"I understand," Melovar said. Not being a man of lore himself, he enjoyed pointing out their pretensions.

"The draugar are obviously better suited to colder climates, such as we have here in the north. The decay is our greatest challenge, for they will remain animated long after they've started to rot, or in battle when they have lost limbs or been stabbed many times."

"Impressive," Melovar said.

With Renrik leading and the Dain and Primate following close behind, the three continued past a massive vat, as high as the tallest tree and as wide around as a large house.

Renrik halted them. "Here, in Ku Kara, when the dead have served their purpose, and can go on no longer, they are recycled. The Lord of the Night gave us something far greater than your Lexicons." The necromancer and his Dain both looked up proudly at the vat. "We Akari have no Lexicon," Renrik continued. "We have no harvesters or extraction plants, eking out droplets of essence from the plant matter and the lignite. The Lord of the Night instead gave us a method of extracting essence from those with the most life force of all. We take our essence from those with much more life than plants. We, Akari, extract our essence from the dead."

~

MELOVAR left the lands of the Akari jubilant. He had his agreement, he still had the book of the Evermen, and he would now head to Seranthia to prepare for Dain Barden's arrival. It had turned out better than he had ever imagined.

The Primate would send a fast messenger to Zavros, ordering him to Ku Kara where the templar would learn from the Akari. In particular Zavros would discover how they extracted essence from the dead.

Soon the Akari would send their armies to Seranthia, and Melovar would unleash the draugar against his enemies.

When he had his own supplies of essence again, and his own method of producing more, he would once again have power at his disposal. When the Primate ruled all the world he would give the Akari the same fate he planned for all of the houses. He would destroy them and give the world peace from lore at last.

Dain Barden believed Melovar would tell him where to find the hidden relic, this powerful magic, the Evermen's greatest work. Melovar still didn't know where it was, but he was determined to find it.

When he did, he had no intention of sharing it with anyone.

~

DAIN Barden spoke with Renrik as they watched Primate Melovar Aspen's departing back. "Stick to the letter of the agreement," he said, "but don't trust them. When we have this relic of the Evermen, and when we have our avenue back into the Tingaran Empire, then we'll show them how powerful we've become since the exile."