The Sanctuary Series: Volume 03 - Champion Read online

  “No one come near me!” The elf’s voice was high and stressed, and Curatio stood closest to him, hands extended in a peaceful gesture. “Stay where you are and this one doesn’t have to die!” Niamh, for her part, was expressionless, biting her lip and staring into the crowd. When she caught sight of Cyrus, her lips tugged upward in a seemingly involuntary motion, then returned to the lack of expression that had been there before.

  “I can help you,” Curatio said, maintaining his distance. “I’m an officer of Sanctuary. What do you want?”

  “We can resurrect Niamh later if need be,” Vaste muttered in Cyrus’s ear.

  “Let’s avoid getting our fellow guildmate and officer killed if we can, yes?” Vara’s eyes never left the elf that was holding Niamh prisoner.

  “Something is wrong,” Aisling said. Cyrus chanced to look back at her and saw the dark elf wore a puzzled expression, her eyes concentrating on the scene in front of her.

  “You are not the most powerful spell in the book, are you?” Vara said in a biting voice. “One of our own is being held hostage at the point of a knife in our own guildhall; yes, something is very wrong—”

  “The daggers!” Aisling hissed. “They’re—”

  She did not get a chance to finish. Niamh screamed, an agonizing, painful cry as the elf shoved her toward Curatio. Cyrus’s hand was already on the hilt of his sword, Praelior, and it was halfway drawn when the floor of the foyer exploded in a burst of broken stone.

  Chapter 4

  The power of his sword flowed through Cyrus, enhancing his reflexes and sending strength coursing through his muscles. Pieces of stone and rock flew into the crowd; shrieks and cries drowned out Niamh’s scream. Cyrus kept moving, realizing as the rock flew through the air that he would have to move quickly.

  A long, craggy arm extended from the hole in the ground and grabbed the elven refugee around the waist. Stones moved aside as Fortin, the rock giant, pushed his way up from the dungeons below Sanctuary, a deafening howl of enmity drowning out all other noise. The rock giant lifted the elf above his head and pitched him with crushing force.

  Cyrus watched the elf soar past, then the sound of crunching bone and flesh came from behind. He turned to look at the interloper, now a messy, broken heap, splintered against the wall near the doors to the Great Hall.

  “Impeccable timing, Fortin,” Vaste called out. “But next time, couldn’t you restrain him?”

  “Could have restrained him this time,” the rock giant rumbled, his torso jutting from the hole he had made in the floor, “but he stabbed the red-haired elf. I like her. He needed to suffer.”

  Vara cuffed Cyrus on the shoulder. “Niamh.”

  “Right.” Cyrus changed course, running to Niamh, who was lying in Curatio’s arms. He slid to his knees, the plate mail on his greaves screeching against the stone. “Hey, Red,” he said with a smile. She managed a weak one back at him, her white skin almost gray. “Curatio will have you healed in a second—” He looked up at Curatio, whose face was ashen, his head shaking from left to right.

  “Knew you guys would save me...” Niamh’s eyes were dazed, glassy, and they honed in on Cyrus. “Especially you. After all, who else would save your...” Her words drifted off and her body went slack in Curatio’s arms, her eyes staring off into nothingness.

  “What the hell, Curatio?” Andren’s voice came from behind Cyrus as the elven healer pushed his way through the crowd to Cyrus’s side. “Why didn’t you heal her? Looking to practice your resurrection spell?”

  Curatio looked up at Andren with an anguish Cyrus had never seen from the healer. Cyrus turned to Andren, whose indignation had faded to uncertainty. Andren shook his head and bowed it, indistinguishable mutterings coming from under his breath as the healer began to cast a spell. With a flourish, he held his hands out and bluish white light filled the air around them; a resurrection spell sweeping from them to Niamh’s body, encompassing the red-haired elf’s corpse with a glow that could restore life...

  ...but didn’t.

  “What the...” Andren muttered a curse and began to cast again.

  “It won’t do any good,” Curatio broke his silence, voice laden with a mournful sadness that Cyrus hadn’t heard from the healer, ever. “She’s been afflicted with the black lace...a poison that nullifies magic.” The healer’s numb gaze shifted to where the elven assailant had been thrown by Fortin. “He must have coated his blades with it. I couldn’t heal her...and now she’s dead and we can’t bring her back...” His hand brushed against her cheek and came to rest in her red hair.

  “Son of a...” Cyrus felt the rage overwhelming him, consuming him. He stood, and his vision swam as he pulled away from the druid’s body, and suddenly she seemed far away, even though he stood only a few feet above her. He turned on his heel and pushed through the crowd, not caring who he knocked aside as he made his way toward the killer.

  He broke through the small circle grouped around the elf and stopped. Her assailant was crushed; bones jutted from points around his body, his blood covering the floor.

  “Someone heal this bastard,” Cyrus seethed, “so I can do this to him again.”

  “No good.” Vara spoke from his side. “We’ve already tried; it would appear he caught the blades of his own daggers when he landed.”

  “Serves him right,” Cyrus said, a flush of white-hot rage upon him. “If he were still alive, I’d kill him myself.”

  A coughing, gagging sound from the elf caused a stir in those who encircled him. “It would appear you get your wish,” came Fortin’s dry rumble from nearby. “You might want to hurry; it would seem he’s about to die of natural causes.”

  “Which part of being thrown against the wall by a rock giant is natural?” Vaste shot back.

  “If someone kills one of my friends, it’s natural that they will be next and that I will cause it,” Fortin replied.

  All thought of revenge forgotten, Cyrus dropped to his knees next to the elf, whose head was shaped unnaturally from the fracturing of his skull. “Why did you come here?” Cyrus asked, trying to meet the unsteady gaze of the killer’s eyes.

  “He’s an assassin,” Aisling said, handing Cyrus one of the daggers, its black blade gleaming in the light of a nearby torch. On the pommel was a snake eating its own tail. “An elven order by the name of Inta’yrakhir. I’ve only heard a whisper of them, once, and that was long ago. They’re quiet, all shadows and mystery—the sort of group that you get nothing out of but a name.”

  Cyrus turned back to the assassin. “You had to know that you’d never get out of here alive. Who sent you? And who were you after?”

  “My master ordered death...he will...receive death...” In a gasping, choking voice, the elf turned his head to look past Cyrus. “You will not see us...and we will keep coming...until you die.”

  Cyrus reached down, calmness masking a more furious rage than almost any he’d ever felt, and grabbed the elf by the remains of his once spotless doublet, now more red than white. “Who sent you...and who are you here for?”

  “My master...is greater than any you know.” The rasping of the assassin’s voice got deeper, more guttural, and slower as his eyes crept past Cyrus’s. “Your death is ordered...it shall be delivered...and we will not stop until you are dead...” He rasped, and his eyes fluttered as he looked over Cyrus’s shoulder and uttered one more word before succumbing to his wounds.

  “Shelas’akur.”

  Chapter 5

  There was silence in the Council Chamber, the flames licking at the logs in the hearth, consuming them, sending shadows across everything. Cyrus sat in his chair, wondering how the room had become so veiled in shadow when it was bright only a short while earlier. Vaste had broken the news with a simple, “Niamh is dead.”

  “Then resurrect her,” Terian said with a flat laugh. “We’ve got a meeting to finish.”

  “She’s dead...” Vaste’s voice trailed off. “Permanently.”

  “What?” The dark elf�
�s complexion darkened as though clouds had rolled in to obscure the light from his face. “She hasn’t been gone over an hour, so if she’s dead you could still use a resurrection spell—”

  J’anda looked at them, wary disbelief cutting through his human illusion. “Was...her body destroyed?”

  “No,” Vaste said. “Her body is still quite intact, unlike her assailant.”

  “I don’t understand.” Terian’s voice rose, taking on a timbre and quality of madness. “If we still have her body, and it’s been less than an hour, why isn’t she being resurrected?”

  Alaric spoke in a low, quiet voice filled with sufficient authority to silence the Council. “There are some curses and magics that can prevent healing from taking place.” He raised his head, his lone eye fixed on Curatio, who sat to his right. “Am I to assume that Niamh fell victim to something of this sort?”

  Curatio seemed to gather his thoughts before speaking. “It was a poison, I believe, rather than a curse, but yes. Neither healing nor resurrection magic took hold on her and now she is simply...gone.” He choked on the last word.

  Cyrus felt the grief and misery close in on him as he pictured Niamh, happy and carefree, her laugh like the twinkling of a crystal wind chime and her eyes as green as the grass of the plains in late spring. His eyes fell on her seat to his left, and he stared at the empty chair, the black leather skin glossy in the dim light, as if it was some amorphous, oily surface of despair that would devour anyone who sat in it.

  With a choking feeling he remembered the times she had saved his life—or as she had put it, “saved his ass”—and wondered if, when he remembered her, it would be the thought of carrying her body through the foyer and Great Hall while their guildmates wept and cried out around him. It had been a long walk; maybe the longest he’d ever taken, and when he placed her in the iced room in the back of the kitchen, the freezing chill had come to rest in his bones, causing an ache that permeated through him, settling in his heart.

  He had set her down with care, closing her eyes, the green in them faded to a dull sheen. Her cheeks were fair and white, and he took his gauntlet off to wipe a drop of blood from the pristine, snowy flesh and was amazed at how warm she still felt to his touch. He smoothed her flame-red tresses around her shoulders, feeling the fine hair slip between his fingers while Larana stared on from behind him in numb shock. As he left the kitchen, facing an audience of refugees and guildmates, silent in their respect for the fallen, the only noise he could hear was Larana’s sobs behind him.

  A loud curse from Terian broke his reverie, catapulting Cyrus back to the Council Chamber. “Who did this?”

  “An assassin,” Vaste replied. “From the Inta’yrakhir.”

  “You say that name like it’s supposed to mean something to me.” Terian’s words slipped out in a long, uninterrupted stream, each flushed with the hotness of his anger. “The only thing it means is that every single person who is associated with this organization will die horribly, with their heads mounted on pikes as an example of what happens when you strike at Sanctuary.” He looked around the table, his long nose and spiked pauldrons combining with the dark clouds to give him an almost demonic look. “Who’s with me?”

  “Hold,” Alaric said. “I must first confess I am not familiar with the Inta’yrakhir. What is this...’Hand of Fear’?”

  “‘Hand of Fear’?” Cyrus asked, still waiting to feel something, anything.

  “‘Inta’yrakhir’ is elvish for ‘Hand of Fear’,” Curatio said, features haggard and worn. “Aisling seemed to indicate that it was an order of elvish assassins.”

  “Why would an assassin want to kill Niamh?” Terian’s fist hit the table, shaking it. “She was the sweetest of us...”

  “They didn’t.” Vaste’s words seemed to echo through the chamber more than Terian’s rage. “They weren’t after her at all.”

  “I’m sorry,” J’anda said. “Who was the assassin after?”

  “Vara.” Vaste’s reply was cool. “He said his order would not stop until the ‘shelas’akur’ was dead.”

  The pause was broken once more by Terian, now approaching the height of screeching as he swiveled to face the elven paladin. “What did you do to bring this down?”

  Vara, who had remained silent and expressionless, now swelled as she turned to Terian, looking as though she were an adder about to strike. “What did I do to attract the death warrant of a band of assassins? I’m not quite certain.” Her sarcasm hung thick. “Perhaps you could track them down and ask on my behalf. If they attempt to stab you in the face, let them; it’s merely a ritual required for entrance to their good graces.”

  “I don’t understand how this assassin could be after you without you knowing why. Have you offended someone... um... maybe done something to agitate... uh...” J’anda held up his hands in exasperation.

  Vara’s hand slapped onto the table, her hue crimson with rage. “Let me repeat this for those of you who may be struggling with substandard intellects: I...DO...NOT...KNOW! I have no idea whether this is some personal grudge or related to...” She reddened further but her voice faltered. “Other...aspects of my life.”

  She halted and Cyrus watched her lip quiver. “I don’t know why that bloody bastard felt the need to kill Niamh rather than restrict his murderous activities to me. I am...sorry for it.” Her face fell. “I would have preferred that if someone had to be caught on the end of that blade it be me instead of her.” Her chin came up and she looked around the table. “But it wasn’t. Please don’t ask me to apologize for being alive.”

  “No one faults you for that, lass.” Alaric’s voice was soothing, filled with authority. “In our grief, we are trying to understand something that, without more facts—and possibly even with them—will be incomprehensible.”

  “Yes, well, let’s try more facts,” Terian said. “This assassin, he said he was after Vara?”

  “No.” Cyrus spoke up, ending his silence. “He said ‘shelas’akur’.” He had heard other elves refer to Vara by the name “shelas’akur” but none had ever been willing to discuss what it meant, not even Andren.

  Terian stared Vara down. “And you can’t tell us what that means.”

  “We do not discuss it with offlanders—non-elves,” she replied.

  “It means ‘last hope’,” Cyrus said, drawing looks of surprise from Vara, Alaric and Curatio. He frowned and looked back at them. “What?”

  “I was not aware you spoke elvish, brother,” Alaric said.

  “I don’t know much,” Cyrus replied.

  “A point on which we can all agree,” Vara said. “But regardless, it remains a matter of internal secrecy to the Elven Kingdom.”

  “Your matter of internal secrecy just cost the life of an elf, and while that wouldn’t much trouble me if it happened inside your damned Kingdom,” Terian replied, voice rising once again until he was yelling, “it happened here! In Sanctuary! To one of our officers! To our friend! And I want to know why she’s dead!”

  “I DON’T KNOW, YOU IGNORANT SODDING JACKASS!” Vara exploded at Terian, standing with such violence her chair flew back and broke into pieces on the floor.

  “Perhaps,” J’anda stood, cold fury radiating from his eyes but his voice as smooth as steel, “you could give us some idea of why an elvish assassin might want to kill the...shelas’akur.”

  “I DON’T KNOW! Are you deaf or merely addled by casting illusions on yourself so frequently that you can no longer remember who you are?”

  “There is no good reason why an elvish assassin would want to kill Vara,” Curatio said. The elf tried to smile but failed, grimacing instead. “She’s a symbol to our people of...well, hope.”

  “Leaving the ‘why’ of that aside for now,” Vaste said, “there are plenty of reasons that someone might want to kill a symbol of hope.” He began to tick them off on his fingers. “They have a grudge against your government and want to send a message; they dislike something she stands for; they want to upset yo
ur entire race...”

  The grimace remained on Curatio’s face. “Without getting into much detail, Vara’s never associated herself with the Kingdom’s government in any way, so that doesn’t fit—”

  “Perhaps someone in the government is displeased with that?” J’anda raised his hands in a questioning manner.

  “Seems a bit much, sending an assassin because she doesn’t endorse the monarch,” Curatio said with a shrug. “King Danay I has been in place for about four thousand years and he’s not unpopular. The political situation in the Kingdom is stable; no major upheavals, no challenges to the powers that be...” He shrugged again. “I don’t think that’s it. The likelihood that someone is trying to dishearten the entire elvish race is much more likely...and rather sad.”

  “This is all bullshit,” Terian said, seething. He pointed at Vara, hand shaking so hard it waved at her. “You should tell us everything. She trusted you, she died for you; the least you can do is give us the full facts so that we can find out what this is all about and slap this ‘Hand of Fear’ to a bloody pulp.”

  Vara stood silent at Terian’s rebuke. Cyrus watched her, and for the first time he realized that she was trembling—ever so slightly, but there it was. “If Niamh were here, she wouldn’t tell you,” Cyrus said, drawing Terian’s stinging glare. “She always refused to tell me about this ‘shelas’akur’ business.”

  Alaric folded his hands on the table in front of him. “In spite of having suffered a great loss we should remember that Vara is one of us and her loyalty to Sanctuary is unquestioned. Were she aware of any reason why these assassins were after her, I am certain she would tell us.”

  “I would,” Vara affirmed, even though no one had looked at her. “I may not wish to discuss internal elven matters, but be assured, I would not put any of you in danger if it could be avoided.” Her hand came up to her neck and rested there; to Cyrus’s eyes it looked as though she were preparing to strangle herself.