All That Glitters (33 page)

 

L
yrelle Reldamar knew, within a quarter of an hour, when Xahlven would come to see her. She wore a gown of cornflower lace and pearls and waited for him in the solarium at Glamourvine. Outside, a thunderstorm brewed, rumbling on the horizon and flashing over the cypress trees.

Xahlven came in as a specter might—­no sound, his midnight robes trailing behind him like smoke. “I suppose you think you're terribly clever, Mother.”

Lyrelle made a show of stirring cream into her karfan. “Don't be obtuse, Xahlven—­I spent too much on tutors for you to be this slow.”

Xahlven's eyes flashed with anger—­insulting his intelligence never failed to get him riled. “He has no idea what you've shown him, old woman. He never will. Tyvian cares only about his next fine meal and his next suit of clothes.”

Lyrelle smiled at her eldest son and sipped her karfan—­it was still too hot. She channeled some of the Dweomer and cooled it to her tastes. “He knows, Xahlven, or suspects at any rate. You underestimate him, as you always do.” She pointed to the chair across from her. “Won't you sit down? You look tired.”

Xahlven scowled. “I am never tired. I am too busy.”

“Trying to destroy the world?”

“Trying to save it.” Xahlven shook his head. “And there's nothing you can do about it either. I
won
mother. I now have control of both the Secret and the Mundane Exchanges—­I'm the
savior
of the West's economy, snatching it from the jaws of oblivion.”

Lyrelle raised an eyebrow. “But, I note, with just
enough
oblivion present to make them think they still need you as overseer of both markets. Bravo, my boy. I'm very proud, of course.”

Xahlven took a deep breath. “I came to give you one final warning—­stay out of my business.”

“My children's business is my business by default,” Lyrelle countered, sipping her karfan—­ah, there it was: the perfect temperature.

“Why do you persist in this ‘caring mother' fiction? You never cared about me—­you only wanted a tool by which to bind father to your will, and so here I am. Must we continue the charade now that he is thirty years dead?” Xahlven came to stand over her, Etheric energy pulsing around him in black waves that Lyrelle could more smell than see.

She set her karfan down—­that much Ether had likely turned the cream now. Such an inconvenience. “Xahlven, darling, I love you despite your faults, not the least of which is a complete inability to believe yourself lovable.”

“If you interfere with me again, I will kill you.”

Lyrelle laughed. “I should like to see that! You, the boy who was afraid of
wisteria vines,
threatening my life? Quite amusing.”

The sunlight vanished behind a black cloud, and Xahlven seemed to loom larger in the room. His eyes glowed red with power as he channeled more and more of the Ether. Outside, the flowering vines that grew up along the outside of the solarium began to wither and die.
“This is your final warning,”
he hissed, his voice reduced to a scratching sound.

Lyrelle looked up at her son and patted him on the cheek, her own Lumenal wards easily nullifying his Etheric transmutation of himself. “Oh, Xahlven—­you don't need to warn me, my midnight child. You needn't concern yourself with me either—­I've already defeated you. It's only a matter of time.”

Xahlven scowled. “You mean Tyvian? Even if he does understand his recent defeat, he doesn't threaten my plans at all. He is not my equal, Mother.”

Lyrelle laughed lightly. “Of course not, Xahlven—­you're a
monster.
Tyvian, on the other hand, is a hero.”

Xahlven rolled his eyes.

Lyrelle nodded at him. “Oh, of course he is—­he just doesn't realize it yet.”

“I see I'm wasting my breath,” Xahlven said, stepping back. “You've been warned.”

Lyrelle nodded. “As have you.”

The young archmage withdrew, leaving his mother to her karfan. After calling for a new cup and fresh cream, she summoned Eddereon to the room.

The big Northron bowed to her. “Yes, milady?”

Lyrelle pointed to the vines outside the solarium, now all but dead. “Be a dear and see about replanting those vines for next season, will you? Xahlven has ruined them in a fit of pique, it seems.”

Eddereon rubbed where his beard used to be. “Of course—­I'll do it right away.”

Lyrelle looked out the solarium toward the approaching clouds. “Oh, I'd wait on it, if I were you. Seems a storm is rolling in.”

On the horizon, the lightning began to flash.

 

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

A
special thanks goes out to my friends, John Serpico, John Fraley, and John Perich, who, sometimes without their knowledge, helped me understand financial markets enough to write this book. I have every confidence that I screwed it up anyway, but am immensely grateful, nevertheless. I also wish to extend a heartfelt thanks to Rebecca Lucash, for stepping in as editor when needed and doing an absolutely wonderful job. Finally, I wish to thank all those who read this continuation of Tyvian's adventures. It is my grand prediction that we will all get to see some more of him, but time will tell. Auguries, as Tyvian is so fond of saying, are not destinies. Until then . . .

 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

On the day
AUSTON HABERSHAW
was born, Skylab fell from the heavens. This foretold two possible fates: supervillain or scifi/fantasy author. Fortunately he chose the latter, and spends his time imagining the could-­be and the never-­was rather than disintegrating the moon with his volcano laser. Auston is a winner of the Writers of the Future Contest and has had work published in
Analog
and
Escape Pod
, among other places. He lives and works in Boston, Massachusetts.

Find him online at
www.aahabershaw.wordpress.com
, on Facebook at
www.facebook.com/aahabershaw
, or follow him on Twitter @AustonHab.

Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at
hc.com
.

 

BY AUSTON HABERSHAW

The Saga of the Redeemed

The Oldest Trick

     Consisting of:
The Iron Ring

                            
Iron and Blood

No Good Deed

 

COPYRIGHT

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

NO GOOD DEED
. Copyright © 2016 by Auston Habershaw. All rights reserved under International and Pan-­American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-­book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-­engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of Harper­Collins e-­books. For information, address Harper­Collins Publishers, 195 Broadway, New York, NY 10007.

EPub Edition JUNE 2016 ISBN: 9780062369192

Print Edition ISBN: 9780062369208

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