“At least they’re not flying,” said Tenquis.
Geth dropped back to climb with them. “You’ve used magic to help us march faster before,” he said to her.
She’d thought of the spell, too, and dismissed it. “They’re drawn to my songs. We’d only have to fight more of them.”
“Not if you can make us faster than they are.”
Ekhaas pressed her lips together for a moment-then nodded. “Stay close,” she warned.
She’d sung spells in battle many times. She’d sung spells in stealth. She’d sung a spell to inspire an entire army and had almost turned the tide of a battle. Somehow, though, summoning up a song as she climbed the long stairs seemed harder than anything she’d ever done before. Her chest already ached at every breath. Darkness and the weight of a mountain pressed down around her. The angry spirits of ancient duur’kala pursued her, and the lives of three of her friends depended on her magic.
And yet she felt a strange flush of satisfaction as she focused her will and sang. She might never be welcome among her clan again, but she was doing something no Kech Volaar had dared to do before. If she and the others could break free, the tiny piece of knowledge that she carried might be the key to saving a nation.
Slapping her hands to set the rhythm and stomping down with every footfall to reinforce it, Ekhaas let the magic flow out of her. She didn’t try to sing against the chorus of the ghosts this time. Instead she sang with it, as if their song were a wind and she were a boat running before it. Her climbing pace quickened. So did the others’ as the magic swept them up. The stone steps raced past beneath them until it seemed as if even the floating globes that she had conjured for light might have trouble keeping up.
And if the chorus of the ghosts grew even stronger in response to her song, it just pushed them along a little faster. The whole shaft echoed and rang with the power of the songs sung within it.
Then they were breaking over the edge of the shaft like a wave breaking on a beach. The transition from racing up the stairs to running across the floor of the cavern made Ekhaas stumble a bit, but she recovered without losing the cadence of her song. They ran on, a little more slowly as the rough floor forced them to watch their steps and the twisting paths among the artifacts once again forced Ekhaas to try and recall the way through the vault back to the stairs that would lead them to safety. Which way to turn at the iron markers? Here left. There right.
She didn’t even notice that the ghostly song they’d left behind in the shaft had been renewed until Geth shouted. She felt the hard grip of his gauntlet on her shoulder, thrusting her aside. A shimmering mask of death, mouth open in song, eyes sealed by untold ages, whirled past her. The ground seemed to rise up and slam into the entire length of her body.
The rhythm broke. The song ended-and another wailing song, angrier than ever, took its place. Ekhaas sucked in a gasping breath and rolled over, looking for the others. Tenquis and Chetiin hung back, wand and dagger at the ready, as they peered off into the darkness, but Geth…
Geth stood with Wrath drawn and poised. Before him, one of the ghosts swayed back and forth as if looking for an opening in his defense. Its fingers stroked the air. Its song sank down and wavered like a breeze.
It struck.
But Geth struck faster. Wrath spun in his grasp, cutting a sweeping arc through misty arm and insubstantial body. Radiance like fading twilight burst from the purple byeshk, the ancient magic of the blade biting deep. The ghostly duur’kala’s song rose in an inharmonious screech as the phantom crumpled in on itself and vanished. It was different from the way the ghosts slid away in reaction to her songs-there was a finality about it. This ghost would not be returning.
Geth shook cobwebby threads from Wrath’s blade and grinned at Ekhaas, showing all his teeth. “At least we know Wrath can hurt them.”
“Getting out is still a better option.” The songs of more ghosts rose from all sides, converging on them. The ghosts had been the same ones that had pursued them from the Vault of the Eye or they might have belonged to the Vault of the Night-Sun-Ekhaas had no desire to find out. She spun around, trying to regain her bearings. They stood at an intersection of paths. The one carrying the moon symbol of the eye marked the way they had come. The way back to the stairs lay along…
She spun around again. And cursed. “Khaavolaar!”
“Which way, Ekhaas?” asked Chetiin tightly.
“Straight ahead!” said Tenquis. “I remember passing that war chariot.”
Ekhaas looked down the path ahead. She recognized the war chariot, too, but they hadn’t seen it from that angle before. She looked right, then left, then glanced at Geth. He shook his head.
“Go with your gut,” he said.
She turned and plunged down the path on the left. She heard Tenquis curse behind her. “That’s not the way!”
“It is!” Ekhaas snapped, then jumped back as another ghost came drifting out from behind a tall plinth, its song already merged with the others. Ekhaas heard Geth cry out, but the spirit swept down on her faster than she could move. A song swelled in her throat, and she sang back at it, wiping it away.
The chorus of ghosts swelled in response.
“I told you, not that way!” Tenquis started down the center path past the war chariot.
“There are ghosts everywhere, Tenquis,” said Geth. He grabbed for the tiefling’s arm, dragging him to a stop. “We need to follow Ekhaas’s lead.”
“And where has that gotten us? We’re lost!”
Doubt whirled in Ekhaas’s head. Was she heading the right way? Maybe Tenquis was right. The song of the ghosts went all the way through her, making it harder to think. The voices of her friends were almost drowned out by it.
Almost but not quite. “You’re both wrong,” Chetiin said harshly. “Blood of the clans, I don’t know why I bother with you clumsy, stupid tallfolk.”
For a moment, his words wiped away the song of the ghosts. Ekhaas turned to stare at her friends. She’d never heard Chetiin speak that way. Even if she suspected that was sometimes the way that the shaarat’khesh felt, she knew that he was too tightly disciplined to permit those feelings to show. Something was wrong. Geth and Tenquis had never argued like this before. And when had she ever felt such crippling doubt?
The song of the ghosts had changed, she realized abruptly. The spirits weren’t just mindless apparitions bent on punishment. There was a cunning about them. Earlier the ghosts had hit them with waves of despair and shame. That had failed so their attack had become more insidious, planting doubt and mistrust, turning them against each other.
Ekhaas drew two slow breaths, calming herself and shutting out the argument among Geth, Tenquis, and Chetiin. She listened to the song, trying to grasp the harmonies of it, the rise and the fall. Then she drew a third breath and sang.
The effort brought a fire to her chest. Her throat burned, but she forced herself to sing anyway. She didn’t waste energy pouring strength and volume into the song-this wasn’t a battle that would be won quickly. The ghosts had changed their tactics. She needed to change hers as well. She made her song bright and cheerful, a reminder of unity and hope. They would escape. The ghosts would not stop them.
Doubt fell away almost immediately, like a heavy pack stripped from her shoulders. She straightened, turned to the others, and extended her magic over them. The release from the ghosts’ song was visible in their faces. Geth and Tenquis blinked and looked at each other in surprise, as if their fight had been something happening to other people. Chetiin’s face tightened, expression wiped away, and Ekhaas could guess the shame he felt for what he’d said. She reached out to all three, gesturing urgently for them to follow her. Without the influence of the ghosts misleading her, she was certain that she’d chosen the correct path-and she had an uncomfortable feeling that the ghosts knew it too. Their song rose, clawing at the defenses she’d raised.