Chapter 46 – The Shadow of the Master, Part 1
Zaphyr, General Steroth, Captain Zel, and the small group of the captain’s soldiers who had stayed with them gave a last, parting look to the twisted body of Vasil Reinhand, which lay sprawled at the base of the spiral staircase. Despite having just willfully killed someone, Zaphyr found to her mild surprise that, when she looked back at her actions of just a minute ago, she felt nothing; not guilt, not disgust, not even a sense of satisfaction. She regarded it simply as something that she had done, independent of any emotional or ethical ramifications or considerations. This cold, detached state would have frightened her, had she been capable of experiencing any emotion at present. She felt drained, like an emptied water pitcher.
A sudden tap on her shoulder reminded her of the others’ presence. Turning, she saw an expectant General Steroth, arms crossed. “You said our next step should be tracking down your brother, Zull,” he reminded her. “Do you have any idea where he could be?”
Zaphyr held up the back of her hand, revealing the intricate glyph branded there by her own hemomancy. “I have a faint idea. Thanks to this, I always have a general knowledge of his direction in relation to myself, as well as the rough distance between us. I just need to focus and get my bearings.” She tilted her head to the side, squinting slightly as she reached out with her hemomantic senses, questing for even the faintest hint of her brother’s presence. To her own surprise and mild delight, she soon sensed him, distant but still closer than he had been previously. More than that, she had a general idea of the direction to travel in which to reach him.
“He’s still alive,” she informed the others happily. “And I know how we can get to him.” Without waiting for a response, she walked past Steroth and his men, back into the empty room where Vasil had set his final trap. She pointed at the locked door opposite her. “Through there.”
Captain Zel gave a curt order to two of his men, who moved to the door and started battering at it, grunting with effort as they repeatedly attempted to knock it down. On their third try, the door splintered open, the lock reduced to little more than bent metal connected to the door by mere scraps of wood. After waiting for the soldiers to move out of her way, Zaphyr daintily stepped through, the rest of their group following shortly behind. They found themselves in another long hallway, which forked at the end, running both to the left and to the right. Without hesitation, Zaphyr chose the left path.
By following Zaphyr in this way, as she relentlessly made her way through the palace, they headed further inwards and downwards, returning to the ground floor only shortly before venturing even further down, into the palace’s many cellars and labyrinthian passages, which all connected back to each other and to the tunnels which ran beneath the entire city. Even General Steroth, who had spent years serving the Empress and living in this very palace, felt bewildered and lost. Only Zaphyr’s unerring precision prevented them from inadvertently doubling back or becoming hopelessly turned around. Her determination paid off when suddenly, a smile coming unconsciously to her face, she broke into a run. Caught off guard, it took General Steroth and the rest a minute to catch back up with her. When they did, they found her supporting a dirty, exhausted, and clearly shaken Zull by the arms. He stood there, leaning with his back against the nearest wall. His face, coated in dust, was streaked where he had recently been crying.
“You’re alive!” Zaphyr said, nearly laughing with joy.
“Barely,” Zull said, his eyes glazed, his voice distant.
Zaphyr then, looked around, her smile slowly fading away. “Where’s Sir Kyr?” she asked quietly.
Zull shook his head. “We were ambushed by Sangue.”
“Sangue survived?” Zaphyr asked, incredulous.
“The Master- Prince Blyth- saved her. He found her somehow, and repaired her bindings,” Zull said. He shuddered, then added, “Among…other changes he made. She was monstrous, much more so than the last time we faced her.”
Zaphyr swallowed slowly, her entire body tensed, as if ready to break into another run at any moment. “What happened then?”
“Then?” Zull said hollowly. “Then, Sir Kyr fought her. He gave me an opportunity to escape, but the way out…he closed it off behind me. There was no other way to escape; they both died fighting there.” So quietly that he was almost whispering, Zull added, “Against his wishes, I went back and checked. They were both gone by the time I got there.”
Zaphyr reeled back, letting go of Zull. While, in truth, she had expected this answer, hearing it confirmed shook her harder than anything since the death of Gerok, weeks before. “No,” she said trembling with rage. “It’s not fair. We saved his life back at the Summer Palace. That couldn’t have been for nothing. He couldn’t have died. No, NO, NO!!!”
“There was nothing you could do, Zaphyr,” Zull said. “Don’t blame yourself.”
She whirled to face him, glaring angrily. He refused to meet her gaze, keeping his eyes steadily on the gray carpet running down the hallway which lay between them. “I don’t,” she snapped at him. “I blame the man responsible. Blyth. He is going to die for what he has done.”
“Wait a minute,” General Steroth said, taking a step towards Zaphyr. She shoved him away from her with surprising strength, nearly knocking him over before one of his soldiers caught him. “Prince Blyth has a great many crimes to answer for, but he is still a member of the royal family. Should he come willingly, then he will stand trial for his crimes-”
“If you find him first, and if he indeed chooses to ‘comes willingly,’ then you may do so,” Zaphyr spat. “But if Zull and I find him first, then we will deliver justice.”
General Steroth tightened his hands into fists, his knuckles slowly turning white. “If you kill Prince Blyth unlawfully, then I will be forced to arrest you instead, Zaphyr Tyrell. I will uphold the law in this regard.”
Zaphyr smirked. “I would like to see you try.” Grabbing her brother by the hand, she started to walk away as she said, “Come along, Zull. We have a lot of work to do.”
Captain Zel moved to stop them, but General Steroth raised his hand in a halting motion. Reluctantly, the captain took a step back and watched as the twins came to another doorway, walked through, and slammed it shut behind them.
“We can’t just let them go, Sir. Not when they have clearly threatened to kill the Prince!” Captain Zel said once they were gone.
“What would you have me do? Attack them?” General Steroth said wearily. “You have seen what just Zaphyr is capable of, Captain. Now, imagine what they could do together. Even with your troops, we might not even win the fight against them. All it would do is waste our resources, when we should be focusing on our true enemy. Afterwards, well…that will be a different story.” Turning to the waiting soldiers, General Steroth barked, “Well, what are you waiting for? Keep moving! Our search continues until Prince Blyth is found.”
As he and his men went about their assigned tasks, Zaphyr and Zull, who now found themselves in what looked to be an abandoned cellar of some sort, stopped to get a quick sense of bearing on their surroundings. They were in a narrow room, lit only by an unattended, flickering candle left in a sconce in the wall. It had melted nearly half away, implying whoever had put it there had left some hours ago. Save for a tall, yet undecorated wooden chair placed in the exact middle of the room, the room sat empty. The chair faced towards a narrow passageway, which let outwards into the darkness.
“What is this?” Zaphyr asked.
“If I had to guess, I would say a meeting room of some sort,” Zull said, frowning thoughtfully. He stepped up to the chair and ran a finger along it. “Perhaps the Master or some of his associates used it as a place to devise their plans, right beneath the Empress’ gaze…”
“Neither he nor anyone else is here. Whoever it was, I doubt they’ll miss this candle,” Zaphyr said. She picked the candle up, checking to see how much wax it had left. Confident that the candle would still be good for several more hours, she held it out before her face as she stepped into the passageway beyond, running a hand along its slimy, rocky surface as she did so. Zull, more hesitantly, followed behind her as they ventured further inwards and downwards.
The tunnel, lit by Zaphyr’s taper, twisted and turned back on itself several times, though it always eventually straightened out and resumed heading in the same direction. The uneven, rocky walls, which lacked any visible markers, made it very difficult for them to tell just how far they had come. No noise disrupted the tunnel’s silence, save for the occasional drip of water falling from the ceiling. Zull jumped every time, looking about wildly before recovering his composure. This reminded him too much of his journey through the darkness with Sir Kyr, and the eerie familiarity was setting him on edge.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
When they reached a split in the tunnel, Zaphyr craned her neck to look back at Zull. “Where do we go from here?” she asked.
“How should I know?” Zull asked, somewhat irritably.
Zaphyr frowned. “You always have ideas about what to do.”
“Not anymore,” Zull said listlessly. “All they ever do is get us into more danger, anyways.”
“I don’t care how much danger it gets us into. You’re the smartest person I know, and right now, I need your mind, Zull. Think!” Zaphyr said angrily, shaking him by the shoulder.
Shrugging her off with a glare, he took a deep breath to steady himself, then carefully looked around. “Well, judging by where we were in the palace before descending, as well as how long we’ve been traveling…assuming that, despite all the twists, we’ve been going in a straight line, we should be just about at the edge of the palace right now, if not technically outside it. Most likely, the city square is directly above us.” He slowly turned in a circle, squinting in the flickering candlelight. He pointed to the offshoot to the right. “If my sense of direction is correct, that way will take us further away from the palace, out under the city.” He pointed to the other tunnel. “That will take us back towards the heart of the palace. That’s the one I think we should take.”
Zaphyr nodded, satisfied with his answer. Setting off once more, her brother following in her footsteps, she soon noticed that the unhewn, natural stone of the walls had been replaced with evenly carved bricks, marking their return to deliberately constructed corridors. Soon they found themselves in a large cavern, a hub of several other branching tunnels. Countless prison cells were set into the walls of the cavern and the adjoining chambers, which almost all sat empty, the doors apparently forced open. There was a table in the center with an unlit lantern set atop it, as well as two half-eaten bowls of gruel and a ring of keys. Judging by the pair of chairs set near the table, one of which had fallen over, whichever guards had been assigned to this portion of the tunnel system had fled it hurriedly and recently.
“Dungeons,” Zaphyr said, wrinkling her nose in distaste. “Looks to be abandoned.”
“The Master freed all of the Empress’ prisoners,” Zull noted, casting a quick eye around the room. “Then he and his men left. There was nothing else here for them, after all.”
In response to Zull’s comments, they heard a soft groan coming from one of the many cells, across the great cavern from them. Curious, they stepped over, finding upon closer inspection that this cell remained locked. Peering in, they saw, to their surprise, Argus Vyle, lying on the floor of the cell. He was bruised, bleeding, but thankfully, alive.
“Vyle!” Zaphyr said in glee, clutching at the bars of the cell as she did so. “You’re still alive! I can’t believe it!”
“They tried to get me to talk,” Vyle said, his words slurred and muted. Struggling, he rose to his knees, showing them that one of his eyes was swollen shut and that his mouth was caked in dried blood. “That blithering idiot thinks calling himself ‘the Master,’ will make everyone around him do whatever he wants. Never met someone more obstinate in my life, barring his mother.” He laughed bleakly, the sound clearly paining him. “I see where he gets it from.”
“What happened to you?” Zull asked, worried for his friend.
“The Master killed Vard, Henricks, and Velen,” Vyle said, his expression darkening as he spoke. “I thought he was going to kill me as well, but instead he had his hired thugs drag me down here. They tortured me, trying to get me to tell them everything I knew about the Empress’ own plans, her military, and all that bunk.” He grinned lopsidedly. “Even if I had known anything, which I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have told them. Eventually, they gave up and left me down here to rot. I haven’t seen anyone since, and that was some hours ago.” After a pause, he added, “I never thought I would say this, but I think I would rather have Yelezna ruling the empire, rather than that maniac.” His brow furrowed. “What are the two of you doing here?”
“We ran into the Master and escaped, barely,” Zull said. “We traveled to the Summer Palace with Sir Kyr, where we saved the Empress from the Master’s men. Then, with her army, we came back here to retake the palace. Sir Kyr…didn’t make it, but we are winning the battle. All that remains is finding the Master himself.”
Vyle bowed his head, his expression unreadable. “I’m sorry to hear about Sir Kyr,” he said softly. “It’s truly a tragedy, what happened to that man. I hope that he finally has some peace now.” Something else seemed to occur to him, then. “You said that you still haven’t found the Master?”
“No,” Zaphyr said. “Nobody has seen him since we entered the palace.”
“Then there might still be time,” Vyle muttered to himself. “He had some sort of grand ritual planned involving his cousin, Grevel. He-”
“-is trying to absorb Prince Grevel’s life energy,” Zull said, finishing Vyle’ statement for him. “We deduced as much.”
“He has the whole ritual, complete with Prince Grevel, set up in the throne room,” Vyle told them. “I saw it as they dragged me past, down here. It looked like they were just getting ready to begin.”
“Do we have any idea how long the ritual will take?” Zaphyr asked Zull.
He shook his head negatively. “Gerok never taught us anything related to blood bindings, and I only learned the very rudimentary principles from Sangue.”
Zaphyr let out a hiss between clenched teeth. “Then we need to act quickly. Vyle, we will get you out of here, then you’ll lead us to the throne room. If we can disrupt the ritual, then the Master will be powerless; nothing more than a frail, sickly little boy.”
“I like the way you think, Zaphyr,” Vyle said, smiling broadly, showing several of his teeth were missing, either broken or pulled from his mouth during the torture he had undergone. “The keys are probably on that table behind you.”
Zull turned to go fetch them, then froze. “Zull?” Zaphyr asked.
“Zaphyr,” he said, his tone hushed and awed. “Turn around.”
Zaphyr did as he requested, and her jaw nearly dropped open in astonishment. A man had entered the cavern while they were distracted, and now stood atop a rocky outcropping jutting out from a walkway above the twins. Despite the dimness, she instantly recognized him for who he was: Prince Blyth, the mastermind behind all their miseries and struggles. He smiled triumphantly down at them, his once pale face flush, his deathly complexion now far healthier looking. His pristine white uniform was speckled with dried blood in several places, though whether it belonged to him or to someone else, the twins could not even dare to guess at. A large blood binding was now branded into his right cheek, just barely visible in the light of the lantern he held in his hand.
“The Tyrell Twins. I’m so glad we can meet again,” he crowed gleefully as he stared down at them from his perch. “I’m afraid that you are just a little too late; the ritual is now fully completed. Grevel’s strength, his health, all of it belongs to me now. Totally and utterly. I’ve never felt better.” He giggled slightly, and the sound echoed through the cave uncannily. “What was it you called me, Zaphyr? A ‘frail, sickly little boy?’ Not anymore.” His eyes flashed with a barely restrained killing rage, and he said, “All I need to do is dispose of you both, then rid the palace of mother’s mewling minions, and things can continue according to my original plan. For all your vainglorious effort, all you have actually managed to accomplish is to annoy and delay me. I want you to know that, before I snuff out your worthless lives.”
“You won’t get away with this, Blyth,” Zull said. “You will pay for what you did to Vard and your other victims.”
“That obnoxious bard?” Blyth said, raising an eyebrow in surprise. “You still remember him? It’s been hours since I killed him. I’m surprised your memory stretches back that far.”
Screaming in sudden rage, Zaphyr tore open the gash she had cut in her palm once more, summoning a long narrow spear of blood, which she hurled with all her hemomantic might through the air towards Prince Blyth. It froze a second later, hovering in the space between the two of them, before exploding in a shower of scarlet droplets, spattering across the floor of the cave.
“What?” Zaphyr asked, incredulous. “Impossible.”
“How does it feel, to be bested by another’s power, Zaphyr? A new experience, I would think,” Blyth said tauntingly. “When I bound myself to Prince Grevel, I took not only his physical strength, but also his hemomantic potential. I’m now twice the hemomancer I was, and I am far more powerful than you could ever dream to be.” Prince Blyth chuckled, as if enjoying a private joke. “In short, there’s nothing you can do. My victory is inevitable.”
“Zaphyr, we need to leave. Now,” Zull said under his breath. “We’ll find another way, but we can’t beat him in a direct confrontation. He’s too powerful.”
“No,” Zaphyr said, eyes narrowed, focused on the smugly grinning man staring down at them. “I’m not going to run anymore, Zull. We can defeat him, here and now. I know it.” Reaching out a hand, she squeezed it into a fist. A shadow of discomfort passed over Blyth’s face, before vanishing as quickly as it had appeared.
“Were you trying to cut off my blood supply to my muscles? Freeze me in place?” Blyth asked. “Amusing. Did you hear a single word I just said, Zaphyr? My hemomantic power is far beyond yours. It took only the slightest effort to push off your will, and to regulate my own blood flow. And despite everything, you chose to try a nonlethal method, one which you must surely realize would leave me alive and capable of retaliation. Pathetic, really.” His smile disappeared entirely. “Now, I’ll show you what a true hemomancer is capable of.”
He raised his hands and snapped his fingers once. Zaphyr clutched at her leg as the most agonizing pain she had ever felt raced through it, replaced by a sudden, eerie numbness. There was a spurt of blood, then, to her horror, her leg below the knee simply fell off with a wet plopping noise, sliced cleanly free from the rest of her body. She stumbled, nearly slipping in the pool of her own blood before Zull grabbed her by the shoulder and held her steady.
“What did you do,” Zaphyr hissed between clenched teeth, shaking visibly as she said it.
“Anyone can take blood outside the body and turn it into a weapon, as you so aptly demonstrated,” Blyth explained. “But to make blood a weapon within the body, to cut and eat away at whatever I desire? Now that requires both power and technique in equal measure.”
“You’re insane,” Zaphyr said.
Blyth shrugged.
Turning to look t her brother, who still supported her under one arm, Zaphyr whispered, “I’ll keep him distracted. You get the keys, free Vyle, and make your way to the throne room. Prince Grevel is most likely still there. You’ll have to undo the binding from that end.”
“You can’t fight him, Zaphyr! He will kill you,” Zull muttered back.
“Maybe,” she admitted. “But I must try. If I don’t then we’re all doomed, regardless.”