We passed the path to the shrine, and I glanced over to see if I could get a glimpse of Turek, but no luck. I felt the grove before we reached the tree tunnel—a subtle rippling touch like a breeze through leaves. Smiling, I entered the shady passage, and the touch shifted to a welcoming caress. Ahead, Idris, Ilana, Safar, and the two faas waited along with three ilius, and the unknown reyza and zhurn who I’d seen playing the strange rock-paper-scissors in the courtyard. To my relief, Safar seemed well recovered.
Power hummed around us as we stepped farther in. Even though I’d already had the experience of a lifetime in the grove, I looked around in rapt fascination as if I’d been out for a walk and suddenly smelled something amazing and had to stop and find the source. I inhaled as the grove enveloped me; a questing presence that the collar had no power to block.
Anxiety and fear slipped away as I welcomed the touch of the grove and felt the power of it hum through the white trunks around us. I exhaled in wonder, only distantly aware of Mzatal’s focus on me. Idris moved to the lord’s side and the two exchanged low words, but I was far too entranced by the feel of the grove to pay much attention.
The grove presence retreated as we clustered near the center. Mzatal crouched and placed his hands on a low smooth knob of wood that reminded me of a cypress knee. He channeled a burst of potency into it, and I understood that he wasn’t powering the grove as much as he was making an offering to it. Frowning, I wondered how I knew that. It wasn’t an Elinor memory or a déjà vu sensation, but I knew.
He stood and gestured everyone in close. I caught a glimpse of movement in the trees ahead. I felt a dropping sensation, and then between one blink of an eye and the next, we were in a different grove.
It looked a lot like the one we left, ringed with white trunks, but it was more elongated, had a “flavor” to it that felt different, and the hum resonated lower.
Mzatal started toward the tree tunnel, then paused as a mehnta stepped out from between the trees. Much like a human woman in form, her full breasts were bare and a loose braid of deep violet hung to her feet. Then it got weird. Her back, hard and shiny green, formed a beetle-like carapace that I knew covered wings packed in like a parachute. I had no idea how such light wings could support her heavy, muscled body in flight. Then it got weirder. Instead of a mouth, she had a dozen or so writhing arm-length tentacles, each ending in its own small, toothless mouth complete with lips.
I watched uncertainly as she approached, her mouth tentacles waving in an oddly unnerving fashion. I remained perfectly still as she laid a hand on my arm. At her touch, my uncertainty faded away, to be replaced by a sense of comfort and welcome, as if I’d been away for a long time and was being greeted again.
The mehnta spoke, voice oddly fractured as it came from a dozen sources at once. I struggled to understand, but soon realized she was speaking in the demon tongue.
I looked up to Gestamar. “What is she saying?” I asked, feeling a strange and desperate need to know.
He gave a low rumble before answering. “She has bypassed all protocols and asked for your name.”
I smiled in gratitude, then turned my attention back to her. “I am Kara Gillian.”
The mehnta kept her touch on my arm and spoke again. Out of the corner of my eye I could see that Mzatal and Idris had stopped and were now watching our odd exchange.
“She says her name is Lazul,” Gestamar said without needing to be asked. The mehnta made an odd whistling sound, then touched my face lightly with her mouth tentacles—soft and warm, like a myriad of little kisses. In any other situation I’d have probably freaked out, but instead, a thrill of delight and acceptance ran through me.
The tentacles lingered for another few seconds, then the mehnta retreated and slipped noiselessly back into the trees.
I exhaled and watched her go, then turned with Gestamar to follow the others up the tree tunnel. The feel of the grove slid away as we exited into the open air, and I swallowed hard against the deep worry that settled back into my gut.
And then…wow. We stood upon a clifftop, sea below on the left, dark stony mountains and lush green foliage rising to the right. A warm breeze teased my hair, carrying the pleasant scent of sea and wet earth. The sun hung high in the sky. Midday here. It had been morning at Szerain’s.
The ground dropped into a grassy, rock-strewn depression, then rose to the base of Mzatal’s palace. The path, cut in the native stone, alternated flat and stairs. The structure itself hugged the cliff face, long and narrow, two levels rising above and more dropping in tiers before the cliff. Glass. Lots and lots of glass. Lots—likely the resinous demon-glass. It even comprised the low walls of the long balconies that ran the length of each level and wrapped around the near end of the two above the cliff. Whatever wasn’t glass was the ubiquitous dark basalt of the surrounding terrain. A waterfall cascaded from the midst of the structure, plummeting to the sea below. On a verdant sward behind the palace, a thick, flat-topped column about three stories tall and of the same basalt as the palace and cliffs shone as though highly polished. I’d obviously stopped and stared because it took a tug on my arm from Gestamar to get me moving again.
Ahead, Mzatal waited, eyes on me, keen and assessing as I approached. “Your affinity for the grove deepens,” he said, as casually as if he’d said, “your hair is brown.” But there was a querying penetration to it, a hint that he fully intended to peel back the why of it.
“Yeah, well…I like trees,” I said, giving a shrug. What the hell was I supposed to say?
He wasn’t buying my nonchalance. His eyes remained hard on me for a moment, then he shifted his attention to Idris. “Prepare a trancing diagram.” He proceeded to rattle off parameters that I couldn’t understand but that apparently made perfect sense to the young summoner. Idris asked for a few clarifications that also sounded like gibberish to me, then took off toward the palace at a light jog.
Mzatal returned his shrewd gaze to me. “We will see if this affinity connects to anything.” He lowered his head. “Or anyone,” he added, and there was no mistaking the vehemence behind the words.
“It doesn’t connect to anything or anyone,” I shot back. “It’s just bunch of damned trees,” I said in a stunning display of brilliance as I jerked my fingers through my hair. “Look, you don’t have to do more fucked up ritual crap on me.” The purification thing had hurt enough.
“You know—intimately—it is much more than that,” he replied, returning to unruffled calm as he pivoted away, clasped his hands behind his back, and headed up the path toward the palace. “I do that which must be done.”
“Hurting me?” I demanded, not moving. “You must do that?” Gestamar set his hands on my shoulders to move me along but went still as Mzatal opened one hand behind his back.
Cold sliced through me at that simple gesture. I knew in that instant that he could pull power and strike before I’d ever sense it coming.
He faced me. “What I do, I do with purpose.” He stepped closer. “Pain is at times a purpose unto itself,” he continued, black menace flowing through his voice. “And, at times, a byproduct of a greater purpose.”
Instinct screamed at me to back away from the coiled peril before me, but with Gestamar behind me I had no choice but to stand and face it. “Easy for you to say when you’re the one dealing it out,” I said, even managing to give a lift of my chin.
“It is easy to say because it is truth.” He turned and continued up the path. “Bring her if she chooses not to walk on her own.”
I snarled at his back. “I can walk,” I muttered, and reluctantly did so, though fear of the unknown twisted in my belly. Asshole. I hated this. Hated being scared all the time. And I especially hated not knowing what the hell was in store for me. About the only thing I could be sure of was that it would only be harder for me if I resisted. Mzatal didn’t need my compliance. He was being damn near generous by allowing me the chance to cooperate and avoid humiliation or discomfort.