Brent Weeks - Beyond the Shadows

“Solon,” Solon said, not giving his clan name, as an exile wouldn’t.

The harbormaster grabbed Solon’s chin and looked closely at his cheeks and ears, first on one side, and then, frustrated, on the other. His eyebrows tightened in confusion. Not only were there no scars where the clan rings had been torn out, but there were no scars from where the rings had been put in.

“Raesh kodir Sethi?” he demanded. Are you not Sethi?

“Sethi kodi,” Solon acknowledged, his Old Sethi diction perfect.

The harbormaster released Solon’s face as if burned. “What was your name?”

“Solonariwan Tofusin.”

One of the Modaini sailors cursed. The harbormaster’s tanned face turned green. He noticed that his long knife was still out and tucked it away as if it were scalding. “I think you’d better come with me …uh, your lordship.”

“What’s going on?” the captain asked.

Neither Solon nor the harbormaster answered. Solon clambered into the rowboat with the harbormaster. The sailor who’d cursed said, “The Tofusins reigned for five hundred years.”

Not exactly. It was four hundred seventy-seven.

“Reigned? They don’t anymore?” the captain asked, his voice strangled. Hopping into the rowboat, Solon couldn’t help but smile.

“No, cap’n. The last one died ten years ago. If this one really is a Tofusin, there’ll be all sorts of hell to pay.”

That, on the other hand, is dead on.

Khali’s blood,” Paerik swore, striding confidently across Luxbridge toward Dorian. “That was rather impressive. Who are you?” His eyes took in Jenine but dismissed her.

“It’s all right,” Dorian told Jenine, though it wasn’t. He’d destroyed a few teenage boys who had underestimated him. Paerik Ursuul was a man in the prime of his powers. And he was fresh. And he had six battle-hardened Vürdmeisters backing him.

One of the Vürdmeisters whispered in Paerik’s ear. Paerik straightened. “No, surely not. Dorian?” He stepped forward and Dorian stepped forward as well, not willing to let Paerik reach the end of Luxbridge unchallenged. Paerik smirked. Seeing that smirk, Dorian hated him, despised him, wanted to crush him.

“I am Dorian,” Dorian said defiantly. Six Vürdmeisters and Paerik. Damn it, he only wanted to leave. The dark clouds overhead rushed past, coldly impartial.

“We thought you long dead, brother, ” Paerik said. “A mistake we shall soon remedy.”

Dorian lashed out with vir and Talent both, splitting the weaves to sweep the Vürdmeisters off the bridge and at the same time yanking at the magical underpinnings to drop the bridge into the abyss.

They rebuffed the attacks with ease. Even with the amplifiae, Dorian was no match for seven Vürdmeisters together.

“Brother, brother,” Paerik admonished. “This bridge will not drop a true-born Ursuul.” He laughed and skulls embedded in Luxbridge seemed to laugh with him, their eyes glowing with magical fire. “Indeed, if any of Garoth’s sons were in danger, it would be you, Dorian: the mage-trained.”

“That’s what I’m counting on,” Dorian said. He stepped forward, out of the shoe he had cut free with his Talent, and put one bare foot on the bridge.

There was a flash as the last quarter of the bridge sensed a magus and unraveled.

Paerik screamed, falling with a shower of skulls that laughed no longer. He and the Vürdmeisters plummeted down and down. They flung vir at the distant walls, hoping to catch themselves, but the walls themselves were bespelled to deny magic purchase. The Vürdmeisters passed out of sight into the thick foul clouds of the abyss. Dorian could sense their magic for several more seconds, trying anything, everything, desperately. Then they winked out, all at the same time.

Before them, Luxbridge reformed itself. Dorian stepped back into his lead-lined shoe and tested it on the bridge. It flared green and began to turn transparent. He had simply used too much Talent too recently for the thin defense of the lead plating to be adequate, so he stretched the vir forth once more and reached under the bridge to steady it.

“We must go quickly,” he told Jenine. “Stay close.”

She nodded, biting her lip. By the God, she was beautiful. She was worth it.

Dorian stepped onto Luxbridge, and it held. It was even more eerie, he thought, to walk across the span without the skulls. Looking at the harmless skulls of the dead scared him less than looking at clouds far beneath his feet.

In moments, they made the crossing. The guards standing at the Gate Keep gaped and dropped to their knees. Dorian recognized Rugger.

“I’m sorry,” he said. Rugger looked up, sure he was about to die. Dorian Healed the man’s wen with a touch. Without the ugly protuberance, Rugger wasn’t half bad-looking. Rugger’s hands went to his forehead, disbelieving.

Hand in hand, Dorian and Jenine stepped through the iron portcullis and looked over the city from their perch.

Paerik’s army wound through the city and out onto the plain. The front of it was just beginning the climb up the ridge where Dorian and Jenine stood. The men and women on the leading edge weren’t soldiers; they were meisters and Vürdmeisters, two hundred strong. And they were already halfway to Dorian. They couldn’t help but have been aware of the magical firestorm he just been part of. Every one of them had their eyes fixed on him.

“Are we going to die?” Jenine asked.

“No,” Dorian said. “These people have lived under tyranny so long, they have no idea what to do after you’ve killed their leader. One more bluff, and we’re on our way home.” What home is that, Dorian?

“You really think you can bluff that? ” Jenine asked, pointing to the entire army.

Dorian smiled, and he realized how long it had been since he’d thought about the future. He was no prophet now, but yes, he was sure. He was about to gamble it all for one last time. A few orders, a few curses, maybe a few deaths, and he and Jenine would be on their way to Cenaria. It would work. It could, anyway.

Something cold touched his cheek. Dorian blinked.

“What?” Jenine asked, seeing the hope die in his face. “What’s wrong?” She followed his eyes up.

“It’s snowing,” he said softly. “The passes will be closed. We’re trapped.”

In the distance, barely audible beneath the hiss of falling snow, Dorian thought he heard Khali laughing.

Snow made the worst weather for invisibility. In Cenaria, snow usually melted as soon as it hit the ground, but tonight it was sticking long enough to show footprints. The sleet itself gave shape to Kylar’s body as it ran down his limbs. Kylar had to move as slowly toward the Ceuran camp as if he were an assassin. At least he still remembered how to sneak. And at least the clouds blocked the moon. Still, it was cold. As usual, Kylar was only wearing underclothes beneath the ka’kari, and it wasn’t enough.

He tugged at his earring, pushing down the distant awareness of Vi. Shivering, Kylar climbed a rocky knoll to get a better view. The Ceurans had four men camped on the windy hill, huddled around a banked fire, with oil-soaked torches nearby so they could give signals to the army below. Kylar sat five paces from a weary sentry. The man was a peasant foot soldier rather than a sa’ceurai. His armor was made of plates sewn onto fabric. Rather than being fastened with leather, which was durable but would harden and shrink if it got wet too often, Ceurans always fastened their armor with ruinously expensive Lodricari silk laces.

After the Battle of Pavvil’s Grove, Garuwashi’s plan had been to pull the Cenarian army east after his “Khalidoran” raiders while the main strength of his own army swept behind them and took the capital. It would have worked, but for something he never could have foreseen: walls.