As they stood, the woman approached and he got a better look at her. Her hair was so dark that it seemed to shimmer purple where the torchlight reflected off it. This dark hair framed very pale skin that shone with an otherworldly radiance. He noticed the pointed ears and cringed as he recognized her for what she was. She had to be a priestess of Lilith.

  His father had long ago warned him of the influence that the worshippers of Lilith had on unwary men, and Seder’s words came back to him very clearly.

  “Avoid the influence of Lilith.”

  Although the Ta’ah normally had no interaction with these dark-haired elves, both of their people lived in the same underground realms. Grisham’s father had always told him to avoid them.

  The priestess wore silken robes that seemed to float around her. The robes hugged the curves of her body, and those curves weren’t lost on some of the male slaves who stared in fascinated worship. Attached to her waist was a flail with a myriad of writhing snakes emerging from its handle. As she approached the nearest slave, the snakes reached out with flickering tongues as if to sniff the object of the priestess’ attention.

  The priestess walked down the line of slaves and paused as she reached a teenaged slave. She smiled and reached out her hand to caress the boy’s cheek.

  Grisham blinked with shock and rubbed his eyes. He was positive that he saw the slave’s aura diminish in brightness after she touched him, while hers had gotten slightly brighter.

  The priestess continued down the line, until she reached Nicholas. His mottled aura held the colors of fear and anxiety. She passed him and paused in front of Grisham, cocking her head with an amused look and asked in the old language, “Ata Ta’ah?”

  Are you a Ta’ah?

  Grisham bowed his head and responded in kind. “Ken, ani Ta’ah.”

  Yes, I’m a Ta’ah.

  She gave him a brief smile that showed a flash of the fangs he’d known were hiding behind her lips. Then she turned and walked back toward the building.

  Nicholas looked at him and Grisham gave the briefest shake of his head.

  This woman had immediately recognized me as Ta’ah. How could that be?

  She walked back to the top of the stairs and made a quick waving motion to someone behind them. Grisham heard a scream as a human was dragged into the cavern. After a few moments of shouting echoing throughout the stone chamber, two slavers dragged a bloody and battered body before the priestess.

  His heart fell. They’d caught the slave who’d tried to make his escape.

  The two slavers held the captive tightly as the elf priestess smiled at the brave fool. She slowly approached him and as she caressed his blood-stained cheek, Grisham saw a distinct dimming of his aura while she grew ever brighter. The man suddenly stopped struggling and his mouth fell open, leaving a vacant expression on his face. The slavers relaxed as the compliant prisoner stared blankly into the eyes of the priestess.

  The priestess leaned into him. She tilted her head and exposed her fangs. She sniffed deeply at the exposed flesh of his neck and quickly clamped down, ripping out the arteries and veins.

  Grisham shivered and his stomach tightened as he fought to control the nausea he felt. He’d witnessed something very different than everyone else. That man was dead before she had bit into him. When she sniffed at his neck, she’d somehow managed to drain all of the slave’s life essence from him without causing obvious damage to his body.

  If she could do that, what couldn’t she do?

  To everyone’s surprise, the Ogre led them into a different cavern to begin a new set of excavations. When the day ended, Nicholas and Grisham lay on their sides and whispered about the earlier events.

  The grizzled soldier murmured, “I hate to admit it, but I’ve never been as scared as when I was in front of that priestess. Did you see all those female statues? I suspect that if she wanted to, she could simply suck the soul out of any man she wanted.”

  Grisham nodded. He doesn’t know how true that is. “I was petrified as well.”

  “Did you see what happened to Gregor?”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t know everyone’s name. Who is Gregor?”

  Nicholas pointed to the teenage slave who the priestess had touched. “Over there. He hasn’t spoken a word since the priestess touched him.”

  “What’s wrong with him?”

  Nicholas shrugged. “Stole his soul?”

  “I was worried that we were all going to be fed to the megapedes for what the escapee did.”

  Nicholas yawned. “Me, too. I’m sorry Grisham, but I need to rest. The pick won’t wield itself when the brute calls for us to bash rocks.”

  Grisham nodded and closed his eyes for some desperately needed sleep. Little did he realize that his sleep would be filled with nightmares from today’s events.

  Grisham felt and heard a crackling energy within him as he saw the priestess. After she killed the escapee, several of them carried what was left of him to the megapede pit. Peering down into that pit, he saw for the first time what a real megapede looked like. They resembled terrifyingly large centipedes with green-hued interlocking bony armor. Their head had six black eyes and monstrous front mandibles they used to chew through rocks – and bodies.

  As Grisham thought of these monsters, he felt a sharp pain and the sensation of something cracking.

  Grisham woke from his slumber with a start and he felt an unexpected shooting pain in his back and screamed. As he gathered his wits and shook the cobwebs from his mind, the pain went away. He stretched and felt a soothing pop come from his back.

  He was shocked to see that all of the slaves had backed as far away from him as their chain allowed. They all had a look of fear on their faces as Grisham stood. He gasped with surprise as he realized that his iron collar had been snapped in half and he was off the slave chain. He stared at his shirt and noticed that some of its seams had been stretched almost to bursting, while his pants were completely torn in half.

  He looked for Nicholas. He was in the front of the crowd gazing at Grisham wide-eyed with surprise and concern.

  Grisham felt around his neck, confirming the loss of his collar and looked down in amazement. His heart beat rapidly as he tried to figure out how the chain had been severed. He’d been dreaming about the priestess, and then about the megapedes...

  He lifted one of the torn strips of his pants and asked, “What happened?”

  Nicholas approached Grisham and touched his shoulder. The Solder felt his neck and shook his head. “Grisham – I swear on the life of my poor children that I am not lying. For a moment, instead of you lying there, I saw a young megapede making chittering noises. With one snap of its mouth parts, it broke the iron collar it wore. Then it began to dissolve and you appeared again.”

  Grisham closed his eyes, and gasped as he detected a power he hadn’t remembered being there before. He silently wondered if this could be what Seder meant when he said, “I have unlatched power that was hidden deep within you.”

  He opened his eyes and looked at Nicholas who still had a worried look on his face. “Nicholas, do you want to try and escape with me?”

  Nicholas shook his head. “No, for two reasons. First reason, I don’t want to slow you down…” Nicholas lifted the chain that was attached to his collar. “Second, you yourself said that we’ll likely get lost. We’ll have no chance of living at all if we see that priestess again.”

  Grisham’s confidence grew and he couldn’t help but smile. “What if I could assure you that I know the way out, and that I can get you off that chain?”

  Nicholas’ eyes widened. He raked his shaking fingers through his beard for a moment and nodded.

  Grisham looked at the others. “What about the rest of you? If I could get you off this chain, would you leave?”

  The majority nodded silently.

  He took a deep breath. “What you’ve seen and what you will see ... will remain a secret between us?”

  Nicholas nodded and turned to the other slaves. “None of you would say anything, right?”

  One of the men laughed. “Of course not. Even if this works – who would ever believe it? Personally, I don’t believe we’re talking to a half-dwarf, half-megapede right now, and I saw the proof right in front of my eyes.”

  “I’ll try to break the main slave chain – then you all can slip yourself off. That will allow us all to move freely, despite the collars around your necks. If things go as I plan, just follow me.”

  Nicholas asked, “Grisham, where will you go?”

  Grisham concentrated on the images in his head. “The only way I know that will take us out of the mines. Up.”

  He replayed the events from his dream and reached for the new reserve of power buried within him. As he pictured the megapedes in the pit, a crackling power surged within him. His chest cracked and odd sensations, some of them painful, scrambled across his body. While the rest of his body changed, Grisham’s eyes fluttered open and a wave of nausea hit him as he saw six images at once. He concentrated on coordinating his six eyes so they could focus on a single object.

  Grisham managed to focus his vision. The slaves had all scrambled far away. He crawled toward them on uncoordinated legs and dove at the chain, biting it cleanly in two.

  The humans scattered and he heard a familiar voice, but he couldn’t for some reason remember his name. It was saying, “We are free. Time to go up, Grisham.”

  He was having trouble gathering his wits, but that verbal cue helped. He tentatively bit at the wall nearest him, pulverizing the rock without any effort. Grisham soon found himself tunneling as quickly as his feet could carry him. The rock turned to loose pebbles as he bit through it. He remembered to angle upwards as he bit at a furious pace. As his dozens of feet gripped their way up the slope, the pebbles raced down the tunnel he created. He couldn’t remember why he was going up, but Grisham remembered it was important. He remembered that he needed to go up and … he didn’t remember what else.

  As he dug, Grisham heard the creatures scrambling behind him. He did the best he could to ignore them. Normally he would have attacked them, but he knew that they weren’t as important as going up.

  As Grisham dug, the rock stopped tasting of the bedrock he loved, and tasted of the upper rock that tasted strange. Not long after, he dug through nothing but worm infested soil. He nearly turned back with disgust at the taste when he broke through the surface and was blinded by the intense rays of the aboveground.…

  Arabelle

  Chapter Ten

  Mastering My Gifts

  “I am frightened of my powers. I seem to lose a part of who I am when I use them.”

  Grisham

  Arabelle’s back made a popping noise as she stretched and reached for her toes. It seemed like every time she woke, her joints were stiffer. Castien had prescribed exercise to keep her blood flowing and loosening her limbs. Once she’d built up a sweat, she truly felt like herself again.

  It had been nearly six months since her encounter with the dragon in Aubgherle, and three months since her training began with Tabor. Arabelle couldn’t wait until the caravan was again in the vicinity of Aubgherle. She felt like she’d changed tremendously in that time. Her father claimed that she had grown half a foot in no time at all, while Tabor had given her what seemed like a sincere compliment on her speed and agility the previous week.

  She lay on the ground, lifting her bare legs in the air and pointed her toes up and down. Arabelle studied the shape of her legs and noticed that they’d smoothed out a bit. Her flexing motions no longer showed every fiber of her muscles moving like it used to. She’d managed to smooth out some of the ripples of her muscles in her legs, but they still seemed a bit too thin.

  She squeezed her fists and watched the muscles in her arms tense, wishing there was a way for her to will some parts of her body to look different. Arabelle didn’t like her arms at all. Even though they were strong, they still seemed very thin to her.

  She reached under her mattress and pulled out the mirror Arabelle had hidden under there and looked at her face. Her father didn’t like mirrors. He said they were the tool of vain women and served no useful purpose. Arabelle loved her father, but in this she couldn’t agree. She didn’t think she was vain, yet she was curious about what others saw that she couldn’t normally see herself.

  In the mirror, Arabelle saw what she thought was a nice looking face with dark brown eyes. She licked her lips and was surprised to see that they were fuller than she remembered. She felt her cheeks and giggled as she realized that her rounded cheeks gave her face a heart-like shape.

  Altogether, she wasn’t displeased. After all, it was her face, and the only one she would have. If her father and Tabor could be believed, she looked exactly like her mother. Arabelle stared at her reflection and she could almost feel a spiritual connection to her mother through the image. For a fleeting moment, she thought she saw a grown woman instead of the young daughter of a Sheikh in that reflection.

  Arabelle sighed as she tucked the mirror back under the mattress. Maggie’s head poked through the flap of her tent. Seeing her awake, she smiled and walked in. “Ready for your bath, Lady Arabelle?”

  Within moments, Arabelle’s hot bath was ready. As she soaked in the steaming water, the warmth penetrated her tired muscles, Maggie busied herself by brushing Arabelle’s hair. “Lady? Why don’t you like having scents in your bathwater anymore?”

  Arabelle stretched her neck and felt a comforting pop as she luxuriated in the water and ignored the question for a moment. Maggie patiently waited and Arabelle closed her eyes. “In truth, it’s because if I need to stalk someone with the intent to spy on or even kill them, I don’t want any unusual scents to give away my presence.”

  Maggie laughed. “Fine. You needn’t tell me. A princess can keep her secrets.”

  The princess kept her eyes closed and smiled. It was clear that her life had changed in so many unexpected ways – even her closest companion couldn’t believe the truth when told to her plainly.

  She concentrated on the blue-eyed boy who was still somehow hovering above her tent and she silently wondered when he might fly down to meet her.

  It was midday, and the caravan had been set up near a group of villages in the western edge of the Trimorian valley. The sounds of the market helped mask the creak of the wooden roof Arabelle rested upon. The aromas of the stables lingered in the air. She suddenly felt a breeze arrive from the northwest, and on it, the sound of villagers haggling with vendors distracted her senses. Arabelle was worried about losing track of her dangerous adversary. Her heart beat rapidly and she struggled to control her breathing when she saw him.

  She held her crouching position, ready to leap. As she crouched on the roof of the wagon, he passed within reach of her attack and Arabelle sprang at him soundlessly.

  Arabelle screamed with frustration as Tabor slipped out of her reach and stuck both fingers out in defense.

  She rolled to her feet and put both hands on her hips. “What did I do wrong this time?”

  Tabor smiled at her with a proud expression on his face. “Let’s talk about what you did correctly first. It’s a much longer list.”

  She blushed despite her frustration. “Fine.”

  “When you started following me, I purposely walked through a crowd and thought you would lose track of me. For a long while, I couldn’t see you, and only about five minutes ago did I spot you watching me. Do you realize what that means, Princess?”

  She shrugged as they walked toward her tent.

  “You managed to make me think you had lost track of me, when in fact, I had lost track of you. That is a very difficult thing for someone to do. And another thing that I will give you credit for. I’m not sure how you managed it, but you seemed to move in the shadows so deftly that you were practically invisible.” Tabor chuckled, “It was as though you were blending into your surroundings like an elf or something.”

  She laughed out loud.

  Thank you, Castien.

  “The mistake you made was that you didn’t pay attention to the light. Whether it’s the sunlight, moonlight, or a torch, light casts shadows, and shadows can give your position away…”

  “Argh!” Arabelle smacked herself on the forehead. “How stupid of me. The sun was behind me and you saw my shadow as you passed underneath me. Right?”

  Tabor winked. “Like I said before. If you weren’t our princess, you would be a fantastic soldier. No, you are too smart for a common soldier. You would be an officer.”

  “I’ll never make that mistake again.”

  Tabor patted her on the shoulder and chuckled. “Of that I am sure.” Tabor looked into her tent as they arrived, and after a cursory inspection, opened the flap for her to enter.

  She turned to her guardian. “Can you make sure nobody disturbs me until it’s time for supper? I would like to rest.”

  Tabor nodded. “As you wish, Princess. Have a good afternoon’s nap.”

  The book that Castien had given her on the uses of plants had been quite unusual. The spidery writing within the book detailed how plants could be used in everything from camouflage to the undetectable poisoning of an intended target. She concentrated on the powdered effects of the plants that Castien had shown her.

  She wore the veiled headwrap that Maggie had given her as she ground a large handful of the red-threaded leaves in her mortar. The dried leaves turned into sand-like particles, and then a fine powder. Arabelle poured the powder into a silk bag that Maggie had made for her and continued with the next handful of leaves until she had filled the little bag. Arabelle carefully pulled the drawstring to cinch it closed and tucked this into her belt.

  Maggie had been busy with accommodating her custom requests. Arabelle’s belt had many hidden pockets for small items. She’d also had Maggie prepare special slits in all of her outfits. The slits were invisible to anyone who looked, but she could instantly reach either of her mother’s daggers that were strapped to each thigh. The dagger that Castien had given Arabelle she hid in the drawer of her desk.

 

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