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Contents ( 92)
  1. What Has Gone Before
  2. CHAPTER ONE
  4. Vérella
  5. Duke’s Stronghold, North Marches, seven days later
  6. CHAPTER TWO
  8. CHAPTER THREE
  10. Vérella, the palace
  11. CHAPTER FOUR
  13. CHAPTER FIVE
  15. CHAPTER SIX
  17. Vérella, two days later
  18. CHAPTER SEVEN
  20. Chaya
  21. CHAPTER EIGHT
  23. CHAPTER NINE
  25. CHAPTER TEN
  27. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  29. CHAPTER TWELVE
  31. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  33. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  35. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  37. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  39. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  41. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  43. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  45. CHAPTER TWENTY
  47. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  49. Valdaire
  50. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  52. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  54. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  56. Chaya
  57. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  59. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  61. Cortes Vonja, Aarenis
  62. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  64. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  66. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  68. CHAPTER THIRTY
  70. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  72. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  74. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  76. Cortes Vonja
  77. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  79. Vérella
  80. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  82. Verrakai Holding
  83. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  85. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
  87. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
  89. CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
  91. CHAPTER FORTY

Selfer had posted guards at the keep entrance; now he told off a hand to be her escort. “I’m coming, too,” he said.

“You are not,” Dorrin said. “If I fall, someone must get word to Valthan, and then to the prince—and someone must burn out the keep.”

“My lord—you know what I saw in Vérella, before Paks redeemed us. I need to be part of this—”

Dorrin turned to him and put a hand on his shoulder; tears gleamed in his eyes; she felt hers burn. “Selfer, in this I must command you. The need is greater—and the task more difficult—where I place you. I know you have courage to face what lies below, but what I need is your determination not to let any evil free. Do you understand?” After a long pause, he nodded. “With Falk’s grace and Gird’s, I will return unharmed, but if I do not, you must do what is necessary. Whatever that may be.”

Before Selfer could answer, she turned to the others. “Touch nothing without my word; this place has as many traps as some of those Rotengre houses. Vossik, you and one other will come with me to the bottom of the stairs. Two on the landing partway down. One halfway down the first flight of steps, to call messages up and down.”

At the foot of the stairs, Dorrin turned right, and twenty strides later paused before opening the door to the blood chamber. She could feel her own pulse pounding. Ridiculous. She was an adult now, not a helpless child. Of course the memories would rise here, of all places, but she had the skills to subdue them. This door had no lock. It needed none. It reeked of blood magery; centuries of fear and anguish had permeated the wood. No one would go there who did not seek what it hid.

“Stay here until I call,” Dorrin told her escort, then touched her ruby, murmured, “Ward of Falk and the High Lord’s grace,” and pushed it open, hanging her lantern on the familiar hook by the door. A soft scuffling sound met her ears. Along the left wall, as in her childhood, cages held small animals … rabbits, kittens that started mewing at once. Eyes gleamed in the lamplight. She ignored them all for the time being, taking a second lantern from a shelf of them, and lighting it. The room was centered with the tables and frames on which the Verrakai bound their victims to practice blood magery. At the far end, another door led to the cells, where human victims might or might not wait in darkness, terrified. To the right, the chambers where, in her childhood, a priest of Liart might be housed if one came to stay.

Those doors were open; those chambers were empty; she reported that to Vossik. Another, smaller, held the instruments, glinting in the light of the second lamp she lighted and set on a ledge. She closed that door, and went to the one at the end, opening it after a prayer for those who had been, and might still be, suffering.