Song of the Dragon

“How far north?” Ethis pressed.

“. . Forget it, Dre,” the tall boy said smiling down at him as they worked under the sunshine in the fields. “It’s too far to walk no matter how long. .”

“As far north as we must,” Drakis snapped, then turned to Belag. “So this is all there is then?”

“Aye,” Belag nodded his great head. “Many are dead. . many more have lost their minds. . others deny their own thoughts and can imagine no other life. We are all who have come.”

“Then it will have to be enough,” Drakis turned, but the large hand of the manticore turned him back around.

“Please,” Belag said, his huge, yellow eyes peering into Drakis’ face. “Tell me. . I have to know. .”

“Belag, we’ve got to move now while. .”

“Please,” the manticore said, gripping the human by both shoulders. “I have to know. . are you the One?”

Drakis let out a quick, short breath.

Jugar spoke from behind somewhere at his back.

“Yes,” the dwarf said with words deliberate and carefully spoken. “Tell us: Are you the warrior-king of the prophecy?”

The Hall of the Past soared above him, not yet fallen to flame and rubble but as it stood just hours before.

“Are you a god?”

The dwarf smiled in return, “Ah. . you want to know if I am a god?”

Drakis glanced at the flaming ruin across the hilltop.

“Belag,” he said, his mouth suddenly dry. “That depends.”

The manticore gazed at him, his eyes puzzled for a time, and then he nodded slowly as he turned away. Belag gathered the still-shaken RuuKag and the Lyric to him and then moved with them down the hill following the line of darkened totems. Ethis considered for a moment and then gathered the cloth at the back of the dwarf’s neck into one of his strong hands. The two of them followed the manticore and his charges down the slope.

Drakis watched them for a moment and then turned and bent down, offering his hand to the woman with whom he had hoped for so much earlier that same morning.

“Mala, it’s time to go.”

The young human woman sat on the ground, her face turned toward the flames. She spoke, but it was not for anyone’s ears. “I liked it here. It was. . terrible and. . unspeakable. . but at least I didn’t have to know about it. Now I’ll have to carry it with me. . and I don’t want the burden. Was it so bad, really, just to love you and hope for something better. . even if it would never come. . rather than to know it could never be?”

“It was a lie, Mala,” he said softly.

“But it was a lovely lie,” she sighed.

He drew her up from the ground. The others had already started down the slope, following the now-dead totems, their lights extinguished, back toward the Fold Temple. He turned away from the ruin of his former life and led her by her hand down the slope.

Mala followed, her eyes looking back all the way.

Book 2: THE PREY CHAPTER 16

Heart of the Empire

Soen Tjen-Rei, Inquisitor of the elven Order of the Iblisi, stepped through the delicately inlaid twenty-foot tall doors, grateful for the warmth of the radiant sun that thawed his chill bones. The grand reception hall had been unbelievably cold-undoubtedly someone’s interpretation of the Emperor’s Will-which even his layers of ceremonial robes were of little help in keeping at bay. It might have felt warmer to him, he reflected, if he had had any real interest in the proceedings. Imperial audiences were, it was true, generally convoluted and complex as the centerpiece of the game of Imperial politics should be. And yes, there was an occasional death and even moments of honest surprise to be had, but this was a game for the Ministers and Masters of the Orders to play. . not an elf like him.

He was an Inquisitor of the Iblisi, and his province was the truth-something generally unknown and unwanted in the Imperial audiences.

He stood at the railed edge of the Emperor’s Cloud Palace and surveyed the enormous city arrayed below him. The palace was currently facing west toward the setting sun. Its rays reflected off the thousands of gleaming avatrium that hung over the city like glorious lilies floating on an invisible pond. Many of those closest to the Emperor’s own floating palace were of extraordinary grace and size, an obvious display of power and wealth that required no further word to be spoken on the subject. That they grew smaller and, in his eye, more reasonable the farther they were situated toward the horizon was yet another indication that he was standing at the very center around which the entire world revolved.

At least for today, he thought with a frown. For today.

Below him and between the forest of avatrium, Soen caught sight of the Coliseum and the northern edge of the great Circus. Several gladiators were practicing on the Coliseum floor, smaller than ants to his eye at this distance. Almost overshadowing them was the towering avatria of Myrdin-dai-the center of that Order’s mystical power and teachings. The Myrdin-dai were currently basking in the glory of their contribution to the victory over the last of the Dwarven Kings. Their planning, execution, and management of the folds had been publicly recognized as a contributing factor in the conquest, and the grace of the Imperial thanks rested with them. This praise went down very hard with the Occuran, the Order that was in constant competition with the Myrdin-dai for control of the Aether and the network of folds that it powered. The Myrdin-dai’s recent management of the fold system for the war seemed to be a shift in the Imperial favor-and the Occuran were forced to offer their respects with as much dignity as society demanded. His own Order, the Iblisi, was closely tied to the Occuran. Soen’s presence at the audience today was intended to demonstrate to the Myrdin-dai that the Iblisi would not be diminished in the eyes of the Emperor despite their ties to the Occuran.

He sighed and looked west down the curving length of the wide avenue known as the Vira Rhonas until his gaze drifted to the horizon and the setting sun.

How did I come to this? he thought as he shifted uncomfortably in the layered, exquisite robes. An Inquisitor of the Iblisi whose very name has been whispered with dread and awe in the farthest outposts of the Empire, and now I stand here as an errand boy fawning to the Imperial Will. He had seen more of the Empire than any other living elf, so far as he knew, and at that it was only a fraction of the glory that rested under the sure hand of the Emperor. He had stalked rebel manticores across their own rolling plains in the Chaenandria Reaches. He had sailed in war galleys against the separatists of the Benis Isles and infiltrated the conspiracy of the Aergus Coast Barons.

That was what had done him in; the fall of the Barons had whispered his name in the Imperial ear. He was no longer an Inquisitor but had somehow transcended that to become a symbol-the incarnation of Iblisi fealty to the Emperor and his damnable Will. That Soen’s original mission had been merely to investigate whether the Iblisi should give covert aid to the Barons was conveniently washed away in a sea of sophistry, and he emerged from the cleansing a pure hero and loyal servant of the Empire.

Such was his fate-a comedy for the enjoyment of the gods while he languished in the cold heart of Imperial Glory.

Soen turned from the railing. Such melancholy did not become him, he decided, as he stepped across the polished granite, rounding the path that circumnavigated the base of the Cloud Palace’s enormous avatria. Though the way was broad, it quickly became crowded with petitioners, guildmasters, clerks, cagistrates and ministers,