I saw no reason to deny it. “I wouldn’t exactly call what happened between us a meeting. More like an avoidance.”
“Only on your part,” he murmured. “Sarad Nukpana is most eager to make your acquaintance.”
I shrugged. “I seem to be having that effect on men lately.”
“Yes, there is something about you that is oddly bewitching.”
I tapped my heel against the floor, knocking some of the mud from my boots. “Must be some indescribable quality I have.”
“I can describe it quite well. A silver medallion of elven make, carved with runes that do not seem to mean anything—except to a dead elven Guardian who had it forged nine hundred years ago. Does that sound familiar?”
I shook my head, which wasn’t easy to do around the lump that had taken up residence in my throat. “Not in the least. But then it doesn’t sound like my taste in jewelry either.”
The goblin prince leaned forward, close enough for me to catch his scent. Sandalwood mixed with spices. His voice was soft and low. “Sarad Nukpana knows you have it—as do I. Your secret is out, Mistress Benares.”
I let the silence grow for a few moments, and when I spoke, my voice was steady, which was another surprise. I made no move to show him the amulet, and I certainly wasn’t going to take it off, even if I could.
“I really think you could afford better,” I told him. “Mermeia has some of the finest silversmiths in the seven kingdoms. What’s so special about this particular chunk of metal?”
It was the prince’s turn to grow some silence. He did it well, and he did it for longer than I did. As the silence expanded, so did his smile. It was genuine. He found something amusing, and I think I was at the business end of his joke.
“You actually do not know what you carry.” There was a note of wonder in his voice. “How can that be?” Then he thought of something that tickled his funny bone even more. “I could tell you,” he teased, “but your stay here would have to be longer. I could not risk you interfering with my plans.”
I wasn’t about to give him the amulet, so he could plan on keeping me here for as long as he liked. I had yet to be locked up anywhere that I couldn’t get out of.
I settled back in the cushions, and leisurely crossed my legs at the ankles. “Enlighten me.” Chigaru Mal’Salin wasn’t exactly the information source I had in mind, but since no one else was willing to talk, I’d take my knowledge where I could get it.
The prince’s black eyes glittered in the dim firelight. “What do you know of the Saghred?”
I knew it was goblin. When Garadin had taught me goblin history, he had concentrated on the crazies—which meant I had a more than adequate knowledge of the Mal’Salin dynasty. The Saghred had been temporarily in the possession of Omari, a Mal’Salin king who had elevated insanity to an art form.
“A legendary talisman first heard of in your peoples’ Fifth Age,” I said, as if reciting from Garadin’s lesson. “It was said to be a black rock that fell from the sky. It was incredibly heavy, but it was only the size of a man’s fist. Rumor had it King Omari wanted to use it to destroy anyone and anything he didn’t like, which was pretty much everyone and everything. Rumor also had it the rock was more than capable of all of the above and then some. Only shamans of the highest order could wield it—at least for a while. Eventually they all went insane and destroyed themselves. The Saghred was contained in a specially made casket of white stone from the Sorce Mountains. The Guardians took it away from King Omari. They tried to destroy it and failed, so they hid it. It was never seen again.” I paused, mostly for air. “I couldn’t walk all that well if I had a rock that heavy hanging around my neck, Your Highness.”
“No doubt,” the prince agreed. “And the Saghred is not an object safely transported. Which is why the Guardian charged with protecting it had a beacon made to enable him to watch his charge without having to keep it with him, or remain in the Saghred’s hiding place for the rest of his life.”
I realized where this was going, and it wasn’t anyplace I wanted to be. “Let me guess, you think his jewelry commission was a silver medallion.”
The goblin prince didn’t answer. He just smiled.
“A beacon with which to locate the Saghred,” he told me. “In my people’s language, the word Saghred roughly translates as ‘Thief of Souls,’ something else it is said to do. According to legend, shamans who had fallen from royal favor were sacrificed to the stone. The shamans doing the sacrificing received enhanced powers from the stone in exchange for their gift. Those enhanced powers came with an extended life and insanity; being sacrificed meant your soul was trapped for eternity inside the stone.”
The prince leaned forward in his chair. “And if I may correct you, Mistress Benares.” His silken voice was little more than a murmur. “While all the shamans who used the Saghred did go insane, only a few actually destroyed themselves. Most were taken by the stone.”
The only sound was the crackle of the fire. “Taken?” I whispered.
“While using the Saghred. If the stone hungered, it would feed to sustain itself. Those shamans were absorbed, Mistress. Their powers and souls added to those already trapped inside—trapped for eternity with the very colleagues they had sacrificed with their own hands.”
“Not much of a welcoming committee.”
The prince smiled. “No doubt. Goblin armies that carried the Saghred before them were indestructible—and their adversaries were annihilated. My brother and Sarad Nukpana want the Soul Thief very badly. I do not want them to succeed in acquiring it. My wants are simple, Mistress Benares. You have the beacon. You are a seeker. You will help me find the Saghred first. Once I have it, you and the boy will be allowed to leave here alive and whole.”
I had the lodestone to an ancient soul-stealing rock hanging around my neck. Wonderful. I had no intention of being caught in the middle of some twisted sibling rivalry. And under no circumstances was I going to help a Mal’Salin, any Mal’Salin, or anyone working for a Mal’Salin gain possession of something with the pet name “Soul Thief.”
“My skills in the craft are marginal at best,” was what I said. “I’m hardly qualified to help you.”
“One does not need to be a mage to use a beacon—or for the beacon to use you. I had been told that this particular beacon was keyed to its maker. Yet, according to my teacher, you have been able to tap its power quite effectively.”
So much for wondering if Primari A’Zahra Nuru sensed me outside Tam’s nightclub this morning.
“I am curious to know how you can do this,” the prince continued, “but that’s not important at the moment. Finding the beacon was one problem for my brother, finding someone who could wield it was another matter altogether. So now I must not only keep the beacon from my brother, but you as well. And since there is the possibility that Sarad Nukpana will be able to locate the Saghred on his own, we must find the Soul Thief first.”
“And if I refuse?”
As expected, he cast the barest glance at Piaras. I needed no further elaboration, and I hoped the prince didn’t see the need to give it.
“Sathrik murdered our mother with his own hands, Mistress Benares. He killed or exiled her most trusted counselors, and he has tried to kill me on numerous occasions. Now he has brought that shaman from the lower hells to rule beside him.” He paused, and I could see the muscles working in his jaw. “Even more that his diseased mind desires will be his once he has the Thief of Souls. Sarad Nukpana only needs spilled lifeblood to open it, and a soul sacrifice to tap its power.” His voice dropped to the barest whisper. “My brother has everything, with even more to gain. I have nothing left to lose.”
His eyes were jet orbs. Not only was he determined, he was desperate—and probably willing to do things a normal person would find just a little bit insane. Unfortunately his brother wasn’t here for him to take it out on. After being brought up in the same house as Sathrik Mal’Salin, I could almost understand the mentally unstable part. And on a certain level, I could understand and almost sympathize with his motivation, but not with what he was trying to do.