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I gave an involuntary shudder. “That’s a matter of opinion. I despise him. I feel like I’ve been slimed.” I scowled at her. “What was he doing here? Why didn’t anyone tell Mzatal?”
Eilahn cocked her head. “Mzatal knew.”
“Knew?” I stared at her. “Wait, you mean he knew and was too involved in his work to come out and kick Kadir’s ass?”
“No, that is not what I mean,” she said. “Do you believe that Fuzzykins will require the services of a veterinary obstetric specialist when it is time to expel her spawn?”
“A veterinary . . . what? No! Jeez, she’s just having kittens.” I narrowed my eyes. “And stop changing the subject. What did you mean?” I suspected she enjoyed messing with me.
“Simply that Kadir was here under agreement, and therefore Mzatal knew.”
“What kind of agreement would he have with that—” I stuttered to a stop as I focused on the tingle of distant grove activation. “I need Mzatal. Now.” My voice trembled with urgency. “Rhyzkahl and Jesral just used the grove network. They have Idris and someone I couldn’t identify with them.”
Eilahn shifted from casual to hyperalert-no-nonsense in a heartbeat. She grabbed my wrist and hauled me toward the tree tunnel. “We will find Mzatal.”
“No! Wait!” I hop-limped in her grasp, failing every attempt to stop. “I’m staying here. I need to know if they move.”
“If they choose to move here, you are vulnerable,” she stated.
“I can’t leave!” I struggled to dig my heels in, but the injured knee didn’t want any part of it. “Look, we’ll wait at the tunnel entrance,” I said, damn near pleading. “I’ll still be able to feel if they move, but I won’t be right in front of them if they come here. And I have the grove potency.”
She looked over her shoulder at me, slowed as we neared the arch of trees that marked the boundary to open ground. “Agreed,” she said, though her eyes remained narrowed.
“Okay. Good. Thanks.” It wasn’t often I won an argument with Eilahn. Though this was more of a draw than an actual win.
We finally stopped on the broad step of basalt just past the entrance. Ahead, beyond a grassy ravine, the glass-walled palace hugged the cliff that dropped five hundred feet to the sea. I reached for Mzatal again, this time with the mental equivalent of a shoulder shake to get his attention. “C’mon, Boss,” I murmured as I repeated the touch, then exhaled in relief as I felt his acknowledgement like a wave of warmth through me.
The air shimmered a few feet in front of me, and Ilana, Mzatal’s ptarl—demahnk advisor—appeared. Though similar in appearance to Eilahn, Ilana was larger, with definitive characteristics of the demahnk: ridges in the hide of her torso and a subtle vertical ridge on her forehead.
“Mzatal is deeply engaged in the plexus chamber and asks what your need is,” she informed me in a chiming voice much like Eilahn’s, but with greater complexity of tone.
“Tell him he needs to get unengaged,” I told her flatly. “Rhyzkahl, Jesral, Idris and someone else just made a grove transfer, and I’m not moving from here in case they go to another location.”
Her large, near-luminous violet eyes went distant, and I knew she was in telepathic communion with Mzatal. After a few seconds she refocused on me. “Which groves?”
“From Jesral’s grove to the one on the coast of the southern continent,” I said, “then immediately to the one where Mzatal brought me when he was going to remove Rhyzkahl’s mark.”
She inclined her head in acknowledgment and silently relayed my message while I fidgeted and waited impatiently for the reply.
It had only been a little over six months since Mzatal had succeeded in summoning me against my will from Earth, but the time before then seemed like a completely different life. And in a lot of ways it was. Back then I thought I had some sort of real agreement with Rhyzkahl, believed he had honor, even if self-serving. My eyes were forced open by his treachery—the evidence of which covered my torso in hideously beautiful scars, sigils Rhyzkahl had carved onto me with Xhan, his own essence blade.
Everything changed that day. I wasn’t the same person anymore. Couldn’t be. Not and survive to protect those around me.
Ilana laid a gentle three-fingered hand on my shoulder. “He is anchoring the strands in the plexus now. I will bring him.” She vanished before I could thank her.
The itch to do something intensified with the waiting, but I ruthlessly shoved down the impulse to make the transfer to the distant grove and do some preliminary recon. Instead, I pygahed—mentally tracing the soothing pygah sigil in an effort to gain calm and aid concentration.
Nope, still antsy. The purely mental version of the pygah was a great way to quickly chill, but I wanted and needed every scrap of focus I could muster. With fluid motion, I traced the glowing sigil in the air before me and breathed in the energy. Instantly, I felt my tension ease. Yeah, that was the good stuff.
Echoes of the four recent travelers remained, but attempts to sense beyond the boundaries of the other grove failed. Like reaching an island and being able to walk every inch of it, yet unable to see anything beyond its shores but foggy sea.
My scars tingled as I felt Xhan, and a shudder ran through me. I knew without a doubt that Rhyzkahl held the rakkuhr-tainted essence blade even now. Millennia ago, Mzatal created the three blades—Khatur, Xhan, and Vsuhl—for himself, Rhyzkahl, and Szerain. For ages the triumvirate held unshakable dominion over the demon realm.
Something happened to break up their little power bloc, but I had yet to put the pieces of that puzzle together.
Ilana appeared before me with Mzatal. Elegant and broad-shouldered, he had lustrous black hair woven into a thick complex braid that hung to the small of his back. His eyes—piercing silver-grey set in a face with an oriental cast—met mine, while both his expression and his aura radiated dark intensity.
“We have to go now,” I urged as he moved to me, but instead of agreeing he dropped to a crouch and wrapped his hands around my knee.
