Page 82 of Queen Demon
“Channeling the Voice inside a small space has to be tricky.” Kai bit his lip, considering. They didn’t have many examples of the Well being used inside a structure, mostly because whoever it had been used on hadn’t survived. The Voice was a weapon meant to be deployed against whole cities, whole armies. Using it inside a confined space was clearly a desperate measure, even for trapped Hierarchs. The force of it traveling through the tor would have destroyed any surviving constructs, or any other living thing, in its path. It was a weapon that didn’t discriminate between allies and enemies. “To use it at all, there had to be at least one expositor and one Hierarch in there somewhere.” That was the terrifying part. There was no way around it, that was the way the Voice worked.
But Ziede tilted her head in the equivalent of a shrug. “As far as we know. But we don’t know much at all, do we.”
She was right, and it was time to know more. “Can I talk to Dahin now, please?”
It was Tenes who came first, slipping into the tent with the air of someone who knew she had some explaining to do. She went toKai’s cot, taking a seat on a campstool, and signed,Fourth Prince, I didn’t do as you said.
“I see that,” Kai said dryly.
After what happened, I thought it best to go with Sister Ziede and Tahren. And you said not to leave Sanja with someone she didn’t know well.She hesitated.Are you angry?
Kai sighed. “No.” It was hardly the first time a Witch had done something other than what he had told them to do, though he still wished Sanja hadn’t come here. He added in Witchspeak,Call me Kai.
Tenes smiled, relieved. Ziede reached over to squeeze her hand in reassurance and said, “I told you he wouldn’t be angry.”
Kai finished what he was sure was a direct quote, “‘And that none of us would care much if he was.’”
“True,” Ziede conceded. Then she added, “Tahren’s here with Dahin.”
Tenes jumped up and retreated to sit behind Ziede. She obviously knew this discussion would not go as easily.
Kai had expected brash confidence, but instead the Dahin who walked into the tent was pale and drawn, his whole body tight with tension. Tahren nodded to Kai as she followed him in, and moved to sit on the cot next to Ziede. She didn’t show her tension like Dahin did, but Kai could sense it, thrumming through her veins in time to her heartbeat. Ziede leaned against her and Tahren slipped an arm around her waist.
Dahin didn’t glance at them. He was trying to look at Kai, or at least next to Kai. He seemed to have difficulty forcing himself to make eye contact. He stood there uncertainly, until Tahren hooked a stool with her foot and pushed it toward him.
Dahin took it and sat down, cleared his throat, and began, “I was wrong. About the location of the Well. I thought—” He shook his head with a bitter half laugh. “We were looking at the tor, and I actually thought, maybe the Hierarchs’ Well islike the Well of Thosaren. Maybe it’s partially underground. It explained so much! Why the Enalin had never found it, why no one has been able to feel its presence in so many years. But I didn’t think they would build on top of it.” He shook his head a little. “Until it opened and we felt it.”
Kai rubbed his face, glad Ziede had made him drink all that tea. It made him feel more grounded, less likely to lose his temper. A little less likely. “Tell me why you wanted to come here alone, Dahin. The truth.”
Dahin let out his breath, but it wasn’t a petulant sigh. It was shaky, resigned, reluctant. A pained expression creased his brow. “It’s part of the reason I started to look for the Well in the first place. I’ve been studying the Blessed Writings about the creation of Wells, you may remember.”
No, Kai didn’t remember. Why everyone expected him to recall everything that had ever happened, particularly things that had happened while he wasn’t present, he had no idea.
Dahin forged on, “There were piles of writings about death wells, I’d been going through them for ages. There were indications, theories, that…”
Kai grated out, “Just tell me.”
Dahin hesitated, then his jaw set. “Promise me—”
Before Kai could snap, Tahren said, “Brother. Kai is not negotiating with you. Just tell us.”
Dahin threw a wincing glance at her but didn’t argue. Clearly Tahren had had a talk with him already. Kai wasn’t sure if they had been treating Dahin too gently all this time or not gently enough. He wished he knew how they had come to this pass.
Then Dahin seemed to steel himself and said, “A death well can be destroyed by an Immortal entering it. It’s a clash of two opposing forces. It destroys both.”
Kai was caught so by surprise that he couldn’t do anything but stare at Ziede. She sat up, her brows drawing together as if shecouldn’t decide if she was more baffled or more angry. She said, “A sacrifice. You’re talking about a sacrifice.”
Kai didn’t know which question to ask first. “What? How? They feed people into it, that’s why it’s a death well—”
“Yes, people, but only mortals! And they don’t throw them into it, like cordwood into a fire,” Dahin said, frustrated and sounding more like himself. “They feed pain to it, they torture them, let it draw their lives out. Like the scholars you rescued, they were letting them starve first—”
Tahren cut him off with a sharp slash of her hand. If she had been holding a sword she would have stabbed it into the dirt. In a voice of cold anger, she said, “An Immortal. You. You were going to— This is why you wanted to come here alone.”
There was a heartbeat of appalled silence. Tenes got up and walked out of the tent, clearly not wanting to intrude on what had suddenly become a much more private conversation.
Ziede looked horrified. She said, “Oh, Dahin, no.”
Kai burst out, “You were going to jump into the Hierarchs’ Well? Fora theory?” He found himself adding, “You didn’t say anything about this in your manuscript.”
