THE SUN DROPPED BEHIND THE PEAKS.
The last rays of warmth touched the earth and only the rosy afterglow of the day remained. From the east, indigo darkness approached rapidly. The wind cut through the hills like a sharp-edged blade, as if spring were only a faintly remembered dream. Winter’s ice still clung to shadow-protected pockets, ice that cracked loudly under the heels of heavy boots. Out of the evening’s darkness three figures entered the firelight.
The old witch looked up, her dark eyes widening slightly at the sight of the three. She knew the figure on the left, the broad, mute warrior with the shaved head and single long scalp lock. He had come once before, seeking magic signs for strange rites. Though he was a powerful chieftain, she had sent him away, for his nature was evil, and while issues of good and evil seldom held any significance for the witch, there were limits even for her. Besides, she had little love for any moredhel, especially one who had cut out his own tongue as a sign of devotion to dark powers.
The mute warrior regarded her with blue eyes, unusual for one of his race. He was broader of shoulder than most, even for one of the mountain clans, who tended to be more powerful of arm and shoulder than their forest-dwelling cousins. The mute wore golden circle rings in his large, upswept ears, painful to affix, as the moredhel had no lobes. Upon each cheek were three scars, mystic symbols whose meaning was not lost upon the witch.
The mute made a sign to his companions, and the one to the far right seemed to nod. It was difficult to judge, for he was clothed in an all-concealing robe, with a deep hood revealing no features. Both hands were hidden in voluminous sleeves that were kept together. As if speaking from a great distance, the cloaked figure said, ‘We seek a reading of signs.’ His voice was sibilant, almost a hiss, and there was a note of something alien in it. One hand appeared and the witch pulled away, for it was misshapen and scaled, as if the owner possessed talons covered with snakeskin. She then knew the creature for what it was: a priest of the Pantathian serpent people. Compared to the serpent people, the moredhel were held in high regard by the witch.
She turned her attention from the end figures and studied the one in the centre. He stood a full head taller than the mute and was even more impressive in bulk. He slowly removed a bearskin robe, the bear’s skull providing a helm for his own head, and cast it aside. The old witch gasped, for he was the most striking moredhel she had seen in her long life. He wore the heavy trousers, jerkin, and knee-high boots of the hill clans, and his chest was bare. His powerfully muscled body gleamed in the firelight, and he leaned forward to study the witch. His face was almost frightening in its near-perfect beauty. But what had caused her to gasp, more than his awesome appearance, was the sign upon his chest.
‘Do you know me?’ he asked the witch.
She nodded. ‘I know who you appear to be.’
He leaned even farther forward, until his face was lit from below by the fire, revealing something in his nature. ‘I am who I appear to be,’ he whispered with a smile. She felt fear, for behind his handsome features, behind the benign smile, she saw the visage of evil, evil so pure it defied endurance. ‘We seek a reading of signs,’ he repeated, his voice the sound of ice-clear madness.
She chuckled. ‘Even one so mighty has limits?’
The handsome moredhel’s smile slowly vanished. ‘One may not foretell one’s own future.’
Resigned to her own likely lot, she said, ‘I require silver.’
The moredhel nodded. The mute dug a coin from out of his belt pouch and tossed it upon the floor before the witch. Without touching it, she prepared some ingredients in a stone cup. When the concoction was ready, she poured it upon the silver. A hissing came, both from the coin and from the serpent man. A green-scaled claw began to make signs, and the witch snapped, ‘None of that nonsense, snake. Your hot-land magic will only cant my reading.’
The serpent man was restrained by a gentle touch and smile from the centre figure, who nodded at the witch.
In croaking tones, her throat dry with fear, the witch said, ‘Say you then truly: What would you know?’ She studied the hissing silver coin, covered now in bubbling green slime.
‘Is it time? Shall I do now that which was ordained?’
A bright green flame sprang from the coin and danced. The witch followed its movement closely, her eyes seeing something within the flame none but she could divine. After a while she said, ‘The Bloodstones form the Cross of Fire. That which you are, you are. That which you are born to do … do!’ The last word was a half-gasp.
Something in the witch’s expression was unexpected, for the moredhel said, ‘What else, crone?’
‘You stand not unopposed, for there is one who is your bane. You stand not alone, for behind you … I do not understand.’ Her voice was weak, faint.
‘What?’ The moredhel showed no smile this time.
‘Something … something vast, something distant, something evil.’
The moredhel paused to consider; turning to the serpent man, he spoke softly yet commandingly. ‘Go then, Cathos. Employ your arcane skills and discover where this seat of weakness lies. Give a name to our enemy. Find him.’
The serpent man bowed awkwardly and shambled out of the cave. The moredhel turned to his mute companion and said, ‘Raise the standards, my general, and gather the loyal clans upon the plains of Isbandia, beneath the towers of Sar-Sargoth. Raise highest that standard I have chosen for my own, and let all know we begin that which was ordained. You shall be my battlemaster, Murad, and all shall know you stand highest among my servants. Glory and greatness now await.
‘Then, when the mad snake has identified our quarry, lead forth the Black Slayers. Let those whose souls are mine serve us by seeking out our enemy. Find him! Destroy him! Go!’
The mute nodded once and left the cave. The moredhel with the sign on his chest faced the witch. ‘Then, human refuse, do you know what dark powers move?’
‘Aye, messenger of destruction, I know. By the Dark Lady, I know.’
He laughed, a cold humourless sound. ‘I wear the sign,’ he said, pointing to the purple birthmark upon his chest, which seemed to glow angrily in the firelight. It was clear that his was no simple disfigurement but some sort of magic talisman, for it formed a perfect silhouette of a dragon in flight. He raised his finger, pointing upwards. ‘I have the power.’ He made a circular motion with his upraised finger. ‘I am the foreordained. I am destiny.’
The witch nodded, knowing death raced to embrace her. She suddenly mouthed a complex incantation, her hands moving furiously through the air. A gathering of power manifested itself in the cave and a strange keening filled the night. The warrior before her simply shook his head. She cast a spell at him, one that should have withered him where he stood. He remained, grinning at her evilly. ‘You seek to test me with your puny arts, seer?’
Seeing no effect, she slowly closed her eyes and sat erect, awaiting her fate. The moredhel pointed his finger at her and a silver shaft of light came forth, striking the witch. She shrieked in agony, then exploded into white-hot fire. For an instant her dark form writhed within the inferno, then the flames vanished.
The moredhel cast a quick glance at the ashes upon the floor, forming the outline of a body. With a deep laugh he gathered up his robe and left the cave.
Outside, his companions waited, holding his horse. Far below he could see the camp of his band, still small but destined to grow. He mounted and said, ‘To Sar-Sargoth!’ With a jerk on the reins he spun his horse and led the mute and the serpent priest down the hillside.
• CHAPTER ONE •
Reunion
THE SHIP SPED HOME.
The wind changed quarter and the captain’s voice rang out; aloft, his crew scrambled to answer the demands of a freshening breeze and a captain anxious to get safely to port. He was a seasoned sailingmaster, nearly thirty years in the King’s navy, and seventeen years commanding his own ship. And the Royal Eagle was the best ship in the King’s fleet, but still the captain wished for just a little more wind, just a little more speed, since he would not rest until his passengers were safely ashore.
Standing upon the foredeck were the reasons for the captain’s concern, three tall men. Two, one blond and one dark, were standing at the rail, sharing a joke, for they both laughed. Each stood a full four inches over six feet, and each carried himself with the sure step of a fighting man or hunter. Lyam, King of the Kingdom of the Isles, and Martin, his elder brother and Duke of Crydee, spoke of many things, of hunting and feasting, of travel and politics, of war and discord, and occasionally they spoke of their father, Duke Borric.
The third man, not as tall or as broad of shoulder as the other two, leaned against the rail a short way off, lost in his own thoughts. Arutha, Prince of Krondor and youngest of the three brothers, also dwelt upon the past, but his vision was not of the father killed during the war with the Tsurani, in what was now being called the Riftwar. Instead he watched the bow wake of the ship as it sliced through emerald-green waters, and in that green he saw two sparkling green eyes.
The captain cast a glance aloft, then ordered the sails trimmed. Again he took note of the three men upon the foredeck and again he gave a silent prayer to Kilian, Goddess of Sailors, and wished Rillanon’s tall spires were in sight. For those three were the three most powerful and important men in the Kingdom, and the sailingmaster refused to think of the chaos that would befall the Kingdom should any ill chance visit his ship.
Arutha vaguely heard the captain’s shouts and the replies of his mates and crew. He was fatigued by the events of the last year, so he paid little attention to what was occurring about him. He could keep his thoughts only upon one thing: he was returning to Rillanon, and to Anita.
Arutha smiled to himself. His life had seemed unremarkable for the first eighteen years. Then the Tsurani invasion had come and the world had been forever changed. He had come to be counted one of the finest commanders in the Kingdom, had discovered an unsuspected eldest brother in Martin, and had seen a thousand horrors and miracles. But the most miraculous thing that had happened to Arutha had been Anita.
They had been parted after Lyam’s coronation. For nearly a year Lyam had been displaying the royal banner to both eastern lords and neighbouring kings, and now they were returning home.
Lyam’s voice cut through Arutha’s reverie. ‘What see you in the wave’s sparkle, little brother?’
Martin smiled as Arutha looked up, and the former Huntmaster of Crydee, once called Martin Longbow, nodded towards his youngest brother. ‘I wager a year’s taxes he sees a pair of green eyes and a pert smile in the waves.’
Lyam said, ‘No wager, Martin. Since we departed Rillanon I’ve had three messages from Anita on some matter or other of state business. All conspire to keep her in Rillanon while her mother returned to their estates a month after my coronation. Arutha, by rough estimate, has averaged better than two messages a week from her the entire time. One might draw a conclusion or two from that.’
‘I’d be more than anxious to return if I had someone of her mettle waiting for me,’ agreed Martin.
Arutha was a private person, ill humoured when it came to revealing deep feelings, and he was doubly sensitive to any question involving Anita. He was impossibly in love with the slender young woman, intoxicated with the way she moved, the way she sounded, the way she looked at him. And while these were possibly the only two men on all Midkemia to whom he felt close enough to share his feelings, he had never, even as a boy, shown good grace when he felt he was the butt of a jest.
As Arutha’s expression darkened, Lyam said, ‘Put away your black looks, little storm cloud. Not only am I your King, I’m still your older brother and I can box your ears if the need arises.’
The use of the pet name their mother had given him and the improbable image of the King boxing the ears of the Prince of Krondor made Arutha smile slightly. He was silent a moment, then said, ‘I worry I misread her in this. Her letters, while warm, are formal and at times distant. And there are many young courtiers in your palace.’
Martin said, ‘From the moment we escaped from Krondor, your fate was sealed, Arutha. She’s had you in her bow mark from the first, like a hunter drawing down on a deer. Even before we reached Crydee, when we were hiding out, she’d look at you in a certain way. No, she’s waiting for you, have no doubt.’
‘Besides,’ added Lyam, ‘you’ve told her how you feel.’
