"Isfrael went to Qeteb with some information about Niah," Goldman said. They'd all resumed their seats again, but the mood between them was stiff and uncomfortable. How long, DragonStar wondered, before any kind of trust can be rebuilt between us? Qeteb did well... very well indeed.

"There was something he told Qeteb about Niah," Goldman continued, his face creasing in thought,

"that has made Qeteb so confident he thought he had the leisure to toy with DragonStar, and with us through DragonStar."

"Toy?" wondered DragonStar, and then furthered wondered when — or even if — he should tell his witches of the consequences if they failed against the Demons. No, he must tell them. But not yet... not yet.

"Something about Niah," he said, remembering Qeteb's words, "that will enable Qeteb to

'eat' Sanctuary and destroy all of us. What? Azhure, can you help?"

Azhure shrugged helplessly. "Niah is much changed since I knew her. Death warped her soul so much that she has lost any —"

"Oh dear gods!" DragonStar leapt to his feet so abruptly that his chair fell over. "Oh dear gods in heaven!"

No-one could speak, all shocked by the look of horror on DragonStar's face.

DragonStar groped behind him for the chair, righted it, and

sank down again. He was trembling so badly he had to grip the armrests with his hands in order to steady himself.

"Niah ..." he cleared his throat and began again. "Niah is an Acharite reborn. She has access to the power of the Enemy."

There was a horrified silence.

Then Gwendylyr spoke, her voice surprisingly calm. "And thus, through her, so also does Qeteb have access to the power of the Enemy."

DragonStar nodded. "He can use her power to dismantle the enchantments and barriers that the Enemy erected to protect Sanctuary."

No-one spoke for a long time.

"And does that mean he can counter whatever you throw at him?" Axis said.

"I do not know," DragonStar whispered. "I do not know!"

No wonder Qeteb was so damned confident! Would his witches have any hope at all?

"But Niah has no soul," Gwendylyr said, trying desperately to find some shred of hope in the situation. "She is an automat only. She is —"

"She is a body ready to be filled with a soul," DragonStar said. "As was the child StarLaughter carried about with her. Niah is willing flesh imbued with the power needed to defeat Qeteb, but which Qeteb can now use to turn against us." DragonStar looked about at the others, meeting each of their eyes in turn. "I think none of us doubt but which soul Qeteb will use to fill her with purpose."

"Rox," Faraday eventually whispered. "He will fill her with Rox's soul."

"Are you saying," Azhure said, "that Sanctuary will fall?"

DragonStar nodded, his eyes sick with grief and self-recrimination. Curse him, he should have realised this earlier! He thanked the Stars that Axis hadn't killed him earlier when Qeteb had spoken through his mouth. If Axis had done so, then Qeteb could possibly have had the power of the StarSon at his fingertips! They had all come so close to complete annihilation!

"And the Sacred Groves?" Faraday said, pulling DragonStar's thoughts back to the problem of Niah.

DragonStar nodded again. "They will go first, my beloved," and he paused as Faraday flinched, although whether at the thought of the Groves falling, or at the endearment, DragonStar did not know. "Qeteb will destroy them first."

"Why?" Azhure said.

"Because he wants to grow on the power of the Mother before he comes after us,"

DragonStar said. "He wants to feast on the Mother."

"No!" Faraday screamed, and threw herself at DragonStar.

A massive storm held the Icebear Coast trapped. The land had witnessed nothing like this since the days of Gorgrael, and even he hadn't had the power to generate this much fury. Sleet lashed down from the north in almost horizontal sheets, stinging into ice and snow with such force that shards of ice shot through the air like shrapnel.

DragonStar grabbed his cloak in the instant before the wind tore it away, and tried to shut his ears against the screaming of wind and ice about him. He was leaning against the lee side of an ice wall, but even here the storm threatened to pick him up and hurl him into some ice-needled eternity.

Nothing was sane in this world, nothing at all.

Not even him, if one believed the fearful eyes of Faraday.

From the chamber where DragonStar had realised the appalling significance of Niah, he had gone to check on Sicarius and FortHeart. They'd been in a different part of Sanctuary when he'd called them into Qeteb's illusion, and DragonStar eventually found them under a buiche-fruit tree, being tended by an Icarii Healer.

Sicarius was the lesser wounded of the two, and likely to make a full recovery. FortHeart had lost her ear, and one of her legs was swollen, but the Healer had said that she, too, would recover, if not to her former prettiness.

From there DragonStar had dared the uncertainties of Spiredore to come to this spot.

Why? DragonStar tried to force his half-frozen face into a grin as he thought that one through. Why?

Because somewhere on the Icebear Coast was the one person who just might be able to help.

Urbeth.

DragonStar had not seen nor heard from her since Qeteb had been resurrected, but he had no doubt that she had survived the wasting of Tencendor, and currently sat with her daughters, waiting out the time before DragonStar managed to best Qeteb and set Tencendor to rights.

"Well, my lady," DragonStar muttered through ice-hardened lips, "DragonStar doesn't have a hope of besting Qeteb if the

Demon harvests both the power of the Mother and the power of the Enemy!"

He lifted his head slightly and stared into the white oblivion before him. "Urbeth!" he screamed.

"Urbeth! Where are you!"

Nothing but the shrieking of the wind and the groaning of the ice.

"Urbeth, you hairy cow, answer me now!"

Nothing. DragonStar struggled to keep his footing. Everything was coated with a slick of ice: not only the ground, but his boots, his cloak, and even his hands glistened under a thin layer of the loathsome stuff.

"Urbeth!" he yelled, his voice thinner now. "Urbeth!"

Nothing.