Crown of Vengeance

“One can only claim a Flower Forest by enclosing it within the bounds of one’s own domain.”

“Then—” Ivrulion began.

“I do not believe there is anything further you can tell us about what Lord Vieliessar has already done, Lightbrother,” Lord Sedreret said.

“I see there is not,” Ivrulion said, after a moment of silence. “Lord Bolecthindial, have I your leave to withdraw?”

Bolecthindial waved a hand irritably. “Go, go,” he said. “Both of you,” he added, as Runacarendalur opened his mouth to speak.

* * *

He had to run to catch up to Ivrulion, who was stalking up the North Road of the encampment as if he were the Starry Huntsman himself.

“I think that went well—don’t you?” Runacarendalur said. “Are you enjoying being brushed aside while Vieliessar Farcarinon does whatever she pleases? It must be galling to know she has done nothing save by your desire for the last four moonturns—”

“Be silent!” Ivrulion snapped.

Runacarendalur laughed. “Make me, dear brother.”

Ivrulion turned and glared at him. Runacarendalur smiled wolfishly. This was not an isolated camp on the Southern Pass Road. This was the main road through the Alliance encampment. Any spell Ivrulion cast would be sensed and noted by a dozen Lightborn, and if the spell’s target were not a lawful one …

Ivrulion snarled under his breath and turned away. Runacarendalur grabbed his arm. “Oh, but you must come and take a cup of wine to celebrate, for inevitably the War Council will choose your plan in the end. And now I’m imagining what Father will do to you when you finally have to tell him why it means my death as well. I’m sure it will be terribly painful.”

He wondered how long it would take the fire to sweep over Vieliessar’s army. Her Lightborn wouldn’t be able to stop it; the Lightborn who’d tried to halt the burning of Araphant had needed to summon rain to quench the flames, and no one could make it rain in winter. A blizzard intense enough to quench the fire would quench the army as well.

They’d die. She’d die. And he’d die. It would be worth it to know she was dead before him.

“Imagine what he’ll do if I don’t have to,” Ivrulion answered oracularly. “Oh, very well. I don’t know what you think you’re accomplishing by playing the gracious host.”

“I’m patronizing you, dear brother. It’s something you should be used to by now,” Runacarendalur answered mockingly.

“Should I? And do your chains gall you, Heir-Prince Runacarendalur?”

“Perhaps,” Runacarendalur answered, still cheerful. “But if they do, I console myself with the knowledge it is not for much longer.”

But on the following dawn, when he dragged himself groggily from his bed, it was to discover that the War Council wasn’t going to burn the southern forest.

They were going to follow Vieliessar’s army into it.

* * *

In Snow Moon Vieliessar’s army crossed the southern bounds of Niothramangh and passed into the depths of a forest no alfaljodthi had ever seen. Vieliessar rode out ahead of the army every few miles to blaze their path. Those Lightborn who had Transmutation as their keystone spell followed. At their touch, great trees turned to sand and collapsed, to return to their native substance a few moments later. To destroy so much forest merely to make smooth their passage disturbed Vieliessar, for the farther they’d gone, the wider the path they cut, until by midday it was nearly a mile across. But if the decision had been hard, the choice had been simple: hundreds of miles of forest turned to dust—or the lives of everyone who rode with her.

Before she had crossed into Niothramangh, she had told Iardalaith to send Warhunt Mages south, for her tactics would depend on her resources. Iardalaith had gone himself, to come reeling into her pavilion giddy to the point of drunkenness with the bounteous Light of the Flower Forest he had discovered. It was to the south and west; Iardalaith could not accurately gauge the distance, he said, as it was stronger than any he had ever sensed. He named it Janglanipaikharain—star-bright forest. Perhaps it was the same one Lady Parmanaya had vanished into thousands of years before.

With this knowledge, Viliessar had made her plan.

They would cross the border a full sennight before the Alliance. When they turned southward, they would vanish to the senses of their Lightborn hunters, and until they saw the trail her army would inevitably leave behind it, the Alliance would think only that her people had drawn upon the Flower Forests of Niothramangh to hide them. Her own commanders had been so stunned at the thought of leaving the bounded Uradabhur that she knew the tactic would not occur to the Alliance. They would look at the forest and see a thing impassable.

But it was not, by the grace of Janglanipaikharain’s seemingly limitless reservoir, a wellspring of power that had not been touched in the whole history of the Hundred Houses.

The first night after they crossed the bounds, Vieliessar wrapped herself in a Cloakspell and walked from the camp.

The air was too cold to hold scent: if it had not been, she would have been able to smell the good fragrance of roast meat, for with the power of Janglanipaikharain to draw upon, the Lightborn had Called herds of deer and flights of birds to their cookfires. Their supplies continued to dwindle, but this night, at least, all had eaten well. What would come tomorrow would depend on what she found before tomorrow’s dawn.

Her steps broke through the surface of the snow; here beneath the leafless trees it was deep, but not as deep as it had been in the open land. She walked for miles, reveling in the silence, the solitude, the sense that for a little while she need answer to no necessities but her own. At last, reluctantly, she came to a stop. If she could not find what she sought here, she would find it nowhere.

She laid her gloved hand upon the trunk of a greenneedle tree and felt its sleeping life, and through it, the life of the whole forest: vine, bush, and grass, lichen and moss. The life of the world, which Mosirinde’s Covenant protected. And beneath it, beyond it, the hot bright life of Janglanipaikharain, its power hers to draw upon.

Thurion said that all the Flower Forests were One in the Light, and so I might walk from Janglanipaikharain to Tildorangelor in a single step—if I were in Janglanipaikharain.

Well and good. But as much as she needed to go there, she needed to lead her army, her people, there even more. And so she wound Janglanipaikharain’s Light about her hands as if it were skeins of silk, and cast her spell.

Find.

In her mind she held her image of Amrethion’s study, the delicate desk of golden wood, the wall of windows. The great green sweep of valley from the window Lady Indinathiel had gazed out of. The star-bright perfection of the Unicorn she had once glimpsed.

Find!

The Light was her guardian, her lover, her companion, her tool. It was all of truth and reality she’d possessed since the spring of her twelfth year. Its wisdom had set her on this path, its strength had preserved her, its need drove her onward.

FIND!

Heartbeat upon heartbeat she drew in power and built the spell. It fluttered against her heart like a falcon on the glove, dreaming of prey. Suddenly, so swiftly she could not anticipate it and prepare herself, the power flew from her like the shaft from a forester’s bow. In the sky above, she heard silver hooves ring against starlight. The Light roared through her, a depthless, sourceless torrent.

Until at last, its work accomplished, it struck, and held, and drew the last of the spell energy to it. Moonlight on snow became the ringing of bells, the tocsin of silver hooves, the wind that felled not trees, but empires.…

* * *

There were hands on her shoulders, shaking her to consciousness, raising her from her knees. The snow had melted around her; her boots and trousers were soaked through, her fingers numb within her gloves.

“Vielle! Tell me you live!” The most welcome, most unexpected voice roused her instantly from unconsciousness.