Daughter of Dragons (Kaunovalta, Book III)

By D. Alexander Neill

5 Stars - "Great series that really captures the mythology and religion of the ancients. Wonderfully developed story and characters."

Lost in the depths of Dweorgaheim, surrounded by foes, Ally finds friends and allies in unexpected places. As she struggles to reach Underdarrow and the First Forge in order to keep her oath, names from her past reappear to aid her. Locked in a duel to the death with the unchecked hordes of an abomination from beyond the walls of the world, Ally struggles with love and loss, and understands at last the nature and limitless scope of the power that lies within her. Denying that power could be as hazardous and as costly as allowing it to burn bright, and wielding it to drive away the darkness that has poisoned the Deeprealm and threatens to tear the world asunder.

• Language: English
• Publisher: D. Alexander Neill
• Release date: Aug 3, 2012
• ISBN: 9780988142138

D. Alexander Neill

D. Alexander Neill is the nom-de-plume of Donald A. Neill. A retired Army officer and strategic analyst, Don is a graduate of the Royal Military College of Canada (D.E.C. 1986 and BA 1989), the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs (MA 1991), and the University of Kent at Canterbury (Ph.D. 2006). He began writing fiction as a creative outlet in Grade 6, managing to overcome devastating reviews of his first novel, which he wrote in 2H pencil in seven taped-together college-ruled notebooks. He initially chose the fantasy genre because he was sucked into it at the age of 11 by the irresistible double sucker-punch of The Hobbit and Star Wars, never managed to escape, and eventually gave up trying. He intends to branch out into other fictional fields of endeavour, but will always return to Anuru, where – Allfather willing – there will always be at least one more story waiting to be told. Don has been married for 20 years to a Valkyrie, and has two children, both of whom resemble her in temperament and, fortunately, looks.

Book preview

The Chronicles of Anuru

Kaunovalta, Book III

♦

DAUGHTER OF DRAGONS

♦

by D. Alexander Neill

2nd Edition

© Copyright D. Alexander Neill, 2012

ISBN 978-0-9881421-3-8 (Smashwords Edition)

License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy.

Thank you for respecting the hard work of the author.

♦♦♦

Table of Contents

The Story Thus Far...

Map of Ally’s Journey

Chapter 12 ♦ The Spellweaver’s Tomb

Chapter 13 ♦ Cousin of the Shadows

Chapter 14 ♦ Loss

Chapter 15 ♦ The Bridge of Bones

Chapter 16 ♦ Underdarrow

Chapter 17 ♦ Blood and Stone

Chapter 18 ♦ Scion of the Void

Chapter 19 ♦ Kaunovalta

Chapter 20 ♦ The Elf-Maid Redeemer

Epilogue ♦ The Apotheosis of Miros

Appendix 1: Songs and Poems

Appendix 2: Dramatis Personae

Other books by D. Alexander Neill

♦♦♦

The story thus far...

Our tale begins with the beginnings of the world itself – how the Powers of Light and Darkness came into being and, from the chaos of the Void, created the Universe, forging the walls of Evertime to differentiate the Made from the Unmade. We learned of the Sacrifice of Miros, an event lost in the depths of time, when an elf-woman of the ancient world made a pact with a dragon, acquiring from him knowledge of the Art Magic, and setting into motion a chain of events that echo down through history, even to the present.

Our story takes place some six thousand years after Miros lived and died. Allymynorkarel Aiyellohax – ‘Ally’ to her friends, and ‘Hax’ to everyone else – is a high-born elf-maid of the Third House, the so called ‘High elves’, the younger daughter of Duke Kaltas of Eldisle; a skilled swordswoman and unwilling sorceress who has difficulty controlling her inborn powers, and who we meet just as she is arriving in the elven capital of Starmeadow. Ally is a child of the Duodeci, the ‘divine Twelve’ – the noblest families of the elves, descended in lineage direct line from the ancient High King, Tior. Tior, who flourished thousands of years in the past, was himself the grandson of Bræa, the Holy Mother, foremost among the Powers of Light – a goddess who came to earth and took a mortal mate. As it happens, some aspects of Ally’s ancestry are even older.

While delivering a message from her father to her uncle, the Crown Prince, Ally falls into an unfortunate argument her aunt, the Prince’s lifemate, nearly killing the woman with a forbidden spell, one that she was not even aware she knew. Running from the confrontation, Ally stumbles into a fight in the palace grounds. Although she kills a number of the thieves, she is subsequently mistaken for one of them; and, unable to explain her actions and unwilling to face what is likely to be skewed justice, decides to flee the city, taking with her an object dropped by the interlopers – a simple chalice of silver and polished stone.

Escaping royal justice is not easy, even for a seasoned warrior; the Queen has all of the resources of the throne at her fingertips, including the College of Stars, whose diviners could find Ally in a matter of moments, and dispatch soldiers (or assassins) by magical means to recover what she has stolen. She keeps moving, by sea and by land, until she finds herself in the hinterlands of a far-distant kingdom of men. She loses her horse to roaming creatures of the night, and while tracking them down, comes upon a diverse party of mercenaries. She joins them for purposes of transportation and learns that they are members of a secret order that supposedly serves dragons. Three of their number are particularly interesting: Qaramyn Lux, a mage of the book of human descent, is friendly enough, but is entirely focussed on increasing his own power; Joraz Tyrellianus, a warrior who seeks peace and fights without weapons, is placid and an easy listener; and Breygon of Æryn, a woodsman of great skill but short temper, who has little time for her naive impressions of life beyond the borders of the elven homelands. His mixed parentage – his mother, she learns, was an exiled elf, and his father a human – makes him a mongrel in the eyes of her people. Despite that fact – or perhaps because if it – Ally finds him oddly compelling.

Fearing pursuit and unable to comprehend why she has not yet been apprehended, Ally leaves her new companions behind and carries on to the north. On Qaramyn’s advice, she makes for the Deeprealm – Dweorgaheim, the ancient kingdom of the dwarves – because for centuries that subterranean world of wonders has been warded against arcane travel. In the course of her journey she meets a trio of dwarves returning to their homeland – Frideswide, a priestess of Khallach the Stoneteacher; Wynstan, her husband, a retired warrior of the Iron Fury, the guardians of the dwarves’ holy places of the ; and Uchtred, an engineer, inventor, and business partner of the first two. When her new friends discover her destination, they invite Ally to join them, and she does so – a magnanimous gesture, as all three dwarves are old enough to remember the attack on the Deeprealm sixty years ago by the Spellweaver. The sorcerer-king of the dark elves, a master of the arts of undeath, killed thousands of dwarves and wrecked the royal city of Thrymsheen before being beaten in personal combat by a company of adventurers that included the legendary warrior Farulf Ironfist; an elven mage called Ven Porwenna; and Darhaxin Deephammer, now the Arch-Priest of the Deeprealm. Frideswide, Wynstan and Uchtred all recall those dark days, and the heroes that delivered Dweorgaheim from the grip of the invader.

When they enter the Deeprealm at the city of Eastgate, Ally begins to realize that all of her preconceptions about the dwarves and their kingdom have been grossly mistaken. The elves tend to dismiss their stubby cousins as little more than miners, blacksmiths and tinkers, but Ally’s new friends show her a vast world of wonder and magnificence beneath the mountains: long, die-straight highways, enormous underground cities, and civic works of staggering magnitude. Ally cannot help but begin to question some of the other things she thought she knew.

After this staggering introduction to the world beneath the mountains, Ally, accompanied by her new friends, travels from Eastgate to Stonewisdom. While en route, she realizes that the goblet she acquired by chance during the abortive burglary at the palace in Starmeadow is in fact one of the ‘Jewels’ of the royal treasury: the Stone Chalice, a holy artefact crafted by the dwarf-god Lagu, one of the Powers of Light, to celebrate his sister Bræa’s marriage more than five thousand years earlier. The ‘Digger’s Cup’ (as it is called, somewhat derisively, by the elves) has been a point of contention between elf and dwarf for all that time – and Ally has unwittingly brought it back to the Deeprealm. Unsure of what to do, but certain in her trust for her newfound friends, she reveals the Cup to Frida, and tells the priestess that she wants to give it back to her masters, the dwarven clergy – not only to throw any potential pursuers off her trail, but also in gratitude for the kindness they have shown her. Frida, overcome by the generosity of Ally’s offer, suggests that they continue to Thrymsheen, the royal city of the Deeprealm, and consult with Elder Brightly, the King’s closest advisor. Brightly, Frida believes, should be able to gain an audience for Ally with Darhaxin Deephammer, the High Priest of Lagu and Arch-Priest of the Deeprealm, in the holy city of Underdarrow, just beyond Thrymsheen. This could be a challenge as, according to rumour, the great gate of Underdarrow has been shut (ostensibly by Deephammer himself) and no one, not the Spellweaver or even the god Lagu himself, has ever able to open the Underdarrow Gate uninvited.

At Stonewisdom, Ally and her friends stay with another business partner – Bedwulf, an artisan, and his wife Eanfled, formerly one of the ‘stonewives’, a sect of dwarf-maidens dedicated to the worship of Khallach. Ally spends a great deal of time coming to grips not only with the nature of life in the Deeprealm, but also with the sophistication of the dwarves and their hospitality and overt friendliness – all of which are a far cry from the politics, petty intrigue and easy virtue of the High Court of the elves. In examining her friends and the things that they believe, she is forced to examine her own beliefs and actions – and doesn’t always like what she finds.

Ally’s inner turmoil worsens as she and her companions head deeper into the ancient underground realm of Dweorgaheim. At Dwéorgámen – the foundry city known to the rest of the world as Pleasure-of-Dwarves – she witness feats of ironwork and industry on a scale unimaginable to her kinfolk. Ædeldelf – Elder Delvin, the oldest and greatest of the cities of the Deeprealm – is even more magnificent still: a cavern miles across, home to millions upon millions of dwarves. There they learn that all roads to the capital, Thrymsheen, have been closed. With plans of the city in hand, Ally and her companions negotiate the bowels of its sewer and reservoir system to find a way to their destination, and find instead that not all of the Spellweaver’s army is dead and gone. To save her friends and herself, Ally is forced to draw upon the powers bequeathed to her by her long-vanished mother – and not all of those powers are benign.

Working their way through disused tunnels and caverns, the companions arrive at last at Thrymsheen and find its citizens in full flight. The city is besieged; bands of dwarves, wronged by some unspeakable evil, roam the streets, killing at will. Ally and Frida, shielded by the elf-girl’s magic, locate the palace of the King, only to learn that Brightly has been killed. Escaping to rejoin Wynstan and Uchtred, Frida and Ally decide to press on, making for Underdarrow, in hopes of finding Deephammer – no longer merely to return the Cup, but also to learn what has happened to the High Priest, and to the wronged folk of Dweorgaheim.

Bypassing the sealed gate and the eyes of the Iron Fury, the companions continue. Ally is forced again to make use of her darker powers, costing her the trust of her companions. Nearing Underdarrow, the dwarves offer to show her the wonders of Waterdeep, where the Spellweaver was vanquished by heroes from the upper world; and the Barrow of Bowrnleoch, the ancient, carefully-warded tomb where the heroes of the Deeprealm are remembered in imperishable stone. There, Ally learns a terrible truth: that Ven Porwenna, the mage who helped to defeat the Spellweaver, and the only elf ever to be memorialized in the Barrow, is none other than her long-vanished mother.

Confronted by the ghosts of her past, Ally succumbs to the darkness and is taken captive by demonic minions of the Spellweaver who appear to have survived their master’s fall. Imprisoned in the shadows, at the mercy of a pitiless foe, and overwhelmed by the ancient evil consuming the folk of the Deeprealm that she has come to cherish, Ally has no recourse, no hope of relief, nothing to fall back on but the iron in her spirit, the memories of her family and friends – and the untapped might that is the legacy of her ancestry, of a bloodline that stretches back through her long-lost mother and into the mists of the ancient world, and that has always lain at the heart of all that she is and all that she may one day become:

A warrior; a sorceress; and a daughter of dragons.

♦♦♦

Chapter 12: The Spellweaver’s Tomb

There was something intoxicating about the ring of steel on steel – a poisonous fascination in the subtle, slithering dance of the gracilensis. No vast sweeps, no clash of blades against shields. The two opponents stalked each other clad only in lightly-padded arming coats.

It was not play, precisely, for the pair were deadly serious in their mirror-perfect footwork and the lightning exchange of thrust and parry, but neither was it work such as they were accustomed to. Now that mid-summer’s hot westerly winds had come, Lallakentan – their arms-master since Sylloallen’s departure, three hands of years past – had decreed that helm and harness would be laid aside until his students had mastered the lighter duelling sword of the court.

When some high-born horse’s ass challenges you at meat, had come the growl, you’ll not have time to send for squires, cuirass and great-sword. If you don’t want to defend yourself with your fish-knife, you’d best learn the prince’s blade.

The taller of the pair – a boy teetering on the brink of manhood – had a marvellously light step. Both were talented dancers, but the lad’s greater weight served him better on the stones of the courtyard. This, combined with his advantage in reach, made life difficult for his female opponent. In the past, Ally had always been able to rely on her superior speed and finer control over the movements of her blade; but time was fast erasing her advantage. No amount of skill was sufficient to make up for weaker wrists – a point that was driven home (so to speak) when the lad feinted a thrust, batted her parry aside and, in an insilio so effortless that he seemed to be floating, drove his blade into her breastbone.

The girl grunted, half in embarrassment and half in pain. The coronel on weapon’s tip had blunted the force of the blow, to be sure; but her opponent had caught her lunging in for a riposte, and the combined force of the impact rocked her back on her heels.

That’s going to leave a bruise, Ally thought glumly, cursing her bad judgement under her breath. The saltatio limenis – her first official appearance as a lady, the ceremony of passing without-the-walls that she had so long awaited – would take place that very evening. Her father, in an admirable victory over his innate conservatism and paternal instincts, had procured for her a gown from Astrapratum – a fashionably revealing thing that had no doubt cost a fortune. It certainly wouldn’t cover what was guaranteed to be a glorious green-black contusion in the precise centre of her décolletage.

Coughing slightly, she held up her left hand to indicate a hit. "Ictus!"

Ally, I’m sorry, Palkywan cried, rushing forward. Are you all right?

I’m fine, she said, waving him back. And I’m about to pay you back, so find your footing and make you ready. She resumed her stance, blade and right foot advanced, wrist cocked in prime, knees bent.

He did not. Don’t play the hero, he said quietly. That hurt. I could feel it in my wrist.

Yes, it definitely left a mark, Ally replied. In a teasing tone, she added, But you’re the one who’s going to have to look at it all night, not I.

Palkywan – to whom she had, after months of impassioned pleading, accorded the honour of standing as her satelles, her official escort at the evening’s ball – thought about that for an instant. Then he simultaneously reddened and blanched.

Good. I’ll take any advantage I can get.

A moment later, she thought grimly, I have to. He’s getting better.

It seemed as though she did everything grimly these days. Something had changed in her disposition, a transformation so slow and so subtle that she hadn’t noticed it. Nor, indeed, had most of those who knew her. Young Ally, the Duke’s daughter, had evolved into your Ladyship, and then into the young Duchess, and then into your Grace so gradually that it seemed almost normal – despite the fact that, by ancient tradition, formal titles were never accorded anyone who had not yet reached their majority.

With Allymynorkarel, daughter of Kaltas, however, no one seemed to give the new modes of address a second thought. Nor had her father issued any special orders on her behalf. It was almost as though she had grown into the titles – and that her acquaintances, having noticed that the self-conscious girl they had known had blossomed into a pleasant (if distant and intense) young woman, were responding accordingly.

Ally did not mind the change so much. She found it gratifying to be addressed and treated like an adult, even if the limenis still lay in her future; indeed, she felt that she had begun to merit it. Her mastery of the ars armorum was growing under Lallakentan’s firm tutelage. Syllo had provided her with a solid foundation in the soldierly skills, upon which the elderly arms-master had built an impressive edifice of tactical and theoretical military acumen.

The dissimilarity between the two and their respective approaches to battle had thoroughly surprised her – at least at first. Sylloallen, a warrior before all else, had turned the uncertain young girl into a gifted swordswoman through a combination of classical exercises and devastatingly precise technique. He had struggled to instil in her the same sense of honour and fair play that guided his every action. But he had always been a solitary fighter – a lone wolf who, though skilled in the fighting arts, had never fought as part of a larger force.

Lallakentan, in stark contrast, had been in the ranks; a one-time soldier of the Queen, who had borne the chalybs altus, the great glaive of the High Guardsmen, upon a dozen different battlefields – including Duncala, where he had stood back-to-back with the Duke, holding a narrow defile against the Hand knights, earning himself a head wound that had taken his right ear, and that had since been immortalized in story and in song – had led to friendship, and eventually to the offer of employment that had brought Lal to Joyous Light.

Lallakentan had accepted, and had spent the subsequent six decades as Kaltas’ arms-master – terrorizing the serving girls, upbraiding the armourers in sulphurous terms whenever he found a dull blade or a speck of rust, and drilling the novices until they dropped. These latter referred to him as lanista, the ‘trainer of fighters’, whenever there was even the slightest possibility of being overheard. When there wasn’t, they called him languefacius, ‘the exhauster’.

Ally had never indulged in such childish name-calling. She liked the old warrior’s gruff demeanour, in part because his intolerance of foolishness meant that she wasn’t wasting her time, and in part because he was so unlike his predecessor. Much of her grimness, her dedication to her studies, came from her determination to keep herself busy, so as not to think too much about Sylloallen’s long absence.

Fifteen years later, she still missed him. At night, as she lay alone in the darkness, she missed him terribly. The skalds, she had discovered, were liars; time did not ‘all wounds heal’. The hurt he had left behind – the pain of rejection, a desperate longing, a vast, hollow ache in her breast, like an empty well – not only did not wane with time; rather, it seemed to grow.

As the days turned into months and the months became years, Joyous Light – which had scarcely seemed to notice Syllo’s departure in the first place – forgot him. But she did not. The first time Ally had mentioned his name to one of her hand-maidens and received a blank stare in return, she had nearly struck the girl. Later, she realized that it had been more than a decade since his departure. The poor girl, new-come to Eldisle, had never known Sylloallen Avarras.

It was only then that she had realized how deep her pain really went.

She had never mentioned her feelings to her father, sensing that he would misunderstand and dismiss her passion as a childish infatuation. Nor had she spoken of them to Palkywan – not after the first time, a month or so after the paladin’s disappearance, when she had asked her sparring partner if he missed their old teacher. The look that she had received in return suggested that Palkywan had heard something more in her voice than she had intended to confess, and the pain in the boy’s eyes – jealousy, she realized instantly – had been real and immediate. She did not love Palkywan, but she had no wish to hurt him, and so had never spoken to him about Sylloallen again.

No mother; a preoccupied, grieving, unapproachable father; a sister far away, learning the skald’s craft; and no other friend or companion. She had suffered her loss in silence. Little wonder she’d grown distant and grim. At least it’s helped my focus, she thought dourly.

"Ineo!" Lallakentan’s shout brought her thoughts immediately back to the courtyard. She blinked, bringing her blade up in an instinctive parry; but Palkywan wasn’t moving. Perhaps he was regretting the blow he’d landed earlier. I’ll give him something to regret, Ally thought savagely. Drawing her arm back, she stomped lightly with her right foot and leapt forward; a classic adsultus. If his mind were elsewhere, like hers had been, she reasoned, it ought to catch him off guard.

It didn’t. The boy-man’s eyes widened momentarily, then he did what he was supposed to do: drew his forward leg back, slapped the tip of her sword aside with the forte of his own, pivoted deftly on the balls of his feet as she rushed past him, stumbling…and then thwacked her sharply across the arse with the flat of his blade.

The blow took Ally entirely by surprise; her feet tangled, and she crashed face-first into the flagstones.

Almost without a pause, she rolled, gathered her traitorous feet under her, and sprang erect again, her face flaming. The humiliation of her bungled lunge stung worse than the welt he had undoubtedly raised across her posterior. He’s definitely not going to see that one, she resolved coldly.

Lallakentan looked as though he was about to say something, so she raised a hand, shouting, "Ictus!"

You jackass, she added in an angry mutter.

He wanted to play rough? Good. She could play rough, too.

She’d tried the power out on many occasions, but always on her own, where no one else could see. In combat – even mock combat – it would take the utmost calm and concentration. That much she knew. And it required a touch.

Better to let him attack, the Voice advised coolly, and take him as he passes.

Ally set herself, inclining her weight slightly onto her rear leg, inviting just such a lunge as she had executed so disastrously the moment before.

Two to one, Lallakentan announced. Next point takes the match. He crossed his arms, grinning sourly.

Palkywan, expecting a trick after the last two blows he had landed, declined her offer. Ally smiled to herself…then, catching his eye, she winked as slowly and seductively as she could manage.

That did it. The boy grinned, snapping forward with alarming agility. She’d thought she would have plenty of time to react, but his speed was awesome. Sliding back, she parried his blade, just as he had done to her, stepping dexterously aside. But instead of attempting a counterblow, she slid her finger along his hip, and whispered "Väsymysta."

The results were instantaneous. Palkywan stumbled slightly, gasping for breath. As he regained his footing, he glanced back at her, confusion and exhaustion warring in his eyes.

She knew exactly what he felt. She had discovered the spell entirely by accident some months earlier, when attempting to comfort her horse during one of his periodic bouts of enthusiasm. The poor thing had gone from spirited to quivering with exhaustion in the space of two heartbeats, and had nearly fallen over.

Lacking any other means of experimentation, she had then tried the incantation out on herself. The experience had left her utterly drained. Terrified at the results of her own foolish temerity, she had sent Jurissa for wine, but had been asleep by the time her hand-maiden returned to her chambers.

Now, Palkywan looked exactly as she had felt. I guess it works, she thought, suppressing a smile. But did he feel it? Does he suspect…

No point, Lallakentan announced. "Promo, et…ineo!"

He doesn’t realize, Ally grinned tightly. Excellent. Maybe it will work again.

For a long time, she did not get any opportunity to try the spell a second time. Palkywan, breathing hard and looking worn, remained on the defensive. He did not land any blows, but neither did she; he was husbanding his strength, saving it for parries and side-steps.

It was frustrating, and she found herself growing irritated, even angry. Once she had drawn in the power, the concentration required to hold it in place was extraordinary. It felt as though she were trying to simultaneously fight a battle and wrestle a frantic leopard to the ground. No mere wildcat, though, could ever have been as frenzied and ferocious as the roiling knot of arcane energy that boiled within her, struggling for freedom.

The dual struggle cost her; she found herself sweating and blinking furiously, stumbling over the flagstones as much as her magically-fatigued opponent, gritting her teeth until her jaw muscles screamed. Phrases rushed up in her throat like bile, and she swallowed furiously, as if the power were some sort of seething venom, seeking a crack in her will through which to escape.

Eventually, it had to happen. Her battle to contain the power until it could be released in accordance with her will had left her dazed, exhausted. Palkywan, sensing an advantage at last, pressed her; and Ally’s heel caught on the corner of a tilted tile. She crashed ingloriously to the ground, landing hard on her already outraged backside. Her sword clattered away across the stones.

Humiliated again, she thought, beyond anger at her stupidity.

How graceful, the Voice said laconically.

Smiling broadly, Palkywan stepped forward and tapped her gently on the shoulder with the tip of his sword.

Point, and match! Lallakentan called. Hardly chivalrous, he added, glowering at the boy, but…

The power and the rage boiled up in Ally’s throat and exploded out of her in a savage, outraged shriek. A flash of blazing, consuming fire blasted from her outstretched hands like a flash from an over-fed forge. The burst enveloped Palkywan, who dropped his sword, throwing up his arms and screaming in terror and agony.

It seemed as though there were two Allys who watched the boy stumble backwards, howling in pain and flaring like a torch. The first – Kaltas’ daughter, Palkywan’s friend, and Sylloallen’s protégé – gasped in horror at what she had done. The second, the dark, brooding monster that had released the power…she revelled in it.

Lallakentan, who had been just outside the blast of incinerating flame, didn’t hesitate; he threw himself on the shrieking boy and bore him to the ground, struggling to smother the flames with his own body, and shouting for water.

Ally glanced around. The others who had been in the courtyard – a couple of servant girls, three grooms walking horses, a lad carrying water – were all staring at her, aghast. When Ally looked at them, they hastily averted their eyes. One of the grooms flashed a surreptitious gesture at her, thumb between forked fingers. The evil eye.

She knew that gesture of old. Venefica, her mind said hollowly.

By now, Lallakentan had managed to extinguish the flames. Ally clambered clumsily to her feet and rushed over to the struggling pair. When she reached them, she gasped in horror.

Palkywan, she saw immediately, was mortally wounded. Her arcane fire had consumed much of his clothing, burning his arming coat and undershirt to charred threads, blistering and boiling the skin beneath it; only his legs, protected by his leather pantaloons, were uninjured. But his head was by far the worst. His hair – the vast, jumbled ebon mass that she knew so well – was entirely gone. Fire had consumed it, along with most of the skin and flesh of his face. He was blind, too; one eye was milky yellow, swelling shut, and the other had burst. Teeth protruded whitely from his lipless mouth, and a thin, agonized mewling issued from his throat. His thrashings were growing feebler.

She could feel her hands trembling. Heal him! she moaned, her voice a quavering whisper.

‘Heal him’? Lallakentan snapped, glaring up at her. Who d’ye think I am? He turned back to the suffering boy. Make yourself useful, he added without looking at her, and fetch the chaplain, while I try to keep him alive.

Ally bolted for the keep.

She barely knew Alorestes, the priest of the Protector who was sacristan at the castle’s chapel. But he knew who she was, and he responded instantly to her panicked, tear-stained summons. Together, they ran to the courtyard, terror erasing Ally’s exhaustion and lending her wings.

When they arrived, Lallakentan was sitting on the flagstones next to the wounded boy. Alorestes bustled over to the pair, but Ally stumbled to a halt. There was something in the set of the arms-master’s shoulders, a line of dejection that she knew only too well.

As the priest, grimacing at the horrific vision before him, felt through the burnt and broiled flesh for the boy’s lifebeat, Lallakentan snorted, Don’t bother.

Ally’s knees began to shake. She put her hands to her lips. Oh, no, she whispered.

Oh, yes, the old elf grated. He’s dead as dogshit.

The priest stared at the dreadful wounds, mouth open in shock.

The arms-master climbed slowly to his feet. Nicely done, my lady.

What do you mean, ‘nicely…’, Alorestes’ voice trailed off, full of horror. "Do you mean, she did this?"

Yes, Lallakentan replied tonelessly. He grasped Ally’s upper arm, fingers digging deep into her muscles. She didn’t resist. Come along, little witch, the arms-master snapped. We’re going to pay a visit to your father. Glancing back at the priest, he said, See to the boy, would you?

I’ll take him to the chapel, Alorestes replied, his voice grim. "And I’ll notify the Ecclesiae. They’ll have to decide what to do next. They have jurisdiction over…"

Priests be damned, Lallakentan interrupted. Murder by magic’s a secular crime, by the Queen’s own law. Do what you like with the corpse, he added. But I’m taking this…this young lady, to the Duke. He strode off towards the castle, half-dragging the stunned girl behind him.

Ally, stumbling after the arms-master, said nothing. She kept glancing behind her, and her eyes remained locked on Palkywan’s sad, burned body until her view was blocked by the corner of a tower.

She felt nothing. She was utterly empty.

And utterly alone.

♦

It was the stench that finally woke her.

Hax emerged slowly from beneath the thick miasma of her dreams, gasping as if she were drowning. Half-remembered images of blood and fire haunted her. She smelled burned flesh and gagged anew, coughing up tiny, acid gouts of phlegm from a stomach already emptied by a night’s retching.

Her muscles screamed and tried to contract; she longed to curl up, to make herself as small as possible, to disappear from the confines of her nightmare. But she could not; although her arms and legs were free, the stone was still firmly fixed about her neck.

She opened her eyes slowly, as if anticipating a burst of sudden pain. The light was the same; a dim, flickering flame somewhere off in the distance. Just enough to penetrate the gloom. Hax had no idea how long she had been lost in darkness, but it had been long enough for the divine enchantment granting her the dwarf-sight to have expired. Were it not for the feeble yellow flicker, she would have been entirely blind.

Nothing had changed. Her throat was still caught in the stone collar, constricted by swelling resulting from her panicked attempts to escape. She had only subsided when the inflammation threatened to cut off her breathing. The stone was part of the floor, and it held her in place as surely as if it had been crafted of adamant. Her hands and feet, she was glad to see, were still unrestrained – although little good that would do her, if she could not free her neck.

Movement caused a bolt of agony to shoot up her spine. The scrape of her knees, her elbows, against rough stone, and the chill of the air made her shiver. She was clad only in shredded rags, and accepted that fact without emotion.

Her recollection of event were blurred by terror; the memories bore a dark, shadowy texture that made them difficult to distinguish from nightmare. Overcome by terror and the life-draining magic of the shape-shifter’s embrace, she had swooned. She recalled seeing Bedwulf’s severed head in the grasp of the spined fiend, but she had no idea how she had been spirited her out of the Barrow, nor, for that matter, what had happened to Uchtred or the others.

She had regained consciousness only to find that her captors had brought her somewhere deep and dark, amid works of stone so ancient and worn, so clogged with the refuse of eons, that she doubted even the dwarves remembered them. She had been dragged, numb and unresisting, through low, claustrophobic tunnels choked with feculent detritus and crawling with vermin; then through dry, dusty chambers, up stairs and down. At last, a heavy door cut from the gut-rock of the mountain had been thrust aside, and she had been hurled to the cold, damp flagstones.

That had only been the beginning of her torment. Dazed and uncomprehending, she had been unable to resist as her equipment, armour and all, were torn from her and hurled in a heap against a wall. The spined fiend’s claws had cut through her carefully-crafted mail as easily as swords through silk. Then the thing – she never learned its name, if it even had one – had caught her neck in one enormous, taloned hand, lifted from the floor, and, ignoring her frantic kicks and grunts, torn her raiment from her body as well. He was none too cautious about it, either; his claws had scored her flesh, and when he flung her to the floor again, she landed in a pile of shredded rags spattered with gouts of her blood. He had been salivating while doing it, too – a horrible, bone-chilling sight.

At last, grasping her by the hair, the creature had dragged her to a long, low block of carved granite. Forcing her to her knees, he had held her neck against the granite, murmuring a few broken, grating phrases in a tongue unfamiliar to her. The stone had softened, running like muck, and The demon had pressed her throat down into it. Then he withdrew his clawed hands…and the rock-muck had hardened instantly, changing back into unyielding stone, and leaving her trapped, half-kneeling, half-sprawled against the numbing chill of the flagstones.

One part of Hax’s mind had registered the similarities between the fiend’s manipulation of the rock, and Frida’s own skills; but she’s had no time for reflection. She had managed to get her hands into place on the floor, propping herself up to keep from choking. The posture was terribly uncomfortable, and she was dizzy, disoriented, and weak; but she could maintain it, and at least she was still alive.

The two fiends had then begun arguing over her meagre possessions. To her surprise, their words, spoken mind to mind, beat against her consciousness like caustic tide, eating away at her strength and sanity. She could not see what they were doing or understand what they were saying; but she could hear them, and sense their rage and perplexity. The gist of their agitation was clear: they were looking for something, and had expected to find it, but could not.

Hax had guessed instantly what they were looking for.

I can’t tell them where it is. Not even if it costs me my life. The realization had crept slowly through her terror and pain, and with it had come the beginnings of a plan.

Balancing on one hand, she had used the other to trace the bumps and knurls of the stone encompassing her throat. She recalled how Frida had shaped the rock walls, in the Tube line downspout, and at the Underdarrow gate in Thrymsheen, and she knew that – with time – she could do the same.

But she certainly couldn’t do it with her captors looking over her shoulder.

Ku është?

It was the she-fiend’s voice, echoing in her mind. Hax had frozen at a surreptitious step against the stones behind her. She’d fancied that she could hear the rustle of the thing’s heavy, auburn wings.

Where is it? The creature’s low, seductive voice had resonated as clearly in Hax’s mind as it had in her ears.

Where’s what? Hax had grunted. The words had seemed to score her throat. She’d realized that she was desperately thirsty.

Mjestrei dhuratë, the thing had purred. The Master’s gift.

The only gift I have for you, and your precious master, Hax had replied, with an air of desperate bravura that she most definitely did not feel, is four feet of cold steel.

Ah, this?

A rustle; then a steely slither. Hax had felt a sudden chill line against her back…and then an intense, burning sting as the fiend drew the razor tip of the aulensis down the length of her spine.

This is a good sword, the fiend had added, almost contemplatively. Then, laughing horribly, she had swung the blade with all her might against the lip of stone next to Hax’s head.

With a ringing snap, the blade had shattered. Scores of razor-edge shards had exploded across the stone; several had struck Hax’s right cheek, lacerating it but mercifully missing her eye. Her instant shriek of rage had swiftly become a grunt of pain.

Don’t fret, the fiend had said, in a voice filled with mock pity. Your belt and baldric still have some wear in them. More rustling. Let me show you.

And then the broad, heavy leather strap had whistled through the air, slashing across her back, driven by all of the fiend-thing’s cruelty, rage and spite.

The demon’s strength was appalling. A half-dozen strokes had fallen in rapid succession, and Hax had screamed in agony with every one.

The horned monstrosity had punctuated every snap of the lash with its fiery, grating laugh.

Ku është!?

I don’t know! she had shrieked. I don’t know what you want!

Mjestrei dhuratë! Give it to me!

I don’t know…ahh!...what you want!

She had been struck again, and again, until at last she had been driven to the floor, silenced by pain and by the stone that pressed hard against her throat. The burning, consuming heat of the leather had been replaced by the cold, stinging chill that meant flowing blood. Hax had gasped for life, nearly fainting again at the screaming agony in her neck, her shoulders, her throat. But she had kept her secret, and her silence. That was something.

The bloodstains had only excited her captors further. The blows and the questions – always the same question, followed always by the same blow – had continued until, slumped in her stony bonds, Hax’s will had fled, and she had fainted.

She had no idea how long she slept. Awake and aware once more, she thought that she was alone. Her neck was still caught in the stone collar, and facing the floor, her eyes were all but useless. But she still had ears. She strained them for any hint of a sound.

Nothing. A drip of water; a scraping, as she shifted her position to relieve her screaming muscles; her own harsh, rasping breathing. That was all.

Were they hiding?

She was suddenly conscious of how thirsty she was. The thought of water consumed her.

Later. She tried to focus. Were they hiding? Perhaps; perhaps they were. With her limited field of vision, she could not be certain. Unless…could she do it, bound as she was?

I might as well try, Hax thought miserably. If I can’t cast the simplest of enchantments like this, then I’ll have no chance of mimicking Frida’s spell.

Focusing as well as she could with her fuzzy head and the burning, throbbing pain of the welts across her back and shoulders, Hax felt within herself for the strands of the flux.

They were there. Crooking her fingers carefully (for she had never before woven any spell without being able to see her hands), she murmured, "Taianomaiinen todeta!"

The yellow light vanished; all the world turned to shades of dull, unrelieved gray. She knew the effect, having seen it many times, while practicing this simplest of incantations under Kalestayne’s gimlet eye.

She turned her head as far as she could to the right. It wasn’t far, but it was enough to allow her to see some way to her rear. She waited for the tell-tale wine-coloured aura of magic to appear…but nothing came. Nor were there any active auras to her left.

Raising her head against the confining ring of stone, she looked up…and squealed in shock.

Ahead of her on the stone, cloaked hitherto in shadow, lay a skeleton. She hadn’t noticed it before; the flickering yellow light provided little in the way of useful illumination, and the cadaver was coated in a thick layer of cobwebs and dust, so that it looked like little more than a mound of rubbish. But with the aura-sight, the body stood out as clear as day. It was limned in a soft, wavering purple glow, like the sky-fire that she had seen atop ships’ masts in a thunderstorm.

Well, she thought, that’s something, I suppose. Concentrating as hard as she could, she focused her attention on the body. The aura rippled once, twice…then contracted slightly, until it alighted on the pommel of a dagger depending from a belt. It seemed to brighten.

An enchanted blade. Excellent. If she could escape from the stone, then at least she wouldn’t be entirely unarmed. Now that her sword was gone…

His sword. Syllo’s sword…

A cold blast of hatred blew through Hax, causing her hands to shake with impotent rage. Syllo’s sword. His gift to her. Apart from memories, it had been all that she’d had left of him.

Gone now, she thought angrily. If she was to exact her revenge, it would have to be with other weapons.

She struggled to master the emotions sweeping through her, and found that it helped to focus on the blinding pain in her lacerated back.

The knife it is, then, she thought a moment later. And I’m going to leave it buried in that bitch’s heart.

But first, to get out of here.

She needed light. She thought of the tiny, enchanted crystal that Coenred had given her, in the hostel at Eastgate, so very far away and long ago. But it had been in one of her pockets, lost along with her clothing. There was no point in wishing for things she could never have.

She winced as she drew her knees up, bracing herself against the stone that confined her. Her toes slid on the flagstones, and she started; her hands were going to be busy, and if she slipped in this posture, she might well break her own neck, and save her captors the trouble of ending her.

Placing her hands palm to palm in imitation of Frida’s stone-moulding gestures, she focused her thoughts and her strength as best as she was able. The strands of the flux were right where she had left them, and she clutched them eagerly in the grip of her mind.

She cast her thoughts back to the tunnel just outside of Thrymsheen. Frida was kneeling on the stone, bent forward, brow furrowed…

…the words, the phrases, even the quivering tremors transmitted by the rock itself that shot up through her boots, her legs, and into her very bones – it all seemed familiar to her…

She had no idea where the words came from. She had never heard them before. But the flux was there when she reached for it, just as she knew it would be.

Why would it not? After all, she thought dreamily, I am Kaunovalta.

Magic is not what I do. It is what I am.

Eyes focused on some otherworldly place, Hax laid her palms against the stone, and whispered "Hahmottua kivittää."

There was a long moment during which nothing happened. Hax’s heart hammered, and a sliver of doubt crept into her heart. Were the words wrong? Had she failed to glean, from her observation of Frida’s work, the essence of this power?

Then the stone squirmed beneath her hands. She bit her tongue, tasting blood, waiting…and then the rock gave way. Her fingers sank into the stone as into soft clay. The whole side of the granite block slumped and sagged.

Hax sighed with relief. She dug her fingers into the soft, dough-like rock, pulling hands-full of it away and tossing them to the floor. She realized that all she needed to do was push, and so she braced her hands against the block and heaved.

The stone yielded before the pressure…and she was free.

Gasping with relief verging on pleasure. Hax rubbed her chafed, swollen throat. Now, she thought, to move, and swiftly, too.

First, her kit. Searching carefully, she looked for the corner into which the demon had…

Her eye caught a flash of sudden colour, and she froze.

A man was standing behind her. A dozen impressions flooded instantaneously into her mind: Tall and dark-skinned. Long, flowing hair the colour of mountain snow.

Dead, empty eyes. A corpse’s eyes.

Sobrinatrus! Her heart leapt into her throat. One of the Shadelven, enemy of her people.

He was leaning nonchalantly against the stone wall of the chamber, watching her, and smiling slightly.

Stumbling backwards, Hax raised a hand and shrieked "Palokerä!" A bright, coruscating ball of fire leapt from her outstretched fingers…

…passed right through him…

…and detonated against the wall against which he stood. A scorching blast of flame blossomed outwards, washing over him like an infernal tsunami, ravening like a living, hungry thing, consuming all that it touched.

The man did not move. And to her utter astonishment, the fire did not seem to touch him.

"Attento aneuo?" he asked, tilting his head, a whimsical smile playing across his face. Would you care to try again?

"Quisquis tuo est?" Hax gasped.

I am your cousin, the man replied easily. Surely that much is obvious. He stood away from the wall, brushing cobwebs from the shoulders of his cloak.

He was well-garbed, she could see; at least as expensively, if somewhat less fashionably, than the courtiers at the Starhall.

His courtly tone reminded her of her dishevelled, partly-clothed state. She made a few feeble attempts to cover herself before giving it up as pointless. Are you...allied with them? she asked, doing her best to conceal her terror.

With whom?

The two…things, she said. The fiends who imprisoned me. She shuddered again. For some reason, the mere presence of this man had caused her wounds to ache abominably.

The white-haired apparition nodded. They are my servants, he replied, and Hax felt her heart sink. On occasion, they interpret my orders in accordance with their own desires rather than mine. As you’ve no doubt noticed, those desires may on occasion be a little…ah, sanguinary.

With an easy gesture, he doffed his cloak and offered it to her. Hax hesitated for a moment before stepping gingerly forward, and allowing him to drape it over her shoulders. "Grates agere, erus," she said, clutching the garment around her throat and stepping back quickly. The lining was cold, smooth against her skin; even so, she winced as the cloth scraped mercilessly against the scabbed wounds lacing her back.

"Non nauca habere," he replied with a polite nod.

You’ll forgive me, she said, if I seem unwilling to trust you. Your servants were not gentle.

I have no doubt of it, the man replied easily. And I will offer you my most sincere apologies, without reservation, and succour as well…the moment you tell me where I may find the thing that they sought. His eyes, ghoulish in their white emptiness, seemed to grow brighter.

A wave of terrible cold washed over her. Who are you? she whispered, backing up until her calves thudded against the stone block that had, until only recently, held her in thrall.

The man smiled. His teeth were white, pointed, and even. Do you not know?

The elf shook her head in negation. But of course, she did know.

He waited patiently, still smiling.

At last she answered, her voice no more than a sigh: The Spellweaver.

The man nodded. "Glycomon Magjithural, in the tongue of my folk. In yours, Glycomondas, King of the Fourth House. Late of Qetëvaditur. I believe that my cousins in Astrapratum call me the ‘Sorcerer-King’. Yes?"

They do, Hax whispered. Her knees had turned to water, and she was forced to brace herself against the cold stone behind them to remain erect.

" ‘Rex Veneficus’, he murmured coldly, eyes glittering . How extremely flattering. That, as you no doubt know, was the title accorded my distant grandsire Biardath by the fools and cowards who betrayed him, and sought his ruin. His gaze returned to Hax, and she saw that a sneer had curled his lip. You are Duodeci, clearly, so presumably you know that much history. Yes?"

I...yes.

At least the College is still living up to its reputation, he smiled. You are an able caster, I’ll grant you that. He cocked his head. Tell me your name, lady.

I…A-A-Allysan, she stammered, flinching as though bitten. She should have expected such a question, and been prepared for it. Of T-Two Rivers.

The white, ghastly smile widened. My subjects, he said almost gently, "when I had any, that is…they generally considered it unwise to