And despite his horrible appearance, he was still, at heart, a man …
or he had been once. And men could be controlled. She was a past master at the art. She would be the only woman who had lain with an awnshegh, the most dreaded and powerful awnshegh of them all. And to control someone like that, to conquer him …
“By all the gods,” said Callador slowly, staring at her with disbelief.
“The thought of it excites you!”
She had revealed too much with her expression, Laera realized.
Callador must not know. “Excites me? Are you mad?”
“The look on your face just now-“
“If terror that chills to the bone can be called excitement, I suppose that is what I feel,” she said, shivering to underscore her words. “What would you know about excitement? You who thrill to nothing save your potions and incantations? You are the one who got us into this! Because of you, I must do something … unthinkable! And if I should not survive or if I should lose my sanity as a result, it will be on your head! By Haelyn, if I were a man, I would strangle you with my bare hands! You have sold yourself to a monster, and in doing so have sold me as well! And now it is my lot to save us both! Damn you, Callador!
Damn you for a fool!”
The wizard hung his head in shame. “You are right, Laera. I’ve been a fool, blinded by my own ambition. Would there were some way I could make it up to you. I truly regret I ever brought you into this. I am so very sorry.”
“Words,” she said contemptuously. “Words come easy when it is I who must made this awful sacrifice!”
“It is true,” said Callador miserably. He brought his hands up to his neck and slipped off the golden amulet that held her lock of hair.
‘Here, take this. I release you from your bond. It is the very least I can do.”
Laera smiled inwardly. Perfect, she thought, as she took the amulet.
Right on cue. ‘Well, perhaps you really did mean it,” she said, her voice softening.
“You have been both a friend and teacher to me, Callador. You thought you were helping us both-you to find a better place in life and me to get revenge on an old enemy and on my brother for bartering me to cement a political alliance. I forgive you.”
“I shall send you back,” said Callador. “I cannot allow you to go through with this. I will take the brunt of Raesene’s vengeance.”
“No,” said Laera. “There may still be a way for us to turn things to our favor. We may yet win our goal.
But first you must be free of Raesene’s power.”
“You would still do this … for me?” the old wizard said with amazement.
“No, for us,” said Laera. “Wait here for me. I shall either return with your token or die trying.”
The corridors of Battlewaite were empty as she made her way back to the great hall. The braziers flickered dimly, their flames dying out. As Laera crossed the hall, heading toward the archway in the back, her heart pounded so hard she thought the
sound of it would fill the hall, echoing off the gleaming black walls.
She had never been so afraid in her entire life. And yet, the fear excited her. She had to go through with this somehow. Not only because she still needed Callador, but because without him, her plans would go awry. The wizard knew too much, and so long as the Gorgon controlled him, Callador remained a threat to her. There was only one way to neutralize that threat.
She went through the archway and down a darkened corridor that led to a flight of stone steps. As she climbed them slowly, her terror mounted, and her excitement as well. This was the greatest risk she had ever taken. If she were caught, she would surely die. But if she succeeded, she would not only have taken the ultimate risk and gotten away with it, she would do what no other woman had ever done. She would have conquered the Gorgon.
No one would ever know of it, of course, but that didn’t matter. She would know, and the sense of power and satisfaction she would derive from that would be intoxicating beyond anything she had ever experienced. The Gorgon, too, would know. Eventually. And there would be nothing he could do about it.
At the top of the stairs, she came to another, smaller archway. She passed through it into a darkened anteroom, illuminated only by several thick candles dripping on a table. The musky odor inside the room filled her nostrils and made her grimace with distaste. It smelled like the lair of some beast.
She crossed the anteroom, headed for a curtained archway in the back.
She tried not to look at the
objects in the room: the bones scattered on the tables; the rats scurrying among the grisly remains of the Gorgon’s last meal-she did not want to speculate what it had been-the human skulls, brown with age, arrayed upon the shelves, trophies of past bloodthefts. She tried to focus her attention on the task at hand. She tried to use her fear, to control it, to employ it as an impetus to see her through what she was about to do.
He was a man once, she told herself. Whatever he may be now, he was once a man, and men could be controlled. This would be her greatest challenge.
Her skin crawled at the thought of what she was about to do, but there was something incredibly compelling about it, too. She moved
