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seventeen
The
knobby ring- of moonstone named Weathermaker blazed green for five interminable heartbeats, and
Beynor gritted his teeth to stifle his outcry as every nerve in his body
reacted to its sorcery by bursting into searing flame. He endured it, tears
pouring down his beardless face from eyes wide open, until the Great Stone
paled and the agony receded and he let his breath escape in a long, broken sob.
Done. And the Diddlies damn well better be impressed!
It was
mid-afternoon on the eve of his coronation. Low clouds the color of lead had hung over Royal Fenguard
for the past four days, pissing oddly warm rain as though the Sky Father himself were registering
his contempt for the patricidal new Conjure-King. Beynor stood looking out one
of the windows of his bed-chamber in the refurbished apartment that had once belonged to Linndal,
dressed only in his undergarments and a
light dressing gown. As he waited expectantly, his view of the Darkling Estuary cleared. The rain
ceased, the clouds ripped apart, and the low-riding sun of subarctic Moss appeared over the
Little Fen on the other side of the river. Although he was not in a position to see it, he had
no doubt at all that the triple rainbow he'd
requested now haloed
"So
let the theatricals commence," the boy-king muttered, turning away. There
was a more crucial matter to consider once again before he put on his fine
clothes and went down to the throne room to welcome the arriving guests.
He went to a magnificent small table, cleverly fashioned
of leviathan bones and
slabs of amber, and sat down. On the table was the flat, velvet-lined platinum case that Rothbannon had made to
hold his Seven Stones. Beynor carried it with him always. Only Fortress was not
kept inside it, resting instead in a golden monstrance as it guarded
his chambers. The Conjure-King opened the case, fitted Weathermaker into its nest, and spent some minutes considering the
sigils, as he had done each day for the past week.
There
were only six of the original moonstones left now. Concealer was gone for good. The Southwater Salka delegated by his monstrous
friends to retrieve Iscannon's stolen sigil had windspoken him a vivid
description of the fiasco in
So the High Shaman of Tarn
and a wild-talented stable lad, sworn to the Cathran
prince, had worked together to foil him . . . How could such a catastrophe
have happened?
Even
worse, thanks to the meddling Tarnian magicker, that bloody boy now owned a living sigil! The preternatural sensibilities
of Gawnn the Salka had clearly perceived the empowered Concealer hanging about
the young wight's neck, covered by a bag
of thin leather. As for the magical book, is seemed all too likely that
the shaman had taken it.
What was he to do?
Or was doing nothing the
safest option?
Damn Ullanoth! And damn
Ansel and the boy Deveron!
"I'll get back what's
mine; Beynor vowed, "and send Deveron Austrey and Red Ansel Pikan to the Hell of Lights if it's my last living act! And
Ulla as well—but only after I've inflicted my own particular revenge
upon her."
But there was no time for
plotting retaliation now. The ship carrying the royal family of Didion and its entourage of high-ranking nobles was due to drop anchor in less than an hour, having been borne 450
leagues northward from Holt Mallburn in less than two days by
Weathermaker's uncanny winds. Inviting the barbarians
to his coronation had been a grandiose (and perhaps incautious) gesture.
However, it was one Beynor felt was necessary in order to validate his
authority as Conjure-King and a man fully mature, worthy to treat with other
monarchs as an equal.
Putting tumbledown Royal Fenguard in shape to receive
important guests in just a week had proved to be a daunting
proposition, but most of the work had been
accomplished with fair success. Grand Master Ridcanndal and Lady Zimroth
were still hard at work marshaling the
resources of the Glaumerie Guild down by the waterfront and along the parade route leading to the castle's
towngate. The type of illusory magic
the Guild excelled in would readily deceive the eyes of the visitors, making the unprepossessing little city
seem in good repair and smartening up the appearance of its shabby
inhabitants.
The Guild's
sleight-of-mind was also capable of restoring Castle Fenguard's exterior, public rooms, and furnishings to a
semblance of their ancient splendor. But
sleeping accommodations for the Didionites had to be authentically magnificent and comfortable, and their food and drink as
well. It was devilishly difficult to
conjure a good night's rest for guests using musty old beds that were actually
lumpy, hard, and home to the occasional
bloodsucking bug, and counting upon glamour
to satisfy the appetite and thirst of high-born diners was an even more dubious proposition. The Mossland national dish of
swamp-fitch stew flavored with mat-fungus and wild leeks, while
nourishing, could hardly be transmogrified into a lavish banquet, nor would
the castle's stock of spruce beer, sour bilberry
wine, and bulrush-tuber spirits impress hard-drinking King Achardus and
his tosspot sons.
So
Beynor had commanded his wealthier subjects to loan him swansdown comforters,
plump pillows, and linen that was clean and flea-free, along with bedroom rugs and fine tester hangings. Those who
possessed elegant dinnerware and napery had to contribute it to the
castle for the duration of the royal visit. The
Conjure-King also insisted, under pain of hexing, that the local aristocracy
present him with their stocks of wax candles, sugar, wheat flour, butter, and
imported liquor. The lords and ladies themselves were instructed to come to
court in their richest apparel; and their older children, suitably attired,
were recruited to take the place of the
slovenly servitors who usually waited upon the castle-dwellers. The Conjure-Duke of Salkbane, who employed a famous
cook, had been ordered to bring him
along to Fenguard, together with all his kitchen staff and his store of
rare spices. The Countess of Sandport lent her cherished portative wind-organ
and an ensemble of musicians to enhance the dignity of the feast of welcome and
the coronation ceremony itself, while the gleemen of Lord Mosstor would provide
earthier entertainment during the reception and grand banquet scheduled to wind
up the celebration tomorrow.
The common folk of the city and its
environs had also been coerced into doing their share. Each merchant had a
quota of foodstuffs or other needful commodities,
to be donated gratis to the Crown. Every family was tithed a quantity of seal oil for the festive illumination of
Fenguard's exterior, along with a barrow of peat for its fireplaces. Girls
gathered sweet-smelling bog herbs and made posies to freshen the castle's stale air. They picked bouquets of late
wildflowers to decorate the feasting
boards and wove green garlands to drape the coaches that would carry the guests
from the waterfront to the castle. Boys were put to work sweeping the streets,
pulling weeds, and covering the worst of the midden-heaps with sand. Each
townswoman had to relinquish a single shift or its equivalent in decent thin
cloth, this to be dyed green or gold, then cut up and stitched into banners to
adorn the parade route and the castle's gates and battlements. Their menfolk
went into the marshes to hunt late-season wildfowl and venison. Well-to-do
householders were assessed two stone of cheese, sausage, smoked salmon, jerked
meat, or pickled fish. Those who skimped or shirked could expect a punitive
visit from the king's warlocks, who had orders to empty the guilty family's
larder.
Now
the preparations were all but complete, and only two problems remained for Beynor to solve. The most
pressing one was Ullanoth.
Since
her escape from his warlock-knights in the throne room, she had apparently barricaded herself in her apartments, secure
behind the spell of her guardian sigil. He might have concluded that his sister had fled, abandoning her
Fortress to put him
off—except that for the past two evenings, just as he and his coterie sat down
to dine, a portion of the best food and drink vanished from the high table. The trick might also be only a
parting jest of Ulla's, designed to infuriate him long after she'd left the castle; but
such a tame piece of mischief hardly seemed appropriate to the enormity of her
humiliation at his hands. She was still here. He was convinced of it. And
somehow, he had to find a way to make certain she did not make a shambles of
his great day tomorrow—to say nothing of the days that followed. Ullanoth and her sigils
were a mortal menace to his reign, one that must be dealt with immediately.
He had no idea how many stones she possessed nor what their
capabilities were. Sigils, whether dead or alive, could not be scried.
Ridcanndal and Zimroth had scoffed at the
rumor that Queen Taspiroth's spirit had gifted Ullanoth with a full
dozen of the things. The notion was ridiculous, they said. If the
princess owned powerful sigils, would she not have used them already? Perhaps
she had found a few lesser stones left by Salka in some forgotten place, but
such things were capable only of minor
magic, as were the moonstone amulets worn by some of the Salka leaders.
Hadn't Conjure-King Linndal himself been assured by the shamans of the Dawntide Isles that all of their
Great Stones save the three given to Rothbannon had been carried away
from the lands ceded to humanity? The two
Glaumerie Guild officials told the young king that it was virtually impossible
for Ullanoth to have sigils capable of high sorcery.
But
Beynor wasn't so sure. The Dawntide Salka had been ignorant of Darasilo's trove of ancient stones, hidden
away for centuries by the Royal Alchymists of Cathra, so the monsters were hardly all-knowing.
And even though his sister was a clever bitch, she could not have made an ally of a man such as Conrig
Wincantor by going to him empty-handed.
Chances were that at least one of her sigils was a Great Stone, capable of doing him
considerable harm.
A
secondary but still vexing dilemma confronting the young king involved an
appropriate demonstration of thaumaturgical power to impress the barbarian visitors. No mere conjuration of
rainbows, fabulous beasts, costumed dancers, or phantom jousters would do. Only a truly
unforgettable spectacle would overawe the notoriously cynical Didionites.
There
was one sure way to solve both problems: by empowering one of his two remaining
Great Stones, even if it meant enduring atrocious pain through-out his
coronation, which should have been the most joyous moment of his life, and on
many days thereafter. If the activation of Weathermaker was any criterion, he
could expect the worst suffering while he slept, and the Coldlight Army invaded his dreams to extract the
price for their favors. Awake, he would be physically debilitated but the pain would be less
severe. He could do it. He'd already done it once .. .
Using
Weathermaker for the first time, he had created a mighty stream of wind that
had permanently diverted the Wolf's Breath away from the southern, settled part
of Moss. His father and the Glaumerie Guild had been mightily impressed; but
the activation of the stone and the subsequent conjuration of the wind had left Beynor half-dead
for eight days. He had no intention of ever again attempting weather-sorcery on such a grand scale—not even to
fulfill his boast to
Didion.
The two Great Stones yet to be empowered rested in the
case next to Weather-maker. Their names were Destroyer
and Unknown Potency. No Guild wizard had ever
fathomed the capabilities of the Unknown, which not even Rothbannon had dared to use. Salka legend called it the mightiest tool
of sorcery ever vouchsafed by the Lights to lowlier beings. Only one sigil of
that name had ever been fashioned by the monsters. The Salka still
reviled the shaman who had cravenly turned it over to a human because none of
their own wizards possessed the audacity to empower it.
Beynor
had expected Vra-Kilian's ancient treatises to provide the key to the Unknown's mysteries, as well as more information on
the powers of the other Great Stones; but
that hope had been dashed, at least for the foreseeable future, by the
Royal Alchymist's downfall.
The boy-king had also
abandoned any notion that the exiled Cathran magicker might be compelled to
share Darasilo's trove of sigils with him. He now prayed with all his heart and soul that Kilian had managed to hide the
stones in a secure place before being captured and windsilenced. If
Prince Conrig got his hands on the sigils and somehow empowered them, he'd
become the true Emperor of the World.
And tiny Moss's saucy young
ruler would be lucky to escape into the fens with a whole skin, to seek
sanctuary among his Salka friends .. .
Reverently, Beynor lifted
the inactive sigils from their velvet nests and set them on the table.
Destroyer was rod-shaped, almost like a stubby wand with a drilled perforation
at one end; it was incised with the phases of the changeable Moon. The Unknown Potency had the strangest form
of all the collection, a kind of
twisted ribbon of thin, delicately wrought stone that resembled a figure eight.
The symbols engraved on it were so minuscule
that they were almost imperceptible
to the strongest magnifying glass, and their meaning was a mystery. As he had
often done before, Beynor ran one of his
slender fingers along the ribbon's cool surface. In some miraculous way,
he was able to caress both sides continuously without let or hindrance, as
though the thing had only one surface with no beginning or end. The ribbon had
but a single edge as well.
Destroyer
and the Unknown Potency. Either one of them could be the key to solving his dilemma . . . or the instrument of his
destruction.
Earlier, when the seriousness of Ulla's threat to him
had finally sunk in, he had sought counsel from those aloof Salka shamans in
the Dawntide Isles who had been
cronies of his crackbrained father. After all, their ancestors had created the
stones, and some of the monsters were even
old enough to remember dealing with Rothbannon.
But Kalawnn, the Master Shaman, had only laughed at Beynor's plea for advice and told him to grow up a bit before
messing about with high sorcery. Arrogant troll!
The Salka of the Darkling
Sands, who had so fortuitously befriended him when
he was a foolish child in imminent danger of drowning in a flood tide, and
had even encouraged him to empower Rothbannon's lesser sigils, could
tell Beynor nothing about the nature of the two inactive Great Stones. Such
important matters were beyond their simple
ken, and they feared even to discuss them.
Beynor
had even considered seeking help from his paternal aunt, the sorceress Thalassa Dru,
who dwelt far to the west in the high mountains along the disputed
borderlands of Didion and
But
what if the sly old witch had only feigned a reconciliation with the king in order to rescue
her niece from an increasingly difficult .home situation? Would Thalassa
be sympathetic to Beynor's quandary concerning the Great Stones, or would she
side with Ullanoth for reasons of her own and play some perfidious trick on
him?
In the end, he'd decided not
to windspeak his problematical aunt, going instead
to the two high officials of the Glaumerie Guild who had tacitly approved
his magical experiments from the first, Master Ridcanndal and Lady Zimroth.
They had advised him as best they could.
He stared now at the
inactive sigils before him, milky-translucent and compelling. Which one would enable him to dispose of his sister once and
for all, no matter how many stones of
her own she had squirreled away? (The astonishment and intimidation of Didion by the new stone's
sorcery would be a mere bonus.)
He
picked up the wand called Destroyer.
When he had discussed his problem with Ridcanndal and
Zimroth, they had both urged him to activate this sigil. Rothbannon
had utilized it to secure his new kingdom, and by itself, it might very
well enable Moss to conquer all of High Blenholme.
But the first Conjure-King had been extremely circumspect in wielding
this particular stone; and when he brought it to life he was a profoundly
experienced sorcerer who had dealt successfully with the Beaconfolk for many years.
Beynor
knew he was nothing of the sort.
Furthermore, Guild Master
Ridcanndal and High Thaumaturge Zimroth were not the ones Who would have to
endure the mind-draining agony that Destroyer
inflicted on its conjurer. King Linndal had confided to Beynor that the stone had wreaked terrible physical and spiritual
damage upon Queen Taspiroth when she
botched its use eleven years earlier. The king blamed the sigil for sending his wife to the Hell of Lights after two weeks
of unspeakable torture. She had been only three-and-twenty years old.
Beynor
had been a child of five when it happened. He only remembered his mother as a remote and beautiful woman with burning
eyes and a braid of fair hair coiled at the
base of her neck, who never had time to cuddle him or play magical games as dear old Lady Zimroth
did. The death of the Conjure-Queen hadn't saddened the little prince much. He'd been rather glad that his big
sister Ullanoth was so prostrate with grief that she forgot about
tormenting him during the months that followed.
Father,
on the other hand, during his interludes of sanity, seemed to discover for the first time that he had a son .. .
Beynor replaced Destroyer
and picked up the Unknown Potency, the sigil neither the Salka nor Rothbannon
had dared to empower.
Might
it combine the powers of all the other sigils into one? Would it convert dross into gold?
Would it make its owner supremely intelligent? Might it change the dreary clime of Moss into paradise, or cause
all enemies to bend servile necks to the wielder's foot? Could it grant
any wish—transforming that she-demon Ullanoth into a tiny swamp vole he might
drown in a slop bucket? Or was its magical action so rarefied and esoteric that
only some scholarly armchair-thaumaturge would find any use for it?
The
only way one could find out was to activate the Unknown Potency and beg the Great
Lights to explain how it worked. After enduring the terrible pain of the empowerment, he'd have to risk his life and
mind questioning the capricious sky-beings, who might only respond with
riddles, or even torture him to death because of some fancied insult.
He put
the Unknown back into its place.
In his frustration, Beynor cursed Deveron Austrey for
depriving him of the small magical book that might have helped with the
difficult decision. The Guild's Library had plenty of information about
the lesser sigils, but almost nothing concerning
the safe operation of the Great Stones. Sweat trickled from his scalp as his hand hovered again over the
small, deceptively simple-looking wand named
Destroyer. It was the undeniable instrument of triumph, but one that might
also provoke the wrath of the Beaconfolk in some unimaginably horrible
fashion.
"What shall I do?"
he whispered. "Activate Destroyer and risk my mother's fate? Or defy logic
and common sense and empower the Unknown Potency itself?"
With
time running out before he must greet his royal guests, he knew at last that he was
going to do nothing. Along with the realization, a vast sense of relief welled up in him.
"I
won't bring either Great Stone to life," he said to himself. "But not because I'm
afraid. I'm a prudent man, one who doesn't take unnecessary risks. If I choose not to empower one of these sigils now,
it's no discredit to me. I'm only exercising
discretion, as a mature man should. Who knows what I'll do in the future, when my situation
changes?"
But the great predicament
remained: Ullanoth barricaded in her tower,
capable of anything.
If only he had more time!
But he did not, and the truth of the matter was
plain enough. There was no one to
help and advise him: not his dead father, not the Guild officials, not impotent Kilian nor his mysterious
aunt nor even the Salka. Beynor ash Linndal, Conjure-King of Moss,
was alone on his throne, with no
one but himself to rely on.
Abruptly,
he began to laugh. He snatched Weathermaker from its nest, fitted it
on his finger, then slammed shut the platinum case.
"I
don't need advice on choosing a new sigil!" Beynor cried aloud. The softly shining
moonstone ring seemed to gleam more brightly in anticipation. "The stones I have already are sufficient for my needs—and I've just thought
of how to use this one to
finish off Ulla in fine style. And if the Diddly barbarians don't appreciate my trick, then futter 'em
for having no sense of humor!"
Still giggling, he hung the
sigils named Subtle Armor and Shapechanger around his neck by their golden
chains, then began to put on the gem-encrusted
garments and jewels laid out by his servitors for the welcoming festivities. When he'd finished dressing,
his young frame was oppressively weighted down by the ceremonial regalia, so
for the first time he decided he would
not carry the additional burden of the heavy platinum case with its two inactive stones. They would be perfectly safe left
in his bedchamber, guarded by the indomitable sigil named Fortress.
"So your nerve did fail
you at the end, little brother. And now, thanks be to the compassionate Moon
Mother, I'll live to bring you down!"
Ullanoth momentarily
relinquished the sigil named Subtle Loophole with a sigh of relief, pressing her fingers to her throbbing temples. Five days
earlier she had empowered the second
of her Great Stones in order to spy on Beynor while he hid behind
Fortress. An open triangle with a small handle attached, through which one peered, Loophole was capable of giving
her a vision—with all sounds attending,
as windsight could not—of anything or anyone, even those protected by the most powerful magic. The only things safe
from its oversight were sigils, alive or dead. But in Beynor's case,
this mattered not. His own actions and his solitary mutterings had betrayed his
fear of empowering another Great Stone.
Activating her own new sigil
had sent Ullanoth reeling to her bed, afflicted by hideous dreams and an agony so unbearable she feared she would the of
it. But she lived, and little by little the pain of empowerment abated,
until on the third day she was able to rise and steal food, having become
invisible, and begin her close surveillance of Beynor.
Ullanoth knew instinctively
that either Destroyer or the Unknown Potency would be able to seek her out and
obliterate her, wherever she tried to hide, so on each subsequent day of her
recovery she watched her brother through the Loophole
and listened to his fevered soliloquies until she could no longer stand
the pain caused by the vision.
Today, with her strength
almost restored, she had observed Beynor's final vacillations, praying that he
would be too spineless to empower either stone. That prayer had been answered.
Having
rested briefly, she lifted Loophole to her eye again, and saw
Oh, compassionate Moon Mother! Look what that young booby
was doing! If only she could act in time.
Beynor
clearly intended to leave the platinum case, with the inactive Great Stones,
behind in his rooms. Even now she saw him moving toward the outer door of his
sitting room. Could she use his own natural talent, with him all unaware, to
solidify her Sending?
She seized the sigils named Sender and Concealer from
her purse, hung them about her neck on
their chains, and ran to her slanted couch. A few moments later, after the brief explosion of pain that
accompanied the speaking of the spell, she stood in her brother's
bedchamber, invisible, hearing the outer door slam behind the departing
Conjure-King.
It had
worked! His Fortress still glowed serenely, no barrier at all to a Sending. She opened
the case and removed Destroyer and the Unknown Potency from their velvet
nests.
But now what?
A Sending could carry things
held or worn by the original body to its destination. It could not bring any
new object back nor leave anything behind.
"I
don't want the awful things, anyway," she said aloud. "It's enough
that he
be deprived of them."
She
went to the ornate fireplace, unlit on this warm day, set the little moon-stone carvings on
the hearth, and picked up an iron poker in her invisible hand. Inactive, the sigils were mere pieces of mineral
that could be battered to bits with impunity;
empowered, the tiny wand called Destroyer was an appalling weapon, while
the amazingly delicate twisted figure eight of the Unknown Potency was . . .
who knew what?
Ullanoth
hesitated. Some day, her hated brother would be gone from Royal Fenguard and she
would be Conjure-Queen. Her mother had assured her of it. Like her ancestor Rothbannon, she intended to
become a scholar of sorcery; but unlike
him, she would have at her disposal all the arcane libraries of High Blenholme
Island—most especially those rare tomes at Zeth Abbey so jealously sequestered by the Brethren. She'd compel Conrig
to give her access to them, and perhaps—just
perhaps
Why not?
Destroyer,
she felt, was too dangerous to play games with; but she lifted the Unknown,
stepped into the cold fireplace, reached up the chimney, and pushed the
damper-plate full open. Beyond it, up the flue, was a shelflike projection having a thick accumulation of ash and soot. The
castle chimneys had not been cleaned in
years. She pushed the little moonstone carving into the far corner of the shelf, burying it in the powdery
stuff.
With luck, it would be
waiting for her when she was ready to study it.
When she emerged from the fireplace, she was amused to
discover that her dirtied hand was visible
as a disembodied black wraith. Well, she'd lose the mess when she sent herself
home .. .
The
poker made short work of Destroyer. When the deadly wand was reduced to grit,
she carefully swept all traces of it into the ashpit.
Then
she Sent herself back to her own tower, leaving behind only a light sprinkling
of soot on the bearskin carpet in front of the hearth—too fine to be seen but
still capable of soiling the bare feet of anyone who chanced to step in it.
Ullanoth
returned to her own tower none too soon, for a quick glance out the window
showed her that the Didionite royal flagship and its four escorting men o' war
were already approaching their mooring out in the estuary. She would have to
step lively in order to meet the arriving royals at the waterfront.
And
leave forever this place that had been her refuge for so long.
Urgent
necessity gave her fresh energy. She speedily donned her disguise, then stepped in front of the long mirror and admired
her reflection for a moment. She did not intend to travel invisible all of the time, so she had assumed
the aspect of a
hunchbacked crone—a role suitable for the drama she had planned for the entertainment of Beynor and the
Didionities. Her gown was tattered and patched and splotched about the hem with dried mud—but
for all its poor appearance it was made of sturdy new wool that would keep her
comfortable in bad weather. Her boots were grubby but stoutly made. She had greased and dirtied her
shining hair to
resemble the stringy grey elflocks of neglectful old age, and used
herbal dyes to make her face hideous. The judiciously selected necessities
prepared for her
flight barely filled the leather fardel that would rest comfortably on her
upper back beneath
her hooded cloak, stained and raggedy but fashioned of heavy, water-repellent
melton cloth.
The
fardel contained her lone unempowered sigil—a second Weathermaker-maps and
battle plans, writing materials, a few instruments of sorcery, and a tiny flask of her favorite vetiver perfume.
She had no need of gold but had removed her mother's small portrait from its frame and wrapped it
securely in velvet and oil-skin. She intended to leave her jewelry behind,
along with her fine garments. In time, all of them could be replaced.
But, oh, how she regretted having to abandon her library!
At the last minute she
included four precious little volumes that she could not bear to leave behind. The Book of Prophecies, alas, was not one of them. But
she had closely studied the section dealing with the Question
of Bazekoy and was fairly confident that she had deciphered King Olmigon's
enigmatic answer.
It was time to go. She
tucked the all-important lesser sigil named Beastbidder into the capacious
belt wallet she had substituted for her gold-mesh purse. Concealer and Sender
already hung around her neck, and Interpenetrator was snug in its cleverly fashioned bag up her sleeve, where a
quick tug would allow her fingers to grasp it almost instantaneously.
Fortress
would have to be left behind, continuing to guard her rooms at the top of the tower
so that Beynor would have no hint that she had decamped. She was desolated at the thought of losing it, but if
she took great care, the power of Concealer
would keep her reasonably secure from both searchers and watchers.
As for her own Weathermaker,
it would remain inactive until she was far away from Moss, safe in some place
where the pain-price of its empowerment could
be borne without jeopardizing her plans. With luck, she might not need it
until Didion was conquered and it was time for her to deal with Beynor.
"Now guide me as I make
my escape, dearest Mother," she prayed. "You forbade me to kill my
vile little brother and I submit to your will, but I intend to leave him
something to remember me by."
A tug of the string up her sleeve let Interpenetrator
fall into her hand, and a windwhisper conjured Concealer. Invisible, she
walked through the closed door of her tower and set off on her journey.
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