Concerned chatter rippled through the room. People among the onlookers shouted out over the noise, wanting to know what was needed to be protected from the dream walkers.

Magda let the worry build for a time before she finally lifted her arm, pointing to the back of the room near the great doors. Everyone turned to look where she pointed.

“There stands Lord Rahl, the key to your survival,” she said in a voice loud enough that all could hear her. “He alone created a protection that shields him from the dream walkers. That protection constructed of magic is powerful enough to protect anyone bonded to him.”

“Lord Rahl!” Guymer shouted. “Not that nonsense again! Lord Rahl has already come before us with his plans to rule the world.”

Magda turned a glare on the man. “And since when is toiling to protect your life and the lives of all the other innocent people of the Midlands as well as the D’Haran Lands interpreted as wanting to rule the world?”

“This is about the oath he insists we must swear to him, isn’t it?” Elder Cadell asked.

Magda spread her hands. “We are all on the same side in this. We of the Midlands and those of the D’Haran Lands share a common interest as well as a common threat. Those in the Old World want to subjugate all of the New World. They don’t care about our internal boundaries. They want to rule us all. If they win, there will be no Midlands, no D’Haran Lands. We will all be either dead or their slaves. This is about our survival, not petty matters of rule.”

“Petty?” Sadler asked. “I don’t see bowing to the rule of Lord Rahl as petty.”

“You will think it petty enough,” Magda said, “if a dream walker silently slips into your mind and becomes your master, if he makes you do his vile bidding. They can make you betray those you care about, even kill people you love. If you’re lucky, that master will choose instead to rip you apart from the inside.”

Sadler licked his lips but didn’t speak up to argue.

The whispers in the crowd fell silent as a man who had been watching from the shadows at the back of the room behind the councilmen stepped out into the light.

It was Prosecutor Lothain. His menacing gaze was fixed on Magda.

Chapter 16

Lothain’s smile looked every bit as deadly as a skeleton’s grin. “And how do you know, Lady Searus, that it was not really Alric Rahl’s own magic that was in fact tearing you apart from the inside, as you put it?”

“Lord Rahl’s magic?” Magda gaped at the man. “Why would he do such a thing?”