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AUTUMN EQUINOX
2 Kyria’s Bounty, 1597 OT
WORTH SPARING
Guttering torches lit the landing at the top of Castra Patria’s north tower. The heavy wooden door of the Dexion’s prison was reinforced with iron and spells, but Lio could still sense the acrid aura of the fire mage inside.
Cassia pressed close to Lio on the cramped landing, her hand on her tense liegehound. “This does not appear sufficient to contain an elite war mage.”
“It isn’t,” Mak said.
Lyros shook his head. “The Tenebran mages’ wards are pathetic.”
Lio tightened the weave of blood magic, illusions, and thelemancy that concealed them, but if the Dexion sensed anything out of the ordinary, one revelatory spell from him might betray their presence. “Hoyefe says the traversal cuff on the Dexion’s ankle is what really keeps him here.”
Mak snickered. “The kind of manacle his own Order uses on apostates to keep them from escaping with magic?”
Cassia covered her mouth with a hand. “How humiliating for him.”
“But that won’t prevent him from using other spells,” Lio said.
Lyros closed his eyes. “I don’t sense any battle wards against Hesperines.”
Lio frowned. “He must know we’re here. If Flavian didn’t mention the arrival of a Hesperine delegation, the Dexion has surely sensed us nearby. I would expect him to take precautions against precisely the sort of visit we’re about to pay him.”
“A dangerous oversight,” Mak said.
“Yes,” Cassia mused, “he’s fortunate our people are so self-controlled.”
“Most of the time.” The Dexion was indeed fortunate that Lio was not here for the sort of justice his father, Rudhira, and Nike had rained down on the war mages who had captured Methu.
Lyros opened his eyes again. “We should be careful. This feels too easy. I don’t trust it.”
“Wards up.” Mak joined his bleeding palm with Lyros’s.
Lio felt the weight of their wards settle over everyone. He pulled Cassia under the shelter of his arm. “Stay close.”
“I will,” she reassured him.
He cast his senses ahead of him, then stepped them through the door.
A flash of white-hot light blinded him, and warmth bathed his skin. Magefire. The explosion faded fast, but not before it seared away the wards.
Lio yanked Cassia tight against him and levitated, spinning to put his body between her and the Dexion. New shadow wards rose, and the second fire spell hit Mak and Lyros’s defenses with a thud that rattled Lio’s teeth. Paws pounded across the floor, and Knight snarled.
Lio jolted the Dexion’s mind in warning. “Stand down! I’ll disarm you with thelemancy if I must.”
The Dexion gave a humorless laugh. “Of course. But you couldn’t expect me to let you simply stroll in here without at least a slap on the wrist?”
The haze of firelight faded, leaving spots on Lio’s vision, and the air cooled. He landed first, and feeling no traps, set Cassia on her feet as well. “All right?”
“Yes.” She sounded a little breathless, but steady.
They turned to find the Dexion on his knees, Mak holding his arms behind him. The mage’s black hair was tousled, his olive skin flushed, and his flame-red robes mussed. Knight snarled in his face, while Lyros held out two hands dripping with blood to feed the wards.
“Welcome to my humble abode,” the Dexion drawled. “What brings you all to the Tenebran slums?”
Lio scanned the room with his gaze and his arcane senses, checking for other traps. But he noticed nothing more dangerous than the overturned chair and a desk covered in scrolls. A Kings and Mages game board sat on a table by the fire, and a sandbag hung in one corner. How like Chrysanthos to maintain his physique in captivity. “I see no cause for complaint. This is a far more pleasant prison than the crypt where you kept our Hesperine hostages.”
