Magic's Promise

'That's it?' Savil said incredulously. 'I must have passed this room a dozen times.'

Vanyel shrugged, and found himself a marginally comfortable chair. They were likely to be here a long while, once Savil got started. 'Did you test that dagger, or were you looking for something hidden?' he asked.

'Something hidden,' she admitted ruefully, walking slowly and reaching for - but nor touching - the dagger. Her eyes unfocused. 'That's it,' she replied after a moment.

'All right. I'll link to you, and you slip me inside the spell,' Vanyel told her, bracing himself in the chair. 'Get out as soon as you can; you've been draining yourself quite enough as it is.'

'Not as much as you, ke'chara,” she retorted, her lips thinning, as she took a seat on the floor at his feet, and laid her hands over his wrists.

'But I'm not a Web-Guardian,' he pointed out with ruthless logic. 'Come on; let's get this over with.'

He closed his eyes and evoked a light trance-state; centered, then reached for a deeper level of Savil than he touched in Mindspeech.

Like hand taking hand, he linked with her; followed her blindly through a twisting, torturous maze of fire and shadow and confusing shapes in which the slightest misstep would mean things he preferred not to think about. Savil knew what she was doing; if she couldn't weave her way through this thing, no one outside of k'Treva could.

:Brace yourself, love. I'm going to toss you in.:

He 'made' himself as compact and small a 'bundle' as he could - and felt himself hurled -

He crawled on hands and knees into consciousness. He opened burning eyes, his stomach in knots, his head pounding, and wanting a bath more than he'd ever wanted anything in his life. He felt filthy inside as well as out.

Savil was still kneeling beside him, holding both of his cold hands in hers, staring intently into his eyes. 'You're back,' she said.

'I'm back,' he replied, swallowing bile. 'You won't like it.'

'I don't like it now.' She released his hands, and he rubbed his eyes with his knuckles.

'Remember what you said, about 'blood' being involved very subtly in this? It is; and given what I found out about the guardianship of the heart-stone it's sicken - ingly logical. When this spell is triggered on someone, it not only goes for them - but for everyone sharing blood - relationship with that person that is also a mage or carries the potential. Everyone, right down to babes in the womb.'

Savil's face grayed a little. 'So whoever did this -'

'I've got that, too. Last person to trigger it was dear Uncle Vedric Mavelan. Last person targeted was Tashir. So much for all his protests about wanting to help the lad.'

'Tashir?' Her voice rose at least half an octave. 'But then - that means that Vedric knew the boy wasn't his!' Vanyel grimaced, and tried to sit up straighter. 'Exactly. He knew it all along, and made no attempt to clear either his sister, or the youngster. Now, I have a few guesses as to why there seem to be inconsistencies. The biggest is why the maid Reta I spoke to survived. My guess is that Vedric shielded the palace to avoid blood in the streets and the question of why Tashir would murder people he didn't even know existed. If he hadn't, it's pretty likely that people would have looked elsewhere for a perpetrator, rather than to Tashir. And that shield would explain why the Mavelans weren't attacked, since they were related to Tashir through Ylyna.'

'And why Ylyna was killed with everyone else; she must have been carrying Mage-potential,' Savil mused aloud.

'The thing is - this is a trap that resets itself. Until we destroy the maker, anyone that knows how can set it against anyone else.''

He sat bolt upright, as the shields on the palace buckled and weakened under a furious attack.

'Did you -' Savil exclaimed, blanching. '- gods, of course you felt that; they're your shields. There's somebody out there trying to get in!'

“Will get in,' Vanyel corrected grimly, launching himself out of the chair. 'It's Vedric. He knows we're in here. He's probably figured out that we know what happened-or soon will. He can't afford to let us escape.'

The shields shrieked in his mind as another attack battered at them. Vanyel started down the hall at a run,