P. Hodgell - Bound in Blood

Torisen looked in vain for the saddlebag. “That’s Willow, isn’t it?”

“Yes. I put her bones into the furnace and mixed her ashes in this batch to represent Kithorn. It was time to let her go.”

While Torisen agreed, Marc’s decision made him uneasy. He had sensed all along that the Kendar clung to his sister’s remains in part as a substitute for Jame. True, she wasn’t at Gothregor most of the time, but her presence in the Kencyrath was growing. If she passed her year at the college, there would be no stuffing her back into the bag.

Not unless you do to her what Greshan did to me, said his father’s voice in his mind, and what I tried to do to you. Whose blood is stronger, boy? Do you dare put it to the test?

Marc raised his head and sniffed. “Do you smell smoke?”

“From these ovens?”

“No. From downstairs.”

They went to look.

Meanwhile, clad in riding leathers, Jame had entered the death banner hall with a torch. Ghostly figures stood around the wall before their tapestries, waiting for her.

“I understand now how blood can bind, even without intent,” she said to the watching faces, some faded almost to oblivion. “I know that many of you are accidentally trapped in the weave of your death, doomed to walk the Gray Land until fiber and mind rot away. Now at last I see how I can offer you freedom—if you want it. Only reach out and take it.”

She walked around the room, offering the torch. Many bowed and accepted it. Flames climbed swiftly, consuming fragile fabric and fading souls. Ash fell, stirred into eddies by the draft under the door.

“Blood binds. Fire loosens. Go in peace.”

Of those aware, a dozen were left. Among them were Kinzi and, of course, Mullen. Jame saluted them.

“We need whatever guidance and protection you can give us. Soon our destiny will come and we are ill prepared for it. At least I know that I am. Still, your blood is mine and mine is yours, whatever you choose. Your names will be remembered forever.”

With that, she doused the torch.

When Torisen and Marc arrived, they found only dancing ashes and a door open to the coming dawn.

Addy:Shade’s gilded swamp adder

Adiraina:blind Matriarch of the Ardeth, beloved of Kinzi; a Shanir who can determine bloodlines by touch

Adric:Lord Ardeth of Omiroth, Torisen’s former mentor

Aerulan:female cousin to Torisen, beloved of Brenwyr, slain in the Massacre of the Knorth women

Anar:a scrollsman who taught Torisen and Jame in the Haunted Lands keep when they were children

Anarchies:a forest on the western slopes of the Ebonbane mountain range, where the Builders disturbed Rathillien’s native powers and were destroyed by them

Anise:one of Jame’s ten-command

arax:a gold coin from Kothifir

Ardet:a Merikit

Argentiel:That-Which-Preserves, second face of the Three-Faced God

Aron:an Ardeth sargent at Tentir

Arrin-ken:huge, immortal, catlike creatures; third of the three people who make up the Kencyrath along with the Highborn and the Kendar; judges

Arrin-thar:a rare form of armed combat using clawed gantlets

Ashe:a haunt singer

Awl:a senior Randir officer

Bane:guards the Book Bound in Pale Leather and the Ivory Knife; half-brother to Jame; may be alive or dead

Bark:Gorbel’s servant

Barrier, the:a wall of mist between Rathillien and Perimal Darkling

Bashti:an ancient kingdom paired with Hathir on either side of the River Silver

Bear:a randon who was brain-damaged by an axe during the battle of the White Hills; Commandant Sheth’s older brother

Beauty:a darkling crawler (see wyrm)

Bel-tairi:Kinzi’s Whinno-hir mare, sister to Brithany, also called the White Lady and the Shame of Tentir

Bender:brother of Tirandys

blood-binder:a Shanir able to control anyone who tastes his or her blood

bone-kin:distant kin, as opposed to blood-kin

Book Bound in Pale Leather, the:a compendium of runes; one of the three objects of power lost during the Fall

bool:a copper coin from Hurlen

Bran:a Brandan randon

Brant:Lord Brandan of Falkirr

Breakneck Rock:a rock jutting out over Tentir’s favorite swimming hole

Brenwyr:sister of Brant; the Brandan Matriarch, also known as the Iron Matriarch; a maledight

Brier Iron-thorn:a Kendar cadet, formerly Caineron, now Knorth; second in command (or Five) of Jame’s ten

Brithany:a Whinno-hir and matriarch of the herd; Adric’s mount, granddam of Torisen’s war-horse Storm

Builders, the:a mysterious, now extinct race of architects who built temples for the Three-Faced God on threshold worlds

Burnt Man, the:one of the Four who present Rathillien; an avenger linked to fire

Burr:Kendar friend and servant of Torisen

Caldane:Lord Caineron of Restormir

Cataracts, the:site of a great battle between the Kencyr Host and the Waster Horde

Chain of Creation:a series of overlapping worlds, each the threshold to a different dimension

Chaos Serpents:vast serpents under the earth whose writhing creates earthquakes

changers:Kencyr who fell with the Master and, through mating with the shadows of Perimal Darkling, have gained the ability to shape-shift

Cherry:an Edirr cadet

Chun of the Soft Furs:a Merikit trapper

Chingetai:the Merikit chief

Cleppetty:a friend of Jame’s in Tai-tastigon; housekeeper at an inn called the Res aB’tyrr

Cloud:Commandant Sheth’s war-horse

Corrudin:Lord Caldane’s uncle and chief advisor

Corvine:a Randir sargent, formerly a Knorth Oath-breaker

Cron:a Knorth Kendar

crown jewel-jaws:a kind of carrion-eating butterfly that can camouflage itself

Dally:a young male friend of Jame in Tai-tastigon

Damson:a new cadet in Jame’s ten-command

Dar:a Knorth cadet, one of Jame’s ten-command

Dari:an Ardeth cadet

Dark Judge:an Arrin-ken allied to the Third Face of God, That-Which-Destroys, also to the Burnt Man

darkling crawler:a wyrm, or very large creepy-crawly with a poisonous bite

Darkwyr sign:a gesture made to avert evil

death banners:tapestry portraits of the dead woven of threads taken from the clothes in which they died

Death’s-head:a rogue rathorn, also the name adopted by the rathorn colt whose mother Jame killed

d’hen:a knife-fighter’s jacket, with one tight sleeve and one full, reinforced with steel mesh, to turn attacker’s blade

direhounds:savage hunting dogs with black legs and head, white body

Drie:an Ardeth cadet in Timmon’s ten-command, also a Falconeer

dreamscape:as with the soulscape, Kencyr dreams can touch, even overlap. However, on this superficial level one can only observe and sometimes communicate, not act.