Cari did not want to die. She’d lived a mere two hundred years and had barely begun to taste the richness of the world. She feared the spells of Ravan as she’d feared nothing else in her short existence, and she feared the vengeful flame she was certain would envelop and consume her the instant she passed beyond those forbidding walls.
And yet, as slave of the ring her master Akar wore on his finger, she had no choice. Akar had forged the ring under a powerful spell and engraved it with her name, thus slipping a noose tightly about her soul. She was his slave, his tool. Today he’d commanded her to enter Ravan and discover the source of the disturbance in the world’s magical network. She must do so, even though she was convinced she would die because of it.
Cari slowed as she neared the w
