Gone.
Chapter 19
Gyre opened his eye and found himself in complete darkness. When he tried to move, his right arm didn’t respond, as though it was bound tightly against him, and something restrained his legs. His left hand flailed weakly across his body, and he felt his breath quicken in panic.
Focus. Calm. He gritted his teeth. He remembered—falling, and pain—
“Oh, you’re awake.” A pleasant voice, familiar. Gyre tried to clear his throat and coughed.
“E … Elariel?”
“Nice to meet you again,” the ghoul said politely. He heard her moving around, felt something brush against him. “You were in better shape last time.”
“Why can’t I see?” Gyre said.
“Ah, yes. Hold still.”
It took considerable effort for Gyre to keep himself calm enough to obey. He felt the ghoul bending over him, the warmth of her breath on his face, and then her fingers touched the skin around his good eye. He suppressed the urge to jerk away, clenching his jaw so hard his teeth ached. Something cool and wet dripped into his eye, and he blinked involuntarily. Elariel let go and moved away.
“This is similar to what you humans call ‘nighteye,’” she said. “But considerably more effective. Don’t light any fires before it wears off, or you may blind yourself.”
Whatever the stuff was, it worked quickly. Gyre blinked again and found the room fading into view in spite of the lack of any light.
He lay on a table in a small chamber. The only other furnishing was a tall stool on which Elariel sat, legs primly crossed, hands on her knee. Her long, expressive ears were raised, and her huge eyes, nearly all pupil, regarded him calmly.
“Where am I?” Gyre said, though he could think of only one possible answer. His breath caught.
“The city you humans call the Tomb,” Elariel said. “We call it”—she made a rolling, whistling sound he couldn’t hope to replicate, and went on—“which in your language translates to something like Refuge.”
The Tomb. Gyre looked around the windowless chamber. Refuge. The last city of the ghouls.
I made it.
“What happened to me?” He tried to sit up but couldn’t manage it, his right arm still restrained. “Where’s Kit?”
“Kitsraea is being tended to,” Elariel said. “As to what happened, the two of you jumped into a rock ingestor.”
“A … what?”
“A construct designed to reduce solid granite to rock slurry and deliver it to the city for use in construction.” There was a slight smile on her face, and her ears twitched. “Needless to say, you were injured in the attempt. It was a most unexpected move.”
“We were running low on options at the time,” Gyre said. “At least it worked.”
“We were forced to extract you before you reached the liquefaction pool,” Elariel said.
“Thanks,” Gyre muttered.
“No thanks are necessary,” she said. “Your digested remains would have ruined a perfectly good batch of building material.”
Now there was definitely a smile on the ghoul’s face. Gyre leaned back on the table, which was pleasantly spongy in texture.
“What’s wrong with my arm?” he said.
“It was broken in three places,” Elariel said, getting off her stool. “I fixed it in place to keep you from injuring yourself further. Do you feel any pain?”
“Not really,” Gyre said, propping himself up again on his other hand. He noticed for the first time that he was nearly naked, with no shirt and only a pair of short, loose trousers. Elariel, of course, wore no clothing at all, and Gyre wondered if that was normal for ghouls. “It just won’t move.”
He tried again and peered a little closer. His right arm was pressed tight against his side, and there was something strange—
His gorge suddenly rose. His arm wasn’t pressed against his side; it was fused to it, skin stretching unbroken from limb to torso. Plaguing fuck!
“Give me a moment.”
Elariel stood at his side, and her hands touched him, fingers running along the join. As Gyre watched, his skin split, painlessly, separating his arm from his body again. Bands of fresh pink were wound around his biceps and wrist, presumably where he’d been … repaired.
Dhaka. The life-magic of which the ghouls had been the foremost masters. For all that he’d come to the Tomb looking for their power, actually seeing it—feeling it used on his own flesh—roiled his stomach. There was no visible sign of the power, just Elariel running her fine-furred hands up and down Gyre’s body, pressing and testing. When she found a stray flap of skin, she touched it, and it retreated obediently. Gyre flexed his arm, and she nodded approval.
“How long have I been down here?”
“Three days now,” Elariel said. “Your legs were damaged, too, so you may feel some aches for another day, I think.”
Three days. Quickheal and bone-break potion—though they were dhak by Order standards—had never worked that fast.
“And Kit?” Gyre said.
“She should be awake before tomorrow.”
Okay. He sat up and met the ghoul’s gaze. She retreated a step, her smile fading, and her long ears drooped. Time for the real question.
“So why are we still alive?”
Elariel looked at him for a moment, saying nothing.
“You must kill anyone who stumbles into your Refuge, or it wouldn’t remain secret,” Gyre pressed.
“No one ‘stumbles in.’ We have had four hundred years to conceal ourselves.” Elariel sighed, her fur rippling. “But you are correct. If the Geraia knew you were here, they would have you killed at once.”
“They’re your leaders?”
She nodded. “The oldest and wisest among us.” Gyre was certain he detected a sarcastic spin on the words. “The heads of all the families who remain in Refuge. They decide any matters that affect the city.”
“And you’re hiding us from them?”
“We are … delaying our report.” Elariel cocked her head. “My master says we need to discover what you know. He commanded me to heal you so you could speak to him.”
“Ah.” Gyre shifted to the edge of the table and stretched his legs. “I suppose I should thank him.”
“I would … wait.” Elariel’s ears drooped again. “He may decide the best way to obtain the information he needs would be to render it from your living brain.”
There was an uncomfortable silence.
“Or he may not!” Elariel said, with a forced smile. “He is unpredictable. But now that you’re awake, you will have to go and see him.”
*
The state of Gyre’s clothes gave him some idea of what the rock ingestor had done to his body. They were practically shredded, ripped and torn as though they’d gone through a spiked mangle. When he asked Elariel if the ghouls had anything that might serve, she shook her head.
“I fashioned those”—she indicated the shorts he was wearing—“when I remembered how odd you humans get about your coverings. Are they insufficient?”
Gyre assured her they were perfectly adequate. They were a little large for him, but he managed to retrieve a mostly intact belt from the wreck of his gear. In the process, he investigated the remains of his pack, but his stash of alchemicals had either been confiscated by the ghouls or destroyed by the journey. Both his knives were missing as well.