Darien slumped, shivering, not wanting to look up to face the wrath of his mother. She was standing at the rail of the balcony above, glaring down at him imperiously. At least she was alone. Darien wasn’t sure he could stand the humiliation of another public dressing-down by her. She was waiting for him, he saw. He moved forward grudgingly, ascending yet another flight of stairs to reach her.
Darien found himself beginning to wish that he was still back at the front. The turmoil of being home again was almost as taxing as the field of battle. At least the brutal trials of war were something he had become hardened to, even if he would never become accustomed to them. In battle, he knew where he stood, who the enemy was, who to swing his sword at, and who not to. Back home, Darien was at a loss. He was no longer used to the equally treacherous game of family politics.
Emelda hastened toward him as he arrived at the top of the staircase. Fury radiated from her very presence, sharpening her every movement. When she reached him, she thrust out her hands and snatched the dripping cloak he was wearing off his back, tossing it across the rail of the balcony. Then she grabbed his face in her hand, turning it to examine him closely. The pressure of her fingers increased until they hurt. She jerked her hand away again roughly.
“What is the matter with you?” she hissed between clenched teeth. “When I sent you away, you were ready for this. More than ready! But now I see you’ve come back to us with the manners of a swine and nothing but contempt for our ways.”
Darien seethed with a silent rage that threatened to ignite. Emelda was Prime Warden as well as his mother. But that was no excuse for the callous way she always treated him. She showed less respect for him than she did for the lowliest kitchen scullion. He didn’t care that she held the keys to his Raising in her hand, didn’t care that she had the authority to send him away again, perhaps this time forever. The anger inside burned fierce, an explosion of fury impossible to contain.
“Then make your choice!” Darien raged at her, eyes glistening with searing heat. “Either let’s do this, or tell me right now, and I’ll be on my way. I’m your son, not some damned indicator of how fit you are to be Prime Warden.”
Emelda was staring at him as if truly seeing him for the very first time in her life. She blinked slowly before dropping her gaze. It was the only time in Darien’s memory that he had ever seen his mother visibly back down. The silence between them stretched. Finally, Emelda looked back up to meet his gaze. An expression of regret had replaced the anger in her eyes. At first, Darien almost didn’t recognize the emotion, it looked so foreign on her features.
“I’m sorry,” she said simply, sincerely. “I’ve always held the highest expectations of you. Perhaps they have been too high. I suppose it’s because, for the most part, you have always lived up to them.”
It was Darien’s turn to drop his gaze. Her soft words had extinguished the last of the anger left within him. He stared at the floor, thoughts and feelings running through his head in a torrent, leaving him feeling terribly confused. He hadn’t even noticed her hand moving until he felt the touch of her fingertips against his.
“It’s time,” she whispered gently. A small smile touched her lips. “Are you ready?”
Darien nodded, but he didn’t speak. He felt incapable of trusting his voice. He allowed her to guide him toward a door off the balcony. Darien opened it for her automatically and waited as she went through first. He followed behind silently in her wake.
What he found inside the chapel looked nothing like the formal ceremony he had been expecting. What he saw rather appeared to be a gathering of old friends. There were far fewer people than he had expected, for one thing. The High Priest of Athera appeared to be gossiping with Grand Master Ezras, an ancient-looking man seated in a large, high-backed chair at the far end of the room. They seemed to be swapping old stories over drinks. Beside them were a few other Masters he recognized, and even a Grand Master, all appearing to be just participating in friendly discussion. Yet, it was who he didn’t see that struck him most deeply. His mother had already warned him that Aidan would be absent. But he had been sincerely hoping that Meiran would be here. It was more than just hope, really.
He needed her here.
Perhaps something urgent had come up. Or, more likely, she had moved on to someone else in the two long years since he’d seen her last. Whatever the reason, Meiran’s absence quenched the last spark of anticipation Darien had left. The only thing he wanted to do now was just get through the ritual then leave and go his way.
No one had prepared him for what he was supposed to do. Everyone was looking at him, he realized, all conversation suddenly halted. He noticed a few people shifting uncomfortably. Looking at his mother for direction, he saw Emelda simply nod her head in the direction of Ezras. So he took a deep breath and then did the only thing he could think of to do.
Darien walked across the room in a carefully measured pace directly toward the form of the old man. He tried not to look at any of the other faces in the room, not wanting to know what was written on them. Instead, he kept his gaze fixed on Ezras until he reached the chair where the Grand Master was seated, surveying his approach with a look of quiet interest. Smoothly, he dropped to his knees before the ancient Sentinel and bowed his head deeply.
Darien wasn’t certain why he had done that, or if it was even the proper thing to do. He was not even sure of what he was expecting. But now that he had chosen to make a place for himself at the Grand Master’s feet, he was committed. By the unwritten rules of protocol, he could do nothing further until he was bid. The next move had to be made by the old man. All he could do now was wait.
The waiting seemed to last a lifetime. There was no sound in the room, not even a rustle of fabric or the tinkle of ice in a glass. Darien closed his eyes, an uncomfortable feeling growing inside him. He was beginning to get the feeling that there must be something else he should be doing, but he could hardly imagine what it could be. The silence in the room was becoming uneasy. It was stretching too long, even for the witnesses. He felt their eyes boring into his back, felt himself becoming unnerved by their unseen stares. He was starting to think that maybe he had made a mistake. He almost stood up.
Then he felt a pressure under his chin. The ancient Sentinel had reached down from his chair to take Darien’s face in his hand, lifting his chin with curled and gnarled fingers, directing his gaze upward and into his own.
He found himself looking into a pair of clear blue eyes that blazed with an acute flame of intelligence. There was no readable expression within them. There was only that single spark that burned with a luminous intensity. Darien found himself transfixed by it, unable to break away. The old man’s stare held him more securely than any iron shackle, even when he became aware that those clear blue eyes were doing much more than merely staring. Darien realized with trepidation that Ezras had been deliberately scrutinizing him the entire time.
Suddenly, he was filled with doubt. The old man before him with the fiery gaze was one of the most powerful mages in Aerysius, and was also the most accomplished. From what he could remember of him, Darien knew that Ezras had been a prevailing force in the effort that had turned back the Enemy at the Battle of Meridan almost twenty years before. He had later gone on to do the same at the Battle of Dobson Hollow. All accomplished while maintaining his Oath of Harmony. Darien wondered if he was worthy after all of accepting the Rite of Transference from this man. He thought of his own professed opinions of the Oath and began to have doubts.
He doubted, but he did not look away.
Neither did Ezras. He sat staring Darien straight in the eye as his cracked lips moved to form words.
“Did you know I was a friend of your father’s?”
Darien blinked. His shock was as much due to just hearing the sound of a voice after such a long silence as it was to the sentiment in the old man’s tone.
When he found his own voice again, it came out as a barely grated whisper, “No, Grand Master.
I did not.”
Ezras nodded slightly. His ancient hand yet lingered on Darien’s chin, while the intense blue stare continued to assess his every reaction. After another long stretch of silence, the old man finally spoke again:
“You have his eyes. And I sense something else of him in you, as well: you have his spirit. Gerald Lauchlin was a truly inspiring man and a loyal friend. You would do well to model yourself after him.” Ezras frowned, pausing a moment in reflection. “Come to think of it, it seems you already have. He was late to his own Raising, too. Well, perhaps not quite so late as yourself.”
Darien felt himself blush as the old mage grinned down at him.
The High Priest must have taken that moment as his cue. He stepped behind the chair Ezras occupied and leaned forward to ask him, “Are you ready, Grand Master?”
Ezras turned to look up at the priest with a warm smile devoid of any sign of regret. “Quite ready. This bag of bones some would call a body has stopped serving any useful purpose I can think of. Yes, I believe it’s well past time. You may begin.”
The priest nodded, a grim smile forming on his thin lips. He turned a bit to look down at Darien, who was still kneeling at the Sentinel’s feet.
The priest intoned, “Darien Lauchlin, are you prepared to assume the chains of servitude that will Bind you forever as a guardian of the Rhen and of its people?”
“I am, Your Eminence.” Darien was able to answer without hesitation, feeling himself bolstered somewhat by the old man’s invigorating strength.
“And are you also prepared to accept accountability for your every action, so that your decisions be always tempered by wisdom, compassion, and humility?”
“Aye, Your Eminence. I am.”
The priest moved forward to stand beside Ezras. He placed a hand on the Sentinel’s shoulder in a warm gesture that suggested an old friendship between the two men. He held his hand there as he stated formally, “Grand Master, may your journey to the Atrament be swift. Your time of service is at an end. Depart in peace, knowing that your servitude has not gone unnoticed, nor unappreciated. Your name will be entered into the Book of Records, so that your works will be known by future generations until the end of time.”
Ezras chuckled as the priest uttered the last line of the ancient ritual and removed his hand. “My thanks, Your Eminence. Most eloquently spoken. Though you should have omitted that last part about my works; I’m certain they’re not worth the waste of parchment.” He looked down at Darien then, a warm and welcoming smile on his lips. “Come, young man. Take these old hands. All this pomp and ceremony is frankly getting on my nerves; I’d like to have an end to it.”
“Yes, Grand Master.”
Darien barely heard the sound of his own voice. His heart was beating fiercely as a host of conflicting emotions warred within him. These were the last moments of the old man’s life. Darien had never really known Ezras until this moment, but had already decided that he was quite fond of the man. The old mage’s imminent passing filled him with a bitter sense of remorse. At the same time, he also felt singularly responsible for the ending of that life. He knew the feeling was unjustified; the transfer of power from one generation of mages to the next was simply the way it had been since the beginning of time, the only way it could possibly ever be. Deciding to pass on his gift had been Ezras’ choice alone, not his. But Darien found it hard to shake the guilt, all the same.
There was also an acute sense of anticipation, knowing that the moment he had always waited for had finally arrived. The feeling was commingled bittersweetly with an intense pang of sadness that had been lingering at the back of his mind throughout the entire ritual.
He had wanted so much for Meiran to be here.
But she was not. So he did as the old man bid and took the mage’s age-spotted and gnarled hands into his own, closing his eyes.
Almost instantly he felt the stir of the conduit that Ezras established between them. He could feel the surge of it, the charge of power that flowed up his arms, into his chest, spreading out to fill his body with an overwhelming gush of exhilarating energy. It was as if every fiber within him had been suddenly awakened together at once. He could feel the magic field pulsing within him, throbbing, as brilliantly radiant as the sun. The feeling swelled, became encompassing, consuming him utterly.
And then, abruptly, he felt the conduit close.
When Darien opened his eyes, he found himself drained and weak. He was gasping for breath as rivers of sweat streamed from his brow and his heart pounded like a stampede of horses in his chest. His cheeks were wet with spilled tears he didn’t even remember shedding. The reality he awakened to was the same as before, and yet altogether different. It seemed more vivid, somehow, as if the world he had known before this moment was just a dim reflection that did not quite do justice to the real thing. The hues of colors seemed more saturated, the shadows somehow less dense. All of his senses seemed overpowered, the experience almost surreal. He felt like a newborn just expelled from the womb, opening its eyes for the very first time.
A shudder in the floor beneath him brought his senses sharply back into focus. He pushed himself up off the ground, rising to a crouch as a stab of cold fear lanced through him. Another tremor hit, this time big enough to rock the entire structure of the temple.
Darien watched as everyone in the room surged toward the window at once. Behind the glass, he could see that the sky had taken on a pasty green hue. He saw, but did not understand. Regaining his feet, he moved toward the others. As he neared the window, he saw for himself that the glow came from far below, from the Square beside the Hall of the Watchers. A pillar of green energy had erupted from the center of the pavement, shooting straight up into the sky above Aerysius. Darien felt a stabbing flare of panic as he stared into the sickening green column of light.
“What is it?” he whispered.
It was his mother’s voice that answered him, leaden and hollow-sounding. “The Well of Tears has been opened. May the gods have mercy on us all.”
Chapter Three
The Fallen
AIDAN LAUCHLIN STARED at the towering column of energy that thrust upward from the center of the Square to stab the skies above Aerysius like a terrible, scintillating lance. The sight of the sickly green pillar filled him with a quivering sense of accomplishment. The column of light soared into the sky, piercing the heavens, a potent signal that could be witnessed from as far away as the Black Lands. So vast was its power that the air around it shimmered as if disturbed. Lightnings called forth from the choking blanket of cloudcover forked down to shatter against that terrible spire, commingling the strength of the heavens with the vile might of the Netherworld. The very air was charged, the odor of it sickly-sweet.
Aidan breathed in deeply, relishing the scent, savoring the sight of his creation with a reverence akin to rapture as he strode out into the luminous glow of the Square. His cloak flapped behind him as he walked, stirred by currents of air displaced by the Gateway. Against that glowing column, his form looked nothing more than a ghostly black shadow, though one with deadly purpose. His brother’s sword rode at his back, still sheathed in Meiran’s blood. Aidan had not bothered to wipe the blade clean; he was yet hoping to give it back to its owner.
He walked toward the heart of the Square as far as he dared, drawing up to pause yet fifty paces away from the brilliant spire of light. He narrowed his eyes, finding it all but impossible to stare right into the blinding radiance of the column. He waited almost casually, hands clasped neatly behind his back, as lurid shadows danced behind him on the pavement. In the distance, the melancholy toll of a single bell rang out over the city. Aidan stared harder at the Gateway, silently willing something to happen.
Eight shapes emerged in unison from the glowing pillar, dark forms spreading out away from the Gateway in a widening circle toward the eight points of the compass. Aidan squinted, trying to put features to the three figures approaching his own position. It was impossible at first; t
he shapes were only moving darkness eclipsed by the brilliant pillar of light. Yet, gradually, details began to emerge. As they neared, the figures resolved into distinctly human shapes that drew slowly out of shadow. The vague features yielded identity only slowly. It was not until the first was standing right in front of him that Aidan was able to put a name to the face that no human alive had ever seen.
Zavier Renquist stopped only feet away, dark eyes considering him with malevolent intensity. The tainted light of the Gateway cast harsh shadows across the chiseled angles of his face. He wore his long, brown hair pulled back sharply from his high brow in a manner that exaggerated the cruel effect of his narrow black eyes and hawklike nose. In life, Renquist had been one of the most distinguished mages ever to exist, his greatness tempered only by the greatness of his betrayal. The histories all gave Renquist almost sole credit for the fall of Bryn Calazar, ancient city and capital of Caladorn. It was Renquist’s treachery that had precipitated the fall of Caladorn itself, propelling the Rhen’s sister-kingdom into the darkening spiral that had eventually ended only with the complete desecration of the entire land. In the years since, the name Caladorn was eventually forgotten, only half-remembered by scholars and the wise. Most people now knew it only as the Black Lands, due in large part to Renquist’s infamous treachery.
But Zavier Renquist was a thousand years dead. The man now standing before Aidan was one of the Eight Servants of Xerys, God of Chaos and Lord of the Netherworld. In life, Renquist had allied himself with the forces of evil. Upon his death, he had become a true demon. And now that Aidan had opened the Well of Tears, Renquist and his associates were constrained to do his bidding.
Other dark shapes drifted toward him. A man and a woman approached first. The man was garbed in the silks of a noble, though the elegant fabric was tailored in a cut that Aidan had never before seen. The woman on his right had dark hair that flowed down her back to her waist and was clothed in a flowing, diaphanous gown that rippled behind her as she moved. At her side paced two creatures that looked like enormous black wolfhounds with glowing green eyes, their feet padding silently across the stone, muzzles torn between the actions of scenting the air and tipping upward to lick the tips of their mistress’s fingers. Aidan had no idea who the man was; accounts of the Eight were often muddled and vague. But he knew the woman to be Myria Anassis, an ancient Querer who had traded her allegiance to Xerys before the fall of Bryn Calazar. Her pets were not mere dogs. They were thanacrysts, creatures that fed solely on the lifeforce of a mage. Aidan had always thought them but a figment of legend. But that legend had come to life before him, and he stared at their matted fur and gleaming green eyes in open, unabashed wonderment.
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