Asunder Page 10

  Where are they? she asked, swallowing her disappointment.

  “Up,” the Elven woman replied. “Come.”

  The curved staircases were even more beautiful up close, Melody saw, the morning glory and moonflower vines that served as handrails were braided together to ensure flowers blossomed throughout the day and night.

  The simple chamber sculpted of branches that Lianodel led her to was the most beautiful thing Melody had ever seen - gently curved walls of branches interwoven with flowering vines, luminous moss dripping from the ceiling, and a single, large hammock in the center of the floor that was outlined by countless soft cushions. There was no one there, however.

  Someone wanted to speak with me? Melody asked, curious.

  Lianodel nodded. “Yes,” she replied. “You did. You should get some rest.” She gestured to the hammock. “Please, make yourself at home.”

  I don’t understand… Despite her confusion, the hammock did look inviting after weeks of only what comfort she could manage to find curled up on the forest floor with the twins.

  “It will all make sense soon,” Lianodel assured her, taking Melody’s bag and offering her a blanket. “As soon as you’re asleep.”

  Asleep? Melody leaned her staff against the living wall, then knelt and lowered herself into the embrace of the tightly woven hammock. Do you mean in a dream? The only person she’d met who could walk in dreams was Rhodoban, but he had fallen…

  “I will help,” Lianodel assured her. She brought forth a vial from somewhere in her robes, removed the stopper, and held it out to Melody. “Smell this,” she said. “Not too deeply, though. It will help you relax, and welcome the dream.”

  Melody obeyed, closing her eyes and gently inhaling the scent from the vial. Lavender, she identified, with rose and a touch of sandalwood … She yawned suddenly, and handed the vial back to Lianodel.

  That was fast, she sent.

  Lianodel smiled. “Rest now, little one. I am at your side.” She also knelt, moving into a reclining position in the spacious hammock. “When you wake, you will understand, I promise.”

  The hour was late, the aroma had relaxed her anxious muscles, and the hammock bed was comfortable - Melody fell asleep almost before she fully closed her eyes.

  Unlike the dark, bloody landscapes of the nightmares that were now more common for her than pleasant dreams, she found herself in the Dweller’s Glade she remembered so well from her childhood. It was summer in the dream, and Melody inhaled deeply, enjoying the scent of the sun-warmed leaves overhead and the morning glories twining up the trees.

  “There you are,” someone said. Melody turned, coming face to face with— herself?

  The Melody in front of her was almost as lovely as Aellielle had been. Her black hair hung loose to the middle of her back, and her wide-set eyes gleamed amber in the late-afternoon sunlight. Bare toes peeked from beneath the hem of her fine dress. There was a smoothness to that Melody’s face, a calm that she couldn’t imagine looking so at ease on her own.

  You’re … me?

  “I will be,” the other Melody replied with a smile. “Or rather, you’ll be me. I know it’s confusing, but we need to talk, and this is the only way I knew how to reach you. Lianodel is helping us.”

  Melody blinked. All right, she sent. She settled herself on the grass, looking up at her other self. Are you the one that came to my— our father?

  She nodded. “I’m why he wrote the journal you’ve finally read,” she said. “Our magic is different than his, but it’s a starting point. You should try some of it.”

  Melody shook her head. I don’t want to risk it, she admitted, or any magic. I barely used enough to help the children sleep.

  “You’re scared.” It wasn’t a question. “Semaj tracks you with it.”

  Exactly.

  “But that’s why you must,” the other Melody said, sitting across from her and tucking her legs into her skirt. “There’s so much ahead of you, and we don’t have much time here. Father’s magic will help some, but first, we have to find your voice.”

  Melody frowned. I can’t speak without everyone knowing what I am.

  “You can. You will. It just takes concentration. Here—" She reached forward and laid the tips of her fingers against Melody’s throat, feather light. “Like that. Do you feel the difference?”

  Melody couldn’t have explained what she was feeling, but it made sense to her body, it was something she believed she could reproduce. Yes.

  “You have to learn control - your magic, your voice, all of it. Soon. Otherwise…”

  Foley.

  Dream-Melody nodded, smoothing her skirts. “I know how you feel. I still feel it. It was … awful. It will never not be awful, but understand if Semaj isn’t stopped, he will do so much worse.”

  I can’t fight him, Melody insisted. Even in the dream her chest was tight and heavy. I won’t use magic like that again. Ever.

  “I know. You don’t have to, not like that, I promise. But you do have to use it.”

  Melody tugged at the too-long sleeves of Jovan’s shirt. I don’t want him to find me, she confessed. Or anyone I’m close to.

  The other Melody’s smile was sad and knowing. “He has to focus on you, Melody. He has to believe you are the threat, not the people you change.”

  Change?

  “That’s part of our magic,” dream-Melody said. “We can wake up magic in other people. With enough of those people’s help, we stand a chance against Semaj. But you have to reach them. It has to be you.”

  How many people? Melody took a deep, anxious breath.

  “More than you want to think about. For now, focus on what you need to change. Your voice, and your looks.”

  Melody frowned. My looks?

  “Semaj isn’t the only one hunting you,” the other Melody reminded her. “Duke Korith has sent your description to every city he can think of, and you’ll be safer if you don’t look like yourself when you leave. Change everything, even your hair. Lianodel will help. Lie about your name, too.”

  Can’t I just stay … here? She knew the answer already. The familiar sense of urgency weighed on her as heavily as it had when Calder had dragged her from her Glade hours before everyone there died horribly.

  “Our two Lianodels can’t maintain this much longer,” the other Melody said, standing. “I have to go. So do you. Concentrate on your voice, remember how I showed you it feels. Use your power - let him sense it. Find the people who need you, and help them. You can do this. You have to.”

  Wait— She had so many questions, but the only one in her heart was for Jovan. She never saw him, but she could sense him in her dreams. Even this one. Jovan?

  Dream-Melody smiled. “His path is his own,” she said. “You must walk yours.”

  When Melody woke, it was morning. Sunlight filtered through the branches overhead, making a bright mosaic on the blanket that still covered her - she hadn’t moved in her sleep, it had been so deep. The dream …

  She sat up, looking around the unfamiliar room, but Lianodel was gone. With a stretch, Melody realized that she felt more rested than she had in weeks. Her experience with her other-self had not drained her, as dream-walking with Rhodoban had. Instead, she was rejuvenated. Which was for the best, she supposed, since she would have to leave so quickly.

  Venturing out of Lianodel’s room, Melody swallowed a brief moment of vertigo when she looked over the railing. She was higher up than she remembered. Far below, however, she caught sight of Lianodel and the twins, sharing a meal with the others. She took a deep breath, and headed down.

  “Good morning,” Lianodel said, motioning for her to have a seat. “Did you rest well?”

  Melody nodded, then paused, considering what to say— and concentrating on using the control Dream-Melody had shown her. “I did, thank you,” she said slowly. To her relief, no power surged forth with her carefully formed words. “Were you there?” she asked, sitting where she had been directed. “In the dream?”


  Lianodel smiled, passing Melody a basket of bread. “I merely made it possible,” she said. “Along with my future self. Bending time is always exhausting, but she - or rather you - came to my dream before you arrived and explained what she needed. She also said when you woke from your dream, you would need my help. How can I help?”

  Let me stay here, Melody thought, taking a bite of the bread. Let me stop moving, let me have a home again. Let me not have to face Semaj, or anyone else.

  “I need to leave here,” she said instead. “But I need to look … different.”

  “New clothes will be easy enough,” the Elven woman assured her, placing a scoop of roasted vegetables on a wooden plate and handing it to Melody. “Yours have seen many mendings.”

  Melody thought about how different Jovan had looked in the woods outside of Foley, realizing only now that his long ponytail had been gone. She set the plate in her lap and reached to touch her braid, pulling it around over her shoulder.

  “Can you change my hair?” she asked. She wasn’t sure she wanted to, but it felt necessary. “Cut it?”

  Lianodel nodded. “I can even change the color, if you have time. When will you leave?”

  Melody took a small bite, considering her words before she answered. “By dusk, I think. Will that be all right?”

  Lianodel smiled her agreement. “We’ll start as soon as you’ve finished eating.”

  17

  Rhodoban drifted in and out of consciousness over the next week, aware that they were traveling but not caring where. Was it Riverchill? With the fever, his memory was unreliable. The initial infection had worsened at an alarming rate, rendering Rhodoban’s arm - and the rest of him - essentially useless. Yet Steel refused to leave him behind.

  When the nightmare began, Rhodoban was certain his fever was about to break - things always got worse before they got better, and this was … unthinkable. It had to be a dream, he told himself, trying to stay still and not panic as he told himself he wasn’t feeling the dream-insects crawling through his hair and over his face.

  That was when the others started screaming.

  Rhodoban opened his eyes to see the others frantically brushing their clothes and slapping at their hair. Insects died and fell and more kept coming - centipedes, spiders, cockroaches, all with too many legs, in too many places.

  Rhodoban lent his voice to the cries of the others as something bigger burrowed under the loose bandage on his shoulder and began to chew at his flesh. He tried to slap it away with his good hand, but it was under the strips of cloth and wouldn’t be dislodged.

  More things crawled over him, insects and rats, up his sleeves and pants legs and in his hair. In a moment, he realized why the cries of the others were stopping when the bugs moved to his mouth and nose.

  The smell came next, an unearthly scent of decay and death that filled the night air and choked them even more. In the flickering light of their campfire, Rhodoban and the others were standing, trying to keep their hands over their mouths and noses while they stomped and slapped at the swarming vermin.

  It was Rhodoban that saw the thing take Steel. The creature was shaped like a man, but when it turned and looked at him, Rhodoban saw not eyes, but dim red lights where the eyes should have been. This was the source of the smell, and it was dragging Steel by the back of his shirt as if the warrior weighed nothing.

  One of the boys - Nathen? - was on his knees, covering his head with his arms and hands and shrieking. Insects and rats, some bigger than seemed possible, some so small they could slip between fingers and into unprotected ears, continued to find their way under every piece of clothing, biting and burrowing at the skin they found.

  With one arm useless and dangling, there was little Rhodoban could do to slap away as many things as were on him - he reached for his magic instead. Fire was his main weapon, it always had been, but he was reluctant to risk the lives of these men trying to target a spider with a ball of fire.

  Ice, then. Shuddering as the things crawled through his hair and dropped down the back of his shirt, Rhodoban made a fist with his good hand and summoned cold. Or rather, he summoned the heat, pulling it from every living thing around him - and he started small. It had been some time since he worked in reverse, and concentration was made all the more difficult by the constant scrabbling, stinging, and biting of the swarm, but after a long moment, he felt his hand getting warmer.

  Rhodoban increased his efforts, demanding more heat from the things around him. In a matter of minutes, every insect had stopped moving. His breath was visible in the now freezing air, and the men had stopped brushing at their clothes to look at him in wonder.

  “Get Steel,” he called, gesturing with his chin which direction their leader had been dragged. It took effort, but he held onto his focus. The heat within him was intense, the air around his fist shimmered like a candle flame and sweat was beading on his forehead, but the spell was working. “That way.”

  The others looked around, realizing Steel was gone. Several of the men took off after him, following the deep scuffs made where he had dug in his heels. Rhodoban stayed where he was, trying to balance the heat he was taking into himself so he didn’t freeze the remaining men.

  “Nathen, come on, it’s ok, get up—" Edwin was pulling the other boy to his feet, brushing at the frozen insects in his hair.

  “Work fast,” Rhodoban said. “Get whatever you can into the fire.”

  The two boys and the one man who hadn’t taken off after Steel stripped and shook their clothes out, shivering as they kicked the motionless bugs and rodents into the dying fire.

  Rhodoban had never tried to use two magics at once, but now seemed like the best time to try. He continued to pull the heat from the air, focusing it all in his fist, then slowly released some of it into the coals of the campfire, bringing it back to life.

  The smell and smoke of burning insects filled the air, and cries reached Rhodoban’s ears from some distance away - the others must have caught up to whatever took Steel.

  Still unnerved, the boys took up their swords and headed towards the sound, and as soon as Rhodoban had grounded the power and shaken as many of the insects out of his own clothes as he could, he followed.

  The scene that awaited him was almost as horrifying as the one he’d left behind. Steel had twisted out of his shirt and stood, sword drawn, between the creature and the body of one of the other men. The rest were either at the downed man’s side or curling around behind the creature, which only had eyes for Steel.

  Rhodoban reached for the magic again, this time straight fire, sending it to ignite the thing’s hair and clothes. He got its attention, which was all Steel needed. The moment it turned to face the mage, Steel stepped forward and swung, separating its head from its body with a single blow.

  “What was that?” One of the men asked, Rhodoban didn’t know who. He pulled the heat from the unmoving creature, extinguishing the fire before joining the others.

  The man on the ground - was it Whitton? Jensar? - was dead, his throat torn out. His chest was soaked in blood, but the wound’s edges were still tinged with green and oozing pus. Rhodoban had never seen anything like it. Neither had the others. Steel had.

  “Lich be dammed,” he cursed softly, crouching beside the body and closing the dead man’s eyes. “Anyone else wounded?”

  “Aye.” The man that stepped forward was gray pale in the pre-dawn light, and his shirt was torn nearly off. Claw marks raked down his side - not deep, but the marks were already filling with thick pus. “Is it bad?”

  “By the break, Jensar!” Edwin reached out to the wound, but Nathen slapped his hand away.

  “Don’t touch it,” the other boy said. “It’s not— What is it?”

  Steel shook his head. “It’s bad,” he replied.

  Jensar looked to Edwin. “You got something for this, right?” His breathing was shallow.

  Steel stood, sheathing his sword. “There’s nothing for it. Not here.”


  “You’ve fought one of those things before?”

  “This one makes four,” he said.

  “It wasn’t trying to kill you,” Rhodoban said. “I saw it take you - it could have killed us all, but it only wanted you. Why?”

  Steel shrugged. “I don’t know. The last one did the same thing.” He held up his wrist where the bruises were only just beginning to fade.

  “You’ve seen these wounds before?” Edwin asked him, getting a better look at the scratches on Jensar’s torso.

  “Felt them. Like fire and dying.”

  Jensar nodded in agreement. “You’re up walking, though. There’s some hope.”

  Steel sighed. “I shouldn’t be. A few times over, truth be told. There was a place…” He paused, remembering. “A Haven. The water there had some kind of magic.”

  “So let’s go,” one of the others said.

  “I’ll carry him myself,” another chimed in.

  “It was somewhere near Cabinsport,” Steel said. “He’d never make it. It spreads fast.”

  “So what are we supposed to do?” Nathen looked from Jensar’s wounds to Steel’s cold blank stare, and back. “We have to do something.”

  Jensar met Steel’s eyes, and found truth. “This is going to kill me.” It wasn’t a question. Steel nodded. “How fast?”

  “It almost dropped me in two days,” Steel said. “I’m sorry.”

  There was a long pause. “That’s not possible,” Nathen said. “They’re just scratches. He was worse off than that.” He pointed at Rhodoban.

  Edwin looked more closely at the rapidly blackening wounds. “No,” he said. “He wasn’t. This is … I’ve never … this isn’t normal, Jensar. I don’t think I can—“

  “Go,” Jensar said. He took a step away from the others. “Leave me here. I’ll take care of it.”