The Wandering Dragon by Irene Radford

Author:Irene Radford
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: DAW
Published: 2014-07-20T16:00:00+00:00

What is that smell? Sort of sweet with an acid undertone and an overlay of stale urine and sweat. It is close to the elixir of life I have found only during the high rituals of sex and torture of an initiation into the coven.

Without waiting for the nicety of taking Bette with me—she is in the laundry seeing to my personal linen—I follow my nose through the meandering rooms and staircases, descending deeper and deeper. I pass the food storage and wine cellars with little interest, though I do note they are comfortably filled if a little lean on fresh vegetables. Geon explored this area earlier and told me the correct corridors to follow. But he went no farther because it was not the way to the library. He carves his own path through this world, guided by his reading and not by me.

That will change soon.

For I find only blank walls when my sense of smell and wave after wave of magical power tells me I should be atop my goal. Power rises through the stones at my feet, making my toes tingle and my thighs itch with the need to move. Like calling to like, bouncing off each other and amplifying at every rebound. This magic is born of pain and blood, as is mine. I feed on it to satiation and still there is more. I must find the source. Now!

Nothing in this castle follows a straight line. A good strategy for defense—confuse the enemy at every turn and withdraw toward a more defensible core by way of hidden passages, secret tunnels, and doors that don’t look like doors.

Hmmmmmm. I stare at the dressed stones and crisp mortar. Nothing out of alignment. Nothing unusual. Perhaps I stare at the wrong wall. So I follow the backward logic of the place and search the blank wall on the opposite side of the cellar. The damp one that faces the ocean and the harbor. Not a stable location for a stairway. But then perhaps the damp and black mold on the mortar are merely illusions worthy of the master magicians of Coronnan.

Nothing there either. These cellars are vast. Many, many rooms that lead one into another. The subterranean levels must also cover as many acres in support of the massive stone keep and outbuildings above. What lies below the wine storage? Only a dungeon would go that deep into the foundations. A dungeon with limited access and means of escape.

So I follow the flow of air back the way I have come rather than seek the power and the scent that draws me. And so, at last I find a narrow wooden door bound in iron with freshly oiled hinges. A stout door that will not succumb easily to a battering ram. The lock is intricate and formidable. But I have magic within me. Strong magic generated by fear and pain and spilled blood.

Holding one finger at the edge of the lock I shoot a spell of unbinding directly into the mechanism.

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