The Mirrors Of Bershan: Bound Part 10

He searched her face for a minute, then straightened and walked over to Swift. She watched him go, realized the vision had faded, and got up to pack. When she tied her bag to Rain's saddle, he seemed restless and she stroked his neck to calm him while looking over her shoulder at Tavis. He was watching her again and the look in his eyes reminded her for some reason of the day he had kissed her. She blushed at the memory, and quickly mounted up to have an excuse to break eye contact. They rode out a few minutes later, and she kept to herself mostly, playing with the pendant under her tunic in an idle fas.h.i.+on, ignoring the looks from the others.

She had become so used to the images Marcius had been throwing at her over the past two days that it was almost a shock when she heard his voice again near midday. You know what I'm offering now, the things I could not explain in my letter. I had to show you. Words could never have conveyed it. All of it, everything you want, it will be yours. I will give everything to you. All you have to do is be by my side. Be mine, Faylanna, be with me. Come to me. Give yourself to me.

She felt the expectation in his presence and there was something in it that frightened her a little. She wondered if there was something he was hiding from her, if that was the cause of her sense of foreboding. She pulled her hand from the pendant and leaned forward a little to let it swing out from her skin under the loose fabric of her tunic. As she did, she concentrated on keeping every thought out of her mind, reflex making her thread the firm intention with magic. Silence filled her like a balm, banis.h.i.+ng worry and pretense. For a moment, she could think more clearly than she had for days. She could see her choices, Tavis and Marcius, and set them side by side for the first time since finding out their feelings for her.

Before she could consider it closely though, she realized that Rain had picked up speed, misinterpreting her movement. She leaned back, pulling on the reins to slow him down, also letting her concentration on the silence fade. The instant the pendant contacted her skin again, Marcius' voice filled her mind, but it wasn't his usual smooth, charming words. Panic made his voice strident.

...leave me here, don't leave me alone in this place. They put me here, left me with it, left me. Faylanna, don't leave me here all alone!

His frantic begging touched her heart. Compa.s.sion filled her, and she was unable to imagine how horrible it must be, locked in the Mirror. She reached out to him. Marcius, I'm here. It's all right, you aren't alone.

Her words had an immediate effect. She felt the sense of his presence wrap around her again, no longer expectant, cajoling or anything she had experienced from him. It was like he was just holding on to make sure she was still there. One word repeated in her mind almost like a long, slow heartbeat. Safe. He didn't speak to her again for the rest of the day beyond that one word, but remained with her, like a drowning man clutching a rock in a fast river.

When they stopped for the night, they were on the last rise before the road dipped down into the valley that enfolded Iondis. They had stopped early enough to allow for a hot supper and she found out that Tavis knew how to cook. The soup he put together in the pot from herbs and dried meat in their packs was delicious. Everyone had seconds and Fay thought she might have had more if any had been left. Night had fallen by then, and Lydia was gathering the dishes to wash them in the nearby Aben River when Tavis rose and turned to her.

"Faylanna, would you like to go for a walk with me?"

She was too surprised to answer, but stood up and followed him away from the fire and across the road. He led her along the rim of the valley for a few minutes, stopping in clearing that overlooked the broad expanse as it dropped away and opened out into the familiar lands of her childhood home. She looked behind her, making sure she could still see the fire that marked their camp in the darkness, before joining him at the rim. She looked out, her heart gladdened by the sight of home, but then she frowned, surprised that she couldn't pick her family's manor out. It was still early enough that she should have been able to see lights from the house she'd been born in, especially if her father was there. She turned to say something about this to Tavis but her words dried up as their eyes met.

He stood next to her, almost close enough to kiss her again, and his expression was serious as he stared down at her. The slight frown that he almost always wore was deeper now. "Why are you doing this?"

She was surprised by the question. "What do you mean? Doing what?"

"Why are you taking this risk, going to Iondis? I agree with you that it's where the Mirror is, and I think it's probably where your father is too, but doesn't that just make the risk greater? I need to understand."

She thought about it before she answered, trying to figure out how to explain it so he would see. "Whatever my father is involved in, I know he's doing it out of some misguided notion that it's what I need, that he's helping me by doing this. He's wrong, as he has always been wrong about the things I need, but that just makes it more important that I stop him. And it has to be me, Tavis, I'm sure of that much. I'm his daughter, and that makes whatever he's set in motion my responsibility too." She had intended to stop there, but her breath hitched in her throat and she felt a tear slide down her face. It undid the calm control of herself she no longer realized she was exercising and the rest came flooding out with her tears. "And I don't think- I think he's in over his head. He looked so ill in the Gardensia. I'm afraid- I think that it's killing him, whatever he's doing, it's destroying him. He's all the family I have, Tavis, all I have left. My mother's dead, so are all the rest of my family, believe it or not. Ganson was like family, but he's gone too and I'm afraid that the dark cloud or whatever it was killed him. My father is everything and-"

She knew she wasn't making any sense, and she couldn't go on. She dropped to her knees in the gra.s.s, wrapping her arms around herself and gave herself over to the tears she couldn't hold back. Even the feel of Marcius recoiling from her mind, his disgust at her tears and weakness clear as he went, didn't stop them. A strong pair of arms wrapped around her shoulders, turning her. She buried her face in Tavis' chest, her arms finding their way around him. Distantly, she was aware of him murmuring softly as he stroked her hair. She didn't know how long they remained like that before she finally regained control of herself.

When the tears had stopped, she tried to pull away, and he loosened his arms enough for her to see his face, but he didn't release her. She saw that his frown had smoothed out, and the intense look that had been in his eyes was replaced by a profound sadness. She dropped her gaze to his chest and was a little embarra.s.sed by the dark patch she saw in the moonlight. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have-"

He pulled one arm from around her and laid a finger on her lips to quiet her. She looked up into his eyes. "You have nothing to apologize for. You've been under more strain than I think any of us knew, and I don't think you had time to grieve for your mentor. I may not have liked my father, but I still spent some time grieving his death, and I already know that you loved Ganson." He removed his finger from her lips and stroked them down the side of her face, a tender smile forming. "But you're wrong about one thing. You do have family beyond your father. He's not all you have. Ki, for one thing. He cares about you, worries about you and tries to protect you. I think that's a good definition of family, once you get past blood. My mother cares too. She doesn't show it as much, but she does. And I do. I care about you, Faylanna. You are never as alone as you think."

He dropped his hand from her face and she held her breath, waiting for him to kiss her, hoping he would. The moment pa.s.sed though and he released her from his arms, drawing her to her feet with him. As she looked at him, she felt a return of the idea that she did not want to put him in danger. Very quietly, she said, "You don't have to do this, you know. You don't have to come with me, risk everything. Maybe- maybe you should walk away. You can, you know. This isn't your responsibility."

He blinked for a moment, then turned to the valley, staring at the dark expanse for several moments. She waited for his answer, frozen in her own indecision. She didn't know what she wanted him to say. Finally, he turned back to her, and his eyes were as they had been at Keari's manor, s.h.i.+ning and warm. He made no move toward her though, only shook his head, his eyes holding hers and said, "Yes, I do have to do this. I will be at your side, wherever you might go."

Neither of them spoke as they went back to the camp. Fay was so conflicted that she didn't think she would be able to sleep at all. The moment she lay her head down though, the familiar sound of the Aben and the distant roar of the falls where the river dropped into the valley lulled her, and a dream took her.

She was standing alone in an island of light. She heard the sound of footsteps behind her, and turned around. Marcius walked out of the darkness, his light blue eyes smoldering with a hunger she thought she had seen before. He didn't smile. He didn't speak to her. He reached her quickly and his hands grasped the top of her shoulders, bare now though she was sure she had been wearing clothes a moment earlier. Pulling her forward to press against him, his lips crushed down on hers in a fierce kiss. But as her eyes fluttered closed and her hands came up to rest gently on his bare hips, the kiss changed, became more gentle, a firm whisper against her lips. Her head tilted up further to maintain this kiss. The hands on her shoulders loosened their grip to run down her arms as the pressure behind the kiss returned and she realized that the slender lips against hers had become full again. Then the pressure eased once more and the lips parted from hers before she could think any further. His hands, rough now with callouses, brushed lightly back up her arms, over the curve of her shoulders before lifting from her skin entirely.

Fingertips trailed down the sides of her face in an achingly familiar gesture that made her open her eyes as she moaned. Green eyes looked down into hers, warm and sparkling instead of hungry and demanding. She slid her arms around his body, her hands gripping a back covered with a tracing of old scars and she pressed herself to him more firmly. As she did though, the green eyes dissolved into ice blue and the hunger returned to them. Under her hands, the scars disappeared. Fingers brushed her nipple, then rubbed it and the bolt it sent through her body caused her to moan again as her eyes slipped closed.

A mouth closed on hers again, kissing and then drawing her lips open against his. His tongue was in her mouth and an electric heat blazed through her as she responded with her own. Then the darkness swallowed everything.

When she woke at dawn, Fay felt like her head had been turned inside out and a deep ache filled her heart and body. She couldn't remember why she felt this way. Confused, she looked around and saw that everyone else was asleep. She walked over to the Aben, knelt on the bank and splashed water in her face. She heard movement behind her and turned to see Keari. He knelt beside her and washed his own face.

"You went to sleep so quickly last night, I didn't have a chance to ask you if you were all right," he said, his voice low to avoid waking the others.

Looking at him, she thought about what Tavis had said, that Keari cared about her like family. She was surprised how much she liked the idea. "I am, yes. I just- I guess I needed to get some of that off my mind."

He nodded and they both rose, turning back to the camp. "I think you should stay close to Tavis today. I'm concerned about what we'll find and, well, the boy has strength and determination. I know he'll do his best to protect you if something happens that prevents me from doing so."

Lydia was awake when they returned to the camp, but Tavis hadn't moved. With a knowing smile that made Fay blush, Lydia pointed wordlessly to her, then Tavis. It was a clear enough message. She wanted Fay to be the one to wake him. Briefly, she considered the many pranks she had seen in her years at the academy, but dismissed the idea. It had never looked like much fun to be on the receiving end of them, and she was keenly aware that she owed him for his kindness the night before. She knelt beside Tavis, who lay on his back, and put a hand on his shoulder. Instead of waking up, he smiled and one of his hands rose to clasp hers. He rolled slightly toward her and his hand s.h.i.+fted on hers, making her aware of the callouses there from his life on the farm. She didn't understand why she suddenly s.h.i.+vered and felt too warm at the same time, but she tried to ignore it.

"Tavis," she spoke softly, "wake up."

His smile widened and he opened his eyes slowly. He stared at her, blinking in the early morning light.

"I can't believe I managed to wake up before you, Tavis," Fay said, trying to suppress her laughter.

"I had the nicest dream. You were there," he mumbled sleepily.

That froze her in place and, like the s.h.i.+ver, she was confused by her own reaction. Suddenly, Tavis came all the way awake and sat up. As he broke eye contact with her, he blushed deeply. He quickly extricated himself from his sleeping roll and left the campsite before she could even move. He didn't return until everything else had been packed up.

They continued down the road, into the valley where she had been born and spent her early years. With every step they took, the feeling that something was wrong with her home intensified. It became worse when she saw the outer fields that lined the road as they reached the valley floor. They were all either lying fallow or covered in the matted rotting remains of old, unharvested crops. The smell of the decaying vegetation was unpleasant, though she quickly became used to it. There was a stone shed by the side of the road, used to store tools for working these outlying fields, and she was disturbed to see the thatched roof had collapsed inward. It looked to have happened sometime many months earlier, but hadn't been repaired. She had never seen something left in disrepair so long in Iondis. What had happened here, she wondered.

They didn't see a single person as they approached the manor, though it was now late-morning in the prime of the planting season. Fay knew there should have been folks from Wyver all over the fields, tilling the ground and sowing the seeds. Even the air felt wrong to her. It was as if something in her home was broken and had leaked into everything around it.

An hour later, they got their first look at the manor that was the heart of the estate, and this drove everything else from her mind. The walls were darkened, as if with soot or dirt, and she saw a shutter on a lower window hanging upside-down from a single remaining nail. Weeds were growing between paving stones everywhere in the once spotless courtyard, some as tall as her knees. She saw a carriage off to one side of the courtyard, but from the awkward way the horse hung in the traces, she knew even at this distance that it was dead.

"I don't understand. It wasn't like this two years ago. How could things have deteriorated so rapidly?" In her agitation, she didn't realized she had spoken aloud until Keari grabbed her reins and pulled Rain around to a stop with him. The others stopped as well, staring at them both.

"How can you know what was here two years ago? You were not to return here after we moved you to Voleno." Though he had his robe and scarf on still, she could see deep anger in his eyes and possibly a measure of fear as well. His reaction made her flinch.

"I- I missed some things, a f-few belongings I hadn't taken to Rianza. I c-came back when I knew Father was in Bershan, and wouldn't be back for weeks. I got what I needed and left. The only person I saw was Neoro, our steward, and even that was brief because he was busy. It was summer. I remember the whole valley smelled of the growing crops. It wasn't like this at all, and the house... Not like that."

Tavis nudged Swift to her side and put his hand on her back. As they had ridden, his embarra.s.sment had faded, and now she turned, looking at him gratefully. Keari let go of her reins and waved for them all to continue, but she thought he was even more wary than before. Their approach slowed, but it didn't take long to reach the courtyard.

The smell from the dead horse was atrocious, though from its appearance, it couldn't have been dead long enough to give off that much of a stink. The cart looked like it had either skidded to its current position sideways or been pushed there. A few of the paving stones had been pulled up by the wheels, leaving bare patches of dirt and weeds. Tavis stared at the carriage, the stag and scythe painted on the door, for a while before speaking.

"I think that was the one the messenger said Calder left in."

Fay was hardly listening. The semi-circle of marble steps in front of the main door had been partially destroyed, black char licking across the surface of much of what remained. She saw pieces scattered all over the courtyard. She slid from Rain's back, afraid what all of this might mean and moved toward the steps, calling out as she went. "Father? Father! Where are you?"

The words didn't carry, though. It was as if the air around them was dead and could no longer transmit sound. She doubted anyone in the house could have heard her. But when a hand grasped her arm, stopping her flight into the house, she nearly screamed before she looked around and saw it was Tavis. "Don't, Faylanna, please. We don't know who or what is around. We need to be careful. If your father is here and needs help, we'll do what we can, I promise."

She looked into his pleading eyes and tried to calm down. Then she heard Marcius' voice. He had been silent since her crying fit the night before, but now he whispered warmly to her, There's nothing to fear in this place, Faylanna. It is our place and nothing can harm you here. Come to me, you're almost there, you'll be safe with me. I need you. She nodded, though she wasn't sure who she was responding to. Tavis let go of her arm, staying close as they mounted the steps and entered the house. She was dimly aware that Keari and Lydia followed close behind.

Chapter 16.

As she pa.s.sed the threshold, slipping between the broken panels of the doors that dangled from the frame, Fay was rendered blind by the gloom. She waited just inside the door for her eyes to adjust, but even after that, the hall looked strange to her. The paintings that had been in the corridor were missing as far as she could see, only brighter squares, rectangles and ovals of silk on the walls remaining to show where they had been. She thought of all the portraits that had hung there before, generations of her family, and wondered what could have persuaded her father to ever take them down.

She moved down the hallway, stopping at the sitting room on the right, and understood almost at once why everything was so dark. The heavy drapes covered the windows, leaving the light that came in around them muted. Shadows gathered in every corner. She saw something in the room made her pause and take a few steps inside for a closer look. It was no longer the place she had played as a child with both of her parents, where games and stories and imagination had delighted her into laughter. The furniture in the room that wasn't broken had been covered with cloth and looked as if nothing in the room had been dusted since. The same odor from the courtyard permeated the house and she began to wonder if it had been the horse or if something else was dead. Or perhaps someone else, she thought with a shudder.

Splinters and chunks of wood were scattered around the room,. She traced them back to a door in the other interior wall of the sitting room. It looked like someone had smashed it down, though there were gouges in the door that made her think of claw marks. The door was hanging askew from one hinge and she saw the privy behind it. The dark, reddish splashes on the walls made her eyes water and she turned to Tavis, who rubbed her shoulder wordlessly.

They retraced their steps back to the hallway. A short distance down from the sitting room, on the opposite side of the hall, was her father's study. Keari was already standing in the doorway, Lydia behind him. He had loosened the scarf so that it hung about his shoulders and she could see from the set look on his face that something was wrong in the room. He turned as she approached.

"Faylanna, I don't think you should see-"

His words only increased her worry and she peered around his shoulder into the room. Even the narrow view she had made her gasp in shock. She saw books strewn across the floor, covered with more splashes of maroon. It was enough to make her try to push past him, though he stood his ground and she wasn't strong enough to force him. After a few moments of unsuccessful struggle, she became frantic to find out what he was hiding from her and pushed him aside with the force of her magic instead of her arms. A small part of her was surprised how easy it was, but the rest of her was searching the wreckage for any sign of her father. She started scrambling over a pile of wood and torn pages that she thought must have been his bookshelf when, again, a hand on her shoulder stopped her. She knew it was Tavis without looking around. His hands were somehow very familiar to her now.

"Carefully, Faylanna, be careful. Please?"

She didn't respond but forced herself to slow down, trying to remember that she wouldn't be able to help her father if she hurt herself searching for him. She looked around the room more carefully. His large desk was on its side, far from where it normally sat. It had been ripped or blown in two, the pieces pushed aside to get at what or whoever had been behind it. When she saw the deep gouges in the floor in front of the halves of the desk, four nearly parallel marks ripped into the once-polished floorboards, she shuddered. The entire room was scarred with more of the same marks. She could guess what had made them, but s.h.i.+fted her perceptions, wanting to be sure. She crouched down by the closest claw marks, her hand reaching out to touch the pool of yellow just behind them, where the pads of its paw had rested.

"The vygazza," she whispered, horrified as her fingers hovered over the trace.

A hand grasped her arm and pulled her back from the sickly yellow streaks that circled the room in a stalking pattern. She turned to see Tavis, frowning again. His voice was worried as he said, "Not again. Please don't do that, not after what happened to you last time you touched that creature's trace. I won't stand by and let you, not this time."

She stared at him for a moment before deciding not to argue. Instead, she turned back and saw another trace among the yellow, her father's pale blue that she knew so well. It was like the vygazza had been playing with him, following him around the room. Blood splashes on the floor among the papers strewn about and on the walls stood out more clearly to her now, s.h.i.+mmering in the way only the blood of a Magicia did. She held her hands close to her chest, unwilling to touch the stains, already certain it would be her father's.

She turned back toward the door, thinking she had seen everything the room could tell her when she stopped, looking at the cold, soot-covered fireplace. Her eyes went wider still as she tried to make sense of what she was seeing. That the fireplace looked as if an explosion had taken place in it hardly registered. It was the mess that stood in front of it that had arrested her attention. She was sure it was her father's favorite chair, the one that had always sat in front of this fireplace for reading. Part of it was still there, stuffing trailing out of the remains of one arm and part of the back where it leaned against the bricks of the fireplace. But a few inches from it lay a puddle sunk into the floor. There were streaks of color in the fluid, cinnamon and green that matched the arms and leather covering of the chair, as well as the darker brown of the floorboards themselves. She was sure it was the rest of the chair, but didn't understand what had happened to it.

Fay approached it slowly, unsure how to proceed. Tavis joined her after a moment, holding a shattered piece of wood a little over a foot long. He gave her a warning look and she nodded. He didn't want her any closer to the puddle, and she wasn't sure she wanted to go further. Keeping his distance, he poked the stick at the puddle. It went in a few inches before Tavis reflexively pulled it back in surprise. Nothing came back out. The stick now ended where it had touched the puddle, and another shade of brown showed at the point on its surface where the stick had touched it.

"How can it still be a liquid? I don't feel any heat coming from it to keep it from becoming solid," Tavis asked, confused but backing a step away from the puddle.

"I don't know." Fay said, hearing unease in her own voice. "There's no touch of magic to it either. I don't know what it is."

Keari stepped closer to it, crouched a little and sniffed before retreating. "I've heard of water from deep in some mines and other substances that can melt things, but they all have an acrid smell to them and this doesn't. I think we should keep looking around, but don't touch anything. Something isn't right here."

Faylanna, hurry, you're almost there, almost with me, where you belong. Hurry. Marcius' voice filling her head almost made her gasp in surprise. She let her senses return to normal, then joined the others in the hallway and led them down to the kitchen. His satisfaction grew with every step she took down the hall. Here, the door was intact but hung slightly ajar. She put a hand gingerly on the door and swung it open.

The sight and smell that greeted her robbed her of any ability to make a sound. She gagged and tried to breathe as little as possible while staring around the room she had once loved for its smell and warmth as a child. Even the sense of Marcius lurking around her mind disappeared. The walls, the floor and even the ceiling were covered in a mixture of blood and twists of what she thought might be flesh. It was as if someone, a person, had exploded in this room. From the pattern she saw, she realized that it might have been more than one.

As horrible as that was, it was the intact body on the floor that tore her heart. She recognized him, though she couldn't see his face. Neoro, the man who had run her father's household all of her life and taught her to ride, lay in the center of a large, dry brownish-red pool, a knife buried so deeply in his back that only the handle was visible. It looked to her as if he had been there for a while. Though she had hidden from him in Voleno, she still loved him and believed he had cared for her beyond his duties to Iondis. Had this happened because of his failure to bring her back? She recoiled from the idea and felt the room darken around her as she swayed.

Arms scooped her up before she could even begin to fall and she was carried back through the doorway, cradled to Tavis' chest. She heard a soft sob behind them from Lydia, and the door of the kitchen was closed, hiding the horror from her, though not the smell. When she heard the latch click, she breathed a internal sigh of relief and clutched at Tavis' neck for comfort. In her mind, Marcius announced his return to her by letting out a shocking snarl, filled with frustration and anger. It forced her eyes open and her mind to clear.

"You can put me down, Tavis." He looked down at her, still concerned, then gently set her on her feet. His arm remained curled around her shoulder, as if waiting for another swoon. "I'm- I'll be all right. I just wasn't expecting-" She fought to keep the tears now filling her eyes from spilling over. "I've known Neoro my whole life. He was our steward, he ran the whole estate for Father. He would take care of me when Father had to go away sometimes, before I went to the academy. I- If it's my fault, if it's because I ran in Voleno-"

"It is not your fault," Keari said, grim determination in his voice. "Leave the blame with those who commit such acts, Faylanna. On them will fall the full weight of the Emperor's justice. I swear to you, it will."

Her eyes were still on Tavis, who added, "Remember the living person, the life he led. Remember the good things about him, not this ending."

Lydia stroked a hand down Fay's hair, though she looked nearly ill from the sight herself, and tried to smile encouragingly. Fay nodded and turned to the stairs next to them. She climbed to the upper floor of the house.

They moved through the first two rooms, guest bedrooms, quickly. The furniture here, like in the sitting room, had been covered with sheets, and the dust lay thick everywhere with no tracks in it save their own. There was no damage in these rooms either, and Fay was beginning to think that most of what she had seen downstairs had only happened recently.

The third door was locked and Tavis immediately put his shoulder to it, though it didn't budge. Keari placed his hand on the younger man's back. "If we do it together, it might-"

"It's been locked for fifteen years, so I doubt that there's anything in there," Fay said. Everyone turned to stare at her, so she explained. "It was my mother's room. When she died, Father locked it. I don't think he's even opened the door at all since that day. I asked to go in once, but he refused. It's the only time I remember him refusing me anything in the years before I went to the academy."

Tavis looked embarra.s.sed but said nothing as they continued on to the next room. That door had been completely removed, with no debris and no sign of where it had gone. That seemed odd to Fay, but before she could comment, she saw the room itself and everything else was driven from her mind. She tried to decide if this scene was worse than the kitchen or only felt that way because it was in front of her now, then that thought also slid from her mind.

"What happened in here?" she distantly heard Tavis ask at her shoulder. As she looked around, she didn't know how to answer, even if she had been capable of speaking.

In one corner, she saw the broken remnants of chairs, shattered and heaped against the wall as if they had been thrown there in a rage and shoved to the side. The floor was covered with a litter of debris and splattered with drips and runs of blood. She didn't need to check if the blood belonged to a Magicia after she looked at the bed. The coverlet and sheet were thrown back over the foot of the bed, dusty enough to have been there for a long time. The sheet that covered the mattress also looked like it had been there for a while, but in a different way. It was covered with layers of stains, sweat and blood and filth, all in the shape of a person her father's size lying with arms out held across the bed's width. Her eyes went to the layers of dried, rusty stains on the floor beside the bed and she choked on her cry. In the center of that stain, she saw a large loop, tied like a noose, at the end of a rope that snaked back into the shadows under the bed. She felt sure it was tied to something underneath, and that there would be one just like it on the other side exactly the same if she checked.

"They held him here," Fay gasped when she finally found her voice. She turned to Keari, who stood at her side. "What have they done to my father? What were they doing to him? How long has this been going on and no one saw it?"

She felt Tavis slip an arm around her again from her other side. Even as she took comfort from this gesture, her eyes continued to search the room. Sc.r.a.ps of cloth littered the floor and, from the colors and patterns, she recognized the remains of her father's clothes. She looked over at the only piece of furniture other than the bed that hadn't been destroyed entirely. She stared at it uncomprehendingly for several moments before realizing it had been her father's dresser. It was only when Keari stepped past her with a growl that she put the pieces together.

The drawers had been ripped out of the dresser, tossed aside carelessly under the window, and the top had been cleared of all the objects it had once held. Blood had dripped down the sides in long runners from the top. Fay flinched when she realized that there was one line that had not faded to the rusted brown of old blood. A long, dark object had been placed in the precise center of the top. It was shaped like a knife, but shone dully in a shaft of light that leaked through a rip in the drape over the window. The prince was staring at it intently, his eyes wide. Fay made herself walk a few steps closer, though her stomach rebelled at the idea of being any nearer to either the bed or dresser. Tavis went with her, his hand still resting in the small of her back.

Keari didn't look up at her approach. She could tell he was examining the object for every useful detail it might provide. She saw that the handle had been wrapped in a leather thong and that the blade curved oddly, as if it had not been shaped at all, and was merely used as it had broken. Keari said, "Obsidian. They have a ritual obsidian blade."

The words made no sense to her, though his tone sent a chill through her that suggested they should. For a moment, she thought that she was refusing to let it make sense to her. Clearly it made no sense to Tavis either, who asked uneasily, "What's going on here? What are you talking about?"

Keari finally turned away from the knife. His face was grave when he looked at Tavis. "There are special properties to the blood of people like us, those who can use magic. You can use your own to find someone connected to you by blood, as Lydia did with you in the Gardensia Exotica, or it can be used in certain kinds of spellwork. In that case, it is used outside the body to enable more complex workings or," his eyes flicked briefly to Fay then back to Tavis, "to affect someone else who is bound to the victim by blood."

"They've been trying to-" Tavis began before Lydia cut him off.

"We don't know what they've been trying to do. That's part of what we're here for."

Keari turned back to Fay now, "Are there any other rooms?"

She nodded slowly and said in a shaking voice, "My room. It's the only one we haven't checked yet."

Leading them out of the her father's room gratefully as she tried not to cry, she turned in the direction of her own. It took her a moment to get moving, and her mind's eye saw a vision of her things torn apart by some wild beast, the vygazza perhaps, and her father's blood everywhere there also. When she reached the door and swung it open, she stared in confusion around the room, not quite able to take in what she saw.

Her bedroom was almost exactly as she had left it. Her childhood toys were still lined up under the large window that let the sunlight stream in, dolls in back against the wall, magical puzzles lined up in front. A child-sized bookshelf stood on one side of the window, her favorite books sitting next to school books she had brought home over the years in Rianza. A dresser full of clothes she knew no longer fit her sat on the other side. The opposite wall held a desk that was now too low for her comfort, the chair tucked in and a neat stack of papers, quills and an ink pot set out on the surface. For a moment, she thought the room now contained two mirrors, the one difference from the last time she'd visited. Looking again, she saw that her old, short mirror was still in its corner. She frowned at the object at the end of her narrow child's bed and realized it couldn't be a mirror. The image didn't move when she did. She took a step closer, and saw brush strokes. It was a unframed canvas, a life-sized portrait of herself, only she didn't remember ever sitting for one, and certainly not since she had started wearing her hair loose and long. She also found it strange that it was set out to face the door, as if it had been waiting for her.

Keari let out a hiss behind her. He dragged her from the room and down the hall by one arm as she stared at him. His face had gone pale and his eyes were constantly scanning around as if he were trying to see everything at once. She turned to Lydia, hoping for an explanation of her partner's behavior, but saw the same expression on her face. They were at the top of the stairs again, Tavis trailing behind them when she was finally able to wrench her arm from the prince's grip. She planted her feet as he turned around and began to reach for her again.

"What is going on? I'm not taking another step until you tell me."

His eyes snapped with impatience and worry, but he spoke clearly when he answered. "That was a memory canvas. I've only seen them a few times in my life. They're rare."

"What's that?" Tavis asked.

"It's a magical painting. When the canvas is made, it's linked to someone's memory. Their most recent memory of the subject of the painting will always be shown on the canvas, though it will look painted. The reason I'm worried is because that one showed exactly what she's wearing at the moment. Her hair was exactly the same, everything identical. They could have been anywhere, and are likely still around. We need to leave, now."

Fay tried to look back down the hall to confirm this, but Tavis blocked her view. "How can that be possible? I only put this on this morning. The tunic is new. It's the first time I've ever worn it."

"Exactly. Whoever is linked to that canvas has seen you, Faylanna. Today. They are here at Iondis now. Even the stain on the bottom hem of your skirt was there." He took a deep breath and went on, more in control of himself. "We will come back. We will find out what they've done with Calder and what's going on, but we must leave now, for your safety."

She was looking down to see what stain he was talking about when she suddenly heard her father's voice calling her. Her head snapped up. The thought that he was there, outside, waiting for her, blazed through her mind. He was close enough that she could save him now. She listened and it came again, behind the house. His voice was so frail, full of pain. She had to get to him.