were, except that they worked for Falk.”
“Well, I can set you straight on all that.” Mother Northwind leaned forward. “You are not a Commoner. Far from it. Your mother was Queen Aldona. She died when you were born. And your father… is King Kravon.”
Brenna gaped at her. The words made no sense. “But the King only has one son… Prince Karl.”
“One child,” Mother Northwind corrected. “No sons. One daughter. You.”
“But Prince Karl…”
“Prince Karl is not the King’s son. He’s not even Mageborn. He truly is a Commoner.”
“But he’s the Heir!”
“No,” Mother Northwind said softly. “You are.”
Brenna seemed to hear a distant roaring. There was a chair against the wall close behind her; she found it with a reaching hand and sat down in it, knees suddenly rubbery. “I don’t believe you.”
“Then why did your knees just fold like broken twigs?” Mother Northwind snapped. “Of course you believe me. You believe me because it makes sense of your whole life. Falk stole you… with my help. .. when you were born. Karl took your place in the Palace, and you became the poor orphaned Commoner girl that Lord Falk took in out of the goodness of his heart.”
“But… why?” Brenna whispered.
Mother Northwind’s eyes were like buttons of black polished stone. “Because to bring down the Barrier requires having the Heir in the right place at the right time-and the best way to do that is to keep the Heir close to you without anyone else even knowing she’s the Heir.”
“You… stole me? For Falk?”
“No,” Mother Northwind growled. “For myself. Falk just thinks it was for him. He thinks I’m just a tool he can use, then discard. Just like all other MageLords think they can use and discard whomever they please!”
“Falk wants to bring down the Barrier so that MageLords can rule the world,” Brenna said. “If you feel that way about MageLords, why are you helping him? Why do you want the Barrier to fall?”
Mother Northwind’s eyes gleamed in the growing morning light. “Because if I bring it down-and I will-then I will destroy magic along with it.”
Brenna’s eyes widened. “Destroy magic? That’s impossible!”
“Is it?” Mother Northwind said. “Then I guess I’ve been wasting my time these last thirty years or more.” She shook her head. “No. It isn’t impossible. The Outsiders found a way to counter magic eight centuries ago, Brenna. That’s why we’re here. They had the help of a Healer who, despite being Mageborn, was revolted by the tyranny of the MageLords. He discovered how to craft a weapon to use against the MageLords, a weapon that rendered their magic useless. He created the Magebane: a man impervious to magic, a man who could turn the MageLords’ own power against them.” She frowned. “I still don’t know everything he could do. I have some records of his… and I’ve found out some things myself… but he must have been an even more powerful soft mage than I, for the Magebane he created could extend his protection over an entire army. The spells of the Mageborn fell on that army… and bounced, falling instead on the Mageborn themselves. They died by the hundreds, and the Commoners vastly outnumbered them to begin with. Without their magic, they were routed. Many MageLords died. Twelve survived. And those twelve brought the surviving Mageborn… and as many Commoners as were trapped in their service… here.”
Brenna found she hadn’t been breathing. She gasped in air, then said, “Are you saying you’ve made a new Magebane?”
“Yes,” Mother Northwind said. “Not as powerful as the one of long ago, but powerful enough to do what I need done.”
“Which is?”
Mother Northwind spread her gnarled hands. “Break the Keys. Destroy the Great Barrier… and because it is tied to every Mageborn in the Kingdom, destroy magic along with it. The Mageborn will become ordinary men and women, powerless, no different from the Commoners they have oppressed in ways large and small for centuries. And the Commoners outnumber them.”
Brenna thought of Falk, and what she had learned from the Minik, and a fierce delight washed through her. “I’d like to see that!” she said.
“You will…” Mother Northwind said. “If you survive the next two days.”
“What?”
“Lord Falk will come to you later today,” Mother Northwind said. “He is going to take you north… to the Cauldron.”
Brenna blinked. North to the great lake of fire that powered the Barrier? “Why?”
“Falk’s plan,” Mother Northwind said carefully, “is to destroy the Barrier but leave magic intact. The only way for him to do that is to first seize the Keys for himself.”
“Seize the Keys? How is that possible?”
“There’s only one way.” Mother Northwind gazed intently into her eyes. “It involves a complex spell, the energy of the Cauldron, and the simultaneous deaths of two people: King Kravon, and in that same instant, as the Keys are being transferred, the Heir.” Mother Northwind jabbed her cane at Brenna. “You.”
Brenna sat frozen, trying to comprehend what Mother Northwind was saying. “Falk means to kill me?” she whispered. “At the Cauldron?” All those years, growing up in Falk’s manor, trying to get a spark of affection from him, longing for the parents she had never known, begging anyone she met to tell her about them but learning nothing.. . because there had been nothing to learn. The parents she’d thought she’d lost as a child had never existed. Her real father didn’t know she existed. She wasn’t even a person in Falk’s eyes. She was a… sacrifice, raised from childhood for no other purpose but to die at the right time in the right place.
She went from frozen to furious in an instant. She jumped to her feet. “You have to get me out of here! You can’t just-if he takes me there with him, how can I stop him? He’ll have guards, he’s stronger, he has magic. I can’t fight him-”
“No, you can’t,” Mother Northwind said. “But I need you alive and unharmed, and I will keep you that way. So. You go with Lord Falk. Be aware of what he has planned for you. But I will see that he does not go through with it.”
“How?” Brenna demanded.
“Sit down and I’ll explain.”
Brenna remained standing.
Mother Northwind pounded her cane on the floor. “Sit down! I’ll get a crick in my neck with you looming up there like that.”
Brenna sat, but not comfortably.
“Although I understand that hearing that someone intends to kill you tends to drive everything else out of your head, you seem to have forgotten that you are not the only one who is to die,” Mother Northwind continued acerbically.
“You said… he’s going to kill the King, too? My…” she still couldn’t believe it.”… my… father?”
“Your father. Not that he knows it. And not that you could expect much fatherly affection if he did. He thinks Karl is his son and he hasn’t spoken to him yet this year that I’m aware of. In any event,” Mother Northwind went on, “if the King does not die, then you must not die either. And the King will not die. I have seen to it. Falk will take you to the Cauldron… but he will bring you back again, alive. And once you have returned, then I will execute my plan, and magic… and MageLords… will be a thing of the past.”
“But… how?”
Mother Northwind heaved herself to her feet, leaning on her cane. “That’s my business for now. But it won’t harm you, lass. And once it is done, you’ll be free to do what you like… with whomever you like.” She managed a leer. “Anton, for instance.”
Brenna blushed. “We haven’t… we didn’t…”
“Yes, that’s what he claims, too.” Mother Northwind cackled, but then turned serious. “You do what you can to stay alive, Brenna, and I’ll do what I can to keep you alive. And soon we’ll both see brighter days.” She studied Brenna. “I don’t suppose you’d care to shake on it?”
Brenna jumped up and backed away until she felt the wall pressing against her spine. “No,” she said.
Mother Northwind sighed. “I do wish,” she said, “that soft magic did not require touch. It would make my life so much easier. Well, then, I guess I’ll show myself out.” She went to the door.
