Blood of the Fold

Zedd straightened his robes at his bony hips. "I've known of the spell, how it extends life spans in order to give you the time to do your foul work."

"Zedd, when the wizards of old began jealously guarding their power and refused to train young men with the gift so as to prevent a threat to their domination, the Sisters of the Light were formed to help these young men lest they die. Not everyone likes the idea, but there it is.

"Without a wizard to help them, the task falls to us. We don't have the same Han as the male, and so it takes us a great deal of time to accomplish the task. The collar keeps them alive, keeps their gift from harming them, from driving them mad, until we can teach them what they need.

"The spell around the palace gives us the time we need. It was laid down for us three thousand years ago, when a few wizards helped with our cause. They had the power to cast a bifurcated web."

Zedd was, for the moment, becoming intrigued. "Yes. Yes, I can see what you mean. Bifurcation would invert the force, kind of like twisting a length of gut, and create an area where the center could be bent to do extraordinary things. The ancient wizards could accomplish deeds I can only dream of doing."

Ann was keeping a constant watch, to make sure they were alone. "Bifurcating a web bends it back on itself, creating an outer and inner region. There are two nodes, like with the twisted gut you mentioned, where this bending would have to take place: one at the outer shield, and one at the inner."

Zedd peered at her with one eye. "But the node on the inner half, where the true event takes place, would be vulnerable to breach. Though created by necessity, it would be a dangerous flaw. Do you know where the inner node is located?"

"We stand in it."

Zedd straightened. He glanced around. "Yes, I can see the thought that went into it — placing it in the bedrock under everything else where it would be best protected."

"That's why, on the off chance it could bring havoc, we unequivocally forbid wizard's fire anywhere on Halsband Island."

Zedd absently waved a hand. "No, no. Wizard's fire wouldn't harm such a node." He turned to her with a suspicious glare. "What are we doing here?"

"I brought you here to give you the opportunity to do what you wish to do — to destroy the spell."

He stared, he blinked, and he stared some more. At last, he spoke. "No. It wouldn't be right."

"Wizard Zorander, this is a highly inconvenient time for you to be overcome with morals."

He folded his skinny arms. "This spell was placed by wizards greater than I will ever be, greater than I can even imagine. This is a wonder, a thing of profound mastery. I won't destroy such a piece of work."

"I broke the truce!"

Zedd lifted his chin, "Breaking the truce condemns any Sister who comes to the New World to death. We are not in the New World. Breaking the truce says nothing about me going to the Old World and doing harm. By the terms of the truce, I have no right to do such a thing."

She leaned closer with a dark look. "You promised me that if I took you away by that collar, endangering your friends, you would come to my homeland and lay waste to the Palace of the Prophets. I am giving you your chance."

"It was a temporarily, passionate outburst. Reason has returned to my head." He fixed her with a scolding scowl. "You've been using devious tricks and sly deception to try to convince me you're a vile, contemptible, immoral malefactor, but you have failed to fool me. You are not the evil sort."

"I've shackled you! I abducted you!"

"I won't destroy your home and your life. Doing so, destroying the spell, would alter the pattern of the lives of the Sisters of the Light and, in essence, be ending their lives prematurely. The Sisters and their charges live by standards of time that to me seem strange, but to them are normal.

"Life is perception. If a mouse with a life span of only a few years were to have the magic to make my life as short as its life, that, to my perception, would be killing me, though to the mouse it would seem he were granting no less than a normal life span. That's what Nathan meant when he said you were killing him.

"I would be shortening their lives to the same as the rest of us, but by their expectations and the oath they have taken, that would be the same as killing them before they have a chance to live, I won't do it."

"If I have to, Wizard Zorander, I'll use the collar to give you pain until you agree."

He smirked. "You have no conception of the tests of pain I have passed to become a wizard of the First Order. Go ahead, do your best."

Ann pressed her lips together in exasperation. "But you have to! I've put a collar around your neck! I've done terrible things to you to make you angry enough to do this! The prophecy says the anger of a wizard is necessary to destroy our home!"

"You've been playing me for a dancing frog." His hazel eyes hovered closer. "I don't dance unless I know the tune."