Warrior

by Jennifer Fallon

  Elezaar bit back a smile. She was a feisty little thing, this daughter of Marla’s.

  “Actually, I was hoping you’d come back to Greenharbour with me.”

  Kalan stared at her mother suspiciously. “Why?”

  “Wrayan tells me the process of acceptance into the Sorcerers’ Collective is quite laborious under normal circumstances. It will be much easier if you’re in the city while we go through the formalities.”

  Kalan’s head jerked up. “Wrayan said that?”

  “I can’t imagine why anybody would want to join the Sorcerers’ Collective, mind you,” Wrayan said behind her, appearing out of thin air.

  His sudden appearance made even Elezaar jump and he’d known all along that Wrayan was there. He just hadn’t seen him pull that rather impressive disappearing act.

  Her scowl forgotten, Kalan squealed with glee and threw herself at the thief. “Wrayan! You’re back!”

  Wrayan hugged the child briefly and then pushed her away, aware that Marla thought her daughter’s crush on him was a little misplaced.

  “Yes, he’s back,” Marla said. “And you just walked straight past him, Kalan, without even knowing he was there. Do you understand that?”

  “But Wrayan’s a sorcerer! He did something so I couldn’t see him.”

  “This is precisely the point I have been trying to make for the past two months. Alija Eaglespike is also a magician,” Marla warned. “And you are not. You would have no defence against her. You must understand that, and I’m going to need to be convinced that you are fully aware of the danger before I let you anywhere near the Sorcerers’ Collective.”

  “But that’s not . . .” She hesitated and looked at her mother. “What do you mean, before you let me anywhere near the Sorcerers’ Collective? You’re going to let me join?”

  “I’m thinking about it.”

  Kalan stared at them in confusion. “What changed your mind? You said you’d never agree.”

  “The arrival of Luciena’s cousin has changed matters somewhat.”

  “You mean Rory?”

  “He’ll be joining the Sorcerers’ Collective when you get to Greenharbour,” Wrayan explained.

  “With someone in the Sorcerers’ Collective your mother can trust—and, more importantly, someone Alija can’t influence—the danger to you might be a little more . . . manageable.”

  “So he wasn’t pulling my leg then?” she asked Wrayan. “He really can wield proper magic?”

  Wrayan smiled. “Yes, he can wield proper magic.”

  “Wow,” the girl replied, suitably impressed.

  Marla wasn’t nearly so enthusiastic as her daughter. “Don’t get too excited, Kalan. Despite both Elezaar and Wrayan championing your cause, I’m far from convinced this is a good idea. There are certain negotiations that have to take place before you’re accepted into the Sorcerers’ Collective, too,”

  her mother explained. “I imagine, at the very least, it’s going to cost me a new temple in the grounds of the Sorcerers’ Palace.

  “On the bright side, along with my patronage—and the fact that you are the High Prince’s niece—comes the ability to dictate a few conditions about your apprenticeship. I plan to ask Bruno Sanval to take on Rorin’s apprenticeship, which should keep him out of Alija’s way. But if I allow you to follow him—and it’s a very big if—it will be on the express condition that you and Rorin are never separated.”

  “Why not?”

  “Rorin can maintain a link with you that will tell him if something happens to you,” Wrayan explained. “Don’t ask me how—it’s a magical thing and you wouldn’t understand.”

  “Really? ” Kalan gasped. She looked set to burst something vital. “Do you really mean this, Mama?”

  Marla held up her hand to dampen her daughter’s enthusiasm. “Understand, Kalan, once I’ve done this, you’re on your own. If you fail, young lady, you won’t have to worry about what Alija might do to you, because I will send you back here to Krakandar and marry you off to the scabbiest, most disgusting old man I can find, just so you can prove your continuing loyalty to your family.”

  Kalan grinned broadly, the first genuine sign of happiness Elezaar had seen in the girl for months. “I won’t fail, Mama. I’ll be High Arrion some day. Just watch me.”

  Marla glanced at Wrayan with a shake of her head, obviously wondering what she had unleashed.

  “May the gods help the Sorcerers’ Collective the day that happens,” Wrayan chuckled.

  “May the gods help us all, Wrayan,” Marla replied, rolling her eyes. “I have a bad feeling we’re going to need it. Elezaar, would you have some tea brought in?”

  “Of course, my lady.”

  “If you’re being so nice to Luciena’s cousin, does that mean you’re not going to hang her as a spy, after all?” Kalan said, looking at her mother curiously.

  Elezaar hesitated on the threshold, wondering how Marla would reply.

  The princess shook her head. “As it turns out, Luciena was an innocent pawn in a game she didn’t even know she was playing. And you should never forget what happened to her, Kalan. If you drop your guard for a moment in Greenharbour, the same thing could easily happen to you.”

  Elezaar didn’t hear the rest of the conversation. He smiled to himself and let the door shut behind him, thinking that of all the delicious punishments he could have unleashed on Alija Eaglespike, the most harrowing might yet prove to be Kalan Hawksword.

  “Elezaar!”

  The dwarf turned, a little surprised to find Ruxton Tirstone hailing him. “Are you looking for the princess, sir? She’s in her sitting room with Master Lightfinger and Kalan.”

  Ruxton rolled his eyes. “There’s a plan afoot I’ll bet I want no part of. However, I wasn’t looking for Marla. I was looking for you.”

  “Did you want something, sir?”

  “It’s more about what I can do for you, actually.” The trader glanced up the hall, taking Elezaar by the elbow gently. He moved away from the door to ensure they were alone before he continued. “Do you remember telling me about your brother?”

  Elezaar frowned, wishing he had never mentioned the subject. But he’d always enjoyed a cordial relationship with Marla’s fourth husband. They had shared many a cup of ale in the kitchens late at night when the rest of the household was asleep. Although he’d never been a slave, Ruxton had a lot more in common with Elezaar, in fact, than with his royal wife. It was during one of those late-night ales that, in a rare burst of inexplicable sentimentality, Elezaar had told Ruxton about Crysander.

  “My brother is dead, Master Tirstone.”

  “Perhaps,” the spice trader agreed cautiously.

  Elezaar’s eyes narrowed. “What does that mean?”

  “Just that I’ve heard a rumour or two. Nothing substantial, mind you. But it might be worth investigating. If you wanted me to look into it, that is?”

  For a moment, the hall of Krakandar Palace faded, replaced by the stark black-and-white tiles of Ronan Dell’s house. The captain’s blade—Alija Eagle-spike’s captain—plunging into Crys without warning . . . the man driving his dagger up under Crys’s rib cage and into his heart . . . Crys falling . . . the creak of leather as the captain bends over to check Crys is really dead . . .

  Elezaar shook his head to clear the haunting nightmare. “My brother is dead, Master Tirstone. I thank you for your concern, but I’d appreciate it if you’d just let the matter drop. And that you mention it to nobody.”

  “As you wish,” Ruxton replied. “I just thought—”

  “Only pain lies down the road of false hope,” Elezaar shrugged. “Crysander is dead and I am taking steps to ensure the person responsible will pay.”

  “Are you certain you don’t want my help?”

  “Certain, Master Tirstone.”

  The trader shrugged, as if he couldn’t figure out Elezaar’s reasoning, and turned back in the direction he’d come.

  Elezaar continued towards the stair
s to get Marla’s tea, thinking Ruxton just didn’t understand.

  Revenge would be a long time coming for Elezaar. The dwarf didn’t mind that Alija would probably never

  know he had engi neered her downfall. All Elezaar cared about was that the seeds for Alija Eagle-spike’s destruction had finally been sown in fertile ground and that—albeit, quite a few years from now—he would live to witness the bitter but oh-so-satisfying harvest.

  part II

  THE PAIN OF TRUTH;

  THE COMFORT OF LIES

  Chapter 39

  Aloud cheer went up as the horses crossed the finish line, another stallion from the stables of the High Prince taking the honours, a fact that irked Alija Eaglespike no end. Not being renowned for their horseflesh, Dregian Province had no horses running in the races today, but it would have been nice to think someone other than Izcomdar Province and the High Prince’s own stables had a chance at the prize money. She fanned herself impatiently with a copy of the racing program, silently cursing the dust, the muggy Greenharbour winter that never really cooled down, the unwashed crowds and the High Prince’s good fortune. It irritated her beyond belief to realise Lernen Wolfblade’s success at the races was directly attributable to a gift of four sorcerer-bred horses from her own cousin, Rogan Bearbow, to Lernen’s air-headed nephew, Damin Wolfblade, when the young man finished his fosterage in Izcomdar six years ago.

  Alija glanced down the grandstand to the High Prince’s private box and frowned as she studied the heir to Hythria. Although as High Arrion she was welcome to sit with the High Prince, Alija preferred the Eaglespike enclosure, situated above and behind the royal box, the perfect vantage point from which to study the occupants below.

  Damin Wolfblade sat on a low couch beside his uncle, laughing about something—probably their remarkable good fortune at the races today. Next to Damin sat Adham Tirstone, and beside him a young woman Alija didn’t know, who seemed rather jaded and bored with the whole thing. The High Arrion paid little attention to the girl. She wore a jewelled collar, indicating she was a court’esa. A slave, then, probably belonging to either Adham or Damin. She certainly wasn’t there to entertain the High Prince. Dismissing the slave as insignificant, Alija turned her attention back to Damin Wolfblade.

  Marla’s son was twenty-four now, having survived all attempts to assassi nate him thus far. Not for the first time, as Alija studied the young man, she wished Damin had been more of a Wolfblade and less his father’s son. Laran Krakenshield, although not a handsome man, had been a tall and imposing figure. Simply because of his stature, the young prince gave people the impression he was far more notable than he really deserved.

  As if he knew she was thinking of him, the young prince looked up. Their eyes met for a moment. Damin smiled cheerily, waved, and then returned his attention to whatever his stepbrother, Adham Tirstone, was telling him. Alija cursed softly under her breath, wondering what it would take to be rid of him.

  It was twelve years since the last time Alija had unsuccessfully tried to eliminate the heir to Hythria’s throne. Twelve years of watching and waiting. Twelve long years in which Marla’s daughter, Kalan, had graduated from her apprenticeship to become a full member of the Sorcerers’ Collective.

  Twelve long years since Luciena—now formally adopted by Marla—had taken over her father’s shipping empire and married Marla’s nephew, Xanda Taranger, giving him three children along the way; all without a hint of suspicion that Alija had ever been inside her mind or that Luciena posed any sort of threat to Damin. It was twelve long years since Damin Wolfblade was sent to Rogan Bearbow to begin his fosterage, too. In that time, Alija’s eldest son had married and already produced a daughter, while Marla had continued to prop up her brother’s precarious position by acting as his aide.

  Besides his frustrating insistence on refusing to die whenever she tried to arrange it, Damin Wolfblade was an irritation to Alija for a number of other reasons. His natural charm was one of them—

  and probably more danger to her plans than any inherent streak of political ruthlessness or leadership ability the young man might possess. People automatically liked the High Prince’s heir, just because he was young and fair and always seemed to be laughing.

  Fortunately, not everyone was taken in by a winning smile. It was clear to all who’d met him that Damin Wolfblade took nothing seriously, a fact that even Marla had complained about on occasion.

  Privately delighted by this obvious flaw in the young man’s character, the High Arrion had advised the princess to put aside her concerns and let nature take its course. “He’ll grow out of it,” she assured Marla frequently, hoping he never did. Of one thing Alija was certain: when it came to a showdown—

  and it would, because Cyrus Eaglespike, not Damin Wolfblade, was destined to rule Hythria—her eldest son’s serious and thoughtful nature would make him a far more attractive candidate for High Prince.

  That had been her mistake with Barnardo, she willingly acknowledged now. There was no point offering to remove one fool just to replace him with another.

  The people want someone they can look up to, not the frivolous charm of an inexperienced, albeit handsome, young man with no sense of responsibility whatsoever.

  Alija watched Damin chatting with his uncle and his stepbrother, wondering what the young prince and his sick old uncle had in common. Damin was here in Greenharbour to learn, supposedly, but if he was learning statecraft, he certainly wasn’t learning it from his uncle and he certainly wasn’t doing it at the palace. According to Alija’s spies, when Damin wasn’t training with the Palace Guard, or at the horse races, or partying with his close-knit circle of friends, he was holed up in Marla’s townhouse learning the gods-alone-knew-what under the tutelage of that damned dwarf.

  Damin had inherited much of his mother’s blonde good looks along with his father’s breadth of shoulder, which made him a popular figure with the young women of Greenharbour, although he’d been careful to avoid scandal with any woman of his own class. He paid frequent visits to Zegarnald’s temple, made a point of training regularly, and could hold his own with the best of them; a fact which did not surprise Alija in the slightest, given the training Damin had received as a boy. He undertook minor royal duties with good-natured forbearance, had kept his nose out of anything controversial—

  once again, that was probably Marla’s doing—and was generally considered quite harmless when it came to anything political. Although he obviously enjoyed a cordial relationship with the High Prince, he rarely ventured near the palace and had never—as far as Alija knew—taken part in one of Lernen’s orgies in the roof garden on the west wing. The only good thing that said about Damin Wolfblade was that he didn’t share his uncle’s perversions. He probably had a whole new set of his own.

  “More wine, my lady?”

  Alija glanced up at the slave and nodded, holding out her cup for a refill as Damin Wolfblade rose to his feet below her to greet some new arrivals to the royal box. Lernen remained seated, but turned on his couch to greet the newcomers. Luciena and her husband, Xanda Taranger. Alija could feel her ire rising. Aware that in such a public place, people were probably watching her with the same amount of interest that she was watching the royal box, she let no emotion show as the couple took their seats behind the High Prince.

  Alija’s attempt to use Luciena Mariner as an assassin when Damin was still a child had proved a complete failure. Either the coercion had worn off before Luciena reached Krakandar, or nobody had ever uttered the trigger phrase in her presence. Unlikely, Alija thought, watching the ease with which the once penniless court’esa’s daughter seemed to mingle with her betters. A respected businesswoman, married to a Taranger and adopted sister to the next High Prince, Luciena had led a charmed life these past twelve years. She’d given birth to three healthy children, ran a trading empire most men would have given a limb to command, and was treated as a member of the High Prince’s inner circle.

  The failure of A
lija’s plan to use Luciena as an assassin still grated, mostly because she had no idea how it could have failed. She would have understood if Luciena had been caught and subsequently executed for attempting to kill Damin—that had always been a risk of the plan. But the whole damned Wolfblade clan carried on as if nothing had happened at all. And maybe that was the explanation. There was no way Marla would have allowed the girl to live if she perceived her as a danger. That Luciena remained alive was proof she had never presented any sort of threat to the family.

  Alija just couldn’t understand how the coercion had failed. To compound the problem, it was almost two years after she’d first met the girl and placed the notion in her head to assassinate Damin before Alija was able to get close enough to Luciena again to touch her (and therefore, her mind) to find out what had gone wrong. Not surprisingly, by then no trace of Alija’s handiwork remained. Luciena’s mind was filled only with shallow thoughts, mostly focused on her husband and the impending birth of her first child. The contact had been quick—a mere brush as they passed in the hall—which meant Alija had little time for an in-depth analysis, so to this day she had never discovered a satisfactory answer to the puzzle.

  If she’d thought it was hard getting to Damin while he was in the custody of Mahkas Damaran in Krakandar, it was damn near impossible in Rogan Bearbow’s stronghold at Natalandar. Even though Rogan was her cousin, he took his responsibility for Damin’s safety so seriously, Alija was certain he would have put one of his own children to death if he thought they were a threat to the young prince.

  So Damin had done his fosterage in Izcomdar and at the age of eighteen had come to Greenharbour, presumably to begin learning what was expected of him when he eventually assumed the role of High Prince. He was careful who he slept with, restricting his pleasures of the flesh to those court’esa owned by Marla’s household. Alija attributed that to Marla’s common sense rather than her son’s. (The Lady of Eaglespike was just as adamant that her own sons, Cyrus and Serrin, not expose themselves either to assassination or some unspeakable disease by consorting with brothel-owned court’esa.) The young prince never ventured out of doors alone and certainly not without a phalanx of dedicated bodyguards all apparently willing to throw their lives away in defence of Hythria’s heir.