But Isfrael was persistent. “Azhure loves the forest, and it her.”
“She shines over forest and plain and sea alike.”
“Yes, I suppose you are right, Papa.”
Axis had never ceased to be relieved that Azhure had accepted Isfrael so well or so quickly into their family. They had been blessed these past nine years with a happiness neither could have anticipated or dared hope for. Their hearts had healed well from the tragedies that had enveloped them, and their family had grown about them, leaping and cavorting and laughing through Sigholt’s corridors and the shores of the Lake of Life.
His family. His children. Five now, yet Axis only ever really thought of three of them as his. The twins remained on the outer. Drago had grown into a surly boy, silent and withdrawn. Obedient, but Axis thought that rebellion lay simmering beneath the outer fragile calm. He showed no trace of his Icarii heritage—even his face had lost its Icarii cast. He had grown no wings, nor had he demonstrated any Icarii Enchanter powers. He’d paid dearly for his treachery, and yet neither Axis nor Azhure, and certainly not Caelum, ever trusted him. They often sent him to stay long months with Belial and Cazna and their two children.
RiverStar was a reserved girl. She kept Drago company, but they were an odd pair. She had grown into her full Icarii heritage, developing wings and Enchanter powers. She was golden and violet, like her aunt EvenSong, and she smiled and laughed and played and hugged both her parents with apparent love.
But she was still reclusive and sometimes sat quietly for hours on end, refusing to play with the other children. She did not harbour resentment or hostility. Not really, but sometimes Axis caught her looking at him with strange eyes, and a shiver would run down his back. When Drago went to Belial’s home in Carlon, RiverStar requested to stay with her grandfather on the Island of Mist and Memory. She got on well with StarDrifter, and he remained largely responsible for her training.
So Drago and RiverStar were absent for long months at a time and, even when there, they were hardly part of Sigholt’s life.
Caelum…glorious, wondrous Caelum. He was nearing twelve now, and growing into his full heritage. He had never developed wings—had refused to, saying that neither of his parents had wings and he wanted to be just like them—but he was Icarii in almost every other respect…save in his overwhelming sense of compassion and humility. He would be an Enchanter like no other, Axis thought proudly.
Now Axis’ expression softened even further as he thought of his fifth child and Azhure’s fourth. Three years ago she had conceived and birthed a daughter (another daughter, he vaguely reminded himself). Azhure had called her Zenith, and she had the look of her mother, but Axis did not realise that one of the reasons Azhure’s eyes filled with tears so often when she gazed into her daughter’s eyes was because Zenith gazed back at her with the eyes of a reborn soul.
She too would be an Enchanter, but Axis did not think she would have to wield her Icarii powers to enchant a man’s soul.
“Will FreeFall and EvenSong join us for Caelum’s nameday?”
Again Isfrael’s voice sounded a trifle impatient, and Axis tried to rouse himself from his reverie; Isfrael must feel as if he was walking these forest paths alone. It lacked only a week until Yuletide, and the Houses of SunSoar and the Stars often used the excuse of Caelum’s birth anniversary, coupled with the sacred rites of Yuletide, to meet as a family.
“Yes.” Axis smiled at the boy. “And Star Drifter will join us, too.”
StarDrifter had made his home on the Island of Mist and Memory—where Axis assumed he created havoc among the Priestesses of the Order of the Stars. Usually he would have led the Yuletide rites on the Island, but there were other Enchanters who could do so, and this year StarDrifter had elected to join Axis and Azhure in Sigholt for the Yuletide season.
These days Axis spent most of the year in Sigholt. In the two or three years after his final battle with Gorgrael he, as Azhure, had spent a great deal of time at Carlon, as well as travelling about the country, making sure that the new nation of Tencendor emerged strong and vibrant from the chaos and division of the previous thousand years. Most Tencendorians had recovered well after the dislocation of war; the Acharites had settled back into their farming existence, and the Icarii had finally managed to reclaim their beautiful cities amid the waving treetops of the Minaret Peaks. EvenSong and FreeFall, now crowned Talon, had made their home there.
FreeFall, Ho’Demi, Ysgryff, Magariz and Belial managed their territories justly and efficiently, and Axis no longer needed to make his presence felt in Tencendor. He met with the Five formally twice a year, and informally more often, but Axis now spent more and more time behind the soft blue mists surrounding Sigholt, exploring and studying his still expanding powers, talking with the Nine when they came to visit, loving Azhure, playing with their children.
Sometimes Rivkah and Magariz and their son came to stay with them. Magariz had built—and continued to expand—a new town in the fertile plains bounded by the Ichtar and Azle rivers. Severin had taken over from the ruined Hsingard and the rebuilt Jervois Landing as the main town of Ichtar, and his mother and Magariz had built themselves a fine palace on a hill overlooking the town.
Whatever reservations Axis had entertained about Rivkah’s son had now mostly disappeared. Zared had inherited his mother’s wit and courage and his father’s dark good looks and sense of loyalty, and Axis found unexpected delight in his younger half-brother. This time, he hoped, he would enjoy the companionship of a brother rather than suffer his hatred and rivalry.
Azhure’s father had never reappeared. No-one knew where he had gone—even Azhure professed no knowledge—and Axis did not care if WolfStar never appeared again. Perhaps he had stepped back through the Star Gate, returned to whatever eternity he should have enjoyed in the first instance. Perhaps. And perhaps he plotted mischief elsewhere.
But Axis did not worry about WolfStar. If he ever turned up, Axis would deal with him then.
Axis had never again uncovered the Rainbow Sceptre since that dreadful day in Gorgrael’s chamber. The rag torn from Faraday’s gown still covered it, and the Sceptre had been placed in a secret chamber in Sigholt. Eventually, Axis knew, he would have to study it, explore the traces and reminders of the Sentinels he knew still inhabited it, but that time was not yet upon him.
The only cloud in Axis’ otherwise sunny existence was cast by the knowledge that one day the Avar would lay claim to his youngest son.
The Avar mostly remained in the Avarinheim, although some Clans spent time walking the paths of Minstrelsea. They would wait until Isfrael grew to his majority, they said, wait until Faraday’s son took his place as their Mage-King, before they would move south in significant numbers.
Axis continued to chat with Isfrael about StarDrifter’s visit, but the deeper they walked into the forest the more unsettled Axis grew. Each year he found these walks into Minstrelsea with Isfrael increasingly disturbing. Within a few years he knew the Avar would request that Isfrael come live with them, to learn their ways and the magic of the trees—and Axis did not know if he could bear to lose Faraday’s son as well as Faraday.
Axis glanced at Isfrael. He was a fey child, and as he grew older Axis could see more of Faraday in him. Especially after their twice-annual visit to Niah’s Grove.
They were close now, and Axis and Isfrael fell silent. Even the sounds of the forest were muted, and birds watched still and silent instead of fluttering gaily about the canopy.
There. Ahead. As she always waited for them.
Shra.
She must be fifteen or sixteen now, Axis thought as they approached. She had the dark eyes and hair of her people, and the fine-boned fragility of all Avar women, but was unusually tall and fair-skinned for her race. She commanded immense respect from among the Avar, where she held sway as the senior Bane, as from both Axis and Isfrael. She exuded power, but it was not the threatening power that Axis and Azhure had felt from previous Avar Banes. It was
enormously peaceful; Shra was always surrounded by a sense of serenity so profound that Axis sometimes felt like an awkward stableboy before her.
“Welcome, Axis,” she said, and held his hands briefly as she kissed him on the cheek.
“Isfrael.” She smiled, and took the boy’s face between her own. “You grow another handspan every time I see you.” She bent down and brushed his cheeks with her lips.
The boy blushed with pleasure. He looked forward to seeing Shra almost as much as he did his mother. He knew of his heritage, knew that one day he’d live among the Avar, and he knew that it bothered his father. But if all the Avar were as beautiful as Shra, then Isfrael knew he would love living with them.
Shra dropped her hands and glanced at Axis. “You must wait at the edge of the grove.”
“I know that,” Axis said roughly. Always he waited, unwanted, unwelcome, at the edge—why did Shra need to remind him of it yet again?
She nodded, then she took Isfrael’s hand and led him forward.
They always came to Niah’s Grove. Axis was not too sure why…why Faraday-that-had-been would feel drawn to the site where Niah lay buried. The grove stood as it had since the day Faraday had planted it out; the nine trees ringed it, their branches interlocked, yet bright tendrils of sunshine still dappled the grove itself. Moonwildflowers, Azhure’s mark, grew in a thick ring in the centre of the grove, and were scattered thinly over most of the grassy clearing.
Shra led Isfrael to the ring of violet flowers, and motioned him to sit inside it. She bent down and talked with him softly for several minutes, then she stood and walked to the far side of the grove. At its edge she paused and looked back, first to Isfrael sitting patiently among the flowers, then briefly to Axis.
Then she turned and was swallowed by the shadows.
They waited, Axis under the ring of surrounding trees, Isfrael in the central circle of flowers. Sometimes they waited only minutes, sometimes two or three hours. But whatever the time, Isfrael always waited patiently, never fidgeting, never speaking. Even as a baby barely able to crawl, when Axis had first brought him here, Isfrael had been patient.
Today she appeared almost immediately.
As always, her appearance was heralded by the White Stag.
Axis, startled, heard a twig snap behind him. The White Stag had walked to within a pace or two of him, his body tense, his dark eyes alert.
He trembled, but he allowed Axis to reach out and touch his shoulder briefly.
Greetings, Raum.
Greetings, Axis StarMan. You are well?
Very well. And you?
The Stag did not reply, and Axis was not interested in trying to continue the conversation. Both turned to look into the grove.
Isfrael sat tense and excited now, knowing his mother was not far away. His eyes darted about the trees, wondering from behind which one she would emerge.
In the end, stunningly, she stepped out from the White Stag’s shadow.
Axis jumped, his heart pounding. Never before had she come this close to him. Stars, but if he stepped forward and reached out he would be able to touch her!
But he stayed still, although the effort cost him dearly. He was terrified that if he touched her she would disappear.
She stared at him briefly, her dark eyes startled, her head and neck tense, the muscles along her back quivering, then, with a single bound, she leaped into the grove and stepped lightly, gracefully, over to her son.
Isfrael gave a low cry of delight and reached out his arms, although he did not rise.
The doe walked up to him and lowered her head, nuzzling the boy’s face and neck.
Isfrael rubbed her neck and shoulders, burying his fingers within her deep red pelt, tears running down his face. He was silent, as he always was, but Axis knew that on some deep level he communicated with his mother.
After a few minutes the doe folded her legs and sank down beside the boy, and they sat for over an hour, Isfrael with his arms about the doe’s neck, she rubbing her cheek against his.
They were surrounded by dancing beams of sunlight, and multicoloured butterflies fluttered about them, but the forest birds kept reverentially quiet, and the usually constant undertone of Tree Song had completely faded. The forest wrapped itself about them, still and silent.
Axis’ eyes filled with tears. The sight never failed to move him deeply, and he yearned, as he always did, to join his son and Faraday-that-had-been in the centre of the grove.
But she did not want him there. She only wanted her son. Whatever love she had once borne him had either gone or been buried so deep that it might as well never have been.
She ran unfettered now, unfettered by pain or betrayal…or by her love for Axis.
When she rose Axis expected her to bound off into the forest as she always did.
But this day she did not.
Trembling so badly Axis thought her fragile legs would fold on her, the doe stepped back towards where he stood with the White Stag.
Behind him the Stag tensed…Axis could feel the entire forest tense.
She halted a pace away from him, and Axis realised he was trembling himself. Slowly, achingly slowly, Axis raised a hand.
Her head wavered, and her dark eyes widened in alarm.
He froze, his hand half extended, his fingers reaching out in appeal. He thought his heart was thudding so loudly its beat would be enough in itself to frighten her away.
Her head jerked, her eyes white-rimmed with anxiety. Yet her nose continued to edge forward, almost unwillingly…so near that her warm breath lifted the hairs on the back of his hand.
Oh Stars, Axis thought, unable to breathe himself, she’s so close! Another heartbeat and I’ll be able to touch her.
But the instant before she nuzzled Axis’ fingers the White Stag shifted slightly behind him, and his movement broke the spell.
With a startled gasp the doe gave a single great leap sideways, and the White Stag moved so that his body stood between her and Axis.
“Faraday!” Axis cried.
She paused, her eyes burning with unreadable emotion, then she turned and was away, bounding free through the forest, the White Stag at her shoulder.
Unfettered.
Glossary
ACHAR: the realm that once stretched over most of the continent, bounded by the Andeis, Tyrre and Widowmaker Seas, the Shadowsward Forest and the Icescarp Alps. Now integrated into Tencendor.
ACHARITES: a people of Tencendor.
ADAMON: one of the nine Star Gods of the Icarii, Adamon is the eldest and the God of the Firmament.
AFTERLIFE: all three races, the Acharites, the Icarii and the Avar, believe in the existence of an AfterLife, although exactly what they believe depends on their particular culture.
ALAYNE: a roving blacksmith in Skarabost who once told the young Azhure stories.
ALAUNT: the legendary pack of hounds that once belonged to WolfStar SunSoar. They now run with Azhure. They are all of the Lesser.
ALDENI: a small province in western Achar, devoted to small crop cultivation. It is administered by Duke Roland under the overlordship of Prince Belial.
ALNAR: a Bane of the Avar people.
ANDAKILSA, RIVER: the extreme northern river of Ichtar, dividing Ichtar from Ravensbund. Under normal circumstances, it remains free of ice all year round and flows into the Andeis Sea.
ANDEIS SEA: the often unpredictable sea that washes the western coast of Tencendor.
ANNWIN: eldest daughter of the exiled and deposed Earl Isend of Skarabost, sister to Faraday. Married to Lord Osmary.
ARCEN: the major town of Arcness.
ARCNESS: large eastern province in Tencendor, specialising in pigs.
ARHAT: a Ravensbund warrior.
ARNE: a former Axe-Wielder and current cohort commander in the combined army, he often acts as Axis’ personal bodyguard.
ARTOR THE PLOUGHMAN: the one true god, as taught by the Brotherhood of the Seneschal. According to the Book of Field and
Furrow, the religious text of the Seneschal, Artor gave mankind the gift of the Plough, the instrument which enabled mankind to abandon his hunting and gathering lifestyle and to settle in the one spot to cultivate the earth and thus to build the foundations of civilisation.
AVAR, The: ancient race of Tencendor who live in the forest of the Avarinheim. The Avar are sometimes referred to as the People of the Horn.
AVARINHEIM, The: home of the Avar people.
AVENUE, The: processional way of the Temple Complex on the Island of Mist and Memory.
AVONSDALE: province in western Tencendor. It produces legumes, fruit and flowers. It is administered by Earl Jorge under the overlordship of Prince Belial.
AXE-WIELDERS, The: once the elite crusading and military wing of the Seneschal. Its members did not taken holy orders but nevertheless dedicated their battle skills to the Seneschal to use as it wished. The Axe-Wielders were the main reason the Acharites managed to defeat the Avar and the Icarii in the Wars of the Axe and, over the subsequent thousand years, enjoyed a well-deserved reputation for military excellence. Once led by Axis as their BattleAxe, the Axe-Wielders are now completely disbanded, their men incorporated into Axis’ combined command, fighting with Axis to reunite Tencendor and defeat Gorgrael.
AXIS: son of the Princess Rivkah of Achar and the Icarii Enchanter StarDrifter SunSoar. Once BattleAxe of the Axe-Wielders, now he has assumed the mantle of the StarMan of the Prophecy of the Destroyer. After reforging Tencendor Axis formed his own house, the House of the Stars.
AZHURE: daughter of WolfStar SunSoar and Niah of Nor. She is married to Axis.
AZLE, River: a major river that divides the provinces of Ichtar and Aldeni. It flows into the Andeis Sea.