Roger Taylor - Arash-Felloren

After a while, his room ordered to his satisfaction, he headed for the entrance with a view to buying food from one of the street traders. As he entered the main entrance hall, the scene of the events which had so advanced his fortunes, he began to feel uneasy. The feeling grew as he passed through the gates and moved towards the arch which opened on to the street. He lifted his hand to shield his eyes.

When he reached the arch, the light became intolerable and the heat struck him like a physical force. He could not move out into the street. Every part of him cried out for the subdued lighting of the Jyolan passages and its cold, enclosing stonework. If he moved forward, he knew the sunlight would burst into him, searing through to his very heart. And the air would be torn from his lungs, escaping into the vast, unbearable open sky – the sky which would ring mockingly with the echoes of his dying cries. As he stood there trembling, he sensed the creature somewhere, howling, lost.

Someone bumped into him. ‘Come on, shift yourself, there’s people with work to do here.’

The impact propelled him out into the street. He tried to cry out, but no sound came. Someone else bumped into him and cursed him. Then something made him open his eyes despite the awful daylight. The face carved into the keystone of the arch met his gaze, calm and serene, yet full of terrible power and purpose. His trembling began to fade. The Jyolan was his place, but then so was the whole city. From the Jyolan he would derive his strength so that, in the fullness of time, he would remake the city in its image. And until that time, he must walk in it, in its flawed, imperfect state. He had nothing to fear. He was awakening. Power was growing within him.

Slowly his breathing grew quieter and the street – his street – formed itself about him.

A hand took his elbow.

He spun round angrily, his hand raised to strike.

A Kyrosdyn stood in front of him. At his back were three bodyguards. Pinnatte held the man’s gaze and did not lower his hand. The Kyrosdyn faltered, as did the bodyguards before they remembered their duty. When they moved forward however, the Kyrosdyn raised his own hand to stop them.

Pinnatte felt the other man’s fear and his weakness. It both surprised and did not surprise him.

Then he recognized the Kyrosdyn who had placed the mark on his hand.

Rostan felt as though all life had been suddenly emptied from him and that he was now nothing more than an ice statue awaiting the sun’s deathly kiss. What was standing in front of him, what appeared to be the young man that he had Anointed, was an abomination. There was Power coiling within him unlike anything he had ever encountered, Power which was without any of the form or control which, by everything he knew, was intrinsic to its existence. Such a thing was not possible. Yet it was there. And it was about to be released at him.

Harsh experience gained over the years he had spent with Imorren rose up to tell him that he must stand firm here, that to flee would be certain to bring destruction down upon himself. But the warnings were unnecessary, he could not have fled even if he had wanted to, so terrified was he.

Yet even through the terror, questions clamoured at him. How could such an impossibility have come about? What could have gone wrong? Nothing he had done by that fountain should have produced this, even if Pinnatte had been totally unsuitable for the Anointing. He might have gone mad, and probably died, but no calculation, no theory, nothing in the long history of the Kyrosdyn’s searching and experimenting could have foretold this!

The anticipated blow did not come, but Pinnatte’s gaze was relentless.

What was this creature seeing, with those wide, angry, black eyes? No more than he could flee, could Rostan tear his eyes away from Pinnatte’s. It seemed to him that he was looking into the shifting, empty void in which this and all other worlds flickered endlessly in and out of existence. Vertigo mingled with his terror, telling him that should he move or speak, those black pools would expand until they encompassed him utterly and he would be lost for ever, tumbling through the dark nothingness where even time did not exist and where lay creatures and powers beyond any imagining.

Pinnatte lowered his hand and turned away slowly to look at the face on the arch. When he turned back, the brief release had given Rostan some of his wits back. He forced his mouth into an apologetic smile.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said, suddenly grateful that his many years serving Imorren had also given him some control over his voice. ‘I startled you.

He felt the strange Power in Pinnatte retreating. It gave him only slight encouragement however. The Power had appeared as suddenly as though a curtain had been flung aside, and it might well do so again. His mind was racing. Since Imorren’s command, he and the Lesser and Higher Brothers had been searching for this man. It had not taken him long to detect the sign of the Anointed – it had grown markedly – but that had given him no inkling of what he was going to face. And now that he had found him he realized that he had walked blithely to the edge of a precipice. To use the Power in such a public place, even subtly, would have been a great risk at any time, but it was completely out of the question now. Who knew what response this thing might make? As for getting the mercenaries to capture him, that would be even more foolish. Imorren’s statement that this man’s role was too uncertain for any rashness had proved to be both a timely warning and a considerable understatement. Nevertheless, he would still have to be taken back to her somehow.

Even as he was thinking, he was aware of Pinnatte’s Power continuing to recede. It gave him the opportunity to look at his erstwhile victim with calmer eyes. What he saw puzzled him. Had it not been for the sign of the Anointed which surrounded him, he doubted he would have recognized the man. He had been a scruffy street thief only days before; now he was clean, and though his clothes were ill-fitting, comparatively well dressed. Some change in his fortunes had occurred other than the Anointing. Rostan gathered enough resources to resort to normal diplomacy.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said again. ‘I didn’t mean to startle you.’

Pinnatte cocked his head on one side, as if Rostan were speaking an unknown language. The Kyrosdyn, in his formal robes, was obviously a high-ranking Brother of some kind and, with the three mercenaries at his back, he should have been an intimidating sight… someone whom, under normal circumstances, he would have diligently avoided. Yet now, though elements of his former existence tugged at him anxiously, he felt at ease and in command of affairs. The Kyrosdyn was nothing. In fact, for some reason, the man was afraid. And Pinnatte knew that this was how it should be – that, if necessary, he could dispatch this irritation into oblivion at a mere touch. The thought made no sense to him, a small voice somewhere was crying out that he was being a fool and that he should not trifle with such people, but he knew that his new insight was true nonetheless.

And now the Kyrosdyn was being polite. Politeness was not something Pinnatte was used to, and to receive it from a Kyrosdyn both stilled such doubts as he still had and triggered a feeling of dark amusement. He did not reply, but continued staring at Rostan.

Rostan shifted uncomfortably, then held out his hand and introduced himself. Pinnatte looked down at the hand and then back at Rostan, without taking it. One of the mercenaries, Gariak, who had been at the fountain, made to step forward, eyes narrowed, but a slight gesture from Rostan stopped him.

Though far from being relaxed, Rostan was feeling easier now. No blow had been struck and the strange Power seemed to have faded almost completely. What it had been, whether it might erupt again, were questions which along with many others he set firmly aside. All that mattered now was that this man be kept at his ease and lured to the Vaskyros. He brought his hands together in an attitude of prayer and affected a look of contrition. ‘I understand,’ he said, lowering his eyes. ‘Our meeting the other day was…’ He shrugged regretfully. ‘Ill-judged, to say the least.’ Pinnatte making no response, he pressed on, mustering all the sincerity he could find. ‘I’m afraid you caught me at a particularly difficult time and sadly, my temper got the better of me. I can assure you I regretted my behaviour almost immediately. In fact I’ve been looking for you ever since so that I could apologize.’ He became fatherly. ‘My name’s Rostan. I appreciate that you didn’t realize who I was when you took my purse. I know the Guild of Thieves has great respect for our Order. It was my fault for walking the streets in ordinary clothes. It’s not something I’ll do again quickly.’