Bahlzair got up to collect the reagents, and for all the bone-weariness he seemed to project, he moved about like a small child. With bottles and small dishes placed carefully on the floor, according to his own specifications, he began to grind roots, put blood in one vessel, and spit in another. Some dirt from the ground went into still another, and I found I could only watch him work. His movements were not unlike Silveredge's as she danced, and I begrudgingly recognized Bahlzair as an artist in his own right- a master, a genius at work, measuring, mixing, and checking for the exact reactions he wanted in each vessel.
For just a moment, I found myself worried about my stealth skills. Was I as good a rogue as Silveredge was a dancer, as Aleksei was a fighter, or as Bahlzair was an alchemist?
Hurried footfalls down the hall drew me to turn my head, and a frantic Ylyssa popped her head into Bahlzair's arch.
"Syjen wants you to go back to Uirrigan- I think he's going to try the domination spell again," she whispered. "Do you think he may have discovered-"
"Is it yet night?" I retorted, standing and crossing my arms. "We'll never get this done if you stand around being useless."
"You must come, or Syjen will become suspicious," Ylyssa frowned. "He wouldn't enter, but if he sends that wench in here, she will tell him everything she sees."
I turned without another word and began to follow, but Ylyssa looked around at the walls for a few moments. "Nothing," she sighed, her frown deepening. "Will you at least be done with this part soon?" She gave a frustrated grunt, and I assumed that Bahlzair had given himself some hours to complete his task.
"Well, what do you expect? I'm supposed to be here, not elsewhere, when this is drawn up. Whatever Syjen wants, we'll have to keep it quick, or all of this will have been for nothing."
And back down the halls we went, twisting and turning in the halls until I had to again turn sideways to get into Uirrigan's sizable work space. Aleksei was pleasantly snoring on one side of the entrance, completely reeking like a brewery. I stopped to poke at him, and he shifted, muttering something in a language I knew wasn't Common.
"Oh, he'll be like that for a while," came a familiar voice. Uirrigan suddenly appeared some five feet away from me, looking down at the peacefully useless Dragonborn. "With all the thick and bitter porters, stouts, or Dwarven 'ales' he throws down, sweet drinks like Dragon's breath do nothing but confuse him- until he's out cold."
"What did you find in my blood? A special magical property? Something you can use?" I asked simply, crossing my arms. "Some blithering idiot turned my weapons to stone, so I can't give you any more to work with than I have."
"Ah, yes, the stone weapons," Uirrigan smirked. "I did hear about that. I'm afraid I can't give your weapons back. But they'll return to your hands soon. Right now-"
"Right now, Uirrigaen and Ylyssane are going to do me a favor," Syjen rumbled from the back of the room. "They're going to help me convince you that Jyklihaimra belongs to me, just as you will belong to someone else very soon." Syjen strode to the center of the room with a sick smile. "Jyklihaimra, come."
And Silveredge followed him to the center of the room, eyes perfectly focused on the ground. Her bodice had entirely disappeared somewhere, leaving her with her loose and battered blouse and her skirt. Her hair fell around her shoulders like a solid sheet of ice. I began to feel my cheeks flush with frustration and insult. Hadn't I just promised that she wouldn't have to go through things like this?
Syjen walked all the way around Silveredge, cutting pieces of her blouse and skirt off until they finally fell off her and to the floor. She stood, stark still and gloriously bare, trembling slightly because of the cold.
"I bet you want to cover her," Syjen smiled. "Want to protect her, to take her into your arms and shield her?" He ran the bone knife that had just done so much damage to what was left of her clothing down her shoulder, and a thin cobalt shimmer appeared. If it were painful, not even her mother would have been able to tell, from the blank look on her face. "Come on, move. Make a move to protect her, witch."
The sensation of being cloaked enveloped me, and finally, a realization clicked into place.
I closed my eyes.
"Go challenge Bahlzair again, see if he does anything else but ignore you when you dare him. The day he takes up arms against you, so will I."
Behind me, Aleksei sat up and muttered something in his own language. Ylyssa turned around to shush him, but he simply said it again more loudly- I couldn't tell what it was, but I could tell that he wasn't pleased.
"Silence that lizard," Syjen demanded.
"Why don't you?" I retorted. "You- great master, untouchable lord- if you want Aleksei quiet, you quiet him, then! Or is that the slice of power you promised her? That she would get to feel like you do, every now and then? Get to be in command once or twice?"
Syjen was absolutely frozen for a few seconds, and I decided to push my luck a little farther.
"Simple, greedy, artless bastard- you don't even want Jyklihaimra. You'd kill her, if you had any hope at all that I wouldn't be as furious as Bahlzair is when you did. Because it's not her you want. It's me. You want to somehow convince me to desire you; want to compel me to crave your 'power' for myself- like you clearly, at some point, did to your oh-so-loving wife. Now, if you want to prove me wrong, then by all means, consummate the union between yourself and Jyklihaimra. Right here, right now. Where we can all see how much you truly desire her."
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