Lord of Lies

down.'

'There you're wrong, lad,' Lord Harsha said to him. 'There will be many marriages this season, as sad as it is. Too many widows will need husbands now, and too many widowers will need new wives.'

In his farmer's way, he spoke of life always engendering more life, of apple trees bearing fruit and new shoots of barley growing out of winter's dead fields. I couldn't blame him for wanting to bring more children into his land — and into his house.

'Then it wouldn't do to make Behira a widow so soon,' Maram told him. 'The wedding will have to wait until I return — if I do.'

He told everyone then that I was setting out for Argattha, and that he would follow me to the end.

At this, Lord Harsha fixed me with his bright eye and asked, 'Then you really do intend to go back to that evil place?'

'Yes,' I told him. 'I do.'

'My daughter and I accompanied you to Tria, but this is no journey for us.' He turned back to Maram and said, 'There are crops to be raised here, and a land to be healed. We'll be waiting for you when you do return.'

He might have added that there was a new king to be chosen and a kingdom to protect, but he would not speak of such things in front of me.

'Now that we've dispensed with that,' he said sadly, 'it's time that Lord Kane gave us the news he's been waiting to tell us.'

Kane peered out over the edge of his cup, gazing first at Estrella, who edged up close to my side, and then at me. Daj was to my right, and then Liljana, Maram and the others. We all sat in a circle, holding council as we had many times during the quest.

'There's news from Alonia,' Kane said. 'There's been war between Tarlan and the Aquantir, and Baron Monteer has declared Iviendenhall an independent domain. And Count Dario leads the Narmadas in fighting the Hastars and the Marshans for the throne.'

Atara, sitting between Maram and Master Juwain, faced the fire without a word, and I watched the light of its orange flames play across her impassive face.

'And I've learned the truth about Ravik Kirriland,' he said, looking at me. 'An innocent, you called him, Val. Ha! He was a Kallimun priest, as I suspected from the first. In the middle of the melee; he was to have plunged a poisoned needle into Atara's neck to murder her so that she could not give Noman away. So, your instincts were right. And so you did not slay an innocent man.'

I stared at the scar on my hand that my teeth had torn in my anguish over Ravik. I felt my heart beating with new life. Kane's words were like a magic incantation that lifted away a great stone crushing my chest.

'Are you sure?' I asked him. I did not want to know how his black knight had come by this knowledge, but I needed to be certain it was true.

'So, I am sure,' he told me. 'You were the innocent one.'

I smiled sadly as I shook my head. Other stones still pressed down upon me with the weight of worlds, and I would never be innocent again.

'So, Val, so.'

His eyes flashed with a knowing light, and I marveled that he could tell me so much with three simple words with a single, luminous look.

'This changes nothing,' I said to him. 'I'm still going to Argattha.'

'You're determined, eh? Well, I've also had news about that hellhole. Morjin has hung new gates, of iron and thicker by thrice, over the entranceways. Packs of dogs he has posted there. And squadrons of knights now patrol every approach to the black mountain.'

I looked at my scabbarded sword, which I had set down upon the bearskin beside me. I said, 'Morjin anticipates me. From the beginning, he has outthought me — and outfought me.'

'What if he has? He has great cunning and even greater power: Skakamen and whole armies at his command.' Kane paused to take a drink of brandy, then continued, 'So, we lost this battle, but we nearly killed him in Argattha, didn't we? There will be other battles to come.'

'And that,' I said, 'is why I'm going back to Argattha.'

'That,' he said, 'is precisely why you mustn't. Morjin has seen into your mind, Val. Don't you think it's time you tried seeing into his?'

At this, Liljana shook her head with so much force that her gray hair whipped the side of Maram's face. And she said to me, 'Look into his mind? Don't you dare try! There's nothing there but snakes, hissing, rats disappearing down holes and dark, twisted things.'

The look of kindness that came into Kane's eyes then surprised me, as it did when he spoke to Liljana with a rare gentleness: 'You were warned against using your gelstei to enter Morjin's mind. And it nearly destroyed you, I know. But we're all warriors, eh? Val proposes to fight Morjin. So, the first rule of war is to know your enemy.'

He turned to me and said, 'Don't you think it's time you read his letter?'

'But how did you know he left me a letter?'

'I saw you put it inside your armor.'

'How do you know I haven't read it?'

'Have you?' he asked, staring at me.

I noticed Lord Harsha and Master Juwain, and everyone else, staring at me, too. And so I shrugged my shoulders and pulled Morjin's letter out of the pocket of my cloak. The memory of finding it in the Lightstone's place on the stand still scorched my mind. As before, with Morjin's first letter, in my parents' chambers, Master Juwain advised me not to open it. But at last I gathered in my courage, and used my knife to break the red seal. I slid out the square of paper inside, unfolded it, and began reading its neatly penned lines out loud:

My Dearest Valashu,

Forgive the brevity of this note, but I write in haste, and there is still much to be done in this little castle of yours. I'm sure you understand.

As I promised, I have taken back the cup you stole from me. If you can be true to the logic of the beliefs you profess, you will rejoice that this is so. You have sought to place the Lightstone in the hands of the Maitreya, and that you have done. You will have ascertained that you are not and could never be this Lord of Light If you had believed me when I advised you of this some time ago, you might have avoided the ugly events of the past month. The death of an innocent man is upon you, as is the defeat of your army and the destruction of all who sought refuge in your castle.

Your mother, you will want to know, died well. After my knights had finished with her, when it came time to put her on the wood, she told me that she would never give me the satisfaction of making her cry for mercy — or even cry out at all. In all my years, which have been many, I've seen few go beneath the nails in silence. Your mother, though, was true to her word. You Valari are strong, and the Elahads the strongest of all.

And you, dear Valashu, if you choose to live, will be a very volcano of strength. I predict that you will so choose. Hate will drive you deeper into life. I do not expect that you will come to thank me for this. Nor thank me for impelling you to find the fire to slay Lord Ravik and all the others that you will want to dispatch with a great, if fearsome, joy. You are who you are. And so I also predict that you will return to Argattha. I shall be waiting for you. Towards this end, I have taken leave to appropriate several of your garments, that my hounds might become acquainted with your scent. I will leave with this letter a piece of gold in repayment for them. After all, I am not a thief.

You will also have ascertained that I keep my promises. Do you remember what I wrote to you previously about the Maitreya's obligation to show the world the terrible truth of things? That truth, I'm afraid, in the event of your incredible presumption in claiming the Lightstone for yourself, has become even more terrible. You have tempted many to speak against me and to make treason against their lord. They shall all be crushed. So shall the evil that you have engendered. Think of this when you behold the forests of crosses that spring up from the soil of Mesh, Ishka, Taron and the other Valari kingdoms. That is, you may dwell upon the suffering you have brought the world, if you live long enough, which I suspect you will not. That is too bad. I would have liked for you to have