Traitor's Knot (epub)

by Janny Wurts

  * * *

  Summer 5671

  Catalyst

  The incandescent shout that swept the grand chord lasted for only an instant. Its shimmering deluge of sound and light keyed a rainbow shower of harmonics, then faded. No mortal mind might encompass the infinite arc of its imprint. Yet every aware mote of existence responded. All spirit expressed in form and in flesh underwent a moment of black-out, ecstatic reaction.

  As the pealing reverberations subsided, initiate talent was first to recover full cognizance. Ath's adepts understood how to access such mystery and spin the exalted stream down into the beauty of manifest dreams. Their circle of peace embraced the influx of dimensional harmony. They channelled the resonance through their sacred groves and captured its pure essence in shimmering form as tree and leaf; as mystery, that welled in the sacred springs; and as the silent movement of animals, knit from the living fabric of dark beyond sight.

  From hedge talent to the offspring of old blood clan lineage, whether healer, or seer, or clairvoyant, the spontaneous uprush dazzled the subtle senses. The event shocked the heart to inexpressible joy, then passed like a blanketing plunge from blinding sunshine into deep shade.

  Highest in rank, the Koriani Seniors also sensed the burning harmonics, as the mighty crest struck a note of keening sorrow off the wardings that guarded their focus stones. While sisterhouse peeresses demanded an inquiry, distraught sisters scrambled to fill basins, or snatch veiling silk off their dormant crystals to enact an investigative scrying. Caution ruled as they sank into disciplined trance. This riddle's pursuit called for stringent protections, since the hapless lane-watchers, caught by surprise, had all crumpled into an unconscious faint.

  An order whose wisdom extended beyond artifice, the Fellowship Sorcerers lived and worked past the bounds of the limited senses. The charge of the dragons forced their choice at the crux: to uphold the compact and guard the parameters essential to Paravian survival. The purge of the Kralovir achieved by Torbrand's descendant demanded a scouring cleanse for completion.

  If the windfall gift came at punishing cost, the benefit must not be spurned. Sethvir's earth-sense recorded the site of each fallen cultist, tucked in their hidden crypts and in secretive enclaves across the continent. His appeal summoned both of his discorporate colleagues and assigned them the rigorous list. Before dawn, those husks of corrupt flesh must be burned. White mage-fire must destroy their scattered remains, down to the least sliver of bone. The ash must be immolated, leaving no trace for some power-blind fool whose ignorance might lead into dabbling.

  Kharadmon answered, and streaked out of the cloistered courtyard in Darkling. Behind him, the actinic blast of raw power he unleashed sheared through the breezeless night. Corpse and candles flared up, consumed at one stroke. The slamming report of heat-shocked air showered dew from the flowerbeds, whose blossoms shivered, unsinged. Though concussion shot cracks through cap-stones and mortar, not so much as a single loose block tumbled from the mountain citadel's outer curtain wall.

  Alarmed sentries shouted, regardless. The ram's horn sounded a blast from the gate keep. While the terrified garrison scurried to take arms, the night-watch guarding the central plaza barricaded the guildhall doors. Convinced that their town was beset by dark sorcery, dispatch runners raced through the streets to summon the town's panicked mayor.

  In distant Jaelot, before the candles at the avatar's formal banquet stopped shivering, the plump priest touched his breast, overcome by a faint rush of dizziness. His auric field swirled, re-arranged by release as the dormant cult sigil burned off in the blaze of harmonic forces. Rocked through a moment of unsteady balance, the man suffered raced pulse and bursting sweat, then a shivering surge of clairvoyance. Sight unveiled an image of blood in a crypt, anhd five cowled figures struck down by a burst of uncanny conjury; further, he beheld Raiett Raven and three ofEtarra's ranked council-men killed in their chairs where they met in closed conference . . .

  If Luhaine was able to damp down the reverberations of after-shock, and arrest the spurious vision's unfolding, he could not prevent the man's horrified shout. Nor could he avert the impact unleashed by the Prince of Rathain's surprise tactic. The Named affirmation of Arithon's being strung through the weft of the world's weave had struck off the inevitable spark from poised flint: the Mistwraith's geas of violence ignited and flared into ungovernable flame.

  Lysaer's impassioned cry exhorting a vigorous retaliation against Shadow pealed across the shocked gap in the guests' conversation. 'I bring no good news, and tonight's bizarre portent affirms this! The Spinner of Darkness has survived Kewar's mazes! My priest corroborates my affirmation: the creature now works in league with other fell powers to fracture our sworn ties of alliance. Heed my word well! If you fear for your lives, your dread is too small. If you think that your gates and the garrison on your walls can defend, beware! Your striving is as the needle raised against the poised axe. I speak this truth, not to dishearten, nor to raise terror or despair, but to guard your back-gate! An ally I held in my highest esteem has been suborned into vile betrayal! For your well-being, for your children's safety, stand with me as I raise my standard to march in redress on the enemy who has turned coat against you . . .'

  Galled by the rising tumult, Luhaine held his ground long enough to ascertain the fat priest's aura had burned clean. Naught else could be tried, short of cold-blooded murder. The back-lash damage was already done. The smashed cabal at Etarra, and Darkling's vanished priest, would now inflame the muster already in progress. No salvage might defang the wrathful campaign or disarm the force now hell-bound to descend on the citadel at Alestron.

  In accord with Sethvir, and in keeping with the tenets of free will posed by the Major Balance, Luhaine whirled out of Jaelot. Time demanded. He must join forces with his discorporate colleague to uphold the honour of Arithon's accomplishment and eradicate the emptied cadavers left at large by the demise of the Kralovir.

  Luhaine arrived on site at Etarra a split-second behind Kharadmon. There, the Light's armed encampment already seethed. Frantic men and shouting officers raced to douse the outbreak of fires set to cleanse the cult's corrupted offshoots. Grooms scrambled to calm panicked horses and uproot the picket lines, while scared foot-troops hauled sloshing buckets out of the cistern. Three officer's tents were already ablaze. Their crackling ferocity still sang of the arcane permission that had kindled the wild element. Another blaze smouldered in the palace precinct. Since his colleague's expedient entry had already shorn through the warded stonewall, Luhaine followed suit and nipped through the tumbled gap still showering fragments and dust over the gate keep's breached southern battlement.

  'You've never liked stays on your freedom, I realize, but that mannerless assault will scarcely win you the next generation's endearments,' Luhaine accosted. Cold as arctic wind, he threaded through the hysterical servants who rushed towards Raiett Raven's torched audience chamber. The tainted remains of the four men inside were already reduced beyond reach of a meddler's recovery. Though Kharadmon always moved with the speed of a jackal where risk of cult practice ran rampant, tonight's unrestrained touch broke all precedent.

  'You'd stall for Davien?' his shade fired back, already arrowed on direct course for the crypt hidden under the cellar. 'Is there a live chick in the hen-house besides? One dead, or twenty, the fox still gets chased.'

  For tonight's upset ran the gamut: all of Etarra's Alliance authority was either struck dead, or already reduced to discredited shame at the outset. No roughshod act of additional sabotage could hammer the hornet's nest any harder.

  'And anyway,' Kharadmon cracked, before Luhaine huffed in to bore him with a trying lecture, 'if a rank upset here could slow down the Alliance assault on Alestron, I'd wave as many red flags as it took. Turn the bull's charge, we could let savage weather defang any maniac's march through the Skyshiels.'

  Luhaine acceded that grudging point. He kept pace with his colleague's scorching rush, whistling through a locke
d succession of doors and swooping through the gyre of dust raised in breezed passage down the wine-cellar's turnpike stairwell.

  No dissembling cover was possible, now. The Kralovir's inroads left too many dead. Each damning account of Etarra's plight would be sent on to Lysaer s'Ilessid. As governor elect, he was lawful authority. His cursed hand would be free to reap chaos. The order forged from the outbreak of mayhem would align hearsay and evidence to further Desh-thiere's design.

  'It's the sad case of the pest who harries the pessimist,' Kharadmon stated, morose. 'The prank works too well, and the back-fire flattens the starry-eyed spectators caught in between.'

  For the crypt, blasted open, proved empty of life. The stone slab was bare, the burst ropes singed away. Both the Kralovir corpses and the wrenching remains of nine children slaughtered in sacrifice had been scoured from the face of Athera by mage-fire. Arithon Teir's'Ffalenn was gone without trace, since Davien the Betrayer had already acted.

  Far under the roots of the Mathorns, beneath the labyrinthine caverns of Kewar, a spark of light sprang into existence inside a parabolic dome of smoothed stone. The mote fell, drifting in air-borne descent through the sealed chamber beneath. The vault existed without entry or exit. Its space was a sealed well of silence. But not empty: the glimmer of illumination rinsed the spare face, the silver-and-cinnamon spill of loose hair, then the gold-stitched patterns on the elegant clothes of the Sorcerer whose exhaustive labour had fashioned the uncanny creation.

  Davien stood with hands braced on the rim of the reflecting pool that centered the floor underneath. Across his lean fingers and trefoil seal ring, the virgin, black waters welled from the earth's deeps and sheeted over the intricately carved pattern inscribed in the living granite. Opalescent light sprang like flame from the electromagnetic release as the flowing current crossed the mapwork array of linked ciphers.

  'Where will you go, Teir's'Ffalenn?' he inquired.

  The falling spark shimmered, a stinging imperative.

  The Sorcerer sighed. 'Could the outcome be different? You knew, once your signature presence responded. The release through the land must unleash Desh-thiere's curse. The muster you feared is already in motion. For better or worse, there's a future. Your half-brother won't risk a repeat of the last campaign's tactical blunders. He will smash a fixed target and wring victory from ashes. Alestron and East Halla will salve the pride torn by his former defeat in Daon Ramon.'

  'No horrors will walk,' the light mote cracked, bitter. 'What choice could have been? You set the stage, knowing: I would author a course that offers clean death, before suffering the spread of a Kralovir abomination.'

  Davien bowed his head. His sleeve rustled as he raised a wet hand. The captive star drifted and settled into his shining, soaked palm. As though contact bit, the Sorcerer's mouth tightened. 'Your triumph is written. Whether or not you could have saved bloodshed, those fallen now shall receive their clear passage. Daelion's Wheel claims all earthly life. Ath's law brooks no exceptions, Teir's'Ffalenn, no matter how savaged your heart.'

  'Tell the s'Brydion widows, if any survive! You say I have choice?' The held spark bristled challenge. 'Then dispatch me to Alland. I have obligations to allies who swore me a commitment that has been wrecked beyond salvage.'

  The Sorcerer raised his peaked eyebrows. 'Healing first, my wild falcon. Fly south, as you wish. Chase your errand in Selkwood, though I warn, you won't find what you seek there.'

  Davien tipped his cupped hand. The adamant spark of a crown prince's being winnowed free and descended. Falling, it met the black well of the rock-pool and winked out of ephemeral existence.

  A rainbow shimmer burst forth, streaming a flare of incandescence more brilliant than midwinter's boreal light. The spring's surface gave birth to an image, exact as a mirrored reflection: of Arithon Teir's'Ffalenn, sprawled naked in starlight on wind-swept black sand, inside the grand focus ring at Sanpashir.

  * * *

  Summer 5671

  After-shocks

  Sunrise at Jaelot sees the flying departure of six trade galleys, oars driving up spray to speed the Light's redoubled muster of the Alliance towns to raise arms for war against Shadow at Alestron; and while the discovery of unexplained deaths and portentous fires sparks unease across the rest of the continent, Lysaer s'Ilessid boards ship for Varens, to raise his standard upon the East Halla peninsula . . .

  Dakar the Mad Prophet awakens from Davien's enspelled sleep to find Etarra driven to rage over the uncanny fires that have murdered three captains at arms, High Chancellor Raiett Raven, and his highest-ranking town ministers; since no more clan children survive to be saved, and the aged bard has suspiciously vanished, he contacts Sethvir, then hires a post-horse to scorch the road to bear warning back to the clans in Melhalla . . .

  Shown the captured lane imprint of a crown prince's sweeping defeat of the Kralovir, Selidie Prime closets herself for a prescient augury, then rejects the Forthmark peeress's pleading request, that initiate Elaira should be recalled: 'No change in her orders. She may resume her lapsed practice of healing only after she meets the terms of her current assignment . . .'

  * * *

  Previous Chapter Contents

  Glossary

  A'BREND'AIA

  the polite word for making love 'the lyrical dance.'

  pronounced: a-bren-day-ee-yah

  root meaning: a'brend'aia - the dynamic balance of yin and yang

  ADRUIN

  coastal city located in East Halla, Melhalla. Enemy of Alestron, usually over the issue of blockades at the harbor mouth leading to the Cildein Ocean.

  pronounced: add-ruin

  root meaning: al - over; duinn - hand

  AIYENNE

  river located in Daon Ramon, Rathain, rising from an underground spring in the Mathorn Mountains, and coming above ground south of the Mathorn Road.

  pronounced: eye-an

  root meaning: ai'an - hidden one

  ALESTRON

  city located in Midhalla, Melhalla. Ruled by Duke Bransian, Teir's'Brydion, and his three brothers. This city did not fall to merchant townsmen in the Third Age uprising that threw down the high kings, but is still ruled by its clanblood heirs.

  pronounced: ah-less-tron

  root meaning: alesstair - stubborn; an - one

  ALITHIEL

  one of twelve Blades of Isaer, forged by centaur Ffereton s'Darian from metal taken from a meteorite. Passed through Paravian possession, acquired the secondary name Dael-Farenn, or Kingmaker, since its owners tended to succeed the end of a royal line. Eventually was awarded to Kamridian s'Ffalenn for his valor in defense of the princess Taliennse, early Third Age. Currently in the possession of Arithon.

  pronounced: ah-lith-ee-el

  root meaning: alith - star; iel - light,'ray

  ALLAND

  principality located in south-eastern Shand. Ruled by the Lord Erlien s'Taleyn, High Earl, and appointed caithdein of Shand.

  pronounced: all-and

  root meaning: a'lind - pine glen

  ALTHAIN TOWER

  spire built at the edge of the Bittern Desert, beginning of the Second Age, to house records of Paravian histories. Third Age, became repository for the archives of all five royal houses of men after rebellion, overseen by the Fellowship Sorcerer, Sethvir, named Warden of Althain since Third Age Year 5100.

  pronounced: all-thay-in

  root meaning: alt - last; thein - tower, sanctuary

  original Paravian pronunciation: alt-thein

  ANGLEFEN

  marsh located in Deshir, Rathain. Also a port town that links the sea-routes to Etarra.

  pronounced: angle fen

  root meaning not from the Paravian

  ANIENT

  Paravian invocation for unity.

  pronounced: an-ee-ent

  root meaning: an - one; ient - suffix for 'most'

  ARAETHURA

  grass plains in south-west Rathain; principality of the same name in that location.
Largely inhabited by Riathan Paravians in the Second Age. Third Age, used as pasture land by widely scattered nomadic shepherds. Fionn Areth's birthplace.

  pronounced: ar-eye-thoo-rah

  root meaning: araeth - grass; era - place, land

  ARITHON

  son of Avar, Prince of Rathain, 1,504th Teir's'Ffalenn after founder of the line, Torbrand in Third Age Year One. Also Master of Shadow, the Bane of Desh-thiere, and Halliron Masterbard's successor.

  pronounced: ar-i-thon

  root meaning: arithon - fate-forger; one who is visionary

  ARWENT

  river in Araethura, Rathain, that flows from Daenfal Lake through Halwythwood to empty in Instrell Bay.

  pronounced: are-went

  root meaning: arwient - swiftest

  ASANDIR

  Fellowship Sorcerer. Secondary name, Kingmaker, since his hand crowned every High King of Men to rule in the Age of Men (Third Age). After the Mistwraith's conquest, he acted as field agent for the Fellowship's doings across the continent. Also called Fiend-quencher, for his reputation for quelling iyats; Storm-breaker and Change-bringer for his past actions when Men first arrived upon Athera.

  pronounced: ah-san-deer

  root meaning: asan - heart; Air - stone 'heartrock'

  ATAINIA

  north-eastern principality of Tysan.

  pronounced: ah-tay-nee-ah

  root meaning: itain - the third; ia - suffix for 'third domain' original Paravian, itainia

  ATCHAZ

  town located in Alland, Shand. Famed for its silk.

  pronounced: at-chaz

  root meaning: atchias - silk

  ATH CREATOR

  prime vibration, force behind all life.

  pronounced: ath

  root meaning: ath - prime, first (as opposed to an, one)

  ATHERA

  name for the world which holds the Five High Kingdoms; four Worldsend Gates; formerly inhabited by dragons, and current home of the Paravian races.