Rian leaned back against the tree behind him and closed his eyes, trying to think of what to do. He had to find the cult, or did he? Wasn’t that what Ransey would do? But he couldn’t just let Ransey do it. Ransey had said eating flesh would give him power and give Mortua strength. Mortua having more power wasn’t a good thing. Rian knew what Mortua would do with that power. As soon as the cults were dealt with, she would send Ransey after Rian and Halbert. But Ransey couldn’t just feed off innocents, could he?
Rian sighed. Ransey could convince himself just about anyone was guilty. Most of the Sancta could. Hands grabbed Rian’s shoulders. He opened his eyes, seeing a blur of movement before a dark sack was pulled over his head. He fought against the hands, but there were a lot of them and they had taken him by surprise. His hands were forced behind him and tied with rope. He was pulled to his feet and forced to walk.
He struggled against his captors, but he was disoriented by the sack and the thirst. Rian stopped struggling and focused on resisting the thirst, which took everything he had with their hands on him, with them standing so close. They walked a long while, then wooden floors creaked beneath their boots. Soon they were going downstairs, where it was colder.
They didn’t walk him much further before he felt a table behind him. His captors lifted him onto the table. They restrained one of his wrists with what felt like a leather strap. When he felt that, he knew where he was, knew who had taken him. They untied the rope from his hands and strapped down his other hand, then removed the sack. They had also taken his cloak.
The cultists stared down at him, whispering among themselves, then most of them backed away. One of them stayed. It was the man Rian had seen earlier, but now he was wearing black robes. He still had the dagger. Another cultist handed the man a wooden cup.
“Blessed recently?” the man asked.
“Blessed by Mortua this morning,” another cultist said.
The cult leader turned and set the cup on a small table behind him, then he drew the dagger and dipped the blade in the water. Rian tensed, sensing the holy water from where he lay strapped to the table. The cult leader returned, staring at Rian without expression before raising the dagger. The thirst was harder to resist this close.
“You could escape these bonds easily,” Trivius said.
Rian tried to ignore that. He didn’t want to become like Norris, but neither did he want to be sacrificed. Especially not with one of those daggers. The cry of birds echoed through the room. Rian felt a bit of hope when he recognized the sound as that of ravens. Ravens swooped down at the cultists. The cultists cried out, some of them running and some drawing various weapons.
Two ravens flew at the cult leader. He swiped at them with the dagger, but they dodged, cutting into him with their talons. The cult leader dropped the dagger, crouching with his arms over his head. Blood ran from the man’s arms, dripping onto the stone floor. The bright red was all Rian could see. He pulled free of the leather straps easily, the nails holding them in place tearing free of the wood.
In moments he was kneeling beside the man. The birds had flown off to torment the other cultists, but the cult leader stayed there, shaking. He lowered his arms slowly, then tensed when he saw Rian. Rian could feel his fangs getting longer. The man cried out, scooting back across the floor quickly.
Rian could catch the man easily. Trivius was waiting for him to strike, willing him to do it but not forcing him to. Behind that feeling, Rian still sensed the holy water in the cup. He didn’t know if it would work, or if it would kill him, but he wasn’t going to drink the blood of the living. Or of the dead. Rian forced himself to move, to turn away from the cult leader. He went over to the little table, staring down at the water in the cup.
“It might not work,” Trivius said. “If you die, this part of me goes with you. I would certainly prefer you be a true undead, not one that relies on the blood of the living, but I will not risk death.”
Rian didn’t know why Trivius would prefer it the other way and doubted it was a pleasant reason, but he wasn’t going to let that stop him.
“Rian!”
He barely heard someone calling his name over the sounds of the ravens and the cries of the cultists. He picked up the cup quickly, before he could change his mind and before Trivius could force him not to. Rian drank the holy water. It burned like fire on the way down, then burned throughout him. It hurt too much to even cry out. The cup slipped from his hand. He collapsed on the floor.
His breath came out with a wheezing sound somewhere near his throat. Had the holy water burned through his throat? Rian tried to move, but couldn’t, the water burning hotter as it moved through him. There was a spreading puddle of red around him. He felt his skin burning, could see it burning on his hands and arms. He was still breathing, fast and panicked now. Was he going to die like this? Would he still be in Mortua’s grasp?
“Rian!” Eiva’s voice was close, but Rian couldn’t move to see where she was.
Rian closed his eyes against the burning that had moved to his eyes as well, but it didn’t stop. He could hear voices, but couldn’t make out the words. They sounded distant. The sound of ravens had gone. He felt someone lifting him up, then felt nothing but the burn of the holy water until there was burial ground beneath him.
The energy still couldn’t reach him. The holy water continued to burn, an inescapable force inside of him that wanted to destroy him. His breathing slowed, then his last breath left him, how it had in the Bone Garden when he sealed Trivius with Arwel’s help. When Rian woke up, there was dirt over him. He no longer felt the thirst, and the wrongness of what Mortua had done was gone.
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He stayed there a moment longer, energy still flowing into him from the dirt of burial ground. The burn of the holy water was gone. He sat up slowly, brushing what dirt he could off his bones. Trivius felt stronger than before, but his presence was different now. Rian thought it might be easier to stop him from taking over. Hopefully Trivius would be just another voice in his head. Trivius said nothing to that, but Rian thought he felt Trivius’s amusement.
Rian was in the graveyard in Wels the cultists had taken him from. Halbert and Eiva sat at the base of a nearby tree. It was night, the moon bright.
“Are you alright?” Eiva asked.
Rian nodded. “I think so. What Mortua did is gone.” He didn’t know what more to say. Even if he had avoided permanently becoming like Norris, he was still ashamed of what had happened in Veron.
“What happened?” Halbert asked. “We only found the archivist in his office. He was missing a piece of flesh and had been drained of blood.”
Rian hesitated, but he had to tell them. “Ransey killed the archivist and took the dagger, then he ate some of the archivist’s flesh.”
Eiva grimaced. “Why would he do that?”
“Mortua gave him some sort of magic,” Rian said. “Eating flesh gives Ransey power and gives Mortua strength. He ran me through and left through the window.” Again he hesitated.
“And you drank the archivist’s blood to survive?” Halbert asked, his voice tense.
“No,” Rian said quickly. “When Trivius was sealed, a part of him went into me. He forced me to…”
Halbert sighed. “How long has Trivius been trying to take over?”
“That was the only time he tried so far,” Rian said. “I think it will be easier to hold him back now.” He looked away. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be,” Halbert said. “It wasn’t your choice. I’m surprised you made it here without feeding on someone, or anyone here.”
“Or the cult leader,” Eiva said. “We got there right as they were about to sacrifice you.” She frowned. “The ravens came. I didn’t mean to call them.” She shook her head. “Why did you drink the holy water? It worked, but it could have killed you.”
“It was that or I wouldn’t be able to stop myself from feeding on the cult leader,” Rian said.
“You didn’t come back to us because you were afraid you would feed on me,” Eiva said. It wasn’t a question.
“I also...” Rian looked away.
Halbert sighed. “It truly wasn’t your choice. Trivius forced you to do it.”
But Rian hadn’t been able to stop him. “Did you find the dagger?” he asked.
Eiva nodded. “It’s next to my sword.” She patted her belt, but it was hidden beneath her cloak. She stood, picking up a bundle of clothes from the ground next to her. “I got you clean clothes.”
“Thank you,” Rian said.
After he got dressed, he put on the fresh cloak and pulled the hood up. It was a strange thought, but he was relieved to be properly undead again. Not that Mortua’s influence had really been like being alive.
“Feel better?” Eiva asked.
Rian nodded.
“Where to next?” Eiva asked Halbert. “Should we go back to the Sancta and tell them about Ransey?”
Halbert said nothing for a moment. “I’m not sure they will disapprove, but we don’t have any leads on the next cults. And we do have a dagger to hand over to them.”
“Could we just let Ransey handle the rest of the cults?” Eiva asked.
Halbert shook his head. “If Ransey feeding on flesh is giving him and Mortua more power, then we should limit his chances of doing so. We also still don’t know who is behind these daggers. Someone gave the daggers to the cults and convinced them it was Mortua’s will that they sacrifice people.”
“That journal we found at the cult’s hideout here suggests a powerful mage,” Eiva said. “It’s not easy to speak to someone through dreams.” She frowned. “Though there are herbs that could cloud someone’s mind enough to convince them they’re dreaming.”
“Either way, we need to find out more,” Halbert said.
“What about the cult here?” Rian asked.
“I’ve informed the guards of the house they were using,” Eiva said. “They won’t be sacrificing anyone else.”
The three of them left Wels that night. They reached Chayer seven days later. Eiva was exhausted, having insisted on most nights that they keep going. She had slept very little on the way to Chayer. When they reached the city that night, Eiva went straight to the inn. Rian and Halbert hadn’t rested on burial ground enough and went to the graveyard closer to the city wall.
Rian awoke to the musty cave. He had almost missed this place.
“Mortua must not gather more power,” the raspy woman said.
“Ransey must be stopped,” a young man said.
“But our Speaker would be aiding the Sancta if he stopped the cults,” an older man said. “Aiding the enemy.”
A young woman sighed. “It must be done. Stopping Mortua from gathering power is what’s most important now.”
The cave faded away as the voices began to argue, but Rian didn’t wake up back underground in the graveyard. He woke up in the cave of the Bone Garden, standing before Trivius’s skull.