Kitabı oku: «Starman: Book Three of the Axis Trilogy»

1 The Day of Power

It was a long day, the day Axis tried to kill Azhure, then married her. It was a day filled with power, and thus power found it easy to wrap and manipulate lives. The power of the Enchantress – untested and, for the moment, uncontrolled – had dominated the morning. Now, as the Enchantress smiled and kissed her new husband, it lay quiescent, waiting.

But as the gate that had imprisoned Azhure’s power and identity had shattered that day, so had other gates shattered, and so other powers had moved – and not all of them welcomed by the Prophecy.

As the Enchantress leaned back from her husband, accepting the warmth and love of her friends and family about her, so power walked the land of Tencendor.

It would be a long day.

Axis pulled the Enchantress’ ring from a small secret pocket in his breeches. He held it up so that all in the room could see it, then he slid the ring onto the heart finger of Azhure’s left hand. It fit perfectly, made only for this woman, and for this finger.

“Welcome into the House of the Stars to stand by my side, Enchantress. May we walk together forever.”

“Forever?” the GateKeeper said. “You and the Enchantress? For ever? As you wish, StarMan, as you wish.”

She laughed, then, from one of the bowls on the table before her she lifted out two balls and studied them.

“Forever,” she muttered, and placed them with the group of seven sparkling balls at the front of her table. The Greater. “Nine. Complete. The Circle is complete! At last … at last!”

She fell silent, deep in thought. Her fingers trembled. Already he had one child, and more to follow. And then … the other.

She held a hand over one of the bowls again, dipped it in sharply, and brought out four more balls. She dropped them into the pile of softly glowing golden balls which represented those who did not have to go through her Gate. The Lesser.

“Yet one more!” A spasm of pain crossed her face. Her hand lifted slowly, shaking, then she snarled and snatched a dull black ball from the pile of those who refused to go through her Gate.

She hissed, for the GateKeeper loathed releasing a soul without exacting fair price. “Does that satisfy your promise, WolfStar? Does it?”

She dropped it with the other four on the pile of the Lesser.

“Enough,” she said in relief. “It is done. Enough.”

Faraday tightened the girth on the donkey and checked the saddlebags and panniers. She did not carry much with her: the bowl of enchanted wood that the silver pelt had given her so long ago; the green gown that the Mother had presented to her; some extra blankets; a pair of sturdy boots should the weather break; and a few spare clothes.

It was not much for a widowed Queen, thought Faraday, fighting to keep her emotions under control. Where the retainers? The gilded carriage and the caparisoned horses? The company of two white donkeys was paltry considering what she had done for Axis and for Tencendor – and what she would yet do.

Carriages and horses? What did she need with those? All she needed, all she wanted, was the love of a man who did not love her.

She thought about Azhure and Caelum, envying the woman yet sharing her joy in her son. Well, she thought, no matter. I am mother to forty-two thousand souls. Surely their birthing will give me pain and joy enough.

The stables, as the rest of the palace of Carlon, were still and quiet. When she had left the Sentinels earlier Faraday had heard that the princes and commanders closest to Axis and Azhure had been called to the apartment where Faraday had left them.

“A wedding, I hope,” Faraday murmured, and did not know whether to smile for Azhure’s sake, or cry for her own.

She took a deep breath and steeled herself. She had her own role to play in the Prophecy and it would take her far from Carlon. Faraday could not wait to leave the palace and the city. There were no happy memories here. Even the recent eight days and nights she had spent at Axis’ side had turned out to be nothing but a lie and a betrayal. It was their memory Faraday wanted to escape most of all.

Why had no-one told her about Azhure? Everyone close to Axis – indeed, many distant from him – had known of his love for Azhure, yet none had thought to tell Faraday. Not even the Sentinels.

“You let me think that once Borneheld was dead Axis would be mine,” she had cried to the Sentinels. “All I had to comfort me during that frightful marriage was the thought that one day my efforts for the Prophecy would be rewarded with Axis’ love, and yet that comfort was a lie.”

Ogden and Veremund hung their heads in shame, and when Yr stepped forward to comfort Faraday, she jerked away.

“Did you know?” Faraday shouted at Jack. “Did you know from the very beginning that I would lose Axis?”

“None of us know all of the twists and turns of the Prophecy, sweet girl,” Jack replied, his face unreadable.

Faraday had stared flatly at him, almost tasting the lie he’d mouthed.

She sighed. Her meeting with the Sentinels had not gone well. She now regretted the harsh words she’d lashed at them before she’d stalked out the door. Ogden and Veremund had scurried after her, their cheeks streaked with tears, asking her where she was going. “Into Prophecy – where you have thrust me,” Faraday had snapped.

“Then take our donkeys, and their bags and panniers,” they’d begged.

Faraday nodded curtly. “If you wish.”

Then she had left them standing in the corridor, as much victims of the Prophecy as she was.

Now all she knew was that she had to go east and that, sooner or later, she would have to begin the transfer of the seedlings from Ur’s nursery in the Enchanted Woods beyond the Sacred Grove to this world.

Faraday gathered the leads of the placid donkeys and turned to the stable entrance. A heavily cloaked figure stood there, shrouded in shadows. Faraday jumped, her heart pounding.

“Faraday?” a soft voice asked, and she let out a breath in sheer relief. She’d thought that this dark figure might be the mysterious and dangerous WolfStar.

“Embeth! What are you doing down here? Why are you cloaked so heavily?”

Embeth tugged back the hood. Her face was pale and drawn, her eyes showing the strain of sleepless nights.

“You’re leaving, Faraday?”

Faraday stared at the woman, remembering how Embeth, like the Sentinels, had urged her into the marriage with Borneheld. She also remembered that Embeth and Axis had been lovers for many years. Well could you dissuade me from Axis and urge me to Borneheld’s bed, she thought sourly, when you had enjoyed Axis for so long.

But Faraday forced herself to remember that Embeth had been doing only what she thought best for a young girl untutored in the complexities of court intrigue. Embeth had known nothing of prophecies or of the maelstrom that had, even then, caught so many of its victims into its swirling dark outer edges.

“Yes. There is no place for me here, Embeth. I travel east,” she replied, deliberately vague, letting Embeth think she was travelling back to her family home in Skarabost.

Embeth’s hands twisted in front of her. “What of you and Axis?”

Faraday stared unbelievingly at her before she realised that Embeth probably had no knowledge of the day’s events.

“I leave Axis to his lover, Embeth. I leave him to Azhure.” Her voice was so soft that Embeth had to strain to hear it.

“Oh, Faraday,” she said, hesitating only an instant before she stepped forward and hugged the woman tightly. “Faraday, I am sorry I did not tell you … about … well, about Azhure and her son. But I could not find the words, and after a few days I had convinced myself that you must have known. That Axis must have told you. But I saw your face yesterday when Axis acknowledged Azhure and named her son as his heir and I realised then that Axis had kept his silence. That everyone had. Faraday, please forgive me.”

Faraday finally broke down into the tears she had not allowed herself since that appalling moment at the ceremony when she had realised the depth of Axis’ betrayal. She sobbed, and Embeth hugged her fiercely. For a few minutes the two women stood in the dim stable, then Faraday pulled back and wiped her eyes, an unforced smile on her face.

“Thank you, Embeth. I needed that.”

“If you are going east then you must be going past Tare,” Embeth said. “Please, Faraday, let me come with you as far as Tare. There is no place here in Carlon for me any more. Timozel has gone, only the gods know where, my other two children are far distant – both married now – and I do not think either Axis or Azhure would feel comfortable with my continuing presence.”

As mine, Faraday thought. Discarded lovers are a source of some embarrassment.

“Judith still waits in Tare, and needs my company. And there are … other … reasons I should return home.”

Faraday noted the older woman’s hesitancy. “StarDrifter?” she asked.

“Yes,” Embeth said after a moment’s hesitation. “I was a fool to succumb to his well-practised enticements, but the old comfortable world I knew had broken apart into so many pieces that I felt lost, lonely, unsure. He was an escape and I … I, as his son’s former lover, was an irresistible challenge.”

A wry grin crossed her face. “I fear I may have made a fool of myself, Faraday, and that thought hurts more than any other pain I have endured over the past months. StarDrifter only used me to sate his curiosity, he did not care for me. We did not even share the friendship that Axis and I did.”

We have both been used and discarded by these damn SunSoar men, Faraday thought. “Well,” she said, “as far as Tare, you say? How long will it take you to pack?”

To her surprise Embeth actually laughed. “As long as it takes me to saddle a horse. I have no wish to go back inside the palace. I already wear a serviceable dress and good boots, and should I require anything else then I have gold pieces in my purse. We shall not want for food along the way.”

Faraday smiled. “We would not have wanted for food in any case.” She patted one of the saddlebags.

Embeth frowned in puzzlement at the empty saddlebag, but Faraday only reached out her hand. “Come, let us both walk away from these SunSoar men. Let us find meaning for our lives elsewhere.”

As Faraday and Embeth left the palace of Carlon, far to the north Timozel sat brooding on the dreary shores of Murkle Bay. To his right rose the cheerless Murkle Mountains that spread north for some fifty leagues along the western border of Aldeni. Relentless cold, dry winds blew off the Andeis Sea, making life all but impossible within the mountain range.

The darkness of the waters before Timozel reflected the blackness of his mind. If, far to the south, Embeth worried about her lost son, Timozel spared no thought for his mother – Gorgrael dominated his mind awake and asleep.

Over the past nine days Timozel had ridden as hard as he dared for the north. With each league further away from Carlon and Faraday he could feel Gorgrael’s grip clench tighter about his soul.

The horror Timozel had felt when Faraday dropped the pot and shattered the ties that bound him to her had dimmed, but had not completely left him. In those odd hours when he snatched some sleep, nightmares invariably claimed him and he always woke screaming. Three times this day he had dropped off in the saddle, only to find Gorgrael waiting for him in his dreams, his claws digging into Timozel’s neck, his repulsive face bending close to Timozel’s own. “Mine,” the dream-Gorgrael would hiss. “Mine! You are mine!”

And with his every step further north the more potent became the nightmares. If only he could turn his back on Gorgrael and ride for Carlon. Beg forgiveness from Faraday, find some way to reconstitute his vows of Championship. But Gorgrael’s claws had sunk too deep.

Despair overwhelmed Timozel, and he wept, grieving for the boy he had once been, grieving for the pact he had been forced to make with Gorgrael, grieving for the loss of Faraday’s friendship.

Beside him lay the cooling carcass of the latest horse he’d killed. The animal had staggered to a halt, stood a moment, and then sunk wearily to the sandy beach. This was the sixth horse he had literally ridden into the ground in recent days – and Timozel had slid his feet quickly from the stirrups and swung his leg over the horse’s wither as it slumped to the ground, standing himself in one graceful movement.