3 When Darkness Falls.8 (2 page)

The conspiracy for which Cilarnen was Banished never existed. Anigrel started it all —

Idalia watched in sick horror as Anigrel murdered Lord Vilmos. It was worse than she had imagined — worse than anyone had feared. Anigrel was the Demons' creature — had been for years. And now he'd managed to reach a position where he would soon be able to strip away Armethalieh's defenses — and let the Demons in.

He was going to give them the City.

And all she could do was watch.

* * * * *

DEEP in the darkness of the World Without Sun, the Demon Queen Savilla stood naked in her ivory chamber. Through the soul-deep link she shared with her Mageman, she felt the festering sickness of the Light approach him.

They will not!

The walls were spattered with blood, and the remains of half-a-dozen dismembered slaves lay scattered about, for she'd had no time to be neat or elegant. The obsidian bowl was filled to overflowing with hot fresh blood, and more pooled on the ebony table and ran down its legs to the floor.

Savilla's fury grew until it nearly choked her. How dare Wildmages meddle in her plans?

She bared her fangs in savage glee as she tested the power of their spell and followed it to its source. They'd worked so hard and so diligently to penetrate the human city's defenses.

But a breech for you is a breech for me, my darlings,
Savilla purred to herself in sudden delight. In their desperation, they had made themselves vulnerable. She struck with all her might.

* * * * *

KELLEN Saw all that Idalia Saw — they all did — but without the Knowing, it meant little to him. He let the images go, concentrating on feeling the currents of power that flowed through them all — through the ring of Wildmages into Idalia; from the army into the ring of Wildmages — searching constantly for anything out of place.

The spark that was Cilarnen was like a bright ember; different, apart, but not wrong.

Jermayan… another sort of difference.

Kellen ignored them both.

Then:

"
No!
"

He sensed disaster — coming — already here — he didn't know which. He reached out to Idalia. She had to end the spell. He was too late.

Time seemed to slow. The surface of the mirror faded to darkness, and bowed outward as if its surface were not crystal but oil. It reached for Idalia. If it touched her, they would all die.

* * * * *

KELLEN saw Cilarnen fling Mage-Shield over Idalia at the exact moment Jermayan Cast his own Shield. But Cilarnen had only his own power to draw upon, and Kellen felt him reach the end of that power in seconds —

And felt Ancaladar bolster Cilarnen's power with his own.

"
Freely given,
" Kellen heard. "
Freely given.
"

Cilarnen's shield strengthened.

Held.

The two shields — one of High Magick, one of Elven Magery — sparked and boiled over each other, the emerald and purple refusing to blend. In moments they would fly apart, leaving Idalia vulnerable to the attack.

They have to hold!

Kellen felt as if the whole force of both forms of magic — neither his — was pouring through him, tearing him apart.

But the power of the entire Circle was his to wield as well.

He drew upon it, forcing the two Shields together. He felt as if he'd plunged both hands into a bed of live coals, but his pain was a distant thing. He forced it still farther from his consciousness, focusing all his intent upon holding the two Shields together. Now he could see them clasped in a faint blue tracery: his Will. The will of a Knight-Mage, which could not be turned aside from its purpose, save by death.

Time seemed to speed up again. The bolt of pure Darkness struck their combined Shield, and if he had felt pain before, it was nothing to what he experienced now. He heard Cilarnen scream; felt Jermayan's agony. Ancaladar bellowed in pain and outrage at the pain — and more, the
vileness
of the attack.

The Shield held. And Kellen held; though he felt as if every atom of his body was being torn asunder, he held, and held, and held, by will alone, as the Darkness hammered at their combined defense, and then as his will eroded, and he felt even that failing —

He was filled again with power, with a pure white power that held every color of magic there ever was within itself. And what little remained of his ability to think put a name to that power.

Shalkan.

This
was why Shalkan had held back from the other workings, even when it was to heal one of his own kind. This was what Shalkan had been saving himself for, without knowing exactly what would be needed, only that it
would
. He fed the very essence of
unicorn
through the bond that tied him to Kellen, and into Kellen's Will, into Cilarnen, because Cilarnen was as virgin as Kellen, into the Shield, so that all powers fused into one color that held all —

With a lightless flash and an earsplitting shriek of backlash, the Darkbolt recoiled upon itself.

Kindolhinadetil's mirror… dissolved.

The Link was gone, and so was the Sphere of Protection. The two Shields vanished beneath Kellen's grasp, and with them, his need to hold them. Suddenly alone in his own skin, Kellen tried to take a step, and went sprawling. Without the spell to concentrate on, all that was left was the pain.

He felt drained — unnaturally drained — as if his body had given up more than it could safely give, and he
hurt
from the energies he had forced through himself.

I'll never be a High Mage
… Kellen thought groggily.

He tried to get to his knees, but he was too sick and dizzy to move.

Cilarnen — Jermayan — I have to get up —

"Stay down. It's all right. I know what they want," someone — Idalia? — said.
"I know what they're doing."

A Thousand Shades of Darkness

THE PRICE THAT the Wildmages, the Elves, and their Allies had paid to learn the plans of their Enemy had been high. Two-thirds of the Allied camp had shared in the cost of the Wildmages' spell, and lay now in their tents stunned into exhaustion, cared for by those who had been exempted from the Price of the spell. No one had expected that the Price would be so heavy. If not for Cilarnen, Jermayan, and Kellen managing to blend their magics to shield Idalia from the attack of the Demon Queen Savilla and save the lives of the spell-linked Wildmages, the sacrifice would have been greater still: the lives of all the Elven Army's Wildmages, and perhaps the death of hundreds, even thousands, of fighters.

But with Shalkan and Ancaladar's help, Wild Magic and High Magick had worked together, though the effort of making them do so had cost Kellen dearly. And the spell had done what they needed it to do: Idalia had seen across Armethalieh's wards and decoded the cryptic warning that it had cost Cilarnen Volpiril so much to bring them. They now knew the specifics of the Demon's foothold in the Golden City.

Somehow, long ago, Savilla had touched the mind of the young Mageborn Anigrel, corrupting him utterly while he was still a child. All his life Anigrel had worked to one goal: to see the Endarkened gain ultimate power. Though Anigrel's father had been Commonsborn, Anigrel had risen above his lowly birth, becoming Arch-Mage Lycaelon Tavadon's private secretary and tutor to his son, Kellen, all the while worshipping his Dark Lady in secret. When Kellen had been Banished for practicing the Wild Magic, Anigrel's fortunes had continued to rise: Lycaelon had relied upon him more and more, elevating him swiftly through the ranks of Magehood. To increase his clandestine power, Anigrel had invented a conspiracy against the Mage Council, which had resulted in the Banishment of High Mage Volpiril's son, Cilarnen, and the resignation of several members of the High Council. The Arch-Mage, knowing nothing of this, had appointed Anigrel to one of the new vacancies, and adopted him as his son and heir.

From his new position of power, Anigrel had continued his work, sowing fear and distrust throughout the City against the Elves and the Wildmages, and creating the Magewardens and the Commons Wardens to watch the High Mages and the Commons for any sign of further treason — treason he himself had created. And all along he moved closer to his ultimate goal: removing the ancient and complex wards from the walls of Armethalieh — wards which sealed the City against attack by Demonic magic…

* * * * *

IT was three days before Kellen was able to leave his bed, and at that, he was the first of the Wildmages — other than Idalia, who had not been touched at all by the spell's backlash — to be able to do so.

* * * * *

HE guessed he was just stubborn.

All his life he'd been stubborn. His earliest memories — the ones he knew that were truly his, that hadn't been tampered with by Lycaelon to remove inconvenient memories of his sister Idalia — were of people telling him he was "too stubborn" — whatever that had meant in terms of life in Armethalieh. Too stubborn to learn his lessons by rote. Too stubborn to be a proper Mage-student and ornament to House Tavadon.

Later, of course, when he'd discovered that he was not only a Wildmage, but a Knight-Mage, he'd understood, because a Knight-Mage's most vital tool and weapon was his will. Once a Knight-Mage had made up his (or her — Kellen supposed the Wild Magic could make a female Knight-Mage if it chose, just as there were female Elven Knights) mind to do something, only Death could turn him aside from his purpose. If that wasn't being stubborn, Kellen didn't know what was.

Being stubborn had saved his life — and the lives of those around him and under his command — more than once since this war began. And it
was
a war. There could be no doubt in anyone's mind about that now.

When it had begun — it seemed so long ago, though the establishment of the Black Cairn to keep the rains from falling on the Elven Lands, which marked the first move in the Demons' strategy, could hardly have been more than a full turn of the seasons ago — no one had been sure of that. Even after Kellen had destroyed the Cairn, and the Elves had discovered that the Elven Lands were infested with a race of Dark-tainted beings that had lived there, unsuspected, for centuries, they had still not been sure.

After all, the Elves had fought the Endarkened twice before — the last time a thousand years ago — and each time it had been openly, on the battlefield. Only Kellen had been sure that this was war again, and though the Elves were polite, and certainly respected the fact that he was the first Knight-Mage born in a thousand years, they hadn't been willing to pay a lot of attention to the opinions of a seventeen-year-old boy. Even battle after battle with the Shadowed Elves — with Kellen proving himself in every one — hadn't really changed their minds. Elves lived a thousand years, and they did not hurry. Especially about changing long-held opinions.

But even before the Wildmages' spell, many of them had been changing their minds. Unfortunately, even if they did, it wasn't much help. You couldn't have a war if only one side showed up, and the Endarkened had shown absolutely no interest in taking to the battlefield.
They
were more than happy to cause droughts, to force the Elves and their Allies to expend their strength in things like cleansing the Elven Lands of the Shadowed Elves, to breed monsters in the Lost Lands and send them out to prey on anything they could reach, but as no one knew where Obsidian Mountain — the Demons' stronghold — was, or how to reach it, there was no way for the Allies to carry the war to the Enemy.

Leaving aside the fact that we're probably outnumbered, and we know that
They're
more powerful than we are,
Kellen thought to himself. Demons were the most powerful Mages there were. All the Allies had to set against them was a handful of Wildmages, and no High Mages at all. In the last war, Armethalieh had fought on the Allied side. But not this time.

Despite that, the constant doubts and near-despair that Kellen had felt since the beginning were gone. With Idalia's discovery of the traitor within Armethalieh, and the discovery of the Endarkened's strategy, Kellen now knew why the Demons had been refusing to fight openly.
Their
intention was to subvert Armethalieh and make it fight against the Elves on behalf of the Demons — Light against Light. And then the Demons would destroy the winner.

Which means that powerful as
They
are,
They're
still afraid of us. Which has to mean we have a chance of winning. All we have to do is figure out what it is — and use it
.

* * * * *

IT was more effort than he'd expected it would be to dress, and for the first time in ages Kellen actually noticed the weight of his Coldwarg-fur cloak when he settled it over his shoulders. But it was unthinkable to brave the outdoors without it — when he'd broken the power of the Black Cairn, ending the year-long drought, the weather-patterns had been violently unsettled, and were still returning to normal. One of the side-effects of that was the hardest winter the Elven Lands had seen in centuries — and the coldest and snowiest, too.