Ширли Мерфи - The Castle Оf Hape. Caves Оf Fire Аnd Ice. The Joining Оf Тhe Stone

Lobon’s voice caught. “And you, Mamen? You . . .”

But already she had turned toward the crystal door. As she stood with it flung back, a big dark stallion winged down out of the sky and a man, broad of shoulder and bearded, leaped down, taking her into his arms.

She was crying, held tight against Canoldir. At last she turned away from him, took Lobon in a strong embrace, and then Meatha. She kissed the child Jaspen and said, “I will return to see Gredillon.” She called to the mare who waited close beside the dome, a bright russet mare. She mounted, and the mare leaped up through clouds beside Canoldir’s stallion, whether to that place outside of Time or to another destination, no one knew.

Stepping to the crystal door. Meatha slid onto the back of the white mare, and Lobon chose Michennann. Skyborne, they turned to wave down at the little pale figure beside the crystal dome, then looked ahead; soon, from the sweeping sky, they saw below them the two wolves heading south, leaping across dunes like swift shadows. Will you come with us? Lobon asked them. We can carry you. And the winged ones banked upon the winds to await their answer.

But the wolves did not pause. We will take our own way, Lobon of wolves, Feldyn told him. There is time now for us to follow our own wild spirit, and time for you, Lobon, to ride a gentler wind.

Time, now, for a kinder life, guided by the runestone, Meatha said silently. And we, in turn, must stand strong to guard the stone’s power. Was it a warning, when the land shattered? That if we fail to keep the safe the runestone, if we weaken and grow soft and let the dark rule the stone, all will be lost forever?

There will be no turning back again, Lobon agreed. We cannot hope to retrieve, another time, what we would lose through weakness. Forever, now, we must stand strong. He touched Michennann’s sleek neck and the winged ones lifted into the wind; their powerfully beating wings carried them up, ever higher, into the clear, deep sky.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Shirley Rousseau Murphy grew up in southern California, riding and showing the horses her father trained. She attended the San Francisco Art institute and later worked as an interior designer while her husband attended USC. “When Pat finished school, I promptly quit my job and began to exhibit paintings and welded metal sculpture in the West Coast juried shows.” Her work could also be seen in many traveling shows in the western States and Mexico. “When we moved to Panama for a four-year tour in Pat’s position with the U.S. Courts, I put away the paints and welding torches, and began to write.” After leaving Panama they lived in Oregon, Atlanta, and northern Georgia before returning to California, where they now live by the sea.

Besides this novels in this volume and the preceding one, The Shattered Stone , Murphy wrote the Dragonbards trilogy (also available as ebooks) plus sixteen children’s books before turning to adult fantasy with The Catswold Portal and the Joe Grey cat mystery series, which so far includes sixteen novels and for which she is now best known. She is the winner of five Dixie Council of Authors and Journalists Author of the Year awards as well as eight Muse Medallion awards from the national Cat Writers Association.

ALSO AVAILABLE

The Shattered Stone

An omnibus containing the first two books of the five originally published as the Children of Ynell series, which tell of the youth of the characters in The Runestone of Eresu .

In most regions of Ere to be a Seer, gifted with telepathic and visionary powers, means death—or does it? For some it may mean an even worse fate: destruction of their minds and enslavement by the dark powers determined to conquer the world. In Ring of Fire , Zephy and the goatherd Thorn are dismayed to discover that they themselves are Seers, but once they know, they are driven to escape from the repressive city of their birth and rescue others, many of them children, who have been captured and imprisoned by its attackers. Only the discovery of one shard of a mysterious runestone offers hope that they can succeed. In The Wolf Bell , set in an earlier time, the child Seer Ramad seeks the runestone itself with the aid of an ancient bell that enables him to control and communicate with the thinking wolves of the mountains, who become his friends. But will they be a match for his enemies, the evil Seers of Pelli, who are determined to control Ramad’s mind and through him, to obtain the stone for their own dark purpose?

Dragonards Trilogy, Book 1: Nightpool

As dark raiders invade the world of Tirror, a singing dragon awakens from her long slumber, searching for the human who can vanquish the forces of evil—Tebriel, son of the murdered king. Teb has found refuge in Nightpool, a colony of talking otters. But a creature of the Dark is also seeking him, and the battle to which he is drawn will decide Tirror’s future.

Dragonbards Trilogy, Book 2: The Ivory Lyre

The bard Tebriel and his singing dragon Seastrider together can weave powerful spells. With other dragons searching for their own bards, they have been inciting revolts throughout the enslaved land of Tirror. Only if they can contact underground resistance fighters and find the talisman hidden in Dacia will they have a chance to break the Dark’s hold on the world.

Dragonbards Trilogy, Book 3: The Dragonbards

Only the dragonbards and their singing dragons have the power to unite the people and animals of Tirror into an army that can break the Dark’s hypnotic hold over the world. Before their leader Tebriel can challenge the hordes gathering for the final battle, he must confront the dark lord Quazelzeg face to face in the Castle of Doors, a warp of time and space.