Once...

Алекс Ланг Once…

Like a chick in its egg, Jenna lay curled within a bubble of ice half-buried in muck at the bottom of Palace Lake. In her gloved left hand she clutched the frost-covered spellstone that kept the walls of her shelter frozen, teased air from the blue-green water… and slowed time. After a day and a night, she should have been so cramped from immobility she would not be able to move when the time came, but to her, it had not been a day and a night; to her, it seemed only a few minutes had passed since she had waded into the lake in the early morning darkness. Her thoughts, though flowing normally to her, in fact moved with all the sluggishness of treacle in midwinter.

She had left that cold the day before, passing through the single Gate in the Lesser Barrier into the Palace grounds with a dozen other young women, newly hired to serve as maidservants.

And what happened to those we replaced? she thought bitterly as she waited in her bubble of ice. Some have grown too old, some have grown too ugly. And some have simply vanished, used, abused, discarded, no questions asked, no investigations launched, no retribution, no recompense… because those doing the using and abusing and discarding were MageLords.

The spellstone filled her left hand, but her right held something else: a tiny crossbow, cocked and loaded, the quarrel white with frost, steaming with cold. Around her neck, she wore a third item of magic: a simple silver circlet, broken in one place, hanging on a cord of leather.

In her time-slowed memory, it had been only a short while since Vinthor had hung that amulet around her neck. “This is the power source,” he had said. “Keep it hidden.” She had nodded, and pushed it down inside her blouse, so that it lay, cold at first but warming quickly, between her breasts, glad that at least it did not glitter with frost like the spellstone and quarrel.

“The spellstone knows what to do,” Vinthor told her. “The moment you are completely submerged, it will form your…” he hesitated, searching for the word.

“Blind?” Jenna suggested. “I am going hunting, after all.”

Vinthor smiled at that, but it was a smile tinged with sadness. “I wish someone else could do this,” he said softly. “But…”

“But only a young woman, hired to be a maid, can get inside the Lesser Barrier,” Jenna said. “I volunteered, remember, Vinthor? When you told us what the Patron needed.” She remembered the pride she had felt, the excitement that at last she could strike a blow for the Commons…

… for her mother’s sister, the aunt she had adored as a small child, until suddenly she wasn’t there anymore-vanished, like so many others, in the service of the MageLords.

That memory brought a fresh surge of hatred to her breast. “I want this, Vinthor,” she said. “It’s the greatest honor I can imagine.”

Vinthor nodded, lips pressed tightly together. “Of course. And I have every confidence in you. As does the Patron.” He put a hand on her shoulder. “I will be watching,” he said. “From outside the Barrier. When you strike your blow… I will bear witness to the Patron that you did your part, and did it well.”

That had been their farewell. There was nothing else to be said, because they both knew that, whether the attack succeeded or failed, Jenna would almost certainly not survive. It was one thing to get inside the Lesser Barrier: another entirely to get out of it, with the Royal guard in full cry.

And that was why Jenna carried one other small object, not magical at all: a simple glass vial, filled with a fast-acting and fatal poison.

Whatever happened, she must not be taken and questioned by Lord Falk, the Minister of Public Safety. And so, whatever happened, she would not be.

She took another long, slow breath. Subjectively, her wait had not yet been long. But it didn’t matter.

Long or short, it would end eventually.

Eventually, the Prince would come.

And then, the Prince would die.

Not ten strides from where Prince Karl and his bodyguard Teran sat in magical sunlight on soft green grass, a snowstorm raged.

Warm enough with only a wrap around his waist, Karl watched snow slithering across drifts that ended abruptly, flat as knife-sliced slabs of cheese, against the Lesser Barrier, visible only as a slight shimmer in the air like heat waves rising from a fire. Then his eyes narrowed. Something was moving out there.

“Teran, look!” He pointed toward the Barrier. Teran, who had been gazing across the lake at the Palace, twisted his head around to look as a shadow took shape, materializing into a Commoner who was struggling through the snow-choked park on the other side of the Barrier. Swathed in a knee-length coat of black fur, with throat, mouth, and chin wrapped in a dark-green scarf beneath a huge fur hat, the man raised his head as the light of the magesun fell on his face. His eyes met Karl’s. For a long moment-a few seconds longer than strictly proper, Karl thought-he stared at the Prince; then he lowered his head and plowed on. Within seconds he faded back into the swirling gloom.

“He didn’t look too happy with you, Your Highness,” Teran said idly. Being technically on duty, he wore his guard uniform of blue tunic and trousers, silver breastplate and high black boots, but he had set his helmet aside on the grass and his sword next to it. His right hand held a dewcovered bottle of Old Evrenfels Amber. Drinking on duty was definitely against regulations, but the only one who could report him was Karl, and Karl had given him the bottle in the first place, from the magic-cooled chest close at hand.

Karl snorted. “ I wouldn’t be too happy with me, either. But what’s he doing wandering through the park in that weather?”

“Probably just wanted to get a glimpse of something green and growing,” Teran said. He jerked his head in the direction of the Barrier. “It’s not easy out there in the winter, you know. Even in the city. That’s when the Commoners envy the Mageborn the most. It’s a good thing you make a point of going out there once in a while, cutting ribbons, making speeches. Otherwise that envy might turn into hate.”

Karl shook his head. “They’re fools if they envy me,” he said. “Oh, it’s a nice enough prison,” he looked around at the manicured grass, the flowering bushes, the sparkling blue lake with the sprawling white limestone Palace on its far shore, the many-arched long bridge across the top of the dam that had formed the lake, “but it’s still a prison.”

“I suspect those held in Falk’s dungeon would dispute your definitions,” Teran said dryly.

Karl laughed. “True enough.” He grinned affectionately at his bodyguard. “So you’re saying I should quit bellyaching and enjoy myself.”

“Exactly.” Teran took another swig of ale. “Like me.”

“You’re supposed to be protecting me,” Karl pointed out.

“From what, exactly?” Teran said. “Out there,” he gestured at the snowstorm, “sure, there could be a risk. I could see a Commoner attacking you, since he might not understand how the magic works. But in here?” He looked around. “Unless some goose gets homicidal urges, you’re safe as houses. No Mageborn would ever attack the Heir. What would be the point?”

Karl laughed again. “Lucky for you.” He took a swallow of his own beer. Teran was quite right, of course. No MageLord or Mageborn would attack him, because it would accomplish nothing; he might be the Heir, but if he died, the Keys, the special magic of the King that kept the Great and Lesser Barriers in place, would simply choose a new Heir. No one would know who that Heir was until King Kravon died and the Keys made the leap to their new host. Since the new Heir would be unknown, no one could influence that person ahead of time. Worse, the new Heir might prove to be an enemy of whoever had arranged the assassination-someone who would then be able to act on that enmity with all the resources of the Kingship once the Keys came to him or her.

Outside the Barrier, he supposed it was conceivable, as Teran said, that some deranged Commoner might attack him. He could even imagine-barely-some disgruntled Mageborn attacking him. But all the Mageborn who lived inside the Barrier, southwest of the Palace in the grand houses of the Mageborn Enclave, had sworn fealty to one of the five MageLords who served on the King’s Council…

… well, almost all, he corrected himself. There were three types of mages residing within the Barrier whose fealty was only to the King: a prime example of one type, the Royal guard, currently sat next to him, drinking his beer.

The Healers were another. Though, like all Mageborn, they had some modicum of hard magic, they had an additional skill, rare and valuable. They could use soft magic, useful for healing bodies and minds. Hannik, the First Healer, resided in the Palace like a MageLord, looking after the health (with the help of a handful of lesser-ranked Healers) of everyone inside the Lesser Barrier. It was unthinkable one of them would be involved in any kind of violent attack on the Heir.

Finally, there were the mages of the Magecorps, who served the King under the direction of the First Mage, Tagaza. Made up of the best and the brightest of those who passed through the College of Mages in Berriton, some hundred miles to the north, the Magecorps did everything from making sure the Palace’s many magical systems continued operating-“water running, toilets flushing, and lights turned on,” as they put it-to researching the theory and practice of magic.

Karl had met First Healer Hannik a few times when he’d suffered a broken bone or nasty cut from some childish misadventure. He met Tagaza almost daily, since Tagaza was his tutor in all things to do with magic and history… and, above all, politics.

Karl glanced at the Palace again. It looked pure and white from this distance, almost half a mile away, but he knew better. It seethed with intrigue, everyone jockeying for power and position.

There were twelve hereditary MageLords. Their ancestors had been the most powerful mages of their or any other day. Karl still found it hard to fathom what they had done, transporting themselves and a few hundred followers halfway around the world from the collapsing Old Kingdom. They had established the new kingdom of Evrenfels in the middle of a wilderness and erected the Great and Lesser Barriers to protect the kingdom and themselves. Despite their extraordinary forebears, the current MageLords were not necessarily any more powerful magically than many ordinary Mageborn, but that didn’t matter. With the MageLords’ titles came vast lands over which they could rule pretty much as they saw fit.

Five of the Twelve held even greater power: they served on the King’s Council, which governed the entire land. In the name of the King, of course, Karl thought sardonically, though he doubted King Kravon knew about even a tenth of what was done in his name. The King’s power lay in being able to appoint the members of the Council, and since even on the Council, some positions were far more powerful-and far more lucrative-than others, every one of the Twelve was constantly jockeying for the favor of the King and looking to undercut his or her rivals.

Or would be, Karl thought, if my father would allow anyone to meet with him except for Lord Athol and Lord Falk. And of those two, Prime Adviser and Minister of Public Safety, respectively, it was common knowledge that only Falk truly had the King’s ear… which made Falk, who also commanded the Royal guard and the Army of Evrenfels, the most powerful man in the kingdom.

Karl took another sip of beer as Teran lay back on the grass, hands behind his head, and closed his eyes. You’d think the King might want to see his only son and Heir once in a while, too, he thought with a touch of familiar bitterness. But you’d think wrong.

He hadn’t seen his father since the Confirmation Ceremony on his eighteenth birthday, half a year gone, when Tagaza had announced that he had tested Karl and that he was, indeed, the Heir. It had been a very public ceremony, however, with all of the Twelve, their families, and even the Commoner Mayor and Council of New Cabora in attendance, and he had not once had an opportunity to speak to the King.

The last conversation with his father that he could recall now lay some three years in the past, and had focused entirely on the sad state of the ornamental gardens.

The Confirmation Ceremony had meant that efforts by the MageLords to curry favor with the Heir, already intensified by the inaccessibility of the King, had intensified even further. Previous Royal lines had failed, the Keys shifting to an Heir outside the apparent succession, which was why the Confirmation Ceremony was a Big Deal. Now that there was no doubt Karl would one day be King, those MageLords not on the Council, as well as those on the Council hoping to keep or improve their current positions, sought to influence him so that the balance of power would shift their way on that sad day when death at last claimed King Kravon. And as the MageLords sought his favor, so, too, did the Mageborn sworn to their service, seeking to boost their own fortunes alongside their lord’s.

Fortunately, Tagaza, who had been First Mage for two decades and tutored Karl for the past twelve years, knew all about Palace intrigue. Thanks to his guidance, Karl assumed an ulterior motive behind every gesture of support, every kind word, every gift, every invitation to a party or play, and kept his own council as to what he thought of the various MageLords.

It sometimes seemed to Karl that, of all the people who dwelled inside the Barrier, only Tagaza and Hannik (and the Commoner servants, of course, but they hardly counted) had not tried, in ways large or small, to win his favor or turn him against rivals.

Then he snorted. Not quite true. Falk hadn’t tried, either. The Minister of Public Safety didn’t need Karl’s favor, and Karl wasn’t fool enough to think he could oust him from that position when he became King, even if he wanted to. In theory, the King could appoint whichever of the Twelve he chose. In practice… Karl knew how it would work. Every other member of the Twelve would refuse the position, because they all feared Falk, leaving Karl in the end with no choice but to keep him, and in the meantime, he would have weakened himself in the eyes of everyone else.

Maybe my dear father has the right idea, sequestering himself in the Royal Quarters and never bothering with any actual governing.

He glanced at Teran, and amended his earlier thought once more. Teran hadn’t tried to win his favor, either. But he didn’t need to: he already had it.

Teran’s mother, a theoretical magician, spent her days researching in the Palace archives and writing long, learned papers of which Karl understood one word in ten. He had met her once or twice; she lived in the Mageborn Enclave. Teran’s father, though he had died when Teran was very young, had likewise been in the Magecorps, though his duties had been more practical: he had been killed in a cave-in while recharging the magelights in the Commoner-worked coal mine that provided fuel for the MageFurnace that burned day and night beneath the Palace to provide energy for the magic of all the Mageborn within the Lesser Barrier.

Like Karl, Teran had grown up in the Palace, and since they were almost of an age, the two boys had naturally fallen in with each other, roaming freely inside the Barrier, swimming in the lake, buying ice cream in the Enclave, chasing the geese, sneaking into the kitchen

… and one night when they were twelve, sneaking into the maids’ bathing room.

That had been memorable not only for the enlightenment and entertainment it had provided, but for revealing to Karl his own peculiar magical ability, an ability he had told no one about because it was too useful as a secret.

As Heir to the Keys, Karl wasn’t supposed to have any magic of his own. Certainly, he couldn’t light fires with a flick of his hand or move small objects without touching them, the way even the lowliest Mageborn could.

But that night, as the boys, passing through the hallways of the servants’ quarters after a snack in the kitchens, had passed the bathing rooms, Karl, laughing to Teran about how he’d love to sneak in there, had said, “Too bad they lock the doors with magic.” Then he had reached out and tugged on the handle…

… and the door had opened.

Nobody had seen them that evening, though they’d gotten a delightful eyeful themselves. Teran had said something about how lucky they’d been that the door had been unlocked, and left it at that.

Karl, though, knew very well that the door had not been unlocked, but had come unlocked at his touch. After that, he’d started touching other enchanted items just to see what would happen.

He only seemed to be able to deactivate small objects: locks, lights, heating stones. Near the Palace’s main entrance stood a famous magical timepiece that showed not only the time but also the positions of the stars and planets, as tiny whirling models inside a crystal dome. One day Karl had casually leaned against it for a while, then walked away. He’d been vaguely disappointed to see it still working.. but a day later he saw two mages working on it, muttering about it needing adjustment for the first time in half a century. Magecorps mages always seemed to be somewhere near his quarters, trying to fix something that had unexpectedly failed.

Once, when he was about sixteen, he’d even dared to touch the Lesser Barrier, though he’d been warned against it; people who had tried that before had suffered severe frostbite. No matter how cold it is, a quick touch won’t hurt anything, he’d thought… and so he’d reached out, ready to snatch his hand away again in an instant…

… and hadn’t felt any cold at all. In fact, the Barrier had felt almost springy to his touch, like soft rubber. He’d snatched his hand back and never tried again.

His best guess was that his strange power had something to do with his being Heir, but he’d never asked Tagaza about it nor mentioned it to anyone else… even Teran. The ability to de-magic small items, unlock locked doors, and turn out magelights seemed much more useful as a secret than something for Tagaza to research… and tell Falk about; the First Mage and Minister of Public Safety were close friends.

It was hardly the only secret he held close. He and Teran were still friends, but their relationship was very different now that Teran was in the guard and he was the confirmed Heir. I have many more secrets than I did as a child, Karl thought. Then a frown flicked across his face. I wonder if Teran does, too?

He shrugged aside that notion, and the whole mass of circling thoughts about Palace life and Kingdom politics that more and more filled his mind these days, put down his beer bottle, and got to his feet. Stretching, he looked around at the wide, tree-studded lawn that sloped up from the lake to the Barrier. This was one of his favorite places, with almost half a mile of water separating him from the Palace. Few Mageborn visited it, and it was off-limits to Commoners, which gave him the illusion of solitude… his bodyguard excepted, of course. On days when the weather inside and out of the Lesser Barrier was the same, he sometimes rested here and pretended that nothing separated him from the rest of the world, that the Barrier didn’t even exist.

He couldn’t pretend that today, with winter still clawing New Cabora and the “sunlight” within the Barrier cast not by the true sun but by the magesun, an enormous, intensely bright magelight that traversed the interior of the dome-shaped Barrier whenever clouds shrouded the outside world, but at least he could pretend to be a free man, not the near-prisoner his birth had made him.

He nudged the reclining Teran in the side with his bare foot. Teran opened one eye. “You called, Your Highness?”

“I’m going for a swim,” he said. “There’d better still be beer left when I come out.”

Teran grinned. “I’m sure most of it will still be here.” He sat up, put on his helmet, then got to his feet, leaned over and picked up his sword belt, and buckled it on. “But first, of course, I have to do my job.”

Drawing his sword, he walked down to the edge of the lake. He peered into the water, searched up and down the grassy shore with his hand shading his eyes, and made a show of poking his blade into all the nearby bushes. He came back and saluted. “Guardsmen Teran reporting, sir,” he said. “After a hard-fought battle, I have secured the beachhead.”

Karl touched his fingers to his forehead. “I salute you, sir. When I am King, you will have your just reward.”

“Actually, I’ll take it now,” Teran said. “If it’s all the same to Your Highness.” He bent down, took a full bottle of beer from the open chest, pulled out the cork with his teeth, then raised the bottle to Karl. “Enjoy your swim!” he said cheerfully, then took a swig.

Karl laughed, then strolled down to the lake, dropping his clothes as he went. Naked, he stood at the water’s edge for a moment, gazing across the lake at the Palace, glad to be here in the faux sunshine instead of locked in that den of greed, graft, and politics. Then he stepped forward. His foot touched the lapping waves…

… and thirty feet offshore, the lake erupted.

A cloud of steam exploded outward, driving a ring of spray across the water. Karl staggered as the blast slammed into him. He glimpsed someone, clad in black, face hidden, standing impossibly on the surface of the water. The figure raised its right hand, pointing something at him. Light brighter than the magesun flashed-and a far greater blast than the first hammered him to the ground. Ears ringing, blood running from his nose, acrid fumes burning his throat and eyes, he found himself on his back in the sand, staring up at a sky wreathed in smoke. Coughing and blinking away tears, he heaved himself up on one elbow.

For twenty feet in every direction, the grass around him had burned black. A bush that a moment before had been clothed in small white flowers now stood as naked, shattered, and charred as though struck by lightning. His discarded kilt smoldered where it lay. Water that seconds before had been calm, glittering blue now tossed brown, foam-flecked wavelets against the muddy bank.

A dozen feet from the shore bobbed something black and twisted.

Karl heard Teran’s booted feet thudding across the turf toward him, but the sound seemed to come from far away. He found himself standing without really remembering getting up, and then he was wading into the troubled water.

He looked down at what floated there.

Once, it might have been human, but now it was as charred and twisted as the blasted bush. He stared at grinning teeth in a noseless ruin of a face, blind white eyes bulging from sockets whose lids had been burned away. His gaze traveled lower.

The body was female.

When Teran reached him, he was kneeling in the shallow water, his back to the blackened corpse, retching sour beer into the filthy gray waves.

Beyond the shimmer of the Lesser Barrier, where falling and blowing snow mingled to conceal all in swirling curtains of white, Vinthor lowered his spyglass. He could no longer see through it anyway: tears had flooded his eyes and frozen on his eyelashes. Lying on a snowdrift, halfcovered with snow himself, he would have been invisible to anyone passing within a dozen feet, much less someone blinded by the magical sunshine beyond the Lesser Barrier.

Jenna! The name stabbed his heart like a knife.

Had the invisible Barrier not separated him as completely from the Palace grounds as a wall of steel, he would have rushed the naked Prince and strangled him with his bare hands, bodyguard be damned. That that decadent Mageborn fool should continue to live while beautiful Jenna, so young, so full of life, floated in the water as a withered, blackened corpse…

He had cursed himself for misjudging his distance and coming unexpectedly onto the very verge of the Barrier fifteen minutes earlier-practically on top of the Prince himself. He’d thought then that it didn’t matter, that even if the Prince and his guard, lolling at ease on the other side of the magical wall, did note his face well enough to later identify him, it would mean nothing, with Jenna ready to strike.

But the Prince and the bodyguard both lived, and Jenna, unthinkably, did not.

He scraped the freezing tears from his eyes, then snapped the spyglass closed. Clambering to his feet, he struggled through the snow away from the Barrier, back toward the shadowy, smoky streets of New Cabora. He wanted no one on the other side to see him now, for certain.

He would report what had happened to the Patron.

He did not think the Patron would be pleased.

Lord Falk, minister of public safety, emerged onto the front steps of the Palace after his daily audience with the King. As usual, he had reported on happenings within the Kingdom in extremely vague terms: “some unrest within the Commons… Royal Army continues to pursue Minik raiders… murmurings from Lord Santhorst’s estate of taxes being too high, and a shortage of coal…” If the King had been paying attention, even that should have been enough to alert him to the fact that the state of his Kingdom was not ideal, but of course the King had not been paying attention. He had a new favorite, a boy that looked to Falk to be no more than fifteen, a Commoner, of course, and had spent most of the audience whispering in the boy’s ear, the boy sipping wine and eating artfully crafted hors d’oeuvres on silver sticks and generally looking like a cat that had managed to swallow a goose.

Falk had hardly been surprised to see the boy there, since he had been the one to pluck him off the streets of New Cabora for the King’s pleasure. He had done it many times before, over the years, but it gave him no small amount of satisfaction to know that he would never have to do it again, if all went according to plan.

Keeping the King entertained, Falk had long since discovered, was the best way to keep him uninvolved in those matters Falk really preferred he remained uninvolved in, such as governing the Kingdom. I can do that a lot better without his interference, Falk thought, lips twitching, though not quite turning up in a smile: he made it a point to never smile in public.

Had he not had that public image to maintain, though, he would have been grinning from ear to ear. The day was fast approaching when he would no longer have to concern himself with keeping the King happy, for he would be the King.

As I should have been anyway, he thought. He stopped at the top of the broad staircase and looked across the cobblestoned drive to the ceremonial gardens stretching a hundred yards down to the lake. In the middle of the gardens, Queen Castilla on her favorite horse held up her hand in an eternally frozen wave to crowds that had been every bit as imaginary when she was alive as they were now that she was only a not-very-well-executed bronze. Falk’s lip curled. That statue goes first thing, he thought. It had been Castilla, grandmother of the current King, who had stolen the Kingship from his lineage.

The gardens-a riot of green, red, white, yellow, and blue-stretched beneath the bright light of the magesun to the red-tiled roof of the boathouse and the three sailboats and two rowboats tied to the long pier. Beyond them glittered Palace Lake. On the far side of the lake, half a mile away, a broad green lawn, dotted with trees, ran up until it encountered the Lesser Barrier. Beyond that, of course, all was white, wrapped in blizzard.

Falk shaded his eyes with one hand as he glimpsed movement on that lawn. Two men: one naked, walking down to the water, the other in the unmistakable blue of a Royal guard. Prince Karl, Falk thought. Someone else who has almost served his purpose.

He was about to start down the steps when something flashed. His head shot up, and then he heard a sound like a single clap of thunder

… but it never thundered inside the Barrier.

And then he saw the cloud of steam and smoke rising from the far side of the lake, and the circle of blackened ground where the Prince had been, and he started running, down the steps, across the drive, sharp left and a dash to the bridge that ran across the top of the dam. “Jansit, to me,” Falk snapped to one of the two Royal guards on duty at the Palace end of the bridge. “Perric, summon Captain Fedric and First Mage Tagaza. Tell them Prince Karl has been attacked with magic on the far side of the lake. Go!”

The two guards exchanged startled looks, then Perric raced off toward the Palace and Jansit fell in behind Falk as he ran toward the bridge. To their right was the lake. To their left, halfway across, the river that emptied the lake wound out through the Mageborn Enclave before passing through the Barrier… or, this time of year, not passing through, since the river on the other side of the Barrier was frozen solid. Together, they pounded across its cobblestoned surface. At the far end the road continued another quarter mile to the massive stone arch of the Gate, beneath which was the only opening through the Barrier, kept open by powerful enchantments within the arch. A red banner flying from the tower showed that the Gate was closed, and Falk nodded approvingly. They must have slammed it shut the moment they heard the explosion.

The guards at the Gate were too far away to summon, but there were also two men on duty at the north end of the bridge, staring into the park, where the smoke Falk had seen was now a rapidly dissipating cloud climbing toward the magesun. “Both of you, come with me,” Falk snapped. “Prince Karl has been attacked!”

Steps led down from the bridge to the lake’s north shore. Falk raced down them, then dashed through the grass. A line of bushes blocked his view of the place where the Prince had been, but when he rounded them, he was relieved to see Karl apparently unharmed, sitting outside a circle of burned grass. His bodyguard’s short cape had been flung around his shoulders, though since it hung only as far as the small of his back, it did nothing to hide his nakedness.

Not that Falk cared about that. “Search the shoreline,” he snapped to the three guards who had followed him. “Go!” As they hurried off, he went to the Prince’s side. “Your Highness,” he said, looking down at the youth. “Are you unharmed?”

Karl looked up. Blood from his nose had caked his upper lip and chin and run down onto his bare chest. “Yes,” he said. “But I can’t say the same for my attacker.” He nodded at the water, and Falk saw for the first time the blackened corpse bobbing there. He waded two steps into the water, but all he could tell from a quick look was that it had been a female. Its clothes had either been blasted away or fused with its skin, but it wore something around its neck…

… he peered closer, and felt a shock as though he had fallen headfirst into the lake’s cold water, followed a moment later by a rush of hot rage. He grabbed the amulet and jerked it free, its scorched leather cord snapping as he pulled, bits of blackened flesh clinging to it. He shoved the thing in his pocket, then stepped back from the body.

With his mind, he reached out for magic and energy. The magic flowed strong all around him, of course; the Palace was built on-in fact the entire Kingdom was centered on-a great lode of magic, deep beneath the ground. It had been that lode that had drawn the First Twelve to this spot, not to mention allowed them to transport hundreds of people here, almost eight centuries before. This far from the MageFurnace, he had to draw energy from the air and water, but it was sufficient to his needs.

He formed the spell he wanted in his mind. Some mages murmured words to help them twist their thoughts into the pattern to accomplish a particular task. Some used talismans; objects whose shape and texture helped them focus. Falk disdained such things. He needed only his will to bend his mind just… so…

With a sound like breaking twigs, the water around the corpse froze solid for a foot in every direction. Mist wrapped the charred remains. An instant later the mist had vanished and the ice broke apart into chunks; but the dead body continued to glisten, as though encased in frost. Locked in magical stasis, it would deteriorate no further until released from the spell, or until the spell wore off naturally, which wouldn’t be for some days.

That task done, Falk spun and waded out of the water. He shot a look at the bridge. A dozen figures were crossing at a run, silver breastplates and helmets flashing on ten of them, the eleventh, wearing gray, close behind them, and the twelfth wrapped in a green robe, bringing up the rear and falling farther behind with every step. Falk crouched by the Prince. “The First Healer and First Mage are coming, Your Highness.”

“I told you, I’m not hurt,” Karl said, though his face was pale and his teeth chattering. “I don’t know why I’m not hurt… but I’m not.”

“The First Healer will make sure of that,” Falk said. He straightened, looked to see how far the three searchers he had sent along the shoreline had gotten, then turned to Karl’s bodyguard. “Teran,” he said, voice cold as the ice still bobbing around the corpse. “What happened?”

Teran, ramrod straight, looked past Falk rather than directly at him. “The assassin rose out of the water, Lord Falk,” he said. “She fired a small crossbow at the Prince. But when the bolt touched him, both she and the ground surrounding the Prince were burned by a sizable blast of magical flame. The Prince was knocked to the ground, but seemed to be unhurt. He waded into the water to look at the corpse, threw up, then at my urging returned to the shore and sat down to await the arrival of help.”

Teran had kept his voice neutral, reciting the bald facts without emotion. Falk knew why, of course. Teran hated and feared him, with good reason, since Falk had “recruited” him to spy on the Prince by the simple measure of threatening his mother and sister, who lived under his control in the Enclave.

He let Teran sweat for a moment, while he turned to face the line of bushes screening him from the bridge, impatient to see Tagaza, but the First Mage had yet to appear. After a moment, he glanced back at Teran. “Very well,” he said. “Return to the Prince’s side. I may have more questions later.”

“My lord,” said Teran, giving just enough of a nod to avoid being insubordinate. Rather than return immediately to the Prince, however, he trotted up the bank to where a chest and a backpack waited, retrieved the backpack, and then headed back down to the lake and the barely-covered Prince. A moment later he was pulling clothes out of the pack and handing them to Karl. Falk watched the Prince start as Teran touched his shoulder, look up, look at the pack, and then almost convulsively get to his feet. Shock, Falk judged. Well, that was certainly to be expected. But he was alive, and that was all Falk cared about. And only for now, he thought.

The additional guards, led by Captain Fedric, jogged into sight. Falk ordered Fedric to have his men join the other three in conducting a thorough search of the area. Hannik, the First Healer, had gone straight to the Prince. As the guards spread out, the First Mage finally arrived, puffing around the bushes. His rather shapeless green robe hid his alarming bulk, but his bald pate, tattooed with blue-and-green flowers, glistened with sweat. The First Healer, a short, thin man who, though balding, still had more hair than Tagaza, glanced up from the Prince as Tagaza leaned on his knees, gasping for air, and got to his feet, as though afraid his services would be needed to deal with Tagaza’s apoplexy rather than whatever had happened to the Prince.

Six weeks, and you can drop dead at your leisure, Falk thought irritably. But not before.

The First Mage’s face had gone from gray to flushed. The Healer seemed to take that as a good sign; he knelt by the Prince again.

Finally Tagaza gathered enough air to speak. “What… what happened?” he puffed. “I was in the… garden… heard the bang, but didn’t…”

Falk jerked his head toward the lake and led Tagaza down through the grass. Tagaza gazed at the crisped body floating in the water within the glimmering sheen of stasis. “She was lying in wait beneath the water,” Falk said. “She emerged, fired a crossbow at the Prince.. and then died, because whatever spell she intended to kill the Prince seems to have claimed her instead. Examine her and tell me what you find.” He lowered his voice. “She was wearing an Unbound symbol,” he murmured.

Tagaza shot a glance at him, eyebrows raised.

“I have removed it. We’ll discuss it later.” He looked again at the Prince, now clothed, standing, and shooing Hannik away with an irritated gesture. “The Prince will ask you questions. Be careful what you tell him.”

Tagaza’s face had gone pale now, as he gazed at the corpse; pale, with a touch of green. “I always am, my lord.”

Falk strode to the Prince, his boots raising clouds of gray ash from the circle of burned grass. He looked first to Hannik. “First Healer?”

“He’s essentially unharmed,” Hannik said. He looked around at the burned circle. “Though, for the life of me, I can’t figure out why.”

“We’re working to determine that,” Falk said. “Thank you. You may return to your regular duties.”

“I do not require your permission to do so, my lord,” Hannik pointed out with a touch of acid in his voice. “I serve at the King’s pleasure, not yours.” He turned from Falk, bowed to the Prince, then turned and strode back to the bridge. They’ll soon enough be one and the same, old man, Falk thought savagely as he watched him go.

Karl had opened his shirt for the Healer’s examination; now he buttoned it up again, ran a hand through his shaggy blond hair, and glared at Falk. “Someone just tried to kill me, Lord Falk. Isn’t it your job to prevent such things?”

Falk clamped down on his temper. Soon, he thought. Soon. Out loud, he said only, “My lord, such an attack is unprecedented. In fact, I would have said it was impossible. I am hoping the First Mage,” he nodded toward Tagaza, who had waded into the water to look at the corpse, robes hitched up in one hand to reveal massive, hairy calves as big as tree trunks, “may shed light on how it was done. But at the moment, I can tell you nothing.”

“Then let us consider the ‘why.’” Karl’s eyes never wavered from Falk’s face. “Why would any Mageborn want to murder the Heir? It accomplishes nothing.”

He’s got the nub of it, Falk admitted sourly to himself. “It could be a personal, rather than a political, attack,” he suggested out loud. “If someone hated you enough…”

“… you would surely know it,” Karl said. “As would I. I can think of no one who hates me at all, much less enough to go to such elaborate lengths to kill me. There are easier ways.”

Falk let slide the notion that no one could possibly hate Karl enough to kill him, since he personally would have slain the Prince without a qualm if he didn’t need him for a few more weeks, and admitted to himself that Karl had a point. A rock from the roof, poison in his cup, a thrown dagger, an ordinary crossbow bolt from hiding… the Prince moved and mingled freely within the Lesser Barrier, because in almost eight centuries, there had never been a plot against the Heir. As Karl himself said, killing the Heir would ordinarily accomplish nothing. And killing Karl in particular, Falk thought, would accomplish nothing… though only a few people knew that.

He frowned. That wasn’t quite true, of course. Killing Karl would accomplish one thing; it would disrupt Falk’s plans. And the Unbound symbol in his pocket lent that possibility more weight than he would ordinarily have given it.

He tucked that thought away to consider in more detail later. First, gather information. “Did Your Highness see anyone nearby before the assassin attacked?” he said.

“No one,” Karl said.

“Your Highness…?” Teran said. Karl glanced at him, then frowned.

“Oh, right. We did see a Commoner, outside the Barrier, a few minutes before the attack.”

“A Commoner?” Falk turned and looked back toward the Barrier. If anything, the storm out there had worsened. They appeared to be inside a glass dome immersed in dirty milk, the outside world entirely hidden in swirling gray and white. “In that weather?”

“He couldn’t have had anything to do with the attack, anyway,” Karl said. “The attacker used magic.”

“But you can’t be certain that the person you saw outside the Barrier was a Commoner, Your Highness,” Falk pointed out.

Karl’s eyes widened. “I never thought of that.”

Of course you didn’t, Falk thought scornfully.

The Prince’s gaze narrowed again. “But even if he was Mageborn, he could have done nothing to trigger or abet the attack. Magic cannot pass through the Lesser Barrier.”

“Not entirely true,” said Tagaza, coming up behind the Prince.

Karl turned toward him. “Master?” he said.

“I’m not teaching you now, Your Highness,” Tagaza said with a slight smile.

Karl laughed a little. “Sorry. Force of habit. First Mage, then. Are you saying magic can pass through the Lesser Barrier?”

“Not easily,” Tagaza admitted. “But of course it is designed to allow some magic through. The smoke and ash from the MageFurnace, for instance, must be transported out to the Chimneys through the Barrier. And there are… other reasons.”

“‘To allow the MageLords to strike at the Commoners should they prove rebellious,’“ Karl said, as if he were quoting.

Tagaza smiled. “And I thought you were asleep during that lesson,” he said.

“But that’s all magic originating inside the Barrier. Surely it is designed to prevent any magical attack from outside.”

“It is, Your Highness. But there are laws to magic. The Barrier cannot be even slightly permeable in one direction and remain completely impermeable in the other. So it is theoretically possible that someone could strike at you magically through the Barrier. Even, I suppose, that someone could find a way to bodily pass through the Barrier. But it would be very, very difficult to accomplish.” He spread his hands. “I am First Mage, and I know I could not do it.”

“Still, the man you saw in the snow could have been the mage who placed and armed the assassin, out there to observe the results of his efforts,” Falk said. “Or, indeed, he may have been a Commoner… which in some ways is an even more troubling prospect.”

“Why would a Commoner want to kill me?” Karl protested. “I’ve represented the Crown in New Cabora for years. I want them to know that, even if the current King is… uninvolved… the next King will keep the Commons’ interests in mind. I cut the ribbon to open the new clock tower of their city Hall just three months ago!”

“Ribbon cutting only goes so far,” Falk said dryly. “You are still a symbol of what they call MageLord ‘oppression.’ There are some Commoners who might see killing you as a way of making a very loud, very public statement.”

Karl frowned again. “Are you thinking of the Common Cause?”

“Not the public version, Your Highness, but as I have told you, there is a hidden, far more dangerous side.” Falk glanced at the milk-white world outside. The Common Cause’s public adherents insisted they were loyal to the MageLords and the King, but lobbied, as much as the Commoners could lobby, for greater control over their own affairs. Falk found them irritating, but left them alone as a kind of safety valve, a way to release the rebellious pressure constantly bubbling beneath the surface in the streets of the city.

But he knew well there was a shadowy side to the Common Cause, secret adherents who drew heart from the fact that once before, eight centuries gone, Commoners had risen up against the MageLords, had driven them out of the Old Kingdom to Evrenfels, terrified them so much they had built an impenetrable wall to protect themselves. Perhaps, those Common Causers suggested, it was time for history to repeat itself…

Fools, he thought. Commoners could not rise up against the MageLords without rebellious mages to fight at their side, and no such traitors existed.

Maybe they think a “Magebane” will arise, he thought, and snorted to himself. The mysterious master of anti-magic that old legends claimed had helped the Commoners defeat the MageLords in the Old Kingdom had been conclusively proved decades ago to be a myth, probably designed to cover the asses of the incompetent MageLords who had allowed the rebellion to get so far out of hand.

What could they do, after all, against a superhuman who hurled their own magic back at them, destroying whole armies and cities? It wasn’t their fault they’d lost the Kingdom. It wasn’t their fault they’d fled to a howling wilderness on the far side of the world. It wasn’t their fault they’d been so frightened of being hunted down, even here, that they had wrapped their new Kingdom inside an impenetrable, magical Great Barrier, a circular wall of protection six hundred miles in diameter.

It wasn’t their fault they’d trapped their descendants in that self-made prison for some eight centuries and counting.

Oh, wait, he thought. Yes, it is.

“But I still don’t understand what they could hope to accomplish,” Karl said. “What message did they hope to send with my death?”

“The message, Your Highness,” Falk said, trying to keep his annoyance at the boy’s thickness out of his voice, “that even inside the Lesser Barrier we are not safe from them. The message that they are committed to the eventual overthrow of the MageLords… and might even have a hope of succeeding.”

Karl shook his head. “That’s stupid. The Royal guard alone could drive off any attack with ease. We wouldn’t even need to call on the army.”

“I know that, Your Highness,” Falk said, this time not entirely successful at hiding his irritation, “but they may not.”

“So how was the attack carried out?” Karl glanced at Tagaza. “First Mage?”

“I cannot tell for certain through the stasis field, of course,” Tagaza said, “but from the nature of the attack, I assume your attacker was, indeed, a Commoner. She still clutches a spellstone in one hand and a crossbow in the other. The spellstone probably allowed her to remain hidden in the water until you came within range; the crossbow is perfectly ordinary, but the quarrel it shot was no doubt also charged with magic.” He glanced at Falk, who knew he was thinking about the Unbound symbol. “Perhaps she also had… something else.. which stored a magical charge. When the bolt touched your skin, the magic was discharged.”

“But not into me,” Karl said. “How do you explain that?”

Tagaza spread his hands. “Poor enchanting skills,” he said.

“All of this lends credence to the idea that Commoners are behind this attack,” Falk said thoughtfully. “Not only was the attacker a Commoner, but they would have had to find a Mageborn to enchant the spellstone and quarrel… and any Mageborn reduced to working for Commoners is hardly likely to be one with any great ability.”

Karl stared out at the Commons. “Someone would murder me just.. to prove they can?”

“Essentially, Your Highness,” said Falk. He looked around; the guards were returning, having searched the parkland from the bridge to where the water ran right up to the Barrier. “Captain Fedric, report!” he called.

Fedric saluted smartly. “We found nothing unusual, my lord.”

Falk hadn’t expected that they would. “Escort His Highness back to the Palace. Swords in your hands and spells ready in your minds. Then launch a thorough search of the grounds and the Palace. All papers checked and double-checked. Any Mageborn or Commoners who cannot properly account for their presence within the Lesser Barrier are to be detained for questioning. The Gate is to remain closed until further notice. Also, send a wagon, a coffin, and two men to collect the assassin’s corpse.”

“Yes, Lord Falk,” snapped Fedric. He turned, barking orders. The guards started to form a protective cordon around Karl, but he pushed his way out from among them. As he confronted Falk, Falk noticed for the first time that the Prince’s eyes were now level with his own. When did that happen? he wondered.

“I will expect more definitive answers from you very soon, Lord Falk,” Karl said. “You may consider that a Royal Command.”

Anger boiled up in Falk, but he let none of it show on his face. “Of course, Your Highness,” he said. “Now, please, I must insist. Return to the Palace, and remain in your quarters until we have searched the entire grounds.”

Karl took one more look at the corpse in the water, then turned and let his guards lead him back toward the bridge, leaving Falk with Tagaza. Once the guards had passed beyond the screen of bushes, Falk pulled the Unbound symbol from his pocket and held it out toward Tagaza. “She was wearing this.”

Tagaza took it, and immediately said, “This was the storage device. Exhausted now, but I can feel a trace of power still clinging to it.” He raised an eyebrow at Falk. “Is there a traitor among the Unbound?”

Falk took the emblem back and glared at it. “I can’t believe that,” he said. “Mother Northwind has examined every one of them. If any harbored thoughts of treachery, she would know.”

Tagaza nodded. “Indeed she would.” He looked back at the corpse. “You will have her examine the body?” he said. “That’s why you put it in stasis?”

“Of course.” Falk sighed. “That means a trip to my manor.”

Tagaza shrugged. “You were going to have to go there soon anyway. Brenna…”

“… must be brought to the Palace, yes, I know.” He frowned. “Why would a Commoner be carrying an Unbound symbol?”

“To throw you off the scent,” Tagaza said promptly. “To make you look to the Unbound instead of the Common Cause, or whoever is really behind the attack.” He smiled. “Everyone knows of your bitter hatred of the Unbound. You have executed several of their leaders.”

“Perhaps,” Falk said. “I hope you are right. Because the other possibility is that someone knows that I am actually the Master of the Unbound, that the Unbound I have executed were ordinary criminals enchanted to lie about their membership in the Order, and that this assassin carried the Unbound symbol so that, after Karl was dead, I would know why he was murdered.”

Tagaza frowned. “You have a devious mind, my lord.”

Falk snorted. “That should hardly be a surprise to you, old friend.”

“If you’re right,” Tagaza said, “then this attack was not really aimed at the Prince at all. It was aimed at you. At us.”

“Someone who does not want the Barrier to fall,” Falk said, “and knows how close we are to making that happen.”

Tagaza shook his head. “An unsettling thought, my lord.”

“Indeed.” Falk glanced at the corpse once more, then up at the bridge. The Prince and his bodyguard were bright specks at its far end. “I’ll leave for my manor tonight and take the corpse to Mother Northwind to examine. And when I return, I’ll bring Brenna with me. I want all the pieces we need for our endgame close at hand. It may be we’ll want to advance the date. I can easily give some excuse for why I want to inspect the Cauldron early this year.”

“I concur,” said Tagaza.

“Wait here with the body until the men come to collect it,” Falk said. “I must get back to the Palace.” He took one more look at the snow-wrapped world outside and let his anger boil up again. “When this storm clears, the Commoners will face one that is far worse!”

He reared back and hurled the Unbound symbol as far as he could out into the lake. The silver circle glittered as it spun end over end, then vanished beneath the waves with a tiny splash of foam.

Falk turned his back on Tagaza and strode toward the bridge.

Tagaza watched Falk stalk away, and sighed. He had left a large and particularly tasty glass of wine in the garden, not to mention a plate of his favorite cheese and some freshbaked crusty bread, and now he was stuck on the far side of the lake from the Palace-howling wilderness, as far as he was concerned-waiting for guards to come and collect a crispy corpse.

He’d also been left quite alone (if you didn’t count the aforementioned corpse), which he found a not-particularly pleasant state of affairs so soon after an assassination attempt. Especially, he thought uneasily, one that Falk suspects may actually have been aimed at disrupting his plans.

He supposed he should say “our” plans. After all, there would be no plans if he hadn’t figured out, over years of research, how the First Twelve had created the Barriers, and-more importantly-how to bring both of them crashing down.

But although he and Falk both wanted the Barriers to fall, their reasons differed. Far more, in fact, than Falk knew.

Tagaza had seldom been as near to the Lesser Barrier as he was now. With a glance at the corpse, which he was reasonably confident was not going anywhere, he strolled north from the lake the hundred yards or so to the Barrier, and looked through its faint shimmer into the swirling storm beyond. Such an amazing achievement, he thought in admiration. Not as amazing as the Great Barrier, which absolutely was impermeable to magic, completely and totally… and, not coincidentally, to light as well. The Lesser Barrier was something you could see through. It was not the dome it appeared, but a giant sphere, half a mile in diameter, the Palace at its center, extending as far beneath the ground as it did into the sky above.

Even more remarkably, it somehow had been carefully tuned to allow air to pass through it, and the stream that fed the lake, without also allowing rain and wind and snow. A very fine piece of magic indeed, and Tagaza knew that the skills of the ancient MageLords that had accomplished it were long lost.

But the skill to bring it crashing down remains, he thought with pride. It remains in me!

And a good thing, too, because the ancient MageLords had badly miscalculated when they’d set an arbitrary expiration date for the two Barriers at a thousand years after their creation. Did they not know? Tagaza thought, reaching out a hand, not to touch the Barrier, but just to feel the power emanating from it.

Perhaps they didn’t. The Old Kingdom, the histories agreed, had sprung up on an “inexhaustible” lode of magic. Tagaza did not believe such a thing existed, but if it were sufficiently large, the ancients might have, since they had never run up against its limit.

But this lode, the one on which the Palace had been built, the one to which they had transported themselves and all their more-or-less loyal followers eight centuries ago, was certainly not inexhaustible: not when the Barriers were drawing incredible amounts of magic from it day and night, and had been for centuries.

Tagaza had stumbled on that hard truth during his student days at the College of Mages. There were methods for measuring the amount of magic available in any particular location. The central lode in the Old Kingdom had been surrounded by many secondary lodes, avidly sought by magic miners. Cities sprouted where those lodes were found (making the miners who found them immensely wealthy).

But this lode, directly opposite the Old Kingdom on the sphere of the world, had no secondary lodes. It existed in solitary splendor, spread through the Kingdom only by a few veins, stretching out into the countryside like the spokes of a wheel. It was on the strongest of those veins that the First Twelve had established their demesnes.

With all the magic in Evrenfels so well mapped, the old magic-prospecting techniques had been long lost… until Tagaza, seeking an interesting focus for his graduate thesis, had decided to research them. Deep in the University archives he had found scrolls and ancient books detailing the methods the magic-miners had used. They weren’t particularly difficult, and in short order he had created one of the enchanted magic-measuring devices he had read about in the histories. He had calibrated it carefully, and then decided to test it by measuring the strength of the central lode itself, which had been precisely measured and carefully recorded when the Twelve arrived.

He still remembered his bewilderment when his first reading had shown the lode considerably underpowered from what the ancients had measured. He’d checked again, recalibrated his measuring device, and checked again. A hundred times he’d checked, double-checked, rechecked. The reading never changed.

Unable to find any fault with his equipment, he had been forced to assume that either the founders of the kingdom had made an error, or that the lode was slowly being drained of magic.

His instructors had laughed at him. But Tagaza had continued to research and ask questions, and though no one else would believe him, he had come to the inescapable conclusion that the Kingdom of Evrenfels was running out of magic. And from further research, he had come to the equally inescapable conclusion that the cause was the Barriers. Magic did replenish itself, slowly, over time; no one knew how, exactly, but the effect had been measured. But it did not replenish itself as quickly as the Barriers were drawing it out of the lode.

Tagaza had graphed it. In no more than fifty years, probably less, the level of magic in the Kingdom would reach the point where all of it would be going to the Barriers. The Mageborn would find themselves without the use of magic for the first time in history. And when that happened…

Tagaza drew back his hand from the Barrier. When that happens, he thought, looking out into the snowstorm outside, nothing will stand between us and the anger of the Commoners we have mistreated and exploited for so long.

He shuddered and turned his back on the Barrier. Which was why the Barriers had to come down. With only the Mageborn’s normal use of magic, the lode would be inexhaustible, or nearly. They could live without the Barriers…

… but only if they came to some better accommodation with the Commoners. Tagaza had argued over and over with Falk that the MageLords had to reform the way they governed, had to give the Commoners more rights… had, in fact, to adopt many of the policies the Common Cause-at least, the legal, public version of it-espoused.

If Mageborn and Commoners could live peaceably together, then the Lesser Barrier wouldn’t be needed. As for the Great Barrier… well, if the histories were true, nothing waited outside the Barrier except wilderness and savages. Ordinary force of arms could secure the borders well enough.

And if the outside world had found this land in the time since the Old Kingdom fell, it was a world ruled by Commoners. All the more reason to reach an accommodation with the Commoners within the Kingdom, before facing those without, Tagaza thought.

He heard a rattling from the bridge, and looked up to see an open wagon, a coffin in the back, rolling across the cobblestones with two men on the seat. He walked slowly back toward the corpse in the water.

Knowing the Barriers had to fall, he’d researched that little problem, too, and had figured out how to do it… but had also realized it was both fiendishly difficult and posed ethical problems, to say the least. It required the simultaneous murder of the King and the Heir.

At that point Tagaza might well have given up, if a certain tall, intense young man, a fellow student, had not come to his quarters one blustery winter night to ask him a few very pointed questions about his research into the construction of the Barriers.

The young man had been Falk, and though he hadn’t said much that night, over time he had revealed that he belonged to the forbidden sect known as the Unbound, and that the Unbound shared Tagaza’s desire to bring down the Barriers. Tagaza had been intrigued by Falk and the insights he offered into the Unbound. Tagaza thought their professed belief in some great “SkyMage” who guided and protected the MageLords as silly as the ancient legend of the Magebane, the “anti-mage” who supposedly had turned the MageLords’ magic against them during the Rebellion that destroyed the Old Kingdom, but the fact that they had held on to that belief, and their belief that the Barriers had been a cowardly mistake, for eight hundred years, fascinated him.

The Unbound taught that the Mageborn were a chosen people, gifted with magic by the SkyMage so that they could have dominion over the entire world. Their roots lay in the religious beliefs of the Old Kingdom, but the impetus for their coming together into an actual organization had been the First Twelve’s decision to hide the new Kingdom of Evrenfels behind the Great Barrier, and the King and Council behind the Lesser. The Unbound saw that not only as cowardly, but also as a direct affront to the will of the SkyMage.

Over the centuries Kings, Queens, and MageLords had persecuted the Unbound to a greater or lesser degree, but the cult had never faded away entirely, new recruits joining regularly, usually from the ranks of the young. Not too surprising, Tagaza thought. The Unbound message boils down to “you’re special, you’re better than everyone else, and unlike them, you know The Truth.” It might have been crafted specifically to appeal to young men. He snorted. Maybe it was.

Then, a little less than a century ago, the Unbound’s fortunes had taken an enormous turn for the better when, for the first time in their long secret history, a MageLord had joined their ranks: Lord Falk’s grandfather, Lord Excar.

Tagaza knew the story well enough to know that Excar’s conversion had had nothing to do with a sudden eruption of piety. It had been humiliation and fury that had driven him to the Unbound. And that message of being special and destined to rule would have really appealed to him, Tagaza thought.

That was because Excar had been the Heir Apparent, son of King Severad. Like Karl, he had grown up in the Palace. The dynasty had been unbroken for two and a half centuries at that point, so no one had doubted that, in time, the Keys would come to him. The First Mage didn’t even test him when he turned eighteen, the youngest age at which the Keys’ magic could be detected in their future recipient: there was no Confirmation Ceremony in those days.

The reason there was one now was because, when King Severad had died… the Keys had gone elsewhere. Five days after his death, five days of confusion and wondering in the Palace, a twenty-year-old Mageborn girl named Castilla had ridden up to the Gate of the Lesser Barrier, driven by an unbreakable compulsion to make the long journey from her father’s horse ranch near Berriton. The First Mage had examined her and declared that she now held the Keys, and she had immediately been crowned Queen Castilla: the first ruler of Evrenfels to arise from the ranks of the ordinary Mageborn rather than from one of the families of the Twelve.

The statue of her on the horse she had arrived on now stood at the foot of the ceremonial gardens in front of the Palace, and her grandson, King Kravon, now sat on the throne (figuratively speaking, Tagaza thought, since he so rarely made an appearance in the Great Hall for court functions).

Excar, now Lord Excar, had not been there to see her arrival. He had fled the Palace for good, returning to the family manor far to the west, near the Great Barrier. Young, bitter, still a MageLord, still wealthy, still powerful, but not King, he had known the Keys would never return to his family.

Tagaza suspected Excar’s real reason for joining the Unbound, offering his manor as a meeting place, providing money and resources, was to strike back at Castilla. In any event, he had quickly become the leader of the Unbound, as was his son after him, and his son after him: Lord Falk.

The Unbound had long faced a serious difficulty: to fulfill the SkyMage’s will, as they saw it, they had to bring down the Barriers. But as far as anyone knew, there was no way to bring down the Barriers.

Until Tagaza came along.

Early on in their discussions Tagaza had told Falk his belief that magic was fading, and would disappear entirely unless the Barriers fell. Falk had scoffed at that. He believed magic came from the SkyMage and could no more fade and fail than the sun, and that the lode of magic beneath the Palace was simply a conduit for the SkyMage’s power. He also vehemently disagreed with Tagaza’s argument that the MageLords and Mageborn had to find a way to share more power with the Commoners, treat them more as equals. The Unbound saw the Commoners first as an underclass, there to serve the Mageborn, and second as a potential threat. After all, it had been Commoners who had risen up in rebellion against the MageLords in the Old Kingdom, with the help of traitorous mages, of course, since it was unthinkable they could have defeated the Mageborn on their own.

“Treat them well as long as they keep their place,” Falk said. “Punish them without mercy if they don’t.”

Their differences were great, but their goal was the same. Both wanted the Barriers brought down.

And when Tagaza finally, one night over a bottle of wine… or possibly two, he couldn’t remember… told Falk how it could be done, Falk had grown very silent, excused himself early, and disappeared for several weeks.

When he’d reappeared, he’d asked Tagaza to work for him upon graduation. Tagaza had agreed, of course-it would have been foolish to turn down such a request from the heir of a MageLord even if he didn’t share Falk’s goals-and a few years later, when Falk’s father had died and Falk had ascended to the Twelve, Tagaza had (officially, though not in practice) left Falk’s service to join the Magecorps, advancing rapidly. When the King named Falk Minister of Public Safety, some years later, he had also named Tagaza First Mage, in which position he had remained now for twenty-five years.

Twenty years ago they had finally been able to begin the process of bringing down the Barriers. Until the Heir turned eighteen, and the presence of the Keys’ magic could be confirmed, they’d been unable to act. Having finally made that confirmation, they were within weeks of carrying out their long-laid plans…

… and now, this.

Tagaza looked uneasily again at the corpse in the water. Could Falk’s darkest suspicions be true? Could someone know, and was that someone working against them?

Mother Northwind may be able to find out, he thought, and shuddered. The old renegade Healer frightened him more than a little. He knew she had only to touch him to read his mind like an open book, and so he never let her touch him. But to think she might also be able to read the mind of a corpse… that was frightening on a whole new level. A man’s secrets should be safe when he’s in the grave, he thought.

Although he had to admit that he fervently wished her luck in obtaining information from this corpse.

The wagon sent to retrieve the body had almost arrived. About time, Tagaza thought. My wine should still be waiting in the garden. I might not even be called on for the Prince’s afternoon tutoring session. An assassination attempt is a pretty good excuse for skipping class.

He smiled a little as he thought about how Karl had stood up to Lord Falk… and how much it must have galled Falk to show the respect due to a Prince to the youngster.

Karl would make a far better King than Kravon, Tagaza thought. Perhaps a very fine King indeed. Too bad he’s not really the Prince, or the Heir, at all.

He sighed, and went to meet the approaching wagon.