I exhaled. Why was talking to people so hard? Could not people just get to the point?

  “What is the under keep?” I asked patiently.

  Peggy looked at me as if I was dumb and asked, “You are not from here, are you? Who are you?”

  “Voss Truechild.”

  “Yeah, right,” the young woman snorted. “Voss Truechild has been ambushed and killed on the road to the cradle.”

  “Is that so? Who told you that?” I asked.

  “The damned that came with the thorgs.”

  I raised my eyebrows and looked at Ilya.

  Ilya dropped the boy in her hand to the ground and looked back at me. “Well, brother, it looks like you were right. Where there are spirits, there are damned. I will have to remember that.”

  Inquisitor Asaki walked to us and said, “Looks like this part was the enemies’ plans.”

  “What do you mean, Master Asaki?” Ilya asked.

  “It makes sense, my lady. Kill you, take your core. Kill His Highness. And while their damned confederates are doing that, take over the cradle city with the control crystal,” the inquisitor began in his wheezing voice and added, “Then finish off Sage Truechild. Without you, he would not be much of a challenge. He is a healer, not a frontline combatant like you both. And then the imperial forces in the fortress would fall. And in one swift blow, you would cut off a large chunk of the empire, kill the God Emperor’s progeny, and deal a long lasting blow to the Starbright Empire.”

  The Lisk boy snorted. “Yes, but they did not expect old man Voss to be able to fight back.”

  “Or us to be such good shots,” Peggy stood up straight and added.

  “I am getting really annoyed with Ascaris,” Ilya said in a heated tone.

  “But they do not know that their ambush failed and we are here,” I added.

  “Their ambush failed? Do you mean you are the new Clan Lord Voss?” Peggy asked with disbelief written all over her face.

  “Yes.”

  The girl looked at Grek and Inquisitor Asaki for confirmation.

  “Look at them, girl,” Inquisitor Asaki pointed at Ilya and me. “Look at their skin. Those streaks are mana veins of a Truechild.”

  Peggy looked at Grek. “Are you sure, Grek?”

  “Yes, Peggy,” Grek said impatiently.

  Peggy recoiled and dropped her crossbow on a chair. She bowed hastily. “I am sorry, my lord. Lord Artabanus was injured. He has been infected. He has shackled himself to the bed in that room.”

  The young boy, Dodger, tugged on Ilya’s trousers and asked, “Will you save old man Voss?”

  Ilya smiled at the boy and looked at the inquisitor.

  Asaki smiled. “We can try if you take us to him.”

  The children rushed out of the way and nearly dragged the old inquisitor to the room.

  I did not move. Neither did Ilya.

  “How do we get to the under keep?” I asked.

  “You do not want to go there,” the response came from the teenage boy who had followed us quietly. “The great remnant spirit of the old clan lord has unleashed spirits to fight the intruders. They will kill anyone who enters beyond the gatehouse.”

  Ilya turned to look at Lisk. “Then how did you survive?”

  “Old man Voss fought the intruders and guided us to the gatehouse,” Lisk looked down. “He got injured trying to save the younger ones. But he locked the gate. Now the spirits cannot spread out.”

  Ilya exhaled. “Great. So we need to fight the damned, the spirits, and the thorgs now.” She looked at the boy. “Is that it? Or are there any more enemies we need to keep an eye out for?”

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  The boy shrank into himself. “Shazed Voss. He has taken up his sword. He is fighting along with the spirits.”

  Ilya pursed her lips. “Perfect. The mad spirit too.”

  “Your highness.” The master inquisitor called to me from inside the room. “Lord Artabanus would like a word.”

  I looked at the room and saw the Peggy girl exit the room with tears in her eyes and hurt written all over her face. She stepped aside to give me space. I entered the room and looked at a man with a missing arm and a foot. They were old wounds, ones that had been surgically amputated and replaced with wooden ones.

  The wound on his right thigh was new. It was seeping blood and pus all over the white sheet. An angry red poison had traveled up the wound to the rest of the old lord’s body. It reached past his neck, to his face, and to his eyes. The bloodshot eyes pulsed red periodically.

  I turned to look at the master inquisitor. He gave me a pained look and shook his head slightly. Before the old warrior priest could explain, the bearded man on the bed coughed and turned to me.

  The old knight in a chest plate looked at me with palpable anger and hatred. “So, you are the new clan lord.” It was a statement, not a question.

  I still nodded.

  “And now you want to rule these lands.” The old bearded man snorted dismissively. “You know what I say? Good riddance. This blighted land has cost us everything. My sons. My daughters. Everything!”

  “Calm, soldier,” the old inquisitor said in a soothing tone.

  “Shut up, you old fool. You are so blinded by the emperor’s brilliance that you cannot even see what he has done to all of us,” Artabanus Voss snapped at the Master Inquisitor. He tried to lift himself, but the rattling chain tied to the bed stopped him.

  With a growl, Lord Artabanus turned back to me. “You know how my children died. Some died protecting these lands. Some died inside the under keep, trying to challenge the spirit. The rest, they died to the traitorous nobles. But all of them died because they tried to serve this flawed empire. And now you come here. To try and take our crystal. What gives you the right?”

  The master inquisitor reached to put a hand on the knight’s shoulder. “Artabanus, you do not mean your words. It is the demonic taint. Fight it.”

  Artabanus scoffed. “Demonic taint. Blight that too. It does not matter. You know why, boy?”

  I shook my head.

  “Because you will die too.” The old knight laughed. “If not by the invaders’ hand, then by the hands of Shazed Voss. And if he does not kill you, I will!”

  “Artabanus!” Inquisitor Asaki said sternly. I held up my hand to let the old knight speak.

  I needed him to speak his mind. I needed to find something he still held dear to his heart. I took a step closer to the old lord with narrowed eyes and waved. “Continue, Artabanus Voss.”

  The old knight glared at me. “Continue what?”

  I just looked at the injured man.

  “What are you looking at, Truechild?”

  “Your soul,” I answered.

  I did not lie. I had been sensing his soul even through the closed doors. That is why I had not been surprised to see the state of the old man. He was mutating into something that did not belong in a human body. And I had two choices: kill him, or spend some of my recovered essence to save him.

  “My soul?” The old knight laughed hollowly. “What? You think you are some sort of priest? Like this old fart.”

  Artabanus jutted his chin at the Master Inquisitor and added, “You will die. Like everyone of our name. We all will die!”

  I looked at Inquisitor Asaki.

  “I cannot save him. Maybe if we reached him sooner…” The Master Inquisitor started muttering the last sentence and stopped midway with a shake of his head.

  I nodded in understanding. “Can you heal his body?”

  The inquisitor looked at me and then at the mad man chained to the bed. He slowly nodded. “Your highness, if we could have reached him earlier, I could have purged the demon taint. But… it has seeped in too deep.”

  “There is no saving any of us, boy,” the old lord cut off Asaki with a growl. He turned to the master inquisitor and said, “Priest. Just do me one last favor. For all the service my family and I have rendered for the empire. Send our children far away from here. Far away from me. And keep them out of your politics.”

  My eyes sharpened. Children. So that was it.

  “Look at me, Artabanus Voss,” I ordered.

  The old lord gritted his teeth and snarled, “Why? What do you want me to see, dead man?”

  “Dead man.” I chuckled. It was funny. He did not know how close to the truth he was.

  “You want to save the children? Then do it yourself.”

  With those words, I slipped into the dark waters. And I was almost thrown out. The waters here had been disturbed. They were so choppy and turbulent that they jostled me. I steadied myself and looked at the wounded soul, leaking essence and fighting doom bringer poison. It was hard, but I swam closer to the soul.

  Outside the waters, the old knight growled and screamed. “Typical imperial. All you do is take and take and…”

  I ignored the old knight’s hateful words and focused back in the dark waters. I looked at the soul. Something had shattered its shield and tainted it with unadulterated hatred. It had almost withered up and dispersed into the dark waters. Soon it would lose all its essence, and all that would be left would be that hatred. And the man on the bed would turn into a rabid monster that would attack everything it saw.

  I shot my hand out and grabbed the man laying on the bed by his face, silencing the knight. In response, Artabanus Voss bit me.

  The old Inquisitor shot to his feet as blood dripped down my palm and in a hurry asked, “What are you doing, your highness? The demonic poison…”

  “Quiet,” I ordered.

  I ignored the pain of the bite, the burn of the demonic poison. There was no pain and no hate in the dark waters. Half submerged as I was, I embraced the cold numbness of the dark and let all the sensations flow out of me and the waters flow into me.

  Something shifted inside. My death magic reacted to the water, and the water answered the death running through my veins. They found each other and were drawn closer together. Was it because I was growing accustomed to this body? Or because I had finally learned how to wield death?

  Whatever the reason, death suddenly came easier to me, and my soul hummed contentedly in the waters.

  I opened my eyes in the world they called Gaia.

  “Do you wish to live, Artabanus Voss?” My cold voice echoed in the small room.

  The old knight’s eyes widened in terror.

  “Do you wish to save the children?” My words rattled the furniture in the room.

  The old knight tried to wrench my deathly cold fingers off his face.

  “Answer me,” I ordered.