Banewreaker(64)

Tanaros nodded. He could smell the prisoner's suppurating wounds. "I do."

"I'm tired of paying for my sins." Speros smiled, taut and bitter. "I never set out to become a thief and a killer, but it's funny the way things go. You make enough mistakes, comes a day when no one will take a chance on you. Arahila may forgive, General Blacksword, but her Children do not. I am weary to the bone of courting their forgiveness. Lord Satoris accepted your service. Why not mine?"

Had he been that young, that defiant, twelve hundred years ago? Yes, Tanaros thought; he had been. Twenty-and-eight years of age, hunted and despised throughout the realm. Kingslayer, they had called him. Wifeslayer, some had whispered. Cuckold. Murderer. He had yearned for death, fought for life. A summons tickling his fevered brain had led him to Darkhaven.

Still, he shook his head. "You're young and angry at the world. It will pass."

The brown eyes glinted. "As yours did?"

Tanaros awarded him a slight smile. "Anger is only the beginning, Midlander. It does not suffice unto itself."

"What, then?" Speros shifted in his chains, but his gaze never left Tanaros' face. "Tell me, General, and I will answer. Why do you serve him? For gold and glory, like the Staccians? Out of mindless loyalty, like the Fjeltroll?"

On his stool, Vorax coughed. Tanaros glanced at him.

"The Staccians' bargain grants peace and prosperity to the many at a cost to the few," he said. "And the Fjel are not so mindless as you think."

"Yet that is not an answer," Speros said. "Not your answer."

"No." Tanaros faced him. "I serve my Lord Satoris because, in my heart, I have declared myself the enemy of his enemies. Because I despise the hypocrisy and cowardice of the Six Shapers who oppose him. Because I despise the tyranny of certitude with which Haomane First-Born seeks to rule over the world, placing his Children above all others." His voice grew stern. "Make no mistake, lad. For many years, his Lordship sought nothing more than to live unmolested, but great deeds are beginning to unfold. I tell you this, here and now; if you swear yourself to Lord Satoris' service, you are declaring yourself an enemy of the Lord-of-Thought himself, and a participant in a battle to Shape the world anew."

The prisoner grinned with his split, swollen lips. "I am not fond of the world as I have found it, General. You name a cause in which I would gladly believe."

"Haomane's Wrath is a fearsome thing," Tanaros warned him.

Speros shrugged. "So was my Da's."

It was a boy's comment, not a Man's; and yet, the glint in the lad's eyes suggested it was deliberate, issued as a reckless dare. Against his better judgement, Tanaros laughed. He had found fulfillment and purpose in service to Lord Satoris, in seizing his own warped destiny and pitting himself against the will of an overwhelming enemy. If it afforded him the chance to play a role in Shaping the world that had betrayed him, so much the better.

Did the lad deserve less?

"Vorax," Tanaros said decisively. "Strike his chains."



THE LAMPS BURNED LOW IN her quarters.

There was a veneer of delicacy overlaying the appearance of the rooms to which she had been led. Tapestries in shades of rose, celadon and dove-grey hid the black stone walls; fretted lamps hung from the buttresses, their guttering light casting a patterned glow. These elements had been added, tacked atop the solid bulwark of the fortress in an effort to disguise the brooding mass of Darkhaven.

Cerelinde was not fooled.

This prison had been made for her.

She paced it, room by room, her feet sinking deep into the cloud-soft carpets that concealed the polished floor. What halls had they adorned? Cuilos Tuillenrad? A faint scent arose at her passage. Heart-grass, bruised and crushed by her feet. Oh, this was Ellylon craftsmanship, to be sure! Her kinfolk had woven it in ages past, with fingers more nimble than any son or daughter of Man could hope to emulate. The wool would have been culled from the first coats of yearling lamb, washed with an effusion of the delicate flowers of heart-grass that bloomed for three days only in the spring. Journeymen would have carded it, singing under the open skies, but the spinning, ah! That would have been done by Ellylon noblewomen, for they alone had the nicety of touch to spin wool thread as fine as silk.

Her own mother might have touched it…

Your mother was known to me.

Cerelinde closed her eyes. Unfair; oh, unfair!

It was not true. It could not be true. Time and time again, Malthus had said it: Satoris Banewreaker is cunning, he Shapes truth itself to his own ends. Her father… her father Celendril, she remembered well, for he had died in the Fourth Age of the Sundered World, slain upon the plains of Curonan amid the host of Numireth.