"You honor me, Empress Llawan."
"Not yet, Director. First, we will test your flash of inspiration. This audience is over."
Llawan broke the connection, and Veza watched the mirror go dark. Then she carefully laid it down and pushed herself off the floor into the water. She felt calm and confident, but her exhilaration faded into fatigue as she floated in lazy circles around her tidal pool.
She knew she'd been ignoring her regular duties as depot director, but she also knew that however things happened, she wouldn't have to worry about them for very much longer. Either her idea would bear fruit, Llawan would reward her, and Aboshan would declare her his enemy. Or, her idea would fail, and Llawan would punish her, and she'd be stuck in Breaker Bay forever, with plenty of time to catch up on her paperwork.
In any case, she thought, she wasn't in any shape to do anything with the next few hours but take some well-earned time to herself in the gentle lapping waves of Breaker Bay.
CHAPTER 11
Chainer awoke in his own private bedroom. He looked around to determine where he was, then checked himself for wounds. There were some minor cuts and bruises, and a few more serious injuries which had already been stitched up and bandaged over. His scanning eyes came to rest on his chain coiled around the bedpost by his foot, and he remembered everything that had happened to him outside the vault.
Everything but how he got back to his own room, that is. He recalled Skellum leading him through the labyrinth of halls and down Manor Way to the academy, but such indistinct memories were quickly eclipsed by images of Deidre's death and the echo of the Mirari's call. Chainer lunged out of bed, but his legs failed, and he fell heavily to the floor. His muscles wouldn't flex, and he could hardly move. His head swam, and his eyes, ears, and throat were raw.
It was only then that he noticed Skellum. His mentor was sitting in a large, wooden rocker with a vague look on his face. Without so much as a flicker of an eyelid, Skellum tossed a censer across the room to Chainer. "Catch."
Chainer slapped his hands around the pewter cage before it hit him in the chest and then winced as his arms objected.
"Skellum," he said through the pain, "they got Deidre. Did they get the Mirari?"
"Catch," Skellum said, and he tossed Chainer's knuckle dagger to him. Chainer was unable to get his fingers to work in time and had to roll out from under the dagger's point before it stuck in the floor. The abandoned censer rolled halfway back toward Skellum. "Skellum, what in nine hells-"
"Catch." Chainer realized his mentor's hat had been spinning a split second before Skellum stopped a gap in front of his face. The vortex spat a small smoking comet toward Chainer. He yelped and reflexively snapped his hand out as if casting his chain.
To his surprise, a black chain did leap out of his empty hand. Its sharp, weighted end intercepted Skellum's casting before it could fully form. There was a small pop, an oily flash, and a foul smell.
Then Skellum was out of the chair and standing over him. Chainer had forgotten how fast the older man was. Chainer himself lie panting and helpless on the floor with his hands crossed defensively over his face.
"I give, Master, I give," he said. "What's going on? Why won't you talk to me? Where's the Mirari?"
"Kirtar of the Order has your precious Mirari," Skellum said. "A wild Krosan dragon came straight into the arena. There was a lot of noise and confusion. Kirtar and your barbarian friend stopped it, and the Master of the Games gave the Mirari to the bird-man as a reward."
Chainer absorbed this. "Kamahl let him take it? Is he all right?" "Kamahl was buried under a half-ton of dead dragon," Skellum said. "By the time he dug himself out, Kirtar was gone, with that pretentious mer ambassador trailing behind him like a scavenger. Do fish scavenge after birds, or is it the other way around? Never mind. Your barbarian friend was half a day behind. He took off after them as soon as we told him they had the sphere."
"I wanted him to have it," Chainer said absently. "The First said he would have won it."
"And he could well have, but now we'll never know. The Mirari is gone, the First is pleased, and we have work to do." He prodded Chainer roughly with the toe of his boot. "Get up."
"Ow. Why? Don't I get to sleep in after protecting the vault? Deidre and that monkey guy were killed, you know."
"I do know, and you did get to sleep after protecting the vault. You've been asleep since I brought you here three days ago." "Three days? It can't be."
"It is. You've slept long enough." He offered Chainer his hand, but his face was still stem and impatient.
Chainer carefully took Skellum's hand and stood unsteadily. "Master," he said, "have I done wrong?"
"Wrong?" Skellum jerked his hand away and shoved Chainer back onto his bed. The younger man clawed helplessly at the air as he fell. He had never heard Skellum raise his voice in anger before. "You abandoned an assignment given to you by the First himself. You used the dementia exercise I expressly told you not to use. You killed three more members of the Order after the First and I both forbade you to do so, and you killed them using a spell that you never told your mentor you knew how to perform."
Chainer waited. Skellum would often browbeat him before praising him, but this was different. Chainer didn't think Skellum was going to break into a smile and laugh off these indiscretions any time soon.
"This isn't a game, Chainer. Games take place in the pits. Games have rules, they have winners and losers. People watch games for amusement. What you did, what I do-what all dementists do-it's not like anything else. You can't dabble in it. You can't polish it and put it in your weapons rack at the end of the day. Dementia space is alive. It interacts with you, it changes you. It shapes you just as surely as you shape it."
"Master-"
"Be silent. The First thinks I'm too careful with you. I don't know what you think, and I don't much care."
"Mast-"
"Be silent! I have trained scores of casters and potential dementists. The vast majority-" he tapped his temple with all five fingers brought to a point- "are gone. They only appear to be here in Cabal City with the rest of us. In reality, they only visit us occasionally. The rest of their time is spent raving, or meditating, or drooling quietly in a darkened room while they run wild in their own dementia space. Do you understand me at all, Chainer? What we do breaks minds. And the sad fact is that a broken mind won't stop you from being an excellent dementia caster. In fact, it often helps."
"But I," Skellum's voice softened slightly, "want you lucid. I want you to be a full-fledged dementist. There is far too much in this world to be enjoyed, and madness tends to water down some of life's strongest flavors. I would rather have you here, in this world, sharing a good meal and a good show while we both serve the Cabal. Not lost in the world within, constantly building monsters so you can surround yourself with them."
Skellum bent his face over Chainer's, and his voice dropped to a terse whisper. "The First also wants you lucid, for his own reasons.
You and I both serve the First, we both serve the Cabal, but that doesn't mean we can't also serve ourselves."
Chainer shut his eyes tightly, then reopened them. "I'm sorry, Master. I don't understand."
Skellum's voice grew stern again. "That is why you should listen to me and follow my instructions."
"I will, Master. I swear it." Chainer offered his hand up to Skel-lum. "Help me to succeed. Give me your instructions. I will not disappoint you again."