A Person, Not a Key

“Lysaerra,” Rishi said.

An alabaster stair descended beyond the burning bed. He turned toward it, then stopped as Grim tried to stand. The orc folded over Gondafrey’s arm, unable to finish drawing breath.

Rishi set his staff against the wall and went to him. “Let me help before you move.”

Grim nodded without lifting his head. Rishi’s burned arm would not reach comfortably across him. He used his other hand, pressing it beneath the scorched coat while Gondafrey supported his weight.

Warmth passed into the damaged flesh. Grim shuddered. His next breath went deeper, and the one after it came without a cry.

“That is better,” he said, sounding surprised.

Rishi left his hand there until the orc could straighten. When Gondafrey eased her hold, Grim stayed upright.

Maeril fastened her crooked staff to her pack. She wrapped the mask from the serpent-legged table and put it away, keeping Manshoon’s staff in her hand. “The Order will want proof.”

Rishi recovered his own staff. They went down, with Gondafrey close behind Grim and Duhlark’s light following along the wall.

The stair opened into a carpeted study. Between two couches, a woman sat in a high-backed chair beside a low table. Pale force held her wrists against its arms. Dark hair hung around her face; when she tried to lift her head, it fell across her mouth.

Maps and street surveys covered the table. A basin of black liquid stood beside her elbow. Inked sigils crowded one hand, several lines rubbed out and drawn again.

Rishi stopped within her sight.

“If you are another memory,” she whispered, “please be kind.”

He lowered his staff beside the couch and knelt. His thigh pulled against the dressing. “My name is Rishi. This is Maeril. We came to take you out.”

Lysaerra looked past him. Grim stayed by the stair, one hand pressed against his ribs. Gondafrey folded her wings to give the woman a clear view of the doorway.

“Out of here?” Lysaerra asked.

“Out of the towers.”

Her gaze returned to the pale bands. She moved one finger against the carved wood. “I tried to get them off.”

Maeril came beside the chair and lowered herself onto her good knee. “Then let me undo them. I will work on the bindings. I will not touch your memory.”

Lysaerra studied her face. “Please take them off.”

Rishi held his hand beneath hers without touching it. “May I support your wrist?”

She nodded. He lifted just enough of its weight for Maeril to work a thin plane of magic beneath the band. The force loosened.

Lysaerra’s hand moved toward her lap, then stopped. “Wait. Just a moment.”

Both of them became still.

She looked at her freed hand. Slowly, she closed two fingers and opened them again. Rishi kept his palm beneath her wrist until she lowered it to her knee.

Then she turned the other hand toward Maeril. “That one too.”

When it was free, she held both hands against her stomach. Rishi let her keep them there while he opened his satchel and took out clean linen. Maeril moved the basin away from her elbow, clearing a place for the water flask.

“I can cover those for you,” he said.

Lysaerra watched him dampen a cloth. After a moment, she offered her hands. He cleaned the raw wrists and dressed them, keeping his touch light where the skin had broken. She took the cup he filled but could not steady it. He supported its base while she drank.

“He asked about streets,” Lysaerra said.

Rishi waited beside her.

“I told him I could not remember,” she continued. “He said he would ask the wound if I did not tell him.”

Her fingers tightened around the cup until water spilled onto the linen.

“He cannot do that to you now,” Rishi said.

“Is he dead?”

Rishi looked into her face. “He is dead.”

She stared at him, then at the blood dried on his hands. “Did you kill him?”

Duhlark spoke from beside the stair. “I killed him.”

Lysaerra looked toward the green flame. Her mouth opened, but nothing came out. Rishi steadied the cup as it began to tilt.

After a while, she drank again.

Maeril sat back against the couch.

Lysaerra followed the movement, watching until the witch had settled. “I still cannot remember what he wanted.”

“You do not have to remember anything for us,” Rishi said.

“Then why are you here?”

He had carried her name through guardrooms and houses, copied it onto requests, spoken it to people who could only offer another place to ask. Now she sat within reach, waiting for him to name a price.

“We heard you had been taken. We came to bring you back.”

She looked down at the dressings. One thumb moved over the edge of the cloth. “I would like to leave.”

Rishi took the cup when she offered it. “We will help you.”

While she rested, Maeril turned toward the far corner. A heavy spellbook lay on a black lectern, its hide cover stretched around the bulging spine. She raised her free hand toward it, then lowered it without approaching. “Something is still guarding that book. Invisible. Leave the lectern alone.”

Gondafrey looked from it to the table’s scattered papers. “These should go to the Order.”

Maeril examined the table before nodding. Gondafrey gathered the maps and loose notes into a cloth from Rishi’s satchel. He helped her fold the corners over them.

“Can you stay until we send someone?” Rishi asked.

“At the entrance. The prisoners are beside it, and no one reaches these rooms without passing me.”

She secured the bundle and tucked it beneath one arm.

Duhlark drifted toward her. “I will remain in my own house.”

Gondafrey faced him. “You will remain where I can see you until the Order arrives.”

His flame sharpened. “I helped you remove him.”

“Killing him did not repair what you did.”

Duhlark turned toward the stair. Grim stood there, his coat burned open along one side.

“No,” the skull said. “It did not.”

Gondafrey waited until he drifted back into her sight. Then she looked at Rishi. “Send witnesses who will not conceal this place.”

He nodded.

Maeril rose and took the four brass rings from her pouch. She gave one to Gondafrey and wrapped a second in a scrap of linen. “For you, and one for the people we send. Rishi has the ring that will take us out.”

Gondafrey secured her ring in the knot around the papers. Maeril returned the wrapped ring to her pouch with the other two.

Grim pushed himself away from the stair and sheathed his rapier. “Are we ready?”

“As soon as she is,” Maeril said. “Once we are outside, you may go where you please.”

His gaze moved to Lysaerra. He came around the table and offered his forearm without speaking.

Rishi recovered his staff from beside the couch and took the other side. He offered her his free arm, keeping the burned sleeve clear of her hands.

“I might fall,” Lysaerra said.

“We will catch you,” Rishi told her.

She set her feet beneath the chair and pushed herself upright. Her grip tightened suddenly on his sleeve. Grim shifted closer, taking more of her weight while Rishi braced on the staff. Pain pulled through his upper arm, and he eased his hold once she had found her balance.

Maeril led them to the stair. Where it narrowed, Grim moved behind Lysaerra and Rishi went ahead, keeping her hand. They passed the burned bed without stopping. Gondafrey followed with the records; Duhlark kept beside her.

In the foyer, Gondafrey set the papers on the high-backed chair. She checked the prisoners through their doorway, then took her place between that room and the arrival chamber. The skull hovered within reach of her folded wing.

“Three guards are still bound in the main tower’s storeroom,” Rishi told her. “We will tell the Order about them too.”

“Take her out.”

They crossed into the glass-walled room.

Lysaerra stopped at the circle’s edge. Her grip tightened; Rishi felt her weight drawing back toward Grim.

“I came through that,” she said.

“It takes us back to the tower,” Rishi said. “Then we can walk out.”

Maeril turned to face her from the runes. “Look at me if you would rather not look down.”

Lysaerra raised her head. She stepped onto the circle between the two men, and Rishi lifted his ring.

White light took the room.

They stood beneath the rafters of the outer tower. The eye-creature hovered before its chests, watching them. “Departure successful.”

“Thank you,” Maeril said, and turned toward the stair.

They descended through the two libraries. At the door onto the exterior walkway, Lysaerra lifted her face into the rain-cooled wind. “Can we stop here?”

Rishi stopped beside her. Grim rested one hand against the doorframe. Beyond the narrow bridge, chimney smoke rose over the city. A cart rattled somewhere below them.

Lysaerra closed her eyes.

No one urged her forward. Rishi watched the wind move the hair away from her mouth. When she opened her eyes again, she reached for his arm.

They crossed the bridge in single file, Rishi ahead of her and Grim close behind. Maeril waited at the reading-room door, holding it wide.

From there, the stairs took them down through the kitchen to the dining room. Rishi opened the storeroom door and checked the prisoners before lifting the panel over the tunnel. All three were breathing; their bonds held. Maeril unfastened her crooked staff from her pack, and they passed the staffs ahead beneath Erik’s braces.

Grim went first. Lysaerra followed on her knees and forearms, with Rishi behind to help when her strength failed. His thigh dragged in the mud. He could hear Maeril working her pack past the timbers farther back, then the tap of a staff being drawn clear at the opening.

Erik’s chalk marks led them beneath the wall and out into the cold air. Grim reached back to help Lysaerra rise. Rishi came out beside her and took up his staff. Maeril emerged last, dragging her pack clear before gathering her own staff and Manshoon’s.

Far bells sounded over the roofs. Lysaerra stood between the two men, her bandaged hands resting on their arms, and looked up at the open sky.