Magic's Price

But it was. Yfandes thundered into the lighted area in front of the gate, as sentries came piling down off the walls -

She stopped with all four hooves set, in a shower of snow-and bucked. Violently.

Stefen wasn't expecting that. He flew over her head and landed in a snowbank -

He thought he was going to land all right, but his breath was knocked out of him and his head cracked against a buried log and he saw nothing but stars -

- and heard hoofbeats vanishing into the distance, followed by a babble of voices.

Hands hauled him out of the snow; he shook his head to clear his eyes and immediately regretted doing so. His head felt like it was going to explode, and colored lights danced in front of him. But his vision cleared enough for him to see as he looked up that one of the people striding out of the gate was the Commander.

She recognized him immediately. “Great good gods!” she exclaimed. “What in the nine hells are you doing here? Where's the Herald?”

His head was swimming, and his vision blacking out, but he managed to get all of his message out -

The Commander turned white, and barked a series of orders. The alarm bell began ringing. So did Stef's ears. The Commander's aide shoved Stef over to one side, and men and women began pouring out of the barracks, hastily arming and armoring themselves as they ran into their ranks. Stef wasn't sure if he was going to be able to stand much longer; his knees were going weak. The post Healer emerged, took one look at him, and started toward him, arms forward.

And that was all Stef knew, before the ground quietly but violently introduced itself and darkness came over him.

Vanyel trembled with exhaustion - but the nodes were still pouring their power into him, and two of the wizards lay charred and dead on the icy ground in front of him. Of the other two, one had tried to flee and been cut down by his own men, and the other was a mindless, drooling thing that crawled over to the side of the trail and lay there curled on its side.

There's another difference. I didn't defeat the wizards, in the dream. I fought them to a standstill. He assessed the damage to himself, and came up relatively satisfied. There was a slight wound to his right leg; blood was running down his leg and into his boot to freeze there. He was a bit scorched, but really, the damage so far was light.

Although a young boy who'd never been in combat - as I was then-would have been convinced that every hurt was fatal. That may be the reason for that “difference”; it may not be a difference at all. Well. Now it's time for Master Dark to appear.

The front ranks parted again, and a single, elegantly black-clad figure paced leisurely through, lit by red mage-light as Vanyel was lit by blue. Right on cue.

The young man was wearing black armor and clothing that had to be a conscious parody of Heraldic Whites. He was absolutely beautiful, with a perfectly sculptured face and body. Somehow that face looked oddly familiar -

It could just be that the face was so perfect, it looked like the statue of a god.

Of course, if I didn't care how I wasted power, I could look like anything I wanted, too.

He was a reverse image of Vanyel in every way, from sable hair to ebony eyes to night-black boots.

“Why do you bother with this nonsense?” he asked, sweetly, his lips curving in a sensual smile. “You are quite alone, Herald-Mage Vanyel.” His voice was a smooth, silky tenor; he had learned the same kind of perfect control over it that he had over his body.

The familiarity of his features bothered Vanyel. At first he thought it was because he very closely resembled the Herald himself, but there was more to it than that. A kind of racial similarity to someone-

“You are,” the young man repeated, with finely-honed emphasis, “quite alone.”

Tayledras. He looks Tayledras, only reversed. Did he always look that way, or did he tailor himself? Either way, he's making a statement about himself, the Hawkbrothers, and the Heralds -

“You tell me nothing I didn't already know. As I know you,” he heard himself saying. “The Tayledras have a name for you. You are Leareth. The name means -”