

### The Chronicles of Anuru

Kaunovalta, Book I

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## THE RUNNING GIRL

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by D. Alexander Neill

© Copyright D. Alexander Neill, 2012

ISBN  978-0-9880653-9-0 (Smashwords Edition)

License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy.

Thank you for respecting the hard work of the author.

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Table of Contents

Prologue: The Sacrifice of Miros

Chapter 1: Starmeadow

Chapter 2: Running

Chapter 3: Frideswide

Chapter 4: The Deeprealm

Chapter 5: Stonewisdom

Appendix 1: Songs and Poems

Appendix 2: Dramatis Personae

Appendix 3: The Tale of the Making

Other books by D. Alexander Neill

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Prologue ♦ The Sacrifice of Miros

When he had finished with each of his vile creations, Uru sent them into the world, and they gave their service and their loyalty to the Powers of the Dark. The fell beasts of the Dark were disobedient, and Bardan took them under his careful overlordship, fearing that if his siblings – who were ever untrustworthy and jealous of his rule – were to gain so great a following, they might one day challenge him for mastery of the Uruqua. Aided by his seven Servants, Bardan undertook to instruct his new minions in the dread knowledge and wisdom of Uru.

The earliest to be sent forth to plague the world were the First-Born: the dragons, and the giants. Achamkris, eldest and wisest of Bardan's Servants, was given lordship over the great wyrms; and the uncertain fealty of the giants was given over to Gargarik, less wise, perhaps, but no less mighty. Achamkris struck a bargain with Gargarik, so that each aided the other; and, as a result, the dragons grew mightily in strength and power, and the giants grew in wisdom and lore.

Foremost among their achievements was the theft of one of Bræa's great gifts to the Kindred. Achamkris, in mortal form, espied upon the elvii, and stole from them the secret of speech, and gave it to his children; and with it, the wyrms, long-lived and shrewd beyond mortal ken, were able to plumb the depths of the Art Magic, mastering its innermost secrets long before any among the Kindred.

Under the tutelage of Achamkris, the Dragons prospered; for they lived long years, and were in time acknowledged the most powerful, wisest, and feared of all the mortal beings upon Anuru. Fell minions of the dark quailed before them, and even some among the Powers feared to contend with the lords and princes of dragon kind. But still they were outdone by the children of Bræa, the Kindred; for the Dragons did not possess the greatest of the gifts that Bræa had vouchsafed her children: the freedom of Choice, to serve whom they wist, Anari or Uruqua, the darkness or the light.

It was Choice – a choice made by one of the daughters of Bræa – that in the fullness of time changed the world, setting at naught all of her careful plans.

\- from the Tarinas Valtakirjas

(The Book of the Powers)

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In the days before days, before the first dawn, when all the earth lay under the stars, Hara – lord of the skies, the woodlands, and magic – walked the valleys and dells, surveying his charge, in mortal guise. In this long-vanished time – before accepting, from the hands of his sister Bræa, dominion and lordship over the elvii – Hara had, as yet, taken only one of the minions of light into his service. He was particular in his vision of the ways of the world, wise Hara was – and adamant in his desire that his adopted children should come into their powers not only with strength, but also with the wisdom to govern that strength. Thus, while the Age of Making lasted, he was served only by Gemmo, the Lady of the Winds, to whom was given dominion over the raptors and predators of the skies. She was a paragon of swiftness and of strength; her sight was long, and none could approach her on the wing, and she wielded a golden sword, from which sprang the fires of the heavens.

But though he was pleased with her service and her guardianship of the skies, Hara sought out others to bear his will unto the woodlands. For Gemmo loved the winds, and the clouds, and descended therefrom only to visit the eyries of her people, and came not unto the earth, save only in pursuit of prey. And so, Hara sought far and wide for one of the minions of light who might be willing to serve him as a guardian of the woodlands. He found none; and so he cast his net wider. At length he discovered one of the Brahiri, the children of Bræa, newly severed from their divine mother; one of the elvii, a rough warrior who roamed the woodlands with bow and sword, confounding the beasts and minions of the Uruqua, taking especial pleasure in confounding the designs of Bardan.

This warrior was called Larranel. In his ferocity, his skill at arms, his love of the forests and of his people, Hara found a spirit meet unto his needs; and he approached the warrior, and elevated him as his second servant. And right well did Larranel serve his new master, haunting wood and wold like death avenging; until, in the fullness of time, he had earned another name among his former kinsmen: Defensor Sylvanus, that is 'Protector of the Woodlands'. And in latter days, Larranel the Protector was much beloved and revered of the greenland-dwellers among the Haradi, and was hailed as the greatest of Hara's servants.

But still Hara besought him still for a third servant; for his sister Bræa had vouchsafed him a third duty, making him the patron of those among the Kindred who counted themselves practitioners of the Art Magic. This was a difficult task to answer, for the Brahiri were yet new to the arcane art, even those who would later become Hara's children, the Haradi; and many long years would pass before they mastered the flux, and the great mage-kings Tior, and Xiardath, and Biardath would come to plumb its uttermost depths. And so Hara searched long, and in vain.

These years, the waning years of the Second Age, the Age of Making, were a fell time for the Brahiri. For they had been rejected by their mother Bræa, who, fearing their free and wilful natures, had lifted up her hand to unmake them; and though they had been spared this doom by the intervention of Ana, and Bræa had repented of her rash decision, and given up the light that was in her, the care of the Brahiri had not yet been given into the hands of the brothers of Bræa, who in time would become their new teachers and guardians. Thus the kindred found themselves bereft of guidance ,and at the mercy of the evil powers, and in darkness; for the light of Bræa was gone from them, and the Lantern had not yet been forged by Ana, and placed in the sky to brighten the world for them. They lived without the protection of their mother, who had hitherto kept them safe from all harm, and were besieged upon all sides.

It was then, after her betrayal and fall, that Bardan attempted to undo the various creations of Bræa. To this end, he sent his monsters against the kingdoms of the Brahiri, all of which were scattered, and disorganized, and despondent in their abandonment. And though the monsters were few in number, they were mighty in stature and in strength. The great vermin spread across the lands of the Brahiri, bringing pestilence and laying waste to crop and furrow. Bats and vultures rained from the skies, wolves ranged far and wide, and the Giants bestrode the land like titans, wreaking untold destruction.

Most fearsome, however, were the great wyrms of Achamkris, Lord of Dragons, who in addition to their matchless strength and invulnerability, had learned well the secrets of the Art Magic that Achamkris had stolen from the elvii. Thus while the Brahiri had the strength to withstand even the greatest of the attacks by the other monsters, the wyrms breached their defences time and again; and Bræa's children stood, in their final extremity, upon the very precipice of ruin.

Into this dark and uncertain world, Miros was born – a princess of the elvii, daughter of one of the lesser kings of a lesser kingdom. The youngest of five children and the only daughter, she was a child of grace and beauty, who had forsaken her family's martial tradition, taking up the staff instead of the sword. It was a hard road she chose, for there were then few magi and books, and no masters or colleges; thus, she learned her art from the winds and skies, and the trees of the forests, and the dark bones of the earth. And though she discovered much in this wise, and grew powerful, as potent a mage as ever her people had known, the deepest secrets of the Art Magic escaped her. For even the mightiest of students, in order to prosper, advance, and triumph, requires a mighty teacher.

Her father was a fell warrior, but he was no mage. For long and long had he held his mountain realm against the onslaught of the minions of Bardan; but mortal flesh was no match for the might of the Powers of Dark, and at length, after too many bloody victories, his warriors had been slaughtered, his bastions had crumbled, and his kingdom lay in flames. One of Miros' earliest memories was of her father wielding his mighty sword left-handed; for one of the great wyrms had taken the right. Yet even maimed, he remained a terror to his foes, slaying all who assailed him, or who threatened his precious daughter. And when Miros marvelled at his strength, and wept for his sacrifice, he told her, in gentle tones and low, that the true warrior of the light does not fear pain, or shun it; but rather embraces pain, and turns it into power.

It was a lesson that she never forgot.

When at last her father was slain whilst defending the gates of his city from the hosts of darkness, Miros – her heart breaking with the pain of bereavement – remembered the lesson of the right hand. She clung to her father's words, so well-remembered, and took them into the shadows of her heart, and there they grew. In that, her darkest hour, she conceived a plan. Cloaked in the raiment of fallen foes, she left her father's city, travelling deep into the mountain vales claimed by Bardan's monsters. Posing as an itinerant conjurer, she sought out the greatest of the wyrm-magi of Achamkris, winning her way past sentries, and even whole armies, by the power of her magic, her sheer audacity, and the force of the spirit that burned within her.

At length, after learning much, and surviving many narrow escapes, Miros came upon the fastness of Sciarratekkan. Most ancient; once the mightiest of dragons, now an aged and wily serpent, the Captain-General of the incarnadine wyrms had at one time stood first among all of the councillors of Achamkris. But no longer; his strength was failing, and his end was near, delayed only by dint of his incomparable magicks, and by the sheer force of the blazing desire within his breast.

The princess of elves cast her life into the crucible in the hope that she had rightly guessed just what the great wyrm's greatest desire might be.

Using all of the skill and wit at her command, Miros penetrated his lair, evading or defeating all of his slaves and guardians in turn, and at last confronted him, seeking to wrest the deepest secrets of his power from him. But unknown to her, her subtleties were of no avail, for Sciarratekkan had lived long, far longer than she; far longer, in fact, than any others of his kind. His power and mastery vastly outstripped her own. In the instant that she met his eye she was unmasked, helpless and mind-bared before the great red wyrm.

As was and is the way of his kind, Sciarratekkan toyed with the elf-maiden, hoping to see how much of herself she was prepared to sell in order to buy her freedom and her life, seeking to debase her and plunge her into despair before consuming her utterly. But Miros surprised him. Rather than pleading or weeping, she stood tall and proud before her fell foe, and offered her flesh to her captor.

It is mine already, to do with as I wish, Sciarratekkan hissed, scorching the air with his sulphurous exhalations, the deadly lash of the wyrm-speech ringing in her mind like the tones of an adamant bell.

"Your pardon, incarnadine one, but you misunderstand," the maiden replied, struggling to keep her voice bright and unwavering despite the swift shiver of fear that clawed at her soul. "I do not offer myself as meat, but as mate."

Pardon yourself, insignificant one, the dragon answered, vile mockery dripping from every word, his vast jaw working in a terrifying grin. But I fear you would find my bulk...uncomfortable.

"Surely a mage of your power could rectify the disparity," she replied archly.

Indeed. Sciarratekkan hissed an incantation in the sibilant tongue of his people, and his figure warped and blurred. An instant later, the great wyrm had vanished, and in its place stood an elf-lord – tall and well-made, of surpassing beauty, like unto that of Miros' folk. But he had scarlet hair such as no elf had, that writhed and smoked in the hot, vaporous atmosphere of the great wyrm's weyr; and his eyes whirled and glowed a deep, deadly crimson, like pools of viscid fire.

Miros stood motionless as this fiendish vision of one of her kin-folk approached. She felt a line of fire along her jaw as Sciarratekkan stretched out his hand and caressed her cheek. "That is not what I had envisioned," she said. Then, with swift words, she repeated his incantation; and in a heartbeat, the elf-maiden was gone. In her place crouched an enormous incarnadine wyrm, blood-red and deadly, sleek, and surpassingly lovely...at least in the eyes of a dragon.

Sciarratekkan reversed his transformation, and a moment later the great wyrms stood together, necks entwining. Is this why you came to me? the elder wyrm asked, eloquent and commanding, at home in the unspoken dialogue of his natural idiom.

In part, Miros replied in the same language. I will speak plainly, for it is said that no lies can be told in the tongue of dragons. I seek only the power and skill to protect my people from the depredations of your armies. To obtain it I offer you my industry, my obedience and my body, for a span of seven years.

That is but the breath of a whisper in the life of dragons, Sciarratekkan replied, nettled by her candour, and yet intrigued by her offer. And – it must be said – aroused, by her beauty and her power. He had been centuries without a mate.

As it is in the lives of Elves, Miros answered tartly. But for you, it is a guarantee of immortality.

Again, I beg your pardon, dread master, but I must speak plainly. You are old; and though your power is yet great, unmatched among your folk, your hide is dark, your teeth are dull, and the beat of your wings no longer shakes the earth. Your mate departed an age and more ago, and never have you taken another.

You have no heir. I offer you the chance for your legacy to live on...through our child.

Sciarratekkan snorted derisively. A bastard offspring; half a dragon, half an elf. What manner of legacy is that?

A legacy of power, Miros replied. You are unsurpassed in might, and all-knowing in the ways of the dark. I am well-versed in the lore of my people and the power of the light. Our child would bestride both worlds, a magus unrivalled in all the history of Anuru.

The ancient wyrm was entranced by the maiden's offer, but still cautious. My master, he said slowly, would not view my betrayal of his arcane secrets with favour.

What matters that, Miros asked bluntly, if you are near death in any case, and your posterity has been assured, and your line hidden from him? She held her breath as the elder dragon debated with himself.

At long last, he nodded. It is well, he said. I accept your bargain, child of Bræa. You will be my love, and learn my art. Our paths will be joined forever, and you will raise our child to follow it. And his footsteps will shake the foundations of the earth.

Thus was the bargain struck. elf joined with Dragon, breaching the unbreachable gulf separating the darkness from light, and spanning the void that had separated the children of Bræa from the monsters of Bardan since the Making. Miros opened herself to the scorching embrace of her foe, and became one with him. The two bloodlines, mingled by magic, grew strong together – mighty in wisdom, rife with arcane power, and as invincible as adamant. The inviolable boundaries set in place in ages long past were shattered, and the shadow of that shattering would in time prove long and grievous upon the earth.

The lovers did not care; each was surfeited by the fruits of their bargain. Sciarratekkan was besotted with his new mate, for Miros was not only beautiful; she was skilled, and talented, and knowledgeable. And she was curious; she learned quickly the ways of dragons, and though the lessons often were difficult, even harsh, she endured them. Indeed, she soon came to long for her weyr-mate's embrace; for, in the union of their bodies, his spirit relaxed its iron vigilance, and their minds were as one. In their shared passion, she gleaned much from his unguarded spirit that might otherwise have been closed to her.

As she slowly came to comprehend the vast, incomparable arcane mastery of the great wyrms, Miros – to her consternation and dread – kindled. As she worked, and studied, and learned, her mate's child quickened in her womb. Oft she lay awake at night, apprehensive, feeling the fell creature growing inside her, gritting her teeth to smother the pain as her diminutive form stretched beyond all nature to accommodate the creature taking shape within it. She knew well what she bore: a twisted, unnatural child; an abomination that had no place in the plans of Bræa or of Bardan, and no claim on life or sustenance anywhere in heaven or upon the earth.

The pain of the quickening was nigh unbearable, but she determined to bear it. Each day, she swore that she would last another, and thus earn another day's wisdom from her ancient tutor, and so purchase another day's survival for her people. To ease the pain, she spent more and more time in dragon's form, living as one of the great red wyrms; and she came to understand their lust for wealth, and power, and glory, and the skies, and began to comprehend their indifference to mortal aspirations and endeavours, and their contempt for the petty, weak, ephemeral beings that crawled like insects in the dust beneath their wings.

All these things wyrm-form granted her; and as she became one with the wyrm, the memory of her old shape faded and grew dim. She had learned well the lesson of the right hand; she had embraced her pain, and it became her power. And that power grew daily.

At length, the seven-year span ended, and it seemed to Miros that the time had come and gone in a fleeting instant, like the beat of a moth's wing. Sciarratekkan was despondent, saddened that his bargain with Miros had come to an end. To his surprise, he had grown genuinely fond of the lovely elf-maiden, for she had proven to be more than a careful and ingenious student; she was also a courteous and gentle companion, a staunch weyr-mate, and a dutiful and dedicated consort. And she was mighty; he realized at last that, under his able tutelage, her power had grown to match his, and he was both please, and astonished.

And, too, she was the mother of his heir. The great wyrm felt a great affection for the child of mingled blood that was growing rapidly within her womb – affection, and pride. He found that he was looking forward, with great anticipation, to meeting his child, and learning its name, and teaching it to fly, to hunt, and – most important of all – to grip the flux in its talons, and bend it to its will.

Thus when Miros arose one morning, taking – for the first time in more than a year – the shape of her mother's people, the great wyrm's spirit quailed within him. For he knew that the period of her commitment, the end of the their bargain was at long last come.

Sciarratekkan eyed the tiny elf-woman's rippling, distended abdomen with dismay, and plunged into despair at the thought that he would not see his child born, nor watch it prosper and grow. He pleaded with her to stay at his side. Will you not remain with me, he implored, that we might raise our child jointly, and see it grow strong, and set upon the path to power, and together instruct it in the arcane arts?

Miros smiled gently. Dread lord, said she, I have no intention of ever leaving this, our home.

Sciarratekkan was relieved, even delighted, but at the same time puzzled. Have you then forsaken your people, and your promise to deliver to them the fruits of your bargain?

I have forsaken no one, Miros replied firmly. I intend indeed to gift them with the hard-won fruits of my labours. But only in part.

Reaching into her robes, she held up a scroll of magnificent white parchment, bound with a golden cord. I have done so every day. All of your wisdom now resides with them. This... testament contains the last of the knowledge, art and mastery that I have learned from you. It is my legacy to my people, for it will give them the power to resist you and all your foul brood; and, if you persist against them, to destroy you.

Also, she added in a forlorn voice, it explains why I have done what I have done; and why I now do what I must. Closing her eyes, she whispered a brief incantation, and the scroll vanished. An instant later, its place in her hand was taken by a gleaming silver dagger.

The great wyrm frowned. What have you done, my love? he asked, still not comprehending the import of her words.

As I promised, I have shared with my people one of the fruits of our union, the elf-maiden replied firmly, yet with a grim set to her jaw. All of your knowledge is now in their hands, to be used to confound your master, and his master, and all the Powers of Dark.

But wherefore yon blade? the dragon asked, nonplussed. What possible reason...

It is a remedy, Miros interjected harshly, for the other outcome of our liaison.

Perhaps one day, the children of Bræa will join with the great wyrms, and will spawn a long line of powerful magi. But if we do, it will be on our terms, not yours.

I, for one, will never be party to such an abomination. And so saying, she reversed the dagger, and to Sciarratekkan's horror, plunged it deep into her swollen belly.

The dark child shrieked in agony within her womb as the dagger pierced her tender flesh, burying itself within the wyrmling's unborn body. Miros ground her teeth against the pain and collapsed to the flame-scarred and smoke-stained floor of the cavern. The wyrm-spawn clawed frantically at her womb, struggling for life; and first one razor-taloned foot, then another, and finally a claw tore through her tender flesh, emerging into the dank air of the great wyrm's lair, staining the stones with gouts and spatters of its mother's blood.

With the grim determination of the doomed, Miros grasped the squawking, struggling, mortally wounded dragonet, and tore its writhing body from the ragged wound in her midriff. Smiling coldly into her mate's horrified eyes, she calmly twisted and broke the tiny creature's neck...then tossed the pathetic, bloody little corpse at Sciarratekkan's feet.

Her eyes fell on the still, silent thing. It had been a female, she realized.

Something within her broke at the terrible, heart-wrenching sight.

The great wyrm reared back in surprise, hissing and baring his fangs. Murderer! Betrayer and oath-breaker! he screamed, shattering the rocks, and scattering his terrified minions to the corners of the cavern.

"This is not murder, but a cleansing," Miros hissed through pain-gritted teeth, lapsing in her extremity into the speech of her people. "Nor have I broken any oaths. The elves make no bargains with the vermin of Bardan!"

Liar! The great dragon screeched. Liar and deceiver! You promised me your obedience and your love!

"I promised you only my flesh, worm," Miros taunted him. "Take it. I need it no longer."

And with that last word – her mission complete, and her life sped – she set the edge of her dagger to her throat, and cut deep.

As her body slumped to the floor of the cave, Sciarratekkan trumpeted like a mad beast, howling to the skies in rage, agony and despair. The very stones of his lair were riven from their foundations, and a black cloud blotted out the sun. A storm of incandescence incinerated his fallen consort and his murdered child, and mounted in a vast, towering pyre visible for a hundred leagues, that melted the very bedrock of his lair, drowning the ancient wyrm and all of his servants, slaves and minions in a vast, seething ocean of consuming flame.

Miros closed her eyes against the incarnadine glare, and greeted the cleansing fire with a sigh of relief.

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Chapter 1 ♦ Starmeadow

Her first glimpse of the great city took her breath away.

She had been catching sight of its spires for the past hour, ever since riding out of the Greenwall and into the rolling verdant hills that her people called Astrapratum, the Starmeadow. The hills seemed to wrap around the vast, bowl-shaped river valley that held the city proper, enfolding it in deep ripples of emerald dotted with scattered trees, farmsteads and small habitats that followed the cobbled ways. Here, in this part of the Homelands, all roads led into the vale fed by the slow, silver-blue flood that was so old and well-known to the elves that it was merely called Lymphus – the Lifewater.

The south-road followed the undulating sweep of the hills, wending its way from valley to peak to valley again, like a river itself, albeit one of close-fit stone. There were people on it – many people. Most walking, some riding, even a few horse-carts and wagons. Commoners, students, farmers, woodsmen, warriors, adepts and acolytes and apprentices; she was even overtaken by a curtained carriage that rattled loudly past, causing her tired horse to shy skittishly. A few scattered folk at first, then dozens; and finally, as she approached the environs of the city, where all of the roadways converged, there were hundreds. The river of cobblestones drowned beneath a river of life.

Hax was glad to be riding. She had never been fond of crowds.

Closer to the city, the road dipped down into a final valley, densely carpeted with trees. It was, she thought, like riding through a garden. The road meandered between vast, towering trunks, through a lighter-green carpet of moss, lichen and low bushes, all planted to form an intricate and eye-catching pattern. The trees themselves perplexed her; there seemed to be no logic to their arrangement, and the odd intermingling of species – oak and apple, pine and beech, walnut and redwood – was unnatural, inexplicable. Until she breathed in.

It's a poem, she realized with sudden delight. A poem, written in the perfume of the forest.

How astonishing.

The trees, flowering in high summer, were exuding their characteristic scents, and these mixed and mingled in an olfactory harmony that simultaneously stimulated and relaxed, intimidated and inspired the observer. Whoever had planted this garden (and Hax, staring up in wonder at the vast, towering heights of the leafy crowns, far above her head, wondered how long ago that had been) had planned its structure and layout to achieve precisely this impact upon passersby.

She breathed in again, consciously flaring her nostrils, and was rewarded by even deeper and more profound shades of sensation – the mosses and lichens, the bushes and flowers, the vines and even the fungi clinging to the trunks; they were all part of the symphony. The scents did not mix and muddy; each remained distinct, like the colours in a rainbow, blending only slightly at their edges, like a delicately-spiced confection.

In the instant that she grasped its purpose, Hax also comprehended that the garden's message – its unique, incomparable scent-poem – would be perceived differently by a rider travelling the road in the opposite direction. You couldn't do it with words, she thought, blinking groggily, bemused by the olfactory assault. A poem of words would be meaningless if spoken back-to-front. But this...

Narrow shafts of sunlight lanced down through the canopy, appearing like pillars of fire in the sparkling reflections of pollen-grains dancing on the light breeze. Butterflies flitted between them, clustering around the beams, seeking warmth in their dance. Hax watched them, gratified by purposeful randomness of their ballet, and noticed that others of her race were wandering slowly amid the tree-trunks, gliding gracefully between the flower-beds, wearing the same rapt, bedazzled smile that she must have been wearing herself.

"First time?"

Hax blinked. She was surprised to discover that her horse was standing stock-still. How long have I been...?

Glancing around, she saw that the foot-traffic on the road was thickening, and that pedestrians were skirting her mount, some shooting her an irritated glance.

One of these had stopped next to her horse's head. It was a man. Commoner, she thought instantly. He was about her own height but much more heavily built, with shaggy hair tied back in a thick braid, simply dressed in a sleeveless leather jerkin over heavy trousers. And he had, she noticed, an odd pattern of white scars across his knuckles and forearms.

"I beg your pardon?" she said politely.

"The Hortum Elandiria," he replied, making an all-encompassing gesture. "It can be a little overwhelming, if you're not expecting it."

"Ah," Hax replied. "Yes, it's...it's..." It's what, she thought? Amazing? Magnificent? Wonderful? It was all of those things. The maelstrom of olfactory sensation was pounding in from all sides, and she found it difficult to focus. "Strange," she murmured at last.

The fellow smiled. "A southlander," he said. It was a statement rather than a question.

Hax was taken aback. "Yes," she replied, blinking rapidly, in an attempt to clear her head. "Yes, I...how did you know?"

Instead of answering, the man nodded towards the city. "Come along," he said. "We're blocking traffic." He reached up, scratched her mount's jowl affectionately, then took the bridle strap in one hand, tugging the creature into motion.

Hax was about to mouth a warning – Torris was battle-trained, after all, and likely to bite – but held her tongue. The fellow seemed to know what he was doing, and her warhorse appeared willing to follow him. Maybe he's half-drunk on flower-scent too, she thought wryly.

They rejoined the flow. The fellow walked beside her horse's head, guiding it like someone who was familiar with animals. The great charger seemed content enough to be led, so Hax did not interfere. She did, however, catch the man glancing back over his shoulder at her, and frowned slightly.

Noble, the fellow was too obviously thinking; maybe even one of the Duodeci.

He saw a young woman, barely past her majority but obviously familiar with her panoply, and at ease in the high-cruppered saddle of a warhorse. She had all of the characteristics of one of the nobler branches of the Third House: a patrician brow, midnight hair, eyes of brilliant emerald. Pale skin, if a little burnt by wind and sun; and regular, even delicate, features. And a confident bearing, he thought shrewdly. Someone used to having their least whim observed as law.

Not whims, he revised mentally a moment later; commands, maybe, but not whims. She looked like someone accustomed to exercising her discretion as often as she exercised her hereditary rights. It was an interesting thought. Hair's a little odd, too, he thought absently. Where most ladies of the noble houses had straight hair, and arranged it according to the dictates of magnificent, often preposterous, fashion, this one's locks, while as long as any, were a confused, tangled mass of curls. No noble bint he had ever seen would've tolerated such disarray.

The final detail – it could hardly have escaped his notice – were what appeared to be a pair of odd tattoos: a double half-moon, executed in dark-blue ink over her left eye, and another double half-moon under it. That seals it, he thought, shrugging. No daughter of the Duodeci would mark her face in such a way. Not permanently, at any rate. It just wasn't done.

Then he caught her eye – a chilly glance, punctuated by a raised brow – and realized that she had been observing his scrutiny. He turned his attention hastily back to the road.

Nettled by the man's none-too-subtle inspection of her features, Hax snapped her reins lightly. He obediently let go of the bridle. Slowing his pace somewhat, he fell back by her stirrup. She held Torris to a slow walk, so as not to outdistance him.

"Your pardon," the man said after a moment, glancing up at her. "I'm neglecting my manners. Allignus Leto, of Starmeadow."

"Orkarel Hax, of Joyous Light."

The fellow blinked, eyes widening. "Any relation to the mighty Fineleor, domina?"

She shook her head, smiling. "None at all. I simply chose it to honour him." An moment later she added, "And don't call me 'domina'. It's 'Hax'."

"My apologies. A worthy choice," the man replied, nodding. "I didn't mean to pry."

She chuckled. "Think nothing of it. I get that question all the time. It's my own fault; I should have chosen a less renowned moniker."

She took a deep breath, felt the forest-scent begin to overwhelm her again, and coughed slightly to clear her head. The man glanced up at her in concern; she waved a dismissive hand. "What do you do in Starmeadow, Allignus?" she asked, changing the subject.

The man held up his hands, palms facing away from her. She could see that, in addition to being marked with a fine intaglio of white scars, they were calloused, and very strong. "Smith," he said briefly. "It's why I didn't fear this fine fellow. I've shoed many of his like.

"Although," he continued easily, "I'm a tool-crafter by trade. I also do work for the city, from time to time. Even for the palace."

"Indeed?" she asked politely, wondering why he had mentioned that.

"Once only," he qualified. "And nothing special. Part of a gate mechanism. Finicky work, but most rewarding."

Hax blinked. "Rewarding? In what way?" she asked, perplexed.

Allignus glanced back up at her. "It hadn't been repaired in generations. I was working with gears and travellers wrought before the Darkness." He flexed his fingers, clearly remembering the experience. "It was like touching history. An honour to mend it."

I can understand that, Hax thought to herself.

"And you?" the man asked. "What of yourself, Orkarel of Joyous Light?"

Hax shrugged. This was one area where the truth would definitely not do. "Latrona est," she replied easily. A sell-sword. "Although, right now, an out-of-work one."

"No wars, then?" he jested.

"Not at the moment. And I'm not complaining," Hax replied soberly.

"What brings you to the capital, if I may ask?"

"Messenger duty," she said.

That, at least, wasn't a lie. She thought of her father's letter, tucked into the lining of her scrip, and sealed with means both mundane and arcane. And of his instructions to deliver it to her uncle. And only to him.

The man reached up and scratched Torris' cheek again. "Humble service for one who bears the aulensis," he remarked absently.

Hax reached over her shoulder and touched the protruding hilt of the great sword self-consciously. She'd known that it would raise eyebrows, particularly her aunt's. But there was no chance that she would have left Sylloallen's gift behind. "It pays the bills," she answered, her voice cold.

They continued in silence for a few moments before Hax, regretting her tone, spoke again. "Your pardon, countryman. It was fatigue, not rancour, that spoke. I've been riding for a week. My shoulders ache, my backside feels like a pounded beefsteak, and I'd give an eye for a bath."

"I took no offence," the fellow said immediately, grinning up at her. "I know exhaustion when I see it." Or smell it, he didn't add. "I frequently see it reflected in my quenching tub."

"May I ask you a question?" she asked. He nodded. "How..."

"...did I know you were a southlander?" he interrupted, smiling.

"Yes," Hax said. "My accent?" she asked, a trifle self-consciously. "I've been told it's noticeable."

"Hardly. Melodious, rather," Allignus replied, somewhat too gallantly she thought. "No. It was your horse. Equus bellator austrinus." He patted the animal affectionately again. "You grow them big on Eldisle. He's beautiful."

"Yes, he is," she replied, suddenly intent. "But you were not speaking about my horse. You were speaking about me. You called me a 'southlander'." She leaned towards him, bending over in her saddle. "How did you know?"

The man looked slightly embarrassed. "Well," he said slowly, "and remember, I'm unarmed..." he added, smiling hopefully.

Hax glared stonily back.

"Ah, very well," Allignus sighed. "It was your reaction to the Hortum." He waved a scarred hand, indicating the ordered forest garden all around them.

"Reaction? You mean, because I was...what, dazed, by it?"

"No," the man corrected. "That happens to everybody. It's what came after that, that piqued my curiosity. You called it 'strange'."

"It is strange," she murmured, glancing around at the regimented ranks of trees and flowers. She took a cautious sniff; the great wall of fragrance was still there, poised to break over her like an avalanche. "It's unnatural."

"Precisely!" the fellow crowed. "That is the difference! In the south, you work, you build, you grow, you live, within the confines of what nature and the world offer you. Here," he indicated the vast expanse all around, "here, we take those things, and remake them to suit our needs, our desires." He paused for a moment, then added, "Our whims."

"I don't think it's bad," Hax protested. "Just..." her voice trailed off.

" 'Strange'," he said helpfully.

"How about 'different'?" she suggested, smiling.

"Yes. Different," Allignus said pensively. "That's a useful lesson, Orkarel Hax of Joyous Light, new-come to the Meadow of Stars. Folk are different here." He tapped her boot with a blunt fingertip. "You'd do well to remember that."

Hax shook her head in wonder. "A blacksmith, and a philosopher too?" she asked, her tone mocking him gently. "Is your metal-craft as complex and nuanced as your arguments?"

"Not at all," he replied, chuckling. "When I work with my hands, the results are simple and beautiful. It is only when I try to work with my poor, feeble head that the outcome is so twisted and brittle." He glanced obliquely up at her. "You should visit my shop, and view my wares. It's in the angiportus statera, near north-end."

Hax raised an eyebrow, and the fellow coloured instantly. He laughed to mask his embarrassment – a little too loudly. "For all my flaws as a thinker," he protested, "I'm a competent armourer. A latrona such as yourself would doubtless be interested in what I have to offer!"

"Enough," Hax laughed. "You have my word, Allignus, smith-crafter of Starmeadow. I will visit you, if my duties permit. If only," she added with a wry smile of her own, "so that you may continue my instruction in how we rude folk of the south differ from the sophisticates of the capital."

♦

"Mirabile defensor!" Hax breathed. Her voice was choked with awe.

"Yes, it's quite something, isn't it?" Allignus nodded agreement. "Two centuries I've lived and worked here, and I'm still struck and stunned every time I come home."

The scent-garden of the Hortum had marked the last of the sheltered vales outside the southern hills surrounding the city proper. The great stone-way left the trees and soared over the verdant knolls, passing between increasingly frequent buildings of cunningly worked stone, and traditional tree-dwellings woven into the branches of the broad maples and oaks. Like a meandering brook, the road flowed through them, wandering left and right of the slope – until, at last, it broached the line of hills. The final trees lined the top of the crest. It was as though the elves – who loved trees, at least in word and in song, above all other things – were loathe to allow nature to interfere with a visitor's first glance of the greatest and most ancient of their cities.

Hax paused on the summit, awestruck. She remembered to give her reins a twitch, moving aside and onto the lush grass that lined the high road, in order to allow the ever-thickening flow of travellers to pass unhindered while she goggled like a yokel.

Allignus joined her. A thoughtful man, he remained silent, leaving her to savour the first few moments of wonder in the tranquillity of her own thoughts.

At first, Hax had difficulty accepting the scale of what she was seeing. Eldisle was hardly a backwater, and Joyous Light no flyspeck; and she had seen great cities before. But the sheer expanse of Astrapratum astonished her.

The river vale was ten miles across if it was a yard, and easily twice that from north to south – and the city filled it. Emerging from a cleft in the hills, the river flowed briskly southwards, splitting into two branches far upstream and rejoining further down. The two arms of the great flood formed the island upon which the oldest and mightiest portions of the city lay – including her destination. She could see its pennoned towers gleaming in the afternoon sun.

The ancient defensive works surrounded the island: towering walls, black and brooding, looming like shadows above the bustling blue of the river. Slender towers, silent and adorned with glistening argent spikes, sprouted every hundred paces or so, leaning far over the waters – a potent guard against invasion.

Those towers have stood since before the Gloaming, she thought giddily. Fineleor, and Yarchian, and the Argent Three walked there.

By the holy mother, what wonders and terrors they must have seen!

Beyond the guard towers, the spires of the old city soared higher still. The island, she knew, was in reality a great rock that had stood in the way of the flood, forcing the river to surround its immovable mass. Astrapratum had begun, some threescore centuries earlier, as a simple fort upon that rock; a tower of guard, erected so far back in time-shrouded antiquity that its foundations were lost among the stones of later constructions. That fort – the citadel of some long-forgotten tribal chieftain of the elvii – had weathered every assault, every blast of war, every foul machination that the minions of Bardan had been able to devise.

It had defied all foes. And so, when Bræa had come to earth, and took Ciarloth to mate, making him High King of all Harad, it was only natural that they would place their hall upon that rock, and build their citadel around the hall. In time, the whole of the great city had, in effect, sprung up around the Holy Mother and her descendents.

Bræa's offspring had dwelt for centuries in peace and plenty. Her grandson, Tior – the first wizard-king of Harad, called 'the Mighty' for his miraculous achievements in wielding the Art Magic – had greatly expanded the palace and the city proper. Such was his fame and power that there had been no need for further defensive works until the following generation. Not until Tior's son betrayed him.

The black walls and the razor-fanged towers had been built by that son, whom the elves now called Xiardath the Usurper. Their foundations had been laid to defend the city – not against the forces of the Uruqua, who had so plagued the elvii in the Age of Making, but rather against his own people, the scions of the First and the Second Houses, that had refused to acknowledge his suzerainty. These, the greatest of Bræa's descendents, did not take kindly either to his rebellion, or to his subsequent tyranny. They abandoned him, and he raised tower and wall to prevent their vengeance, and his own overthrow.

He was not the trusting sort, Xiardath; nor should he have been. But, Hax reflected, as the Halpinya say, he turned out to be holding the sword by the sharp end. He should have been looking within the walls, rather than without; for, having betrayed his own father to eternal exile beyond the walls of the Universe, stolen the Filigree Throne, and purloined the Crown of Stars, Xiardath was in turn betrayed by his own ill-borne son. In the fullness of time, Biardath, black-skinned, white-eyed and fiend-borne bayed his father, slew him, and fed him to the white wyrms. A sad and ignominious end for Tior's get – even for a traitor.

The sight of the ancient walls, heavy with their bloody cargo of treason, murder and terror, brought the old, half-forgotten tales back to her. Hax felt a chill trickle down her spine. Too much history, she thought gloomily. The city reeks of it.

Allignus had been watching her, and saw her face go from wide-eyed wonder to thin-lipped distrust. "You get used to it," he reassured her quietly.

"What's that?" Hax asked. She hadn't been listening.

"You're thinking that the city has seen too much blood," he replied, "or some other such gloomy thoughts." He crossed his arms and stared fixedly at the soaring towers. "I feel the same way, sometimes."

Then he sighed, shrugging. "But it passes. The Lantern still shines; the trees still bloom. And the wine tastes fine after a long day's walk. There are flaws, yes, but also beauty here; beauty enough to make the heart ache."

"Nothing to be done about it in any case, I suppose," Hax murmured. "It's stood so for a long, long time. Defeated all besiegers. Defied all foes."

"More's the pity," the smith said pensively.

"Eh?" Hax glanced down at the man. His expression was at least as fierce and dismayed as her own. "How do you mean?"

Allignus pursed his lips. "Defeat can be a powerful cleanser," he replied slowly, as if thinking carefully about his words before releasing them into the world. "Purges the soul, as it were. Makes for a new beginning." He glanced up at the Elf-girl. His face was grim. "Too many victories, Orkarel of Eldisle," he said firmly, "and you start to think that you can only do right. Defeat makes you think about what you might have done wrong."

His gloomy tone seemed to lift Hax's spirits. "Have you done much wrong, Allignus, philosopher-smith of Starmeadow?" she asked, gently mocking.

The man snorted laughter. "Have not we all?" Reaching up, he grasped her stirrup, and caught her eyes. The afternoon sun glinted redly in his pupils.

His voice turned sombre, even grim. "I speak now in seriousness, Orkarel of Joyous Light. Citizen to citizen, if you like." There was an urgent intensity in his voice. "I know not whither you are bound, but you should know that, in Astrapratum, it is said that the kind word masks a lie, and every smile hides a false face." He lowered his voice, speaking in a conspiratorial whisper. "This is especially so at the Palace, if your path leads you there.

"Trust yourself, latrona. And none else."

The smith's chilling words stayed with Hax as they progressed into the valley and approached the outer walls. They reflected her mood. She was not looking forward to this visit.

Hax had many fond recollections of her uncle, Landioryn. In her childhood, he'd been a regular visitor at her father's siege in Joyous Light, both as a casual traveller, and latterly as the Queen's envoy and commander-in-chief. She'd sensed a kindred spirit in her aunt's lifemate. He was a daunting specimen; at more than seven hundred and fifty summers he was barely middle-aged, but retained all of the vigour and urbane dignity that had made him a skilled warrior, a respected general, and a fearsome diplomat.

But there was a certain restlessness behind the façade. Hax sensed it, sensed that he felt stifled by the stultifying rigor and fixed, immutable patterns of the courtier's life. Perhaps she was more sensitive to such sentiments because she felt the same way herself.

She recalled dining with her aunt and uncle during a visit years earlier, and feeling comforted that, of the dozens of richly-garbed courtiers lounging and feasting about the marble tables, only she and her aunt's lifemate seemed out of place.

Or perhaps, she admitted with wry self-perception, I only like him because Sylloallen has always spoken so highly of him, and I miss Syllo.

Her aunt, in stark contrast to Landioryn, was not at all to Hax's liking. Annalyszian was nothing at all like her sister Alrykkian – Hax's mother. The wretched woman was a socializing flitterby, a congenital gossip and professional meddler who seemed to bear some deep grudge against Hax's father. Her visits to Joyous Light, whenever she had seen fit to grace them with her presence, had inevitably been tense, unpleasant affairs. And it had only gotten worse after Hax's mother had vanished. Sixty years ago, now, the girl thought bleakly.

Even though Rykki's disappearance had occurred during a visit to Annalyszian's own home, the dreadful woman had somehow contrived to blame Kaltas. Meetings, as a result, were always fraught with tension.

Hax planned to stay close to the Grand Duke, and as far away from his Duchess as she possibly could.

The outer walls, of some rough, gray stone, were less impressive than Xiardath's ancient fortifications. They were only a dozen paces high, built far more recently; within the last few centuries, during the interregnum of the Hand in Ekhan. They seemed to be less a defensive outwork than an administrative demarcation for the city proper. The rock between the rivers, as it turned out, represented only a tenth part of the city as a whole; on both sides of the flood, beyond the black walls, the buildings, trees, squares and such-like sprawled across the bottom of the valley bowl, climbing its sides like some hungry, creeping predator. The outer walls appeared more than anything to be designed to stem the spreading tide of buildings and people.

The gates were still open when they approached – two travellers in a vast, creeping caterpillar of life that wound far back up into the hills, half inching towards the city, half creeping slowly away from it.

The gatehouse itself was simple but elegant; a graceful tower of sand-coloured stone, decorated with swooping bas-reliefs, a work of art as much as of fortification. If it was guarded, she could not see the guards; and she was equally surprised at the absence of tollsmen or tax collectors.

She considered mentioning her impressions to Allignus; but the swelling throng had taken on a life of its own, and was exuding a continuous, numbing roar that made speech between travellers difficult. Especially if one of them was horsed.

Once beyond the gate, the crowds diminished slowly, as those who were coming to the city from far away gradually found their streets and quit the high road.

Hax scarcely noticed the change; her eyes were elsewhere. Everything about the city fascinated her. The roads, die-straight and perfectly even, were well-worn but also well-maintained. The structures that lined them were equally gorgeous, all the more so as they appeared to follow no common design or even philosophy of construction. Broad buildings, and narrow; high buildings, and low; structures of a dozen different shades of stone and a hundred different shades of wood, with windows of glass or mica or even isinglass, roofs of tile or plank or thatch, sprawling gardens, towering orchards, gleaming orblights, smoking torches, flaring lamps...

It was too much to take in; a welter of sensation, a maddening profusion of sights, sounds and smells that beat in upon her like a hurricane. She found herself sweating and flushed, heart hammering against her ribs, until the slowly waning crowds began to trickle away.

"What do you think? So far?" Allignus asked. Although he still had to raise his voice to be heard, he no longer had to shout.

"Terrifying!" she replied, forcing a smile. "And wonderful! Although..." glanced around. "It doesn't feel as old as it should."

"This is the new city," he said, waving idly at the buildings lining the road. "Only built since the Sundering, in the last thousand years or so. Hardly time for grass to grow between the cobbles," he added with a grin. "Don't worry, we'll be at the river wall shortly. You can tell me how old it feels then."

The smith – unsurprisingly, given that he was a resident – was true to his word. As the crowds shrank, they were able to resume their earlier pace.

The darkening sky drove them onwards. Allignus had told Hax that the High Guardsmen locked the river wall gates at sunset. He wanted to reach home that night, and Hax, now that she was within striking distance of her goal, was just as eager to complete her mission.

They reached the river while the Lantern was still a hand's-breadth above the eastern lip of the valley's wooded rim.

Seen from the east bank of the Lymphus, the old city was even more impressive. Allignus had advised staying on their present path, as the southeast high road led directly to the Crane Gate, and there was no time to circumvent the metropolis and find another gate before nightfall.

Up close, the river was stunning; a vast, slowly-undulating ribbon of deep blue a half-bowshot wide – wider by far than any river that Hax had ever seen. And this is only the eastern branch! She reminded herself.

The high road led to a narrow bridge – a stone ribbon pointing straight at the fortified island that lay in the heart of the stream. Four paces wide at best, the bridge was divided down the centre by a low wooden railing; traffic approaching the island (there was little) took the downriver side, while departing pedestrians and horsemen, a significantly larger throng, used the northern, eastbound lane. It seemed to be a sensible arrangement to Hax, given the narrowness of the stone way.

A few moments later, as they negotiated the slender span, she realized that its narrowness was intentional – a means of restricting an invader's access to the island. Should've made it meander, then, instead of leaving it straight, she thought, recalling Lallakentan's sombre lessons on the science of siege craft.

If I were the defending general, she used excitedly, I would mount...

She looked ahead, squinting. The setting sunbeams at her back helped a little, shedding their powerful light on the vast, razor-peaked tower overlooking the bridge. Above the portcullis, gilt-edged, iron-shod doors stood, shut tight. I wonder what's behind them? she thought idly. Crossbows? Oil? Something worse?

This is the fortress of the High King, the last redoubt of the Third House, she thought, suddenly chilled. It would be something worse than oil or bows. Much worse.

Unlike the sand-coloured gatehouse of the outer wall, this gate was heavily guarded. Hax counted fully two dozen armed and armoured soldiers, clad in the polished steel cuirasses, peaked helmets, and bright emerald cloaks of the High Guard. She felt a martial thrill when she saw them; these were the cream of the Queen's army. A private soldier in the Guard was deemed equivalent to an officer in any other force.

Half the troupe was arrayed at rest within the tunnel leading through the tower, leaning, relaxed but alert, on the hafts of their glaives – the Chalybs Altus, the 'Great Steel' that Sylloallen had taught her how to ply from her earliest days in the training yard at Joyous Light. The other half were questioning travellers seeking admittance to the old city. This naturally caused a back-log, especially as curfew was approaching. Hax and her companion found themselves at the end of a lengthening line of grumbling, footsore travellers.

"Does it always take this long?" she asked after a few moments, as the line crept slowly forwards.

The smith made an equivocal gesture. "Sometimes," he replied. "Usually when there's a diplomatic visitor. A neighbouring king dropping by to see Her Serene Majesty. Or a fête at the Palace. Or some wit slid a leech into the guard captain's porridge." He shrugged. "Nothing to worry about."

That proved to be her companion's only inaccurate prediction. As they reached the front of the line, Allignus waved her deferentially ahead. Hax spurred Torris lightly, reining up just as she reached the line of Guardsmen at the head of the bridge.

Their chief – a serious-looking fellow, unhelmeted, with wisps of grey at his temples – looked her up and down, and said tiredly, "No weapons."

Hax blinked. "I beg your pardon?" she replied, astonished.

The old soldier repeated himself. "No weapons, miss. Nothing longer than a hand-span blade." He motioned at the great sword and bow slung across her back. "Disarm, please."

Hax frowned at the unexpected request. She had never before been asked to cede her arms; it simply wasn't done. Then she kicked herself mentally. You're not in Eldisle anymore, idiot. No one here knows who you are.

She was at an impasse. She had to reach her destination – but there was no way, no way in this life, that she was going to relinquish her mentor's blade.

Try tact, the Voice warned her.

Why not? she thought bleakly. I've nothing to lose. "I bear a message for the Palace, captain," she said courteously.

"All the more reason to hand over your arms, mistress," the old soldier replied, his tone grim. He laid a hand on the hilt of the gracilensis that depended, slender and deadly, from his baldric. "No harm will come to them, I assure you."

Hax tried again. "I claim herald's right," she said, politely but firmly. Maybe that would work.

"Herald or no," the man replied, "you will cede your arms, or turn back." He beckoned to his troupe, and four of them stepped forward.

The commoners behind her surged backward in a body. Hax heard Allignus draw his breath in sharply.

Staring balefully at the guard commander, Hax sighed. "What is your name, captain?" she asked.

"Yaarin Eliassyn of Starsheen, Lady," he replied firmly. Evidently, her garb notwithstanding, he had seen the same thing in her mien that Allignus had seen. "Tessarius, of the Eighth Guards' Regiment. Commander of the Crane Gate. Your sword, please. Now." His voice, though still polite, took on a hint of menace.

She had hoped to keep a low profile while in town. But I'll be damned before I turn Syllo's blade over to this pike-pusher! she thought angrily. "Tessarius," she said her voice ringing with unaccustomed authority, "I would be happy to debate this matter with you. In the meantime, perhaps you would consent to send a messenger to the Palace to inform Crown Prince Landioryn that his niece, Allymynorkarel Aiyellohax, daughter of Kaltas of Eldisle, dux et imperator, regrets that she has been delayed at the Crane Gate, and so will be unable to attend upon him this evening." She smiled thinly. "You may give the reason for the delay or not, as you see fit."

The colour drained from the man's face. Hax found that mildly amusing, so she decided to push a little harder. "I'd be obliged if you would also advise the Grand Duke that, as commanded by my father, I will wait upon my great-aunt, Her Serene Majesty, Ælyndarka the Fair, Queen of the Third House, the moment I am at liberty to do so."

The guard captain was no fool. He bowed low, then straightened, pressed his fist to his lips, and raised it, palm open, in salute. He was not smiling. "You may pass, your Grace," he said.

Taking their cue from their captain, the rest of his troupe bowed as well.

Hax was impressed to note that there was not the slightest trace of a quaver in the fellow's voice. She instantly regretted embarrassing him. Putting the spurs to Torris' flanks, she trotted through the opened infantry line, beckoning to Allignus to follow. The smith held up empty hands, and gave the captain a helpless shrug.

As she passed the commander, she leaned over in her saddle until her stirrup strap creaked. "One of the disadvantages of command, captain," she whispered softly. "Every now and then some uppity tart will pull rank on you."

The man's eyes went wide with astonishment. Then he grinned. Haughty noblewomen he was used to. Jesting ones were an oddity.

If anything, his surprise made Hax feel even worse about her tantrum. "I'll tell my uncle you're a good man, captain," she added sotto voce, straightening up.

The old fellow gathered his composure. "As you wish, your Grace," he said, struggling to keep from smiling. He bowed again.

Hax waved as nonchalantly as she could manage, spurred her mount, and cantered gracefully into the tower tunnel.

Behind her, Allignus hurried to follow. He was cursing softly under his breath.

As he passed the captain, he muttered, "If it's any consolation, captain, I didn't know either."

Yaarin snorted in amusement. "Not especially," he called out to the smith's retreating back. "But I thank you, nonetheless."

♦

" 'Your Grace'?" Allignus asked a moment later.

Hax sighed and glanced down at the man. "I'm sorry about that. I was hoping not to make any noise about who I am. But I'm in a bit of a rush, and didn't feel like waiting."

The smith nodded non-committally, one eyebrow raised. "I thought nobles travelled in state. Carriages, servants, guards and the like."

"I hate carriages," Hax replied. "They make me queasy. And I don't need guards," she added, tapping the hilt of her sword.

Allignus laughed, his temporary reticence forgotten. "Not even a single lady in waiting?"

She rolled her eyes. "I can bathe myself."

Her companion nodded, still smiling. "I don't imagine that there would have been many volunteers to make the ride from Eldisle to the capital."

It was Hax's turn to chuckle. "No, indeed."

A few moments later, the smith cleared his throat. "Lady, may I –"

She cut him off. "Don't 'lady' me, Allignus. My name is 'Ally'."

"Ally, then," he said. "If I may ask – why ride?"

"Eh?"

"I know who your father is," he shrugged. "Why not leap the flux? Does his Grace the Duke of Eldisle not maintain a house wizard?"

"Ah," Hax nodded. "Yes, we do. But the fellow's young, newly-appointed. His master, our previous mage, had served my father for centuries, and left only a few years ago, to take up new duties." She snorted. "You may have heard of him: Kalestayne of Arx Eos."

The smith's eyes widened. "The Master Magister himself?"

She nodded. "I studied under him, for a time." The memories still made her shiver.

"No wonder you felt safe insulting a High Guardsman," Allignus murmured. "You move in powerful circles, La...Ally."

"Fortunate birth," she shrugged. "Nothing more than that."

A few streets, and a few hundred elves later, Allignus laid a hand on her stirrup. She tugged Torris to a halt.

"I go north, here," he said, raising his voice to be heard above the crowd. "You go south, to the palace gates!"

"Yes!" she replied. She could see the elegant towers and snapping pennants looming over the southern end of the island.

"Remember my invitation!"

"I will!" She extended her hand.

The smith took it. Instead of shaking it, he tugged her sideways and pressed his lips to the back of her glove. "Good journey, your Grace!"

To her astonishment, Hax found herself blushing. To cover her embarrassment, she nodded curtly. "Good journey, Allignus."

He bowed, then straightened up and, with an airy wave, moved off into the crowd. Hax sat, silent and thoughtful, atop her steed, watching until she lost him in the throng. Then she turned Torris' sleek, massive head towards the south, and eased him carefully through the swarming masses of townsfolk.

Hax's previous astonishment at the scale of the great city was thrust into the background the moment she saw the size, grandeur and opulent magnificence of the Palace. Her ultimate destination was not difficult to find. Palatium Prosapiae Tertius, the Palace of the Third House, as it was known throughout the Homelands, was more than a building, or even a collection of buildings; more than tower, keep or fortress. It was a massive, sprawling complex that completely dominated the southern third of the island; a vast array of soaring towers, magnificent temples, stately gardens and extravagant mansions.

The whole glorious, monstrous, untidy lot served as the residence, the ruling chambers, the resting halls, and the seat of power of the Duodeci Basilicum, the Divine Twelve. These were the great names of the realm – the foremost families of the Third House. Descendents in line direct from Tior and Dior, the grandsons of the Holy Mother, descended also from Hara the Wise – the children of gods who had come to earth in mortal form, intermarrying with the elvii, spawning the Houses of imperial Harad, and giving rise to the Age of Wisdom, more than five thousand years earlier. A wonder, she thought, mesmerized.

The palace grounds were separated from the rest of the island by a vast, silent moat, drawn not from the river, but from some deep spring of dark water. Beyond the moat lay a tall, glistening black wall, identical to the river wall surrounding the old city – but higher and thicker, topped with glinting machicolations, and interspersed with glowering, fortified towers. There was but one gate in that wall, and behind it lay all of the majesty and glory of Elvehelm. The great tilting grounds; the arboreta, which were to the Hortum as a beech is to a potted plant; the Queen's own flower gardens; the ponds and streams and waterfalls, driven by arcane means; the royal playhouse, the auditorium, the opera; the High Guards' garrison and training hall; the royal residences, the vast ballrooms and dining rooms and sitting rooms and libraries; the matchless kitchens and monstrous store-houses, and the quarters of the servants who worked them; the salons, the libraries, the solaria, the dancing floors, the music halls; and the hospitals, where skilled healers mended wounds, prolonging the final hours of the last generation, and witnessing the first moments of the next. It was a glorious maze of majesty, a riot of colour – white marble, gleaming silver, yellow gold. The lustre of bronze, the shimmer of steel, the rich sparkle of gemstones, all shining in eternal light – an aurora that outshone the setting sun.

And amid this splendour walked a greater splendour still; the scions of the Third House, the lords and ladies of the Twelve. Decked in finery unequalled anywhere on earth, they strode the corridors, lounged idly in the chambers, and wandered the gardens where the glory and wisdom of all Anuru lay concentrated and distilled, like brandy wrought from the finest wine. Satins and silks; furs and gilt; bright eyes, and bare shoulders. The inviting smile, the sly smirk, the suggestively lowered eyelid. The gentle lilt of the flute, the heart-rending quaver of the vithelle, the insistent, throbbing pulse of the tambours; candlelight and arcane spark, roast meat and incense, exotic floral scents, satin, silk, sweaty musk...and the headiest of all perfumes: power, sweet and intoxicating, addictive, treacherous, delicious, poisonous. Depending on the hands that held it, it could be a balm to heal the soul, a nectar to seduce the gods, or a venom to freeze the veins and stop the heart.

Pleasure and poison, wine and bile, wisdom and gluttony, fidelity and sluttish excess, restraint and depravity; honour, treachery, and all the limitless shades between. All flowing in one direction: towards the southernmost peak of the island; the great chamber, perched like a watchful, hungry hawk above the reunited rivers: Astraprytaneum, Starhall, the hold of the Kings and Queens of the Third House, they who had for a score of generations sat upon the gilt chair below the ancient throne of Tior – the magnificent effigy, wrought of adamant by ancient smiths in the shape of a rearing dragon, fire-eyed and vigilant. The Filigree Throne, the siege of the High King of the elves. Ælyndarka, Queen of the Third House, occupied the golden chair. The great throne of the High King had been empty since Tior's passing, save for the brief, profane touch of his tainted get.

As she traversed the final gate (a trifling matter; the guards, who had evidently received word from the unfortunate captain at the Crane Gate, passed her through immediately and without question) and entered the palace grounds, Hax thought on all of these things. She recalled the advice she had been given by Kaltas, her father, especially about her aunt; the warnings about the Court that Sylloallen, her long-time master, had let slip, before his abrupt departure some years earlier; and the old, off-hand comments, half forgotten, that her mother had voiced in laughing, lilting whispers, before vanishing on the southroad, sixty miles, and sixty years, from where Hax now sat.

A sigh escaped her lips. Thinking about Syllo – or about her mother – always made her melancholy.

She shook herself back to her purpose, determined to heed all of the counsel and warning she had been given. The Court could be a battlefield, her father had told her; but it was not the sort of battlefield that she had spent half her lifetime preparing to address. She would watch her surroundings; guard her flanks; guard, even more carefully, her tongue; be wary of flatterers; and be warier still of kin.

But I can't be wary of them, she thought tiredly, unless I can find them first.

She glanced around, hoping for some sign. The sheer scale of the Palace was intimidating. From the hilltop, far to the south and east, the place had looked reasonable, manageable; but now she realized that it was, in essence, a city within the city proper. It had only looked small because she had failed to comprehend how incredibly gigantic the city itself was. All of Joyous Light would fit within the Palace grounds, she thought dully. How am I supposed to find anything? Or anyone?

Some rules, fortunately, were universal, regardless of where one found one's-self. Hax asked the gardeners. Ten minutes later, she was clattering across a square bearing an exquisite fountain featuring water spurting from the lips of a trio of fabulously-rendered mermaids, heading towards a vast, expansive mansion. There was something comforting in the sculpture; the mermaid was the sigil of House Aiyellohax, her father's personal seal. The fountain made the place feel a little less alien.

The grand duke's personal guards – a hard-bitten, professional-looking lot, which was precisely what Hax would have expected from Landioryn – met her at the gate of the Ala Martigona, the 'Lily House' traditionally occupied by the Heir and his family. Despite the wear and tear of travel, they had recognized her instantly. Hax assumed at first that they had been given a description; then she saw one of the guardsmen surreptitiously attempting to conceal a scrap of parchment bearing a reasonably accurate likeness of her visage. She nodded in resignation; the previous year, her father had engaged an artist to produce a rendering of Hax and her older sister, Jianni. Evidently, Kaltas had contrived to have additional copies made, and had distributed them far and wide. With any luck, only family's seen them, she thought sourly.

Then she snorted. Pity they hadn't thought to send a copy to the Crane Gate.

The guards led her through a long, high-ceilinged foyer. Hax shook her head in wonder; the simple antechamber alone was larger than her father's banquet hall. Illumination came from high windows, and from orblights scattered here and there with seeming randomness. Silver basins balanced on knurled pedestals of marble held rainwater and floating blossoms, lending a delicate scent to the air. Intricately-carved marble pillars supported the distant ceiling, where pass-throughs admitted more light and fresh air – and birds, Hax realized with a smile.

She glanced down at the floor. It was spotless; evidently, someone had taken steps to prevent the avian visitors from fouling the tiles. Clever, she thought grudgingly.

The guards deposited her in a sitting room off the entry hall. Hax selected a likely-looking settee and dropped onto it with a contented groan, massaging her aching thighs.

Her respite was short-lived. After mere moments, while she was still trying to work the kinks out of her spine, a regal-looking elf-woman opened a high door of dark wood inlaid with ivory, entering the sitting room with lithe, silent grace.

This worthy was black-haired and green-eyed like Hax, and just as tall, but centuries older. Her hair was coiled and knotted into complex braids, and piled into an edifice perched precipitously atop her head, making her appear taller still. She wore a silver gown that covered her from throat to floor, leaving her arms bare, and trailing behind her like a lemur's tail.

The woman glided towards Hax like gossamer borne upon mist. Hax was wondering whether her memory was faulty – whether this, in fact, was her aunt Annalyszian – and was about to bow, when the silver-clad woman bowed first.

"Amplexo, domina," she said, her voice low and lilting. "I am Alicante, Her Grace's chamberlaine." She waved a hand at the surrounding splendour. "Her Grace has directed me to bid you welcome. Lily House is yours."

A surprisingly cordial message from the damnable woman, Hax thought. "I thank you," she replied awkwardly. A peculiar sensation was creeping over her: discomfort, unease. Terror. The elaborate, suffocating courtesy and ritual of the capital and the Palace had caught her in their clammy grip. She hated it. It was so different from the easy informality of her father's court. She felt as though she were on enemy ground.

Jumping at shadows again? the Voice asked slyly.

"I have prepared the Thalami Vesperae for you, domina," Alicante explained. "Her Grace asks that you attend upon her at dinner." The woman looked at the windows, noted the levelling of the Lantern's rays. "There is sufficient time to bathe and dress."

She gave Hax a long, dubious glance, as if making a mental appraisal of her condition and the amount of labour necessary to improve it. "Just," the woman added blandly.

Ally felt a muscle jump in her cheek, but held her silence.

"I have had a selection of her Grace's gowns brought to your rooms," Alicante continued remorselessly. She gave Hax a cursory once-over; the Elf-girl felt like a dubious side of venison being assessed by a butcher. "No doubt one of them can be altered in time for dinner."

Hax blinked. Things were progressing a little more rapidly than she had expected. "Actually," she temporized, "I've had a long and trying trip. I was hoping..."

Ignoring her, the chamberlaine stepped forward, and without so much as a by-your-leave, lifted Hax's baldric over her head, relieving her of sword and bow. Hax had to suppress a momentary, panicked urge to whip out her dagger and gut the woman. "You will be partnering your esteemed cousin, His Excellency the Marquis of Liliandera." Hoisting the weapons under her arm, the woman turned and made for the door through which she had entered.

Hax didn't move. Alicante – possibly through some arcane sense that enabled her to detect reticence on the part of her noble charges – halted, turned, and favoured the girl with a grave and reproving glance. "We do not have time to waste, domina. Follow me, please." She turned again and strode briskly out of the room, obviously – too obviously – assuming that Hax would follow.

The girl shook her head wearily. She wondered, briefly, whether there was any possibility that she could simply drop her father's scroll on her uncle's desk, collect Torris, make for the hills, and spend the night at a roadside hostel. Or wrapped in a blanket beneath the stars.

Of course not.

Sighing, Hax followed the woman out of the sitting room. This bears, she thought morbidly, every indication of turning into a long and difficult visit.

As it turned out, she was only half right.

♦

Hax endured innumerable indignities over the next several hours. The most embarrassing was being bathed by no less than three of her aunt's maids – middle-aged, matronly women of the common class, who spent a good hour clucking and muttering about her bodily cleanliness and the variety of slowly-fading bruises remaining from her last practice match with Lallakentan. At least she didn't have to endure their conversation; apparently, the sight of her numerous, self-inflicted tattoos deterred the women from addressing her directly.

I suppose, she mused later on, that I ought be glad they didn't break out the lye soap and scrubbing brushes.

The most painful part of her ordeal was when all three went to work on her tangled mane, plying comb and brush with sadistic gusto. Hax's hair, as Allignus had noted, was the lustrous blue-black that marked most of the Third House, and all of the Duodeci; but unlike the majority of the women in her family, hers was curly rather than curtain-straight. Especially when wet. That fact tended to make cleaning it, and arranging it into something more dignified than helmet-padding, something of a nightmare.

Compared to the work of the coiffeurs, being fitted into one of her aunt's gowns – floor-length, high-collared and long-sleeved – was a pleasure. Hax was relieved; the thing was surprisingly demure for the capital. She'd heard tales about the revealing and immodest fashions preferred at court, and had been dreading being tricked out like some sort of dockyard strumpet.

As it turned out, though, she was the same height and only a little thinner around the midsection than her aunt, and thus only a few minor stitches were required to nestle her tightly into the dress. The shoulders were uncomfortably snug, but that, she thought with a wry snort, merely reflected the disparity in their chosen professions. Training with the great blades evidently built larger muscles than gossip, fêtes and slander.

Shoes were found as well. Hax found the raised heels annoying and difficult to walk in, but she comforted herself with the thought that she wouldn't be expected to run or fight in them.

Once all was ready, she was garnished, like some sort of ambulatory confection, with a long, translucent veil affixed to her piled, still-damp tresses with silver pins. She felt like a caricature, and wondered whether she would seem out of place with her great sword slung over her shoulder. It would certainly draw comment, she mused, but it might make dancing difficult.

She nearly forgot about her father's letter. While the attendants' backs were turned, she managed to extract it from the secret compartment in her scrip and transferred it to her person. The dress was snug, but the folded parchment was thin, and it fit invisibly under her shift, against her belly. She hoped that she wouldn't be called upon to exert herself to the point of staining the thing with sweat. Neither the Grand Duke nor her father would thank her if the ink ran.

When Annalyszian came to collect her, even she was forced to nod with thin-lipped approval. Hax looked nothing like the bedraggled and travel-worn mercenary that had ridden into the palace only a few hours earlier; she had been transformed, inch by painstaking inch, into the very picture of elven nobility.

Teetering uneasily on her heels, the girl essayed a smile. It was not reciprocated. "You'll do," the older woman said flatly. "Follow me."

Where Hax had thought her own dress elaborate to the point of outlandishness, her aunt's attire made the girl blink several times. The Grand Duchess wore an exquisite gown of gilt-stitched imperial purple, constructed to appear as though she were being embraced, front and back, by a pair of peacocks. The birds' wings, bodies, tail-feathers and even heads were accentuated with tiny jewels worked into the fabric, and were strategically placed (or so it seemed to Hax) to display as much skin as possible, while maintaining an absolute minimum of decorum. Her hair, long and straight (Like mother's, she recalled, feeling a pang of grief stab her unexpectedly), was unadorned, save for a bright, finely-wrought coronet denoting her rank.

Hax's aunt, Annalyszian Æyllian, lifemate of the Crown Prince of the Third House, was very rich, very well born, very well-connected, very beautiful, and very aware of it all. As a result, Lily House, the official residence of the Crown Prince, was the throbbing heart of most of the intrigue that took place within the Palace. Its mistress worked hard to keep it that way.

Hax knew all this in the back of her mind, but the next few hours were to implant the knowledge deep in her vitals. She resolved to keep a close eye on her mother's sister, especially as they had quarrelled once already. It had been a long time ago, but 'Lyszi had a long memory.

The Grand Duchess seemed sublimely unconscious of her niece's scrutiny.

As they strode through the corridors, Hax racked her brains to come up with some means of breaking the chill between them. "Thank you for the gown," she said at last, speaking in subdued, polite tones, determined to avoid another quarrel. "It's lovely. Very traditional," she added, admiring the long sleeves.

"I didn't expect you to be travelling with anything appropriate for the Palace," her aunt replied coldly. "And it's not lovely; it's thoroughly out of style." She sniffed. "But it's the only thing I had that would cover those ghastly tattoos. Most of them, anyway." The woman turned and shot a meaningful glance at Hax's face.

The girl took a deep breath, struggling to maintain her equanimity, trying not to think about what the pair of half-moons above and below her left eye signified. Animus later, she thought grimly. Errands first.

"Will uncle be at dinner?" she asked tentatively.

"No," her aunt answered. "The Grand Duke" – she laid special emphasis on the title, as if to discourage further familiarity – "is away north, inspecting the Cellovallis garrisons." She turned and gave Hax a chillingly neutral glance. "Why?"

Say nothing, the Voice advised her. "I...simply wanted to pass on a greeting from my father," she temporized. "They were both at Duncala."

That had been a famous battle at the founding of the eponymous Ekhani county north of the Homelands, some sixty years earlier. Unable to think of anything else to say, she continued chattering. "They stood back-to-back, in the last redoubt, when the Hand knights..."

"I've heard the story," Annalyszian interrupted coldly. "You may give any messages you carry to me. In his absence, I am Landioryn's viceroy, and hold his chair at the Council."

She knows. Hax thought of the letter concealed beneath the tight, binding stays of her bodice, and felt a worm of panic creep up her spine. She had no idea what the letter said, but her father's directions had been explicit: Give it to your uncle, the Grand Duke, he had said; but not to your aunt. Above all, not to her. Destroy it first.

Hax shrugged elaborately. "It was merely to say 'Salvete', aunt. Nothing more." She knew that Annalyszian was not a caster (How well I know it! she thought) and hoped that the woman did not possess any arcane means of detecting falsehood.

Apparently she was safe; Annalyszian eyed the girl balefully for a moment, but Hax could not decide whether the look on her face denoted distrust, or simply the profound dislike that she had come to expect from her aunt.

"Very well," the older woman snapped. They began walking again. "Speaking of battles, I don't want to see you carrying that ridiculous butcher's blade around here," Annalyszian commanded as they strode towards the library to greet the princess' guests. "If you must go armed, you may wear the pugiunculus, like a lady. Or the gracilensis, if, quod abominor, I am forced to present you at Court."

Hax felt a splinter of cold hatred enter her heart, due less to the woman's patronizing tone than to the insult to her former master. Her great blade was a gift from Sylloallen, the sword that he himself had borne in battle, including at Duncala. Other than memories, it was all that she had left of him.

And her father had borne it before Syllo. Put it aside? she thought, enraged. A frown crept across her face. Take it from me, bit...

No. She could not afford another breach. Not until she had done what her father had sent her here to do.

"Moreover, your taste needs to improve, and quickly," her aunt was saying. "No more dressing like a vagabond or a pirate. We'll have a wardrobe fit for a lady in a week or so." She snorted derisively. "I suppose I can always bill your father."

Hax felt another splinter enter her heart – a razor-shard of hot, sanguinary rage. She did not understand what grudge her aunt held against her father; she only knew that Annalyszian refused to speak his name. It was a deliberate slight that Hax had, somehow, contrived to forget. Being reminded of it now set a slow fire of resentment burning in her belly.

"And," the woman continued remorselessly, "take that stupid ring off. It makes you look like a peddler."

Hax stopped walking. Politeness be damned. "This was my mother's," she said flatly. "And your mother's, too, before that."

"I remember," Annalyszian snapped. "Aylanni wore it all the time. Rykki, too. It looked ridiculous on both of them." She sniffed. "Take it off. We'll find something more suitable."

"I passed without the walls seven years ago, aunt," Hax said, reminding her aunt, as diplomatically as she knew how, that – as a legal adult – she was entitled to make her own decisions. Especially about jewellery, the girl thought sourly.

"Really?" the Grand Duchess asked, sounding chilly. "Odd. It seems only yesterday that you were pissing your breeks and thwacking imaginary Hand knights with a soup ladle."

She continued walking. "Come along, child."

Hax gritted her teeth and followed her aunt. She did not remove the ring. But the slow boil of anger that Annalyszian had ignited flared brightly.

It was not going to be a pleasant night. For anyone.

Her cousin, the Marquis of Liliandera – a nobleman only a few years her senior – proved to be a stunningly attractive specimen of high elven manhood. Tall, with deep black hair and rare amber eyes, well-dressed, well-armed, and obviously well-moneyed, he was the very picture of the grace and polish she expected of the cream of the Duodeci.

He was also an effeminate, supercilious, drunken boor. Between greeting Hax with unctuous courtesy in Annalyszian's library prior to dinner, and seating her carefully at the high table a quarter of an hour later, he managed to grope her no less than three times.

The first time, Hax pretended not to notice, hoping that a chilly reception might discourage him from further adventures. That did not work. So the second time it happened, she caught his hand, put her lips next to his ear, and threatened to break his wrist. He laughed, too sodden with wine to take her threat seriously.

The third time, she broke it.

The fellow was game, she had to give him that; he was gritting his teeth, tears standing out in his eyes, but still smiling as he bowed apologetically to Hax's aunt, grovellingly excusing himself, pleading an urgent errand that he had somehow, tragically, forgotten. Annalyszian had been unable to conceal her surprise and discontent (Hax wondered how often high-ranking guests fled one of her dinner parties before the first course had even been served), but she had graciously excused the sweating lordling.

As he left, he took Hax's hand in his unbroken left one and bowed over it, grating, "We'll meet again, lady. I intend to revisit our conversation at the earliest opportunity."

"I look forward to it, my lord," she had replied sweetly. "You've many bones left." And for good measure, she'd blown him a kiss.

Now, however, she was regretting her impulsiveness. The Marquis' adventurous fingers would at least have been moderately diverting; in his absence, dinner promised to be paralyzingly dull. There were a score of couples present, and those on either side of her (the seating arrangements had been hastily reshuffled to cover the Marquis' sudden absence) had little to offer in the way of conversation beyond banal observances about fashion, horses, and new fragrances; and gobbets of pointed, slanderous gossip about the innumerable and often indecipherable petty scandals that were the currency of the High Court.

Hax recalled the Queen's last visit to Joyous Light, a little more than a ten-year earlier, and the overt ribaldry of her courtiers. Ælyndarka herself, not to be outdone by her ladies, had recounted a drolly inappropriate tale about her attempt to talk her way out of a satyrs' ambush. The story had been juicy enough on its own merit, but the rank and fame of the teller had lent a special frisson to the occasion. Hax had felt her ear tips reddening at the Queen's risqué japes, and had watched her father, close to purple with embarrassment, doing his best to return the conversation to a more demure topic.

Kaltas had succeeded on that occasion, but Hax did not share her father's gift for easy persiflage. Seated now at her aunt's table, she did her best to emulate her father's example, listening to the conversation swirling along the great length of the board; but it was more of the same. This dressmaker, or that; this cobbler, or that one; to buy hats here, or there; who was keeping company with whom; whether feathers or plumes were, or were not, perfetto; whether a certain perfumer used too much rosewater in his new scent, or too little musk oil and amomum; and on, and on, until Hax caught herself fingering her gold-handled table knife, wondering whether it was sharp enough to pierce her bodice, and long enough reach her heart.

As a consequence of crushing boredom, she drank too much. Analyzing her behaviour later on, she came to the conclusion that her overindulgence was not entirely her fault. Each pair of diners was backed by an attentive steward, who carefully and unobtrusively replenished every glass that fell below a certain level. Hax – who detested the lack of control that accompanied drunkenness, and despised those who allowed themselves to fall prey to it – was normally cautious to the point of abstemiousness. Sylloallen, and later Lallakentan, had mocked her gently for it, but her father was approving of her practice; not so much because he feared that she might be taken advantage of when deep in her cups, but because, he once explained, "hands shaking with wine-lust would spoil her aim." She had venerated Sylloallen; but she loved her father, and so took his advice to heart.

As a result, she normally watched her wine-glass like an owl watching a titmouse. Her vigilance, however, was amateur, while the stewards' ministrations were expert; and so, an hour after the affair commenced, she found that her head was spinning, and that her patience with the witless trivialities being spouted by her tablemates was at an end.

When the woman on her right – a vapid, coquettish thing called Fellinaria, whose sole distinguishing characteristics were ostentatious jewellery, an immense, bouffant hairstyle, and less sense than the chair upon which she sat – asked Hax where she had purchased her 'exquisite' gown, Hax smiled demurely, and said, "Oh, I stole it."

Fellinaria tinkled merrily with laughter, one hand to her rouge-smeared lips. "Nicely put," she giggled. "We all like a good bargain. Don't we ladies?" This last was addressed to the two women seated across from Hax, whom Fellinaria had somehow managed to bring into the conversation with a mere glance.

The more, Hax thought grimly, the merrier. "Bargains don't come any better," she agreed, favouring the ladies with a toothy smile. "After all, it's not like she needed it anymore. The real challenge," she added in a clinical tone, holding up her right sleeve and inspecting it closely, "was getting it off her corpse without any tears or bloodstains."

There was an instant of stunned silence. Then one of the ladies across the table tittered uncertainly. This led to a more general effusion of mirth, until even the addle-pated Fellinaria was giggling happily again.

"You're dreadful," this worthy expostulated, patting Hax on the forearm like a clever child.

Her smile, Hax thought, looked a little forced. "Just thrifty," the girl replied. "Good dressmakers are so expensive." Then she gave the woman a slow, calculating look, and remarked, "You know, I think we're the same size." She took a sip of wine, adding, "You are staying at the palace tonight, are you not?"

That was the last Hax heard from Fellinaria for the rest of the evening.

♦

All things – even the excruciating torture of a dull dinner party – eventually come to an end. Hax lost track of the time; but the Lantern had long since set when the last of the guests – a fleshy-lipped, dissolute-looking gentleman with a fresco of gravy stains decorating his tunic who had partnered Hax's aunt with, in Hax's opinion, an unseemly degree of enthusiasm – took his leave, tottering down the steps of Lily House and collapsing into a waiting carriage.

Annalyszian maintained her happy smile, waving as the fellow was bundled into the conveyance, and holding her pose until it vanished into the gloom, rolling jerkily towards the Palace gate.

When she turned to Hax, her smile was gone; and her voice, when she spoke, was like winter frost. "Come with me."

Hax was well acquainted with wine, but unaccustomed to the volume of the stuff that typically inundated social functions in the capital. She was sobering quickly – the night air helped somewhat in that regard – but she was still tipsy enough to take umbrage at her aunt's peremptory tone.

The older woman led her back into the residence, bypassing the library and dining hall, traversing a half-dozen other well-lit and well-appointed chambers, climbing broad stairs, and eventually ending up in a comfortable, exquisitely decorated boudoir.

The doors to this chamber – they were actually gilt wood, Hax saw with amazement – were flung noiselessly wide by a pair of ladies-in-waiting. Annalyszian ordered them out of the room, then sat on a gorgeously brocaded day bed and began removing the long, lethal-looking garnet-tipped pins that had held her hair in place.

When the doors were closed, she snapped, "I won't have ill-bred animals in my house."

Hax blinked in surprise. "I beg your pardon?" she asked.

"You heard me," the elder woman hissed. The last of the pins came out, and her hair tumbled down, a glorious ebon curtain reaching nearly to her knees. "D'ye think I'm blind? This is Lily House; the palace of the Crown Prince. It is not a sailor's ale pit, where thugs brawl over coppers in the shit-soaked straw!"

If Hax had been taken aback before, she was positively stunned now. She's talking to me as if I were still a child, she thought angrily. Memories of the terrible day, threescore years earlier, when all Eldisle had gathered to bid farewell to Hax's mother, flashed through her mind. She had had a similar confrontation with her aunt just before the ceremony. It had not ended well. Evidently, she thought, she remembers it, too.

Well, piss on her. Hax squared her shoulders. "If it's the 'Crown Prince's palace'," she replied, her voice flinty, and her face expressionless, "then who was that chubby lout who spent the night pawing at you? Aunty?"

Annalyszian had been struggling with the tiny pearl buttons that secured the collar of her gown. When she heard this, the colour drained from her face. She leapt to her feet. "How dare you?" she shrieked.

Lunging forward, she aimed a swift slap at Hax's cheek. Despite her state of inebriation and the damnable heels, Hax sidestepped this easily, and the older woman stumbled. Before Hax realized it, her clenched fist was flashing towards her aunt's unprotected neck. It took a supreme effort of will to withhold the blow.

Annalyszian caught the movement out of the corner of her eye, and prudently stepped back a pace. "You'd strike me?" she demanded theatrically. "In my own home, you'd strike your own blood kin?" There was a thin edge of nervousness in the woman's voice now.

Hax rolled her eyes. "Turnabout's fair play, your Grace," she replied. It was not quite a sneer. "You weren't too shy about striking me just now."

Rage and – Is that fear? Hax wondered – warred in Annalyszian's face. "I knew this day would come," she said at last. "Rykki tried. But you were always his child, not hers. And now look at you!" She waved a deprecating hand towards Hax. "Disobedient. Rebellious. More like a footpad than a daughter of the Duodeci." She paused, then added, in as off-hand a tone as she could manage, "I hope he's proud of what he's achieved."

He. His. He's. Hax felt her blood begin to boil. Her judgement, never good when she was deep in her cups, disappeared completely when her father was impugned. Especially by this...this woman.

"Say his name," she grated, clenching her fists.

Annalyszian glared. "Never under this roof," she hissed. "And as for you...if you weren't my dead sister's daughter..."

" 'If'!" Hax laughed mockingly. " 'If', and 'if'! Always 'if'!" She reached up, tore the costly veil from her hair, and threw it to the floor. Silver pins scattered like hailstones. "What honour do you show your dead sister when you deny her husband's name, and treat her daughter like a beggar at your door?"

"More than he showed her!" Hax's aunt raged. "Dragged away from the capital, to an island hovel! Crammed into a draughty fort, along with the kine and the swine! A daughter of an ancient line, scrabbling in the dirt like a commoner!"

Forgetting her trepidation of a moment before, the older woman stalked towards Hax, eyes flaring with rage.

Hax blinked at her sudden fury, backpedalling. This was a side of her aunt that she had been warned of by both her mother and her father, but that she had never before witnessed.

"A daughter of kings," the duchess raved, "taken in wedded bondage by a petty southern lord!" she spat. "What welcome should I afford one of his bratlings, heya?"

Through the haze of amazement and wine fumes, Hax felt the calm of sudden clarity descend upon her. If I stay, she realized with something akin to astonishment, I might kill her.

"Farewell, aunt." She bowed mechanically, then turned and strode towards the doors of the boudoir.

"Nec averso, scortum!" Annalyszian shrieked.

She heard running, slippered steps, and turned back to face her aunt – just in time to receive a bone-jarring slap. Nails like talons gouged her cheek, stinging and drawing blood.

Hax flinched; the heel of her shoe caught on the hem of the gown, and she stumbled backwards. Pouncing like a cat, the older woman followed, drawing her hand back for another blow.

Hax's calm restraint vanished instantly, like tears fallen on white-hot steel. A blind, blank-eyed fury descended over her.

She caught Annalyszian's wrist as it fell. Fingers long accustomed to the weight of the aulensis, the greatest of all elven blades, ground into the older woman's bones, eliciting a hiss of pain.

"Scortum?" Hax hissed. " 'Whore', is it? I, who have never known a man's touch, called 'whore' by the likes of you?" With her left hand, she bent her assailant's arm towards the floor; with her right, she caught the woman's throat.

" 'Whore', thyself, aunty!" she shouted. Flecks of spittle sprayed from her lips. "I am not one of thy court-cunnies, spreading my legs for every rake with a heavy purse and a ready smile!"

Rage like bile hammered up her throat; she opened her mouth to breathe, and was dumbfounded when hissing syllables tumbled out. It was a phrase that had come to her long ago; she had mastered it in the silence of her soul, but never once uttered it – not against enemies, not even against the fell creatures of the night, much less one of her own kind. Especially her own kin.

The magic answered her call. Night bloomed in her breast, and a vast, frost-fanged maw opened within her heart. Beneath her fingertips, the older woman's lifebeat hammered frantically; Hax could feel it fluttering like a moth, could feel the feeble flickering of the woman's essence beneath her claw. Warmth like fire, like hot blood, like magma, suffused her hand, her arm, her breast, flowing into her like flame, suffusing every fragment of her being. Hot spurts of glory filled her with exaltation. Life, delicious and heady as wine, flooded through her.

Specks danced before her eyes. Hax drank it in, panting with blood-lust, bathing in it, shuddering at the unutterable ecstasy of the taking.

Her enemy screamed once; a febrile, terrified scream, that trailed swiftly off into a gasping moan.

Hax smiled in victory – a terrifying, ghoulish rictus. "Say...his...NAME!" she snarled.

The colour draining from her face, her eyes rolling and white, Annalyszian slumped.

Were you planning on killing her? the Voice asked drily.

She's...what? Her mind was heavy, clotted with power and the taste of blood. What am I...

At the last possible instant, Hax came back to herself. With a supreme effort, she choked off the magic; cut through the throbbing conduit of power with the blade of her mind, like an axe biting through an anchor cable. The twisted strands of the flux, shadow-dark and splintery, whipped away into the aether.

She blinked like a sleeper rising from deep dreams. The exaltation broke like a fever, leaving her shaking and chilled. A bitter taste of ashes and gall lingered on her tongue.

She let go of her aunt's throat. Deprived of that meagre support, the woman slumped bonelessly to the floor.

Terrified, Hax knelt at the older woman's side, feeling for the lifebeat in her throat. It was there; weak, certainly, but there.

"Hara laudior," she whispered. She glanced around the room, found her aunt's dressing table, and located a hand mirror of polished silver. She held this before the stricken woman's lips, waiting an agonized eternity before the faintest hint of mist appeared.

What to do? She had no skill at healing. But there had been a cut-crystal decanter on one of the tables. Striding quickly to the curtained corner where it stood, Hax removed the stopper and sniffed. Mons Temetum, she thought. Or some other sort of ardent spirit. Lallakentan had been a firm believer in the restorative power of drink.

Flask in hand, she hurried back to her stricken aunt. Kneeling, she poured some of the potent fluid into the palm of her hand, then held it to the woman's lips. When she failed to drink, Hax put the bottle down, pried her jaws apart, and rubbed the liquor into her gums.

That worked. Annalyszian coughed weakly, retched, and began thrashing feebly.

Hax held the decanter to her lips until the woman had taken two small swallows. When her aunt's eyes opened, she whispered, "Condona me, matertera," putting all of her remorse into those three words. It was difficult, as she did not feel especially remorseful.

Annalyszian's eyelids flickered weakly. Her face was grey, her lips blue-tinged. They parted, and when she spoke, her voice was a harsh, atonal croak. "Ego te abligatio, sicaria," she gasped. "Proditor," she added, her voice growing progressively weaker. "Venefica."

A blaze of ice shot through Hax, gripping her heart in a fist of iron. Assassin rang in her mind like a funeral bell. Traitor. Sorceress.

And so ends my mission, she sighed, her heart clenched tight within her. Less than a day. Fast work, she sighed, even by my standards.

Hax stood. "Pareo," she said dully. Then she strode to the window – the high tower window that overlooked the palace gardens.

I need time, she realized suddenly. Time to think, to...to decide.

Turning back towards her aunt, who lay, gasping, on the carpeted floor, she made a swift gesture, and intoned "Uinahtaa." An old incantation, one she had used safely, many times.

A look of impotent fury skittered across Annalyszian's face...and then it faded. Her eyes closed, and she slumped to the carpet.

Hax nodded once. "Thank you for the gown," she murmured quietly.

Then she stepped up to the sill of the vast window, grasped the shutter cords in her hands...and threw herself onto the night breeze.

♦

She plummeted like a stone, dropping four stories between one heartbeat and the next. At the last possible instant, she murmured a spell to arrest her fall, stepping lightly to the ground between two plum trees, heavy with blossoms and ripening fruit. Her costly shoes sank into the thick, aromatic loam of the garden. The life-giving scent of flowers filled the air, and she breathed it in gladly; it went a long way towards cleansing her palate of the horrid, coppery tang of magic and blood.

To Hax's eyes, the gardens lay in a sort of twilight. Although the Lamps had not yet risen, the cloudless sky shone with starlight, bathing the trees and flowerbeds in a soft blanket of argent glory. And the Starhall itself – the heart of the city, the Queen's residence, where stood Tior's ancient throne – blazed with arcane splendour, lighting the whole of the palace like a second sun.

Multicoloured shadows lay everywhere. Slipping between the trees, Hax sat on a convenient patch of grass, and became one of them.

Her mind was at war with itself. While one part gibbered What did I do? over and over, like a child who has broken a valued bauble and is awaiting a parent's judgment, another reflected coldly and dispassionately on the evening's events. This part asked a different question.

What do I do now?

That, she knew, was simple enough. After all, her mission was not to pay a visit to her aunt; nor was it even to remain in Starmeadow. It was to deliver her father's missive to the Grand Duke. She touched her bosom briefly, reassuring herself that the letter was still in place. It was.

Well, then, she pondered, what next?

I have to flee, she realized immediately. That was no benign spell she had cast against her aunt; it was lethal, a working of the Ars Anecros. Had she used it against a fellow elf in Eldisle, she would have faced her father's judgment, and the punishment would have been severe. He had already excused her once, taking the punishment that had rightfully been hers; but she had been a child then, and his responsibility under the Codex. She was an adult now. There would be no more pardons.

Her mother, in her last letter to Hax, had warned her daughter against letting her passion get the better of her. No one would take the blame for her this time. Neither Kaltas nor Lallakentan had any sympathy for necromancers; both had faced the shambling fruits of that dark art in battle too many times. And here, having used the power against the wife of the Heir...

She could not hope for leniency. She had to flee.

My sword, she bethought herself suddenly. My bow. My armour. My...her saddlebags, her bedroll, her clothing; it was all still in the chambers she had been assigned.

The urgency spurred her to action. She had minutes, at most, before Annalyszian raised a hue and cry. She scanned the multitude of high, arched windows, trying to guess which one was hers.

Then her head snapped around. There was a rush of slippered feet; half a dozen people were running, swift and soft, through the shrubbery. Hax heard harsh, whispered orders being given, and though the words were indistinct, the tone was not.

She could not afford to be seen. With a quick gesticulation, she whispered "Näkymättömyys", and vanished into the shadows.

Cloaked in ethereal dimness, Hax stepped into the lee of a statue depicting some ancient warrior-king. She strained her ears. Who could be so foolish as to make mischief in the Queen's gardens? she wondered with dry despondency. Apart from me, of course?

It would be folly. She knew that much; the place was positively swarming with armed and armoured members of the High Guard.

The answer to her unspoken question came swiftly, in the form of a steely slither, a low grunt, and the soft clatter of armour on stone.

Gods! She knew those sounds of old. This was no pair of illicit lovers seeking the solitude of the bushes.

She ran her hands over the gilt-embroidered silk of her gown. Nothing. Not so much as a nail file.

No. Not 'nothing'. After what she had just done to her aunt, certainly not 'nothing'.

Hax hissed an incantation under her breath, raised her arms to her shoulders, and soared, silent and invisible, into the night sky.

Atop the trees, the breeze was brisk, and the thin material of her gown offered little protection from the chill. She ignored it as best she could, straining to see.

From her new vantage point some fifty paces above the gardens, she could easily make out what was going on. Six...no, seven black-clad forms were slipping noiselessly between tree and flower-bed, navigating expertly the gaps between the patrolling bodies of Guardsmen. She saw the glint of steel, and her lip curled involuntarily, baring her teeth. I need a...

There. She dove noiselessly, landed softly near the cooling corpse of a silver-mailed soldier, presumably the one she'd heard expire a moment before. She laid a finger on his throat, feeling for the lifebeat, and was unsurprised to find nothing.

Her fingers found blood and a small, foul-smelling wound just under the angle of his jaw.

Hax gritted her teeth in a silent snarl. Taking care to avoid making a sound, slid the elf's sword out of the scabbard slung across his back. A chalybs altus, she was happy to note; the great glaive of the High Guard. So unlike Sylloallen's gift, her own aulensis. Heavier, more cumbersome. But it would do.

She hefted the weapon in one hand, smiling grimly, and blessing Sylloallen for having trained her in all of the blades. For all its weight, the thing was well-forged, and had a delicate balance. At least the High Guard still gets good kit, she thought.

An instant later, the new sword in hand, she was once more soaring invisibly through the chill night air.

After an instant's frantic searching, she had located the shadowy infiltrators again. The Voice was screaming cautions at her now. She ignored it. No more planning, she thought. Nor any vacillation.

Audacity. She dove towards the group, gesturing frantically, and whispering incantations in the tongue of wyrms. One after another, they took effect. Her tender flesh hardened against blows and darts, and flickers of arcane force danced over it, shielding her from other harm.

The last spell, she shouted: "Palokerä!"

A radiant speck of light shot from her outstretched fingertips, flashing through the sky, striking the ground amid the black-clad stalkers. It blossomed instantly into a roaring, incandescent ball of flame. Two of the figures ignited and collapsed, screaming in agony, to the ground; a third was blasted backwards into a tree trunk.

Hax felt a slight tickle as the illusion of invisibility surrounding her dissolved and disappeared.

The other four seemed unharmed. Two, possibly having heard her incantation, looked up and caught sight of Hax; one raised a crossbow to its shoulder, took aim, and released the bolt. The other dipped a hand to its belt and flung a trio of tiny steel darts in her direction. All four missiles ricocheted harmlessly into the treetops, deflected by the invisible barrier of arcane force that she had erected around her unarmoured flesh.

Without hesitation, Hax swooped lower, aiming for the dart-thrower, snapping "Kärventää raasku!" Coruscating blades of light lanced from her fingertips. The shadowy figure was struck by two of them and fell, thrashing and shrieking. The crossbow-wielder, still struggling with his cocking mechanism, dodged nimbly out of the way.

By this time, a third figure had caught sight of her. It was robed in black, like the others, and had a heavy leather satchel slung over one shoulder. A woman, Hax thought, judging solely on the basis of shape and posture.

As Hax watched from her aerial vantage, this worthy raised a hand, gesturing in the girl's direction and hissing a series of iron syllables.

Hax recognized immediately the nature and purpose of the gesticulations. She had no time to try to counter the spell, and just enough to mutter "Pestis!" before a cold wave of energy washed over her.

Her flying spell failed, and she fell.

She had one more chance. In the instant before striking the ground, she cried out, "Kynäleta!"

Her tumbling body jerked to a halt just above the greensward, then settled softly to the lawn.

Hax clambered to her feet, hampered by the tight sleeves and long train of her dress. She had retained her grip on the Guardsman's sword, so now she hefted it, watching her opponents carefully. In the distance, she could hear the thunder of plated boots on the pathways of crushed marble; evidently someone had seen her display of fireworks. Good, she thought. A delay ought to...

The figure that had assailed her a moment ago raised its hand again. Hax focussed carefully on her attacker's gestures.

Two more darts whined softly through the air, bouncing off her shield.

Hax ignored them, squinting, her mind racing. The woman was...

The elf-girl flung up a hand, shrieking "Keskeyttää Palokerä!"

A glowing ball of intense, shimmering fire streaked towards her. At the very instant it began to blossom into lethal, consuming flame, Hax's countervocation reached out and quenched it.

The backlash was terrible. A bolt of agony lanced through her mind. She had succeeded in interrupting the caster's spell, but the power of the casting had nearly knocked her off her feet.

Hax's own power was not inconsiderable, but this enemy mage was far, far more skilled than she. Time to go, Hax thought bleakly, preparing to flee.

The black-clad crossbowman, mirroring her thoughts, snapped at the caster. "We don't have time for this!"

It was a man's voice. And he was speaking the elven tongue.

"Decessio," the caster snapped. Definitely a woman, Hax thought. The figure extended its arms and began chanting.

The crossbowman and the third figure stepped closer, each grasping one of the caster's hands.

"No!" Hax leapt forward, lashing out with the guardsman's glaive. The blade hissed through the air...and then she tripped, stumbling over the hem of her damnable gown. The keen edge missed the caster by a hair's breadth, slashing through the leather of the woman's satchel.

One of her assailants cursed foully at the close call. A glint of light, something tumbling; the crossbowman reached down, caught a small object, fist-sized, as it fell...

...ichor-green light flared...

They were gone.

"Damn it!" Hax shrieked. She stabbed the great, curved sword point-first into the sod and fell to her knees, howling in frustration.

Then she saw it. A dim, grey thing, glinting against the grass, exactly where the black-robed caster had been standing. She picked it up, tossing it lightly in one hand.

It was a goblet. A simple wine-cup, formed out of some sort of smoked glass, with a stem and base of rough-wrought silver. It felt cold and heavy in her grasp. She examined it as closely as she could in the darkness, but found no markings. Nothing to tell whence it had come, or what it was.

Boots thundered to a halt behind her. "Stand up!" a voice commanded.

Hax stood and turned, still regarding the cup in her hand. She felt dazed, unable to speak.

Then she looked up and saw their faces. A thick, heavy feeling of dread descended upon her heart.

The Voice within her was conspicuously silent.

"Identify yourself." The words seemed to float down to her, as though she were standing at the bottom of a deep, narrow well.

Hax turned to regard the speaker. Five High Guardsmen, one of them a grizzled veteran bearing the plumed helmet of a Captain, stood before her. Two held their glaives at the ready; a third levelled a razor-tipped pike at her face. A fourth, unarmed, seemed to be winded. He was breathing heavily, as if he had been running.

Hax inspected the Captain's visage closely, or at least, those parts that were visible beneath his helmet. It was not Yaarin Eliassyn. She sighed; the odds had not been good in any case, but she'd hoped for a friendly face.

The Captain half-turned to the unarmed soldier. "Kessaline? Is this her?"

The soldier had a torn piece of blood-soaked cloth pressed to the side of his neck. "That's her, Tessarius," the elf replied. "I saw her evoke the fire. She was flying."

The captain turned back to Hax. "Your name?" he asked quietly.

She blinked rapidly. "Orkarel Hax." The cup seemed to weigh a thousand pounds in her hand. For some reason, she was thinking about it, rather than about the weapons pointed at her breast.

Or, her conscience rebuked her, about your sleeping aunty upstairs, whom you just tried to kill.

The Captain shook his head. "Nomen virago est. Your true name," he insisted.

"That is the only name I use," she replied stubbornly. A buzzing sensation ran up her arm and settled into her heart. Her throat felt numb.

The officer shrugged. "Very well," he said. "The diviners can always get the rest, I suppose. I arrest you for theft, murder and high treason, by the name of Orkarel Hax." He stepped back, sheathing his glaive. "You will please come with me."

No. The Voice was back. "I...this isn't..." she stammered helplessly.

The captain's eyes hardened. "Lady, do not make me use force." His hand was still on his sword-hilt.

The pikeman leaned in, and Hax felt the razor point, cold and hard, against her ribs. "She's a magus, captain. Perhaps the shackles..."

"Yes." The officer fumbled at his belt and produced a pair of glimmering silver manacles. He looked up and said, almost apologetically, "Your hands, lady, please."

No. The Voice again.

Yes, she thought frantically. You have proof of your innocence. The enemy left bodies behind. Perhaps there are other witnesses. You can...

Kaltas warned you about this, and Sylloallen, too! the Voice within her shrieked. There are unseen forces at work here! Fool, flee!

The Voice was right, Hax realized. Unconsciously, she took a step back.

Nerves strained to the breaking point, the pikeman lunged forward. She felt the point of his weapon slash through the stiff brocade of her gown and skitter across her ribs, leaving a deep gash behind. The cut burned, first hot, and then cold.

Gasping, Hax grabbed at the wound. She hissed a spell, and vanished.

Instantly, she dropped to the ground. The captain roared in anger, drawing his blade again, while the pikeman and the two swordsmen lunged at the spot where she had just been standing. Moving as quietly as possible, Hax rolled between the wielders' legs, scrambled to her knees, and scuttled off as silently as she could manage. Blood and crushed grass stained the knees of her gown.

Her foot struck a pebble, and it clattered audibly.

"There!" one of the Guardsmen shouted, pointing.

Enough, she thought weakly. With a frantic gesture, she whispered, "Lennähtää mina!" Blood streaming from the wound in her chest, she soared invisibly into the night sky, the grey glass goblet still clenched tightly in her fist, while shouts and bells summoned the High Guard from its barracks to face a threat to the Palace and the Queen.

♦♦♦

Chapter 2 ♦ Running

Cloaked in shadow, wincing as the night air stung the wound in her side, Hax soared above the gardens and flew back up to the high windows of Lily House. She located her own suite by the simple expedient of drifting silently along the broad third-floor balconies until she saw her saddlebags draped over a curule chair. The window was already open to the night breeze, and she was inside an instant later, securing it behind her.

No hue or cry seemed to have been raised during her brief absence. That won't last, she thought grimly. Sooner or later, her aunt's hand-maidens would arrive to light her to bed, and the panic would be up.

Moving swiftly, she gathered her meagre belongings and stuffed them tightly into her pack, ignoring cosmetics, perfumes, lace and sundry frippery in favour of the serviceable woollens and leathers that were her customary garb. Careless of the exquisite fabric and careful stitching, she tore off her aunt's dress and rid herself of the tight, chafing undergarments. She slipped into her own smallclothes, donned her arming coat, unpacked her armour and buckled it on. As always, she was comforted immeasurably by the snug weight of the hardened leather.

In the midst of all this, she noticed that her father's letter had fallen to the floor. Hurriedly, she bent to retrieve it, stowing it back in the concealed pocket in her scrip. As an afterthought, she added the goblet that she had found in the garden.

Finally, she reached between the feather-stuffed mattresses of her bed and retrieved her bow and her sword, sheathing the latter, and stringing the former.

She took a final glance around, ensuring that she had left nothing useful behind. She considered leaving an explanatory note; but the increasing profusion of lights and noise outside her window suggested that she had already dallied too long. She did not consider, even for a moment, descending to the stables to saddle Torris. Even if she had had that kind of time, the Palace gates would be shut up tighter than an oyster until dawn. It was the skies, or nothing.

She stepped to the balcony. Her charms of invisibility and flight had worn thin, so she renewed them, and added a third: "Vuolas perääntyminen." Instead of the gull's desultory flight, she would move with the alacrity of the hawk.

Focussing her thoughts, she soared into the night sky. The wind, colder now, whistled past her ears. She had reason for haste; her enchantments were of limited duration, and as a result of the evening's festivities, she was close to exhausting her powers. She was still bleeding, too; and tired, mortally tired. She needed to find a safe place to rest.

Higher, higher, until the night air bit through her fluttering cloak, and Astrapratum lay glittering beneath her, a sparkling jewel in a mundane setting.

Where to go? she wondered bleakly. Far to the west – hundreds of long, weary leagues – lay the Insea and the great Empire of Ekhan. Even if she had known anyone there, that land's recent predilection for persecuting her kind, and its close alliance with the Filigree Throne, meant that it offered no refuge. And she could not fly for days over sea. She could not even fly for hours.

South and home? she thought hopefully. The Voice within her rejected the idea immediately. They would expect her to flee to her father. She had no hope of reaching Eldisle before the Queen's diviners could locate her, and the Guardsmen catch up with her. Nor would it be fair to Kaltas to draw the Queen's ire down upon him for her idiocy.

North, then? Should she seek out Landioryn, deliver her father's missive, and plead for clemency? She pondered that option for an instant, then rejected it as well. However unintentionally, she had nearly slain Landioryn's mate; it would be foolhardy to expect him to forgive her. And something deep within her heart made her cautious; not the Voice, but some other presentiment, that warned her against fleeing to the mountains of Convallis. Landioryn might be in the north at the moment; but so were Eldarcanum, and the Priscossium, and the grim duchess. Both her father and Sylloallen had long ago counselled her against venturing anywhere near that shadowed vale.

East. That was it. The coast, and ships; north of them, the Great Wastelands, where there was aid and succour for none; and further still, Mirabilis, where no elf would ever dare to tread. She could think of no good reason to go east, and many reasons to eschew that road.

That, therefore, was the answer.

She consulted the stars overhead, then banked carefully and turned her face towards the mountains where the sun had set some hours earlier, pushing herself to the uttermost limits of speed. When the enchantments began to falter, she renewed them. She did so again, and again, until she was miles beyond the city walls, and her power was utterly spent. She passed a restless, fitful night on the ground, wrapped in a thin blanket beneath a bower of twisted spruce branches, waking at ever bird-call and rustle of leaves.

When the Lantern rose to a dim, foggy dawn, Hax set out on foot.

Two days later, the sunrise saw her, footsore and fatigued, climbing the low hills bounding the Eastridge. She had moved fast, making good time, avoiding the roads, and blessing Syllo for drilling her with forced marches, and Lallakentan for continuing the practice. She was tired, but nowhere near the limits of her strength. Hax was in the prime of youth, at the peak of conditioning, and well-trained. She could run for a long while yet.

It became easier rather than harder; she was beginning to relax. She hadn't sensed any attempts to descry her whereabouts, but she knew that she lacked the proficiency to do so by arcane means. Anyone looking for her would be far more skilled than she. Her nerves, thus, remained frayed and on edge; she kept expecting to be surprised at any instant by a turma of High Guardsmen, leaping the flux to apprehend her with the aid of the Queen's diviners and the magi of the College.

But nothing happened. She even managed to avoid her countrymen – the travellers, merchants, farmers and others that she might have expected to meet. Her only companions were the birds and beasts of the forest, the trees, and the periodic mid-summer rain. And the Lantern. And, at night, the Lamps.

She stayed off the high road, too, as she approached the sheer, glimmering walls of Astraputeus, guardian of the Eastridge Pass. The lofty city could not be avoided or bypassed; it lay in the throat of a mountain vale, blocking – quite intentionally – the only easy access to the coastal plains beyond the range. And so, as she had done at Starmeadow, Hax rendered herself invisible, and flew over the city as rapidly as she could. It took almost all of her power to renew her incantations long enough to traverse the high pass. She was gasping with exhaustion and chilled to the bone by the brisk mountain winds by the time she alighted in the scraggly greenery at the peak of the pine-capped saddle.

In the grim desolation of the alpine forests, she made camp. She slept for a night, a day, and another night in order to regain her strength before starting down the long river valley that led to the coastal town of Advenaportus.

The weeks that followed were a nightmare of nervous exhaustion. Hax had no skill at disguise or dissembling. The first time she saw, tacked to the door of a tavern near the docks in Advenaportus, a poster featuring her name and likeness accusing her of sorcery, murderer and treason, she found herself trembling in rage and despair. Fortunately, the image on the poster – taken, obviously, from the depiction her father had provided to Lily House – showed her in better and more prosperous days. Weeks of hard travelling had erased the high-born maiden, leaving behind a ragged vagabond. The road and forest had stained her cloak and her clothing, and sleeping out of doors had left her mass of ebon curls greasy, tangled, and laden with fragments of twig and leaf.

Her stench completed the picture. Although it made her skin crawl to do so, she had resisted washing in order to take advantage of the well-known fastidiousness of the nobility. Her caution was borne out when she was accosted in the street by a pair of High Guardsmen, who shoved a tattered copy of the circular under her nose and asked her whether she had seen "the traitor, Orkarel Hax."

Fortunately, she had been upwind of them. She had grunted, "No," making sure to exhale sharply in their direction. The duo, noses wrinkled in disgust, had left her alone.

She still had money, and it was enough to purchase passage in a trading caravel bound for Sanalin, capital of the far eastern kingdom of Zare. She took the precaution of first exchanging her own currency for Zaran crowns, using a seedy-looking dock-side money-lender, and taking a heavy loss on the transaction in order to avoid pegging herself as a Homelander. She needn't have bothered; the purser had eyed her filthy condition with disgust, taking her money without any further interest.

Hax boarded the ship uneasily. Its low decks, narrow companionways, tight bulkheads and cramped quarters brought her fear of confined spaces to the fore. She struggled briefly with herself before she was able to choke her panic back. In the end, she installed herself in a dank corner of the 'tween-deck spaces, jammed in between lashed bundles of some herb or other, and waited nervously for the ship to leave port.

It did so the following day. Hax quickly discovered that she had no love for sea travel. The ship, though it hugged the coast, was Ekhani, a round-bottomed thing with a lively motion even in calm littoral waters. Its sole advantage was that it offered progress without any effort on her part; she was badly in need of rest, and the cramped quarters notwithstanding, revelled in the sensation of an easy voyage. And once she could eat, she discovered that the food, while plain, was filling, and superior to what she had enjoyed – or, more often, not enjoyed – during her flight from the capital to the coast.

The ship docked twice in Mirabilis – once in the city of Vestkappelle, and a second time in the grim, silent capital of Asheilagr. Hax did not go ashore; she cowered in the hold, keeping her hood up, shivering at the hourly ringing of the cathedral bells, and listening intently for any untoward activity on deck.

Her nervous caution was understandable. The purser had warned his elven passengers that the followers of the White Hand, who had governed the colony since its founding after the battle of Duncala, still retained their ages-old enmity for the elves. Even in the trading enclaves, supposedly protected by treaty, 'incidents' still occurred. The Holy Circle – the council of dour-faced, black-hearted priests that ruled Mirabilis – routinely 'deplored' such incidents, of course, even paying compensation from time to time, especially when the victims were well-connected members of the Third House. But that did little to aid those who perished beneath the leather, on the iron, or in the flames.

Hax felt that she had already tempted fate enough for one lifetime. Years ago, Kalestayne had given her a taste of what it had once meant to be an elf – especially a mage – in the clutches of the Hand. It had not been pleasant, and she had sworn to herself to avoid Mirabilis and its terrible, blood-thirsty governors for as long as she could. Being sought by the High Guard, the College and the Queen was sufficient excitement for her taste.

She stayed aboard, tucked away out of sight.

After Asheilagr, the ship left Mirabilan waters, and Hax breathed a sigh of relief. She began spending more time on deck. The pilot took a long reach southwards, rounding the reefs that marked the southernmost extremity of the Wastes, standing far out from the coast, and passing within sight of a variety of uninhabited islands that lay well to the south of Erutrei's shores. Hax was delighted when the ship was intercepted by a school of porpoises that followed them for several hours. She had swum with the clever creatures in the Sunlit Seas that lapped at the shore of Joyous Light, and wished that she could do so again, if only to help scrub the accumulated filth of travel from her hide.

After the islands, whose names she never learned, the ship stood north-eastwards again, back towards the coast. The crew helpfully pointed out the Red River Barony, but the ship did not make port there. After that, the low, rolling hills and broad fields of western Zare dominated the northern horizon. Twelve days after leaving Advenaportus, they docked in Vejborg.

Although she had paid for passage to Sanalin, Zare's far-distant capital, Hax decided to confound potential pursuers by taking to the land again. Her nervous caution reasserted itself, and rather than walk down the gangplank in the full light of day, she waited until nightfall, then – invisible once more – launched herself into the lowering sky.

She spent an uncomfortable night crouching in the lee of a barn in some nameless hamlet a mile north of the city walls, struggling without success to keep the persistent rain off with her cloak.

In the morning, bedraggled and stinking worse than ever, she paid too much for a horse that she purchased from a family of drovers. Riding bareback, she struck out along the Nordvej, the trade road that followed the great river known as the Stjerneflåde as it meandered deep into the mountains that formed the northern boundary of Zare.

The drovers' horse was a wretched, spavined thing that merited the name only by virtue of having four hooves and an annoying, sickly whinny. It was undernourished and sway-backed, and its pronounced spine cut into her at the most inconvenient place possible.

After enduring three days of torture, Hax finally gave up, stripped off her threadbare garments, and waded into an icy mountain stream in an attempt to numb the pain. It didn't help her bruises, her chafing, or her dignity much, but at least she managed to get somewhat clean.

A week later, in a riverside town called Ballohek, she had a hot meal and a bath – her first in more than a month. Dipping into her purse, she bought a decent saddle and a better horse to put it on. The stableman gave her a young and energetic mare, taking her cart-nag in trade. Hax, suspecting that it would soon be either glue or stew, did not bother to bid the miserable beast farewell.

That night, she slept in a bed. The linens – old and worn, but clean – beckoned like a long-absent lover. But before putting her head to the pillow, she did what she had to do; what she had needed so desperately to do, ever since that terrible night in the Palace gardens.

Composing herself, she disrobed and sat cross-legged on the bed. Her small chamois packet of needles and her precious vial of indigo ink were spread on a clean towel.

She was certain of only three of the interlopers, but uncertain of the fourth. Gritting her teeth, she selected three bare spots on her freshly-scrubbed hide – one on her left thigh, a second in the crook of her left elbow, and a third immediately below her right breast – and began the exacting, agonizing task of atoning for the lives that she had taken.

By the time she was finished, three new, bloody tattoos – indigo half-moons – adorned her pale flesh. The bed sheets were speckled with hundreds of tiny scarlet flecks. She put her needles away and slept deeply and long.

The following morning, she rode out of town in better spirits than she had known in weeks. She had no plan, no destination in mind.

She was listening to the Voice.

♦

The change in pace was welcome. A month had passed since the events in the Palace garden, and although she remained wary, Hax was no longer terrified that her pursuers, whomever they might be, would appear suddenly, and accost her without warning. She could not imagine the diviners of the College being unable to locate her, so she could only conclude that – for whatever reason – either they had found her, and were not following; or they had not tried to find her at all.

She could not imagine why the Queen would be content with either course of action. Frustrated at her fruitless attempts to rationalize the patently irrational, she soon gave up speculating, and began to enjoy the rugged charm of her surroundings.

Unlike the vast majority of her kin, Hax had never attended the College as an apprentice, nor any of the lesser scholae scattered throughout the cities and larger towns of Elvehelm. Not that she hadn't wanted to. Like all children of the Third House – especially the noble-born scions of the Duodeci – she had, while still only a prepubescent girl of sixty, undergone the customary testing to determine whether she possessed the necessary aptitude for wielding the flux. The trials were usually brief, impersonal and objective; but in her case, the test had been administered by Kalestayne, the Lord Wizard oathed to her father's house, an ancient friend of the family. He had been just as astonished as Hax had been, and just as disappointed, when she failed the tests.

Like all elves, Hax had been exposed to casters and shapers since her birth. Magic was the birthright of the children of Hara, the legacy bequeathed to them by the sacrifice of Miros, long before Bræa's betrayal and the first rising of the Lantern, and later cemented by Hara's wise and benevolent overlordship. All elves were expected to learn to wield the flux, at least to some degree. Well-born elf children – even those whose station or predilections destined them for some other path in life – invariably attended either the College or one of the schools, at least for long enough to gain a minimal proficiency in the Art. Those who were especially gifted remained longer, studying the deeper mysteries. The most skilled among them eventually graduated as wizards, those whose power and knowledge sustained the realm, protected it from its foes, and guided its leaders.

Her mother had been one of those. Almost since Hax had mouthed her first words, her mother had spoken to her of little else. Alrykkian had studied in many places – at one of the lesser scholae in Astrapratum, and later, at the Ludus Astralis, the great College of Stars itself. Supremely gifted, she had, by the time she took Hax's father as lifemate, become an accomplished mage.

Rykki had always assumed – often quite vocally – that Hax would follow in her footsteps. Her other daughter, Hax's older sister Jianscæn, had done so, at least partially; her own skills had emerged early, and she had blossomed under Alrykkian's teachings. Disdaining the College, Jianni had turned to poetry, music and song, becoming, instead of a wizard, a talented and much sought-after skald. She was now the toast of Sinulatus, a glorious sea-front city on the south-eastern coast of the Homeland, not too far from Eldisle. Hax hadn't seen her in years.

Skilled, and famous. Mother would've been proud, the elf-girl thought bitterly.

The only person who hadn't seemed disappointed by Hax's failure to pass the tests had been her father. When she'd returned from Kalestayne's library – a devastated stripling of a girl, stony-faced with rage, desperately trying to keep her lip from quivering – she'd had a hero's struggle to retain her composure. Her effort had succeeded all the way to the door of her father's study, where she had finally collapsed in a fit of weeping.

By the time the Duke had managed to calm her down and she was able to think again, Hax had realized what he had known all along: that all of her stress and sorrow had less to do with the prospect of failure, than with having to confess her shame to her brilliant, accomplished and famous mother.

Riding along the Nordvej now, six decades later, Hax smiled wryly at how clearly that afternoon stood out in her memory.

♦

A half-hour, a glass of wine and two sodden handkerchiefs had sufficed to steady her nerves. Her father, always a good judge of moods, had remained mostly silent throughout the storm of weeping, allowing her to pour out her fears and regrets, comforting her with his presence instead of with words. Once she had calmed down, though – as was his wont – he faced the problem squarely, asking her what, now that the Collegium was denied her, she planned to do.

Ally, at sixty still a girl barely on the cusp of womanhood, had never considered any path other than the one that had been described to her in glowing terms by her beloved but often daunting mother. "I don't know," she had confessed helplessly.

Her father had simply nodded. "There's someone I'd like you to meet."

So had followed her first encounter with the man who was to become her mentor. Sylloallen Avarras, one of her father's retainers, was a rough-looking but exceptionally soft-spoken fellow, younger than her father, but still close to four times Ally's age, a seasoned, professional-looking warrior. His garb – simple, well-worn, and clean – was undistinguished, similar to what any commoner might wear. His mailshirt, however, was not; and Ally could see the long, slightly-curved hilt of an enormous sword protruding over his right shoulder. Unlike her father's elaborately-coiffed mane, Sylloallen had gathered his ebon locks into a top-knot secured by a woven ring of silver.

His eyes were the strangest thing about him – a pale, piercing blue, like the sky after a rain. It was a weird departure from the vibrant emerald irises common to the scions of the Third House, and hinted at some irregularity in his descent. Ally found them both odd, and oddly compelling.

The warrior couldn't help but notice her staring at them, and smiled. She blushed furiously and looked at her feet.

At her father's request, Sylloallen told her his tale over another glass of Eldisle's finest, explaining how he'd come into the Duke's service. Like her, Sylloallen had been born on Eldisle, although not in a palace; not by a long stretch. His home was an ancient treetown called Spreading Wonders, nestled into a cove on the southern coast of the island, about a day's walk west of Joyous Light. Ally knew it well; she had seen it often while riding, and had even purchased exquisite bits of jewellery crafted from the amber that washed up on its shores.

He had been schooled at home by traditional parents, raised under the strictures of the Codex Diorcan, emphasizing diligence, frugality, humility, honesty and valour. Ally nodded approvingly; her father had raised her the same way.

His career had begun in earnest when, for some reason or other, he'd caught the Duke's eye during an inspection tour, and had been invited to come back to the palace in Joyous Light as a page.

"Good thing, too," Sylloallen had explained, smiling. "Didn't have a flicker of the flux about me. Not then, at any rate. Never would've made it in the mages' school. Luckily for me, my mother considered his Grace's service to be a better deal than eel-fishing or tending goats." He threw his master a grin when he said this; Kaltas had merely shaken his head wryly.

So had followed ten years of scouring pots, cleaning pigeon coops and learning arms before the grubby stripling was made a squire. He then served as messenger, equerry, and eventually knight-errant, winning his spurs right at his majority, a century or so earlier. That was when his life had changed.

"I must've caught Somebody's eye," Sylloallen had told her soberly, "because at my vigil, the Protector called me." Larranel's clergy had immediately intervened, and instead of merely a knight, the new esquire was consecrated as one of the Luxmyrmidae of Larranel Sylvanus – a holy warrior, sworn to the service of the Protector of the Homelands.

"Don't know who was happier to hear about my consecration," he'd smiled wryly. "My mother, Lady Alrykkian, or the Duke himself. I was just glad that it meant no more pots." He'd taken a long draught of wine, adding, "I've served Kaltas of Eldisle ever since."

"And now," her father had interrupted, "he's going to serve me again. Allymyn, my dear, meet your new master."

Ally had been too surprised to say anything. Her father waited a moment for a reaction, muttering "Hmm" when none came.

Turning to Sylloallen, he'd said "So, teacher. Where do you want to begin?"

Sylloallen had unslung his enormous sword. Ally saw that it was an aulensis, the great court sword of the High Elves, patterned after the black blade that Tior Magnus had forged for his brother Dior, War Chief of Harad, during the Age of Wisdom, thousands of years in the past. I might not know magic, she'd thought bitterly, but at least I know history. Kalestayne had seen to that.

The thing was slender-bladed but enormous, at least as long as she was tall. The warrior had hefted the scabbarded blade thoughtfully for a moment. Then he'd tossed it casually at Ally.

Stunned, she'd sprung from her chair, clutching at the weapon, more to prevent it from hitting her in the face than for any other reason. Not surprisingly, she fumbled and dropped it. It fell to the floor with a clatter. Her father had merely raised an eyebrow.

"I think," Sylloallen had said, looking her over clinically, "that we'll start with some push-ups."

And so had begun Ally's apprenticeship as a sword-thegn. The first months were a gruelling experience; she was still young, decades away from her majority, and it was not customary to begin training elven youths in the martial arts until they had at least seen their first century. Worse, her sheltered childhood, as the daughter of a nobleman and a scion of the Duodeci, had spared her not only the physical labour that was expected of the common folk, but also the physical development that came with it. Simply put, she was weak; she lacked both the muscular strength and the endurance that a commoner of her age would have already enjoyed.

That was where Sylloallen decided to begin.

He'd wasted no time. They'd left her father's study together, and he'd led her, at a brisk pace, into the castle's sand-strewn courtyard.

When she'd offered him his sword, he'd simply shaken his head, saying, "It's yours now. And don't ever let me catch you without it."

Recalling that moment, years later, Ally was proud that he had never done so. From the moment he'd given the thing into her hands, to the day that he'd left the palace, never to be seen again, he'd never caught her unarmed. For all of her other omissions, errors and failures, for all the innumerable disappointments she'd inflicted on her mother, her father, and Sylloallen, she'd never once fallen down in executing the first command he'd given her.

It was something.

In the courtyard, she'd expected him to turn for the stables; instead, he'd turned towards the barbican and the castle's great gate. He paused for a moment, looking her carefully up and down, then said, "Let's go," setting off towards the portcullis at an easy run.

Ally had stared after him in disbelief. In addition to carrying the heavy sword, she was still garbed as she had been for her examination that morning: in a floor-length gown of satin and heavy brocade, with a moderate train, and numerous costly combs, pins and veils supporting her elaborate coiffure. Could he really expect her to run in such dress?

He could, and did. Sylloallen had paused by the gatehouse, turning and beckoning to her impatiently before vanishing into the long, shadowy tunnel. A moment later, she'd heard his boot heels thundering on the drawbridge.

He's serious, she'd thought, amazed and horrified. Her heart, already blasted by her failure before Kalestayne, had sunk even further.

For a moment – just one – she had considered letting him go and returning to her chambers. There were other things she could do; other paths in life. She had glanced down at the heavy sword in her hands and thought about dropping it in the dirt.

Go ahead.

Ally had looked around. The voice had rung clearly in her head, and she'd half-expected to see someone standing behind her. But she was alone; the other residents of the castle, noble and common alike, were going about their business, politely ignoring their lord's younger daughter and the immense weapon she held in her slender fingers.

Drop it, the Voice had counselled. Go back inside.

She wanted to. It seemed like the sensible course. It was certainly the easier one.

And what then? she'd asked herself.

Whatever other highborn ladies do, the mysterious Voice had replied instantly. Dance. Sing. Read poetry. Ride in the countryside.

Do needlepoint, it had continued, ringing hollowly, snidely in her ears. Gossip. Take some highborn imbecile to mate. Be his cushion, bear his brats.

Betray him with his friends. Raise children to bear more brats, do needlepoint, gossip, and betray their own mates in turn.

The voice grew ever louder, more hollow. Pick flowers. Grow old. Die. And be forgotten.

She had begun to hear a roaring in her ears, like thunder or the distant surf, and realized that it was a scream of frustration building in her chest. Is that all there is for me? she raged.

All, the voice concurred. Unless...

Unless what? she'd demanded frantically.

Unless you choose a different path.

"Sylloallen's path," she muttered under her breath. You're saying that I should follow him?

I am saying, the voice replied, fading beneath the roaring murmur of her discontent, that the Holy Mother's gift to you is more than life.

It is choice.

This choice, the deep, penetrating Voice said firmly, is yours. Yours alone.

She'd listened a moment more, blinking in astonishment. But the Voice – she'd already begun to think of it in those terms – did not return.

Hefting the sword, Ally had glanced up at the castle battlements, to the wide, glazed windows that concealed her parents' apartments. She could not be sure that her father was watching, but she would have bet that he was.

Two paths, she thought. Which way?

A moment later, she was thundering breathlessly across the drawbridge, the heavy sword cradled awkwardly in her arms, shouting for Sylloallen.

♦

Hax was awoken by the screaming of her mare – a desperate, high-pitched whinny that was suddenly choked off, trailing away into feeble thrashings amid the underbrush.

Her immediate, panicked reaction – They've found me! – vanished almost at once. Whatever the High Guard might do to her, they wouldn't harm her horse.

Galvanized, she rolled out of her makeshift bed, clearing the mattress of evergreen branches that she had laid on the ground, and kicking off her blankets. Her hand found the hilt of her sword right where she had left it, and she came to her feet in a clumsy but adequately stable fighting stance, blinking to clear the rheum from her eyes.

She was surrounded.

A dozen hunched, grey-skinned creatures – man-like, but horribly misshapen and feral – snarled and slavered in a tight cordon around her. Beyond them, limned in moonlight, she could see others tearing at the feebly-twitching remains of her horse.

The stench was incredible, an amalgam of fear and rot that clutched at her throat, making her feel as though she were drowning in bile. She was surprised that the smell alone hadn't roused her.

Snarling, spittle flying from filth-encrusted fangs, they rushed her.

She struck the head from the first one to reach her, but two more leapt onto her back, driving her to her knees. Claws dug deep into her shoulder, tearing easily through her flimsy chemise. She gasped at the sudden, stabbing pain, recalling too late that her armour was lying uselessly under a nearby tree.

Still on her knees, she spun in place, managing to throw one of her assailants off, and pinned it to the ground with an awkward thrust. Mortally wounded but entirely ignorant of that fact, the thing hissed and spat at her, its eyes blazing like pinpricks of hellfire, a reek of death and corruption rising from its gaping maw.

The other still clung to her like a limpet, sinking its fangs, over and over again, into the soft flesh near her neck. The pain was horrific, and Hax shrieked now. Her screams seemed to embolden the rest of the mob, and they edged close to the struggling duo, eager to share in their comrade's kill.

Hax realized dimly that she was losing. The agony in her neck was unbearable; the horror clinging to her back had got an arm around her throat and was remorselessly tightening its grasp. Its touch was even worse than pain; it was cold, cold beyond winter's night, a deep, draining cold that clawed at her being, gnawing at the spirit within her even as the thing's fangs and claws raked at her flesh. She had no idea what the creature was, but she knew that it was killing her.

Any of her more complicated incantations were beyond her ability at that moment. Keeping one hand on the hilt of her sword, she grasped the thing's cold, slimy wrist, and gasped, "Vahinko kuollut!"

Smoke burst from the flesh where Hax had touched it. The thing snarled in surprise.

And it loosened its grip.

With the last of her failing strength, Hax flung the thing to the ground, swept her sword in a vast overhand arc, and split the creature's skull down to its breastbone.

She yanked the gleaming steel lath out of the thing's shuddering corpse and breathed deep. Air like liquid fire scorched her injured throat. Gritting her teeth against the flaring agony in her neck and shoulder, and desperately conscious of the blood running freely down her breast and back, she shouted a challenge, flourishing her blade.

The enemy seemed hesitant now, circling her like a maddened wolf pack, glancing from her sword to the hollow of her throat, then over to the blood-stained bushes where their pack-mates were making free with the remains of her stallion. Good enough, she thought grimly.

Shrieking a challenge, she feinted a lunge at the largest single group of the creatures; then, clenching her will, she shouted, "Lennähtää mina!"...

...and soared into the freezing, wind-swept sky. Droplets of blood from her torn flesh spattered down like scarlet rain.

The cacophony was terrific. The grey-skinned creatures capered and pranced as though possessed, clustering beneath her and screaming their rage and hunger into the night sky.

Perhaps they are possessed, she thought grimly. Well, I can rectify that. Transferring her sword to her left hand, she took a deep breath, gritted her teeth, and, making a short series of arcane gestures, muttered, "Palokerä!"

A shimmering glint of power leapt from her fingers, plummeting to earth like a tiny, glowing meteorite. It landed in the midst of the slavering crowd and blossomed into a terrible ball of fire.

The slap of the detonation was accompanied by a hungry roar. Flames burst outwards, engulfing her assailants and billowing into a red-orange cloud that illuminated the night sky. The hungry crackle of the fire was instantly overwhelmed by the desperate shrieks of the fanged horde. More than half of their number fell, smoking and twitching feebly, to the forest floor; the remainder, trailing flames and shedding gobbets of burnt flesh, bolted for the trees. Their screaming flight sparked panic amid their uninjured fellows, who were still clustered around her horse's partially-consumed carcass; then these, too, broke, and fled bawling into the night.

A moment later they were gone, their deranged howls fading into the forest. Hax sighed with relief...and then gasped in agony as her exhilaration fled too, and the pain in her neck and shoulder flooded back, nearly blinding her.

She had to bind her wounds.

Her original fireblast had ignited the trees around her campsite. Once her attackers had vanished, Hax swooped in, landing awkwardly, half-blinded by pain. As she had expected, her blankets had been incinerated; but fortunately, her armour and saddlebags, and for that matter her scabbard, all being of oiled leather, were only lightly singed. Her bow and quiver, leaning against a tree a short distance away (That's never going to happen again, she cursed to herself), had, miraculously, escaped unharmed.

Without much hope, she stumbled across the clearing to the small copse where her horse had been hobbled. It was, as she had expected, dead. And worse than dead; its flesh was torn and half-consumed, its entrails spread across the forest floor like a vast, gruesome carpet. Flies, made sluggish by the evening's chill, had already begun to gather.

A white-hot anger boiled up within her breast. Then she retched, and the pain of doing so brought her back to herself. She touched a hand to her blouse; it came away bloody, and she was overcome by a sudden light-headedness. Bindings, she thought drunkenly.

Leaving her dead horse, she returned to her campsite. The fires she had ignited were, to her considerable relief, dying out; it had rained recently, and the woods were still damp. At least she did not have to fear a wildfire.

She rummaged through her scorched saddlebags and extracted her last remaining linen chemise. None too clean, she thought morosely. It would have to do.

She had no wine with which to sponge her wounds. She rinsed them liberally with her waterskin, hoping that doing so would flush the filth of fang and claw from the terrible gashes; then tore her spare shirt into strips.

She paused, remembering Sylloallen's lessons, and glanced around. No, she thought, eyes a-squint, looking from tree to tree...no, no...yes.

With her fingernails, she scraped clusters of dry, hair-like moss from the bark of a towering oak. The worst of the wounds were in her neck and shoulder. Gritting her teeth against the searing pain, she pressed moss into the torn flesh. She covered this makeshift poultice with a pad of folded rags, and bound the whole mess in place with strips of linen. It was a difficult, awkward business; she ended up holding the cloth with her teeth while tightening the knots with her left hand.

The last of the fires was out by the time she was done. She regarded her torn, blood-soaked shirt for only a moment before discarding it; it was too gory even to be useful for bandages. Shuddering, she shrugged bare-skinned into her sweat-dampened arming coat; then clenched her jaw again as she carefully donned her armour. Its weight rested uncomfortably on her bandaged wounds, but she reasoned that, the discomfort notwithstanding, it might help to hold the poultices in place.

As she donned the rest of her clothing and kit, she discovered a score of smaller gashes and cuts all over her torso and legs. Damned things must've had fangs everywhere, she grimaced. Given the filth and stench of her assailants, the chance of her wounds not festering was vanishingly small.

I'm going to need a healer, she realized glumly.

"And a new horse," she added, a moment later. Even to her own ears, her voice sounded panicked and febrile.

There were other matters to take care of first. Repacking her saddlebags, she was relieved to find them considerably lighter without her two blankets. She could keep warm by walking. Knotting her quiver and bow to her baldric, she slipped it over her left shoulder, avoiding the injured right, then lay her saddlebags atop that. The weight was not too great for a forced march, but it was awkward, and she was going to have difficulty moving both swiftly and silently. She briefly considered taking her saddle along as well – after all, she had only just paid for the damned thing – but decided that she didn't need the extra weight. And in any case, it was useless without a horse to put it on.

Speed was more important. The rest of the horrid things, after all, were still out there. And this was farming country.

Resolving to ignore the throbbing agony of her wounds, Hax set her jaw and left her campsite behind, following the blood-speckled trail of her attackers through the starlit forest.

♦

By the time she caught up with her quarry, a day and a night had passed, and Hax was exhausted. Her wounds were inflamed, painful to the touch, and she was certain that they were becoming infected. Her water skin was empty again. She had paused to refresh herself at streams that she crossed, but had been forced on each occasion to range a short distance upriver, so as not to drink water contaminated by the passage of her attackers' foul feet. Each such foray cost her precious time. Her enemy was moving so swiftly and tirelessly that she had begun to suspect that they were more than what she had assumed them to be – more than mere feral hominids. The icy lassitude that had come over her when she had been grappled by them had hinted as much. Revenants, she supposed; although whether they had risen spontaneously, or had been made, she could not guess.

Whatever their origin, the things refused to halt, even for rest. So much for taking them asleep and unawares, she thought grimly.

She did not pause for food. Between her exertions and her wounds, she felt feverish and nauseated. More than once she considered abandoning her saddlebags in order to quicken her pace, but each time she rejected the notion. She had no idea how far she would have to go, and was unsure that she would be able find her way back to her kit. Her skills as a woodsman might be sufficient to pursue a ravening band of monsters through late summer underbrush, but she had no illusions about her capacity for more refined tracking. For all the vaunted wood-lore of the Elves, Hax was principally a creature of cities and civilization, and she knew it.

Even with autumn coming on, dusk came early in the Bjerglands. Hax had begun to despair of catching her quarry up before nightfall and had resigned herself to another cold, painful night in the forest, when, to her relief and alarm, she heard a rising cacophony of shouts, snarls and screams break out a short distance ahead.

Protector bless me! she thought, a thin note of exultation breaking through the haze of sweat and pain. At last.

The clamour increased, and she thought she could hear the song-note of bowstrings. There was definitely light ahead – the flickering flame of an open fire.

She had been prepared for this possibility since morning. Dropping her saddlebags, she unslung her bow, nocked an arrow, and dashed the last few paces forward, dancing nimbly between the young pines, trying to ignore the cramping pain in her neck and shoulder.

She broke through the trees, then paused, astonished. She was...I'm back at the high road, she thought angrily. Those wretched things led me on a great, sweeping loop through the hills and swamps.

She surveyed the situation. The firelight was blinding, but she was able to make out some details: a few small, weather-beaten buildings, thatched roofs fallen in; a rail-fenced paddock; a wagon; tethered horses.

Travellers, she thought instantly. She could see no more than four of them, bayed, with their backs to a bonfire.

Her quarry stood between her and the farmstead, nicely silhouetted against the fire. There were more than a dozen of the things, snarling, circling. One of the travellers stepped forward, aiming a crushing blow at one of the creatures with a heavy club; another, armed with a light bow, loosed arrow after arrow into their ranks, with limited effect. A third, hooded and standing some distance behind his colleagues, seemed to be gesturing...

Another mage. Hax smiled. We may have a chance after all. Bending her elbows to bring her bow nearer her face, she put her lips to the polished steel blades of the arrowhead resting loosely against her fingertip, and whispered, "Vahinko kuollut!" Then she stepped forward into the circle of firelight, raised her bow, drew the fletchings to the angle of her jaw...

...and a short, slender figure leaned out from behind the wagon, and shot Hax in the leg.

The agony was intense, excruciating. The elf-girl yelled in surprise as much as in pain. Her own shot went wild, the enchanted arrow sailing off harmlessly into the night.

She glanced down. The other archer's shaft was buried in the outer muscles of her right thigh, away from the great blood vessels. No ill fortune without some good, as Sylloallen might have said. She gritted her teeth and tried putting her weight on it, found that she could stand without too much pain.

Then remembered that her assailant probably had more...

She looked up. Sure enough, the tiny archer was nocking another arrow. "Amicus est!" Hax screamed. "I'm on your side, damn it!" she added for good measure, screeching like a harpy in the travelling tongue.

The shock in the diminutive archer's eyes was gratifying if a little overdue. The bow sagged, and the elf-girl sighed in relief.

Her respite did not last long. To Hax's dismay, fully half of the slavering monstrosities that had been circling the travellers turned at her shout, lust and hunger glinting in their eyes. Hells, she thought, nocking another arrow.

They charged.

Not much time. Her hands were trembling, and she did her best to command them to be steady, trying to visualize the archery lists that lay between the inner and outer wards of her father's castle. She struggled to recall Sylloallen's soothing, confident tones. It helped, a little; she let fly, reached over her shoulder for another arrow, nocked it, drew it smoothly, and did so again. The two missiles smacked into the chest of the first of the galloping beasts, a hand-span apart, causing it to fold at the midsection and collapse in a disjointed heap.

She did the same to another, catching this one in the arm instead of the chest. It checked but did not drop. Dimly, she heard shouting and the roar of distant flames, and saw another of the creatures charging her stumble and fall.

Too close for archery. She gestured swiftly, shouting "Kärventää raasku!" Scarlet lances of fire blasted from her fingertips, searing pale flesh and blasting crumbling bone into ash. Another of the creatures dropped to the rain-dampened leaves, afire and shrieking.

Discarding her bow, she reached over her shoulder, drew her sword, and readied herself. An instant later, the last two creatures slammed into her like catapult boulders.

Razor claws clotted with blood and rotting flesh tore at her eyes; charnel fangs snapped at her throat and vitals. Backpedalling swiftly, she hacked downwards, and saw a vast, bloodless gash open like a dry canyon in the breast of one of her opponents. It fell, thrashing and screaming. The other raked at her, its claws tearing ribbons of flesh from her arm. One of its knees brushed the arrow embedded in her thigh, and she screamed at the redoubled agony. Continuing the smooth motion, she brought her blade around in a whistling arc...

...the creature stiffened, an arrowhead sprouting from its forehead like a third eye...

...and hacked its head from its shoulders.

Her leg finally gave out. With a grunt of pain, Hax fell to her knees, readying her sword as best she could, and looking around for targets.

There were no more. The battle appeared to be over, and she released her pent-up breath in a great, shuddering sigh. Flicking the gore from her blade, she laid it carefully on the earth and bent to inspect her wounds.

The gashes across her upper arm were bloody but shallow. Probing gingerly at her makeshift dressings, she found that she had managed in her exertions to re-open several of the wounds she had sustained the previous day. But the bleeding (and the effusion of bloody pus, she noted with disgust) was minor, and seemed to be under control.

The arrow in her thigh was the worst. She touched it gingerly, and hissed when a glassy bolt of agony shot through her groin, into her spine, and up her back.

She heard a furtive step. Hax glanced up. The bow-wielding warrior was standing a few paces away, cloaked and hooded, his posture tense. He had an arrow nocked but not drawn. Though she could not see his face, she could tell from his posture and pace that he was a man. Probably a Zaran, she thought, gritting her teeth. He was short and muscular, like the locals she had seen.

When he saw her pale, high-browed visage, he stiffened slightly. Then he straightened up and replaced the arrow in his quiver.

"Licito succurso est?" the fellow asked, his accent odd but understandable. He was trying to ask whether it was permitted to offer assistance.

Hax smiled sourly at the stilted phrasing. A man; a son of Esu. "Your friends have done enough already," she replied in travelling tongue. She had intended it as a rebuke, and was annoyed when the fellow simply looked relieved, if little embarrassed.

"My apologies," he replied, in the same language, grinning wryly and nodding at the arrow in her leg. "Poor payment for your aid in battle." He slung his bow over his shoulder and dropped to one knee. He touched his fist to his lips and then raised it to her, palm open. "I am Breygon of Æryn. Can I be of assistance?"

"In ossus est," she grated, indicating the arrow and lapsing unconsciously back into her mother's tongue. "Is there a leech among you?"

The fellow shook his head. "I'm afraid not," he replied, sounding even more embarrassed. "Nor anyone who knows much about the healing arts. Excuse me," he added, climbing to his feet again. Cupping his hands near his mouth, he shouted, "Qaramyn!"

One of the figures engaged in ensuring their fallen foes were all dead glanced up. It was the tall, hooded caster she had earlier descried. He waved peremptorily, then gestured at a pile of fallen corpses; they burst into bright orange flame. A greasy pillar of smoke mounted into the night sky.

The fellow nodded contentedly, then left his gruesome task and strode towards them. Hax could see that he was another human, somewhat taller than Breygon, although much more lightly built. "Aye?" he asked. His voice was high-pitched and smoother than it should have been, given the events of the evening.

"We've got a wounded...ah, visitor," Breygon explained, indicating Hax.

The caster swept back his hood, revealing a face that was typically human – and to Hax's eyes, very young. The fellow was pale and slender to the point of emaciation, with deep, serious eyes of unrelieved black, and a shock of unruly raven hair above a high forehead. He knelt next to her and looked her over carefully, his eyes widening. Then, to her astonishment, he nodded deeply. "Welcome to Zare, lady."

"Thank you, I suppose," she replied uncertainly.

The caster glanced up at the archer. "Third House," he said pointedly.

"I know," Breygon replied shortly, crossing his arms.

Qaramyn turned back to Hax, holding up his hands, palms open and facing her. "May I examine your wound, lady?" he asked, his voice solemn.

"Of course," she replied, taken aback by his unexpected deference, but oddly comforted by it. She was a little nonplussed; she hadn't expected to be identified so readily this far out in the hinterland.

The caster laid a gentle hand on her leg, fingers spread around the arrow-shaft. Hax noticed, entirely irrelevantly, how long and slender his digits were. He grasped the nock, rotating it gently, stopping the moment she hissed in pain.

"In ossus est," he said, shaking his head.

"That's what I said," Hax grated. Apparently he was one of those humans who thought that speaking the elven tongue made them appear learned.

The caster glanced at her momentarily before looking up at Breygon again. "Does Gwen use barbed arrows?"

The archer shook his head. "I don't know. I shouldn't think so."

"Find her and ask, would you? I'd like to know before I start pulling." Breygon nodded and strode quickly away

Qaramyn looked up from his work, grinning mischievously. "Better move that sword out of the way," he chuckled.

He glanced at the weapon, lying cold, gore-speckled and deadly on the grass, then raised his eyes to hers again. His smile was gone. "That's a mighty blade, lady," he said softly. The black eyes searched hers. "You're a long way from home."

This human is young, Hax thought, but he's no fool. Tread cautiously. "I'm travelling north. Those things came upon me in camp, last night, not far from Ballohek, and killed my horse." She nodded towards the trees, where her saddlebags lay, concealed by the darkness. "I managed to drive them off."

"And then you followed them? Ten leagues, at night, through the forest, on foot? And wounded, to boot?" the caster asked, shooting a glance at her blood-stained dressings. "That's quite a feat."

Hax shrugged. "I didn't want them coming upon other travellers. Most are less capable of defending themselves than I."

Qaramyn nodded. "Like us." He resumed probing her wound. "Commendable," he murmured. "Stupid, but commendable."

Hax was speechless for a moment. Then she smiled tightly. "I don't believe I've ever been called 'stupid' by a human before."

The caster shrugged. "Stupid is as stupid does, my lady. You were alone, badly fatigued, and bleeding. Outnumbered, too. Had you come upon those things alone in your present state, you would almost certainly have perished."

"You reached that conclusion quickly enough," Hax observed coldly.

"Men don't live as long as Elves, lady," he replied, probing gently at the entry-point in her thigh while she gritted her teeth, as much at his arrogant presumption as at the pain of her wounds. "We don't have time for elaborate courtesy and placatory euphemisms. The Holy Mother gave us a limited span, and we have to make the most of it. I prefer to get to the point."

He tapped a finger on the arrow's nock, grinning wickedly. "If you know what I mean."

Hax hissed at the pain, and grasped her leg tightly. "I'm not sure I like you," she said softly, her eyes glittering.

Qaramyn chuckled. "Don't judge so hastily." Sitting back on his haunches, he began searching through the many pouches and bags that depended from his girdle, and the belts draped over his shoulders. A small pile of glass phials, cloth bags and miscellaneous what-not gradually accumulated on the ground before him. "I might be the best comrade you'll ever have."

"How so?" Hax grated.

"Well," the fellow replied evenly, fiddling with his materials, "if I decide to be your friend, I'll never lie to you. I'll burn the world to its roots to defend you. And, if you're nice to me," he leaned closer, waggling his eyebrows suggestively, "I might even share spells with you."

" 'Commendable'," Hax replied, her voice dripping with irony. "I wonder, how many such friends do you have?"

The caster glanced upwards, humming lightly to himself as if engaged in complex calculations. "One, now." He grinned happily at her.

His manner was so outrageous that Hax forgot her anger and laughed. "Very well," she replied. "Burning the world can wait. For now, I'll settle for you taking this arrow out of my leg."

Qaramyn nodded. "I will, once our good sergeant digs Gwen out of whatever hole she's hiding in to avoid having to face you. I don't want to start yanking until I know whether I'm going to do more damage taking the thing out than she did putting it in."

" 'Sergeant'?" Hax asked, cocking an eyebrow. They didn't look like soldiers.

"A poor choice of words," the wizard shrugged. "Ductor, perhaps. Leader and guide. We're a patrol of the Æryngard. The 'Watch', as the locals call it. It's the Duke's constabulary. Breygon is our chief, for the nonce."

"You don't strike me as someone much interested in taking orders," she observed.

Qaramyn shrugged. "I needed to get out of the scriptorum for a while. The Watch provided an opportunity and a salary. As for Breygon..." He glanced over at the bowman, who was standing next to the wagon, in conference with the club-wielder, and a wiry-looking man she hadn't noticed before.

"What about him?" she asked, finding her gaze drawn to the man.

"He's a sensible enough fellow," the wizard shrugged. "But a lodestone for trouble. I thought that life might be more interesting in his company than at school. Tonight's events validated that hypothesis, I'm sad to say."

Hax nodded. Restlessness was a sensation that she understood. She tried to focus her attention away from the pain. "This Gwen," she mused, staring into the flickering firelight. "The one who shot me. She's Halpinya, yes?"

"Yes," the caster answered absently. "And a gentle soul, too, so she's probably overcome with remorse at having nicked you." He was probing around the arrow shaft with his fingers. "I'm going to have to cut your breeks."

Hax shrugged. "Go ahead. My wardrobe hasn't fared at all well these past few days. Another tear won't matter."

Qaramyn produced a short, bone-handled knife. Working swiftly, he cut a long slit in her trouser-leg above and below the embedded arrow. "How did you know?" he asked.

"What? That she's a Halfling?" Hax asked.

Qaramyn nodded.

"Apart from her size?" Hax shrugged. "Short arrow."

"Could've been a gnome," the caster countered, eyeing her with evident interest. "What made you guess 'Halfling'?"

Hax thought about that for a moment. "The fletchings, I suppose," she replied. "Too colourful. Gnomes are more...er, practical, I guess."

Qaramyn nodded. "Never thought of that." Opening one of the small glass phials, he sprinkled a dark red powder around the arrow wound. Hax felt a brief, intense burning sensation, followed by a delicious numbness.

"Meliusculus est?" the caster asked.

"Ingens," she replied, her voice filled with relief. She glanced at the phial. "What was that?"

Qaramyn pursed his lips, glancing at her ears before answering. "Best I not say, lady. No disrespect, of course, but your folk are known for harbouring some rather...ahh...illiberal attitudes, towards certain of the alchemical arts."

Hax frowned. "I'm not a child. We invented herbalism, you know," she said, somewhat stiffly.

"This isn't a herb," he replied drily, tucking the phial away in his scrip.

"What?" A note of alarm crept into her voice. "What did you put on me?" she demanded.

The caster made a placatory gesture. "Relax, lady," he said soothingly. "It's entirely natural. And it helped with the pain, didn't it?" he added, smiling darkly.

"I suppose," she admitted. Although, she reflected, there were a great many 'natural' things that she would not have wanted rubbed into an open wound.

"Good." He sat next to her. "You'll appreciate it all the more when I make with the brandy."

"You're not going to cauterize it?" she asked, surprised.

Qaramyn's eyebrows went up. "Are you that fond of pain?" he asked.

"Not especially, no," she replied. "But that's the standard treatment for an arrow wound when there're no healers about." She bent her knee slightly, wincing at the expectation of agony, and relaxed again when none came.

"Not where I come from," he snorted. "Better a good wash, inside and out, first with boiled water, and then with brandy. Then we'll bind it up in boiled rags soaked in more brandy." He nodded at her shoulder. "Once the rest are done piling corpses, I'm going to fix you right up. Alric, too; he took a nasty swipe back there." He snorted again, half to himself. "Howall's going to put up a fight when I try to pry his cache of rot-gut away," he mused, tugging absently at his pointed chin. "Maybe I'll have Joraz do it. He has quick hands.

"In the meantime," he continued blithely, "let's try to keep your mind off of your miseries." Reaching into his pack, he extracted a heavy, leather-bound book, rune-covered, and embossed with dragon rising in flames. "We can talk about spells while we wait for Gwen to turn up."

She recognized the sigils of Miros instantly. "You're a wizard," she said with a sigh.

"Qaramyn Lux, at your service," the caster replied, bowing from the waist. His gangly stature made it an almost comical gesture. "A recent graduate of the Gandrskole in Æryn." He shrugged self-deprecatingly. "It's not the College of Stars, of course, but..."

He trailed off, seeing the guarded look on her face. "Yes?" he asked, eyebrows raised inquisitively.

"I'm not. A mage of the book, I mean. A wizard," Hax replied. She watched him carefully to gauge his reaction. Not all Zarans had rejected the teachings of the Hand...

Qaramyn's eyes widened. "Ah! Well!" He seemed to be trying to cover his surprise, and to decide what to say next. "Hmm. Not an Ekhani warcaster, obviously. That would make you an inborn caster, yes? A sorceress?"

She said nothing. There was a long pause while they stared at each other. Finally, Hax broke the silence. "You don't often find yourself at a loss for words, do you?"

That provoked a self-deprecating laugh. "Well struck," Qaramyn replied, chuckling. "No, I do not. But in all seriousness, lady," he continued, lowering his voice, "you might be wise to pretend to be one of my kind. A studied mage. Those who draw their power from within rather than without may be well-regarded in your Homelands..."

"You might be surprised," Hax muttered darkly.

"...but among the common people, here and elsewhere, they are looked upon with suspicion. Even fear." He paused for a moment, then added, "The prejudices of the White Hand have not lost all of their former appeal, especially among the lower orders. And we are not all that far from Mirabilis."

"How well I know it," she murmured. Nodding her thanks for his advice, she said, "I intend to keep my powers a secret, insofar as is possible." Glancing down at her garb, she added ruefully, "And besides, I'll be more likely to pass as an out-of-work mercenary than an itinerant wizard."

"You know best, of course," Qaramyn agreed. "Still, you must forgive my disappointment."

"Disappointment? At what?" Hax asked, confused.

"At my luck," he replied with a roguish grin. "I finally meet an elf of the Third House, and she turns out to be the only one in all Erutrei who hasn't been to the College." He clasped his hands around his knees. "What shall we talk about, then?"

Hax frowned; the man had poked a particularly sore spot in her psyche. All the same, she found that she had a hard time taking his insults seriously. His manner was simply too self-deprecatingly jocular. "I'd like to talk about that powder you put on my leg," she said, trying for sternness, but failing by a wide margin.

"Excellent," Qaramyn replied, smiling broadly. His teeth, she noticed, were neither terribly white nor terribly even. "I'd be delighted. And after that, perhaps we can discuss what a daughter of the Duodeci –" he nodded at her sword, lying cold and blood-soaked in the grass "– is doing butchering ghouls in the forests of northern Zare."

There was an awkward silence. After a few moments, Hax shifted her seat uncomfortably. "I'm not sure I like you very much, Qaramyn Lux," she said again.

The wizard nodded sagely. "Well, you're in the right troupe, then."

♦

Hax found the rest of the group somewhat less complicated. Qaramyn handled the introductions, interspersing his intelligent but clumsy attempts at leech-craft with a running flow of wry, sarcastic commentary. His propensity for unwonted eloquence, she quickly decided, was one of his least endearing traits.

The club-wielding warrior – a shy, taciturn fellow about the same height as Qaramyn, although considerably heavier – was called 'Alric'. He had three long, jagged, partially-healed scars running down one cheek, one barely missing his left eye. "Alric Wolvesbane," Qaramyn chuckled, gently teasing the arrowhead out of her leg while she gritted her teeth and hissed at the pain that penetrated the numbing powder he had applied. "A recent appellation."

"'Wolvesfeast', to my friends," the warrior said weakly.

Happily, the arrow had not been barbed, and it had only been the work of a moment to worry the point free from Hax's thighbone. Qaramyn inspected the bent tip of the arrowhead, then turned and handed it to its owner, saying "Ruined, I'm afraid."

The diminutive archer – the aforementioned Gwen – was introduced to Hax as 'Gwendolyne of Æryn.' This worthy was, as Hax had guessed, one of the Halpinya, about as tall standing as the elf-girl was while seated on the ground. Gwen was somewhat more slender than the norm for her race, and rather younger than Hax would've expected (few Halflings, she knew, left home before reaching their majority). The woman – girl, she amended mentally – might have been pretty, had her eyes not been reddened by weeping, and her rosebud lips drawn down in a moue of anguished remorse.

Taking the arrow from her comrade in trembling hands, she exclaimed, "I'm so, so, sorry!" for what must have been the eighth time.

Hax waved her apologies away. "I've had worse," she said stoically, "and recently, too. I'm just grateful you aimed low."

Gwen grimaced, and tears filled her eyes again. Evidently the image of her striking the elf in a more vulnerable spot was too much to bear. "Oh," she moaned, "I'm so, SO –"

"Enough," Breygon murmured. "She knows. It was battle. Accidents happen." He squatted easily on his haunches beside the wretched Halfling.

"You're in my light," Qaramyn snapped waspishly. "We don't all have your eyes."

That caused Hax to glance back up at the hooded bowman. "Eyes?" she asked sharply.

The fellow sighed. Reaching up, he swept his hood back, revealing a guarded visage, a heavy shock of black hair...and pointed ears. "Breygon Sylvanus," he said with a nod, "of Æryn. And Elvehelm, obviously. On my mother's side." His rough voice dripped with a complex admixture of bitterness and self-contempt.

Hax was too surprised to notice. Upon hearing the low tone of his voice and the manner in which he had mangled the elven tongue, she had assumed him to be human, albeit an unusually short one. Searching his features, she noted the peculiar amalgam of physical traits that marked the half-breeds: high cheekbones in an otherwise broad face; violet orbs in round eye-sockets; eyebrows that sloped upwards, but that were dark and thick; ears which, while pointed, were neither as pronounced nor as graceful as her own; and a form that was at once lithe, compact, and far more muscular than any true elf might have boasted.

Then she kicked herself mentally. Breygon! What human mother would give her child such a name?

When her eyes focussed again, he was grinning sardonically at her. "And you are?" he prompted gently.

She was forgetting her manners. "A...Orkarel Hax," she said after a brief stumble. "Of Sinucernus. On the south coast," she added, entirely unnecessarily.

"An unusual name," the wizard murmured, plying his lavage bulb and boiled linens, "for an unusually well-armed herring fisherman."

Hax glared at the wizard coldly, but he did not look up from his work.

"Welcome to Zare, Orkarel Hax," Breygon replied, ignoring his comrade. "Whither bound?"

"I was heading north," she replied. "I...excuse me," she continued, changing the topic suddenly. "Where in Elvehelm?"

"Eh?"

"Your mother," Hax replied, eyeing Breygon closely. He looked oddly familiar. It could not have been him personally; Hax had never before met one of the verruca...One of the half-breeds, she corrected mentally, taking care to avoid the vulgar epithet.

The bowman shrugged. "I've no idea," he replied evenly. "She left the Homelands decades before I was born, and never returned thereafter. For reasons which, I presume, are obvious to you," he added neutrally.

While she bristled at his insinuations, Hax could not take umbrage at them. The half-elf's sort were – had always been – unwelcome in the Homelands. Half-breeds were only barely tolerated in the outlying realms, like her father's duchy of Eldisle; had this archer dared to present himself at the gates of the Palace at Starmeadow, he would have been turned away. And there was a better-than-even chance that his life would have been forfeit.

"I understand," Hax said, as evenly as she could manage. She sensed that words of explanation would be rebuffed, and decided not to offer any. Instead, clearing her throat, she continued, "To answer your question, I am northward bound. For Ellohyin, at present, and points beyond, if time and the weather permit."

The archer regarded her evenly for a moment, then nodded slowly. "We are only going as far as Bornhavn. You are welcome to join us. You can take ship there for Ellohyin, or if you prefer, buy a new horse."

"Wait for Ellohyin," Qaramyn advised, interrupting. "Bornhavn's little more than a hamlet. You'll have better luck with horseflesh in a bigger city." He looked her up and down. "You should be able to obtain warmer clothing there as well." He nodded towards her light jerkin and leggings. "The habiliments of your homelands are ill-suited to winter in the mountains."

"I'm hoping not to winter here," she replied, wondering how he had divined her intentions.

"Whatever you say." With a sharp tug, he tightened the knot of the cloth strips he had secured about her thigh; Hax grunted at the sudden stab of pain. "Try putting some weight on that."

Breygon extended a hand. Hax hesitated only a moment, then took it, and pulled herself to her feet. As his physique suggested, the half-elf was surprisingly strong. The instant she was upright, she released her grip and stepped away from him.

The half-elf's only response was a thin smile, as if he had anticipated her reaction. To cover her momentary consternation, she bent to check the wizard's doctoring.

Qaramyn's dressing seemed secure enough. Hax gingerly lowered her weight onto her injured leg, and found that the pain was minimal. "Nicely done," she murmured to the wizard, who nodded and began repacking his collection of rags and whatnot.

"We're not finished yet," he warned, jerking a thumb at a flagon of thrice-distilled wine that Alric had managed to wrestle away from one of their travelling companions.

Hax nodded. She glanced briefly around, catching Gwen with her eye.

"Y-yes?" the nervous Halfling asked, looking uncomfortable.

The Elf-girl fumbled in one of the pockets of her vest, produced a silver shilling, and flicked it wordlessly towards the tiny archer, who caught it reflexively.

"What's that for?" Gwen asked, puzzled.

"Custom," Hax said without a hint of irony. "Where I come from, it's bad luck not to pay for a weapon."

Gwen's face crumpled into tears again. "Oh," she wailed, "I'm so, so sorry..."

Breygon, his face stony, put a comforting arm around the diminutive woman's shoulders. He was staring at Hax with distinct disapproval.

Qaramyn, however, was braying with laughter. "I like this one!" he chortled nastily. "Can we keep her?"

The remainder of the night passed swiftly. Breygon – who, it transpired, was an experienced woodsman, having spent part of his youth squiring the wealthier members of Æryn's upper crust around the forests and preserves of the duchy – kept watch, while the rest of the troupe passed around the last remaining flask of brandy before nodding off. Pillar Howell, a ship's pilot whom the group was escorting to Bornhavn, was apparently the bottle's owner, and he grumbled bitterly at each swig, until a baleful look from Alric – accentuated by his fang-scarred cheeks – shut him up.

Hax declined when the flagon came her way; the bandages on her neck and shoulders, which Qaramyn had laboriously replaced, were soaked with the potent stuff, and she was already lightheaded from the fumes.

She was also, perhaps understandably, still terrified of what she had done the last time she had been deep in her cups. Wrapped in borrowed blankets, she slept fitfully, waking with a start to unfamiliar noises half a dozen times, and each time dropping off again when she recalled that she was in unfamiliar lands, and surrounded by unfamiliar persons.

At home, the restless sea had always helped her to sleep. She was grateful for the thundering whisper-song of the great river that lay to the east, just within bowshot. She was still pondering sleepily the miseries of farming the difficult, stony land, when exhaustion overtook her at last, and she fell asleep.

♦

Ally's first day under Sylloallen's tutelage was a study in misery. She had run, stumbling and tripping in her gown and slippers, out of the barbican and across the drawbridge, shouting for the warrior to wait. An incredulous crowd of commoners, lining up to enter the palace for some purpose or other (a wedding, she thought irrelevantly, judging by the state and style of their clothing), swiftly made way for her as she jogged awkwardly past. She tried to find a comfortable way to carry Sylloallen's immense blade, but was unable to do so. So she simply cradled it in her arms.

Sylloallen was waiting for her on the opposite side of the great square that fronted the palace. He nodded slightly when he saw her, as if confirming an earlier estimate. Without speaking, he turned and continued running easily down the high street towards the harbour.

Ally followed. In moments, her breath was coming in gasps, and her feet had begun to ache abominably. The shoes, she thought. She halted for a moment, kicking them off. She briefly considered picking them up and carrying them, but she already had more than she could manage in the sword, and she sensed that her new mentor was probably not going to offer to carry the costly but impractical things for her. Shrugging, she toed them into the gutter, and continued running in her stocking feet.

A few moments later, the thin stockings had worn through, and she was running barefoot.

The high street stretched more than a mile from the palace gates to the harbour. It was downhill all the way, past shops, inns, eateries, taverns, and every manner of hearth and home. By the time they reached the docks, her arms were aching with the effort of carrying the sword, her feet were throbbing from pounding on the cobblestones, her hips and ribs were chafed by the fashionably snug bodice and stays of her gown, and she was panting like a blown horse.

She saw her new teacher turn and regard her carefully, and prayed that Sylloallen would slow and allow her to catch her breath. She nearly wept when he turned to the right and continued without pause, running easily along the long line of docks.

After the docks came the waterfront warehouses, and then a long, unbroken row of fishermen's huts...and finally the Silverstrand. This was a narrow beach a mile or so long, broken only by a wide river, the Sallekyn – a broad, slow flood that wound lazily through the plains far to the north before emptying into warmer seas here in the south. Beyond the river lay the Dræywood, a royal preserve. Ally knew the route well, having ridden it many times. It had never seemed so long.

As she passed the huts, her pace began to slow; she was developing a painful stitch in her side, and was panting harshly in an attempt to relieve it.

Sylloallen had made a good estimate of her stamina, and had evidently been keeping an eye on her over his shoulder. Seeing her stumble, he slowed his pace. At the edge of the beach, he stopped and waited for her to catch him up.

A minute later, she did, stumbling to a halt next to him. She thought briefly about collapsing to the sand, but her pride refused to let her do so. After she caught her breath, she asked, "Can we...walk back...to the...palace?" Even the effort of speaking made her start coughing.

" 'Back'?" Sylloallen asked, smiling. "There's no going back, child. There is only forward."

"I can't...run any...anymore," she gasped. Exhaustion brought tears to her eyes.

The older elf looked her over carefully. "Yes, you can," he replied after a moment. "And you will. But for now," he said, "We'll walk." He set off along the beach. Over his shoulder, he added, "I see you lost the shoes. That's good. You'll run better without them."

A moment later, Ally hefted the sword, and followed.

Her respite was brief; Sylloallen allowed her only a few minutes of a brisk, marching stride before breaking into a run again. Ally aped him. She quickly discovered that running barefoot on dry sand was a nightmare.

Glancing at her tutor, she saw that he was running close to the breaking surf, where the beach was soaked regularly by the waves. She tried this herself, and was gratified to discover that her narrow feet did not sink as far, and that the wet sand offered her surer footing.

An endless time later, they reached the bank of the Sallekyn. Ally was spent; she fell to her knees in the soft, loamy sand that formed a broad point where river met sea. The grains between her fingers were coarse and cold. Her breath rasped in and out of her throat, and her hair, having come completely undone in the course of her struggles, hung down around her face and shoulders in tattered streamers. She'd lost her combs and pins somewhere along the route.

Sylloallen gave her a full five minutes, watching dispassionately as her breathing came slowly under control. "You've never run before, have you?" he asked quietly.

She shook her head, unable to speak.

He smiled – not with sympathy, she thought, but at least with understanding. "It will come to you, in time," he said. Nodding at the river, he asked, "Can you swim, at least?"

Still staring at the sand, Ally nodded weakly.

"Good," he replied. "Let's go."

She looked up, mute protest in her eyes.

"Problem?"

"I can't...swim in this," she panted, indicating her dress.

"No, probably not," he agreed. "I couldn't, either."

She smiled slightly at the image his statement evoke. Her smile vanished at his next words.

"What are you going to do about it?" He asked expressionlessly. "When you figure it out, I'll see you on the other side." Turning, he stepped into the river, forging ahead until the water was at his waist, before calling back, "Watch the current mid-stream; if you're not careful, it'll take you out to sea."

Before her eyes, he ducked under the swirling water, reappeared, and struck out for the opposite shore.

Ally stared after him, appalled. She was so tired.

She glanced over her shoulder, up the gentle slope of the city, past the hundreds of red- and yellow-tiled roofs, to where the palace stood at the crest of the low hill. What would her father's face look like, if she were to appear before him, clothed in failure once again? He won't chastise me, she thought. He won't say anything.

That would be the worst response of all, she sighed.

She glanced around to ensure that she was not being watched, then began undoing the innumerable buttons at her bodice.

Moments later, she stood at the river's edge, shivering in her shift, clutching Sylloallen's monstrous sword to her breast. She'd removed the laces from her corset, discarding it on top of her gown, and tying them to the weapon as a makeshift baldric. This she slung over one shoulder. The thin cords cut uncomfortably into her neck, but she couldn't think of any way to pad them.

Ally tried the water with a toe, relaxing slightly as she did so. The water was as warm as she remembered it. Gazing across the broad river, she gritted her teeth, then waded into the flood.

Fortunately, Sylloallen had waited near the mid-point of the watercourse, treading water easily despite his mail and riding boots. When Ally's tired muscles cramped and her head went under, he dove down and yanked her back to the surface, supporting her while she sputtered and coughed.

When she had recovered her breath, he shoved her gently in the direction of the opposite bank, and she struck out for it, gamely but slowly.

The heavy sword felt like an anchor around her neck. Sylloallen had to intervene twice more before her feet finally touched bottom again.

The far bank of the river was unlike that on the city side. Instead of sand, it consisted of a long reach of bottom mud, silt washed down from the fields above the city. The tide was out, exposing a long, low, stretch of black, clinging mire. They struggled through a hundred of paces of this until they reached the low brush at the river's edge, emerging from the sludge wearing a thick coat of filth, like a pair of half-drowned sewer rats.

Even Sylloallen was beginning to look tired at this point; Ally simply collapsed onto the forest floor, breathing shallowly. The warrior sat next to her, watching her closely for signs of distress.

Moments later, he gave her shoulder a rough shake. Ally started awake, moaning. "Light's eastering," Sylloallen said, climbing to his feet. "Let's go."

"Go?" she groaned. Her breath was still coming in gasps. "Go where?"

"Into the forest."

She blinked. "It's going to be dark soon."

"Yes. We'll need to find shelter."

Ally's eyes watered; she was so exhausted that she hardly had the strength to weep. "There's shelter...back at the palace," she panted.

"So there is," he agreed, twisting his head from side to side and easing his shoulders, as if limbering up for more exercise. "Do you want to go back?"

Ally turned and looked at the river, fast and grey, now, in the dimming light. It looked like it was a league across. "I can't go back," she whispered.

Sylloallen nodded. "Do you want to stay here?"

"No," she shivered.

"Well, that only leaves forward," he said calmly. "Up you get."

Forward, Ally thought weakly. Very well. Forward it is.

She loosed her makeshift sling and used the sword as a crutch to push herself to her feet. Her legs were quivering with the strain of simply standing, but she managed to stay erect.

Sylloallen regarded her closely for a moment, then nodded. "Good. Follow me." He turned and set off into the forest at a swift walk.

Her head spinning with exhaustion, Ally followed.

♦

Recollections of her years under Sylloallen's tutelage flitted through her mind with the fuzzy-edged recall common to dreams. She awoke to a burning flare of pain in her neck and thigh, and stiff cramps in her back and legs that made her think the first night she had spent with her mentor in the Dræywood. The recollections stung a little; she still missed the serious, pleasant warrior. Especially at night.

The hard-packed soil alongside the Nordvej made for a poor mattress. Opening her eyes, she lay still for a moment, carrying out a mental inventory of her condition. Apart from the sudden spike of pain and some lingering cramps, her wounded leg ached only a little. Her shoulder, though, where the flesh had been gnawed and clawed to the bone, stung abominably.

She smelled wood smoke. She sat up and saw that the half-elven woodsman, Breygon, was squatting on his haunches near the fire, which he had built up with a new infusion of fallen branches and bits of broken fence rail. His face was grey with fatigue. She watched him stretch his neck and shoulders, working out a night's worth of kinks, then run his fingers through his hair in a futile attempt to shake out the knots and tangles.

Sylloallen had always told her, "We see more clearly in a single glance than in an hour's long study." She regarded the half-elf's profile in the firelight, adding up what she knew about him. She already knew, for example, that he was a skilled archer, at least as skilled as she. The arrow that had transfixed her enemy's skull the night before was proof enough of that; had it been off by only a finger's breadth, it would have gone through her own head. Either the fellow was indifferent to friendly casualties, or his confidence stemmed from genuine ability. She thought it was probably the latter.

He would be a dangerous swordsman too, she thought critically, eyeing his shoulders and forearms; stronger than a pure-blood, but just as quick. Maybe even quicker. The sword and dagger at his belt looked as though they had seen heavy use. She tried to estimate his age, and gave up after only a moment; having never encountered a half-breed, she had no standard of comparison. Breygon looked no older than Qaramyn, nor more weather-beaten than Alric; but his elf blood meant that he was almost certainly had several decades on either of them. For all she knew, he could be older than both of them put together. She just couldn't tell.

Hax wondered if there was a diplomatic way to ask him his age. She couldn't think of one. So much for the value of the single glance, she thought wryly.

She tossed her blanket off, yawning loudly to alert him to her presence.

The archer looked up, caught her eye, and nodded. "Salvete, era," he said quietly.

"Salve, ductor," she replied, returning his nod. "Sopima otiosus?"

"Immo," he said shortly. "I'm sorry, do you mind if we speak the common tongue?"

"Not at all," she replied in the same language. His reticence piqued her curiosity, but it would have been rude to press the point. "Did you sleep at all?" she asked instead.

"I'll sleep when I'm dead," he answered. Then he grinned tiredly. "I'm sorry. That's one of Ben's sayings." In response to her questioning glance, he added, "The fellow who recruited us."

"Where is he?"

Breygon shrugged. "Off on another task. Babysitting a pair of teamsters and an ale-soaked sailor must have been beneath his dignity."

He seemed moody, even gloomy. Hax decided to try a different tack. "You've some skill with a bow," she said tentatively.

"As do you," he replied. "You had a good teacher, yes?"

She nodded. "The best. A luxmyrmidon of the Protector. One of my father's retainers. An old friend of the family." She found herself drifting in the melancholia of recollection, and squashed the blossoming sentiment brutally.

"Do you pray to him?" Breygon asked, still staring at the fire.

Hax blinked. Then she realized that he was talking about Larranel Sylvanus, the forest god, rather than her former mentor. "The Protector, you mean?" she asked.

He nodded.

"From time to time," she said with an indifferent shrug. "And to Hara. And Miros." She paused for a moment, wondering how far she should go in explaining this last, odd devotion. "Although probably not as often as I should. Do you not also do so?"

"I do," he replied distantly, "although I've yet to receive a reply."

"The Powers speak to us in their own good time," she said, somewhat more primly than she had intended.

"And that is how I speak to them," he muttered, half to himself.

The silence between them lengthened. Looking around, Hax noticed a growing light in the west – the merest hint of rose against the star-flecked ebon velvet of night. "Dawn's coming," she remarked absently.

"It always does."

Despite the serenity that always accompanied waking, Hax was growing exasperated. "You're not very fond of conversation, are you?" she asked, more waspishly than she had intended.

The briefest flicker of embarrassment flashed across the half-elf's face. "I've spent a lot of time alone," he replied obliquely.

"The woodsman's curse," she said. It was half a question.

"The woodsman's blessing," he corrected. Still sitting easily on his haunches, Breygon gestured at the surrounding countryside. "The rocks, the rivers, the trees...they are good companions. They keep their counsel. They make no demands. They give without asking recompense – food, shelter, warmth, even guidance, if you know how to read the great book of the world. And they offer the most welcome gift of all: silence." He poked the fire again with his stick. "If you let the silence enter you, if you cease prattling and let the emptiness fill you, then their words can be heard. And in their words are all the ancient tales of Anuru."

Breygon glanced idly up at Hax, and the intensity of his gaze caused her heart to thud ominously in her breast. "Be patient, lady. Heed the whispers of the woodlands," he said quietly. "When you learn to listen with your heart as well as your ears, then you will need no other companion."

Hax regarded the ranger with kind of startled wonder, as though she had come upon a gemstone sparkling in a castle midden. He caught her eye, then turned back to the fire, snorting his disgust at his own volubility, and poking angrily at the embers.

"You remind me of someone," she said softly.

"Do I?"

"Yes." She paused, then continued. "I'd not thought to receive a lecture on love of the lustrum from a...from one of your...your background," she finished lamely.

Breygon stiffened, and Hax realized instantly that she had made a dreadful mistake.

"Semiferus," he said bitterly.

"I did not say that," she protested.

"You didn't have to." He stood and tossed aside the charred stick with which he had been stirring the fire. "Your pardon, domina." He bowed, a sardonic, self-mocking grin twisting the corners of his mouth into a rictus. "I must be about my duties."

As he stomped away, Hax cursed herself under her breath.

"He can be a little sensitive about his parentage," a high voice said quietly.

Hax pivoted and saw Qaramyn lying nearby, tucked beneath a half-dozen homespun blankets. His eyes glinted redly in the firelight. "You were listening," she said unnecessarily.

"I'm always listening," he replied with a wide, ironic smile.

She nodded. "What is your counsel, then?"

"Concerning our dear leader?" Hax nodded. "That depends."

"On what?"

"On your intentions."

She cocked an eyebrow. "My 'intentions'?"

"Why do you want to know?" he asked patiently.

Hax thought about that. "He's quick to take offence from his mother's kind," she said carefully. "But I would like to learn more about his background, without giving offence in the process."

"His father was a human; his mother, an exile from your homeland. Is that not enough?" the wizard asked. "More, he won't willingly tell you."

Hax gave a half-hearted nod. "I'd still like to learn more about his mother. Especially whether she was one of the Duodeci."

"Why?"

The Elf-girl had no answer to that. Finally, she said, "Because he is one of us."

"No," the wizard corrected her firmly, "he isn't."

Hax raised her eyebrows. "That's for the Elves to decide, is it not?"

"It is," the wizard answered, sitting up and fixing her with his gaze. "And the Elves have decided." Tossing his blankets aside, he sat facing her, punctuating his remarks with stabs of his ink-stained fingers. "They decided when they shunned his mother, and she went into exile; and when she could not return to her homelands when, years later, she bore a half-blood child.

"They decided when they began treating his ilk like outlanders, like Elves who had been polluted, instead of fellow Children of Bræa who had been exalted. And," he hissed, "they decided during Xiardath's day, when they put the first half-breed's head atop the Palace gates at Astrapratum."

"Xiardath's been dead for eons," Hax muttered. "And as for the other...that edict hasn't been enforced in years," she muttered, unable to meet his gaze.

"Thirty-one years, to be exact. Not in my lifetime, true," the wizard agreed harshly. "But well within yours. An eye-blink in the lives of your folk." He nodded at the forest-edge where Breygon had disappeared into the wood line. "And of his."

"It wouldn't happen today!" she protested. The ground was hard, the blanket confining; she threw it aside and stood, ignoring the sharp twinge from her leg. "It could not!"

"Maybe not in Eldisle," the wizard replied, watching her closely.

"Never in Eldisle!" she replied hotly. "My father would never countenance...he would..." her voice trailed off. She stared at him, frowning suddenly.

"What would your father never countenance?" the wizard smiled.

Hax sighed. "Damn you," she whispered. "How did you know?"

He shrugged. "Your accent," he replied, lowering his voice to match hers. "Your blade, or the hilt at least. And your surname."

" 'Hax' gave me away, did it?" she whispered, shaking her head in wonder.

Qaramyn rolled his eyes. "Kaltas Aiyellohax is well-known, lady, not only in the homelands, but throughout the wider world as well. I won't presume to tell you your business, but I would suggest that if you intend to continue travelling incognito, you ought to choose a nomen virago that does not bring his Grace the Duke of Eldisle immediately to mind."

She rubbed her face with one hand, sighing. "I didn't think of that," she admitted.

"There is only one family in all of Elvehelm that bears your name," he replied softly, shrugging. "The ranks of Duodeci are small, and the noble Houses too well known. All of them. Even outside the elf-realm, it's going to be almost impossible for you to hide.

"I'd conceal that sword, too," he added, nodding at the blade that lay next to her bedroll. "Or at least, find something to cover the escutcheon. To those who know anything about heraldic devices, you might as well be wearing your father's livery."

"I'll do that," she replied, fatigue creeping into her words. She sat unmoving on her blankets, feeling like an imbecile. "You're very perceptive, Qaramyn Lux. For a guardsman."

The wizard gave her a long, measuring glance. "You've been honest with me, even if I had to trick the truth out of you. I owe you the same courtesy, I suppose."

"You're more than mere guardsmen," Hax guessed.

"We're more than mere guardsmen," the wizard grinned, nodding.

"What, then?"

"Fraterni Draconi," Qaramyn said. "If you'll pardon the mispronunciation."

Hax started. Surely, she thought, stunned, he could not mean...

The wizard's eyes widened at her obvious turmoil. "Is there something amiss, lady?"

"I...no, not really," Hax stammered. "It's just...It's an unusual term."

"You are not familiar with it?"

She shook her head. "Not...not in the way you mean it. Obviously."

Qaramyn raised an eyebrow, as if he was considering asking her what else he might have meant. Instead, he said, "We are members of an order, spread throughout the Kindred races, dedicated to battling evil." He grinned again. "Put as baldly as that, it sounds a bit ridiculous, doesn't it? Children, playing at knights-errant."

"Not at all," she replied solemnly. "If that is your quest, then I wish there were more of you. But why 'draconi', may I ask?"

"Because we work for dragons," the wizard replied, winking at her.

Hax laughed out loud. "You work for..." Her eyes widened. "You're serious, aren't you?"

Qaramyn nodded. "Deadly serious. A dragon recruited us only a few months ago. An argent dragon, in fact. In human form."

" 'An argent dragon'," Hax repeated, sounding incredulous. Her lip twitched. "If he was in human form, how do you know he was a dragon? And what was his name?"

"Her name," the wizard replied, sounding slightly nettled by her doubt. "It was a female. I'm afraid her identity was a confidence, though.

"As for the rest, I'll assume you're being facetious. It's impossible to stand in the presence of one of the great wyrms and not know it.

"When they walk in mortal guise," he added pensively, his gaze growing distant, "they are more than us. The heart senses it, if the eyes do not. Even if it is a young one, such as our contact was. Is."

"I see." Hax remained doubtful, but decided that it was unwise to press the point. Regardless of whether he was mad or telling the whole truth, there was nothing to be gained by antagonizing the fellow. "Any more advice?" she asked.

"About dragons?" Qaramyn snorted. "Or concealing your identity? Or perhaps about unscrewing our inscrutable sergeant?"

"How about where I should go next," she said. She had heard enough dragon nonsense, and was tired of hearing about the mercurial half-elf. For the time being, at least.

The wizard paused for a moment, reflecting. "On that point," he said at last, "I'd suggest you get out of Zare. This kingdom trades heavily with your Homeland. Too many know your language, and to know your language is to know your father's name."

Hax nodded. "I had had the same thought. What's the fastest way out?" Maybe, she reflected gloomily, I should have stayed aboard ship.

"North," he replied at once. "You'll avoid the coastal cities, where most of your compatriots tend to gather. If you're running – and I assume you are –" he glanced at her for corroboration, but she remained expressionless, saying nothing.

He shrugged. "Head north, beyond Ellohyin, to Bitterberg and the Whitestone Pass. You've got a month or so to get over it before the first snow flies.

"In Dunholm, you can head east to the sea, and thence to Oststrand, or the eastern isles, or even Jarla." He paused, then added, smirking, "That is, if you've a hankering for honey wine, smoked fish, fornication and recreational murder. Otherwise, I'd suggest you turn west at the Greatwater, and make for the Deeprealm."

"The dwarves?" she replied, shocked. "Are you serious?"

"Entirely," the wizard answered soberly. "The northmen might respect you and leave you alone after you'd incinerated a few would-be suitors. But the folk of the Deeprealm will treat you well. And..." he paused, looking troubled.

"And what?"

"Well," he continued hesitantly, "if you think someone might be hunting you, you'll be safer by far in their caverns than anywhere else in Anuru. It's said that the Deeprealm is warded so that none can leap the flux, either into or out of it."

Hax snorted derisively. "That's a myth."

"Is it?" Qaramyn shrugged. "I wouldn't know. I've never tried." With a crooked grin, he added, "I wouldn't underestimate the dwarven wizards. They're few and far between, but they've had a long time to arrange things to their liking. I wouldn't want to end up lodged in a mountainside if the myths were right and I was wrong."

"That's a good point," Hax agreed, shivering slightly. She had no love of small spaces, and the thought of being entombed in solid rock made her courage evaporate, and turned her bowels to water.

"So," she said after a long moment. "The dwarves, you think?"

"If you don't tell me your decision," Qaramyn replied, looking thoughtful, "then I can't betray you if I am put to the question. But if it were I," he continued, "then that is where I would go. The inevitable pain notwithstanding."

"Pain?" Hax asked sharply. "What pain?"

Qaramyn brushed the top of his tousled hair with one long-fingered hand and grinned. "Tall wizards," he replied ruefully, "and low tunnels. An unpleasant combination."

♦

After breaking fast, the group packed their gear and resumed their voyage. The meal itself was simple, but a welcome change from the salt meat and hard biscuit that she had been struggling with since leaving Vejborg. It also gave Hax the opportunity to meet the remainder of Breygon's turma. Pillar Howell, the pilot, favoured her with a wink and a leer when introduced; the two common soldiers, whose names she immediately forgot, simply bowed awkwardly, as though meeting royalty. Like as not they'd never seen one of the Third House before.

What a treat for them, she mused sourly.

The last member of the group was the oddly-dressed fellow that she had seen the previous evening. This worthy, although definitely human (and, with his dark hair and eyes, obviously of Zaran extraction) was only slightly taller than Breygon himself, and just as wiry. Hax's eye was caught by his peculiar garb – a loose tunic and pantaloons – and by the fact that he bore no weapons. Although she had not seen him fighting, he had clearly been engaged in the battle, as he bore a number of recent claw-marks. Qaramyn introduced him as "Joraz", without anything more in the way of explanation. Hax nodded, and received a nod in return, but no other greeting. While the man's demeanour seemed to discourage conversation, she found his placid serenity reassuring, and so was glad to discover that he would be accompanying her as a passenger in the wagon.

She, Joraz and Howell (who spent the day's travel tucked into one corner of the wagon, snoring loudly) proved to be the fortunate ones. Shortly after they rode out under a lowering, leaden sky, a light drizzle began falling. A stiff northeast wind turned this into an unpleasant, biting spray that sought out every nook and gap in the riders' cloaks. The two soldiers driving the wagon were hard-pressed to keep the horses' heads pointed into the blast, the senior of the two quickly shouting himself hoarse by cursing the recalcitrant beasts.

Hax stayed relatively dry. In order to protect its cargo – a variegated load of cloth-wrapped bales of arrows and crossbow bolts, and several hundred-weight of preserved meat and fish – the wagon was covered with an oil-cloth tarpaulin. Hax and Joraz gratefully took refuge under this, escaping the worst of the weather. This had its disadvantages too, of course; the jerking movement of the cart over the ruts of the road, in combination with the pervasive odour of oiled metal and smoked fish, quickly turned her stomach.

Her companion was no help; whenever she stole a glance at him, she saw that his demeanour was as calm as ever. If the jerking motion and the stench were affecting him, it didn't show.

At length, she found that she had to speak, if only to keep her mind off of her rebellious stomach. "You're part of the Watch as well," she said. It was more a statement than a question.

The man nodded, but said nothing else.

"And the Fraterni?" she asked.

He nodded again.

"What do you do?" she asked after a moment.

Joraz smiled. "Well, I cook," he replied thoughtfully.

Hax shook her head. "I meant 'do you fight'?"

"I fight," he confirmed. Indicating the scars festooning his right cheek and the backs of his fists, he added, "Not as well as I'd like, of course."

"But you're not armed," she protested.

"Not true," he disagreed, sounding amused. "I have a sling." He tapped a leather pouch that hung at his belt.

Understanding suddenly washed over her. "Animproeliator," she said suddenly.

"Ordo non percipius," he replied in the same language.

"Ah," she smiled. "So you speak elvii, too." He nodded. "It means 'warrior of the spirit'."

"That's what I thought," Joraz replied. He shrugged. "It's as good a term as any."

"Whom do you worship?" she asked.

"It's not that kind of 'spirit'," he said, shaking his head. "My brothers and I...my former brothers, I mean," he corrected, a distant look in his eyes, "we follow...followed...the teachings of our master, Tyrellus. We sought purification in combat, and peace through our never-ending quest for the strength and tranquillity that are given to those who find the Inner Eye."

Hax eyed the fellow cautiously. "I'm not familiar with your...er, order," she said, stumbling over her words. "There are weaponless warriors in my Homeland, but they all follow one of the Powers, or their Servants or Avatars. Feynillor, usually, or Istravenya. Sometimes Hara himself."

"I've heard of them," Joraz nodded. "Our way is similar, save that we seek the divine within us."

Hax was about to say something, then caught herself, coughing to mask her discomfiture.

Joraz smiled gently. "You don't approve," he said. It wasn't a question.

"It's not my place to approve or disapprove," she replied quickly. "I...I mean, we, my people...we believe that all have the right to choose their own path in life." The words came out adequately enough, but she did not meet his eyes.

The warrior chuckled. "Even heretics, like me?" he chided gently.

Hax nodded, smiling crookedly. "Even heretics," she agreed.

Joraz smiled back. He stretched until his joints cracked. "Sorry," he apologized. "It's not a comfortable method of travel. I'd almost rather be running."

"Not I," Hax murmured, flexing her wounded leg to relieve its stiffness.

Silence dropped over them for a time, punctuated only by the swaying of the cart and the rattle of the harness.

Finally, Hax's curiosity got the better of her. "So you believe in nothing?" she asked a little more abruptly than she had intended.

"Oh, no," the fellow replied. His serene smile belied any irritation at her insistent probing. "No, that's not so at all. The Powers are as real as this board I'm sitting on. I simply choose not to follow any of the many and varied paths they prescribe."

"Then what path do you follow?"

"My own," he replied easily. "The rules that my master set for us all, and those that I set for myself. Discipline and perseverance. Rectitude. Order, in all things." He smiled again. His easy manner was infectious, and Hax found herself smiling in turn. "Such laws as are necessary to secure the wellbeing of the helpless. And my own conscience," he added, almost as an afterthought. "Of course."

"Of course," she echoed, somewhat perplexed at this odd litany.

"And you?"

Hax was taken aback. "What about me?"

Joraz smiled. "How do you judge right conduct?"

She thought about that for a moment, sensing that he was asking a serious question rather than merely being flippant. He was probably never flippant. "I obey the injunctions of the Powers," she replied slowly. "Or, at least I try to."

He nodded. "And you've met them? These 'powers' whose injunctions you struggle to obey?"

"Of course not," she answered testily.

"Then how do you know you are on the right path?"

"We have priests, just as your folk do," she retorted. "They speak with the Powers, interpret their will, transmit their teachings to the rest of us. And," she continued, warming to her subject, "there are the old tales, the legends. The writings – the Tarinas Valtakirjas, the book that was brought to us by Kalmanwartan and the Argent Three, and ended the Eon of Darkness." Something hard was digging into her back, and she shifted to avoid it.

Joraz nodded. "I know of it," he replied soothingly. "I've even read parts of it. But you see my point, don't you?"

"I'm afraid I don't," Hax said, her voice brittle.

"You still follow rules," the warrior answered. "But they're rules devised by someone else, and passed to you by someone else. They can be changed by someone else." He spread his hands. "So long as you obey another's rules, you serve their goals, rather than your own." He chuckled softly. "In a way, seeing as how they brought you the great book, you serve the whims of dragons."

"That's nonsense," she snapped. A human, she thought angrily, purporting to teach an elf about freedom!

Is it? the Voice asked her suddenly. And given what you really are, how can you say that you also do not obey the 'whims of dragons'?

"It's not nonsense, it's life," he responded. "Which itself is nonsense incarnate. It's the defining question that all thinking beings must face: what drives your conduct? Is it necessity? Desire? Avarice? Hunger for power? Lust? A craving to do good or evil? Your own conscience? Or the conscience of another?"

Rainwater was pooling in a hanging section of the wagon's cover. He reached up and tapped the oilcloth. A rush of water cascaded over the side. "Are you guided by the voice of your own soul?" he continued, pointing at his own breast. "Or by something outside the walls of the self?" He waved at the wagon cover.

Still somewhat offended, Hax shut her mouth and considered the man's words. He has a point, she thought. How many times have I wondered what path to take? How often has the answer come from within – from the Voice – and how often has that answer conflicted with what others would have had me do?

Joraz was still watching her steadily. "It's a good question," she acknowledged grudgingly. "The answer is, 'I don't know'."

He nodded happily. "Very good. Understanding that we don't know what drives us is the beginning of the long, long path to wisdom."

She frowned, a little frustrated by his composure. "I want to find out."

Her sudden disgruntled vehemence made him chuckle. "That," he replied, "is the first step on the path."

His self-mocking laughter caused her ill-humour to evaporate, and Hax found herself smiling as well. They rode in companionable silence for a few minutes. The pattering of the rain on the canvas overhead was loud and soothing. Hax found that their conversation had taken her mind off her rebellious stomach.

After a while, as though there had been no break in their discourse, Hax said, "Can you tell me how much time this 'path to wisdom' is likely to take?"

Joraz burst out laughing. "My dear lady!" he chortled. "What makes you think I'm any further along it than you?"

♦

The rain continued through the night, making for a miserable evening and poor sleeping conditions. It did not help that the Nordvej continued to follow the high ridge above the river, exposed to the biting northeast wind. Hax could feel autumn in that stiff breeze, and was astonished at how swiftly it appeared to be coming on. On her father's estates, the grain and grapes would only just be beginning to ripen, and harvest time would still be a month off. Yet here, in the rolling, rocky foothills far to the north, the leaves were already beginning to turn.

She had a cold and uncomfortable night, but at least it was by her choice. They had stopped early, taking advantage of the little shelter offered by a copse of oaks that still retained their leaves. Someone, long ago, had built a stone dolmen at the roadside. Possibly an ancient shrine, it was worn and weather-beaten, and covered with centuries of lichen. Whatever its original purpose may have been, some helpful soul had left an enormous stack of fallen deadwood beneath the overhanging rock ledge, and this was still dry.

Qaramyn and Alric, working swiftly, rigged an oilcloth shelter in the wagon's lee. This protected them from the worst of the weather. The cheery fire that the wizard ignited with a word and a gesture did the rest.

For the sleepers, anyway. Qaramyn had announced his preference for the pre-dawn watch shift, so Breygon, as usual, had taken the first watch. Hax, determined to do her part, volunteered to stay up with him. His only reply had been his infuriating shrug.

Thus had begun one of the most trying nights of her long life. Eschewing the dry comfort of their makeshift tent, Breygon had wrapped himself in his cloak and settled into a tailor's seat beneath a vast, spreading evergreen. Hax had taken this as a challenge and had joined him.

Although large for the Bjerglands, the tree was tiny in comparison to the mighty pines and redwoods of Eldisle, and the trunk was barely large enough to shelter them both from the chill rain. They ended up shoulder to shoulder, and Hax found herself grateful for even the negligible warmth that leaked through the half-elf's rough, sodden cloak.

"No bow?" she asked as they settled themselves for the watch.

Breygon glanced at her. His eyes were dark, nearly purple in the deep, gloomy night. "The rain's worsening," he replied in a whisper. "We won't see anyone, or anything, far enough off for archery to matter."

She glanced around. Hax noted that he'd chosen a good spot; they could see not only their campsite, but much of the road as well; and with the fire screened behind the wagon, there was no dazzling glare to interfere with their vision.

She adjusted her seat, shifting suddenly when a bolt of pain shot up her injured leg. "You don't seem enamoured of your new profession," she said, staring into dripping, leaf-shrouded trees.

"I'm not overly fond of taking orders," he replied moodily. After a moment's hesitation, he added, "Or of giving them."

Hax glanced over at him. "That's a problem in any army."

"I know." He shrugged. "If I get tired of it, I can always resign."

Her eyebrows went up. "There's no term of service, then? Among the Fraterni Draconi?"

Breygon shot her an annoyed glance before relaxing into a sour frown. "Qaramyn told you."

She nodded.

"He enjoys the sound of his own voice a little too much," the ranger growled.

"That's a fact," she agreed fervently. "But 'Truth harms only those with ill in their hearts'," she replied primly. It had been one of her mother's sayings.

"A nice, trite, Third House aphorism," he muttered, "as out of place in the real world as any who would utter it."

"It's true, though," she asked, ignoring his biting sarcasm. "Isn't it? About your troupe, and the dragons?"

"True enough."

"What are you doing for them?" she asked, curious.

"Looking for someone," the half-elf said succinctly.

"Who?"

"A wizard." He sighed. "One of the masters at the College of Waves in Vejborg, who went missing some weeks ago a short way north of here. The elders of our order believe that he was looking for something. Something dangerous. They want to know whether he found it."

Hax's eyebrows rose. "What was he looking for?" she asked, interested despite herself.

"I cannot tell you that."

"Secrets," she murmured. That was fair. She carried a few herself.

"No," he replied. There was a hint of anger in his voice. "I cannot tell you what he was looking for, because our...counsellor, I suppose is the term...she did not see fit to tell me."

"Ah." She cast about for something – anything – else to say. "And this annoys you."

He shot her a withering glance. "What do you think?"

She shrugged.

A moment later, she continued. "And if you tire of serving the wyrms, and wish to leave your order – what then?"

He smiled thinly. "I can run fast, if need be."

Her eyebrows rose. "As fast as dragons fly?"

"Probably not. But I'm also very good at hiding," he said sardonically.

Hax snorted in amusement. "So you do have a sense of humour after all."

Breygon shrugged non-committally. "We'll hear any interlopers long before we see them tonight. If we keep our ears open, and our mouths shut."

Hax bristled slightly at this rebuke. She stole a sidelong glance at the half-elf and saw that he was staring fixedly at the road, eyes flickering back and forth along its length every few seconds. She was about to snap back at him, and then stopped herself. It would be just about what he would expect from a spoiled noblewoman, would it not?

Instead of answering back, she held her peace. She drew her cloak more tightly about her shoulders and settled in, like the seasoned campaigner she was.

Looking back on that night in later days, Hax was surprised to recall how much she learned. True to his character, Breygon spoke not a single word. Sitting motionless, he seemed to almost blend into the wood of the great trunk against which they leaned. The illusion was so complete that, at one point, Hax dozed off, and when she started awake an instant later, she thought she was alone. She patted the ground next to her...but instead of touching damp earth, she found herself grasping her comrade's boot. Breygon had eyed her in amusement, a slight, mocking smirk touching his lips, before returning to scanning the roadway.

Hax was too embarrassed to essay an apology. Instead, she tried to emulate her companion. Stretching her perceptions, she listened past the rain, past the howling snap of the wind, past the creaking of the branches of the vast fir towering above them, casting her senses into the forest.

Whether it was some trick of the night, some phantom of the Bjerglands, it worked. The basso rush of the river; the creaking of lesser trees; the rustle of broody birds in rain-drenched nests; the sly skittering of squirrels and chipmunks; all this and more came to her, caught by her heightened awareness. Beyond the smoke of their fire, she smelt clean loam, damp lichen and moss, the putrid exhalation of swamp waters, and the clean breath of the trees.

And the river. Always, in the background, the river. It was as much a part of the Bjerglands as the sea had been back home in Joyous Light.

Hax closed her eyes, and all the sounds and smells of the night woods became clearer and sharper still, filling her, all but drowning her. She had felt like this at home, among the rolling fields and trees of Eldisle; but this forest was different. Heavier, more insistent, more primal. These hills and woods were just as old as the forests of the Homelands – but they had never known the gentle guidance and guardianship of the elvii. These lands were wilder, more untamed, than any she had ever known. In her exalted state, she could feel the difference rising up from the earth beneath her, soaking into her bones like a warning.

She heard a furtive step, and started. Reflexively, her hand sought the hilt of her sword, but was stopped.

Her eyes flew open. Breygon had caught her wrist. As she drew a breath to protest, he released her hand, put a cautionary finger to her lips, and breathed, "Cervus."

A deer. Hax nodded, forcing herself to relax.

The half-elf climbed noiselessly to his feet. Putting his finger to his own lips, he hissed, "Persideo," and glided silently into the rain.

She waited. In her companion's absence, Hax found that her heightened sense of the forest remained with her; if anything, it had become more acute. She strained her ears for the slightest sound, but heard nothing beyond what she had already noted – the roar of the river, and the insistent rattle of the rain on the ever-softening surface of the road. That'll slow us tomorrow, she thought gloomily.

Two hands of minutes later, she heard a step, followed by another. She was surprised to realize that she could recognize Breygon's footfalls, although they sounded heavier and less certain than usual.

The reason quickly became clear. A hunched, shadowy shape emerged from the rain. As it approached, Hax could see that it was the half-elf, walking slowly and softly with a small buck draped across his shoulders. He strode heavily to the tree where she sat, and laid the carcass gently on the damp pine needles.

She could see that the kill had already been cleaned. "Fast work," she whispered.

He shrugged. Of course. "We needed breakfast," he replied. "But I didn't want a pile of offal lying around our camp all night." He pulled a few fistfuls of earth mixed with pine needles from the ground, and rubbed them between his hands to scour away the deer's blood.

Hax glanced over at the carcass. Apart from the gaping gash in its belly where its entrails had been removed, she could see no wounds other than to its throat, which had been expertly slit. She glanced over at Breygon, who was scrubbing silently at a bloodstain on his cloak. "You –" she began, but decided to hold her tongue.

The half-elf looked up at her inquiringly. She had been about to say, You snuck up on a deer? but thought better of it. She decided not to give him an excuse for more mocking self-deprecation, and so merely shook her head. He turned back to his work.

After that they sat together in silence. Hax found that the blood-scent rising from the butchered deer carcass blocked out most of the other smells of the woodlands. It was a powerful, intoxicating odour, charged with possibilities. She found herself glancing sidelong at her companion every now and again. When she became aware that she was doing it, she made a conscious effort to pay attention to her duties.

An hour later the rain stopped. The wind swiftly pushed the few remaining tatters of cloud away, revealing the Lamps standing high in the sky – Chuadan and Lodan, gold and silver, casting a shimmering pall over the verdant, shadowed land, the former eternally pursuing the latter, as they had since ancient times. The soft light lent an eldritch sparkle to everything it touched. Hax found herself glancing at her companion again, and thought that he looked younger, that his features seemed somehow softer when limned by moonlight.

Breygon noticed her stare and glanced back at her, eyebrows raised as if to ask the reason for her scrutiny. She looked away swiftly. He snorted, and whispered, "Time to turn in." Climbing stiffly to his feet, he tip-toed over to the wagon, bent, and roused Gwen and Alric for the next watch. Both required several nudges before crawling out of their blankets, donning their cloaks, and taking up station beneath the fir tree. Hax noticed that the Halfling woman gave her a wide berth as they exchanged places.

Hax doffed her rain-dampened cloak and hood and crawled gratefully into her bedroll, studiously ignoring the half-elf as he did the same. A few moments later, she could hear him breathing evenly; a few moments after, he was snoring.

She frowned to herself, and lay awake long into the night, listening to the river and the wind. They were soothing; like the sea, and yet so much unlike it. She was, as Qaramyn had said, a long way from home.

Eventually, she fell asleep.

♦

Night-time in the Dræywood was vastly different from night-time in the palace. There, Ally would have dined, bathed, spent some time brushing her hair (or having it brushed by one of her mother's attendants), and then passed a few pleasant hours reading, either in her father's great, dome-ceilinged library, lit by dozens of enchanted orblights; or in her own bed, tucked between crisp sheets, the room illuminated by the fireplace and the cheery flickering of candles.

Instead, the darkness found her tucked into a foetal ball atop a bed of dry pine needles, shivering uncontrollably in her damp, mud-caked shift, and starting every time a branch poked her through the thin cotton.

It was dark, as dark as night in the forest could get. Bræadan had set an hour before, and neither Lodan nor Chuadan had risen as yet. And she was already cold.

A few feet away, Sylloallen sat cross-legged on the forest floor, watching her through lidded eyes, and gnawing absently on a birch twig. After a time, he said quietly, "All right?"

"Of course not," she snapped. An hour's rest had restored her spirit, if not her strength. She was still exhausted, but she had recovered enough to be angry about this idiocy her father had foisted upon her. After all, she reflected, needlepoint and dancing weren't as bad as all that, were they?

"What's the matter?" he asked, smiling at her.

"What's the..." she repeated, incredulous. "I'm f-f-freezing!" It was true; though the night was certainly not overly chill by normal standards, she was hardly dressed for it, and was shaking like a leaf.

"Hmm," he murmured around his twig. "What are you going to do about it?"

"Me?" she asked. "W-w-why don't you m-m-make a fire?"

"I'm not the one that's cold," he answered, so reasonably that she felt like stabbing him with his own sword.

Still shivering, she moved into a sitting position, her arms wrapped about her knees. "I've never m-m-made a fire," she said sullenly.

"I didn't think you had." He nodded at the sword that lay next to her. "There's plenty of fallen wood about, and a piece of flint and a striking-steel in the frog of the scabbard," he said. "See what you can manage." He climbed to his feet. "I'll be back in an hour or so. Try to have some coals ready by then."

"Wait!" Ally started to her feet. Then she shrieked, and fell to her knees again as the muscles in her right thigh knotted into an agonized fist.

Sylloallen was at her side in an instant. Ally was thrashing on the ground, clutching at her leg. The warrior slapped her hands aside and kneaded the tightly-locked muscles with strong fingers.

She gasped for breath through clenched teeth, then sighed a moment later as the muscles unclenched. "What was that?" she moaned, tears standing in her eyes.

"Cramp," he answered briefly. "You don't take a lot of exercise, do you?"

Ally's eyes began to tear. "Until this morning," she said, a note of anger in her voice, "I was going to be a m-m-mage. I spent the last twenty years s-s-studying history, ph-philosophy, not...not..." she waved her hands about indignantly. "Not 'running'."

"Yes, and it shows," he replied clinically. "We've got a lot of work to do." Standing once more, he said, "Back in an hour. Have the fire ready." And with that, he moved off into the twilit forest at an easy lope.

By the time Sylloallen returned, one of the moons had risen, and Ally had failed yet again. She had cleared an area of the forest floor and had managed to accumulate a respectable pile of dry, fallen branches, but she had not yet achieved flame. Nodding wryly to himself, the warrior deposited a small armload near the woodpile and squatted beside the shivering girl.

Watching her struggle, he said finally, "You can't light twigs with flint."

"So I g-g-gather," she muttered. Glancing up at his infuriatingly calm visage, she said, "Do you h-h-have any suggestions?" He could see that her teeth were chattering. He could even hear it.

"You need tinder," he replied. "Old leaves, bark. Moss works best, if it's dry. Or you can make small shavings of wood." He did not offer to help.

Ally ground her teeth. She spent the next quarter-hour looking for the things he had described, without success. Finally, without asking permission, she sat cross-legged near her chosen fire-bed, pulled his sword toward her, inched the blade carefully out of the scabbard, and began making slivers by drawing a broken bit of branch across it. After several tries (and one shallow cut on a finger, the result of a moment's inattention), she managed to produce a respectable pile of narrow shavings.

To her delight, these took fire readily when she plied her flint and steel. She promptly piled twigs atop the smouldering bits, smothered them, and was forced to begin again.

An hour after he'd returned from his hunt, the second moon had risen, and a merry fire was burning in the glade. "Good," he said, helping her add wood carefully until they had a roaring blaze going.

Once the initial roar of flames had died down, he showed her his finds. Most of what he had brought back were mushrooms. Ally's face fell; she'd been hoping for a rabbit or some other such game. "What's that?" she asked, pointing at an especially dubious-looking object.

"Maplewort," he said, holding a handful of small, wrinkled fungi up to the light. "Hard as stones, but roast them in the coals, and they soften nicely after an hour or so." He also produced a handful of tubers, like twisted, scraggly potatoes.

"It's not much," he explained as they gnawed measly fare. "Too early in the season for a lot of the things we'd normally find here."

"There are fish in the river," she replied hopefully.

"That's true," Sylloallen agreed. "Tomorrow you can try your hand at catching some."

Altogether, they made a thoroughly unsatisfying feast. Ally didn't complain; she had been hungry enough to gnaw on a branch. If only I knew which branches to gnaw on, she thought wryly to herself.

The fungi were salty, stinging her cracked lips. "Did you find any water?" she asked, after choking them down.

Sylloallen shook his head. "We'll have to look for a spring in the morning."

"There's the river," she proposed.

He shook his head. "Water's running fast right now. Too silty."

The moons were low in the sky again when they threw the last of their wood on the fire. "We'll need some sleep," he said finally. "You've got a decision to make."

"W-w-what's that?" Ally asked, staring fixed at the fire. She had her arms wrapped around her body, and was still shivering.

"Well," he replied, sounding strangely uncertain for the first time, "you'll be a lot warmer, and sleep better, if we share body heat. But I'll understand if you prefer not to."

For the first time today, Ally smiled. Her new mentor's unease on this one subject was somehow comforting. "I'm still f-f-freezing," she said.

"All right."

As they bedded down on a thick next of torn-off pine boughs, Ally found herself chucking despite the chill.

"Something funny?" Sylloallen asked

"No offence, praeceptor," she murmured, "but I prefer blankets. You're bony. And you stink."

"I do indeed," he replied. She could hear the smile in his voice. "And so do you, my dear. Now shut up."

For the remainder of the night, they slept facing the fire, Ally wrapped tightly in her teacher's arms.

♦

"What do you know of the road north of Bornhavn?" Hax asked.

It was the following morning, and they were riding. Qaramyn had offered the elf-girl his horse, explaining that he wanted to study, and suggesting that she might prefer to sit a saddle instead of bouncing about in the wagon like a sack of dried peas for another day. She had accepted his offer gratefully. The wizard had taken a seat on the wagon's bench, exiling the junior soldier to the wagon-bed with a baleful glance.

"Only what the map shows," the half-elf replied, shrugging. It seemed to be his preferred mode of expression, and Hax was beginning to find it enormously exasperating.

Then, much to her surprise, as if regretting the paucity of his response, he added "I'm out of my range." He nodded at the mountains that lay far off in the distance, to the north and to the east, across the wide river valley. "I've never travelled the Bjerglands before."

"Surely you've met plenty who have," she said dubiously.

"It's not the same thing." He sounded distant, almost morose. "You can't know a country until you've walked it yourself."

Didn't Syllo say that once? the Voice asked, sounding both snide and curious. She ignored it.

Hax waited for Breygon to expand on his observation, but he said nothing. She rolled her eyes. She'd never met anyone as reticent as the half-elf. Even Joraz, taciturn to a fault, had begun to jest with her after their philosophical discussion in the wagon bed.

At least the weather was cooperating. The autumn rains had vanished, and the sky was cloudless, an azure vault stretching from horizon to horizon like an unblemished canvas. The Lantern blazed overhead, warming them without diminishing the bite of the north wind, which cut down out of the far-distant mountains like a scythe. Hax was amazed at how far she could see in the chill, crystalline air; the jagged peaks of the Dragonspine range, still more than a hundred miles off, shone whitely, the morning light reflecting back from slopes that were already blanketed with snow.

That sent a chill down her spine. She had to get through the passes before they, too, felt winter's touch. I need to move faster than this, she thought determinedly. If there were indeed someone following her – and she could not conceive otherwise – then she did not want to be caught in Zaran lands. The king in Sanalin was too closely allied with the Third House. A fugitive from Starmeadow would find neither help nor refuge here.

Hax shook herself. The sunlight was warm and soothing; it was not a day for pessimism or gloom. "It's not like home," she said, more to pass the time than in any expectation of a reply, "but it's beautiful nonetheless."

"I've never seen the Homelands," the half-elf replied. He spoke slowly, as though he were choosing his words deliberately. "But I understand the difference." Nodding at the dense blanket of forest on their left, and the deep river valley to the right, he continued, "This land has never known the elves. It was settled by the sons of Esu, and only a little more than a thousand years or so ago. The Yonar-ri came much later to these shores than they did to Ekhan, but they established the great cities along the south coast in precisely the same way. That was long after the end of the Darkness." He fell silent.

Hax was astonished at his sudden volubility. "Go on," she said gently, hoping to draw the fellow out a little more. For some reason, she was drawn to him.

He's a great deal like Sylloallen, isn't he? the Voice said quietly.

That's nonsense, Hax thought. The two are nothing alike.

Aren't they?

"What else is there?" Breygon said, shrugging. "The Yonar-ri came first as plunderers, and then as conquerors. They found the remnants of the ancient Esudi tribes, their own forebears, and bred with them. The children of the invaders became woodcutters, fisherman, farmers. Their descendents pushed northwards, into the Bjerglands. They found swamp and stone instead of farmland, but they also found iron, copper and tin. So they followed the upland rivers.

"Ellohyin started that way. Then Bitterberg. It all began with metal and the mines. Then lumber, hides, brandsteen. Rare woods. Even some gemstones."

He snorted derisively. "Fortunes were made, castles and temples built. Shops to support the castles. Labourers to man the shops. Farms to feed the labourers." He gestured at the water flowing to their right. "The same story, all over Zare. The people followed the rivers. They stayed out of the woodlands, save to take what they needed.

"In the Homelands," he continued without looking at her, "you domesticate the forests. Here, they are still wild. That's the difference."

"You prefer it here," she said, more as an accusation than a question.

He shrugged again. "As I said, I've never seen the Homelands. I've no basis for comparison."

"But nonetheless, you disapprove," she said heatedly. "I'm not deaf, semiferus. I can hear it in your voice. You judge what you have never seen."

Stung by her epithet, the half-elf turned to glare at her. "I judge you by your attitude, domina, not just by your deeds," he replied, his voice taut as his bowstring. "You are brave, to be sure. But you are presumptuous, too; insufficiently humble before the wider world. I find it foolish. And distasteful.

"Worst of all, though, is your impious arrogance."

"Arrogance?" she snapped. "How dare – "

"You change things," he continued, interrupting her as though she had not spoken. "Certain, assured, unswerving in the conviction that you know better. That it is your right to reshape the living world to your liking." There was an outraged tremulousness underlying his words. "This tree to grow just so. These flowers here, not there. The lairs, the nesting places. The courses of rivers. The ancient falls of stone, all bent to your liking. As though you were the masters of the world, instead of just a part of it."

"Are we not?" Hax shot back. "Are not the Homelands ours by right? Have we not defended them for eons, against all the forces of darkness and shadow? Have we not spilled our blood to earn the right to call such dearly-bought ground our own?" She was quivering with rage. Presumption? Arrogance? Who was this...this worm, to question...

Breygon replied in the same tone, albeit in a lower voice. "Did your lands not suffer, too? And whence came that suffering, lady? From the shadow? Or from your own hands?

"Who was it who first turned blade against brother? Tior's son betrayed his sire, and bathed all your lands in gore. And his grandson did the same, turning to Bardan Eyðar in his lust for power, slaying his own mate, and taking a fiend into his bed. And when his hell-spawned daughter rose in fire and fury, she spilled blood enough to drown all the forests of the world."

The half-elf hawked and spat. "And at the end of all things, mighty Yarchian, whom all call 'the Renewer' – he summoned the trees, and the spirits of wood and wold, and even the stones themselves to stand at his side at the Gloaming. And all mourn the elves, and the wyrms, and sometimes even the men, who fell at Oldarran. Who mourned the passing of the spirits, heya, and the forest-folk? Who mourned the burning of the trees?

"Speak not to me of the love that the Third House bears for the woodlands, lady. The fields, the flowers, the beasts, the trees – they are pawns to you. Like all the rest of us. Like all living things." He fell silent.

Hax was boiling with ill-suppressed rage, her hands white-knuckled on her mount's reins.

Breygon glanced at her, grinning sourly. "Amazing," he murmured, his voice dripping with irony. "Have I finally managed to offend you?"

"Yes," she breathed through clenched teeth. "And if you say one more word against my house or my people, I will blow you out of your saddle, down the hill, and into the river."

"Bene," the half-elf laughed, slapping a gloved hand down on his saddle horn. "At last! Now we can speak as equals."

Hax turned to glare at him. "Excuse me?" she said.

"You've been dancing around it since we met," he replied. "I'm a half-breed. It is who and what I am. I accept it. But you – you can't. You're bound into knots by your upbringing, incapable of seeing me as human or as elf. It's been amusing watching you try to figure out what I am, and how, therefore, to speak to me." He laughed again.

He's actually laughing, Hax thought wonderingly. The fact that it was at her, rather than with her, bothered her not at all. His features softened in mirth; he looked like a boy. She felt the beginning of a smile creep aboard her visage.

"Your clumsy politeness, lady," he continued more seriously, "is nothing more than condescension. It offended me. So I decided to offend you back. Until you came to see me as an equal. Instead of as...oh, I don't know. Some sort of curiosity."

"You are that," she muttered under her breath. Out loud, she said, "If I offended you, I'm..."

"Reticeo," he snapped rudely. "You've just doffed your blinders, lady. Why don them again?"

"Don't test me," she growled. "I meant what I said about the river."

"I know you did," Breygon replied with a frank stare. "It was the first thing you've said to me in two days that was unfettered by your overly studious politeness. So I'll do you the courtesy of being honest in return." Leaning towards her in his saddle, he lowered his voice. "If I can sneak up on a deer in the night, and have it dressed before it knows it's dead, what do you suppose your chances are of getting a spell off before I can put you on your back, trussed like a goose and wondering whether I'm going to rip you open like that buck? Eh?" He winked mirthlessly. "Care to try your luck, Domina?"

Hax blinked, shivering slightly as the image flashed across her mind. She did her best to swallow her anger, but did not trust herself to speak. They rode together in silence; but the wall of tension between them screamed more loudly than words.

After several miles of this, she could stand it not longer. Turning to Breygon, she said in a rush, "We need to clear the air. I'm not accustomed to quarrelling openly with...well, with anyone."

" 'Quarrelling'?" her companion scoffed. "Don't be ridiculous. Where I come from, it's not even considered a discussion unless knives are drawn."

"Enough jesting," she said angrily. "I'm serious."

"So am I. Stop looking for hidden meanings," he advised. "There are no courtiers or diplomats in the wilderland. Yes, I insulted you just now. Accept it. It doesn't mean that I wouldn't lay down my life for you, right now, if need be."

Hax was astonished at how easily he said it. She knew he was telling the truth. "That's...you surprise me," she said uncertainly. "You give your loyalty very easily."

"Only to your eyes," the half-elf snorted, shaking his head. "You're making the same mistake again. Before, you thought I was a human. Now you're thinking of me as an elf. I'm neither.

"In Astrapratum," he went on morosely, "and especially among the Duodeci, life is all about appearances. Careful manoeuvring and innuendo. False faces, false politeness. Worth measured by ostentation, status by proximity to the throne, credibility by how long it's been since you last betrayed someone. Easy comradeship, easy virtue, and an easy knife in the back when it serves someone's interests. My mother told me all of this, before..." he paused. "She told me what it was like."

He shook his head, a cynical smile playing about his lips. "You'll get none of that from me, lady."

" 'Too noble for nobility'," she murmured, staring off into the distance. It was what her father had once called Sylloallen.

Breygon turned his frank, disturbing gaze on her. "If you learn nothing else from our time together, I'd suggest you learn this: courtesy, often as not, is a façade masking betrayal. And not all outrage is feigned."

"Mine certainly wasn't," she muttered, nettled by his directness, and uncomfortable at being appraised so bluntly by those violet eyes. But his words about the Court cut her deeply. She had seen it herself. And had it not been her own unfeigned outrage that had led her to use forbidden magic against her aunt?

"Nor was mine," he replied. "Save the coquettery for the high court, Orkarel Hax. This is the real world. There's little time for games. Those of us who exist here do so by choice. We say what we mean, and we live by our word." He smiled humourlessly. "And sometimes, we die by it."

He's an awful lot like Sylloallen, isn't he? the Voice chuckled.

Hax thought about that at some length as they rode on in a thick, febrile silence.

♦

The party reached Bornhavn that afternoon. It was little more than a hamlet – what Sylloallen would have called 'a wide place in the road' – but Hax was happy to see it nonetheless. The wind had been picking up all morning, bringing low, iron-grey clouds down from the mountains. She didn't think that it was cold enough to snow, but she had no interest in finding out until she had had a chance to purchase warmer clothing.

And she had been growing increasingly uncomfortable in Breygon's company. She felt as if the half-elf were looking through her, rather than at her; as if he knew her better than she knew herself. She regarded the impending parting with a curious mixture of anticipation and relief.

The ridgeline along which they had been riding for the past two days had petered out some time that morning. The Nordvej, following the rise and fall of the land, had plunged down into the river valley, until they were riding only a stone's throw from the water. The valley itself had narrowed somewhat, and the river, still immense, was constrained between two banks that were only a long bowshot apart. As a result, the water was leaping more frantically. Hax suspected that the recent rains had swollen it well beyond its normal capacity. At one point, a pair of heavily-laden barges went rushing downstream, tiny figures scrambling about their decks, using poles and sails to slow rather than speed their passage. She shivered slightly at the sight; there was something profoundly unnaturally in riding a bucking, twisting mass of timber down a mountain river. Especially, she reflected, shivering, with a hold full of new-smelted iron ingots. She was happy to leave such pastimes to the sons of Esu.

Bornhavn, when they finally hove in sight of the village, appeared to be made up largely of farms, clustered along the road and tumbling down the slope of the long hill leading from road to river. The soil must have been more fertile here; Hax saw that the scraggly pines of the uplands had given way to grassy fields dotted with apple trees and broad-leafed chestnuts. She was initially perplexed at what appeared to be shifting clumps of white moving across the fields like earth-bound clouds, until closer inspection revealed these to be herds of sheep grazing placidly among the tree-trunks. She did not note any cattle or horses, a fact that caused her some consternation, as she urgently needed to replace her own slaughtered mount if she were to continue her trek into the mountains.

That thought led naturally to thoughts of Torris. She missed the warhorse terribly, and wondered what had happened to her old friend. Was he still quartered at the Palace in Astrapratum? Had her father retrieved him? Or had her aunt taken her thirst for vengeance out upon the only available target?

Hax shook her head to clear it of such gloomy thoughts, and tried to concentrate on the scenery surrounding her.

The town proper lay at the lowest point of land, where the road dipped down until it was nearly level with the river. Hax was surprised to see that the Nordvej had been cobbled where it traversed the town. Indeed, the 'wide place' was a stone-paved square surrounded by larger, half-timbered buildings, mostly shops and houses. A few more substantial buildings – a palatial mansion, an inn, and something that, according to her nose, might have been a brewery – lay just off the square. Another cobbled street led downhill towards the river, where a stone watch-tower stood next to a wharf that projected into the river like a tongue of granite. At the end of the stone pier, a two-masted carrack lay, silent and sullen, tugging gently against its mooring ropes.

At the sight of this vessel, the pilot, Howall, showed the first signs of animation in nearly two days. "That'll be Swiftkeel," he muttered unhappily from his perch in the rear of the wagon. "Maybe a jar or two, before we report in?" he added hopefully.

"Maybe we'll see you aboard, and you can talk about it with your new captain," Qaramyn said, glaring menacingly at the man.

"Qaramyn, see to that, if you will," Breygon said, turning in his saddle. "Alric, see if you can find a smithy." The warrior nodded.

"There's an inn," Gwen piped up, pointing at one of the larger buildings. This one was adorned with a roughly-carved sign depicting an apple, a cup and a pillow, all under the legend 'Bellik'.

Breygon nodded. "Try to get us a decent price, would you?" The Halfling nodded, spurring her pony towards the building.

"And you, Sergeant?" Qaramyn asked, his tone sarcastically chipper. "Whither bound?"

"The tower," the half-elf replied. "I'm going to visit the guard captain. Once you've delivered Howall, bring the garrison stores along. We'll get the wagon off our charge." The wizard nodded acknowledgement.

Breygon turned to Hax. "This is where we part company, lady," he said neutrally.

Hax nodded. "I plan to stay the night, and carry on northwards in the morning." She glanced around the square. "I need to find a horse," she added, her voice dubious.

"I'd wish you luck," he said, glancing around, "but it doesn't look promising." He held out a gloved hand. "If ever you need anything, call on me first. If there's aught I can do to aid you, I will."

Hax nodded. "You may do the same." She took his proffered hand and held it briefly, warrior to warrior. "I'll be staying at the inn tonight, and leaving on the morrow, assuming I can find another horse." She slipped off the wizard's horse and handed him the reins.

The half-elf took them and nodded. "Until this evening, then."

She strode over to the wagon. Qaramyn reached into the bed among the stores and extracted her saddlebags. As he passed them down to her, he leaned close, and whispered, "Don't lose yourself in your alias, lady. When the time comes, remember who and what you are. It will save you." He nodded at Breygon. "And him."

Hax stared back at the man, perplexed. Her patience with his occult maunderings finally collapsed. "What in all the hells are you talking about?" she snapped.

The wizard simply winked. "Occursus non fors inter Elvii," he whispered, bowing elaborately. "Something tells me that I will see you again."

Hax simply nodded, taken aback. Qaramyn winked at her, snapping the reins. The wagon lurched forward, down the cross-street, towards the pier and the watchtower.

Breygon raised a hand in farewell, turning his horse to follow. She waved briefly in return.

Occursus non fors inter Elvii, she thought, as she watched the group depart. It was an old adage. There are no chance meetings among Elves.

What, she wondered, was that supposed to mean?

♦

Hax spent the rest of the afternoon prowling about the town, trying to reconstitute her lost or damaged equipment. She had no difficulty purchasing several blankets and some useful trinkets – a tinderbox, a new waterskin – and she was able to acquire a number of new shirts to replace those that she had lost in action or used as bandages. To guard against any similar eventuality, she also bought a few small poultices from an apothecary, cleverly made; boiled rags soaked in raw spirit, and sealed in waxed paper. These set her back quite a few shillings, but after the problems she'd experienced making her own dressings, she judged them worth the extra expense.

Her greatest success, however, lay in finding clothing suitable to the unpleasant weather that came with autumn in the Bjerglands. Hax had taken a room at 'Bellik's Rest', the town's only inn, dropping her bow, quiver and saddlebags on the narrow cot provided, locking the door, and pocketing the small bronze key with a sense of relief. The innkeeper's assistant, when asked where decent clothing might be found, directed Hax to a small hut near the north edge of town. When she tapped deferentially at the door, it was opened by a wizened old gentleman, who'd wheezed politely upon seeing her face. He was no taller than she, and only a little heavier, and looked to be close to her own age – which, for a human, meant that he had already vastly exceeded the span normally allotted by the Mother.

She found his excitement at her appearance a little unnerving – at least, until a chance movement caused his wispy, snow-white hair to blow back, revealing ears that bore the merest hint of a point. Elf blood, she realized. Not much...but enough to lengthen his days upon the earth. And enough to give him a sense of kinship, even with a scion of the Third House. She wondered whence it came; whether he was the result of a noble's dalliance in ages past, or the distant descendent of a half-blood.

Or even one of the Hiarsk. She examined his hair closely; but it was so completely white that she couldn't tell whether it had once borne the flaming scarlet trademark of her semi-noble cousins.

He had introduced himself as 'Pardo', which told her nothing at all. But he'd seemed so anxious to please her that she had readily acquiesced when he offered to show her his wares.

She was glad that she did. Old he might have been, but Pardo still retained much of what must once have been a master's skill with awl and needle. He was a leatherworker, and an accomplished one; examples of his craft festooned his tiny hut, and lay stacked here and there, cluttering a worktable that had probably seen a century's hard service.

In short order he had produced several pair of serviceable trousers, a long jacket (that had obviously been made for a stripling human girl, but that fit her well enough), and a hooded cloak of light, supple oiled leather dyed a deep wine-red. The trousers, cut to a human woman's fit, were of course too long, and far too broad across the fundament; and so, while she tried the remainder of the garments (standing behind a hanging blanket that the old fellow had hastily tacked to one of the ceiling beams), Pardo sat atop a short stool, plying needle and thread at a speed that would have done credit to a far younger man. Throughout his labour, he kept up a rattling stream of prose, interspersing it with jokes that made her smile, and questions that she was hard-pressed to deflect.

When at last he was done, he bundled her purchases into the cloak. She proffered him her purse, and was appalled when he refused payment. When she insisted, he pushed the brilliant gold away, saying awkwardly "Libet regina Elvii." A pleasure for the elven princess.

What could she say to that? Hax nodded as regally as she could manage, then kissed the fellow's forehead, causing him to blush and sputter like an addled schoolboy. She left him beaming happily before his hearth, closing the door behind her.

Outside, she glanced up and down the road; and, seeing no one, stooped and laid a dozen Zaran crowns in a neat pile on his threshold. Then she hurried back towards the inn at the centre of town.

As she re-entered Bornhavn from the north, she noticed a small path leading westwards, into the forest and away from the river. Two things caught her eye; a bright, white dome; and a dark, slender figure emerging from the trail, partially obscured by the twilight. This individual seemed to be walking towards her; and, unwilling to have a stranger following close behind, Hax stopped and waited for the person to catch her up.

It turned out to be a woman; Hax could tell as much, even though the figure was hooded and cloaked like herself. Human females were less delicately proportioned than elves, and the differences tended to show more readily through clothing.

Hax spoke first, while the woman was still a few paces away. "A good evening to you, mistress."

"And to you, lady," the woman replied. Her voice was an octave below Hax's, which was not surprising seeing as how human towered over elf by nearly a full head. "You are new-come to Bornhavn, yes?"

"Yes," Hax replied noncommittally. There was something in the other's demeanour that caused the hair to rise on the back of her neck. She switched her bundle of clothes to her left arm in order to leave her right free.

The human noticed the gesture, flicked her eyes to the elaborate hilt projecting above Hax's right shoulder, and stopped where she was. Moving slowly, she raised her hands and pushed back her hood. "No need for nerves, daughter of Hara," she said softly. "I am unarmed. At the moment."

Hax pursed her lips speculatively. By human standards, the woman was severely attractive, with high, narrow cheekbones, an arched brow, and hair as long and black as her own. A lot coarser, though, she thought cattily. But there was still something...

Hax nodded politely. "I thank you for your greeting. Are you a resident?" she asked.

"More than that," the woman answered. She pulled aside her cloak. Hax saw that she was clad in a long surplice, belted at the waist, and overlain with a tabard bearing...

...Hara save me, Hax thought, panic rising in her breast. The woman's tabard bore a raven perched atop an anvil. "Your pardon, priestess," she said, nodding again. Thinking rapidly, she added, "May the Allfather's grace be ever with you."

The woman smiled; a little coldly, Hax thought. But there was no ice in her voice when she replied, "And also with you. My name is Viloriannis," she added. "And you are...?"

Belatedly remembering Qaramyn's advice, Hax replied, "Annalyszian." Racking her brains, she added, "of Two Rivers."

Nodding towards the town, the priestess said, "You are staying at Bellik's, I presume?" With a wave, she indicated that they should continue.

There was no point in denying it. "I am," the elf-girl replied. "I didn't think there were any other options." They began walking together.

"None but the hostel at the Allfather's Hall," the priestess replied. She gave Hax a calculating glance. "And, excuse my presumption, but you don't look like a pilgrim."

Hax said nothing to this. The woman continued remorselessly. "You came in with that group earlier today, yes?"

"If you mean the party of the Æryngard," Hax said carefully, "yes, I did." The priestess seemed to expect more, so she added, "My mare died on the road, three days to the south. They were kind enough to allow me to ride with them, rather than walk the rest of the way." She forced a smile. "I'm in the market for a new horse, if you know anyone who might be willing to part with one."

"You'll find none in town," the woman answered, frowning. "Horses are for the wealthy, and these are poor folk. Even File, the trader, rarely rides; and his fat fingers flow with silver."

Hax ground her teeth. Sanctimonious religious fanatics! she thought angrily. Where did they think the money came from to build their fancy temples? "I'm sure I'll manage," she replied placidly.

As they reached the town square, the priestess asked, "Do you know where I might find the leader of the watch-men whose company you shared?"

Hax shrugged. "Doubtless they'll be staying at the Inn as well," she answered carefully. "Although when we parted, their sergeant was going down to the river to seek the guard captain's counsel."

The woman snorted. "Good luck to him, then," she said derisively. "He'll find no wisdom there."

There was nothing Hax could say to that. Clutching her bundle, she nodded at the nearby inn, half-bowed, and said, "Dinner calls. And bed. I'll bid you good night, priestess, if I may."

"Certainly, Annalyszian," the woman said archly, "of Two Rivers. Sleep you soundly and long, and may the Allfather watch over you." She made the sign of the fist before her breast.

Hax felt a chill crawl up her spine. She nodded as dispassionately as she could, and walked swiftly away, doing her best to look as though she were merely sauntering.

As Hax pushed open the Inn's wide front door, she saw that Viloriannis was still standing in the square, eyeing her speculatively. The elf-girl shivered again, and not with the evening's breezes.

♦

Supper in Bornhavn was a humble but filling affair. Halagor Bellik, the proprietor of the inn, was a retired guardsman, and believed fervently in the restorative powers of potatoes, ale and gravy. The meat was not to her taste; spring and the lambs were long gone, and Hax was not fond of mutton no matter how much garlic was used to mask its woolly flavour. She made do with bread and vegetables. There was no wine to be had; but apples grew in profusion, and the first of the autumn cider had already been pressed. This was one of the tiny town's better products, and Hax found herself draining cup after cup of the delicious, effervescent stuff. If nothing else, it took her mind off of her nerve-wracking encounter with the priestess.

By the time she pushed her plate away, she was conscious of a persistent ringing in her ears. She wondered briefly if she had overindulged, then realized that the noise was coming from a corner of Bellik's great room, where one of the locals, a gray-haired Zaran, was tuning a stringed instrument that she recognized as a mandora. It had a deeper, mellower tone than the lutes and gitterns of the Homeland – a distant, almost haunting timbre.

Once the musician was done fiddling with the keys, he launched into a slow, rhythmic air that she had never heard before. Hax listened closely. Her mother had tried without much success to make a musician of her, and her tutelage had included both plucked and bowed instruments. Hax had dreaded the lessons, in part because her instructor had been a halfling virtuoso who, in addition to numerous other unsavoury traits, had been quite mad. Fortunately his eccentricities had not managed to entirely eradicate her love for music. And the time she'd spent beating out rhythms and learning fingerings at least had the virtue of teaching her what to listen for.

The tune the fellow was plucking out was almost mournful, and ridiculously simple to boot. Hax was about to turn back to her cider in disappointment when the old player suddenly drew a second melody from the strings, weaving it into and around the first. That caught her interest; the complexity of the dual motifs made it sound as though he had a least two extra fingers. She found herself nodding easily in time to the music.

When the fellow glanced idly over the crowd and saw that she was listening closely, he gave her a mischievous smile. An instant later, a familiar tune emanated from his instrument, and Hax felt the hair stand up on the back of her neck. It was the principal theme of Ave Sedes Tiora, the closest thing that the Third House had to a royal anthem.

Was that an accident? she wondered, suddenly tense. Or did he...

"Any luck finding a horse?"

Hax started, nearly spilling her drink. She spun swiftly on her stool, then relaxed slightly when she saw that the speaker was Joraz.

She shook her head. "Not yet."

The Tyrellian slid onto a stool next to her, motioning to one of the harried-looking girls scuttling to and fro with arms loaded down with platters and mugs. Turning to Hax, he said easily, "Well, there's always the river. Ships go as far north as Ellohyin, Bitterberg even, or so we were told. That might be faster than riding."

Hax frowned. "I don't much like the idea of waiting around dockside for a ship to show up by chance."

The monk nodded. "Better to keep running," he said expressionlessly.

"Yes. Better to..." her voice trailed off. She shot him an alarmed glance.

Joraz held up a hand. "I'm not one to pry," he said quietly, "but you seem a decent sort, and you helped us out of a tight spot. If there's anything we can do to help you, we will."

Hax pursed her lips. "Is that your word," she asked wryly, "or your sergeant's?"

"Our sergeant's," he grinned. "Who do you think figured out you were on the run?"

She smiled narrowly. "And you're here to find out what I'm running from. Is that it?"

"No," the monk replied. "I'm here for dinner."

Hax laughed self-consciously. "Where are the others, then?"

"Well, the wizard's upstairs with his nose jammed in a book, as usual," Joraz said. "Excuse me." He turned, tapped one of the serving girls on the arm, and gave her some quick, muttered instructions. When she had gone, he turned back to Hax. "Alric's still off at the smithy. Breygon said he wanted to take a quick turn 'round the town, and so did Gwen. Although I imagine for different reasons," he added drily.

"Your Gwen's a pickpocket," Hax snorted. "You know that, don't you?"

"Certainly," Joraz nodded. "But she has a good heart. I'd liefer have her at my side than some intolerant, meddling priest."

"I don't know," the elf-girl muttered darkly. "Priests come in handy when you've got an arrow stuck in your leg."

Joraz laughed in sympathy. "How are your wounds?" he asked.

"Mending," she replied curtly. Changing the subject, she said, "So, what's next for you lot? Onwards to Ellohyin, or back to Æryn?"

"Neither, for now," the monk answered soberly. "When we dropped Howall off at his ship this afternoon, we found out why they needed a new pilot. It seems the previous one disappeared. The ship's captain wants us to look for him."

"I shouldn't think that'd be much of a mystery," Hax shrugged. "Poor fellow probably fell overboard."

Joraz shook his head. "According to his shipmates, he went missing somewhere between the Allfather's temple and Bellik's cider kegs." He nodded at the long wooden board behind which the innkeeper stood, swiftly sponging out mugs.

Hax shrugged again. "Small town. I'm sure he'll turn up."

"One hopes."

They listened in silence to the musician for a few moments. At length, Joraz nodded approvingly. "He's good, isn't he?"

"Very good," Hax agreed. She grinned, overtaken by a sudden burst of whimsy. "Do you dance?"

"You're serious?" The monk's eyebrows shot up. She nodded. "No, not really," he admitted. "But I can usually manage to avoid falling over my own feet."

He rose and extended her a hand. "Shall we, my lady?"

Hax laughed and took it. "Thank you, my lord!"

Joraz tugged her easily to her feet. "Best you lead, I think," he added in a loud whisper.

Together they stepped into the small open space between the rough trestle tables. The musician was still playing a slow, melancholy air. Hax, who had trained in the gentle arts under her mother's discerning eye, could think of any number of measures that would accord with the beat and tempo of the skald's tune. Out of consideration for her partner, she selected a simple one, remembering at the last moment to shift the position of her hands and feet to those of the gentleman lead.

It proved much easier than she had expected. The monk had obviously never seen the dance she had chosen, much less danced it himself, but he had good poise, posture and balance, and was quick on his feet. He watched her with careful concentration, doing his best to anticipate her steps and twirls, and did a creditable job. At the third repetition, he surprised her by taking the lead himself. Hax laughed and allowed him to do so, settling into the distaff pattern with an ease born of long familiarity.

When the song ended, the pair were flushed and laughing. Hax actually felt slightly winded; evidently she was out of shape. They were greeted by a thunder of applause from the patrons of the establishment, to which Joraz responded by stepping back and allowing Hax to keep the floor. She laughed at that, too, punching him lightly in the shoulder as punishment for abandoning her.

A winsome plinking indicated that the musician was adjusting the tuning of his instrument once more. Hax turned and threw the fellow a happy salute; he nodded gravely in return. Then he set his plectrum to the strings once more, and began a new air – one even slower and more sombre than before, but infinitely more complex, evoking a longing melancholy that caught Hax entirely off guard.

If she had been surprised before, she was dumbstruck now. She knew the tune at once; knew it well, in fact. Every elf of the Third House knew it. It was the Lugeo Fineleorus – the Lament of Fineleor. It had been written eons past to commemorate the death of the great general who had led the armies of the Third House to disaster against the hordes of Bardan, during the battles that had ended the Age of Wisdom and ushered in the Darkness. When the elves had been routed, Fineleor had remained behind in a narrow pass with none but his mate at his side, to atone for his failure with blood. Together, they had purchased his soldiers' escape with their lives.

After the battle, Yarchian, the High King, had granted Fineleor the posthumous surname 'Orkarel', meaning 'courage unto death'. It was the same moniker that Hax's mother had given her. She had used it as her nomen virago ever since she had passed without the walls seven years earlier, putting aside her maid-name, Allymyn.

Does he know who I am? she wondered, terrified. Was it simply another coincidence? Or was the old fellow merely trying to honour a visitor from the elf-realm?

Confused and nervous, she turned back to Joraz, intending to quit the floor and return to her room. Instead of the monk's broad, open face, she met Breygon's solemn visage and calm, violet gaze.

"Tandem saltatamus?" the ranger asked quietly.

Hax froze, eyes wide. Glancing from side to side, she saw that the inn's patrons were paying them close regard. A sudden departure would probably garner more attention than if she simply stayed.

Breygon's eyebrows drew together. "Lady?"

Hax nodded swiftly. "Do you know the measures?" she whispered urgently.

"Measures?" he replied, nonplussed. "No. The tune is familiar, but..."

"Take my hands!" she commanded.

Blinking in surprise, the ranger did so. Hax seized them and thrust them into the correct opening positions, shoulder and hip, and palm-to-palm.

"What are you..."

"Follow me!" she hissed. "And for Hara's love, do our people proud!"

The half-elf's face darkened slightly, and he looked as though he was about to offer some retort. Hax did not give him the opportunity. Pivoting deftly on the balls of her feet, she drew him into the difficult opening paces of the Lugeo.

Breygon had a choice. He could launch into an angry tirade...or he could swallow his pride and try to follow the elf-girl's shifting steps. He chose the latter, stuffing his anger into a tiny corner of his consciousness, then applying the rest of it in a desperate attempt to follow her twirling feet and shifting hands.

It was like trying to walk a roof-peak or a tightrope. While he knew the melody well enough, he did not know the paces. These were complex, deliberate and tightly measured. The Lugeo was an ancient dance, and it quickly became obvious that Hax knew it in her bones. Breygon had to pay close heed simply to keep up.

Gritting his teeth, he focussed his attention on the girl's midriff, reasoning that dancing must be like fencing, if only in the sense that any change of direction would be signalled there first. It was also, he reflected after a moment or two, a not entirely unpleasant place to rest his eyes.

Breygon was aware of the elves' passion for dance, and he also knew whence came their mastery of the art – from long life, and centuries spent in practice. He did not share their enthusiasm, in large part because he did not, and would not, have time for such frivolities. And yet, even as he struggled to follow the girl's movements, he realized that there was something compelling in it – something insidious, addictive even.

After a few moments, he warmed to the challenge; after all, there were worse things in life than dancing with a pretty girl, however insufferably arrogant she might be. If nothing else, the effort demanded poise, attention, grace and skill. And strength. And flexibility. And wind, too.

He began to see it as an athletic contest. Taking it in that spirit, he threw himself into his work, matching Hax pace for pace and figure for figure. His native vigour and agility served him well, and he was gratified when he thought he saw a flicker of surprise in the girl's eyes when he executed a particularly difficult measure without stumbling.

Hax saw his intent grimace, and snorted with laughter. She had been going easy on him. There were many versions of the Lugeo; it was almost an art form in itself, and the elves of the Third House learned it from an early age. Hax had been following the measures prescribed for children. When she saw that the ranger was keeping up with her, she shifted into the patterns that adults were expected to perform.

A moment later, the ranger's smile had disappeared and he was sweating heavily. He managed to stay on his feet, but there was a look of panic in his eyes. Hax grinned back, and was rewarded with a silent grimace of concentration.

He had spirit; she had to give him that. As the skald moved into the final measures of the piece, Hax deliberately scaled back the intensity of her forms, moving back into the children's' patterns again. She noted the immediate relief in the half-elf's eyes, and tried not to smile. Instead, she broke the pattern, taking his hands and drawing him into an uncharacteristically close embrace.

She could feel his heart hammering through his tunic, and smiled nastily to herself. Evidently she wasn't all that badly out of form after all.

The music trailed off mournfully – it was a lament – and the duo executed the final, simple steps in tandem, to scattered applause.

Hax smiled happily at her partner. "That was very well done. For a first attempt."

Breygon released her hands and stepped back, panting. "If I had an ounce of strength left, I'd strangle you right now," he said crossly, rolling his neck in an attempt to work some of the stiffness out of his shoulders.

"Cramp?" Hax teased. Her own neck and shoulders were screaming obscenities at her; she would probably find blood seeping from her half-healed wounds. But she would be eternally damned before she showed weakness to the half-elf.

"It's not how I usually relax after a week's hard riding," Breygon replied sourly.

"You should try it more often," she teased gently. "You've potential."

"Oh?"

Hax couldn't suppress a grin. "Certainly. With a century or so of practice..."

The half-elf grinned sourly. The musician began a new air, which Breygon recognized as a folk tune of the Bjerglands. To forestall any possibility of more dancing, he jerked his head toward the table. She followed obediently, smiling triumphantly to herself. They seated themselves opposite Joraz.

"Very impressive," the monk commented. "You're more poised and graceful than I would have thought possible."

"She's had good teachers," the ranger grunted, "and a century or so to practice."

"Actually, I was talking about you," Joraz chuckled.

Breygon shot his colleague an annoyed glance from beneath a thunderous brow. Hax laughed out loud at the half-elf's obvious discomfiture.

With a nod, the monk stood. "I'm off to bed. Don't stay up too late, children."

Breygon snorted.

"Fare you well," Hax said, touching the monk lightly on the arm. "And thank you for the dance."

"It was my distinct pleasure," Joraz replied, bowing.

After he had gone, she turned her eye on Breygon. "Was that your doing?" she asked sharply.

"What?" he replied, taken aback at her sudden vehemence.

"That song. The Lugeo. Did you tell the skald to play it?"

"Is that what it's called?" the ranger asked. "No. I simply asked the fellow if he knew anything from the Homelands. I thought it might...oh, I don't know. Please you." He reddened slightly.

Hax took a deep, calming breath. There was no lie in the half-elf's words, but she was still uneasy. She could not 'see' him – could not read his intentions, his heart, in a single glance, as she normally could with one of her kind. And Syllo had taught her not to believe in coincidences. "Do you not know its name?" she asked intently.

"No." Breygon shook his head. "I know the tune, though. My mother used to hum it, usually while doing chores. I asked her about it once, and she told me that it was an old song from the northern reaches of the elven realm. A sad song. I whistled the tune for the skald, and he knew it from the off.

"Why?" he asked, curious now. "What is it called?"

"Lugeo Fineleorus," she said briefly. She glanced away, staring at the musician again. He seemed lost in his music.

"Ah," Breygon said, nodding in sudden understanding. "And you thought I – or he – had picked it, because of your name."

Hax nodded.

The ranger shook his head, chuckling. "I wouldn't worry," he said. "I doubt anyone in this town has the slightest idea who Fineleor Orkarel was."

"You obviously know," she shot back.

Breygon gave her a hard glance. "I had a somewhat different upbringing than the average Zaran," he grated.

Hax sighed. It always came back to that, didn't it? "Perhaps someday you can tell me about it," she said gently.

"Perhaps," he replied distantly. His tone said, Not bloody likely.

She rolled her eyes. "You're infuriating, do you know that?"

"Oh?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

She scowled, angered by the return of his bitter self-contempt. She continued in the elven tongue, her tone soft but insistent. "Yesterday you accused me of not being able to decide whether you were a son of Hara or Esu. How could I, when you have not yourself decided?"

"I beg your pardon?" he asked, his face colouring.

"You've spent your life between two worlds," she said angrily. "Do you even know what your name really is?"

Breygon blinked, taken aback. "What?" he said uncertainly.

" 'Breygon' is a human vulgarity. A pathetic corruption of Bræagond. It means 'Glory of Bræa'," Hax snapped. "It's an ancient name among our people. One of the oldest. A moniker of pride, a celebration of the divine origin of our House. And you reject it!"

"The Third House rejects me!" he hissed back, furious. "It deems my kind accursed, worthy only of exile or execution!"

"Then prove them wrong!" she cried. "Accept what you are! Acknowledge your blood, your name, and live up to them!"

Breygon glanced narrowly at the other denizens of the taproom. No one seemed to understand what was being said, but the volume and tone had been noticed.

His nervous glance chilled Hax's ardour. She reached across the table and took his hand. "Dolor hic tibi proderit olim," she said softly, speaking their shared tongue.

Breygon frowned sourly. "Ceorlinus, I suppose?"

She nodded. "It means 'Someday, even this pain...'"

" '...will be useful to you'. My accent may be poor, but I understand the language well enough. And the idea."

"It's an important idea," she insisted. "We can let our pain poison us, even overwhelm us. Or we can embrace it, and turn it into power. The choice is ours." She gave his hand a gentle squeeze. "Yours."

"The lady is a philosopher, too. Why doesn't that surprise me?" He pulled his hand back, forcing a grim, lop-sided smile. "So, lady philosopher. Are you staying here? Or moving on?"

She shook her head. "I'll be leaving in the morning, heading north," she said quietly.

"Without a horse?"

"I have legs."

"You certainly proved that a moment ago," he snorted. Standing, he gave her a polite nod. "Then I'll wish you good journey now, Orkarel Hax, in case I don't see you before you depart."

"It's 'Ally', actually," she said, rising as well.

He cocked his head, his sardonic, self-mocking smile softening into something a little less bitter. "Ally." There was an odd look in his eyes. "I'm honoured to have met you."

She bowed lightly. "And I you. Vita longa."

"How singularly inappropriate," he murmured, "coming from one of your House. But there's no need for final farewells. We'll meet again, you and I."

"Ah, I'm a philosopher, so you must be a seer?" she said, chuckling.

"Not at all. I just don't believe in coincidences." He glanced down at her, his violet eyes darkly intense. "There are no chance meetings..."

"...between elves. I know. Qaramyn said the same thing." She smiled, and for the first time, Breygon saw the girl that lurked behind the woman's visage. "I'll look for you on the road, then."

"As will I," he replied with a slight bow. "Via leniter, lady."

Hax summoned enough of her hard-learned courtesy to nod politely. "And you also, Glory of Bræa."

♦

Once back in her room, Hax locked the door and spent a moment pacing back and forth, wracking her brains over where she was going to find a horse. She was distracted; by the memory of the warmth of the half-elf's hands in hers, the exhilaration that had come with treading the measures of the Lugeo in his arms, and the trip-hammer pounding of his heart against her breast.

Then she forgot all of that, and wondered nervously what the presence of a priestess of the Allfather in such a small town might mean.

This latter worry stuck in her mind. Clearly there was a temple here; Joraz had mentioned it. Was that what the dome had been?

And she knew of our arrival, Hax thought nervously. She wanted to talk to Breygon. The candle on the night-table flickered intermittently as she passed.

What, she wondered, would the half-elf tell the priestess about her? Even if he respected her confidence, as she thought he might, what else might the priestess guess?

Hax's worry was entirely natural. The atrocities committed by the theocracy of the Hand had ended, more or less, some threescore years earlier, and were fading in the minds of men. The elves, though, had longer memories. For the inhabitants of the Homelands, hardly an eye-blink had passed since the Hierarchy had been purged from Ekhan, its last remnants defeated at Duncala by the elves, the common men of the Empire, and the rebel Knights united by their contempt for the corrupt rule of the priests. Many families of the Third House had lost loved ones to the persecutions of the Hand. And although the priests of the Allfather had not instigated the imprisonments, tortures, and murders carried out under the mandate of the theocracy (indeed, some had aided the Elves, even helping them escape to lands uncontrolled by the Hand), many of the Allfather's flock had participated in the pogroms with noteworthy enthusiasm.

And, unlike the Church of the Hand, Esu's servants had never been punished for their collusion with murderers and magicides. They were stronger and more numerous today than they had ever been. As the humans were, everywhere.

I need to decide, Hax thought nervously. And quickly, too.

While she debated, she stripped off her vest and tunic, and crawled out of her filthy, sweat-soaked undergarments. These latter items she discarded in a heap on the floor; they were unsalvageable, and she had purchased more than enough replacement articles.

She would have vastly preferred a bath, or even a quick swim in an icy mountain river. But time was working against her now. She had to be content with a wooden wash-basin and a pitcher of tepid water. At least there's soap, she thought, working the rough, gritty glob up into a stinging, foamy mess, and sponging gingerly at her skin, working around the rapidly-healing wounds.

There was no hope of washing her hair; that would have to wait. She twisted the grubby mass into a long rope down the middle of her back, securing it with leather thongs. Then, cleansed if not actually clean, she donned her new clothing.

She sighed contentedly as she fastened the last of the buttons and buckles. A bath and a change of clothing. Better salve for the soul than prayer, she thought happily.

That sentiment reminded her of the priestess again, and her newfound contentment disintegrated. I have to get out of here, she thought, worms of panic once again nibbling at the corners of her mind. Not tomorrow; tonight.

Now.

But how? She had been jesting with Breygon; she could not afford the time it would take to walk.

The ship? No, she recalled. It's going downstream, to the river forts and beyond. To Vejborg. Retracing her steps would be too dangerous. And she could not disappear on the river.

The woods? No. Swampland for miles. Dense forest, cliffs and valleys, rivers. And then the mountains. And winter coming on.

She had no choice. It was the road, and the road only went north. Qaramyn had been right. Which meant that she had to move fast.

Which meant that she needed a horse.

But there are no horses in town! she screamed to herself.

Of course there are, the Voice said softly, echoing through the empty halls of her mind.

Hax looked blankly at the cracked plaster wall. Then she smiled. Of course there were.

It would have to be later, after dark. Which meant that there was plenty of time for something else that she had to do. She reached into her saddlebags and removed her small packet of chamois-wrapped needles. Opening it, she extracted her vial of precious indigo ink.

After her lonely fight in the forest and the battle alongside Breygon and his troupe at the abandoned farmstead, Hax had considered adding to her collection of tattoos. She'd immediately rejected the notion. The marks, after all, were in some fashion a form of penance for the lives she took. Save for the two pair of crescents marking her face, above and below her left eye, the tattoos were visible symbols of her remorse. But she felt no compunction whatsoever at destroying the foul, unnatural creatures that had slain her mount and attacked her...friends? Is that what they were? she wondered.

In any event, what she had done was in no wise a crime against the Mother; it had been pure service, a mercy to the earth. The destruction of such abominations required no penance.

But there was another reason to commemorate meeting the half-elf and his comrades. It wasn't a conscious decision on her part, nor was it something that she did at the urging of the Voice. Not this time. It was an act more instinctive, more primal, that seemed to spring from some deep well of need within her soul.

She went to work, smiling softly, wincing only a little as she applied the needle to a bare patch on her right thigh, enjoying the focus, the concentration, as always. Oddly, instead of the twinge of expiation that she customarily experienced, this time she felt a slight quiver of pleasure as she laboured at her craft.

When she was finished, she blotted the blood carefully away, and checked her work as she always did. Two perfect half-moons, nested closely together, as always. One for me, she thought, her heart hammering; and one for...

She looked closer. Her needle must have slipped; a thin, almost invisible indigo line seemed to join the two curving shapes, the back of one to the belly of the other. She tried to rub it away, but it was there to stay.

She cursed softly. It was a foolish, embarrassing mishap, her first ever. She wondered what it meant, if indeed it meant anything other than a shaky hand. In any case, she would have to live with it.

As she repacked her kit, she thought about taking her leave of Breygon and the rest, and about what she had said to him. Was it true, she wondered? Would they meet again?

Best to simply ride out of their lives, she thought.

She did not want to leave it at that. Fortunately, her precious dye could serve different purposes. Drawing her dagger, she trimmed the tattered quill that lay alongside her fine needles, moistened the tip with her tongue, dipped it carefully into the deep blue ink, drew a scrap of parchment towards her, and began to write.

When she was done, she tucked pen and ink away. She folded the parchment into a small square, and thought again about her resolution. Biting her lip, she tugged her mother's battered silver ring from her finger and, before she could change her mind, dropped it into the paper pocket she had created.

She sealed the envelope with beeswax from the candle. That ought to make my damnable aunt happy, she thought angrily.

Half an hour later, just as the Lamps were rising, Hax was riding swiftly out of town, northbound on the Nordvej, heading for Ganesford, and Dolin's Pit, and Ellohyin, far upriver; and then Bitterberg, and the mountains, and beyond. She had looped strips of torn cloth through the bridle and girth-strap buckles of her mount's tack to keep them from jingling as the horse – a spirited, midnight mare – trotted along the night-brown strip of the high road.

She'd left the letter with the innkeeper, with instructions to deliver it to the half-elf the next day.

Hax hoped that Breygon would forgive her for stealing his horse.

♦♦♦

Chapter 3 ♦ Frideswide

Hax's journey up the Nordvej was tiring, but without incident. The road, well-maintained in the summer, was firm and wide, with sound, stone-arched bridges and regular towns. It seemed to unroll like a ribbon beneath her mount's hooves. The only denizens of the countryside she saw were the four-legged ones that populated the fields and vales, and the two-legged ones who tended to them. She rode alone, avoiding passersby, and keeping her hood up and her sword concealed beneath her cloak whenever she passed through a town. Outside of the cities, elves were not a common sight in Zare, and a maiden of the Third House – especially of the Duodeci, if there were anyone about astute enough to recognize her for what she was – alone, horsed and armed, would be unusual enough to excite comment. She wanted to avoid that.

She had no difficulties with her new steed. Breygon's mare took to her far more readily than its master had done, bearing Hax's lesser weight without complaint. In further contrast to the half-elf, it proved to be even-tempered, tranquil, and biddable. She found herself warming to the creature, and wished that she knew its name.

In the days following her brief sojourn with Breygon and his turma, she managed to avoid company. Neither Ganesford nor the mining town to the north of it – a dismal place with the charming name of 'Dolin's Pit' – had anything much to offer in the way of accommodations. Ellohyin, though, which she reached four days after leaving Bornhavn, was a different story. She arrived in the great city on the Stjerneflåde in the wee hours of the first day of Lastreap, the day that marked the end of summer and the beginning of autumn.

She slept a single night at a likely-looking establishment called 'The Shades of Shadizar'. This proved to be a poor choice of venue, as it seemed to come alive after dark, keeping her awake with loud music, revelry, and feminine squeals. Evidently there was more going on behind its many doors than a cursory inspection suggested. As a result, Hax left Ellohyin the following day, more exhausted than when she had arrived. She would have preferred to stay another night to recover her strength, but the possibility of snow in the mountain passes preyed increasingly on her mind. She bought a long cloak of thick brown fur from a merchant in the city's grote markt, replenished her supply of hard bread and cured meat, and pressed on.

Three days' hard riding brought her to Bitterberg, a little over two-score leagues north of Ellohyin. Originally named for the hops that grew in profusion on the hillsides about the city, the town's economy – as Breygon had recounted to her – had long since been overtaken by the mines that lined the hillsides, turning the settlement into a bastion of the northern iron market. Vast, low-sided barges plied the tributaries, poled downstream by sweating crewmen, loaded to the gunwales with ore. They were emptied swiftly, only to be towed back upstream – full of men, food, equipment and ale – by labouring teams of horses. The Stjerneflåde was wild and vicious here, fed by rivers and creeks descending from the Dragonspine Mountains. The whole of the city's commerce went downstream, to Ellohyin and beyond, even to Vejborg on the coast. There was no travelling the great river above Bitterberg.

It was a busy, bustling place, filled with all manner of denizens; the only requirement for admittance appeared to be a full purse, or failing that, a willingness to work. In addition to the ubiquitous humans, she saw dwarves, halflings, gnomes, and even a few elves. She also passed what could only have been an ogre, although she had never seen one in her life, and detoured widely around a filthy work crew consisting of unidentifiable creatures bearing fangs, fur, and foul expressions.

Hax did not linger in the city, although she did part with enough gold to buy a satchel full of biscuit, jerked meat and dried fruit. She tried the wine, grimaced, decided that it was unwise to trust the local vintage in a place that didn't grow grapes, and settled for a couple of corked bottles of distilled spirit. It was lighter than ale, and she could always mix it with water. And it could do double duty for medical purposes.

The next day she struck out for the Whitestone Pass, setting a stiff pace. There had been a decided nip in the air when she rose, and as she cantered past the fields, she saw that they were full of labourers, getting in the last of the hay before the first frosts struck. The axes of woodsmen rang, and she passed many barns packed with lowing, panicked kine, as the people slaughtered, dressed, smoked and salted the meat that would see them through another Bjerglands winter.

She dug her heels into the flanks of her mount. She had no intention of letting the snow find her still climbing the pass. Breygon's horse, at least, seemed to be up to the challenge, and responded to her proddings with good humour. She was going to have to give it a name.

The transit of the pass was easier than she had expected. The weather cooled considerably as she mounted the flanks of the mountain, but the skies stayed clear. A few brief bursts of chill rain ensured that she stayed damp and miserable, but it wasn't enough to soften the road. She spent the final day of Lastreap in a cliff-side hostel perched precariously at the apex of the pass, paying a pretty penny for rough fare and a simple cot. She was glad to do so; although the snow had not yet begun, the wind was high and bitter. And the fire allowed her to dry her clothes.

She started down the north side of the pass the following morning, spending a miserable night huddling in her damp fur cloak beneath a rude shelter of hacked-down evergreen branches, and reached the borders of Dunholm in the first week of Ars-Waning.

Her first contact with that bucolic land was Menyra. Like Bitterberg, it was a mountain town very much defined by its key exports – in this case, timber and pitch. Vast pine forests covered the north-facing slopes of the Dragonspine Mountains, and Menyra supported the loggers who limbed and felled the trees, and either rolled them down the hills or rafted them down the rivers for rendering in the giant fieldstone ovens south of the city.

The rising smoke blanketed the place like a permanent, putrescent fog bank. Hax rode through the unpaved streets quickly, eyes streaming, one of her precious bandages bound tightly over mouth and nose. Happily, the northern, downhill side of the city boasted cleaner air and better roads. Her nostrils thereafter went unassaulted, except by the occasional caravan carrying wagonloads of oozing pitch barrels downhill to the trading ports on the Broadwater.

She reached the largest of these port towns, Rolling River, a few days after leaving Menyra. The place had a whimsical look about it. It had been built half on piles driven into the river bed, and half in the rolling hills surrounding the water. Men and Halflings, sons of Esu and Nosa, seemed to occupy it in equal numbers, chaffering, gambling, drinking, working, singing or just chatting amicably on street-corners. In contrast to the busy (if noisome) industry of Menyra, an air of casual sloth seemed to pervade the place. Hax suspected that a great deal of bustle lay behind that facade, and that at least some of activity that appeared purposeless must have been productive. The ostentatious character of the inhabitants' clothing and the brightly-painted facades of the businesses seemed to indicate a certain amount of comfort, if not outright wealth.

Hax found that she was receiving an undesirable amount of attention, and soon realized why. She hadn't seen another scion of the Third House since leaving Bitterberg. Evidently, her folk were few and far between in this northern valley kingdom.

Upon noticing this, she raised her hood, and kept it up.

Desperate for somewhere warm and dry to sleep, Hax stayed overnight in a riverside hostel called 'The Harriers'. Once again, this proved an unwise choice. The establishment was evidently the favoured watering-hole for the lowbrow celebrants of Rolling River, and had shaken noisily and mercilessly until the wee hours of the morning, exuding the clangour of unskilled but enthusiastic music, the thunder of dancing, and raucous, drunken shouts for "More ale!"

I suppose I'm destined to lie in ditches if I want to get any sleep, she sighed. She made a mental note to avoid all such places in the future.

Three days later found her a hundred leagues upriver, searching for an appropriately-sized inn in the city of Greatwaters, the halfling capital of Dunholm. The proportion of Halpinya in this place was much higher than in Rolling River; there were few humans to be seen, and no elves of any description. The occasional gnome mixed freely with the crowds, though, and she saw the odd dwarf here and there. She thought they were hill dwarves, although she wasn't sufficiently acquainted with the Dweorga to be certain.

Taken altogether, apart from the absence of any of her own kin, it was one of the most cosmopolitan places she had ever seen. Indeed, she thought – just for a moment – that she saw what she would have sworn was one of the fey folk. She hadn't seen any of that rare, exquisitely shy breed since her last trek through the deep, ancient forests of Eldisle.

The halflings proved something of a challenge. They clustered fearlessly around her mount's stamping hooves, dodging, weaving and courting death as they presented a profusion of goods for her inspection. Had she been riding Torris instead of Breygon's far more sedate mare, she would have quickly been surrounded by blood-soaked sod and pathetic, trampled bodies. Her new steed, however, bore the distraction with nothing more than an irritated flaring of her nostrils. Hax was certain that her own expression was something similar.

She had to admit that the array of goods was impressive: woven carpets, brightly-coloured clothing (all of it clearly too small for her), hats, belts, boots, silver cutlery, earthenware teapots, horn combs, pewter tankards, tiny pocket knives...the list was all but endless. She felt as though she had stumbled into a flock of miniature merchants.

Hax tried to wave them away politely, but this proved a futile gesture given the persistence of the small folk. Eventually she gave up, spurring her mount and continuing down the street at a quick trot, praying that Breygon's horse was compassionate and dextrous enough to avoid the scampering mass of salesmen.

As it turned out, she needn't have worried. The Halpinya were apparently used to big folk trying to ride them down, and danced nimbly out of her way. They heckled her mercilessly in at least six different languages as she cantered off.

Night was falling, and she was beginning to despair of finding an inn that she could stand up in. Rather than risk another unpleasant night out-of-doors, Hax reined in at a suitably-sized tavern at the western edge of the town – the 'Pickens Hovel', a low, robust establishment built entirely of close-fitted fieldstone, and sporting a weather-beaten sign that bore crossed mining implements and a legend in the – to her eyes – indecipherable dwarven script. The lintel of the door was precisely at the same level as her forehead, but it would have to do. It was a good foot higher than the ceiling of every other place she had thus far tried.

She entered, blinking against the sooty lamplight, and sought out the proprietor. This worthy, an obvious hill dwarf with an eye-patch and a leather jerkin stained with smoke and bacon grease in equal proportions, introduced himself as one Gareth Pickens. Eyeing Hax carefully as she approached, he reached for something concealed under the bar. Then he seemed to think better of it, and placed his hands carefully on the scarred wooden surface before him. Hax smiled broadly, taking his wary regard as a compliment.

When she inquired about a room, he snorted derisively, pointing towards the hearth, where three shapes – dwarves, by the look of them – were already huddled in blankets, snoring like a trio of bellows. Hax nodded resignedly, and tossed Pickens a handful of copper. This bought her a filling and surprisingly tasty dinner (if over-salted; the dwarves, she recalled Sylloallen telling her once, over-salted everything), a mug of ale that she was quite unable to finish, and a blanket that was, if ragged, at least clean. This she folded carefully into a make-shift mattress, covering herself with her own blankets. Her saddlebags she placed under her head, with her bow and sword by her side. Between a hard floor, a smoky fire and snoring Dwarves, Hax expected to lay awake most of the night.

She was asleep within minutes.

♦

Ally's mother was none too happy with her daughter's new career. As soon as she learned that Sylloallen had returned with the girl from the Dræywood, she summoned them both for an immediate and thorough dressing down.

That, she realized the moment the miscreants entered her exquisitely-appointed and scrupulously clean day room, was an error of judgement. When the bedraggled pair were admitted by a handmaiden (who prudently fled, closing the door firmly behind her), all that Alrykkian could do was goggle at them in disbelief.

The warrior and the girl had spent five nights in the forest. Although they had managed to find a mountain stream in which to bathe, they remained filthy beyond description. Sylloallen was still clad in his everyday garb, but now, instead of being barely-suitable attire for the palace, his tunic, shirt and cloak were fit only for the ash heap. The right leg of his breeches was blood-soaked and torn high on the thigh; dirty white cloth, stained with more blood, showed underneath. His boots were scuffed and worn, and the left one was missing a heel; and there was a glaring, painful-looking contusion under his right eye.

The girl, however, looked far, far worse. Rykki was hard-pressed to recognize her daughter at all in the filthy, grime-encrusted guttersnipe that stood before her. The girl's hair was smutty and tatted, and the whole sodden, mud-caked mess had been tied back with what looked like either a piece of vine or a boot-lace. She was wearing – over the rags of what had once been a costly gown – a motley collection of what appeared to be uncured hides, and she was unshod. Her bare legs were criss-crossed with cuts and scrapes, and there were dark circles etched under her eyes. Her arms were bare, and a cut on her left bicep was bleeding sluggishly.

The duchess took a deep breath to calm herself. That, too, proved to be a mistake; the pair stank like the castle midden on a summer afternoon, and her inhalation quickly became a gagging cough.

The girl looked worriedly up at her mentor.

Sylloallen made a calming gesture. "Your Grace," he began, "Let me explain. The duke..."

"Bother the Duke," Alrykkian cut him off. 'Bother' was not the term she used. "You're rusting, Syllo. And what on earth happened to your eye?"

The knight glanced down at his mailshirt, and winced; sure enough, the fine links were beginning to turn an angry orange. "My lady, your lord husband –"

"I'll deal with 'my lord husband' later," she snapped. "And you, too. For now, go take a bath. And do something about that ridiculous bruise," she added waspishly, with a wave of her fingers near her own eye. "I thought you fellows were able to manage with that sort of thing."

Turning to her daughter, she said incredulously, "Are you naked under all that...that...mess?"

"Not entirely, mother," the girl replied, exhaustion helping her to remain calm under her mother's withering gaze. "Sylloallen took a bad goring from a boar. We needed some cloth for bandages." She glanced down at the mangled remains of her undergarments, intermittently visible through the grisly layers of hides. "This was the best I could do."

"Why didn't you use his shirt instead?" Rykki asked, pointing at Sylloallen.

"He was unavailable for consultation," the girl replied through clenched teeth.

Her mother glared. "Your tone isn't helping your case, daughter mine." She turned back to the warrior. "You couldn't have just healed yourself?"

Sylloallen shrugged. "I was unconscious, my lady. Besides, what would she have learned from that?"

"Possibly that you're not completely insane," Rykki fumed. "Unlike 'my lord husband'." She jerked a thumb at the door. "Get out."

"I'd rather he stayed," Ally interjected.

"Thou, daughter," her mother said frostily, "may hold thy tongue." She gave the girl a chilling glance that promised punishments galore. "And give him back his sword."

"It's her sword, now," Sylloallen said quietly.

"Why, my dear friend," the duchess snapped, an ominous note creeping into her voice, "are you still here?" 'Dear friend' was not the term she used, either.

Ally glanced over her shoulder at the hilt of the aulensis that Syllo had given her. She'd used part of the hide from the first deer they'd killed to fashion a rough baldric. It had taken a great deal of finicky work with a sharp stone to get it right, but she was proud of the result; the heel of the scabbard for the enormous weapon barely cleared the floor, but she was now able to carry it without difficulty. Still chafes my shoulder, though, she thought tiredly.

"Ab venerabundus, domina," Sylloallen was saying quietly, "but she is my pupil now. She comes or goes at my will. Not yours."

Alrykkian's eyes went flat. Ally knew something of her mother's power; if the hair on the back of her neck had not been so badly matted with filth, it would have stood stiffly upwards. "I sincerely hope," the Duchess hissed, "that you're not thinking of invoking legal precedent where o...where my daughter is concerned."

Sylloallen smiled narrowly, wincing as the expression split his cracked lips. "I would not presume to quote the Codex Diorcan to one of your ancestry," he replied respectfully. "You know the law as well as I, I'm sure, my lady."

Frowning, Alrykkian drummed her fingers on her desk. "Nicely done," she said at last. It was not a compliment. "You have my leave to withdraw. I'll sort this abomination out with my husband when he returns." Turning her gaze on Ally, she added, "Go get cleaned up. See the leech and have those cuts attended to. Especially your shoulder," she added, eyeing the wound in Ally's upper arm. "And get rid of that sword."

Ally thought about the past five days – all of the things that she had endured, and all of the things that she had learned. She thought of the terror that had flooded through her when Syllo had taken a goring. She'd managed to kill the boar, but she'd been left alone to deal with the gaping wound in his leg. Her frantic struggles to stop the bleeding haunted her nightmares. In her mind, her master had already died a hundred times.

Against that, she weighed her mother's abiding love for her daughters, her insistence that they attend the Collegium, her hopes for their future...and the deliberate insult to Sylloallen. My Master, she realized suddenly. Her mother's peremptory command had been a direct challenge to his authority.

As was Alrykkian's command that Ally surrender her sword.

Although she was certain that he did not speak, she seemed to hear Sylloallen's voice inside her head. What are you going to do about it?

Ally lifted her makeshift, putrefying deerhide baldric over her head and balanced the heavy weapon in both hands. She saw the beginnings of a triumphal smile lift the corner of her mother's mouth. That was enough to decide her.

She stripped the scabbard from the blade – the blade that she had, every night after the first, rubbed carefully with raw, stinking animal fat to protect it from rust. Grunting slightly at the effort required, and ignoring the agonized screaming of her overworked muscles, she faced her mother and swung the weapon into the two-handed accinxi stance that Syllo had taught her.

"Take it," she said calmly.

The Duchess' eyes went hard, flinty...and a burst of hearty laughter filled the room. And the sound of clapping.

Ally looked around; Sylloallen was standing cross-armed, his mouth closed, trying to ascertain the source of the chortling as well.

"Kumota näkymättömyys." A figure faded slowly into view behind Alrykkian's chair. It was Ally's father. He was applauding lightly, a broad smile on his face.

Sylloallen bowed deep. Ally was far too surprised to curtsey. And, frankly, she was unsure how to do so when holding a two-handed sword, and wearing nothing but half a shift and a motley collection of uncured animal hides.

Still chuckling, Kaltas stepped forward and laid a gentle hand on his lifemate's shoulder.

"I suppose you're pleased with yourself," Alrykkian snorted angrily, glancing up at him.

The Duke nodded. "I knew you had it in you," he said to his daughter, who was still staring at him in shocked surprise. He turned to Sylloallen. "And I knew you could get it out."

The warrior smiled, wincing, and bowed again.

"By the way, what did happen to your eye?" the Duke asked, smiling as though he already knew the answer.

Sylloallen smiled. "Your...my student," he corrected himself, "managed to slip past my guard."

"With what? Her fist?"

"Tree branch," the warrior admitted ruefully. "It was a big one," he added defensively when Kaltas burst into renewed laughter.

The Duke nodded happily. "I told you she showed promise."

"I never doubted it, my lord."

"You're going to continue with this farce?" the Duchess demanded angrily.

Ally's father leaned down and kissed his wife gently on the top of her head. "Would you rather she end up at the Starhall," he asked, "jesting and riding, dancing and flirting, whiling away her days and nights with your sister, and the rest of the noble-born braggarts, sots and whores?"

"Kaltas!" she hissed, glancing at Ally, whose eyes had widened remarkably.

The Duke shrugged. "It's the way the world is," he said. "If we don't tell her, he'll have to." He gestured at Sylloallen. "It's his duty, as praeceptor, to prepare her to face the world. In every way. Nec est?" He added, smiling wryly at his friend.

"Praedixit," Sylloallen agreed. "Sire," he continued plaintively, "may I withdraw? As your lady wife rightly points out, I am in sore need of a bath. And a change of clothing. And a moment to beg the Protector to do something about my student's handiwork." He smiled, indicating the blue-black splotch under his eye. "And I could use a drink."

"Of course, Sy," Kaltas laughed. "And take your pupil with you."

The warrior bowed, and Ally, still bemused with exhaustion, and thoroughly flabbergasted at the turn of events, imitated him. They left together.

As they neared the door, Kaltas called out, "Discipulus!"

Ally realized that he was speaking to her, and turned back. "Yes, father?" she asked.

"Treasure that blade," the Duke said, his face serious. "Don't ever let me catch you without it."

"No, father," she replied. She closed the door behind her.

In the hallway outside her mother's chamber, Ally paused, smiling. Sylloallen noticed her expression. "Something funny?" he asked.

"No," she replied. Then she nodded. "Well, actually, yes. 'Don't ever let me catch you without it'."

"What's funny about that?" the warrior asked.

"It's the same thing you told me."

Sylloallen laughed. "Of course it is." He strode off down the corridor, limping slightly as he favoured his wounded leg. "That's what your father told me, a couple of centuries ago. Who do you think gave me that sword in the first place?"

♦

At dawn, Pickens himself provided a wake-up service: a nudge, none too gentle, with the toe of his grimy boot.

Hax stirred, sitting up just in time to avoid a second kick. Stiff and cramped, she looked around for a servant of some sort, but saw only the proprietor himself. No one else was in evidence except for the other groaning sleepers who were clustered around the fireplace. She saw that there were now half a dozen ranged alongside her, all of them dwarves, and surmised that more patrons must have joined her in the night.

She stumbled out into the early morning mist, found the pump, drew a bucket of icy water, and plunged her head into it. When the water was still again, she regarded her reflection soberly. Her hair was a total loss. If I have to go much longer without washing it, she mused wryly, I'll be better off shaving my head. Wringing the damp, greasy mass, she twisted it into a rough horsetail and tied it off with a hank of rawhide. She tried not to think too hard about how she smelt, or the deplorable state of her smallclothes. No more hope of a hot bath now; she was heading into the uplands. Greatwaters had been her last chance.

When she returned to the tavern, she found Pickens awake and serving breakfast. She avoided the bacon, knowing that it would be inedibly salty, and accepted half a loaf of hot bread, a pat of butter, and a pot of honey. This proved to be a better meal than she had had in some time. She was pleasantly surprised when Pickens, with a surreptitious wink, offered her berry tea rather than small beer, and emptied several cups gratefully.

In the midst of her repast, a low, guttural voice startled her. "Heading up-country?"

Hax turned and saw a pair of hill dwarves regarding her with interest. The man was dressed soberly, in travel-stained woollens and leathers, with a knife and short sword at his belt; the woman looked a little better off, wearing robes of some sort, well-worn, but well-made. Both had plaited their hair and knotted it at the napes of their necks; the man's beard had been similarly treated, and was festooned with small ringlets and beads.

She was glad they spoke the travelling tongue, as she knew only the merest smattering of dwarven words. "Why?" she asked around a mouthful, reaching for her cup.

"Saw you last night, coming up from Rolling River," the man replied, frowning. "Look like you're going far and fast. Thought you might like company."

The dwarf-woman shot him an annoyed glance. "What he means," she said, in a voice nearly as deep, but a lot more mellifluous, "is that we're heading up-country ourselves, to Eastgate and home. And that, if you're going the same way, we wouldn't mind passing the Feywood in the company of one of your...of an elf."

Trust them.

Hax started slightly. She hadn't heard the Voice since leaving Breygon and the others at Bornhavn. Shrugging, she nodded. "I'm leaving after breakfast," she replied. "Meet me outside in a quarter-candle."

The male dwarf looked confused. "In a what?"

"Half an hour," the dwarf-woman muttered to her companion. To Hax, she said, "Good. We'll be there with our cart."

As they turned to leave, the elf stopped them with a gesture. "I'm riding fast," Hax warned. "If you can't match my pace, we're quits."

The man snorted, and the woman elbowed him into silence. "I'm sure we'll be fine, ducks," she said soothingly. She seemed to hesitate for a moment, then added, "I'm Frideswide Balwyf, by the way. And this is my husband, Wynstan Carrlárdan."

Hax nodded. "Any relation to the poet?" she asked, gnawing on the heel of her loaf.

The man's eyes widened, and the woman nodded happily. "Great-grandson," she said. She elbowed her mate a third time, eliciting a wince. "See?" she said brightly, "I knew she was good luck."

A quarter-candle later, Hax stood outside the Pickens Hovel, staring at the dwarves' conveyance and blinking in surprise. The thing – which looked like a large horse-cart combined with a ship's wheel and what appeared to be an enormous whisky still constructed of highly-polished, green-tinged metal – stood next to the pump. The man – Wynstan, she reminded herself – was working the pump-handle, filling buckets which he then handed up to another male dwarf, who stood in the cart-bed. This latter worthy, whom she did not recognize, was hoisting the buckets over his head and emptying them carefully into a pair of tall wooden barrels ranged alongside the metal tub.

Wynstan looked up. "All ready, then?" he growled.

Hax stared at the contraption in astonishment, and didn't answer for a moment. Then she said simply, "I need to get my horse," and walked around to the rear of the tavern, wondering what she had just seen.

The story emerged, in fits and starts, during the first half-hour of their journey. The odd-looking wagon was in fact a 'horse-less coach', and the unfamiliar dwarf – whose name, it transpired, was Uchtred Fladingann ("Flatfingers", the fellow explained helpfully) – was both its creator, and its pilot.

The contraption rattled softly over the ruts of the uplands highway, emitting a slight hiss every now and then. After shying several times, Hax's horse eventually got used to it, and trotted easily alongside it.

"Got the idea from the gnomes," Uchtred explained happily. His voice was just as gravelly as Wynstan's, but he was a good deal more cheerful – and surprisingly voluble. "Saw one of their fire-carts down in Néahéah," he went on. "Ingenious –" this elicited a snort from Wynstan "– but inelegant. Had to stoke it, and even with charcoal, it took'em forever to get up a head of steam. Bad planning, especially for an emergency vehicle. This beauty," he gestured at the boiler, "stays hot year-round."

"I don't see any wood," Hax said. "Or firestone." From her saddle, she could look down into the conveyance. It was piled high with satchels, bags, packs and twine-wrapped parcels. Nothing else.

"Hah!" This from the woman, Frideswide. "No, no fuel at all, my dear. Dwarven ingenuity." She tapped her temple with one thick finger. "And a little help from the Stoneteacher."

Hax smiled. "Would you care to explain that?"

"The mystical might of the master of the mountains," the Dwarf-woman replied primly.

The elf-girl nodded. "Bound elemental?" It wasn't unknown. Kalestayne had told her about...

"What?" the Dwarf-woman expostulated, looking shocked. "Of course not! That would be unconscionable!"

Hax frowned. "Why?"

"It's the same thing as slavery, dearie," Frideswide replied, her tone reproving. "They're living, thinking creatures."

"Living, thinking, stupid creatures," Hax corrected. "Most are no smarter than my horse, here. And I have no qualms about riding him."

"But he's not likely to incinerate you if you annoy him," Frideswide responded, waving an admonitory finger. "Besides, if lack of brains were all it took, I'd have this one in a yoke in a heartbeat." She elbowed Wynstan in the ribs. He grunted a protest. "Anyway, we found a different way. Uchtred's idea and forge-work; and my master's power."

"So?" Hax asked, her curiosity overwhelming her customary taciturnity. "How'd'ye do it?"

"Spell research," Frideswide replied smugly. Leaning over in her seat on the buckboard, she reached back, grasped a handle, and pulled. A thick brass door near the base of the 'still' swung open with a creak. Even from where she sat, Hax could feel a blast of heat on her face, as thought the woman had opened a furnace. But oddly, there was no light emanating from the tiny enclosure.

"That's the boiler," the Dwarf-woman continued. "Steam drives an arm that turns a crankshaft, spinning the back wheels. So long as we keep the boiler topped up, we can run forever." She smiled happily. "Uchtred rigged up the gears. We can even go backwards."

"It's not recommended, though," Uchtred grunted. "Too hard to steer."

Hax tugged at her chin, perplexed. "It's not the steering that interests me," she said, wondering. "It's the heat. Where did you get it? What spell did you use? And how did you make it permanent?"

"Áwunigende æledfyr," Frideswide replied. "Umm, that would be 'eternal fire', in the travelling tongue."

Hax raised an eyebrow. Kalestayne had taught her about that one. "That produces light, not heat," she said, surprised. "How in the world did you coax fire out of it?"

"Just tweaked it a little," Uchtred interjected. "Artificer wizard back home gave her a hand. Tuned it like a lute. This version produces heat, but no light."

"I call it Sceadál," the Dwarf-woman said proudly. "Shadefire. It's become pretty popular back home. Easy enough for divine casters, like myself."

Wynstan grunted agreement. "Yup. Great for heating a room at night, for example. Good for cooking, too."

"You'll put the firestone miners out of business," Hax remarked, saying the first thing that popped into her head.

"Not likely," Frideswide snorted. "It's a pretty expensive thing to rig up. Took nearly two thousand doubleweights worth of components to enchant the burner for this cart. That's on top of five thousand doubles to build it. Horses and firestone are still a lot cheaper."

"Plus, if you run out of water, ye're stuck," Uchtred added.

Hax chuckled, shaking her head. "It's very impressive nonetheless."

"Oh, aye," Wynstan growled. "King liked the spell so much he put heaters and stove-burners all throughout the Thrymgaard Palace. Made us a pretty penny. Won the little woman a medal, too."

"That's why we're in business now," Frideswide commented happily.

"Still," Hax said thoughtfully, "a horse would be a lot faster."

Uchtred barked a laugh. "Think so?" Reaching down, he grasped an iron wheel protruding from the floor and gave it a couple of rapid turns. The copper boiler hissed alarmingly, and a cloud of steam burst from the valves atop it. Hax's horse shuddered sideways, spooked by the sudden noise, and she struggled to control it.

With a clanking rattle, the cart accelerated rapidly, bouncing and careening over the cobblestones. As Hax watched it recede into the distance, she heard Uchtred's laughter billow out over the noise of its passage. "I thought you were riding fast?" he chortled.

"Slow down, ye fool!" Frideswide shouted, clutching frantically at the seat edge.

Hax sighed, and put the spurs to her mount.

♦

For the most part, the dwarves kept their rolling speed down to an easy trot out of consideration for her mare. Hax rode to the right of the cart, letting the creature enjoy the thick grass that lay beside the roadbed. This position also allowed her to indulge in increasingly lengthy conversations with Frideswide. It was during one of these that the woman – she was a priestess of Khallach, one of the four Dwarf-Lords, and the god of the mountains, whom the dwarves also called Carrláréow, the Stoneteacher – expounded at some length upon the ancient subject of elf-dwarf enmity.

" 'The Digger's Cup'," the priestess said with a contemptuous snort. "Delferelíthr. The only earthly relic of the Forgemaster, save for the stone at the First Forge itself. And that's what the humans call it. 'The Digger's Cup'. I ask you!"

"Aye," Hax muttered in agreement. Then she smiled at herself; a few hours in dwarven company, and she was already repeating their colloquialisms. "But what is it?"

"It was the bride-gift of Lagu to his eldest sister," Frideswide replied, looking surprised. "Surely you know of it?" She elbowed Wynstan in the ribs again. "Hear you that, heya? She's never heard of the Cup!"

Uchtred cleared his throat ostentatiously, and intoned:

Eldest the cup that the Delver made

To give to the Mother of light and shade;

Ruby the lips that touched the brim

As she clove to a mortal's immortal whim;

So fill it with water and drink it down,

And your soul will exalt, and you'll wear a crown.

"You're full of surprises, aren't you?" Wynstan grumbled.

"Some of us paid attention in school," Uchtred replied primly, his prodigious nose high in the air.

"That's human doggerel," Frida sniffed. "More likely you got it in a taphouse."

Hax was tremendously confused by all of this. "I've never heard that verse," she admitted. "What's it about?"

"It's about the treasures of the elves," Uchtred said, shrugging. "No idea who wrote it. Remind me sometime, and I'll recite the whole thing for you, if I can remember it all."

"I imagine they'd keep quiet about that stanza, 'mong your folk," Wynstan muttered.

"Very quiet," Frida emphasized.

"I'm sorry," Hax said carefully. They were both clearly agitated. Wynstan was doing his best to hide it, but his wife was giving full vent to her indignation. "I simply don't know what you're referring to."

"Your people, dearie," Frideswide said archly. "The Third House of the Elves was spawned when the holy mother," (here she made a fist, raised it first to her lips, and then to the sky), "took a mate from among the firstborn of the Haradi."

"I know that," Hax said.

"Ciarloth," Wynstan interjected absently, his eyes on the trail before them.

"Ciarloth, aye," Frida agreed, eyeing her husband. "No accounting for taste. Any road, when they were wed, they asked Lagu, who, though the youngest of the Seven, had always been the most honourable and forthright of the Powers of Light, to bless their union. So he did, and he offered them a health; and to help them drink it, he reached into the earth, and from it pulled a wine-cup, with a bowl of stone, and a base of purest silver."

"Bræa called for wine..." Wynstan began.

"...called for wine, aye," Frida interrupted, elbowing her husband into silence again. "But mighty Lagu, he said no to that. He said that for the health of their line ever after, they should drink only the blood of the earth from his cup. And so he dipped it into a spring, and gave it to holy Bræa," (fist, lips, sky) "to drink; and she drank; and her power passed into the cup.

"And from that cup," the priestess continued, now fully submerged in her sermon, "charged with the might of Lagu, and of the Lightbringer, and of the earth, Ciarloth drank also; and so he became, even if only briefly, as one of the powers. And while so endowed, he and holy Bræa," (fist, lips, sky) "enjoyed their wedding night; and thereafter did she give birth to the first of her children, and to others after, and they went on to found the Houses of Harad."

She paused, took a breath, and added, "And that is the tale of the Delferelíthr – the 'Digger's Cup'."

"Gifan néodlof!" Uchtred said loudly.

"Æt néodlof!" the priestess and Wynstan intoned together.

Hax had no idea what they were talking about. She rode in silence for a number of minutes, surprised by this unexpected display of piety.

She had never met many dwarves; Eldisle was so far off the main trade routes, and so far from the dwarven homelands that, prior to her present journey, she had only ever seen them infrequently, in ones and twos, here and there about the duchy. In the palace, there had been only those who had come to serve her father, usually in some technical capacity, and never for long. And those few that she had spoken to had been reticent to the point of taciturnity. Nor had any of them made mention of their theological proclivities; apparently, they had accommodated themselves to the largely secular, non-demonstrative observances of Elvehelm.

Or, the group she had fallen among now were some sort of missionaries. That was also possible.

"So now you know," Frideswide said happily after another few moments.

" 'Gecythig helfan níthplega es'," Ucthred chimed in.

Hax shot him a querulous glance.

"Old dwarven proverb," he shrugged. " 'Knowledge is the greater part of any struggle'."

She nodded. "That one I've heard. The Ekhani knights say something similar: 'Knowing is half the battle'."

"Say heya," Wynstan grunted.

Hax waited for him to say something else, but he had lapsed into stony silence again. "So," she asked a moment later, "why is this Cup so important? I mean, apart from its obvious religious significance," she added quickly.

"Because you stole it, dearie," Frideswide said complacently.

Hax swallowed and coughed simultaneously, choking harshly. Frida glanced over at her in alarm. "Do you need some water?" she asked, concerned.

Hax shook her head, gradually regaining control of herself. "How did you know?" she whispered, alarmed.

"How did I..." the priestess asked, incredulous. "Cildic, the theft of the Cup is taught to our schoolchildren. We call it – beggin' your pardon, of course – 'fácen numoléarede'. 'The Treason of the Sharp-Ears'." She shrugged as if embarrassed. "The young ones grow up learning about it."

"Stupid, that," Wynstan growled. "What's past is past. Thousands of years of bad blood, to what end?"

"Excuse me," Hax said. She was becoming exasperated. "I still don't understand what you're talking about."

"Lagu's cup," Frideswide replied patiently, as though she were speaking to an addled child. "The Stoneteacher made it to toast Bræa's wedding; but Bræa's offspring claimed it was a betrothal gift, and never returned it, as by rights they should have done. When the priests of the Dwarf-Lords sought its return centuries later, Tior – for by then, he sat atop the Filigree Throne, and Bræa had passed into obscurity, mourning her lost mate – Tior, that you call the Mighty, laughed at them, and sent them packing."

"That hardly seems fair," Hax said, as neutrally as possible. She was relieved that they were talking about ancient history rather than her recent adventures in the High Queen's garden.

Then she thought about what lay, wrapped carefully in a towel, in her pack...and her blood suddenly ran cold. She closed her mouth with a snap. What if...

By Holy Miros, what have I done?

More importantly, what would the Dwarves say if they knew about it? And what would they do?

"Fair, aye," grumbled Wynstan. "Not much of that going 'round back then. Nor since."

"As you said," his wife responded archly, "it's in the past. The Cup has become part of the regalia of the Third House, and is guarded as jealously as Tior's star-crown. It hasn't been out of the Starmeadow vaults since Ælyndarka took the throne hundreds of years since. No?" she added, glancing over at Hax.

The elf-girl's blood ran cold again. "Not to my knowledge," Hax replied, feeling goose flesh crawl up her neck.

"Well and good," the priestess said contentedly. " 'Tis said there are many things in the elf-queen's treasure chests that are best left undisturbed. Belike we're better off with that bauble staying where it has lain for four ages of the earth."

"Belike," Wynstan grunted. "Who knows what those fool priests at the First Forge might do with it, if it fell into their hands again?"

What indeed? Hax thought to herself.

Why had she never even thought to cast a divination on the damned thing? And now, to be carrying it blithely towards the Deeprealm...

This is what comes, she thought angrily, of acting on instinct instead of using my head.

Somewhere, Sylloallen had to be laughing at her.

♦

As it happened, the three dwarves had reason beyond simple conversation to be grateful for their spur-of-the-moment decision to invite an unknown elf-girl on their journey.

Above Greatwaters, the countryside grew progressively wilder. The Halpinya villages hugged the lakeshore, with fields cleared back to the thick forests of oak, ash and maple that tumbled out of the mountains like a spilled basket of greenery. The lakeshore road was firm, but hardly wide, at least by the standards of the dwarves' fire-cart. Whenever they met another conveyance, Wynstan generally pulled off to one side and let it pass. Hax smiled the first time this happened, seeing a soft spot in the gruff fellow's character; it would be a lot harder for one of the little folk to extricate a mud-stuck pony-cart than for the dwarves to dig their spell-powered contraption out of the mire. On the third such occasion, he caught sight of her grin and muttered something profane and unintelligible. His outburst shocked a genuine laugh from her, her first in many weeks.

Three days after leaving the Pickens' Hovel, the quartet passed the last halfling house at the head of the Broadwater, and entered the hilly region that the residents of Dunholm called 'the up-country'. This was a wilder but still pleasant land of gentle, rolling hills, smalls copses, and mist-filled dells. The mountains were all around them, now; the sharp, jagged peaks of the Dragonspine Range to the south, the older, blunter-looking ridge of the Dunholm Range to the north – and to the west, silhouetted each morning by the rising of the Lantern, the heavy, snow-capped spires of the Dwéorgahéahbéorgr. Despite much coaching from Frida, Hax proved quite unable to wrap her tongue around the dwarven term, and the priestess had to content herself with referring to the mountains by their customary appellation – the Deeprealm Range.

It was toward these lofty peaks that Uchtred directed the fire-coach, rolling from morning until evening. They grew ever more imposing as the tiny group drew nearer to their foothills.

The road continued, over knolls and through vales, trending generally westwards, meandering from north to south as it followed the contours of the landscape. Each morning saw more mist in the hollows; a thick, deep blanket of white, impenetrable as fluffy cotton, and cold and clinging as a damp shroud, until the Lantern rose above the western mountaintops and melted it away. The road itself was still firm, but it was becoming increasingly difficult to find. Well-set, well-worn cobblestones still showed through the hummocks here and there, and now and then Hax saw the remnants of stone walls against the greenery: abandoned farmsteads, old buildings, even the tumble-down wreck of an ancient watchtower. The sight made her shiver slightly. The mountains in Zaran Bjerglands had been desolate – but at least the marks of the Kindred were recent there. They felt alive. These lands felt long-abandoned, and dead.

She mentioned her impression to Frideswide, who nodded. "Naught but the little folk here now, sure," she said. "But in time long past, before the Gloaming, Dunholm was one of the kingdoms of the Empire of Esud. Great fields of wheat, as far as eyes could see; cities of stone, and mighty war towers; and armies, always armies, clad with iron, shod with iron, armed with iron, and plumes all waving in the sunlight."

"None of our legends speak of this," Hax objected. "The tales of the Third House from the Age of Wisdom..."

Frida waved her hand impatiently. "The 'tales of the Third House'," she snorted. "The elves were mighty warriors, and wielders of the flux, aye; and they had the friendship of dragons. They were great writers, too. I've read your Ceorlinus, child. Have you noticed that history belongs to those who leave behind the most books?"

The priestess smiled wryly. "And who lend such books freely to their neighbours. Most of the history of the Age of Wisdom," she continued primly, "was written by elves, and so it concerns the elves, and them alone. But our own history is as deep and rich; the dwarves were not idle during those days. While Tior was reading the stars, we were burrowing deep into the earth, carving a kingdom out of stone. And men were busy, too, hacking empires out of the wilderness, usually at the point of a sword.

"When the Age of Wisdom began, dearie, the elves were supreme; and under their wizard-kings, they became greater still. But all of that ended in the Gloaming. Your houses fell, but the dwarves were unscathed. Men, too, endured. The sons of Esu stood with Yarchian at Oldarran Field, true enough; and for every elf that died there, three men died also. Do your tales mention that?

"O' course," she went on pensively, "by that time, men outnumbered your folk by a score to one. And so while the Third House lost eight out of ten of its warriors that day, to the sons of Esu, it was merely another defeat. A bad one, to be sure, but not a catastrophe. And after the Gloaming came the Eon of Darkness – another name chosen by the elves, who had suffered so much. But to many of the kingdoms of men, untouched by war, it was a time of glory, and greatness, and the building of nations. The Powers retreated, yes, all save Ekhalra, the Dark Queen – but she demanded little more than obedience. So if the Kindred had no aid from above, neither was there much interference from below.

"Remember," Frida added, wagging an admonishing finger, "while you lot, after Yarchian's fall, lay locked behind the mountains of your homeland, licking your wounds and bemoaning your ill fortune, we laboured long and hard, and built the great cities of Dweorgaheim. And outside your borders, men forged the empire of the Yonar-ri, what stood strong for nigh on two thousand years, until it was brought down in the Sundering. The rest of us weren't idle.

"This place – the Dunholm Vale – was once a mighty kingdom of men. All that you see around you," Frida concluded, waving her hand in a vague circle, "are the remnants of that once-proud land."

Hax was blinking, stunned as much by the woman's detailed knowledge of history as by her...peculiar...interpretation of it.

Reining in her horse, she raised a hand and pointed ahead. "Except for that," she said. "Right?"

The fire-coach emitted a hissing screech as Uchtred applied the brake. "Aye," he said absently. "We're here."

They had come to the end of the Up-Country hills. Before them, the road crested a final ridge before plunging into a deep valley. Shrouded in the shadow of the Deeprealm Range, the vale was filled with dense emerald foliage, and looked dark and foreboding. Enormous trees – oak, ash, maple, and beech in the forest's heart, giving way to lush pines and firs at its edges – clawed for the sky, leaning one against the other in a frenzied floral jumble. Beyond the forest, the mountains seemed to spring suddenly into the air – as though it was the trees that limited the extent of the peaks, rather than the other way around.

"I take it that's the Feywood," Hax said, raising an eyebrow and clearing her throat.

"Aye," Wynstan grunted. He glanced over at her, eyes narrowing. "What's the matter? Thought you'd like it. Taste o'home."

Hax shook her head slowly. "That's not what home looks like," she muttered.

"No?" the dwarf shrugged. "Well, gotta go through it anyway." Standing, he checked the brass gauges stapled to the sides of the water tuns. "Plenty of juice," he murmured to himself.

"I hope you're feeling rested," Frideswide said moodily.

"I'm fine," Hax answered, frowning. "Why do you ask?"

"Because," the priestess replied, "we don't stop until we reach Eastgate."

Hax thought glumly about her aching posterior. Her expression must have mirrored her thoughts, because Frida's discomfiture seemed to disappear. She laughed out loud. "You can always join us on the cart if your fundament pains you, dearie!" the dwarf-woman cackled.

The elf coloured slightly. "I'll be all right," she said stiffly. "Why the caution?"

"The fey folk aren't ill-natured," the priestess replied, "but they're tricksters."

"I know," Hax said. "We've plenty of their sort in the forests, back home on Eldisle."

"And they've no notion of Kindred limitations," Frida went on, as if the elf-girl hadn't spoken. "They'll lead you off a cliff for chuckles, and then be genuinely shocked when it turns out you can't fly. That sort of thing."

"They don't mean any harm, o'course," Uchtred murmured, looking trepidatious, "but you won't be any less dead. Best just to keep your guard up, your eyes open, and your feet on the path."

"They're not at all malicious back home," Hax said, frowning, eyeing the trees ahead with alarm.

"It's likely a little different living next to elves, compared to living with an expanding human empire for two ages of the world, and then in total isolation for a third," Uchtred replied. "No?"

"I suppose," Hax shrugged. She couldn't believe that they were in any real danger. She thought about stringing her bow, and then rejected the notion. The fey she had seen had been masters of concealment; if they were hostile, she wouldn't get a shot off anyway.

She decided not to mention that fact to her already sufficiently-nervous companions.

"Just keep yer eyes open, everybody," Wynstan growled. "Are we ready?"

"Aye," Uchtred said.

"Yes, dear."

"Lead on," Hax replied, wondering if she should be more concerned.

Wynstan released the brake. The fire-coach emitted a screeching whistle and a blast of steam, lurching forward down the hill, towards the narrow gap where the ancient Yonar-ri highway entered the forbidding wall of trees.

♦

Six hours into their journey through the forest, Hax had begun to regret her earlier bravado. She had saddle sores on her saddle sores. Only pride kept her from abandoning her mount for one of the fire-coach's padded seats.

But she already had reason to feel more useful.

Less than a mile inside the first looming trees, they had been challenged. Rounding a sharp bend in the forest path, they had come upon a short, squat, goat-legged fellow with a hairy chest and a pair of knobbly, curling horns atop his head. He was standing in the middle of the path, half-leaning on a long spear of ash bearing a dark, fire-hardened point.

Uchtred groped for the brake and the fire-coach shuddered to a halt, hissing alarmingly. Hax reined her horse in beside the fulminating contraption.

"God e'en to you, sir," Frideswide called out, speaking the Travelling Tongue. "We are travellers on the road to the Eastgate of the Deeprealm. May we pass?"

The creature – Hax recognized it at once as a satyr, one of the more whimsical and unpredictable of the fey folk – gabbled something at them. Hax strained her concentration, and the words came through clearly. She coloured slightly. It was speaking the tongue of the forest folk – the common speech of those who lived among the trees, liquid and beautiful, like a fine distillation of the Elven tongue.

It was not the language that interested her, though. It was the words. Had they been spoken aloud at the Queen's court, they would have resulted in drawn blades.

Hax cleared her throat in embarrassment. Glancing over at her companions, she saw nothing on the Dwarves' faces but blank incomprehension, and relaxed slightly. "The master welcomes us to the forest," she translated – very loosely – "and demands a toll for passage."

"What does he want?" Uchtred grunted. "It is 'he', right?"

"Satyrs are all male," Hax confirmed. She could feel the flush rising to the tips of her ears. "He...uh, maybe we should offer him some gold."

"Over my cooling corpse," Uchtred muttered.

"Is that really what he asked for?" Frida wondered softly, shooting the elf a sidelong glance.

"Well...uh, no," Hax admitted, cheeks flaming. "No, he didn't. But I'm...sorry, I'm not going to translate what he really wants."

Frida blinked in confusion. "Come on, now, dearie. What's he after?"

"Well," Hax temporized, "...er, I suppose if I were to put it politely...'a tumble in the leaves'." And that was putting it very politely, she thought.

Frideswide chuckled. "Not willing to make so great a sacrifice for a trio of newfound road-mates, eh?" she laughed. "I thought better of you, cildic!"

"Actually," Hax corrected coolly, smiling despite herself, "he suggested that we both join him behind yon hillock."

Frida's eyes widened. Uchtred roared with laughter, slapping his thigh repeatedly.

"Well," the satyr piped up, switching to the travelling tongue, "it's not much fun if you're not going to tell them everything I said."

Its voice was surprising deep and mellifluous. "Lovely lady of the Deeprealm," it continued, "what I propose is that, in exchange for safe passage through my woods, you, the elf-maid and I amble off, arm in arm, and spend a few hou..."

"Enough, sir," Hax interjected, wiping tears from her eyes at the look on Frida's face. "Enough, I beg you." She took a deep breath, remembering a story she had once heard – from a most surprising source. "My companion and I would be delighted – nay, honoured – to join you in fulsome frolic. Your company and your masterful attentions would be a most welcome respite from the uncouth, unwashed and unseemly wights in whose company, by circumstance rather than by choice, we travel."

"What," Frideswide whispered through clenched teeth, "are you doing?"

"Trust me," Hax whispered back. Raising her voice, she pursed her lips ostentatiously, made wide calf-eyes at the hairy little man, and batting her eyelashes like an idiot courtier. Uchtred was making choking sounds, and seemed to be having difficulty keeping his seat.

"But," Hax continued, doing her best to ignore the hiccoughing dwarf and imitate a lust-besotted imbecile, "what are two worthless chits such as we to one so virile as yourself, who has no doubt enjoyed countless conquests? And with lovelies far more delectable than we?

"Would you sully the memory of past pleasures, merely to roll in the dirt for a few, unsatisfying moments with two worthless, travel-stained wretches like ourselves?"

To the dwarves' collective astonishment, the goat-man seemed to except this grotesque flattery at face value. "What you say," he mused solemnly, "is true. I have favoured more than a few with my attentions. Many maids more comely than thou have felt the thrust of..."

At that point, he digressed into a lengthy monologue, describing (in detail so vivid that, after a moment, tears were rolling down Uchtred's bearded cheeks, and Hax was forced to bite her lip to keep from chortling aloud), a lengthy list of thoroughly improbable conquests, each more spectacularly unlikely than the last. Hax made the mistake of glancing at Frideswide, and nearly lost control of herself when she saw that the dwarf-woman was quaking with appalled laughter.

At length, the satyr's ode to his own virility trailed off. He gazed at them expectantly.

Hax knew that she had to acknowledge his claims, and struggled to master herself. "Truly," she gasped, "you have accomplished feats to shame even the Powers. The Maiden of Blinding Beauty, wondrous Miyaga, would consider herself blessed if she could but benefit from your masterful labours."

"Indeed she would," the satyr agreed, stroking his goatee and looking extremely pleased with himself. "So. As you say; I would far rather meditate on past glories, than tarnish their memory with a few moments' frantic scrabbling in the dirt with two gruesome hags like yourselves. Have you a token?"

"I...a what?" Frida replied, her voice finally under control.

"A token, a token," the creature said impatiently. "A trifle, a trinket, a bauble; something to remind me forever that there were two – and only two – grubby strumpets on the whole of the earth who were too plain to merit my attention."

"Allow me," Hax interjected. Reaching behind her neck, she untied the leather thong that held a small, drilled piece of amber about her neck. "Take this, sir, I beg you; and with it, cherish the unrequited longings of two uncouth maids who met with thy magnificence, and were found wanting." She tossed the stone to the goat-man.

He caught it and eyed it closely, a gleam of avarice in his emerald-green eyes. Struggling to conceal his glee, he looked up at Hax, and said, "It is small, lumpy and altogether plain, and so, a perfect reminder of your unworthy selves. Get you hence, and pass the forest in peace. And may the morrow bring me prettier fare."

Hax bowed in her saddle. "Let's move," she whispered to Uchtred. Still convulsing silently and emitting, like his boiler, the odd hiss of escaping air, the dwarf released the brake. Metal squealed, and the cart rattled forward.

Hax dug her heels into her horse's flanks and trotted into the lead. Glancing back, she saw the little goat-men perched on a grey boulder, trying to tie the leather thongs around his own neck. As she watched, some two-dozen of his fellows swarmed out of the trees, discarding spears and bows as they reached for her necklace. The gang was still squabbling like magpies when she lost sight of them around another bend in the forest track.

Frida blew out her breath in a relieved whoosh.

Wynstan was chuffing silently with uncontrollable hilarity. "What is it?" the priestess asked him crossly.

" 'Gruesome hag'," the dwarf chortled, bursting into laughter.

"You watch it, now," his wife warned, wagging a finger.

" 'Grubby strumpet'."

"I'm warning you!"

"Why, what'll you do to me? 'Lumpy'..."

He never finished the sentence. Frideswide's stout fist whistled around, driven by the compact power of her form, and thudded into his ear. Unfortunately for Wynstan, his shout of surprise and pain contained a little too much laughter. This only led to more blows.

Uchtred collapsed to the bed of the fire-coach, roaring with glee. Hax wondered whether she was going to have to leap aboard and grab the tiller.

♦

"So you're saying they want you to talk them out of it?" Frida asked once her temper was under control again. Wynstan was back at the tiller, sporting a purpling eye and a split lip, and still shaking from time to time with tremors of mirth.

Hax nodded. "Satyrs are very proud of their...er...their endowments," she replied, blushing slightly. "And their prowess. It's their defining characteristic as a race. It's almost a madness for them. They don't really lust after those who aren't of their sort," she continued, the tips of her ears burning. "I mean, they would, of course; when there's a satyr about, even the furniture's not safe. But others among the fey folk have similar...er...appetites, and manage to keep them pretty satisfied in that regard." She flushed. "Of if not satisfied, at least busy.

"What satyrs really want, you see," she continued, "are tokens of respect and deference from those they encounter."

"Is it always jewellery?" Frida asked.

"It can be just about anything," Hax shrugged. "It's the gesture that matters, the 'tribute', not the value. They live in the woods, after all; gold really doesn't mean anything to them. They just like it because it's shiny.

"Shiny is good; unique is better. And the deference you display to their leader's magnificence," she added. "That's the most important part of all. That fellow back there," she nodded over her shoulder, "managed to talk four pretty rough-looking characters out of a nice bit of sparkle; and he did it in a way that enhanced his reputation as a paramour before the rest of his troupe. I helped him with that. It's why he let us go so easily. He'll be running that gang a while longer, I think."

Frida nodded, smiling. "So that's why you were playing up to him," she chuckled. "I thought you'd gone mad."

Hax shrugged. "It's a common enough game for them," she said. "Elf-maids find out about satyrs when they're young, especially if you live cheek-by-jowl with'em, as we do in Eldisle. You learn. Either the easy way – from your mother, as I did – or the hard way. For example, by being caught alone in the forest by a randy troupe."

The smile drained away from Frida's face. "You don't mean that they...that..." she began, her voice hollow.

"No! No, no!" Hax replied quickly. "Not at all! Satyrs are wild and unpredictable, but they're basically good folk. They just like playing their little games, and as you saw back there, they're pretty colourful in describing the games they like to play. It can be a little frightening to be young, naïve, and surrounded by a gang of playful pucks like that, of course. But however...um...explicit their prose, they'd never act on it. They'll see a lost youngling home first, and even fight to protect her."

Hax smiled again, shaking her head. "Of course, when she finally gets back to her parents, she'll definitely know more about the ways of the world than she did when she left. And a great many more cursing words."

"They're more than 'playful' here in the Feywood," Wynstan growled. "I've come through twice before, and once I ended up with a handful of arrows stuck in my wagon-bed."

Hax shook her head in disagreement. "They're masterful archers," she averred. "If they'd been aiming for you, they'd've hit you. Like as not, they were just making mischief."

"Bloody dangerous mischief," the dwarf muttered.

The elf-girl nodded. "As you said before, they've no understanding of peril," she agreed. "You could hardly hit one of them with an arrow, and even if you did, they seem to heal right up. So they wouldn't think to worry about hurting you with one of theirs. It's one of the things that make them so unpredictable."

She chuckled ruefully. "I once heard the Queen tell a tale about how, during a hunt and cheuvauchée near Two Rivers, she and her maidens ran into a big covey of pucks. They had to talk their way out of it. That's where I got the idea to...to..."

Her voice trailed off as she realized that all three of the dwarves were staring intently at her.

"What 'queen' would that be, now, my darling?" Wynstan asked, squinting at her, his curiosity manifest in his face.

Hax realized instantly what she had done. Damn it! A bolt of fear shot down her spine. "I...I'd heard, once, that the Queen..." she stammered, her face reddening again. But she couldn't think of anything to say. She shut her mouth, berating herself silently for letting it run on.

Frida leaned over the seat railing and patted her arm. "You're among friends, dearie. You can tell us or not, as you see fit."

Hax nodded. "I'm sorry," she whispered, mortified beyond words at her stupidity. "I don't want to lie to you. But if you know the truth, I'll put you in danger, and I can't do that."

She looked so thoroughly miserable that Frida smiled sympathetically.

Uchtred chuckled. "Best to change the subject, then," he remarked. "Do you know any good songs?"

Hax blinked tears out of her eyes. "A few," she admitted, grateful for the respite. "Let me think on it awhile, will you?"

"Take your time, dearie," Frideswide murmured.

They rode on through the darkling wood. But the silence seemed deeper and more painful than before.

♦♦♦

Chapter 4 ♦ The Deeprealm

It took them all night and most of the next day to traverse the Feywood. By the time they emerged into the tumbled foothills of the Feymount, the first line of peaks delineating the Deeprealm Range, Hax was nearly spent. She had managed to retain her saddle and therefore her pride, but the cost had been severe; bolts of pain were shooting up and down her spine, and her thighs and backside felt as though they had been flayed. She was hungry, and even thirsty; their water bags had gone dry a few hours back. They were, all of them, in dire need of rest. Wynstan, however, had firmly vetoed any halt.

"Nearly done," he kept muttering. "We can rest when we're safe under stone." Clearly, Hax thought, that phrase had a different meaning in the dwarven tongue than in the vernacular of her homeland.

The end of the woods came almost as a surprise; one moment, they were rolling through twilit glades (Uchtred having slowed the fire-coach to match her horse's tired walk); the next, they had left the trees behind and were clattering across a broad, sloping shield of grey stone.

"That's it," Wynstan said, relief evident in his voice. "We're nearly home. Two more miles, three at most."

" 'Home' looks a little bleak," Hax remarked. The rocky ground rose precipitously before them, seemingly refusing to support any growth more sophisticated than lichen.

She glanced up. The mountain peaks were much, much closer, now, towering over them, glimmering with a white-verdant sheen that, Hax realized, was the result of the setting sunlight reflecting off the tips of the forest at their back, and colouring the mountains' frosty mantle. Had she not been so painfully exhausted, she might have found it beautiful.

"All homes do, if you sit outside on the doorstep," Frida remarked primly. "The door wardens, dearest," she said, simultaneously pointing and elbowing her husband in the ribs. "Over there."

"Saw'em," Wynstan grunted. He turned the tiller obediently.

Hax followed the priestess' pointing finger. The road – it wasn't really a road anymore, so much as a near-invisible set of ruts worn into the soft stone – bent to the right, seemingly aiming for a gap in the tumbled wall of rock. As they approached, two shapes that she had taken for fallen lumps of mountain resolved themselves. They were statues, carved out of the hills themselves – great, hulking, crouched effigies of dwarven warriors, armoured and bearing enormous shields and heavy, hooked axes. The road passed between them, looking too narrow for the cart to squeeze through.

Hax mentioned this to Frida, eliciting a laugh from the three dwarves. "First-timer," the priestess chuckled. "You'll see. The distance is deceptive."

The elf-girl learned what that meant a few moments later. Thinking that the statues were close to life-size, she had misjudged the range. Badly. In fact, they were still more than a mile from the gap. The mottled stone ground-cover, moreover, blended imperceptibly with the stone of the mountain wall, confusing her further. As the distance shrank, she could see that the statues, and the gap between them, were huge. Enormous, in fact.

Ten minutes later she was looking up, up, and still up, marvelling at the size and majesty of the stonework towering over her head. The stone effigies were easily a hundred feet tall, and despite being heavily weathered, retained a degree of detail and artistry that took her breath away.

They were unlike anything she had ever seen. Elven architecture, when wrought in stone, was light, airy, almost insubstantial – strong, to be sure, but only just strong enough, and given to mimicking the growths of nature, lending an impression of grace and impermanence. This dwarf-work was as unlike the soaring arches and elegant, slender towers of Astrapratum as she was unlike her hosts. The guardian statues were squat, broad, and powerful; they radiated the solidity of the mountains, as if the dwarven artisans, in removing chunks and slivers of stone, had left behind something that was even stronger and more solid than the native gut-rock of the Feymount.

Between the statues, the roadbed rose slightly, the close-fit stones smooth and untouched by time or the elements. Wynstan directed the fire-coach down the centre of the channel, his eyes fixed straight ahead. Frida, Hax noted, had bowed her head and was whispering a prayer, fingering her medallion all the while. Only Uchtred shared her curiosity; he was craning his neck, the better to look upwards. She followed his gaze, marvelling at the clean, sharp angles of the stonework, silhouetted against the scudding, fluffy clouds and wheeling ravens. Lichen like gilding adorned the stone, lending the immense effigies an austere, regal air.

"What do you think?" Uchtred asked, eyeing her closely.

"They're amazing," Hax replied. "I'd no idea your people built on...on such a scale."

Wynstan snorted sourly, and Frida and Uchtred burst into laughter. "Oh, my dear!" the priestess chortled. "This is...I mean..."

"Wait'll you see Elder Delvin," Wynstan muttered. "The Door Wardens – these statues – are chess pieces compared to the Lords of the Great Cavern."

Hax nodded silently, still inspecting the stonework.

Then she turned her gaze forward...and gasped again.

Beyond the statues, the tumbled stone walls of the Feymount dropped away, plummeting into a vast chasm that ran parallel to the mountain foothills. Like a trench cloven by a god's axe, the channel ran from north to south; craning her neck, she could see no end to it. It was broad, too, easily a hundred paces from the near edge to the vertical grey walls of the mountain face opposite.

The road, flanked by smaller copies of the great stone statues flanking the entrance to the valley, led towards the lip of the chasm, where a long, narrow bridge of granite arced across the void towards the mountain. Where this tongue of stone touched the far wall, Hax could see a pair of high doors, glinting with a green-yellow lustre in the light of the descending Lantern. It was flanked by smaller, brighter glints. Shading her eyes, she could make out armed and armoured dwarves. Sunlight glinted like skyfire from polished shields and the tips of spears.

She glanced at the fire-coach. Wynstan and Uchtred appeared to be sitting up straighter in their seats, and Frida was making a show of fixing her hair. "Coming home," the priestess murmured apologetically. "Don't worry," she added with a knowing nod at the horrific state of Hax's coiffure, "we'll find a hostel with a hot bath as soon as we can. It's only a couple of miles from the Doors of Brass to Eastgate."

Hax nodded. She was morbidly conscious of her ragged appearance after a full day in the saddle, and twitched her cloak around her shoulders to conceal the more obvious defects of her clothing. For some reason, looking presentable was more important to her in the dwarven realm than it had been while riding through human or halfling lands. Perhaps it had something to do with her new companions. Their good opinion had become important to her.

As they traversed the narrow stone bridge, Hax tried to concentrate on unpacking this novel thought. It was an alternative to looking down.

♦

Frida was as good as her word. They passed their first night in a hostel called the Árduru Æfenliss, located in a warren of tunnels and caverns only a short way beyond the gates. Uchtred had translated the name of the inn for her as, "the place of evening rest at the Brass Doors." Hax reflected that she was going to have to learn at least some of the dwarven tongue if she was going to spend any time in the Deeprealm.

The route they had taken once past the gate itself had been astonishing. The elves rarely spoke about the dwarves, and Hax knew almost nothing about them. Syllo had given her an overview of their battle practices, and Kalestayne had mentioned some of the accomplishments of the dwarven magi during the classes she had had to take in her later childhood. But when the Deeprealm was mentioned at all in elven circles, it was usually described as 'caves', or 'tunnels', or 'burrows'.

She had never really thought about it all that much, but such talk had conditioned her to think of the dwarves as little more than miners who occupied the played-out shafts they sunk into the earth while searching for gold or precious stones. The first mile she travelled under the earth demonstrated unequivocally how completely wrong her perceptions had been.

To begin with, the Doors of Brass had, like the massive statues they had passed, been a noteworthy feat of engineering. The doors were easily five times her own height, and four times as wide. The fact that they were not solid brass, but plates of brass covering massive blocks of stone, was even more impressive. They were balanced on hinge-pins as thick as her torso, and connected to some sort of mechanical gearing system the purpose of which she was unable to descry, until Uchtred explained it to her.

"Water-powered," he huffed, nodding happily. "Doors're well-balanced, o'course, but too heavy to open or shut by hand. So they're powered by a water-column what drives pistons linked to a gear-box. Rack and pinion, with the rack concealed in a travelling chamber in the floor."

"Get any of that, dearie?" Frida stage-whispered once Uchtred fell silent.

"Not a word," Hax confessed. "Except 'water'. And 'floor'."

"I'll draw you a diagram later on," Uchtred shrugged.

Beyond the doors lay the tunnel they were to follow. Hax, who had never been fond of small spaces, was enormously relieved when she saw its dimensions. Her relief quickly passed into amazement. The 'tunnel' was easily ten paces wide, allowing her horse and the fire-cart to travel rapidly, and half again as high, with a barrel-vaulted ceiling supported at intervals by buttressed coigns carved from the living rock. The floor was polished smooth by the passage of countless feet over the years. And, to her surprise and delight, it was lit by something that she took at first to be orblights, but which, when she slowed her horse to inspect one, seemed to be glowing spots in the rock wall itself.

"Why?" she asked Frida.

"Why what?"

"Why the lights? I thought your folk could see in the dark?"

"We can," the priestess replied, smiling. "But a lot of visitors can't. If we didn't provide light, they'd need torches or lamps."

"Got enough problems with air circulation down here, without having to deal with smoke from pitch, tallow or oil," Wynstan grumbled.

"Helps with the draft animals, too," Frida added. "A lot of them get panicky in the dark."

"I know the feeling," Hax muttered. Thus far, the tunnels had been big enough that her fear of confinement had not yet asserted itself. But it was only a matter of time.

Eastgate – the dwarven name for which Hax was entirely unable to understand, let alone pronounce – proved to be a large, natural cavern with a confusing jumble of passages leading off in all directions. Hax was somewhat relieved to see that it reinforced her long-held impression of the nature of dwarf-made dwellings, and she admired the large, open space. The floor had been cleared, but the ceiling, hundreds of paces overhead, still sprouted innumerable stalactites, the result of some long-vanished geological process. Evidently there was a great deal of moisture in the surrounding rock, as the cavern sported numerous decorative statues, both free-standing and built into the circumferential walls, that spouted trickles, streams and jets of water from different, and often humorously inappropriate, orifices.

She made an admiring comment about the place, eliciting – to her surprise – laughter from her comrades. "This isn't the city, dearie," Frida chuckled. "It's just the market."

Sure enough, the cavern was crowded with vendors and stalls of all sorts. "Where's the city, then?" Hax asked, confused.

Frida pointed at the stone walls. "All around us. In the rock. Tunnels, chambers, homes, store-houses, meeting-rooms, bath-houses, hostels, armouries, barracks, foundries...and the mines, o'course."

Hax looked around. There were many, many tunnel entrances interspersed, here and there, around the enormous room. "How many?" she wondered aloud.

"Rooms?" Frida asked, looking helpless. "I've no idea."

"Not rooms. Dwarves."

"Ah. Not many. Eastgate is small, and we're still a long, long way from the capital. Three, maybe fourscore thousand," the priestess replied easily.

Hax turned and stared at Frida, certain that the dwarf-woman was mocking her. "That's not possible," she said coldly.

"Oh?"

"Astrapratum itself," the elf-woman snapped, "has no more than five-score thousand inhabitants. At most. And it's the greatest city in the world."

Frida shrugged. "I don't know what to tell you, cildic. This is just a small town."

"Wait'll we get to Ædeldelf," Uchtred chortled. "That's a city."

Hax rolled her eyes at him. "And how big is Ed...Ethel..."

"Just call it 'Elder Delvin', dearie," Frida interjected helpfully. She looked thoughtful. "I'll tell you what," she continued briskly, "why don't you ask me that question again, after you've seen a little more of the realm? You might be better disposed to believe me then."

Hax felt a little bad after that. Her automatic assumption that her new companions were either lying to her or deliberately having her on was unfair to them. She was the newcomer here, after all, and entirely dependent upon them for information and advice. The least that she owed them was to trust in what they told her.

Uchtred selected one of the larger passageways and directed the fire-cart down it. Hax, her posterior aching, hoped that it led to the hostel they sought, but she was disappointed once again. The detour, however, was only temporary; a few moments later, Uchtred stopped at a set of heavy doors, from beyond which emanated the unmistakeable reek of manure.

"Stables," he explained. "No place for a horse in a dwarf-hostel."

Hax nodded gratefully. She removed her saddlebags and threw them over one shoulder while Frida haggled with the owner, a short, pudgy dwarf with flaming red hair and a badly tangled beard.

In the end, Uchtred left the fire-cart there as well, and they returned to the market cavern on foot. As they left the stables, Hax – who had been a little concerned at taking a large animal deep underground – was glad to see that Breygon's mare appeared perfectly content, and was tucking into a deep nosebag of grain.

The 'Brass Doors Inn', as she thought of it to herself, being unable to vocalize the dwarven name, lay a few hundred paces down another, smaller passageway. There was little indication of its presence beyond a pair of glowing stone lanterns on either side of a pair of heavy brass doors. Wynstan did something to the wall that Hax could not quite make out; a moment later, the doors swung silently wide.

The proprietor of the Árduru Æfenliss, a stout and jovial hill dwarf who introduced himself as Yffi, spoke the travelling tongue fluently and almost without an accent. Uncharacteristically verbose for a dwarf (a result, he explained as part of the flood of verbiage which their arrival occasioned, of a youth misspent as a soldier of fortune, plying the eastern coasts of Erutrei in the company of a band of Oststrander corsairs), Yffi had recognized Hax's pedigree instantly, expressing unbounded delight at the prospect of playing host to a scion of the Third House, a daughter of the Duodeci. His delight, though, immediately transmogrified into chagrin, and he began apologizing profusely for being, as he put it, "unable to offer her quarters suitable to her sylvan grace". As a compromise, he offered her a chamber designed for occupancy by humans, but at half-price.

"Nothing there to delight the eye of an elf," he admitted, smiling apologetically, "but at least you won't whack your noggin every few steps, or wake up with a crick in your neck from a too-short bed."

"My 'sylvan grace' will be just fine," Hax laughed. "Just so long as a bath is included in the price of the room."

This remark set all three of her companions laughing. "It's her first time amongst civilized folk," Frida explained jokingly. "Just give us the numbers, you chubby scrabbler, and we'll be fine."

Yffi had smiled politely along with them, handing over one silver and three brass disks, all of them stamped with dwarf-script, and depending from fine-linked chains. Wynstan looked them over and passed the silver disk to Hax. "Thirty-one," he grunted.

"Come along, dearie," Frida said, taking Hax's elbow. "I'll get you stowed."

"Æfengereordung licgan nóntíma," Yffi called after them.

"What was that?" Hax asked, nonplussed.

"Dinner's at nine," Frida said shortly. "We've three hours and a bit. Plenty of time to get cleaned up." She hustled the elf-girl along a lateral corridor.

Hax kept a close eye on the ceiling, heeding Yffi's words. Fortunately, the inn was generously proportioned in order to cater acceptably to men as well as to dwarves. For the most part, the vaulted stone roof remained a good two feet over her head.

"I need some things," she mentioned to Frida. "Soap, towels, some fresh clothing..."

"Already taken care of," the priestess replied, hurrying her along. "You're in my homeland now, cildic. Trust me.

"And step you lightly," she added. "The bath-water's a-waiting."

♦

The next three hours proved to be a greater shock to Hax's senses, and to her sense of propriety, than the whole of her journey to date.

Her room, which she had expected to display the same artistically spartan character as the great statues guarding the Eastgate, proved to be a pleasant surprise. Although all of the furniture was obviously sized for humans, and was thus a little too large for comfort, it was exquisitely crafted, and lavishly decorated with careful file-work and intricate runic carvings. The stone walls were largely concealed behind tapestries woven of brilliantly-dyed threads, most of them depicting underground scenes, gem-work or abstract patterns of brilliant complexity, while the floors were so thickly laden with heavy carpets and coarse furs that she was unable to see what sort of stone they consisted of. A small table, a writing desk, a shelf stacked with well-worn books. And the light...

She looked around. The room was lit by a small stone orb set into the wall near the head of the bed. It was glowing softly, emitting a pale yellow luminescence more akin to the light of Lodan than to that of Bræa's Lantern. Examining it more closely, she found a brass plaque set next to it bearing six lines of text – three in Dwarf-runes, matched by three in the travelling tongue: "Léohtlic – Bright; Léohtfæt – Dim; Déostorlic – Dark."

She touched the glowing stone with one finger. It was cool. She said, "Dark."

The light faded instantly, plunging the room into darkness. "Well, that was stupid," she muttered to herself. Feeling around in the inky blackness, she found the stone again, and said, "Bright." The light returned, glaringly brilliant this time. She found herself blinking rapidly, and said, "Dim." The illumination dropped back to its former level.

Important lesson, she thought grimly to herself. You can't see underground, idiot. She'd known that, of course, but it was helpful to have confirmed it through experiment.

A soft chime, like a gently-struck gong, interrupted her investigations. She looked around, alarmed. What on earth was...

Of course, she realized. The door. She walked quickly back to the stone portal through which she had entered, and realized to her dismay that there was neither latch nor knob on this side. In despair, thinking of the light-orb, she muttered, "Open?"

The door swung silently inwards. Outside, a young-looking, beardless dwarven lad stood with her saddlebags draped over one shoulder, and her bow and quiver in his opposite hand.

"Evening, missus," he said brightly. "Your kit."

Hax made a gesture as if to take the items from him, and he bustled past her, leaning the bow and quiver in a corner, and slinging the saddlebags over the back of a chair.

She blinked in surprise. Her saddle-bags were clean, and the scuffed leather looked as though it had been expertly polished.

The dwarf turned back to her. "I'm Coenred. Anything else I can do for you, mum?" he bubbled, rocking back and forth from heels to toes as if incapable of restraining his enthusiasm for his work.

Hax thought frantically. "No, not at all. I...wait," she corrected. "Er..." She felt embarrassed to have to ask, like a provincial bumpkin on her first visit to the big city (Isn't that what you are? the Voice muttered snidely). But then she decided that a little embarrassment was infinitely preferable to spending five more minutes feeling as though she had just crawled out of a sewer. "How do I take a bath?" she asked in a rush.

"Water closet's at the far end of the hall," Coenred replied instantly. "Instructions're on the wall, in the common tongue if you don't speak the Dweorgaspræc. As it seems you don't." He strode to one of the tapestries and brushed it aside, revealing a deep closet set into the stone. Piles of folded cloth adorned the shelves. "Bathrobes here. Don't bring the room towels, there're plenty at the baths. Soap and suchlike, too." He paused. "Anything else?"

Hax found herself warming to the cheerful fellow. "Actually," she said, "I'm a little worried about light. I don't have your vision. How do I get around in the dark?"

The dwarf ambled over to the bed, opened a drawer in the nightstand, and extracted a small, regular solid, seemingly carved of crystal and about the size of her fist. He held this up, said, "Light," and the object burst into glimmering luminescence. He said, "Dark," and the extra light faded away. He tucked the thing back into the drawer and closed it gently.

Hax immediately fished it out again, inspecting it closely. "Where can I buy one of these?" she asked intently.

Coenred fished around in one of his pockets and extracted a smaller version of the same device, pressing it into her hand. "Yours," he said conspiratorially. "They're issue. Don't tell anybody where you got it," he whispered. "Anything else?"

"No," she said faintly, turning the small, crystal shape over in her hand. "Thank you."

"All part of the service, mum. Don't forget, dinner's at nine."

Hax nodded, bemused. The dwarf let himself out.

Before the door closed, she remembered something. "Wait!" she called.

Coenred's head reappeared around the jamb. "Yes?"

Hax gritted her teeth. "How do I...I'd like to...b-b-but I don't have any of your coin," she admitted, blushing.

The lad shook his head. "Not necessary, missus. Your friends took care of it." He winked. "Enjoy your bath."

And disappeared.

♦

Hax's next lesson came only a few moments later. Calling the baths a 'Water Closet' was, in the elf-girl's opinion, as inappropriate as calling the massive statues guarding the Eastgate 'figurines'.

After Coenred left, she shed her filthy clothing as quickly as possible. She had located a brass panel in one of the walls with a dual legend engraved up it: 'Gearwæsc – Laundry'. This seemed straightforward enough, so after only a moment's hesitation, she dumped her travel-stained garb through it.

That left her with another problem. The chill of the room raised an acre of gooseflesh before she managed to don one of the bathrobes. Human-sized, it trailed on the carpets and felt as though she had wrapped herself in a scratchy horse-blanket, but at least it was warm. Taking her silver room-medallion and looping the light chain carefully over her head, she opened her door again, and stepped out into the hall.

Left led back to the reception desk. She turned to the right and padded down the corridor, bare feet freezing on the chill stone.

She passed a dozen more doors like her own, all numbered in both dwarven runes and the angular characters of the travelling tongue, before she came to a broad stone portal at the end of the hallway. The door bore a brass plate marked 'Lafiærna – Water Closet'. She put one hand on the stone and pushed; nothing.

"Open," she said hesitantly. Still nothing. Then she remembered how her room door had worked. She pressed the silver medallion against the stone, and the door swung wide.

Hax stood in the open door for the next few seconds, gaping. A slight odour of brimstone flared her nostrils. At length, she muttered, " 'Water Closet'," to herself in a wondering, mocking tone, and stepped through, allowing the door to close behind her.

The 'Water Closet' was a rough stone cavern at least twenty paces across, containing three separate pools – one large and two smaller ones. Light emanated from glowing stones set in the walls, and a half-dozen stone doors were set around the perimeter. The air was warm and moist, and she immediately felt better after the chill of her bedchamber. The floor...

The floor felt oddly familiar beneath her toes. She looked down. It appeared to be carpeted, but on closer inspection the covering proved to be a thick bed of some sort of dark blue moss. It was soft, spongy, and an enormous improvement over the bare stone.

Hax walked carefully around the chamber, inspecting the pools. The largest was cool but not cold, fed by a small waterfall pouring from a hole in the stone wall, and drained by some invisible means. The two smaller pools were still, but perfectly clear; one was icy, as though fed by a glacier, causing her to withdraw her hand quickly; the other steamed slightly, and was almost painfully hot.

That's the one for me, Hax thought blissfully. Doffing her robe, she gritted her teeth and slid into the simmering water, gasping as it rose over her hips. In a few moments, she had become accustomed to the temperature, and was floating blissfully on her back, trying to soak the weeks of embedded grime out of her tangled mass of hair.

"HEEEYAAAAHH!!"

Thundering footsteps and a deep-pitched shout woke her from her reverie. Hax inhaled a mouthful of the hot, sulphur-smelling water and struggled to find her footing, gasping and spitting. She opened her eyes just in time to see Uchtred's naked, hairy form soaring over her head, beard and braids flying. The dwarf landed in the largest pool like a catapult boulder, splashing water in every direction and causing a tidal wave to burst over the stone rim, soaking the floor.

"Léasere!"

Hax heard laughter and turned, frantically searching for something to cover herself with, and of course finding nothing. Frida and Wynstan were standing at the edge of the hot water basin, laughing uproariously. The priestess noted Hax's frenzied gestures, and quipped, "An inappropriate time for spell-casting, don't you think, dearie?"

As the elf-maid gaped, blushing furiously, both dwarves doffed their bathing robes and slid into the water, Frida with a blissful sigh, and Wynstan hissing curses under his breath. Hax turned away from them, only to find that Uchtred had emerged from the larger pool and was sliding into the hot water next to her. She got an alarmingly full view of a number of things she had never thought to see.

Hax took a deep breath and screwed her eyes resolutely shut. Coping with life in the Deeprealm was going to be more of a challenge than she had thought.

♦

"What d'ye expect?" Frida chuckled moments later. Hax, conditioned to Sylloallen's credo that politeness demanded that one imitate one's hosts, did her best to overcome her native shyness. Rather than leaping for her bathrobe, she settled for sinking into the water up to her neck. She tried to camouflage her timidity by remaining submerged to the jaw-line while scrubbing frantically at her hair. This became easier when Wynstan wordlessly handed her a large, greasy block of some unidentifiable, earth-toned material. Immersed in water, this produced a pleasant foam that did an admirable job of working the accumulated filth out of her tangled midnight tresses. It also produced a dense, concealing froth that was a helpful sop to her discomfiture.

"We live cheek by jowl," the priestess went on, pausing only to dunk her own head under the water. "Always have. In each others' laps, from waking up to bedding down again. Not much point in an excess of modesty. Leastways, not between friends."

Hax nodded mutely, her common sense at war with a lifetime of social conditioning. Mixed bathing was widespread among her people, at least within social classes; but the nobility of the Third House, under whose strict regime she had been raised, lived according to different standards. Public nakedness was permissible only under certain social circumstances – swimming, bathing, training – and forbidden under others. Her father had tried to raise her that way, requiring Hax and her male training mates to use the same arming room, "Just as Dior's warriors did!" But Kaltas often found himself a lone light of reason in a sea of prejudice. And besides, he wasn't the one who'd had to strip down in front of a handful of painfully nonchalant male classmates.

Even if she had been comfortable showing skin before members of her own social class, the unspoken but ingrained xenophobia of the Third House prohibited displaying any immodesty whatsoever before members of other races. The idea of being naked in front of a dwarf would have mortified any elf.

Hax had always found her people's collective attitude duplicitous on this score, especially in view of the nobility's penchant for revealing clothing styles, and the open, if winked-at, licentiousness and casual liaisons of the High Court. It was almost as though common-sense accommodations were forbidden, while illicit pulchritude was tolerated. Encouraged, even. We're all of us a pack of filthy hypocrites, she thought ruefully.

Except Syllo. He'd've been the first to get his trousers off. The man always put politeness before propriety; he had an unerring instinct that way. Hax decided that she would do her best to emulate his example and copy her hosts, lest they think her the uncivilized one.

To try to cover this depressing introspection, Hax hefted the beige block. "What is this stuff?" she asked. "It works like soap, but it doesn't sting like it."

"Lámhéafodbæth," Uchtred interjected. "Means 'earth-head-wash'. Hair-soap."

" 'Shampoo'," Frida corrected. "And t'isn't soap, as you know it. It's made from a fungus that grows in damp caverns. Better than your boiled fat and fire-ash. No stinging."

"Doesn't keep, though," Uchtred added. "It rots after a few weeks."

"It doesn't smell at all like soap," Hax replied, dubious. "In fact, it smells..." she broke off, laughing. "Is that beer?"

"Aye," Frida replied.

"What else would you wash your hair with?" Wynstan grunted, scrubbing furiously at his braids.

Hax shrugged, smiling, and continued worrying away at her knotted mane.

They bathed in comfortable silence after that. Hax noticed that despite the amount of time they had spent in the pool and the masses of filth they scrubbed off, the water remained clear, and the temperature remained comfortably constant. She mentioned this to Frida. Without speaking, the priestess nodded at Uchtred.

"Hot springs," the engineer replied. "One of Lagu's gifts to the Dweorga. Our diviners locate them and we pipe the water throughout the cities. Never have to worry about washing up."

"But how does it stay clean?"

"Filtered through sand-beds," he replied. He ducked his head under the water and came up with a handful of fine grey sand. "The fungus that we make soap from clots onto the dirt, and the whole sticks to the sand. You can either discard the sand, if you've got a ready supply, or fire it over magma to cleanse it for reuse."

"Amazing," she said, honestly astonished. "I had no idea what this place was like. You people are wonder-workers."

"We aren't naturally attuned to the flux, like you point-ears are," Frida replied solemnly. "Wizardry comes hard to us, and inborn casters..." She sighed.

Hax's eyes widened. "What about them?" she asked, curious.

Frida pursed her lips thoughtfully. "There aren't any."

She continued rapidly, "Those of us who serve the Dwarf-Lords can help, of course, and we do – moving earth and stone, finding voids and water and the like. But to make the Deeprealm support so many families, we had to create devices to enable one to do the work of many." She smiled wryly. "Running water and rocklight were only the beginning, dearie. Wait'll you see the Tube."

"The what?" Hax asked, curious.

"The Dweorgaværk," Uchtred interjected. "The great endeavour of the modern era." He dug feverishly at something that was lodged in his beard. "Pride o'the Deeprealm.

"Designed and built the valve beds at the Carrlár station myself, you know," he added proudly. "Worst draining problem we ever faced. They've been working thirty-nine years, now, without a failure." He beamed at her.

"I don't understand," Hax replied honestly. That was quickly becoming her mantra.

"You will, dearie," Frida said. "Carrlár's our first stop." She turned to her husband, who was floating silently on his back, revealing far more than Hax wanted to see.

"Hey! Slug-a-bed!" The priestess hurled the block of fungus soap at him, narrowly missing his protruding belly. "Scrub my back!"

♦

Half an hour later, Hax realized that she faced a minor dilemma. She was beginning to feel like a sponge, but despite her growing comfort in her new friends' company, she didn't want to exit the pool in full view. She could not, however, see any other option. So, while the three were engaged in an argument about whether to leave on the morrow or take another day to recuperate from the travails of their journey, she made a hasty dash for her bathing robe, struggled into it, tied the too-long belt around her waist, and began wringing the water out of her waist-length curls.

"All done?" Frida called, interrupting the discussion.

"Yes," Hax answered. "Is there anywhere warm I can dry my hair?"

The priestess nodded. "Through the second door."

Hax padded obediently across the moss-carpet and pushed on the indicated portal. It swung open easily.

A blast of dry, searing heat, like the exhalation of a furnace, struck her full in the face, and she gasped.

"Lúcan dyren!" an unfamiliar voice rasped.

Hax guessed what the words meant. Squinting against the intense heat, she stepped across the threshold and let the door shut behind her.

"Incuman ægther licgan criba!"

"Excuse me?" Hax said, blinking rapidly until her eyes cleared. The scene slowly resolved; she was in a long, low chamber, lit redly by a heap of glowing stones set dead-centre between what looked like four low stone biers.

"Niet ánspræcan dweorgaspræc?"

The speaker was a dwarf – bald, bearded, braided and bare-chested, clad only in sandals, trousers and a heavy leather apron.

"I don't understand," she said, resorting in desperation to the travelling tongue and clutching her robe about her neck.

"Ah, sorry," the fellow grunted, smiling broadly. "Should o'guessed. Don't speak elfy, myself." He gestured at one of the stone tables. "Stretch out, miss, and I'll take care of you."

" 'Stretch out'?" Hax asked, confused.

"Get comfortable," the fellow replied. He turned to a shelf on the wall and selected a stoneware pot. Then he glanced back over his shoulder at her, shook his head, replaced the pot and selected a different one. "And lose the gown."

"Hunh?" she blurted, bereft of her usual eloquence by the abrupt command.

A sudden blast of seemingly frigid air hit her in the back of the neck. "Bert!" Frideswide shouted happily.

The bare-chested dwarf dropped his pots and swept the priestess up in a spine-cracking hug, planting an indelicate buss on her cheek. "Frida! Léasbréd hæmedwíf! Why didn't you tell me you were in town?"

"We just got here, you goat," Frideswide replied, slapping him on his bald pate. "This is our first stop."

"As it damned-well should be." He hooked a thumb at Hax. "Who's your skinny friend?"

Before Hax could speak, Frida said, "Lyszia Ellacana, sell-sword of Oststrand; meet Tordbert Twelvefingers. Best bone-cracker in the Deeprealm."

Hax blinked rapidly. "Twelve fingers?" she asked.

Bert held up his hands. They looked normal.

"He has the usual ten," Frida said with a hearty chuckle. "They just feel like twelve."

"You're gonna make me blush," the bald dwarf said gruffly.

Frida threw off her robe and draped it over the foot of one of the tables. "Come on, old man. Make me purr." She climbed up on the stone – Hax saw that it was covered with a fine layer of the same sort of spongy lichen that covered the floors – and stretched out on her belly. She also noticed that Frida had an enormous, rune-covered anvil tattooed across her shoulder blades. Knowing something about the art, she winced at the amount of time and needlework that must have gone into it.

Bert laughed. "Sorry, my dear." He turned back to Hax. "Up you get, sweet thing. First come, first served."

Hax waved her hands in alarm. "No, that's all right," she said, taking a step back. "I think I'll just go brush my hair."

"That can wait," Frida said, a humorous lilt in her voice. She grinned. "Courage, dearie. My home, my rules." She turned her eyes to her countryman. "Bert, get somebody else in here with strong hands. I've been on the road for two weeks, and my spine feels like Khallach's own tuning fork."

Hax hesitated, considering; then, setting her jaw, she climbed up onto one of the low tables, opposite the prostrate cleric.

Bert stopped her. "Lose the robe, skinny-britches," the dwarf commanded.

Hax sighed, gritted her teeth, and complied.

♦

A half-hour under Tordbert's masterful touch (she told Frida that his nickname should have been "Twelve-Hands", evoking chuckles) left her as limp as an empty stocking, and feeling more herself than at any time since she had left her father's house. The Elves practiced massage, but more as a sensual art than as the exercise in clinical sadism that the dwarves had made of it. She reflected later that their techniques were probably not designed for anyone as lightly built as an elf, and blessed Syllo for the muscles that six decades of training had added to her lithe frame. Given his enormous strength, Bert would probably have snapped one of her less robust countrymen like a dry twig.

Whatever the fellow did, though, worked miracles. Hax had never felt so good. After a few moments spent evaluating her muscular strength, the range of motion of her joints, and her tolerance for pain, Bert had systematically pummelled, twisted, stretched and loosened every muscle between her jaw line and her toes, eliciting squeals of agony and groans of ecstasy in equal measure. Hax wasn't certain, but she thought she might have shrieked out a marriage proposal at one point. She hoped it had been in her tongue, and not his.

Frida, similarly contorted by a burly dwarf-woman half her age, matched Hax groan for groan. This went gone on for close to an hour. They were able to speak in the intervals between squeals.

"Do you mind a personal question?" Frida mumbled at one point.

"Not at all," Hax replied, minding very much, but unwilling to offend her newfound friend with an outright refusal.

"Your tattoos," the priestess said after a moment. Her eyes were still closed, and she waved a finger vaguely in Hax's direction. "I thought they were just on your face, but you've got'em all over. Or just about. What do they signify?"

Hax was silent for a moment. Frida had inadvertently hit upon one of the few areas of inquiry that the Elf-girl preferred not to discuss. In fact, she'd never discussed it with anyone. Not even Syllo. Or her father.

You should've thought about that before taking the needle to your face, she told herself ruefully.

Frida noticed the girl's silence. "Sorry, ducks," she said. "I didn't mean to intrude."

"It's not that," Hax replied quickly. "It's just that – well, I don't really have a good explanation for you. It's just one of those things. I feel I have to do it."

"So it's a regular practice, then?" the priestess prodded.

Hax nodded slowly. "Every time."

" 'Every time' what, dearie?"

"Every time I kill," the elf said quietly.

Frida opened her eyes. "Do you mind – I won't, if you'd prefer – "

"Twenty-four," Hax replied. "Sorry, twenty-seven." She'd forgotten the most recent trio, added after her little adventure in the Queen's garden.

Frida nodded solemnly. "That one, there – its looks new," she murmured, pointing to a tattoo on Hax's right thigh, where the flesh was still red and raised.

The Elf-girl smiled sheepishly. "It is. But it...ah, it doesn't count, exactly. That one was to remind me of a fight with some ghouls on the road north, through the Zaran Bjerglands. They were gnawing on a small party of travellers."

"Looks painful," the priestess remarked sleepily.

"Not as painful as the other leg," Hax chuckled. "I came into the fight from the wrong end. Took an arrow for my trouble."

"Oh, my," Frida snickered. "I hope you got some healing out of it."

"No healer," Hax shrugged. "Got a nice, sincere apology, though."

Frida was silent for a while. Hax winced as the masseur found a tight spot in her neck, and went to work on it.

Moments later, the priestess said, "Why ghouls?"

Hax blinked, surprised. "Well, to begin with, the wretched things ate my horse."

"No, no. I meant, why the remorse for slaying them? You were doing the world a favour."

"Oh, I know." Hax flushed. "It...it wasn't really about the ghouls, so much. That's why I said it didn't count."

Frida raised a sceptical eyebrow. "Oh?"

The elf-girl sighed. "One of the party of travellers I helped rescue was a likely enough fellow. I sort of...it's...damn it!" Her face was flaming. "That one's for him."

"You didn't kill him, did you?"

"No!" Hax flared, embarrassed.

"Oh ho!" the priestess expostulated, suddenly interested. She raised herself on one elbow. "A suitor, then? Tell me more!"

"Not a suitor," the Elf-girl objected. "Not hardly. Not while I'm on the run. And not –" Hax stopped herself, unwilling to go any further.

"Not what?" Frida pressed.

Hax sighed. She wasn't going to be able to avoid this any longer. " 'Not a half-blood', is what I was going to say," she replied ruefully. "I'm sorry, Frida. My upbringing got the better of my sense, there."

The priestess was silent for a moment. "Sounds like an elf thing," she said at last.

"It is."

Frida nodded slowly. "Far be it from me to question your customs," she said, in the tone of one who was about to do precisely that. "But I've never understood why you folk of the Third House deem the ancient half-breeds, the Hiarsk, acceptable as friends or mates, but hound the recent half-breeds so mercilessly."

Hax's voice was small. "Nor do I."

An uncomfortably moment of silence ensued. Finally, Frida said, "You were telling me about the tattoos. You do them yourself, aye?"

"Are they that bad?" Hax asked, surprised.

Frida chuckled. "No. It's just that there're none on your back," she replied. Glancing lower, she added, "Or your backside."

Hax hastily adjusted the narrow towel that Bert had draped across her posterior.

"Stop twitching, skinny," the masseur growled. He went to work on her lower spine. Conversation ceased as Hax lapsed into a relaxed haze.

Thoroughly tenderized, the pair stumbled into an adjoining chamber where careful attendants brushed, combed and disentangled their hair. Neither spoke the travelling tongue, so Frida obligingly translated Hax's questions and instructions. And, as it became apparent later on, gave a few of her own.

Exhausted by their endurance ride through the Feywood, warmed by the bath, loosened up by Tordbert's expert ministrations, and lubricated by a large glass of mead, Hax fell asleep in the soft leather chair while still under the brushes and combs of the hairsmiths. Some unknown time later, she was shaken awake and handed a polished steel mirror – and gasped when she saw that her thick masses of curls had been expertly knotted into an intricate pattern of braids, complete with silver, bone and stone beads. They clicked and clattered when she shook her head.

As she gaped, she heard Frida laughing and slapping her knee in a transport of hilarity. "I look like a dwarf," Hax said plaintively. The she blushed, hoping it didn't sound like an insult.

The priestess didn't seem to take it as such. "Well," she gasped between chuckles, "if you gained a hundred pounds and we pencilled in a moustache, you'd be well on your way."

This set Hax to giggling. She was still laughing brightly when she got back to her chamber.

She dressed in a simple but serviceable blouse and skirt, with a calfskin vest that she loved – the one that her benighted aunt had said made her 'look like a pirate'. So attired, she sought out the dining hall.

Dinner was an enormous success. Wynstan had arranged a private room, and the four of them made merry late into the night. At least, it felt like night to Hax.

At one point – after three deep cups of mead – Hax finally thought to ask the question that had been bothering her for hours. "How d'ye know it's 'night'?"

"Clocks," Wynstan grunted. "How do Elves do it? Look up?" He chuckled into his mug.

Frida rapped her husband across the knuckles with the rib-bone she had been gnawing on for the past several minutes. "Léasergerád!" she snorted. Turning to Hax, she said, "We keep time with water-clocks, dearie. Bells strike the hours during the work-day."

"How do you...how do you set them?" Hax asked. Her lips felt slightly numb. Evidently, the mead was a little stronger than the Homelands vintages to which she was accustomed.

"The Art," the priestess replied shortly. "Each city has a master-clock; the magi use their divinations to determine when the Lantern is directly overhead. We servants of the Powers can do it too. I've done it myself, from time to time. It's nothing special. We set the master-clock like that, and all the citizens set theirs by the master-clock."

Hax shook her head, puzzled. "Why do you care?" she asked blearily. "Why does this hour matter, or that one?" Blinking, she added unnecessarily, "I'm a little drunk." Reaching out, she carefully slid her cup to the centre of the table. Enough, she thought blearily.

"Gotta keep the Tube on time," Uchtred replied happily, misreading her gesture and topping her goblet up from a clay pitcher. "Can't schedule the coaches without a decent clock."

"What you just said," Hax replied solemnly, her eyes blinking with alarming rapidity, "made absolutely no sense." The room began to spin.

Wynstan and Frida shared a look. "Bed," they said simultaneously.

Hax shook her head angrily. "Non...nonshensh," she stammered. "'m fine. No problem. Got an iron...an iron cons...consti.."

Uchtred caught her as she tumbled off her chair.

♦

They started early the next day. Hax's head was still throbbing from the evening's excesses, but with characteristic cross-grainedness, she refused Frida's offer of healing magic. Wynstan had controlled his appetite, but Uchtred had imbibed four cups for each of Hax's, and was in sore straits until the priestess sorted him out with a brief prayer and a much longer lecture.

"At least she didn't poke me in the ribs," the engineer quipped to Hax as they started out. Frida heard him, and did just that.

The elf-girl was delighted to find that she would be able to ride Breygon's mare to their next destination. The Gamolportherpath (" 'Ancient Town-Road'," Frida explained primly while Hax choked on the pronunciation) was of the same generous proportions as the road to the gate: some ten paces wide and twice as high, vaulting to an ogive somewhere high above their heads. This was enough space not only for her to go horsed, but for Wynstan and Uchtred, with care, to navigate their fire-coach. "We'll have to leave it at Midpoint Station," Uchtred told her, "at least until a bulk cargo coach has space for it. Your horse, too. But they'll catch up with us eventually."

Hax didn't know what a 'bulk cargo coach' was (or for that matter, a 'midpoint station'), but she knew that she did not like the idea of being separated from her mount. It wasn't so much a question of affection, although she had grown genuinely fond of the companionable creature, not least because it represented, in some distant way, a link to its former owner. It was more a matter of speed. She had no idea whether there was anyone on her trail, but if there was, she hoped to be able to outrun anything she couldn't outfight.

This last question was still plaguing her. Since entering the Deeprealm she had relaxed a little; she might be woefully ignorant of dwarven customs and lifestyles, but she now knew that their homeland was shielded against flux-leaping by ancient and powerful magicks. Even if someone was capable of probing for her with arcane means, they wouldn't be able to pop in and assault her. She was as safe as she could be, for now.

She finally learned to pronounce the name of the city they had visited – Néwólnes Ceastorhlid – as they were leaving it behind; but as her comrades continued to refer to it as "Eastgate", she did the same. Hax was determined to learn more of the dwarven tongue, and to her delight, Uchtred and Frida agreed to teach her.

It proved to be a more difficult task than she had anticipated. The dwarves' language was wholly unlike her native tongue, replete with peculiar accents and odd, guttural stops. But it wasn't as difficult as it might have been; she was already fluent in the travelling tongue, and that, after all, was really nothing more than a barely organized mish-mash of the old Yonar-ri and modern Jarlin tongues, flavoured with dashes of Elven, dwarven and even halfling talk, and with a smattering of archaic contractions, giantish proverbs, goblin curses and the odd bit of wyrm-speech thrown in for good measure. Many of the easier words they taught her she already knew; it was simply a matter of discovering how to pronounce them correctly and in the proper order, and learning to spell them using the angular dwarven runes.

This latter task was something of a bother, as she was unable to read while on horseback. Frida resolved this difficulty via the simple expedient of writing the letters in fiery lines in the air before her. Hax's lessons progressed speedily after that.

They spent their nights at the comfortable if utilitarian hostels that appeared alongside the Town-Road at regular intervals, every five miles or so. Uchtred tried to augment her linguistic training by recounting children's tales in the dwarven tongue: simple stories and parables, intended to convey simple messages. It was slow going; after each telling, Frida would help the elf-girl work through the syntax and verb tenses, and correct her understanding of some of the concepts and vernacular that she had missed. The priestess did so with good humour and no visible frustration, and Hax thanked Miros for her luck at finding someone who not only genuinely liked her, but enjoyed teaching too, and had a knack for it.

On one of these occasions, Frida managed to prod Uchtred into singing an old dwarven ballad, recounting the tale of Malloch the Mighty at the Bridge of Bones. Hax listened to it carefully, and was disappointed to only be able to pick up a word here and there. Frida told her not to feel bad, as although the piece had been written recently, it had been crafted in an ancient idiom by an author trying to recapture the sense of battles long past. She made the engineer repeat it, and translated it for Hax, working line-by-line. Hax agreed that it was an admirable tale, but that it lost some of its rolling majesty when rendered in the travelling tongue.

More songs were sung. Other groups of travellers used the hostels as well, and Hax overheard many ballads, jingles and laments variously warbled and bellowed over the course of the evenings that followed the long days of travel. Most would have been indecipherable even had she possessed a rudimentary knowledge of the dwarven tongue; even her companions seemed to ignore them. But at one point during an evening's meal, all three seemed to prick up their ears. Uchtred merely sighed; but both Wynstan and Frida looked grim, and the priestess, after a few stanzas, hissed "Tchah!"

"What is it?" Hax asked, nonplussed by their reaction. She couldn't understand the words, of course, but the rhythm and tune seemed remotely familiar.

Frida seemed to come out of a grim reverie. "Eh?" she said. "Oh. Sorry, ducks. It's just the song." She nodded at the cluster of dwarves responsible for the offending tune. "Léoth ymbe Isenfyst. 'The Lay of Ironfist'." She snorted. "Hargóin's great masterpiece."

"What about it?" Hax asked, perplexed at the mixture of annoyance and contempt in her friend's tone.

"Load o'bollocks," Wynstan growled. He was staring at the offending singer with narrow, red-rimmed eyes.

Hax listened more closely, trying to sort the melody from the syncopated rattle of the tambours. "I've heard this before," she said, increasingly certain. "A skald sang it, at one of my...at a feast I attended, back in Joyous Light. It's about how Ironfist slew the Spellweaver, the king of the Sobrinatri, the Shadelf who invaded the Deeprealm."

"That's the one," Wynstan grumbled. "Threescore years it's been, now." Hax noticed that he had a spoon in his hands, and had twisted it into an unusual shape.

"Don't believe everything you hear, dearie," Frida said, patting her husband soothingly on the arm.

They did not offer to translate the song for her, and, after witnessing their reaction to it, Hax decided that it would be imprudent to ask.

Afterwards, lubricated by a little too much mead (the first she had touched since what she had come to call her 'day of debauchery' in Eastgate), she was convinced to sing a ballad of her own. Hax had never been considered much of a songstress among her own people. The minstrels of Eldisle were renowned throughout the Homelands, and her own lute master – a scrawny halfling martinet with a lazy eye and the unlikely and deliberately appalling stage-name of 'Packalful of Shyte' – had once dismissed her vocal pretensions as "the tuneless warblings of a gravel-throated little thug." Her training companion, poor Palkywan, outraged at the insult to his friend, had chased the nimble little fellow around her father's great hall with a hearth shovel. But with her inhibitions numbed by honey-wine, she stood near the firestones and, doing her best to recall her lessons, held forth.

As Wynstan had given her a war-song, she decided to reply with one of her own: Ultimo Pugnum Fineleorus et Antaïssina – the 'Last Battle of Fineleor and Antaïssin', which Sylloallen had, at her mother's urging, drummed into Hax's head. After so many repetitions, she could at least be certain that she wouldn't forget the complex stanzas, even under the influence of too much drink. There were other reasons for her choice, too; the ancient general was, after all, her namesake, and the source of her nomen virago, her war-woman's moniker. And, too, the song reminded her of the tavern in Bornhavn; of a local skald who had known the Lugeo, of rough hands in hers, a racing heart thudding against her ribs, and warm breath on her neck.

She shook her head to clear it and tried to concentrate. Her voice was untutored, but it was at least clear, and several octaves higher than the dwarves were accustomed to. I must sound like a twittering bird to them, she thought giddily, appalled at her audacity, wondering idly how many of them had ever seen or heard a bird. Such inane introspections nearly caused her to stumble and she forced herself to concentrate. As she worked her way through the convoluted verses, singing in her mother tongue to preserve the rhyme and scansion, sweat beaded her brow.

When she finished, she was surprised by a thunderous round of applause. Flushing scarlet, she turned to see that the whole population of the Town-Road hostel had gathered behind her. Five-score Dwarves, including a dozen children, were hooting enthusiastically and slapping their left hands against their right shoulders. Her embarrassment deepened further when one of their number – an ancient greybeard, so bent with age that his chin-whiskers seemed to brush his knees – came forward, mumbled something incomprehensible to her, and favoured her with a gap-toothed smile.

"Bend down," Frida whispered. Hax complied. The old fellow seized her by the shoulders with a grip that belied his frailty, and kissed her soundly on both cheeks. Feeling as though her face was likely to burst into flame, Hax straightened up again, and found that the eldling had put something around her neck. She fingered it, finding a bright, irregular orange stone on a fine silver chain.

She returned the old fellow's smile, and made as if to return the bauble, but he motioned for her to keep it. Sensing the mood of the crowd, she seized one of the old fellow's hands, kissed it, and placed it against her forehead in the elven gesture of a student acknowledging a master. This proved to be a hit with the onlookers, who responded with a roar of approval. The old dwarf grinned toothily again, bursting into laughter; then, oddly, he waved his hand in a dismissive gesture, smiled again, and ambled back into the crowd.

Hax found a battered copper mug thrust into her hand, and realizing that she was thirsty, raised it to her lips and took a deep draft. Raw, scented alcohol seared her throat, and she sputtered and hissed like an untended kettle. "Appello Defensor!" she swore, choking. "What in all the hells is this?"

"Laguhland," Frida replied with a grin. "It's a distilled spirit."

"What's it m-made from?" Hax gasped. "Dragon b-b-bile?"

"It's – " Uchtred began.

Frida stopped him. "You don't want to know," she interjected, winking at her. "And don't try to dump it when nobody's looking."

"Why not? Would it damage the stone?"

"Custom," the priestess smiled. "You have to finish it, I'm afraid."

"You're not serious," Hax gasped. Her throat felt as though she had swallowed a handful of nails.

"It's the 'Cantor's Cup', dearie," the priestess replied, smiling roguishly. "You've been adjudged the best singer of the camp. Old Burarda tradition. Bad luck not to empty it."

"Bad luck not to empty it in one go," Uchtred added helpfully, draining his own cup by way of example.

Hax looked at the oily poison swirling in the bottom of the vessel. "What was the old fellow chortling about?" she asked.

"Just some subtle cultural differences," Frida answered, grinning. "When a Dwarf-maid kisses her suitor's hand and places it on her forehead, she is agreeing to be ruled by him. It's part of our betrothal ceremony." She laughed. "Lucky for you I'm not a priest of Lagu, or I could have welded you to that knock-kneed old bugger on the spot!"

"Don't you mean 'priestess of Lagu'?" Hax asked, eyes wide. "And what do you mean, 'welded'?"

"Lagu...only admits priests," Uchtred snorted drunkenly. "M-m-men. Frida l-l-lacks at l-l-least one of the qual...qualifications."

Frida threw a bone at the engineer, striking him squarely in the forehead. Unperturbed, he rubbed grease from between his eyes, adding "And 'welded' means m-m-married."

Ally turned to Frida. "I'm lost," she admitted.

"Lagu's priests," the dwarf-woman said slowly and carefully, "are the only members of the Dwarf-Lords' clergy empowered to perform namings, betrothals, weddings, and funerals. The rest of us can assist, but not officiate.

"So you see," she added, taking a deep draught, "you should ask about our customs instead of improvising. By law and tradition, you just about got engaged to the old fellow."

"Ælást," Uchtred chortled drunkenly. "Don't se-se-settle for l-l-less."

"Excuse me?"

"What my inebriated kinsman means, I'm sure," Frida said, casting a threatening glance at the engineer, "is that we should all hope for a lifemate who inspires Ælást: the eternal vow, unbreakable even by death."

"How can a vow be 'unbreakable by death'?" the elf-maid asked, baffled.

" 'S a dw...a dw...dwarven thing," the engineer mumbled. Somehow he managed to get himself to his feet, and trundled off to a dark corner, his intentions obvious.

"I have got to learn more about this place," Hax muttered to herself. "And your...ah, peculiar customs."

Frida chortled gleefully. "You're holding one of those customs right now, cildic," she prodded. "Bottoms up!"

Hax stared into the vessel; there had to be a good half-pint of liquid skyfire remaining in it. She braced herself, put the cup to her lips, took a deep breath, and upended it.

Things went rapidly downhill from there.

♦

Despite moving at a steady pace and over much smoother terrain than she was accustomed to, it took the group eight days to reach the small underground town known as 'Midpoint Station.' Frida had explained the peculiar etymology during the trip. Due to the great distance between Eastgate and Elder Delvin, the Town-Road had, in the past, originally led to the surface on the western edge of the Feymount, allowing caravans to travel through uninhabited and fairly inhospitable valleys high in the Deeprealm Range, before plunging underground again closer to the centre of the dwarven kingdom. But the cutting of the Tube lines had changed that. Now, the Town-Road led to a station on the line connecting Gálmodnædre – a large settlement southeast of the Famgían Mere – to Carrlár, which, after Elder Delvin and Underdarrow, was the oldest of the ancient dwarven tunnel cities. The Town-Road met the Tube line roughly at its midpoint – hence the serviceable, if unromantic, name.

"Sooner or later," Frida explained, "we'll get around to cutting a direct line from Carrlár to Eastgate. Then this highway will be no more than a relic of older days."

"It won't be 'sooner'," Uchtred groused. "That'll be the longest tunnel ever cut. And it won't be nice and straight, either; it'll have to pass under valleys and through a lot of fractured rock. Nasty proposition."

"I'm sure you lot'll manage," Frida said soothingly.

"You're working on that project?" Hax asked, surprised. She had known the Uchtred had some experience with the Tubes, but he had never mentioned any ongoing involvement.

The dwarf shrugged, saying nothing. Frida lowered her voice. "He won't admit it, but they need his help. One of his old school chums is a chief architect on the Carrlár- to-Eastgate dig, and he's asked Uchtred to help devise new – what's the word? 'Mission cams'?"

Uchtred nodded soberly.

"New mission cams," the priestess continued, "for the line. The tunnellers are having trouble negotiating the waterbreaks, strain zones and blind caverns. And nobody knows the little tin buggers like their daddy does." She gave Uchtred an affectionate shove.

Hax blinked several times. "I didn't understand any of that," she confessed.

Frida chuckled. "Well, you will once you see more of the system. We're proud of the old wrench-bender here; each of his toys can do the work of a thousand dwarves."

"Four hundred and sixty six," Uchtred corrected her absently.

This peculiar exchange gave Hax plenty to think about as they entered Midpoint. The town was nothing like the orderly if busy Eastgate; it was a jumbled, chaotic mass of surging dwarven bodies, a throng vastly complicated by countless parcels, coaches, carriages, carts, vendors, hawkers, itinerant priests, soldiers, draft and food animals and a bewildering variety of pets. Odours both identifiable – roasting meat, mead, and even the dreadful Laguhland that she had learned through bitter experience to avoid – and unidentifiable assailed her nostrils. And the aural cacophony was, after more than a week underground, simply deafening.

What truly overwhelmed her senses, however, was the sight that awaited her once they reached their destination. After struggling through surging crowds for more than an hour, they finally reached the heart of the settlement. The fire-coach, followed closely by Hax on horseback, rolled slowly through an enormous pair of bronze-rigged stone doors, and into a cavern greater than anything she had yet seen underground.

"Welcome to Midpoint Station," a grinning Uchtred shouted over the din.

Hax goggled. The tunnel opened onto a roughly spherical chamber that was easily two, maybe three hundred paces across, lit by crystal globes hanging from chains fixed to the far-distant ceiling. Overhead, immense stalactites hung point-downwards, water dripping from their gleaming tips. Before her, and all around, thousands upon thousands of dwarves surged in disorderly waves, circumnavigating piled ranks of wooden crates, metal barrels, nets of miscellaneous cargo and tethered animals of all kinds. The walls were lined with vendors of every possible variety, selling everything from hot bread, cold ale and spit-roasted meat to clothing, arms, armour, more animals, books, printed broadsheets, potions, exotic spices and fungi, hair and beard-trimming services and an indescribable welter of miscellaneous knick-knacks.

An odd sound made her look down, and she gasped. The stone floor was gone; the pedestrians, the fire-coach and her horse were walking across an artificial floor made entirely of intermeshed metal rods. She could see larger iron beams and thick, angular braces beneath them, connecting the structure to the stone walls, as well as numerous walk-ways, passages and ladders further down, and, far below – very far, she thought with a gulp – the glint of water.

Uchtred damped the coach's boiler down to a low hiss, and Wynstan edged the contraption forward at a crawl, leaning over the buckboard to keep a closer eye on the foot traffic, all the while making for the opposite end of the metal platform. Hax examined this more closely. The platform ended before reaching the far wall, butting up against what appeared – from a distance, anyway – to be a colossal tree trunk lying on its side. As they approached, however, she could see that her perception had been somewhat off. The thing was clearly artificial: a gigantic cylinder of metal, seven or eight paces in diameter and more than a hundred paces long. It emerged from the left-hand wall of the cavern, traversed its full width, and disappeared into the right-hand wall. Robust iron braces supported it, fastened to the stone walls with heavy bolts, and it was covered by a bewildering metal scaffold, and festooned with other pipes and conduits both large and small.

Her inspection was interrupted by a sudden rumble, like distant thunder. She looked around, alarmed; but no one in the crowd seemed to be disturbed. The sound grew louder, and louder still; and then it was suddenly overtaken by a roaring like a nearby waterfall. The cacophony reverberated through the immense cavern. Hax's horse, reacting to her nervousness as much as to the sudden roaring, shifted skittishly, and she struggled to keep him from trampling the dwarves that clustered all around.

She leaned over and tapped Frida on the arm. "What in all the hells is that thing?" she shouted.

"Our next leg!" the priestess shouted back.

Like vapour from a bursting dam, a blasting spray of water exploded out of a series of valves protruding from the gigantic iron tube. As this new noise died away, Hax could hear a rumbling squeal, like ungreased wagon wheels, and a heavy clatter, all seemingly growing closer.

The enormous tube began to shiver, and then shake, vibrating like a tree in a high wind. A groan of stressed metal echoed through the cavern, and the squealing rose in pitch until it seemed to pierce her ears...and then it suddenly died away. Silence fell, and the bustling babble of the dwarves began again.

Blasts of air and water issued from the enormous pipe...and then, suddenly, huge doors opened all along its length, disgorging hundreds of busy-looking dwarves onto the platform. These newcomers melded instantly with the crowd, who began pushing and jostling towards the metal portals.

The commotion overwhelmed Hax's senses. She came back to herself with Frida all but yelling into her ear. "Let's go!" the priestess shouted. "We've about a half-hour to see to the coach and your horse, and get aboard."

"Aboard? That?!" the elf replied, incredulous.

"Aye!"

Hax took a deep breath and tried to force her misgivings into a small compartment in her mind.

"Is there a problem?" Frida asked, seeing the look of panic on the elf-girl's face.

Hax forced an unconvincing smile. "Not so long as you've got some more of that Laguhland handy," she shouted back.

♦

"Won't Wynstan be upset?" Hax asked.

Frida fluffed her pillow. "Not as upset as you'd be if you had to put up with Uchtred's nocturnal gut-rumblings. And his 'accidentally' pawing you while you're washing up."

As it turned out, Frida had some pull with the station manager, and despite a long waiting list, had managed to secure two cabins in a first-class coach. As all of the cabins came with two bunks, she had decreed that the two women would travel in one room, and the two men in the other. Obviously doesn't think I'm sufficiently acclimated to dwarven customs just yet, Hax thought wryly when she heard about the sleeping arrangements. Not that she'd been looking forward to getting another glimpse of Uchtred's hairy torso. The man ought to shave with sheep-shears. If he ever shaved, she amended belatedly.

They had turned over the fire-coach and Hax's horse to the station's cargo wranglers. Hax had been concerned about saying goodbye, but the patient animal seemed perfectly content to go with the dwarves, who appeared to be competent at their trade and accustomed to dealing with large beasts. The purser had assured her that the mare would be sent along with the next bulk cargo shipment ("Midnight tonight, at the latest, my lady!" the fellow had promised, looking harried but efficient), so she shouldered her saddle bags and followed Frida and Wynstan, who were trundling their own rather bulkier possessions along in a hand-cart.

They had only just found their rooms when the great doors clanged shut, and the coach lurched slightly. "Best sit down until we're up to speed," Frida had counselled. Hax had plopped herself down on her bunk, feeling her gorge protest as the coach accelerated. She could hear water rushing past beneath her. From all around came a low, thundering rumble, like a cacophony of cartwheels on a smooth road. She concentrated on studying the bunk on which she sat; built for a dwarf, it was barely long enough for her to stretch out, but could have accommodated three others of her girth. A human's feet would be out in the hallway, she thought with an inward chuckle.

After a couple of moments, the tremble subsided and the rushing noise eased somewhat. The walls, ceiling and floor still vibrated slightly, but there was something in the suspension of her mattress that damped the motion down. She found that if she picked her feet off the floor, there was almost no sensation of movement save for an occasional, almost imperceptible lurch.

"What's 'up to speed'?" she asked, curious.

"Eh?"

Hax glanced over at the dwarf-woman. "You said to sit down 'until we get up to speed'. How fast are we going?"

"Ah," Frida replied. "About five leagues in the hour, I think."

Hax blinked. This thing – which, by the evidence of her senses, was scarcely moving at all – was travelling as fast as a galloping horse? "You're joking," she said uncertainly.

"Not me, dearie," Frida answered with a light laugh. "They can go faster, of course, but the pilot keeps the speed down so as not to mess up the schedules. And to avoid accidents, of course."

Hax nodded, looking around at the tiny room, and marvelling at the sophistication of the contraption. "How does it all work, anyway?" she asked, her voice full of wonder.

Frida shrugged. "Water pressure," she replied. "Best get Uchtred to explain it for you," she added. "That way he won't have to correct any mistakes I make."

She reached for and found a small bronze key in the ceiling, and made a small adjustment. Cool, moist air flooded into the tiny room. "A little chilling," she said apologetically. "But it gets stuffy otherwise."

The cabin may have been small, but it was comfortable. Hax had to watch her head, as the outer wall of the coach - it was a perfect cylinder, conforming to the shape of the vast metal tube she had seen from the platform – curved up and over them. But in view of Hax's slender physique, Frida probably had more room than if she had shared a compartment with her broad-shouldered husband.

She mentioned this to the priestess, who laughed. "Aye, doubtless they're in each others' laps over there."

Despite the stature of the accommodations, Hax found them very cleverly laid out. Small compartments were built into the ceiling, floor, walls and even the bunk itself; she had no problem stowing her kit, and she was even able to wedge her sword and bow into one of the shelves by laying them cross-wise. Frida opened a low, broad closet, and showed her how to work the facilities it contained. Hax was delighted to see that she would not be forced to go without bathing, or to share common toilet facilities with hundreds of other passengers.

"Worth every doubleweight," Frida snorted. "The poor souls in steerage make do with wooden benches and one pot for four-score riders. Of course, they pay pennies. It's fine to ride this way, but plenty costly."

Hax started slightly. It was the first time that any of the dwarves had ever mentioned money in her presence. At the conclusion of their stay at the inn in Eastgate, she had tried to settle her bill, only to find that it had already been paid. No one at the any of the Town-Road hostels had ever asked for remuneration (she had assumed that the dwarves were paying her way behind her back – an uncomfortable situation, but one that she had not been able to figure out how to address). She had bought a few things at the odd vendor's stall during their underground voyage, paying in the plain but serviceable Zaran coins, which the proprietors had accepted readily enough; but the one time she had tried to raise the question of paying her share with Wynstan, he had harrumphed abruptly and stomped away.

She had been afraid to raise it again. But she couldn't let the matter go unsettled any longer. "Frida," she said hesitantly, "I want you to tell me how much this costs, so I can pay you what I owe."

"Nothing," the priestess said curtly, concentrating on arranging her bedding to her satisfaction.

"Come now," Hax snapped. "You've been extraordinarily generous, offering the open hand of friendship to a stranger, no questions asked, when you could have asked many, and would have been justified in expecting answers. I will always treasure the friendship you have shown me. But I cannot allow you to continue to pay my debts. I have money. I want you to take it." She crossed her arms and did her best to look stern.

It didn't work. Frida chuckled ruefully. "Time for another lesson, I see. Sit down, ducks," she said, waving at Hax's bunk.

Hax sat, feeling both frustrated and puzzled.

"I know how we dwarves are portrayed in the outside world," the priestess mused, pulling out a soft cloth and polishing her medallion with it as she spoke. "As money-grubbing jewel-mongers, no? Hoarders of treasure. Greedy, grasping, gold-hungry..."

"Yes," Hax interrupted, feeling terribly embarrassed. "That's about the gist of it."

"And," the priestess continued remorselessly, "those tales are especially pointed when told by the folk of the Third House. Are they not?"

Hax nodded, her face flaming.

"I'm not trying to embarrass you, dearie," the dwarf-woman said in a kindly tone, "but only to suggest that you think about the other things you have seen in the past week. Think about how well your experience accords with the tales you were told."

"Not at all," Hax replied immediately. "You...this place..." She shrugged. "It's like the difference between cub-tales and the real world."

Frida nodded. "It's time to broaden your linguistic education a little." She settled herself comfortably. "Do you know the word for we use for 'money'?" she asked.

Hax nodded. She had heard it used many times around her household as a child, and it was one of the staples of the travelling tongue. "Goldóra," she replied instantly.

"Wrong," Frida said, grinning. "That's just a colloquialism. It really means 'gold ore'. The gold-bearing rock from which we smelt the pure metal. A common misconception."

Hax frowned, taken aback.

"How about 'wealth'?" the priestess prodded.

The elf-girl thought about that. She had overheard a great deal of dwarven conversation over the past few weeks, and thought she knew the answer. "Koneringerne?" she said hesitantly.

"That means 'royal seal'. We stamp the King's seal on the coins, but that's not what we call them. Try again."

Hax shrugged, and offered the only other term she had heard them use: "Céapgyld, then."

"Sorry," Frida answered, smiling again. "That means 'purchase price'." She paused. "Shall I tell you?"

"Please," Hax answered, mildly annoyed, but interested in learning why she had misjudged what she had overheard.

"Horines," Frida said, with a guttural rasp in her throat.

"Hang on," Hax interrupted. "You've never used that word before. Not in my hearing."

"Not in a way that you would understand." She breathed on her medallion, carefully polishing the mist away. "Do you know any words in our tongue that sound similar to horines?"

Hax shook her head.

"How about 'gor'?"

" 'Filth'?" Hax asked, incredulous. "What does that have to do with wealth?"

"Everything," the priestess replied intently. "Listen carefully, because it's important that you understand this, and it's not often any of our folk will pause to explain it to an outsider.

"We dwarves," Frida said, growing serious, "do not judge wealth by gold, or silver, gems or mithral, ostentation or the lack of it. We judge wealth by what it costs us to acquire it. We don't care if one of our folk has a huge store of coin; we care how he obtained it."

"I don't see the..." Hax interrupted.

Frida ploughed ahead. "There are lesser means of obtaining wealth, and greater means. The lesser means include business, trade, taxes, usury; the greater means are knowledge, labour, the sweat of the brow, the aching back.

" 'Filth' and 'wealth', cildic, sound similar because, in our eyes, only the man who earns his fortune by his own labours is judged truly wealthy. Filthy hands mean a clean heart. The mud-spattered stonemason, the flat-thumbed smithy, the rouge-stained gem-cutter – these have always been the measure of truly wealthy men. They were the model for all, because they made wealth. Men with clean hands were reviled, because even if they paid dearly for it, they only took wealth.

"In the travelling tongue," Frida continued, chuckling, "there is a saying: 'filthy rich'. You use it to revile someone who is exceedingly well-off, regardless of where his money comes from. Our saying - Gorine horines – sounds the same, but means the opposite. 'Filthy wealth' is, for us, a mark of pride. It is the origin that matters. Not the quantity."

She stowed her holy symbol back within her bodice and replaced the polishing cloth in her kit. "When you grasp that distinction, dearie," she concluded, "you'll understand us a good deal better."

"Just a minute," Hax stopped her. "You can't tell me dwarves don't admire show-goods. I've seen some incredible clothes and trinkets here, and some downright stunning gem-work. Isn't that ostentation?"

"Remember who has the dirty hands, dear," Frida chided her. "If I wear a diamond tiara – I have one, somewhere back at home – I'm not telling my neighbours that I have a great deal of money. I'm telling them that I disposed of my money in order to share in the glory of the work of someone whose skill and perseverance created it. My choice is to rid myself of 'clean' coin in order to acquire 'filthy wealth' – to own and display something exquisite, wrought by a master craftsman." She began unpacking her luggage, folding her smallclothes carefully and stowing them away in the various compartments beneath her bunk. "By displaying a great artisan's work, I honour the artisan. The money I pay for the piece is just a way for him to live while he plies his trade, and enriches us all."

" 'Lyszi," Hax muttered darkly.

"Sorry?"

"My aunt," the elf said moodily. "My mother's sister. She has a habit of giving people a tour of her show-room, telling them how much she paid for each of the trinkets. I once admired a silver brooch she was wearing – simple work, but powerful, a wonderful piece – and asked her where she got it. She couldn't remember where or when she had purchased it, let alone who had made it – but she knew how much she'd paid for the thing. Down to the last, edge-clipped groat."

Frida nodded sagely. "Clean hands, I suppose?" she asked.

Hax laughed without humour. "The cleanest."

"Customs differ, ducks."

Hax nodded slowly. "All things considered, I think I like your way better. Thank you for explaining that to me." She snorted suddenly. "But none of it answers why you won't let me pay my share."

"Oh, that," Frida said, colouring slightly. "Well, the same principle – wealth lies in achievement, rather than money – encourages us to assist others according to their means. You're on a quest, dearie. It's the ultimate in 'dirty hands'. We gain honour, and 'clean our coin', as it were, by spending it to assist you. The more assistance we can provide, the more honour we gain. And the more coin we 'clean'."

Hax blinked several times. "Well, just don't 'clean' yourself into the poor-house on my account," she said, smiling.

"Little chance of that," Frida said glumly. "We're...ah...rich, I suppose, is the best way to put it." She looked uncomfortable, as if she were confessing a peccadillo.

Hax sighed in confusion. "And that's a bad thing?"

The priestess managed to look furtive and embarrassed at the same time. "Well, among us, there's such a thing as being too successful," she said quietly. "Uchtred's fire-coach design, the 'lightless heat' spell...Wynstan managed to turn those inventions into a business that did...a little better than we expected." She sighed. "Well, a lot better, actually."

"I still don't see how it's bad," Hax prompted when the dwarf-woman fell silent.

"We couldn't keep up with demand on our own," Frida said. "That's a shameful thing for a dwarven artisan to have to admit. We had to hire labourers to keep the business running."

Hax rubbed her forehead tiredly. "And it's not good to employ your countrymen at a salary?" she asked, confused.

"No, no, nothing like that," Frida said, looking shocked. "It's wonderful for them. But it meant running a business rather doing our own work. Putting his hammer down nearly killed Uchtred.

"Now he's so busy supervising the factory that he has no time for personal errands. No time to spend in his workshop, at his forge, inventing. For the first time in his life, his hands are clean. He's a taker now, instead of a maker. That's not true, of course, but that's how he feels. Wynstan, too. That's why I've been trying to talk Uchtred into taking the commission on the Carrlár-Eastgate tube. To keep him from going out of his mind.

"This was our first time away together in six years, and we still spent it working. Uchtred had to keep his hand in. Idleness would've been the death of him."

Hax shook her head, perplexed. "All right, I can see how you would miss your métier," she replied. "But it can't be as bad as all that. I mean, how many people do you employ?"

Frida scratched her chin. "When we left," she said thoughtfully, "it was about eight thousand, with a payroll of about a quarter of a million double-weights." She shrugged. "Probably more, now."

Hax did the arithmetic in her head. "Half a million crowns? Per year?" She asked faintly, her eyes slightly unfocussed.

"Per month," Frida corrected. Noticing the Elf's dazed expression, she added sadly, "I told you we don't like to talk about money."

Hax cleared her throat. "Just forget I asked," she said after a moment. "I won't challenge you for the tab any more. You can keep me as a pet for as long as you like." Smiling widely, she added, "If you want to buy me something, I've always liked Ekhan. You could buy me Ekhan..."

She kept up the flow of inane patter until Frida relaxed and began laughing again.

♦

The half-day that Hax spent encased in the metal cylinder of the Tube coach between Midpoint and Carrlár was easily among the most fascinating in her long life to date.

She nattered happily with Frida until the priestess fell asleep. Hax, much younger and in better shape after a month on horseback, was certainly fatigued by all of the travelling, but the unusual surroundings invigorated her, and her eyes refused to close. Moments after Frida's snores began, the elf-girl stole out into the corridor, closing the cabin door with care and padding soundlessly down the long hallway.

The coach was easily fifty paces from prow to stern. Do they even use those terms? she wondered idly. Based on the orientation of the thing when they had entered it, Hax's cabin was on the 'port' side, so upon exiting it, she turned left, towards what she assumed was 'forward'.

The corridor was about five feet wide and comfortably high; the curved ceiling was an arm's length over her head. Cabin doors punctuated the walls every three paces or so, and there were twenty on each side of the coach. Eight hands of passengers, she thought. Four-score in all. She tried to calculate how many people were under way at the moment...then realized that she had no idea how many coaches were linked together.

Forward, she saw another door. Unlike the portal to her chamber, this one was heavier, a circular hatch of green-gold metal surrounded by what appeared to be about a dozen heavy bolt-ends. The whole apparatus was set in the end-wall of the metal tube.

When she reached the door, she was surprised to see a middle-aged dwarf-woman tucked into a small nook, sitting in a comfortably padded chair. Before her, a small bronze bell protruded from the wall. A large, horizontal metal wheel with spokes like a ship's tiller stood on a heavy metal screw set into the floor.

"Feeling restless?" the dwarf murmured, speaking – much to Hax's surprise – the elven tongue.

"Yes," she replied in the same language. "Is it possible to go forward?"

The dwarf nodded brusquely. "Knock when you get to the pilot coach; the conductors get twitchy if you barge in on them."

"How about aft?" she asked.

"Surely. Not much to see, though; you'll have to crawl over the steerage passengers, and the cargo coaches're buttoned up tight."

"Safety reasons?" she asked, wondering what lay beyond the cargo containers.

"Necat. Insurance."

Hax didn't know what that was, so she merely said, "Thank you," and tried the hatch. After some fumbling, she managed to get it open.

"Dog it behind you," the dwarf said, and closed her eyes again.

Hax looked around, but did not see any dogs. Then, by process of elimination, she realized what the woman meant, and snorted in amusement.

The hatch was heavy, but balanced and well-oiled. She was able to swing it open and shut again without difficulty. She snugged the latches down ('dogged' them, she sniggered softly) and found herself in a short, hinged tunnel formed of overlapping bronze rings. Some sort of black, spongy substance oozed from between the plates; she touched it with a fingertip and found it to be cold, and slightly sticky.

She traversed the tunnel in two swift paces, and found herself facing another hatch. She opened this, stepped through, and secured it quickly again. Glancing around, she found that she was in another first-class coach, identical to the one she had just left. Once again, she padded noiselessly forward. Another dwarf – this one younger, and male – was perched on a chair behind the spoked wheel. He was snoring loudly. She managed to open the hatch and secure it again without waking him.

Another short, hinged tunnel. On the far end, however, the hatch door had a runic inscription in dwarven runes, which of course she could not read. "Must be the 'pilot coach'," she muttered. Shrugging, she rapped on the door. She waited a few moments, then rapped again.

The latches twitched and the door swung out, towards her. She stepped back.

An older dwarf – male, with long, silvery braids and elaborate tattoos stencilled across both his cheeks in faded russet ink – blinked at her in surprise. Then, suddenly, he grinned. "First-timer, right?"

"Yes," she replied, relieved that he spoke the travelling tongue.

"Want to take a look-see?"

"Yes, very much," she answered.

He beckoned her forward. "Come on in. And make sure you shut the door tight; Theolg's already had his bath this month, and 'e won't stand for another."

Hax stepped over the threshold, pulled the metal door to, and snugged the latches down. The dwarf watched her closely, nodding approval. "Good. Safety first." He gave her a frank once-over. "Pretty," he added, much to her surprise, and stuck out a calloused hand. "Welcome to the Iron Python, Pretty. I'm Faulgrimm Coyle, engineer." Jerking a thumb over his shoulder, he added, "Conductor's Doff Ogrettik. Co-conductor – that lump o'bacon there – hight Theolg Weasand."

The co-conductor – an immensely fat, hairy dwarf, with uncharacteristically yellow braids – called back from the front of the coach: "If she's that pretty, you tunnel rat, you gotta share!"

"I don't think you're her type," Faulgrimm shot back. "She's not blind or drunk! Come on, Pretty," he continued with a wink. "I'll show you 'round."

"My name's not 'Pretty'," Hax said faintly. "It's..." she paused for a heartbeat, remembering what Frida had told Bert at Eastgate. "Lyszia. Lyszia Ellacana. Of Oststrand."

"Oststrand!" Theolg exclaimed, glancing over his shoulder. "Fantastic! Why, I once knew an Ostrander girl, nimble as a tunnel viper. She could wrap her legs..."

Another dwarf – Hax assumed it was the conductor – leaned over and swatted Theolg on the head, hissing "Átemia! Keep your eyes on the shaft, you fat fool!"

"Now, see, there you go again," Theolg said in an aggrieved tone. "The clíewen ládmann told you, no more hitting..."

"If you can ignore the comedy troupe," Faulgrimm said sotto voce, "I'll give you the tuppenny tour."

"Thank you," Hax whispered. "What's a clíewen?" she asked as they walked forward.

"It's...ah, there ain't no word for it, in this tongue," he replied, looking puzzled. "It's a gathering, an organization. Of folk who work in the same field. To ensure good pay, fair treatment..."

"Conlegium!" the elf-girl blurted out. "A guild! Like chandlers, or barrel-makers..."

"...or teamsters," Faulgrimm replied, smiling. "Right, right. Except we tunnel rats got a little more power than that. 'Cause we keep things moving. Or we don't. See?"

Hax nodded. She did see. They could refuse to work.

Or could they? she wondered a moment later. After what she had seen thus far, she had difficulty imagining any dwarf ever refusing to work.

She had no more time for speculation about the nature of labour relations in the dwarven realm. Faulgrimm halted at the centre of the coach. "You can see most of it from here," the elderly dwarf said in satisfied tones.

He was right. The chamber was only about ten paces from the hatch at the rear to the two dwarves seated at the front. Beyond them was nothing but what looked to be a sharply angled, mist-clouded mirror, glittering with rainbow shimmers.

The two drivers – conductors, she reminded herself – sat in comfortable, high-backed chairs. Each had a bewildering array of levers, all with different-coloured handles, protruding from the floor before him. Between them and slightly to the rear stood a larger version of the horizontal, spoked 'ship's wheels' that she had seen at the forward ends of the coaches she had already traversed.

Further back, on the left side of the coach, a small metal desk lay covered with open scrolls and bound volumes containing intricate ink drawings; while the right side consisted of an enormous armoire of beaten metal containing scores of tiny drawers. Further back still – near where she and Faulgrimm stood – were two sealed rooms.

"Heads on the left," Faulgrimm explained with a jerk of his thumb, "sleeping cabin on the right. For an extra co-conductor, on long-haul runs.

"Okay," the dwarf continued. "Left front is the conductor; he's in command of the caravan. You ever see a boat?"

"Of course," Hax said, shooting the dwarf an incredulous glance.

"Hey," he said, raising his hands defensively, "it's a natural question, no? I mean, how many dwarves have ever seen one?"

The elf-girl nodded apologetically. "Sorry." Am I ever going to get used to this place? she wondered despairingly.

He waved her chagrin away. "Never mind. Anyway, conductor's like the captain of a boat, you unnerstand? Second in command is the co-conductor. That's him on the right. They each got the same controls."

"That's what I wanted to know!" Hax interrupted eagerly. "How does it work?"

"Oh, it's really complicated," Faulgrimm chuckled. "The wheel makes it go; the coloured levers make it stop."

Hax blinked. "That's all?"

"C'mere," the dwarf said, motioning her towards the desk behind the conductor's chair. "This is my station. I'm the engineer. I fix things when they break – not often – and spend the rest of my time telling these two idiots to slow the hells down."

Theolg raised a hand over the back of his chair and made a rude gesture.

"Look here." Faulgrimm pulled a large scroll from the chaos on his desk and unrolled it.

It was a schematic diagram of the pilot coach. Hax goggled; the intricacy and sheer beauty of the penmanship was breathtaking. "It's beautiful!" she breathed.

"It's just a technical drawing," Faulgrimm said dismissively. "Look. See all of the coaches? They're all basically cylindrical pipes, yes? Each is surrounded by wheelbelts, and the wheelbelts are connected fore and aft with braketendons. The bottom of each coach – beneath the floors, see? It's hollow. A big channel. So we line up all the coaches and connect them with the hinged tunnel tubes, and ligature up the braketendons all the way from the aft-most coach to the main-cables here in the pilot coach. That lines up the bottom channels. Then we flood the tunnel behind the caravan."

"I beg your pardon?" Hax said, blinking at the deluge of unfamiliar terms. He was speaking the travelling tongue, to be sure, but it was like listening to an unfamiliar dialect. Only half of the words made any sense.

But she thought she had understood one principle correctly. "Do you mean to tell me," she asked in a tiny voice, "that we're surrounded by water?"

"Not 'surrounded'," Faulgrimm said patiently. "Not exactly. And keep your pretty yap shut whilst I explain the rest of this." He softened his rebuke with a wink so elaborate that Hax couldn't help but snicker.

"The water flows under the coaches down the channel, see?" he continued. She nodded. "So when we're ready to go, the conductor releases the braketendons and all the wheelbelts are free to roll. Then I turn the wheel and that shuts the watergate under the pilot coach. The water pressure builds up behind us, and off we go."

"Like a stick down a creek," she whispered, staring at the schematic in fascination.

"More like a cork out of a bottle," Faulgrimm amended. "But yes, that's the general idea."

"How fast?" she mused, half to herself.

"Eh?"

"How fast can you go?"

"Fast as you want, bee-yootiful!" Theolg chortled, slapping an enthusiastic paradiddle against the arms of his seat, his beard bouncing against his enormous gut. Despite herself, Hax smiled at the man's buffoonery.

"Operating speed's twenty-two feet per second," Faulgrimm replied. "Call it fifteen miles in the hour, or so."

Hax nodded. She had no idea what a 'second' was, but it was obviously shorter than a minute. And fifteen miles in the hour was a reasonable canter for a good horse. "No faster?" she asked, sounding disappointed.

The dwarf chuckled. "Plenty faster. Depends on how much of a hurry you're in. We keep the speed down and steady mainly to serve the schedules and prevent avoidable accidents. Don't want to bang into the south end of a northbound caravan. Also, slower speed means fewer maintenance problems. And it reduces the chance of a prang-up if we throw a wheelbelt or have a shaft problem."

"How much faster can you go?" she asked immediately. "And what's a 'shaft problem'."

"You're a curious one, ain't you?" Faulgrimm said with a grin.

"Give her to me!" Theolg shouted. "I like'em brainy!"

"You like'em breathing!" Faulgrimm shouted back, throwing a book at the co-conductor's head. "Sorry about him," the engineer said apologetically.

Hax was quaking with suppressed laughter at this exchange. "How fast?" she asked again.

Faulgrimm shrugged. "I've done a test run on a six-car caravan at ninety eff-pee-ess," he said. "That's close to forty-eight miles in the hour. We were trying out a new wheelbelt array, and held speed for thirty minutes without anything falling off.

"And," he went on, looking thoughtful, "I once had a repair coach, all by its lonesome, up to ninety miles in the hour, whilst trying to reach a flooding caravan that had buckled in the north-south tunnel near Cáffyst." He scratched his beard solemnly. "Whoo. That was thirty years ago!

"Well," he mused, "wheel bearings're better now. We could probably manage a hundred or better with a new pilot coach, unburdened, on a downhill run."

"Downhill?" Hax asked, puzzlement clear on her face.

"Sure," Faulgrimm replied easily. "Tunnellers keep the shafts level as they can. That way the water's only fighting the wheels and the walls, not the world's weight as well. But some lines have a slight downhill trend. Hard to avoid if you're heading for an especially deep destination.

"Like Dthrosmcíne, for example. The royal city's deep, so the line from Elder Delvin's downhill all the way. Return trip takes an extra three hours; you can only make about twelve eff-pee-ess, as the water's got to push you uphill from start to finish. Plays hob with the schedules, heya, but what can we do? When theory bangs into the real world, you get engineering." He paused for a moment, scratching his beard. "What was the other thing you asked?"

She thought for an instant; the flood of information was fascinating, overwhelming, and she was struggling to take it all in. Hax resolved to have a sharp talk with her father when she got home. Nothing she had ever been told about the Deeprealm had revealed so much as a hundredth part of the glories she had witnessed thus far.

Then she remembered that she was a fugitive. Her face fell as the crushing realization that she might well never see Joyous Light again landed on her like a falling tree limb. "Er...'Shaft problem'," she said. The vibrancy had gone out of her voice. "What does that mean?"

With more than four centuries under his tool-belt, Faulgrimm was no fool. He noticed the change in the elf-girl's demeanour and decided to take a slightly different tack. "Oh, lots of different things," he said dismissively. "Fault line lets the water drain out, or a fallen bit of stone jams a wheel. Every now and then some tunnelling beastie breaks through and we have to do an emergency patch job to hold pressure until the masonry crews can come out and fix things up. Nothing serious."

Theolg turned in his seat and shot Faulgrimm a meaningful glance. The older dwarf shook his head surreptitiously. Hax, still focused on the schematic and her own inner concerns, noticed none of this.

"D'ye want to look out?" Faulgrimm said, hoping to reignite her interest.

Hax glanced up, eyes widening. "You can do that?"

"Doin' it right now, gorgeous," Theolg interjected. "What'd ye think this was in front of me, artwork?"

Hax stepped carefully around the big wheel and leaned over the portly dwarf's shoulder. She stared intently at the angled wall with the rainbow pattern of flickering...and thought she saw...

"It's a window!" she exclaimed. "But what's that on the other side?"

"Spray," Theolg interjected before Faulgrimm could answer. "We don't close the watergate completely; if we did, we'd burn out the brakebelts and have us a runaway. So a lot of water escapes through the channel ahead of us. What you're seeing is spray, reflecting the light in the cabin."

"It's not just a speed control mechanism," Faulgrimm added. They seemed to be competing for her attention, and Hax smiled again. "The coaches are watertight, up to the air intakes. They're designed to float in the tunnels. Helps reduce friction. If we didn't let a little water flow through ahead of us, we wouldn't float, and the pilot coach wheelbelts would take too much pressure."

"It's amazing," she said, impressed beyond words. "But I don't see how the window helps."

"Maybe elves don't have dwarf-sight," Theolg stage-whispered loudly.

"Comedian." Faulgrimm rolled his eyes. "Light the floods."

Theolg placed a chubby hand on a copper-coloured panel before him, intoning a short phrase in the dwarven tongue. Hax jumped as brilliant white light exploded into the tunnel ahead of them.

"We keep the floods off because they're distracting," Theolg explained. "Only turn'em on if there's an obstruction or something. We can see well enough without them."

"He means they keep him awake," Faulgrimm added dryly.

When her eyes recovered from the initial shock, Hax laughed out loud. She could see at least a hundred paces into the tunnel. Bright light illuminated the slick, shiny and perfectly cylindrical walls of the tube, and glaring in brilliant sparkles off the tumbling, frothy mass of foam that boiled out from under the prow of the pilot coach. The walls raced by; for the first time, Hax noticed the vibrations beneath her feet, and felt a sense of speed. She groped reflexively for the back of Theolg's chair.

The co-conductor laughed. "You should see what it looks like at top speed," he chortled.

"Yes, I absolutely should," she agreed, mesmerized by the sight of the gleaming stone walls whipping past the window.

Theolg leaned over to the conductor. "What do you say, boss?" he said conspiratorially. "Want to wind her out a little? Rattle the slugs a bit?"

"Slugs?" Hax murmured.

"Passengers," the engineer replied.

The conductor, who had sat silent and grim throughout all of this, cleared his throat. "Faulgrimm," he said distantly, "If this blubbering pudding doesn't put a clamp on his ale-pipe, you have my permission to render him down for bearing grease."

"Tyranny," Theolg muttered darkly, as Faulgrimm and Hax laughed.

The portly co-conductor shot an aggrieved glance at the elf-girl. "See what sort of conditions I have to work under? I'm telling you, the clíewen's gonna hear about this."

♦

"Waste of bed linen, if you ask me," Frida said half-seriously, handing Hax the cheese-knife. "Why pay for clean sheets if you're going to spend the night chattering with ne'er-do-wells?"

The second bunk had still been tightly made when the priestess had awoken after twelve hours' unbroken slumber. Hax had returned from the pilot coach while Frida was refreshing herself in the cabin's tiny water closet. When the priestess was finished, the elf-girl had splashed some water on her face, and the pair had gone in search of breakfast.

"I was having fun," Hax said, mumbling around a mouthful of dark, heavy bread. "This is the most incredible thing I've ever seen. How much longer?"

She was tired but alert, astonished by what she had seen. The realm of the dwarves was so astoundingly different from everything that she had been led to expect that she was still attempting to wrap her mind around the reality of the place.

The elves of the Third House dismissed the children of Lagu as miners and metal-smiths, and she had had in her mind's eye an image of bow-backed, grunting troglodytes scratching a living out of the rocks of the Deepdark. It was as false a notion as could be imagined, and the truth had set her back on her heels. She had to see, to learn, more.

Did father know the truth? she wondered. Or Syllo? Or even Kalestayne the wizard, the most widely-travelled man she had ever met?

Had her mother known?

She wished she had more time. Hax had a passion for novelty, and an almost boundless capacity for wonder. She could easily have spent weeks on the tube, listening to Faulgrimm, prowling the thing's innermost workings, learning more and still more without feeling fatigued, much less sated.

But there was no time. No time! She had to push her astonishment into the background, and concentrate on the present.

Not everything was glory and sunshine. Breakfast, normally her preferred repast at home, was proving to be her least favourite meal in dwarven lands. Where the elves emphasized fruits, nuts, bread and light pastries, a dwarf's idea of fast-breaking appeared to be based on cured and smoked meats, salt fish, thick porridge (including what appeared to be a porridge chiefly of minced meat, with more meat roasted atop it), dense, dark breads and pungent cheeses. There was also a dizzying array of fried and pickled 'deep-veg' – assorted mushrooms and fungi, the origins of which Frida, after a first disastrous attempt involving something called gyruláser, or 'mud-weed', had delicately avoided explaining to her.

And – of course – beer. Hax liked beer, but not for breakfast. She hunted in vain for tea.

In response to her question, Uchtred swallowed, glancing up at the dials of the complicated chronometer that hung like a decoration over the door to the kitchen coach. "A little over an hour," he replied.

Turning to Frida, he added, "D'ye suppose Bedwulf'll meet us?"

The priestess shrugged. "I hope so. I'd like to show 'Lyszi' the glories of Stonewisdom.

"If not," she continued pensively, "we'll leave a message and carry on. He can catch the next caravan, and link up with us in Ædeldelf."

Hax's silent curiosity must have shown in her face. Frida nodded in her direction. "We're stopping in Carrlár to look into a boiler design that Uchtred left with an artisan friend before we hied us for Dunholm and points east. Probably take a day or so. Then we'll carry on to Elder Delvin, and then to Dthrosmcíne. That's where the factory is. And home."

She paused for a moment, as if she wasn't certain how her next words would be received. Smiling uncertainly, the priestess said, "You're welcome to join us, cildic, and to stay as long as you like. Our home is yours."

Hax was taken entirely aback. Would a casual acquaintance in the Homelands have offered her houseroom so readily? She knew the answer, and it did not reflect well on elven hospitality. Or trust.

She tried to smile in reply, but knew that it looked like a grimace. "I've never explained..."

Frida reach quickly across the dining table and patted her hand. "No need to, ducks. There aren't any conditions on the offer."

"I know. And I'm grateful," Hax continued in a rush. "More grateful than you can imagine. But I'm not travelling, like you are."

That was sufficiently ominous to gain their attention. Three pairs of eyes widened.

Hax sighed, and came to a decision. "I'm running. Before you offer to help me, you need to know why."

Glancing over her shoulder to make certain she would not be overheard, she told the three dwarves her story in about a dozen terse sentences. She told them everything – her dispute with her aunt, the battle in the palace gardens, her long flight eastwards. She did not bother recounting her meeting with Breygon and his comrades, reasoning that it had no bearing on her travails; and she omitted describing the cup she had found. Just to be safe, she mused. After all, she had suspicions about what it might be, but they were no more than that.

"So you're hunted," Frida said matter-of-factly. "By your own folk, no less. And the Elf-Queen's seers, and her guardians, too." She laughed softly. "Oh, my. What a pickle, lass!"

"No better place for you to run to," Wynstan said unexpectedly. "You made a sound decision, there."

"How's that?" Hax asked, subdued. She was relieved to finally have told her story to sympathetic ears, but nervous at spreading it further than she had to.

The priestess shrugged. "The Deeprealm's a good place for a runner to hide. It's not easy to find one among millions, so far underground. And even if your queen's diviners could locate you, there's no way for them to leap in to accost you, or take you away from us. There's no bending of the flux in the Deeprealm. Not in that wise, anyway."

Hax nodded. Qaramyn had told her the same thing, but she still wasn't convinced. "I don't think that will stop them," she said quietly. "The Queen has the whole of the Ludus Astralis at her beck and call. The Master Magister of the College may well agree to seek me out himself. No disrespect to your ancient mages," she said with a lopsided grin, "but it'll take more than a dwarf-magic to stop Kalestayne of Arx Eos if he decides to seek me out himself. He's..." She caught herself again. "I've known him since I was a little girl," she finished lamely.

Frida let out a prim snort. "And what would an elf-mage know of dwarf-magic?" she said, so haughtily that Hax could not help but laugh. "If need be, I'll spirit you off to Underdarrow, and dare your mighty Kalestayne to seek you behind the door that denied Lagu himself!"

"Actually," Hax said quietly, "I was thinking of going there anyway."

"Really?" Uchtred said, leaning forward and entering the conversation. "My sister's husband's niece lives there. Got a nice doubler right down on the holy waters. I'm sure she wouldn't mind a little extra company."

Hax chuckled wanly. "I wasn't looking for company," she said. "I was thinking of dropping in on your Archpriest, Deephammer."

Uchtred coughed into his ale, and Frida's eyes widened. " 'Dropping in', now," she said softly, "and on the master of the First Forge, at that. That's a bold plan." The priestess leaned back in her chair and crossed her arms. "What could an elf be wanting to discuss with Father Deephammer, dearie?"

"I'll tell you back in the cabin," Hax said evenly. She discarded the loaf-heel she had been toying with. "I'm full, anyway. Let's go."

♦

"Dótheri dweorgalar!" Frida gasped, when Hax unwrapped the stolen cup and laid it on her bunk. "Do you..." she paused, catching her breath. "Ducks, do you know what this is?" The priestess extended a trembling hand, then drew it back. She turned stricken, worshipful eyes on the elf-girl.

"I didn't when I found it," Hax replied morosely, "But I've had my suspicions ever since we spoke about it on the road, and Uchtred demonstrated his virtuosity as a poet. Judging by where I found it, and from your reaction just now, I'd guess it's probably Lagu's Cup."

She sighed heavily. "But if it is, then that only raises more questions. Who was trying to steal it from the royal vaults? Did they take anything else? Who were they working for?" She shuddered slightly. "Why was I allowed to escape so easily? If this is the most ancient and precious thing in the Queen's vaults, then why isn't every mage at the College looking for me, eh? Why hasn't there been a regiment of the High Guard dogging my steps from the moment I left Starmeadow?"

"All good questions," Frida muttered, wiping her streaming eyes. "I can think of one more." She glanced sidelong at the Elf-girl.

" 'What am I going to do with it now'?" Hax asked, staring at her hands.

"Aye," Frideswide whispered.

Hax shrugged, grinning wryly. "Give it back to the Dwarves, I suppose."

The priestess burst into racking sobs. Hax watched her carefully, slightly worried; she had never seen her friend break down so completely.

After a moment, Frida regained control of herself. "Just like that?" she asked with a twisted smile.

"Just like that," Hax answered honestly.

"It belongs to your queen," Frida countered.

"Does it really?" Hax asked. "I don't know. And even if it did," she continued, "your people have as much a claim on it as mine. I can think of no compelling reason to bring it back to Starmeadow. And I can think of at least one good reason to give it back to you."

Frida swallowed heavily. "What's that, dearie?"

Hax shrugged. "You took me in, befriended me, protected me, gave without asking recompense. You opened your hearts to me, a complete stranger, without equivocation or reserve."

She dropped heavily onto her bunk, causing the cup to bounce around and Frida to emit a terrified squeal. "Had our positions been reversed, do you know how unlikely it is that you would have received similar treatment from my kin? When we entered your lands, Frida, you vouched for me, and I was admitted without delay or demur. I doubt I could get you past the Crane Gate and into Starmeadow even if I held a knife to the Guard Captain's throat."

"Would we not even be welcome in your home?" the priestess asked, surprise replacing awe on her face.

Hax nodded. "For my part, always," she replied. "But my home is my father's home, and there his word is law. After...that..." she indicated the cup with a thrust of her chin "...well, I doubt my word will carry much weight, even with him."

"Surely you father would believe you if you told him the truth?"

"Perhaps," the elf-maid replied. "But he's more than just my father, Frida. He is Lord of Joyous Light, Duke of Eldisle. He's the Knight Commander of the Champions of Larranel, and one of the foremost members of the Queen's Council. If the Queen has set her hand against me, then to believe me is to betray her."

She lowered her eyes, studying the floor. "Such a thing would be unwise in any kingdom. Amongst the children of the Third House, it would mean the end of his lordship. Perhaps the end of his life." She drew her knees up to her chest, crossed her arms about them, and bit her lip to keep it from trembling. "I can't make him choose, because I'm afraid that he would choose me...and that would be the end of him and our line. So, like as not, I'll never see my home, or my father, again."

Frida sat next to the stricken elf and put a bulky, companionable arm about her shoulders. "Never say 'never', cildic," the priestess chided gently. "We'll build this one brick at a time, shall we?

"First things first." She took a deep breath. "If you're serious about returning the Holy Cup to us – and I'm not pushing you, there's no need to decide about it yet – then you're right, you'll need to see the Archpriest." She smiled. "I know it's small consolation, dearie, but if you do present him with a relic crafted by the hand of Lagu himself, you'll be a hero of the realm, honoured for as long as you live. Deephammer will bless you, kneel before you, and shower you with gifts. Your own people may name you traitor, but here you'll have your pick of titles.

"And suitors, of course," she added with a wink. "If, that is, you don't mind bending down to kiss your husband, and shaving his back for him twice daily."

Hax, who had been weeping silently, burst into appalled laughter at this last sally. She used her sleeve to dry her eyes. "You make it sound so tempting," she half-chortled, half-wept. "How could I refuse?"

Frida smiled and patted her shoulder. "Here's what I suggest," she said. "Come with us to Elder Delvin. If you change your mind and decide to go on running, you can take the Tube from there to the north, to Céappyt – that's 'Seagate' – and cross the Gebrytansæ to the lands of the Jarlin plunderers if you like. Or you can head south to Korfax, and the Great Waste, and Skywaters, however you please. From either destination, you can find a ship or a caravan, and keep moving.

"If you decide to go on with your plan, though," she continued, tapping her lower lip with a finger, "you can stay with us until we leave for Dthrosmcíne. I don't know Deephammer personally, and Khallach's servants have little pull with the masters of the First Forge. And my own hierarch, Akkinlo the Mountain-Tall, dwells at the mother temple in Caffyst. That's too far out of our path.

"But," she added decisively, "one of my old acolytes works at the Palace. He's an aide to Elder Brightly, the Archpriest of Zoraz, and the King's spiritual advisor. Brightly's a wise and sober man. If we can get to him, he can arrange your passage to Underdarrow, and give you his sigil as an introduction to Deephammer." Her face turned solemn. "I'd like to see that. You'd be the first elf to pass the Barrow of Bowrnleoch since the Spellweaver met his end at Inflède under Deephammer's fist, nigh on threescore years ago."

Hax nodded absently. "I thought Ironfist slew the Spellweaver," she said after a moment's reflection. "Along with Ven Porwenna, the elf-mage, and Harwéac Hargóin. Isn't that what the song says?" She had heard the piece sung only recently, at one of their stops on the road from Eastgate, and recalled the tune vaguely. There was something in it about Ironfist's sword breaking against the Spellweaver's midnight blade; and Ven Porwenna falling before the white staff, to save her comrades.

Ven Porwenna. Hax sighed. It wasn't even an elven name so far as she could tell; certainly not Third House. Artistic license, she supposed. Or an exile trying to preserve her anonymity.

"Well, Hargóin wrote that song himself, didn't he?" Frida replied, slightly nettled, "and he was a friend of Ironfist, not Deephammer, was he not?" She snorted. "We've still a bit of a trip ahead of us. I'm sure you'll hear more than one tune." Then, calming her irritation, she took Hax's hand and held it gently. "What do you say, cildic? Does it sound like a plan?"

Hax nodded. "Thank you for being so...well, so good, about all this."

Frida shrugged the compliment off. "It's my job, dearie. Now, dry your eyes," she added, passing Hax a small, rough cotton handkerchief. "We'll be in Carrlár shortly, and we'll have at least a two-hour layover. Even if we're not staying, that's more than enough time to take a turn 'round the shops of the lower market. I'll need to see the runners and send a message to Bedwulf. And there's a dressmaker there, does wonders with dthéostrfluyer hide..."

As the priestess spoke, Hax wrapped the cup in a cloth and repacked it with the rest of her kit.

They continued nattering about inconsequentialities, and by the time the caravan began to shuddering to a halt, with the customary shuddering, roaring whoosh of escaping water, Hax felt a good deal better.

♦♦♦

Chapter 5 ♦ Stonewisdom

Carrlár, Frida explained to Hax as the caravan shuddered to a halt in the Tube station, meant 'Stone-Wisdom', and was a contraction of the moniker Carrláreow, or 'Stone-Teacher' – one of the many names that the Dwarves ascribed variously to Lagu, the master of all stone-lore, and to Khallach, the divine servant of Lagu who had taken the hill dwarves under his tutelage thousands of years in the past, during the Age of Making. The priestess had recited a translated version of the Treléodscearula Dwéorga that told of the Holy Mother's rejection of her children, and her attempt to destroy them; of how Ana had prevailed upon Bræa's four brothers to divide the Kindred between them; and of how Lagu had, after some negotiation, accepted responsibility for the Dwarves, giving the three tribes over to Khallach, Barraj and Zoraz to be instructed in the arts of stone, metal and gem-craft.

Hax had found the tale interesting (she had heard a similar version, transliterated into the elven tongue, during her early schooling nearly a century earlier), but she had difficulty concentrating on it. The sights, sounds and smells of the Dwarf-city immediately overwhelmed her.

Immediately upon disembarking from the coach, she realized that the city was unlike any other dwarven settlement she had seen thus far. Eastgate had been busy, but it was a relatively remote outpost, the furthest such habitat from the centre of the Deeprealm. She had seen many dwarves there, to be sure, but nothing like the crowds she had seen bustling around the platform at Midpoint. And even that mighty cavern paled in comparison to the sights that awaited her when she exited the Carrlár tube station. But actually making good her exit, she discovered, took some time.

The arrival platform at Carrlár (she was desperately trying to improve her comprehension of the dwarf-speech, and so eschewed the travelling tongue equivalent) could not have been more different from its counterpart at Midpoint. When the coach door opened, she found that she faced not a vast, open space, but a narrow stone tunnel only as wide as the door itself. The ceiling was low, and puddles of water covered the floor. The air was stuffy, damp, and reeked of moss.

Hax froze at once, her fear of small, enclosed spaces creeping over her limbs and numbing them. The dank, narrow passage was what she had always imagined the dwarven realm to be like. A cold, sickly feeling settled into her stomach, and she wondered whether all of 'Stonewisdom' would be like this.

A gentle nudge from Frida set her feet moving, and, with her saddlebags over one shoulder and her bow and baldric over the other, she ventured slowly forward.

Her claustrophobia, fortunately, did not have much time to manifest itself. The tunnel was soon joined by similar exit tunnels leading (she assumed) away from the other coach doors. The joint tunnel was broader, slightly higher, and well lit, with better air flow – a good thing, too, as she soon found herself surrounded by hundreds of Dwarves, hauling a vast array of suitcases, crates, chests, shoulder-bags and other varieties of luggage. She kept glancing up nervously at the ceiling, expecting to crack her head on a protruding stone (there were few of these) or sign-stanchion (of which there were many).

A moment later she saw a man of Ekhan, easily six inches taller than she, shuffling uncomfortably down the passageway, his neck bent at an awkward angle. She immediately felt better.

Several twists, turns and stairways later, Hax found herself in an immense, rectangular hall. Waist-high (thigh-high, to her) barriers separated the vast throng of travellers into long, shuffling lines that inched slowly forward. She had become separated from her companions in the press, and, when she asked the dwarf behind her – a gruff-looking fellow with eyes and beard as black as firestone and the stained fingers of a glassworker – what the purpose of the queue was, he merely shrugged, and replied, "Niet ymbsprecan ælflæden."

Hax knew that phrase; she had heard it dozens of times. It meant the he didn't speak the elven tongue. Feeling slightly adventuresome, she tried a few of the words she had learned from Frida and her men-folk. "Ac ábídan?" she asked, hoping that she had put the emphasis on the correct syllable. What are we waiting for?

The dwarf snorted. "Gafolgeréfan," he replied, obvious contempt in his voice. "Ábregdan nestpohha, lufigendlic."

Hax didn't understand a word. "Gafolgeréfan?" she asked, adding an interrogative inflection in hopes of receiving some further explanation.

"Gése," the dwarf replied shortly, busying himself with his kit-bag.

Hax smiled helplessly, looking around. She knew that gése meant 'Yes, indeed', and therefore that they were waiting in line for the Gafolgeréfan. But as she had no idea what a Gafolgeréfan was, she was no further along than before.

The line snaked back and forth between the barriers. The pace was so slow and so gradual that Hax was nearly driven to distraction. The dwarves, though evidently tired and surly, were remarkably patient; had any of the folk of Eldisle been forced to stand in such a line, she reflected, most would have either drifted away in search of other interests, or rioted before ten minutes had passed. Thanks to a night spent questioning the coach-crew, though, her fatigue kept her from becoming too restless.

As did her nervousness over what she was carrying, tucked deep within her pack. Hax had no desire to draw attention to herself.

She occupied herself by inspecting the intricate, detailed bas-reliefs that decorated the walls. Most appeared to be allegorical representations of historical or mythological events; she recognized dwarven warriors and clerics, as well as orcs, giants, and what she thought were probably hobgoblins. She lacked the cultural references for most of the works, though, and soon lost interest in them.

After about half an hour spent glancing idly at the room and her fellow travellers and growing increasingly fidgety, she found herself at the head of the line, only to be directed – by an elderly dwarf wearing some sort of rune-marked, burgundy-coloured sash and a pair of brilliant white gloves – to one of perhaps half a dozen small booths set into the stone walls. A bored-looking dwarf-woman sat behind a low desk half-buried in rolls and scraps of parchment. Without looking up, she said, "Nama æghwæther ingehyd néosung?"

"I'm sorry," Hax replied in the travelling tongue. "I don't..."

"Name and purpose of visit?" the dwarf-woman interrupted in the same language.

"I'm travelling with friends," Hax replied, relieved that the woman could understand her. "They're here somewhere; I've just lost them in the..."

The woman ignored her, selecting a thick, rectangular piece of heavy paper festooned with black and blue runes, and hammering it with a heavy bronze stamp. "Temporary visitor's visa," she snapped. "Good for three ten-days. Six silverweights."

Despite Frida's insistence on paying for everything, Hax had managed to exchange some currency at Midpoint Station. Somewhat nonplussed by the woman's abruptness, she fumbled in her purse, eventually producing the requisite coins. She slid them across the desk; the woman slapped them into a slot and thrust the stamped paper back at her.

"What if I want to stay longer?" Hax asked quickly.

The clerk eyed her with irritation. Snatching the paper out of Hax's hands, she selected another stamp, hammered it down, and passed the form back. "See the 'immigration' office," she replied. "It's the one marked 'Udlanderne', halfway down the embarkation hall, on your left. "Níehst!" she shouted, glancing over Hax's shoulder.

The black-eyed dwarven glazier jostled her impatiently from behind. Hax hurriedly retrieved her belongings and stumbled past the desk, feeling that she had gained considerable insight into what it felt like to be a sheep.

She joined the throngs flowing out through what she assumed was, according to the dwarf-woman, the 'embarkation' hall. To her infinite relief, Frida was standing a-tiptoe next to a pillar, waving to catch her eye. Hax thrust her way through the crowd to the priestess' side.

"Liking it so far, dearie?" she said with a sympathetic smile, speaking loudly to be heard over the crowd.

"It's a madhouse!" the elf-girl gasped. "Do you go through this every time?"

Frida nodded. "You get used to it, after awhile. Did you get your papers stamped?"

"Yes." Hax produced the document the clerk had given her.

Frida took it and scanned it with a practiced eye. "Planning on settling down?" she asked, grinning slightly.

"I just asked what to do if I wanted to stay longer than...what does it say, three 'ten-days'?"

Frida nodded. "You can ignore it," she said shortly. "You won't be settling in Carrlár anyway. And if you do decide to stay with us, we'll make permanent arrangements once we get home." She handed the paper back. "Keep this with you. But from now on, stick next to me, and I'll make sure you don't get lost in the paperwork." She shouldered her pack. "Come along. The men folk are already outside."

"Good," Hax said tiredly. "I've had enough of this place already."

Frida took her by the elbow and steered her into the crowd. "Don't fret," she said encouragingly. "You haven't seen the best of it yet."

♦

The worst of Carrlár, she decided later, was the tube station. The 'best' was nothing short of astonishing.

By purest chance, Uchtred, while waiting for Frida to locate Hax, had come across his contact, Bedwulf, in one of the shops on the Tube station platform. The two fell immediately to talking, and it emerged that Bedwulf was waiting on delivery of a crucial component for Uchtred's new boiler design, and that it had been promised to him the following day. The four dwarves conferred, and it was decided to wait for delivery in order to ensure that the part met Uchtred's specifications before carrying on to Elder Delvin and points west.

Moments later, Hax had to revise her opinion of the city once again. Upon exiting the tube station, her senses had been overwhelmed by the variety and splendour of the sights, sounds and smells surrounding her. Not damp and moss this time, but iron, firestone-smoke, roasting meat, perfume, incense, clean water, fresh air, brimstone...and, to her amazement and delight, trees.

Trees! The city of Stonewisdom, as it turned out, was built in the empty shaft of an enormous, long-extinct volcano. The Tube station, not surprisingly, occupied its lowest level, in an area reclaimed from groundwater, regularly pumped out to prevent flooding. This, Uchtred informed her proudly, was the system that he had worked on in his youth. He pointed its features out to Hax as they ascended through the city's imposing foundations. She made a point of exclaiming loudly every time he did so, even though she did not understand even a tenth part of what the engineer was saying.

Their exit from the station had been a marvel that left Hax speechless. They entered a broad, round-walled room seemingly carved of crystal that held upwards of a hundred passengers. Once its doors were sealed, the entire chamber rose swiftly through a smooth stone channel, propelled by some unseen force beneath her feet. A few moments after motion began, the room shuddered slightly, and was suddenly surrounded not by stone, but by clear, lime-green water. An instant later, it burst into open air, and was immediately engulfed by rainbow shards of brilliance as beads of water, cascading down the transparent walls, shattered and reflected the gleams of light emanating from some vast source far overhead.

Hax looked down, and gasped in amazement. The crystal room seemed to be floating – flying, soaring ever upwards on invisible wings, passing alongside (and occasionally through) stone platforms bearing shops, temples, homes, cave-entrances, free-standing buildings...and hundreds upon hundreds of dwarves. Surging, teeming crowds of them.

At each level, the chamber slowed noiselessly to a halt. Doors opened, allowing passengers to enter and leave, then closed again, before the room once again took to the air.

She looked up, and saw that the light overhead was getting closer, growing from a gleaming pinprick to a broad, yellow disk, as bright as the Lantern itself. She found herself blinking rapidly as her eyes adjusted to illumination of an intensity that she had not seen since leaving the sunlight behind more than a week before.

It was a marvellous experience, and Hax found herself holding her breath, clutching Frida's calloused hand tightly. At last, though, it ended; at the ninth or tenth platform (she had lost count), Frida tugged her towards the opening door, and they exited the chamber along with a dozen or so other passengers. Hax hung back, watching the crystal room soar ever higher, until it passed through the next stone platform some dozens of paces overhead.

At least her new perspective revealed the propulsive mechanism. The chamber was perched atop a gleaming shaft of polished metal. She shook her head in wonderment, promising herself that she would ask Uchtred to explain how it all worked.

Glancing around, Hax saw that they were standing on a narrow platform, almost a ledge, halfway up the throat of the volcano. A thin, delicate-looking metal railing ran around the edge. She stepped carefully towards it, and found herself looking down at dozens of other such ledges, big and small, that encircled the shaft; and beyond them, to the clear, bright green of the vast pool of water from which they had emerged, hundreds of paces below. "Mirus mirificus," she breathed.

Frida smiled. "I'll take that as a compliment," she said. "Come along, we're nearly home."

"Home?"

"Bedwulf's home. It's this way."

Bedwulf, it transpired, was a second cousin to Uchtred, and also happened to be married to a distant niece of Frida's. Frida tried to explain the relationship to Hax, but the attempt only left the elf-girl more perplexed. The dwarves, she was learning, set great store by familial bonds, both by blood and by marriage, and put considerable effort into sorting out parentage, lineage and other ties.

It was unfamiliar, and rather confusing to the elf-girl. Apart from the records kept by the noble families of the Third House (mostly for purposes of determining the royal line of succession), her people paid little attention to ties other than blood; long life-spans, frequent and prolonged absences, and the ease with which the nobility traded spouses (both formally and less formally) meant that the web of family ties – especially among the Duodeci – resembled less a 'tree' than a bowl of noodles. Hax did her best to try to follow her friend's explanation, but the discussion broke down quickly once Frida realized that the travelling tongue simply lacked the words for most of the relationships she was attempting to portray.

She breathed a sigh of relief when the priestess finally gave up. Hax had no desire to supplement her meagre knowledge of the Dweorgaspræc with volumes of pointless minutiae. She needed to acquire basic courtesies more than reams of genealogical terminology.

Being a guest in a dwarven home, fortunately, was, nowhere near as daunting a task as trying to sort out dwarven blood-trees. After leaving the astándanyppe ("It means 'rise-up-room'," Uchtred had explained helpfully), Frida led Hax and the dwarves into the first of a trio of broad, low tunnels leading away from the ledge. The illumination dropped off quickly once they left the volcano's throat; light sources were few and far between in the tunnels, and Hax found herself squinting in dim passageways once more. She remembered the light-crystal she had been given in Eastgate, and patted her pockets to ensure that she still had it. Just in case.

After a bewildering array of passageways, narrower side corridors, ramps and stairways, the priestess finally halted before an intricately-carved stone door decorated with plaques of hammered bronze.

"Home at last!" she announced. Placing her right palm flat on the door's surface, she said clearly, "Bedwulf, Frideswide infær cépan."

"I got most of that," Hax murmured to Uchtred. "But what's 'cépan' mean?"

" 'To ask for'," the engineer replied.

Hax nodded. Then another thought struck her. She struggled to recall what the dwarven glazier had said to her in the Tube Station entry hall. "How about 'Ábregdan nestpohha, lufigendlic'?" she asked, trying to mimic the correct pronunciation.

Uchtred and Frida both burst out laughing.

"What?!" Hax asked, feeling embarrassed.

"It means, 'Get your purse out, gorgeous'," Uchtred chortled. "Making new friends, were you?"

Frida ignored the engineer and patted Hax kindly on the arm. "Your accent's improving, dearie."

A moment later, the door swung noiselessly inward. Hax immediately found herself immersed in the gabbling frenzy of a dwarven family reunion. She quickly discovered that even distant relations were greeted like long-lost brothers, and that the greetings involved vast amounts of food, and even vaster amounts of beer, jordwin, and the dreaded Laguhland. She also discovered to her delight that the jordwin was simply delicious – fresh, fruity and flavourful. Hax immediately instructed Frida and Uchtred not to tell her how it was made, fearing that if she discovered that it was distilled from some horrible subterranean mould or other, she would no longer be able to enjoy it. Fortunately, while stronger than the ale, the earthwine was nowhere near the potency of the more ardent dwarven spirits. Those she studiously avoided.

Bedwulf's wife, Eanfled ("Me name you Yanni," she had said with a shy smile, in a heavily-accented attempt at the travelling tongue), was a trim, compact thing, younger than the other four. Hax was surprised; the woman would likely have been deemed attractive even outside the Deeprealm, with flaming red hair and pale green eyes complimented by a dense array of freckles. These features were apparently rare enough among Dwarves that women so marked were deemed great beauties, and were remorselessly sought after by suitors of all social grades. "Some go further than others in search of loveliness," Uchtred jested, giving Bedwulf a playful shove. Hax had no idea what that was supposed to mean, and did not have a chance to ask.

She was less impressed by Eanfled's physical traits (which were, after all, common enough among the Hiarsk, and for that matter, among the humans of Jarla and Ekhan) than she was by the woman's cuisine. When the family sat down to dinner at the round stone table with the elf-girl in the position of honoured guest between her host and hostess, Hax quickly found herself attacking everything within reach with the voracity of a wolf bitch nursing two litters. She had to will herself consciously to exercise restraint.

"Cempestre niet æten?" Bedwulf murmured with a sly grin, eliciting a burst of laughter from the assembled company. Hax, not understanding, turned to Frida with a helpless shrug.

The priestess was chortling into her beer stein. "He asked, 'Don't you feed the warrior-woman?'," she translated.

Hax smiled self-consciously. She ceased gnawing on the roasted thigh-bone that was her current focus, and saluted her host with the grisly relic. "Æbrucol anbyrignes. Dancword ac giestning," she gurgled, trying not to spit too much as she masticated the complicated syllables.

The roar of laughter that greeted this sally nearly knocked her backwards off her seat. Uchtred coughed a mouthful of ale across the table, narrowly missing Frida, and began choking. Eanfled pounded him on the back until he recovered. Bedwulf howled gleefully while slapping his thigh, and even the dour Wynstan managed a smile.

"Did that not come out right?" she asked Frida, feeling terribly self-conscious.

"Oh, aye," the priestess chuckled. "I'm proud of you, cildic. You're mastering our language faster than I ever thought you would. Especially the...ah...colourful parts."

Hax flushed scarlet. "I've heard Uchtred use that phrase before!" she protested faintly, as the engineer laughed even more loudly. "What did I say?"

The priestess rolled her eyes. "You could find a better model to teach you polite speech," she replied, casting a threatening glance at her hiccoughing kinsman. "Best you not know. Don't take it to heart," she went on when she saw Hax's wide eyes and trembling lip. "Knowing when to swear, and when not to, is an art-form for us, dearie.

"Using so foul an epithet to praise a meal was..." she snickered, "well, let's just say it was so horribly inappropriate that it couldn't help but be funny." She raised her mug, and added, "I think you're going to fit in just fine."

"So long as don't compliment the King's chef like that," Uchtred chortled around a mouthful of black bread.

The complexities of the dwarven tongue plagued her for the rest of the evening. At one point, Hax found herself discussing the vagaries of vocabulary with Frida. She asked for and was given the correct phrase for complimenting a host, and practiced it several times, struggling to wrap her tongue around the convoluted syllables. Frida complimented her on her efforts, if not the results.

At one point during the evening, she recalled what Uchtred had said about 'going far in search of beauty.' She asked him what he had meant.

"Yanni," the engineer replied, jerking a thumb at their hostess. "She was a stonewife when Bedwulf set his level on her. Had to petition the High Priestess of Khallach herself for permission to carry her off."

" 'Carry her off'?" Hax repeated, confused. "She was a prisoner?"

"No, no! Not at all. Like I said, she was a stonewife."

"What," the elf-girl asked with exaggerated patience, "is a 'stonewife'?"

Uchtred was about to reply, but Frida silenced him with a shove. Turning to Hax, she said, "The Stonewives – we call'em gástliccavindren – are maidens who are promised to Khallach. Adepts of the faith."

"Priestesses?"

"Necat," Frida snorted. "They're not ordained. They do wield power, though, by virtue of their sacred oath. To remain pure and faithful to the Stoneteacher."

"They live apart from the other clergy, and other folk in general," Uchtred chimed in. "In abbodriccar. That's what I meant when I said that Bedwulf had 'made off with her'. From the abbey."

"Coniuga sancta," Hax blurted out, suddenly understanding. "Divine novices, yes?" She wanted to add virgo intacta, but was relieved to discover that she did not know the correct phrase, either in the travelling tongue, much less the Dweorgaspræc.

"I suppose," Frida shrugged.

"Then how did she marry?" Hax asked, confused.

"Just as Uchtred said," Frida replied patiently. "Bedwulf begged the High Priestess to release her from her vows, and she did so."

"And she lost her powers when she wed?" Hax asked, stunned.

"That's how it works, dearie," Frida shrugged again. Turning to Eanfled, she spat out a few swift phrases. The red-haired woman smiled and replied softly.

"What'd she say?" Hax asked, enthralled.

Frida shook her head sadly. "She said she's never tried to summon the power. She'd rather not know, than be certain that it was gone."

"That old life my," Eanfled said slowly. "New life – him." She pointed at Bedwulf, and her whole heart was in her smile.

Hax smiled, touched by the girl's obvious love for her husband. Then she remembered something else that she had meant to inquire about. If anything, it would require even more tact. "There's something else I don't understand," she said, wondering how best to proceed.

"What is it, dearie?"

"Your...liquor. The lagu-land. That stuff." She pointed at one of the pitchers.

The priestess glanced at the vessel. "Laguhland? What about it?"

"Well," the elf-girl began, "and don't be offended if this doesn't come out right, but I'd always thought that dwarves were...well, you know, more devout."

"More devout than whom?" Frida asked. To Hax's relief, she looked puzzled rather than offended. "Some are more so, and others less, naturally. What does that have to do with..."

"It's the name," Hax blurted. "I mean, really; 'God's piss'? Don't the priests get...I mean, don't you find it offensive?"

Frida burst out laughing. Uchtred, ever ready for a solid joke, inquired what she was chortling about; and upon receiving a hasty explanation rendered in dwarf-talk, burst into renewed gales of hilarity himself.

Hax sighed. She waited until the entire company had been told and the chuckles were dying down. If this keeps up, she thought, exasperated, I'll be able to make a living here as a jester.

Frida saw the expression on her face and patted her consolingly on the arm. "Sorry, my dear. I thought everyone should know."

"What, how miserable my grasp of your language is?" Hax muttered. "I'd've thought it was pretty obvious already."

"No, no! Not at all!" the priestess averred, holding up her hands. "If anything, you should be proud of yourself."

Hax blinked. Now she was confused. "Why, exactly?" she asked.

Frida poured her another glass of jordwin. "Our tongue," she explained, "is ancient. Other languages have changed over time. Even your own has, although not as much as some. But ours has not. Over time, a lot of jokes have crept into it. Especially...oh, what's the word..."

She glanced over at Uchtred, raised her voice, and said, " 'Toórder'?"

" 'Puns'," the engineer replied, around a mouthful of half-gnawed meat.

"Just so," Frida said, nodding. "Puns." She raised her glass to Hax. "You, my dear, have managed to detect one of the oldest ones in our language."

Hax's eyes widened. " 'God's piss' is a pun?"

"Part of it is. You see, we are the folk of the earth, are we not? All of the old songs speak of it." She paused for a moment, thinking. "Do you remember when I recited the Treléodscearula Dwéorga for you?"

Hax nodded, grimacing. "Vaguely. The vagueness, I should note, was due to all the Laguhland you poured down my gullet that night."

"I should sing it for you again, then!" the priestess crowed happily.

"If you must," Hax mumbled.

Frida shot her a hard glance under lowered brows. "I'll attribute that remark to the wine. The Treléodscearula Dwéorga," she continued archly, "or 'Three Tribes of the Dwarves', is an ancient poem that tells how Lagu became the god of the dwarves. One of the early stanzas concerns how Bræa made her children. In the common speech, it is usually rendered thus:

The dame of the Kindred, the Mother of Morning

Created her sons from Anuru's fair form;

From fire she brought forth the curious Men-folk,

And Elvii she wrought from the clouds of the storm.

The happy Halpinya she formed from the waters

The rippling rivers, the fast-falling rain;

And Dweorga she made from the bones of the mountains,

And gave them the Deepdark to be their domain.

Thus made the Mother the breeds of the Kindred;

Thus wrought the Powers in Bræa's bright reign.

"Nice," Hax remarked, emptying her cup and motioning urgently for Uchtred to refill it. "It even rhymes."

The engineer chortled, and tipped the wine-pitcher for her.

Frida rolled her eyes, "My point," she said, exasperated, "is that according to all legends, all songs, we are the folk of the earth. We live here, beneath the stone. We created the Deeprealm. We are, in all ways, people of rock."

"That's not news, Frida," Hax said patiently. "So what?"

"So," the priestess said, "Lagu is the chief deity in our pantheon, the mightiest of the Dwarf-Lords, the master of earth and iron and stone. And in our language, lagu means 'water'." She smiled triumphantly, as if she had made an important point.

If she had, Hax's head was too fogged with wine to see it. "Your g-god's name is 'water'?"

"Yes," the priestess replied smugly.

"Isn't that s-singularly inap-p-propriate?" Hax asked, stumbling over the polysyllables.

Perhaps, she thought giddily, I should put my cup down. She did so, watching it carefully.

"Yes!" Frida crowed.

"So that stuff," Hax asked, pointing at the pitcher of Laguhland, "is called 'piss-water'?"

Frida's smile began to fade. "I think you're missing the..."

Hax looked down into the priestess' half-full cup. "You're drinking piss-water?" she asked, blinking.

By this time, Uchtred was red-faced, gasping for breath between spasms of laughter, and pounding his horny fist upon the table.

"Stoneteacher give me strength," Frida sighed heavily.

Dinner eventually ended, leaving Hax feeling as though she had consumed half her own weight in meat. Despite having avoided the stronger liquors, she had consumed more of the jordwin than was perhaps wise, and her head was swimming.

And not only with drink; at one point, she started up in her seat, and realized that she had nodded off in the middle of a conversation.

Eanfled was regarding her sympathetically. She leaned over and said something quietly to Frida, who nodded. "Bed-time," the priestess announced.

Beckoning to Hax, she said, "Come along, cildic. Mine hostess has a nice, cosy guest-room set aside for you."

Hax rose obediently, remembering her manners just in time to bow to Bedwulf, the host, who nodded happily in return. She stepped carefully around the table and followed the two women, receiving a hearty "Sleep well!" and a companionable slap across her backside from Uchtred, who – having drunk most of a pitcher of Laguhland himself – seemed to be having difficulty getting his eyes to uncross.

Shocked, she briefly considered punching the dwarf in the nose; but then, thinking better of it, simply blew him a kiss.

"See?" Uchtred stage-whispered to a stony-faced Wynstan. "I told you! She likes me better!"

"I was going," Hax said with the immense dignity of the badly inebriated, "to p-p-punch you in the eye. But I was afraid that eye-p-p-punching might be so...some obscure d-d-dwarfy courtship ritual."

Laughter billowed after her as Hax followed Frida and Eanfled deeper into the Dwarves' snug, compact home.

At length, the red-haired woman threw open a stone door, and gestured to Hax to enter. The elf-girl did so.

She backed out again immediately, shaking like a windblown leaf, nearly falling over Frida.

The room – which was attractive enough – was no more than six feet long, four deep, and at best five feet high. It contained a comfortable looking metal-framed bed, piled high with clean linen and multicoloured blankets – but it was lightless and, with its heavy stone door, looked entirely too much like a crypt for Hax's comfort.

She found that she was trembling. She put a hand on one wall to steady herself.

"What is it, ducks?" Frida asked, her voice filled with concern.

"It's very nice," Hax replied, her voice tiny. "But I can't...it's too..." she trailed off.

The priestess was nodding. She'd seen this before. "Too small?" she asked.

Hax nodded mutely. "I'm not good in tight places," she whispered.

Frida glanced over at Eanfled, who had been watching this exchange with a look of surprise on her freckled face. "Hwæt lá?" she asked.

"Lytelnes dthraciana," the priestess replied, speaking softly.

Eanfled's eyes widened. "Æltæwelíce?"

"Géa."

The red-haired woman put a sympathetic arm around Hax's waist; the latter was so distracted that she nearly did not notice the gesture. "Ábútan geswebban gád?" she asked softly.

"Eh?" Hax muttered.

"Eanfled asks, 'Do you want to sleep outside?'" Frida translated.

Hax turned an inquisitive eye on the priestess. "What?" she asked, confused. "How could...I mean, aren't we underground?"

Frida saw the nascent panic on the Elf-girl's face, then turned and nodded at their hostess. "Géa. Ábútan geslápian."

Eanfled nodded, smiled, and began gathering up the bedding. Frida took Hax by the elbow, and said, "This way."

They returned to the dining room, receiving curious glances from the men, and ignoring them studiously. Frida led Hax through the kitchen, where tables, countertops and a charcoal stove were festooned with the detritus of their repast, and into a smaller sitting room. There, she opened a pair of wide, shuttered metal doors...

...and Hax gasped. Beyond the doors lay a small balcony ringed by a thin metal railing, looking out over the throat of the volcano.

She walked hesitantly forward and gazed down. They were standing on a narrow stone ledge; below and to the right she could see the platform where they had disembarked from the 'up-lifting-room'. But from this higher vantage, Hax could also see innumerable other details: hundreds of similar ledges, and thousands of similar balconies, many framed by lighted windows. Vast, soaring support struts of stone and metal arced across the open space, intertwined with walkways and stairs that looked to be constructed of gossamer, alongside more robust cargo-handling cranes and lifting equipment.

Far below, the green-tinged water glinted up at her like one of her own eyes, magnified ten thousand-fold.

She looked up, and felt her eyes swim with tears. The blinding light she had seen earlier was gone now; from this height, she could see that the mouth of the volcano was covered by some shimmering, crystalline substance, as clear as glass, but brighter than any diamond she had ever seen. Beyond it, stars twinkled in the night sky; and each twinkle, like the Lantern's blazing luminescence of earlier, was transmitted by the crystal, refracted into a thousand points of glittering light. All of the glimmering light spots were moving slowly and in concert, as the starlight shifted with the inexorable rotation of the earth.

The gleams illuminated the cavern walls above her, and she could see innumerable broader ledges, many holding bushes, small plants, and even trees. Presumably these were the source of the fresh forest scent she had noticed earlier.

Small shadows flitted almost invisibly between the tree branches. She thought she heard a lark's call; and its beauty, after so many days underground, nearly broke her heart.

"Is this all right, dearie?" Frida asked quietly.

"Oh, yes," Hax whispered, still staring upwards, a rapturous smile on her face. "It's perfect."

The priestess grinned to herself, and helped Eanfled lay the bedding out on the moss-stuffed mattress she had brought along.

The ledge was barely wide enough to hold it all, and Frida shuddered slightly. "Couldn't pay me enough to sleep out here," she muttered. "Honestly, I don't know how your folk do it."

"Don't give it a second thought," Hax replied, wrapping one of the blankets around her narrow shoulders. "It'll be just like home."

"I'm glad you think so," Frida shrugged. "But I couldn't sleep in a tree, myself."

"If ever you visit me at my father's palace," Hax replied, grinning happily, "I'll ask him to find you a nice, cozy spot in the crypts."

Frida laughed, and then translated Hax's reply for Eanfled, who laughed as well. The two Dwarf-women bade her good-night, and left, half-closing the balcony doors behind them.

Hax stared at the stars for a long, long time before she finally fell asleep. She was thinking of home.

♦

"But I want to come with you!" Ally shouted.

"No," her father replied roughly. Two of his attendants were helping him into his mailshirt, and his voice was muffled slightly until his head emerged from the neck hole.

"She's my mother!" she begged, nearly shouting.

"And my lifemate," Kaltas shot back, his voice rising angrily. "And the Duchess of Eldisle. And a child of...of a noble, ancient line." He paused, visibly trying to calm himself. "It may be nothing. You will remain here, daughter, against my return."

His voice may have been calm, but his eyes were not. Ally caught the merest hint of his panic, and it chilled her blood. Even in time of war – it had been no more than two hands of years since the final engagement with the Hand knights at Duncala – she had never seen her father lose his patient equanimity.

She had to remain respectful. Although she was nearly seventy, and had been Sylloallen's apprentice for almost a decade, she was still half a century from her majority. By ancient custom – by the Codex Diorcan itself – her father's word was still her first law. And even were it not, her love for him would have commanded obedience.

She lowered her voice, trying reason. "Father, I beg you," she said softly. "I'm skilled enough. You'll need..."

"It's not a question of skill," Kaltas said. He grasped her by the upper arms, drawing her into a tight embrace. She had just come from the training ground upon hearing the news of Alrykkian's disappearance, and his mail clinked against the heavy scales of the practice gambeson she wore.

"I know your worth, daughter. It's why I want you here." He drew back, smiling lopsidedly, and brushed an errant, sweat-soaked curl out of her face. "Your mother's missing, Janni's nowhere to be found, and I don't know what I'm riding into. That's enough unknowns. I need to be certain you're safe."

He paused for a moment, as if considering, then tugged the heavy signet off his little finger. "You may need this."

"Father!" she protested. Ignoring her, he grasped her left hand, spread her fingers roughly, and jammed the ring onto the only digit large enough to hold it in place – her thumb.

Footsteps echoed in the hall, and the door of the Duke's study was flung wide. Sylloallen rushed in. He had obviously paused on the way up from the square to change his attire; a silver-chased breastplate, its buckles dangling, was draped over one shoulder, and a longbow and quiver were slung over the other. His sword was naked in his hand. "I heard, my lord," he gasped. "I'm ready." He glanced around the room, panting slightly. "Where's Kalestayne?"

"On his way," Kaltas replied. "But you're staying here, Syllo. With Ally."

"Sire!" the warrior protested.

Despite his obvious worry, Kaltas smiled narrowly. "Do I have to go through this with you, too?" he asked. "I've given Allymyn my signet, Sy. Help her hold things together until I get back. With Rykki," he added, a complex broil of emotion tinting his voice.

Sylloallen looked as though he was about to plead again. Ally could see her teacher wrestling with his own fear...and then she saw it melt away. The warrior's face changed visibly, as though a mantle of tranquillity had been draped over his shoulders. "I understand," he said calmly. "May the Protector's grace go with you, sire."

"Thank you, my friend." He grasped his comrade's hand, glancing obliquely at Ally. "I know how much you need...how much you want to go. But I need you here. Your place is with Ally, now."

The paladin embraced his lord. "I know. Go swiftly, sire," he said quietly. "For both of us. And give your lady my duty. And my love."

His mailshirt settled, Kaltas turned to accept his sword-belt from an attendant.

Ally stepped forward, took it out of the startled man's hands, pushed him aside, and knelt. She buckled the heavy girdle about her father's waist herself. Then she stood and saluted the Duke, soldier to soldier.

A sad, slightly bemused smile crept over her father's face. He saluted her back, then stepped forward and crushed her to his chest, kissing her softly on the forehead. "Take care of Sy, Ally," he said gruffly. "Keep him safe for me. And don't declare war on anyone while I'm gone!"

"Yes, father. No, father."

A commotion behind them. The Duke released his daughter as the house wizard, Kalestayne, bustled into the study, accompanied by a half-dozen lesser casters and apprentices. "Ready, sire?" the elderly mage asked.

"As soon as you are." Indicating the furniture, carpets and what-not with a sweep of his hand, the Duke asked, "Do you need any special preparations?"

Kalestayne shook his head. "None, your Grace."

"What are these for, then? Support?" The Duke waved at the half-dozen hangers-on littering his study.

"My students, my lord," the wizard said evenly. "Here to learn." Glancing at Ally and Sylloallen, the wizard added, "It is still only you and I?"

"Yes."

"Where do you wish to arrive?"  
"Astrapratum," the Duke replied instantly.

"The Palace?"

"No. The Crane Gate."

"I know it well," the wizard murmured. "Give me your hand, sire."

Ally wordlessly passed her father his heavy, gold-chased gloves. The Duke tugged them on, then joined hands with the silver-haired wizard.

"Everyone step back, please," Kalestayne said. Then he began chanting – deep, sibilant syllables that seemed to echo through the corridors of Hax's soul.

As he spoke, a low thrum of power began to build in the tower room. Hax felt gooseflesh rise on her forearms, and smelt something odd – like the sea air after a thunderstorm. All around her, lines of light faded slowly into view, humming with barely-contained might. I could touch them if I tried, she thought, mesmerized.

A sudden fire seemed to gather in her belly, growing hotter and hotter until she felt faint and gasped for breath.

Sylloallen grasped her outstretched fingers, centring her again, and the disorientation faded. The warrior raised his free hand, palm facing the wizard and his Duke. "Larranel Sanctus, defensor lustrum," he was murmuring, "commendo princeps et principessa, amici mi, ab custodio tuus. Bene et aucupari se, hodie et usquequaqu." He raised his hand in salute, and the Duke did the same. "Fiat voluntas tua," he added.

The hum of arcane power built to a crescendo, whipping Kalestayne's incantation away into some unknown realm. Sparks gathered around the pair...and they were gone.

"Mother," Ally whispered. She had to grit her teeth to keep the tears at bay.

♦

Hax awoke on the high terrace bathed in sweat, her heart pounding. She had relived, in excruciating detail, the terrible, icy panic that had clutched at her soul when she had first learned of her mother's disappearance. That grief was old, now; decades old. But she had learned, from bitter experience, that it still lurked around every corner, ready to leap out and claw her heart when she least expected it. That dream, especially, always disturbed her. She was quiet and withdrawn upon rising.

As it turned out, the artisan that Uchtred and Bedwulf were waiting on needed one more day to complete the component he was fabricating for the new boiler. They decided to wait for it to be finished and tested. Over breakfast, Frida announced that the men-folk could take care of the metalwork, while she and Eanfled showed Hax some of the features of a real dwarven city.

Fortunately, there was much to distract her. Long after having completed her toilette, Hax was still marvelling at the magnificent simplicity of the water-closet. During her brief stay at the hostel in Eastgate, she had been too overwhelmed with fatigue and astonishment at some of the other facets of dwarven city-life to wonder about the plumbing, and during her journey on the Tube, the question of where the water to feed the wash-basin and relief-chair came from and went to had seemed relatively straightforward. But as she freshened up before breakfast, she found herself wondering where the washing water – especially the hot water, an indescribable luxury to her mind – came from, and how it was fed to the home.

She broached the question after breakfast as the three women were leaving the apartment – "In search," as Frida put it, eyes twinkling, "of adventure." To Hax, it sounded a lot like they were going shopping.

Frida laughed self-consciously. "You're asking the wrong dwarf," she replied. "Uchtred's the engineer. I'm sure he could draw you a diagram. But as I understand it, the water all comes from natural springs. The hot water is simply fed through pipes in a magma bed before being sent to individual dwellings."

"Wouldn't it cool off on the way?" Hax asked.

Frida actually stopped walking and thought about that one. "You know, it should, shouldn't it? Well, that just goes to show that you'd do better to ask somebody who knows something. If you want somebody to compound a poultice or recite the ninth Antistrophe of the Stone-teacher's creed, I'm your woman. For plumbing, you'd best seek out a plumber."

"It doesn't really matter," Hax replied as they continued walking again. "I was just curious."

"It does matter, though," Frida disagreed, her voice unusually thoughtful. "We shouldn't take these things for granted. There are fifty times a hundred-score people living in this city. What would we all do for water, if the system suddenly failed?"

"Has it never failed before?" Hax asked, surprised. In her experience, mechanical technology was never as reliable as arcane solutions. Of course, she recalled drily, that was before I'd met a dwarf.

Frida consulted incomprehensibly with Eanfled for several moments before replying. "Yanni tells me that every now and then they lose the hot water; she says that it's usually because one of the feed pipes in the magma beds melts through, or gets shattered by a fault or tremor. The átimbranican – that's 'builders', dearie – usually manage to have the problem fixed in a day or so. She just heats water in kettles on the stove until it's fixed."

Hax shook her head. "It's simply amazing," she said, overcome by wonder at how much labour and ingenuity had gone into providing so simple, and so necessary, a thing as hot water.

Eanfled said something that Hax didn't catch. Frida obligingly translated. "Yanni wants to know, how do the elves heat water?"

Hax chuckled morosely. "Like you do when the hot water fails, except we do it that way every day," she replied. "In pots or kettles, on the stove or in a fireplace. Or, if you've the skill, by magic."

Eanfled asked another question, eyes wide. "Have you no baths, then?" Frida said.

Hax shrugged. "The great cities do," she said. "They're public, and they're generally very nice. But they're heated by arcane means, not molten rock."

"What about country folk?" Frida continued, translating Hax's reply for Eanfled.

"Streams and tubs," Hax replied, feeling like a bumpkin. "There were baths in Joyous Light, but I preferred streams and pools. Or the ocean, in summertime." She blushed slightly, and added, "And alone. Or at least, in...er...distaff company."

Frida chuckled, adding a few explanatory sentences to her translation. Eanfled laughed lightly.

"Cold is?" the red-haired woman asked, surprising Hax somewhat.

"The sea?" the elf answered. "Not at all. Eldisle's a long way south. It's warm there, even in winter."

She paused, looking around. They were leaving the residential section by a different tunnel than they had entered it. "This isn't the way to the 'lifting room'," she said.

"We're heading across to Southwall," Frida replied. "There's a dressmaker I want to visit." She smirked. "He had a special place in his heart for me, long ago, and I think I can lean on that to talk him down a little in price."

"How do we get across the crater?" Hax asked, confused. "I didn't see any bridges."

Frida laughed out loud; once she had translated Hax's question, Eanfled laughed too. "No," the priestess shook her head, wiping a tear from one corner of her eye. "No bridges. We could walk around, of course, but there's something a little quicker."

A few stairs, ramps and tunnels later, Hax found out what 'something a little quicker' meant. Emerging from a large doorway at the end of a well-travelled tunnel, she and her companions joined a short line of Dwarves standing patiently on a broad stone platform set into the wall of the volcano's throat. The line was delineated by more of the thigh-high barriers she had seen in the Tube station's entry hall. A dwarf wearing an official-looking tabard and a small cap roamed up and down the line, collecting coins from those waiting, while another stood at the edge of the platform, holding a pair of torches – although, instead of throwing bright yellow light like a normal torch, one of the short staves glowed red, while the other glowed blue. He was waving these up, down and sideways in regular patterns, and she realized intuitively that he was signalling to someone far away.

Straining her eyes, she tried to make out whoever the torch-bearing dwarf was communicating with.

"Can you see the other ledge?" Frida asked, noticing where Hax's attention was focussed.

Hax didn't notice that the Dwarf-woman was grinning broadly. "No," she replied.

"Keep watching."

"Okay," the elf-girl said a moment later. "There's something big. It's blocking...wait, there he is. It's another fellow with torches. He's waving the blue one, now. He...oh, gods, something's...aaaaaAAHHHHH!" Hax leapt backwards as a gigantic glass and metal structure appeared to fall off the opposite wall. Like an enormous, flying slug, it dove slightly, rushing downwards. It dipped down in the centre of the volcano's throat, then banked upwards again, climbing and slowing as it approached their platform.

It slowed, slowed...and at last, with a gentle thud and a ringing CLANK, it shuddered to a halt.

"Our chariot," Frida said proudly, indicating the thing with a bow.

"What in the nameless hells is THAT?" Hax shrieked.

The priestess regarded the elf with a mixture of sympathy and humour. "It's a pendular," she explained patiently. "That's how we get across to Southwall, without having to walk all the way around through the warrens; or taking the liftroom down, crossing the lake, and climbing sixty stories worth of stairs to get back up again."

Hax eyed the contraption wildly. It was some sort of metal carriage. The lower half was solid, but the upper half consisted only of a light framework of struts supporting square panes of glass. "We're supposed to ride it?" she asked, her eyes wild. As she watched, a door opened at the front end of the carriage, and a swarm of dwarves poured out, heading back into the tunnel from which she and her friends had just emerged.

Frida shook her head. "Have you never ridden a swing, cildic?" she clucked.

"Yes, but not...I mean, we're...how high..." Hax clamped her mouth shut, realizing that she was babbling incoherently. You've danced from treetop to treetop, she reminded herself fiercely. You will ride this dwarven monstrosity, and retain your dignity when doing so!

And besides, she thought, panicked, if I soil myself, I'll have to buy new smallclothes. And I don't think they make my size here.

Frida pushed her gently between the shoulder blades. "Forward you go, dearie. We're next."

Her resolve notwithstanding, it was all Hax could do to keep from bolting in panic as she approached the metal carriage. She could see one of the dwarves – the torch-wielder – laboriously turning a large crank set in the floor. An alarming series of clicks and twangs accompanied each turn. "What's he doing?" she asked, curious in spite of herself.

"Setting the launch spring," Frida replied, glancing over at the dwarf in response to Hax's question. "It gives us the kick we need to get all the way up to the other side."

"What happens if..." Hax trailed off. Her mouth closed with a snap. Do I really want to know?

"If it doesn't work?" Frida finished the sentence for her. "There's not much that can go wrong, really. If the brake-latch fails, we swing back and forth for a while until the carriage stops in the middle of the air. And then we wait for the operators to hook on and winch us back to one side or the other." She smiled grimly. "It's not common, but you'd better pray that doesn't happen, dearie. We won't be in any danger, but a quarter-hour of swinging back and forth...we dwarves have strong stomachs, but there's a limit to everything. There'd be a lot of vomiting."

"Sounds wonderful," Hax replied, her voice quavering.

During the priestess' reply, they had managed to board the metal carriage. It was tilted slightly upwards at the ledge-ward end, and Hax found herself at the windows opposite, looking down at the green-tinged lake, glittering silently some hundreds of paces below.

"It'll be fine," Frida replied soothingly. She decided not to tell Hax about the adamant wires that suspended the carriage. They almost never broke, so there was no point in terrifying the girl. "Just hold onto the support railing, and remember to keep your knees rigid."

"My knees?" Hax asked, as the dwarf closed the carriage door, latched it, and began waving his torches furiously back and forth. She shot a panicked glance at the portal. Maybe there was still time...

Frida nodded. "Just do it," the priestess advised. "There's a lot of force when..."

CHUNG.

The metal carriage jerked suddenly, leaping away from the wall. Angling downward, it swung like a descending scythe blade, accelerating rapidly. The slither of displaced air became a roar, and at the bottom of the swing, the scenery outside the window panes became an indistinct blur. Hax understood what Frida had meant about locking her knees; the downward force at the bottom of the swing was incredible, nearly driving her to the floor. The much stockier Dwarves, she noticed, seemed to have an easier time staying vertical.

Then all of her attention was taken up by the opposite wall of the volcano, which was rushing toward them like a charging cavalry regiment. Hax clamped her jaw shut and closed her eyes, determined to die in dignified silence.

She didn't open them until she felt a slight jolt and heard a deep, metallic CLANK. There was no further motion.

She waited for three full breaths until she opened her eyes again. While she counted, she tasted blood, and realized that she had bitten her tongue.

The door opened, and the Dwarves flooded out of the carriage. Frida and Eanfled began moving as well, so Hax followed.

Exiting the glass and metal pod, she found that her knees were trembling, and she had to clutch the metal railing for support.

"So?" Frida asked, eyeing her carefully after they had disembarked.

Hax took several deep breaths before answering. Her heart was still racing. Finally, she said, as solemnly as possible, "That was the most amazing thing I have ever done."

Frida snickered, and Eanfled eyed her with something akin to maternal pride.

"If we're not too rushed," Hax continued, pleading, "could we do it again?"

They ended up riding the pendular five times, with Hax shrieking and giggling like a schoolgirl during each crossing.

She insisted on paying for all five trips. Frida did not object.

♦

By the time they returned to Eanfled's home that evening, Hax had begun to suspect that she had only been invited along as a pack animal. The two dwarf-women had cut a wide swath through the economy of Carrlár, and the trio finished the day with armloads of purchases.

It had been an educational experience, too. Frida may have been a sharp customer, something that Hax had already discovered during their travels – but Eanfled was an absolute terror to the shopkeepers. On more than one occasion, they left behind proprietors rending their beards in frustration, bemoaning in lugubrious tones the inevitable collapse of their businesses, and the abandonment and starvation of their children. She wielded her beauty like death's own scythe. Hax took careful note of the dwarf-woman's technique for future reference.

For her part, Hax had enjoyed the day immensely. Haggling was not precisely unknown in the Homelands, but it was largely a feature of the villages and towns, something that took place between tradesmen and farmers, or stall-keepers and their patrons on market days. Among the nobility, it was considered to be in poor taste.

She had shared this prejudice until she saw Eanfled at work. Among the dwarves, haggling was, it seemed, a part of every transaction, both a science and an art combined.

The most brilliant example occurred late in the afternoon. Fortified by the flagon of jordwin she had consumed with lunch (a half-dozen fried meat and vegetable balls wrapped in spiced flatbread purchased from a cliff-side vendor – this was so delicious that she completely forgot to ask what sort of animal the meat had come from), Hax had decided to purchase a new necklace to replace the one she had given to the satyr in order to buy their passage through the Feywood. The drilled bit of amber she had received from the elderly dwarf was nice enough, but she did not think of it as jewellery. And she wanted a keepsake to remind her of the glory of Stonewisdom.

The choices were, she quickly discovered, virtually endless. Dwarven jewellery came in infinite varieties, both in style and in source material – from agates, garnets, topaz, aquamarine, beryls and amethysts, up to diamonds, sapphires, and emeralds that would have done credit to the Queen's court. Much to her astonishment, she even found pearls, comparable in size and lustre to those that divers occasionally found off Eldisle.

When she mentioned to Frida the incongruity of finding pearls in an underground city, the priestess had snorted. "Geweariaed. Cultured."

"Cultured?" Hax asked. "What does that mean?"

"It means they were made, not found. Live oysters raised in trellises, in salt-water caves. They do it up in Seagate. It's a huge industry."

Eanfled had made a dismissive noise, earning a harsh laugh from Frida.

"I didn't get that," Hax confessed, wondering what they were talking about.

"Sorry," Frida had apologized. "We tend to be a little snobbish about manufactured gemstones. Cultured pearls are like glass beads; some people would rather wear nothing than wear something geléaffulnes. That means 'fake'."

The remark had set Hax back on her heels. It was yet another profound difference between the elven and the dwarven perspectives on life.

She thought of her aunt, Annalyszian. The woman possessed a magnificent diamond necklace that Hax was almost certain – based on its weight – was made of cunningly-cut crystals rather than real gemstones. There was no way to tell that it was anything other than what her aunt claimed it was, unless you knew something about gem work.

That's the answer right there, she realized. There probably wasn't a dwarf anywhere in the Deeprealm who didn't know at least something about gem work.

Well, she thought glumly, I guess there's no necklace for me today. I can't afford anything dear...and I certainly can't buy anything chintzy in front of these two.

Then she realized that there was a solution to her dilemma: all she had to do was ask for a recommendation. She explained her desire to Frida, who conferred with Eanfled. Then they all three set off immediately for a jeweller's shop deep in the throat of the volcano, close to the level of the lime-green lake.

As they walked, descending by ramp and stair, Hax thought she noted something different about Frida's stride and the set of her shoulders. Normally very relaxed, the priestess was moving with grim determination, as though she were on a mission. Hax was flattered that her friend had taken her request so seriously, but she was also a little nonplussed; after all, it wasn't the sort of thing that one would normally be serious about.

At the end of the first thirty seconds in the jeweller's shop, Hax began to wonder whether she had, in her ignorance, unleashed forces beyond her control.

Eanfled had led them down a narrow, damp-dripping alleyway, indicating a non-descript stone door. Visibly expanding, Frida had slammed through the portal, shouting for the proprietor at the top of her lungs.

With a rattling crash, two young-looking (to Hax, this meant that they had short beards and unlined faces) dwarf-men tumbled into the store-front. The first was clad only in boots, breeches and a leather apron, and still bore a small iron crucible, smoking hot, in a pair of long tongs. The other, obviously the first Dwarf's brother, was more soberly dressed, but – rather disconcertingly – had a loupe screwed into each of his eye sockets, making him look like some sort of bizarre insect.

To Hax's astonishment, Frida begun thundering at the two Dwarves in deep, penetrating tones, punctuating her words with occasional flourishes of her holy medallion, and pointing at Hax on no less than five separate occasions.

Both artisans blanched visibly. The loupe-bearer turned and bolted for the back room, while the bare-chested fellow remained behind, gesticulating wildly and speaking so rapidly that his words sounded like a hail of arrows on a slate roof. Frida's replies were equally rapid, and far louder. Hax, who had no idea what was going on, watched the waving medallion carefully, hoping that her friend wouldn't lose her focus and accidentally incinerate the cozy establishment.

In less than a minute, the second dwarf – now minus one loupe – stumbled back into the antechamber, bearing a small, brassbound wooden chest. Standing before Hax, he flung back the lid and held the contents up for her inspection.

"Pick one," Frida said brusquely.

"Excuse me?" the Elf-girl stammered, still nervous at having been on the fringes of Frida's verbal assault. She was terribly embarrassed for the dwarven artisans; Elves, even the nobility, were generally far more polite to shop-keepers and artisans.

"These are his finest wares. It is his honour and his pleasure to offer them to you. Pick one."

"Really?"

"Yes."

Blinking in astonishment, Hax glanced into the tiny coffer. Her breath caught in her throat. The chest contained at least three dozen necklaces, maybe four: of silver, gold, mithral, and even one that appeared to be crafted of links wrought from some orange stone, carved with infinite care and precision. All manner of gems winked up at her: sapphires and some sort of azure crystal appeared to be the most common, but she recognized rubies, garnets, tourmaline and amethyst as well.

"Is there nothing you like?" Frida said brusquely.

"No, no, no!" Hax replied. "They're stunning! I've never..." she glanced helplessly over at her friend. "Frida, I can't afford any of these."

"That's not a consideration," the priestess said flatly. "Pick one."

Hax felt trapped. She rummaged quickly through the chest. Something caught her eye; a chain of some sort of black, glossy beads, cold and heavy, linked together with tiny golden eyelets. It looked elegant and simple. She held it up. "Is this one all right?"

To her astonishment, all four dwarves shouted something in unison. Frida and Eanfled were smiling broadly. The loupe-wearing dwarf closed the casket and stepped back; but his brother (who had fortunately remembered to put down his tongs and the smoking crucible they held) lunged forward and grasped Hax in a bone-cracking hug. Her breath whooshed out of her lungs, and she felt a rib creak ominously.

The dwarf put her back on her feet. Hax coughed several times, wheezing as she struggled to regain her breath. Frida patted her happily on the back.

"I knew you had it in you, cildic," she said warmly.

"Had what in me?" the Elf-girl asked, hopelessly confused.

"I'll explain later. In the meantime, kneel down." Hax did so, and the loupe-wearing dwarf deftly clasped the black stone necklace about her slender throat. She was about to thank him when he grasped her by the shoulders and planted a resounding kiss on each of her cheeks. His whiskers tickled, and she he did her best not to giggle.

After that, Frida hustled her out of the shop. "I didn't pay!" Hax protested.

"It's taken care of, ducks," the priestess said soothingly.

"What?" the elf said, dismayed. "Again? Frida, I told you, I have..."

"It's not about money," Frida interrupted. "Yambol – that's the gem cutter – was going blind. Cataracts. I healed him. Put Khallach's blessing on his hands, too; he's working on a big diamond right now, and that ought to help him do a good job."

"Still, it can't be worth as much as this necklace," Hax protested. "Can it?"

"No?" Frida asked, smiling. "How much do you think that necklace is worth?"

Hax fingered the cold, hard stones. "I don't know," she admitted.

"About four silver doubleweights."

That was a little less than a Zaran crown. A pittance. Hax turned and stared. "What?" she said, confused. "I thought..." She stopped herself, not wanting to be rude.

"You thought what, dearie?"

"I thought...I thought that Dwarves disdained cheap jewellery," Hax said in a rush.

"Ahh," Frida said. She turned and murmured a few phrases to Eanfled, who chuckled lightly. "You're confusing 'cheap' with 'fake', child."

"So this is cheap, but not fake?" Hax asked, perplexed.

"Do you like it?" Frida asked.

Hax nodded. "It's beautiful."

"Did you pick it by accident?" Frida persisted.

Hax thought about that for a moment. "Well, you certainly rushed me," she replied.

"That was deliberate. Was there one in the casket you liked better?"

"No."

"Well, then," Frida said happily, "you got the one you wanted. You make me proud, dearie."

Hax sighed. "I don't have the slightest idea what you're talking about."

Frida spoke briefly to Eanfled. The red-haired woman fished around in her bodice and pulled out a small chain of gold-linked black beads. Hax blinked. It was virtually identical to her own.

"It's a camæfenlác," the priestess explained. "In the common speech, a 'prayer collar'. You remember the tale of the Three Tribes, don't you?"

Hax recalled the song Frida had translated for her. "Yes."

"Well then," Frida continued without breaking stride, "you know that Lagu, in his infinite wisdom, gave the teaching of the tribes into the hands of Khallach, Barraj, and Zoraz, the masters of stone, iron and patience. That is one of the things that divides us. But the thing that unites us is that we all cleave to the overlordship and teachings of Lagu himself.

"The camæfenlác reminds us of this. All true children of the Carrláréow wear one." She grinned up at the elf. "This is one of the ways we try the hearts of visitors to the Deeprealm. Many come here seeking wealth, for our 'vast halls of treasure' are well-known, spoken of far and wide. Whenever we meet someone whom we would call 'friend', we administer this last test: we present them with a choice of baubles, the finest and most expensive we can muster, and ask the newcomer to choose a gift from among them. They are told to choose swiftly, so that it is the heart that chooses, and not the head.

"Among the costly trinkets, we include the camæfenlác. Those who seek only riches, wealth; they inevitably choose the most gaudy and most expensive. And so we learn something about them.

"But those who choose the stone-teacher's collar...well, we learn something about them, too. We learn that they come to us not for wealth, but for the other things that the stone-teacher offers: a welcoming hand, a warm hearth, and a little wisdom."

"So it was a test," Hax said softly. She glanced down at the Dwarf-woman. "If I had given you cause for doubt, could you not simply have used your magic to learn my intentions?" That's the way we do it at home, she thought glumly to herself.

"We don't do that to friends," Frida replied simply. "Especially to those who, we think, might become more than a friend. Family, maybe." Reaching up with her free hand, she tapped Hax's new necklace with a thick fingernail. "That's what I learned today. You are no mere 'friend', dearie; you are Gerád-Fandian, a 'seeker of wisdom'."

"Carrnydmæge," Eanfled interjected with a broad smile.

Frida nodded. "Just so. A 'blood-cousin of the stone'. As I said - family."

Hax felt a little overwhelmed by the Dwarves' obvious fervour. "I'm not really...you know, don't you, that the Elves...we revere the Protector, and Miros, and Hara the Wise. What I mean is – and don't get me wrong, I'm..." she stammered.

Frida cut her off with a dismissive wave of her hand. "I'm not trying to put a beard on you," she snorted. "Who you worship in the silence of your own devotions is your business. But the trial of the camæfenlác is a trial of the heart; it was your heart that chose, not your head. And what's more, the Powers of Light are all united in their divine glory. Since you're among the Dweorga, now, I'm certain that the Protector, or the Lady of Dragons, or whatever tree or bush you normally bow and scrape to will forgive you if you whisper a prayer to the almighty power who guards and guides the folk of Dweorgaheim."

Hax laughed out loud. " 'Whatever tree or bush I bow to'?" she repeated, doing her best to mimic Frida's deep voice, and failing utterly. "Is that how you talk to a new bloody stone-cousin, or whatever it is I am now?"

"Just doing my job, cildic," Frida replied with a smile. "I'm a priestess of the Dwarf-Lords. If I manage convert an elf, I get a bonus."

♦

"Gone?" Ally asked, disbelief warring with grief in her voice.

"Yes," her father replied. Still clad in his old leathers and travel-stained cloak, Kaltas was sitting on a stool near the hearth in his study. He had summoned his daughter the moment that he and Kalestayne had returned from their fruitless visit to the capital. Ally had passed the wizard on her way in, and the look of despair on his aged face had confirmed her worst fears.

They had been gone for three weeks. In that time, the duke and the wizard had scoured the roads south of Astrapratum, questioned the gate guards, and spoken at length with Rykki's sister Annalyszian, and her husband Landioryn, the Grand Duke.

Kaltas had even stormed into the Lord Chancellor's suite, demanding – and receiving – a private audience with the Queen. Few of the outlying nobles of the realm would have been able to get away with such temerity, but Kaltas of Eldisle was one who could. Ælyndarka knew how much she owed to the Commander of the Champions. And in his panicked extremity, the Duke – who had once served as equerry to her older brother and predecessor on the throne, King Callayian – had not been shy about reminding her.

"But she's not dead," Ally pleaded. Once again, she had come straight from the practice yard, where she had been perfecting her already impressive skill with the greatbow, and was dressed with peculiar incongruity, with a chain shirt over a simple peasant gown. She still had a half-full quiver at her side. For the past three days she had hardly spent a moment without a weapon of some sort in her hands. Constant exercise was the only thing that had enabled her to keep despair at bay.

"Dead, alive...I don't know," Kaltas replied, exhausted.

"How can you not...Kalestayne can read thoughts, the skies, even the past!" Ally cried. "Was there no trace? No sign? No one to question?"

"Nothing," her father replied, despondent. "Not so much as a hair."

"That's impossible!" Ally snapped.

"Daughter..."

"It's impossible!" she shouted. "Sylloallen says that there's always a sign! Always something left behind!" She tore her baldric over her head and flung the quiver into a corner. Practice arrows, tips blunted from repeated use, scattered across the stone floor. "Where could she have gone?"

Kaltas spread his hands helplessly. "How do you propose I find out?" he asked. He had intended to be gentle, but Ally's words – her tone, perhaps, or something she had said – seemed to sting him to the quick. He hadn't slept in days.

"I don't know," she replied, weeping. "Look again. Look harder." Her eyes met his, and he saw that they were filled with tears. "Take me with you this time. I can help."

Her father snorted. "Do you think you'll see something I missed?" he asked. "Or Kalestayne?"

"Take Syllo, then!" she cried. "Or Vennadyle, or Lallakentan!" They were the hunt-mistress and the arms-master, respectively – two of her other teachers.

"Half the High Guardsmen in the Capital are combing Starmeadow, child," Kaltas replied impatiently. He stood and walked to his desk. "Along with half the College." He sat heavily in his working-chair. "If she can be found, they'll find her.

"If," he added heavily, "there's anything to find."

Ally took the stool he had vacated. Silent tears rolled down her face. It was blank, empty of expression. "So we do nothing," she said hollowly.

"Well, I'm going to pray," her father replied. "To Hara, Larranel, Miros...any of the Powers, dark or light, who'll listen."

He paused, weighing his next words carefully. Reaching a decision, he said, "I'm going to give you something. It's time. Past time, probably."

Ally looked up, her eyes dull. "What?"

Her father stared at her, and Ally felt certain that he was measuring her. Against what? she wondered. And why?

They looked at each other for a long moment. At last, her father sighed. Standing, he crossed to the fireplace opposite. "Grey stone with the pink quartz inclusion," he said absently. He gave her a hard look. "Remember that."

Frowning, Ally nodded, and stood. Kaltas was still staring at her, so she answered quickly, "Yes father."

A deft movement, and the stone sank into the chimney. Not far; not more than a finger's breadth.

From inside the hearth itself, Ally heard a thud. Bending down, she glanced under the mantelpiece.

A hinged metal drawer had swung out of the fireplace wall.

"Don't try this if the fire's been burning," her father cautioned, "or you'll lose some skin." Reaching into the hearth, he swung the drawer towards him. Ally glanced at it; the thick metal box was lined with a thin layer of ceramic, and contained a smattering of miscellaneous items. Her father fished one of the larger ones out and handed it to her without a word.

It was a simple bone tube, as long as her forearm, and about as thick. Rough and irregular, it was capped at each end with parchment and thick, red wax. Gilt threads were woven through the seal.

"What is it?" she asked.

"A letter," her father replied simply. He swallowed audibly.

Ally looked up and saw that he was weeping silently. "From your mother," he added hoarsely.

Ally checked the seals; they were intact. "You never read it," she said, surprised.

"No," Kaltas agreed. "She attuned the seals to your touch." He smiled sadly. "You know how cautious a practitioner she was, and how expert. I'm not fool enough to tamper with one of Rykki's wards."

Ally turned the thing over in her hands. "But you know what it says, don't you?" she asked.

Her father nodded. "I think so. Your mother hoped to tell you herself, when you became a woman," he replied. The ache of longing in his voice broke Ally's heart. "She made that in case she was unable to do so."

"Why don't you just tell me what it says?"

Kaltas sighed. "Because I don't know. Not exactly. I'd prefer you hear it from her, in her own words.

"Why don't you just find a quiet spot," he suggested, "and let your mother tell you? Just as she intended?"

Ally found herself nodding. "All right. I'll be in my chambers."

Kaltas shook his head. "No," he said. "Use your mother's boudoir." He smiled lopsidedly. "It's yours, now, anyway."

The thought of treating her mother's day-rooms as her own drove home Rykki's loss in a way that nothing else had, and Ally had to grit her teeth to keep from breaking down on the spot. She was about to refuse; but the look of anguish on her father's face was so terrible that she did not want to gainsay him, or give him any further cause for pain. So she simply nodded.

"Come back when you're finished," her father added as she left, "and tell me what you've learned. And Ally..."

She paused, glancing back at him. He was staring out the windows at the sea.

"Regardless of what you read," he said softly, "remember that we – all of us – make mistakes. Remember too that no mistake made from a full and honest heart should ever be adjudged evil. The Holy Mother in her wisdom forgives us for those."

Ally had no idea what he was talking about. She turned on her heel, and left.

Alrykkian's chambers were bright and airy, with south-facing windows that made the most of the sea breeze. Ally had spent countless hours there, perusing her mother's many books, having her hair brushed (or watching her mother brush her own straight, silky, floor-length mane), submitting to stern words for some childhood fault or other, or simply rolling around on the thick carpets, staring up at the sky-vistas of clouds and birds that had been painted on the chamber's vaulted ceiling.

Ally looked around, remembering. The many plants had been watered, and some were flowering. Everything was tidy; the windows were open, and a wind that bore the salt scent of the ocean carried with it the harsh cry of the harbour gulls. Everything was as it had always been.

Except that now, the room felt like a tomb.

Her mother's favourite seat was an old, threadbare reading-couch tucked into one of the corner towers. The high, narrow windows were set with panes of multicoloured glass – a gift to the Duke from the glaziers' guild, in thanks for her father's decision to eliminate a troublesome tax a century earlier. Rather than depicting some ancient hero or battle, the coloured panes in the windows bore no clear pattern. As a child, Ally had enjoyed staring at them, watching the play of the light on the walls – especially at sunset, when the level beams of the Lantern transformed them from mundane decorations into living flames of blue, scarlet, green and gold. She recalled dancing happily in the shifting, coloured rays of light, dancing in simple, childish pleasure, dancing until her breath came in gasps, and she collapsed, giggling madly, into her mother's arms – and they both laughed, the daughter because she was happy, and the mother because the daughter did.

No laughter now, Ally thought dully. Nor ever again.

She sat on the couch, fingering the plain, unmarked bone tube that her father had given her, examining it carefully from one end to the other. There was nothing especially distinguishing about it; no writing, no runic marks, nothing of note other than the threads running through the seals.

There would be no danger; her mother knew, and had often lamented, that her daughter had none of the flux about her. Alrykkian would not have expected anything special from her in order to open the thing.

The Elf-girl shrugged. Danger be damned, she thought. Grasping one of the threads, she tugged gently; then, when she met resistance, more firmly. The thread broke the wax easily, releasing the seal on the end-cap. Once the seal had been cut through, Ally tugged sharply on the thread...and the end-cap came out in her hand.

Despite her certainty that no horrid curse or trap lay in wait for her, Ally winced. When nothing transpired, she mentally cursed her megrims. She tilted the bone case, and a tightly rolled and tied vellum tube slid out and into her hand.

And something else, that bounced off her palm and rolled, tinkling, onto the floor. Ally bent down to retrieve it. It was a ring.

She recognized it in an instant. Grandmother's ring.

Ally was stunned. As long as she could remember, she had seen this ring on her mother's finger. Her mother had told Ally that it had been given to her by Aylanni, Alrykkian's own dam, when she had been but a girl herself.

Inspecting it closely, she saw that it was indeed the same ring – a broad band of silver, decorated with what looked like interwoven vines, and as worn and battered as any bauble she had ever seen.

She tossed it lightly in her palm. Given its size, it seemed heavy. Maybe it's the weight of history, she thought, intrigued. After all, Aylanni had been famous in her day; a mage and swordswoman of the High Guard, one of the youngest that had been allowed to travel to aid the men of Ekhan against the Shadow King more than a thousand years before. She had fought at Niriam Vale, holding the river line against the hordes that had come swarming down out of the shadowed mountains of Ensher, and had been one of the few to survive the horrific slaughter that had followed. She had lived through the Sundering, too, to make the long march back to the Homelands.

She had never met the woman, of course; Aylanni had passed to the Long Halls, centuries before Ally was born. But Alrykkian had known all of her mother's tales by heart, and had recounted each of them, many times over, to her two daughters.

And now I have her ring, Ally thought bleakly. It was cold comfort.

Perhaps the letter would explain. She slid the ribbon off the smooth, peach-coloured vellum, and unrolled it carefully.

Moments later, she was sobbing uncontrollably. Her mother had written:

To my daughter Allymynorkarel,

If you are reading this missive, then I have gone to the Long Halls. My first and greatest regret is that I must leave you and your sister. The second is that I will not be able to myself tell you what must be told.

You know my power. I have told you that I acquired it through learning, in the ancient way, at the Ludus Astralis. I also told you the same tale about your revered grandmother, Aylanni.

I must beg your forgiveness. For my part, this was at best a half-truth. For my mother's, it was a lie.

Your father counts his descent from the Duodeci, and the name of Aiyellohax denotes one of the oldest and most ancient families of the realm, descended of Dior and Anyalla in the Age of Wisdom. But my clan – whose blood also you share – is older still.

You will not have heard the name, for it is kept hidden; but it is we who are the true royalty of the Realm. Ours is a lineage not of majesty, but of power. We are descended not of the lines of Tior or Dior, but rather from Holy Miros herself – she who gave her body to the Powers of Darkness, gaining wisdom and survival for all the elvii, even at the cost of her own life.

You know from the songs of the skalds that Miros bore a daughter by the ancient wyrm, Sciarratekkan. What the songs do not tell is that her daughter bore daughters of her own. In the countless years that followed, all of her descendents bore children. Never many; never more than a few. But all daughters. And of those children, some bore the mark of power bequeathed them by the union of their divine ancestress with the greatest dragon-mage ever to soar the skies of Anuru.

These children, scions of knowledge and power, are called the Kaunovalta. This name is yours, too. In my line, you are called Allymynorkarel Kaunovaltas. Our clan has never been large, but it has stood in the forefront of every great struggle the elves have faced. We fought to resist the dread majesty of Xiardath after he betrayed Tior; and fought also against the hordes of Biardath, too, when the son betrayed the father. Fanduiline, the true-born wife that Biardath slew at the behest of his fiend-whore, Shannyra, was one of our blood.

We led the First House and the Second against the evil that had oe'erwhelmed the Third; and we stood in the van, wielding blade and bane together, when Bræa herself led the Powers of Light to overturn Mærglyn's treason, and sent her and all her foul children down to darkness.

All down the long years, through Yarchian's reign to the gloaming; through the Darkness, to the coming of the Argent Three, and the voyages of conquest of the Yonar-ri that repopulated all the world, and that in time begat the terror of the Shadow King – we stood in the forefront, our names and lineage hidden, but our deeds known to all. They continue to this day. Your own grandmother, my beloved dam Aylanni, herself strove with the Shadow King's dark and deadly minions; and later with the Knights of the Hand, who slew her. One day my call too will come, and when it does I shall answer it, as those of our line have always done.

It is time you learned why.

The women of our clan, daughter, bear a terrible and wonderful burden. The blood of Miros and her weyr-mate flows mingled in our veins. The power that she stole from her dread tutor runs true in us. Locked within your heart, Ally, is the might to command the flux – not to wield it by the word, like the magi of the book, but by will alone, like the dragons do.

Your power – like mine is, and like your grandmother's was – will doubtless be great. You must conceal it. People honour and respect the wise who earn their spells by dint of hard study; but they fear and distrust those who appear to gain power without effort. Make no show of your strength, daughter, lest you be named witch, devil's-bride, fiend, or worse. You must find a way to explain your skill that doth not overly disconcert those with whom you must deal.

It is for this reason, and this reason alone, that I despaired when you failed to gain admission to the College. Not because I was not proud – I have always been proud of you, dear one! – but only because I knew what you would one day become. Formal training would have lent you a formal excuse for the might that will soon break upon you like a summer storm. It was fear, not disappointment, that led me to condemn your decision to take up the sword instead of the staff. Forgive me, if ever I made you believe otherwise.

The power will come upon you with your womanhood. Be wary. Never relax your guard. When it comes, test your abilities; but do so in private. Learn what you can and cannot do. You cannot control what form your strength will take, nor what you can do; but you can control what you do with it. Indeed, you must control it. All power is only a tool, like a sword, and a sword can be used for good or for ill.

Your father, if he still lives, will help you. Kalestayne, too; his knowledge of the history of our land was too great for me to fool him. He knows what we are, and has never betrayed us. You can always trust him. Seek out your sister, too; Jianscæn took a different path than I did, and that I believe, in my heart of hearts, you will take; but that is because her power, though present, was far less than mine. Yours will not be. Janni has a gentle soul, Ally; but you have Aylanni's heart. And you are your father's true daughter, in every sense of the word.

Finally, look you to Sylloallen. Though he is no mage, he is a man, and there is none better. He knows what I am, and therefore what you may one day be; and he has better reason than most to defend and preserve you. I have trusted him with my life, and more; you can do so, too.

Be wary of what you choose to do. I have told you of the blessing that we, the women of the Kaunovalta, share; now know the curse. You cannot know what form the power will take when it comes to you. You will never know how much you can do until you have done it. Therefore, be careful; guard your temper. Seek always to master your rage. Do not lash out on a whim, for you may do evil – great and terrible evil – without meaning to. Strive ever for reason and calm. It is all too easy for one of our kind to become drunk with might. With our power, Ally, we could have ruled the elves, or even the world. None of us has ever done so. We chose, all of us, to serve rather than reign.

You must discover why we made this choice. And then you must make it for yourself.

Know, too, that not all of the women of our clan are granted this terrible gift. In each generation, there are some in whom the power fails to appear. My sister, Annalyszian, is one such. I know that she has it not; and she knows that I know. Therefore, though I have given her no other cause, she has ever feared and distrusted me. I have grieved at this, for more years than you can imagine; but there is no overcoming it. Though it pains me to say it, you must never trust her. In all things, she is ruled not by love of what she has, but envy of what she has not. And always by fear.

Lastly, daughter, I pray that, along with my advice, you take also my love. To outward eyes, you seem more your father's daughter than mine. Never have I begrudged him this; for though my heart has known many loves, your father I have adored my whole life. He too has secrets to share with you, and will, in time. If I could exchange an eternity in the abyss for one more hour in his arms, I would do so happily.

But you must never be deceived by appearances. In blood, and in heart, and in spirit, you are my child first: a woman of the Kaunovalta, born to wield the might vouchsafed our clan by the sacrifice of our distant ancestress. We are not practitioners of the book, daughter; magic is not merely something that we do. It is what we are. When your power comes, embrace it. Plumb its depths. Learn it, revel in it, and wield it, to the betterment of our clan, and to the glory of all our people.

Do this, and you will do honour to Miros' divine legacy, and our clan's.

And your grandmother's.

And mine.

Fare you well.

When the Duke entered silently an hour later, he found Ally sitting on the hard stone floor before the reading couch, hugging her mother's letter to her chest, rocking and keening softly. He wondered what Rykki had told her, how much she had revealed.

Then he saw his wife's silver ring on his daughter's finger, and sighed. Watch over and guard her, Protector, he prayed silently.

I cannot lose her, too.

♦

Hax's novel status as a stone-cousin, or a wisdom-seeker, or whatever she was now, seemed unlikely to help her keep a low profile. She kept her new necklace out of sight, tucked away inside her bodice as she and her five companions negotiated the teeming throngs inside the Carrlár tube station.

Frida led the group, thrusting her way through the mob of Dwarves, followed immediately by Eanfled, who widened the breach. Hax kept close behind the red-headed woman, shouting navigating instructions to Wynstan, Uchtred and Bedwulf as they followed along behind her, staggering under the weight of luggage.

Uchtred was further burdened by the new pump body he had ordered for his boiler system; this, he claimed, was something far too precious to entrust to the "bumbling halfwits" in charge of loading and unloading the cargo coaches. His concern notwithstanding, the extra hundredweight of cast iron wrapped in rough sacking strapped across his shoulders did nothing to improve either his temper or his gait.

As she danced nimbly through the crowd, Hax had to keep reminding herself to pick up her skirts in order to avoid tripping on them. During her commercial depredations of the previous day, Frida had found time to outfit the elf-girl in high dwarven style. Where the priestess had managed to find dwarf-made fashions suited to her slender physique was entirely beyond her; Hax half suspected that Frida had simply ordered tailor-made clothing cut to elven dimensions, and that the dwarves, with their customary efficiency and artistry, had merely stitched up appropriate attire in the wink of an eye.

The results were more practical, and more comfortable, than she had expected them to be. Dwarven clothing was better suited to their living environment than her own eclectic mix of arming vestments, armour pieces and miscellaneous small-clothes. Her new garb was warmer, softer, cleaner, and far more robust than her previous attire; and notwithstanding the fact that it covered her from neck to wrists and toes (a fashion statement that would have gotten her instantly dismissed from the Queen's palace as some sort of uncouth bumpkin), it was not at all confining. The chemise, hooded cloak, long skirt and high boots were a mix of beige, brown and other earth-tones, and each was stitched together out of soft, durable fabrics and softer, supple leather. Her snug vest went well with these, and she was glad to have an excuse to wear it; the many pockets, and the oddments she had secreted in them, were a comfort to her.

She even felt comfortable enough to leave her armour packed. It took up most of the space in the haversack she carried over one shoulder, leaving the other free for her baldric, quiver and bow.

The boots, she found, were particularly exquisite, fitting her like a second skin. They were softer than the finest doe-hide she had ever encountered. Amazingly, they had soles that, in addition to providing comfort and support, not only felt thin enough that she thought she might be able to tread on a shilling and call king or spade, but also seemed to offer such wonderful traction that she felt as though she could, if she tried, run straight up a wall.

The best thing about the boots had been discovered by accident. She had insisted on trying them on the previous night, to show them to Uchtred (Frida and Eanfled being engaged in the kitchen). Smiling, the engineer had shown her the secret compartments inside the top of the boots; the right one held a long, thin, flat-bladed stiletto, and the left, a trio of delicate lock-picks. "We call these 'cat-boots'," he chuckled. "I'm surprised she could find them in your size." He chortled. "Looks like the old girl's fitting you out as a burglar."

Hax let that pass. She extracted the stiletto; the blade was bright, flexible, and razor-sharp. "How in the world do you get the leather so soft?" she had asked, replacing the dagger, and admiring once again the silky texture of the hide.

"Badger piss," the engineer had answered without a hint of a smile.

Hax, struggling through the crowd at the Tube station, felt a momentary shudder of revulsion as she recalled the conversation. She squashed it brutally. I stepped in worse than that with my old boots.

Fortunately, getting out of Carrlár was considerably easier than getting in. A dwarven official with a heavy bronze stamp wordlessly hammered an inky rune onto her entry papers (Hax presumed it was an exit mark of some sort) and waved her through onto the tube platform. Once all six of them had passed through the gate, Frida turned to the left, leading the group to the far end of the platform.

The priestess set a good pace, and the men were puffing under the weight of their burdens by the time they arrived at the entry port. This, Hax was surprised to see, was considerably fancier than the last coach-door she had entered. The hatch was surrounded by gold filigree, and had intricate, detailed runes cut into it, limned in a shining, grey metal that she recognized instantly as hardsilver.

"Ythwórigende," Eanfled said, nodding solemnly.

"Excuse me?" Hax turned to towards her.

" 'Wanderer-on-the-Waves'," Frida translated. "That's a good omen."

"What is?" the elf-girl asked.

"Our coach," the priestess replied, just as the door swung open.

Behind it, a pair of young Dwarves – one male, one female – stood at attention, dressed in livery that matched the coloured patterns of the interior, a shocking combination of red and gold. The pair bowed.

Hax blinked. "What do you mean 'our coach'?" she asked.

Frida glanced back at the surprised Elf. "It's nearly two days from here to Ædeldelf," she replied, a mischievous gleam in her eye. "I decided we ought to go in style."

"You rented the whole coach?"

"Why not?" the priestess asked.

Hax shook her head in disbelief. "Nice to have rich friends," she muttered. Then she paused and turned to Frida. "Why is it a 'good omen'?"

"What, 'Ythwórigende'?"

"Yes."

"Well – step aside, dearie, and let the men folk load the luggage –" Hax did so "– mostly because it's a joke. 'Wanderer-on-the-waves', or 'Salt-roamer', you see."

Hax shrugged. "I don't understand why it's a joke."

"Well, because there's no 'wandering' or 'roaming' in the Tube. Right?" the priestess replied with an amused smile. "The coaches ride the wave, true enough, but only in the direction the tunnel goes, and back again. No wandering."

"I see," Hax said. In fact, she didn't see at all.

It must have been obvious. "Perhaps another example," Frida said. "Look, if I were to come up with a nickname for you – just on a first meeting, without knowing anything about you – I'd probably dub you 'Cyrtanyfellic', or something like that."

"What does that mean?"

" 'Short and ugly'."

Hax blinked. "I beg your pardon?"

"It's a jest," Frida explained patiently. "In our tongue, all nicknames are jests. Our true names we reserve only for family and our closest friends. Our day-names, our mock-names, are unimportant, so we allow others to select them. We do so as a joke. If I didn't know you, 'Short and ugly' would be an easy mock-name for you, as you're tall and fair. Understand?"

"I suppose," the elf said dubiously. "Why would knowing me make a difference?" she asked.

"Ah," the priestess replied. "Well, you see, that's because while mock-names based on physical features are all right, we prefer to base them on things that nobody can see at first glance, that tell you something – albeit backwards – about their bearer's personality. It's not particularly clever to call you 'Short-and-ugly' because anyone can see at a glance that you're neither. But, for example, Uchtred's mock-name is 'Léasáberd'. Means 'lazy and deceitful'."

"And of course, he's neither," Hax nodded. "What's yours?"

" 'Lythrestníthering'. 'Gentle coward'."

Hax laughed out loud.

"See?" Frida said cheerfully, "You understand."

"I suppose I do," Hax replied. "But I've never heard you use those names."

The dwarf-woman shrugged. "You've always been among friends and family, haven't you? Mock-names are for casual acquaintances. Actually," she added thoughtfully, "it's quite an honour to be given one by one of our greater folk. The King, for example, or a High Priest."

"I suppose that makes sense," Hax nodded thoughtfully. "So...what's mine?"

"I don't know yet," the priestess answered. She shouldered her bag and turned towards the coach, giving Hax a speculative look. "I'm still working on it. Although," she added pensively, "Uchtred did suggest 'Uchtredsnydhæmestre'."

Hax laughed. "I could never pronounce that! What does it mean?"

Frida winked. "It means 'Uchtred's night-mistress'."

The elf-girl blushed scarlet and made a number of inarticulate choking noises.

The priestess smiled, giving her friend a palms-out placatory gesture. "It's a jest, remember! It sounds much funnier in our tongue, cildic. I swear!"

As they boarded the coach, Hax was still sputtering incoherently.

♦♦♦

Here ends the first part of the tale of Orkarel Hax

Her story continues in:

♦♦♦

Appendix 1 ♦ Songs and Poems

♦

Léoth ymbe Isenfyst

("The Lay of Ironfist")

From the Æfenléoth Hargóinna, the "Evensongs of Hargóin"

by Harwéac Hargóin, Gamolfeax-láruw Dweorga, Master Chanter of the Dwarves

(Trans. from the Dweorgaspræc)

I sing of a hero;

A hero iron-gray, iron-hard

Ironfist, a man, a man of great (spirit/destiny), a warrior

Ironfist, a freeman, a (war)lord of Ekhan

A child of Esu, a (spiritual son/true descendant) of Esu

Ironfist, a son of giants,

and also a friend and a brother to me.

I sing of a battle, a (hard fight/slaughter), a clash of spears;

Of glory won in battle, of wounds given by the long sword.

A tall man, sword-bearer, bearer of honour

Who came from the south, steel-coated, steel-guarded

Bearer of a glaive giant-forged

And a heart forged by Esu as though in the snows

Of the Northlands he never saw.

In the depths of the Deeprealm,

At the Gates of the Barrow of Bowrnléoch,

The forces of darkness assembled; in shadow

They schemed the demise of the

Children of Lagu.

The hammer-falls silenced; the forge-fires failed

Not for lack of (fire/fuel), but lack of (fire/heart),

Did the Children of Lagu tremble, for the first time,

In darkness.

Then out from the shadow sprang shadow eternal

Cold shadows; hell-shadows; (spirit)shadows of evil

Blood spilled on the stone, and all hands

Loosed hammers, loosed darts

Upon the fell foemen.

First to fall was Ulfrican, Forgemaster,

(Spiritual son/true descendant) of Barraj, axe-wielder

Whose hands blessed the children;

Off were his hands hewn, and after (crowned/adorned)

The accursed brow of the king of the darkness.

Forth sprang Ven Porwenna, bright light of Harad

Long laboured she in the dark depths of the Underfolk

Tending the aged; with bright light and (invocation/magic)

She fell on dark foemen, and so fell in turn,

And pillowed her fair head on a mountain of (gutted corpses/fallen foes)

And Ygrak, (wild warrior/berserker) of Kelva fell there beside her

Avenged and avenging the death of his beloved,

His great hands crushing the throats of the enemy,

His great axe sinking and drinking deep,

He swam to the next world and his heart's desire

Through a river of heart's-blood.

At the last stood Ironfist, spirit-son of Esu,

Bright sword carrying the light

of Breadan into the depths of the earth.

Before the Pillars of Barraj

And the Throne of the Deeprealm

He strove with the Spellweaver,

Darkskinned and whitehaired, fell of hand

Wielding a white staff.

And from him, Ironfist struck hand and arm,

And clove his skull open;

And the bone-white staff, the white staff of nightmares,

Fell to the stone; a trophy of battle

To lie cherished by the Underfolk, beside the cleft skull

Of Spellweaver the Thrice-cursed.

But Ironfist fell also, wounded with many wounds; and him they bore up

To a couch of fine furs, the bed of a hero,

And hot fires, and ice-cold mead, and many songs

To honour his iron with all of the (honours accorded by/praises due the saviour of)

the folk of the Stonedark.

Ironfist left them

Alone in the Deeprealm, bearing with him

Naught but scars and thanks.

Remembered in song and story so long as the darkness lasts

For courage and tales outlive the living

Borne down the long tale of years.

Thus the brave live forever, the tale of their deeds sung

With the banking of fires and broaching of (ale)casks

And so it will be in the Deeprealm

Until at the end the world breaks,

And Lagu banks the fires of heaven one last time,

And Barraj calls back his own,

To fight the great fight of world's gloaming.

♦♦♦

Appendix 2 ♦ Dramatis Personae

OUR PROTAGONIST

Allymynorkarel Aiyellohax: an elf-woman of the Third House; scion of the Duodeci; a sword-magus; uses "Orkarel Hax" as her nomen virago

HER FAMILY

Kaltas Aiyellohax, Ally's father; Duke of Joyous Light, Commander of the Champions of Larranel, and a nobleman of the Duodeci, the line of Dior

Alrykkian Aiyellohax, Ally's late mother

Jianscæn Aiyellohax, Ally's elder sister

Annalyszian Æyllian née Aiyellohax, Ally's aunt; her mother's sister, and lifemate to Crown Prince Landioryn

Aylanni, Ally's grandmother, and mother of Alrykkian and Annalyszian; a warrior-mage who fought alongside the royal standard at the Niriam Vale, a thousand years ago

PERSONNAGES OF NOTE

Children of Hara (Elves)

Sylloallen Avarras, Ally's master in swordcraft; a divine warrior of Larranel, and a retainer of Duke Kaltas

Ælyndarka Æyllian, Queen of the Third House of the Elves

Landioryn Æyllian, eldest son of the Queen, Crown Prince, and Commander-in-Chief

Bræagond Æyllian, the Queen's younger brother, long dead

Æloeschyan Æyllian, Bræagond's daughter; an accomplished wizard, and Magistatrix of the College of Bone

Jurissa, Ally's hand-maiden at Joyous Light

Palkywan, a merchant's son, her sparring partner

Kalestayne of Arx Eos, her master in magecraft; House Wizard at Joyous Light, and latterly, Magister of the College of Stars

Lallakentan, arms-master at Joyous Light, and her teacher after Sylloallen's departure

Breygon Sylvanus, a half-elf; a woodsman of Æryn, whom she met on the North-Road in Zare

Luperio Szælloszænya, ambassador to the Deeprealm

Erestrëia of Eldarcanum, wife to Luperio, and niece to Æloeschyan

Terrelek, their son

Children of Lagu (Dwarves)

Frideswide Balwyf – Dehorda, a priestess of Khallach

Wynstan Carrlárdan – Burarda, once a warrior, now an engineer, her husband

Uchtred Fladingann – Burarda, a metal-worker

Bedwulf – Burarda, an artisan

Eanfled – Burarda, his wife

Æthelthryd – Burarda, an armourer of Dwéorgámen, and half-sister to Frideswide

Yffi – Dehorda, an innkeeper at Eastgate

Coenred – Dehorda, a steward at an Eastgate inn

Children of Esu (Men)

Qaramyn Lux – Zaran, a wizard, a graduate of the Brandeskole at Æryn

Alric Wolvesbane (aka 'Wolvesfeast') – Zaran, a soldier of fortune of Æryn

Joraz – Zaran, a Tyrellian ascetic of Æryn

Prochiliarch Thanos Mastigo – a warcaster of the Army of Imperial Ekhan

Karrick Scutator – his shield bearer

Children of Nosa (Halflings)

Gwendolyne – Halpinya, a light-fingered soldier of fortune of Æryn

NAMES OF LEGEND

The Spellweaver (aka Glycomon Magjithural, aka Rex Veneficus) \- the Sorcerer-King who brought the Shadelvii of the Fourth House against the Deeprealm, sixty years ago

Malloch the Mighty – Burarda, a hero of the Iron Fury, who broke the Bridge of Bones to spare Underdarrow from the Spellweaver's army

Farulf Ironfist – Ekhani, a son of Esu, a divine warrior of the White Hand, who aided in the defeat of the Spellweaver

Ven Porwenna – elf of the Third House, a wizard, who aided in the defeat of the Spellweaver

Darhaxin Deephammer – Dethekda, a priest of Lagu, who aided in the defeat of the Spellweaver; later, High Priest of Lagu, and Arch-Priest of the Deeprealm

Fax Falkenhayn – Dethekda, Commander of the Iron Fury at the Bridge of Bones; later a political rival to Darhaxin Deephammer

Harwéac Hargóin – Dehorda, a skald, who aided in the defeat of the Spellweaver; later Gamolfax Laréow, Master Chanter of the Deeprealm

Ceorlinus Rectinarius – an ancient historian and playwright of the Third House, who flourished ca. 600 years ago

Siarszed Æyllian – One of three brothers of Ælyndarka Æyllian, Queen of the Third House; killed in battle with the armies of the Shadow King a thousand years ago

Sciarratekkan – a First-Born dragon of the Ancient World, whom Miros, then an elf, took as mate; and from whom she purloined the Art Magic on behalf of her kin, ca. 6000 years ago

Tior Magnus – Tior the Mighty; grandson of Bræa; King of the Third House of the elves; first High King of Harad (the elves), nearly 4000 years ago

Dior Fell-Handed – younger brother of Tior, first War Chief of Harad; progenitor of the current royal line

Xiardath the Usurper – Tior's son, who usurped his throne, and cast Tior beyond the walls of the universe

Biardath the Ill-Born – son of Xiardath by his aunt, who slew his father and crafted the dread Wand from his bones; overthrown by his fiendish daughter Mærglyn

Mærglyn Kinslayer – daughter of Biardath; overthrew him with the aid of a fiendish army, and took his Wand; was expelled from Harad and exiled to the Deepdark by Bræa herself; progenitrix of the Fourth House of the elves (the Sobrinatri, or Shadelven); later challenged Ekhalra for rule of the world, and was slain by her, and the Wand sundered

THE POWERS OF LIGHT AND DARKNESS

Ana, the Light

Uru, the Darkness

Powers of Light (the Anari)

Bræa, the Holy Mother, First among the Anari

Tian the Just; the Imprisoned Goddess

Vara the Merciful, the Healer

Hara the Wise, father of Elves

Esu the Brave, father of Men

Lagu the Strong, father of Dwarves

Nosa the Swift, father of Halflings

Miros, Servant of Hara, who traded her life for magic, and saved the Elves

Barraj, Servant of Lagu, who taught iron-craft to the Dwarves

Zoraz, Servant of Lagu, who taught the Dwarves patience

Khallach, Servant of Lagu, who taught them the lore of stone

Powers of Darkness (the Uruqua)

Bardan, First among the Uruqua; Bardan Eyðar, the Ender-in-Shadow

Ekhalra the Witherer; the Dark Queen; the Queen of the World

Tvalt, master of the Long Halls; guardian of the dead

Vilyacarkin, the Mistress of Lies; goddess of the Elves of the Fourth House, the Sobrinatrii (Dark Cousins), worshipped by them as Dashnorrej, the Lover in the Darkness

Appendix 3 ♦ The Tale of the Making

On star-strewn nights – on the eve of Bræa's Dawn, upon the solemnity of Harad, at Jule, and in celebration of the founding of Ekhan – the skalds lay down their vithelles, lutes and tambours, and they tell the tale of the Making.

In voices reverent and low, they speak these words.

♦

In the beginning, all was Unmade; naught there was but the Void, ever-changing, chaotic, unpredictable, and infinite in its constant fury. All that lay within it was ruled by chance. In time, chance calls all things into being, and so, at length, chance brought forth light; and in the instant that there was light, so also was there darkness. The light, which was called Ana, knew itself – and so, too, did the darkness, which was called Uru. Together, they desired a firmament upon which to contest one against the other, to determine which was the mightier, the light or the darkness. And so together they forged the Walls of Evertime, to separate the World Made – the vasty Universe, and all that lay within it – from the World Unmade, the seething madness of the Void.

Through the formless mists, light and darkness circled each other, like foes everlasting, seeking ever for advantage and ascendancy. But because they were equal in might and in purpose, the struggles of Ana and Uru were in vain. Nothing came of their endless strife. And so, after an eternity spent in fruitless jousting, they joined.

In the instant of their union, the Powers were birthed: seven of Light, called the Anari; and of Darkness, seven also, called the Uruqua. First among the Powers of Light was Bræa, the eldest, of radiant beauty and matchless might; and her two sisters, Vara, of gentle mien, and Tian, who stood for justice and order. Their four brothers were Hara, the wise; Esu, the brave; Nosa, the swift; and Lagu, the strong. The Uruqua counted among their number Zaman, called the deceiver; Tvalt, who became the judge of death, and later the Master of the Long Halls; Kær, the thief; Morga, the destroyer; Ekhalra, the witherer, she who, in latter days, became the Queen of the World; and Dæsuglu, befouling all with his accursèd touch. And above them all, chief among the Uruqua, stood Bardan, lord of darkness; Bræa's opposite in every way, and her bitterest foe.

The Powers fell swiftly into debate over how the universe should be governed. Debate became disagreement, and disagreement, dispute; and dispute slid swiftly into battle. The Anari strove with the Uruqua, and all the universe shuddered with the blows that were struck, for the light and for the darkness. But because they were equal in might and in purpose, the Anari and the Uruqua, like Ana and Uru before them, struggled in vain. Nothing came of their endless strife. And so, after an eternity spent in fruitless combat, they brought forth new life: slaves of power, to do their bidding.

Thus were the Minions born; and they were mighty, brightening the skies with their fires, and darkening them with their wings. Though lesser in might than the Powers, they were more numerous by far. And because of their numbers, they beseeched their masters and mistresses to make for them a battlefield; a thing over which to fight. And so Bræa and Bardan met, and reached agreement, and put forth their strength – and thus were created the heavens and the earth. And these were together called Anuru, that is, the place of light and darkness.

The struggles of the Minions grew until all Anuru echoed with the thunder of their strife. The Minions of the Light wielded the power of the Anari, shattering their foes with lightning, and spilling their heart's blood with lances of silver fire. But the Minions of Darkness responded in kind, scorching their foes with fire, and smothering them in clouds of suffocating shadow. In these battles, the fallen were legion. The Uruqua who perished turned to stone, and from their petrified flesh were formed the mountains, the hills, and all the sands of deserts and of seas. But the Anari who perished turned to light, brilliant and joyful; and they became the stars of the sky, and so even in defeat, bathed their fallen foes in benevolent luminescence.

The War of the Powers lasted an eon, and the fallen littered the earth, and made brilliant the Heavens. But because they were equal in might and in purpose, the Minions struggled in vain. Nothing came of their endless strife. And the Minions, and even the Powers, despaired; for none among them could conceive of any way to end their eternal war, and bring it to a conclusion, through triumph and defeat.

None, that is, save Bræa, who envisioned a means of sundering the stalemate; for she alone understood that the Balance was an ineluctable facet of the universe itself, an artefact incorporated, all unknowing, into its fabric, by Ana and Uru, who had had the Making of it. And so Bræa reached beyond the Making, beyond the Walls of Evertime, and took in hand some of the formless substance of the Unmade realm beyond; and with this, and with scraps of each of the four elements of Anuru – the winds and fires of Heaven, and the waters and stones of the earth – she crafted the four Kindred.

From the wind, she made the Elves, light-hearted and free; gentle in repose, but furious when aroused. From fire, she crafted Men, curious and fecund, who spread swiftly throughout the world, like the hungry and rapacious flames of which they were made. The Halflings mimicked the waters of the rivers, fast-flowing and capricious, deep and unquenchable, from which they sprang; and from the bones of the earth came the Dwarves, stolid and steadfast, and implacable in their enmity for the darkness that sought, from the very first, to overwhelm them.

Because they were formed of the body of Anuru, the Kindred were native to the universe, the World Made; a part of its being, belonging to it like none others – not even the Minions – ever did, or ever could. But because they bore also within them a piece of the Unmade realm that lay beyond the Walls, they were forever free of the strictures of the Balance – the endless and eternal equilibrium that bound even the Powers themselves.

Bræa hoped that her children would willingly serve the Anari; that they would grow in mastery, might and wisdom; and that, in the fullness of time, they might overturn the Balance between the Light and the Dark, that the Light might, someday, emerge triumphant. And that it might do so before the World Made returned, as someday it must, to the chaos of the Void, in the inevitable Unmaking – the apocalypse foretold, that the Kindred who knew of it called the Breaking of the World.

But her children did not meet her expectations. They proved to be wilful and disobedient; they disobeyed Bræa's commands, and flouted her will. Some even abandoned the light, and swore allegiance to Bardan.

Bræa was wroth, and gathered her strength to destroy her wayward sons and daughters. But Ana intervened, and stayed her hand, saying that freedom had been Bræa's gift to her children, and that freedom meant choice – including the choice to serve the darkness, rather than the light. Bræa refused to accept this; and so Ana was forced to break her, and took the light that was in her. And from that light, Ana formed a great star in the sky, the mightiest of stars, and called it Bræadan, which is 'Bræa's Lantern'. And the light of the Lantern was an eternal reminder to the children that their mother had essayed to betray them, and had been stayed.

That they might never again be threatened by their mother, Ana took from Bræa her children, and divided them into four peoples; and gave each of the peoples to one of Bræa's younger brothers. Hara, lord of woodlands, skilled in the ways of the Art Magic, was given lordship over the Elves; Esu, courageous, warlike, an explorer and conqueror without peer, received Men as his charge; Nosa, swift and cunning, meddlesome and curious, was given the task (some said 'punishment') of attempting to govern the Halpinya, the Halflings; and Lagu, wise and compassionate, who loved the earth, and was skilled in shaping metal and stone, was made the father of Dweorga, the Dwarves.

Thus sundered from each other, and from their mother Bræa, the Kindred prospered under their new masters. But they were still wilful and disobedient.

♦

Among all the Kindred, the tale is the same. In the lofty bowers or starlit palaces of the Elves; at the firesides, in the longhouses, or alongside the castle hearths of Men; in the comfortable homes of Halflings, smelling of breads and meats and ales; and even in the deep stone halls of the Dwarves, redolent of water and iron, the same tale is told.

The skalds tell this tale to remind all good folk – all of the Kindred – of their common origin.

They tell this tale to teach the children, who cluster at their parents' knees, eager to hear the words, if barely grasping their great import.

But mostly...mostly, the skalds tell this tale to show how the Powers themselves have erred.

For even the designs of the gods, howsoever carefully crafted, can sometimes go awry.

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Other books by D. Alexander Neill

The Chronicles of Anuru

Kaunovalta

Book I: The Running Girl

Book II: Dweorgaheim

Book III: Daughter of Dragons

(available now!)

The Brotherhood of Wyrms

Book I: The Road into Ruin

Book II: The Lover in the Darkness

Book III: The Tower by the Sea

(coming in 2013)

Bjornssaga

Book I: The Sea Dragon (Available now!)

Book II: The Azure Wind

Book III: Shadow-of-Midnight

(coming in 2015)

The Filigree Throne

Book I: The Last Warden

Book II: Red Rose and White

Book III: The Queen of Summer

(coming sometime before the end of the century)

The End in Fire

Book I: Dragonhome

Book II: Ebon Night

Book III: The Breaking of the World

(coming hopefully before the heat death of the universe)

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For more information, including background, lore,

and information on ongoing projects,

visit my website and author sites...

http://www.alexanderneill.com/

 My Smashwords Author Site

...and my blog:

http://chroniclesofanuru.blogspot.ca/

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