He nodded, although she could see the hurt in his eyes. He wanted to be brave, strong, powerful, in control. He wanted to be all the things he saw in Archer. And in time, perhaps, he might be. This was not that time, nor had she moments to spare to comfort his ego. She trusted Tess and the Ilduin power. He must do likewise.

  Tess was already moving, striding purposefully, and Sara hurried to keep up. Tom, chastened, sidestepped behind them, watching lest someone spring upon them from the rear.

  * * *

  Chapter 28

  The door of the small tower room slammed open. Lantav jumped, temporarily losing his connection with the woman and, through her, his connection with the hive. Turning, he faced two women and a youth. The youth he discounted. The younger woman was clearly Mara's daughter, the one he would kill if necessary.

  But the other woman... Lantav stared in dumbstruck awe. The woman he had captured, Tess, had somehow escaped her cell. But more, she had somehow escaped the uncertainty and reticence he had seen in her during their previous meeting.

  This woman felt no such weakness. Her eyes blazed with fire, white fire, and she faced him as if he were nothing but a worm to be stepped on.

  "Sara," said Tess.

  "Aye?"

  "Take this to your mother." She pressed something into the younger woman's hand. Lantav thought he glimpsed something red.

  "No!" He stepped forward and pulled forth the sword that had dangled useless at his side these many years. "I will kill her if she approaches."

  "Really?" Tess smiled, but it was not an expression that Lantav found reassuring. "How do you propose to do that, you misbegotten son of a drunk and a streetwalker? Your powers are puny, and most are not your own."

  Lantav, for the first time since he had begun his pursuit of mage-hood, felt that his own life might be at risk. Sweat began to pour down his spine.

  But the greater darkness within him, his ally, his mentor, his master, would tolerate no such weakness. Unwillingly, Lantav stepped forth and placed himself between Mara and her daughter.

  "Touch me," he said, his voice surprisingly deep and steady, "and you will engage the wrath of one who is stronger than me by far. One who would like nothing more than to end the blight of the Ilduin. He is the Ilduin Bane."

  At his words, the room seemed to dim, as if a black cloud were filling it. An oily, chilly black cloud.

  They all stood frozen before it.

  Images began to fill Tess's mind, as if the darkness wished to display its power. The images felt both as if they were pieces of her past and as if they belonged to someone else.

  She glimpsed a city full of beauty, built of white, sun-washed stone, with gardens everywhere. Fountains trickled in courtyards, filling the world with watery music. The people she saw were all garbed in flowing robes, and their faces reflected a beautiful serenity.

  But then that image vanished, to be replaced by one of two brothers, one fair and beautiful, the other dark and chiseled like stone. They laughed with one another...

  Then the fire rained down, and the fairer brother's face filled with unholy anger. Screams replaced the sounds of beauty and music, and terror filled every face.

  Then, before her eyes, in a single moment of horror, an entire city vanished in an explosion of fire and smoke.

  Faster and faster the images came, all of them carrying the same message: See what I can do?

  Somehow she had to stop this mental assault. But how?

  Archer faced Glassidor, who still lolled upon his throne as if he had nothing to fear. The Anari stood back, guarding Archer, uncertain what he would have them do now. It was clear that Archer's stance had made them uncertain.

  "Aye," said the man on the throne, "I watched you creep around this world all these many years, a wanderer with no place to lay his head. Archer Blackcloak indeed. The time for your atonement has come."

  The man on the throne rose. "I have waited for this moment." His face filled with evil delight. "You are but a paltry shadow of yourself now. And the time has come for me to take my revenge."

  Within Archer, emotions battled. He had known this moment would come eventually. Part of him felt that whatever was dealt to him, he deserved. But the rest of him knew the danger of unleashing this man's power into the world unopposed, and how many would suffer for it.

  He had wandered these many years waiting for this moment. That was the only way he could atone. Without the hope of this moment, he would have ended his life long ago.

  With one swift movement, he hurled his sword. The blade spun through the air almost faster than the eye could see. Then, for one terrible moment, it hovered in the air as if caught in a giant grip. The other man laughed as if relishing his power, as if relishing the fact that now Archer was defenseless.

  But in that moment of laughter, something happened. Archer willed the sword to complete its task. It trembled in the air, then swooped toward the man, piercing him through.

  He fell, grasping at the sword, a cry of pain escaping him.

  Then, as he lay there, his eyes open, black as the pits of hell, he looked straight at Archer. "We are not done yet."

  A moment later, he died.

  "What in the names of all the gods was that?" Ratha demanded. His face reflected confusion.

  But Archer did not answer him. He lifted his hand, and his sword returned to him, as pristine as the moment it had left his hand.

  "By the gods," said Giri, his voice hushed.

  "Aye," said Archer. "By the gods. Now we must find the others."

  But before they even left the chamber, shouting from outside drew them to a window. They could see, beyond the gate, a growing army trying to break in.

  Archer looked from the army back across the room to their dead leader, his confusion apparent.

  "What's happening?" Ratha asked. "If he's dead, how can the hive still function?"

  Then an icy certainty crept through Archer's mind. "That," he said, pointing at the dead figure in the chair, "was not Lantav Glassidor. He was merely speaking through another of his minions. We have wasted time, and now we are the poorer for it."

  He turned toward the stairwell, but Giri grabbed his arm. Giri pointed at the mob. "We must stop them, Lord, or none of us will have a chance."

  Archer nodded.

  Instead of heading upward to seek the rest of their party, they headed downward to defend the gate.

  Archer felt torn by conflicting responsibilities, but he realized their only hope now was to hold off the hive. He would have to trust that the two fledgling Ilduin would be more than Lantav and his ally could handle.

  If not, all was lost.

  Sara halted in confusion, poised between Tess and Lantav. Each time she tried to approach her mother, Lantav moved, blocking her way. Worse, Tess seemed to be engaged in some terrible struggle she could not escape.

  Sara's gaze drifted reluctantly to her mother. Once she had been such a beautiful woman, but these years under Lantav's control had turned her into a dried husk of what she had once been, hardly able to sit up in the chair that held her. The sorrow that filled Sara was deep, as deep as it had been when her mother disappeared.

  Now she was found but perhaps lost in the same moment. Sara's heart railed against gods that could allow such a thing to happen. That could allow her mother to have been used this way. Grief pierced her with an ache that almost overwhelmed her.

  Suddenly Tom was at her side, murmuring, "Give me the thing she wanted you to give to your mother. I am of no consequence here, and he cannot guard against all of us."

  Without a word, taking care that Lantav didn't see, Sara relinquished the red stone to Tom.

  He stepped back from her, seeming to move away. Lantav spared him barely a glance, for he was involved in his dual contests with Tess and Sara.

  Tom reached the edge of the room and little by little began to work his way around to a position that would put him behind Lantav and Mara.

  Sara squeezed her eyes shut for a few seconds, steeling herself against the pain in her heart and her fear for Tom. Then she looked at Tess, wondering how she could help.

  But at that instant Tess said something to Lantav that shocked Sara to her very toes.

  "Had I known how powerful you would become, I would have chosen you."

  Archer and the Anari ran down the stairs and through the door that led to the courtyard. By the time they arrived there, a dozen or more of the hive had surmounted the walls and were inside, attempting to unbar the heavy wooden gate.

  Archer, Ratha and Giri at once waded in, tight abreast, swinging their swords in broad arcs, a blood-letting deadly whirl of steel and will. The hive army was ill-trained to fight such tactics. Each hive soldier focused on the man directly in front of him, not adapting to the killing blows that fell from the sides. For Archer and the Anari, it was a nauseatingly mismatched struggle. Their long experience and silent cooperation more than made up for the hive's greater numbers.

  Or it had thus far. Even as they fought those who were already inside, more were climbing the walls. The danger of being overrun was increasing by the minute.

  Lantav had never dreamt that the Chained One would take him over this way, using his body the way Lantav had used the bodies of the hive and the Ilduin. He had never imagined that after all these years of tireless service he would be treated like a puppet to be played with. From the corner of his mind that was still his own, he began to rage. He deserved better than this!

  But the Chained One merely bound Lantav tighter and laughed within his head. Tuny man-thing, the Chained One said. You are nothing without me. You would be nothing without me.

  Betrayal pierced Lantav like a lance, but he knew better. The Chained One would have accomplished nothing at all without Lantav, for Lantav was his only channel to this world.

  Not for long, the mocking voice answered. You see how the White Lady chooses me.

  Lantav railed. She's not Theriel, you fool. She's some farmgirl I picked up out of the horse muck and brought here because the other is dying.

  And finally, finally, the bonds about Lantav began to loosen. He had given the Chained One some food for thought.

  Tom was still easing around the edge of the room toward a position from which to dart forward to give the red stone to Mara.

  Now Tess reached out and pressed a blue stone into Sara's hand.

  "Mother?" said Sara.

  The woman's eyes opened, and something like a smile split the husk of her sunken face. "My child."

  "Stay back!" Lantav warned.

  Tess returned her attention to him. Somehow he had pushed back the dark presence, though it still remained. Perhaps her words, born of the images the Chained One had given her, had helped. It was rather unsettling, however, to realize she was being mistaken for a woman who had died many hundreds of years ago. There must be some way she could take advantage of that.

  In her mind's eye, she realized that she saw Lantav as a black hole in the golden cloth of reality, a place where the fiber had been singed and burned, where the surrounding fibers had warped and melted. He needed to be killed before that black evil spread any farther.

  But she had no weapon, nothing but a white stone in her hand.

  At that instant Tom darted forward and placed the red stone in one of Mara's hands. Lantav turned, swinging his sword, but Tom darted away in the nick of time.

  Mara cupped the stone tightly to her breasts. "Aid me now, sisters," she breathed. "Aid me now."

  And from her hands a red light began to fill the room.

  Archer, Ratha and Giri knew they were looking death in the eye. The more hive soldiers they dispatched, the more there seemed to be. Their tightly choreographed tactics of constant motion were exhausting, and each took stock of his diminishing strength.

  "We must find a choke point," Archer said, the words rasping on ragged breath. "A place in which we cannot be outflanked, and where two can do the fighting while the other gathers his breath."

  "Aye, m'lord," Ratha said. "If we stay here, in the open, we will die this day and for naught."

  The palace doorway was suitable, though a bit wider than Archer would have liked. The two in the doorway would have to swing their swords in a broader, flatter arc, and that would exhaust them even faster. Still, exhaustion was better than the risk of being flanked.

  "To the doorway," Archer said.

  Slowly, deliberately and in unison, they stepped back, their blades never still. Blood and bits of flesh flew this way and that as the hive soldiers pressed their futile attacks in wave after wave. In this test of skill versus numbers, Archer realized that defending the doorway was the only sane option. He cursed himself for wading out into the courtyard at all but knew that was merely another regret to add to an age-old stockpile.

  They reached the doorway, a carpet of carnage strewn in front of them.

  "Ratha, fall back and take your rest first. When you feel ready, relieve Giri. Giri will relieve me."

  "Aye, m'lord," Ratha said, and dropped out of the formation, leaving Archer and Giri in the doorway.

  "Rest quickly, brother," Giri said. "This is no time for a snack or a nap."

  "You will be the one napping," Ratha replied from behind them. "Archer and I will have to finish them off alone."

  "At least your tongues are not tired," Archer said, hewing off a head and part of an arm with a mighty swing. "Perhaps, if you rested them, your bodies would refresh more quickly?"

  "'Tis the Anari way of battle," Ratha said. "Else we might regret what we are doing."

  "Regret," Archer said, "is what we ought to feel."

  * * *

  Chapter 29

  Sara felt a wave of warmth flow through her, unlike anything she had ever known before. The blue stone gleamed in her hands, but more than that, she felt the warmth of her mother's love for the first time in so many years.

  "Yes, mother," Sara said, her voice a quiet sigh. A soft melody began to flow. "Sisters, we. Darkness, flee."

  The words seemed to come from the gods themselves, for she had never heard them before. But at those words, Lantav's face went pale.

  "The Ilduin song," the dark voice whispered from within him. "So long has it been since I have heard it. So light in its words, yet so black in its outcomes."

  Sara felt the memories flood in, even as the rest of the song began to form on her lips.

  "Sisters, we. Darkness flee.

  Death, the dying by our light.

  This we sing, life we bring,

  End of sorrow, end of night."

  Sara saw the image as clearly as if it were happening before her. Eleven women singing, their voices raised up to the gods, and a dazzling, blinding light seeming to rise up above them. But high in the air it turned to fire and sped away, leaving a trail of scorched air in its wake.

  "Dancing fire, death's own pyre,

  Warms the heart and hearth and bed.

  Living flame, give thy name,

  To the lost, the tired, the dead."

  Then Sara saw something that would have terrified her, had she not been held sway in the song and in memories that were not her own. Far away, the fire approached on the horizon. Brave men, and women who had borne great pain and sorrow, looked up with trembling hearts. In a tower, high above, dark eyes tethered to a darker heart saw the flame, and the mage made for the stairway and the only hope of escape.

  "Crackling fair, doom beware,

  Gilded dreams that rise to life.

  Breath of love, from above,

  End of suff'ring, end of strife."

  The fire crashed down from the sky, an all-consuming white heat that instantly turned flesh and bone and wood and thatch to ash. Even stone melted before the flame, and Sara saw the city atop the mountain hewn low as if by the vengeance of an angry god, leaving in its wake naught but a sea of glass.

  "Living justice, living heart,

  Heals the wounded, hails the Twelve.

  Doves of Eshkaron descend,

  Into man's own heart to delve."

  Sara fought against the overwhelming weight of guilt that the images had wrought. With Ilduin blood came Ilduin stain, and yet she could not let that deter her from the path ahead. She heard Tess's voice joining hers, and the voice of her mother, the voice that had sung her to sleep as a baby. The voice of the purest heart ever born, now twisted in upon itself, begging to be free of the chains that had bound it for so long.

  "Sisters, we. Darkness, flee.

  Given touch to salve the soul.

  Banish night, glowing light,

  Give our blood that all be whole."

  Sara felt the stone pierce her flesh and the spreading wetness in her palm. She reached out to Tess and saw that her hand was stained with blood, as well. Their hands clasped, the blood suddenly turning to cold fire. In Mara's hand, fire now grew, as well, and for a moment her visage was of the young woman Sara had so adored. A smile spread across her face, and Sara knew the moment was ripe.

  Archer stepped back as Giri tapped his shoulder, and with the fury of battle now borne by the Anari, he gasped for breath and let his weary arm hang at peace. The muscles screamed with white hot pain, worn down by the pace of constant combat.

  As his pulse thudded within him and he drew great gulps of air into his lungs, he felt in his heart a song he had thought long dead. Memories rushed at him in unrelenting waves that were little different from the waves of hive soldiers he had just faced. Betrayal, death, horror.

  And the pain of knowing he had caused it all.

  Though his body still screamed with exhaustion, he could rest no longer, for his rest was more draining than the fury of battle. He stepped up and tapped Ratha's shoulder, then joined in the fray as Ratha withdrew.

  "There are fewer now," Giri said, streams of sweat pouring down his iridescent ebony face. "But still too many remain."