Firebrand

SETTING THE TRAP

A bound and gagged Terrik knelt before the seal, still alive, his eyes wide as blood leaked out of his neck from the artery Grandmother had nicked. Meanwhile, she wrestled with a length of brown yarn, the color of earth, for they were underground. She knotted frantically, desiring to finish the spell, a variation of one she had tried before, but this time she exerted better control over it, would not let it master her.

The knots resisted being tied, forced her hands apart, stung her fingers. Sweat beaded on her brow as she concentrated. She made the yarn go under and over and through. She tightened the knot and felt the pressure within the chamber quicken.

She spoke the words of power in a precise cadence. She tried not to gag as she spoke these words of shadows and death. The things beneath the seal boiled and clamored all the more. The symbols on the seal writhed and glowed as though to increase its protection. The sluggish ones did not change. She rocked back and forth as she chanted and felt the burgeoning power build. Had she made a mistake doing this at night? When entities of the dark were strongest? Could she control it, dark within dark?

An end of the yarn started to untwine, separate into individual strands. Hastily she commanded it to cease, and then tied a knot for awakening.

Before the yarn defied her again, she tied a knot to call.

The last time she had tried this spell, it had failed to awaken the dead in the royal tombs, or at least she had not heard that it had. She thought she would’ve if it had proven successful. Perhaps it would have worked if she had been at the source commanding the spell herself, as she did now.

Terrik made a gurgling sound and collapsed to his side. Swiftly, she tied a knot to rise.

Her fingers stung, stung with the sensation of burning needles. Wind howled through the passage into the chamber, tossing her cloak about her shoulders. It bit her cheeks and caused the flame in her lantern to flicker. The shadows were preternaturally deep, her lantern light so feeble.

She must finish the sequence and use all her strength to do so. The wind now roared, an unnatural wind that felt not refreshing, but foul. As it careened around the chamber, it seemed to carry voices of another world, from the land of the dead, voices of the past, of those begging her not to kill them, voices of her sacrifices, the wail of a baby.

She spoke words of power, and the knotted yarn bulged and contracted and contorted. She felt the power she loosed rush out into the forest, seeking life, feeding as it went. It fed on greenery, even that which had yet to sprout from the earth, and the small lives of forest creatures. She directed it with single-minded purpose outward, seeking, seeking. It must not feed on the soldiers of Second Empire, no, and not even that of the enemy. She must be precise, control how much the power consumed, or it would become utterly unstoppable and destroy all, which was not her goal. She diverted it, and it flushed out sleeping birds, took foxes in their dens, caught a doe and day-old fawn even as they tried to run away. Coyotes in a pack . . .

It hungered, seeking with greedy fingers till it found the groundmites—Skarrl and his group—where her people had trapped them. It sucked the life from them, all eight of them, and when her control slipped for a panicked moment, it took those of her people who guarded them, as well.

She called the power back, lured it back with the promise of fresh blood. It surrounded her, a restive breeze that tapped her cheek. It pressed in on her as if to crush her. She caught her breath. Would her personal shields hold?

She used everything she had and drew the power into the knots. They bulged and expanded, the strands of yarn worming as though alive, then melding into one another and darkening until a black sphere hovered above her blistered and oozing hand. It lowered until it sat on her palm as smooth and cold as the first one she had ever made. Now she must bind it.

Blood pooled beneath Terrik’s throat. She touched his forehead. His eyelids flickered. He was barely conscious. The sphere quivered on her hand in anticipation.

“You are doing your duty for the empire,” she told Terrik. She had actually attended his birth all those years ago, assisting his mother’s midwife. He had always been a good boy, but he’d failed as a captain. “I now absolve you of your sins and failures,” she told him, “as you provide this one final service for your people and empire.” She did not know if he heard her, but in the afterlife he would know. She was certain, with her blessing, he would find paradise, and they would remember him as a martyr. Yes, that’s how she would explain it to his mother—he was a martyr for the cause.

She placed the sphere in the pool of blood beside his throat, and it drank. When it was sated, Terrik’s corpse was drained of blood and the sphere was a dull silver that pulsated. Grandmother dared not pick it up.

“Cole!” she called.

It took a few minutes for him to reach the chamber. He looked around warily, his gaze settling on Terrik and the sphere, and then her. He looked rattled.

“Are you all right, Grandmother? That was some wind that tore through, shrubs dying before my eyes, birds dropping dead out of trees.”

“Yes, Cole, I am fine.” Truth was, she was exhausted and her hands, with their blistered and open sores, pained her. She wished Lala was there to coat them with ointment, but she’d been evacuated with the others. “Please bring the slaves. I am ready for them.”

“Yes, Grandmother.” He gave the chamber one more look before heading back up the passage.

All was ready. The time had come. She glanced at the sphere and sensed an eagerness about it. It wanted to fulfill its purpose. She was sad about Terrik, but proud of him, too. Perhaps he’d been a poor choice for captain, but he’d faced sacrifice without fear.