There, enthroned, sat a being Shaped of darkness with glowing eyes.
"Tanaros." Cerelinde's voice, small and dry.
"Don't be afraid." There was more, so much more he wanted to tell her, but words fell short and his heart burned within him, drowning out thought. Settling the Helm of Shadows under his left arm, he offered the right in a gesture half-remembered from the Altorian courts. "Come, Lady. Lord Satoris awaits us."
How long? Ten paces, twenty, fifty.
Thrice a hundred.
The torches burned brighter as they traversed the hall, gouts of blue-white flame reaching upward. The M�rkhar Fjel paced two by two on either side of them, splendid in their inlaid weapons-harnesses that glittered like quicksilver.
Always, the Throne, looming larger as they drew near, Darkness seated in it. Fair, once; passing fair. No longer. A smell in the air, the thick coppery reek of blood, only sweeter. The brand that circumscribed Tanaros' heart blazed; Cerelinde's fingertips trembled on his forearm, setting his nerves ablaze. Directly beneath the Throne Hall lay the Chamber of the Font, and below it, the Source itself. In the dazzling light, she might have been carved of ivory.
"Tanaros."
He drew a deep breath, feeling his tight-strung nerves ease at the Shaper's rumbling voice. Home. "My Lord Satoris!" The bow came easily, smoothly, a pleasing obeisance. He relinquished Cerelinde's arm, placing the Helm's case atop the dais. "Victory is ours. I restore to you the Helm of Shadows, and present the Lady Cerelinde of the Rivenlost, the betrothed of Aracus Altorus."
Gleaming eyes blinked, once, in the darkness of the Shaper's face; one massive hand shifted on the arm of the Throne. His voice emerged, deep and silken-soft. "Be welcome to Darkhaven, Elterrion's granddaughter, daughter of Erilonde. Your mother was known to me."
Her chin jerked; whatever Cerelinde had expected, it was not that. "Lord Satoris, I think it is not so. Your hospitality has been forced upon me at the point of a sword, and as for my mother… my mother died in the bearing of me."
"Yes." A single word, solemn and bone-tremblingly deep. "Erilonde, daughter of Elterrion, wife of Celendril. I recall it well, Cerelinde. In the First Age of the Sundered World, she died. She prayed to me ere her death. It is how I knew her."
"No." Delicate hands, clenched into fists. "I will not be tricked, Sunderer!"
Laughter, booming and sardonic. The rafters of the Throne Hall rattled. The M�rkhar Fjel eyed them with pragmatic wariness. "Is it so hard to believe, Haomane's Child? After all, it was my Gift… once. The quickening of the flesh. Generation." The air thickened, rife with the sweet scent of blood, of desire. Satoris' eyes shone like spear-points. "Do you blame her? Many women have prayed to me in childbirth. I would have saved her if I could."
"Then why didn't you?"
The words were flung, an accusation. Tanaros shifted uneasily between his beloved Lord and his hostage. The Shaper merely sighed, disturbing the shadows.
"My Gift was torn from me, pierced to the heart by Oronin Last-Born, who drove a shard of the Souma into my thigh. I had nothing to offer your mother. I am sorry. If Haomane had not disdained my Gift when I had it, it might have been otherwise. I grieve that it was not. Your people will dwindle for it, and die, until you pass forevermore from Urulat's memory."
Cerelinde eyed him uncertainly. "You lie, Lord Sunderer."
"Do the Ellylon not dwindle in number?"
"Yes." She held his gaze, a thing few mortals could do unflinching. "And so we shall, until you relent or the Prophecy is fulfilled. Haomane has pledged it."
"Haomane," the Shaper mused, plucking the case that held the Helm of Shadows from the dais. "My Elder Brother, the Lord-of-Thought. Do you not find him an absent parent to his children, Lady Cerelinde?"
"No." She stared, transfixed, as his dark fingers undid the case's clasps.
"This was his weapon, once." Satoris lifted the Helm and held it before him, its empty eye-sockets gazing the length of the hall. "It contained in its visage the darkness of Haomane's absence, the darkness that lies in the deepest cracks of the shattered Souma, those things which all the Children of Uru-Alat fear most to look upon. To Ardrath the Counselor my Elder Brother gave it, and Ardrath called me out upon the plains of war." He smiled, caressing the worn, pitted bronze of the Helm. "I prevailed, and now it is mine. And I have Shaped into it my own darkness, of truth twisted and the shadow cast by a bright, shining lie, of flesh charred to blackness by the wrath of merciless light. Will you gaze upon it, Haomane's Child?"
So saying, he placed the Helm upon his head.