'But what is Azaer?' Isak insisted, disturbed as much by the horrific reverence in Aryn Bwr's voice as his words. The most accomplished, the most highly blessed – no matter what he had done with those blessings – of mortals, and Aryn Bwr was in awe of a shadow?

'I have no answers for you there.'

'You must know something. You've stayed hidden all the time I've been in Scree; you're afraid of something in this city. I think your paths have crossed before.'

For a moment there was complete silence. Then-

'Whispers… Shadows speaking to me from a cloudless sky while the stars watched and the moons hid. Long in the night, deep in the night, in the height of summer during the Wars of the Houses, and I, barely adult, yet leading my House's armies, I walked the pickets when 1 could not sleep and found 1 was alone in that. Even the sentries were beyond rousing, though they stood still at their posts. 1 could see dawn lightening the sky on the horizon, but the Land was still dark, so dark that even the shadows had voices.'

Azaer spoke to you?' Isak spoke softly, hesitating to interrupt.

'Perhaps it was a dream, but what figment of the living mind would reveal such truths? These were terrible truths, truths that would change the face of the Land for ever, leading me down paths 1 had feared to tread, and showing me my own soul, its true shape and shine.'

'Paths within you, or hidden places?' Isak asked. 'Why did the shadow come to you? What made you special?'

'Why do shadows do what they do, go where they go? Shadows follow the living, witness to our deepest secrets. The shadow found me because I was the one to be found – even so young, my genius was lauded by all. What use to tell secrets to fools? Even in darkness, the shadows will follow.

'The blinkers were taken from my eyes. Azaer does not lie – Azaer can¬not lie, for if you draw the shadows back, you reveal what is hidden. The shadows illuminate the path, they do not force one to take it, and certainly not one such as I, born to change all and leave Gods broken in my wake. Fools forge weapons to their own devices, I learned that before my tenth season, when my uncle showed me the mysteries of fire and metal. This you already know to be true: iron and stone have their shapes within them, and those shapes should never be denied. Not all steel should become a sword.'

Sudden laughter rang through Isak's head, so fleeting that he wondered if the last vestiges of sanity Aryn Bwr had retained were gone forever.

Then the voice returned with a chilling clarity. 'You above all know this to be true: you, the weapon both men and Gods tried to forge to their own ends, resulting in – well, not what was wanted. Azaer does not forge, but Azaer can see the shape within, because it itself lacks mortal flesh.'

'Where did the shadow lead you?' Isak asked.

'Deep, deep into darkness, down paths that had not been there under Tsatach's fiery eye.'

'Where?' Isak insisted, desperate for concrete information. This mystical litany was beginning to try his patience.

'No place mere mortals could find,' the dead spirit said, oblivious now to everything except his memories, 'no place to be found, except at twilight, where one world meets the next; between the edges of what we know and what we fear. We were three days' ride from where 1 would build Keriabral, on lands my House controlled, though I never found that barrow again. It was outside of time, the link between this life and what lies past Death's final judgment.'

'A barrow,' Isak said, sensing they were getting somewhere useful, 'so you were underground?'

'Down into darkness, into the bowels of the Land, the heart of the Land, a point of balance, a place of harmony and standing stones. Deep; so deep I feared going further would bring me to the six ivory gates of Ghenna itself

'And what did you find?'

'Gifts, links in a chain, twelve means to a thousand ends.'

'Twelve gifts… and there was no price for these gifts?' Isak asked hoarsely. He could guess what they were now, for this was a scrap of history that made sense at last. Aryn Bwr had been a mage-smith of great power, but weapons that struck fear in the Gods themselves? The ballads and stories of that age told how Aryn Bwr had forged the twelve Crystal Skulls and made gifts of them to his allies. Nowhere did it say how he had managed this, nor from what he had forged them.

'A fool's price, a fool's soul. I paid nothing, but I knew I would not wit¬ness the Land I re-forged. I strove for a legacy and it was that they tore from me. I was never driven down the path, only shown the one 1 would choose. My actions were predicted, anticipated, by hateful shadows that whisper and laugh in the night… they knew they would have me one day. They were always watching, always waiting, ever-patient for their prize.' He broke off suddenly and Isak felt a chill breeze run through his head.

'In a moment of desperation, 1 gave it, in return for petty revenge,' Aryn Bwr said at last.

'Revenge?'

A memory stirred, one Isak recognised from his dreams. A great fortress crowned by towers as massive as the one he had come to know so well in Tirah: Castle Keriabral, Aryn Bwr's fortress, where he should have died – until, in a last desperate act, he'd called out a name and secured a completely different fate.

'I remember,' Isak said, subdued. Pain and grief flowed from the dead king's spirit now. It took Isak a moment to shake off the anguish and pursue his original line of questioning.

'What does Azaer want? What links the Skulls to the destruction of Scree?'

'Deeds done openly betray little; done in the shadows, they speak the truth.'

Isak hesitated. All this could be misdirection? Thousands of people are going to die – have already died. It cannot be so simple. If Azaer has had only a light hand in events, then it most likely hasn't the strength to become more involved – this change in tactics means either it's growing stronger, or it's taking a risk.'

He tailed off as he tried to understand it all. For the hundredth time since his elevation, first to Krann and then to Lord of the Farlan, he cursed his own ignorance. He'd stolen time whenever he could to struggle his way through impenetrable scrolls and ancient books. He was not one who found pleasure in reading, but he knew the worth of knowledge. He had begun to associate the scent of leather bindings with a yearning for the breeze in his hair, and the feel of the rough parchment under his fingers brought on a sense of dread, a precursor to the stilted, ritualistic style of writing that invariably fogged his mind.

'It can't be,' Isak muttered, more to himself than Aryn Bwr.

'All deeds serve a purpose,' the dead king replied solemnly, 'but what use can shadows have of grand gestures!'

In short, careful phases they came within sight of the barricade. They were all listening hard for voices: signs of panic, sudden shouts, anything that might signal the order to attack. Doranei looked at the half-dozen wooden houses blazing away on his left, casting long

shadows over King Emin's painfully small company. The men made their way down the middle of the street in three neat columns. They marched smartly, keeping in formation, their best defence against the barricade's defenders. Even so, every one of the Brotherhood had an ear cocked for that first whistle of an arrow shaft.

'Your Majesty.'

Doranei didn't need to turn his head to know it was Beyn, on their right flank, who'd spoken. The street was silent aside from their quiet footsteps and his voice carried easily.

'Something in the shadows,' Beyn said.

'Something?' the king echoed.

'Figure; too quick to see properly, but tall, not a citizen.'

'Hooded and cloaked in white? Watching us?'

'Yes, all in white. Looking towards the barricade, but he saw us too. Moving alone, not frightened to be seen.'