“No other could approach Cloud Chaser so fearlessly, my Lord,” Rorin told him. “You may not like to think of yourself as a Divine One, but there is no denying the bond.”
“Getting along with animals doesn’t make me divine,” Brak snapped as he swung into the saddle.
“It does with that beast,” Rorin chuckled. He turned to the soldiers who had mounted their own, less noble mounts, and were waiting patiently, staring at Brak with a mixture of curiosity and awe. “Lead on, Sergeant.”
“Don’t bother,” Brak said, leaning forward to pat Cloud Chaser’s neck. “I know the way.” He reached for Cloud Chaser’s mind and told him where they were headed. With a shake of his magnificent head, the beast galloped off towards the Sorcerer’s Palace, leaving Rorin and his escort behind.
Brak’s mad ride was halted soon enough as he rode through the streets to the Sorcerer’s Palace, picking his way through the night-time revellers. The palace sat high above the city on a bluff overlooking everything in Greenharbour, even the Royal Compound. Although everyone called it a palace, it was actually a complex of Temples and residences, encircled by a thick white wall constructed of stone quarried from the chalk cliffs west of the city. Their fragile strength was reinforced by age-old Harshini magic. It had stood for over two thousand years, almost as long as the Citadel.
He rode through the Palace gates unchallenged. The guards stood back to let him enter, not knowing who he was, but certain that anyone riding a sorcerer-bred mount had a right to be there. The night was dark although the buildings were lit in almost every window, criss-crossing the central paved courtyard with a tapestry of shadows and light. Brak paid the imposing buildings no mind at all. He rode straight up to the steps of the Temple of the Gods and dismounted, leaving Cloud Chaser waiting patiently. He took the marble steps two at a time, grimly determined to do this before he changed his mind.
The Temple was almost empty, but for a few sorcerers praying silently or staring in wonder at the large crystal Seeing Stone which had suddenly spoken after nearly two hundred years of silence. He ignored them, striding down the centre aisle of the Temple, his boots clicking loudly on the mosaic tiled floor. They looked up as he passed, muttering to themselves, some even thinking to object to the presence of this stranger. As he approached the front of the Temple, where a solid lump of polished crystal as tall as a man sat on an altar of black marble, a young woman stepped forward, blocking his path. Brak stopped and stared at her, surprised to see the diamond-shaped pendant of the High Arrion resting against her simple black robe.
She bowed elegantly. “My Lord Brakandaran.”
Brak studied her for a few moments. “You’re very young to be High Arrion.”
“And you don’t look nearly as old as you should,” she replied evenly, with the hint of a smile. “Would you like me to clear the Temple?”
Despite himself, Brak returned her smile. It was good to see a High Arrion who didn’t simper at the sight of a Harshini, even a half-breed with a bad reputation.
“Thank you.”
She waved her hand imperiously and within minutes the Temple was empty of everyone but the two of them. Brak was rather impressed by her air of authority. As soon as Kalan was certain they were alone, she turned to him, her expression serious.
“My Lord, the Seeing Stone has been silent for almost two hundred years. The political ramifications of this event are not to be underestimated,” she warned. “I have no idea why Korandellen wishes to speak with you, and I suspect I don’t want to know…But you must understand something: when the Stone came to life, the Warlord of Krakandar was here, making his annual offering to the Temple. If you know anything of Hythrun politics, you can imagine what effect that news will have, and I don’t know how much longer I can keep it secret. I beg you, my Lord, speak with your King and leave Greenharbour as soon as you are able.”
Your King, she said, not our King. The days when the Hythrun paid fealty to the Harshini were long gone.
“I will, my Lady, I can assure you.” He stepped up to the altar and studied the Stone for a moment before he turned to her. “What was Lord Wolfblade’s reaction?”
“His reaction?” she echoed. “One of great caution, thank the gods. My brother is no fool, my Lord. He plans to leave the city as soon as possible. Being divinely sanctioned might make the people of Hythria happy, but it won’t make him popular with the other Warlords. He quite sensibly fears assassination.”
Her brother? Suddenly many things became clear, while at the same time, the mystery deepened. The heir to the High Prince’s throne had already placed his sister in the Sorcerer’s Collective as High Arrion. She, in turn, was obviously surrounding herself with her own people. When Lernen died, he would take the throne with the most powerful group of individuals in Hythria supporting him. And now Korandellen, the King of the Harshini, had appeared in the Seeing Stone after two centuries of silence, in the presence of Lernen’s heir.
Would they never stop accidentally interfering with these people? If Damin Wolfblade was assassinated because the other Warlord’s feared his growing power, would Korandellen think himself responsible? He would have had no way of knowing who was in the Temple when he used the Seeing Stone…no way of predicting what affect it might have on this nation. The knowledge that he had been responsible for someone’s death might drive him mad, as it had his uncle. Brak couldn’t imagine what was so important that he would break his silence and risk contacting these people after all this time. Another thought sliced through Brak like a sliver of sharpened ice. What would happen when word reached Medalon and the Sisters of the Blade? Brak suddenly wanted to speak with Korandellen very badly, if only to tell him he was a fool.
“I will leave you now, my Lord,” the High Arrion said with a small bow. Brak barely paid her any attention. He was focused on the Seeing Stone, almost afraid to touch it, knowing that as soon as he did, he would undo almost two decades of hard work, forgetting who he was. Forgetting what he had done.
With a sigh, Brak closed his eyes. He reached for the river of power that nestled within his mind which he had tried so hard not to touch for so long. As he dipped into it, the power leapt at him with frightening intensity, as if it was anxious to escape the bonds he had so carefully placed around it. He opened his eyes, which had changed completely now. No longer were they a faded shade of blue, weathered and disillusioned. They were totally black. The whites of his eyes were consumed by the power that coursed through him. Brak reached forward, placed his hands on the cool crystal surface of the Seeing Stone, and sent his mind out to his king.
Brakandaran.
It seemed hours before the voice filled his mind, although he knew it could only have been minutes since he laid his hand on the magical stone. Korandellen’s face appeared in the surface of the Stone—no longer a lump of polished crystal, but a milky backdrop for the proud face of the king. He wore his kingship a little uncomfortably. He had not wanted to be king. First Lorandranek’s insanity and then Brak’s own hand had forced him into it. Until now, Brak had thought he was doing a reasonable job.
“Your Majesty,” Brak replied silently. Although the High Arrion had vanished from sight, he didn’t put it past her to be listening in. She was human, after all. Better this conversation be of the mind. Brak was out of practice, but his telepathic ability was merely rusty, not forgotten. It was frightening how easily it all came back to him.
“I wasn’t sure you would answer my call,” Korandellen said.
“Your minions left me little choice,” Brak retorted. “Have you any idea what you’ve started by suddenly appearing in the Stone after two centuries of silence?” He realised this was hardly the way to address one’s monarch after a twenty year absence, but he couldn’t help himself. His temper got the better of him. It always did.
Korandellen looked unrepentant. “I would not have called on you unless the matter was urgent. I know how you feel.”
“You have no idea at all how I feel, Korande
llen. You cannot kill. You cannot even contemplate the thought. You cannot know what it is to live with what I have done.”
“But you are forgiven,” Korandellen assured him generously.
“By you, perhaps,” Brak said. “But I will never forgive myself.”
Korandellen shook his head sadly. “You were not to blame, Brak. You took a life to save a life. Lorandranek was insane. What you did could be viewed as a kindness. You put an end to his pain.”
“I killed my King. I took his life to save a miserable human.” Brak closed his eyes for a moment as the long buried memories threatened to overwhelm him. He could still recall every detail as if it had happened only yesterday.
Brak had gone looking for Lorandranek té Ortyn at Korandellen’s request. The mad king disappeared quite often from Sanctuary, sometimes for months at a time. The Sanctuary Mountains seemed to soothe his tortured mind in a way that not even the magical halls of the Harshini could and nobody had the heart to deny him that peace. But summer was drawing to a close and they were worried about him. Lord Dranymire and his demon brethren could feel the king through the bond they shared with the té Ortyn family, but Lorandranek was too close to human settlement for the demons to risk going after him. Brak was half-human. He could move among humans without the need for disguise. He had promised Korandellen he would bring his uncle home.
He had followed the Harshini king for weeks, through mountains painted a riotous blend of autumn colours, although the trail was almost cold by the time Brak was given the task of tracking down the king. He knew Lorandranek had a fascination for humans that bordered on dangerous. It did not surprise Brak to find Lorandranek heading for a human settlement. He sought out humans to reassure himself that they still flourished.
When he finally found Lorandranek one chilly, starlit night, almost a month after he had set out from Sanctuary, the scene that confronted him was too unreal to comprehend. He knew what he had seen, but even now, found it hard to accept. The king was living in a cave littered with the chattels of long habitation, perched high on the side of a mountain above a small human village. Brak had entered the cave cautiously, softly calling Lorandranek’s name.
The cavern was dark, lit only by the glowing coals of a dying fire. Brak saw a shadowed figure with a knife, poised over another prone body. The figure was trembling so hard the assailant could barely grip the blade. Brak reacted without thinking. He had drawn his own blade and hurled it with deadly accuracy at the assailant’s chest before he knew who it was.
The assassin cried out as he clutched at the knife. The enormity of his crime hit Brak like an anvil dropped on him by the gods. He vaguely remembered yelling something, barely remembered the screams of the sleeping girl as she awoke to discover Lorandranek dripping blood on her face. He recalled catching the dying king and holding him as the lifeblood pumped from his chest. The Harshini were long-lived, but not immortal. Brak didn’t need to look to know the wound was fatal. He knew his own ability too well.
“The gods…they ask too much of me, Brakandaran,” Lorandranek had breathed softly as he lay dying in Brak’s arms. Brak’s eyes were blurry. It had taken him a moment to realise he was crying.
“Why?” he had asked desperately. What had the gods asked him to do? “Who were you trying to kill? How could you even think of it? The Harshini cannot kill.”
But Lorandranek had never answered the question. Brak had held him until he grew cold in his arms and harsh daylight flooded the cave. When he could finally bring himself to move, the girl, whoever she was, had fled—presumably back to her village—and Brak never spared her another thought. Brak laid out the king and kept vigil over him for two days and nights, neither eating, drinking nor sleeping. The following day he reached out through his bond to Lady Elarnymire.
The demon had appeared soon after in the shape of a swallow, landing with incredible grace on the narrow ledge in front of the cave. To assume a larger shape meant melding with other demons and Brak had specifically asked her to come alone.
The shock of seeing Lorandranek’s cold body startled the demon back into her true form. Elarnymire had stood on the ledge, her black eyes wide, her wrinkled skin a motley shade of grey, as Brak told her what he had done. He asked the demon to tell Korandellen. He couldn’t bring himself to do it. Elarnymire had placed her tiny, cold hand in his and promised him faithfully that she would deliver the message.
Brak had buried his king in a grove of tall pines near the cave and never gone back to Sanctuary; never given in to the pull towards home; ignored the demons’ attempts to coax him back. He could never face the Harshini again in that palace of peace and harmony. They had always known his capability for violence, and with typical Harshini tolerance, had accepted it as a part of him. But he could not—would not—ask them to accept this. He had turned his back on his people, denying the nagging need to see Sanctuary again, rejecting the magic that only those who cannot kill should be allowed to possess.
“I need you to finish what was started by Lorandranek,” Korandellen told him gently as he relived the memory through the mental link he shared with Brak.
“You do not need me at all,” Brak replied, shaking his head.
“There is a child. Lorandranek’s child.”
Brak looked up sharply; the painful memories pushed aside by Korandellen’s startling news.
“A child?”
“Lord Dranymire says the demons can feel the bond. It grows stronger every day. Somewhere, there is a child of té Ortyn blood approaching maturity.”
Brak’s eyes narrowed. The child of the girl in the cave? No. It was too soon. Harshini did not reach maturity until they were well into their third decade. On the other hand, a half-human child might mature earlier than a full-blood. He had come into his own power in his teens.
“If Lord Dranymire can feel the child, why doesn’t he seek it out?” It was a bitter irony, Brak thought, that he had killed his king to save a human woman, just so that nearly twenty years later he could hunt her child down.
“The child is living with humans, Brakandaran. Which is why I must call on you.”
“I am surprised the gods have let it live this long.”
Korandellen shrugged. “The gods have their own agenda. The thought of this child does not seem to concern them, only that it will do what they ask of it.”
Brak frowned. “And what is that, exactly?”
“They have not chosen to share that with me. I only know that they want the child found.”
Brak sighed. A human child of té Ortyn blood was a very dangerous being. The humans who worshipped the gods called such a being the demon child. And the gods, who had placed the prohibition on such a child ever existing, wanted this child for something. The gods, they ask too much of me, the king had said. For the first time in twenty years, Brak thought he understood what Lorandranek meant.
“Where is the child?” he asked, cursing the gods and their interference.
Korandellen hesitated. “The Citadel,” he said finally. “The demons say the child is at the Citadel.”
CHAPTER 8
“You’re awake.”
Joyhinia stood over her, her arms crossed, her expression annoyed. It took a moment or two for R’shiel to realise she was in the Infirmary.
“Mother.”
“You at least could have had the decency to announce the onset of your womanhood in a less public place,” she scolded. “I suppose I should be grateful that it was Tarja who found you, although why he insisted on running through the Citadel, yelling like a fishwife, instead of dealing with the matter discretely, is beyond me.”
“I think I fainted.” R’shiel wished she had never left the peaceful serenity of unconsciousness. Any hopeful thought she might have had about sympathy from her mother was dispelled in an instant.
“Sister Gwenell says you lost a great deal of blood,” Joyhinia continued impatiently. “I expect you to follow her instructions to the letter and ensure that you recover as soo
n as possible. It’s not as if you’re the first woman to haemorrhage on her first bleeding.”
“I’ll try to do better next time.”
“If you eat properly, there won’t be a next time,” Joyhinia told her, ignoring the edge in her voice. “I don’t know what you think you hope to gain by starving yourself, my girl, but I have given orders that you are to be force fed, if you continue to refuse meals.”
Who had she been talking to? R’shiel wondered. Junee? Kilene? Some of the other Probates? But thank the Founders, her headache was gone. Even the dull throbbing at the back of her eyes had miraculously vanished. The pain had been such a constant companion lately, she almost felt empty without it.
“I’ll do as Sister Gwenell orders.”
“Good,” Joyhinia announced, as if that was the end of the matter. “Gwenell says you’ll need some time to recuperate, once she has discharged you. I suppose you’ll have to come back to the apartment until Founders’ Day. After that, I expect you to return to your studies and I’ll hear no more about this.”
The discussion at an end, Joyhinia turned on her heel and strode out of the Infirmary, past the long lines of perfectly made-up beds, which for the most part were empty. R’shiel watched her go, wondering what it would take to make Joyhinia happy. For five years Joyhinia had been angry with her for not reaching her menses. Now that she finally had, she was angry with her for doing it in public. R’shiel turned over and pulled the covers up over her head, shutting out unexpected tears, and tried to wish herself back into oblivion.
Joyhinia didn’t visit the Infirmary again. Sister Gwenell kept her bedridden for almost a week, before she relented and let R’shiel out for short walks in the gardens outside the long windows of the Infirmary. R’shiel liked Gwenell, and once she was convinced her charge was not about to keel over if she sat up too fast, she would sit and talk with R’shiel, or play a game of two-handed tharabac with her, even though R’shiel always won.
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