Legacy of Kings
Novels by
C. S. Friedman
available from DAW Books:
The Magister Trilogy
Feast of Souls
Wings of Wrath
Legacy of Kings
The Coldfire Trilogy
Black Sun Rising
When True Night Falls
Crown of Shadows
The Madness Season
This Alien Shore
In Conquest Born
The Wilding
Legacy
of
Kings
C. S. Friedman
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Copyright © 2011 by C.S. Friedman.
All Rights Reserved.
Jacket art by John Jude Palencar.
DAW Book Collectors No. 1558.
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All characters and events in this book are fictitious.
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First Printing, September 2011
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This book is for Jen Kuiper:
Awesome role-player
Valued friend
Mensch
Acknowledgements
L
ITERARY THANKS go to Cordwainer Smith for his stunning story “The Game of Rat and Dragon” and Anne McCaffrey for her Pern series, for sparking my interest in the linkage of human and animal consciousness. While the theme has appeared in more books than one can count, the ways in which those two writers handled it raised questions in my mind that took on a life of their own over the years, until they helped give birth to this series. Those were benign relationships, of course, involving domestic cats on one hand and a species genetically altered to interact with humans on the other. Being of a much darker bent, I found myself wondering what such a relationship would be like if the species in question were one whose mind was not naturally compatible with the human psyche, but a truly wild creature with whom we had no common ground. And thus began the creative journey that culminated in this book.
Creative thanks go to Betsy Wollheim and Russ Galen, who helped me take that idea and mold it into a truly great story. No writer could possibly ask for a better editor or agent.
Revision thanks go to my reading team, who labored tirelessly to provide an answer to the writer’s eternal question, “Hey, how do you think it’s going?” That’s Carl Cipra, Zsusy Sanford, David Walddon, Steve Rappaport, Paul Hoeffer, and Jennifer Eastman.
Research thanks go to Christian Cameron, Jon Herrmann, Aleksandra Kleczar, Dr. Julian Redditt, and Markus Ofner for providing the kind of information and assistance you just can’t get from books.
Artistic thanks go to John Palencar for my beautiful covers. All I can say is . . . wow. Seriously. Wow.
And last—but definitely not least—very special thanks go to the people who helped keep me sane while I was writing this book. I have had a few speed bumps in my life during the last couple of years, and these people helped me overcome them and get back to the keyboard: James and Jenny Wood, Carmen C. Clarke, Jen Kuiper, David Williams, Anthony C., Jed Stancato, Cathy Wallin, Kristi Kelly, Hugh Montgomerie, Melissa Hendrix, Amanda Spikol, Chazz Mahan, and Tonya Druin. You guys were great. Thank you for being there when I needed you and for helping me stay grounded. (Well, as grounded as I ever get.)
What will future minstrels sing of the days leading up to the final battle?
They will sing of the Souleaters with their stained-glass wings, who feasted upon the life-essence of mankind and brought down the First Age of Kings. And of the army of martyrs that gathered to fight them, led by the world’s last surviving witches. By fire and faith they herded the great beasts into an arctic prison, where the incessant cold and long winter’s darkness would rob them of strength, and hopefully of life. And the gods themselves struck the earth with great Spears, it was said, erecting a barrier born of their Wrath, which would hold any surviving Souleaters prisoner until the end of time. For forty generations the Wrath held strong, so that the Second Age of Kings could thrive. But it was not truly a divine creation, merely a construct of witches, and when it finally faltered, the Souleaters began their invasion.
They will sing of the Magisters, undying sorcerers who wielded a power that seemed without limit, and of how they were bound by their Law to the fates of mortal men. But no minstrel will sing of the secret that lay at the heart of that dark brotherhood, for no mortal man who learned the truth would be allowed to live. The Magisters fueled their sorcery with the life-essence of human consorts, offering up the death of innocents to assure their own immortality. Perhaps that practice was what corrupted their spirits, so that they became innately hostile to their own kind . . . or perhaps there was another cause. Colivar alone seemed to know the truth, but even his most ancient and determined rival, Ramirus, had not yet been able to pry that information out of him.
They will sing of Kamala, a red-headed child destined for poverty and abuse in the slums of Gansang, who defied the fates and became the first female to learn the art of true sorcery. But her accidental killing of Magister Raven broke the brotherhood’s most sacred Law, and even her reclusive mentor Ethanus dared not give her shelter any longer. Forced to masquerade as a witch, she traveled the world in search of some knowledge or artifact that she might barter for her safety, so that she could bear the title of Magister openly and claim her proper place in the brotherhood of sorcerers.
They will sing of Danton Aurelius, who ruled the High Kingdom with an iron fist until the traitor Kostas brought him down. They will craft lamentations for the two young princes who died alongside their father, even as they celebrate the courage of Queen Gwynofar in avenging her husband’s death. Alas, it was not to be the end of her trials. For when prophecy summoned her to Alkali to search for the Throne of Tears, an ancient artifact that would awaken the lyr bloodlines to their full mystical potential, the gods demanded her unborn child in sacrifice, and later her beloved half-brother, Rhys.
They will sing of the Witch-Queen, Siderea Aminestas, mistress of Magisters and consort to kings, whom the sorcerers abandoned when her usefulness ended. And of the Souleater who saved her life, at the cost of her human soul. Vengeance burned bright in her heart the day she fled Sankara on the back of her jewel-winged consort, seeking a land where she could plant the seeds of a new and terrible empire.
They will sing of Salvator, third son of Danton Aurelius, who set aside the vows of a Penitent monk to inherit his father’s throne, rejecting the power and the protection of the Magisters in the name of his faith. Songs will be crafted to tell how he was tested by demons, doubt, and the Witch-Queen herself, even while the leaders of his Church argued over how he might best be manipulated to serve their political interests.
And last of all they will sing of the confrontation that was still to come, in which the fate of the Second Age of Kings—and of all mankind—would be decided. And those who hear their songs will wonder whether a prince-turned-monk-turned-king could really save the world, when the god that he worshiped might have been the one who called for its destruction in the first place.
Prologue
T
HE BATTLEFIELD was silent.
Bodies lay strewn across the blood-soaked ground, corpses of enemies intertwined like lovers. Thousands upon thousands of men who had once been the pride of their nations—strong and loyal soldiers—were now reduced to carrion. With death they had lost all dignity, all purpose. It no longer mattered who they had fought for, or how deeply they had believed in their causes. The ravens that were gathering over the battlefield cared nothing for such human niceties.