Tower Lord

CHAPTER NINE

Vaelin

They stayed with the Bear People for another three weeks, the first days spent dispelling their hunger with the steady stream of supplies coming from the south, and also the occasional delivery of elk meat from Eorhil hunting parties. Despite their deliverance, the mood of the Bear People remained largely joyless, though some of the children were more given to laughter as the days passed. Others continued to perish from the depredations of their trek across the ice, mostly the old, and a few dozen fur-wrapped bundles were left out on the plain in that first week. The Bear People did not burn or bury their dead, knowing the wild would reclaim any flesh left to it soon enough.

The shaman’s name was far beyond the ability of Vaelin’s tongue to pronounce, but from the visions he divined it as some concordance of bearlike ferocity and great knowledge, so took to calling him Wise Bear. They communicated mainly through visions but Vaelin found it too taxing to share his own with any regularity, so began to teach the old man Realm Tongue, with Dahrena’s help.

“Bear!” he said, thumping a hand to his bone-staff when she had managed to communicate a desire to know what animal it derived from.

“And these?” she asked, her fingers playing over the many symbols carved into the bone. “Words?”

The old shaman frowned, seemingly surprised by her ignorance. Vaelin was beginning to understand that the knowledge of the Dark possessed by this man far exceeded their own. He never seemed to tire from the use of his gift, despite his age, and his facility with Realm Tongue grew rapidly thanks to his ability to share visions of the words they conveyed. This time, however, Dahrena’s question seemed to have stumped him.

“Writing,” Vaelin said, singing a little, a small sensation of words captured in text.

“Ahhh.” Wise Bear nodded in understanding then shook his head. “No . . . words.” His hand smoothed over the myriad markings on the bone-staff. “Power.”

They were ready to move on by the second week, Dahrena leading them on a south-westerly course. “There’s an inlet some fifty miles along the coast,” she explained. “The forest has game and the waters offer good fishing. There was a settlement there many years ago but it was abandoned when the bluestone mine proved too poor to sustain the effort of surviving the winter. I doubt these people will have that problem though.”

During the journey Vaelin was able to piece together a clearer picture of the events which had driven these people from their home. Wise Bear told of countless years on the ice, warring with the Cat People to the west or trading with the Wolf People to the north. Life remained unchanged until the Cat People grew ambitious. It seemed a new shaman had arisen amongst them, great and powerful in his command of beasts. Under his hand the Cat People became ever more discontented, looking with envious eyes on the vast hunting grounds enjoyed by their neighbours. They couldn’t hope to defeat them alone, of course, for all the war-cats and spear-hawks they bred, and so sought alliance with the iron-shapers south of the ice. Traditionally they had been looked on with a mixture of bafflement and contempt, living in the same dwelling all year round, shutting themselves away when the snows fell, valued only for the iron tools they fashioned and traded for furs. But recent centuries had seen them change, seen them range further and further north, and not always with the intent of trade. Children were taken, later seen dragged away south in chains. The Bear People exacted vengeance of course, for a feud cannot be turned from on the ice, many iron-shapers were killed, but there were always more, and the Cat People’s shaman saw an opportunity for alliance.

“But you defeated them,” Vaelin said, recalling the vision of the great clash between cat and bear. “Drove them into these lands where they perished.”

“Lost . . . many men,” Wise Bear said. “Many bears. Too many.”

Their victory had been no more than a respite, and a costly one. When the Volarians came north in force they were too weak in number to stand against them. The Wolf People fled east, the Bear People west, and the ice was lost to them forever.

The inlet was known as the Mirror Sound for the placidity of its waters which offered a clear reflection of the tall-forested slopes rising on either side. Dahrena guided them to the site of the former settlement, now a ramshackle stockade on the eastern shore, the wooden dwellings overgrown with creepers and moss. Wise Bear gave it only the most cursory of glances before turning his attention to the water. “Boats,” he said.

“I can have some brought here,” Vaelin offered but the shaman shook his head.

“Make boats.”

He disappeared into the forest with a group of the younger men and women and soon the sound of chopping wood was echoing through the trees. They returned some hours later with a number of midsize tree trunks and set about stripping the bark. When the trunks were bared they were split with some well-placed axe blows and the ice folk began hollowing them out and shaping the rounded sides into hulls. Within two days the Bear People had a fleet of ten boats with ever more being fashioned on the shoreline. They had also begun to pull a regular supply of fish from the inlet, mostly cod and a few salmon.

They made no effort to repair the settlement, even pulling some of the huts down for firewood. Their own shelters were easily collapsible rounded structures of twisted branches covered with skins or foliage. “We move,” the shaman said in response to Vaelin’s query about where they intended to make their home. “People are home . . . not place.”

The first child was born that night, a girl, brought to term by a combination of her mother’s will and the sacrifice of her family, who starved so she would eat. The shaman emerged from the shelter holding the child aloft as she squirmed and cried towards the heavens, calling out his unfathomable blessing, raising the ice folk to their feet in hushed reverence. Vaelin felt it lift then, the pall of despair that had covered these people since he met them, seeing smiles on some faces, tears on others. They may have lost their name but they were alive again.

He took his leave the next morning, having agreed to return in two months with fresh supplies, although, given the Bear People’s proficiency as hunters he doubted they would need any. Wise Bear’s mood was warm with gratitude as Vaelin clasped his hand in farewell, but also held a note of foreboding. “Volariaanns,” he said. “Won’t stop.”

“They can’t reach you here,” Vaelin said. “If they come, we’ll fight them together.”

The shaman’s expression was sorrowful, a deep sense of apology colouring the vision he sent: an army, dark ranks of infantry and cavalry, stretched out across a frozen plain, more than could be easily counted, heading south towards a distant port. “Not coming . . . for us,” he said. “For you.”

He rode in silence for much of the day, the old man’s vision stuck in his mind, unwelcome but compelling.

“They called the baby Dark Eyes,” Dahrena told him, riding alongside. “In honour of you.”

He nodded, still distracted. He tells of an army marching on the Realm, but the blood-song has no note of warning. And Volaria is an ocean away.

“I shall be glad to get home,” Dahrena said. “It’s been a few years since I spent so long in the saddle. I’m afraid I’ve grown too fond of comfort.”

“I should like to call on my friends before we return to the tower,” he said. “If you would care to accompany me.”

“I would, my lord.” She lapsed into silence for a moment, then gave a small laugh.

“My lady?”

“Just a thought, something Brother Kehlan said, ‘They’re sending us a warmonger.’ In fact they sent a peacemaker.”

That night he sat apart from the fire where Dahrena kept company with Captain Orven and the Eorhil woman, far enough away to escape the distraction of voices, and began to sing. He found his sister first, dabbing paint onto a canvas in her room at the tower, a rendering of the harbour, the ships and sailors depicted with her usual unnerving precision. She seemed rapt by her work, content, but it pained him to see her alone.

Reva was next, the first time he had sought her out. The relief at seeing her safe was palpable as he watched her offering a much-missed scowl to a buxom woman holding a scroll. They appeared to be in a library of some kind and he could see the twin spires of the Alltor cathedral through the window. It was strange to see Reva in a dress, squirming in discomfort and boredom as she listened to the woman, who seemed vaguely familiar. He saw Reva’s scowl deepen before she voiced a no-doubt-biting insult. However, the woman just laughed and reached for another scroll.

He found Caenis encamped with the Realm Guard, sitting in council with the other Wolfrunner officers. Their expressions had a uniform tension he knew well; the faces of men sent to war. More discord in the Realm? he wondered as his unease deepened. Or something worse?

Caenis himself seemed as unconcerned as ever in the face of impending battle, issuing orders with the unhesitant surety Vaelin remembered. But the song carried a sorrowful note as he watched his brother and he knew their last words weighed on him.

He moved on, feeling the creeping chill that would soon force a halt to his song, spending his remaining strength on a final effort to find Frentis, but as ever it proved hopeless. The song became discordant, the images fragmented, a cluster of rocks in a scrub desert, a burning house, a ship approaching a harbour . . . This last proved the most compelling, even though it lasted barely a few seconds, the tune becoming more ominous as the ship ploughed through the waves, hull and sails dark from age . . .

The chill lurched, dragging heat from his body, and he knew it was time to stop. He started to open his eyes, seeking to quiet the song but it kept on unbidden, the vision shifting, fixing on a road tracking through the Urlish Forest, a young woman with golden hair riding a pony at the head of a cavalry regiment, a tall Lonak woman at her side. Lyrna . . . The princess had grown yet more beautiful in the intervening years, but whatever recent trials she had endured seemed to have brought a change in her that went beyond beauty. There was an ease to her manner that hadn’t been there before, the way she laughed with the Lonak woman spoke of genuine friendship. Also the fierce intellect she had hidden so well now shone in her eyes, unbound and unsettling. The song’s tone deepened as the vision lingered, Lyrna’s face filling his mind as the ominous note heralded by the sight of the aged ship stretched then built until it was almost like a scream . . .

He coughed, feeling blood spatter onto his chin. He was on his back, retching, the chill so intense he trembled from head to foot. “Lie still, my lord.” Dahrena’s voice was a whisper, her hands warm on his face, brow furrowed in concern. “I fear you have been somewhat foolish.”

“When I lived with the Seordah, I met a woman. Very small, very old, but every soul in her tribe afforded her the greatest respect.” Dahrena added more fuel to the fire as she spoke, Vaelin huddling in his cloak, as close to the flames as he dared. The chill had lessened somewhat but still he trembled.

“I sensed her gift,” Dahrena continued. “And she sensed mine. The Seordah are not like us, they speak openly of the Dark, discuss it, try to understand it, even though true understanding still eludes even the wisest amongst them. She told me something about the nature of gifts, she told me that the greater the gift the greater the price it exacts. For this reason she rarely used her own, for it was great indeed, but every instant of its use brought death one step closer, and she wished to see her grandchildren grow. I only saw her use it once, when the summer came. Fires are common in the great forest during the summer months, the tinder grows dry and it only takes a single bolt of lightning to set whole swathes alight. The Seordah do not fear the fires of summer, in fact they welcome them, for they thin the forest where it grows too thick to hunt, and bring forth stronger trees from the cindered ground. But sometimes the fires grow large, and when two or more fires meet they birth an inferno that destroys more than it renews. And that summer was very hot.

“When it came it moved so fast there was no outrunning it, the way it leapt from tree to tree, as if it were some great hungry beast, and we were its next meal. It surrounded the camp on all sides, we huddled in the centre and my brothers and sisters sang their death songs. Then this small, old woman stepped forward. She spoke no incantations, made no gestures, just stood and stared at the fire. And the sky . . . the sky became black. The wind came down, chill and cold, bearing rain, a rain so heavy it bore us to the ground with the weight of its waters, so much I feared I had been saved from burning only to drown. Steam billowed as it met the fire, covering us all in a dense mist, and when it faded the fire had gone, leaving damp, blackened stumps, and an old woman lying on the ground, bleeding as you bled just now.”

Vaelin rubbed his hands together, trying to keep the chatter from his teeth. “D-did she live?”

Dahrena gave a small smile and nodded. “Just one more season. To the best of my knowledge she never used her gift again. It was strange but the summer ended that day, rain and wind replacing sun and heat until autumn brought golden relief. She told me she had tipped the balance too far and it would take time for the scales to right themselves.”

Dahrena extended a hand towards the fire, fingers wide in the warmth. “Our gifts are us, my lord. They do not come from elsewhere, they are as much a part of your being as your thoughts or your senses, and like any other action they require fuel, fuel that burns with the use, as this fire will burn until it’s nothing but ash.” She withdrew her hand, her face serious. “As First Counsel, I ask that you exercise greater care in future.”

“S-something comes,” he stammered, clenching his teeth in frustration. “My song brings warning.”

“Warning of what?”

Lyrna’s face . . . The song like a scream . . .

He closed his eyes against the vision, fearing the song would return, knowing he wouldn’t survive another verse. “I don’t kn-know. B-but there is one amongst the gifted who may, one who lives at the p-place they call the Dark Clave . . . A man named Harlick.”

She wanted him to spend the next day resting but he refused, clamping himself to Flame’s saddle and staying there by sheer effort of will, though Captain Orven had to reach out and steady him a few times. The guardsman was clearly disconcerted by his Tower Lord’s sudden and unexplained illness but wise enough not to voice any unwelcome questions. Insha ka Forna however, felt no such restraint, offering several caustic observations to Dahrena throughout the day. He thought it best not to ask for a translation, though from the discomfort on Orven’s face, it seemed his knowledge of the Eorhil language had grown considerably.

The chill had begun to abate by midday, and by the time they made camp all trace of the tremble had disappeared. But the vision lingered, the princess’s face capturing his thoughts with maddening compulsion. Throughout his captivity he had never sought her out when he sang, more through indifference than spite. His anger towards her had faded that day on the Linesh docks, but he never grew any more regard for her than his already healthy respect for the sharpness of her mind. Her ambition had been too great, the crime they shared too terrible to allow for affection or friendship. There were times though, when he felt the song tug at him, singing the tune he recalled from his last vision of her, when she had wept, alone with no-one to see. But he had always resisted the song’s call, concentrating instead on Frentis and, occasionally, Sherin. Finding no more than the vaguest glimpses of the former and increasingly dim visions of the latter.

Is it because she feels our love gone? he often wondered. He understood now the blood-song was not limitless, that he could seek out only those he knew, those who had touched his soul somehow, and even then the clarity of the vision varied. His first visions of Sherin had been bright and clear, like looking through well-polished glass, gradually becoming more opaque as time passed. His last glimpse had seen her alongside Ahm Lin, standing in a courtyard set within a house of completely unfamiliar design, exchanging words with a man in plain clothing, unarmed but exuding a warrior’s nature. Vaelin saw how the man tried to hide his regard for Sherin, but it was clearly considerable from the way his eyes tracked her. Vaelin knew his own face had once held a near-exact expression. The vision faded, leaving hurt and regret in its wake. He didn’t search for her again for almost a year, and when he did all he could find was a sensation of clear air and great height, as if she stood atop a mountain . . . That and something more; she had been happy.

The journey to the place Sister Virula called the Dark Clave, and Dahrena called Nehrin’s Point, took the best part of another week, tracking through mountain and forest. They took hospitality from a few settlements along the way, Vaelin gaining an appreciation of the hardships and rewards on offer to those who chose to make a life in the Reaches.

“Came north four years ago, m’lord,” a gap-toothed Asraelin bargeman told him at Lowen’s Cove, a small port serving the mines some forty miles south of Mirror Sound. “Worked barges on the Brinewash from a boy, till the Fleet Lord scooped me up for my three years under the King’s flag. Half the fleet’s gone now, sold off to settle the war debts. Got left on the quay with no more than the shirt on my back, worked passage on a freighter to the Reaches. Came ashore penniless, now I got a wife, son, house and third share in my own barge.”

“You don’t miss the Realm?” Vaelin asked.

“What’s there to miss? There a man is born to his station, here he makes his own. And the air.” The bargeman put his head back and breathed in deeply. “It’s clearer, sweeter. In the Realm I was always choking.”

Nehrin’s Point sat on a promontory overlooking a sickle-shaped bay where waves pounded a beach of white sand. There were perhaps forty houses, well-built with thick stone walls against the sea-borne wind. They arrived in late afternoon when a stream of children were emerging from one of the larger buildings. There was no sign of any Faith presence or guard house.

Vaelin made for the large building where a blond, bearded man played with an equally blond boy of no more than six years age. The boy was throwing stones at the blond man, his small hands plucking them from a pile at his feet, the man batting them away with a stick. Despite his age the boy had a good arm, his throws fast and precise, but the blond man smacked every stone from the air with unerring precision as the stick moved in a blur, stopping as he caught sight of Vaelin, giving a pained grunt as one of the boy’s stones thumped into his chest.

“Got you, Father!” the boy yelped, jumping with excitement. “Got you! Got you!”

Vaelin dismounted a short distance away, walking towards the blond man who dropped his stick and ran to embrace him.

“Brother,” Vaelin said.

“Brother.” Nortah laughed. “I could hardly believe it was true, but here you are.”

Vaelin drew back, seeing the curious stare of the boy, and the settlers beyond who had all paused to take in the sight of the Tower Lord. The blood-song’s note of recognition grew loud in proximity to so many gifted.

“Artis,” Nortah told the boy. “Give greeting to your uncle Vaelin.”

The boy stared for a few seconds more then gave an awkward bow. “Uncle.”

Vaelin returned the bow, feeling the song’s volume dip a little. The boy has no gift. “Nephew. I see you have your father’s arm.”

“You should see him with a sling,” Nortah said. He turned to bow as Dahrena joined them. “My lady. Your visit is welcome, as always.”

“Teacher,” she replied, returning the bow.

“There was talk of the Horde,” Nortah said. “My fellow townsfolk were concerned.”

“It wasn’t the Horde,” she replied. “Just starving people in search of refuge. Which the Tower Lord provided.”

“Cheated of battle, brother?” Nortah enquired, a small glint in his eye. “That must have been a bitter pill.”

“One I swallowed happily.”

Nortah’s gaze went to the canvas bundle hanging from Vaelin’s saddle. His eyes narrowed but he didn’t press the matter. “Come, come.” He turned, beckoning them to follow, taking Artis’s hand. “Sella will be anxious to see you.”

They found Sella hanging freshly washed sheets on a rope fixed to the side of a single-storey house. Nearby a girl of about four sat astride a huge cat which padded back and forth, the girl giggling as she bounced on its back. The horses began to fidget in alarm as the cat bared its daggerlike fangs. Vaelin and Dahrena dismounted and he ordered Orven to make camp a good distance away.

Sella came to him with a bright smile, gloved hands touching his in welcome. She was as lovely as he remembered, though considerably more pregnant, her dress billowing in the wind around the bulge of her belly. Twins, her hands said as she tracked his gaze. Boy and girl. The boy will be named Vaelin.

“Oh, don’t curse him with that,” he said, squeezing her hand.

Never a curse. Always blessing. She extended a hand to Dahrena who came forward to take it. “It’s been far too long.”

Snowdance came padding up, grown to full size since the fallen city, pressing her great head against Vaelin’s side, purring like distant thunder as he played a hand through her fur. The little girl on her back stared up at Vaelin in wide-eyed curiosity. The blood-song stirred in recognition and he felt a sudden tumble of images in his head, toys and sweets and laughter and tears . . . He grunted, blinking in discomfort.

Sella clapped her hands and the images faded. The little girl pouting a little as her mother wagged a finger at her. Apologies, her hands said to Vaelin. Her way of saying hello. Doesn’t realise not everyone can do what she can.

Vaelin crouched down, coming level with the girl’s gaze. “I’m your uncle Vaelin,” he said. “Who are you?”

A murmur in his mind, soft and shy. Lohren.

Sella clapped her hands again and the girl frowned and spoke in a sullen voice, “Lohren.”

“I’m very pleased to meet you, Lohren.”

“I had a dream once,” she said, smiling broadly. “I saw you on a beach, it was nighttime and you were killing a man with an axe.”

Sella took her hand and tugged her from Snowdance’s back, her free hand making the sign for food as she pulled her daughter towards the house.

“Don’t worry,” Nortah said. “You should hear the dreams she has about me.”

Sella gave them fish pie and potatoes cooked in an onion broth whilst Nortah related the tale of their journey from the fallen city to the Reaches. “Took us the best part of four months, and not all made it.”

“The Lonak?” Vaelin asked.

“No, curiously they never troubled us. It was the cold, the winter came early, caught us on the plains. If not for the Eorhil we’d surely have starved. Gifted folk can do many things, but they can’t conjure food from thin air. The Eorhil fed us and guided us to the tower where Fief Lord Al Myrna, thanks to the Lady Dahrena’s kind influence, saw fit to grant us tenancy of the long-unused settlement at Nehrin’s Point.”

“Your mother and your sisters?” Vaelin asked.

Nortah’s face clouded. “Mother had passed the year before we arrived, my sisters . . .” He trailed off and Sella clasped his hand. “Well, not everyone is able to master their fear of the Dark. Hearing your niece’s voice in your head before she’s old enough to talk can be a little disconcerting. Hulla is married to a North Guard sergeant, Kerran a merchant. They live in North Tower and don’t feel obliged to visit.”

Vaelin finished his meal before broaching another subject. “Is Harlick still with you?”

“In a manner of speaking,” Nortah replied. “Lives by himself in a hut on the beach, scribbling away from dawn to dusk. Never lets anyone read whatever it is he writes though. Most are content to leave him be, except for Weaver. Trades the baskets he makes for food to keep them both fed.”

Vaelin pushed back from the table. “I and the lady must speak with him, if you’ll excuse us.”

You’ll stay with us tonight, Sella signed. We have room.

The house was certainly large enough to accommodate several visitors. Nortah had described how it had been built by an exile from the Alpiran Empire who saw fit to continue his tribal tradition of keeping multiple wives.

“He hit one of them,” Lohren chipped in. “Hit her hard, and made the other ladies angry. They all stabbed him.” She took a firm grip of her fork and began to thrust it into a bread roll. “Stab! Stab! Stab!” She stopped with an annoyed grimace when Sella clapped her hands again.

“I should be glad to stay,” Vaelin told Sella, turning to Dahrena. “If my lady would care for a walk on the beach?”

“I’ve seen war, inferno and the souls of murderous men,” Dahrena commented as they strolled along the sand to Harlick’s hut. Night was coming on and the surf was high, her hair an inky tumble in the wind. “But that little girl scares me more than all of it combined.”

“Such power is bound to breed fear,” Vaelin assented. “Her gift will be hard to bear as she grows older.”

“At least now she has a gifted uncle to help protect her.”

“That she does.”

“How many years since you last saw the teacher?”

“Why do you call him that?”

“It’s the only name he gives himself, and it’s what he does. Every day save one, the children gather in his school. Some of the adults too, those that have trouble with numbers or letters. He teaches them all, and well. In his own way he’s gifted too.”

He recalled Nortah’s patience with Dentos before the Test of Knowledge, his ability to get Frentis to sit still for instruction and the rapidity with which he had trained the Wolfrunners’ company of archers. All those years a teacher at heart. Had he stayed with the Order no doubt he would have been Master of the Bow in time. “It must be over eight years,” he said. “Since the fallen city. It’s good to see them settled here.”

“There were those who counselled my father to send them on their way,” she said. “The Eorhil had been free in describing their abilities, arousing the fears of the Realm folk.”

“But he listened to you.”

“In truth I think he would have granted them sanctuary in any case. He had the kind of heart that couldn’t pass up a generous deed.”

Her words brought unwelcome memories of Sherin and he was pleased to find them nearing the hut. It was a ramshackle structure of driftwood with a slate roof and a stove-pipe chimney. There were no windows but a glow of candlelight emanated from the half-open door. A broad-shouldered man in a sleeveless jerkin sat on the sand outside, his curly blond hair ruffled by the wind as he worked, muscular arms flexing as his deft hands intertwined broad-bladed sea grass. A pile of completed baskets lay in the lee of the hut.

“Weaver,” Vaelin greeted him. “Good to see you again, sir.”

The broad, handsome face looked up, a faint smile curling the lips. The blue eyes tracked from Vaelin to Dahrena, blinked and returned to the work in hand. “Not hurt,” he said.

The door creaked, opening to reveal a slightly built man with long ash-grey hair, and a less-than-welcoming expression. “What do you want?” he asked Vaelin. His voice was hard with resentment, possibly at their intrusion or perhaps the fear Vaelin had induced at their last meeting.

“Same as before, brother,” Vaelin told him. “Answers to difficult questions.”

Harlick shook his head, turning back inside. “I have no answers for you. Just let me be . . .”

“Your Aspect would disagree, I think.” Harlick paused and Vaelin continued, “I met him recently. Your name came up. Would you like to know the context?”

The librarian sighed through gritted teeth and went back inside, leaving the door open. Vaelin bowed to Dahrena, “My lady, shall we?”

Harlick’s hut was furnished with a simple table, chair and narrow cot. An iron stove stood in the corner, a recently boiled kettle steaming atop the hob. The table was piled high with parchment, several quills scattered about the pages amongst inkpots, most empty. By far the most salient feature of the hut, however, was the scrolls, stacked against the far wall, twenty high from floor to ceiling.

“Do you forget them?” Vaelin asked. “Once you’ve written them down?”

Harlick made a harsh grating noise that might have been a laugh as he moved towards the stove.

“I am remiss, my lady,” Vaelin said. “Allow me to present Brother Harlick of the Seventh Order, former scholar to the Great Library in Varinshold. Brother, this is the Lady Dahrena Al Myrna, First Counsel to the North Tower.”

Harlick offered Dahrena a shallow bow. “My lady. Please forgive the meanness of my home. I have freshly brewed tea if you would care for some.”

Dahrena returned the bow with a polite smile. “Another time, sir.”

“Just as well.” Harlick lifted the kettle from the hob. “I only have enough for one more cup.” He spooned some leaves from a clay pot into a small porcelain cup and poured in the water.

“Your Aspect had a story to tell,” Vaelin said. “About a forest and a dead boy.”

He was impressed by the absence of a tremble in Harlick’s hand as he stirred the tea leaves. He did, however, cast a guarded look at Dahrena.

“I hold no secrets from this lady,” Vaelin told him.

Harlick sighed and shook his head. “You are a liar, my lord. We all hold secrets. I expect the lady has a whole bushel of her own, and I’m certain you do.”

He’s different, Vaelin decided. Lost his fear somehow. His gaze wandered to the scrolls covering the far wall. Something he read perhaps?

“Tell me,” Harlick said, sitting on the only chair and sipping his tea. “Did my Aspect give you a message for me? A command to answer your questions?”

“No,” Vaelin replied. “But he did tell me your mission here was not some sacred trust. You do not enjoy his favour. You are lucky, in fact, to be alive, and this”-he cast his gaze around the hut-“is your punishment. You are in exile.”

“As are you.” Harlick sounded weary, putting his cup aside and reclining in his seat. “If you’re here for vengeance, just get it done. My actions may have been misguided but they were driven by honest and unselfish intent.”

For the first time in years Vaelin felt a true anger building in his breast. “Misguided? You set assassins to kill me in the Urlish. Instead they killed my brother. A boy of just twelve years. They cut his head from his shoulders. Were you there for that? Did you linger to see the results of your unselfish intent?”

“My lord,” Dahrena said in a quiet voice and Vaelin realised he was advancing on the scholar, fists clenched.

Harlick merely stared up at him, face impassive save for a mild curiosity.

Vaelin took a deep breath and stepped back, forcing his hands open. “You know of my gift?” he asked when his breathing had calmed enough to speak in an even voice.

“Manifestations Volume One,” Harlick recited in a flat tone. “Index Four, Column One. All known instances recorded amongst the Seordah, none concurrent. Seordah name translates as ‘Song of Blood’ or ‘Blood Song’ depending on inflection. Known manifestations in the Realm at the time of writing: none. All detected manifestations to be reported to the Aspect with extreme urgency.” He met Vaelin’s eyes then spoke on. “Addendum: known manifestations in the Realm: One.”

“When?” Vaelin asked. “When did you know?”

“Before you did, I expect. The prophecy was unusually unambiguous. ‘Born of the healer and the Lord of Battle.’ Who else could it be?”

“And what else did this prophecy tell you?”

“‘He will fall to the One Who Waits under a desert moon and his song be claimed by reborn malice.’” Harlick took another sip of tea. “I was not prepared to see that happen.”

“The Aspect told me there was another prophecy, one not quite so pessimistic. One you chose not to believe.”

“We all make choices. Some are harder than others.”

“So you hired assassins to prevent the prophecy’s ever coming true.”

“How would I go about hiring assassins? A scholar of the Grand Library is not so resourceful, especially since I knew my Aspect would be unsympathetic to my intent. But as it transpired, research revealed an interested party who had ample knowledge of such matters. A king’s First Minister is required to dirty his hands on numerous occasions, I expect.”

A king’s First Minister . . . “Artis Al Sendahl. Nortah’s father hired the men?”

“And required little persuasion, I assure you. He made a show of reluctance at first but a few whispers of my Dark knowledge and he was all enthusiasm, his duty to the Realm demanded it no less. Plus with the Battle Lord’s boy tragically taken from the Order, there would be no reason to keep his own son shackled to them.”

“But when your scheme failed . . .”

“We had made great efforts to conceal our involvement, but your Order is persistent. It took them two years or more to ferret out the truth, and when they did . . . my Aspect was not pleased. I expect the matter was communicated to the King in due course, hence Lord Al Sendahl’s execution, supposedly on charges of corruption.”

Janus’s words, from years ago: He wasn’t a thief of coin, he was a thief of power. Nortah’s father was executed for exercising the power to kill, a power reserved to the King.

“There was someone else there that night,” he said to Harlick. “The assassins spoke of another one. One they feared. Who was it?”

The scholar sipped some more tea. “I know of no other.” For the first time there was some fear there, just a small flare to the nostrils, a slight twitch to the mouth . . . and a discordant note from the blood-song.

“You know my gift,” Vaelin reminded him.

Harlick put down his tea cup and said nothing. Vaelin felt his fists begin to curl again, knowing he could beat it out of Harlick if he chose to, for all his apparent unconcern the man remained a coward at heart. “There are others,” he said. “Others in the Seventh Order who shared your belief. You did not act alone.” The blood-song’s murmur confirmed it as Harlick maintained his silence. “Even now,” Vaelin went on. “All these years later, you cling to your delusion. That what you did was right.”

“No,” Harlick replied. “All prophecies are false. I see that now. Those with the gift for scrying are usually mad, driven so by the swirl of visions clouding their thoughts and dreams. It is not the future they see, just possibility. And possibility is infinite. Wouldn’t you agree? But for chance it could well have been some malign soul from the Beyond standing before me now, possessing your gift and made Tower Lord no less. Fortune may have proved me wrong, but only by the most slender margin.”

“Not fortune,” Vaelin said. “Blood, most of it innocent, much of it spilled by my hand.”

Harlick gave only a slight nod by way of acknowledgment, regarding Vaelin in resigned expectation. “Thank you for allowing me my tea, my lord.”

Vaelin gave a mirthless laugh. “Oh, I’m not going to kill you, brother. Arrogant wretch though you may be, I have too much use for you. And there is a great deal for you to balance. You are hereby appointed Archivist of the North Tower.” He waved a hand at the hut’s contents, moving to the door. “Gather your things and be ready to leave by morning. We will have much to discuss at the tower. My lady?”

She paused to offer a stunned Harlick a bow of congratulation then followed him from the hut.

“I do not like that man,” she said as they walked back along the beach.

Vaelin glanced back at the hut, seeing the scholar’s wiry figure outlined in the doorway. “I doubt he likes himse-”

It hit him like a hammerblow, the screaming note of the song surging once more to an instant crescendo. He staggered, feeling blood flow from his nose, collapsing to the sand as the scream brought a vision . . . Flame, all is flame, all is pain and fury . . . A man dies, a woman dies, children die . . . And the scream never ends . . . The flames swirl, coalesce, two dark patches appear, forming into eye sockets as the flames shape themselves into a skull, then a face, perfect and beautiful . . . And familiar . . . Lyrna, formed of fire . . . Screaming.