Not ugly, he corrected himself. No, this was a single battle in an unseen war. He’d started seeing things differently since his meeting in the Blue Wolf. After so many years, he realized the truth of what it meant to be Mornae. The high matron was doing what she must, and he had to do the same. He’d left the fighting to others for far too long. Not all wars were fought gallantly on a battlefield, soldiers arrayed, banners fluttering.
Today, war meant making this trade. Tomorrow it would mean healing the orchards. The next day, something else would threaten his house.
We’re close, the voices in his devices said. He’d worn the bracer and ring. Against his brother’s wisdom, he wore the assassin’s dagger sheathed against his hip. He’d touched its blade and whispered his intention, but it had been cold and silent. If there was an enchantment, it chose not to speak to him.
He stopped, almost vomiting from the terror. Ahead, a single angry voice carried through the tunnels, muffled, warbling in the cavernous undercity’s strange air. Arguing followed. Taul crumpled to the ground. The first voice throbbed in the kith.
He crept forward and down into a groove in the tunnel, flattening himself.
Hiding?
He ignored the devices. They weren’t helping him overcome the terror. Continuing in the groove, he crept forward. At the end of the groove, he rolled out and hid behind a cluster of protruding crystalline rock. He pulled his hood close around his face. In a stretch of open cavern, an unmistakable shape was kicking another on the ground.
Leave, the priestess said. Leave now!
The other device concurred.
Maunyn raked blazing, blue-tipped fingers through the kith cavern wall, leaving a trail of indentations.
“You disappoint me, Ren!” he boomed. The cavern quaked. “You dare take one of mine?”
Ren whimpered at his feet.
“I raised you!” Maunyn yelled, fists shaking.
Thump!
“You ingrate!”
Thud!
“I gave you everything!”
Ren groaned.
“And the acolyte…” Maunyn said mournfully. Sadness pierced Taul’s heart as well. “You leave me no choice! Someone must answer for that crime!”
The cavern vibrated as his furious rage entwined with the zaeress stored there for eons.
Ren held up a hand. “She was no real priestess, milord! Where was her power? She let me cut her with southern steel.”
Maunyn loomed over Ren. Blacklight danced along his limbs, blue flame like hackles along his shoulders and spine.
“She was false!” Ren screamed. “A fake! Beneath you, milord.”
Maunyn turned, took two steps away, hands raised in supplication. “Why do you take from me?” he asked the darkness. “Have I not done all my matron demands? Will you not exalt me for my fidelity?”
Ren sat up, his face a bloody pulp, and said something.
Maunyn whipped around, his black blade pointed at Ren.
“You dare speak to me?” he sneered. “You, a brothel rat? No, even less! A nomad train mouse. Didn’t know that did you?”
Taul couldn’t tell whether the knowledge surprised Ren. His face no longer had any expression. Only the whites of his eyes gave any sign of recognition.
“Yes, we found you in that camp,” Maunyn said, “and gave you comrades. We tested your quality and deemed you worthy of meager recognition. A thief. A thug. We made a place for you. In time, we would have joined your qualities to ours and given you a house of your own. What do you think of that Yauren Lor… Lor… Lor’Naldril? Oh, you know the name, do you? Yes, you have that blood and a name you’re not worthy of. That is the only reason you’ve lived this long. That is the only reason I restrain my wrath at your blunders.” Maunyn hissed at him, his hand twisting the handle of the blade. “And this is how you repay me?” He kicked Ren again.
Ren breathed hard, gasping and spitting blood, gripping his right side. He wouldn’t live much longer.
“But this thing you have done.” Maunyn shook his head. “Trouble follows you, Ren. I can no longer excuse your actions. I’d hoped you’d change, but your power oozes out of you at the least provocation. Do you think Mornae are great because they flaunt their power? No! We keep it well hidden. It’s not for others to see or know unless dire need requires it. It’s your secret heart and mind, known only to the goddess, but you… you spill yours out like a nomad pissing on the plains where yaks stomp and vultures devour. I just can’t help you! Did I fail to teach you, or are you just a fool? Unworthy of the small gift the goddess gifted you, a tiny flame you could not increase. So now I must snuff it out. You force my hand at last.”
Maunyn grabbed a sack beside Ren.
Ren wailed.
“This thing,” Maunyn said, “this ugly little thing. Do you know what’s in him?”
Ren reached for the sack.
Maunyn shook it at him.
“Well?” he asked. “How little you know, weaver of puny shadows, master of alleys and maker of powders. You see this blade? It’s kithaun from before the Fall, from before your people had a name. But do you want to know something? It is less precious than what is in this sack, so I’m told. Yet I cannot bear to even look at it. It disgusts me.”
Maunyn pressed the flat of the blade to the sack.
“You only ever saw yourself. Never passed yourself to the future, to the life your progeny may live in your place, that you might live through them into eternity. You thought only of your own insignificant peevish joys, and not the epic drama before you. That you might be the turning point of a new beginning for Lor’Naldril. Instead, you chose to be a… god… amongst ants.”
Maunyn chuckled bitterly.
