by Rachel Aaron
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PROLOGUE
High in the forested hills where no one went, there stood a stone tower. It was a practical tower, neither lovely nor soaring, but solid and squat at only two stories. Its enormous blocks were hewn from the local stone, which was of an unappealing, muddy color that seemed to attract grime. Seeing that, it was perhaps fortunate that the tower was overrun with black-green vines. They wound themselves around the tower like thread on a spindle, knotting the wooden shutters closed and crumbling the mortar that held the bricks together, giving the place an air of disrepair and gloomy neglect, especially when it was dark and raining, as it was now.
Inside the tower, a man was shouting. His voice was deep and authoritative, but the voice that answered him didn’t seem to care. It yelled back, childish and high, yet something in it was unignorable, and the vines that choked the tower rustled closer to listen.
Completely without warning, the door to the tower, a heavy wooden slab stained almost black from years in the forest, flew open. Yellow firelight spilled into the clearing, and, with it, a boy ran out into the wet night. He was thin and pale, all legs and arms, but he ran like the wind, his dark hair flying behind him. He had already made it halfway across the clearing before a man burst out of the tower after him. He was also dark haired, and his eyes were bright with rage, as were the rings that clung to his fingers.
“Eliton!” he shouted, throwing out his hand. The ring on his middle finger, a murky emerald wrapped in a filigree of golden leaves and branches, flashed deep, deep green. Across the dirt clearing that surrounded the tower, a great mass of roots ripped itself from the ground below the boy’s feet.
The boy staggered and fell, kicking as the roots grabbed him.
“No!” he shouted. “Leave me alone!”
The words rippled with power as the boy’s spirit blasted open. It was nothing like the calm, controlled openings the Spiritualists prized. This was a raw ripping, an instinctive, guttural reaction to fear, and the power of it landed like a hammer, crushing the clearing, the tower, the trees, the vines, everything. The rain froze in the air, the wind stopped moving, and everything except the boy stood perfectly still. Slowly, the roots that had leaped up fell away, sliding limply back to the churned ground, and the boy squirmed to his feet. He cast a fearful, hateful glance over his shoulder, but the man stood as still as everything else, his rings dark and his face bewildered like a joker’s victim.
“Eliton,” he said again, his voice breaking.
“No!” the boy shouted, backing away. “I hate you and your endless rules! You’re never happy, are you? Just leave me alone!”
The words thrummed with power, and the boy turned and ran. The man started after him, but the vines shot off the tower and wrapped around his body, pinning him in place. The man cried out in rage, ripping at the leaves, but the vines piled on thicker and thicker, and he could not get free. He could only watch as the boy ran through the raindrops, still hanging weightless in the air, waiting for the child to say it was all right to fall.
“Eliton!” the man shouted again, almost pleading. “Do you think you can handle power like this alone? Without discipline?” He lunged against the vines, reaching toward the boy’s retreating back. “If you don’t come back this instant you’ll be throwing away everything that we’ve worked for!”
The boy didn’t even look back, and the man’s face went scarlet.
“Go on, keep running!” he bellowed. “See how far you get without me! You’ll never amount to anything without training! You’ll be worthless alone! WORTHLESS! DO YOU HEAR?”
“Shut up!” The boy’s voice was distant now, his figure scarcely visible between the trees, but his power still thrummed in the air. Trapped by the vines, the man could only struggle uselessly as the boy vanished at last into the gloom. Only then did the power begin to fade. The vines lost their grip and the man tore himself free. He took a few steps in the direction the boy had gone, but thought better of it.
“He’ll be back,” he muttered, brushing the leaves off his robes. “A night in the wet will teach him. ” He glared at the vines. “He’ll be back. He can’t do anything without me. ”
The vines slid away with a noncommittal rustle, mindful of their roll in his barely contained anger. The man cast a final, baleful look at the forest and then, gathering himself up, turned and marched back into the tower. He slammed the door behind him, cutting off the yellow light and leaving the clearing darker than ever as the suspended rain finally fell to the ground.
The boy ran, stumbling over fallen logs and through muddy streams swollen with the endless rain. He didn’t know where he was going, and he was exhausted from whatever he had done in the clearing. His breath came in thundering gasps, drowning out the forest sounds, and yet, now as always, no matter how much noise he made, he could hear the spirits all around him—the anger of the stream at being full of mud, the anger of the mud at being cut from its parent dirt spirit and shoved into the stream, the contented murmurs of the trees as the water ran down them, the mindless singing of the crickets. The sounds of the spirit world filled his ears as no other sounds could, and he clung to them, letting the voices drag him forward even as his legs threatened to give up. Page 2
The rain grew heavier as the night wore on, and his progress slowed. He was walking now through the black, wet woods. He had no idea where he was and he didn’t care. It wasn’t like he was going back to the tower. Nothing could make him go back there, back to the endless lessons and rules of the black-and-white world his father lived in.
Tears ran freely down his face, and he scrubbed them away with dirty fists. He couldn’t go home. Not anymore. He’d made his choice; there was no going back. His father wouldn’t take him back after that show of disobedience, anyway. Worthless, that was what his father had written him off as. What hope was left after that?
His feet stumbled, and the boy fell, landing hard on his shoulder. He struggled a second, and then lay still on the soaked ground, breathing in the wet smell of the rotting leaves. What was the point of going on? He couldn’t go back, and he had nowhere to go. He’d lived out here with his father forever. He had no friends, no relatives to run to. His mother wouldn’t take him. She hadn’t wanted him when he’d been doing well; she certainly wouldn’t want him now. Even if she did, he didn’t know where she lived.
Grunting, he rolled over, looking up through the drooping branches at the dark sky overhead, and tried to take stock of his situation. He’d never be a wizard now, at least, not like his father, with his rings and rules and duties, which was the only kind of wizard the world wanted so far as the boy could see. Maybe he could live in the mountains? But he didn’t know how to hunt or make fires or what plants of the forest he could eat, which was a shame, for he was getting very hungry. More than anything, though, he was tired. So tired. Tired and small and worthless.
He spat a bit of dirt out of his mouth. Maybe his father was right. Maybe worthless was a good word for him. He certainly couldn’t think of anything he was good for at the moment. He couldn’t even hear the spirits anymore. The rain had passed and they were settling down, drifting back to sleep. His own eyes were drooping, too, but he shouldn’t sleep like this, wet and dirty and exposed. Yet when he thought about getting up, the idea seemed impossible. Finally, he decided he would just lie here, and when he woke up, if he woke up, he would take things from there.
The moment he made his decision, sleep took him. He lay at the bottom of the gully, nestled between a fallen log and a living tree, still as a dead thing. Animals passed, sniffing him curiously, but he didn’t stir. High overhead, the wind blew through the trees, scattering leaves on top of him
. It blew past and then came around again, dipping low into the gully where the boy slept.
The wind blew gently, ruffling his hair, blowing along the muddy, ripped lines of his clothes and across his closed eyes. Then, as though it had found what it was looking for, the wind climbed again and hurried away across the treetops. Minutes passed in still silence, and then, in the empty air above the boy, a white line appeared. It grew like a slash in the air, spilling sharp, white light out into the dark.
From the moment the light appeared, nothing in the forest moved. Everything, the insects, the animals, the mushrooms, the leaves on the ground, the trees, the water running down them, everything stood frozen, watching as a white, graceful, feminine hand reached through the cut in the air to brush a streak of mud off the boy’s cheek. He flinched in his sleep, and the long fingers clenched, delighted.
By this time, the wind had returned, larger than before. It spun down the trees, sending the scattered leaves dancing, but it did not touch the boy.
“Is he not as I told you?” it whispered, staring at the sleeping child as spirits see.
Yes. The voice from the white space beyond the world was filled with joy, and another white hand snaked out to join the first, stroking the boy’s dirty hair. He is just as you said.
The wind puffed up, very pleased with itself, but the woman behind the cut seemed to have forgotten it was there. Her hands reached out farther, followed by snowy arms, shoulders, and a waterfall of pure white hair that glowed with a light of its own. White legs followed, and for the first time in hundreds of years, she stepped completely through the strange hole, from her white world into the real one.
All around her, the forest shook in awe. Every spirit, from the ancient trees to the mayflies, knew her and bowed down in reverence. The fallen logs, the moss, even the mud under her feet paid her honor and worship, prostrating themselves beneath the white light that shone from her skin as though the moon stood on the ground.
The lady didn’t acknowledge them. Such reverence was her due. All of her attention was focused on the boy, still dead asleep, his grubby hands clutching his mud-stained jacket around him.
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Gentle as the falling mist, the white woman knelt beside him and eased her hands beneath his body, lifting him from the ground as though he weighed nothing and gently laying him on her lap.
He is beautiful, she said. So very beautiful. Even through the veil of flesh, he shines like the sun.
She stood up in one lovely, graceful motion, cradling the boy in her arms. You shall be my star, she whispered, pressing her white lips against the sleeping boy’s forehead. My best beloved, my favorite, forever and ever until the end of the world and beyond.
The boy stirred as she touched him, turning toward her in his sleep, and the White Lady laughed, delighted. Clutching him to her breast, she turned and stepped back through the slit in the world, taking her light with her. The white line held a moment after she was gone, and then it too shimmered and faded, leaving the wet forest darker and emptier than ever.
CHAPTER 1
Zarin, city of magic, rose tall and white in the afternoon sun. It loomed over the low plains of the central Council Kingdoms, riding the edge of the high, rocky ridge that separated the foothills from the great sweeping piedmont so that the city spires could be seen from a hundred miles in all directions. But highest of all, towering over even the famous seven battlements of Whitefall Citadel, home of the Merchant Princes of Zarin and the revolutionary body they had founded, the Council of Thrones, stood the soaring white spire of the Spirit Court.
It rose from the great ridge that served as Zarin’s spine, shooting straight and white and impossibly tall into the pale sky without joint or mortar to support it. Tall, clear windows pricked the white surface in a smooth, ascending spiral, and each window bore a fluttering banner of red silk stamped in gold with a perfect, bold circle, the symbol of the Spirit Court. No one, not even the Spiritualists, knew how the tower had been made. The common story was that the Shapers, that mysterious and independent guild of crafting wizards responsible for awakened swords and the gems all Spiritualists used to house their spirits, had raised it from the stone in a single day as payment for some unknown debt. Supposedly, the tower itself was a united spirit, though only the Rector Spiritualis, who held the great mantle of the tower, knew for certain.
The tower’s base had four doors, but the largest of these was the eastern door, the door that opened to the rest of the city. Red and glossy, the door stood fifteen feet tall, its base as wide as the great, laurel-lined street leading up to it. Broad marble steps spread like ripples from the door’s foot, and it was on these that Spiritualist Krigel, assistant to the Rector Spiritualis and bearer of a very difficult task, chose to make his stand.
“No, here. ” He snapped his fingers, his severe face locked in a frown even more dour than the one he usually wore. “Stand here. ”
The mass of Spiritualists obeyed, shuffling in a great sea of stiff, formal, red silk as they moved where he pointed. They were all young, Krigel thought with a grimace. Too young. Sworn Spiritualists they might be, but not a single one was more than five months from their apprenticeship. Only one had more than a single bound spirit under her command, and all of them looked too nervous to give a cohesive order to the spirits they did control. Truly, he’d been given an impossible task. He only hoped the girl didn’t decide to fight.
“All right,” he said quietly when the crowd was in position. “How many of you keep fire spirits? Bonfires, torches, candles, brushfires, anything that burns. ”
A half-dozen hands went up.
“Don’t bring them out,” Krigel snapped, raising his voice so that everyone could hear. “I want nothing that can be drowned. That means no sand, no electricity, not that any of you could catch a lightning bolt yet, but especially no fire. Now, those of you with rock spirits, dirt, anything from the ground, raise your hands. ”
Another half-dozen hands went up, and Krigel nodded. “You are all to be ready at a moment’s notice. If her dog tries anything, anything, I want you to stop him. ”
“But sir,” a lanky boy in front said. “What about the road?”
“Never mind the road,” Krigel said, shaking his head. “Rip it to pieces if you have to. I want that dog neutralized, or we’ll never catch her should she decide to run. Yes,” he said and nodded at a hand that went up in the back. “Tall girl. ”
The girl, who was in fact not terribly tall, went as red as her robe, but she asked her question in a firm voice. “Master Krigel, are the charges against her true?”
“That is none of your business,” Krigel said, giving the poor girl a glare that sent her down another foot. “The Court decides truth. Our job is to see that she stands before it, nothing else. Yes, you, freckled boy. ”
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The boy in the front put down his hand sheepishly. “Yes, Master Krigel, but then, why are we here? Do you expect her to fight?”
“Expectations are not my concern,” Krigel said. “I was ordered to take no chances bringing her to face the charges, and so none I shall take. I’m only hoping you lot will be enough to stop her should she decide to run. Frankly, my money’s on the dog. But,” he said and smiled at their pale faces, “one goes to battle with the army one’s got, so try and look competent and keep your hands down as much as possible. One look at your bare fingers and the jig is up. ”
Off in the city a bell began to ring, and Krigel looked over his shoulder. “That’s the signal. They’re en route. Places, please. ”
Everyone shuffled into order and Krigel, dour as ever, took the front position on the lowest stair. There they waited, a wall of red robes and clenched fists while, far away, down the long, tree-lined approach, a tall figure riding something long, sleek, and mist colored passed through the narrow gate that separated the Spirit Court’s district from the rest of Zarin and b
egan to pad down the road toward them.
As the figure drew closer, it became clear that it was a woman, tall, proud, redheaded, and riding a great canine creature that looked like a cross between a dog and freezing fog. However, that was not what made them nervous. The moment the woman reached the first of the carefully manicured trees that lined the tower approach, every spirit in the group, including Krigel’s own heavy rings, began to buzz.
“Control your spirits,” Krigel said, silencing his own with a firm breath.
“But master,” one of the Spiritualists behind him squeaked, clutching the shaking ruby on her index finger. “This can’t be right. My torch spirit is terrified. It says that woman is carrying a sea. ”
Krigel gave the girl a cutting glare over his shoulder. “Why do you think I brought two dozen of you with me?” He turned back again. “Steady yourselves; here she comes. ”
Behind him, the red-robed figures squeezed together, all of them focused on the woman coming toward them, now more terrifying and confusing than the monster she rode.
“What now?” Miranda groaned, looking tiredly at the wall of red taking up the bottom step of the Spirit Court’s tower. “Four days of riding and when we finally do get to Zarin, they’re having some kind of ceremony on the steps. Don’t tell me we got here on parade day. ”
“Doesn’t smell like parade day,” Gin said, sniffing the air. “Not a cooked goose for miles. ”
“Well,” Miranda said, laughing, “I don’t care if it’s parade day or if Master Banage finally instituted that formal robes requirement he’s been threatening for years. I’m just happy to be home. ” She stretched on Gin’s back, popping the day’s ride out of her joints. “I’m going to go to Banage and make my report. ” And give him Eli’s letter, she added to herself. Her hand went to the square of paper in her front pocket. She still hadn’t opened it, but today she could hand it over and be done. “After that,” she continued, grinning wide, “I’m going to have a nice long bath followed by a nice long sleep in my own bed. ”
“I’d settle for a pig,” Gin said, licking his chops.
“Fine,” Miranda said. “But only after seeing the stable master and getting someone to look at your back. ” She poked the bandaged spot between the dog’s shoulders where Nico’s hand had entered only a week ago, and Gin whimpered.