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  Wrayth

  ( The Order - 3 )

  Philippa Ballantine

  In the Empire of Arkaym, the Order of Deacons protects and shelters the citizens from the attacks of the unliving. All are sworn to fight the evil forces of the geists — and to keep the world safe from the power of the Otherside...

  Although she is one of the most powerful Deacons in the Order, Sorcha Faris is still unable to move or speak after her last battle. Even her partner, Merrick Chambers, cannot reach her through their shared Bond. Yet there are those who still fear Sorcha and the mystery of her hidden past.

  Meanwhile, Merrick has been asked to investigate a new member of the Emperor's Court. But when Sorcha is abducted by men seeking Raed Rossin, the shapeshifting rival to the throne, Merrick must choose where his loyalties lie.

  Wrayth

  (The third book in the Book of the Order series)

  A novel by Philippa Ballantine

  To all the librarians in my life.

  You opened up a world of knowledge

  and adventure in my mind

  that helped bring these stories to fruition.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Thanks are always necessary when a book is finally birthed, because no author is an island, and no story is written in a vacuum. To Danielle Stockley for helping to shape Arkaym and keep Sorcha under control. To my agent, Laurie McLean, who held my hand as I ventured out into the publishing world. To Jason Chan, who has always brought my thoughts to life with his amazing covers. To all my kind, generous and supportive podcast listeners—these books wouldn’t have happened without your backing. To my wonderful, talented husband, my captain who helped me set out on this adventure, and keeps me paddling. Finally, to my daughter, who might find writing “boring” but hopefully will enjoy these books when she’s older.

  ONE

  Taken in Shadow

  In the time when the earth bucked and heaved, many secrets were revealed—some were for good; some were most definitely for ill.

  As Caoirse followed her partner into the darkness, she could only wish that the situation they were walking into was the former. It had already been a long day for both her and Klanasta. Against the moonlight he was only a gray shadow on a horse before her, but they shared much more than moonlight. In her mind, her Active burned like a warm ember—something to hold on to, something to put all her trust in when surrounded by a perilous world. It was the real joy of being a Deacon: never being alone. It couldn’t make up for the dangers of hunting geists, but it came awfully close.

  She tucked damp curls of her reddish hair away from her face, pulled her green cloak tighter and shivered. Her mount, Tilin, was a Breed horse, and a fine creature to ride, but she’d been in the saddle going on three days now. It was enough to make anyone tense, so Caoirse kneed him up to walk alongside Klanasta’s horse.

  “How much farther?” she asked with a sigh.

  Klanasta’s long nose was the only real detail she could make out in this dark and fog. “The tunnel isn’t far away, and Goine and Leontis should have a nice stew waiting for us.”

  Since they were two young lads just out of the novitiate, Caoirse had severe doubts about their abilities with a pot, but she stayed silent on the matter. Instead she opened her Center and spread it out all around them, looking for their compatriots.

  Caoirse frowned. Everything was laid before her: the snake sleeping in its underground lair, a vulture with his head tucked beneath his wing and a vixen snuffling her way through the undergrowth.

  She didn’t need to tell Klanasta what was missing; they shared the Bond and her Sight.

  “No Deacons,” he whispered. The Active Deacon’s hands instantly sought out the Gauntlets he kept tucked in his belt. When he slipped them on, Caoirse felt better. Her partner was no wet-behind-the-ears novice. If there was a geist waiting for them, then it was the undead that should fear, not them.

  She did her part too. As the Sensitive Deacon in the pair, she probed deeper into the mist and swamp with greater focus. All she uncovered were more hungry predators and frightened prey. No geists and no Deacons.

  It was only when Tilin’s large hoof clattered into a tin plate that she realized that they were at their fellow Deacons’ camp. The fire was long dead. At least two days of rain had dampened the area considerably.

  Together she and Klanasta slipped down off their horses, landing with a wet slap in the mud. Her partner did not have to ask. Caoirse brought her Sight to bear on the camp. Activating Aiemm, the Second Rune of Sight, she let her mind run back in time, back to when two Deacons were sitting at this campfire talking about the things young men talk about—even those from the Order of the Eye and the Fist.

  She did not listen in to their conversation until they rose to their feet. Certainly their expression said they’d heard something, but it wasn’t something that she could perceive. Very odd.

  The lads gathered up their cloaks and the foci of the Order, the Gauntlets for the Active and the Strop for the Sensitive.

  “They heard something,” she said to Klanasta, “and went this way.”

  He followed her, as she in turn retraced the path that Goine and Leontis had taken. “They went down toward the temple.”

  Her partner groaned with ill-concealed frustration. “They were told to wait for us.”

  A chill ball of dread made itself known in Caoirse’s belly, but they went on. The temple was not much to look at, a scattering of old rocks covered with faded writing. No one had ever been able to decipher the language of the Ancients, but that didn’t stop scholars of the Order from trying.

  An earthquake a month ago had opened up the side of a hill, near the temple. On hearing of it the Mother Abbey scholars had almost frothed at the mouth. Maybe there were untouched artifacts or unmarred writings down there, they clamored. Through weirstone communication, they demanded someone be sent to investigate. Goine and Leontis were the closest, being Deacons of the nearest Priory, and their mission was only to secure the site. Caoirse and Klanasta had been sent for, from further afield, to make the actual examination.

  “This way,” she hissed to her partner as she pushed aside branches and followed the path the foolish young Deacons had taken.

  A large part of the small hill had indeed broken away and revealed an ancient tunnel.

  “I’ve yet to meet a lad who can resist a tunnel.” Klanasta rolled his eyes. “It was bound to happen.”

  “They should have sent someone with more experience,” Caoirse agreed, “but it is what it is. Come on.”

  They scrambled up through mud and broken vegetation to the entrance. A lantern was perched on a nearby rock. Klanasta raised an eyebrow. “Looks like they expected us.” He opened the lantern, struck a match, and lit the wick.

  He went first though, a faint shimmer coming off his Gauntlets, as if to remind Caoirse that she was safe.

  The tunnel dipped down, and Klanasta jumped back in irritation. The rain of the last few days had collected in the depression, making a wide pond of the passageway. It was impossible to see the other side, or if the tunnel rose up again.

  Then suddenly that became the last thing on the Deacons’ minds. It was as Caoirse feared; the bodies of Goine and Leontis floated facedown in the water.

  Klanasta shook his head. “I suppose they were trapped down here when it flooded. By the Bones, when will the young learn some sense!” Bunching up his cloak in one hand, he began wading out to them, grumbling all the time. Deacons deserved a proper burial—even if they were fools.

  Caoirse didn’t have any real desire to see the boys die, but some sense of duty propelled her to watch the rest through Aiemm.

  Klanasta reached the first body, and rolled it over. “That’s strange,” he called as
he began to pull it back toward her. Caoirse’s eyes widened, as the image of what had been laid over what was currently happening.

  “Klanasta!” she screamed, while her Center wrapped around him. At the same time, something exploded toward him out of the water.

  It was not a geist, and she would have sworn her Center had not seen it until a moment ago. Her partner was hampered by the body and slow moving in water. To her horror, she caught a flash of legs, long and sharp like a crab’s, but much, much larger, dart out from under the water. They wrapped around Klanasta and jerked him off his feet and into the seething pond.

  Drawing her sword, she leapt into the murky pool after him, but she didn’t need to see the blood in the water to know he was dead; the abruptly severed Bond told her that. Caoirse gasped in horror, but plunged deeper—even if it were just to wrestle her partner’s body from this foul creature.

  She had little regard for her own safety, because it mattered so little to her in that moment. When she dived down under the water she thought briefly that she had got hold of Klanasta, until her fingers locked on something harder. The claw twisted in her hand and grabbed her in turn.

  The Deacon thrashed wildly for the surface, but more of those nightmarish things closed around her, jerking her down. Caoirse kicked out hard, gasping in a mouthful of dirty, bloody water.

  Whatever these things might be, they were strong. Their pincers and legs formed a cage around her, and carried her below the water, down into unseen depths.

  Her last desperate thought was outrage that she hadn’t seen them coming.

  TWO

  Life of a Moth

  If there was any worse thing in the world than being conscious and unable to communicate Sorcha Faris did not know of it. She lay on her back, propped up on pillows, staring at the ceiling of the Mother Abbey’s infirmary and counted the dancing moths by her bedside. It was the only thing she had to keep madness at bay.

  She could feel Kolya’s hand on her wrist, but she could not pull it away as she wanted to. Her oh-so-nearly-former husband only ventured in to sit with her when Merrick was out of the room. At first he had spoken falteringly of his sadness, his regrets. He had been wrong. He should have let her in, should have trusted her.

  It’s too late for that, had been her unspoken, unheard reply.

  Yet despite herself she started to listen. Sorcha knew she had not been the best of wives. It was easy to admit that in the quiet of the infirmary, with nothing to do but think.

  But Kolya, he was not without fault—even now. She could feel him trying to renew their withered Bond, the magical connection between an Active and a Sensitive Deacon. Sorcha shared an exceptionally strong one with her younger partner Merrick Chambers. What Kolya was trying to do was immoral and highly illegal within the strictures of the Order of the Fist and the Eye, and she suspected that he was acting under Arch Abbot Rictun’s command. Not that she, lying mute and incapacitated, was capable of telling anyone. Even with Merrick, she could not manage to send words along the Bond as she once could. He could feel her emotions and that was it, and it was hard to reveal Kolya’s duplicity with just those. She had probably given Merrick more than his fair share of headaches by trying. Sorcha might have felt sorry for that—but trying was all she had left.

  If she cared to strain her eyes to the left she would be able to make out Kolya’s head bent over her hand, pressing his forehead against it. She could feel the low tug on the remains of her Bond with him, like an unpleasant tickle that she could not scratch. Deacon Kolya Petav was wearing away her strength. Sorcha resisted as best she could. She bent her will to keeping the Bond with Merrick alive, and burying the one she had once shared with Kolya.

  She’d fought and defeated the geistlord Hatipai, but she’d overstepped her bounds as a Deacon. Now, this was her life—and what a miserable life it was.

  By the Bones, Kolya, don’t bother. I’m not worth it…

  “Deacon Petav?” If Sorcha had believed in gods at that moment she might have let out a shout of exaltation. The curly, dark head of her current partner appeared around the door frame. “To what do we owe this unexpected visit?” Ever the diplomat, he didn’t let out a curse as she might have done in the same position. Still, his tone was accusatory. On the inside Sorcha cheered. It was delightful to see the young Deacon taking the situation firmly in hand. Watching from her bed, Sorcha realized her partner had grown up.

  Kolya, as always keeping his demeanor cool, stroked the back of Sorcha’s hand. “I am still her husband, Deacon Chambers.”

  It’s not about that is it, Kolya?

  Merrick stepped through the door and carefully placed a tray down on the table. From this angle Sorcha couldn’t see what was on it. In the good old days, two months before, she would have hoped for a cigar or a spot of hard liquor—now such bodily pleasures were beyond her. Instead, she settled for watching the two men spar over her prone body.

  Her real partner took his place on the other side of her, and his voice was calm but sharp. “Only because she was not capable of standing at the final reading of the dissolution. It was merely a formality that Sorcha could not unfortunately attend.”

  “Still formalities are formalities,” Kolya said, and it was the first time that Sorcha had ever heard real steel in his tone. She knew him well after years of marriage, and Kolya could be stubborn—beyond stubborn in fact.

  Straining her eyes, Sorcha could make out Merrick’s tight expression, and observed him swallow hard. Without the complete Bond, she had to hang on every little nuance and expression. Funny how she had once been so annoyed by the leaking of words and thoughts between them—and now she missed them terribly.

  “Brother Salay said we must leave her to sleep, and I believe Presbyter Mournling is leading a discussion this evening on the latest findings on geistlords.” The Sensitives faced each other from opposite sides of the bed, and even Sorcha, trapped in her body, could feel the tension. If they had been Actives it would have already devolved into a brawl, but Sensitive Deacons were different creatures altogether. In point of fact, Sorcha had no idea how they settled arguments.

  Kolya was the first to break. “I’ve been looking forward to that discussion.” He turned, caught himself, and swung around to plant a brisk kiss on Sorcha’s cheek. “I will see you later.”

  Don’t come back. Just let it go. She concentrated on moving her arm, just a little bit—just enough for a small gesture. Yet there was nothing.

  Then she and Merrick were alone, and she turned her attention to the Bond; funneling all of her frustration into it. Merrick took a step back, and pressed his fingertips to his forehead. “I know, Sorcha. I know—but there is little I can do. I can’t keep him out of here since his status as your partner and your husband has not been tidied up.”

  Sorcha immediately felt guilty. For the last two months she had leaned heavily on their Bond. By dumping all her feelings to her partner, she had managed to hang on by her fingernails to her mind, however in the process she had strained the young man to that very same point.

  I just want to get better. A wave of despair washed over her, and when it drew back she was not the powerful, stern Deacon—she was just a woman trapped in her body and terrified that it was going to be that way forever. If so, just kill me now Merrick!

  He couldn’t hear that plea, but he could feel the emotion it rode on. Merrick sat on the bed next to her and took her hand in his. “It’ll be all right. Think how much better you are than when we brought you back from Orinthal. You really are healing! Brother Salay says your muscles are responding to the exercises they put you through.” His brown eyes sparkled dangerously with something close to tears. “Please, don’t give up, Sorcha.”

  Sorcha wasn’t embarrassed when one of her own leaked out and ran down her cheek. Merrick wiped it clear and smiled. “I won’t tell a soul about that. Now I want to hear what Presbyter Mournling has to say as well. I’ll see you tomorrow.” He was lying to her—that much she could tell
from the Bond. However she would not deny him his secrets.

  Her partner got up and snuffed out the wicks on all but two lamps in the room. The sound of him closing the door behind him was bleak indeed. The moths were altering their dance accordingly, with the change in light, but these new patterns held no magic for Sorcha. She was alone. The small hours of the night were quite the worst.

  Dimly off in the corridors she could hear lay Brothers about their work, the whisper of hushed voices, and the occasional sob from relatives come to visit their loved ones in the infirmary. Then the door creaked open again.

  Maybe Merrick had changed his mind and was coming back to sit through the night with her as he had when she’d been first brought back to Vermillion.

  “She’s in here.” Sorcha recognized the voice, and felt even better than if it had been Merrick. It was one she had sorely missed these last months. Her partner before Kolya, Garil Reeceson was now a retired Sensitive—old, battered, but still one of her best friends. As a trainer at the Abbey he was busy, so she had understood his infrequent visits.

  He came into view at the foot of her bed, but his face had changed since he was last there. Sorcha knew Garil; knew his strengths, his fears and his weaknesses. She had seen him when he was in pain, in fear and in triumph. Yet, she had never witnessed this expression from him before. Great guilt lingered about his eyes, but his mouth was set in a hard determined line.

  Just as she was trying to puzzle out what that might mean, she observed he was not alone. Sorcha could not have been more surprised to see Aachon appear at his shoulder than if the Prince of Chioma had. He was the first mate of the Dominion, Raed Rossin’s friend, and someone she had not seen since the attack in the ossuary in Vermillion. When she had met the Young Pretender in Orinthal he had described how he had left Aachon and most of his crew on the Dominion. He’d planned to rendezvous with them later after finding his sister. Could this mean that the Young Pretender was close by?