THE COURT POET OF KHARKANAS DEPARTED THE CHAMBER, AND in the silence that followed, it seemed to Rise Herat that Gallan had taken with him every possible word, every conceivable thought. Sorcery still roiled about in the room, heavy and sinuous as smoke from a brazier. Cedorpul, seated on a bench that lined one wall, had leaned his back against the worn tapestry behind him, closing his eyes. Endest Silann, sallow despite the ebon hue of his skin, sat on the edge of the old dais, his hands cupped in his lap and his eyes fixed upon them with peculiar expectancy.

Standing opposite the doorway through which Gallan had departed, Lord Silchas studied the swirls of magic that still drifted above the tiled floor. His arms were crossed, his features fixed and without expression.

‘The Court of Mages,’ said Cedorpul, his eyes still closed. ‘Well, it was a bold ambition.’

Rise Herat rubbed at his face, but everything seemed strangely numb to his touch, as if he was no more than an actor upon some stage, truths hidden behind thick makeup, while he stumbled through a play constructed of lies and penned by a fool.

‘Why does it still linger?’ Silchas asked.

‘Slipped the tether,’ Endest Silann replied after a moment, squinting down at his hands. ‘He left it to wander like a lost child.’

Silchas turned to the young priest. ‘His reason?’

‘To prove the conceit,’ Cedorpul answered when it became obvious that Endest would not. ‘That we can control this power. That we can shape it to our will. It is as elusive as darkness itself, a thing that cannot be grasped. The Terondai bleeds this… stuff. It fills every room in the Citadel. It commands the courtyard and stalks the streets beyond.’ He finally opened his eyes, revealing their red-shot exhaustion, and met Silchas’s stare. ‘Have you seen where it gathers, milord? About statuary, the monuments of the city’s squares, the caryatids shouldering the lintel stones of our proud public edifices. Around tapestries. In the taverns where bards sing and pluck their instruments.’ He waved a plump hand. ‘As if it possessed eyes and ears, and the ability to touch, or, perhaps, taste.’

‘The one you would make seneschal to this Court of Mages,’ said Silchas, baring his teeth, ‘simply flings it all back into your face, Cedorpul.’

‘It is his manner to mock our aspirations. A poet who ran out of words. An awakener of sorcery with nothing to say.’

‘How did he come by this power? To awaken the darkness?’

Endest snorted, and then said, ‘Forgive me, milord. He found the power in his words. In the rhythms, the cadences. Unmindful, he discovered that he was capable of uttering… holiness. Needless to say,’ Endest added, attention returning once more to his cupped hands, ‘the discovery offended him.’