Cast in Honor (Chronicles of Elantra, #11)(101)

Draalzyn nodded slowly. He never looked precisely happy, and his beard framed his face in such a way that his pallor was the second thing you noticed, if you noticed anything at all. “Your point is taken. Have you spoken to Private Neya outside of the Tha’alaan?”

“Not in any great detail. Will you speak with her directly?”

Draalzyn looked as if he’d rather kiss a hundred toads. Which was fair, because Kaylin would rather kiss two hundred. They both shut up.

“Scoros?”

“It is as you know. We will retreat to this building and open the interior gates. Those who flee through the tunnels will not survive; they perish first. Those who remain to defend and guard their retreat perish shortly thereafter.”

“What attacks the quarter?”

“It is still not completely clear to us,” Draalzyn replied. The stalks on his forehead were weaving in a graceful way that was at odds with everything else about the man. “The deaths are not instant—but they are quick. Some are crushed. Some are, we think, beheaded; some are torn apart in a matter of seconds. Some feel the pain of fire—but only briefly. They are panicked. They are in their homes or in the streets; there is very little warning.”

“They don’t see anything?”

“No, Kaylin.”

“So—whatever kills them, whatever slaughters them, is invisible?”

Ybelline answered before Draalzyn could. “There are tactile impressions, but these are also confused. Yes. I would guess that the deaths will be the same across the city. In this possible future, I reach the mirror,” she added softly. She hesitated. “We manage to secure a safe area, a barriered hold. But activation of the mirror—” She inhaled sharply. “It summons death into our chambers.”

Kaylin’s hands were fists.

“Don’t,” Ybelline said, reaching for those fists and forcing Kaylin’s fingers to unbend. “It is a mercy. For all of us, it is a mercy; the pain and the fear of our people’s deaths have driven us all to the edge of madness.”

“Or over it,” Scoros said quietly. “We have attempted to piece more together. I believe it is Draalzyn who suggests the barrier.”

Draalzyn nodded, his lips twisted. “I have gained some knowledge among your Hawks. It is not, in future, enough. I do not cast the spell in question.” He didn’t say who did. Kaylin didn’t ask.

“Can you tell me what kind of barrier? What is it meant to protect you against?”

“It is an inversion,” Ybelline replied, “of a summoning spell.”

“A summoning spell?” Kaylin felt like a parrot.

“We have, prior to this, summoned water. And fire. It is a specific spell that requires the names of those elements. The barrier is comprised of that knowledge and the attempt to drive them out.”

“But—but why?”

“Draalzyn?”

Draalzyn looked as if he’d swallowed a rat that wasn’t quite dead. “Ybelline, must I?”

“If you prefer, I can visit the memories of your death and the hours before it occurred.” Her eyes, as she spoke, were gold.

Draalzyn grimaced. “You think I would spare you that pain when I have had to endure it myself?”

“Yes, actually, I do.” She smiled.

He threw both his hands up in disgust that was only partly feigned. “This,” he told Kaylin, “is what you must watch out for when Ybelline knows you too well. She will twist you around her finger; you will do what she wants you to do because you can’t bear to cause her pain. Even,” he added darkly, “when you wish to strangle her.

“The concept of a magical barrier exists among the mages. It was of interest to me, and of interest to my kin. It was not a priority, because it does not prevent actual people from crossing its lines. The barriers exist in a particular form; they exist as a counter to other magicians. There are many theories about magic—its use, its origin—and therefore many theories about the counters that can be put into play.

“The barrier was one such theory. I suggested it to Ybelline at an earlier stage in her education. She considered it with the same care she considers many foreign things.” The implication was not lost on Kaylin.

“The barrier works, in the future?”

“Yes.”

“Wait.” Kaylin held up a hand, although Draalzyn didn’t seem to be in a hurry to interrupt her. “You—you don’t think it’s the elements that destroy the city?”

“We do not know,” he said, drumming the table at which he sat. “We do not speak with the elements. We speak into the Tha’alaan. The Tha’alaan is part of the elemental water—but it is a small part, at odds with the whole. It is inconceivable to us that the water itself would destroy the city—but I am told I, at least, suffer from insufficient imagination.” This last, he said in a very sour voice, with an expression to match.

“It is, in theory, possible that magic as our mages currently understand it has its underpinnings in the elemental forces. Frankly, this makes sense to me, if we accept that the world itself is derived from those forces.”

“There’s no way the elements go to town if...”

“If the Keeper is still in control of his Garden,” Ybelline finished for her.