[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
should have expected as much, for although he had not known about the
Shardith, he had been aware that some catkin tribes served a yuwenghau a
young rogue god Dynarien, twin brother to Dynanna, God of cussedness. His
only comfort lay in the knowledge that Aejystrys Rowan was dead.
The cave where he waited for his companion, Bodramet, to rendezvous with him
was small, dark, and stank of the dry muskiness of animals that had once
laired there. It had two natural chambers with a narrow waist between them.
Mephistis crouched before a small fire, shoving twigs into it, staring into
the flames climbing the meager fuel. The fire could not warm him; he could not
build it large enough, for fear the smoke would be seen. The chill worsened
the pain of his wound. He had taken as much blood as he dared from his
surviving acolytes to heal himself, before ordering them to scatter in pairs
and make their way to the last remnant of free Waejontor. It would take much
more blood to complete the healing for Kaethreyn's, Aejys' blood mother's
sword thrust had torn his internal organs and intestines. Had he not been
sa'necari, the living embodiment of the undead, with willing blood available,
it would have killed him. Kaethreyn materialized on the altar of hecatomb just
Page 40
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
as he had been taking mortgiefan on Aejys' dying body, his seed ready to
explode inside her at the moment of death. The act would have shattered her
soul and he would have absorbed part of it, thus enhancing his magical
energies.
His beloved Margren, who shared his taste for death, had not been at
Dragonshead when it fell and been left behind. Mephistis tried several times
to contact her mind to mind through their link. When she did not answer, he
knew she had been slain. So he sent Bodramet, his companion, to try and
recover her body before someone could take her head and heart. So long as her
body remained whole, it would rise undead and return to him. For a time
Mephistis prayed in silence to the Hellgod, Bellocar, for Margren and
Bodramet's safe return.
He found himself thinking also of Isranon, praying that the Sharani had not
caught him. While he loved Margren, he trusted the youth far more. Isranon,
with his Dark Brothers sense of honor, devotion, and duty, was not like the
other sa'necari: his loyalty did not depend upon Mephistis' strength and
patronage to ensure it. And yes, Mephistis admitted, I love him also.
Mephistis would never forget seeing the somewhat scrawny boy, who had not yet
begun to fulfill the promise of his broad shoulders, break from cover in front
of him in full flight from a pack of hunting sa'necari. Mephistis had mistaken
him for a lycan, since they were on the edge of Claw's valley. He snatched him
up with a hand to his collar and a spell, thrown him across his saddle, and
stopped the hunters with a slash of dark power. But when his hand had brushed
the fourteen-year-old's cheek, Mephistis had recognized Isranon as sa'necari.
"Be safe, Isranon. Be safe."
Finally he rose, pulling his cloak tighter around him, and moved to the cave
entrance to stare at the sun rising through the treetops. "A day," he
muttered, his darkly sensual, almost feminine face twisted in worry. "It's
been a full day... Where are they?"
He hungered, but dared not go out after a victim until Bodramet returned: the
Sharani were hunting him. They knew what he was, maybe even who he was, so the
hunters would be paladins, priests and mages strong enough to have a chance of
taking him in open battle. He remembered the exquisite taste of Aejys' dying
body as he pushed into her, moving in rhythm to the struggling beats of her
failing heart. So close. He had been so close to taking mortgiefan, to
shattering her soul and drinking it in. His member rose in response to the
memory, deepening his hunger. His nerve endings burned and his muscles ached
for the taste of her.
A flash of color among the trees jerked him from his reverie. He retreated a
short way into the outer cave, watching. A single figure on horseback,
something large and blanket-wrapped tied before him: Bodramet had returned
with Margren's body.
Mephistis emerged, seizing Bodramet as he dismounted and embracing him. "You
found her."
"Indeed, lord," Bodramet answered. "She and the others were cut down in the
great hall as they celebrated her victory. Kaethreyn is dead. The lineage of
Rowan is ended."
Sadness swept through Mephistis, remembering the last time he saw her alive.
She had been happy and afire with passion, telling him to come to her bed
later wrapped in Aejys' blood so she could lick it off him. He had been eager
Page 41
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
to do so. But that nameless mage had somehow opened a gate directly onto the
altar, ending all their dreams and plans. There had been too many unknown
variables in his equations; variables he had never dreamed existed. Where in
Hell's name could Aejystrys Rowan have found a mage with such terrible power,
Mephistis had never imagined that anyone like that could have existed without
his knowledge, his spies were everywhere, even in Charas, the city of magic
itself. With the Rowans decimated, only the Asharen and Danae bloodlines
remained to threaten Waejonan's lineage and he would find a way to destroy
them also. Then his people would retake their lands and strike out across the
world. But what of this mage? With Rowan gone, would this mage come after him?
Together they took Margren's body down. Mephistis knelt in the snow,
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]