Fugitive Prince

  On Tharrick’s release, Feylind uncoiled from the bench and bolted before anyone but her twin sensed the tears behind her fierce anger. Her flying footsteps dwindled through the doorway and tapped over the scuffed floor tiles which adorned the run-down grace of the sea-quarter houses of Innish.

  Lacking the spitfire heat of her presence, the workaday kitchen seemed suddenly airless and dead. Jinesse rubbed the stuck wisps of hair from her temples. Pale against the age-darkened paneling, she breathed in the mingled scent of beeswax and stale cooking, then sat in defeat beside Tharrick. “That girl could so easily come to a bad end, and for what? Arithon s’Ffalenn needs none of her help. She’s headstrong and wild, and no one’s good sense has the impact to mold her opinions.”

  Since Tharrick had no sound consolation to offer, he gathered his wife’s tired shoulders to his side and caressed a smear of flour from her cheek.

  “Let her be.” Fiark moved the chipped bread bowl to the drainboard, puffed away the few stray flecks on his sleeves, then lent his good-natured advice. “Doesn’t anyone notice? Feylind takes care of herself. She listens to Arithon. We’ll just have to trust his sound planning will keep her out of harm’s way.”

  Tharrick raised craggy brows, his eyes on his stepson grown piercing. “Better speak if you know something you haven’t told us.”

  Fiark’s subtle, secretive nod burst his restraint and exposed a conspirator’s grin. “Arithon’s own planning. You’ll see.”

  Moments later, an earsplitting scream slapped echoes back down the corridor. Jinesse startled. From mercenary’s instinct, Tharrick reached for the broadsword he forgot he always left at the armory.

  When the cry changed pitch into shattering joy, Fiark took pity on his mother’s confusion. “The Master of Shadow left her a letter.”

  Above the approaching patter of Feylind’s swift feet, and another pealing crow which set tremors through the crockery on the shelves, Fiark answered Tharrick’s puzzled inquiry. “Rathain’s prince has bound us over clear title to the merchant brig, Evenstar. She’s mine to ship cargoes, and Feylind’s to captain. So I much doubt my sister will curse round-bottomed tubs after this. In fact, I’ll lay silver her share of the vessel never gets sold to meet her woman’s need for a dowry.”

  Now Jinesse straightened with surprising distress. “How long does he plan to be gone?”

  Tharrick stared, amazed. “Then you’re not glad he’s left?”

  “He was a friend,” Jinesse stated in perfect aplomb. She shot up and paced to the small copper sink and splashed water over her face. “I just don’t approve of his Grace’s activities where the safety of my daughter’s concerned. Now answer my question. When does he come back?”

  Tharrick’s honest features showed a disconcerted unease. “Never.” His attentive regard held upon his wife’s back as he qualified with soft sympathy. “Arithon made his will plain in absolute terms. He would hear no plans to renew ties on this continent for the rest of his natural life.”

  Far removed to the northwest, amid the firelit heat of her cramped room in Capewell, Enchantress Lirenda swore as she cleared her mind from the vivid scene in the quartz sphere. “Damn him! Fiends curse him for a conniving, clever bastard!”

  No s’Ffalenn prince since Torbrand had ever welcomed anyone’s prying; Arithon’s unearthly, clever machinations made her problem by lengths more difficult.

  Lirenda closed her eyes, the fine tendrils of hair at her temples licked to her flushed, sweating face. She put off her disgruntled longing for the comforts of a cool, scented bath. The knot held her tied. While her future swung in the balance, her quarry was no longer conveniently ill, languishing in cosseted vulnerability at Innish.

  Again, Arithon had escaped to the open sea, where the lane scryers held no chance in creation of finding a trace of his movements.

  Neither could she devise any way to predict the erratic, close secrecy of those landfalls he chose to arrange. If Morriel Prime expected a plan by the time Sethvir reached Isaer Circle, three days remained to deliver. The last avenue of inspiration was the quartz sphere which reflected the baked downs at Araethura, where the ostracized initiate Elaira sat in the hot dirt, drawing stick figures of animals beside a tattered shepherd urchin.

  Stabbed by pinprick resentment for the carefree innocence of their play, Lirenda took up the scene reflected in the crystal’s stone heart. The dry days that foreran the ending of summer touched the downs to a sea of gold grass. Woman and child shared the antique glaze of buttery, late-day sunlight. The herder’s boy seemed an ordinary enough creature, his bare feet rimmed with powdery dust, and his sturdy wrists thrust out of ragged cuffs where growth had overtaken his wardrobe.

  Elaira shared a like-minded untidiness. Her knuckles were briar scraped from foraging herbs, and her blouse of a faded, mulberrydyed cotton clashed with the jarring, hard fire of her wind-tangled auburn hair.

  Lirenda surveyed the exchange, secure within her groomed elegance. Her kohl-lined lids slitted with contempt that verged upon boredom until the child chanced to look up.

  Through fronding black hair, his eyes were the identical, piercing green of any royal-born scion of s’Ffalenn. His expression of innocent entreaty gouged up the unbidden association: woke the echo of a grown prince’s compassion with the opening force of a thunderbolt.

  Lirenda froze with stopped breath.

  In the quartz, trapped unguarded in the same moment, Elaira’s tanned face recorded her unwitting and identical response: a flash-point surge of tender emotion, brought to light on the wings of a memory.

  For the span of one fated second, the displaced First Senior felt as if the whole universe had rocked and resettled in her hand.

  Then logic reasserted. The penciled arch of Lirenda’s brow smoothed. Clear thought reengaged and stamped back the unbridled contamination of wild fancy. A high-order senior and a streetorphaned field herbalist held nothing at all in common. Resentment remained, that Elaira’s headstrong fascination with Prince Arithon’s character had been the original catalyst to bring Morriel’s disfavor on them both.

  Lirenda tapped an impatient nail against the crystal. Inspiration bent her thoughts to exquisite, fine malice. How better to amend a shared fall from grace than to see Elaira swept into the center of the plot to take down Arithon s’Ffalenn?

  In the quiet, sealed room, wrapped in the musk of her heat-sodden silk, Lirenda sat straight. The quartz sphere itself seemed to kindle with fire as inspiration unfolded into a hard plan of action. Through Elaira, sure means could be formulated to match Morriel’s demand. Satisfaction curved Lirenda’s coral lips, then widened to a smile as sensuous and sure as the stalking crouch of a panther.

  If Arithon s’Ffalenn could not be bought with gold, or tracked with spells, or snared into captivity through dark lures of compulsive magic, he still had one weakness for which he would hold no rearguard defenses. The s’Ffalenn royal gift of compassion could not be gainsaid. He must come to the net of his own accord if the stakes were aligned, and the bait for her trap was an innocent.

  Intervals

  Late Summer 5653

  In the overfurnished sitting room of a cottage at Innish, Felirin the Scarlet winces and casts his lyranthe aside, resigned that his fire-scarred hands can no longer play for his living; nor is he aware of any observer until Halliron’s spinster daughter addresses him from the doorway: “Never mind. This house cries out for the retired bard it never came to shelter. I would be pleased if you would consent to make your permanent home here with me…”

  At Avenor, faced across the pearl-inlaid lacquer of a table in a fashionable tavern, Mearn s’Brydion pours fine brandy for a drunken palace scribe, and presses the inveigling question he has waited like a snake to present: “Never mind principle. For the Light, I’d pay gold to congratulate the stout man who sent his letter to Etarra, betraying the Shadow Master’s interests at the Riverton shipyard…”

  When the Paravian focus circle inside the Second Age ruin at
Mainmere flares active to receive the spell-turned energies of Sethvir’s crossing, Morriel Prime rules on the proposal Lirenda presents at Capewell: “Your plan to take Arithon has one severe drawback, and that, the fifteen-year span to achieve his final defeat. Yet the premise is sound. The quarry will succumb. You have my permission. Proceed…”

  GLOSSARY

  AL’DUIN—deceased father of Halliron Masterbard.

  root meaning: al—over; duinne—hand

  ALESTRON—city located in Midhalla, Melhalla. Ruled by the Duke Bransian, Teir’s’Brydion, and his three brothers. This city did not fall to merchant townsmen in the Third Age uprising that threw down the high kings, but is still ruled by its clanblood heirs.

  pronounced: ah-less-tron

  root meaning: alesstair—stubborn; an—one

  ALITHIEL—one of twelve Blades of Isaer, forged by centaur Ffereton s’Darian in the First Age from metal taken from a meteorite. Passed through Paravian possession, acquired the secondary name Dael-Farenn, or Kingmaker, since its owners tended to succeed the end of a royal line. Eventually was awarded to Kamridian s’Ffalenn for his valor in defense of the princess Taliennse, early Second Age. Currently in the possession of Arithon.

  pronounced: ah-lith-ee-el

  root meaning: alith—star; iel—light/ray

  ALLAND—principality located in southeastern Shand. Ruled by the High Earl Teir’s’Taleyn, caithdein of Shand by appointment. Current heir to the title is Erlien.

  pronounced: all-and

  root meaning: a’lind—pine glen

  ALTHAIN TOWER—spire built at the edge of the Bittern Desert, beginning of the Second Age, to house records of Paravian histories. Third Age, became repository for the archives of all five royal houses of men after rebellion, overseen by Sethvir, Warden of Althain and Fellowship Sorcerer.

  pronounced: al—like “all,” thain—to rhyme with “main”

  root meaning: alt—last; thein—tower, sanctuary

  original Paravian pronunciation: alt-thein (thein as in “the end”)

  AMROTH—kingdom on West Gate splinter world, Dascen Elur, ruled by s’llessid descendants of the prince exiled through the Worldsend Gate at the time of the rebellion, Third Age just after the Mistwraith’s conquest.

  pronounced: am-roth—to rhyme with “sloth”

  root meaning: am—state of being; roth—brother “brotherhood”

  AN’ALT—Paravian name for the rune symbolizing infinity

  pronounced: an-allt

  root meaning: an—one/first; alt—end/last

  ARAETHURA—grass plains in southwest Rathain; principality of the same name in that location. Largely inhabited by Riathan Paravians in the Second Age. Third Age, used as pastureland by widely scattered nomadic shepherds.

  pronounced: ar-eye-thoo-rah

  root meaning: araeth—grass; era—place, land

  ARITHON—son of Avar, Prince of Rathain, 1,504th Teir’s’Ffalenn after founder of the line, Torbrand in Third Age Year One. Also Master of Shadow, the Bane of Desh-thiere, and Halliron Masterbard’s successor.

  pronounced: ar-i-thon—almost rhymes with “marathon”

  root meaning: arithon—fate-forger; one who is visionary

  ARWENT—river in Araethura, Rathain, that flows from Daenfal Lake, through Halwythwood to empty into Instrell Bay

  pronounced: are-went

  root meaning: arwient—swiftest

  ASANDIR—Fellowship Sorcerer. Secondary name, Kingmaker, since his hand crowned every High King of Men to rule in the Age of Men (Third Age). After the Mistwraith’s conquest, he acted as field agent for the Fellowship’s doings across the continent. Also called Fiend-quencher, for his reputation for quelling iyats; Storm-breaker, and Change-bringer for past actions in late Second Age, when Men first arrived upon Athera.

  pronounced: ah-san-deer

  root meaning: asan—heart; dir—stone “heartrock”

  ATAINIA—northeastern principality of Tysan. pronounced: ah-tay-nee-ah

  root meaning: itain—the third; ia—suffix for “third domain” original Paravian, itainia

  ATCHAZ—city located in Alland, Shand. Famed for its silk.

  pronounced: at-chas

  root meaning: atchias—silk

  ATH CREATOR—prime vibration, force behind all life.

  pronounced: ath—to rhyme with “math”

  root meaning: ath—prime, first (as opposed to an, one)

  ATHERA—name for the world which holds the Five High Kingdoms; four Worldsend Gates; original home of the Paravian races.

  pronounced: ath-air-ah

  root meaning: ath—prime force; era—place “Ath’s world”

  ATHIR—Second Age ruin of a Paravian stronghold, located in Ithilt, Rathain. Site of a seventh lane power focus.

  pronounced: ath-ear

  root meaning: ath—prime; i’er—the line/edge

  ATHLIEN PARAVIANS—sunchildren. Small race of semimortals, pixielike, but possessed of great wisdom/keepers of the grand mystery.

  pronounced: ath-lee-en

  root meaning: ath—prime force; lien—to love “Ath-beloved”

  AVENOR—Second Age ruin of a Paravian stronghold. Traditional seat of the s’Ilessid high kings. Restored to habitation in Third Age 5644. Became the ruling seat of the Alliance of Light in Third Age 5648. Located in Korias, Tysan.

  pronounced: ah-ven-or

  root meaning: avie—stag; norh—grove

  BITTERN DESERT—waste located in Atainia, Tysan, north of Althain Tower. Site of a First Age battle between the great drakes and the Seardluin, permanently destroyed by dragonfire.

  pronounced: like bitter

  root meaning: to sear or char

  BLACK ROSE PROPHECY—made by Dakar the Mad Prophet in Third Age 5637 at Althain Tower. Forecasts Davien the Betrayer’s repentance, and the reunification of the Fellowship of Seven as tied to Arithon s’Ffalenn’s voluntary resumption of Rathain’s crown rule.

  BRANSIAN s’BRYDION—Teir’s’Brydion, ruling Duke of Alestron.

  pronounced: bran-see-an

  root meaning: brand—temper; s’i’an—suffix denoting “of the one”/the one with temper

  BWIN EVOC s’LORNMEIN—founder of the line that became High Kings of Havish since Third Age Year One. The attribute he passed on by means of the Fellowship’s geas was temperance.

  pronounced: bwin—to rhyme with “twin,” ee-vahk—as in “evocative,” lorn as in English equivalent, mein—to rhyme with “main”

  root meaning: bwin—firm; evoc—choice

  CAINCYR ISLAND—islet located in the archipelago at Min Pierens, in the Westland Sea.

  pronounced: cain-seer

  root meaning: caincyr—sailfish

  CAINFORD—city located in Taerlin, Tysan.

  pronounced: cay-in-ford

  root meaning: caen—vale; ford—not from the Paravian “ford at the vale”

  CAITH-AL-CAEN—vale where Riathan Paravians (unicorns) celebrated equinox and solstice to renew the athael, or life-destiny of the world. Also the place where the Ilitharis Paravians first Named the winter stars—or encompassed their vibrational essence into language. Corrupted by the end of the Third Age to Castlecain.

  pronounced: cay-ith-al-cay-en, musical lilt, emphasis on second and last syllables; rising note on first two, falling note on last two

  root meaning: caith—shadow; al—over; caen—vale “vale of shadow” link with prime power. An old Paravian colloquialism for unicorn.

  CAITHDEIN—Paravian name for a high king’s first counselor; also, the one who would stand as regent, or steward, in the absence of the crowned ruler.

  pronounced: kay-ith-day-in

  root meaning: caith—shadow; d’ein—behind the chair “shadow behind the throne”

  CAITHWOOD—forest located in Taerlin, southeast principality of Tysan. pronounced: kay-ith-wood root meaning: caith—shadow “shadowed wood”

  CALUM KINCAID—the individual who invented the great
weapon which destroyed the worlds of humanity, and caused the refugee faction, including the Koriathain, to seek sanctuary on Athera.

  pronounced: calum kin-cade

  root meaning not from the Paravian

  CAMRIS—north-central principality of Tysan. Original ruling seat was the city of Erdane.

  pronounced: Kam-ris, the i as in “chris”

  root meaning: caim—cross; ris—way “crossroad”

  CAOLLE—past war captain of the clans of Deshir, Rathain. First raised by, and then served under, Lord Steiven, Earl of the North and caithdein of Rathain. Planned the campaign at Vastmark and Dier Kenton Vale for the Master of Shadow. Currently in Jieret Red-beard’s service, and feal liegeman to Arithon of Rathain.

  pronounced: kay-all-e, with the “e” nearly subliminal

  root meaning: caille—stubborn

  CAPEWELL—city located on the south shore of Korias, Tysan. Home of a major Koriani sisterhouse.

  CARIADWIN—ship stolen from the royal shipyard at Riverton, by Cattrick’s conspiracy with Prince Arithon.

  pronounced: care-ee-add-win

  root meaning: ciaria—swallow; dwin—tail

  CARITHWYR—principality consisting primarily of a grassland in Havish, once the province of the Riathan Paravians. A unicorn birthing ground. Currently used by man for grain and cattle; area name has become equated with fine hides.

  pronounced: car-ith-ear

  root meaning: ci’arithiren—forgers of the ultimate link with prime power. An old Paravian colloquialism for unicorn.

  CATTRICK—master joiner hired to run the royal shipyard at Riverton; once in Arithon’s employ at Merior by the Sea.

  pronounced: cat-rick

  root meaning: ciattiaric—a knot tied of withies that has the magical property of confusing enemies

  CEREBELD—Avenor’s Lord Examiner, whose given task is to hunt out and try those who practice dark spellcraft.