My companion cut away the strip of linen that bound my forearm to Jayereth’s, allowing our mingled blood to feed my sorcery. The cold touch that seared my flesh was not his knife-his hand was too experienced for that-but the sealing of a scar that would forever remind me of my failure in my young counselor’s last need.
The red mist vanished with the death tide, and my bleary eyes focused on the ravaged body crumpled on the stone floor of my lectorium. The only sound in the candlelit wreckage of the chamber was my shaking breath as I knelt beside my fallen counselor and grieved for the horror she had known. Cross swiftly, Jayereth. Do not linger in this realm out of yearning for what is lost. I’ll care for T’Vero and your child. On D’Arnath’s sword, I swear it.
I envisioned Jayereth as she had been, short and plain, with brown hair, a liberal dash of freckles across her straight nose and plump cheeks, and the most brilliant young mind in Avonar tucked behind her eccentric humor. When I summoned Jayereth’s young husband, T’Vero, I would try to keep this image in mind and not the gruesome reality.
“Was there nothing to be done, my lord?”
Two small, strong hands gripped my right arm and helped me to my feet. Bareil always knew my needs. Unable to speak as yet, I shook my head and leaned on the Dulcé’s sturdy shoulder as he led me to a wooden stool he’d set upright. Padding softly through the wreckage, he summoned those who huddled beyond the door.
One by one the four remaining Preceptors of Gondai crept into the chamber, gaping at the devastation. The oak-paneled walls were charred, the worktables in splinters, the shredded books in jumbled heaps. No vessel remained un-shattered, no liquid unspilled; every surface was etched by lightnings more violent than any storm of nature’s making. The acrid smoke of smoldering herbs mingled with blue and green vapors from pooled liquids to sting noses and eyes. Most fearful, of course, was the corpse sprawled in the midst of the destruction-Jayereth and the rictus of horror that had been her glowing face.
“How was it possible, my lord prince?” one whispered.
“Who could have done this?”
“In the very heart of the palace…”
“… treason…”
The word was inevitable, though I didn’t want to hear it.
“… and her work, of course…”
“All lost,” I said. I had known it in the instant I’d heard the thunderous noise.
Jayereth’s discovery should have been secured the previous night. I was her Prince. It had been my responsibility. But my own selfish desires had lured me into a night’s adventure, and so I had put off duty until this morning. Too late. Before I could protect Jayereth or her work, our enemies had ripped her apart and left no place for me to heal.
With a furious sweep of my hand, I cleared the tottering worktable of chips of plaster and broken glass, then kicked the splintered leg and let the slate top crash to the floor. Only when the dust had settled again had I control enough to address my waiting Preceptors. “Search every corner of the palace, every house, ruin, and hovel in the city. No one is to leave Avonar. Ustele, you will watch for any portal opening. We will discover who dares murder in my house.”
Useless orders. Useless anger. No common conspirator had wrought such destruction fifty paces from my bedchamber. The protections on the palace of the Prince of Avonar were the most powerful that could be devised. For a thousand years no enemy had breached these rose-colored walls, and no Dar’Nethi thought-reading was required to understand what every one of the wide-eyed Preceptors saw. No soulless Zhid had slain Jayereth-no lurking stranger. The murderer was one of us.
Bareil went to summon Jayereth’s husband. The Preceptor Gar’Dena, a giant of a man resplendent in green silk and a ruby-studded belt, brusquely dispatched the other Preceptors to the duties I had detailed. When Gar’Dena and I were left alone, he looked down at Jayereth. “Has there been any disruption in the Circle? Any sign from Marcus or the others? This event leaves me wary of all our enterprises.”
I shook my head. “No ill word from the Circle.” As far as we knew the Lords had not yet noticed our most powerful sorcerers taking up positions on the boundaries of the Vales, ready to form an expanding ring of impenetrable enchantment around the healthy lands of my adopted world. “As of yesterday, Ce’Aret had almost two hundred in place. And we’ve had no news of our agents in Zhev’Na, but, of course, we’ve no way to know if they’ve been taken. Maybe that’s what this is-the notice of their failure.”
We both knew it wasn’t so. The elimination of Jayereth and her work was no blind strike of retaliation, but clearly aimed. Someone knew what she had discovered and knew that she’d not yet passed on all of her knowledge. Only six people in the universe knew the secret-and to every one of them I would entrust my life.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Though Carol Berg calls Colorado her home, her roots are in Texas in a family of teachers, musicians, and railroad men. She has a degree in mathematics from Rice University and one in computer science from the University of Colorado, but managed to squeeze in minors in English and art history along the way. She has combined a career as a software engineer with her writing, while also raising three sons. She lives with her husband at the foot of the Colorado mountains.
Version
V1.0-Proof read and formatted in detail.