“Not at all.” Laren gestured at the ground beside her. In the yellow lantern light, she discerned an apprehensive expression on the Rider’s face. “Something wrong?”
Ty set his mug aside as he made himself comfortable on the ground. He glanced over his shoulder at the other Riders, then said in a quiet voice, “It’s Karigan. She’s been acting a little strange ever since we left the city, and I’m not the only one to have noticed.”
“Oh?” Laren did not want to pass on her own thoughts about Karigan, lest she add fuel to the flames of any speculation on behalf of her Riders. She needed them to trust one another. Somehow she was not surprised it was Ty who came forward. He had been Karigan’s mentor, and likely still felt responsible for her. His personality was also such that anything out of place required being defined, and if possible, put back into place. It made him a trifle unbending and strict, and for that reason alone, she had never promoted him to Chief Rider or lieutenant, positions that required flexibility.
“Just now,” Ty continued, “she was murmuring about being abandoned. I could swear I saw a tear in her eye, and when I asked her who abandoned us, she acted confused and didn’t seem to understand what I was talking about.”
“I shouldn’t worry about it,” Laren said, despite the fact that was precisely what she was doing.
“But—”
“We’ve all been under enormous strain of late. We’ve lost Ephram and Alton, and barracks has burned. My mind wanders, too.” Laren tried to sound reassuring, even as her own concern escalated. “If you notice anything else that warrants my attention, do bring it to me.”
“Yes, Captain.”
“Now, let’s take a look at tomorrow’s route.”
The sky clouded over and it showered the following morning. They rode off, spirits dampened as much as bedrolls, and the usual conversation was stilled to silence. When Laren tired of listening to the pitter-patter on her hood, she drew it back and let the rain fall on her head. Doing so returned her side vision, and she glimpsed the horseman.
A gray cloak had been thrown over white armor, and he blended in well with the gloom and forest backdrop. When he perceived her gaze, he vanished again into the woods.
Laren veered Bluebird around, and much to the astonishment of her Riders, kicked him after the horseman. She looked for any sign of him, and when she found nothing, she began to wonder if he were an illusion. Then she saw the slight depression of a hoofprint.
She sat there in the rain, staring into the woods. He must be an Eletian. From what she knew, or thought she knew, only Eletians could move so swiftly, and with so little trace.
If so, why would an Eletian be tailing them?
Karigan rode through the mist and rain, fogged by shadow like a dark hand in her mind—someone peering in, violating all that should remain private. It was like living in a dream, her attention drawn inward, reliving memories that were hers . . . and were not. Terrible battles raged through her sleeping dreams, and sometimes she awakened with such feelings of power, she thought she could dash away the world with the sweep of her arm—all living creatures, any structure created by the hands of humanity, all traces of civilization.
And always, he was there in the falling snow, goading her to come.
Yes, I am coming. Her reply, involuntary.
As she rode, she thought she heard the muffled sound of a horn trying to break through the clouds and murk, but it was never enough.
Please help! she cried out, but all she heard in return was, You will come.
Journal of Hadriax el Fex
Today, Alessandros called me into his work chamber. I never enter it because I’ve no wish to view his experiments, but this time I had no choice. He was very excited, babbling about some finding or other.
I entered the chamber seeing nothing but that which lay on a table, in its center, fully illuminated by the glow of prisms. It had been an Elt—male. Alessandros had surgically sliced out the Eletian’s various organs, which now float in jars of syrupy preservative. His chest cavity lay open, the ribs drawn wide. Alessandros had made a circular cut of the brain case, like a cap cut off the skull.
I reeled out of the chamber retching, I who have slain countless others, in countless ways; I who have picked my way through battlefields strewn with the dead, and tortured the living. Alessandros followed me out, laughing as I heaved, and that was even worse.
“What?” he said. “My staunch soldier cannot stand the sight of blood?”
I leaned against the wall, fighting to restore control of my guts and to stop weeping, while Alessandros nattered on about his finding—something to do with etherea and eternal life. I did not care.
Alessandros did more than kill one of God’s angels—he had taken it apart piece by piece as if it were no more than the clock-works of a mechanical. And I know this can’t have been the first time. Beneath the physical beauty and pure etherea they exude, are only flesh, bones, fluids. . .
I can no longer abide this long war, or Alessandros’ madness. He is no longer the man I knew of old, but something twisted like the monsters he creates. Truly he is Mornhavon the Black, as the clans call him. For me, Alessandros del Mornhavon, the friend I loved so well, is dead.
It is clear that I must end the madness, and I now know what I must do. The vision of the young woman with her brooch in the mirror lake was truly a sign—a sign that I must contact Lil Ambriodhe.
BLACKVEIL
Exhilarated. < That was the only way he could think of to describe how he felt. She was coming. She with the long brown hair and ready smile. She who was of Hadriax’s blood.