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time. Becoming better every time - or so the gods would mislead us to
believe."
They moved closer to Luercas and he lashed out at them with magic - not enough
to damage them;
just enough to fling them away from him as if they were toys.
He snarled, "That is the fate you would demand for all of us equally. Well, I
applaud your idealism and your fine and shiny belief that all souls, given
time, will become worthy of life, but I don't share your optimism. The evil
stay evil; the good wear down from the weight of bitter lives one piled upon
another and become evil. I see a better way to spend eternity. My way helps
many, hurts only those deserving of hurt, and removes me from a cycle of
existence that I find pointless, humiliating, and disgusting."
"And the billions who are trapped in the Wizards' Circles?" Kait asked.
She saw surprise cross his face, but then he shrugged. "They're lost, ruined a
thousand years ago, damaged now beyond repair. Their madness grows deeper and
more terrible with every passing day, and the magical poison they spew out
into the world grows worse. For them - and for the survival of Matrin -
oblivion will be a mercy. I do a service, really. To them. To all who live or
ever will live in Matrin again."
"You delude yourself if you think there is anything but evil in your plan,"
Kait said.
"You may believe what you wish. I am a good man, though, and I will prove it
to you. You may walk away from this battle unscathed, right now, if you will
only swear on your souls that neither you nor your Falcons will attempt to
hinder me again. Your only other option is to die, which you don't want and I
don't want. You cannot win. Surely you can see that; you haven't the talent or
the strength to stand against me."
Kait felt him probing at her mind as he turned, as they circled; he was
digging for her thoughts. She shielded herself as best she could, and so did
Ry, but Luercas was right: He was stronger than both of them together, and he
tore through their meager shields and into the secrets they had tried to keep
as easily as a child would tear through ribbon and paper to get to the treat
beneath.
She felt him pawing through her thoughts and through Ry's.
He did not gloat at what he found, though. Instead he grew still, and stared
at the two of them with an expression of sudden uncertainty that bordered on
fear.
"You planned to die," he whispered. "You planned to go into the void with me -
you accept eternal oblivion for yourselves as the price for my death. Your
uncle has abandoned you to me, and yet, knowing that you cannot win, you still
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intend to fight. What manner of madness has gripped you?
Have your lives no value to you?"
He gestured again, and his body became brighter and began to expand. "How can
a god bargain with those who embrace oblivion? I cannot offer you heaven; I
cannot threaten you with hell. I can only destroy you regretfully, then use
the energy I draw from your destruction to create something good."
Kait kept circling, keeping Luercas between her and the void, keeping Ry
always in position where one of the two of them might have a chance to lunge
in again if Luercas became distracted or dropped his guard.
Dughall should have been there, she thought. He had said he would be with them
- if he were there, he could have provided a third distraction, and perhaps
she or Ry might have gotten a clean shot at Luercas's throat, could have
dragged him into the void.
What had happened to him? Had he faltered at the last moment? Had his fear
grown to be too much for him?
In her mind, she felt Ry's comforting touch, it is to be just us, then it will
be just us. Hunt, love; hunt with me as we would have hunted in the hills
together. We have only this moment. Let us make it count.
Between them and the void, Luercas shook his head. "Your choice, then. I
offered reason, you picked annihilation." He made a single, simple gesture,
and power began to pour into him as if it were water from a broken dam. He
began to expand and to brighten, filling with cold white light, stretching
upward and outward.
They weren't going to be able to destroy him, Kait realized. They simply
didn't have a prayer.
Nonetheless, she leaped at him, and in the same instant, Ry leaped, too.
Chapter 56
Dughall, his spells awaiting only the trigger of a single event, crouched
inside his chalk-drawn circle, staring at the still Karnee-Scarred forms of
his niece Kait and her soulmate, Ry. They lay in each others embrace, lovely
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