The Elf king’s eyes flashed. “It is anything but.” A muscle jumped in his jaw. “To know a future that you cannot change—that you must merely stand by and witness—to know what must happen and which people you love must suffer or die, and know you must not—youcannot—do anything to stop it…that is neither convenient nor easy, Worldscorcher. Foreknowledge is the gods’ most excruciating form of torture.”
“So you say,” Gil sneered, “but which of your own loved ones have suffered lately?”
Hawksheart’s expression became a mask that seemed carved of smooth, impermeable Sentinel wood: golden, silent, and emotionless. Except for the burning green fire of his eyes. His hand swung gracefully out, and the elegant, tapered fingers gestured. “These.”
In the shimmering veil, a new image took shape. A pair of lovers cast in shadow, their skin glowing faintly silver in the darkness. The man tall, broad shouldered, the woman slender and elegant beside him, her hair a mass of gleaming curls that spilled down her back in fiery waves as his powerful arms clutched her tight. Ellysetta’s heart skipped a beat as she recognized the couple from her dreams that night by the shores of the Bay of Flames.
Her parents. The tormented souls who had given her birth.
Darkness slashed across the image, and a new, grim picture of the man who was Ellysetta’s sire replaced the other. He hung limp and bloodied from thick black metal chains. His head drooped on his chest, and the matted tangle of his black hair draped around his face like a ragged shroud. Slowly, he looked up, paralyzing her with the blazing green gaze that filled her vision…pupil-less, radiant green wells of power…tairen’s eyes.
Rain and every member of Ellysetta’s quintet went still, and silence fell over the chamber. The only sound came from the low chant of Elvish words that seemed to rise from the wood of the chamber walls, as if the Grandfather Sentinel tree were alive and speaking in the low murmur of a host of voices.
To the right of the man, another scene took shape. Within a bright, well-lit room, the flame-haired Fey woman lay strapped to a birthing table. She was screaming, her beautiful face creased in anguish as a woman hurried away with a small, swaddled babe. Sensing his mate’s grief, the chained man roared and lunged against his bonds in helpless fury.
“Blessed gods.” Gaelen’s stunned voice—barely more than a whisper—was the first to break the silence.
“But they died,” Bel protested. “They were lost in the Wars.”
“You know them?” Ellysetta flicked her quintet a quick glance and saw the stunned recognition on their faces. “Who are they?” She turned back to the images of the man and the woman—strangers, yet somehow so familiar—who had given her birth.
“The man is Shannisorran v’En Celay.” Gaelen’s voice was hoarse. “The fiercest warrior ever to walk the Fading Lands. He was mychatokin the Cha Baruk. The woman is his truemate. Her name is—”
“Elfeya.” Tajik sank to his knees. His nails scored bloody lines down his face. “My sister.” His hands, his face, his entire body was shaking, and power gathered around him in swirling waves. “The Mage has her? The Mage has my sister?” Slowly, fists clenched, he faced the Elf king. His eyes had turned to blue flame, and magic flared about him in a flash of near-blinding green light. The ground rumbled and shifted as Tajik’s Earth magic shook the great Grandfather Sentinel to its deepest roots. “You knew,” he snarled.
“Bayas,” Hawksheart acknowledged without flinching. “I knew.”
Tajik snatched two red Fey’cha from their sheaths and whipped his hands back to throw.
“Tajik,nei!” Gil cried.
Before the Fey’cha could leave Tajik’s hand, Gaelen drove a fist into the side of the Fire master’s head. The red-haired Fey dropped like a stone.
Ellysetta cried out and ran to kneel at Tajik’s side. After checking to verify that the warrior was unharmed, merely unconscious, she cast Gaelen a reproachful look.
The formerdahl’reisenmet the gazes of his shocked friends with a grim, set jaw and wintry eyes. He snapped a hard glance at Rain. “We should take his memory before he wakes.”
“Take his memory?” Bel protested. “This is his sister you’re talking about. He has a right to know—”
“To know what?” Gaelen whirled on Bel. “That she’s been a captive of the High Mage of Eld for the last thousand years? Tortured, raped, forced to endure and serve gods only know what sort of evil?” His lips curled back. “I know what a powerful Fey can do to avenge his sister. Marikah at least died quick. If she had suffered the same fate as Elfeya, and I knew of it, I would have laid such waste to Eld, not even the gods themselves would have been able to redeem my soul.Dahl’reisen? Bah! I would willingly have become the blackest soul of the Mharog and gorged myself on blood and death.”
Violence raged just below Gaelen’s surface—not hot, as Rain’s Rage was, but deadly, icily cold. Only his will kept the power of that Rage from spilling over in a freezing wave.
“Tajik is almost as powerful as I am. If he wakes remembering that the Eld took his sister, all the magic in the world won’t keep him from trying to reach her—or seeking his vengeance for what’s been done to her. I may not like vel Sibboreh very much, but I’ve no mind to see him walk the path I tread. Do you?” He looked around. No one could hold his challenging gaze without looking away. “Take his memory. One day, he will thank you for it.”
“He is right,” Gil said.
Rain’s jaw tightened.“Aiyah.”
“Anio.”
Five warriors whipped their heads around and bared their teeth in a snarl at the Elf king. “Stay out of this, Elf,” Rain bit out. “You have done enough.”
“This is his verse in the Dance,” Hawksheart insisted. “Elfeya is my kin, and more beloved to me than you know, but what has happened—no matter how brutal—was her verse. Her captivity had to happen just as it did. And her brother must have that knowledge.”
“Scorch your flaming Dance,” Gaelen growled. “For a thousand years, you’ve watched the torment of your own cousin and done nothing to help her—even knowing hershei’dalinpowers made her helpless to defend herself. There are not words enough to describe the contempt I feel for you.”
Hawksheart lifted his chin. “I understand your feelings.”
