Its taste did little to erase the dryness in her mouth and had reduced her hunger only slightly. Her mind felt full and satisfied with the peaceful calm of magic that flowed through her blood and rested at her fingertips. She threw the bread among the bones beneath the window and walked back to the cushioned divan, unable to resist further rest.
Sitting down, she stared into the glowing coals in the brazier, focusing on their light. Though she wanted to be prepared for the coming battle, she considered sleep a necessary evil, tolerated but unwanted. "Wasted time," she murmured. She wondered at her own words.
Did they describe sleep, or her youth? Past and present were interchangeable at times, and she'd often feared waking up face down on the stone floor of the courtyard in Goorgian's pit. She scoffed at her foolishness and knew that worse fears lingered in the cloudy mists of her memory. When she awoke next, the Order of Twilight would move against Brookhollow and the Oracles of the Hidden Circle. As she lay on the long couch, she imagined their faces as she strode into their sacred ground, as her minions took apart their defenses and brought low the primary obstacle against her ambitions. Flames licked at the walls of their temple as she drifted to sleep. Her waking thoughts faded as she slumbered, giving way to incessant memory. Marble walls became rough stone and peace became chaos.
Talmen had escaped the battle, hiding in the ruins and wringing his hands in anger and fear. He did not consider himself a coward, but he knew a losing situation when he saw one. The Sedras had come prepared to kill and die in their crusade against his kind. The Gargauthans had not been prepared for either, trusting in the natural fear the Nar tribesman bore for the abandoned cities and ruins of their ancestors. They hadn't counted on Morgynn or a mother's desire to see a daughter dead. As the remainder of the Gargauthans fled in a hail of arrows and spears, Talmen watched. The Sedras gathered around their high priestess, prying her away from the fallen form of Morgynn.
Climbing up on ropes and bare stone, the Sedras left the pit known as the Well of Goorgian, taking with them their own dead and leaving the rest to rot. Time passed and the malefactor saw no evidence that the Sedras would return, but he could still hear noises high above and he ordered the other priests to go below, deeper into the ruins. The light of numerous flames flickered from the mouth of the pit, growing brighter with each breath. Talmen could feel the heat that filled the chamber and watched in rage as stone melted and dripped. Crashing down in a glowing cascade, the magic of Lathander's priests sealed the entrance with molten rock, causing cave-ins that blocked any escape.
As the seal spread, compounding itself with fallen rocks and cold soil from beneath the tundra's surface, Talmen's eyes returned to the still and bloody body of Morgynn. Even in death he found her beautiful.
Looking to the darkness behind him, to the safety in the lower depths, he was suddenly pulled by some unfathomable desire to that battered body staring at him with blank and half-closed eyes. He was at her side in a few heartbeats, dodging the rocks and glowing bits of debris that tumbled down the steep sides of the collapsing pit. A heated rock landed on the hem of his robe, burning a neat hole through it and setting it aflame. He cursed and beat the fire away, glaring at the unseen presence of the Sedras above, swearing an oath to exact satisfaction for their incursion. Looking down on Morgynn again, his oath took form and face, seeing the proper tool for such vengeance.
Without delay, he pulled her legs away from the glowing, encroaching wall and lifted her limp form over his shoulder. He carried her, disappearing into the chilled corridors and fallen stairways of the ancient city. Grimly, his mind was already beginning to imagine what bargaining it would take to gain Gargauth's favor in this endeavor. As he pushed on, deeper and deeper, he felt a sense of providence and strange destiny, a calm that strengthened his resolve to continue. In spite of that feeling, uneasiness lurked somewhere behind it, like the waiting jaws of a trap from which he might never escape.
Morgynn's eyelids fluttered and she rolled uneasily in her sleep, but she did not awaken from her slumber on the divan.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Elisandrya sat on a boulder and stared. She had done all she knew for Quin-bandaged his wounds, mixed healing herbs for poultices as the Ghedia had taught her, and collected rain water for him to drink when he stirred. He'd slept peacefully the entire day. Night was once again dominating behind the clouds, banishing the misty, veiled light of the sun. In the flicker of the small campfire, she studied him and wondered if he was the one-if Savras had led her to him. The implications of that possibility boggled her mind in light of Sameska's prophecy. She saw no symbols of Hoar on him, no sign that he followed the fickle lord of justice. He was attractive in an odd way.
A pervading sense of goodness surrounded him, but something else lingered in his strange eyes, something dark. That curiosity held her gaze for a long time. Eli had seen and heard of aasimar before, people touched by the blood of a celestial ancestor, but she had never come face to face with one or known their names. He had fought with an unexpected fierceness, a lust for battle that went far beyond mere necessity. She had not gone so far as to touch the screaming blade he'd wielded in battle, having wrapped it in his cloak and carried it carefully out of the temple through a secret passage beneath the altar. Quin coughed in his sleep, disrupting her thoughts as he finally awoke. Groaning, he rolled away from the fire, shielding his eyes. His hand went to his side and he looked about, searching for the sword absent from his hip. "Not to worry, stranger, your blade is safe." Quin turned and stared at her for a few moments before recognition dawned. Their introduction had been interrupted so abruptly. She wasn't surprised he didn't know her at first. Though the events afterward had felt like days, he still knew her name.
"Elisandrya." "Yes. You've been asleep for quite some time. I'm surprised to see you awake after the beating you took, and had obviously taken before. You lied to me when you said you were all right." "I never said I was all right, just that I would survive." His wan smile belied the pain in his aching body. "I guess I was right, eh?" "Just barely," she murmured, and leaned forward to check the bandages on his leg. Quin's hand shot forward and grabbed her wrist, holding it inches above the injury. He looked at her in confusion and alarm. Eli froze, shocked by his reaction, but his grip relaxed as he realized her intent. He waited quietly while she inspected the wound.
"I don't think it's fractured, but the skin was broken and the bone is surely bruised. You were lucky. If the mastiff had held a moment longer, it could've been much worse." An awkward silence came between them as Eli sat back and stoked the fire. Quin looked away, and she felt sorry for him. Though they were strangers to one another, despite fighting for their lives together, he seemed more vulnerable than she'd imagined. It did not seem a trait he was comfortable with. She knew herself that independence breeds a tough skin until broken by circumstance or injury. Not wanting to rely on others seemed a trait they shared. "I'm sor-" he began. "No need for apologies. I'd have reacted much the same had our situations been reversed." She turned to look at him. "Trust is a hard thing to come by." "Indeed," he answered quietly. Returning her attention to the fire, she changed the subject.
"How did you know how to seal the temple like that?" "I've seen its like before." He pushed himself to a sitting position as he spoke, wincing. "Demon cults, usually. Their priests are fanatical about recruiting new followers into the fold, but not very attached when it comes to enacting suicide pacts for their unholy masters. When the time for poison, bleeding, or flames comes, measures are taken to ensure the souls reach their intended destination. "Stone blocks, or locked or guarded doors keep the followers inside, while the priest himself escapes, extolling the virtues of spreading the faith."