Previously on Sanctuary Road:Libeza stopped and lifted an incredulous eyebrow at the taller woman. “You have a ghost tearing up your basement, and you want a warrant?”
Something made a thunderous bang, shaking the building. Casey said impatiently, “Shana, she’s been more than helpful. Giving us an ID for Simon is . If she wants to arrest the ghost, she can. Let her pass.”
Shana muttered, “let the cops in,” but she moved aside.
“Don’t worry,” Libeza said cheerfully, “I’m not arresting anybody here today. Pretty hard to sic you guys on that sociopath of a blood mage if you’re in jail...”
“What?” Avery demanded, echoing Simon’s sentiments.
Casey, who showed every sign of being one of the most powerful Seers Simon had ever met, just sighed. “That’s going to be necessary, isn’t it?”
Simon jerked his head around to stare at Casey. What had Casey just sensed? He had no desire to get tangled up in the kind of magic that Libeza had alluded to. Casey wasn’t trained, and the rest of his friends weren’t even Gifted. Simon had his fill of mundane versus magic fights a long time ago. He’d hunt bandits all day, up until one of them lobbed a spell his way. Then, it was time to summon a temple priest to take point.
he swallowed hard and forced that memory back. Now was not the time to allow old nightmares to resurface.
“If it makes you feel better,” Libeza said, “I expect the Book will be a lot more helpful once you’re doing her bidding rather than cussing her out. That’s always how it goes with her.”
“That’s very reassuring,” Casey snapped. Then he made an ‘after you’ gesture at the stairs. Libeza and the others proceeded down the stairs.
The Book lay open on the desk inside the cage, with the air shimmering and rippling above the pages. Simon eyed that light warily; it was the first time he’d actually seen a Power field around the Book. Then, suddenly, the energy coalesced into the faintest outline of a woman. He could make no details out; she was simply a pale, near-invisible shadow hanging in the air.
He’d been correct, then, about her Power. She could make herself seen if she was sufficiently motivated.
“What are you doing to our basement?” Casey demanded of her, voice taut with anger. His reaction was understandable, however, as the room was a disaster. All the shelves along the far wall had come off the wall, scattering the contents across the floor. Broken glass from smashed tableware mixed with an assortment of what Casey mockingly called ‘mall ninja’ weapons — Simon hadn’t had a chance to look up the definition of a 'mall ninja' yet, but by context, he gathered they might be similar to the silly foppish noblemen at court who brandished elaborately decorated and bespelled but not especially useful weapons at one another while being scorned by the real soldiers.
He’d watched one teenage lordling challenge an old general to a duel. The youth had been confident in the jeweled hilt of his sword and the spell woven into it; supposedly, it allowed him to strike devastating blows. The general had been armed with an ordinary broadsword. The boy had swung at the old man, who’d calmly stepped out of the way — and due to the power of the swing, the sword had slammed into the flagstones of a palace courtyard and shattered.
The general had then left the boy with a scar across his cheek, and everyone had agreed that was more than fair punishment for rank stupidity.
Multiple electronic gadgets lay in a heap, some visibly broken. Pepper spray bottles rolled across the floor. Simon wouldn’t soon forget the pain that substance could cause, and he was glad none were leaking. Numerous objects that he couldn’t identify were strewn about. Overall, the damage was massive and looked expensive.
Several of the toy trains on the table rolled off with a clatter. The ghost was still throwing a fit.
Libeza said, “Knock it off, Nadria. You made your point.”
“She made a fucking mess.” Casey had his arms folded and a scowl on his face. “I didn’t think she had the power to tear shelves off the wall.”
“She doesn’t,” Simon said with confidence backed by years of lessons on magic and the supernatural. “She backed the screws out of the wood.”
Avery folded his arms. He looked a lot more nervous than Casey but less than Shana — Shana was staring at the shimmering air above the Book, and she hadn’t moved far from the stairs. Avery continued, “There are a lot of ways she could mess with us without much strength, yeah?”
“She could fuck with the building’s wiring,” Shana suggested.
“She won’t do anything that could damage the Book, so she won’t start a fire,” Libeza shook her head. “But Avery’s right. Nadria has a way of making her opinion known.”
“Faucets,” Avery said, and that was not a non-sequitur when Simon thought about it for a few seconds. Overflowing water in one of the attic bathrooms could affect several floors if it happened when no one was around to notice right away. Avery’s lips pressed together so hard that the skin around his mouth was pale and wrinkled. He added, “Basement thermostat on a cold night. Unlock the door and push it open. Frozen pipes.”
“Hey, let’s not give the ghost ideas,” Casey objected.
“She doesn’t need your help imagining new and creative forms of sabotage,” Libeza rolled her eyes. “She’s a menace when she’s angry, and that is often."
“Which, I assume, explains why we found a haunted book in a storage unit a hundred miles from the Riley place, if she was screwing with the Rileys.” Casey ran a hand over his face. Simon knew the feeling. To the Book, Casey said, “Fine. You have my attention. What’s so important that—”
Libeza made a gesture with one hand. The faint outline floating next to the Book coalesced into a nearly solid figure, clearly visible even to the unGifted. Simon’s hair went up on the back of his neck. He’d often regretted his lack of magic, but he was glad he wasn’t a medium. Libeza was strong enough that she had once described her vision of the world to him as looking like a ‘well-populated graveyard with more haunts than living people.’
The ghost was a few inches taller than he was, but they had the same cheekbones, mouth, and eyes, and the same shade of white-blond hair. Though her entire body was translucent, he could still make out her eye color, which exactly matched his green.
The spirit’s voice was a whisper, but it was audible even to the UnGifted. “you, Libby. I wasn’t sure if Simon could see me, and I didn’t want to waste power... mine is very limited, as you know. He needs to hear this.”
Simon knew that the presence of sound meant Libby had temporarily solidified the ghost’s spirit matter, which required considerable Power and was likely unsustainable. Libeza was strong, but without a source of energy, she was pulling directly from the ley lines. Casey’s amateur attempts to harness their energy had presumably churned everything all to hell around here. She would quickly run out of usable Power.
Shana muttered, “If I had any doubts about magic ...” Then she fell silent, eyes narrowed, and one hand on the stair railing behind her. Simon saluted her instincts. If trouble went down, she’d be the first to get out of the way, and that was a good thing; it meant one less innocent bystander in the line of fire. He’d been in a few fights too many where civilians had been hurt.
Avery didn’t look like he’d run, which concerned Simon. When the shelves had come down, a number of the flimsy decorative swords had been scattered across the floor. Avery bent over and picked up a blade shaped like an elongated half moon, with fur-covered grips on the back side and rhinestones glued to the metal. It would also have been what Simon would have chosen, given the available options; it was substantial enough not to break on the first swing, and it was longer than the other weapons. Reach truly mattered when fighting magic with steel.
Libeza also glanced at Avery, but didn’t comment on his arming himself. She did ease away from him, however. That ‘sword’ looked awkward to wield, and Avery was a large man with long arms. An inexperienced swordsman could be as dangerous to a friend as he was to a foe.
Simon made a mental note to include Avery in some of Casey’s magic lessons. The man needed instruction on the basics of magic to be effective in a fight. Plus, Simon had no idea of Avery’s actual fighting skills beyond a suspicion that he’d had instruction. His stance was confident, and he was holding that odd blade like he meant business with it.
“Mm. What trouble are we in, Nadria?” Libeza asked.
“More to the point, I want you to lift the spell on Simon,” Casey said, taking a single step towards her, fists balling. Simon didn’t think punching a ghost would do much, but he wouldn’t put it past Casey to summon power and throw a leybolt purely by instinct. That could hurt the ghost, or even permanently dissipate her if enough brute force was applied.
She was almost a foot shorter than Casey, and Casey was furious, but the ghost met his gaze with a fearless expression through the barrier of the cage. Either she had faith in her own skills at magic to handle an unskilled attack, or she didn’t think Casey was mad enough to actually fight. Coolly, she said, “No. You and Simon must be able to communicate to end a threat to two worlds. And, Simon would be very slow to trust you without the spell — likely, he never would. With what the prophecy said... nevermind. I’ll lift it when it is no longer needed. Not before.”
“Fuck. You.” Casey said. “How you presume—”
Libeza interrupted, “Casey, don’t waste your energy. Just learn to cast a null ring for those moments when you need to reduce the effect of the geas on Simon. You’re vastly more powerful than she is. I normally tell young mages that brute force is never the answer, but in your case, applying prolific amounts of power will work a lot better than trying to reason with stubborn woman.”
The ghost scowled. Then her expression softened as she looked directly at Simon. “Esmon Adrial,” she said, stepping towards him. Her booted feet moved silently across the floor, leaving no shadow and making only the smallest whisper of noise. He remembered those boots. He’d clumped around their tent in them as a child, and asked for a pair just like them for the Harvest Festival. She’d obliged, and he’d been wearing his brand-new matching boots the day she’d...
... died.
He remembered the rain, thundering against the Great Hall’s glazed windows. There was still the illusion of mud on her feet, and her hair looked damp as if she’d just come inside. She was exactly as she was in his memories.
There was no blood on her dress.
Her blood haunted his dreams. He had forgotten her face, but not the shimmering golden fabric turned wet crimson. Her blood had spilled on the tart he’d been eating. Cherries still made him think of that day.
Something eased in his soul when he saw her. This was how she look if she were alive now. It was a memory to replace the nightmares.
He blurted out, “I couldn’t stop them from killing you, Mama. I couldn’t!”
She stepped soundlessly through the cage's wire barrier. Libeza let out an irritated sound as the conductive metal caused the spirit’s visage to distort and flicker.
Simon did not retreat as the spirit approached, and then a ghostly hand brushed against his cheek, leaving a cool tingle behind. “You were four years old, Esmon. You have no guilt in what transpired.”
“But I tried and because I tried, I can also say I failed.” He wanted to hug her, dive into her arms, and feel safe, secure, and innocent just for a moment. He added plaintively, “I don’t understand. Why did you do this to me?”
She sighed, breath whispering through pursed lips. “Casey is a good man. He’ll treat you very well. You’ve never before been able to trust another person, and you have that with him — and he is worthy of it. Are you not happy?”
Simon’s gut turned over in awful realization that she had meant for him to be bound, fully knowing who he was. There was no accident or misunderstanding on her part. Bitterly, he snapped, “Any joy I feel now isn’t real.”
And was the familiar pain of the geas, punishing him for any hint of displeasure with his situation. Suddenly, he was coolly angry, the sort of temper that was clear-headed and settled. This was not something he could ever forgive. The geas didn’t like the anger, but he didn’t care; he could handle the pain.
The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
She countered, “You’re being treated with respect and affection by an attractive man who likes you. At a minimum, he’ll be a good friend. He could very easily become something more.”
“I chose a life of celibacy a long time ago, and was content with it!" Simon flinched as the spell punished him; he wasn’t supposed to hint he wouldn’t love his master. “Trust, and blind loyalty, isn’t my way. Nor do I wish to hurt another if I do not, in the end, fulfill their dreams!"
She held a hand out, palm up, in Casey’s direction. “Here stands a man worthy of love. Is it so wrong that you feel those things for him?”
“Where did love get you?” Simon spat. “Dead. Bound to a Book of Need, serving the whims of human sorcerers. You loved a man, and he betrayed you utterly.” He hadn’t wanted to discuss this in public or, honestly, ever, with anyone.
Libeza spoke up, “Nadria, sorry to interrupt the family reunion here, but I can’t hold this spell forever. Tell them what they need to know.”
The spirit cast her an irritated look, then said, “Twelve years ago, Todd Riley stole the Book of Needs from Tara Bright. Normally, we — myself and the children bound with me — could have made his life a merry hell until he gave the book . However, it turns out he’s one of the more powerful blood mages I’ve ever tangled with, and he found others like him on this world’s internet to learn from—”
Shana muttered, “?”
“Reddit, I believe. Not all shitposts are pure shit.” Libeza shrugged.
“That tracks,” Shana rolled her eyes. “I don’t care how obscure the subject is, an actual expert always pops up.”
“Between a decent level of instruction from the experts he found, and significant natural talent, he was able to strip the souls of the children from the Book. Eleven were sealed to a Spirit Staff, and the twelfth — a boy with a truly potent healing gift — was bound to the necklace that Avery is wearing.”
Avery glanced down at the necklace. “That’s why I survived? My necklace is possessed?”
Nadria inclined her head in a single graceful nod. “His name is Caradrel Miriol du’Adrial — call him Drel. Simon, Drel is your first cousin, and a nephew to both Libby and myself — his father was my brother. He died in an accent before either of you were born. You were two months apart in age and would have been raised like siblings.”
His cousin? Simon glanced at the bit of costume jewelry around Avery’s neck. He had distant memories of playing with another boy as a child: riding double on a pony, splashing in a shallow creek, chasing fireflies together one summer night. Had that been Drel? He had no idea. There were no names attached to any of his memories, only vague impressions of images.
Nadria continued, “Todd made the necklace for his mother. However, she was terrified of magic... not that I blame her. She locked Drel and I away where you found us.”
Libeza asked, “How long ago was that?”
“About three and a half years.”
“The Riley woman died shortly after that.” Libeza sounded suspicious.
“You’d end my existence if I ever killed without your sanction,” Nadria replied, tone very mild. “That an accident.”
Simon didn’t believe her. Spirits could lie. By Libby’s expression, she was also suspicious.
Avery cradled the dragonfly pendant in one hand and stared down at it. Casey said quietly, “So, this Drel, is he forced to heal whoever wears the necklace?”
“Yes,” Nadria confirmed.
Something in her tone made Simon narrow his eyes in suspicion. “Was it made without safeguards?”
“Yes. You’ve learned your lessons well,” Nadria confirmed.
“Given the degree of damage I did to Avery, how badly was Drel diminished?” Simon asked. He tried to focus on the important part, which was to ask key questions of the spirit before the leys became too disturbed to tap. A growing sense of horror mixed with fury. It was hard to think, but he needed to. This was bigger than he was.
“He will recover with time — a week or two. He is currently very weakened. In the future, it would be best if Casey learns to feed power to Drel when Drel must heal another.” Nadria smiled at Casey, a genuinely fond expression. “Drel doesn’t wish to return to the Book, so, for now, he is where he wants to be, tied to that necklace, but it does mean his existence is shadowed by danger. It would be very easy for his gifts to be abused.”
Avery asked, “Diminished...?”
Simon translated, “Spirits have limited power reserves on their own, and you’re not Gifted, so he cannot draw from you. To heal you, he would have been forced to exhaust himself of every last fragment of personal power at great pain and risk to himself. Spirits do not , they if a spell draws away all that they are.”
Avery’s hand closed around the dragonfly pendant. “He could have... ended, you said?”
“Casey claimed Avery fell on his own sword,” Libeza said, tone wry, while staring at a point somewhere above Casey’s head. “Much is clear now."
All four of them, and the spirit of Nadria, gave her an alarmed look. Avery face-palmed.
“To be perfectly clear,” Libeza drawled, “You accidentally fell on a sword that happened to have Lord Yienry’s sigil on the hilt. I was unaware of a geasbound man with the Mark of the Hunt on his back hiding in a chest, nor did I see the Book of Needs sitting on a table." She said this while somehow looking down her nose at Avery, who was a solid foot taller than her. Then, to the spirit, she added, “You’d best come to the point, sister, or we’ll need to conclude this another day. The power I can tap is rapidly dwindling. The leys in these parts are a mess right now.”
“Todd and the Spirit Staff appear to have gone through a portal to my world,” Nadria said, “and for a while, I hoped the Temple or my people would eliminate him, but he seems to have worked his way into the good graces of powerful men. This is based on what I can scry, which is limited to the immediate location around the staff, and quickly disrupted once he senses my presence. However, my supposition is that he has cast a geas upon several noblemen, including the king—”
Simon said, “That’s hardly our responsibility to solve.” For many reasons, he was disinclined to be heroic on the king's behalf or concerned about his fate. The fact that King Sohan had signed off on the Temple decree sending Simon to the Hunt was far down on his list of grievances with the man.
Except... if Sohan was geasbound, who was pulling his strings? Had Todd somehow maneuvered directly into a position to control the most powerful man in the land? That seemed unlikely. A geas could easily be detected and not-so-easily but plausibly removed. If the King was bound, and none had acted in his defense, that hinted at a fairly significant amount of political machination.
He guessed Prince Rishard was behind whatever plot was afoot, and Todd was a useful pawn. That meant the expedient solution of simply killing Todd (ideally from a distance, perhaps with one of the sniper rifles Simon had seen on YouTube) wasn’t a good plan. Kill Todd, and Sohan would die, too, which meant Rishard would inherit the throne. All of Sohan’s male heirs were dead. However, Rishard had powerful enemies; he couldn’t believe a coup wouldn’t go unopposed. Eastland would launch an immediate, vicious civil war.
“Simon, Yienry is among the others.” Nadria’s tone was softer now, but her words jerked him out of his musing on Eastland’s politics.
Simon closed his eyes, saying nothing. Did this change anything?
He remembered the hot stickiness of blood on his hands when he’d snatched up his mother’s sword and stood over her dying body, facing off against Yienry. He’d been so small and so angry. Despite the best efforts of Simon, then a very small boy, Yienry had disarmed him with little difficulty. Yienry had been left with a scar through his eyebrow and no other injuries, and Simon hadn’t been hurt.
He also recalled rare moments of private laughter between them, coming much later, and Yienry’s frequent and honestly meant words of approval. Yienry had sheltered him from the worst of Lady Ellia’s venom and ensured he was raised in a world of relative comfort and education.
Then, as an adult, he’d treated Simon as a fifth son, giving him responsibilities better suited to an heir. Simon knew he’d never given Yienry cause to regret that trust, but many had questioned it. It had cost Yienry a little reputation with his peers and triggered frequent arguments with his wife and sons — but no one sensible would have trusted Yienry’s heirs with Simon’s duties.
As well, for most of his life, Yienry’s smile had often lit up the room when Simon entered. He’d never looked at his own sons quite the same way, but then, his own sons were often blatantly disdainful of their father.
“Simon, between his own natural talents and the Gifts of the elven children bound to that staff, Todd is truly dangerous. And...” her expression softened. “I do not wish Yienry harm. His position was utterly untenable; I cannot say my decision would have been any different had the roles been reversed. Take me with you, and I will help your quest.”
“And that’s the price for my freedom — my assistance in helping the man who murdered you?” Simon demanded.
His mother smiled, but he didn’t return the expression. She said, “You could not deal with Todd alone. None of you can. What he has become is truly frightening. Saving Yienry is the reward. The task is stopping Todd’s self-serving evil.”
“There is no need to bind Simon now, though,” Casey said, dropping a hand onto Simon’s shoulder. It was a warm comfort that Simon found himself leaning into. “If we can reasonably help, we’ll consider it. If we can’t, Simon is simply geasbound for no reason.”
“He cannot speak your language.”
“That’s not a reason to keep me bound,” Simon said, eyes narrowing at her. He’d always picked up foreign languages with ease. The spell's masking effect, which turned English words into their Eastland counterparts in his mind, made learning English vocabulary right now nearly impossible. However, he’d already done some reading on English’s grammatical structure, which seemed... unnecessarily complicated but comprehensible. He thought he could quickly pick up enough to communicate, and he trusted Casey to be patient with him in the meantime.
“The matter is settled,” she pronounced. Simon recognized that irritated look she favored him with from his own mirror. It matched his current expression.
“Can Todd turn Tara back?” Avery asked suddenly.
“Turn her what?” Libeza said, “I’m sorry. I can’t spy on Tara. I don’t have a good focus for her. What happened to her?”
Avery explained, reluctantly, “Todd turned her into a grimalkin.”
Libeza ran a hand over her face. “That man needs . Where is she now?”
“It’s not like you ever cared about her,” Nadria said. The ghost’s voice was tart. “Poor Tara. She's suffered more than most, and you've never been bothered enough by it to lift a finger to help, even after you stole the inheritance that should have been her birthright.”
Libeza looked up sharply. “I have of descendants, sister. There are thousands of people who call me their ancestor. I cannot personally take an interest in all of them, nor see that every problem across the two worlds is solved. That ranch, however, has been a refuge for the most elven among us since I came here. I wasn’t going to see it passed to someone outside the clan, especially since she’d never be respected enough to handle the clan politics.”
Nadria dropped her voice to something akin to a growl. “Tara was among the children of the clan, the great-granddaughter of a respected elder, the descendant of several others, with elven lineage down multiple lines. She worked hard, and with considerable success, to learn our ways, or lore, and our language, even though she knew would never consider her one of us. She hoped to be accepted by some of the others, but you prevented that by banning her from the ranch. Libeza. especially after Hazel died, Tara had absolutely no one. You were needlessly cruel to a little girl who was absolutely alone in the world. I am to be your sister.”
Nadria’s anger made Simon uneasy. She was powerful. Libeza didn’t seem afraid of her, but Simon would have been. Nadria’s voice dropped to a harsh whisper, “After Todd stole the Book, she didn’t even have . Were I still living, she have been one of us. We’ve always taken in orphan children, regardless of ancestry. Always. Even those of us who claim to be of the purest blood certainly have humanity in our ancestry, because those human children considered clan, every bit as much as any dai’sheea ever born.”
“She’s not an orphan. Her mother and father are living. It’s their choice to treat her poorly, not mine — one prefers his addictions to alcohol and video games to his daughter, but her mother does not even have that much of an excuse. And, do you know how many there are like her? Humans never take care of their own — in an entire community of thousands of humans, could be bothered to help that child. Why should I bear guilt when her own people were unmoved by her plight?”
Libeza glared at the ghost. Her features might have been those of a stranger, but Simon recognized the ire of a Lady of the Court. He’d seen Libeza turn that same temper towards Lady Ellia more than once. Voice as cool as a winter breeze, she noted, “Moreover, her great-grandmother Hazel did try. The laws of this land put her legal custody and control with her father, despite the fact that Hazel contributed far more to her upbringing than her father, and her father was an useless drunk. I would not invite scrutiny of the Adrial clan by intervening when the child have a legal parent.
“As far as regaining the Book, I presumed you were where wanted to be, Nadria. I’ve never known a thief to keep the Book more than a few minutes unless you wished to be with them. And, thrice before, you’ve chosen to stay with the one who stole you away, the last being Hazel herself and the first being . You go where you wish, sister; you always have.
“With that context, we presumed this was the same. Our hope was that you would change that terrible boy for the better. Therefore, I did not remove you from Todd’s possession, just as I did not steal you from Casey.”
“Todd is powerful,” Nadria’s voice dropped an octave. A cool gust of wind swirled through the room, and the hair on Simon’s neck rose. There was temper there, though she wasn’t shouting. Libeza, with her Gift for manipulation of spirit energy, could no doubt handle anything that Nadria threw her way, but he didn’t want to be caught in the crossfire! He edged sideways, then stopped when Casey didn’t follow. Nadria continued, “For the first time in our existence, we could not counter a human mage who sought to use us. I need to talk to Tara. I know something terrible has happened, but not what precisely. I cannot reach the other spirits, now bound to the Staff. She must be so very alone.”
Simon glanced around the room, taking a quick assessment. If this turned into a fight, Shana would sensibly retreat. Avery and Casey wouldn’t. He’d need to factor their potential reactions into his own response. Libeza could take care of herself.
As for himself, his best bet would be to go for the ghost with the sword he bore in his hand and try to disrupt her spellbound form with a swat of steel through her middle. It wouldn’t do her any permanent damage, but that might be enough of a distraction to allow Libeza to get the upper hand.
He didn’t trust Libeza, or after what he’d heard here, even her, but Libeza wasn’t the one who’d bound him with a geas and then defended her actions without a hint of guilt.
Avery spoke, voice tight with nerves but otherwise steady, “We’ll help Tara. To turn her back, I mean. And, of course, we’ll help her until we turn her back. What happened to her is wrong.”
“What do we need to do?” That was Casey. As he spoke, Casey’s hand on Simon’s shoulder tightened just a little. It was the only indication that Casey was afraid. His voice was very level.
Nadria sighed, and a cool draft curled around their feet as she did. The lights in the room flickered and dimmed. Her eyes, once green, were now dark pools with not a trace of light. Libeza’s spell was dissolving, Simon realized, and Nadria was adding her own scant power to remain.
The ghost of his mother said, “Todd will have crafted Tara’s transformation spell so that he is the key. Anyone else who attempts to dissolve it might kill her. We will need to track him down and him to turn her back.”
“She was also concerned about something she called a geographic binding,” Avery said. “She can’t go far from the house.”
Nadria inclined her head. Now, her face was just a blur, a suggestion of form. “That, I can deal with. Please take the Book to her.”
Libeza was breathing rapidly and shallowly, eyes narrowed, fists balled. Abruptly, there was an audible and Nadria disappeared. Libeza took a deep, gasping breath and then said, “I’m out of practice. There are far fewer haunts to manipulate in this world than ours.”
Simon realized he was shaking. He felt numb inside, with feelings he couldn’t name clenched in a tight ball. His vision seemed dim around the edges. His breath was too loud as it whistled through his nostrils.
There were too many people in the basement, and it felt crowded and tight. The electric lights were very bright, and the air was too warm. He knew he should stay with his master, but the pain of the geas’s punishment wasn’t worse than the claustrophobia. With a gasp at the searing agony that shot through his nerves, he spun and bolted for the stairs.
