Lord of Lies

I drew my sword and cut the ropes holding fast the table. With a great heaving that nearly broke my back, I eased this great slab of wood onto the floor, between the bodies that lay there. I knelt beside my grandmother. I touched her quavering arms, her bloody hands. I could think of no easy way to pull her off the bent-over nails without further tearing her flesh.

'Who did this to you?' I cried out.

She gathered in a deep breath and murmured, It was. . Morjin. He said that he wanted you to know this. The traitor, Samelu — he held my wrists. And Morjin pounded in the nails.'

'Damn them!' I shouted. I shook my sword at the stones of the ceiling high above. 'Damn them to death!'

'Valashu — '

'Damn them! Damn them! Damn them!'

'Valashu, listen to me!' she pleaded. 'You must help me, please.'

I gripped my sword as I used my other hand to brush back the sodden white hair from her forehead.

'Help me to die in peace.'

I looked down through the blur of water in my eyes at my grandmother's beautiful face. In the soft, anguished lines, I saw to my wonder that there was no hate there. There was no resentment, either, nor anger at her fate — only a warm and overwhelming concern for me. For she, too, was a Valari warrior in her fierce, sweet spirit. And so she said to me, 'Promise me you won't waste your life in seeking vengeance.'

'But how can I not?' I shouted. My fury struck her like a blow, and I bit my lip to see her wince in pain. I lowered my voice and gasped out, 'How can I not slay Morjin?'

'Slay him if you must,' she said to me. 'But do it only because you must … for Ea's sake, not out of vengeance. Do not let the burning for his death destroy you.'

'But I — '

'Please, Valashu. Don't let him kill you this way.'

She fell still then, and I thought she had died. But I felt her heart beating, weakly, somewhere inside her.

Just then footsteps sounded along the hallway leading into the keep. Then Kane, Maram and Atara came hurrying into the room. 'Oh, my lord!' I heard Maram cry out. 'Oh, my lord!' It seemed that someone had told them of my father's death, and they had followed me up from the battlefield.

'We've got to get her off of here!' I said, laying my hand on my grandmother's wrist 'Help me.'

Atara descried a great, iron maul cast onto the floor near the body of a little boy whose brains had been bashed out. She went over and picked it up, and wiped the gore on the surcoat of one of the Dragon Guard, adding another stain of red to the bright yellow cloth. She brought the maul over to me.

'Why don't we try pounding out the spikes from the other side?' she said, tapping the maul against the table.

Kane, Maram and I made ready to lift the table off the ground, but just then, my grandmother opened her eyes. I knew that, somehow she could see the only part of me that really mattered. And she whispered to me, 'Promise me — please promise me.'

'All right,' I told her. 'I will.'

'Good,' she said. And then she died, too, joining my mother, father and brothers in that icy, black emptiness from which there is no return.

After that, we took down both my grandmother and mother from their mounts of wood. We laid them on the cold floorstones. I pulled the great black and silver swan banner off the wall, and covered them as with a shroud.

Then there came the sound of horses and men entering the middle ward outside. Kane told me that Sar Vikan and his knights had ridden up to the castle, too.

'Keep them out of here!' I said.

My grim-faced friend went out of the hall's southern doors for a few moments to confer with Sar Vikan, and then returned, shutting the doors behind him.

I began walking slowly around my slain people, toward the dais at the end of the hall. As I neared it, I had to step over a small wall of Morjin's knights and the Guardians who had fought them. Sunjay Naviru, in death, looked younger and smaller than I had remembered. Skyshan of Ki had fallen next to him, and Sar Kimball, Lord Noldru and many others. I climbed up the dais, where there were more of the enemy; a ring of dead Guardians fairly surrounded the white granite stand.

The Lightstone no longer rested upon it. In its place had been set a square of paper, topped by a piece of gold. I grasped both in my hand and tucked them down into my armor.

Maram came up to me and said, 'Maybe one of our knights secreted the cup on his person. Or had time to hide it, somewhere.'

I swept my sword down toward my dead knights. It glowed only dully. I pointed Alkaladur south, in the direction that Morjin would have ridden with the thousands of his Dragon Guard in order to escape from Mesh with the Lightstone. And its blade flared a bright silver.

'No, it is gone,' I said.

A shudder ripped through me as I tried not to fall writhing to the floor. It was as if one of Morjin's knights had chopped my legs out from under me and then gutted me with his sword.

Kane came over and placed his hand on my shoulder. 'So, then, we'll take it back! We'll ride after them and kill the Dragon!'

Atara shook her head at this. 'No, that's impossible, now.'

'You say that?' he growled out.

'Yes, I do. This was well-planned. Morjin is hours gone from here. We willl never overtake him.'

'We must overtake him.'

'He will have had fresh horses stationed in relays all along his way,' Atara said, holding her hand against her blindfold. 'Our horses are all exhausted and would have trouble galloping a mile.'

'But Lord Avijan still commands a battalion of knights!'

'Half a battalion, now,' Atara said. 'And they, too, are exhausted. I doubt if they have the will to pursue Morjin.'

I wrapped my hand tightly around my sword as I struggled to find the will to keep standing. I stared at the stand's bare granite where once the Lightstone had shone so splendidly. Then I cried out, 'But why did this have to happen!'

The echo of my words off the hall's cold stones, falling like thunder upon the dead, was my only answer.

Kane stepped over to the dais and rolled over one of the bodies there. I ground my teeth together as I stared at the face of Lansar Raasharu.

'It was he who did this,' I said to Kane. 'Somehow, he killed the guards at the gates, and opened them to Morjin.'

'So,' Kane said: 'So.'

'He was a ghul,' I murmured. 'He was the one that Kasandra warned of.'

'No,' Maram forced out, shaking his head, 'not Lansar — it can't be.'

'He always hated Morjin,' I said. 'Too much, for too long. And then, when I struck down Ravik and Noman killed Baltasar, the hate, too terrible — like a robe of fire, you see. It maddened his soul. And then Morjin seized him.'

Kane slowly nodded his head. His black eyes searched for something in mine. 'Yes, it would be like that.'

'And I made it worse,' I said. 'I encouraged Lansar to believe that I was the Maitreya. And so he had already surrendered part of his will to me.'

'So, it was his will to do this,' Kane told me.

'Why didn't I see it?' I said, looking at the wounds in Lansar's body where Morjin must have stabbed him with his own sword.

'Please, don't blame yourself,' Atara said, moving over to my side.

'Why didn't I see any of it?' I said, looking at my sword.

There came a knocking at the door leading into the keep, and I shouted for whoever it was to go away. And I heard Master Juwain's voice call back to me, 'Val, open the door!'