t hard to find Ashra standing amidst a cluster of men, looking even more out of place in her elegant dress than she had before. She was staring out over the walls, an intense look of concern on her face. Gil made his way over to her, weaving through the press of bodies that crowded the tower.

  Grabbing Ashra by the shoulder, he turned her toward him. “You’ve got to get down from here. They’re going to be at the gate any moment, and from there, it’s going to get ugly.”

  Ashra shrugged out from under his grip, stepping back out of reach. “Then I’ll stop them,” she replied tartly, walking away.

  Deciding to try one, last time to appeal to her sense of reason, he dodged in front of her, saying quickly, “If you use magic in battle, you’ll betray everything the Lyceum stands for.”

  Ashra spun away from him. “I’m not having this argument again. Is that the only reason you’re here? If so, then get down off my tower!”

  Gil suppressed the impulse to slam his fist into the stone of the rampart. She was going to leave him with no choice, and that infuriated him. In the end, there was nothing else he could do. He unhooked the talisman from his belt and, holding the morning star at his side, strode forward to intercept her. Ashra stood in the corner of the tower, doing her best to ignore him, which actually worked to his advantage. She didn’t see him coming.

  Reaching out, Gil caught her by the arm. Before she could react, he reached within her and twisted something deep inside.

  The expression on her face changed instantly, going from vengeful to slack.

  He caught her as she fell against him and whispered, “Vergis.”

  The ground shifted under his feet, the tower disappearing.

  5

  Father of All

  Rylan awoke to a cold morning sun peeking timidly into the room through narrow windows he hadn’t noticed the night before. The bedchamber was dominated by an enormous canopied bed with carved posts. Tiny crystals in the walls reflected the wan light coming in through the windows, creating a dizzying ambience. He looked around the room, seeing a few other items of note: a squat wardrobe and two chairs seated at a table that held a glass vase with fresh flowers. Everything seemed to be carved in a way that eschewed right angles. Even the wardrobe had a multifaceted girth.

  He rose from the bed and stretched, feeling warm and languid, as though he had been sleeping for days. Opening the double doors of the wardrobe, he saw it was full of drawers. Curious, he pulled them open one at a time and was surprised by what he found. Within were many different tunics cut to fit a man, each perfectly folded. The garments were made of oki, the priceless silk of the whisper butterfly. The bottom drawers contained trousers woven of the same fabric. Lifting one of the folded garments, he was impressed by the weight of it. Xiana had told him once that oki silk was tough as armor. He believed it.

  Selecting a black tunic and matching trousers, he pulled them on and stood holding his arms away from his body, considering the garments, grateful to find they were cut long enough to fit his tall frame. The thought occurred to him that this outfit might have once belonged to Shiro. It was possible, perhaps likely. He wasn’t sure if that bothered him or not. In the end, it didn’t matter. He couldn’t go naked about the palace. He buttoned the tunic’s high collar, then started the hunt for his boots. It took him a moment to remember that he had emerged without them from his prison. He had no idea where any of his belongings were, or if they had even been saved.

  He needed to try to find them, and he also wanted to find his daughter. She was somewhere within the palace; he could feel her through his link with the Unity. She was asleep at the moment, peaceful and content. Wherever she was, she had been well-cared for.

  He opened the bedchamber door and stepped out into a well-lit corridor. To his surprise, he found two men and a woman who appeared to be stationed in the hallway. Each wore and iron band on their wrist with a ring that could be attached to a length of chain. He could feel the power in them, and it was substantial.

  They were mages. All three of them.

  Two were Darl. The woman had dark gray skin, her hair gray with a lavender sheen, worn close-cropped in a style he had never seen before on a female. At her side, she carried a slender black staff that was longer than she was tall. The Darl man next to her head hair white as frost, worn pulled back from his face. The third man was older, balding, his skin a warm brown mottled by freckles. A wooly beard formed a soft fuzz over his cheeks.

  At Rylan’s appearance, all three mages lowered their eyes and bowed their heads. The devotion they held for him came to his awareness through the connection they all shared, the bonds of the Unity. He wasn’t surprised. It was simply the way it was meant to be, the natural compliance to hierarchy and structure that was fundamental to Khar society.

  The muscular Darl man brought a hand to his brow, touching two fingers to his forehead. “Warlord.”

  Rylan took it for a gesture of greeting. He mimicked it quickly, asking, “Do you know where my possessions are?” He knew it was a small chance. He wanted his boots returned to him, along with his father’s belt and the sword given to him by the Sultan.

  The Darl woman immediately turned and strode off down the hallway. Rylan wondered if he should follow, but decided against it. Instead, he remained behind with the other two mages. He considered them critically, wondering who they were and what their relationship to him was, if any. After a moment, the woman returned carrying an oiled sack, which she handed to him.

  Rylan thanked her and knelt to open the bag. Rifling through it, he was grateful to find that all of his possessions were accounted for. He donned the boots and strapped his belt on over the thick black tunic. The clothes he had worn during the battle were badly damaged, stiff with blood, the fabric torn and, in some places, charred. Not knowing what else to do with them, he tossed them into the bedchamber. Feeling whole again, he turned and nodded his gratitude at the woman.

  He started down the corridor. To his surprise, the three mages followed. Rylan stopped and looked back at them. He had assumed they were guards posted to ward his chambers. All he wanted to do was find his daughter. He didn’t need an escort.

  “Why are you following me?” he asked, abandoning subtlety and most likely courtesy.

  “Father, we are your cadre,” the burly Darl man responded, bowing his head.

  Rylan winced. The unchained mages Shiro had surrounded himself with had all addressed him as ‘Father.’ Perhaps it was a customary honorific, but even so, Rylan didn’t like it. It made him sound like a priest. In all truth, he wasn’t sure if he was comfortable with any title, after spending a lifetime resenting those who wore them.

  “Don’t call me that,” he said.

  The faces of all three mages became very serious, as though he had just set before them a weighty problem. For a moment, they appeared deep in thought. At last, the Darl man asked him, “You are the Warlord, the Father of All. What else would we call you?”

  Rylan thought about it. He understood that his rank would have to be acknowledged, at least in public. Grudgingly, he told them, “You can call me Lord. Or Warlord. Whatever you like—just not ‘Father.’”

  All three mages glanced at each other. The woman shrugged, and the old man nodded slowly, fiddling with something he wore around his neck tied to a length of twine.

  The Darl man said stiffly, “Very well. We will call you Lord. Or Warlord.”

  Hesitantly, he extended his hand. “Rylan,” he said, then hesitated, not sure which of his two surnames he should supply. All his life he had been Rylan Marshall, using the name of his adopted parents. But that was their legacy, not his. “Rylan Lauchlin,” he decided with a sigh of defeat. Xiana had once told him he could not run from his heritage, and it turned out she’d been right. “It’s an honor to meet you.”

  The white-haired mage grasped his hand in a strong grip. “Thank you, Warlord. My name is Varik. I am your base.”

  The lavender-haired woman came forward, bowing slightly, and saluted him with her staff. “Thank you, Lord. I’m Farash. I am your crown.”

  The older man dipped his chin. “I’m Jendo Mahr. I am your core.”

  Rylan wasn’t sure how their respective relationships to him mattered—or what they meant—but he could feel the esteem they held for him through the bond. They did not question his status as their Warlord, even
though he had wrested the title from their former leader. He wondered if these three mages had served Shiro in the same capacity. He didn’t remember seeing them in Shiro’s retinue, but then again, he had been overwhelmed at the time and incapable of noticing much of anything.

  Rylan asked, “What is a cadre?”

  Varik responded, “Warlord, we are here for you to draw on, should the need arise.”

  It took Rylan a moment to realize what he meant. The man was referring to the power within them—within all three of them. If they were linked to him with one of the Khar artifacts that resembled chains, their power could be combined. He supposed that if the four them all linked together at once, the sum of their power would be substantial.

  “How can I draw on you?” he asked. “Don’t we need chains?”

  Jendo answered, “Through the A’isan, the Warlord is linked to every member of the community. Theoretically, you could draw on every mage of the Khar Unity. Of course, channeling so much magic would no doubt kill you.”

  Rylan didn’t doubt him. That would be like trying to light a candle with a bonfire. He would probably melt just like the wax of the candle, should he try to draw so much magic all at once. The thought made him shiver.

  He looked from one mage to the next. “Then, how could I handle the power of all three of you? Wouldn’t that be too much?”

  Jendo shrugged. “I’m sure you can do it for a short while without suffering any lasting damage. We are each forth tier.”

  Rylan thought about it. “So, if I drew on all three of you at the same time, it would be like being…” He did the math. “Twentieth tier?”

  Jendo nodded. “That’s right.”

  “That’s not too much?”

  “It shouldn’t be. Legend has it, your own father handled much more than that when he helped seal the Well of Tears.”

  Rylan winced. He’d heard the same legend. “Aye, but it killed him.”

  “Only because he couldn’t rid himself of it afterward.”

  Rylan bowed his head, suddenly saddened by the mention of a father he had never known. He wished he could have met him. He had heard so many conflicting things about Darien Lauchlin. In the Kingdoms, his name was used to scare children into obedience, while the Malikari regarded him as a hero. It was hard to know who to believe.

  He turned his mind to the three mages in front of him and sifted through possibilities. Combined, their power would be overwhelming. The accomplishments that might be possible…

  He thought about what it would be like to use such dreadful amounts of power on a battlefield. The results would be truly horrifying, he supposed. But the advantage… No wonder the Khar had been able to advance from nation to nation, leaving complete devastation in their wake. The might of the Warlord alone would be enough to lay waste to entire villages.

  “If I link with you, how does that work?” Rylan asked. “Does that mean the entire community will know everything I’m thinking and feeling?” Since making his compact with Isaerae, he had become protective of his emotional autonomy. He didn’t want to sacrifice it, at least, not until he was ready—which he wasn’t yet.

  “No,” Jendo shook his head. “Because you are Warlord, your link with the community works in only one direction unless you desire otherwise. That way, you can maintain your independence—which you’ll need if you’re going to be making hard decisions. If you link directly with any one of us—take me, for example —your private thoughts and emotions would be shared just between the two of us. It wouldn’t go any further.”

  “That’s good,” Rylan mumbled, chewing on that information. Looking down at his worn boots, he wondered if these mages would know the location of other things that belonged to him. He asked, “Can you take me to my daughter?”

  “Of course,” Varik said with a slight bow. “Come with me, Lord.”

  Varik turned and immediately started down the corridor. Rylan fell in at his side, Jendo and Farash walking behind them. They wound their way through a series of hallways that made up the guts of the palace, arriving finally at a narrow white door. There, Varik stepped aside, motioning for him to pass.

  “Your daughter is within,” he said.

  Suddenly apprehensive, Rylan opened the white door and stepped into his daughter’s room. There, he halted and stood gazing around in mild surprise. It was the perfect room for a little girl: small but tidy, full of plush woven rugs, a petite bed just her size, and a corner stuffed with dolls and toys. His arrival had awoken a young woman who sat in a chair on the other side of the room. His daughter’s nursemaid, he guessed. Rylan smiled and nodded to her in greeting.

  Moving forward, he approached the small bed and crouched beside it. He searched inside a nest of blankets until he found a little girl with soft black curls beneath all that bedding. At the sight of her, Rylan smiled, warmth flooding his heart. Amina’s sweet face was relaxed in sleep, her lips parted slightly. The sound of her rhythmic breaths was the most beautiful noise in the world.

  “Baby,” he whispered, and reached to wake her.

  But then he stopped himself. Amina was sleeping soundly, and he didn’t want to disturb that tranquility. He decided to return when she was awake, perhaps spend the day with her. He ran a loving hand through her hair. With a nod of thanks at the nurse, he rose and left the room.

  6

  The Enemy

  Gil knelt, setting Ashra’s unconscious body down on the ground, and then stood, glancing wildly around at the camp to get his bearings. The makeshift tents that surrounded him were arranged in long rows and occupied the entire street in front of the Lyceum’s charred rubble. They had arrived in the exact spot his mental image had conjured: the cleared space in front of the Prime Warden’s pavilion.

  Reassured, he quickly fastened Thar’gon to his belt and hefted Ashra into his arms, resting her head against his shoulder. Then he just stood there, realizing he had absolutely no idea what to do with her. His planning simply hadn’t gotten that far. Come to think of it, he really hadn’t had a plan.

  She would have to be confined, though the thought of physically restraining her made him want to cringe. There were few intact buildings left in the quarter, and none of them were prisons—at least none that he knew of. Certainly none that could hold a mage against her will. There didn’t seem to be any good solutions.

  Taking notice of them, two mages stopped what they were doing and started toward them with looks of alarm on their faces. Gil shook his head, fending them off. They slowed to a stop and, shooting him and each other confused glances, eventually turned away and went back to what they were doing. Gil heaved a sigh, wishing there was something they really could do to help. But in this entire despicable situation, the only person who really could make a difference lay unconscious in his arms.

  Adjusting Ashra’s weight, he set out down the street, his boots crunching on broken cobbles as he wound his way around fragments of debris. His gaze was drawn to a three-story structure a couple blocks down that had somehow survived the assault that had leveled the surrounding district. The building stood alone and forlorn, its walls blackened by soot. Within it, they had stashed many of the relics that had been rescued from the Lyceum. The building was under heavy guard to protect it from the looters who had made a career of going from ruin to ruin, sifting through debris like vultures picking over carrion. The building was the most secure place Gil could think of, the only place where he thought he could keep Ashra safe from others—and from herself.

  At the building’s entrance, he greeted the two well-armed sentries guarding the door. Recognizing him, the men stepped aside to let him pass, although their confusion over the unconscious woman he carried was evident on their faces. Shifting Ashra’s weight, Gil carried her into the dim interior, past rooms stuffed full of scattered objects that together held more power and mystery than any other such collection in the world.