Magiere saw her whole life infested with the dead and undead. Even her birth was somehow forecast with these bones, yet she couldn't fathom what they told her of the past. She sensed-somehow knew-that the contents of this room were connected to her.

There were only more questions, and no answers.

Beside the crusted vat lay the second body they'd found. Wynn had partly cleared the hardened leather clothes from it, telling them it was-had been-a dwarf. The sage knew of these people from a seatt-dwarvish for a city stronghold or fortified haven-across the bay from the capital of her homeland, Malourne. That capital, Calm Seatt, had been named out of respect for the dwarven people who'd helped to build its first keep.

Neither Magiere nor Leesil had ever met one of his kind. Wide framed and wide jawed, with a skull as large as a soldier's helmet, his thigh bones were as thick as her whole wrist. Slightly yellowed with age, the bones had speckled shadows in them like a hint of granite.

"If any of this bears upon the past you're looking for,"

Cadell said, "I don't care to know any more of it. We've enough troubles of our own."

"More than you thought," Magiere replied bitterly, but she didn't explain.

Whatever happened here had been done in haste and then sealed up. Few but Leesil could have uncovered its existence. But if she had come looking, who else might do so, as well, once word traveled of what had been found here?

Magiere couldn't bear looking at anyone in the room. She turned her attention to the vat, and hunger churned inside her.

The vat's outside was tarnished. Wynn had scraped away dust and grime to reveal engraved symbols, each no larger than a coin, across its entire surface. She had asked Jan for paper and charcoal to make rubbings for later study. At one side of the vat, dark stains ran down it as if the contents had been poured out or had spilled over.

When Magiere looked inside the vessel, a thicker stain covered the bottom third of its depth, creating a dried and cracked layer. She took the crystal from Wynn, startling the sage, and lowered its light into the vat. The cracked layer in the bottom had a distinctive dark brown color, like liquefied earth dried out. When her hunger stirred again, Magiere knew what it was from instinct more than anything else.

"They were bled… here," she whispered.

When she stood up, she faced the elf's corpse lying in the chamber's front left corner, and she looked down at the dwarf's.

"Sacrificed," Wynn whispered.

"How long ago… " Magiere trailed off and turned to Wynn. "How old are these remains?"

Wynn looked away, and it took a moment for her to answer.

"It's impossible to be exact. But from decomposed animals I've studied in the past, I would guess no more than thirty years, perhaps less."

The sage backed toward the far side of the room. Her hand shook visibly as she pulled her short robe more securely around herself.

"So," Magiere asked in a hard voice. "Twenty-six years would be as good a guess? About the time I was conceived."

Leesil came up beside Magiere, glanced once at the vat, and tried to pull her away. Magiere jerked her arm out of his grip-In all, six corpses had been found. One was human with leather armor and a sword, perhaps a guard during the time when her father had been lord of this place-a father who might not be as unknown to Magiere as she'd once thought. Welstiel had posed as an ally during the fight with Miiska's undead, but that conflict, as with the one in Bela, had been of his making. From the beginning, he'd known of her dhampir nature, as well as the falchion and the amulets. In Bela, he'd claimed to be preparing her to assist him in gaining whatever ancient treasure he sought.

Visions… in Bela, there had also been horrible visions. By accident, she'd stumbled upon another attribute of her dhampir nature-to experience the moment of a kill through an undead's perspective. To lure her to the capital, Welstiel murdered the council chairman's daughter and left the girl's body on her own doorstep. By chance, Magiere had walked in his steps at the death scene while holding a scrap of the girl's dress. She relived that moment, felt the victim's flesh tear in Welstiel's teeth as if she were him.

How much more would she see with an innocent's bones in her hands? At least she would know if he had been here… if he was the one she'd come here to find.

Magiere knelt down and wrenched the dwarf's skull from its carcass.

"What are you doing?" Cadell said, and took a step toward her. "Enough of this. You will not desecrate-"

"Stop it!" Leesil snapped, and he was on her from behind, grabbing for the skull. "Whatever happened here, you don't want to see it… not like that!"

Magiere cradled the skull with one arm and snapped her shoulder back into Leesil's chest. She followed with her arm and sent him sprawling. Before he got up, she looked into the skull's sockets, the grit of bone against her bare palms and fingers.

"No!" Leesil called.

Magiere closed her eyes.

Darkness. The sounds of voices around her and quickened breaths behind curses. The stench of the cold chamber filling her head.

Nothing more, as Magiere opened her eyes again.

"I'll have no more of this sacrilege, defiling the dead," Cadell growled, and he stepped threateningly toward Magiere. "Get out of here."

Magiere tightened her grip on the skull as she raised her eyes to Cadell. She wasn't going anywhere, not without answers. She rocked back on her heels and stood up. Leesil stepped in front of her, snatching the skull from her hands.

"Leave," he told her. "Now. Go back to your aunt's, and wait for me."

"Yes, all of you go and leave this to us," Cadell said.

Jan looked upset but didn't speak, and Wynn remained quiet at the back of the chamber.

"We're not done here," Leesil replied, and returned his attention to Magiere. "Wynn and I will join you shortly, once we've finished examining the bodies."

Magiere looked about the room. As she received no vision by touching the dwarf's skull, she didn't believe he died by a vampire's attack. Some part of her felt relief at the thought of escaping this place. She didn't even acknowledge Leesil when she turned and walked out.

Outside the keep, the two village men paid her little attention as she strode through the courtyard and back down the road. More corpses had been found in her life's wake, yet they'd revealed nothing. One more of the dead still waited.

Chap had long since ceased battering the shed's door and walls. He spent even longer trying to claw up the rough planks on the floor. Neither approach gained him an escape. Mounted to the hut's side, the shed proved sturdier than it appeared, and he couldn't get his thick claws into the floor cracks.

He peered through a crack in the wall and saw that night had come. With time, he could break free, but Magiere and the others had already been gone too long. He had to try another way, and he began to howl in long mournful tones.

He kept at it as loud as possible, hoping to disturb someone. In a short while, footsteps approached outside, and a woman's stern voice came from beyond the shed's door.

"Fe leneshte, tu emportun corcheturu!"

He could not understand her words but reached out to touch her thoughts. Surfacing memories flashed through his mind.

Magiere arriving in the village.

The inside of the hut… and an image of himself curled alone in the corner that morning.

Magiere's relative, Bieja, stood outside the shed's door.

Chap could not delve into a being's thoughts further than the memories that came to the surface of its mind. All living things remembered their pasts in scant pieces. He could also use these memories to poke and prod an unaware being's choices or actions… nothing more than a mental suggestion.