Lord of Lies

brothers and the Guardians into the palace. The main hall was a splendid affair of great cherrywood and ebony columns carved like the pieces of my chess set. Its panels of shatterwood were as black and beautiful as jade. All this darkness contrasted with the room's floor, an almost unbroken expanse of white oak waxed and polished to a high gloss. The massive throne, at the center of the hall, had also been carved out of this wood which was as common as it was strong. King Hadaru sat upon it waiting to us to take our places before him. He seemed to disdain surrounding hjmself with a private guard. Instead, some of the greatest lords of Ishka stood by the sides

of his throne.

I nodded my head toward Prince Issur and Lord Nadhru, a dark and difficult man who had once threatened to bind me with ropes and drag me out of Ishka. Lord Mestivan attended King Hadaru as well and next to him stood Lord Solhtar who pulled at his thick black beard as he eyed us with a fierce pride of protectiveness of his king and his land. Devora, the King's sister, was not in attendance this evening, but his beautiful young wife, Irisha, stood near the very foot of the throne. Her hair was raven-black like Behira's and her skin was as fair as hers, too. But she had a fineness of face and form that the plump Behira lacked. Maram stared at her with a barely-concealed lust heating up his red face. And Behira, holding tightly onto Lord Harsha's arm, stared at Maram.

'Welcome to my house,' King Hadaru said as his black eyes caught Maram up in their cold light. He was a big, burly man — bigger even than Maram — and his large head and face reminded one of a bear. Many battle ribbons were tied to his thick, white hair. 'Prince Maram Marshayk, Lord Valashu, Lord Asaru, Lord Raasharu, and everyone — welcome all.'

I stood directly in front of the throne with my arm covering Estrella. Asaru, Yarashan and Lansar Raasharu took their places to my left with Maram, Master Juwain, Lord Harsha and Behira on my right. Baltasar and the Guardians were arrayed behind us. I made the presentations while King Hadaru nodded his head and smiled cordially. He regarded us as might a bear eyeing a herd of deer who had presented themselves as a meal.

Then he raised his hand, and Lord Jehu and his two hundred knights marched into the room and stationed themselves between the Guardians and the main doors. At the same time, the hall's side doors opened to let in another hundred knights. They crossed the room at speed to take their places near the throne. If King Hadaru didn't usually keep a private guard, he certainly had one now.

'Val!' Maram whispered to me as he nudged my side, 'we've walked into a trap!'

To my left, Asaru's hand came to rest on the hilt of his sword, and so it was with my brothers. I didn't turn to see if the Guardians behind me were also prepared to fight for their charge, any more than I would doubt the rising of the sun. King Hadaru gripped the hilt of his own sword, the famed kalama with which he had once beheaded Mukaval the Red of the Adirii tribe. And then he smiled his cold smile and demanded that I deliver into his outstretched hand the golden cup called the Lightstone.

As calmly as I could, I asked Sivar of Godhra to step forward. He was a diligent man who held his rather, short body rigidly erect at all times. His face, steely and serious, was now lit up with pride because it was his tunrn to bear the Lightstone. He brought it forth and gave it to King Hadaru, even as I asked him. Then he stepped back and waited to see what King Hadaru would say — and what he would do. 'Very good, very good,' King Hadaru murmured. His fingers closed around the golden cup as his eyes drank in its light. He fairly trembled with lust, envy and greed at last fulfilled. 'Very good, indeed'

'We have walked into a trap,' I whispered back at Maram. 'Let us hope that King Hadaru cannot escape it.'

King Hadaru, who missed little of what occurred in his palace, or in his realm, shot me a swift, hard look. His thin lips broke into another smile. 'Valashu Elahad, you must be honored for keeping your promise, after all.'

'My father said that the Lightstone would be brought into Ishka,'

'Yes,' King Hadaru said, nodding at Prince Issur, 'we had word of this. But no one thought it would be so soon.'

'Soon means soon,' I said, echoing my father's words. 'I confess you've caught us unawares. We've no stand on which to set the Lightstone, as your father keeps in his hall.'

Now my hand, which had never left the hilt of my sword, gripped its black jade and the seven set diamonds tightly. It had come time to dash King Hadaru's hopes, and I did not know what he would do. 'That's just as well,' I said, 'for no stand will be needed.'

The frostiness of King Hadaru's stare nearly froze my heart. 'What do you mean, Lord Valashu?'

'The Lightstone,' I told him, 'is on its way to Nar, even as are we.' I turned to nod at the Guardians behind me, and I saw that Lord Jehu and his two hundred knights lined up behind them were ready to draw their swords at their king's command.

'What?' King Hadaru snarled out. 'What treachery is this?'

'No treachery at all, King Hadaru, but only need.' I explained that the events in my father's hall had impelled the decision to take the Lightstone on the road. 'As Prince Issur has reminded my father, the Lightstone is to be shared among all the Valari.'

'Yes, but first it was to be shared among the Ishkans!' King Hadaru thundered. 'This was the promise made on the field of the Raaswash!'

'And it was shared there,' I said, 'on the day that my companions and I returned from Argattha. Every warrior and knight in you’re army held it in his hands.'

To the side of the throne. Prince Issur's plain face lit up with wonder as if he well-remembered the feel of the Lightstone's gold gelstei. So it was with Lord Nadhru and Lord Solhtar and the many other Ishkans in King Hadaru's hall.

'And still it is being shared,' I continued. I pointed at the golden bowl that King Hadaru now gripped in both hands. 'Its light now graces your hall.'

'For a night? For two? You promised that the Lightstone was to reside in Loviisa as it did in Silvassu.'

'No, that promise was never made.'

'It was made in spirit.'

'No, not even in spirit, King Hadaru. If you search your heart, you will know this is true.'

King Hadaru glared at me with his cold, dark eyes. I knew him to be an honest man, with others if not himself.

'Am I to be made to accept then,' he said to me, 'that you intend to take the Lightstone from my hall tomorrow? You promise me a birthday cake and leave me with only crumbs. I had hoped, I had hoped. .'

It was the great sorrow of his life, I thought that so many of his hopes and dreams had turned to despair.

'The Lightstone,' I reminded him, 'was made to be possessed by no man.'

'No, possessed by none,' he muttered. His eyes stabbed into me like cold swords. 'But claimed by one.'

'No one has claimed the Lightstone yet.'

'No, not yet,' he said as he gripped the cup even more tightly.

'I'm only the Lightstone's Guardian,' I said. 'And as its Guardian, I'm charged with deciding — '

'Who decides matters in this hall?' King Hadaru broke in. 'Who is king in my kingdom? Who must protect all its treasures?'

'The Lightstone belongs to no kingdom on earth. Its first Guardian brought it from the stars only to — '

'The Elahad,' he interrupted me again, 'was the ancestor of the Ishkans, too. But even he did not claim to be the Maitreya.'

The bitterness in King Hadaru's voice was a poison in my veins. He stared at me with a strange mixture of loathing and longing. All kings wish for their sons great virtues and great deeds that prove them worthy of inheriting their realms. But on the Raaswash and six nights ago in my father's hall, I had proved his firstborn, Salmelu, to be nothing more than a murderer and a traitor. And more, it had been I who had brought the Lightstone out of Argattha and not Salmelu or Prince Issur. And so I brought great shame to King Hadaru and all his line; my very existence and presence in his hall was an insult that tore his heart with an anguish almost too great for him to bear.

'Do you remember standing in that ring?' King Hadaru asked me. He pointed past my shoulder at the floor, where a great circle of red rosewood had been set into the white oak. The Guardians formed their lines behind it. I remembered too well standing in this ring of honor where the Ishkans fought their duels. There Salmelu's sword had pierced my side; there I had wounded him nearly to the death 'You spared the life of him whose name we no longer