Sitting in his chair, Ushahin watched the Shaper pace, a vast moving shadow in the flickering chamber. There was a question none of them had dared to ask, fearful of the answer. It had been on the tip of his tongue many times. And when all was said and done, the fears of Ushahin Dreamspinner, who had made a friend of madness, were not like those of other men. This time, he asked it. “Will it come to that, my Lord?”

“It will not.” The Shaper ceased to pace and went still. Shadows seethed in the corners of the chamber, thickening. Darkness settled like a mantle on Satoris, and his eyes shone from it like twin coals. “For if it came to that, Dreamspinner—if it became necessary that I must venture onto the field of battle myself—it would mean we had already lost. It is not the defense I intended, nor have spent these many years building. Do you understand?”

“Perhaps, my Lord,” Ushahin offered. “You have spent much of yourself.”

“Spent!” Lord Satoris gave a harsh laugh. “Spent, yes. I raised Darkhaven, I bound it beneath a shroud of clouds! I summoned my Three and bent the Chain of Being to encompass them! I bent my Brother’s weapon to my own will and tuned the Helm of Shadows to the pitch of my despair. I brought down the Marasoumië! I am a Shaper, and such lies within my reach. It is not what I have spent willingly that I fear, Dreamspinner.”

The blue-white glare of the Font gleamed on the trickle of ichor that bled down the black column of the Shaper’s thigh. At his feet, a dark pool was beginning to accumulate, spreading like ink over the stone floor. How much of the Shaper’s power had his unhealing wound leached from him over the ages?

“My Lord.” Ushahin swallowed, the scent of blood thick in his throat. “I spoke to you of my time in the Delta. There is power there, in the place of your birth. Might you not find healing there?”

“Once, perhaps.” Satoris’ voice was unexpectedly gentle. “Ah, Dream-spinner! If I had fled there when Haomane’s Wrath scorched me, instead of quenching my pain in the cool snows of the north … perhaps. But I did not. And now it is Calanthrag’s place, and not mine. The dragons have paid a terrible price for taking part in this battle between my brethren and I. I do not think the Eldest would welcome my return.”

“She—” Ushahin remembered the endless vastness behind the dragon’s gaze and fell silent. There were no words for it.

“You have seen.”

Not trusting his voice, he nodded.