Raymond Feist - Krondor - The Betrayal

Harper Voyager

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 1998

Copyright © Raymond E. Feist

Cover design by Dominic Forbes © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2019

Raymond E. Feist asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008311254

Ebook Edition © January 2018 ISBN: 9780007374977

Version: 2018-11-13

For John Cutter and Neal Hallford

with thanks for their creativity and enthusiasm

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Map

Prologue: Warning

Chapter One: Encounter

Chapter Two: Deception

Chapter Three: Revelation

Chapter Four: Passage

Chapter Five: Mission

Chapter Six: Journey

Chapter Seven: Murders

Chapter Eight: Secrets

Chapter Nine: Suspect

Chapter Ten: Nighthawks

Chapter Eleven: Escape

Chapter Twelve: Preparations

Chapter Thirteen: Betrayal

Chapter Fourteen: Instructions

Chapter Fifteen: Quest

Chapter Sixteen: Tasks

Chapter Seventeen: Misdirection

Chapter Eighteen: Regroup

Chapter Nineteen: Encounter

Chapter Twenty: Retribution

Epilogue: Dedication

Afterword

Acknowledgements

About the Author

By the Same Author

About the Publisher

THE WIND HOWLED.

Locklear, squire of the Prince of Krondor’s court, sat huddled under his heavy cloak, astride his horse. Summer was quick to flee in the Northlands and the passes through the mountains known as the Teeth of the World. Autumn nights in the south might still be soft and warm, but up here in the north, autumn had been a brief visitor and winter was early to arrive, and would be long in residence. Locklear cursed his own stupidity for leading him to this forlorn place.

Sergeant Bales said, ‘Gets nippy up here, squire.’ The sergeant had heard the rumour about the young noble’s sudden appearance in Tyr-Sog, some matter involving a young woman married to a well-connected merchant in Krondor. Locklear wouldn’t be the first young dandy sent to the frontier to get him out of an angry husband’s reach. ‘Not as balmy as Krondor, sorry to say, sir.’

‘Really?’ asked the young squire, dryly.

The patrol followed a narrow trail along the edge of the foothills, the northern border of the Kingdom of the Isles. Locklear had been in court at Tyr-Sog less than a week when Baron Moyiet had suggested the young squire might benefit from accompanying the special patrol to the east of the city. Rumours had been circulating that renegades and moredhel – dark elves known as the Brotherhood of the Dark Path – were infiltrating south under the cover of heavy rains and snow flurries. Trackers had reported few signs, but hearsay and the insistence of farmers that they had seen companies of dark-clad warriors hurrying south had prompted the Baron to order the patrol.

Locklear knew as well as the men garrisoned there that the chance of any activity along the small passes over the mountains in late fall or early winter was unusual. While the freeze had just come to the foothills, the higher passes would already be thick with snow, then choked with mud should a brief thaw occur.