The confused wails of the children, the scrape of a door bolt, the sudden cringing deference shown by family members still left on the gallery made no impression upon Lysaer. From his unobstructed place at the rail, he drew himself up to full height. Delineated by a nimbus of sunlight, his hair gleamed bright gold and his presence seemed charged with righteous wrath as any angel sent from Athlieria to scour the land of bleak evil.
Lysaer raised his hand and singled out the slight, dishevelled fugitive that elbowed and shoved to escape the square, then lifted his voice in a thunderous shout.
‘People of Etarra, behold the prince you would crown king and hear truth! Your lands have been restored to fair sunlight, yet one lives who can wield darkness more dire than any mist! Arithon Teir’s’Ffalenn is full Master of Shadow, a sorcerer who would succour barbarians and waste your fine city to ashes!’
The roar of the multitude overwhelmed any further accusation; but the velvet-clad figure on the balcony drew notice. People thronging the great square stopped and tipped their faces up to stare. Lysaer’s pointing finger and the circling flight of Traithe’s raven drew notice to the other figure in that strange, partnered tableau.
Arrested in mid-flight by the grasp of two stolid merchants, Arithon cast a fraught glance at the bird.
To Lysaer, watching, the gesture affirmed s’Ffalenn guilt. A prince who was innocent of machinations would never count a dumb beast above his subjects or his own threatened fate. Jolted to savage antagonism; unaware he was the manipulated instrument of Desh-thiere’s fugitive wraith, Lysaer raised rigid hands to call his gift…
Buffeted by the crowd that streamed through a side-street, an illusion cast over his person that lent him the semblance of somebody’s benevolent grandfather, Asandir ceaselessly scanned the grand square. Then an odd flare of light drew his eye to the rail of a nondescript balcony. ‘There!’ he whispered, his word too quiet to be overheard. His thoughts framed the image he saw: of Lysaer, poised in an unmistakable effort to summon light.
Although nowhere near the tumultuous scene by the council hall, Sethvir picked up the communication. He could do nothing, embroiled as he was in his own difficulties. His head cocked, one hand braced against the doors of the south gate wardroom, the Warden of Althain sent back acknowledgement. Under his palm stout planking shuddered and bounced, assaulted from without by a ramming squad under Diegan’s acting captain. Ordered to disrupt the coronation, Gnudsog had pulled every sentry from the gatehouse with intent to breach the sealed armoury. Busied with stayspells and bindings to withhold more weapons from the chaos in the streets, Sethvir had no chance to express relief.
Quartering the city mobs for Lysaer had been worse than seeking a needle in a haystack. Where steel and straw could at least be winnowed separate by Name, the wraith that Desh-thiere had insinuated into the matrix of Lysaer’s spirit posed a quandary. Without means to command its true essence, no stop-gap spell of transfer could rescue the possessed victim from his stance of attack upon the balcony.
Sorrow and grief the strands foretold, were the Fellowship to stand restored to Seven; but with a second, unanticipated forecast entangled on top of the first, the validity of Dakar’s Black Rose Prophecy stood threatened. Caught in the critical crux, the Fellowship raged with tied hands. They dared use no power to divert, but could only inadequately observe the blow as inevitably, it must fall.
‘
From his stance on the street side, Asandir loosed one of Dakar’s randiest oaths; an offended mother glared in his direction and scooped her toddler beyond earshot.
On the balcony above the crowd, Lysaer’s hands bunched to fists. A crack split the air and light flared raw brilliance across the sky.
‘
Silver-white light flared in a starburst that dazzled and blinded: Alithiel’s Paravian-wrought protections sheared out a chord of pure heart-break, sure proof the defending cause was just. Asandir saw, and despaired.
The light-bolt that speared from the balcony was wholly the work of Desh-thiere’s vengeance and the wraith that now fully possessed Lysaer.
Arcane energies collided in wrenching dissonance high over Arithon’s head. He thrashed, but despite a madman’s contortions failed to evade the vigilantes who tackled him across shoulders and knees. His sword arm was seized and torn downward.
That he might have turned his blade and cut to kill never seemed to occur to him; as if the only peril that held meaning lay in Lysaer’s unprovoked assault.
Asandir’s hand was forced, the full might of his protections engaged to shield helpless bystanders from harm. He cursed fate, agonized that Dakar’s new vision had upset the strands’ forecast and precipitated crisis too soon. No coronation could take place now. On every side of the square, people were screaming, flash-blinded and whipped to stampede in raw terror that their city was being savaged by sorcery.
As light-bolt and sword-flash sheeted through the maze of his own conjury, Asandir mourned that Alithiel’s bright magic would offer Arithon no shred of defence. The spells of Riathan Paravians were never wrought to take life, but only to dazzle an opponent, and divert or deflect unjust attack.
Lysaer’s was full command of light; his sight would be unimpaired by a ward that flashed just to blind.
The revenge engendered by Desh-thiere’s possession arced on toward its targeted victim.
Isolate from the ward-light that shielded the chance-caught bystanders, Arithon yanked a wrist clear of encumbrance. He no longer held his sword. Only shadow cracked from his spread fingers: for defence of Traithe’s raven, Asandir saw in split-second, grief-sharp perception.
Uncaring who noticed, the sorcerer wept as Desh-thiere’s offensive hammered down.
The bolt struck Arithon’s raised palm and snaked in a half-twist down his forearm. Scalded flesh recoiled in agony. Worse horror bloomed upon impact, as conjury well beyond Lysaer’s means burst from his killing band of light.
Arithon screamed.
Red lightnings jagged over his body. The merchants who struggled to bear him down were tossed away like ragdolls, leaving the Shadow Master a figure alone, strung through and threshed by patterns like tangled wire.
