He closed his eyes and stilled his mind, drawing it into quiescence. Using magic here would be foolish and irrelevant. For a moment, he worked to remember why he had come.
Elspeth. Blood of an immortal. War. The heart of a prince.
He opened his eyes and gazed across the plain. A second moon, smaller and higher in the sky, wheeled over the night. Why had his intention brought him here? He peered around the stone at the tall, war-clad lords talking to each other in a strange tongue, their breath visible in the cold air. Among other things, the entities in the Pentacle of Ealiron were war gods, every one. He wouldn’t be getting any blood here. His own, maybe.
He withdrew again. Time to go.
His flesh rippled as one of the entities raised his voice with the grace of a howling wolf. “Lorth of Ostarin!” he called out. “Do join us.”
Going nowhere, he added. Shit. Though the Lords of Formation were as vast and brilliant as any divine lover of the Old One, they were not easygoing, as a rule. As seasons of war might make a man hard skinned and detached from the softer things in life, eons of war were to a god simply the expression of his nature. The repercussions of his blade affected the entire timelines of worlds, even universes. Such beings didn’t stop to consider the needs of a single mortal. The Destroyer’s own, they didn’t discriminate.
Lorth pushed himself from the stone and stepped into the light. He briefly considered returning to his body, but he didn’t think they would let him. He stood there like an idiot; his hands at his sides as five entities dressed in the flawless trappings of battle turned and regarded him. A sixth, he knew.
“Come along,” Eusiron said. His stony gaze glittered and his obsidian hair, unbound, moved on the wind. Lorth couldn’t tell if his manner held malice or amusement. The god reached up and casually clasped a braided black sword strap on his chest. “We will not harm you.”
“Yet,” another put in. His companions rumbled with laughter.
Lorth walked slowly towards the fire. They wanted something from him. Not good. Gods did not request small things from mortals.
One of them had flaming red hair and wore the colors of granite and steel. He held out a horn filled with drink. With a respectful nod, Lorth took it and drank. Mead, fine as the fresh blooms of heather on a summer’s day. An airy sensation swirled in his forehead. In his physical body, he might have thought it drugged.
“The darkness in your heart brought you here,” Eusiron said. “Quiet as a panther, you are. Perhaps you can tell us what you know about Ascarion.”
Lorth lifted his chin. They awaited his reply with the patience of seas apt to change moods in an instant. Fear trickled down his spine. Rogues. What he knew about Ascarion he had seen by the hand of the Old One herself. Defying her favors was unthinkable. She could strip his powers as a Web, for a start.
“If Maern wanted you to know that,” the hunter said carefully, “she would have revealed it to you.”
Their moods hardened. The red-haired warrior drained his drink and threw the horn into the fire, shattering it. Another, wearing a wine-red cloak trimmed in green and a black breastplate imprinted with a crow in flight, placed a hand on the hilt of his sword. Seemingly unruffled, Eusiron said, “We are at war. It is our task to balance the murder of Ascarion. As my aspect, what you know is mine.”
“Not until you know it,” Lorth returned.
The crow-clad lord drew his blade. Lorth stood his ground, but his life grew distant beneath his feet. This lot cared nothing for what might befall him at the hands of the Old One. It would be his transgression, not theirs. But if he didn’t appease them, they could see to it that he never awoke in Willowfae’s garden. Had he known slightly less about the Destroyer than he did, Lorth might have believed she would protect him. But he had learned a long time ago never to make assumptions like that.
The red-haired lord said, “If you die, we’ll know what you know.”
“Na,” Lorth said. Lying and trickery were not beyond them, evidently. “The Void crosses all probabilities. Dead or alive, what I know stays there.”
The crow lord approached him, spinning his blade. “Then we have no reason to let you live, do we?” His presence had the force of an avalanche. Lorth tore his gaze from the glittering tip of the war god’s sword and looked at Eusiron. The dark lord lifted his brow in expectation.
With that, Lorth made a decision. If he was going to die here, he would do it on his terms. The Destroyer had ever been his guide, fickle as she was, whereas these bastards cared only for the wheels of events vastly beyond his personal concerns. Lorth knew death. It knew him. He didn’t need to test its value.
“I offer a trade,” he said.
One of them snorted a laugh; another said something in their language that might have been a curse. His two hotheaded assailants were not amused. The crow lord grabbed him by the throat, blond braids flying. Lorth’s drinking horn fell from his hand, splashing mead on the ground. In a blur, the god slammed him against a standing stone. The red-haired warrior joined him, sword bare and ready to do damage. Their eyes blazed like suns. Lorth worked to bring the air back into his lungs as he reconsidered his own fine sentiments.
“Aorin,” Eusiron said. “Math. Stand down.” The warriors stepped back from Lorth as if attached to a leash. Their cheeks were flushed. The redhead turned to Eusiron and said, “This one is over bold.”
“We told you he wouldn’t turn,” said one of the other three, who stood nearby watching with casual interest. His blond hair shone in the firelight as he crossed his arms over his chest. His companions, a green-eyed lord with a longbow on his back and a brooding entity with wavy black hair bound over his brow with woven leather, appeared bored.
Math and Aorin sheathed their blades and returned to the fire, leaving Lorth in the cold aura of the stone. Why were they bothering with this drama? There were quite a few things they could do to persuade him besides threaten his life. Instead, they were waving swords and threats like common ruffians. The observation emboldened him. Either they were not as unfettered as he had supposed or Eusiron, who outranked them in Formation hierarchy, held their reins.
“For what would you trade?” Eusiron asked. He lifted a horn to his lips as he awaited the answer.
“The blood of an immortal.”
They stared. Eusiron lowered his drink, then tilted his face back to the moon and laughed. The sound echoed across the hills. When his mirth passed, he lowered a black, incisive gaze on Lorth that stripped the flesh from his bones. “I know for what you want that. You would risk death at our hands to honor the Destroyer and yet you would defy her by turning back a soul she has chosen?”
Lorth dropped his gaze to the stony ground. The god had a point. “It is for love that I ask.”
“The Void loves nothing,” Eusiron mocked, quoting the Shade of Forsaken.
Lorth looked up as Wulfgar’s words returned to him. You brought a realm to its knees for the sake of those you loved. No arguing that point, either. “During the Faerin occupation, an assassin cast me into the form of a tree.” He addressed the others, not knowing how much of his life was visible to them. “I would have died there, my identity lost. You brought me back to fight for Ostarin. How is this different?”
The archer said, “The seeress is not a warrior.”
“Is she not?” Lorth shot back. “She fell by the hand of Carmaenos. Wulfgar of Tromb is a warrior and an aspect of Ascarion. If he loses her, you will lose him.” He stalked back and forth before them. “And if you lose him? You’ll lose his sister Rhinne and she’s the only hope you have against Carmaenos now. Because she knows what I know.”
It was a risky claim on more than one front. Lorth had no idea what Rhinne knew. He was guessing. But he had their attention. Wearing a slightly less terrible expression, Eusiron approached him. “You would risk displeasing the Old One by revealing to us what she has shown you—for the children of Tromb?”
“Aye,” Lorth affirmed, once again hoping that Wulfgar�
�s love for Elspeth was true, and that Lorth’s theory about Ascarion would hold water. These beings would know if it didn’t.
The Dark Warrior reached to his belt and pulled forth a knife, curved and barbed on the tip. It was covered in symbols. The others drew close as he held the wicked blade aloft. “Tell us, then.”
“Ascarion, though formless, is able to appear in this dimension through the eyes of Maern. I believe he helped Rhinne escape from Eyrie. And I have seen him.” In the hollow of their stunned silence he swallowed hard, putting together what he had learned from Nightshade’s odd behavior, Heimnor’s interpretation of Rhinne’s message as the Shade of Low, and what he had learned from the book. Disembodied on the gaunt fabric of this place, the pattern became clear to Lorth’s mind for the first time. “In her incarnation as Eifin, Rhinne was a priestess of Ascarion. She provided a ground, like the earth calling lightning. Through her, Ascarion chose to know the pleasures of this world. Now, through a Web, he is materializing from Void itself to take vengeance on Carmaenos.”
As they saw what had been hidden from them, the entities stirred like the sun breaking over a stormy sea.
Eusiron’s gray eyes held regard. “You are worthy of me, Hunter.”
The Dark Warrior drew the blade over his palm and held his fist into the air, dripping blood.
A Spy in the Ranks
Rhinne lay in a bed on the second floor of a tall stone guardhouse on the edge of Caerroth’s harbor. Soldiers moved about in the rooms below, and out in the hall, their voices low. The blankets smelled of sweat and some kind of exotic spice. The fire had burned down in the hearth. Too cold and sore to get up and tend it, she gazed at the reflections on a window facing the harbor. Wind and rain lashed the panes. Somewhere in the corner, water dripped from a leaky roof. Now and then, when she looked over there, she imagined a trickling waterfall deep in a budding forest.
Rhinne’s would-be assailant on the docks had nearly frightened her to death when he silenced her from alerting half the city to her presence. What he expected her to do after sneaking up on her like a wraith, she couldn’t imagine. He had called light from a crystal, further unnerving her as she recognized the wizard who had come through the door of the impossible wilderness just before she escaped. He introduced himself as Eaglin, the Raven of Eusiron, and informed her that she was fortunate to be alive. No arguing that point.
Eaglin brought her food and asked to see her wounds. Rhinne had resisted at first, until he informed her that he had cared for her in Ealiron’s private realm and quite possibly saved her life. With little left to hide, she allowed the wizard to tend to her, his pale face set in the lamplight, his manner as silent and mysterious as an ancient forest glimmering with stars. He had a healing hand, she had to admit.
She had initially feared Eaglin intended to return her to Eyrie. Instead, he had brought her here to protect her until they set sail for Tromb. One problem solved. However, she wouldn’t be doing it in secret as Ascarion had warned her she must. Assuming Eaglin knew about Carmaenos and wouldn’t risk that the god might refocus the timeline of the world, Rhinne had told him about her encounter with Ascarion in the impossible wilderness. She could still hear the Raven’s quiet reply, burdened with compassion, the doors to his conviction closed and sealed with a curse.
Ascarion was destroyed centuries ago, in our terms. Only the Old One knows him now. As Rhinne stared, blood leaving her face, he added: Many things could have appeared to you there. A dream, a desire, anything could deceive you into believing you saw Ascarion. But he is formless. Unfocused.
Rhinne didn’t want to believe him, but the Raven of Eusiron wouldn’t likely be wrong about such a thing. As a result, every dream and vision of the beautiful blond-haired war god fell apart in a dissonant crescendo of doubt that ended with the conclusion that she had made it all up. Just a cobweb spun from loneliness and despair.
After destroying her already shaky belief in Ascarion’s existence, Eaglin had asked her about her journey from Eyrie. Rhinne quietly answered his questions. He said nothing when she risked stating that Ascarion had freed her from the citadel. He looked up with a startled shine in his eye when she mentioned the dark Lord who questioned Fana on the road. And he had expressed a different kind of surprise when Rhinne told him about the oborom assassin. Eaglin doubted that Fana had killed him. Privately, so did Rhinne. But someone had. Fana was the only one there.
Despite her doubts and fears, Rhinne now had one consolation, a sun shining through the shadows like a sword.
Wulfgar had come to Eyrie.
Eaglin was called away before telling her anything about it except that her brother had returned to Caerroth from Eyrie two days ago, accompanied by Lorth. As he departed, Eaglin had suggested she sleep. That hadn’t been easy with this on her mind, her heart fluttering at the thought of seeing Wulfgar again. Every voice, closing door, step and sound in the house brought her alert with excitement that he had arrived.
The ferocity of the storm outside relieved her, as it delayed the inevitable. Rhinne had planned to return to Tromb and face the Riven God herself, somehow. A ridiculous plan, it gave weight to what Eaglin had told her about Ascarion. Her belief in the war god’s existence had never been strong enough to stand to reason, let alone the knowledge of a wizard. As a result, she now doubted her erstwhile resolve with solid conviction, leaving her with nothing but a war she had to assume Wulfgar had initiated upon his arrival.
Water, trees, and the rhythmic sounds of hoofbeats lulled her into a doze. Half asleep, she dreamed of warriors in gray and black riding through the woods, their faces grim. As a dream drifting like mist through another, the storm raged outside.
He stood at the helm of a great, dark ship, his black hair moving in the wind. A star sparkled on his brow. Hoofbeats struck the earth in the rhythm of lovers, creaking leather, soft voices and the smell of leaves, fresh and clean. Black sails strained in the wind. A rush of cold stirred the surface of the water, causing the coals in the hearth, nearly spent, to glow.
The sea lifted her up with a gentle word, wrapping her in warmth with a dark green coil. She moved through the air changing from cool to cold as she rose into the sky on the wings of an albatross. Rain blanketed the sea, rippling in great, foamy sheets. Horses rode the waves and hands touched her everywhere. The fire and the tinkling waterfall had gone. Only darkness now and the warmth of warriors.
The forest swayed with a terrible presence. It expanded into the trees, down into the earth, in stones and gardens and horses, into the storm and the sky above. It enveloped her in the arms of a mountain and sheltered her from the rain and wind.
She felt sick. Dizziness stirred her in an ascending spiral as the sea rained down, shivering with voices. They slowed and lifted her up into the icy wind. After a time, she went into a closed space that smelled of old wood, leather and wool. Men were talking. She didn’t understand them.
Softness and warmth surrounded her. Light parted the distance. He stepped from the mist, clad in the shades of the storm, black hair shining like a raven’s wing and eyes of ancient stone. Somehow, she knew him.
“Awake,” he said in the voice of a sword.
Rhinne opened her eyes, blinked, and stared. The man from her dream stood before her, his tall, shimmering form filling the small chamber. The yellow light from a swinging lamp flickered on the pommel of his sword, his boots, the threads in his clothes and the sapphires holding the braids of his hair.
“You,” she croaked, clearing her throat. It was the immortal warrior that had stopped Fana on the road. She tore her gaze from the entity and glanced around. She no longer lay in the guardhouse. This looked more like a ship’s cabin; it moved and creaked around her, rocked by the sea. “Where am I?”
The entity regarded her calmly, his flawless features showing no emotion. “You are aboard the Winterscythe, a Keepers’ warship bound for Tromb. I brought you here in an illusory event to hide you from the eyes of your enemy.”
A spell.
A chill crept up her spine, followed by panic. “What about Eaglin and Lorth? Wulfgar? He was coming for me. Are you saying they don’t know I’m here?”
“They do not. We will be well underway before they learn of it.” His presence, though familiar, rattled her wits to the bone. “Had I not brought you here, you would never have seen them again. Now you must wait but a short time.”
Rhinne pushed herself up on one elbow. “Why? Are they in danger?”
“No, you are. There is a spy among them. I created a deception to hide you from him.”
“Who are you?”
“I am Eusiron, Fourth Formation in the Pentacle of Eaon. If not for me you would have been killed or discovered ten times over, foolish as you are. However, you were picked up by a thief who wanted something from you badly enough to behave, for a time. Though you are hidden in the Old One’s domain, your companion was not. Through her, I watched over you.”
Rhinne gulped as she worked to put together the meaning of that. She and Fana had felt this entity in the forest. The realization was not entirely comforting. “That warlock nearly killed me. If Fana hadn’t been there—”
“I killed him,” the god corrected. “Your companion let you think she did it.”
Rhinne’s cheeks warmed. Rat bitch. “She told me there was another, the night she found me. A dead man by my side. Did you do that too?”
“No.” A strange smile touched the corner of his mouth. “That was the Destroyer, through a bond you share with Lorth of Ostarin. You both have the eyes of the Old One. Which brings me to a question for you.” His manner deepened with intent. “How did you get out of Eyrie?”
Rhinne opened her mouth to speak, but no sound came out. If Eaglin hadn’t believed her account of Ascarion, then this entity surely wouldn’t. It would seal her madness once and for all. She looked down and fumbled with the covers in her lap. “I just...” she started.
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