My feet took me toward the ruins of the old temple grounds. It was a path I’d walked before, and I could see the differences that the new priests had wrought in the landscape. Grass had been trimmed and flowers planted, but the wooden hut that served Menogue as its new temple was overshadowed still by the ruined walls that rose up to hide it from the sun. The crude wood structure paled in contrast to the ancient artisans’ skillful carving. Some of the fallen blocks had been cleared away, leaving patches of raw earth where the stone had lain since they fell two centuries before. Strange how Oreg made me think of two centuries as recent.

I sat down in the shade of the old ruins and shivered. It would probably be snowing in the mountains of Shavig by now. Closing my eyes, I felt outward as Oreg had taught me at Hurog. I wanted to see if the magic here was as I remembered it. I reached out, touched the morning-cold walls of the old temple, and found what I sought.

It was ancient, this magic, and, unlike Hurog’s, it held memories. I saw things for which I had no explanation, battles and great victories or defeats, but many more small memories, a man holding a black stone in his hand and flinging it to crack against the bark of a tree, a woman laughing as she ate a ripe fruit. My mouth salivated and I knew the fruit was tart and juicy. Tattoos bisected my wrists and I hated them bitterly for the symbol of thievery that they were—though part of me was certain that I’d never heard of anywhere that tattooed thieves. These were the memories of the people who tended this temple in times past and shaped the magic here with the help of Aethervon, binding the magic until it would protect His temple unless Aethervon himself restrained it—as he had when it had been overrun. It was this part of the magic of Menogue that reminded me of the oily black magic that had oozed out of Farsonsbane. It had been magic without direction, yet strong and aware.

I pulled my hand away from the wall and realized that the shadow I’d sat in was gone—as was the darkness the Asylum had laid upon me. For the first time since I left Hurog, I felt at peace.

“Oreg was by a while ago,” Tisala said. She was reclining on one of the massive stones that had formed the arch of the dome. Close enough to keep watch, I thought, but not so close that she’d disturb me. “He said you were ‘daydreaming,’ and to get him if you didn’t wake up by noon.” She glanced at the sun straight over our heads. “He also told me to ask you if you learned anything.”