–Take hold–
Pen gripped the branch tentatively, feeling the heat course through his fingers and down his arm. The branch was vibrating, humming deeply as it did so, a strange, mournful sound.
Then the entire tree shook, and its trunk split apart where the branch sprouted, a sharp rending that sent pieces of bark and splinters of wood flying in all directions. Pen ducked his head and closed his eyes, keeping tight hold of the branch, rocking unsteadily with the tanequil’s quaking. There was a deep, audible groan of darkest protest, and abruptly the branch came away in Pen’s hands. The boy caught himself against the trunk and stared in shock. The tree had cracked wide open where the branch had broken off, and sap was leaking out in a steady stream. The sap was red and viscous and looked like blood. It ran down the trunk in thick rivulets. It dripped from the branch onto his arm.
He was studying it, his left hand braced against the tree for support, his fingers gripping one of the older splits, when the tree groaned again, deep and menacing, and the split closed over his fingers. He screamed in agony and jerked away, feeling flesh and bone tear free as he did so. He reacted at once, but was still too slow. When he stared down at his hand, he saw that his middle two fingers had been severed at the first knuckle. Blood dripped from the ragged wounds and ran down his hand. His finger bones shone white and raw.
Still clutching the tanequil’s severed limb, Pen collapsed into a crook in the branches of the tree, pressing his injured hand against his chest, staining his clothing with his blood. For a moment, frozen by pain and shock, he couldn’t move. Then, realizing the danger as his blood continued to well up, he tore free one sleeve of his tunic and wrapped the cloth about the stubs, compressing it into the wounds.
–A part of you for a part of me–
Pen nodded miserably. He didn’t need to be reminded. The pain ratcheting through his hand and arm was reminder enough.
–Take my limb in your hand–
Holding his shirtsleeve-wrapped fingers tightly against his chest, he reached down with his right hand and took the tanequil’s limb from his lap, where he had dropped it moments before. To his surprise, it was still warm and pulsating, as if it retained life, even though it had been severed from the tree.
–The wood of this limb comes from deep inside me, where my life is formed. The limb must be forced to the surface from the soft heartwood and forcibly severed. Such a sacrifice is necessary if a darkwand is to be shaped to the use you require. But you must give back what you are given if the sacrifice is to have value. A piece of your body. A piece of your heart. Remember this–
Pen closed his eyes and exhaled slowly. The loss of his fingers in exchange for the loss of the tanequil’s limb. He wasn’t likely to forget.
–Climb down from me. Carry my limb with you–
Pen cautiously made his way down from the tree, protecting his injured hand as he did so, cradling the limb in the crook of his arm. It was a long, tedious descent, and when he was still ten feet from the ground, he slipped and fell, striking the earth with force and jarring his hand. Fresh pain caused him to cry out. He was sweating heavily as he dragged himself to his feet and leaned back against the ancient trunk. His fingers throbbed, and the fabric wrapping them was soaked with his blood. He felt nauseous and weak.
–Move away from me and sit–
He lurched from the tree and found the patch of ground he had occupied before. He dropped heavily, crossed his legs before him, and bent his head to the earth as he felt everything begin to spin. He glimpsed the tanequil’s root tendrils as they reemerged and began to stroke his clothing and boots. He pulled back his pant legs so that the roots could find his skin, so that the tree could make contact with him. He reached out with his own hand to touch them.
–Unwrap your fingers. Take the sap from the end of my limb and place it on your wounds–
Pen hesitated, then unwound the soiled cloth. The stubs of his fingers were red and inflamed, and blood was still leaking from them. He used his good hand to gather sap still oozing from the end of the tanequil’s limb, and he rubbed it gingerly into his wounds. Almost instantly, they began to close, the bleeding to stop, and the flesh to heal. The pain, so intense only moments earlier, faded to a dull ache. He stared at his fingers in disbelief.
–Take your knife from your belt–
He did so, frightened anew of what would be asked of him.
–Close your eyes–
Again, he did so.
–You must shape the darkwand now, while the life of the wood is still strong–
He waited. He could not begin to carve the wood until he could see how to do so. He must be permitted to open his eyes. But no command to open them came. Instead, the nature of the touching changed, and communication that had come in the form of words now came in the form of images. He saw in his mind what he was meant to do, a clear and unmistakable direction.
Then something odd happened. He felt another hand on his, covering it, guiding it, and his own began to move in response. By feel alone, he began the cutting that would shape the limb into the darkwand. He should have been terrified that he would make a mistake. The cuts were often tiny and intricate. They were impossibly time-consuming. But the images were so clear and his sense of what was needed so strong that he never wavered in his efforts. And time did not seem to matter. It was as if time had stopped and he could use it in whatever manner or measure he deemed necessary to accomplish his task.
He worked through the remainder of the day and into the night. He did not eat or drink. He did not move from where he sat. His concentration was complete as he responded to the tree’s steady, calm commands. Nothing distracted him; not the tiny itch of an insect’s wings or the cool whisper of a breeze against his skin. He was in another world, another time, another life.
It was night when he finished, the moon risen and the stars come out, their light falling through the forest canopy in pale, thin streamers, the darkness about him deep and pervasive. The images stopped, the roots withdrew back into the earth, and he was alone in the silence. He opened his eyes and looked down at his lap.
The darkwand lay cradled in his hands, its six-foot length a rich mottled gray and black, the same colors as the tanequil’s trunk, gleaming and smooth in a way that should have been impossible for newly carved wood. An intricate pattern of runes wrapped its surface, strange markings that Pen did not recognize and could not interpret. When they were turned to the moonlight, they gleamed as if lit by an inner fire. Pen could still feel unmistakable warmth emanating from the wood, the tanequil’s life force firm and strong.
The boy unfolded his legs, which were cramped and sore. His mouth was so dry he could barely open it. He took a few minutes to gather his strength, then got to his feet and began hobbling toward the pool that Cinnaminson had showed him earlier. He carried the darkwand with him; he knew he would carry it everywhere from then on. Slowly, his legs regained their feeling and the cramps disappeared. He listened for signs of life as he walked, but there were none. Even as long as he had been sitting beneath the tree, he was still alone.
He wondered suddenly what had happened to Cinnaminson. She had told him she would come back to him at nightfall. She had promised.
He found the pool and dropped down on his hands and knees to drink. The water was cool and sweet, and he got back a little of his strength. When he had drunk his fill, he stood up again and looked around.
Where was Cinnaminson?
He exhaled in frustration. He didn’t like it that she was still gone. He never liked it when she was gone. Losing her was worse than losing his fingers . . .
He stopped himself, remembering suddenly the sensation of another’s hand guiding his as he shaped the tanequil’s limb into the darkwand, one that allowed him to work blindly, his eyes closed, his reliance on touch alone.
A piece of your body. A piece of your heart.
A terrible certainty swept through him, harsh and implacable, so traumatizing that he could not give voice to it,
but only whisper it in the silence of his mind. He thought he had understood. He hadn’t. He assumed that the loss of his fingers was enough to balance the scales. It wasn’t.
Something more was required.
Cinnaminson.
TWENTY-FIVE
Shadea a’Ru stood at the window of her sleeping chambers and looked out from Paranor’s towers over the forested sweep of the land beyond. The sun was rising, a soft golden glow in the east that silhouetted the jagged peaks of the Dragon’s Teeth against its bright backdrop and gave promise to the coming of a warm, languorous summer day.
Her lips compressed into a tight, angry line. It would not be such a good day for her. And less so for some others.
She glanced down at the note she held in her hand, at the words written on it, then looked away again. Idiots! She brushed absently at her short, spiky blond hair and flexed her shoulders. Her muscles were stiff and tight. She missed the training and fighting that had been so central to her life when she had been a soldier in the Federation army. She missed the discipline and the routine. She had never thought she would feel that way, but after weeks of struggling as Ard Rhys of the Third Druid Order, she was ready to abandon it all for a chance to go back to a time when things were less complicated and more direct.
Her gaze drifted back to the note. It had arrived during the night, while she slept, and she had found it on waking, tied to the leg of the arrow swift. The bird’s dark, fierce face had peered out at her from its enclosure, almost daring her to reach inside. But it was her bird, one of the many she had appropriated and trained to carry her messages from her co-conspirators and servants in the plot against Grianne Ohmsford. Its countenance only mirrored the intensity that could be found in her own.
She knew the bird. Split was its name, chosen for the strange wedge in its tail feathers, an accident of birth. The arrow swift was one of those assigned to Traunt Rowan on his departure to the Northland; it had been sent by him.
She had reached inside for the message, untied it from Split’s leg, withdrawn it from the cage, opened it, and her face had gone dark with rage immediately.
THE BOY AND HIS COMPANIONS
ESCAPED FROM TAUPO ROUGH.
HAVE FOLLOWED THEM INTO THE KLU.
And lost them there, of course, though the writer had been careful not to say so.
She looked back at the message again, still furious with its contents and its incompetent sender. She had expected better of Traunt Rowen. She had expected better of Pyson Wence, as well, and better still of the two of them working together to track that boy!
She gritted her teeth. Why was it so difficult for anyone to find and hold him? The effort had cost Terek Molt his life. It had cost Aphasia Wye her respect, a respect she had thought nothing could diminish. What would it cost her this time? The lives of two more of her allies, men whose support she could scarcely afford to lose, even if they were proving less competent than she had imagined possible? Her respect for them had long since vanished, so there was no danger of losing that.
She crumpled the note in her hand, then set it in a small bowl on her desk, fired it with magic, and scattered the ashes out the window. She watched the breeze carry the ashes away and wished her anger and disappointment could be made to vanish as easily.
What was she going to have to do to finish this business?
For a moment, for just an instant, she toyed with the idea of breaking off the hunt entirely. It was requiring much more time and effort than she cared to spend and netting no favorable results at all. She had the boy’s parents safely locked away in her dungeons. couldn’t she just wait for him to come for them? He would surely do so, once he found out where they were, and it would be easy enough to make him aware.
Her frustration building toward a headache, she rubbed at her temples with her fingers.The trouble with ignoring him was that she was almost certain she knew what he was doing. He was trying to find a way to reach his aunt. She had no idea how he planned to do that and believed it beyond his or anyone else’s capability. But she could not chance being wrong. If he had found a way into the Forbidding, if he had discovered an avenue about which she knew nothing, then she had to stop him from using it. Because if he managed the impossible and actually reached Grianne Ohmsford from Paranor’s side of the wall, he might find a way to guide her back again.
If that happened, Shadea knew she was finished. They were all finished, all who had conspired with her.
The chance of that happening was so small that it was scarcely measurable, but she knew better than to put anything past the Ohmsfords. Their history spoke for itself. They had survived impossible situations before, several generations of them. They were imbued with both magic and luck, and the combination had kept them from harm more times than anyone could count.
She could not afford to allow that to happen again.
So she would leave things as they were. She would allow Traunt Rowan and Pyson Wence to continue to hunt down the boy. Perhaps Aphasia Wye still tracked him as well, even though she had heard nothing from her assassin in days. One never knew about that creature. One could never predict.
The ashes of the burned note were gone, turned to dust and blown away. She breathed in the morning air, calming herself, reassuring herself that everything was going to be all right. In the next few days, she would journey to Arishaig to meet with Sen Dunsidan. The Prime Minister was seeking her support for a sustained assault on the Free-born, a course of action on which they had already tacitly agreed but had yet to act. The Federation required the backing of the Druids if they were to succeed in their plans to break the stalemate on the Prekkendorran and advance into Callahorn. The Prime Minister needed to know that Shadea, as head of the Druid order, would not act to stop him. She, in turn, needed to know that he would continue to support her as Ard Rhys.
She was less concerned about his backing than she had been at the beginning, when her support was so small and her position as acting Ard Rhys so tenuous. But things had changed. Once she’dbedded Gerand Cera and made him her consort, she began working to gain the support of his followers as well. One by one, using promises and threats, she had subverted them. Even though Cera still thought of himself as leader of his own faction, she had long since replaced him in that position.
She glanced at the rumpled bed to one side and grimaced. She had played at that game long enough. She had allowed him enough liberties. It was time to put an end to it. It was time to toss him from her bed and from her life.
Intent on going out to confer with a handful of those on whom she believed she could depend, she threw off her nightclothes and dressed in her Druid robes. Matters would get rough before the day was out, and she must know who would stand with her when they did. She knew better than to leave such things to chance.
Wrapped in her black garments, her chain of office hung about her neck, she was moving toward the chamber door when it burst open and Gerand Cera strode through, his hatchet face dark with anger.
“We have been betrayed, Shadea,” he announced without preamble. He flung off his robe and threw himself down in one of the cushioned chairs. “By the very ally you were so confident would not dare to do so.”
She stared at him. “Sen Dunsidan?”
A sneer twisted his lean face. “Sen Dunsidan. Last night, the Elves launched an airship strike against his army. The strike failed because the Federation forces knew about it in advance and were waiting. They have invented a weapon that produces a light beam of such intensity and power that it can burn an airship right out of the sky. It did so in response to the attack, destroying virtually the entire Elven fleet before the Federation airship that bore it was damaged and had to set down.”
He leaned forward. “But that was just the beginning. During the airship battle, the Federation army attacked the Elven defensive lines and broke through. The Elves were driven right off the Prekkendorran. They might still be running, for all I know. Their allies are trying to hang on, but they’re surround
ed. I wouldn’t give them much chance.”
He shook his head in disgust. “So tell me, Shadea. What do you think of your precious Prime Minister now?” His sharp eyes fixed on her. “You didn’t know about this attack beforehand, did you? I would hate to think you were keeping things from me.”
She hadn’t known a thing about it, of course. She was as surprised by the news as he was. But there was no reason for her to tell him so. Better that he thought her one step ahead of him.
“There was some discussion about it. I hadn’t thought he intended to act so quickly.”
“It would have been nice if you had told me.”
She shrugged. “We both keep some things to ourselves, Gerand. Don’t pretend otherwise. As I said, I hadn’t thought he was going to do this until later. Apparently an opportunity presented itself that he couldn’t afford to pass up. We can hardly begrudge him that.”
Gerand Cera frowned. “I don’t like it that he’s acted without seeking our approval. It will look to everyone as if he no longer cares whether we stand with him or against him. It will look as if he considers our support irrelevant.”
Just so, she was thinking. Sen Dunsidan would have to be called to account once she was able to confront him. It might be that it was time for her to end their relationship in a way that left no doubt as to who was the real power in the Four Lands.
“This weapon,” she said, changing the subject. “It doesn’t sound like anything I have ever heard of. It sounds as if it employs a form of magic.”
Gerand Cera shook his head in disagreement. “The Prime Minister doesn’t have the use of magic.”
“Perhaps he has acquired the aid of someone who does.” Her eyes locked on his. “One of us.”
He snorted. “Who? Who would want to give aid to Sen Dunsidan, knowing that you would view it as a—” He stopped himself. “Are you thinking of Iridia?”
“Do we know where she is? Did we ever find out where she went after she left here?”
Cera shook his head slowly. “No. But she wouldn’t dare to betray us. She knows what would happen if she did.”