time?” I demanded.
“Yes, I could.”
I gazed out as frustration and futility twisted tightly around me. Sensing I was conflicted, the Fire Warper let the souls draw near to me so I could see the fate of my friends. Their cries grew shrill in my ears and the heat baked my skin, making it difficult to concentrate. The fetid odor assaulted my senses.
“Watch,” he said, and pointed to the scene beyond the fire. “Roze has ensnared Irys in a cocoon of magic. She will force her to lie upon the sand and be tied down.”
Sure enough Irys walked toward Roze. She knelt before her. Irys’s eyes glanced to the side before the other Warpers secured her in the sand. I followed her gaze and spotted Valek.
He fought four Warpers with swords, but I knew they threw every ounce of magic at him. And by Roze’s intent gaze, she aimed all her power against him. Even though the magic didn’t work, he still felt the presence and it slowed his movements. A soldier waited nearby with a blowpipe, seeking the first opportunity to hit Valek with a dart.
“And Valek will be next,” the Fire Warper said. “What do you want to do? Watch your friends and lover die or guide me to the sky?”
I held out my hand to Moon Man and to the Fire Warper. “Come,” I said.
CHAPTER 34
A TRIUMPHANT GRIN SPREAD on the Fire Warper’s face. Moon Man remained unflappable. He held my hand. Even though it appeared to be made of smoke, his hand felt solid in mine. Moon Man looked at me. The oval shape of his eyes matched Roze’s. Why hadn’t I noticed the resemblance before?
Roze’s comments replayed in my mind. Could I reanimate Moon Man’s body after I took him to the sky? According to Roze, soulless bodies were unaffected by magic. Could I create a small force to help Irys and Valek?
My bat flew around my head. Odd. How could he be here?
Moon Man sighed. I missed the point. It didn’t matter how the bat had gotten here, but why was he here at all. Bats. Opal’s glass bat. I reached for my pocket, but the answer halted the motion. Opal’s sister. Tula!
When Ferde had stolen Tula’s soul and strangled her, I had used my magic to breathe for Tula, but as soon as I had stopped, she had stopped.
I didn’t possess the power to raise a soulless army.
The magician born one-hundred-and-fifty years ago wasn’t a Soulfinder, but a Soulstealer.
I was a true Soulfinder. And I knew what my job entailed. The Fire Warper grew impatient with my delay and reached for my free hand; I yanked it away. My bat cried out with joy and disappeared.
I sought Roze with my mind, seeing her soul and the souls of all her victims trapped within her. Their blood had been injected into her skin to bind them to her. I pushed at the blood, sweeping and forcing it through her pores, pulling the souls free, sending them to the sky.
She yelped and rolled up her sleeve. Black liquid oozed from her arms, dripping onto the sand. The putrid smell of rancid blood surrounded her like a fog. Each one I removed weakened Roze until only her own power remained.
Then I projected my mind to Gede and did the same to him. One by one I plucked souls from the Warpers, weakening them.
The Fire Warper cried an oath and lunged for me. Moon Man intercepted and fought him so I could return my attention to the Keep.
Roze’s magical hold on Irys had slipped when I extracted her power. Freed from the magic, Irys used her own skills to draw a knife close to her and cut the rope. Once loose, she ran to a few others who had not been pricked with Curare but who, like her, had been captured by magic.
Gale and Marrok joined her and they attacked Roze. Valek’s opponents had been distracted by the scene around them, giving Valek the opportunity to dispatch them. The man with the blowpipe ran off. Valek turned his full attention to Roze.
Satisfied all was well with my friends, I focused on the Fire Warper. He held Moon Man in a tight grip, compressing Moon Man’s soul to bind him to the fire world.
“Stop,” I said. “You’ll gain no more power today.” I pulled at Moon Man with my magic and he popped from the Fire Warper’s grasp. “I find souls and ensure they arrive at the proper destination. He doesn’t belong here. But you do.”
I moved past him. He tried to stop me, but he was a soul just like all the others and I controlled him. Moving through the fire world, I found those who didn’t belong and released them to the sky. The Fire Warper screamed at me with each one, but I ignored him. A long time passed as I freed them all, but my energy increased with every rescue.
“Why aren’t I tired?” I asked Moon Man.
He smiled. “Think about what you have learned today.”
I glanced around. The Fire Warper’s power had diminished with each freed soul. Perhaps stealing his power had increased my own?
“No.” Moon Man looked a little exasperated, as if he couldn’t believe how slow I was. I did take some pleasure from his expression. To alter his calm demeanor required much effort on my part.
The Fire Warper glowered at me. “It is only a matter of time before I regain my strength,” he said. “There is always someone who desires more power and I will be waiting for them.”
“Not if I can help it,” I said.
“Then you will have to spend eternity with me to prevent it. The knowledge is out there now. Another fool will figure out how to contact me through the flames.”
He had a point. But I was the Soulfinder. In order to do my job, I would have to stay in the underworld and send the souls to their proper places. Thinking about my job, I remembered a promise to Moon Man.
“Can you guide me to the shadow world?” I asked him.
“No. But you can lead me.”
“And you call yourself a guide?”
He smiled serenely.
“I hate you.” I clasped Moon Man’s hand.
I thought of the shadow world with its gray plain and sky. The red glow faded and soon the featureless expanse spread in front of us.
“This is only the corridor between worlds, Yelena. Look deeper to see the real shadow world.”
Another cryptic instruction. For all my abilities, I still couldn’t get Moon Man to give me a straight answer. I pushed away my frustration and focused on who I was trying to find. The Sandseeds who had been killed by the Vermin in the Avibian Plains.
The flat area began to undulate and transform into the plains. Small outcroppings of rocks grew and the smooth gray ground sprouted grass and a few bushes. A cluster of canvas tents popped up and circled a fire pit. The scene before me resembled a Sandseed camp. Yet there was no color. Only black and white and every shade of gray.
Sandseeds huddled together in this camp on the altered Avibian Plain, living in the shadow cast by the real world. They clung to their memories of life, not realizing peace awaited them in the sky.
I walked among them and talked to them. Their numbers grew and I had to stop myself from reliving the horror of the Vermin’s attack and massacre. I made promises to watch over the living Sandseeds who had hidden during the attack. Days and weeks could have passed while I convinced them to move on. I had no concept of time.
Again, as I sent each one into the sky, my strength grew. “There are many more souls clinging to the shadow world,” I said to Moon Man, thinking about all the towns and cities in Sitia and Ixia. “Let me return you to your body and you can tell the others my fate.”
