It was an hour of careful travel before they rounded the port-side island and hove-to in a wide channel from where the horizon in every direction was studded with islands. The crew stood down, the light failing quickly, and soon the smells of cooking filled Erienne’s nose while somewhere, a flute was playing softly. Hardly daring to move, Erienne and Lyanna shifted where they sat on the netted and tied crates, not part of the relief the crew shared. Ren’erei came over to them, carrying mugs of tea for them both.
‘We’re stopped for the night. Only a madman would risk the channels to Herendeneth in darkness. We’re hidden from the ocean and few could follow us even this far. You have no wish to know how close our hull came to the reef and it will be no better at first light.’
Erienne accepted the tea and watched a while as Lyanna cupped her hands around her mug, breathing in the fresh herb fragrance.
‘But surely you’ve sailed this stretch before?’ she asked eventually.
Ren’erei nodded. ‘But sand shifts and reefs grow. Eventually the course of channels change. You can’t be too careful and there must always be passage. Our charts change almost with every voyage. Never by much, but enough to keep us alert.’
‘Will we make land tomorrow?’ asked Erienne.
‘I want to walk on the sand!’ announced Lyanna abruptly, taking a sip of her tea. The young elf smiled and shook her head.
‘No sand where we are going, my princess,’ she said. ‘Not tomorrow. But one day, I’ll take you to the sand, I promise.’
Erienne saw the warmth in Ren’erei’s eyes.
‘Do you have children?’ Erienne smoothed Lyanna’s hair. The child pulled away slightly, concentrating on her drink. It was easy to forget the depth to which her mind already ran and the power that was harboured there.
‘No,’ said Ren’erei. ‘Though I’d love to. My duties take me away from the attentions of males, but it won’t be forever.’
‘You’ll make a fine parent,’ said Erienne.
‘For now I can only hope so,’ said the elf. ‘But thank you.’
The night passed quietly, the crew savouring whatever rest they could get, acutely aware of the rigours dawn would bring. The Ocean Elm set sail again in the cool of early sunrise and Erienne had woken to the feel of the ship underway, albeit slowly, and the curious quiet that held sway as they moved through the narrow channel that led inexorably to Herendeneth and the voices that had urged them to their journey.
Washing and dressing quickly in a pair of pale brown breeches, a wool shirt and leather jerkin supplied by Ren’erei, Erienne had taken to the deck, pausing to frown at her daughter’s slumbering form. Normally a bundle of energy that rose with the dawn, Lyanna had slept more and more every day of their voyage and Erienne couldn’t help but feel that it was sleep not entirely under her control. But on the other hand, she was refreshed and bright when she awoke, and her calm acceptance of the uprooting of everything she had known was pure blessing.
Up on deck, Erienne returned to her position of yesterday, soaking up a watery sun that shone through a thickening cloud bank. The wind was brisk but even and the Ocean Elm made slow and steady progress through the archipelago.
Throughout an anxious day, they crawled between islands. An idyllic lagoon setting would give way to a scatter of lifeless rock fists or a sweeping volcanic atoll, its ridges obscured by cloud. Up in the rigging, the crew stood waiting as they had yesterday, ready to reef or unfurl sail on barked command, and the jib was slackened any time the wind picked up pace.
The threat beneath the waves removed the romance of this final leg of the voyage, and though Erienne never ceased to marvel at the sheer scale and beauty of Ornouth, she couldn’t help but feel they were somehow unwelcome. A paradise of tranquillity it might be but, lurking close by, a sense of malevolence. The Ocean Elm was here under sufferance and failure to show respect would be met with the dread sound of reef ripping through timber.
In the middle of the afternoon, with the cloud blowing away to leave a blanket of blue sky, the temperature rose as the wind dropped. Lyanna, who had joined Erienne late in the morning, scrambled to her feet, using Erienne’s back to steady her as she peered forward intently.
‘What is it, sweet?’ asked Erienne.
‘We’re here,’ said Lyanna, her voice soft and almost inaudible above the creaking of spars and the gentle bow wave that ran past the ship. Erienne looked too. The captain had been holding the Ocean Elm on a starboard tack, taking the ship past a sweeping sandy beach at the back of which cliffs soared hundreds of feet into the air, giving a home to thousands of sea birds whose calls surrounded them.
Skirting the edge of the island, the ship turned slowly to run down a channel barely more than three ship’s widths across. Bleaker cliffs towered above them on both sides now, closing in above their heads, the shrill cries of gulls echoing down to them from where they circled high above or sat on precariously sited nests.
But it was at the end of the channel that Lyanna stared, because closing with every passing heartbeat was Herendeneth. Like the cliffs by which they passed, the island was dominated by a sheer rock face that scaled many hundreds of feet into the afternoon sky. And slowly revealed was a shore from which spears of stone protruded and cliffs tumbled down to the sea, the scattering of huge boulders evidence of ancient tumultuous movement.
Moving steadily down the widening channel, the Ocean Elm was silent once more. Herendeneth reached out with an aura that demanded reverence and quiet contemplation. Any sailor not tending sails or wheel, dropped briefly to one knee with bowed head, touching the centre of his forehead with his right index finger.
‘You are here, Lyanna,’ said Ren’erei. Erienne started; she hadn’t heard the elf approach. ‘Soon you will be standing with the Al-Drechar. ’
The name sent shivers down Erienne’s spine. Al-Drechar was a name written in legend and ancient texts. They were the holders of the faith, the guardians of true magic. They were the Keepers of the One. There had never been any doubt that a substantial sect had survived the Sundering, the cataclysmic battles that had seen four Colleges emerge from the ruins of the one that had previously dominated Balaian magic. But that had been over two thousand years before and they were assumed to have died out as time passed and peace returned to Balaia. All that was heard were rumours, explained away by the clashing of charged mana or the unpredictability of nature.
Yet the idea that descendants of the One had survived had never been conclusively disproved and through the centuries, enough mages had been strong enough to state their beliefs and perpetuate what had appeared at best a myth.
Now, Erienne knew different. She knew. And in a while, she would physically meet with those who many dreamed still lived, but more prayed were dead.
‘How many are there?’ she asked.
‘Only four remain,’ replied Ren’erei. ‘Your daughter truly represents the last hope for furtherance of our cause.’ She placed a hand on Lyanna’s head who looked up and smiled, though a frown chased it quickly away.
‘Are they dying then?’ Erienne asked.
‘They are very old,’ replied the elf. ‘And they’ve been waiting for you a long time. They couldn’t have waited too much longer.’
Erienne noticed tears standing in Ren’erei’s eyes.
‘What will we find there?’ she mused, not really expecting an answer.
‘Peace, goodness, purity. Age.’ She looked into Erienne’s eyes and the mage saw desperation burning in those of the elf. ‘They can’t be allowed to fade uselessly. I and the Guild, we’ve watched them grow steadily weaker over the years. She must be the one.’
‘She is,’ said Erienne, Ren’erei’s fervour unsettling her. Lyanna felt it too and had leant against her mother. She was gazing again at the island that would be her home for the Gods only knew how long.
‘Tell me, Ren’erei, how many of you serve them? The Al-Drechar, that is.’
‘We are few. Forty-three in all, but our sons a
nd daughters will carry on the work until we are not needed any more, one way or another. We’ve served them for generations, ever since the Sundering, but the honour is undiminished.’ She stood tall, pride on her face. ‘We are the Guild of Drech and we will not falter until our service is fulfilled. All else is secondary.’ She turned from Erienne and looked towards Herendeneth, touching index finger to forehead as she bowed.
The ship dropped anchor about a quarter of a mile off the bleak northern coast of the island. Only the most tenacious of vegetation clung to the towering rock wall ahead of them and waves raced into crash against hard stone. In the sky, a few birds circled, their calls lost in the breeze.
Immediately they were stationary, the crew began unlashing the three long boats and lowering them into the water. Scrambling-nets and ladders followed, and a brief flurry of activity saw luggage and supplies passed swiftly down to be securely fastened to two of the craft. Each boat took four oarsmen and a skipper. Erienne was invited to climb down a ladder while Lyanna sat on Tryuun’s broad shoulders, very quiet and pale, as the elf descended swiftly to the boat that would carry them ashore.
The crews pulled away strongly, heading for a shore apparently barren of landing sites. But rounding a spit hidden from shipboard view, they beached on a narrow stretch of shingle, away from which a path climbed up and disappeared through a cleft in the rocks. Ren’erei helped Erienne and Lyanna out of the boat, smiling as they skipped through the cold shallows to escape the water and joining them as they stared down, wet above their knees.
‘Not far now,’ she said. ‘Just one last climb. The crew will bring up all your things.’
The path was well kept, its steps long, carefully carved and shallow in the rise, and it wound up in a deliberately gentle incline overlooked by birch trees.
Looking back down the stairway, Erienne could see the scope of the illusion. This was no harsh rock island. True, the landing points were difficult and crowded with reefs, but the height of any cliff had been hugely exaggerated. And beyond the shore line, the island rolled gracefully up to a low pinnacle through tumbledown rock and rich green forest under which the heat of the day was captured. Away from the sea breeze, the air was humid and Erienne felt sweat beading and running all over her body.
Beside her, Lyanna trotted along, clutching her doll in one hand, humming to herself, her face intent.
‘Are you all right, darling?’ Erienne trailed a hand across Lyanna’s head.
‘Yes,’ she affirmed. ‘Will you do the walking song again?’ Erienne smiled. ‘If you like.’ She held out her hand and Lyanna gripped it tightly. ‘Here we go,’ Erienne said, changing to a shorter stride.
‘I step with my right foot,
And the left follows on.
If I do it once again,
Then the journey soon is done.
If I don’t move my left foot,
Then the right one gets away.
If I don’t move my right foot,
Then just here is where we’ll stay.’
Repeating the words over and over while they stepped and double-stepped, Erienne couldn’t help but blush as she caught Ren’erei and Tryuun watching her over their shoulders. Both elves were smiling and as they turned back, Ren’erei mimicked the double steps the song demanded.
‘One day, it’ll be your turn,’ said Erienne, joining in their laughter.
Lyanna skipped up to the elf and took her hand.
‘You’re not doing it right. Mummy, sing it again.’
‘Just once more, then,’ said Erienne. ‘Pay attention, Ren’erei.’ And while she sang, she watched her daughter, carefree, giggling at Ren’erei’s attempts to mimic the steps, and wished fervently that Lyanna had been born without the burden she carried. And with that, came guilt. Because Erienne had planned it to be this way. And though it was a great thing they were trying to do, before they achieved their goal, there was so much hardship to come. And Lyanna, of course, had no choice in the matter. Erienne already grieved for the childhood she was to lose.
Lyanna let go of Ren’erei’s hand and trotted on, warbling a vague approximation of Erienne’s walking tune. She turned out of sight, around a corner of the tree-lined path a few yards ahead. Erienne had upped her pace the moment she heard the song falter. And by the time Lyanna’s scream had split the air, she was moving at a run.
Chapter 3
Four years after the last Wesmen had withdrawn, the College city of Julatsa had returned to something like its old self, with one significant difference.
Ilkar stood on one of the few undamaged sections of College wall and turned a full circle, his shoulder-length black hair drifting in the light breeze. On the city’s borders, the Wesmen’s wooden fortifications had long been stripped away to use in rebuilding homes, businesses, municipal offices and the scores of shops and inns burned and demolished by the invaders during their brief occupation. Original stone was much in evidence, bearing the scarring and scorches of war. The populace, scattered or enslaved, had flooded back once the Wesmen departed and the destroyed city now glowed with energy again, the people bringing with them the pulse of life.
Ilkar shook his head slightly at some of the new architecture. The kindest word to describe much of it was ‘enthusiastic’. Yet no one could deny the energy that the rash of twisted spires, white stone domes and flying buttresses exuded. They had been built with tremendous verve but Ilkar couldn’t help but wonder what those builders thought now.
Their desire and that, perhaps misplaced, enthusiasm had run out at the gates of the College. It hadn’t started that way. In the immediate aftermath of Wesmen withdrawal, the devastated College had been the city’s focus as it struggled to come to terms with its trauma. There had been a recognition of the scale of violence visited on the College and in the early months, new building work had forged ahead. Quarters, administration, kitchens and refectory, a long room, the old quadrangle and a library - sadly empty but for a few of Septern’s texts, brought there by Ilkar himself following the closing of the Noonshade rip - had appeared from the rubble.
But the job was enormous and, as more Julatsans returned to the city, attention turned quite rightly to its infrastructure. The trouble was that with life able to begin again, it was easy to turn away from the College and forget the work that was still needed there.
Ilkar couldn’t. His circle ended with a view down over the new library. He couldn’t argue with the quality of what had been done but it left them so far from having a functional college. And vital to it was the building that should occupy the black, scarred, jagged hole, three hundred feet wide, that dominated the centre of the College.
The Tower.
Ilkar knew that what lay below scared the city builders and tradesmen. Gods, it scared him sometimes, but for him it was the enormity the crater represented that was the fear. At its base, covered by an impenetrable black mist, lay the Heart. Buried as Julatsa fell, by Barras, the old elf Negotiator, and a team of senior mages, its raising was critical to the College’s return to power.
So much knowledge lay within. Not just key magical texts but, of greater immediate importance, plans and blueprints. Until the Heart was raised, they could not rebuild the Tower, ManaBowl, Cold Room or recovery chambers among others. And until he had enough mages, he couldn’t hope to raise the Heart.
Ilkar sat down on the parapet and let his legs swing. There was the nub of the crisis. Hammering echoed up to him. New paint sparkled in the sun under the clear blue sky, its odour fresh in his nostrils. Wood dust covered the stone flags that had been awash with so much blood.
But it would never be finished. There weren’t enough Julatsan mages to cast the necessary magic. Gods in the ground, there was barely enough experience to form a council but he’d done it anyway, just to give the place some structure. He didn’t particularly want to take on the role of High Mage but there was no other figurehead and at least his reputation with The Raven earned him respect and weight in negotiations.
&nbs
p; He’d had to put out wider calls for mages. There had to be Julatsans scattered across the continents, those like himself who rarely visited the College but who owed their lives to it nonetheless. He’d even sent word into the Southern Continent of Calaius, to the elven homelands where so many Julatsan elves had returned over the years, bleeding Balaia of a crucial resource. The Gods knew what the state of their magic would be. Ilkar only hoped their Julatsan Lore training hadn’t lapsed with the passing of time. It was becoming increasingly clear that he needed them badly.
‘Ilkar!’ called a voice from below. He leaned forward. Pheone, her brown hair tied up in a bun and her long young face smeared with dust and sweat, looked up at the parapet, her green dress flapping gently at her ankles. She was a fine mage but inexperienced, and lucky to be alive after surviving the rout of the Dordovan relief column during the siege of Julatsa at the height of the war.
‘How’s it going?’ he asked.
‘The cladding on the long room is complete. A few of us thought we’d run a test. Release a little pent-up emotion, if you know what I mean. Care to join us?’
Ilkar chuckled. He hadn’t cast an offensive spell in four years. He flexed his fingers and hauled himself to his feet.
‘I don’t mind if I do,’ he said. He brushed stone chips from his tan breeches and the dark leather jerkin that covered his fawn shirt and headed for the stairway.
A feeling of energy caused him to look up at the sky. A bolt of lightning, pale as straw and angry, arced in the unbroken blue heavens, its report echoing dully in his ears. Another flash, and then a third, broke the peace of the day. He frowned at the repetition of the startling and worrying sight.
Ilkar descended the stairs, resolving to mention the subject over supper. Someone, he expected, could provide an explanation.
The Unknown Warrior sat in a chair beside the sleeping form of Jonas. The boy had spent a quieter night than his father, who had come home not long before dawn. And though he had slipped into bed next to Diera to try to grab what little sleep he could, his mind had churned over Denser’s words, and kept him from his dreams. Shortly after Diera had risen in response to Jonas’ cries, to feed and comfort him until he slept again, The Unknown had ceased his endless turning and come to sit in the calm of Jonas’ room to give his wife the chance of uninterrupted rest.
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