The Gray Lady ushered Alize through a doorway into a stone house, and then into an unfurnished room. Alize’s heart began to race just as the Mage stepped forward. She spoke a word of command and the stones blocking their path dissolved. The Mage covered her lips with one finger and took Alize’s hand, pulling her into the space between the outer and the inner city walls. No one stood to witness it. Using the same magic, the Mage brought them through the second wall, into another dark and empty room.
But a torch wavered at the doorway and when Alize turned, muddled brown eyes greeted her.
“Kell,” Alize’s voice cracked. Her knees grew weak again.
“You have me committing treason before sunrise,” Kell answered, drawing Alize into his arms. “It is true you have Davram’s soul?”
“Yes.”
“Rehsan must have blessed you,” Kell exhaled. He squeezed Alize and then looked to the Mage. “And thank you.”
“Hm,” the Gray Lady answered. For a moment she frowned in deliberation. “There is something else. The Deku can track you.” She announced. She drew her fingers together. It pained Alize, such a visceral reminder of Onder. “They have cast a black mark on you.” A green light emerged, dancing over Alize’s chest. When it fizzled, Alize tucked her fingers under her collar. Her scar was gone. Her chest heaved in relief.
The Mage said, “I will put it on a horse, and send it north.”
Alize stared at the gray lady for a moment, unable to quite comprehend the new lightness she felt. “Why are you helping me?”
“Do not mistake our intentions. The Magi have not changed their minds about our neutrality,” the Gray Lady announced stiffly, “but Onder died protecting you and protecting the Ginmae prince. The Deku have forgotten that there is power in death too.”
“For Onder,” Alize whispered. There was no way to save the dead of that evening, but the gray lady’s actions perhaps would save her and Davram in the coming days. She watched the Mage depart the way they had come, the stone wall forming once more behind her.
“We haven’t much time, Alize.” Kell spoke. “I found you a donkey to pull the cart with Davram’s body. Try to feed him, give him water, during your journey.”
“Aren’t you going to ask where I’m taking Davram?”
“Don’t tell me. The less I know, the better.”
“Can’t you come with me?” Alize whispered. An instant later she realized it echoed Kell’s own request. Stay with me. Had that only been the previous evening?
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“I’m sorry Alize,” Kell shook himself, “We didn’t know that things were this bad.”
“Bad?”
“The Deku, we were all so blind,” Kell stammered bitterly, “the Deku made their plans in our province at the same time they made plans for the others. The princes in Farib, Orestar and Dsarte provinces all fell to Deku-Kogalok forces tonight, and we received messengers from Ismarn and Priam begging Greer for aid. The dead are mounting, and we fear they will swell the Kogalok armies.” Kell squeezed Alize so tight her bones ached.
Still it was not enough.
Hollan appeared at the doorway. He tipped his head to Alize. “Hrumi. The Ginmae prince can survive only by your hands. My family has restrained his salt crystal for your journey – it will delay Davram from falling fully into the Emptiness. You have four days.”
Alize paused as she tried to place Hollan’s words in her memory. Restrain. Hesna had known the runes for restrainment. But she had concurred when Alize observed that no Hrumi would ever leave a sister in salt longer than the requisite evening of the dagger binding ceremony. Alize had never learned the runes. But they might be enough to save Davram on this journey.
Hollan was still talking. “…be sure to give him water. May the Rehsan protect you in the steppes.” Hollan then turned to address Kell. “You need to return to the palace.”
Kell turned to Alize, his eyes ablaze. “I can’t leave Parousia now, not if this province too might fall. I’m so sorry.”
Alize could only stare at him. She would be again cast out and left to make her way alone.
“Come,” Kell took her hand. His inner struggle manifested on his face. “Alize, I’ll walk you out.”
As they entered the outer city’s darkness, Alize buried her head in Kell’s shirt. He pulled her close, every inch of him resisting releasing her.
“I’m afraid.” Alize whispered into his tunic. They were words she had never spoken aloud, words she would not dare voice to anyone else alive.
“Don’t be,” Kell kissed her forehead. “Only Rehsan could have been more prepared than you are for this journey. And,” Kell exhaled, “in the very worst case, you still have this.”
Kell reached into his sac and pulled out a narrow wooden box. In the semi-darkness, the etched hunting scene culminating on the lid all too easily invoked Alize’s own circumstances.
“No!” she thrust it back towards Kell. “You can’t entrust me with Davram and give me my own wicked hunger to bear!”
“Leiz,” Kell murmured, “it’s your soul. It can’t be wicked. And you must take with you, in case you need to call the echoes, and to protect you from the Empty. I won’t send you away without that choice.”
“But I’m coming back,” Alize whispered.
“There’s a chance,” Kell swallowed, “that I might not be here by then. You have to take it now.”
Still Alize hesitated until Kell pressed the box into her numb fingers. When she could no longer avoid grasping it, she tossed it into the cart and then leaned back to Kell.
He held her close, letting this last sweetness linger like honey on the tongue.
But in the end Kell could not see Alize off. Hollan caught up to them to escort him back into the stables, warning of fires in the Oghuz section that risked isolating them from the rest of the city.
When their footsteps died down, Alize stood in the empty street’s profound isolation. She heaved a deep breath and directed the donkey forward, looking east to where the sky was starting to glow scarlet above the sloped rooftops. Beyond the silent trees, beyond the eroded mountains, lay a city of gray granite overlooking the steppes. There, an old Conjurer sat waiting to decide the future of all the souls resting below him.