Wyvern's Lair (Desert Cursed Series Book 5) Page 11

  “Well, you surely are not either of our friends, are you?” Maggi said as she turned her floppy-footed mount around so we were all headed in the same direction.

  He glared at her. “I am no one’s prisoner.”

  “Then you are here by choice? You wish to be with us?” she asked, and I watched his face carefully. The response was immediate, fueled by anger. His eyes narrowed and his mouth tightened before he turned his face away. No matter what he said, the truth was there.

  A prisoner he was, and once he was free, he would kill her. I was sure of it.

  “Marsum,” I deliberately didn’t speak to him as if he were Maks this time, “the other two stones, what happened to them? Even a rumor can give a hint as to the placement of those things.” I’d learned that in my years gathering the other stones for Ishtar. I frowned, wondering how she could have been fooled into believing there were only ten stones instead of the thirteen Marsum believed there were. I looked to Maggi. “Do you know about the three missing stones?”

  “Not missing,” she said. “No, they were never missing. But hidden, yes, I was aware of them. Some of us were. Except Ishtar. Merlin kept that information from her, and those of us who received a stone with a portion of her power were not supposed to know. Merlin never could play cards. His face always gave it away.”

  “How did you find out?” Lila asked. “My father doesn’t know.”

  “Goddess, no,” Maggi said. “If Corvalis found out, I can only imagine the hunt he’d put on to take any one of those three stones. The most powerful three. That is why only a few of us knew.”

  I looked from Marsum to Maggi and back again, trying to put the pieces together. How could both Maggi, the Ice Witch, and the polar opposite, the Jinn masters, both know?

  Holy crap stuck in a camel’s ass hair.

  “You really did sleep with one of the Jinn masters?” I blurted it out before my brain caught up and thought better of my words.

  Maggi shrugged. “Davin and I were friendly, a long time ago. We kept each other company in a world where our power made us feared.”

  Marsum snorted. “He thought he could use you and he stupidly fell—”

  He cut himself short and shook his head, his jaw flexing and tensing. Holding back whatever that last bit was he was going to say.

  “Fell in love?” Lila offered, helpful as always. “So what happened? Davin fell in love, and Marsum took his head?” She gasped. “Oh my, that’s exactly what happened, isn’t it? The ties that bind. Boy, do they mess you up when they are sticky with power and sex.”

  He shot her a look and then shook his head. “He’s gone, dead. That’s what happens when the heart is involved. That is why I am still in charge.”

  “His consciousness is not gone, nor are his memories,” Maggi said, a softness to her voice that turned my head. She was looking at Marsum in a way I wasn’t sure I liked.

  As though maybe she wasn’t interested in Marsum, or Maks, but that like me, she thought she could somehow bring her long-gone love back.

  Like I needed something else to worry about.

  Don’t worry, though, those concerns were wiped out in three . . . two . . . one.

  12

  Marsum barked a laugh at Maggi as we rode along, three abreast, me in the middle.

  “Davin has zero control here,” Marsum said. “And even if he did, I doubt he’d want a dried-up, no-magic witch as a lover.”

  The hurt on Maggi’s face was immediate and though she turned away, I saw the glimmer of tears. Awesome, just what I needed, a heartbroken Ice Witch.

  “I would not want him back,” she said, her voice far harder than the tears would have led me to believe. “He was weak. As you can see, he lost his head.” She laughed then, and I could swear I heard the sound of the White Raven. I checked the sky just in case, but there were no telltale white wings.

  “He was not weak,” Marsum snapped. “He was a damn brilliant man who very few people understood, including you, witch.”

  “Too bad he didn’t pass those brains on,” Lila muttered.

  I grabbed her and pulled her close as Marsum turned an icy glare on us, his eyes going nearly black with anger. “You best watch yourself, dragon, before I find an accident for you to stumble onto.”

  “Don’t you dare threaten her!” I turned my glare on him and his eyes bugged wide as his throat flexed. Of course, I’d given him a direct command and was about to give another. “Apologize to her. Now.”

  His face darkened along with his eyes, and slowly he opened his mouth. “My apologies.”

  I held Lila close, feeling her shake against me. Marsum scared her, and I understood. At his full power, he could have wiped the floor with either of us.

  I found myself reaching for the two stones I still had. The emerald stone taken from the Dragon’s Ground, and of course, Maggi’s blue sapphire. The sapphire cooled under my fingertips, but I felt nothing with the green stone, not even a faint flicker of magic. Good enough by me, I didn’t need it right then.

  But if Marsum decided to attack, that would be a different matter altogether.

  “Look, can we just deal with one thing at a time?” I said. “Wyvern’s Lair, Blackened Market, and the crossroads, not necessarily in that order. Then we can discuss who is going to claim his body and mind?”

  “Actually, the Wyvern’s Lair is not far from the Blackened Market,” Marsum said, and then clamped his mouth shut like he hadn’t meant to say anything at all.

  “But is there time to go there?” Maggi shook her head. “I do not believe so. If you must be at the crossroads when the golden moon rises, then there is no time to diverge.”

  The Oracle’s words came back to me.

  The Wyvern is only part of the answer, the most dangerous part. You must embrace death to find what you seek. A child waits at the crossroads. A spell is broken on the impaling stake on the third golden moon. An Emperor dethroned. It comes for you three. Three. Three. Three.

  The fire in you will burn until it can burn no more, the curse will be offered a cleansing, the magic, the child, the spell, they are tied . . .

  I spoke the Oracle’s words quietly, over and over as I tried to make sense of them. Because I couldn’t throw the feeling that if I could figure them out, then I would know what to do, where to go. “Damn it. If you’re so bloody smart, what does it mean?” I looked at Marsum and spoke the Oracle’s words one more time, loud enough for him to hear.

  His eyes faded to a blue I knew and went thoughtful. Maggi drew closer.

  “The Wyvern being the most dangerous part makes sense. He is territorial like the dragons in the north,” she said. “And his magic affects the surrounding area so that the land bends and shifts at his will. It could be an offshoot of his power through the stone.”

  “You mean the landscape adjusts to his needs?” Lila asked. Maggi nodded.

  Well, that sounded fun.

  “I don’t know what child could be waiting at the crossroads,” Marsum said. “But the Impaler’s Stake is the mountain range near the crossroads. Dethroned can also mean displaced, so not necessarily what you would immediately think it could mean. Could just mean the Emperor will be moved.” He tapped his fingers across the front of his saddle, drumming out a steady beat. “Embracing death. Golden moon. Fire in you burning.” He mumbled the words out of order.

  After a solid hour, he finally grimaced and rubbed a hand over his face. “None of it quite fits right now. Whatever comes, will come in threes?”

  “Seems to be the gist of it,” I said.

  “Then we need to watch for that. Attacks in threes. Enemies in threes.”

  I glanced at him, then to Maggi. “Well, I’ve got two of you already. So I need a third enemy?”

  Maggi sniffed. “I am helping you now.”

  “Well, then . . . enemies who were enemies, now friends?” I laughed.

  That seemed to mollify her some.

  A sharp pain ran through my back, stiffening me in my s
eat. Like a wave, it crested, stealing my breath and then slowly faded as I struggled to get my wind back. Little black dots warping into miniature lightning bolts danced across my vision.

  “Zam, what’s wrong?” Lila tugged on my face and I realized I’d slumped over my saddle.

  “Just some growing pains,” I groaned.

  I pushed myself upright to see Marsum in nearly the same position. “Damn it, that was unpleasant,” he said.

  “Yeah. That’s the magic still?” I took a breath, breathing out the last of the pain. My skin and bones felt all tingly.

  Marsum gave me a terse nod. “Yes, which means there is only one choice. We go to the Blackened Market first. If we are already feeling this power cut through us, then we are only going to be less and less able to handle it with each passing day.”

  And then he clamped his mouth shut and stared straight ahead. I wondered what was going on in his head. What sort of war of his memories was happening? Because each time I looked at him, his face was twisted in a grimace, or he’d be shaking his head ever so slightly like he was arguing with himself. Maggi said nothing more, and Lila fell asleep in my lap, snoring slightly.

  We rode like that for the rest of the day and then set up camp near a trickle of water sliding down a slope of rocks. Without a word, I dug out a pit at the base of the slope for the water to gather, lining the melon-sized hole with a chunk of oiled leather from my saddlebags. The horses drank their fill slowly, draining the small bowl I’d made several times before we could get our own refills.

  “Clever,” Maggi said as her camel drank—after us, I made sure of it. I wasn’t drinking camel washback.

  “Desert life teaches you to survive.” I shrugged and turned around to see the horses untacked and Marsum currying their hides. He’d laid a fire and even got it going.

  Just like Maks would have.

  I bit my lower lip to keep from pointing it out. Lila, on the other hand . . . “Damn, can you make dinner too? Maks did that for us. Though I’ll say he always had to have his food cooked through, couldn’t stomach it even near to being raw.” She shook her head and sighed. “What a terrible sin to overcook a steak.”

  His face greened a little and I grinned to myself. Maybe would have even had a quick laugh at his expense.

  Except I swayed where I was, suddenly so tired I literally couldn’t keep my eyes open. Someone cried out my name.

  “Zam.”

  My knees buckled and I could do nothing to stop it. Lila yelled for me, and Maggi might have stepped toward me, I’m not sure. I only know I stood there in the desert with them one second, and the next I was somewhere far more dangerous than a land of heat and Jinn and ophidians.

  I was in the dreamscape world that the Emperor had created to keep his fingers on the waking world while he lay bound in his prison.

  I lay on the sand, the same place that I’d fallen in the waking world, the sky above me black and without stars. There was no Marsum, no Maggi, no Lila. Both horses and the camel eyed me as I rolled to my belly and stayed where I was, thinking about what had happened.

  I’d never had the dreamscape come over me like this, dragging me in when I was awake. Did that mean I’d been drawn here by someone? But who could have done it? The Emperor, I supposed, and maybe Merlin. Someone had called my name, but the voice was far away and I couldn’t even tell if it was male or female.

  Could it have been Maggi? Had she shoved me here so that she had time with Marsum and Davin? That rang far truer than I wished it did. Which meant I would wake when she let me.

  “Just freaking awesome.” I pushed to my feet and did a quick check of what I had on me. The flail was on my back and warmed instantly when I touched the handle. A knife in its sheath on one thigh, and my pouch with the two stones. Good enough, at least I wasn’t weaponless. That being said, I needed to go as quietly as I could while I was here. The last thing I wanted was to draw attention to myself.

  I shifted to my four-legged form. With fur black as night and a body that was a tiny little house cat, I could keep my stay here hopefully unremarkable.

  “Zam. Hurry. Please hurry.” My name was called, coming from the south from a voice I knew this time, one that was full of fear. Ollianna.

  Low to the ground, I scooted forward, the land flying under my feet as I raced toward her. Was she the one who’d called me to the dreamscape? Somehow, I didn’t think so. Which meant she was in trouble.

  The world twisted and jumped around me as I went as fast as I could, all but flying over the desert. After a few strides and off to my left was a place of darkness and water that slowed my feet a little. The water frothed and turned, and a set of eyes peered at me from the depths. I made a mental note of the place that could only be the Wyvern’s Lair and then continued on to the crossroads.

  At the base of the Gashishum Mountain range were the crossroads where the three golden moons would rise and the power to do big ass miracles would happen.

  Trick—Lila’s dragon-crush who ruled the power of storms and lightning—had taken Ollianna, a witch from the Swamps who’d joined with us, to prep the crossroads. I wasn’t sure what to expect when I arrived there, but not what was in front of me now. Especially since Ollianna was not at the crossroads. Or at least, it didn’t look like it to me. She sat by herself, sobbing into her hands within a stand of trees well off the road to the north of the mountain range.

  “Zam, hurry,” she whispered, rocking where she sat.

  “Did you call me here?” I slid to a stop, kicking up a flurry of dust. She shot up, her hands out, magic curling around her, thick and dangerous, her tears gone in a flash.

  “Zam, you should not be here.” She lurched toward me, catching me in a hard hug, squeezing me as if she was afraid to let me go. I shifted to two legs, and held her tightly, feeling the tremors go through her body. I patted her back and worked to unpeel her arms from around me. “I didn’t plan on being here.”

  She pulled away from me. “You have to go. The Emperor is hunting you.” She shook her head. “And he is not the only one.”

  “Who else?” Ishtar, most likely.

  “Trick says there is another dragon sniffing around here. He’s not sure who, though, and every time he goes to see who it is, they fly away before he can see.”

  “A loner then?” I didn’t know if that was possible. I’d have to ask Lila. “As strange as that may be, it’s not a reason for—”

  “Where are you?” She cut me off, shaking me a little. “Right now, where are you in the waking world?”

  I blew out a breath. “We aren’t far from the Wyvern’s Lair. It’s to the east of us.”

  “You need to go to the Wyvern,” she said. “You need to ask for his help before you come this way.”

  Like I needed her to remind me that I had more than one task on the table. She didn’t know about the other stone, about the magic absorbing into me, and slowly killing me. She didn’t know Marsum was with me.

  “Look, it’s not that easy—”

  “The crossroads are being held by the ophidian queen,” she said, cutting me off once more. “We cannot get closer than this, ten miles away. Trick has tried to fry them with his lightning, but it just makes them laugh.”

  “SHIT FUCK DAMN.” The words shot out of my mouth like bullets from a gun. “We’ve already dodged ophidians once and not well.” I rubbed a paw over one ear. What else could go wrong? No, strike that, I didn’t want to know.

  “Our time is slipping by,” she said. “What do we do? Will you go to the Wyvern’s Lair first? I think you should.”

  She couldn’t know that the Wyvern had a stone, one that embodied destruction. That could be useful against the ophidians and their apparent queen. Goddess of the desert, since when did those creatures have a queen?

  I didn’t know how much time we had so I went with the simplest answer. “We can’t. I’m sick. We need to get to the Blackened Market to heal me.”

  “But your brother . . . if you do not g
o to the Wyvern, how will you save him? And we need him to face the Emperor.” Her green eyes were worry-filled and I didn’t like it. All the pieces were tied together, and I couldn’t separate one from the other.

  “I know, but I can’t save him if I’m dead!” I snapped.

  “I understand.” She shook her head slowly. “You must do what you must, as we all do.”

  “Ollianna, it’s not that easy to just walk into the Wyvern’s Lair and . . .” I almost said take the stone from him, “and ask him a question,” I finished lamely.

  “Perhaps it is that easy,” she said. “And you are just more worried about your own life than anyone else’s.”

  I stared at her, shock dumbing me. I spluttered, shame and guilt rolling through me like the waves of pain from earlier. Did she really believe that? Worse, was she right?

  Her eyes widened, she spun and ran from me as what felt like a rope tightened around me. I looked down, but could see nothing, no rope, no magic spell. But that didn’t stop the feeling of being squeezed.

  I was yanked away from where I stood as though I had a string tied around my middle and I was pulled through the air, end over end. Breathing was not possible, the tension around my middle too much. Right as I thought I would pass out from lack of oxygen, I landed with a thump on a chunk of flat rock. The pressure around my middle faded and I sucked in a big breath, blinking rapidly as my eyes were all watery from the high speed with which I’d been pulled through the freaking air.

  Clouds floated by. Clouds and a few birds. The rock below me was cold and slippery with condensation. I blinked and stood; the flat stone I was on wobbled precariously side to side until I found my balance, legs spread wide. Just how high was I? I couldn’t see over the edge of my platform, but at a distance there were mountain peaks and they were on eye level with me.

  Awesome.

  “No dragon with you this time? Pity for you, seeing as I suspect you’ll take a tumble before this is over.” The Emperor’s voice was not a surprise to me.

  “You yanked me into the dreamscape?”

  “Much as I would have loved to do so, no, that was not me. Someone is playing games with you, I think.” He smiled as he stepped into view, his teeth even and white. He was on a flat rock as well, but his floated in the air and didn’t wobble under his feet. Fucker.