The Mage scrambled to her hands and knees, and snatched up the Staff. “Run!” she screamed at the top of her voice. Grince scrambled up, took one look at her face, and obeyed. Reacting to her urgency, Forral, no longer hindered by the cat, grabbed her arm and hauled her to her feet, and together they fled down the hill, Shia flanking them and Tarnal and Grince running ahead of them down the slope, their feet slipping on the wet and frozen turf.
Suddenly Aurian turned her head, as though reacting to some call that only she could hear. With a stifled cry she dragged her arm free of Forral’s grasp and ran back up the hill.
“What the ... Come back, you idiot!” The swordsman spun on his heel and hared back up the slope in pursuit. Aurian ran to the stunned bird and scooped it up, then came racing back the way she had come.
Lightning sheared down from the crown of tenebrous cloud and struck the monolith with deadly accuracy. With a tearing crack like a thunderclap, the great stone split asunder and a massive explosion ripped the top off the hill.—The distant deathsong of the Phaerie was like the whine of a sword blade splitting the air. The fierce, wild cries of their silver horns were like the raw breath of winter on the wind. Vannor, in his sleep, turned restlessly and dreamed of the Valley, and the Lady Eilin with a glowing sword clasped in her hand. Then he awakened, bolting up from his blankets with a hoarse cry of dismay. The horns and cries were louder now. This was no dream—the attack on Hellorin’s city must have failed, and the Phaerie had come to Nexis to extract their vengeance.
Pulling on whatever garments came to hand, Vannor ran to the window. Already the Wild Hunt could be seen as streaks of glittering light arcing down through the sky like shooting stars. In the city, the brassy calls of horns arose to combat the sounds from the sky, while the great forewarning bell of the Garrison had begun to ring, alerting the Nexians to their peril as it had done in times of danger throughout all the centuries since the Cataclysm itself.—Much nearer than these sounds came a tumult of voices from downstairs, where Vannor’s household staff were beginning to panic. Through the window he could see manservants and housemaids running out into the garden to witness the spectacle, as they mingled in terrified knots with the gardeners and grooms.—Vannor threw the window open with a bang. “Get inside,” he bellowed. “Get into the house, you fools—and stay there.” Snatching up his sword, he ran downstairs. For the first time since her angry departure he was glad that Dulsina had left him. At least in the secret caverns of the Nightrunners she would be safe.
As Vannor watched from the vantage of his hilltop mansion, the Phaerie came down on the city like a firestorm, their shimmering robes shedding drifts of sparks that swirled in the air behind them. The exultant horns had taken on a deeper, more menacing note. Spars of light leapt from the top of the Mages’
Tower as the immortals rode past on their great horses, the luminescence spreading rapidly down the curving sides of the building and throughout the Academy complex, outlining in scintillating starlight the splintered shell of the weather dome and the rococo ornamentation of the great library. Similar patches of glimmer were springing up and spreading rapidly throughout the city, wherever the Phaerie touched down.
For the space of a few heartbeats it was a vision of breathtaking beauty. Then harsh angry light dispelled the dreamlike radiance as hungry flames leapt up in a dozen places, and the shrilling of the horns was drowned by screams.—Then Vannor was running, running through the burning streets, seeing a man cut in half by a Phaerie sword, his guts spilling out across the cobbles ... A little girl clutching a rag doll and weeping over the body of her mother ... A young lad running from a burning house, engulfed in a ball of flame. A woman shrieking as her children were snatched away from her and borne aloft, screaming, by a Phaerie woman with burning sapphire eyes ... The victims all had their eyes fixed on the High Lord of Nexis; accusing, condemning ... Scenes of torture, torment, and slaughter were repeated over and over again before Vannor’s eyes, while Phaerie stalked everywhere, cold-eyed and terrible, veiled in the coruscating glamourie of their magic ...
“Vannor is trapped within his own mind,” D’arvan muttered. “He’s a prisoner of his guilt, unable to face the slaughter he caused.” His eyes flashed with anger as he looked at his father. “Judging from some of the outrages I’ve found in his memory, he’d be better off placing the blame where it truly lies.—How could you revel in such atrocities?”
“They’re only Mortals,” Hellorin said mildly. “After the endless misery of their long imprisonment, would you begrudge my folk a little sport?”
D’arvan sighed and kept his thoughts to himself. Right now, his father’s goodwill was all-important. It would serve no purpose to start a quarrel.—Hellorin, he knew, would never change; he was too accustomed to seeing the Mortals as nothing more than low, brute creatures, fit only to be slaves—or quarry.
“It won’t be easy to release Vannor,” he said instead. “His mind is locked into a cycle that relives the horrors of that night over and over again. I’m sorry, but I can’t find any clue as to why he mounted his attack on you—he seems as genuinely baffled by his own actions as the rest of us.” D’arvan turned away from Hellorin so that his father would not see the depth of his dismay. In Vannor’s memory there had been horror unending, and it had shaken him badly. The last thing he wanted was to go back into the mind of the tormented man and experience it all again. “I wish Aurian were here. She would know what to do—she’s been properly trained in the skills of healing.”
“There is no reason why you should not succeed.” There was an edge of impatience in Hellorin’s voice. “And if you do not—well, the world will keep on turning. One Mortal more or less will make no difference.”
“Except to Vannor,” D’arvan said firmly. “My Lord, surely there’s no need to pursue this further? I’ve searched all that I can access of Vannor’s mind and memory—no matter how much you wish it, I can’t find any reason for his attack on the city. Let him go, I beg you. He is no further use to you here. Let me take him to Aurian—it may well be that she can help him where I have failed.”
“No. Try again, D’arvan,” the Forest Lord insisted.
Vannor lay in the tower chamber that had been given to D’arvan, on the same low couch from which, three days earlier, Maya had produced her audacious plan. The Mage sighed. Unfortunately, Hellorin had liked her idea all too well—he was anxious both to extend his bloodline and obtain his son’s help in ruling the Mortal race, and for this he was willing to forfeit a slave or two, or even make the greater sacrifice of releasing the two Xandim.
Putting off the evil moment when he must enter Vannor’s mind once more, D’arvan turned away from the stricken Mortal and went to look out of his window at the spectacular city—a dazzling blend of Phaerie magic and Mortal labor—on the lower slopes of the hill. Over the past few days, events had moved with dizzying speed. Over the years of their long exile, the Phaerie Healers had become expert in the manipulation of Mortal fertility, for the Forest Folk themselves had been unable to reproduce with their own kind, thanks to a cruel twist of the Magefolk spell that bound them. Already, Maya was carrying the tiny mote of life that would one day become their child. At his insistence she had been moved into the comfort of D’arvan’s chambers, away from the slave quarters and their ruthless guards. Parric, still bristling with hostility toward the Mage, had been perforce left down in the caverns until it was time to leave, and now there was only one task remaining—the reconstruction of Vannor’s mind—before Hellorin gave them his permission to depart.