‘It also totally isolates Cthol Murgos,’ Urgit pointed out the one fact that Javelin had hoped to gloss over. ‘I exhaust my kingdom pulling your chestnut out of the fire, and then the Alorns, Tolnedrans, Arends, and Sendars are free to march in and eliminate the Angarak presence on the western continent.’
‘You have the Nadraks and Thulls as allies, your Majesty.’
‘I’ll trade you,’ Urgit said drily. ‘Give me the Arends and the Rivans, and I’ll gladly give you the Thulls and Nadraks.’
‘I think it’s time for me to contact my government on these matters, your Majesty. I’ve already over-extended my authority. I’ll need further instructions from Boktor.’
‘Give Porenn my regards,’ Urgit said, ‘and tell her that I join with her in wishing a mutual relative well.’
Javelin felt a lot less sure of himself as he left.
The Child of Dark had smashed all the mirrors in her quarters in the Grolim Temple at Balasa that morning. It had begun to touch her face now. Dimly, she had seen the swirling lights beneath the skin of her cheeks and forehead and then had broken the mirror which had revealed the fact to her – and all the others as well. When it was done, she stared in horror at the gash in the palm of her hand. The lights were even in her blood. Bitterly, she recalled the wild joy which had filled her when she had first read the prophetic words, ‘Behold; the Child of Dark shall be exalted above all others and shall be glorified by the light of the stars.’ But the light of the stars was no halo or glowing nimbus. The light was a creeping disease that encroached upon her inch by inch.
It was not only the swirling lights, however, that had begun to consume her. Increasingly, her thoughts, her memories, and even her dreams were not her own. Again and again she awoke screaming as the same dream came again and again. She seemed to hang bodiless and indifferent in some unimaginable void, watching all unconcerned as a giant star spun and wobbled on its course, swelling and growing redder as it shuddered towards inevitable extinction. The random wobble of the off-center star was of no real concern until it became more and more pronounced. Then the bodiless and sexless awareness drifting in the void felt a prickle of interest and then a growing alarm. This was wrong. This had not been intended. And then it happened. The giant red star exploded in a place where that explosion was not supposed to happen; and, because it was in the wrong place, other stars were caught up in it. A vast, expanding ball of burning energy rippled outward, engulfing sun after sun until an entire galaxy had been consumed.
The awareness in the void felt a dreadful wrench within itself as the galaxy exploded, and for a moment it seemed to exist in more than one place. And then it was no longer one. ‘This must not be,’ the awareness said in a soundless voice.
‘Truly,’ another soundless voice responded.
And that was the horror that brought Zandramas bolt upright and screaming in her bed night after night – the sense of another presence when always before there had been the perfect solitude of eternal oneness.
The Child of Dark tried to put those thoughts – memories, if you will – from her mind. There was a knock at the door of her chamber, and she pulled up the hood of her Grolim robe to hide her face. ‘Yes?’ she said harshly.
The door opened, and the Archpriest of this temple entered. ‘Naradas has departed, Holy Sorceress,’ he reported. ‘You wanted to be told.’
‘All right,’ she said in a flat voice.
‘A messenger has arrived from the west,’ the Arch-priest continued. ‘He brings news that a western Grolim, a Hierarch, has landed on the barren west coast of Finda and now moves across Dalasia toward Kell.’
Zandramas felt a faint surge of satisfaction. ‘Welcome to Mallorea, Agachak,’ she almost purred. ‘I’ve been waiting for you.’
It was foggy that morning along the southern tip of the Isle of Verkat, but Gart was a fisherman and he knew the ways of these waters. He pushed out at first light, steering more by the smell of the land behind him and the feel of the prevailing current than by anything else. From time to time he would stop rowing, pull in his net, and empty the struggling, silver-sided fish into the large box beneath his feet. Then he would cast out his net again and resume his rowing while the fish he had caught thumped and flapped beneath him.
It was a good morning for fishing. Gart did not mind the fog. There were other boats out, he knew, but the fog created the illusion that he had the ocean to himself, and Gart liked that.
It was a slight change in the pull of the current on his boat that warned him. He hastily shipped his oars, leaned forward, and began to clang the bell mounted in the bow of his boat to warn the approaching ship that he was here.
And then he saw it. It was like no other ship Gart had ever seen before. It was long and it was big and it was lean. Its high bowsprit was ornately carved. Dozens of oars propelled it hissing through the water. There could be no mistaking the purpose for which that ship had been built. Gart shivered as the ominous vessel slid past.
Near the stern of the ship, a huge red-bearded man in chain mail stood leaning over the rail. ‘Any luck?’ he called to Gart.
‘Fair,’ Gart replied cautiously. He did not wish to encourage a ship with that big a crew to drop anchor and begin hauling in his fish.
‘Are we off the southern coast of the Isle of Verkat yet?’ the red-bearded giant asked.
Gart sniffed at the air and caught the faint scent of the land. ‘You’re almost past it now,’ he told them. ‘The coast takes a bend to the northeast about here.’
A man dressed in gleaming armor joined the big red-bearded fellow at the rail. The armored man held his helmet under one arm, and his black hair was curly. ‘Thy knowledge of these waters doth seem profound, friend,’ he said in an archaic form of address Gart had seldom heard before, ‘and thy willingness to share thy knowledge with others doth bespeak a seemly courtesy. Canst thou perchance advise us of the shortest course to Mallorea?’
‘That would depend on exactly where you wanted to go in Mallorea,’ Gart replied.
‘The closest port,’ the red-bearded man said.
Gart squinted, trying to recall the details of the map he had tucked on a shelf at home. ‘That would be Dal Zerba in southwestern Dalasia,’ he said. ‘If it were me, I’d go on due east for another ten or twenty leagues and then come about to a northeasterly course.’
‘And how long a voyage do we face to reach this port thou hast mentioned?’ the armored man asked.