But once all was said and done, his hand seemed to spasm open of its own accord. The tin dropped back into his cloak.
Anusha watched him a moment more, then asked, "Do you suffer? I don't understand. You said your Lord of Bats keeps you from succumbing to the effects of traveler's dust."
"True, but the craving never leaves me."
"Maybe you're not getting the full benefit of your arrangement."
Japheth considered, and then said, "I have taken more than the Lord of Bats was willing to offer. I may not negotiate further without risking all I have already gained."
Anusha digested that, and then she asked, "What is a 'pact stone'? In my half brother's office, Behroun said he'd break your pact stone if you didn't do as he said, and something about how that would make the Lord of Bats so mad he'd come for you."
The girl looked at him, waiting for a reply. Confident she'd get one. Was this unearned confidence a product of her youth or her privileged upbringing? Or, it dawned on him, perhaps it was merely her personality.
"It is a complicated story."
Anusha stretched back. "We have days before we get to the atoll, you said. Tell me."
Japheth rubbed together the thumb and forefinger of the hand that had so recently held the dust tin. Why shouldn't he tell her?
The warlock said, "All right. This is the story. Before it became widely recognized that traveler's dust was ultimately lethal, I traveled too far down the crimson road. I knew I was to die, so I decided to perish in dramatic fashion, at a time of my own choosing. I took all the dust I had at one time. A lethal dose."
Anusha put a hand to her mouth.
"The crimson road leads directly into what may be the literal Abyss. Demons wait, hunger chasing across their glassy eyes. Victims of the dust walk, screaming, into demonic embrace. The road ends in a precipice, and in its tooth-lined gullet the drug-addled are consumed, mind and soul."
The girl's eyes were wide. The high color in her cheeks drained to parchment white. She believed him.
"Terrified, I regretted my decision and called out for succor, promising anything, if someone would save me from my self-inflicted fate. And thus, when a great bat sailed down from the burning sky, I thought it was my savior. It grasped me up before I could plunge to the road's terminus. Its claws held me tight, but they also cut me."
Japheth's words quickened. "It winged up through a tempest of fire, ice, and lightning, until we emerged into an enchanted reflection of the world. I saw streams of crystal water, vivid forests of living green, and mountains so high their beauty and majesty stopped my breath. I recognized it as the same landscape described in a tome I had been reading, Fey Pacts of Ancient Days. I realized the great winged creature was an entity also named in that tome, and I knew fear again. For the creature that held me could be none other than the Lord of Bats."
Into the silence that followed, Anusha asked, "Who is the Lord of Bats? A god?"
Japheth shook his head. "No god, but a powerful and potent creature, if called up in just the proper fashion. More by luck than wit, I had done so in dabbling with the ancient tome that named him, and my subsequent promise to enter into a bargain with any that saved me. The Lord of Bats had the strength to find me, save me, and seal a pact between us."
"A mutually beneficial pact?"
"It might have been, but in the urgency of my need, I promised everything and all; I pledged my soul, though I needn't have done so, had I known better. The Lord of Bats took advantage of my desperation. He sealed my pledge to him in a physical object-a small emerald pendant. The pact stone. It is the pact stone Behroun threatened to break, if I didn't do as I was told."
Anusha's brows tightened with incomprehension.
"My pact stone is, for all its small size, laden with consequence. Because it exists, I can call upon fell powers and feats of magic that are known to the Lord of Bats. Moreover, I can command the Lord of Bats's lesser minions, use his implements of power as my own, and even travel to his shadowed fortress. The stone is a potent tool, and it binds me to him, and him to me."
"Why would he cede you so much of his power? That seems like a mistake."
"The pact stone has one more function. The Lord of Bats pledged to take back my pact-born powers, then to drink my blood and eat my body, should the stone ever be destroyed. He invested the stone with such consequence so he could hold it to ensure my good behavior. If the pact stone is broken, I lose my powers and the Lord of Bats comes for me to collect his due."
"Oh!" Anusha gripped his shoulder as if to comfort him. He didn't shrink from the contact.
"The Lord of Bats showed me the pact stone. He told me he would destroy it if I did not do as he commanded in all things. He said I would be his puppet in the world that had banned his entry. He said that through me, the Lord of Bats would hunt the world again, as he had done in the days when humans were still 'beasts without language' and Faerie hadn't receded from the world."
The warlock clenched both fists and said in a louder voice, "Snatched so recently from the crimson road, I had little to Ipse. Without pondering the danger, I called swiftly and without full understanding on the power the Lord of Bats bequeathed me. I wrested the pact stone from him even as he brandished it!" "He let the stone go?"
"His ego was his undoing, I suppose. He couldn't conceive I'd have the effrontery or wit to immediately act. Perhaps he was used to dealing with primeval men of duller wit. Perhaps his fey nature prevented him from recognizing my mortal desperation. After he realized his error, it was too late. With stone in hand, I commanded a portion of his power, and I held the implement through which he'd planned to leash me. We fought, but I imprisoned him in the highest spire of his own fortress. I claimed the castle as my own and returned to the world. I was my own agent, and the world seemed alight with possibility and promise. Until your half brother stole the stone."
"Behroun is a criminal and a bastard," agreed the girl. "I can't believe I share even half his blood. But he is no wizard or sage. How did he discover the significance of the stone?"
"That question has long troubled me. I suspect the Lord of Bats sent out messages on bat wings far and wide. The Lord of shadow-mantled Darroch Castle schemes always to break the stone, whereupon he would free himself and find me. He must have made contact with Behroun and showed Lord Marhana the significance of the stone. Not long after, I received a cordial invitation to visit New Sarshel."
The girl sniffed. "He has a way with words, when he tries."
"Yes, and my guard was down. I had no reason to suspect a trap. Moreover, I didn't expect anyone in the world to recognize the pact stone's significance, and I was lax in its safekeeping. Once I arrived in New Sarshel, your half brother employed master thieves to bring him the stone. His instruction from the Lord of Bats was to smash it. But upon gaining my pact stone, Behroun was too savvy to break it. Instead, he uses it to compel my service even as the Lord of Bats meant to." "I am so sorry, Japheth."
He made no reply. He merely looked into her eyes. They were dark pools of mystery hinting at unphimbed depths.
She leaned forward, her lips slightly parted. It would be so easy to bend to meet her halfway and touch his lips to hers.
His heart tried to escape his chest, beating with two coequal emotions: confusion and desire.
The warlock stood abruptly and said the first thing that came into his head. "Would you like to see Darroch Castle? I can show you. We can use my cloak as a bridge."
The moment was broken, as he'd intended. And now half regretted.
The girl sighed. Then she cocked her head and smiled. She nodded up at him. "I'm on a ship bound for who knows where because I wanted to see wonders beyond Sarshel. Now you say you want to show me the castle you keep in your cloak? Of course… but is it safe?"