The Black Knife

Christopher G. Nuttall

http://www.chrishanger.net/

http://chrishanger.wordpress.com/

http://www.facebook.com/ChristopherGNuttall

Cover Blurb

The most dangerous form of magic on Touched – a world where those born with magic wield political power – is necromancy, the art of drawing magical power from the act of murder.  It has long been banned and rightfully so, yet the ambitious and power-hungry Duke Herod – intent on placing his posterior upon the Golden Throne – has resurrected the art, planning to use it to destroy the Royal Family and take the Throne for himself.

On the eve of their wedding, Prince Eric and Mistress Hind are forced to flee the Palace as Herod’s forces launch a coup against the Emperor.  As they make their way to the only safety left in a world touched by necromancy and darkest magic, they are pursued by Herod’s men, while behind them Herod sinks further into madness.  If the necromancer cannot be stopped, the entire world is in terrible danger…

…And may be destroyed.

(As a matter of principle, all of my self-published electronic books are DRM-free.  If you don’t like Kindle format, just convert the files using Calibre or another conversion program.  And you can draw a much larger sample from my site...)
Dear Reader

This is a sample, roughly one quarter of the complete book.  If you like it, please visit Amazon and download the complete edition.  

As a matter of principle, all of my self-published electronic books are DRM-free.  If you don’t like Kindle format, just convert the files using Calibre or another conversion program.  

This book is dedicated to everyone who believed in my writing enough to help.  

Thank you!

Christopher G. Nuttall
Kota Kinabalu, 2012

Prologue

The chamber stank of blood.

Duke Herod smiled to himself as the five people he had invited reacted to the smell.  The mere presence of the blood – crusted and ancient, more a shade of what had once occurred than anything else -  proved to anyone with the knowledge to see just what the chamber had once been used to do…and what it would be used to do again.  All such chambers should have been destroyed, but Herod’s ancestors had been careful, preserving their secrets in case the fragile peace had shattered.  A magician with the Sight who peered into the chamber would have seen the blood, and ghostly echoes of times long gone, before recoiling and closing down his Sight.  The shimmering magic that ran though the walls of the chamber would see to that.

“We are deep under the ground,” Herod said.  His ancestors had built Castle Azimuth on a rocky mountain peak, using old and complex magic to secure it against all comers…and then dug deep under the mountain, hiding their most secret possessions from all who would seek to take them by force.  Castle Azimuth had never been taken, not in all the time it had existed.  Herod had no intention of being the last Lord of the Castle.  He just wanted something more.  “There is no way that any of the Emperor’s pet sorcerers can spy on us.”

He cast his eyes over his guests.  One of them was a Master Magician, a man who would have been Grandmaster of the Academy, were it not for childish resentments and hatred.    The others were all, in their own way, as powerful as Herod himself, at least in theory.  His position as second in line to the Throne of Touched would put him above them in a social situation, but here they were his equals.  They all shared his concerns for the future.  He watched as they waited for him to speak, smiling inwardly.  They knew what the chamber was for…and they hadn’t run.  It wouldn’t have mattered if they had – he had stationed guards in case one of his guests had a sudden change of heart – but it was good to know that they were committed to the cause.  They just didn’t know how committed they were, not yet.

“I spoke to the Emperor twenty days ago,” he said, calmly.  “He has rejected our objections to the…proposal to lift several commoner families into the nobility and intends to proceed with it.  His allies among the lesser nobility will help force it through even over our objections.  There is no longer any time to hope that he will come to his senses.”

The group showed no reaction, even though it was the worst possible news.  To be born a noble on Touched meant being automatically part of High Society, no matter the level of magical talent such a person developed.  The influx of commoners, who traded their magical blood for acceptance into the nobility, was one thing.  They were married into older families, after all.  The new families, men and women who had made their money in trade rather than land ownership or magic, were something else altogether.  The older families looked upon the face of the future and saw their doom approaching.

“One month from today, on Midsummer’s Eve, he intends to present the commoners with their Patents of Nobility,” Herod continued.  “From that day on, High Society will no longer be pure.  It will not be long before we are crushed under the weight of the new nobility.  We need to act now.”

He watched their faces as the news sank in.  They knew what would happen if there were more lower-born families in High Society.  The newer magicians would marry into those families, rather than the older families, ensuring that the newer families would rapidly become more powerful than the older families.  The whole concept of land ownership would be called into question.  No one cared what a magic-less commoner and his family thought about politics, but an aristocratic family was something else.

“The Emperor can be toppled,” he said, watching their faces carefully.  They were stepping over the line to outright treason.  “We can topple the Emperor.  If we act now, and fast, we can remove him and his son before his son produces a Heir.”

There was a long chilling pause.  “I have heard,” Lady Asma said, finally, “that Prince Eric is on the verge of choosing a wife.”

Herod didn’t miss the disgust in her tone.  Lady Asma was young – her parents had been killed during one of the innumerable clan feuds that ravaged that part of Touched – and it wouldn’t be long until she would have to marry.  When she did, she would have the choice between the young aristocrat she loved or a common-born magician, someone whose blood could be added to her own and produce stronger children.  Society – the lesser lords under her – would push her towards the commoner.  It was her duty to the nobility to ensure that the magic grew stronger.  Of all of them, she had the greatest stake in changing the status quo.

“I believe that he has made his selection,” Herod said, confirming her fears.  After the Crown Prince was married, she wouldn’t be able to delay her own marriage any longer.  “It will be announced on Midsummer’s Eve, after the new nobles have been raised to the peerage.”

He smiled inwardly at their expressions.  “I intend to unseat the Emperor and reclaim what is ours,” he said.  “Why should we bow down to commoners when we can rule over them?  Why should we give them our daughters and sons?  Why…when we can take the power that is ours by right?”

“I seem to recall that we bring commoners into the nobility because of their bloodlines,” Lord Galen said.  He was a lesser lord who wanted to be a greater lord.  His appetite for everything – food, drink, women and power – was insatiable.  No matter how much he ate, he could never satisfy his hunger.  “The noble bloodlines that did not embrace the commoners declined and faded in power.”

Herod smiled.  “We have spells that can track down common-born magicians,” he said.  “When we find them, we kill them, strangling the threat in its cradle.  The only magicians who will be allowed to live will be those born to the nobility.”

“The Grandmaster will not allow us to hunt down magicians,” Master Reginald pointed out.  Only he and Herod knew that they had planned that question beforehand.  “Can we stand against the Academy itself?”

“Of course,” Herod said, sensing their doubts.  The Academy might have been required to remain politically neutral, but they all knew the power concealed within its walls.  If the Grandmaster backed the Emperor, their plans for a coup and a swift transfer of power would be imperilled.  “We have friends and allies within the Academy itself.  We also have an ace up our sleeves.”

He stood up.  “Come with me.”

The outer chamber had been small, small enough to allow them to feel both comfortable and secure.  The inner chamber was much larger.  At one point, it had held over a thousand men and women in relative comfort, but now it was empty, apart from the woman – girl, really – lying on the altar.  The stench of blood – and the odd sparks of magic – grew stronger.  Herod closed down his Sight with an effort, trying to hide from the ghostly images echoing through the room.  The others, seeing the chamber for the first time, recoiled in horror.  They knew what it was, all right.

“We caught this commoner on the edge of Lycanth,” Herod said.  He gazed down at the girl.  She was, if he was any judge, barely older than sixteen.  The Journeywoman’s robes she wore were new, suggesting that she had only just graduated from the Academy.  Her eyes were wide with fear.  She was trapped under a complex network of spells that drained her power, making it impossible for her to free herself or summon help.  “We believe that she was sent to spy on us.”

He smiled.  “Take your places,” he ordered, nodding to the five-pointed star that had been drawn around the altar.  “It’s time.”

Master Reginald had speculated that some of the guests would refuse to take part in the ceremony, but no one argued, or refused his commands.  Herod stood, smiling down at the girl as they took their places, before he drew the black knife from under his robes and held it above her chest.  The knife tingled against his skin, whispering dark suggestions into his head, but he pushed them aside.  There was no time to listen to the knife’s suggestions.  He had been learning how to use it properly ever since he’d inherited it from his father.  It hadn’t taken him long to see how it – and the lost art of Necromancy – could be used to stake his claim to the throne.

“There is power in death,” he intoned, beginning the ceremony.  No one was quite sure how much of the ceremony was actually required, but research into the subject rarely led to a long and happy life.  The girl whimpered, straining against her bonds, as he spoke the words of power.  There was power in death...and the greatest power came from a dead magician.  “On the cusp between life and death, there is power.  I claim that power.”

The knife seemed to plunge downwards of its own accord, stabbing deep into the girl’s heart.  Oddly, there was no blood.  Instead, a rich heavy wave of power seemed to shimmer in the air, spreading out rapidly to all five points of the star.  Herod heard his guests cry out as they sensed the first wave of power, boosting their leader’s magical reserves.  The sensation was almost intoxicating.  The altar lit up, casting a dull reddish light across the chamber.  He pulled the knife out of the girl’s body and held it in the air, feeling the power spiralling through the knife and down into his body.

And then it was over.

He looked over at his guests and chuckled.  Plotting rebellion was one thing, but necromancy – and murdering a Journeywoman – was another.  The Academy would never forgive them for either.  The only hope for them was to win the coming war and take power for themselves.  They hadn’t realised that yet, not still caught up in the after-effects, but realisation would come soon enough.  And then they would be his.

Herod laughed aloud, feeling the power coursing through him…and if there was a hint of madness in his laugh, no one noticed, or cared.

Chapter One

It was a dark and stormy night.

Hind braced herself as she ran through the forest, drawing on her magic to avoid collisions with the trees that she barely saw in the darkness.  Branches lashed out at her face, briefly illuminated by flashes of lightning in the sky, before vanishing again into the shadows.  The missing girl had to be somewhere ahead of her, but it was so hard to see or sense anything.  There was so much wild magic in the area that her Sight was almost useless.  The magic mocked her with the promise of power, at a price no human could pay.  Wild magic, magic without control or limits, was abroad in the night.

Her hair tangled in one of the branches and she paused to pull it loose, catching her breath as she did so.  She wanted to swear, but with so much magic around it was impossible to know who – or what – might be listening.  If the girl’s mother hadn’t begged, if the girl hadn’t been born poor and hopeless, if…Hind might not have raced after her.  Very few people would risk going anywhere near wild magic, not if it could be avoided.  Even a Master Magician would hesitate before going anywhere near wild magic.

Lightning flashed again…and, this time, she caught a glimpse of a clearing up ahead.  She pulled her hair back into a bun – it had come loose during the long chase – and paced herself as she walked down towards the clearing.  Her senses were completely scrambled by the wild magic, denying her any way of sensing the dangers before she stumbled into them, but she’d gone too far to back out now.  The trees seemed to back away from her as she passed them, withdrawing their branches from blocking her path.  They could almost have been alive.  With wild magic, anything was possible.  Even as a young Apprentice, Hind had heard stories about magicians who tinkered with wild magic.  Those stories never ended well.

“Emily,” she shouted, calling the girl’s name.  It was barely audible above the storm.  Emily had fled from her family just after Hind had arrived in the village, fled from her parents and the boy she was to marry.  No one knew why.  The villagers called the forest the Forest of the Dead and refused to have anything to do with it, so when they’d realised – after a long search – that Emily had to be somewhere within the forest, they’d asked Hind to search for her.  Only a magician could hope to survive, they’d said.  Right now, part of Hind was wishing that she hadn’t listened to them.  “Emily!”

There was no response as she stepped into the clearing.  Up close, it seemed to be miles across, with a tiny pool of water in the centre.  As Hind stepped into the clearing, the noise of the storm suddenly faded and was gone, leaving her standing in the midst of silence.  It was eerie enough to almost break her resolve, but she pushed on, walking slowly and carefully towards the pool.  Wild magic seemed to be glowing around it, mocking her.  Carefully, she opened up her third eye and peered towards the pool, only to slam it closed as the wild magic almost blinded her.  It wasn’t a pool, she realised, as she clutched her head.  It was a wellspring, a source of magic.  No wonder the forest was so dangerous.  Over the centuries, wild magic had been leaking out into the forest and warping the environment randomly.  Who knew what could be lurking within the trees and branches.

She swallowed a curse under her breath and stepped closer, studying the pool carefully.  If Emily had dived into the pool, there would be no hope of recovering her, no hope of saving her from what she had become.  If Emily was anywhere near, she might not have survived even the forest itself, not as she had been.  Whatever had made her flee, whatever had called her into the forest, had probably killed her.  Hind turned, gazing towards the trees at the edge of the clearing, and felt her eyes narrow.  It was hard to tell in the darkness, but it looked almost as if the trees were closing in on her, pushing her towards the pool.  She couldn’t see the path that had brought her to the clearing any longer.  The flashes of lightning high above revealed nothing, but unbroken trees.

Hind turned, realising that she’d walked right into a trap, and stopped dead.  There was a person standing at the edge of the pool…no, standing within the pool.  Another flash of lightning revealed that it was a young teenage girl, standing with her back to Hind, staring at something she held in her hand.  Hind glanced at the trees, daring them to move closer, and slipped around the edge of the pool to Emily.  It had to be Emily, yet…why wasn’t she moving?  If she’d swum in the pool, what had happened to her.  Hind called to her, hoping that she would turn and answer, but Emily said nothing.  A flash of lightning, so bright that Hind screwed up her eyes to protect them from the light, revealed the answer.  The girl was nothing more than a perfect marble statue.

“Oh, Emily,” Hind breathed.  Up close, there was no mistaking her resemblance to her mother.  Emily’s still form mocked her.  She reached out to touch the statue and then yanked her hand back, hard.  Whatever had petrified her and turned her into marble might still be around…and, without her Sight, it was going to be hard to face it.  “I’m sorry.  I’m so sorry…”

A faint glow seemed to appear from deep within the pool, illuminating the scene.  Emily was naked, standing within the pool as if she had intended to bathe, before she’d been transformed and killed.  Hind studied her face, puzzled; the girl hadn’t been in agony, but almost in wonderment.  What had she had in her hand, she wondered, that had made her so happy in the seconds before she had been transformed?  She looked back and swallowed a curse under her breath.  The trees were definitely moving closer.

She took one last look at Emily, fixing the girl’s memory in her mind, and turned to go.  A flash of light from behind her caught her attention and she turned back, just in time to see a small figure standing on Emily’s stone hand.  For a moment, Hind felt some of the sense of wonder that had to have gripped Emily as she took in the tiny, but perfect figure.  It was a naked woman, barely larger that her finger, with a pair of gossamer wings.  Hind had seen fairies in Apothecary stores, where their wings had been clipped and used for alchemical experiments, but this was the first time she’d seen one in the wild.  The tiny creatures preferred to have as little to do with humanity as possible, knowing that they were feared and hated by the human race.  She smiled at the tiny creature…and then she saw the wand it clutched in one hand.

The fairy took to the air and came right at her.  Hind ducked sharply, feeling unreasoning panic bubbling through her as it swung its wand towards her.  Even with her Sight so badly damaged by being so close to a wellspring, she could sense the danger and knew what had happened to Emily.  The fairies had colonised the wellspring and were using its magic to defend themselves against all intruders.  Why not?  Humans had tapped wellsprings for their own use before.  The fairy’s face twisted in hatred as she took another swing at Hind, trying to touch her with its wand.  Hind risked a tiny spell and raised a ward in front of the creature, only to see it punch through the ward as if it wasn't there.  Hind wasn't entirely surprised.  The ward hadn’t been designed to do more than stand off a threat.  Any half-way competent magician could have broken through with a little effort.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” she said, as the creature seemed to drift in front of her face.  It was a marvel…and it would be too easy to allow herself to become distracted.  She used one hand to undo her cloak while keeping her eyes on the tiny creature.  “I really don’t want to hurt you…”

If the fairy heard her, or understood her, it gave no sign.  Instead, it just lunged at her again, lifting the glowing wand towards Hind’s face.  Hind lifted her cloak and yanked it down over the creature, trapping it inside the cloak.  A second later, the cloak started to turn to stone and she dropped it on the ground, smiling inwardly as the fairy trapped itself.  Unless it had other tricks up its sleeve, it wasn't going to get out of the stone wall it had grown around itself.

She turned…and the ground shook beneath her feet, hard enough to send her stumbling to her knees.  The trees had suddenly moved in, pushing her up against the pool.  The waves of wild magic were growing stronger, taunting her even though she’d closed her Sight down completely.  There was something within the pool; something old, powerful and hungry.  Hind saw the waters bubbling and felt something’s presence, just under the surface.  The light was growing brighter, yet it was a sickly light, heralding the arrival of something corrupt and unthinkably evil.  She recoiled from its mental touch, unwilling to face such a coldly malevolent force.  It wanted to take her and eat her and…

Emily’s stone form seemed to waver, just for a second, and then toppled and fell into the pool.  Hind felt, more than heard, the roar of triumph from the creature in the pool, the mocking delight of a creature that existed solely to cause pain and suffering.  She thought she heard Emily cry out before her soul was devoured, but she could have been imagining it.  She hoped that she had imagined it.  Wild magic transformations were permanent and Emily had been dead, or as near to death as a human could come without stepping into the darkness.  The light grew brighter and Hind turned to flee, suddenly aware that even looking upon the creature could be lethal.  There was a gap in the trees and she ran towards it, silently praying to all the gods that she would escape before it was too late.  The trees seemed to lash towards her…and then a root sprung up right in front of her, sending her crashing to the ground.  Other branches reached out like demented arms, wrapping around her wrists and pulling her to her feet.  She struggled desperately, but it was impossible to break free as vines lashed around her legs, rendering her immobile.  She was trapped.

She could feel the monster behind her as it rose out of the pool.  It was making a rough sound, a horrifying rasping sound, as if it were having problems breathing in the open air.  She found herself wondering if it, as a creature of wild magic, was having problems as it pulled itself out of the wellspring, even though there was so much magic surrounding the pool.  Perhaps, like dragons or gorgons, it needed magic to live and couldn’t survive long on a reduced diet.  It hardly mattered, she realised, as the trees started to push her back towards its gaping maw.  It would have plenty of time to devour her before it had to return to the wellspring and lie in wait for the next victim.  Down in the stream of magic flowing into the world, it could wait for eternity if it had to.

Something touched the back of her neck and she screamed, grasping at the magic surrounding her.  Her instructors had warned her never to risk drawing on wild magic if there was any other choice, but she was trapped and helpless.  Channelling the wild magic through her was hard – it felt as if her brain was on fire – yet somehow it worked.  Flames burst out, burning the trees that were holding her…and then surging back to attack the monster behind her.  She heard something screaming in agony – the entire forest was alive, she realised in horror – as her bonds loosened and allowed her to fall to the ground.  Her entire body was aching, but she couldn’t stay there.  The trees were burning down around her.  It took all the concentration she had to channel the magic a second time, but somehow she made it, throwing a sheet wall of fire behind her towards the creature.  Whatever it was, it seemed to hate fire; she heard it screaming before it started to withdraw back to the pool.  She pushed the fire right at it, trying to kill it, but it seemed to be impossible.  The creature could be hurt, but not killed.  The flames were still spreading through the forest and setting fire to the ground.  She found herself coughing as she breathed in smoke and realised that she couldn’t stay there any longer.  The fire was already spreading out of control.

She turned and fled through the forest, back towards the village.  This time, the trees seemed to leap away from her, bending over to avoid catching her gaze.  She saw some of the trees even uproot themselves and flee, heading away from the fire as fast as they could.  It made her wonder if the forest had been alive, or merely part of a trap set by the entity in the pool, but there was no way to know for sure.  The flames were starting to abate as the skies opened and rain poured down from the heavens, extinguishing the fires one by one.  Hind smiled to herself as the rain started to splash through her hair, soaking her garments.  It didn’t matter.  She was alive!  The noise of the thunderstorm high overhead suddenly burst in on her and she laughed.  She was definitely alive.  

Hind was still smiling when she reached the edge of the forest and turned to look back towards the wellspring.  The flames had all gone now, leaving only the faintest suggestion of burning wood hanging in the air.  She carefully opened her third eye and peered into the forest, using her Sight to sniff out the magical currents flowing through the air.  She was struck with the sensation that something was looking back at her, but she wasn't able to tell if it was the creature, or the forest, or something else.  She ran her hands through her damp hair, feeling the bun she’d carefully constructed before she’d entered the forest coming loose, and sighed.  She would have to write a report for the Grandmaster and he’d want details, lots of details.  He’d want to know everything, starting with why she’d walked into a deadly trap with no back-up or even outside support.  There weren't enough Master Magicians working for the Academy to risk losing any of them.

She shook her head.  The Grandmaster was minor nobility, his position secured only by his formidable magical powers.  He wouldn’t understand risking his life to go after a commoner – a poor girl from a village so poor that no one outside the village knew its name – but Hind had been born a commoner herself.  If the gods had decreed differently, it would have been her who had fallen into the pool and Emily who had tried to rescue her.  The common folk had no protection from magic, apart from a handful of people like Hind.  She wasn't going to abandon them because the nobility barely cared about their lives.

“I’m sorry, Emily,” she said, and turned to walk back down to the village.

The inn was lit up, she realised when she walked through the ward guarding the village against supernatural vermin.  It wasn't a very good ward, but the village only had one witch and she would have barely qualified as a magician at all, had she been tested by the Academy.  Hind had tested it when she had arrived and found it wanting.  She had been thinking about ways to politely suggest improvements when Emily had vanished.  The inn itself was the largest building in the village and, as she reached it, she realised that someone had parked a horse right outside the building.  The beast itself glowed with the faint light of high magic, suggesting that it was far more than it seemed.  A normal horse would have been placed into a stable, but this one had been left outside.  It eyed her with disconcertingly intelligent eyes and then tossed its head towards the entrance.  Hind smiled and followed its instructions.  Only one kind of person would ride such a horse.

“Mistress Hind,” the innkeeper said, as she stepped through the doors.  The innkeeper was short, fat and remarkably friendly.  If he’d had doubts over playing host to a magician and an unmarried woman, he kept them to himself.  “You have a visitor.”

Hind followed his gaze to the man in the corner, who stood up and saluted her with one armoured hand.  He wore no armour – it had been placed on the table, where he’d been clearing it carefully – but she saw his shield and the golden emblem that marked him as a Knight of the Golden Order, the Emperor’s Own.  He had a rough, but pleasant face.  The innkeeper would have found him a surprisingly decent guest.  The Knights of the Golden Order held themselves to very high standards.

“Mistress Hind,” he said.  He had the faint, yet firm accent of a native of the Golden City.  “I have orders to escort you back to the Academy and then to the Golden City.”

“I see,” Hind said, her mind racing.  Her tour of the outer lands wasn't supposed to end for another year.  There should have been no reason to call her back early, unless one of her earlier reports had interested the Grandmaster and the Emperor.  “Might I ask why?”

“I have not been vouchsafed that knowledge,” the Knight said.  “The Prince merely wishes to see you as soon as possible.” 

Hind blinked.  The Prince?  What did Prince Eric want with her?

Chapter Two

The Academy was perched on top of the highest mountain in the land and surrounded by ashes.  Centuries ago, during the Necromantic Wars, a force of Necromancers had used their powers to attack the Academy, generating awesome and terrifying forces to crush the centre of resistance to their advance.  The forces they had unleashed had scorched the surrounding land, leaving nothing, but dust and ash for miles around.  Hind had heard that the Academy had tried to encourage people to settle and reclaim the lost land, but nothing had worked.  There was no way to grow anything in the wrecked soil, or make a living from the land.  Only magicians and those who had business with them travelled through the wastelands.

She pulled her horse to a stop and covertly massaged her thighs.  She’d learned to ride at the Academy – horses were rare outside the nobility, traders or wealthy farmers – but it was something she had never truly liked.  Her horse had been a gift from the Grandmaster, yet Hind had the private suspicion that the Grandmaster had been trying to rid himself of a liability rather than make a gift to her out of the goodness of his heart.  Magic could be used to heal away the pains, but when one was riding for several days, even magic had its limitations.  She caught her breath and scowled in the direction of Sir Pellaeon.  The Knight of the Golden Order hadn’t shown any sign of having his own aches and pains.

He’d been an interesting, but demanding travelling companion.  It had taken seven days to travel from the village to the Academy and, every night, he’d insisted on spending only a few hours asleep before they returned to the road.  Hind actually had the feeling that she was the one holding him back and, without her, he might have just kept riding, without any concern for anyone else.  His enhanced horse could probably have just kept galloping along for weeks before it needed to take a rest.  Hind’s own horse wasn’t as capable.

“Don’t worry,” Sir Pellaeon called, as he cantered back towards her.  “We’re nearly at the Academy and you can take a rest there.”

Hind scowled at him, sitting up in the saddle.  The Knight was right, of course, but she was still hurting.  She had spent part of the trip composing her report to the Grandmaster, before Sir Pellaeon had pointed out that she didn’t have to actually write it, not when she could deliver it in person.  She’d spent the rest of the trip wondering just why Prince Eric wanted to see her.  It had been four years since she’d last met him in person, back when they’d graduated from the Academy and burned their green Apprentice robes.  She’d gone on to become a Journeywoman and eventually reach Master rank.  He’d gone back to the Golden City and started his duties as Crown Prince.  They’d exchanged a handful of letters since then, but neither of them had much time for writing.

Eric had been the same age as her, she remembered, when they’d first met.  They’d been partnered by the Academy and had learned from each other.  She’d actually found him rather thoughtful for a Prince, although he’d been a born warrior, and had come to enjoy his company.  Unlike some of the noble children at the Academy, he hadn’t automatically dismissed every common-born girl as a slut or a whore.  He hadn’t been strong on book-learning, but she’d assisted him and, in turn, he had assisted her.  She had been sorry when he’d left the Academy, even though she had understood.  Unlike her, or some of the lesser nobility, he couldn’t afford to turn magic into a career.

She looked up towards the Academy as Sir Pellaeon led her up the single road.  It was a cluster of golden domes perched on the mountain, surrounded by enough wards and magical defences to deter anyone from committing an act of aggression within the area.  The Academy was neutral ground and a succession of Grandmasters had ruthlessly enforced that law, preventing the nobles from bringing their blood feuds and petty scrabbles into the Academy.  Where everyone else had to pick a side, the Grandmaster remained above the fray, tutoring pupils in magic and – more importantly – control.  A magician who failed to learn control was a danger to everyone around him.  Not every magic-user went to the Academy, but all of the truly powerful ones had, at one point, passed through its gates.

It grew larger in front of her as they started to pass through the wards.  Her hair stood on end as the wards seemed to consider them before allowing them to pass through towards the gates.  Some of them would merely repel any intruder; others, more dangerous, would hold the intruder helpless until the guards arrived to decide what to do with him.  The statues surrounding the outer walls bore stark testament to what happened to those who tried to break through the wards.  The Academy had pressed the intruders into service as inner guards.

She felt a shiver running down her spine as she took in the statues, remembering Emily and how she had died in the pool.  The statues guarding the Academy were never seen to move, but rumour had it that they moved when no one was looking, changing position with terrifying speed.  Blink…and you would miss it.  She met the cold stone eyes of one of the statues and shivered again.  If they’d somehow broken through the wards, those cold eyes would be the last thing she saw before she died…or joined them.  The massive gates swung open and she urged the horse forward.  The less she saw of those statues, the better.

“I will wait for you in the guardhouse,” Sir Pellaeon said, breaking into her thoughts.  “I believe that the Grandmaster has arranged room and bedding for me.”

“Thank you,” Hind said, as the gates swung closed behind them.  She slipped off her horse and drew on the local magic field to heal herself, before passing the reins to one of the servants, who took it gratefully.  Her entire body hurt, but as the magic filtered through, she felt better and stronger.  “We’ll complete the rest of the journey tomorrow.”

She nodded to one of the guards and walked through the inner gates, feeling the wards testing her before they allowed her to pass.  Inside, she saw the lawn and a dozen Apprentices practicing magic on the grass, moving their hands in a series of careful patterns.  Master Usthin, the Head of Alchemy, was watching them critically, calling out suggestions to some of the new magicians.  Hind, with the perspective of age, understood what the Head meant, but some of the new magicians clearly thought that it was a waste of time.  Her lips twitched in private amusement.  Eric and Hind had thought the same when they were both Apprentices.  She walked on into the next section, where some of the advanced classes were practicing more complex spells, and winced inwardly when she caught sight of a girl trapped halfway between a human and a bird.  Human transfiguration was complicated and sometimes very dangerous – and self-transfiguration was the most dangerous of all - but the girl was refusing all assistance as she struggled to either complete the transformation or change herself back to normal.  The sight brought back unhappy memories.  The Academy, like any school, had its fair share of bullies and magic added a whole new dimension to bullying.  The Tutors believed that it taught magicians to adapt and react quickly.  Hind had never believed that claim.

The next courtyard held a pair of duelling warriors and a small audience.  Hind paused to watch as they threw spells at one another, using wands to focus their magic into basic spells.  They wouldn’t become Journeymen until they learned how to cast spells without wands – wands, as a general rule, only served as focusing devices, rather than sources of magical power – but for the moment, it would allow them to duel without hindrance.  Magical duelling was complex, a mixture of attack and defence, yet both duellists were clumsy.  Hind could have beaten them both with one hand tied behind her back.

She shook her head and walked on, stepping into the Academy itself.  The building was ancient – no one knew how the ancient magicians had built it – and was surrounded by magic.  There were still wards in the air, but these were intended to contain and deflect any magical accidents, rather than prevent intruders from getting into the castle.  The Apprentices could barely touch the full limits of their power until they grew into maturity and accidents had been known to happen.  Back when she had been an Apprentice, rumour had had it that the wards were also used to allow the Tutors to keep an eye on their charges, but no one knew for sure.  It would have made sense, Hind knew; a building full of inexperienced and immature magic-users was asking for trouble and needed to be closely supervised.

The interior of the Academy seemed to rearrange itself at whim.  There was no point in drawing up a map when the interior just kept changing, so Hind just kept walking, trusting in the subtle magic that made up the building to take her to where she had to go.  It was no surprise to turn down a corridor she’d never seen before and walk right into her old room, the one that had been placed aside for her when she’d become a Master and therefore entitled to a private room.  She pushed her hand against the door and opened it, undoing her private ward as she stepped inside.  It had been over a year since she had last set foot inside her room, but it was as clean and tidy as ever.

She undressed rapidly, washed herself in the bath and then walked over to the mirror, examining herself critically.  Most magicians hated mirrors – they showed the truth, not what illusions and glamour spells showed to the world – but Hind had never fallen for that particular vanity.  At twenty-two years of age, she looked good, with long flowing blonde hair falling down her back and muscles rippling along her arms.  She dressed herself, pulling on trousers and a shirt before donning the black robe of a Master Magician and pulling the hood over her hair.  She had always found the arrangement a little awkward, but it was tradition and therefore not to be argued with.  She placed her dirty clothes in a small basket for the maids and then stepped out of her room.  The corridor had changed and she found herself just outside the Grandmaster’s office.  It didn’t surprise her at all.  

The wards surrounding his office were stronger than she remembered, but they let her in without complaint, welcoming her into his visiting room.  It was empty, so she paced around the room, examining the nine portraits of the current Heads and the blank spot that had once shown the Head of Necromancy.  Necromancy had been banned ever since the Necromantic Wars and the position hadn’t been filled for centuries.  Hind knew more about it than most – one of her tasks for the Grandmaster had been to watch out for signs of necromancy – and she fully supported the ban.  Necromancy brought vast powers, but the price was eventual madness.

“Mistress Hind,” a voice said, from behind her.  “Welcome back to the Academy.”

Hind turned to see the Grandmaster behind her.  Grandmaster Rupert, of Family Garach, was in his late forties, but he was clearly in the prime of life, with short dark hair and a muscular figure that wasn't hidden by the multicoloured robes he wore.  He seemed to crackle with magic, silently challenging her and anyone else to dispute his right to his position.  The Grandmaster was the strongest magician known to exist, yet his position was challenged constantly.  If he were to be beaten in a duel, his challenger would become Grandmaster, with all the honours – and responsibilities – of the post.

“Grandmaster,” she said, with a bow.  Magicians never bent the knee to anyone under the Emperor himself, even their Grandmaster.  “I trust that you are well?”

“Well enough,” the Grandmaster said.  “The Trials will be upon us before Midsummer’s Eve and I may face a challenger or two then, but until then I am well.”

Hind nodded absently.  The Grandmaster couldn’t accept challenges from just anyone, so anyone who wanted to make a play for the position had to go through the Trials first, establishing themselves as a formidable magician before attempting to take on the Grandmaster.  Not everyone who passed through the Trials choose to risk attempting to unseat the Grandmaster, knowing that failure might mean death.  Still, every year, there were always at least two challenges.  It wasn't a post she had been tempted to try to claim herself.

“Good,” she said.  The last time they’d spoken, he’d sent her off on a mission that should have taken at least four years.  “May I ask why you summoned me back here?”

“Direct as always,” the Grandmaster said.  He sounded almost…nervous, which was odd…and worrying.  “I need to discuss an important matter with you, but first…have you noticed anything odd on your travels?”

“Odd,” Hind repeated.  “In what sense did you mean odd?”

“Anything,” the Grandmaster said.

Hind spoke briefly, starting with a handful of minor magical incidents and ending with her desperate chase after Emily and her encounter with the beast in the wellspring.  The Grandmaster looked disapproving, although he didn’t bother to argue, which was somehow even more worrying.  He wouldn’t have hesitated to lecture her on risking her life before.

“There have been odd signs and portents,” the Grandmaster said, vaguely.  His eyes sharpened suddenly.  “Do you know Master Ciler, or Journeywoman Ashe?”

Hind shook her head.  “I sent them on a mission into Azimuth,” the Grandmaster explained.  “Master Ciler was one of the strongest talents at my disposal and Journeywoman Ashe showed rare promise, if she could learn to tap into inner reserves she didn’t know she had.  Both of them have vanished.”

“Vanished?”

“I haven’t heard from either of them for several months,” the Grandmaster explained.  “They’re not the only ones who have disappeared, merely the…most prominent.  I’ve had a cluster of reports from Yolanda about entire villages just...disappearing.  Several lesser Lords have dropped out of sight.  It’s odd.”

Hind leaned forward.  “And you want me to go after them?”

The Grandmaster laughed.  “No,” he said, as if she’d accidentally said something very stupid.  “Do you remember Prince Eric?”

“Of course,” Hind said, in surprise.  The Grandmaster had known that she had known him.  He’d probably overseen their partnership.  “Why…?”

“He is twenty-two years of age,” the Grandmaster said, portentously.  “This year, he is to be acclaimed Crown Prince and presented to the Golden Throne.  Over the next decade, his father will divest himself of his powers and present them to his son.  Prince Eric will become the new Emperor of Touched.”

Hind nodded, impatiently.  The Emperor of Touched was first among equals, if that, presiding over a world divided into kingdoms, territories and wastelands…and that didn’t include the territories owned and controlled by non-humans.  The Emperor had strictly limited powers outside his own personal territories and any attempt to expand them would trigger off a war as the other nobles struggled to put him down.

“This ceremony will take place on Midsummer’s Eve,” the Grandmaster continued.  He looked up at Hind, his eyes silently warning her that he was coming to the point.  “When he becomes Crown Prince, he must take a wife.  I believe that he intends to ask you to marry him.”

Hind gaped at him.  Whatever she had expected, it wasn't that.  “Me?”

“You meet the requirements for a Royal Consort,” the Grandmaster pointed out.  “You’re a powerful magician.  You’re of age to bear children.  And you’re of new blood.  Prince Eric has relatively few choices and I suspect that you would be top of the list.”

He smiled.  “And at least you know him,” he added.  “Not every candidate would be able to say the same.”

Hind flushed, unable to control her thoughts.  The Emperor had to marry someone of common-born blood, someone who could bring new talent into the Royal Family, which already had talent to spare.  She had never dreamed that it would be offered to her, though; her parents, who had never been more than farmers, would become grandparents to the new Emperor of Touched.  And yet…she didn’t want to become a Royal Consort, or even Empress.  And yet…

There had never been a man in her life, not really.  Eric had never tried to get her into bed, or even given her a sign to suggest that he was interested.  The nobles who had tried to lure her into their beds had thought of her as nothing more than a slut who would spread her legs for a title and perhaps a purse of gold.  A commoner man would be too intimidated by her and it was rare to find any love between Master Magicians.  It was a tempting offer.  She liked Eric.

No matter what the Grandmaster said, it had to be real.  Sir Pellaeon would not have been diverted from the Golden City without permission from the Prince – or his father.  The Grandmaster might have been asked to prepare her for Eric, without promising her that she would be asked to marry him.  It was…it was wonderful and terrifying and…she stared at him, wondering if he understood.  Life as a Royal Consort would mean giving up her independence as a freelance mage.

“I don’t know,” she said, finally.  How could she make an instant decision?  How could anyone expect her to make an instant decision?  “I…”

“The Prince would like to see you in two days,” the Grandmaster said, gently.  “Perhaps, by then, you will have an answer for him.”

Chapter Three

“Your Highness,” Martha said, “Sir Pellaeon and Mistress Hind are approaching.”

“Thank you, Martha,” Prince Eric said, trying to keep his voice calm and level.  It wasn't working.  “Please inform me when she reaches the outer chambers.”

Martha bowed, revealing an alarming amount of cleavage, and retreated, leaving Eric alone with his thoughts.  He had noticed the glances Martha threw him from time to time, the suggestion written in her eyes that he could have more...intimate services from her, in exchange for favours or perhaps nothing more than money.  It would have been worth the deal, Eric knew, but sleeping around had its own dangers, particularly when one was a member of the Royal Family.  Martha’s dark skin and tantalising brown eyes might have called to him, yet he had chosen to resist.  His father had drummed one lesson into him time and time again.  A royal bastard could break up the lines of succession that held Touched together and the only way to avoid a bastard was to remain chaste and pure.  As the years had worn on, it had become harder and harder to keep that vow.

Eric took a deep breath as he sat down in one of the chairs, but somehow he couldn't remain still and stood up to pace the library.  He’d chosen the library for a meeting place as he knew that Hind loved books, both the ancient hand-crafted manuscripts and the newer volumes produced by the new printing presses.  The Golden Palace had the largest library in the world, outside the Academy, on as wide a range of subjects as anyone could imagine.  Eric had spent many happy hours in the stacks as a child, learning about the different kingdoms and nations that made up Touched, the different kingdoms and nations that he would rule, one day.  His father had urged him to study, reminding him that a tiny piece of knowledge could make the difference between life and death, or between keeping a throne to pass on to his son or losing it.  He gazed at one of the volumes, part of a seven-volume history of magic, and remembered puzzling his way through it as a child.  It was magic that kept his father on his throne and even though Eric had never been allowed to seek Mastership for himself, he had learned to control and respect it.

He turned his head, wondering how Hind had changed over the years.  It had been too long since he’d seen her in the flesh, back when she’d graduated and had been awarded Master’s rank.  She’d been a good friend, yet what would she say when she heard his proposal?  Eric had always known that he would face an arranged marriage – to a commoner, no less – but she’d never had to face that possibility, ever since her powers had blossomed into life.  Would she accept, or would she laugh in his face?

Eric’s father, the Emperor Haled, had been polite, but firm.  He’d given Eric a list of eligible commoners and informed his son that he would be making his choice from only a handful of names.  Eric had known only three of them...and one of them had been the most stuck-up girl he'd ever known, something that had always struck him as odd.  Before she’d come into her magic, she’d been nothing more than a pig-girl, helping her father to tend to his pigs.  The other had been a bookish sort with little else to recommend her.  But Hind...

Hind had been something special, even when they’d been partnered up by the tutors.  She’d been smart, and pretty, and funny, and fun to be with.  He would have been attracted to her – no, he had been attracted to her – but all of his father’s warnings had kept him from making a pass at her...and perhaps a fool of himself at the same time.  They’d been friends; they’d shared good times together, yet was it enough to make a life together?  He’d heard that she’d spent the last two years working as a Freelance Mage.  Would she be willing to give it up to be his bride and the Royal Consort?

The thought kept echoing in his head.  There was nothing like being the Heir to the Empire to make one irresistible to the girls.  If he’d wanted to, he could have had his pick from the noble girls of the Court, let alone the servants and maids.  He’d even had to deal with a pair of older women who had tried to lure him into their bed, treating the whole thing as a crazy game.  Only his innocence had saved him the first time, while the second time had been embarrassing.  He’d confessed everything to his father and the old man had laughed his head off, before explaining some of the facts of life to his young and confused son.  Years later, the thought still made Eric’s face burn.  It would have shocked and amused the male members of the Court to know that, at twenty-three years old, Prince Eric was still a virgin.  The thought of meeting someone he wanted to marry terrified him.  He hadn’t been so scared since he’d stepped between two warring parties in the Mountains of Light and convinced them to put down their weapons and allow him to mediate their dispute.

You’re a Prince of the Blood, he reminded himself.  The thought was unconvincing, somehow.  Part of his mind kept insisting that any woman would have to be a fool to refuse; the other part kept reminding him that Hind had worked hard to reach her present rank and wouldn't throw it away, even for him.  He’d tapped a few of his married friends for advice, but they had all given him different advice...and some of it sounded crazy, even to him.  They’d suggested that he should be firm, that he should tell her that it was a done deal and that she was marrying him, even if she didn't want to marry him.  Others had told him to take it calmly and talk her into it, rather than just demanding that she accept the honour of being the Royal Consort.  His head kept spinning with nervous terror.  Who, he asked himself, would want to be a Prince of the Blood if they knew how they would have to get married.

“I have only one piece of advice for you,” his father had said, when Eric had nerved himself up to ask the older man.  “Be yourself; be truthful and honest with her.  She’s going to be as nervous as you are, perhaps more so.  Don’t force her into anything and you won’t regret it.”

Eric shook his head sadly, catching sight of the portrait of his mother on one wall.  The Empress Elaine had died fourteen years ago, giving birth to his sister, but he’d never had any reason to think that his parents had ever argued or fought.  His father had never taken another woman to wife, even though he’d faced almost as much pressure as Eric had faced from the Ladies of the Court.  If his mother had been alive, she could have advised Eric...but then, she’d been born a commoner himself.  Eric had never even met a commoner until he’d gone to the Academy.  His mother would have understood exactly what Hind would go through in the coming months...if she accepted his proposal, of course.

He looked away from his mother’s portrait towards one of the most famous paintings in the world.  The Birth of Magic had been painted by an Alchemist thousands of years ago – it predated the Empire and the Necromantic Wars – and showed the Great God Solaris, Lord of Heaven and God of the Sun, shining his golden light over the land.  The legends claimed that Solaris and the lesser gods had given humans magical powers by mating with human women and producing children who had a direct link to godhood.  Eric didn't know if it was true – there was no way to know – but he did know that the magical bloodlines dominated Touched.  Magic kept the nobles on their thrones and allowed commoners to rise to the very highest levels.  Those who had no magic were lucky if they became traders, or independent farmers.  He studied the god’s face, hidden within the golden glow, for a long moment.  The painting was magic itself, allowing the watcher to see strange signs within the glow, if he stared long enough.  As a child, Eric had been fascinated by the painting and had spent hours just staring at it, even though his father had thrashed him for it several times.

The door opened and he turned to face Martha.  “Your Highness,” Martha said, formally.  “I present to you Mistress Hind.”

Eric felt his heart leap into his mouth as Hind was shown into the room.  She hadn't changed in the years since he had last set eyes upon her, apart from a new grimness in her eyes.  Her long blonde hair had been braided into a ponytail – it hung down her back – contrasting oddly with the trousers and shirt she wore.  He did his best to keep his eyes off her breasts, but the strange flicker of amusement in her bright green eyes suggested that he had failed.  Eric felt his mouth go suddenly dry and he wanted to run and hide.  How could he even make small talk with her, let alone discuss marriage and all that that entailed?

“Mistress Hind,” he said, with equal formality.  As a Master Magician, Hind was entitled to as much deference – and respect – as a Lord.  He privately considered that she was worth far more than a Lord – he’d spent too long meditating between the various political factions in the House of Lords – but the formalities had to be observed.  “Welcome to the Golden Palace.”

Hind went down on one knee, bowing her head.  Eric felt a flush rising to his cheeks and banished it with a mental discipline that he had learned at the Academy.  He knew what that ancient formality had signified, long ago in the past, and cursed himself for thinking of it right now.  It was the last thing he wanted on his mind, even though part of him just wanted to take her in his arms and press his lips softly against hers.  But then, it was far too early.

“Please, rise,” he said, urgently.  He looked over at Martha.  The maid was keeping her face straight, but he was sure that he detected amusement lurking deep within her dark eyes.  “I’ll call if I need you.”

Martha took the hint and left the library, closing the door behind her.  Eric schooled his features to immobility – or as near to immobility as he could manage – as Hind rose to her feet.  Standing tall, she was almost as tall as him and her eyes met his without flinching.  That, at least, was unsurprising.  Hind had known him when they’d been partners and it was hard to hold to the proper respect when she’d seen him with his guard down.  The memory of some of their escapades rose up with him and he found himself smiling.  A second later, she returned the smile.

“It’s good to see you again,” he said, and held out a hand.  She clasped it firmly.  Even if she rejected his suit, he found himself hoping that she would stick around until Midsummer’s Eve.  She had always been fun to be with.  “I understand that you had a little adventure seven days ago?”

Hind took the hint and started to talk, telling him all about the wellspring and the monster she’d encountered lurking within the magical pool.  She barely paused when he pointed her to a comfortable seat and sat down opposite her, detailing what had happened and how she’d escaped.  She attributed most of it to dumb luck, but Eric knew better.  Hind had always been resourceful and clever.  Her tale fascinated and horrified him in equal measure.  Magic could be very useful, if controlled, but when it was uncontrolled the results could be dire.  People without magical talents had no business playing with fire.

“I told the locals to stay away from the forest until the Academy managed to take a careful look at the wellspring,” Hind concluded.  “The Grandmaster said that he might try to dispatch a team to investigate properly after Midsummer’s Eve, but until then we’re probably going to have to abandon it.  It’ll just be another part of the wildwood.”

Eric nodded.  There were hundreds of magical wellsprings scattered over Touched and some had given birth to truly strange creatures.  There were entire tracts of land where no human dared venture, save at risk of his life.  The wildwood, the strange forests that sprang up around an uncontrolled wellspring, helped dissuade visitors, although they were never completely successful.  There were plenty of magic-users who believed that they could find the power to boost their own powers within the wellsprings.  The lucky ones died in the attempt.  The unlucky ones lived as object lessons...and objects of pity.

The conversation passed from subject to subject, never staying in one place for long.  Eric told her about his brief stay with Lord Danlo and how the old magician had tried to teach him some of the spells for summoning demons, even teaching him a couple before Eric had finally managed to convince him that he didn't want to know.  The Academy’s advice on summoning demons had boiled down to one word.  Don’t.  Hind hadn’t been surprised and had countered with a story about uncovering a cult of demon-worshippers in a small town, one that had tried to kill her before she’d been able to bring down the Guard on them.  They hadn’t managed to summon anything, much to her relief, but with that kind of bad intentions, they would have succeeded sooner or later.  And then all hell, quite literally, would have broken loose.  She was easy to talk to and Eric almost lost his nerve.  Perhaps he could speak to her tomorrow about marriage...

But he couldn't leave it.  He’d promised his father.

“Hind,” he said, finally.  His mouth was dry again.  He would have sooner faced a hundred demon worshippers stark naked, without a single weapon.  “Do you know why I invited you here?”

It was a stupid question.  He knew that as soon as the words came out of his mouth.  Of course she knew; his father and the Grandmaster had arranged matters so that she would know, sparing him the experience of having to broach the subject himself.  She knew and all the time he’d been chatting about nothing, catching up on her life and her on his, she’d been wondering just when he was going to ask her to marry him.

“The Grandmaster hinted pretty bluntly,” Hind said.  Her tone was carefully neutral, but Eric knew her well enough to detect a hint of nervousness under her words.  He hadn’t really believed that she might be as nervous as he was.  Hind had always been confident when she faced the world.  “You want me to marry you.”

Eric opened his mouth, and then closed it again.  It was so hard to think of the right words.  He knew it looked like he was fumbling, but he couldn't help himself.

“Yes,” he said finally, wondering how many of the gods were laughing at him from their home in the clouds.  “Hind, I...”

All of his carefully-prepared explanations seemed to slip out of his mind.  “I like you,” he said, finally, and cringed inside.  She could mock him for years now and he would deserve it.  His father hadn’t told him how hard it would be to ask a girl to marry him, particularly a girl he genuinely liked.  He felt his face flushing again and looked up to see that she was flushing too.  Oddly, he found that reassuring.  “I think that you could make a good...”

“Royal Consort,” Hind said, completing his sentence when he broke off.  Eric was almost relieved.  All of the courses – and practical experiences – he’d had on diplomacy had never covered anything like this.  “Eric...I like you too.”

Eric felt his face growing warmer.  He would have been surprised if someone couldn't have used his face to cook.  The surge of relief almost kept him frozen for a moment.  She hadn't said no!  A part of his body demanded that he kiss her right now, but he kept that part under firm control.  The last thing she would want was to be pawed by a man, even a Prince.

“I know it’s a hard choice,” Eric said, feeling the words spluttering out one by one.  “I know that it will change everything, but...I promise that I will be a good husband for you and that I will...”

Hind held up a hand.  “I know you will,” she said.  “I don’t doubt it.”

She paused.  “Eric...I do have to think about this,” she added.  “I cannot say yes or no now.”

Eric nodded in understanding.  The noble families were used to arranged marriages – sons and daughters were traded for alliances, or wealth and power – but commoners rarely had to consider all of the aspects involved in a marriage.  In one sense, Hind didn't have to worry about inheritances or bloodlines, but if she married him, she would have to watch her step.  There wouldn't be any shortage of Ladies of the Court who would try to undercut and disgrace her.

“I understand,” he said.  His father had warned him that this might happen.  “Please will you stay with us for a week before you make up your mind?”  He gave her his best smile, the one that he’d been practicing on the maids.  “I would love your company for the next few days.”

The smile she gave him in return could have launched a thousand ships.

Chapter Four

The sunlight was streaming through the windows when Hind awoke, blinking in confusion as she took in her surroundings.  She was lying in a massive four-poster bed, positioned in the centre of a room that was larger than some of the Academy’s classrooms.  Just for a moment, she wondered where she was and how she’d come to be there, before remembering.  Last night, Eric - Prince Eric of the Golden City, Prince of Larkrise, Heir to the Throne of Touched – had proposed to her.  It hadn’t been a surprise – not after the Grandmaster had warned her in advance – but somehow it hadn't been real.  He’d proposed to her!

She stretched, shaking her head and allowing her blonde hair to spill down her back.  Hind rarely slept naked – it was unwise while she’d been in the Academy, or serving as a Freelance Mage – but she hadn't been able to resist the temptation of silken sheets.  Besides, she hadn't brought any proper nightwear with her and she hadn’t wanted to bother the maids with a request they found something for her.  She thought that she was reasonably safe from Eric trying to climb into her bed – he’d never been that kind of person, even as a younger man – and few others would have dared to risk her wrath.  Even though she hadn't set the wards around her bedchamber, the wards she’d worked into her own body would have required a Master Magician to undo and anyone who tried would definitely wake her up.  There might have been something odd about the wards surrounding the Golden Palace – they felt peculiar to her senses – but they seemed to be perfectly serviceable.  The Golden Palace was the safest place on Touched.  

A bird outside called to its mate and Hind smiled, pulling herself out of bed and inspecting herself in the mirror.  She looked...well enough, she decided, as she stepped over to the small table at one end of the room.  The maids had left a small selection of clothing for her there, allowing her the chance to pick and choose between several different outfits.  Hind cast her eyes down a pile of garments, some of which probably cost more than her entire earnings for the decade, and shook her head.  She didn't have any idea how to put on half of the strange clothing.  One dress, a silvery outfit that sparkled when the sunlight struck it, seemed to be designed to be impossible to don.  It took several minutes before she located her original outfit and realised that someone had cleaned it for her.  She waved her hand over it, casting an incantation to check that no one had attached any nasty surprises to her clothing, and then pulled the clothes on.  The sunlight was calling to her and she wasn’t going to spend any longer in bed.

She opened the door and stepped onto the landing, feeling her bare feet pressing against the carpet.  “Mistress,” a voice called, from behind her.  It was one of the maids.  “Surely you don’t intend to go out like that?”

Hind felt her eyes narrow at the maid’s tone.  She was loyal – the tiny spelled jewel implanted in her forehead proved that, marking her out as a person under an unbreakable loyalty spell – but clearly she was allowed to hector her superiors.  Hind had never been comfortable around servants, even the maid she was allowed as part of her Freelance Mage position, and tried to avoid having anything to do with them.  At the Academy, the building itself had taken care of all of her requirements.

“I intend to find the dining hall” – it hadn't occurred to her just how large the Golden Palace was, or how hard it would be to find anything without the building’s help – “and eat breakfast,” Hind said, trying to keep her voice level.  Some loyalty spells punished their wearers if they believed that the servant had annoyed her superior.  “Is there something wrong with what I’m wearing?”

“Oh, no, Mistress,” the maid said.  “I just thought that you would prefer to dress formally for breakfast and...”

Hind cut her off.  “No, thank you,” she said, tartly.  If this was the kind of environment that Eric had grown up in, it was a minor miracle that he wasn't a spoilt brat.  But then, his father had always been a sensible man.  “Please escort me to where I am expected to eat breakfast today.”

The maid bowed and turned, leading Hind along a long corridor and down a massive flight of stairs.  Hind followed in her wake, already regretting her harsh tone.  Loyalty spells had always sent a chill down her spine, for she knew that they could easily be abused by an unscrupulous master.  The maid had probably accepted the spell voluntarily as the price for working in the Golden Palace and that meant that it was unbreakable.  She would have no choice, but to obey any order given to her by one of the Royal Family, or their guests.  There was no way, short of examining the spell directly, to determine what limits had been placed on it by the original magician or sorcerer.

“The Breakfast Hall, Mistress,” the maid said, with another bow.  “May I be released from your service?”

Hind nodded absently, already stunned by the sight before her.  The Breakfast Hall was easily large enough to feed an army, yet there was only one table in the room, covered with small plates of food and drink.  A couple of lesser nobility glanced up at her, found her of little interest and looked away again.  Hind was almost insulted, yet she kept her peace.  Eric had agreed not to mention that she might become the Royal Consort until she actually said yes, or no.  Besides, one of the nobles was digging into a plate of sausages and only had eyes for his food.

“Hind,” a female voice said, from behind her.  “You have to be Hind, right?”

Hind turned, to see a small dark-haired girl wearing Academy robes.  She recognised Princess Eleanor from her official portraits, although the portraits had never shown just how brightly the girl smiled.  At fourteen years old, Eleanor would still be at the Academy, although the Grandmaster had clearly consented to allow her to take a few weeks off until after Midsummer’s Eve.  As the youngest child – and only daughter – of the Royal Family, Eleanor would probably be encouraged to learn as much magic as possible, even though she would probably not be allowed to become a Journeyman.  One day, she would be married off to someone for best political advantage.

“I am,” Hind said.  She had wondered how the other royals would take to her, but Eleanor seemed to have no doubts.  “I was wondering...”

“Eric is probably being dragged out of bed by a pair of burly knights,” Eleanor said, with a wink that would have gotten her whipped in some of the more conservative kingdoms.  She giggled, in the way that all younger sisters giggled at their older brothers since time out of mind.  “He should be downstairs in a few minutes.”

Hind took the seat Eleanor waved her to and accepted a bowl of oatmeal porridge from one of the servants.  Breakfast on the road as a Freelance Mage had been something of a hit-or-miss prospect, but at the Golden Palace it seemed that all breakfasts were formal.  The servants took the bowl as soon as she had finished and replaced it with a plate of bread and meat.  Eleanor chatted happily as Hind devoured the food, barely pausing long enough to notice when Eric came into the hall and ordered a massive mug of something black and steaming.  Hind took one sniff and decided to stick to fruit juice.

“I was thinking that we could go down to the city today,” Eric said, formally.  He seemed to have lost his embarrassment from the day before, although Hind had to admit that he didn't seem quite human until he had eaten and drunk his way through a large breakfast.  She couldn’t complain about that.  Her old Master had always insisted that breakfast was the most important meal of the day and had taught her to eat a proper breakfast every day she could, even threatening to whip if she failed to eat.  “The Midsummer Faire is underway and my presence is...desired.”

He grinned at her, all formality forgotten.  “And besides, the City Guard would probably be pleased to see another Master Magician,” he added.  “The usual troublemakers have turned up for the trials.”

The Golden City lay below the Golden Palace.  It was the largest city on Touched, although Hind knew that several of the cities in Azimuth came close in population density alone.  Its exact legal status was in some dispute owing to the considerable number of freemen in the city and its proximity to the Emperor’s place of power.  The city was officially governed by an elected mayor, who pledged loyalty to the Emperor each year, and both sides tried hard to avoid putting pressure on the relationship.  She was mildly surprised that the Knights of the Golden Order allowed Eric to go down to the city without a massive force of armed guardsmen, but as they headed down towards the city gates, she noted that they were followed by a surprising number of birds.  The Knights had more than a few surprises up their sleeves.

It had been a year since she had last set foot in the Golden City and it was always a pleasant surprise to discover how clean it was, compared to almost every other city and town she’d visited.  The Mayor and his Council kept the streets clean by employing men to take rubbish away from the buildings, as well as hiring a proper force of guardsmen to keep order.  They were probably stressed to the limits now, Hind knew; with the Midsummer Faire underway, their city was overrun by magic-users and hustlers.  Hind had helped her Master police one of them, years ago, and she’d been horrified by how many magical accidents – and genuine malice – had affected the local population.  The smarter natives would have sent their families out of the city if they could, knowing that they might end up being turned into toads, or worse, if a drunken magician decided to have a little fun.  The City Guard was rarely able to do anything about it.

“What a mess,” Eric said, so quietly that Hind could barely hear him.  “And they insist on doing this every year.”

Hind nodded in understanding.  The Midsummer Faire – and the Trials – provided a safety value for the magical population, even though it was – at best – unnerving for the mundane inhabitants of the city.  She caught sight of a pair of magicians wearing Master robes and hoped that they could keep a lid on the chaos, even though there were never enough Masters willing and able to patrol the city during the Midsummer Faire.  Her old master had once spent an afternoon undoing a complex spell that an unknown magician had cast on a barmaid, turning her into a monstrous old hag.  No one had ever been able to identify the magician responsible...and no one would have cared.  Unless someone was caught in the act, no one would bother to give chase, or try to bring the magician to justice.

The next hour passed slowly as Eric exchanged small talk with the Mayor and his cronies, while Hind tried hard not to look bored.  Eric seemed to be good at being diplomatic to the city’s rulers, she noted, although it wasn't something she could handle for long.  If she’d had to make small talk with them for more than a few minutes, she would have probably ended up turning them into birds.  At least then they would have sung in tune.  The Mayor seemed to be complaining about the mess, and the disturbance, but at the same time he welcomed the influx of magic.  No one could be more generous than a drunken magician.

Eventually, they freed themselves from the Mayor and were able to wander the streets.  Hind smiled at the rows of tiny stalls, each one offering a different magical product to anyone willing to put down the gold, silver or bronze coins they cost.  She opened her third eye and studied some of the products, somehow unsurprised to discover that most of them were nothing more than cons.  The mirrors that promised to turn their user into the most beautiful woman in the world were nothing more than standard mirrors, without even a tiny glamour to confuse potential buyers.  The various health potions – they promised to cope with everything from a broken heart to broken bones – were just standard potions, with barely any – if any – magic within them.  The Head of Alchemy at the Academy would have laughed his head off at any student who produced such a potion, before sending them down for a punishment duty.  

“Look at that,” Eric muttered, out of the corner of his mouth.  “Do you think those actually work?”

Hind followed his gaze towards an old crone who was rocking backwards and forwards in her chair, sometimes letting out a loud cackle that drew attention back towards her.  She was selling love potions, with a handwritten sign that promised that anyone who drank such a potion would fall in love with the first person they saw.  Hind opened her third eye again and shook her head.  The potions were nothing more than oddly tinted water.

“No,” she said flatly, unwilling to admit how disturbing the whole concept was, at least to her.  Love potions were no joke.  A real love potion could leave its victim fixated on one person, without any way of realising that they had been drugged.  Some of the simpler ones could be undone – although it was hard to convince the victim that their feelings were anything, but pure – but the stronger ones were impossible to cure.  The only way to deal with that was to swing the fixation onto something – or someone – else.  The whole concept of love potions struck her as little more than rape.  “There’s no magic in them at all.”

Leaving the old witch behind, they walked down towards the proving ground, where the Trials were slowly taking place.  On the field below them, surrounded by some of the most powerful wards Hind had ever sensed, new magicians were duelling with one another to see who was the most powerful – and adaptable.  The crowd was cheering them on indiscriminately, while bookies moved from person to person, taking bets on which magician would survive the trials and make a try for the position of Grandmaster.  Hind watched as two young magicians – wearing basic white robes, not the colourful robes of Master Magicians – threw spells at each other.  The crowd was cheering them on, but she could tell that neither of them were Master Magicians.  The odds were that neither of them would survive the Trials.

“There’s always some young idiot who wants to prove himself,” Eric said, when she pointed that out.  The crowd roared as one of the youngsters was caught by a spell he hadn't prepared for and slowly melted down into a pile of goo.  The umpires examined the remains, declared his opponent the victor, and used transport spells to move the remains somewhere else.  The victor did a victory lap around the ground that ended when the next challenger, a Master Magician, stepped into the arena.  “This isn't going to end well.”

Hind nodded, looking over at the statue that dominated the arena.  Lord Byron had been a novice magician, someone who had never been through the Academy yet had somehow picked up enough magic to consider himself an expert.  A couple of lucky wins and he’d thought that he was greater than any other magician, so he’d called out the Grandmaster himself.  The Grandmaster, having nothing to prove to a mage who hadn't even gone through the Trials, had declined the challenge, so Lord Byron had started a whispering campaign that had suggested that the Grandmaster was a coward and the Trials were rigged.  After several weeks, the Grandmaster had accepted the challenge, walked into the arena and just stood there while Lord Bryon tried time and time again to break through his wards.  Eventually, his stamina had failed, whereupon the Grandmaster had casually broken through his wards, turned him into a statue and left him mounted at one end of the arena as a warning to all comers.  No one had dared to suggest that the Trials were fixed again.

She turned and allowed Eric to lead her away from the arena, up towards some of the other displays.  A screeching racket assailed their eyes from the mermaid lake, where a dozen mermaids played a bizarre collection of instruments, terrorising everyone else.  Hind had heard that mermaid music was supposed to be good when underwater, but above the waves it was just a senseless racket.  The mermaids didn't care.  Eric spoke briefly to the mermaid leader, before moving on to the werewolves and introducing himself to their pack leader.  The werewolf-dominated kingdom of Lycanth was a strong supporter of the Empire, if only because they knew that without the Empire, humans would start hunting them down like animals.  Hind felt the hair on the back of her neck stand up as she looked into the eyes of a werewolf, but she kept her composure.  Besides, she’d killed werewolves before.

“Tell me something,” she said, as the day finally drew to a close.  “Are all your days always like this?”

Eric considered it.  “No,” he said, finally.  “Some of them are downright packed.”

Before Hind could think of a suitably cutting reply, Eleanor interrupted them.  “You received a message while you were at the Faire,” she said.  “The Oracle has said that you will be visiting her tomorrow.”

Hind blinked.  “The Oracle?”

“Yes,” Eric said.  He seemed indecently amused at her surprise.  “We’ve had one here for the last six months.  A genuine Oracle, not some fake.  And she thinks you’re going to see her.”

He winked.  “It must be something important...”

Chapter Five

It had taken hours of argument, but Hind had finally talked Eric into allowing her to visit the Oracle on her own, without escort.  He’d argued that as his potential bride she was at risk from factions within the Royal Court who might wish to do her harm, but Hind had refused his arguments.  If the Oracle had summoned her – and her alone – it would not do to offer offence.  Besides, she was a Master Magician and, wearing her robes, very few people would dare to pick a fight with her.  Those who wouldn’t would not be deterred by the Royal Guard, or even the Knights of the Golden Order.

The Street of Temples stretched from one end of the Golden City to the other, a living monument to the vast array of gods and goddesses that made up the pantheon of Touched.  The buildings ranged from the massive Temple of Solaris – glowing with golden light generated by some of the artefacts held within the building – to tiny temples that housed a handful of worshippers, praying the gods that the rest of the world had forgotten and allowed to lapse.  Hind had always found formal religion to be a distraction, but she’d prayed with her family at the family shine and remembered some of the celebrations held for the major gods.  She felt a sudden burst of homesickness as she walked down the street, nodding in passing to a pair of Master Magicians heading in the other direction, and pushed it down as hard as she could.  Even if she didn’t marry Eric, she couldn’t go back home and hope to fit in.  She belonged to a different world now.

She passed a cluster of buildings belonging to a set of gods who were, according to legend, not only siblings, but mortal enemies.  Their followers seemed to embody that hatred, although in the Golden City they normally confined that hatred to blazing sermons and the occasional bloody scuffle after dark.  Outside the Golden City, where the rule of law was weaker, the various cults didn’t hesitate to fight each other to the death, slaughtering men, women and children to exterminate their foes.  Hind had seen the aftermath of one particularly bloody raid and it had left a lifelong impression on her.  The men and women in blood red cloaks would never have any impact on her children, not if she could help it.

Outside the temples, hundreds of street preachers sang the praises of this god or that, trying to convince the tourists that their god was the greatest of all gods.  Hind paused to watch a miracle worker show off some of the powers his god had granted him and smiled when he lost control of the flames and burned himself with his own magic.  The tourists loved it, of course; everyone in the continent tried to make at least one visit to the Golden City, for where else could they see such sights?  They even believed that the streets were paved with gold.  That rumour, at least, had no basis in truth, luckily for the city.  Some enterprising Mayor would have dug them up and sold them to make a profit.

She smiled and walked onwards towards the single building at the end of the street.  Unlike the other buildings, there were no preachers outside, only a single sign written in the Old Tongue.  Hind could read it vaguely, but few of the tourists could have hoped to understand, let alone speak it.  The sign for Oracle was followed by warning signs, informing supplicants that the Oracle was only open for business after noon and anyone who tried to come in early would be pushed away by the wards.  They were strong wards too, Hind noted, although few would dare to try to break into the temple.  An Oracle wasn’t supposed to take part in the political game, but Hind knew of stories where an Oracle had worked to influence events, always against someone who had annoyed her.  No one wanted to risk irritating even a young and unformed Oracle.

Hind smiled and stepped up to the wards, allowing them to flow over her.  It seemed that she was expected – unsurprising, with an Oracle involved – for the wards seemed to move back, allowing her into the courtyard.  There were no guards stationed outside, which suggested that the Oracle and her Sages were very confident in their defences, and no one moved to bar her passage as she stepped through the darkened door.  Inside, a wave of cool air struck her in the face, something that she suspected cooled down angry supplicants.  An Oracle had to stay one step ahead of everyone else.

“Mistress Hind,” a voice said.  “Welcome to the Temple of the Oracle Kuralla.”

Hind bowed as the Sage stepped into view.  He was a middle-aged man wit a long brown beard, wearing the dark robes of a Sage.  A cluster of tiny badges on his chest marked out a series of awards, including combat and medical spells.  The Order of the Sages was dedicated to identifying and protecting Oracles and no one ever crossed them twice.  They were devoted to their charges and would happily die to protect them.  Hind had heard that they were celibate and would remain so until they were released from service.  That typically only happened after they had grown old.

“You are expected,” the Sage continued.  He had a pompous voice that reminded Hind of some of her tutors, although she did note that the Sage hadn’t relaxed in her presence.  It was extremely difficult to fool an Oracle, but the limitations the gods had placed on their very rare magic meant that it was possible.  A very determined attacker might be able to get through the wards and assault his charge.  “If you would come with me…”

He turned and swept into the inner chamber before Hind could respond, forcing her to follow him.  The interior of the temple was much as she had imagined, combining a surprising amount of luxury with the drab existence of a student.  The entire temple was geared towards the young woman sitting in the throne at one end of the room, a young woman – Hind realised in a moment of surprise – who couldn’t be much older than Eleanor, if at all.  Kuralla had frizzy brown hair, a very wide smile…and eyes that were older than her body.  One day, Hind was sure, she would be beautiful, but for the moment she looked like a girl who was slowly growing into her teens.

“Hind,” Kuralla said.  She had the voice of someone who wasn't sure that they belonged where they were.  “Welcome to my temple!”

She jumped off the throne and advanced on Hind, holding out a hand for Hind to clasp.  “Don’t worry,” she said, chattering away to the Sage.  “The Oracle of Ars used to greet people by hugging them, while the Oracle of Thyme used to hide herself away behind a veil and insist that all of her supplicants came towards her naked and alone.  I can at least shake their hands.”

Hind frowned, with the uncomfortable feeling that she’d entered into a conversation that had been going on long before she had arrived.  Oracles were supposed to follow strict protocol, but no Oracle in history had ever followed protocol exactly, with so many different examples that no one knew for sure what was protocol.  Their magic was very rare – only one or two Oracles appeared in each generation – and was subject to its own limitations.  The Sages had their work cut out for them.

“So, you’re going to marry the Prince,” Kuralla said, as she waved the Sage out of the room.  She sat down on the floor and motioned for Hind to sit facing her.  “I have Seen that you will marry him, but all of the visions have been…vague and imprecise.  We are standing at a point where everything will change and your decisions will determine the future of Touched.”

Hind frowned.  “My choice, if I marry Eric or not, will determine the future of Touched?”

“Oh, not that choice silly,” Kuralla proclaimed, with a big smile.  She managed a child-like giggle that was somehow not at odds with her appearance.  “You’ve already made up your mind, even if you don’t want to admit it to yourself.  I’m talking about later choices.  One of them is going to determine the future of Touched.”

“I see,” Hind said.  It was a lie and she knew, by her smile, that Kuralla knew that it was a lie.  “And what have you Seen?”

Kuralla leaned forward, as if they were old friends sharing a confidence.  “It doesn’t work that way,” Kuralla said.  “I have to Show you what I have Seen.  Will you link hands with me?”

She held out a hand.  Hind hesitated, thinking hard.  There were only a handful of classes on Oracles and their magic at the Academy because they were so rare and never went to the Academy once they came into their magic.  What she did know wasn't encouraging.  An Oracle could see a glimpse of the future, but without any context or understanding of the meaning behind the vision.  Their visions could change depending on what choices people made – many perfectly genuine Oracles had had plenty of visions that had never come true – but it wasn't uncommon for a vision to remain a puzzle until after it had taken place.  Few magicians were comfortable around Oracles.  They claimed that they had a dangerous effect on reality itself.

Kuralla was still holding out her hand.  “It’s going to be fine,” she said, as if reassurance was what Hind wanted.  “Take my hand.”

Hind braced herself and took the young girl’s hand in hers.  A moment later, the visions started to flicker through her head, like riding on an uncontrollable horse.  The mental magical discipline had never been her best, but she knew the basics – all Master Magicians were expected to know the basics of all disciplines – and her training allowed her to remain calm.  It wasn't real, not yet…which didn’t alter the fact that an unprepared magician could be killed by mental communication.  Hind had heard enough horror stories to know that the magic could easily turn on its user.  Her head spun…

…She was standing on a stone floor, watching in horror as blood dripped down around her.  A man she didn’t recognise was standing in front of her, lifting his blade for the kill.  She tried to focus on the knife he carried – it was a strange weapon to assault a magician – but it twisted out of focus, as if it wasn't really there.  The man lunged towards her with his blade…

…Eric took her in his arms and held her close, kissing her on her lips before allowing his fingers to trail down her shirt.  No, it wasn't Eric, it was someone else and the grip was suddenly becoming painful.  Cold icy hands clawed at her and she found herself reaching for magic, but it slithered away from her…

…A naked woman wearing nothing, but a strange necklace spoke to her, whispering words of great power that she couldn’t quite hear.  She was safe, and yet somehow she was in terrible danger.  A bubbling pool of warm water was calling to her, demanding her attention…

…A man she vaguely recognised was standing on a stone altar, lifting his hand to cast an incantation that would somehow change the world.  She lunged forward, trying to stop him, but her legs refused to move and she crashed to the floor…

…She saw a castle burning, a series of visions shifting so rapidly that she couldn’t tell if it was one castle or many castles.  Great beasts hung in the air, taunting her as they poured fire down onto their targets.  Flames leapt from house to house while the population below panicked, but there was nowhere to run…

…She was falling from a great distance and she was so very tired.  Everything seemed to blur…and then Eric caught her, holding her in his arms.  She felt his warmth and relaxed into sleep…

…A golden ring sat on her finger; a golden crown sat on her head.  She looked over to see Eric and saw him looking back at her.  He wore a matching outfit…

…Very tired, she looked down at the baby in her arms.  It was her child, yet somehow she knew that something was very wrong.  It wasn't her child…

Hind broke free, the force of her shock throwing her backwards onto the carpeted floor.  She was sweating all over, as if she’d been panicking or worse.  It was all she could do to keep herself together.  Her head felt as if it was threatening to explode, with images of visions she hadn’t seen – and yet had seen – pounding through her skull.  Kuralla held out a hand and placed it on Hind’s shoulder, but she flinched away, unwilling to risk seeing more visions.  The last one had shocked her more than words could express.

“You knew,” Hind accused, as she pulled herself to her feet.  It wasn't hard to become annoyed with the Oracle, not now that she knew that the Oracle was a young girl.  “You knew what I would see.”

“I knew some of it,” Kuralla admitted.  She looked suitably repentant for a second, and then brightened up.  “I don’t just see visions involving you.  I see visions involving everyone.  All of history seems to be focused around you.”

“So you said,” Hind said, impatiently.  “How many of those visions are going to come true?”

Kuralla shook her head.  “I have no way of knowing,” she said.  “The Sages tell me that I will learn more with practice, but I don’t think that I will ever grow more precise.”

Hind nodded.  Kuralla was doomed to remain in her gilded cage for the rest of her life, now that the Sages had tested her and certified her as a real Oracle.  Divination was normally the territory of hedge witches – their successes were the work of random chance, rather than anything else – and there were legions of frauds in the game.  It was an easy way to make money, at least for a short period of time, but a real Oracle couldn’t be allowed to live like that.  Kuralla would remain under their control to help keep the balance of power.  

“I see visions that don’t seem to mean anything,” Kurilla continued.  “Some just seem to be visions of the distant past, or perhaps possible futures.”  Her tone softened slightly.  “It’s quite possible that everything you saw today will never come true.”

“Thank you,” Hind said.  She didn’t envy anyone who developed Oracle powers.  The gift of glimpses of the future brought with it the curse of knowing that not everything an Oracle foresaw could be prevented.  Her tutors had used to debate the many issues behind Oracles; if they saw visions of the future, were they gazing into one single future or many possible futures, in many possible worlds.  Some of them had even gone so far as to speculate that every vision did come true – in one possible world.  Hind privately considered that to be rank speculation.  There was only one world and no way to undo the past.

She changed the subject hastily.  “How did you end up here?”

Kurilla smiled.  “I started having visions back when I had my first blood,” she said, with a blush.  “I thought I was going mad!  Eventually, the Sages arrived, tested me and took me with them to the Golden City.  And here I remain.”  She smiled again.  Hind guessed that there was more to the story than Kurilla was willing to admit.  “Uncle Hinkarilin and Uncle Laraneth take good care of me, but I get bored.  Please tell me about some of your adventures…”

Hind smiled back and started to tell Kurilla about a handful of her smaller adventures.  A couple of them Kurilla already knew about, although she’d only heard tales from some of her visitors.  It was customary to pay an Oracle in stories and Kurilla, it seemed, had taken full advantage of the tradition.  She probably knew more of what was going on than anyone else, even the Emperor himself.  Between what she was told and her visions, she would have a complete picture of what was going to happen.

“There is a great deal of trouble brewing over the patents of nobility,” Kurilla said suddenly.  “You may have to watch your back.”

Hind questioned her for a few minutes, but Kurilla knew little else.  It was easy to sense her frustration at how her powers only provided limited glimpses into reality, rather than a clear and concise look into the future.  Eventually, the Sage entered and gently reminded the Oracle that it was almost Noon and the first line of supplicants was already forming outside the temple.  

“I will come back soon,” Hind promised, at Kurilla’s half-pleading look. The Oracle wouldn’t get many visitors who didn’t want something from her.  “You’ll see me again soon enough.”

Kurilla gave her an odd look, as if she knew something Hind didn’t, and said nothing.

Outside, the air was ringing with preachers calling the faithful to pray.  Hind smiled at the things of tourists making their way towards the temples…and then stopped.  Just for a second, she’d caught sight of a man wearing the robes of a pilgrim.  There was nothing special in that, but she’d recognised him from her days at the Academy.  Master Reginald had been one of the most obnoxious students the Academy had ever had.  He would have been expelled if his father had been a commoner.

Now, that’s odd, Hind thought, as she turned to walk in the other direction.  Perhaps she’d been mistaken, but a good memory was a requirement for a magician and she was sure that she hadn’t been mistaken at all.  The face was older, sharper, but no less recognisable.  Why would Reginald be here?

Chapter Six

Duke Herod, as befitted the Lord of Azimuth, had inherited one of the largest mansions in the Golden City.  The First Emperor had ordered that all of his subordinate nobles build themselves mansions within his new city and they had competed to build the largest and most luxurious apartments for themselves, showing off their wealth and power to their peers.  It had taken them several years to realise that the First Emperor – who was no fool – had intended to distract them from making any bids for his power by pushing them into a pointless competition.  Herod had to admire the man’s political skill, even as he despised his legacy.

He stood up and greeted the four men who entered his private chambers, noting that they had passed through his wards without sounding any alarms.  The Emperor would have his spy rings seeded throughout the city – everyone who was anyone would have tried to plant spies and agents everywhere they could – but he was fairly confident in his own defences.  The mansion was secured by some of the most powerful wards money could buy, protecting him against both unwanted intruders and spying spells that would have revealed his plans.  The sorcerers who had secured his mansion had sworn that the wards might not be completely impregnable – no ward was completely impregnable, even if an attacker had to batter it down with sheer force – but they would definitely warn him if someone was on the verge of breaking in.  His servants were all under the strictest of loyalty spells, ones they had accepted willingly for the honour of serving the Lord of Azimuth.  His security was as tight as he could make it.

There was no way to disguise the comings and goings of some of the men of noble blood – and even, although it pained him to see them, the richer trader families – but even that would pass unnoticed.  The Lords were expected to visit each other and play host to countless parties – another way to keep them from considering schemes to upset the balance of power – and no one would have been surprised to see every Lord in the city passing through his gates.  Herod had no love for parties and disliked even the concept of the Midsummer Faire, but they served a useful purpose.  Even the Grand Dames, who seemed to believe that he would cheerfully accept one of their daughters in marriage, could be used for his own purposes.  It only required a little imagination.

“It’s good to see that you all made it here successfully,” he said, as they took their seats.  Powerful wards shimmered into existence, adding a further layer of security to their meeting.  It was probably overkill, but one thing Herod’s father had hammered into his head was that failure to take precautions, even extreme precautions, led to disaster.  And, given what he’d done to get as far as he had, a fall in power would lead rapidly and inevitably to his execution.  Even a Duke couldn’t hope to get away with what he’d done.  He pushed the thought aside and turned to the first man.

“General,” he said.  “I trust that all the troops are positioned safely?”

General Sayrald bowed his head.  He wore the drab outfit of a low-ranking trader, but no one who saw him walking would mistake him for anything, but a soldier.  General Sayrald had commanded Herod’s private guard for longer than anyone cared to remember and had shown himself to be completely trustworthy.  Only the General, and Herod himself, knew why he was so devoted to the Lord of Azimuth, but it was a very real devotion.

“They are all in position,” the General said, his face twisting into a smile.  The soldiers had prepared endlessly for their mission, but even the smallest of mishaps could have revealed their presence and then all hell would break loose, perhaps literally.  “I do not believe that their presence is suspected.”

Herod smiled, humourlessly.  The compacts that bound the Empire together forbade the Emperor to raise a large army of his own, apart from the private army in Larkrise, his own ancestral lands.  The Royal Guard and the Knights of the Golden Order were all the fighting men the Emperor could call on in a hurry, although given time he would probably be able to convince others to flock to his banner.  All of the other Lords, even the Crown Prince himself, were forbidden to bring any of their soldiers – apart from a tiny honour guard – within fifty miles of the Golden City.  Even asking permission to bring an army through the Golden City could be considered a declaration of war against the Emperor.

The solution had been simple enough.  There were always tens of thousands of visitors – ranging from traders to pure tourists – thronging their way towards the Golden City before Midsummer’s Eve.  Herod had slipped his men into the region in small groups, bunking them with friends or allies within the city, or positioning them out in the forest.  No one knew it, but he had managed to conceal three thousand of his best soldiers within striking distance of the city, while another ten thousand waited on the border.  It was the most sizable army in the region, all the more so because no one knew that it existed.  Three thousand soldiers would be more than enough to seize the entire city – the City Guard was hardly a defence force worthy of the name – but they couldn’t take the Golden Palace.  The defences around the Palace were formidable, formidable enough to stymie Herod’s father and prevent him from considering a strike against the Emperor.  It had taken Herod and his experiments into dark and forbidden magic to understand how the defences worked…and how they could be taken down from the inside.  He was quite proud of his solution, even though it would expose him to more than a little personal risk.

“That doesn’t mean that the Grandmaster doesn’t know,” Master Reginald pointed out.  The Master Magician’s thin sallow face peered out from the black hood he wore.  He had insisted on donning his robes as soon as he was inside the mansion, ignoring quiet suggestions that there was no need to dress for the meeting.  For Reginald, the whole purpose of magician’s robes was to wear them, and show off his status to the world.  “The interfering old bastard might have spied your preparations and warned the Emperor.”

“And then we would all be in jail now, or dead,” Herod pointed out.  The Emperor wasn't so foolish as to allow a known enemy to bring an army in under his nose…if he had the slightest idea that that army existed.  Allowing the army to continue to form might have risked losing anyway, after the battle began.  “I believe that the Grandmaster is…unlikely to take a side in the coming unpleasantness.”

He smiled.  It had been years since he had been at the Academy himself, but he’d known many of the Heads of Disciplines personally.  A couple had even been willing to open discussions with him, although he’d kept his statements and promises vague.  When he was Emperor, and could appoint his own Castellan, those who supported him openly would be rewarded.  Several of them were lesser sons of noble blood, chafing against the restraints the Grandmaster placed on them.  And the Grandmaster, for all of his power, was just a man.  He could be beaten.

Reginald changed the subject with a muttered oath.  “I saw Mistress Hind at the temples today,” he said, coldly.  “I do not believe that she saw me.  Is she really going to be the Royal Consort?”

Herod smiled at the disdain in Reginald’s tone.  He hadn’t shared any classes with Hind – he shouldn’t have had, unless he’d been kept back a year – but unless he missed his guess, there was a very personal grudge deep within the young magician.  Reginald was almost as capable and knowledgeable as he thought he was, yet he had no sense of subtlety or self-restraint.   The only thing that kept him in line was fear of Herod’s anger and the promise of vast power opening up in front of them…if they kept their nerve.  Striking early would be almost as disastrous as striking too late.

“So far, the Emperor has made no announcement,” he said, finally.  “I believe that he will make a statement before the House of Lords tomorrow, or perhaps Mistress Hind will be pushed to one side and another commoner bitch will be brought in to take her place.”

“Of course she will take it,” Reginald burst out.  “Why, the commoner bitches wouldn’t hesitate to take the chance to become Royal Consort, if it were offered.”

“Perhaps,” the General said.  “Or perhaps she fears the loss of her independence.”

Reginald leered.  “She’s in for a surprise them, isn’t she?”

Herod nodded.  Once they had secured power – total power – they would move rapidly to eliminate all of the commoners in positions of power; traders, freemen…and magicians.  Hind would either die on Midsummer’s Eve with the rest of the Royal Court, or die later when she and her fellow commoner magicians were hunted down and exterminated.  And then they could reshape Touched itself to their heart’s content.

“It is unwise to count one’s chickens before they hatch,” Lord Galen said, calmly.  “We must not allow our contempt for our enemies to blind us.  The plan will only work if we take them completely by surprise.”

“Correct,” Herod said.  He stood up and paced around the massive chamber.  “Reginald, I expect you to assemble the sorcerers on the day before Midsummer’s Eve and get them into position.  General, have the first body of troops move into their positions at the same time.  Once the wards go down, we will have to move fast to secure the Golden Palace before the Royal Guard can put together a conventional defence and try to delay us.  Lord Galen…I trust that you have been practicing with the spells I gave you?”

Lord Galen nodded, once.  “Yes, Your Excellency,” he said, formally.  He was a lesser Lord and would die a lesser Lord, unless he took the opportunity that Herod had dangled in front of his nose.  Few would have had the determination and skill to play his role in the proceedings, but Lord Galen was a skilled hunter and warrior.  He would play his part or die trying.  “My people and I are ready to proceed with the plan.”

“Good,” Herod said.  He glanced from face to face, his eyes coming to rest on Reginald.  “And now, all we have to do is wait for our moment to strike.  I expect that each of you will keep that in mind.  If there is a single leak, we’re all going to die.”

And he smiled, concealing his own thoughts.  He had no doubts about the General, and Lord Galen knew the value of patience, but Reginald was a problem.  The young mage was ambitious and headstrong.  He’d even wanted to fight in the Trials until Herod had firmly nixed that idea.  If someone had seen him and asked the wrong questions…after all, whatever Reginald had done to earn banishment from the Academy’s post-graduation programs, it had to have been something dreadful.

He shook his head, dismissing the thought.  Once, the Lords of Azimuth had been wealthy and powerful beyond the dreams of avarice.  And, when his plans reached the final stage, they would be wealthy, powerful and in sole control of Touched.  The prize was definitely worth the risk.

***
Hind composed herself as best as she could when she returned to the Golden Palace.  After leaving the Oracle, she’d visited the Faire and watched a handful of the bouts between different Master Magicians.  None of them looked as if they were going to unseat the Grandmaster, but Hind knew from experience that sometimes the unqualified magicians could be the most dangerous.  There was no rule forcing magicians to compete in the Trials and it wasn't unknown to discover a more powerful magician hidden away somewhere, refusing to show his power.

Eric didn’t meet her at the gates, much to her private relief.  Her head was spinning with ideas and thoughts, tempting her and challenging her, even as she dreaded some of the darker visions she’d been shown.  They’d be happy together – she’d pulled that lesson from most of the visions – and they might even have a child.  No, they would have a child; both of them had magic in their blood and knew basic self-healing.  There was no reason why they should not be able to have a child, or why the child should not be healthy.  There was no reason why they shouldn’t have quite a few children.  Eric would definitely be a good father.

But did she love him?  She rolled the question around and around in her mind, barely aware of the servants helping her out of her clothes and into a formal gown for dinner.  Eric was…nice, and she liked him, and she remembered the feel of his lips on hers in the vision.  They had much in common, yet they were not completely alike.  And, she had to admit, he was handsome.  If she had to marry someone – and it was generally assumed that female commoner magicians would marry someone of higher status, if only to improve their bloodlines – she could do worse than Eric.  He knew it too.

She opened her eyes long enough to take in the dress and try to object, but she should have known better.  A formal ball required more than standard magician’s garb; indeed, it would have been regarded as scandalous.  The maid’s had dressed her in a long flowing green dress that set off her blonde hair nicely and had even washed and dried her hair for her, before placing a flower into her hair.  A knock on the door announced Eric’s arrival and she had to smile at his expression.  He looked almost as if she’d knocked him on the head.

“Ah,” he said, coughing as he remembered himself.  “Would you do me the honour of allowing me to escort you to the ball?”

Hind smiled, as daintily as she could.  “I would be delighted,” she said, and allowed him to take her hand.  She made her voice as airy as possible.  “I’m sure that we will have such a good time.”

And they did.  Eric partnered her for the first four dances, before passing her off to a younger Lord who danced in a slightly different style, who in turn traded her to one of the traders.  The trader was actually interesting to talk to, unlike the first Lord; he’d made his money honestly and intended to make more, after rising to the nobility.  The Emperor’s plans to expand the nobility, according to him, would eventually enrich the whole of Touched.  Hind, who remembered what the Oracle had said, shivered at his words.  It might not work out as well as he hoped.

Eventually, at her request, Eric led her out of the ballroom and into the library, where she removed her shoes and rubbed her feet.  “I’m sorry,” she said, sincerely.  “It’s been too long since I danced in public and my feet are killing me.”

“Mine too,” Eric admitted.  They shared a grin.  “Every time I get out on the dance floor, I have to keep reminding myself that running a few of the other dancers through with my sword would probably not be the most diplomatic thing I could do.”

Hind laughed, put her feet back on the ground and looked up at him.  “Eric,” she said, slowly, feeling butterflies rising up inside her stomach.  She felt vulnerable, but it was almost a good kind of vulnerable.  Hind pushed on before she lost the ability to speak.  “Do you want to marry me?”

Eric blushed.  “Hind,” he said slowly, “I like you.  I care about you.  I think I could be a good husband to you.  I think that we could build a good relationship together.  I think that yes, I do want to marry you…”

His voice had broken down into a stammer.  Hind smiled at him, trying to show him that it would be all right.  “I know,” she said, and held out a hand, pulling him down onto the sofa beside her.  “I think we can make it work.”

Eric’s face lit up into a grin.  “You’re saying yes?”

“I think you’re meant to ask me first,” Hind pointed out, with a wink.  Eric’s blush grew brighter.  “Aren’t you going to ask?”

Eric slipped off the sofa and knelt in front of her.  “Hind,” he said, formally, “will you do me the honour of accepting my hand in marriage?”

Hind smiled down at him.  “Of course I will,” she said, and helped him to his feet.  A moment later, their lips were touching and he kissed her.  It sent shivers down her spine as she returned the kiss.  When he finally let go of her, she didn’t want it to end.  “I think…”

Eric’s face flushed again.  He’d probably had the same thought.

“We’ll have to tell my father,” he said, bursting into another grin.  “We’ll have to organise the wedding on Midsummer’s Day.  That’s just three weeks away.  The servants will have to work harder.  We’ll have to…”

Hind broke him off by pulling him down for another kiss.  “It’s all right,” she whispered, as they kissed again.  “We will have time enough for that afterwards.”

Afterwards, lying in her bed, Hind felt as if she wanted to go back to the dance floor and dance all night.  They couldn’t go all the way, not until they were married, but even kissing alone had opened up all kinds of feelings in her body.  The tingling running down her spine and over her lips where he’d kissed her…

She almost couldn’t wait for the wedding.

Chapter Seven

It had been years since Eric had set foot in the Bloodlines Chamber, but the room seemed to welcome him, the hidden wards concealed in the surrounding walls humming a greeting to the Prince.  His father had told him, on the day he’d become a man, that the Bloodlines Chamber was the key to the subtle and complex gifts that ran in the Emperor’s Bloodline, the gifts that enabled them to rule.  The Chamber would reject anyone who didn’t share the Bloodline and kill them if they tried to return to the Chamber, or so his father had told him.  He had been careful not to tell Eric that little fact until Eric had stepped through the wards for the first time.

“Father,” he said, in surprise.  The summons had been delivered by a maid, who’d told Eric where to go and then left him.  His father was working, with his own hands, on a small table.  A handful of magical artefacts and tools were scattered around the table, allowing him to work without needing to break his concentration.  Eric, who had never realised that this father had any sort of aptitude for Alchemy, could only stare.  “You called for me?”

Emperor Haled looked up at his son.  He was a tall powerful man, with a long beard and bright red hair, but the hair was starting to go grey at the edges.  No one outside his family would know, not as long as there was magic running through his veins, yet Eric knew…and it chilled him.  The thought of a life without his father, the kind yet stern man who had taught him how to be a Prince, was somehow unthinkable.  And yet, despite his hopes, he knew that one day he would have to face such a life.

“I did, Eric,” the Emperor said.  “What do you make of this?”

He held up a bowl of clear water.  At the bottom, cooling rapidly, lay two golden rings.  They seemed almost normal, but Eric could feel the magic shimmering around them, magic that seemed almost linked to him.  The rings were calling to him and his hand was halfway towards the bowl when his father coughed.

“They’re magic,” he said, in surprise.  “What are they?”

His father didn’t answer directly.  “I trust that you and Hind have been watching your step,” he said.  It wasn't a question.  The complex wards woven into the Golden Palace would allow the Emperor to watch whoever – or whatever – he wanted to watch.  Eric had known that they would be under some supervision, but he hadn’t wanted to know just what his father had seen.  “You know, of course, that there are gifts within our bloodline that are not present in other bloodlines.”

Eric nodded impatiently.  “Many of those gifts are tied to our families,” the Emperor said.  “Others are tied directly to our state of being.  And, most importantly of all, some are tied to our blood.  The blood of any living creature has a magical use, but the blood of a magician is the most potent of all.  And, of all of those, the blood of the Emperor’s Bloodline is the most powerful in the world.  Sometimes the overt gifts are weak, or perhaps don’t even exist, but the subtle gifts are always there.”

He poured the bowl over his workbench and nodded towards the two rings.  “One of these is for you,” he said.  “Like my father, and his father, and all of the Emperors back until the First Emperor, I have produced your wedding rings with my bare hands.  I have used the finest gold and mixed them with blood; yours and hers.  You will discover that they will trigger some of your gifts.”

Eric stared at the rings, trying to keep his face composed.  It wasn't easy.  He had never realised that his father had any Alchemical training, beyond what he would have picked up at the Academy.  Alchemy, the discipline of infusing magic into potions and even objects, was the most complex discipline in the world.

“I will teach you some of the basics,” his father said, anticipating Eric’s thoughts.  “Once you and Hind wear the rings, you will discover that you are always…aware of one another, able to speak together without being overheard.  It has its advantages from time to time.”

The Emperor grinned.  “You will be amazed to discover that when I used to send my wife, your late mother, on diplomatic missions before you were born, I was always in contact with her.  It’s quite easy to block most magical communication, but not this.  The secret has been passed down from generation to generation.  When you become Crown Prince, I will educate you in all of the secrets.  You will learn secrets that thousands have died to keep hidden.”

“Yes, sir,” Eric said.  “I thank you.”

“Not yet, son,” his father said.  He stood up and stared down at the rings for a long moment, before turning and striding towards another door, hidden within the stone walls of the chamber.  “You know about the three Great Swords?”

“I learned about them at the Academy,” Eric said.  His father pressed his hand against the stone door and opened it, waving him through into a smaller chamber.  “I know that one of them is lost…”

“Perhaps for good,” his father said.  He waved a hand in the air and a light shone down from high above, illuminating a stone anvil and a sword hilt emplaced within the stone.  “Shadow is lost, perhaps forever.  Soulfire I wear on state occasions.  And Morningstar…Morningstar is right in front of you.”

Eric barely heard him.  There were thousands of legends surrounding the Great Swords, thousands of tales…and here one of them was, right in front of him.  His father’s casual comment about wearing one barely registered with him.  The older a magical artefact was, the greater its power and the Great Swords dated back further than the Empire.  The oldest legend surrounding them claimed that Solaris himself had forged them with the heat of the sun and presented them to his first human children.

“Morningstar is given to the Crown Prince, who wields it until he becomes Emperor,” his father said, finally.  “Once you become Emperor, I will give you Soulfire and you will return Morningstar to the stone, until the day when your son steps up to become Crown Prince.  Now…take the sword.”

Eric stepped forward, feeling as if his third eye was being wrenched open.  He’d never developed his Sight properly, but he barely needed it to see the shimmering magic surrounding Morningstar.  He couldn’t understand how his father had been able to wear the other Great Sword without the entire Royal Court knowing what he was wearing, unless the sword chose to hide its true nature from the courtiers.  Eric reached out, barely aware of his own actions, and clasped the sword in his hand.  A moment later, Morningstar slid out of the stone and shimmered in the air.  It felt as if he was wielding a weapon made out of light.  History itself seemed to be pressing down on him.  The Great Swords had built and toppled kingdoms before they’d been used to help build the Empire.

“Put it in the scabbard,” his father said.  It seemed almost impossible to let go of the sword, but somehow he managed to slide it into the scabbard and buckle it on his belt.  “How are you feeling now, son?”

Eric blushed.  He was old enough to marry and have children and his father could still make him feel like a tiny child.  “Nervous,” he admitted.  “What happens if the ceremony goes wrong?”

“Heads will roll,” the Emperor said, flatly.  He marched back into the other chamber, picked up the two rings and carefully placed them into a pair of jewelled boxes.  “You can relax for a few hours before you exchange vows and then you can go off on honeymoon and really get to know one another.”

Eric blushed.  “Father, I…”

His father laughed.  “Do you really think,” he asked, “that I didn’t feel the same way when I married your mother?”  He clapped Eric on the shoulder companionably.  “If you learn nothing else from me, learn this; Hind is not a toy, nor a pet, nor is she something you can discard at any moment.  Listen to her, understand her and she will be able to help you in ways you can barely imagine.  Treat her well and your marriage will be long and happy; treat her poorly and you might discover that she turns on you, or your children grow to hate the very sight of their father.  You’ll make mistakes, of course, and so will she.  With respect – and simple conversation – you will get through them and survive.”

Eric nodded slowly, wondering when his father had become such a wise man.  “Thank you,” he said, finally.  “Why…?”

“Children,” his father said.  He rolled his eyes.  “Every generation always thinks that it has discovered something new when it loses its innocence.”

He clapped Eric on the shoulder again.  “Now,” he said, “get up to your rooms and start dressing for the ceremony.  If you think that Midsummer’s Eve is going to be bad, just wait until you hit Midsummer’s Day.”

Eric shivered.  On Midsummer’s Eve, Hind and he would exchange the first set of vows; on Midsummer’s Day, they would be formally married.  And, as much as he was looking forward to being able to lie with his wife, the prospect scared him as much as it enticed him.

“Go,” his father ordered.

Eric went.

***
Hind awakened slowly, one hand reaching out towards the other side of the bed.  There was no one there, of course.  Eric had blushed deeply at the very thought of sex, but one of the Ladies of the Court had explained that the couple couldn’t do more than kiss until they were married…and had taken to sleeping in the antechamber to keep the two apart.  She seemed to tell Hind that once a day, in-between some frank talk that would have shocked Hind’s mother and probably made Eric faint.

“Good Morning, Mistress Hind,” one of the maids said.  Hind came fully awake to see no less than four maids standing in her chamber.  She kept her face blank with an effort, but silently cursed under her breath.  A month of living in peaceful surroundings had done nothing good for her awareness of what was going on around her.  The maids could have driven knives into her before she was even aware that they were there.  They were all bound under loyalty spells, of course, but Hind was more aware than most that any spell had limitations.  “We have been sent to make you presentable for Midsummer’s Eve.”

Hind scowled, but the maids refused to be deterred.  One of them helped her out of bed and led her over to the bathroom, where a great steaming bath awaited her.  Hind was helped into the bath – it seemed that she wasn't going to be allowed to do anything for herself, even if she tried to argue with the maids – and pressed into the water.  One of the other maids knelt behind her and started to clean her hair, while the other two took her hands and started to work on her nails.  Hind normally used basic spells to keep her hair clean and tidy, but as the maid worked on it, she found herself relaxing into the water.  It seemed that every last part of her body was going to be scrubbed clean before the maids finally relented and allowed her to stand up, before they started dressing her in silken undergarments.  Hind wanted to protest before they added the first wedding gown – it seemed that Royal Consorts had to say their vows in purple gowns – but it was too late.  A tiny fraction of the material in the dress, sold at market rates, could have kept an entire commoner family fed for over a year.  The waste appalled her, but it was tradition and even the Emperor couldn’t buck tradition.

“You love lovely, Mistress,” one of the maids said, finally.  Hind stared at her reflection in the mirror.  She looked rather like a woman who had been covered in plum juice, at least in her opinion.  Fashion was definitely not going to be something that she would ever understand.  And the maid, loyalty spell or no loyalty spell, was clearly a liar.  “You look just right for the Prince.”

Hind snorted.  “And what did Prince Eric do to annoy you?”

The maid let that sally pass.  “Once you have eaten breakfast, you will be escorted to the antechamber where you will wait until the ceremony begins,” she said.  “The Emperor will call you and the Prince into the chamber and present you with the rings, which you will exchange…”

“I know,” Hind said, with some asperity.  She’d hoped for a simple wedding, but the Emperor and his Court had lined up a week of celebrations.  On Midsummer’s Eve – today – they would exchange rings, after Eric had been confirmed as Crown Prince.  On Midsummer’s Day, they would complete their vows…and then there would be a week of parties and tournaments before they were finally allowed to slip off to Larkrise for a honeymoon.  The Emperor and the Ladies of the Court had drilled her in the proceedings so much that she felt that she could have gone through it in her sleep.  “Now, just let me prepare myself in my own way.”

The maid bowed and stepped back, allowing Hind to study herself in the mirror again.  Her first impression of the dress hadn’t changed, but at least she wouldn’t have to wear it for the second part of the ceremony.  She could change into something that suited her body a little better, or so she told herself.  It seemed that the only people who had no say in the conduct of the wedding were the bride and groom.

“I’m ready,” she said, finally.  The butterflies in her stomach refused to fade.  She was marrying Eric, a man she knew and liked, perhaps even loved, but she was still nervous.  She would almost sooner have faced a rogue demon or a vampire.  “You’d better take me to the chamber before I lose my nerve.”

***
Herod braced himself as the small procession reached the outer edge of the wards surrounding the Golden Palace.  They were the most formidable wards in the world, apart from the ones surrounding the Academy, and normally they would have provided all the defences that the palace could possibly require.  Their presence had baffled his father and prevented him – and probably most of the other Lords – from scheming too openly against the Emperor, for no one knew how they were generated or controlled.  It had taken years of research before Herod had figured out the truth and worked out how to counter the wards and eventually bring them down.  If he hadn’t been so close to the Throne, it would have been impossible.  The magicians who had built the Golden Palace – using magical tricks that had been forgotten over the years – had been very clever magicians.  It was almost a shame to ruin their work.

The wards seemed to drift over him, but nothing happened.  No wave of magic blocked his path, or held him frozen until the Royal Guard could investigate.  He kept walking, chafing slightly against the servant’s outfit he wore, smiling inwardly.  Ahead of him, one of his most loyal servants walked in his form, cloaked in a spell that would make it impossible for anyone to tell that he wasn’t Herod.  The wards might have picked up on the simple illusion spell surrounding the servant, who had his own role in the plot, but Herod had gambled that they wouldn’t.  He would have been surprised if most of the Court didn’t use illusion spells to hide their true features.  Even the Emperor wouldn’t be able to convince them to drop them for the ceremony.

He smiled again as he saw the other Lords and Ladies as they entered the Golden Palace.  Everyone who was anyone was going to be at the ceremony, where the Prince would finally wed his commoner bride.  If anyone had any doubts about his choice, they wouldn’t risk saying it aloud, not in the Golden Palace.  The wards that kept the palace and its inhabitants safe allowed the Emperor to see and hear everything that took place inside his walls and any dissenters would be noted for later attention.  The line of brightly-dressed Lords and Ladies had no idea of what was about to happen.  It was one ceremony that they would never forget.

The gates seemed to close behind him as they stepped into the palace and allowed a servant to lead them up towards the reception areas.  The servant didn’t see through Herod’s disguise and motioned him brusquely into a waiting area for the visiting servants, a room that was too small for its inhabitants.  Every Lord and Lady had bought along at least seven servants in order to show off their status, from massive burly male servants to young female pleasure slaves.  They all wore the badges of their owners…and jewels, set within their foreheads, to mark their status.  They would all die for their owners, for the spells placed on them would give them no choice.

Herod checked his timepiece and settled down to wait.  The ceremony was due to begin in an hour and, if he knew the Emperor, it would begin right on time.  No one would say anything aloud if the ceremony was delayed, but certain people would start wondering if the Emperor was going soft and then they would start hiring assassins.  No, he reassured himself, the ceremony would begin on time.

And then all hell was going to break loose.

Chapter Eight

“And now I present to you my son, Prince Eric,” the Emperor said.  “Today, he comes into his inheritance…”

Eric barely heard the rest of the speech.  It was hard enough to step out of the chamber and face the gathered Lords and Ladies.  His friends had given him a rousing party to celebrate his marriage and the first step towards becoming Emperor himself – and he’d taken enough potions to ensure that he was sober afterwards – but he still felt weak at the knees.  The Lords and Ladies were the people he was supposed to rule, once his father had finished handing over the reins of power to him, yet all of them remembered him as a little child.  Ruling them wasn't going to be easy.

He felt Morningstar thrumming at his belt and relaxed slightly, but it still took everything he had to walk up to his father and kneel before him.  The Lords and Ladies might be smiling at him now, promising to serve him faithfully until the end of his days, but such promises weren't worth anything.  It wouldn’t be long until one of them decided to see what he could get away with, perhaps breaking one of the minor sections of the Compact…or attacking another Lord directly, just to force the Emperor to overreact.  He knew that he would still have his father’s advice, just as his grandfather had advised his father though the early years of his reign, but the responsibility would be his.  The sons of other noblemen had been allowed to relax and slack off, while their parents took care of everything, yet that wasn't an option for the son of the Emperor.

His father smiled at him, his face showing no doubt or hesitation.  By tradition, the Crown Prince – once he was formally acclaimed – would spend a year slowly taking over from his father, after which he would be declared Emperor in his own right and the former Emperor would go into retirement, leaving his son on the throne.  It was different to the other nobility – their sons only inherited when the parents died – yet it had its advantages.  It also had disadvantages, for everyone would be comparing him to his father.  The weight of history seemed to be pressing down upon him.

“In the name of Solaris, Patron of Our Rule, I swear to you now that he is my son,” the Emperor said.  He nodded to a pair of Court Magicians wearing black robes.  “The Emperor’s Bloodline always tells.”

Eric had been carefully briefed on this part of the ceremony, but he still had to force himself to hold out his finger to allow one of the magicians to prick it and take a tiny drop of blood, which fell into a clear glass bowl.  A chill ran down his spine as the magician placed it on a small white altar, before his companion added a second bowl, with a drop of blood he’d taken from the Emperor himself.  The white altar seemed to glow as the magicians chanted a spell aloud, revealing that the two bloodlines were identical.  The Lords and Ladies pushed forward to look, confirming it for themselves.  No one would be able, after the ceremony, to suggest that Eric might be a bastard son.

He found himself relaxing, even though he had never really doubted it.  He’d asked his father, back when he’d been a child and still learning some of the basics, what would have happened if he hadn’t been his mother’s son.  His father had clouted him on the head and pointed out, very dryly, that he was still his father’s son.  It hadn’t been until much later that Eric had understood just how badly his innocent question had hurt his father, who had always been faithful to his wife.

“He is my son,” the Emperor said.  One of his hands was resting on the hilt of his sword, the sword that Eric now knew was the second Great Sword.  “Does anyone here question his claim to the Throne?”

There was no response.  “I now proclaim my son as the Crown Prince,” the Emperor said.  “As it has been written; so it has been done.”

“As it has been written,” the Lords and Ladies echoed back, “so it has been done.”

Eric suddenly felt very young and very insecure.  He had thought he had known what it would be like, but now he felt terrified, as if the entire Empire was about to collapse the moment he became Emperor.  He had spent years learning how to be Emperor, yet he realised now that he barely knew anything.  He kept his eyes on his father, knowing that if he looked at the Lords and Ladies they would see his fear and self-doubt.  They would take it as a sign of weakness.

The Emperor reached out with a single armoured hand and helped Eric to his feet.  It was another piece of symbolism, Eric knew, but one that was more important than most.  It was recognition of formal equality, almost an acceptance of his son as a co-ruler of the Empire.  One could stand in the Emperor’s presence, one could turn one’s back on him if it was required, but one could never treat him as an equal.  He had no equals.  The Empire was the supreme authority of Touched.

“My son,” the Emperor said.

By rights, the cheers should have brought down the roof.

***
Herod found slipping out of the servant’s chamber easier than he had expected.  He had thought that he would have to deal with one or more guards – and he had brought along a few surprises for dealing with any unwanted observers – but no one tried to block his path out of the chamber and into the bowels of the Golden Palace.  It was easy, in hindsight, to understand why.  The servants had all been ordered to remain where they were and, like all people under obedience spells, they had had no choice, but to obey.  Placing a guard on them would have been unnecessary.  It was an oversight that Herod had carefully not pointed out to anyone, although he knew that there would be other defences further into the Golden Palace.

He pulled a basic spell around him to conceal him from prying eyes and started to walk.  Unlike the Academy, the Golden Palace was a fixed building and corridors never changed their destinations at random.  The old plans, stolen years ago by some long-dead Lord of Azimuth remained accurate; indeed, as far as he had been able to establish, the palace had never been renovated in the thousands of years since it had been built.  No one had thought to alter a few of the rooms, or perhaps expand the palace…or, if they had thought of it, no Emperor had allowed it to take place.  It was a mystery that had never been solved, until now.  It had provided the final clue to the nature of the wards.

A pair of maids walked past him chatting about nothing and he pressed himself into a side corridor, waiting until they were gone before he reached the stairwell.  The maids might have been commoners, but they wouldn’t have hesitated to challenge another servant, or even the Lord of Azimuth.  If someone raised the alarm now, the entire plan would come apart at the seams.  He kept glancing from side to side as he found the stairwell and walked down it, deep into the bowels of the palace.  The lower levels, carved into the mountain itself, were secured by darker wards.  Carefully, relying on his blood connection to the Emperor, Herod slipped through them and into the chamber.

It wasn't uncommon to build a magical building on top of a tapped and controlled wellspring.  Indeed, Herod’s first thought was that the First Emperor had done just that, but it hadn’t taken long to realise that there was no wellspring under the palace.  Other researchers had reached the same conclusion, leaving them to wonder uneasily just what the First Emperor had done to secure his castle.  The unanswered question had kept them from plotting too openly against the Emperor, but once Herod had worked out the answer, he’d seen the underlying weakness.

There were few defences around the inner chamber, a chamber that bore more than a passing resemblance to the Bloodstained Chamber he’d discovered in Azimuth.  It was nothing more than a rocky room carved out of the mountain itself, lit by a faint glow that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere, illuminating a red circle that someone – the First Emperor himself, perhaps – had drawn on the rocky floor with their own blood.  Herod braced himself and opened his third eye, just a little.  The roaring tide of power slammed into his head and forced him to shut his Sight down.  So close to the source, it was almost blinding.  His head hurt and he almost collapsed in pain.  It explained, if nothing else, the surprisingly low level of security.  No one, even someone under the strongest of loyalty spells, could have remained in the chamber for long.

He took another step forward and was stuck by an overwhelming sense of decay and corruption.  The feeling almost made him step back, but somehow he forced himself to move on, pushing through the mental miasma until he was standing at the edge of the circle.  It took all of his nerve to push forward and touch his bare fingers to the blood on the floor.  A golden light flared into existence and he looked up, to find himself looking into a pair of golden eyes, hanging in the air.  He froze, almost hypnotised by the sight, before he gathered himself.  There was no longer any time to waste.

“WHO ARE YOU THAT DISTURB MY SLUMBER?”

The voice echoed in his head.  The demon might have been bound within the circle, but it still had power, power enough to drive anyone away.  Herod braced himself, remembering the words he’d learned, and pulled himself to his feet.  The massive eyes followed him, boring deep into his soul.  This close, the sense of overwhelming power and limitless evil were impossible to tolerate for long.  It was no ordinary demon.  The First Emperor had pulled one of the most powerful demons out of the abyss and bound it to his service.

Herod felt his head spinning at the thought.  The one form of magic that almost anyone could do – if they knew the words – was to summon creatures from the other planes.  Some of them – the Sprites – were harmless, if playful, but demons were far too dangerous to trust.  Give a demon an inch, his old tutor had warned, and the demon would use that inch to break free and wreck havoc.  The old stories included thousands of tales about magicians who had made bargains with demons, only to discover that they’d been tricked and devoured by the monster they’d summoned.  Even the darkest of magicians would hesitate before summoning a demon.

The First Emperor, he saw now, had not only summoned the demon, but he’d bound it in such a way that it remained bound for eternity, using it as a power source for the wards surrounding his castle.  Some of the older legends surrounding the Golden Palace made sense now.  The story that claims that over a thousand magicians had died in building the Golden Palace suggested that binding and securing the demon hadn’t been easy…and, of course, no one would dare change anything in the castle.  The demon might be able to use it to break out and escape…and such a demon, loose upon the world, would be a disaster beyond anything any of the necromancers had ever done.  The old arts to contain and banish such a demon were long lost, probably on purpose.

He looked into the golden eyes of the demon and smiled.  “I am Herod, a descendent of the one who bound you here,” he said.  “His blood runs in my veins.”

The demon eyes seemed to sharpen.  Herod smiled again.  He might not have all of the gifts that were reputed to run in the direct bloodline, but even a much-diluted version of the Emperor’s Bloodline would be sufficient to claim descent.  Blood Rites were regarded as dangerously close to necromancy for a reason.  Used properly, they could be used to strike down an entire family, or inflict all manner of agonies upon their soul.

“SPEAK,” the demon commanded, finally.  The monster’s voice echoed in his head.  “SPEAK TO ME, HUMAN FOOL.”

Herod ignored the demon’s sardonic tone, took a deep breath and started to speak Words of Power.  The Dark Tongue might have, at one point, been understood perfectly, but now it survived only as Words of Power.  It was the primal language of Demons and Sprites, words that bound them to obey – within the limits of the order.  There were human magicians who believed that not all of the Words were necessary to bind and control a demon, but research into what was necessary and what wasn't necessary rarely led to a long life.  It had taken months to build up the Words he now spoke, banishing the demon back to the Darkness and forbidding it to return.  If it went wrong…

“BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR,” the demon said.  Herod clutched his head as its voice echoed through his skull.  There was a terrible bout of laughter, utterly inhuman.  “YOU MAY DISCOVER THAT YOU DID’T WANT IT AFTER ALL!”

There was another bout of laughter and Herod collapsed onto the floor, almost blacking out.  The demonic eyes vanished.  A moment later, he felt the wards surrounding the palace collapsing and fading out of existence.  The defences were down.  The palace was vulnerable.

It took him everything he had to pull himself back to his feet, but once he was standing the pain faded away rapidly.  All traces of the demon, even the blood on the floor, were gone.  And, now, all hell could break loose.

***
Hind had never felt so uncomfortable in her life.  The waiting had been agony for someone who preferred to be out and about, doing something, but stepping into the Great Hall had almost been worse.  The Lords and Ladies watched her as she walked down the long aisle towards Eric and his father, their cold eyes seeming to promise nothing, but trouble.  They knew – they had to have known – that Eric could hardly have married any of their daughters, but that didn’t keep them from staring at her.  She was a commoner within their world and they would never let her forget it.

Some of them she knew from the Academy, young nobles who had inherited their positions from their parents and taken their place in the House of Lords.  Others were complete strangers.  Oddly, the strangers seemed more inclined to be friendly than the ones who knew her personally, although perhaps that wasn't so much of a surprise.  The nobles who had gone to the Academy had hated it when they had been outdone by the commoners they had barely tolerated, believing that a lifetime spent in a palace actually counted for more than a lifetime spent milking cows and raising chickens.  They might have been right, if they had actually tried to learn something during their childhood, but in her experience the first actual learning any of them did was at the Academy.  

She kept her face composed and dismissed them, ignoring the tickling sensation at the back of her neck.  Out in the countryside, she would never have ignored the sense that someone was watching her and just waiting for the right moment to stick a knife in her back, but here…here she felt safe.  She looked up and saw Eric’s face, smiling at her, and knew that she could trust him, at least.  It was a shame that Eleanor had been forbidden to take part in the ceremony, but tradition ruled that if the Emperor had any daughters, they were kept well out of sight during any wedding ceremonies.  Hind had never understood exactly why and no one, not even the older Ladies of the Court, had been able to enlighten her.

“You are welcome to my court,” the Emperor said, as she reached the altar.  Hind barely knew Eric’s father, but he had a reputation for being fair-minded, which was more than could be said for many of the older noble families.  His grand plan to ennoble some of the wealthier commoner families was a sign of his fairness – or foolishness, according to some of the older families.  “Do you, Prince Eric of the Emperor’s Bloodline, take this woman to be your wife?”

Eric’s voice didn’t quiver.  “I do,” he said.

The Emperor turned to Hind.  “Do you, Mistress Hind” – he put a stress on Mistress, reminding the Court that Hind was a Master Magician and therefore not to be trifled with – “take my son, the Crown Prince of the Empire, as your husband, to share his life and to bear his children, to serve him and the Empire faithfully?”

Hind felt history pressing down on her shoulders, remembering what the Oracle had said.  The decision she made would determine the future.

“I do,” she said.

“You may now exchange rings,” the Emperor said.  Hind reached into her pocket and produced the ring she’d been given.  Eric produced his own ring and reached for her hand, taking her hand in his and slipping on the ring.  Hind felt the ring react oddly with her wards, but it wasn't dangerous.  A moment later, as she slipped Eric’s ring onto his finger, she understood.  The rings linked them together.  She was suddenly very aware of Eric.

“You will now spend a night in silent vigil before the ceremony is completed,” the Emperor said.  Hind nodded inwardly.  It wasn't going to be easy, not now that she could feel Eric’s presence at the back of her mind, and he could feel hers.  “I now declare…”

He broke off.  Something was happening.  Hind opened her senses wide and realised that the wards were coming down.  Before she could react, before anyone could do anything, the wards had faded out of existence.  She felt Eric’s shock through the ring…

A second later, a black knife was buried in the Emperor’s heart.

Chapter Nine

The entire room seemed to come apart into chaos as the Emperor staggered backwards and collapsed to the floor.  Hind threw any concerns she might have had for her ugly dress aside and ran over to him, placing her hand against his bare skin and trying to heal him.  It was already too late.  The black knife, whatever it was, whoever had thrown it, had carried a powerful curse.  The wards the Emperor had had for his personal protection had failed completely and the knife had not only struck him, but it had also killed him instantly.  No amount of magic, outside necromancy, could bring the dead back to life.

She looked up and realised, in horror, that some of the guests were attacking other guests.  The various Lords and Ladies were being cut down like helpless sheep, unwilling or unable to believe what was happening to them.  They had all brought their swords and daggers – it would have been a deadly insult to disarm them – but they had also known that the wards surrounding the Golden Palace would have stopped anyone who tried to draw a weapon in their tracks.  But the wards were gone and the attackers were slicing through the nobles like knives through butter.  Blood was pooling on the floor as the attackers cleared a space around themselves and advanced on the altar.

An instinct warned her and she ducked back, just in time to avoid a nasty slash at her head from a man wearing a servant’s uniform.  Hind threw all of her other concerns away and lifted her wards, pushing him away with a wave of magic.  She had expected resistance from the castle’s wards – part of her couldn’t believe that they had just failed, or had somehow been dismantled from the inside – but nothing stopped her from using her magic.  Her attacker twisted and turned, before coming back at her, sword raised.  Hind focused her mind and pushed a pulse of magic at him, shaping it with her mind.  The servant – if he really was a servant – had some powerful protections, but they weren't the best she’d seen, or defeated.  He shrank down suddenly into a tiny statue of himself and froze.  She left him there on the floor, after locking the spell to make it difficult – if not impossible – for someone else to remove.  Eric would probably want prisoners to interrogate.

She sensed Eric suddenly through the ring and saw him battling a pair of Lords wearing their full regalia.  She recognised both of them from their portraits as men who were lesser nobles – which didn’t stop them lording it over the commoners – and who believed that they should be greater nobles.  They’d even petitioned the Emperor to grant them additional lands so they could attempt to develop them and rise higher in the Court.  She lifted a hand, preparing to intervene, when another man ran towards her, knife raised.  Hind focused a pulse of magic against him and blinked in surprise as the magical spell was deflected from his body.  The protections wrapped around him were stronger than the last attacker’s protections.  She pushed her own wards out, trying to prevent him from slashing at her, and focused her mind.  Before she could use any more magic, he threw a container of blood over her and she howled in agony.  Pain flared along her nerves, sending her crashing to her knees, as the blood seemed to crawl over her body.  The dress was completely ruined and her wards were gone.  It was all she could do to focus her mind to see him standing over her, knife raised to strike.

“No,” she said, but her magic refused to form.  It slipped and slithered away from her, mocking her as the blood dripped down to the carpeted floor.  The knife in the man’s hand seemed to twist and turn, as if it was something else, something greater, pretending to be a knife.  Through her daze, she could see dark streams of power coiling around it, linking it into its user.  The blackest of black magic had been used to create the knife.  “I won’t…”

Her attacker lifted his hand and brought the knife down towards her heart.

***
Eric had had barely a second to react, to realise that his father was dead, before a second knife came right at him.  He’d already started to draw Morningstar and the sword seemed to leap up into the air, deflecting the knife and knocking it to the ground in a shower of bright sparks.  He stared into the chaos, trying to determine who had thrown the knife, but it was already too late.  Two Lords came out of the crowd and threw themselves on him.  He lifted Morningstar, feeling the sword humming in his hand, and knocked their blades aside.  He was somehow unsurprised to discover that their blades, whatever they were, refused to break at the Great Sword’s touch.

“Idiots,” he snarled, as he jumped down from the podium, away from the altar.  The two Lords were spreading out, forcing him to deal with two threats coming from different directions.  Their faces were hidden behind illusion spells, but he knew who they were.  Lord Harerin and Lord Calaradur, two Lords who wanted more than they had and willing to do whatever it took to increase their power.  His father had warned him about the dangers of such ambition and it seemed that he had been right, but Eric couldn’t understand how they’d broken down the wards or – for that matter – how they’d killed his father.  The wards surrounding the Emperor were the strongest personal wards in the world.

He pushed his back up against the wall and concentrated on fighting, pushing thoughts of the mysteries aside until everything was over and he could deal with it at leisure.   The two attackers now had to come at him from the same direction, which made fighting them both easier, but they weren't bad at fighting themselves.  Eric had had swordplay beaten into his head by a succession of tutors, yet those tutors had never dared to put the Prince in real danger.  The two Lords had fought a succession of duels against equally good opponents and never even looked like losing.

The fight was badly uneven.  If he risked a lunge at one of his opponents, the other would take the opportunity to run him through and end the fighting.  If he stayed on the defensive, he was certain to run out of luck eventually – even with Morningstar – and one of them would kill him, ending the fight.  He dodged a slash that would have decapitated him if he’d allowed it to hit, and then twisted, feinting at one Lord before taking a tiny slash at another.  The fighting outside his tiny corner of the room seemed to be dying down, with piles of dead Lords and Ladies.  Eric had liked some of them, hated others and hadn’t cared about the rest, but none of them deserved to be cut down like that.  It was a fight without honour.

He felt, through the ring, a sudden shock from Hind and he risked a look towards her.  She had been knocked to her knees; blood dripping all over her dress, and a man was advancing on her with bad intentions.  Eric remembered, as a wellspring of horror rose up in his mind, just what the Oracle had shown her.  The two Lords stepped closer and Eric, before he could think about it and realise what a bad idea it was, stepped forward.  They hadn’t expected that and he was right next to Lord Calaradur before the Lord had a chance to react.  The tiny dagger Eric had concealed in his left sleeve came flashing out and he buried it in the Lord’s chest, before he slashed through the other Lord’s arm.  It was hardly honourable, but he was past caring.  Leaving the second Lord to bleed out, he turned and ran towards Hind.  Her attacker barely had a moment to react before Morningstar sang out and sliced him in two.

Eric caught hold of her and helped her to her feet.  She was covered in blood, the stench reaching up and assaulting his nostrils, but he ignored it.  All that mattered was her and keeping her safe, somehow.  They might not have been completely married, but they were close enough to count.  The ring glowed on his finger, reminding him of his choice.

“I’m fine,” Hind said, weakly.  She didn’t sound fine, but Eric decided not to challenge her on it.  “Just…what happened?”

Eric looked around the hall.  The guards had come charging in as soon as they’d realised that something had gone badly wrong, but it had been too late for some of the Lords and Ladies.  The attackers had slaughtered them mercilessly.  The survivors were looking around the room, their eyes unfocused; Eric realised, suddenly, that they were in shock.

“I don’t know,” Eric said.  He reached out with his mind, in the manner his father had taught him, and felt…nothing.  The wards were gone.  His father had promised to tell him how they had been generated, but that was no longer possible.  He looked over towards the body of his father and shook his head.  His father was dead.

“Don’t touch the knife,” Hind said, sharply.  Eric blinked at her, before understanding what she meant.  If the black knife had cut through the Emperor’s protective wards like they weren't even there, it had to be a creation of the darkest magic and even touching it with unprotected skin could be lethal.  “I…”

She pulled at her dress until it came undone and stepped out of it, revealing underclothes that would have passed for another dress anywhere else.  Eric caught himself looking at her, flushed with sudden embarrassment, and felt her own embarrassment and amusement through the ring.  Clearly, wearing the rings would take some getting used to.

“Your…ah, Your Majesty,” Sir Pellaeon said.  The Knight of the Golden Order had taken charge of the Royal Guard as soon as he had entered the hall.  “You cannot stay here.”

Eric stared at him.  He hadn’t realised, at first, that his father’s death meant that he was the rightful Emperor.  He should have realised, but he’d been so used to the concept of a slow and peaceful transfer of power, with his father retiring at the end of the year.  

Hind was more practical.  “Why?”

“The Golden Palace is under attack,” Sir Pellaeon said, flatly.  Eric felt his senses reel, but after so many other shocks, it was just water off a duck’s back.  “There are armed men attacking the gates with magical support.  I suspect that they have help from within the palace.  I cannot contact any of the other guardsmen without the wards and they’re all gone.  This building is no longer secure.”

Eric gathered himself, feeling Morningstar thrumming against his palm.  “Sir Pellaeon, I will not desert my castle,” he said, firmly.  The presence of an invading army meant that it was more than just a simple coup or political assassination…it galled him, suddenly, that he didn’t even know who was behind the slaughter.  Lord Harerin and Lord Calaradur couldn’t have been the mastermind.  Neither of them could have come up with such a plan.  “I am not going to abandon everyone in this building to the tender mercies of the enemy.”

“You will leave the building now, while you still can,” Sir Pellaeon said, equally unwilling to yield.  “This building is impossible to secure without the wards and there is no prospect of rebuilding them in time to matter.  You have to get out of here.  If you remain alive, and free, you can rally resistance to the plotters and eventually recover the Throne.  If you’re dead, there will be nothing stopping them from placing their own choice on the Throne.”

Eric was unwilling to admit it, but Sir Pellaeon was right.  The Golden Throne was one of the oldest magical artefacts in existence – not as old as the Great Swords, to be fair – and it served as the arbiter of Empire.  As long as he was alive, no one else could sit in the Golden Throne, unless they wanted to die in screaming agony.  If he died, the next person in line would become Emperor.

“Eleanor,” he said, suddenly.  He rounded on Sir Pellaeon suddenly.  “Where is she?”

“She was in her apartments, the last I heard,” Sir Pellaeon said.  Eric cursed, not for the first time, the tradition that kept princesses away from wedding ceremonies.  If Eleanor had been with them, it would have been easier to leave the Golden Palace.  She might not be in immediate danger if she was taken alive – she couldn’t take the Throne herself, which left her as a useful bargaining chip – but he couldn’t leave her behind.  He wouldn’t leave her behind.  “I shall send a platoon of guardsmen to escort her out of the palace and to safety.”

“I’m coming with them,” Eric said, sharply.  “I will not leave her behind.”

“You will get yourself and your wife out of the palace, now,” Sir Pellaeon said.  It was an order, Eric knew.  He wanted to disobey, but Sir Pellaeon had more experience in such matters than he had.  And he was right.  Eric felt like a coward, but Sir Pellaeon was right.  As long as he was alive, the coup plotters had failed.  “Go.”

Eric bowed his head.  “I understand,” he said, sourly.  He looked up at Sir Pellaeon.  “I am charging you to take personal care of her.”

“Yes, Your Majesty,” Sir Pellaeon said.  “Go!”

***
Hind felt oddly exposed in the undergarment, even though it would have been modest even in the kingdoms that refused to allow their women to show more than their faces and hands to the outside world.  The presence of the guardsmen wasn't much of a reassurance, not after the wards had come crashing down, for she knew that that suggested powerful magic.  She ignored the debate between Eric and Sir Pellaeon, choosing instead to examine the Emperor’s body and – using part of her ruined dress – pull the knife out of his chest.  Up close, the black knife kept flickering, as if it couldn’t settle on a shape or form.  The more she stared at it, the more she was convinced that it was far more than just a knife.

She risked opening her third eye, just a little, and recoiled in shock.  The knife was twisted with magic, magic that did far more than just kill its target instantly.  She turned it in her hand, careful not to touch it with her bare skin, and studied the glowing red jewel in the hilt.  It pulsed with evil light, a glow that suggested power, power there for the taking…if she didn’t mind losing her soul.  She had no doubt that the knife was nothing less than a necromantic tool, one used to sucking the life force out of a corpse and using it to power deadly magic.  How much power, she wondered, could a necromancer draw from the body of a dead Emperor?

“Hind,” Eric said.  She felt his confusion, shame and dismay through the ring.  He didn’t want to run and abandon the castle, even though he knew that it was the right thing to do.  “Hind…we have to leave, now.”

Hind straightened up, wrapping the knife in the remains of her dress.  “I’m coming,” she said.  She could feel his fear for his sister, his desperate need to take care of her – and of the woman who had become his wife.  Hind giggled suddenly.  Were they actually married now, or would that have to wait until the ceremony was completed, if it was ever completed?  The only man who could marry the Crown Prince to his bride was lying dead at her feet.  “How are we going to get out of here?”

A guardsman ran in the door and babbled a quick message to Sir Pellaeon.  “The passageways,” Sir Pellaeon ordered, sharply.  “The enemy has broken through the gates and is advancing rapidly towards the Great Hall.”

Hind nodded, opening her third eye again.  She could sense dark magic being worked below as the attackers, whoever they were, smashed through the remaining defenders.  Most of the servants and slaves would fight, she was sure, but it would be futile against such magic.  The wards had provided all the protection the castle needed and now they were gone.

Eric strode over to the wall, pressed his hand against a particular space, and a massive hatch opened in the centre of the stone wall.  “Come on,” he said, bitterly.  Hind followed him into the passageway.  “Sir Pellaeon?”

“I'm staying here,” Sir Pellaeon reminded him, dryly.  “You get out of here, now.”

The sound of fighting in the distance broke over them.  “Now,” Sir Pellaeon repeated, waving his men – and some of the Lords – into defensive positions.  “Go!”

Hind watched as the hatch closed itself behind them, leaving them in the darkness.  A moment later, a faint glow started to shimmer down from above, revealing that they were in a stone passageway sloping downwards.  Eric had told her that the Golden Palace was riddled with secret tunnels, but it was the first time that she had ever seen one.  She had planned to push him into showing her around after their honeymoon.  If half of the stories were true, they could walk from one end of the castle to the other without being seen by anyone else.

“Come on,” she said, watching Eric carefully.  He was a good man – a bad man wouldn’t have hesitated to abandon his sister and his guards, the guards who were now fighting to buy him time to escape – and she could taste his shame at having to run.  “One day, we will come back.”

Eric took her hand and clasped it tightly, before they started to run.

Chapter Ten

Master Reginald could hear the sounds of fighting as he and his guards swept into the Golden Palace, pausing only to secure a handful of prisoners.  The sorcerers following him had linked their power to his, forming a shield that moved over the guards as they advanced into enemy territory, but it was barely challenged.  The wards were gone and, with them, the Royal Guard’s will to resist.  A handful of men fought hopeless battles against overwhelming odds – a Knight of the Golden Order led seven men in a desperate last stand before a single spell killed him and his companions – but they all knew that the game was up.  The Golden Palace had fallen into enemy hands.

He felt the magic boiling within him, seeking a target.  It had been so long since he had set foot in any such building, but the hatred and resentment that had been brewing within him had festered since he had been banished from the Academy.  His parents had been publicly supportive, but in private they had turned on him, warning him to stay well away from their hands.  Only Duke Herod had been willing to take him in and teach him some of the secrets that had long been hidden from the common herd.  Between them, they had overthrown a dynasty that had ruled for thousands of years.

“The guards are making their final stand in the Great Hall,” one of his escorts reported, touching the side of his head.  Without the wards, the Royal Guard had no way to block magical communication, or to use it for themselves.  The forces racing into the Golden Palace could coordinate their actions.  The defenders had been isolated into tiny groups.  One by one, they would be slaughtered or captured, as the whim took him.  “They’re trying to hold us off.”

Reginald smiled.  “Not a hope in hell,” he said, coldly.  The magic within him surged at his words.  “Lead us to the fighting.”

The defensive position was stronger than he had expected, he had to admit.  There was only one set of doors into the Great Hall and they were all guarded by experienced swordsmen, while the corridors were designed to make it difficult for more than a handful of men to approach at any one time.  It would have worked very well in a world without magic, but without a magician of their own, the defenders were at a grave disadvantage.  Reginald felt the magic raging up within him and he focused it, throwing it out towards the enemy.  A mighty wind swept up in the passageway and roared down towards the defenders, sending them staggering back or knocking them to the ground.  Reginald could have burned them all to ash, but Herod had insisted – ordered – that they take as many prisoners as possible.  The more Lords and Ladies who survived the coup, the more who could be convinced to see matters the right way.

He watched as his guards ran forwards, slamming into the defenders before they could recover from the wind.  A handful of guards were slaughtered quickly, while others stood and fought savagely...but the outcome was no longer in doubt.  A knight wearing golden armour fought desperately, using his sword and shield to keep his tormenters back, yet even he couldn't stand for long.  Reginald lifted his hand, carefully shaped raw magic around his fingers, and projected it towards the Knight.  The golden suit of armour provided some protection against magic, but it couldn't hold out against such an attack.  Enough magic leaked through to leave the Knight lying on the floor, his arms and legs utterly immobile.  And, with that, the fighting was over.

“Secure the prisoners,” Reginald ordered, sharply.  Some of the Lords and Ladies gathered in the room had been in on the plot from the start, but he had orders to treat them just as he would treat the others.  Most of them would probably join the winning side, given time to realise that the old order had been destroyed, yet there was no point in taking chances.  Some of the survivors, he realised, had been allies of the late Emperor.  Herod would want to deal with them personally.

There was little resistance from the shell-shocked Lords and Ladies.  They had been lords and masters of all they surveyed until their world had come tumbling down.  They’d even been forced to watch as others of their numbers were slaughtered.  Reginald knew that they would have watched and laughed if it had only been commoners killed in the fighting, but aristocrats?  Aristocrats didn't like to watch each other dying.  It might give the commoners ideas.  The guards herded them together, searched them roughly and relieved them of any weapons, before ordering them to remain still and keep quiet.  For the moment, they complied.

Reginald left the guards to deal with the prisoners and moved from body to body, inspecting each of the dead.  There was no point in trying to preserve any of them for necromancy, for they had died long before his forces had raged into the chamber.  Whatever power had been within them at the moment of their deaths was gone.  He checked each body carefully, looking for three in particular.  The Emperor’s still form – he noted, with a worried frown, that the knife that had killed him was missing – was easy to recognise, but there was no sign of either Prince Eric or Mistress Hind.  He looked down at the Emperor’s body and paused.  The sword at his belt, the sword that he hadn’t had a chance to draw, was glowing with magic.

Carefully, almost without being aware of his body’s movements, Reginald reached out and touched the blade.  There was a flash of light and he found himself lying back on the floor, his entire body aching.  He had heard of some weapons that were enchanted to prevent anyone, but their owner from using them, yet he was sure that this was something different.  He reached out again, opening his third eye, and saw a complex pattern of age-old magic, reaching down into the sword.  He pulled off his cloak, wrapped the sword in the cloth, and slung it over his shoulder.

“All right,” he said, turning to look at one of the ladies.  Lady Viva had been one of his tormentors, back when he had been young and foolish; she was a silly older woman whose word had determined what was In or Out every season.  Now, she was shaking in fear and outrage, feeling genuinely threatened for the first time in her life.  If she had been born a man, her mouth would have earned her a thousand duels, but as a woman – and one of the richest and most influential women in the Empire – she had never been truly threatened.  It was a new sensation for her.  “Where is the Prince?”

He had wondered if she would try to resist, but she didn't even attempt to mislead him.  “He went down a secret passage,” she said, ignoring the attempt by two other lords to stop her from speaking.  Reginald nodded to his guards and the two lords were brutally and efficiently beaten.  “He went through that wall there.”

Reginald followed her pointing finger.  The wall looked solid, but where magic was concerned, that could never be taken for granted.  Leaving Lady Viva behind to stare at the two bleeding bodies, he stood up and walked over to the wall, running his fingers over the cold stone.  Someone had built this part of the Golden Palace out of the raw stone of the mountain, rather than transporting in materials from across the Empire.  It felt solid, yet...he concentrated, reaching out with his third eye, and sensed a tiny series of weaknesses within the wall.  If there were a secret passageway – and Lady Viva had been too scared to lie – it had to be there.

He lifted his hand and blasted the wall with magic, feeling the rock crumble under his beating.  A secret passageway was revealed beyond the dust, leading down into the bowels of the castle...and perhaps outside the walls.  It didn't take a genius to realise that Prince Eric had to be trying to get out of the castle before the noose tightened around his neck.  There was no point in trying to organise resistance any longer.

“Get the prisoners down to the ballroom and leave them there,” he ordered some of his guards.  “The rest of you can start searching these passageways and find out where they lead.”

***
Hind heard the dull rumble from up above as Eric led her further down into the complex network of passages under the Golden Palace.  Someone had found the entrance to the secret passageway, which meant that they would be having company very soon.  She tensed, wishing that she could wash the blood off her soul, wincing at the tiredness washing her thoughts away.

Blood Rites, she thought, grimly.  It was all she could do to remain focused.  Magic ran in bloodlines and certain particular bloodlines could be used to do extraordinary acts of magic.  They could be used to find someone, or curse an enemy, or even short out someone’s magic, if only for a few seconds.  The blood might have been on her dress, the one she’d left behind in the Great Hall, but she still felt it on her soul.  Working any kind of magic was going to be very difficult, at least for a few hours.  They used Blood Rites against me.

Blood Rites weren’t exactly banned, not like necromancy, but they were regarded as dangerously close to dark magic.  Hind knew some rituals that could be used, yet her tutors had drummed it into her head, time and time again, that they were not to be used except in gravest emergency.  Most Master Magicians wouldn't use Blood Rites even if they were in grave danger, fearing the effects on their soul.  The fact that someone had been willing to use a Blood Rite so...carelessly was alarming.  If their enemy was prepared to do that, what else might he do?

She looked down at Eric’s back as they reached a wooden door set within the stone passageway.  Eric pressed his hand to the knob and Hind felt a tiny flicker of magic, checking his identity before allowing him into the massive room.  He waved for her to follow him and she found herself in a chamber of weapons.  There were swords, knives, axes, daggers and several odd-looking weapons she couldn't even begin to identify.  The air smelt as if no one had been into the chamber for years, yet each of the weapons was in perfect condition, as if they had only been cleaned yesterday.

“One of my family’s secrets,” Eric said, as he picked up a handful of weapons.  Hind accepted a knife belt and buckled it around her wrist, pulling her undergarments tightly around her.  Whoever had stocked up the room hadn't thought to include clothes suitable for woman warriors.  Eric took another sword, some armoured underclothes and a large sack of gold and silver coins.  “If I could bring an army back here...”

He shook his head.  “We have to get out of the castle,” he said, bitterly.  Hind could feel the frustration and helpless rage burning through him, but his voice was surprisingly even.  “If we can get down to the Golden City, we might be able to figure out what’s actually happening.”

Hind nodded...and then a wave of dizziness almost sent her falling to the stone floor.  “Hind,” Eric said.  She sensed his alarm through the ring.  “Are you all right?”

“Yes,” Hind said.  She swayed again and Eric caught her arm.  Too late, she remembered the ring and how Eric would be able to feel her emotions.  The bone-numbing tiredness burning through her was urging her to sleep.  “I think...”

“You’re not all right,” Eric said, flatly.  She could feel his worry and alarm.  If he had to remain with her, they would be caught by the men they could hear making their way through the passageways.  If he had to abandon her, or carry her, one or both of them would be caught.  “I’m not leaving you here.”

Hind made her decision.  “Put me down on the ground,” she ordered.  Eric blinked at her tone, but obeyed, allowing her to lie face-down on the floor.  Hind sensed his puzzlement as she started to remember a spell, one she had been warned should not be used unless there was no other choice.  She pushed her hands as hard against the stone ground as she could and focused her mind, mumbling the spell under her breath.  A wave of energy washed through her, banishing the tiredness, and she leapt to her feet, grinning.  Her body seemed to be buzzing with limitless power.  She felt as if she could fight a dozen Master Magicians and win.

Eric was still staring at her.  “Hind, what...?”

“Just a little spell,” Hind assured him, gaily.  She sobered rapidly.  The spell, like all magic, came with a cost.  She had roughly six hours before it would all catch up with her and she would have to sleep.  By then, they would either have made their escape or they would have been captured or killed.  “Come on.”

She took his hand and led him back into the passageways, down towards the lower levels.  She could sense the men above them now, hunting blindly through a series of passages that seemed to twist and turn in all directions, but as long as they were moving, they were safe.  She was aware of Eric watching her closely – she guessed that he knew what she’d done and what price she would have to pay – yet she ignored it.  It dawned on her suddenly that they were at least partly married and they wouldn't have to wait any longer, a thought she rapidly suppressed.  Running from the enemy was hardly the time and place!

Eric was still holding her hand when they reached the lowest level of the passageways and encountered a stone wall.  Hind could sense different kinds of magic crawling over it, seemingly focused around strange runes someone had carved into the rock years ago.  She studied them thoughtfully, but she’d never seen anything like them, not even in one of the Academy textbooks on old and long-forgotten magic and magic-based cultures.  So much had been lost over the years, she knew; the Grandmaster had once told her that, centuries ago, magicians had been far more powerful than they were in her era.  It seemed unbelievable, but perhaps it was true.

Just for a second, she felt the weight of history pressing down on her.  The Golden Palace was old, perhaps older than anyone really understood.  Eric had told her a little of its history, but there was so much of it that no one could really grasp it.  The secret passages, the hidden store of weapons and other equipment, spoke volumes about the paranoia of the original builders.  Just what, she wondered, had convinced them to build so many secrets into the heart of their Empire?

“Here,” Eric said, pressing his hand against the wall.  Hind winced as an eye appeared from out of the stone, staring at her with a cold emotionless gaze.  She found herself frozen as the eye inspected her, feeling a creepy presence peering into her mind before it moved on to Eric, leaving her shaking in outrage.  The eye seemed to find them acceptable and the stone wall melted away, revealing a darkening sky outside.  The passageway opened near the road leading up to the Golden Palace, but as they stepped outside, Hind saw a line of men marching up the road.  The Palace had been completely taken.

“Duke Herod,” Eric said.  Hind winced at the sudden burst of cold fury in his voice.  “Those men are wearing Herod’s livery.  The bastard shouldn't even have more than a handful of men for thousands of miles around.”

Hind understood what he meant.  “It has to be him,” she agreed.  She tried to remember what she could of the Duke.  He was third in line to the Golden Throne, if she recalled correctly, after a complex series of marriage negotiations that had been taking place before she’d been born.  She had only seen him twice, though, and she’d never exchanged words with him.  His kingdom, Azimuth, had been on the list of places Eric and her would have visited on their honeymoon.  “He’s the one who killed your father.”

She looked up sharply.  Eric’s hand was on Morningstar’s hilt, as if he were threatening to draw it and throw himself on the band of armed men.  Hind caught him and pulled him back into the shadows, trying to distract him before he did something stupid and got them both killed.  Eric glared at her as the men faded away into the distance, but he seemed to understand.  This was no time for foolish stunts.

“We have to get down to the Golden City,” he said, bitterly.  Hind nodded in agreement.  If the guards somehow managed to come out of the passageway, they’d be right behind the fugitives.  How long would the defences stand up to a dedicated sorcerer?  “Come on.”

It took nearly four hours to make their way down to the base of the mountainside and, by then, Hind was on the verge of collapse.  The spell was extracting its price early and she was barely aware of her surroundings as Eric brought them into the city, silently grateful that they encountered no one who meant them harm.  Eric somehow found them an inn and carried her upstairs, ignoring the sharp looks from the landlord and his prune-faced wife.  As soon as he entered their room, he placed Hind on the bed and kissed her forehead.

Hind was asleep before he ended the kiss.

Chapter Eleven

Herod had visited the Golden Palace on many occasions, but he had always been a visitor to the Emperor’s apartments, never the owner of the palace.  Perhaps now, no one owned it – it would be dangerous to use it as a base of operations until the wards could be repaired – but merely having it under his control would give Herod the legitimacy he sought to claim the Throne and rule as Emperor.  He strode through the passageways, accepting the salutes of his soldiers, and surveyed his conquest, making a series of notes about what he would change when he had the time.  The Hall of Portraits, a corridor lined with portraits of long-dead Emperors, would have to go.  The Hall of Weapons needed to be redesigned.  The Great Library would have to be exploited, rather than leave the forbidden knowledge safely locked up in the books.  When he finally reached the Great Hall, he was surprised to encounter a nervous-looking Reginald and an irate General Sayrald.

“Your Grace, the Crown Prince has escaped,” the General said, before Reginald could say a word.  Herod suspected, from the way the younger man was rubbing his hands together nervously, that he had been trying to think of a way to present the news that wouldn't make him look incompetent.  “Several of my men have been killed within the network of secret passages.”

Herod lifted a single eyebrow.  “Killed?”

“Yes, Your Grace,” the General said.  “The passageway are booby-trapped with a number of traps, some magical and some more mundane.  I have lost nineteen soldiers to the various traps, perhaps more unless the spells on them can be undone.  Master Reginald has insisted on deploying the lesser sorcerers to pick their way through the traps and...”

“Countermand that,” Herod ordered, sharply.  Reginald flushed and seemed about to speak, but a sharp look from Herod forced him to close his mouth.  “We need the sorcerers working on establishing wards around the Golden Palace itself.  Without the...power source the Emperor used, we’re going to have to build up new wards from scratch.  I want this building as secure as we can make it before our position is challenged.”

“Of course, Your Grace,” the General said, with a bow.  “You will be pleased to know that the building itself is completely secure, apart from the secret passageways.  All resistance has been terminated; the Royal Guard has either been killed or captured.  Most of the servants tried to fight, but they were unarmed and unable to offer serious resistance.  I believe that some of the younger guards wish to amuse themselves with the captured maids.”

“That can wait,” Herod informed him.  He had no objection to rewarding his men by allowing them to slake their lusts with the Emperor’s maids – it was one more slap to his memory – but rape would have to come after the building was secured and the reinforcements were on their way.  “How many prisoners do we have?”

The General smiled.  “We captured seventy Lords and Ladies, including several Lords who were...ah, busy during the ceremony,” he said.  “They have been separated from our allies and are currently awaiting your attention in the ballroom.  The allies themselves have been placed in a different room.  We also captured over a thousand servants of various kinds – including two hundred and seven maids – and a hundred and twelve guardsmen.  Only one of the Knights of the Golden Order survived the fight.”

Herod nodded.  That was not unexpected.  The Royal Guard might fight for pay, but the Knights of the Golden Order fought for honour and loyalty to the Emperor.  They would have carried on the fight as long as they could, but if they were all gone...that was just one less problem to worry about.  Unlike some of the other Knightly Orders, there were never more than a hundred Golden Knights and most of them remained in the barracks in the Golden Palace.

“I captured that one,” Master Reginald said, quickly.  Herod smiled at the delight in his tone.  “We put him in the stockade to discourage any escape attempts.”

“Good,” Herod said.  He looked over at the General.  “Have you deployed the reinforcements?”

“The palace is as secure as I can make it,” the General confirmed.  “I have also called in the forces waiting on the border, but it will be at least a day before they can arrive to assist.  I do not believe that we should attempt to secure the Golden City before they arrive.”

Herod scowled.  That wasn’t such good news.  If Eric had made his way to the Golden City, he might try to rally resistance to the coup and convince the City Guard to oppose Herod and his men.  It wouldn't work, or so he told himself, but it could prolong the agony long enough for some of his allies to start wondering if they needed him after all.  Striking first had a certain element of simplicity to him, but he trusted the General’s military advice implicitly.

“Send down criers,” he ordered, finally.  “Tell the Mayor and his Council that I have taken the Throne and that if they encounter Prince Eric, who I have declared outlaw, they are to send him to me in chains.  If they resist, they will have no place in my Empire.”

“Of course, Your Grace,” the General said.  “There is one other important point.”

Herod quirked an eyebrow, inviting him to continue.  “The Emperor was killed by one of the knives you provided, thrown by one of our allies,” the General said.  “Someone has taken the knife from his body and we cannot find it.”

“Interrogate the prisoners,” Herod ordered, savagely.  If one of the knives fell into the wrong hands, it would be proof – at least to some eyes – of necromancy.  The Academy might feel compelled to intervene.  They might hesitate, if they didn't know how the Golden Palace’s wards had been taken down, but the ban on necromancy was the one thing that united the Academy and its staff.  “One of them must have seen who took it.  Find out from them and then find the knife.”

Reginald looked up, a sulky expression on his face.  “It could have been taken by the Prince,” he pointed out.  “What do we do then?”

Herod turned and headed out of the Great Hall, down towards the stables.  “If that is the case,” he said, as he walked away, “we may have a problem.  I think that...”

Something flew right at him and slammed into his wards.  The flare of light startled him, but training and experience told him that he wasn't in any danger.  The tiny knife – a woman’s weapon, if ever there was one – bounced off his wards and fell to the ground.  Herod lifted his hand, reaching out with his Sight, and located the thrower hiding in an air vent.  A moment later, his magic had grasped her and pulled her out helplessly into the open air.  The young woman – no more than a girl, really – struggled and thrashed against his power, but there was no hope of escape.

“Princess Eleanor,” he said.  The Princess’s struggles refused to abate.  “It is a honour to meet you at last.”

Eleanor’s eyes flashed fire and she lashed out with her magic, battering against his restraints through sheer raw power.  Herod held her effortlessly, waiting patiently for her to exhaust her power, even though he could have crushed her in an instant.  He’d fought enough duels in his Academy days against opponents who were stronger, but less practiced; the secret to beating them was to force them to expend their power uselessly.  Eleanor was nowhere near as strong as Herod – or any Master Magician – and her power drained rapidly.  The waves of fire and light died away, leaving her floating helplessly in a bubble of his power.

“I sent a platoon of men to secure the Princess,” the General said.  He sounded rather surprised.  “I thought that they would be enough to handle her...”

“I killed them all,” the Princess spat.  Her face was twisted with enough hatred that, if looks could kill, to leave them all piles of ash on the floor.  “I killed them, just as I am going to kill you!”

She resumed her assault on Herod’s power, but her power faded rapidly.  “If you keep draining your power like that,” Herod told her, as calmly as if he were ordering dinner, “you will eventually do permanent harm to yourself.  I suggest that you rein in your power before it is too late.”

His calm tone seemed to provoke her to a final assault, after which she just floated there, helpless.  Herod studied her with calm amusement, considering the second level of options that had opened up in front of him.  Eric, his father and his bride had all had to die, of course, but Eleanor was a different story.  As a Royal Princess, she could never take the Golden Throne herself, yet the man she married would have a very strong claim to the Throne.  Herod’s own claim was stronger, but if he married Eleanor, he would bind their claims together.

She was breathing hard, tears of frustration running down her face, when he finally lowered her to the ground.  Herod expected her to hurl herself at him and try to hurt him physically, but instead she just stood there, quivering.  He took a moment to study her body through his Sight and was relieved to see that she had escaped permanent damage, although she had drained herself pretty dry.  She would need a good meal and several hours of sleep before she could hope to work any magic again.  Herod focused his mind, wove a complex series of wards around the young girl, and then straightened up.

“You will return to your rooms and await my pleasure,” he said, flatly.  She might have drained herself, but she would have sensed him weaving his web around her, even though she was defenceless.  “The spells I have wrapped around you will keep you within the Palace.  I suggest that you don’t try to leave.”

He clicked his fingers and two guardsmen came forward.  “Escort the Princess back to her rooms and ensure that she is not disturbed,” he ordered.  The social niceties couldn't be expected in the wake of a battle.  Eleanor would be safe enough under their care and neither of them would dare to touch her themselves.  Herod wouldn’t touch her either, at least not for a few years.  It would take time to unlock all of the secrets within the Emperor’s Bloodline and Eleanor was the key.  Hurting her would be useless, or worse.  “General, you may lead me to the commoner prisoners.”

The General took the hint and remained quiet as they walked down two flights of stairs into a massive chamber that had once been used to muster the Royal Guard.  The prisoners had been stuffed into the chamber, their hands bound firmly behind their backs, and were guarded by two platoons and a handful of sorcerers.  A couple of piles of ash on the floor marked where some of the former servants had tried to fight and had been killed for their pains.  The remainder were just sitting or lying on the stone floor.  A number had been injured and the wounds had been left to fester.  No one would have bothered to give a commoner any medical care unless there was something in it for him.

Herod’s gaze swept over the prisoners, ignoring the looks some of them were directing towards him.  Many of the maids looked as if someone had taken the chance to grope them before throwing them into the chamber; the men looked as if they had been battered once they had been secured.  The handful of soldiers, placed to one side of the chamber, were staring at him with murder written on their faces, while the older servants were rocking backwards and forwards, as if they couldn't believe what had happened.  Their families would have served the Emperor and his family for generations.  They had served him and, in exchange, he had protected them from the outside world.  Now the outside world had broken in and destroyed their lives.

“They’re all under various loyalty spells,” Reginald said, eager to impress after his early failure.  Herod nodded, studying some of the older servants.  They were just commoners, utterly unimportant in the grand scheme of things.  A few of them might have had the talent for magic, if they had ever allowed themselves to develop it.  “We could never trust them.”

Herod nodded, looking at a golden-skinned maid from Sind.  “No, we couldn’t,” he agreed.  He looked over at the guards.  “Take the maids into the other barracks and hold them there.  Leave the men in this chamber.”

He sat back to watch as the guards helped the maids to their feet and urged them out of the room, pushing them along with pushes and kicks if any of the maids hesitated.  Some of them were clearly terrified; others were being separated from their sweethearts among the male servants, or perhaps the guards.  Herod didn't care.  Commoner relationships – even commoner marriages – had no validity in the eyes of the law.  The Emperor had been willing to encourage the commoners to become uppity, but all of Touched would pay the price.

That is about to change, he thought, and opened up his third eye, studying the spells binding the servants to the Emperor.  As he had expected, they were voluntary spells and therefore impossible to remove without the Emperor’s blessing – and, now that the Emperor was dead, that loyalty would have gone to his son.  It wouldn't matter anyway.  At his command, the servants were pushed and shoved into the centre of the chamber, separating them from their guards.  Herod reached within his cloak and produced the black knife from his belt.  The knife seemed to jump and twist in his hand, eager for blood.

“Stand back,” he ordered, and held up the knife.  The incantation was long and complex, but it grew easier every time.  As he said the last words, he slashed down with the knife and the servants convulsed in agony, before they died.  Herod laughed aloud as the rush of energy flew into him, wave after wave of sheer power pouring into his wards.  He barely heard the screams of the dying.  He was intent on sucking out every last tiny particle of power into his soul.  The wave of power abated as the last servant died, but the rush refused to fade.

“Done,” he said.  The black knife didn't feel satisfied – it wanted more blood – but he pushed it back onto his belt.  “It is done.”

He turned to the General, feeling the waves of power bubbling around him.  The power would eventually settle, allowing him to use it without risking absolute chaos, but until then he had to be careful.  The servants might be dead, yet their bodies could still be of use to him.

“Have the guards transfer all of the bodies out of the Golden Palace and leave them in the courtyard,” he ordered.  “Master Reginald can see to spells that will prevent them from decaying.  I want all of the dead bodies deposited there.”

“Yes, Your Grace,” the General said.  Herod could sense his concern about his master’s use of necromancy, but he said nothing aloud.  There was nothing to say.  The General was loyal and would always be loyal, whatever his master did or became.  Master Reginald was staring at him with pure envy.  His real motive for joining Herod’s plot was to learn how to summon and control such vast power himself.  “I will see to it at once.”

Herod left the room and walked upwards, back towards the Emperor’s private apartments.  They would have to be checked, of course, just in case the Emperor had left any nasty surprises behind him, but for the moment they would serve as a place to rest and recuperate.  The two guards who the General had placed outside the door looked at him and stepped aside hastily, fear written in their faces.  There was so much power burning through him that they, men without magic, could still sense it shimmering on the air.  It was beautiful...and deadly.  Herod nodded to them and stepped into the Emperor’s apartments.  He had wondered if the Emperor kept a pleasure slave, yet the quarters were empty.  He was alone.

Sitting on the Emperor’s chair, Herod stared down at his hands without truly seeing them.  The waves of power burning through him were hard to control, but he had had practice in controlling vast amounts of magic over the years.  Prince Eric might have escaped, yet how could he and his wife stand against the power he had drawn into his soul?  Let him run, let him hide...eventually, Herod’s power would reach out and reshape the world.  His allies, the Lords and Ladies who had feared the Emperor’s plans to create new noble families, had no idea of what he had become.  One day, one day very soon, they would discover that they needed him, but he didn't need them.  And, on that day, the true Emperor would be born.  Touched would be united under his rule.

He chuckled again, feeling the power washing against his mind, demanding to be used.

Not long, he thought, compressing the power back down into the back of his mind.  Learning Control had been the hardest thing he’d ever had to do, when he’d first entered the Academy, but he was grateful to the tutors who had insisted that he work and work at it until he had mastered it completely.  The darker magic arts were hard to master – they often mastered the magician instead – yet he had successfully mastered necromancy.  No magician in the world could stand against him.  Soon, they would all learn what he had become...and then they would know the meaning of fear.

Chapter Twelve

Once, three years ago, Eric had donned a disguise and stayed for two nights in one of the inns in the Golden City, using it as a cover to meet with various important personages for the Emperor.  It had been an interesting experience; when people didn’t know that he was a Royal Prince, they treated him differently, even if he had the money to buy the entire inn several times over.  He’d posed as a trader, without even a single drop of aristocratic blood to his name, and watching how he was treated was an eye-opening experience.  He hadn’t been mistreated, not with the amount of money he was paying for each night, yet he hadn’t been fawned over either.  His father, when he’d told his father about the inn, had laughed.

“You were born into rights and responsibilities, boy,” he’d said.

The thought of his father made him wince.  His father was dead, struck down by treachery, and all Eric had been able to do was flee.  Cold logic told him that flight had been the only logical course of action, but cold logic was nothing compared to the sense of desolation and despair.  He’d wanted to throw himself on his enemies and fight to avenge his father, but that would have been suicide.  His father should have handed over the throne and then retired, enjoying a happy retirement or even remaining at the Golden Palace to advise his son, the new Emperor.  He should not have been killed by treachery.

He turned and looked down at Hind, lying on the bed.  She looked unnaturally pale, but she was breathing normally and should be fine, assuming that her sleep wasn't interrupted.  Eric wasn't the expert in magic that she was, yet he knew enough to know the spell she’d used and the price it extracted from its user.  She was going to be out of it for hours to come, but once she awoke she should be fine.  He kept telling himself that, watching the rise and fall of her breasts as she breathed deeply, yet it was hard to be sure.  So much of his life had turned upside down that he couldn’t bear to lose her too.

Eric stood up and paced over to the single window, staring up towards the mountainside, up towards where the Golden Palace stood.  The castle itself was cloaked in darkness, but the ever-present background noise of the wards was gone.  Every magic-user for hundreds of miles around would have sensed their collapse; by now, the entire world would know that something had gone badly wrong in the Golden City.  Eric knew enough to know that most of the Lords would sit on the sidelines and wait to see what happened before committing themselves, even if the wards hadn’t fallen.  Duke Herod would have all the time in the world to consolidate his power and claim the Empire for himself.  That left Eric as the only real threat to his power and, at the moment, all Eric had was one of the Great Swords and a comatose magician.  His father’s Great Sword was lost.

He looked back towards Hind and found himself captivated by her beauty.  Even in the semi-darkness of the inn – the innkeeper had reluctantly consented to loan them a torch, burning merrily in a wall socket – she was beautiful.  He felt a sudden surge of lust and almost reached out to touch her, before pulling back and cursing himself.  Waking her now could be fatal to her, or at least force her back into a longer healing trance to heal herself.  Besides, the second half of the ceremony hadn’t been completed.  They might not be legally married.

Eric chuckled inwardly, laughing at himself.  The chances were that it wouldn’t matter in the slightest.  Duke Herod had an entire army in the Golden Palace.  Eric had one other person to call to his banner.  The Great Swords had raised and destroyed entire kingdoms in their day, but Duke Herod had a Great Sword of his own now, the one wielded by Eric’s father.  Any resistance would likely end with their rapid capture and executions.  It was what Eric would have done in his place.

He turned and looked back up towards the Palace.  It was tempting, terrifyingly so, to just take the Great Sword Morningstar and walk back up to the Palace.  He knew a handful of secret passages and entrances that no one else, even the most-trusted allies, knew about and he could gain access.  With the Great Sword, he could cut a bloody swath through the guards until he reached Duke Herod and cut off his head…no, it wouldn’t work.  The Great Swords were powerful, but they weren't omnipotent and Duke Herod had an entire army behind him.  It would just be a quick way of committing suicide.  He reached down to touch Morningstar’s hilt and was surprised by a sudden burst of confidence emitting from the sword.  Old memories seemed to flicker through his mind, memories of great heroes who had suffered defeats, yet lived to avenge themselves on their enemies and see them slain.  The history of the Great Swords was more than a little murky.  They had passed through many hands before two of them finally took up residence in the Golden City.

The thought made him smile.  Every so often, rumours reached the Emperor that someone had uncovered Shadow, the missing Great Sword, and intended to use it.  The Emperor had to investigate, but every rumour had rapidly proven false; the uncovered sword had been one of the lesser swords, or a simple enhanced sword created by an enchanter.  No one knew what had happened to Shadow, only the fact that destroying the Great Swords permanently was supposed to be impossible kept people from believing that it had been destroyed.  It was probably buried in an old mine and forgotten about years ago.  

He leaned back, one hand on Morningstar’s hilt, and breathed deeply, entering a meditation trance.  He didn’t dare sleep, not when Duke Herod’s sorcerers were probably already looking for them, but if he meditated he’d at least get some rest and he’d be up and fighting if they burst into the room.  The hours slipped by slowly, despite the trance, reminding him of just how alone he was in the darkness.  Hind’s breathing was a comfort, but he wanted desperately to take her in his arms and pretend that everything was normal.  And yet, how could he?  The entire world had been turned upside down.

Damn you, Herod, he thought coldly, feeling the sword’s power thrumming against his hand, promising bloody revenge soon enough.  What the hell made you take up arms against my father?

It was an easy question to answer.  The Great Lords, the rulers of a thousand kingdoms, some large, some small, had never been easy bowing the knee to the Emperor.  Many of them were related to the other Great Lords through intermarriage, and, like the Royal Family, they integrated commoners into their ranks.  But each of those commoners came in on their own; raising an entire family of commoners into the peerage was a direct challenge to those men and their power.  The Emperor had believed that the long-term interests of Touched demanded that the peerage be expanded and had hoped to use his final year to push through the reforms.  They – the Emperor and his son, Eric himself – had calculated that the Great Lords would take several months to get their opposition together, surmounting the hundreds of petty rivalries that would make it harder to get them to agree on anything.  It was clear that their calculations had been badly in error.  If it hadn’t been for Duke Herod, someone who was in line to the Throne…

He shook his head grimly.  One day, he promised the shade of his dead father, there would be a reckoning.

***
The moon was high in the night sky when Duke Herod walked out into the courtyard, breathing deeply and inhaling the fumes of hundreds of dead bodies.  The stench was appalling, yet part of him found it appealing, a premonition of what was to come.  He looked up towards the moon and felt his magic twist and jump in response to the suddenly-heightened currents of magic flowing through the air.  Out in the wild woods, werewolves would be losing their minds and reverting to beasts, while good folk would be locking their doors and trusting to small charms to keep them safe from ghosts and goblins and things that went bump in the night.  Commoners were always terrified of magical creatures, having no magic themselves, and needed protection from their betters.  Herod smiled at the thought, knowing that the night was about to birth new terrors.

He muttered a spell under his breath and suddenly he could see perfectly, taking in the sight in front of him.  The guards had simply dumped the bodies in the courtyard, without bothering to line them up or put them in order – although, he noted with a smile, they had taken the time to go through their pockets and steal anything valuable.  Herod had ordered that the main court be preserved, but the thought of desecrating the remainder of the Emperor’s apartments had amused him.  The guards had torn through sheets worth a king’s ransom, urinated and defecated in the Emperor’s bed and held a wild party in the Great Hall.  They’d also done other, darker acts.  Some of the bodies added to the pile were those of maids, who hadn’t survived the attentions of the guards.  Herod didn’t care.  For all the power he’d amassed into his person, he couldn’t break the loyalty spells binding the maids.  They just couldn’t be trusted.

A large convoy of servants was already on its way from Azimuth, but they wouldn’t be at the Golden Palace for months to come.  Once they took the Golden City, Herod had decided, they would simply round up a few thousand people and enslave them, putting them to work in cleaning up and repairing the Golden Palace.  When the time came to declare himself formally as Emperor Herod I, he would be doing it from the seat of ancient royalty, putting another stamp of legitimacy on his claim.  Once he’d taken the Golden Throne…

His lips narrowed angrily.  As long as Eric was alive, anyone who sat in the Golden Throne would die; the powerful charms and spells woven into the Throne would kill them in screaming agony.  The enchanters and alchemists he’d brought with him had taken a look at it, wondering if they could undo the spells, but after four of them had been killed by the Throne’s defences, they’d given it up as impossible.  It was frustrating and Herod had been tempted to simply blast the Throne to rubble and create another, but it was all-too-likely that that would be impossible.

Herod shook his head angrily and turned back to the pile of bodies, drawing on his power.  Necromancy, like a handful of other magical disciplines, worked better at specific hours of the day…or, in necromancy’s case, specific hours of the night.  There were good reasons why necromancy was banned, but it was growing harder and harder to even think of them as he advanced, using the power to smooth away all the obstacles in his path to power.  The dead bodies ahead of him seemed to glow with potential power.  He had slain them…and, in the act, gained vast magical power.  He knelt in front of them and focused his mind.  This wasn't going to be easy, even for him.  He’d practiced back at Azimuth, yet…

His awareness expanded suddenly, showing him the bodies and the complete absence of any life energy within the empty shells.  Necromancy hadn’t just killed the humans, but everything inside them as well, leaving them completely dead.  The bacteria that made up part of the human body’s digestive system – discovered by a long-dead alchemist thousands of years ago – were gone.  Their absence was actually slowing the decay that was threatening to render them useless.  Carefully, he reached into his magic and slowly started to filter it out over the bodies, directing it to enter them and work one of the darkest of magical acts.  His power infused the bodies, sliding through them and into their dead brains.  Controlling such a massive reserve of power was difficult, almost impossible, yet somehow he held on.  The legendary necromancers had thought nothing of it.  How could he do any less?

One of the bodies, a former Royal Guardsman, twitched.  Its eyes opened and gazed sightlessly upon the world.  A moment later, it started to get up, struggling against gravity, decay and the sheer absence of any organic memory to remind it how to move.  The power flowing through the zombie grew stronger, more practiced, and the zombie staggered to its feet.  Others were rising to their feet behind it, their cold sightless eyes locking on Herod’s face and waiting for orders.  The waves of magic were fading now as they were sucked into the zombies, creating and empowering a whole army.  Herod relaxed as most of the remainder of the dead bodies stood up and joined the ranks of silent zombies.  A handful who had been too badly injured in the fighting couldn’t move, although they were dragging themselves forwards on their hands and knees.

“Good,” Herod said, as the zombies stopped and stood in ranks, facing him.  A terrible wellspring of power was burning through him, pushing him towards darker and darker acts.  The zombies weren't very smart individually, but combined they presented a formidable threat…and they were completely loyal to the man who had raised them from the dead.  He caught sight of a dead chambermaid, her pretty neck barely marked despite the blow that had broken her neck and killed her.  No one would realise that she was a zombie until it was far too late.  The thought was delightful, for there was another trick to the spell that had created them.  Anyone bitten by one of his zombies would rise from the dead and join his zombie army.

A pack of zombies made a formidable and terrifying opponent.  A zombie felt no fear or pain – or scruples.  The only way to kill the monsters was to completely destroy their bodies and their ability to move – even a crippled zombie could be dangerous - whereupon the spell would fade away and vanish, leaving the dead body behind.  They could be shot by arrows or stabbed by swords and they would just keep coming at their target, moaning aloud to summon other zombies to the battle.  Best of all, a zombie could never be disloyal to the necromancer who had summoned it into existence.  They would just obey orders mindlessly and wouldn’t be deterred by certain death.

He reached out with his power and felt the spell covering them.  It was easy to give directions to the zombies, ordering them to positions down near the Golden City.  He didn’t want to show them to any potential enemies, not yet, but used properly they could still block anyone from escaping the Golden City.  The zombies turned with eerie silence, marching towards the gates and down to the long road leading down from the mountainside.  Some of them would probably lose cohesion and collapse along the way, but it wouldn’t matter.  There were plenty more where they came from.  It would be easy, after everyone in the Golden City had been put to the sword, to summon them from the dead as well.  His army would increase exponentially.  

The gates clanged shut behind the last of the zombies and Herod tried to relax.  The Academy had told him, time and time again, that working heavy magical spells had to be done carefully and had to be followed by relaxation, but somehow it was impossible to relax.  He didn’t feel tired or drained; he felt…as if he could go on, as if there were no limits to his powers.  It was on the tip of his mind to go find the General and order an immediate march on the Golden City, but he stayed his hand.  It would take the zombies, despite their complete immunity to cold weather or most of the creatures prowling out in the darkness, several hours to reach their destinations.  The spells he’d wrapped around them would keep people from looking too closely at them and realising what they were, but like all such illusion spells, they worked better if they were unchallenged.  He would wait.  He had waited ten years to make himself Emperor and he could wait a little longer.  

He was vaguely aware of the looks the guards cast at his retreating back as he strode back into the Golden Palace, passing ruined paintings and destroyed statues as he walked towards the Library.  The guards had to be nervous after they’d seen him perform one of the darkest of magical acts, creating an entire army of the dead.  They had to be wondering if he intended to do the same to them.  Herod had no such plans – zombies, for all of their advantages, had weaknesses as well – but it would keep them on their toes.  The guards could have their fun this night – there was no danger of anyone attacking the Golden Palace tonight – yet he would need them alert in the future.  Many of the Lords would go along with him, but others would not…and then there was always the Grandmaster.  The longer Eric remained alive and free, the more challengers would gather to try to unseat Herod from his stolen throne.

The Library’s door opened in front of him and he stepped inside, sitting down on a sofa and forcing himself to relax.  When dawn broke, his forces would advance down to the Golden City and claim it for his own.  And, if Eric had remained within the city, he would be taken too.  And then the Throne of Touched would be his. 

Go to Amazon for the full edition...