the thief in the desert, the image of her former self-unstoppable as a sandstorm, rearing up, lighting crackling in her jaws as the wall of Blue Fire rushed in and swallowed them all. Riding the dragonfear the image streaked into the men's heads as well. She screamed-a battle cry, a thunderclap, a keening.
The one on the left started shrieking. The one on the right dropped his weapon, his eyes so wide the whites gleamed all around. He stood there for a moment, knees shaking so hard he could barely stand, before turning tail and bolting down the tunnel.
There was an ugly grunt and a thud.
The second guard stopped screaming, and though he trembled, he turned toward the dark tunnel, sword held high. He glanced over at Nestrix, who was still forcing the dragonfear on him, though the effect was clearly diminishing.
His face contorted in a sneer and he started down the tunnel.
Only to walk straight into one of Tennora's fireballs.
The flames ignited his hair and he screamed again, twisting away from the tunnel.
Tennora ran out of the shadows, holding the other guard's sword, her face white and determined. As the guard beat down the last of the flames, he turned and caught the blade of the sword across the fleshy part of his belly. The armor he wore protected him somewhat, but not from being knocked onto his back.
Still faintly gray, Tennora pulled out her dagger and, planting her knee on his chest, held it to the man's throat.
'Keys,' she said.
'I… I haven't got 'em,' he gasped. 'The master carries them.'
'Give me a good reason to let you live, then,' Tennora replied, and oddly, she sounded as if she meant it.
'I–I-I-'
'There's a chemical in here somewhere,' Nestrix interjected. 'They used it to put me to sleep when they kidnapped me. Knock him out and deal with him later.'
Tennora's brown eyes fell gratefully on Nestrix for a moment. She prodded the man with the dagger. 'Where's the poison?'
'It's… it's… I'll get it for you,' he said. 'He keeps it in a case, over in those crates there. Let me get it for you. Don't kill me.'
Tennora glanced up at Nestrix briefly, then shifted her weight off the man. 'All right. Go find it,' she said. She made a little gesture with her hand, as if telling him to get up.
'Oh thank you, thank you,' the man said, climbing to his feet. 'You're doing the right thing. It's right over-Ha!' He pulled his own dagger from his belt and spun on Tennora with a cry of triumph.
'Ziastayix.''
He was cut short by the silver bolts that flew from Tennora's pointed finger, catching him in the face twice. Tennora stepped out of his attack and plunged her own dagger into his side. His eyes went wide as he sank to the ground.
For a moment, the only sound was the water dripping from the ceiling of the room.
'You did give him a chance,' Nestrix said after a moment. 'Everything after that is his own fault for underestimating you.'
The young woman's face was still white as a sheet. 'I knew he would,' she said quietly. 'I just hoped…'
She looked up at Nestrix again, and all Nestrix's grief and fear came flooding back. Her eyes welled up with tears. 'They said they'd killed you,' she explained, wiping the tears off. 'And I never… I'm not meant for this! I don't want to care whether you're dead or alive, but I do, Tennora-oh gods, and they said you tried to save me?'
'Sort of,' Tennora said. 'Calm down. I'll explain once we're out.' She pulled a lockpick from her belt and went for the door.
A spark as long as her finger leaped between the lock and the pick as she went to work the mechanism. Tennora jumped back with a hiss.
She tried again, but again the lock sparked.
'Stlarning hrast it,' she swore. 'It won't quit!'
Tennora took the lock in her hand-nothing happened. 'It's charmed,' she said. 'We need the key.'
Nestrix frowned. 'Check the guards. The one might have been lying.'
Tennora dragged the dead man in from the tunnel and searched both guards' pockets and belt pouches, even unbuckled their armor in case the key hung around either's neck. Nothing. She swore again.
'We have to wait for Dareun then.' Tennora looked at the bodies lying on the ground. 'I'll hide them for now. When he comes back, we can work out where the keys are and get you out.'
'No,' Nestrix said, grabbing her by the arm. 'You need to leave. That henich may be a wyrmling with a bad temper, but he has enough power to back that up. He'll kill you, and he won't fall for the same tricks his lovacs did.'
Tennora slipped out of Nestrix's hold. 'I'm terribly sorry,' she said, 'but you don't get much say in the matter. You're in there, I'm out here, and I'm not leaving without you.' She picked up the first guard's ankles. 'Also, I don't know how to get out of here, so they'd be on me in a few hours anyway.'
One at a time, she hauled the two minions behind the piles of crates, repositioning the boxes so it wouldn't look as if they'd been moved.
Hells-the smell of their blood was still thick in the room. That had to be fixed. Tennora gave the crates a last shove into position and returned to stand in front of the door, studying the lock.
'Get as far to the side as you can,' Nestrix said.
Tennora stayed standing directly in Nestrix's range. 'What are you going to do?'
'Burn off the smell of blood. Move out of the way.'
'No,' Tennora said. 'You'll hurt yourself.'
'Not as badly as Dareun will hurt us both if he finds his men dead. We don't have a chance of deceiving him while it smells like this.' Nestrix pointed over to the wall behind the crates. 'Over there.'
Tennora scowled and stood in front of Nestrix as if she were going to argue again, but after a moment she relented and squeezed between the cage and the crates, into the comer farthest from Nestrix's range.
'Stop your ears,' Nestrix said. 'It will be louder down here.'
Her stomach quivered-it was going to hurt; there was no avoiding it. She drew several deep breaths to calm herself and find the node of magic that remained, tingling in the back of her throat. For a moment she felt normal, as if her neck were long and sturdy, her throat call used against the lightning. When the tingling became almost unbearable, she drew hard on the frayed Weave that floated through her.
The clap of thunder pounded her ears before her mouth could burn. Her throat-and then her whole body- droned with the lightning. For the moment before it hurt, Clytemorrenestrix remembered what it was like to ride the storms.
Then she burned.
She collapsed, shattered, to the ground, as Tennora shouted her name. Every breath seared, every muscle refused to comply with the merest demands. She lay still and waited for the slow creep of magic to soothe away her wounds-if the Spellplague had left her vulnerable in her own body, at least it granted her this balm.
When she stirred, the smell of lightning hung in the room, bare and faintly metallic, and there was no trace on the air of the meaty odor of blood.
'Are you all right?' Tennora said. She was kneeling at the door of the cage, eyes like saucers.
Nestrix coughed and sat up. 'As right as expected. Did I break the lock?'
Tennora prodded the keyhole with a pick-the same spark. 'No such luck.'
Nestrix stared at the lockpicks, the sight of them overlaid by the memory of other picks in unfamiliar hands, the thiefs short-fingered ones, then her own darker ones. The locks coming undone, click by click.
'Oh,' she said softly.
Tennora gave her an alarmed look.
'Give me the picks.'
'You don't know how to use them,' Tennora said.
'Give me the picks.' She reached out to hold the lock, and studied it. 'Do you believe the hunter?' she asked.
