By Blood Betrayed (The Kingsblood Chronicles) (3 page)

His goal was the innermost wall of the castle, which faced Firavon’s Tower. A buttress, one of the many that connected the castle’s inner structure to the mighty Tower, lay at the end of his path. The topmost portions of the castle were the tall watchtowers that surrounded the castle at the eight major and minor compass points, only about sixty yards from the ground. The dusky red Tower of the Artificer-King stretched another five hundred and forty yards above those, the kind of building that only magic could have raised, and only magic could sustain.

The particular buttress he was heading toward had a concealed passageway at the Tower end which led into the quarters of a mage, one of the Tower’s former occupants. The mage in question had perished during the fighting that had taken the Tower and Lian had never learned his name nor of what importance he was. He supposed those things didn’t matter, especially now.

He had only been in the room three times previously, with Elowyn accompanying him on each occasion. “Only I know that your escape route is through the Tower,” he’d explained. “Your parents, I’m sure, wouldn’t approve, but if events have played to that point, you must take the risk in order to avoid capture.” Lian had been impressed with Elowyn’s confidence in his ability to escape his pursuers in addition to those horrors which dwelt in the arcane place.

During the rebellion three decades ago that had earned his father the nickname Wizardsbane, the Tower of Firavon had been the last bastion of the Theocracy’s mages. According to the songsmiths and minstrels, only a handful of the mages escaped the assault.

His father had confided to him once, however, that the bard songs recounted only a half-truth about that. True, only three mages managed to escape on that fateful day. On the other hand, two dozen or so of the Theocracy’s highest ranking sorcerers had abandoned the Tower and their country weeks beforehand. Those who stayed believed that the rebels could never violate Firavon’s keep. His father told him that those who left understood that Firavon built doors and that doorkeepers could be bribed.

It appeared that someone had committed treachery on this day as well. No external enemy could find their way through the labyrinthine passageways of the castle, yet there were soldiers, by the sound of them, advancing within the walls. Lian was certain that they weren’t any of his father’s units, because he spoke each of their battle languages.

Maybe they’re a friendly mercenary unit
, he thought without any real hope that it would be true. He knew that such wishful thinking would only get him killed, but he couldn’t help thinking it.

He reached the concealed panel that led out onto the buttress, hoping that he wouldn’t meet another assassin, waiting outside with crossbow at the ready. He couldn’t identify the substance or spell that had caused the bolt to flame so, but he knew he’d be greeting his ancestors in the afterlife had it touched him.

He unclipped his crossbow and loaded a bolt, choosing one of his small reserve of
lashthirin
-edged bolts. These Truesilver bolts were heavily enchanted, and at any close range Lian was unlikely to miss. That Truesilver was the bane of demonkind wasn’t lost on him, either, just in case the attackers had violated the Tower wards that contained its denizens.

Opening his pack, he removed the shirt of fine-scaled
lashthirin
-alloy mail that made up most of the weight, though not bulk, of his bundle. He removed his royal tunic and drew the cold armor on next to his skin. The shirt made him look as if his hide was covered with fine lizard scales, and he always marveled at how the unknown elven smith had accomplished the extraordinary suppleness of the armor. He’d witnessed its protectiveness firsthand, however, during the bandit trouble last year.

The main body of brigands had turned south, rather than west, and as a result the unit he was accompanying had been attacked by thirty armed and desperate men.

He’d assumed command after the leader of his guardsmen had been killed by a crossbow bolt, and the remaining guards had rallied about their prince. One of the bandits, however, had landed a solid blow with his broadsword square onto Lian’s shoulder. The blow would likely have severed his left arm, and would certainly have been fatal, but the Truesilver scales held, causing the attacker’s blade to turn in his hand. Lian had been forced to his knees by the sheer power of the blow, and the bruising would have lasted for a month without healing magics.

His left arm had hung useless from the shock of the strike, but his right arm, gripping Gem tightly, had been just fine. The bandit stood clutching his right hand dumbly, for he’d dropped his own blade. Lian hadn’t given him a chance to recover, however, and had eviscerated the bandit with Gem before he regained his feet.

You’d better stop dwelling in the past if you want to have a future
, Gem admonished.

Lian shook off the memory of the battle and finished dressing. He removed an unfamiliar tunic, one of dull grey and green coloration, from his pack. He donned this over the
lashthirin
shirt and tucked his original tunic into a niche in the wall, securing it with a coverstone. Elowyn’s gentle spell on the stone sealed it over the niche as if it were an original part of the castle construction. Finally, he pulled on a pair of leather gloves.

His preparations complete, he opened the panel and revealed the side of the Tower of Firavon and the buttress which bridged the fifteen yard gap between the castle wall and the Tower wall. The ground below him was forty yards distant, but he’d been on this structure before, and his fear of falling wasn’t bad despite the narrow width of the bridge. In the courtyard below, a few of his father’s men were engaged in battle with another group of soldiers wearing the red and orange livery of his uncle, Rishak.
The traitor is revealed
, muttered Gem.

Gritting his teeth to suppress his anger, and wishing he could do something to help the men below, he crawled across the buttress. There were watchtowers and guard posts on top of the castle walls, but none had a clear view of this particular span, an oversight Lian was certain had been deliberate on the part of the castle’s architects.

He hoped that Rishak’s knowledge of the castle plans didn’t include that minor fact. After what seemed like an eternity, Lian reached the end of the buttress without incident. He caressed the always-warm stone of the Tower. His mother had once told him that the Tower absorbed the force from any attack and distributed it evenly throughout the walls as heat. The Tower was still radiating from the magical onslaught brought against the mages who dwelled there thirty years prior. According to his mother, even at the height of the battle, the Tower hadn’t been more than pleasantly warm to the touch.

He activated the catch that opened the passage down into the Tower proper. A gust of musty air swept out, carrying with it a faint charnel odor, for the Tower had been mostly sealed for the thirty years since the overthrow of the Theocracy. He slipped down into the passage, drawing the trap door closed behind him. The small tunnel through the end of the buttress terminated at the window of the mage’s quarters.
Window
was a term that didn’t really apply to the opening, since from the outside it appeared to be stone. From the inside, however, it was transparent, and before the castle was built around Firavon’s Tower it presented a pleasing view of the river below Dunshor City.

The window swung inward to allow fresh air to circulate and flying servitor creatures to enter and exit. Elowyn once told him that on the final day of the battle, those windows had been used both for escapes and for suicides. The Castellan of the Tower, a mage in the trust of the High Wizard, held the artifact known as Firavon’s Key. Possession of the Key, lost during the siege, would have allowed the Castellan to seal all of the windows, doors, and portals of the Tower, rendering them as impenetrable as the stone walls of the Tower itself.

The Castellan at the time of the siege had been a necromancer named Avet Bey, and although his body was recovered, no trace of the Key had ever been discovered. Lian theorized that the Key had disappeared before the fighting started, since the great doors to the entry hall had been sealed with magics cast by the defending mages, rather than with the tremendously powerful native wards of the Tower.

He removed a small lump of jasper from his pack, the red stone warm to his touch. Placing it on the floor of the tunnel he’d just traversed, he touched it with Gem’s hilt. The sword thrummed for an instant, and the jasper transformed from a dull red to the dark grey of the buttress rock.

Taking a deep breath and steeling himself for his flight through the haunted Tower, Lian Evanson moved out of the tunnel and into the mage’s quarters, pushing the window shut. Behind him, he knew that the enchanted jasper would grow to fill the tunnel, barring pursuers from following him into the Tower. It also blocked Lian’s escape from the Tower through this avenue.

Chapter Two

“In ages past, nearly all creatures spoke the Tongues of Magic. These languages were composed of the very Words of Power themselves, and were consequently very musical. Some lent themselves to harsher songs than others, to be sure.

“As time went on, and the Created moved ever farther away from the Creators, new, lesser words came into use. For the most part, only the supernatural races, such as demonkind, still use the ancient Tongues. Of the races of mortalkind, only the elves and kossir-teh remain among those who used the Old Words in conversation.

“The magical implications are very interesting, as I’m sure you’ll agree.”

-- The Sage Alionur, in a lecture to the Dunshor Academy of Magic, 27 A.R.

The blade was poisoned
, Elowyn decided. The elf was making his way to the castle roof to assess the situation. He’d staunched the bleeding from the sword gash on his thigh, but he was starting to feel dizzy and cold. Elves were naturally resistant to many poisons, and the ring Elowyn wore slowed the progress of toxins through his system.

Normally, he would find one of the castle mages or priests with plenty of time to treat the deadly venom before it killed him. Now, he suspected, all of the familiar mages and priests were probably dead or captured.

His quarters held various magical potions and antidotes, but he was certain that someone would be waiting there for him. The invaders would have considered him one of their greatest threats, and would surely be searching for him.

The four men sent to kill him weren’t proficient in fighting together as a unit. He’d turned that weakness against them and had managed to dispatch all four of them. The last one, however, had dealt a blow with his shortsword, which was unmistakably poisoned.

From the symptoms, I’d say it’s
filaka
or some derivative
, he mused as he opened the hatch leading out onto the roof. There were only three men stationed up here, more assassins apparently, but they seemed bored and inattentive. As Master of Assassins for the kingdom, Elowyn possessed the skills to either avoid them or eliminate them.

He selected the latter, silently ending their lives. They had unwisely chosen positions without a clear view of each other, and thus he was free to slay them. Eliminating them didn’t really improve his situation, but it might make Lian’s escape easier, or perhaps allow some nobleman or mage loyal to the royal family a chance to use the roof to flee via some magical means.

All of his victims had carried crossbows, and upon examining their bolt cases he was amazed to discover three Nightblood-tipped bolts in one of them. Even the quartet of killers sent after him hadn’t carried the poison, for it was nearly beyond price. Said to be distilled from the very blood of the night goddess, it would enflame anything it contacted. Only total darkness could extinguish its flames, and he quickly closed the light-proof case so not to waste the venom. Even the enchanted steel of the bolts would eventually be consumed by the ravenous black flames.

Creeping forward to peer down into the main courtyard, he spotted an entourage near the main gate under the mage lights that hung there. There was still some fighting from the garrisons that held the towers, but it looked to his practiced eye that the courtyard and the entrance to the keep had been secured.

The faces of the entourage were illuminated by the permanent magical lights of the castle gatehouse. He recognized Stevan, King Evan’s nephew and Grand Duke Rishak’s son, in the group. He also saw Jenine, Evan’s middle daughter. Of her husband, Prince Veran, there was no sign. Jenine was standing unnaturally still, her wide eyes staring unseeingly ahead. Elowyn narrowed his eyes, summoning his elven power of witchsight, then spotted the tendrils of magic creeping off of the princess and evaporating into the darkness. Further wisps of magic emanating from the mage leaning against the castle walls would have revealed his position if Elowyn’s darksight hadn’t.

Jenine is compelled
, he thought. Most compulsion magics controlled only the body, like the spell apparently restraining her now. There were others, more difficult to administer, which could induce a victim to become a willing slave, and he had no doubt that one of these would become her eventual fate.

Rishak wants a wife for Stevan or Ruthold
, he thought, including the Duke’s other son in his thoughts. The marriage of Jenine following a coup would solidify his claim to the throne, particularly if Jenine were the willing and loving wife of one of his sons. A majority of the peasantry wouldn’t question her reasons for transferring her devotion from her Delsani prince to one of her half-cousins.

Elowyn could predict what fate would befall any nobleman who asked.

He leaned back against the parapet, his head spinning and the coldness spreading throughout his body. His own magical talent was weak, and even if he were able to counterspell the compulsion, there was no future for Jenine. He knew that Lian and Jenine were the only survivors of the night’s assault. The rest of the royal family, from Evan himself to Radiel, the youngest daughter, were all dead. He’d spent some time creeping through the secret passages to attain confirmation of this before his unfortunate encounter with the four assassins. It was a tribute to his skills as Master of Assassins that none of the men
originally
sent to find him had been successful.