Traitor's Knot by Janny Wurts Page B

as unworthy. The other, descended matrilineally is your own.’
    Sulfin Evend might have laughed for the evil, sharp irony. With his father now standing as Mayor of Hanshire, and his uncle, Raiett Raven, as Lysaer’s acting chancellor to secure the absentee mayorship at Etarra, his immediate family wielded the axe blade of Alliance power. That set them in direct opposition to s’Gannley, as dedicated enemies of the clans. Unless, of course, the preposterous tale was founded on senile fancy.
    â€˜A fine theory,’ he said in scorching relief. ‘I might have believed you, had my great-grandame not been taken captive in Westwood.’
    Enithen Tuer nodded. ‘She was there for her wedding. Her name, do you know it?’
    Sulfin Evend was forced to concede he did not. The infamy was part of the family legend. The woman had left a blank line in the register, when his great-grandsire had forced her to wife.
    â€˜Now you’ll hear why. She was Diarin, Emric s’Gannley’s first daughter. The clanborn blood enemy of Lysaer s’Ilessid is none other than your distant kindred.’
    That news fell like a blow to the chest. Strong man though he was, his heart missed a beat: for why else should the Koriani enchantresses have pursued their strangling interest in his father’s offspring? Moved to slow rage, Sulfin Evend said tartly, ‘Old woman, which of my two bollocks would you take for your offering, that my prince might regain his autonomy?’
    â€˜Your oath,’ said Enithen Tuer, not gently. ‘Sworn now, on your blood and then repeated in the presence of a Fellowship Sorcerer. You must promise to journey to Althain Tower, where you will seal tonight’s pledge in completion.’
    â€˜No man could reconcile what you demand,’ Sulfin Evend blazed back.
    The seeress stared him down. ‘There must be. I have seen. One day fate will force you to choose which of two loyalties you will sacrifice. The land does not bear a blood-sworn oath lightly. The powers you invoke will be greater than you, and they will not treat with duplicity. You will stand before them, stripped naked, young man. Heart, mind, and body, you will be bound true. No way else can I give what you ask for.’
    Sulfin Evend returned her glare, anguished. ‘Demand something different! My own life, if you must! I cannot consent to dishonour.’
    The crone watched him, saddened. ‘Then go. Abandon the life debt you owe to s’Ilessid. Walk away loyal, and do nothing.’
    Yet he could not. Should Lysaer be suborned by a necromancer’s cult, the power at risk was too dire to unleash on an unsuspecting populace. The seeress had weighed the fibre of his character and measured him down to the bone. ‘Then fetch out your knife, and be quick, old witch. You have saddled me with the reckoning.’

Late Spring 5670
Errand
    The unseasonable cold lingered on through the spring, blustering off the Bittern Desert and whistling over the stark bastion of Althain Tower, set amid the sere and frost-scoured hills. The tightly latched shutters rattled and creaked. Yet no influx of draught winnowed the candle in the snug chamber on the fourth floor. In the beleaguered lands to the west, this isolate haven remained: the tempestuous gales born of misaligned lane flux were not granted licence to enter.
    The quarters where Sethvir of the Fellowship languished stayed sealed to inviolate calm. There, the wax light burned straight and true, as flame must, in the presence sustained by the white-robed adepts of Ath’s Brotherhood.
    Here, where tranquillity reigned absolute, the frail fulcrum that balanced the fate of the world trembled, poised, at the brink of disaster.
    When Paravian presence had ebbed from the land, the Fellowship Sorcerers had shouldered the task of guarding Athera’s mysteries. Heir to the last centaur guardian’s gift of earth-sense, Sethvir provided their eyes and ears