«Finist? Finist, love, it's me.»
There wasn't the slightest response. Maria continued, a bit more intensely:
«Finist! Come now, wake up!»
He didn't so much as stir, and Maria, staring at the wan, peaceful face, felt the first stirrings of alarm.
«You really are asleep, aren't you? I'm sorry to have to disturb you, but‑come, wake up! Finist! Wake up!»
But he slept on, composed and still as death.
«Finist!» Maria shook him, gently at first, then with increasing frenzy. «Oh, please, please, wake up! Finist!»
Dear God, it was useless! He wasn't going to awaken, no matter what she did. Ljuba wasn't going to let her prize escape, not so easily—she must have bespelled Finist while he was weak and defenseless from illness. And that meant…
A little sob of despair escaped Maria. She certainly didn't know how to fight sorcery.
Akh, but Finist… Aching with love, Maria reached out a gentle hand to caress his face, tenderly brushing back the wild locks of bright hair from his forehead.
But what was this? Something sharp was tangled in his hair.
Carefully she worked it free.
A pin? Maria held the ugly little thing gingerly between thumb and forefinger. It looked like iron—a very odd metal for a magician to be wearing.
Unless this was part of Ljuba's charm? With a sharp cry of disgust, Maria hurled the pin from her, then, shaking, turned to Finist—
But Finist slept on. And nothing she could do, not pleading with him, not shaking him, not even—wincing as she did this—slapping him, could make him wake.
«Finist…«It was a weary moan. «I've come all this long way for you! I've borne all my trials for you! Won't you waken for me? W-won't you…»
He stirred not the slightest of stirrings. And it was more, suddenly much more, than she could bear. Maria, who prided herself on never weeping, Maria, who hadn't wept during all her journey, at last felt her strength give way. Arms flung about Finist's still body, she sobbed in complete despair.
«How touching," said the coldest, most mocking of voices. «How very touching.»
Dear God, in her haste to get to Finist's side, she hadn't stopped to think there might be other doors into the royal chambers! Maria whirled, choking on her tears—and saw her death before her.
It was Ljuba.
Chapter XLIX
Power Play
Trapped, chained, wings pinned closely to his sides, the anguished falcon strained against his bindings, aching for the sky, staring painfully up at that endless, dizzying sweep of blue, at that open freedom he could never reach—
And then, all at once, it happened! Miraculously, the iron chains were falling away from him, and he was free, peel Breathless, bewildered, trembling with joy, the falcon leaped into the air on fiercely outstretched wings, soaring up and up and up.
But something was wrong. The fierce blue sky was turning overcast, grey as grief. And something was striking his upturned face—rain? Warm, salty rain? Confused, he felt his wings begin to falter… And now the sky was fading… and he was—
He was awake, and Finist, man, not falcon, and the warm, salty rain wasn't rain at all, but tears—
Who would be weeping for him? Surely not Ljuba! Finist blinked, trying to clear his hazy vision. As his senses returned, he froze, staring up in sheer, stunned wonder.
Oh kind, merciful, wonderful Heaven, could it be? These were Maria's tears! She was here, his dearest, somehow she was here!
«Maria…» Finist gasped.
But before he could say anything more, before he could see more than the very first, faint dawnings of joy on her face, she was turning wildly from him, staring with horror.
Ljuba stood in the doorway—a fierce-eyed Ljuba gathering Power to her to strike Maria down.
How could she know about— Aie, no time for questions! «Ljuba, stop!» Finist shouted, or tried to shout, struggling to get to his feet and— Oh, damn, damn, he didn't have the strength. He wasn't going to be able to stop Ljuba in time, and Maria was going to be slain right before his helpless eyes.
«No!»
There wasn't time for finesse. Finist abandoned the fragile physical, and desperately threw all the essence of his will at his cousin even as she struck. Power flared dazzlingly—there was a soundless, agonizing rending of reality about them—
And the world of flesh-and-blood was gone. Around them was… nothing.
Nearly nothing. There was no sense of hot or cold here, no clearly defined up or down, there was only a featureless, boundless blue-grey haze—a haze that fairly glowed with Power. And after a second of confusion, the prince realized with a surge of triumph what had happened. This place had nothing to do with any of the Realms of Flesh or Spirit:
We've thrown ourselves onto a plane of pure energy, of pure magic!
Granted, he could still kill himself here; though he had left his physical self somewhere back in reality, he was still linked to it, and there was always the chance he would exhaust that weakened body beyond the point of recovery.
It's worth the risk, thought Finist, drawing Power to him.
This time, he knew with a little shock of horror, it couldn't be a case of merely stopping his cousin. This time there could be no reprieves. After all the years of forgive and forgive, this time only one of them could survive.
Oh, my cousin! It was a cry of silent pain.
Ljuba struggled to get herself back under control. God, that had been a shock! First to find Finist conscious—and frighteningly coherent, too—then to be hurled roughly out of herself and dumped in this… wherever it was, at the mercy of her almost certainly vengeful cousin—
Akh, wait. This place had a strangeness to it, a tingling, electric strangeness that meant they could only have fallen onto a plane of pure magic.
Oh, Finist, you fool! I may be a weaker magician than you in the real world. But here, with Power all around me, I am truly your equal!
With that, she seized magic from the richness all about her, glorying in the ease of it, and hurled it at her cousin in a wild, raw, deadly wave of Power.
Off balance, Finist barely managed to defend himself against the savage attack that had plainly been meant to slay his mind and leave his body helpless. Of course, he thought, she still needs my body as her puppet. Staggering beneath the dizzying impact of that arcane wave, he sighed with relief to feel it striking, recoiling, breaking apart against the psychic wall he'd hastily hurled together.
Ljuba, too, was staggering, dazed by the backlash of unspent force.
Now's your chance! Finist shouted to himself. But he couldn't strike to kill‑curse him for a fool, he couldn't! Even knowing what she was, even knowing what she'd meant to do—he couldn't block the memory of the past. There she lingered in his mind, not the ruthless, lovely woman-who-was, but the girl-who'd-been, the girl he had been too young to know how to help, child‑Ljuba, unloved and so alone…
You idiot, forget your misplaced pity! She's a traitor to the crown; she tried to break your mind. She tried to kill Maria! Will you let her escape?
Shaking, Finist pulled Power to him, all the wild, terrible Power his being could control, and hurled it at Ljuba in one blazing, deadly spear-But the memory of a smooth golden form, warm and radiant in candlelight… the thought of that perfect form lying torn and broken in death…
And even as he hurled that blazing Power, Finist cried out in despair and cast it wide.