From his distant eyrie, Calandor’s thoughts brushed hers, tinged with warm approval.
Well done, Lilias.
It was the dark of the moon, and dark in the Tower of Ravens.
There was no view, here, though the windows stood open onto the night. The rooftops of Darkhaven fell away beneath them, illuminated faintly by starlight.
All of them were there, all of the Three.
And in the center of them stood the Shaper.
“They are ready, Dreamspinner?” he asked.
Ushahin bowed low and sincere, starlight glimmering on his moon-pale hair. “They are, my Lord.”
“Come,” Lord Satoris whispered, his voice carrying on the night breeze “Come!” And other words he added, uttered in the tongue of the Shapers, tolling and resonant, measured syllables that Shaped possibilities yet unformed.
Beating wings filled the air.
Through every window they came, filling the tower chamber, ravens, the ravens of Darkhaven, come all at once. They came, and they flew, round and around. Silent and unnatural, swirling in a glossy-black current around the tower walk—so close, wings overlapping like layered feathers, jet-bright eyes gleaming round and beady. Around and around they went, raising a wind that tugged at Vorax’s ruddy beard, making the Staccian shudder involuntarily.
Still, they held their positions, each of the Three.
Where are you, Tanaros wondered, which are you? To no avail he sought to pick a raven, his raven, .from the dark, swirling tide that enveloped the tower walls, looking to find a mischievous eye, an errant tuft of pin-feathers, from among them. Darkness upon darkness; as well pick out a droplet of water in a rushing torrent.
“The Ravensmirror is made,” Ushahin announced in a flat tone.
In the churning air, a scent like blood, sweet and fecund.
Satoris the Shaper spread his hands, drawing on ancient magic—the veins of the marrow-fire, running deep within the earth; the throbbing heart of Godslayer, that Shard of the Souma that burned and was not consumed.
“Show!”
The command hung in the air with its own shimmering darkness. Slowly, slowly, images coalesced, moving. Sight made visible. Only fragments, at first—the tilting sky, a swatch of earth, an upturned face, a scrabbling movement in the leaf-mold. A mouse’s beady eye, twitching whiskers. A drawn bow, arrow-shot and an explosion of feathers, a chiding squawk.
Such were the concerns of ravens.
Then; a face, upturned in a glade. A thread for Lord Satoris to tease, drawing it out What glade, where? Ravens knew, ravens kept their distance from the greensward. One flew high overhead, circling; their perspective diminished with lurching swiftness to an aerial view. There. Where? A greensward, ringed about with oak, a river forking to the north. And in it was a company of Ellylon.
There was no mistaking them for aught else, Haomane’s Children. Tall and fair, cloaked in grace. It was in their Shaping, wrought into their bones, in their clear brows where Haomane’s blessing shone like a kiss. It was in the shining fall of their hair, in the touch of their feet upon the earth. If their speech had been audible, it would have been in the tenor of their voices.
“What is this place?” Ushahin’s words were strained, a taut expression on his ravaged face. Always it was so. More than the children of Men who had shunned him, he despised the Ellylon who had abandoned him.
“It is called Lindanen Dale,” said the Shaper, who had walked the earth before it was Sundered. “Southward, it lies.”
“I know it, my Lord,” Tanaros said. “It lies below the fork of the Aven River. Betimes the Rivenlost of Meronil would meet with the sons of Altorus, when they ruled in the west. Or so my father claimed.”
“But what are they doing?” Vorax mused.
In the shifting visions, Ellyl craftsmen walked the greensward, measuring, gauging the coming spring. Banners were planted, marking the four corners of the Dale; pennants of white silk, lifted on the breeze, showing the device of Elterrion the Bold, a gold crown above the ruby gem of the Souma, as it had been when it was whole. The Ravensmirror churned and circled, showing what had transpired.
A Man came riding.
The weak sunlight of early spring glinted on his hair, red-gold. His eyes were wide-set and demanding, his hands steady on the reins as he guided his solid dun mount. Tanaros felt weak, beholding him.
Aracus Altorus.
It was him, of course. There was no denying it, no denying the kingship passed down generation upon generation, though the kingdom itself was lost. It did not matter that he wore no crown, that his cloak was dun-grey, designed to blend with the plains of Curonan. What he was, he was. He looked like Roscus. And he looked like Calista, too—Tanaros’ wife, so long ago. The set of the eyes, last seen believing. How not? He was of their blood.
And at his side, another, dark-haired and quiet, with scarred knuckles. Unlike his lord, he was watchful as he rode, stern gaze surveying the wood as they emerged into the glade. Ravens took wing, the perspective shifting and blurring as they withdrew, resolving at a greater distance.
Once, Tanaros had ridden just so, at the right hand of his lord.
Strange, that his memory of Roscus’ face as he died was so vague. Surprised, he thought. Yes, that was it. Roscus Altorus had looked surprised, as he raised his hand to the sword-hilt protruding from his belly. There had been no time for aught else.
In the churning Ravensmirror, in Lindanen Dale, Aracus Altorus halted, his second-in-command beside him. Behind them, a small company of Borderguard sat their mounts, silent and waiting in their dun-grey cloaks.
The Ellyl lord in command met him, bowing low, a gesture of grace and courtesy. Aracus nodded his head, accepting it as his due. Who is to say what the Ellyl thought? There was old sorrow in his eyes, and grave acceptance. He spoke to the Altorian king-in-exile, his mouth moving soundlessly in the Ravensmirror, one arm making a sweeping gesture, taking in the glade. There and there, he was saying, and pointed to the river.
Such a contrast between them! Tanaros marveled at it. Next to the ageless courtesy of the Ellyl lord, Aracus Altorus appeared coarse and abrupt, rough-hewn, driven by the brevity of his lifespan. Small wonder Cerelinde Elterrion’s granddaughter had refused this union generation after generation. And yet … and yet. In that very roughness lay vitality, the leaping of red blood in the vein, the leaping of desire in the loins, the quickening of the flesh.
Satoris’ Gift, when he had one.
It was the one Gift the Ellylon were denied, for Haomane First-Born had refused it on his Children’s behalf, who were Shaped before time came into being and were free of its chains. Only the Lord-of-Thought knew the mind of Uru-Alat. The slippery promptings of desire, the turgid need to seize, to spend, to take and be taken, to generate life in the throes of an ecstasy like unto dying—this was not for the Ellylon, who endured untouched by time, ageless and changeless as the Lord-of-Thought himself.
But it was for Men.
And because of it, Men had inherited the Sundered World, while the Ellylon dwindled. Unprompted by the goads of desire and death, the cycle of their fertility was as slow and vast as the ages. Men, thinking Men, outpaced them, living and dying, generation upon generation, spreading their seed across the face of Urulat, fulfilling Haomane’s fears.
“A wedding!” Vorax exclaimed, pointing at the Ravensmirror. “See, my Lord. The Ellyl speaks of tents, here and here. Fresh water from thence, and supplies ferried upriver, a landing established there. From the west, the Rivenlost will come, and Cerelinde among them. They plan to plight their troth here in Lindanen Dale.”