as unnutal bowed and strode towards the doors, brys said to the king, 'i beg my leave as well, sire.'

'go on, champion. once you have detailed your soldiers return here. i want you close, from now on.'

'yes, sire.'

in the hall outside the throne room, unnutal hebaz was waiting. 'he suspects tehol.'

'i know.'

'why?'

brys shook his head.

'you had better warn him, brys.'

'thank you for your concern, preda.'

she smiled, but it was a sad smile. 'i admit to a certain fondness for tehol.'

'i was not aware of that,' brys said.

'he needs some bodyguards.'

'he has them, preda. the shavankrats.'

her brows lifted. 'the triplets?' then she frowned. 'i've not seen them about for some time, come to think of it. meaning you have anticipated gerun eberict, which in turn suggests you know more than you revealed to the king.'

'my concern was not regarding eberict, preda.'

'ah, i see. well, you need not inform those brothers to be extra vigilant, since i don't think that is possible.'

'agreed, preda.'

she studied him briefly, then said. 'would that you could join us on the field of battle, brys.'

'thank you for that, preda. errant be with you.'

'i'd rather the ceda,' she said, then added, 'i apologize. i know he was your friend.'

'he still is,' brys said.

she nodded, then departed, her boots echoing in the hallway.

brys stared after her. in a few days from now she might be dead .

so might i.

chapter twenty-one

the betrayer stands in the shadow of the empty throne. that is why it is empty.

the casting of the tiles ceda parudu erridict

the mass of refugees had forced them from the main road, but seren pedac was familiar with all the old tracks winding through the countryside, the herder paths, quarry and logging roads, the smugglers' trails. they were skirting an overgrown limestone quarry four leagues north from brous as the sun sank behind the trees on their right.

the acquitor found herself riding alongside the mage, corlo. 'i have been wondering,' she said. 'the sorcery you use. i have never heard of magic that steals the will from its victims, that reaches into their minds.'

'not surprised,' he said in a grunt. 'here in this backwater, all the sorcery is raw and ugly. no subtlety, no refinement of the powers. yours is a land where most of the doors are closed. i doubt there's been any innovation in the study of sorcery in the past ten thousand years.'

'thank you for those admiring sentiments, corlo. maybe you'd care to explain things for my ignorant self.'

he sighed. 'where to start?'

'manipulating people's minds.'

'mockra. that's the warren's name.'

'all right, bad idea. go back further. what's a warren?'

'well, even that's not easy to answer, lass. it's a path of magic. the forces that govern all existence are aspected. which means-'

'aspected. in the way the holds are aspected?'

'the holds.' he shook his head. 'sitting in a wagon with square wheels and complimenting each other on the smooth ride. that's the

holds, acquitor. they were created in a world long gone, a world where the forces were rougher, wilder, messier. the warrens, well, those are wheels without corners.'

'you're not helping much here, corlo.'

he scratched at his beard. 'damned fleas. all right. paths of aspected magic. like forces and unlike forces. right? unlike forces repel, and like forces hold together, you see. same as water in a river, all flowing the same way. sure, there's eddies, draws and such, but it all heads down eventually. i'll talk about those eddies later. so, the warrens are those rivers, only you can't see them. the current is invisible, and what you can see is only the effect. watch a mob in a square, the way the minds of every person in it seem to melt into one. riots and public executions, or battles, for that matter, they're all hints of mockra, they're what you can see. but a mage who's found a way into the warren of mockra, well, that mage can reach deeper, down into that water. in fact, that mage can jump right in and swim with the current. find an eddy and step back out, in a different place from where he started.'

'so when you say "path" you mean it in a physical sense.'