decided to camp at the spot where they’d found the Dairly, in an open field good for grazing with a nearby cluster of five trees. Though all three were exhausted, Ladonna offered to take the first watch while Par-Salian and Tythonnia slept beneath the cloudlike canopy of the green ash.
“You can cast while riding,” Par-Salian said to Tythonnia, as they made ready to sleep. “Nifty trick, that.”
Tythonnia blushed at the compliment. “I was taught to spell-ride. I can cast some spells from horseback.”
Par-Salian nodded in appreciation. “I’m glad you can. You must teach us how you do that.”
Tythonnia nodded before her eyelids fluttered heavily. “We have the time for it,” she said with a yawn. Her eyes closed.
A moment later, Par-Salian’s eyes closed as well.
Ladonna paced around to stay awake. She would have loved to sleep, but her mind was in turmoil as it analyzed scenarios, went over plans of action, and argued with itself. She understood their obligation to the mission, the need to reach Palanthas. It was a reunion she herself eagerly and nervously awaited. But there was the matter of the monster that had animated the dolls. Par-Salian and Tythonnia opposed his execution, which was expected, considering the robes they wore, but they hadn’t heard the dead one speak. They hadn’t heard the dead cry out for vengeance. Ladonna had. She’d heard the terror in their voices, the ghosts of parents searching for their children, the ghosts of children crying to be held. Neither ever seeing the other. They would never be reunited and move beyond the pale of life until someone satisfied their need for justice.
The villagers were more than just terrorized and murdered. They were torn from life, their every connection broken until there was nothing and no one to remember who they were. Ladonna could not abide that. Ghosts created in that fashion would never rest until satisfied, and without rest, they would haunt whomever came upon them.
By no means were the Black Robes saints. In fact, murder and terror were well-regarded tools in their repertoire, but they did not condone either without regard for the specific benefit to the Order of Black Robes first and the Society of High Sorcery second. It was necessary, since many felt that the line between Black Robe and renegade was thin at best. So the members of Ladonna’s order, while advancing personal wishes, always used “benefit of the order” to legitimize their actions in the eyes of others.
Ladonna sighed. The old man responsible for crafting the dolls was proof that magic needed rules, that Ansalon itself needed the orders. She understood the mission, but sometimes the needs of the moment temporarily took precedence over longer-term ambitions. Ladonna knew what needed to be done, and it would be her responsibility alone. She waited a half hour longer, until she was certain her companions were sleeping deeply.
She circled the small cluster of trees once in a wide arc while swinging a tiny bell from a silver string. She incanted the words, barely stirring her own ears with her whispers, and felt the magic slip through her feet and fall along the path she’d trodden. The circle was complete and if anything broke its borders, the spell’s cry would be shrill enough to wake the dead.
At the very least, she wouldn’t be leaving her companions without an alarm. She only hoped that she would be back before they awoke.
The rain had lessened by the time Ladonna spotted the old man’s cabin; it was out of the way and at least twenty minutes from the ruins of the small village. With any luck, Ladonna thought, she could be done and back at the camp within another hour. Ladonna dismounted from her Abanasinian and patted the tall horse on the neck, grateful for its calm temperament. She tied its reins to a nearby tree stump and walked slowly to the cabin. Its ragged curtains were closed, but the frayed edges betrayed flickering candlelight. The walls were rubble stone, cobbled together to form a low-ceilinged house. The roof was thatched and in bad need of repair. Ladonna crinkled her nose at the building; it barely managed as a barricade against the elements, much less a home.
Carefully, she nudged a corner of the wet cloth from the window, enough to afford her a peek inside. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust and another moment to suppress the shudder that ran through her body.
The one-room cabin held little furniture-a rickety chair to lend company to the rickety table, a molding mat on the floor for a bed, and a cooking pit dug into the earth. A sewing bench rested against one side, where two dozen more dolls hung from hooks in the wall, waiting to be finished. The floor was cleared of grass and covered in a layer of packed dirt. Piled on the floor and table, however, were dozens of small artifacts and trinkets. Jewelry, coins, children’s toys, gourds, bottles, a decomposing chunk of ham already white with maggots, fabric rolls-everything stolen from town, Ladonna realized.
What held Ladonna’s attention, however, was the old man himself. He sat on the bed mat, his back to the wall, attended by a half dozen dolls. Silk cloth torn roughly from a bolt was arrayed over his shoulder; an exquisite quilt covered his lower body. Two dolls fitted him with rings and necklaces, riches for their king. Another doll served him morsels of dried fish and meat from gelatin-filled pots, but the food tumbled from his lifeless mouth.
The old man had been dead for days, by the stink of his corpse. His eyes were white, his body drying. His head lolled to one side, and food covered in maggots filled his mouth. And yet the dolls continued to cater to him as though he lived. They were his friends in life, and his death had somehow tainted them. Did they blame the villagers for his death? Ladonna wondered. Or perhaps he imparted into the dolls some loathing of his neighbors.
Ladonna didn’t know. All she knew was that the companions the old man had created were killing people. Perhaps, even, they might have killed him, though despite their hellish appearance, the dolls administered to the old man gently, even lovingly.
She didn’t know or care.
Ladonna quietly stepped away from the cabin, grateful that the rain had covered her footfalls, and retreated to her horse. When she was comfortable with the distance, she turned and pointed her finger at the home.
“Be undone,” she whispered.
The ruby-colored stone set into the ring on her finger sparkled and turned into a pea-sized ball of flame. It shot straight at the cabin, growing in size until it was larger than a horse’s head. The ball struck a stone wall and exploded it inward. Almost instantly, the cabin collapsed in upon itself, the fire quick to devour the roof and everything inside that was flammable. Curls of flame licked upward.
In seconds the cabin and everything inside it were gone, destroyed. Ladonna abandoned hope of ever feeling satisfied at her actions, and simply mounted the Abanasinian. She cast a final look at the bonfire and directed her steed back to the camp.
The three riders were similar in appearance, from their dark cloaks and hoods to their three black Blödegeld horses, a stock so stout and thick they were said to have ogre blood in them. But of all horse breeds, there were few that were as tireless and strong as the Blödegeld. It was the perfect animal for the three renegade hunters.
Dumas had been quiet the entire trip, though the trio rarely spoke. It was the quiet in each other that they preferred, and hunting renegades for the past few years had given them a comfortable familiarity with each other. Still, Dumas knew both the slender Thoma and the bearlike Hort were troubled by her seemingly distant manner. In fact, Dumas herself was troubled by her own thoughts.
She did feel detached from everything around her, as though the roots of her feet had broken free of the soil. As though there was nothing left to anchor her in the seas of the sky. She’d been feeling that way since leaving the chambers of Highmage Astathan, Reginald Diremore, Yasmine of the Delving, and … Belize? Was Belize there, she wondered? No, she couldn’t remember him attending when the three masters of the orders instructed her to find and kill the three renegades.
Perhaps that’s what bothered her. For Highmage Astathan to condone the deaths of three wizards, regardless of their actions, was highly unusual. She quickly chastised herself. Who was she to question the highmage himself? Had anything been too untoward regarding his request, surely Yasmine and Reginald and Belize would have spoken up.
No wait, Dumas reminded herself again, Belize was not there.
Dumas shook her head against the rain and the gauze that seemed to fill her mind. She kept seeing Belize
