attendance.”
“Of course. I’m sure Kathryn meant no slight.”
“I’m sure,” he answered with faint enthusiasm. “And besides, it seems Master Rothkild is much too busy with his studies at the moment. Master Orquell and I will answer the castellan’s summons. I’m sure she will appreciate my personal attention.”
Tylar offered a bow of his head in feigned gratitude. Master Hesharian and his elderly companion set off toward the stairs, pushing past them with hardly a glance back.
Still, Rogger slumped into Tylar’s shadow as if not wanting to be noticed. Tylar glanced to his friend, but he merely shook his head, his eyes shadowed with worry. Tylar waited until the two masters vanished beyond the bend in the corridor before turning back to Gerrod.
The bronze master glowed in the firelight. “Thank you for driving Hesharian from my doorstep.” He edged back into his room, inviting Tylar and Rogger inside with a whirring wave of his arm. “I can only guess there was a greater purpose in drawing off the head of the Council.”
Tylar nodded. “Best he is out from underfoot. We have much to discuss.” He quickly related all that had happened in the past half bell, from the storm’s threat to Dart’s apprehension. “As Kathryn works above, we must work below. Word must spread through the Masterlevels. We must be prepared.”
Gerrod nodded, expressionless behind his bronze mask. “But prepared against what?”
“That’s what Rogger and I will seek out. Tracker Lorr is down there somewhere. We must find him. We’ll head to the deepest levels of your domain while you raise your fellow masters.”
“And this storm…” Gerrod turned away and strode toward an arched opening into an inner study. “I knew there was something dangerous in its manner-the way it sucked air alchemies to itself. And now, if the Wyr- mistress was correct, it casts out seersong to bend all Grace to its will.”
Tylar followed the master, drawn by any hope of an answer. He still pictured Eylan vanishing into the storm. If there were to be any possibility of fronting a rescue, they would need to know more.
“Seersong is also fueled by air, darkly twisted as it may be,” Gerrod said, stopping before the closed door to his study. “The storm seems tied back to that aspect of Grace. Air. If only we knew more…”
“Mayhap we do,” Rogger said, warming himself beside the hearth. He turned to heat up his backside and eyed Tylar pointedly. “The storm. The face it bore…”
Gerrod glanced to Tylar for elaboration.
Tylar recalled the countenance shaded in streaks of Gloom-a disquietingly familiar countenance. He had not even voiced his misgivings to Kathryn earlier. There had been no time, and Tylar had wondered if he could be mistaken. Here in the warmth, he had begun to doubt what he had seen.
Or maybe he just wished it to be false.
Rogger dashed that hope. “I recognized the face, too.”
The thief yanked up the sleeve of his woolen shirt and bared his upper arm to the firelight. He tapped a scar burned into his flesh.
Tylar read the Littick sigil. The name of a god. The same as whose face had been borne by the storm winds.
Ulf of Ice Eyrie.
“It was the third god-realm I visited for my pilgrimage,” Rogger said and pulled his sleeve back over the branded sigil. “There’s no mistaking that cold face.”
Tylar slowly nodded. It had been long ago, when he was new to his cloak. He had been hunting some bloodrunners with a small group of knights, tracking them into the god-realm of Ice Eyrie. They had been caught in an ice storm, came close to expiring. Rescue had come from Ice Eyrie. The hunting party had been taken to the hollowed-out mountain that was Lord Ulf’s domain. Tylar had spent the rest of the winter in that ice-locked realm. And in all that time, he saw the aloof god only once. Lord Ulf spent most of his time in his castillion atop the windswept peak. Still, it was hard to mistake him, with his snowy hair framing a dour and long face, as craggy as his peak. He was one of the rare gods who did not bear a youthful and pleasant demeanor.
And now here again was his countenance, painted in swirling swaths of Gloom. Tylar met Rogger’s eyes. There was no denying the truth.
Another of the Hundred had been swallowed by the Cabal. Once again, the War of the Gods stirred, striking openly at the heart of Myrillia.
Gerrod took the announcement with his usual armored indifference. “It makes a certain sense. Lord Ulf bears a Grace rich in air. But it still doesn’t explain how he controls this storm. Not even he can wield such power.”
“Perhaps he is aided by the Cabal’s dark forces,” Tylar offered, picturing the swirl of Gloom, the bleeding of the naether into his world.
Gerrod shook his head. “Such power would still have to flow through Lord Ulf. It would have to be wielded by him. Even Chrism, possessed by his naethryn undergod, would have failed to bind this blizzard to his will.”
“Then how is it being done?”
“I can’t say. Not yet. The answer is hidden behind the white cloak of the storm. But I have a growing fear.”
“What’s that?”
“The storm was not born out of nothing. It rose from the north and traveled south across the First Land. It has taken a full half turn of the moon to reach here. Arriving in a timely manner. Tied to the arrival of the Godslayer.”
“Not all of the Hundred were happy with your regency,” Gerrod continued. “Several spoke against you, while others remained silent.”
“Like Lord Ulf,” Rogger said, worriedly scratching at his beard. “He had closed off his realm, freezing his borders.”
Tylar had never given such actions much thought. Lord Ulf’s isolation seemed merely a solidifying of the god’s usual solitary nature, turned inward to protect his realm. But was there a darker purpose to it all?
“It would take the strength of more than one hand to birth this storm and guide its path and wickedness.”
“Or more than one god…” Rogger mumbled.
Silence settled over them.
Tylar now understood the bronze master’s fear. After the Battle of Myrrwood, Tylar had been wary of another move by the Cabal, the dark naethryn forces who sought dominion over Myrillia. But could Gerrod be right? Could the storm herald something even more dire? A faction of the Hundred now turned against him, against his regency?
Tylar held out one hope. “The face in the storm…it was sculpted of Gloom. Surely that must suggest the Cabal is involved here.”
Gerrod sighed. “Not necessarily. As any alchemist can manipulate Graces to dark ends, so too can any god. Though you are right to still fear the Cabal. When gods corrupt their own Grace, they lay themselves open to the dark forces of the naethryn. It is a dangerous path. And I worry that if we challenge Lord Ulf and his fellow gods too fiercely, require them to tap even more deeply into this dark font, then our own efforts could push them over the edge and fully into that dark abyss.”
“So either we succumb without a fight,” Rogger said, “or risk forging an even greater threat?”
Gerrod nodded. “Where there was one daemon-possessed god before, a legion could arise now. Myrillia would be torn apart.”
Tylar allowed all he had heard to sink into his bones. The others stared at him for guidance. He had none. It was a situation a thousandfold more dire than he had first imagined.
The heavy silence was finally broken-but not by anyone in the room.
A distant baying reached them, rising from far below.
Only one beast could howl that loudly.
“It’s Tracker Lorr’s bullhound,” Tylar said, turning to the door, reminded again that they had more to fear than just the storm.
Kathryn swept forward, casting out her cloak between her young page and the guards’ swords. “None will harm her!” she declared.
To one side, the soothmancer still lay on the floor, cradling the burnt stumps of his fingers. The silver bowl of
