The Turquoise Tower (Revenant Wyrd Book 6) Read online

  “Do you miss it?” she asked.

  “I miss my work, the machines, and my family. The constant darkness? No.”

  Little more was said before they headed out. Angelica knew all about missing family, but at least the frement had a home to go back to, a job, activities as they had always been. This was just a vacation from his life.

  But that’s not right, Angelica thought. She knew she was wrong. This wasn’t just about her family any longer. The attacks of the fallen angels proved that. This was a struggle for all the realms. If they failed, how long would it be before Shelara and Caldamron didn’t have a home to go back to?

  Angelica could almost imagine the darkness of Chaos sweeping over the lands, decimating whatever lay in its path to domination.

  Late in the evening, as Maeven was scouting ahead for a place to camp for the night, a howling could be heard off in the distance.

  Cianna held her hand up to Joya, hushing the younger woman, and turned her head to listen.

  “What is it?” Angelica asked, coming to a stop behind her cousin.

  “I don’t know,” she said, a frown knitting her dark brows. “It sounds like a wolf, but not living.”

  “An undead wolf?” Angelica asked. The thought struck her almost as comical, until she realized such a thing might be possible. It was a sobering thought.

  “A ghost, maybe,” Cianna said. Several minutes passed, but the howl didn’t come again.

  That night they camped to the side of the road, huddled around a camp fire, their wyrded bedrolls warm enough to keep the cold of the night from harming them. Angelica didn’t pay any attention to the chatting that took place, and instead stared off into the distance, her eyes trying to find the darkness of the Shadow Realm that Caldamron claimed to have seen. She couldn’t see any sign of it, either because it was already growing dark, or because it wasn’t there to see.

  There was a stiff wind that night, but their camp sat in such a way that a cliff face was to their back, and the squall didn’t touch them. When they woke early in the morning, it was to find themselves covered in an inch of snow and reluctant to get out of their beds.

  For a week they traveled like that, camping where they could find shelter against the mountainous weather, hearing the baying of the lone wolf tailing them, and deep in their own thoughts. Around the third day Angelica started coming out of her reverie and talking with Caldamron, who traveled close behind her on guard.

  At first they spoke of home, what they missed, different customs they had, and similar ones as well. Angelica was surprised to hear their religious beliefs were darker than her own. In the amount of time between the borders of the Shadow Realm coming up and meeting the frement, a lot had happened. She understood that the frement were a somewhat newer race, but they had old customs.

  The Goddess to them was a mirror opposite to the one Angelica knew. In the rest of the realms, they worshiped the fertile Goddess, the mother of the holy trinity: Maiden, Mother, and Crone. In the Shadow Realm, they worshipped the Crone, the wise elder, the bringer of death and the mysteries after.

  “But then how do you celebrate the holidays, if it isn’t through the life coming and going from the land?” Angelica wondered.

  “Well, we have the same principles. We understand what the seasons mean in the lifespan of the Goddess, but we see them as lessons. The Goddess is always teaching us,” Caldamron told Angelica. He spoke softly, so as not to disturb other conversations. All the while he scanned the sides of the trail, which was rather hard going at times. “Sometimes the lessons are harsh, sometimes they are pleasant. The changing of the seasons teaches us about the rhythms of our own lives. But always the cool death of the Crone is around the corner.”

  “And this is the way for all people in the Shadow Realm?” Angelica asked.

  “Well, different races might have their own beliefs, but for us, yes. We honor the Goddess the way we used to when we were human, before our feline sides were brought to the surface.”

  Her mind was racing with questions about the differences, which her more curious side launched into right away. Caldamron answered all of her questions with a shake of his head and a smile on his lips.

  She thanked the frement in many ways for lifting her spirits during the first part of their travel. But soon the winter weather became too treacherous for idle chatter. Even if they could talk over the exertion of their trip, the gale-force wind and blowing snow would have muffled their words and carried them off over the peaks of the mountains.

  Travel was slow, as they made their way haltingly along the trails, insuring they were on the right path and not about to topple over some cliff. Many times Caldamron gripped Angelica’s elbow as the snow shifted beneath her and fell away, and nearly took her with it.

  On especially windy nights they couldn’t get a fire going, so they often ate their dried rations while wrapped in the comfort and protection of their bedrolls.

  And then on the thirteenth day, the snow stopped, the weather cleared, and for the first time in almost a week they were able to shake the snow from their cloaks and enjoy the warmth and sights the sun brought, impossibly close as they were so high up in the mountains.

  It was the first time they’d had a warm meal in a long while. Jovian and Maeven, with the help of Shelara, had gone hunting and brought back several mountain rabbits, which were much larger than normal rabbits. Most likely they could keep these rabbits for days in the cold up here, and certainly one, maybe two would be enough to feed them for a night.

  “Do you think it sounds closer?” Joya asked that night around the fire, cleaning the meat off the bones of her share of rabbit. Her tea sat beside her, cooling in the snow. She didn’t enjoy hot tea like the others, despite the fact it would help keep her warm.

  “I was wondering that myself,” Cianna said, her head turned back down the way they came, listening for another howl from the wolf.

  “It’s just a wolf,” Jovian said. “And only one at that. Why’s it important?”

  “There’s something strange about this wolf,” Joya said. “Haven’t you been paying attention?”

  “Probably not,” Jovian shrugged, his attention riveted on the rabbit leg he tore into.

  But watches came and went, and there was no sign of the wolf. If it was there, somewhere, it was staying out of sight.

  It was mid-day the following day that they picked up tracks of another traveler.

  “That’s strange,” Maeven said, crouching beside the print.

  “Giant?” Cianna asked, coming up beside him.

  “No, it looks human,” he said, perplexed.

  “What would humans be doing up here?” Shelara scanned the way ahead, her rapier at the ready.

  “Well, we’re up here,” Maeven said.

  “So you think it’s another person going to the tower?” Angelica asked. She was only partially joking. No one answered.

  “All we can do is follow them,” Jovian shrugged.

  “Or we can leave them alone and continue on our way,” Cianna suggested.

  “We’ve been taken in by enough stuff like this in our trip,” Joya agreed. “Whatever it is, leave it alone, and we’ll be fine.”

  Angelica knew that Jovian didn’t like the idea of leaving someone out here alone, but Joya was right. They had run up against this kind of distraction many times in the past, and it had never ended well.

  “At any rate,” Angelica said. “If they came up here, they knew what they were doing, right?”

  “Yeah,” Jovian said, but he didn’t sound like that consoled him at all.

  They didn’t have to wait long to see who the prints belonged to. Around evening time, when they were nearing the end of their scouting for a place to camp, they saw a flicker of firelight reaching out to them through the haze of cold.

  They drew to a halt, trying to see what they could ahead of them.

  “It’s the person these tracks belong to,” Maeven told them after a moment of searching. �
�A man; he’s alone.”

  “Your path-sensing has grown a lot since we last traveled with you,” Joya commented.

  “No, I’m using the sight of my eagle side.”

  “Oh,” Joya said. It was easy to forget that Maeven was now a druid and able to shape-change into an eagle. Furthermore, she didn’t know that he could tap into his animal side while he was in human form.

  “Hello,” a voice called out to them from the fire. They were still far away, and at first Angelica wasn’t sure if it was the sound of the wind or an actual voice.

  They all shifted nervously.

  “What do we do?” Jovian said, looking at the path behind them. “It’s getting too dark to backtrack and make camp further away.”

  “It doesn’t matter anyway,” Shelara said, her voice soft. “He’s already seen us.” She nodded ahead, and sure enough, there came a silvery gray orb whizzing away from the firelight and to their group.

  “Greetings,” the orb said, the words it spoke swirling on the surface of the wyrded message orb. “I travel from the Guardian’s Keep. My name is Russel. Are you headed to the Turquoise Tower as well?”

  Russel wasn’t sure they would join him. He’d seen them at the Guardian’s Keep, though he’d never spoken to them. He’d been having dreams of the tower for a while now, but hadn’t wanted to let those two out of his sight.

  The two blonds. He’d learned their names were Angelica and Jovian. He had to make sure they made it to the tower safely. His mistress had bid him to protect them and get them to the tower unharmed. There they would meet their fate.

  “I’m so glad you could join me,” he said, welcoming them to his camp. “I’m sorry I don’t have much food.”

  “We have our own,” the one he knew to be Cianna said. None of them looked as though they trusted him. Yet. He would have to put them at ease.

  “Very strange to meet another person up here,” the dark-haired man who always traveled with Annbell said. Maeven? Yes, I think that’s his name.

  “Not so strange — you’re all here as well.” Russel gave the pot of vegetables a stir.

  “And you’re going to the tower?” Angelica asked, setting her bags down closer to him than he would’ve thought they’d be comfortable with.

  “Yes. I’ve been receiving the dreams for a while now. I think my daughter, Josephine, will be there. It’s been so long since I’ve seen her. I thought she was dead.”

  Joya nodded, as if she had weighed the truth of his words and found him safe.

  “Food isn’t a concern,” she said. “We have our own. If we travel together, we can hunt together as well, and make sure we split up camp duties.”

  “Another sword would be a great help,” Maeven agreed.

  The two from the Shadow Realm, the man that looked like a cat and the dark elf with the blue skin, stood back, away from him. They studied him, but didn’t say a word. They were the protectors of the one he knew to be Joya.

  Another LaFaye. Mistress never said anything about her . . .

  “That’s a wise plan,” Russel said, and smiled.

  “We’ll take guard duty,” Jovian said.

  “As you wish. Now, help yourself to my fire, and I’ll share my vegetables,” Russel blushed a little, embarrassed he didn’t have anything else to offer them.

  “And we’ll share our game,” Joya said.

  The Mistress might not have said anything about her, but she certainly seems like the leader.

  Russel smiled and nodded his head.

  Grace hated traveling by rojo. She stood in the underground chamber, surrounded by flickering torches and chattering people, waiting for her turn. If she had her choice, she would have stepped through immediately, but Sara was the first to step through the shimmering portal and into the decimated street of the beyond.

  There was a moment, as Sara stepped through the iron doorway, where her image vanished, and then seconds later Grace could see her again, on the other side of the arch and thousands of leagues away in the Ivory City.

  There was a tall blonde woman standing there waiting for them. Her golden dress hung in velvety folds around her slender frame. If Grace didn’t know any better, she would think Aladestra was made of porcelain, her skin and hair were so perfect and radiant. And though she didn’t really care for the Guardian of the Holy Realm, there was no denying Aladestra had very strong wyrd.

  Annbell stepped to the portal next, and through, her form slipping past the glass-like surface of the portal, flickering out of sight and then winking back into existence on the other side. Before Grace closed her eyes and prepared to step through, she saw her auburn-haired sister hugging Aladestra.

  When Grace stepped through the portal, she couldn’t help but open her eyes. It was the sensation of being pulled violently through space and time that she hated more than the vision. She was among the stars, standing in the void of space, being transported from one place to the next. When she stumbled through the rojo and into the shattered streets of the Ivory City, Grace felt like she’d left part of herself behind. The transportation was so violent that when she appeared on the other side her stomach lurched painfully, and she had to fight to keep her breakfast down.

  “Grace, it is so good to see you,” Aladestra said in her sing-song voice, and hugged the old crone.

  “The pleasure is all mine,” Grace lied.

  As the rest of the group — Mag, Astanel, Rosalee, and Dalah, as well as Flora and her charges — came through the portal, Grace took a look around. This side of the rojo emptied out onto a cobbled street, on the opposite side of the constable barracks. There was obviously work being done, but Grace couldn’t see proof of it. Through the rubble and debris she heard the shouts of workers to other workers, and the sounds of heavy stones being moved. Directly across from where they stepped out Grace could see the ruined gate of the dungeon where they’d kept the verax-acis. It was now empty, and the thought made Grace shiver.

  To her right Grace could see nothing but towering stones and debris.

  “This is where the academy came down?” Grace asked.

  “Part of it,” Aladestra nodded. “We’ve had the glass and smaller rubble swept away; now there’s only the larger stones to break up and dispose of. We were able to clear a path this way.” Aladestra pointed to Grace’s left, where there had been a path cleared through more rubble. From her time in the towering city of ivory, Grace knew this corner well. It was the one where the central city started, the home of all the offices of state and the wyrder’s academy.

  “Shall we?” Aladestra asked, and Sara nodded.

  As they made their way through the rubble, Grace kept to herself, admiring the staggering size of the city. It was said, though Grace didn’t believe it, that none of the buildings here were constructed with wyrd, but she just couldn’t understand how towers and apartment buildings could reach so far into the heavens without the aid of some kind of wyrd.

  They turned right once out of the rubble, and Grace looked ahead of them. Every time she saw the cobble street winding up the hill to the Ivory Tower at the apex, it took Grace’s breath away. The sun sparkled majestically off the crystal observatory at the tip of the tower, where Aladestra was able to stargaze at night and practice the ancient art of astrology she so loved. But as Grace’s eyes drifted down the tower, to where the bridge was supposed to rest, reaching out to the wyrder’s academy, her blood ran cold.

  The bridge was gone, as was the upper half of the wyrder’s academy. Grace could see evidence of the ruined tower on the ground all around her.

  “Did it explode?” Grace asked. Fragments of the tower lay all around in a circular pattern. Stores and homes had been crushed under the weight of some of the larger blocks. There was blood in various spots on the cobbled streets, where it couldn’t be washed away. The sun had darkened the blood into brown stains.

  “I really don’t know,” Aladestra said with a shrug. “I remember fighting the fallen, but there was so much confusion. It sou
nded like an explosion, but with such destruction, who can really tell one sound from another?”

  Grace nodded.

  “Would you like to see the fallen?” Aladestra asked. “We have kept it for observation.”

  “Yes,” Grace said, despite her better judgment. She hated going into the morgue of the Ivory Tower. Being surrounded by so much death might not bother some people, but Grace just didn’t like it. “I’ve never seen a fallen up close.”

  “Really? With everything you’ve been through?” Pi asked, coming to walk beside Grace, or maybe Grace was just slowing down the further they made it up the hill.

  “Even with the battles I’ve lived through, no.”

  “Count yourself lucky,” Aladestra said. “It’s a terrifying sight. To know that the being in front of you looks human, but has such power, such thoughts that you just can’t understand.” Aladestra shivered. “And something new — this one had black eyes.”

  “Black eyes?” Sara asked. “That is new.”

  “What do you think that means?” Grace asked.

  “Eh, who knows? Anyway, the rest of the Realm Guardians are waiting for us, so your inspection of the angel might have to wait, Grace,” Aladestra said, coming to a stop before the oaken doors of the Ivory Tower.

  Around the base of the tower was green grass, no gardens like one might expect, and nothing overly grand. The tower sat at the top of the hill, and though it wasn’t crowded, other buildings sat nearby. Off in the distance Grace could see a tunnel leading under a series of streets to the more seedy part of the city, one she might have visited in her younger years.

  Aladestra pushed the door open and welcomed them all into the dimly lit corridor of the entrance hall.

  The hall was fashioned of mud-colored brick, lending a darkness no amount of firelight could quench. Grace knew this hallway would open out into a lobby of sorts, but they weren’t going that far. To the right, not far from the entrance, a series of stairs carved into the building wound up and out of sight.

  “I’m not sure how long this will take,” Aladestra said, turning to the rest of the group. “We only need Grace, Sara, Annbell, and Mag — the rest of you can explore if you’d like. We’ll break for lunch in three hours, and meet anyone who would like to dine with us in the lobby straight ahead.” Aladestra motioned down the hallway ahead of them.