The Stars Beyond the Stone, page 1
part #3 of The Price of Magic Series
The Stars Beyond the Stone
The Price of Magic: Book III
Bonnie Wynne
Contents
Prologue
Part I
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Interlude
Part II
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Interlude
Part III
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
About the Author
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Published by Talem Press, 2021
An imprint of Writer’s Edit Press
www.talempress.com
Copyright © Bonnie Wynne 2021
Bonnie Wynne asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission of the publisher.
First printing, 2021
Print ISBN 978-0-6451630-0-1
Ebook ISBN 978-0-6451630-1-8
Cover design by Deranged Doctor
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
For my ghouls. We rise!
Prologue
A Visitor
The cell door crashed open.
Enoch looked up, bleary-eyed. He had been sleeping. Or maybe not. It was hard to tell in the dark, sometimes. Dreams, memories, hallucinations: they were all the same, all just layers of reality, folded together like those sweet misille cakes he used to eat as a boy. He’d been dreaming of those cakes; could still taste the sugar dissolving on his tongue.
He wanted to hang on to those dreams. Wanted to catch them like fish, silver-quick in the shallows of his mind.
Instead, he found nightmares.
These past weeks (months? Vim, how long had it been?) were a nightmare he couldn’t seem to wake from. When he had fled the Clockwork City with Gwyn, Enoch had believed he was doing the right thing. She was his apprentice, at least in name, and he had a duty to pull her back from whatever darkness had seized her.
But on the three-day ride south, his mistake had become clear. Little things at first. Her hair spilling loose over her shoulders, where Gwyn had always worn a braid. Her voice, a half-octave lower than it should have been. The way she pricked her finger to light the campfire, when she could have just summoned a spark of vim. She asked questions, too, about things she should have known. Who wore the Archmage’s torc of office? Who sat on Shatse’s Cloud Throne? Which nation could field the most men, the most resources, the most wealth?
Enoch had shivered, watching her from the corner of his eye as she stirred the campfire’s coals, shooting sparks into the night. A suspicion. A fear. And, finally, when it was too late – a certainty.
That this wasn’t Gwyn. That it never had been.
Now, Not-Gwyn leaned against the doorframe, a lamp swinging from one hand. The brightness stung Enoch’s eyes, and he shied away.
‘Still alive?’ she said. ‘Good. I have some questions.’
Part I
Chapter 1
Rumour and Folklore
Gwyn approached the clearing with a knife gripped firm in her fist.
The leaves underfoot made no crackle. No snap of breaking twigs gave her away.
She pushed a lock of hair out of her eyes. Stalked closer.
Quietly, now.
Gwyn didn’t know the man in the clearing. He was old, his skin sunken into heavy folds, his hair thin and wild. She didn’t know him, but she would kill him if she had to. If she could.
She moved the way Alcide had taught her: heels first, weight distributed on the outer edges of her feet. Her breaths were deliberately shallow and regular. Her footsteps made no sound … but even so, before she was within striking distance, the man’s head shot up. Wide, startled eyes met hers.
Gwyn hurtled forward, knife raised – but the man had already disappeared.
‘Stop!’ cried a voice from behind her, and she spun, disoriented. The old man stood at the edge of the clearing, well out of range of her blade, both palms raised. ‘Stop! I’m a friend.’
Gwyn bared her teeth and palmed the knife. ‘You don’t know me.’
‘I do.’ He swallowed, eyes fixed unblinkingly on hers. Ready to disappear again if she even twitched. ‘You’re Faolan’s apprentice.’
Gwyn was poised to rush him again – if she was fast, she could get inside his guard – but his words made her hesitate.
A trick.
He lowered his hands slowly, still watching her. ‘I know you’ve been looking for us. That’s why I’m here. I was hoping to find you.’
‘Who are you?’ Gwyn barked, still lowered in a crouch. Up close, he wasn’t nearly as old as she had thought; not far past his middle years. Exhaustion and hard living had taken their toll.
‘Eoghan. I’m a … friend … of Faolan.’
‘He’s never mentioned you.’
‘We haven’t spoken in years.’ Eoghan took a step closer, cautious, as though approaching a dangerous animal. His eyes didn’t leave hers. ‘Please. Will you put the knife down?’
She hesitated, then lowered it a fraction. It might still be a trick. Never trust a necromancer. Faolan had taught her that.
With the knife out of his face, Eoghan’s posture relaxed. ‘Thank you.’ He let out a breath through his teeth. ‘Vim, you’re new to this, aren’t you?’
In an instant, she flashed the knife up again. ‘What do you mean?’
Eoghan didn’t panic, or disappear. He reached out, slowly, carefully, as though to lay a hand on her wrist.
Gwyn jerked back. She wasn’t about to let him touch her. Especially not here.
He gave a tired sort of smile. ‘I mean you’re threatening a necromancer with a knife,’ he said. ‘This isn’t the first time, either, is it?’
She said nothing. The others had all vanished before she could get close. The knife had proved useless; no better than a wooden spoon.
But Gwyn wasn’t going to come here without protection. And she certainly wasn’t going to give up. That left her no choice.
‘Do you know where the other necromancers are, or not?’ she asked instead, summoning her coldest and most imperious tone. She had learned it in the Bird Tower, during her months of captivity, and it still amazed her how that voice discomfited people.
But Eoghan just gave her a small, cautious smile. ‘I do. They’re meeting tonight, at the old standing stones in the Samerine Grasslands. Will you let me show you?’
Gwyn blinked, trying not to let her confusion show. He had just given her the answer. No bargaining. No promises.
He was holding out his arm, waiting for her to take it. Gwyn stepped back, suddenly wary. It had to be a trick.
Before he could do anything – seize her, attack her – Gwyn released her hold on the Lurk and let it dissolve around her.
Her eyes flew open, and she gasped. A cold slick covered her.
Tonight, at the old standing stones in the Samerine Grasslands.
It was a trap. It had to be. Necromancers loved bargains and deals and pacts. They would never give away information for free. Maybe this stranger, this Eoghan, meant to ambush her.
Maybe Sepion – the necromancer who had battled Faolan in the Court of Bones; who’d been the last to see him alive – would be there waiting, with a host of bound demons at his back.
The thought made Gwyn shiver. She had never seen one of the Lurk’s demons, but Faolan had spoken of them often. Monstrous, twisted things, more beast than spirit. Many necromancers had tried to bind the creatures to their service. Most had been ripped apart for their trouble.
Why, then, was she almost certain a demon was following her?
Gwyn stood, stiff-kneed as a crab. She had been in the Lurk for … how long? It had been barely full dark when she submerged herself, but now a faint, creeping line of pink showed on the eastern horizon.
She couldn’t be certain it was a demon. Maybe it was just her imagination, overfed by fatigue and anxiety and lack of sleep. But too often lately, as she entered the Lurk and prowled the empty halls of Priory, or the bare-limbed forests of Nederlund, or even the streets of the Clockwork City, Gwyn could sense someone watching her. Something. And sometimes, when she stared into the blind windows of buildings, she swore she caught a glimpse of lidless, slit-pupiled eyes, or heard the scuff of claws.
Gwyn shook her head, trying to banish the fog. Imagination. Vim knew she had plenty on her mind at the moment. No wonder she was on edge.
She ran through a series of stretches, until her body started to feel almost human again. Her breath puffed in the cool pre-dawn air.
It had been foolish to jump out of the Lurk without returning to the entry point first. These weeks of experimentation had taught her that. Sometimes she escaped with just a pounding head, but other attempts had left her almost senseless with pain, the morning light like a chisel scraping the back of her eyes. Foolish – but Eoghan had surprised her.
Tonight, at the old standing stones in the Samerine Grasslands.
The words kept coming back to her, and for once, Alcide’s stretches did nothing to centre her thoughts. A trick? A trap? She wanted it to be true, though, and that was dangerous in itself.
After defeating the storm god, Molech, she’d sworn to hunt down and destroy the four remaining Scions. Yotha. Iahta. Siasr. Umbrael. Names from legend that had become suddenly, terrifyingly real. But instead she’d found herself stuck here in the Clockwork City, doing the work a clerk could have done. Signing off lists of building supplies. Checking the grain stores. And meetings – vim, so many meetings, it made her want to scream.
Gwyn knew she was looking for a way out. That made her vulnerable.
‘The Scions are a threat, yes,’ Idris had said a few weeks ago, peering at her over the top of his spectacles. She’d been struck by how right he looked there, seated at the Archmage’s desk, the winking lights of Tintarel visible through the window behind him. Only a day since her speech on the balcony, but he’d already settled in. ‘The fact remains, however, that we have no information on their identities, nor their whereabouts.’
‘What’s your plan?’ Alcide, a silent shadow, pushed away from the wall and stalked over. He was sticking close to Idris for now, seeming to distrust the Clockwork City and its inhabitants. ‘Ride around the countryside until you just stumble into a Scion? You’re lucky, but you’re not that lucky.’
‘I have information,’ Gwyn had said, through gritted teeth. She produced a sheaf of paper – the result of a single, almost delirious night of research. ‘Look. Yotha, the Sun God. His sphere is war. Music. Culture. What country is known for both sun and war? Crater Deep. They even worship him there.’ Alcide opened his mouth to say something, but she barrelled over the top. ‘And here. Iahta, the God of the Hunt. Now, nobody worships him, but Surudar is known for its hunting culture, and every winter solstice they host —’
‘That’s not information,’ Alcide said, his voice cutting through hers. ‘It’s folklore.’
‘Be patient, Gwyn.’ Idris folded his hands on the desk. The Archmage’s torc gleamed at his throat, like a coiled snake. ‘Everything in its time. I’m sure you’ll find plenty to occupy yourself here while you wait.’
Reports. Lists. Contracts. Yes, she’d certainly found things to occupy her time. Gwyn finished her stretches and straightened, knuckling the small of her back.
These new quarters were much larger than her old ones in the Hall of Adepts, and larger still than her room in the Hall of Neophytes. She had wanted to stay there, in her Adept quarters, but the other wizards wouldn’t allow it. True – they had no way of stopping her, and wouldn’t have dared anyway. But as she was beginning to learn, they had their own, subtle ways of applying pressure.
‘The Adepts’ Hall,’ her friend Ashild had said, mouth actually falling open in shock. Without being asked, she had installed herself as Gwyn’s seneschal these past two weeks – a job she took very seriously. ‘Oh, no. That would send completely the wrong message.’
Blaise’s reaction had been more measured. The Crater Dhavian prince was still recovering from wounds taken during the fight against the storm-binders, and lay with his feet propped up on a divan. ‘An Archmage sleeping in the Hall of Adepts? Well, that would give the gaggle something to squawk about.’
‘I’m not the Archmage,’ Gwyn had pointed out. ‘Idris is.’ They had wanted her to take the Archmage’s quarters, too, but she had flat-out refused.
‘In name, perhaps,’ Blaise had said with an easy shrug. ‘But so long as you’re here, everyone knows where the power lies.’
After her speech on the balcony, when she had taken – and given away – control of the Syndicate, Gwyn had mostly kept to herself, and to her paperwork. She had no intention of becoming caught up in Clockwork City politics.
But she hadn’t accounted for the wizards’ love of power. From the first day, once they’d recovered from their shock, the trickle of visitors had begun. Former tutors, giving not-so-subtle reminders of their ‘friendship’. Wizards she’d never met or even seen, coming to assure her of their loyalty. Students requesting favours, dispensations. As Lucian had said: after the rain, the worms come out.
The worst visit – the one that still woke her at night in a clammy sweat – was the day three Inquisitors had knocked on her door, silver chain emblems winking on their coats. Shock had rooted her to the spot, and that was the only thing that kept her from attacking them on sight.
‘We’ve come to discuss the leadership of the Inquisition,’ one said, before she could gather her wits. He had a round, babyish sort of face, with lips like two fat slugs.
‘The …’ She faltered, hating how weak her voice sounded. Inquisitors. At her door.
‘High Revenant Faiding is dead,’ said one of the others, fixing her with a look just short of insolence. Killed by your hand, that look seemed to say. She had told only Lucian, Idris, Severine and Alcide the details of what had happened in the Rift that night – but everyone knew she had killed Faiding.
‘And Exorcist-General Castlemaine has abandoned the City,’ said the other. Even in her daze, Gwyn noticed he didn’t say abandoned the Syndicate. Perhaps they still expected him to return.
‘New leadership must be appointed,’ the fat one finished. ‘There is much work to be done.’
Work. The Charnel Vaults were empty, but there were new prisoners in the Bird Tower, waiting to be tortured – storm-binders who had lost their powers when Molech was slain. Some had recovered their sanity, but most hadn’t. The storm magic had burned through them like a lightning strike. And there were necromancers to root out and silence; rogue wizards to hunt down like dogs.
‘Get out,’ she said, voice shaking. The Inquisitors stared at her as if she spoke a different language, but made no move to leave. ‘Get out!’
At the last, a gust of wind snapped out of her, sending papers from her desk flying through the room. Her inkpot rattled and almost upended itself.
The lead Inquisitor snarled, but in a moment, all three turned and left. Gwyn leaned against the door frame and watched them go, weak and shaky.
That was careless, she thought. An uncontrolled explosion of the vim, when she hadn’t even tried to touch it. That was the kind of mistake fresh novices made. She had thought she was past that stage.
Then again, she reasoned, as she began gathering the scattered papers, perhaps it was no surprise. It was easy to forget that she was a novice, in every way that mattered. A year ago, she had never even heard of the vim. She had come a long way in a short time.
Gwyn set her papers back in order and stared around the room. For the Inquisitors to seek her out here in her Adept quarters, as though she were a student in truth …
Blaise and Ashild were right, she thought, feeling faintly ill. She couldn’t stay in these rooms. Not if she wanted the Syndicate to respect her – and maybe fear her.
