‘Tyrellan,’ he said, stepping from the shadows.
Tyrellan rose smoothly, slipping the blade into his belt.
‘Yes, my lord?’
‘Years ago you went to find a dragon in Dennali, called Shebazaruka.’
‘I did.’
‘Can you mark it on a map?’
‘I already have,’ said Tyrellan. He went to his cupboards and revealed a shelf of neatly stacked scrolls. ‘Here,’ he said, pulling out a map of Dennali. ‘It’s the very one we took on that ill-fated mission.’
‘Thank you,’ said Losara.
‘Anything I should know?’
‘Not sure yet,’ said Losara. He went to the window and left the room, taking the map with him. He could not turn it to shadow – in fact the only things he ever took with him in shadowform were his clothes. Why he was able to bring those he wasn’t quite sure, except that maybe they were, more or less, a part of him. At any rate, he did not travel as quickly as usual, for fear the paper would rip from his ethereal grip or shred to pieces in the wind. Going so slowly, it took nearly an hour to reach Swampwild.
There he found the funeral mire where Lalenda’s mother was buried. He stepped out onto a hillock surrounded by willow and gravebloom. Going down to the deep mud that encircled it, he called out, ‘Eldew! It is I, Losara, here to invoke your promise to serve!’
Nothing happened. Losara tried a few more times, then wondered if he was simply shouting at nothing. He sat down on the hillock to wait. Around him the bog was quiet, save for frogs and the occasional bubble breaking. Perhaps the Mireform had forsaken him?
Bubbles soon burst in quick succession and Eldew rose glistening from the mud. He was even larger than most Mireforms, his abdomen and head like one boulder upon another, his wide mouth rich with rows of glinting silver fangs. The lumpy growths of moss protruding from his skin were a healthy green, and his knife-like claws so long they looked almost cumbersome. He flowed to the bog’s edge and pulled his bandy legs free with a slurp. Losara rose, and despite the fact he was higher on the slope, they met eye to beady white eye. In the bog, other shapes moved beneath the surface – it seemed Eldew had not come alone.
‘I answer your call, Losara Shadowhand,’ said Eldew, his voice deep and resonant, like bubbles breaking underwater.
‘I have a task for you,’ said Losara. ‘One of great importance.’
‘The Mireform shall serve.’
‘It requires journeying into Kainordas.’
Eldew’s tendrils whipped about. ‘Hmmm, hum,’ he said. ‘That can be a difficult place for us. So dry.’
‘It would be Dennali,’ said Losara. ‘A wet land, full of swamp and wood and water.’
‘Yes,’ said Eldew. ‘The east is not so restrictive. What would you have done?’
‘How fast can you travel?’
‘Not so fast as the Shadowhand …but fast nonetheless.’
‘Then I need you to get, as fast as you can, to here,’ said Losara, holding out the map. Eldew took it delicately in his long claws and held it up for inspection.
‘Quite a ways,’ he said. ‘What do we find there?’
‘Dragons,’ said Losara, ‘that I want you to kill.’
Eldew’s tongue slopped out and made a little unconscious jabbing motion with the spiked end. He slurped it back in.
‘Dragons,’ he repeated.
‘Does that trouble you?’
‘No,’ said Eldew. ‘How many?’
‘Two.’
‘Then we shall be six,’ said Eldew and raised his voice. ‘Tarka, Eddow, Gremin, Thrasker, Ectid, attend!’
From the mud rose five more shapes, turning themselves into Mireforms. As Eldew rolled the map up carefully, a small recess opened in his side. He slid the map into it and it slopped closed.
‘Two more things,’ said Losara. ‘First, if you come across my counterpart, another man with blue hair, he must not be harmed.’
Eldew gurgled.
‘Secondly, in the dragon’s hoard you will find a special stone, which flashes with light and creeps with shadow. This you must retrieve.’
‘We understand,’ said Eldew. ‘Is there anything else you bid? You will not easily find us once we move, for magic rolls right off our backs.’
‘Nothing but that you must be swift. You must try to beat my counterpart to the dragon’s lair, and he is closer to it now than we are here.’
‘Then we shall not tarry. The fastest way through the bog is underneath it. We will take our leave, saviour child.’
‘Take it,’ said Losara.
Together the Mireforms lost their shapes, melting back into the mud. Losara wondered in what form they’d emerge on the other side.
With a shrug that ended in him collapsing to shadow, he sped back to Skygrip and, in the dim light of morning, found his Lalenda sleeping once more. Re-forming slowly between her arm and the pillows, he slipped into her embrace without waking her.
Sitting on Refectu, Losara was thankful for the silence. As he had discovered, not only could he fill the throne room on a whim, he could also have it emptied. Only Tyrellan waited with him now, silently watching his new companion, thinking his own unknown thoughts.
Despite the orders he was about to give, Losara’s mind was elsewhere – back with his other , and the Stone. The morning had brought him doubts that snatching it away was the best course of action. He needed time to think – no, more than that: he needed more information to think about. An idea began to form in his mind, one he hoped was not too reckless.
‘Roma has arrived, my lord,’ came Turry’s announcement from the opposite end of the throne room.
Losara nodded and a moment later Roma strode through the archway. He was as impressive a figure as Losara remembered from that day they had fought each other in the duelling chamber – stony-faced and sleek, his black hair pulled tight into a ponytail streaked with red dye, an open-chested robe swishing around his feet. As he arrived at the throne, the shadowmander ran up Tyrellan’s leg to perch on his shoulder for a better view of the mage. Roma was clearly astonished by the creature.
‘An improvement on your last familiar, First Slave,’ he said.
Tyrellan pulled back his top lip to reveal a gleaming fang. ‘Thank you.’
Roma turned to Losara and bowed low. ‘I am sent for, lord. I come.’
For some reason Losara felt sure he could trust this man. Although Roma had once coveted the seat in which Losara now reclined, that singular feud had been ended decisively. There was no way Roma would risk returning to the pain Losara had engulfed him in, pain through which Losara had forged himself a loyal servant before plunging him into the cold water of mercy. Thus tempered, Roma was now unwavering in his support.
‘It is good to see you,’ said Losara. ‘I thank you for your patience in waiting to serve me. I promise that you will never again have to earn your coin performing idle tricks for passers-by.’
‘It was not the most …illustrious profession for a mage such as I,’ acknowledged Roma.
‘I agree,’ said Losara. ‘That is why I’ve called you here. I want you to help Tyrellan oversee the gathering of our army. Our target will be Holdwith, where many Kainordan mages train. Tyrellan will explain to you why we have need of them alive …at least for a while.’
Internally he was troubled by what he intended. He had only killed a person once before, and the Throne’s look of disbelief still came back sometimes to haunt him. Yet he had also seen much killing …seen how Bel would lay waste to all Fenvarrow if he could, leaving the parts he could not stick with his sword dry and dying beneath a sweltering sun. Did the fact that Losara only sought to defend his land against such devastation excuse his actions?
What choice do I have? he thought.
‘For that reason,’ he went on, ‘we shall need the numbers for a decisive victory. Roma, I am making you Magus Supreme.’
It was a position that Battu had, if not done away with, at least never filled – the head of all magic in Fenvarrow, bar the Shadowdreamer himself.