Hall of the Mountain King (38 page)
“Vadin?” He could hardly speak. “Vadin, I—”
“It’s all right,” Vadin said, rough with the effort of
keeping back his own tears. “It’s all right. You’re alive. You’ve won.”
Mirain’s head tossed from side to side. Vadin laid an arm around
his shoulders, pulling him close, stroking away the dirt and blood and tears
with a corner of the parti-colored cloak.
Mirain neither resisted nor acknowledged his squire’s
ministrations. “I killed him. I didn’t—I wanted—I killed him. Vadin, I
killed
him!”
His voice was shrill. Vadin nerved himself, and hit him.
Mirain gasped. His head rose. He opened his eyes to the sky,
to Avaryan clear and strong and unsullied in a field of cloudless blue.
“I killed him.” But now he said it calmly, with sane and
seemly grief. “He must go to his pyre with all honor. So must they all.
Even—even she. She was my bitter enemy; she slew my grandfather, she destroyed
my beloved, she would have shattered my kingdom. But she was a great queen.”
Vadin could not speak. He was no godborn king. He had no
power to forgive what was beyond forgiving.
Mirain’s head bowed, raised again. He straightened.
Vadin let him go. He faced his judges, standing erect and
royal although the tears ran unchecked down his face. “Do your office,” he
commanded.
They woke as from a trance. The herald turned toward the
west with his rod uplifted, its tip of amber catching the bitter light. But
Obri faced the east, and ivory glowed with his own springing joy, proclaiming
Mirain’s victory.
They turned back to Mirain. Obri knelt and kissed his hand:
homage as rare as it was heartfelt. Mirain found a smile for him, although it
did not live long.
The herald stood stiff, fist clenched grey-knuckled on his
rod. Half of his anger was fear, and an awe for which he despised himself. He
forced words through his clenched teeth. “You have won. You must put me to
death. It is the law. I knew of the weapon which my lady turned against you.”
Vadin could have struck the creature. Could he not see how
utterly exhausted Mirain was? The king had spent all his strength; he had none
left even for joy in his triumph. And he had so much yet to do. Ten thousand
men wavered on the brink of battle, their commanders reeling still with the
shock of Moranden’s defeat. Only that, and the herald’s stillness, held them
back from a charge.
Mirain regarded the herald with eyes in which the god’s fire
burned ashen low. “You and all your people are bound to me now until death or I
shall free you. That is a penalty more fitting than swift death, and perhaps
more terrible.”
For a long moment the herald did not stir. Then he bent down
and down, even to the ground. His voice boomed forth as if from the earth
itself. “Hail, Mirain, king in Ianon!”
Mirain’s own men echoed him, clashing spear on shield,
shaking the sky with their jubilation.
The west was silent. Ominously silent.
Somewhere amid the ranks a great voice rang out. “Mirain!”
Another joined it. Another. Another. Five, ten, a hundred, a
thousand. It rose like a wave and crested, and crashed down upon him. “Mirain!
King in Ianon! Mirain!”
He moved away from his judges and his witness. The army of
the west advanced with weapons reversed, chanting his name.
But his eyes lifted, fixing beyond it where Ianon’s
mountains marched against the sky. Shadow lay coiled among them. He raised his
golden hand. “Someday,” he said, “I will chain you.”
The Mad One burst free at last from the bonds of his will
and plunged into the circle. Herald and squire and scholar parted before him.
A hair’s breadth from Mirain’s body, the flying hooves
settled into stillness. The horned head bent, nostrils flaring at the scent of
blood and battle.
Softly Obri laid the scarlet cloak about Mirain’s shoulders;
Vadin set the torque around his throat.
The Mad One knelt. Mirain settled in the saddle; smoothly
the senel rose.
East and west and all about them, the armies came together,
clashed, and mingled. One army, one kingdom. And above them all one banner: the
Sun-standard of Ianon’s king.
Mirain bowed under the weight of them all: grief and joy and
kingship, and triumph wrested from black defeat.
But somewhere in the depths of his soul, he found a seed of
strength. His eyes kindled. He drew himself erect, squared his shoulders, flung
back his hair.
The armies roared his name. He rode forth from the circle to
claim his own.
Copyright & CreditsThe Hall of the Mountain King
Avaryan Rising: Book One
Judith Tarr
Book View Café Edition May 28, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-61138-260-0
Copyright © 1986 Judith Tarr
First published: Bluejay Books, 1988
Cover illustration by Arenacreative, www.dreamstime.com
Cover design by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff
Production team:
Proofreader: Julianne Lee,
Formatter: Vonda N. McIntyre
v20130429vnm
v20130515vnm
v20130523vnm
About the AuthorJudith Tarr
is the author of numerous novels and short stories including the World Fantasy Award nominee for Best Novel,
Lord of the Two Lands.
She lives near Tucson, Arizona, where she raises and trains Lipizzan horses.
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Living in ThreesSample Chapter
Judith Tarr
Book View Café Edition
November 20, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-61138-208-2
Copyright © 2012 Judith Tarr
For the real Meredith
who has waited very long and patiently for her book to come
out in the world
This book could not have existed without the help of many
friends and colleagues.
My agents, Russell Galen and Ann Behar, believed in it enough
to let it go—and to encourage me to publish it through Book View Café.
But before that could happen, this happened: a successful
Kickstarter, a round 256 backers, and the wherewithal to transform a manuscript
into a book.
Thanks to the backers who have made it possible for
Living in Threes
to make its way out
into the world:
Cora Anderson, Richard Kirka, Marty Grabien, Gwyndyn
Alexander, Kari Sperring, Kathleen G. Seal, Alan Hamilton, Robin Taylor, Marci
Ellingwood, Carole Nowicke, Ingrid Emilsson, Lisa Clark, Kit Kerr, Meredith
Tarr, Woj, Katja Kasri, Hugh Agnew, Marianne Reddin Aldrich, Val Kondrich, Nancy
Kaminski, Kathleen Hanrahan, Robin Marwick, RJ Nicolo, Molly Kalafut, Elizabeth
Bennefeld, Michael Gaudet, K. Case, Linda Antonsson, Frauke Moebius, Jenny
Graver, Noriko Shoji, Deborah Sumner, C. Joshua Villines, Mary Ellen Garland, Lauri
M. Weaver, Christy Marx, Shauna Roberts, Catie Murphy, Ruth Stuart, Adrianne
Middleton, Paula Mikkelsen, Paul “Princejvstin” Weimer, Pat Knuth, Mary Kay
Kare, Peter Aronson, Rebecca Stefoff, Joseph Hoopman, Di, Valerie Nozick, M.
Menzies, Nancy Pimentel, Dawn Marie Pares, Leah, Beth, SAMK, Anne Walker, April
Steenburgh, Margaret C. Thomson, Ashley with the Morgans, M.L.K. Ondercin, Jaakko
Kangasharju, Mary Spila, Poppy Arakelian, Sarah Patrick, Helen Wright, Paula
Meengs, HY Tesler, Patricia Burroughs, Nancy Barber, Maryanne Stroud, Amanda
Weinstein, K. Kisner, Pat Hayes, Kate Elliott, Phil Freund, Ceffyl, Solveig,
Regina A. Tarr (hi, Mom!), Marti Wulfow Garner, Kerry Stubbs, Amy Sheldon, Mary
Caelsto, Pat Cadigan, Christine Swendseid, Heidi Berthiaume, Sue Wolven, Donna
P., Melinda Goodin from Australia, Kate Kirby, Cameron Harris, Ron Chance, Alison Farrin.
You are amazing. Thank you all.
