“Kirion!”
He turned and laughed, Hadrann’s brainless cousin. “What are you doing here, cousin?” He sneered. “It’s the wrong time to come calling on a sorcerer. Do you want a potion to make you pretty, to make men love you, is that it? Well, once I’m done here I might even give it to you. But you’ll have to wait.”
“No,” Aisling said quietly. “I’m done with waiting.”
He turned sharply. “You’ll do what you’re told, you brainless clod.”
“You could not order me as a child. You will not order me now,” was her reply. Kirion stared. Something teased the corners of his eyes. By Cup and Flames, the girl was beglamoured. His hands wove a swift spell and cast it outward. It passed over her, and she changed before him. Kirion gave a strangled yelp of recognition, then smiled, a slow evil smile of anticipation.
“Sister. My dear little sister. Come out of your kennel at Aiskeep to see your brother. What a prize for me. What a morsel of power. I’ll drain you and that jewel dry, and feast.”
No.
“Oh?” She was too confident. Allies! That was it: there were others. He cast his power out again and winced. Two humans and—he blinked in amusement—a cat. Kirion flung back his head. A high whinnying laugh rang out from him. “Dear little sister, you bring help against me but what help? Two without training and a cat. If that is all you can conjure against me, then I have nothing to fear. Let me deal first with them.”
He hurled power so that it flowed about the three who stood behind her. Kirion poured out more of his darkness until he knew them held fast. Then he turned back to his sister as she waited. He studied her a moment, and his smile was hungry.
“That jewel, it tells me where you were, but it is a gateway into you, sister. I have the power to draw from it all you are.” He raised his hand slowly, speaking soft words that seemed to smoke across the room. The chain that held the jewel fell into glittering dust, the jewel flew to Kirion, seeming to nestle into his hand. He smiled.
“Now, sister, I shall have it all.”
“Ishari!” She spoke aloud the word that would free the jewel’s power, even as his mind probed into it.
She was still near the door, her allies behind her, and Kirion was almost in the center of a large room. The jewel exploded, but Aisling was able to shelter herself and those with her. Kirion too was more fortunate than Aisling would have wished. He had always feared some trap of the power might strike at him, so about himself he had layered protections.
The jewel’s force beat at those like a whirlwind. Kirion reinforced his words from within, spending recklessly almost everything he had left. The trap tore at his protections, tearing them down almost as fast as he could reinforce them. For long moments they contended, but Kirion had sucked just sufficient power from his two victims. When the storm was over, he was unharmed, yet there were only the dregs of his power remaining to him. Now, it seemed, was the time to use Varnar.
Kirion spoke his word softly. In the corner Varnar shuddered. His eyes snapped shut in a reflex of agonizing pain. His wife, his adored child. In that instant both died, and he knew the bitter truth: he’d been tricked, betrayed, cheated of all he’d ever wanted and come to believe in. They had been lovely illusions, his life with them crafted perfectly to cause him the greatest agony a man could bear. He was Varnar the ugly, Varnar the scarred. Varnar who walked alone and always had, always would. He groaned, a slight breathy sound redolent of the agony that filled his mind and heart. His master drank in the torment and felt dark power swell within him.
Unseen by the sorcerer Wind Dancer padded forward. Hadrann and Keelan were bound by Kirion’s spell, but the big cat was untouched. He moved with the slow flowing gait of the hunter.
Aisling had learned from Hilarion, but her gift was mostly for the land, for healing and growing. Her spells were more defensive than those that brought death or destruction. Kirion was chanting. His power slashed out, striving to reach her again, to drain from her all she had or was. She shielded as step by step she closed with him. For a moment she felt despair. He was too strong, too skilled. He’d had longer to learn, and his sorcery was overcoming her mists.
But Kirion too was growing fearful. The girl was still advancing. Involuntarily he stepped back a pace, then another, half-turning as he retreated. Wind Dancer had circled. His paws were silent as he padded around behind the fringe of wall drape. He moved until he was just inside his enemy’s edge of vision, paused to be sure Kirion caught the movement, then leaped.
As he did so, he howled, the wild tearing cry of a cat about to give lethal battle. Kirion flung up an arm and screamed a word. Fire surrounded the leaping cat. It dispelled the glamour Wind Dancer still wore and more. To Kirion’s amazement the attacking beast swelled in size. It was now twice, three times the size of a normal cat, but other than that, Kirion’s power had left it unharmed. He cursed and drew savagely on Varnar’s pain.
It flooded in, transformed into the rawness of dark power. But Wind Dancer had reached the sorcerer. His claws and teeth fastened to a leg, and Kirion howled as they dug in. He seized the beast by the scruff, dragging him loose and casting him aside with all his strength. Wind Dancer hit the wall with stunning impact. As he landed, Kirion struck at him again with a hammer blow of force. No spell, no finesse, merely brute power. Wind Dancer wavered up onto his paws. His ribs were flaring pain where he had met the edge of the wall.
Across Wind Dancer’s shoulders he felt a touch. The pain was gone. It was Kirion alone who saw a dim upright shape standing behind the big cat. It turned slanted, emerald cat-eyes on him, and scowled even as one hand touched away Wind Dancer’s injuries. Distracted, the sorcerer stepped back once more.
From his corner Varnar came crawling weakly. He’d lost everything. His wife and child had been illusion, all their happy years together illusion’s bitter ash. Everything he’d remembered, dreamed, rejoiced in—all had been dreams to sow a harvest of power in pain for the man who used him.
He crawled forward, not knowing why, only that he wanted to hurt the one who’d torn out his heart and feasted on his pain. If these people wished to harm his enemy, then he’d aid them with his last breath. Wind Dancer had paused. He felt a hand stroke lightly over his ears. There was a scent in the air about him. No human would have smelled it, but the nose of a cat is far keener. It reminded him of herbs his human used. He took in the room with one swift cat-eyed glare.
There two of his human friends were held unable to move. There, a man who stank of pain, crawled. There too another lay shuddering. One who’d been kind to Wind Dancer, now struck down by an enemy. His human was closing with that enemy. She should not fight alone while Wind Dancer, hunter, warrior, son of Shosho remained alive. He felt approval flow from the presence that stood by him. It warmed him, although he had no need of approval. He was a cat; he would do what he willed, and he willed to attack. He screamed again as he leaped.
Beset on two sides Kirion lost his temper. He cast a curtain of fire about Wind Dancer and Aisling. The cat ignored it and appeared on the other side before the surprised Kirion. Aisling had diverted the fire cast at her. To one side the wall hangings were smoldering. Her fingers wove frantically as she tried to contain the dark power her brother had stolen. Varnar reached his master. The strength Kirion leeched from him was slowly stopping his heart, but he had strength enough to reach up.
He ignored the duke, crawling past him as Shastro sprawled, deep in his own pain. The white fire was consuming the man who’d ruled, but Shastro didn’t care, not since he’d seen his cousin’s faces. He’d seen Aisling’s transformation and dimly understood she was the sister Kirion had spoken of before. The cat’s change was more puzzling, but he had no strength left to bother with that. He clung to the remnants of his life. Something told him he should, and dumbly he obeyed.