For Pride's Power
                         Prologue
            6988, Age of Arcadia, Early Summer
    Elaer Goatleap glanced proudly at the guards marching 
around their leader's carriage. Sunlight winked off spear- 
points and the glimmering gray and amber coats of glorlae, 
those great cats who paced beside them. The leader of the 
Elite rested one hand comfortingly on the head of his own 
glorla, a beautiful gray female named Smoke. She kept 
starting nervously at every small sound and snarling at 
the toddling children who wanted to run beside the guards.
    ^Let them do it,^ the land Elwen told his cat 
telepathically. ^It is not often they, much less all 
Rowan, sees such a celebration.^
    Smoke's swishing tail finally calmed, but she still 
rumbled, deep in her chest, where he could only feel it 
when he was patting her, as she replied. ^I have a bad 
feeling about the air today. Something does not smell 
right. Something will happen.^
    Elaer sniffed loudly and glanced over his shoulder 
again. The carriage still trundled quietly along the 
silver-paved streets. Their leader, the Councilmaster 
Herran Turnlong, had yet to make an appearance. ^You worry 
too much.^
    The sudden outpouring of acclamation made him turn 
around yet a third time. Sure enough, there was Herran, 
climbing out of the carriage with graceful, flowing 
movements designed to hide the hitch that old age had put 
in his ability to walk. Only a few years shy of the ten 
thousand-year mark, the Elwen limit on life, he 
nevertheless seemed much younger, his golden hair and 
pyrite eyes as bright as ever.
    He lifted a hand to acknowledge the crowd's adoration, 
his smile deepening, or seeming to, as he saw the mixed 
racial makeup of the throats the cheers came from. Elaer, 
watching him closely, intently, felt a burst of pride. 
That was all his leader's doing. On his orders, humans, 
elves, and the other Elwen races had finally been allowed 
to pass the gates of the oldest city in the world, which 
for so long had been land Elwen alone. Herran had worked 
tirelessly to smooth the transition and turn hatred into 
acceptance, respect, and at last love. It was only one of 
the reasons he had stayed Councilmaster longer than any 
other Elwen in history.
    Elaer felt a thrill that he, the son of a minor 
family, had been chosen to head the guards that protected 
such a man. There were many others he might have called 
on- the Deerfriends, the Durillos- but no. He had chosen 
the Goatleaps. Elaer fervently wished Herran to be alive 
when the first of his children was born, that they might 
at least meet him before he died. 
    He hurried to his leader's side as Herran began the 
walk toward the silver platform where he would make his 
speech. Always there, unobtrusively, to lend his support, 
the young land Elwen would allow no one else to do this 
task. Anyone else, despite his reassurance to Smoke, might 
be an assassin carrying a hidden knife.
    Herran turned, saw the expression on his face, and 
dismissed his fears with a laugh as rich as honey. "I do 
not know why you are so concerned, Elaer! I received my 
last death threat more than a millennium ago. Surely there 
are none here who wish to harm me."
    "Are you saying the purpose of the Elite has been 
exhausted, my lord?"
    Herran winced. "I wish you wouldn't call me that, 
either," he murmured, and for a moment they glided toward 
the platform in silence, the waiting hush of the crowd 
thick about them. The flag of Rowan bound to the platform- 
a spreading silver rowan tree on a field of deep blue, 
surrounded by five broken silver crowns- fluttered bravely 
in a slight breeze that also lifted the older land Elwen's 
golden hair and the younger's jade-green mane.
    "It may be time to disband the Elite, Elaer," Herran 
said at last. "I cannot say for sure. On my death, surely, 
there will be no need-"
    "Oh, my lord, do not say such things!"
    "But I am mortal, and I will die." Herran smiled 
gently at the expression on his young guard's face. "Does 
the thought of mortality distress you so? It did not me, 
even when I was so young."
    Elaer bowed his head, feeling once again humble in the 
face of a wisdom greater than he could comprehend. 
"Forgive me, my lord," he whispered. "I was not thinking 
of my own death, but of yours."
    He lifted his head to see Herran watching him with a 
strange expression, almost of sorrow, and wondered at it. 
"My lord, I swear I tell the truth-"
    "Of course." Herran waved a hand. "I do not doubt your 
veracity." He paused with one foot on the steps of the 
platform, looked out at all the faces lifted to him, and 
murmured something that Elaer convinced himself later he 
had not heard. It was unthinkable for the Councilmaster to 
doubt his own accomplishments.
    "I wonder if I have done the right thing in teaching 
my people humility. Pride is an Elwen's soul, his 
strength, his spirit. If I have taken that away..."
    He mounted the dais in deep thought, his brow 
furrowed, in direct contrast to the cheerful fluttering of 
the flag. The crowd still watched him with the adoring 
faces of hounds about to be fed, but Elaer, waiting at the 
bottom of the steps, suddenly felt as uneasy as Smoke had 
been.
    "My people," Herran's voice said a moment later, that 
rich golden voice that had once dissolved hatred between 
the races, "I must tell you I am mostly content in heart. 
I have achieved almost everything I wanted to-"
    Laughter. Herran's creeping modesty, oddly coupled 
with vaulting ambition, was well-known. Elaer chuckled 
with the rest, but also kept his eyes roaming incessantly, 
from his leader to the crowd and back. Smoke's words, her 
warning that something was going to happen, came back to 
him, and he felt his spine prickle.
    "And I am ready to hand on my burden to a younger 
Elwen, or human, or elf."
    A chorus of protest. Elaer whipped his head back to 
his leader, objections distending his mouth as they did 
ten thousand others, and assuredly more beyond. As not all 
the ten million inhabitants of Rowan could fit within 
hearing range, several mages were using magic to amplify 
his voice to those standing beyond.
    "After I die," Herran finished, and laughed himself at 
the relief-painted faces they lifted to him. "Which should 
not be-"
    Elaer saw a flash of sunlight off something that 
should not have been there, a glint of steel on one of the 
balconies of the buildings surrounding the Square. He saw 
it, and then it was in flight, driving straight and true 
for its target, Herran's back.
    He dashed up the stairs of the dais yelling, but 
Herran only looked at him, his face pulled into a slight 
frown. Elaer tried to make the nonsense, gasped words 
pouring from his mouth form into coherent ones, tried to 
grasp his leader and bear him to the ground, tried to-
    And then Herran was on the ground, a knife through 
some vital organ, bleeding. In agony, Elaer flung up an 
arm to command the glorlae into tracking mode, screaming, 
"Find that assassin!" through a voice that seemed as 
streaked with tears as his face. He himself could only 
fall on his knees beside his dying leader, rip the knife 
out, turn him over, and call uselessly for a healer.
    Herran shook his head, his eyes on the young Elwen's 
face. Elaer blinked back the threatening tears, but one 
fell anyway and landed on his leader's face. Herran 
reached up and touched it in wonder.
    "All I could ever have asked for," he breathed, in a 
voice thick with the death-rattle, "that someone should 
weep for me as I departed."
    Elaer wept, but wiped it away, determined to see his 
leader's eyes in this last, crucial moment. Then he felt 
Herran's hand catch his shoulder in an unexpectedly strong 
grip.
    He looked down to see the pyrite eyes staring at him, 
wild with horror, but also staring beyond, somehow, to a 
vision he could not share. The maddened eyes and powerful 
hand drew him close in time to hear the last whispered 
words.
    "Beware the master torturer..."
    And then Herran Turnlong, leader of Rowan, died, just 
as the healer ran onto the dais, white robes fluttering 
around her ankles.
    Elaer rocked back on his heels, face in his hands, and 
gave himself entirely over to grief.




                        Chapter 1
                      The Painmaster
           10,000, Age of Arcadia, Early Spring
    "Pain is the art of dominating souls. Not the mind, 
not the memory, not even the heart. The soul.
    "For only through his spirit can the prisoner escape 
you."
    -From Toa Y'endo Dol, or The Art Of Pain, by Yendiy 
Darkspinner.

    The buildings glimmered in the moonlight- golden 
radiance from Lureth, Lady of the Autumn, purple 
brilliance from Rareth, Lord of Spring. Takon, Lord of 
Summer, had not yet cast his blue-green ball into the 
jade-green sky this season.
    So beautiful. A city of twenty million minds, twenty 
million hearts and souls. And all of them liable to cross 
his table sooner or later.
    There was so much subtlety in pain, so much that 
others never realized. An Elwen reacted differently from 
an elf, an elf from a human...
    His hands clenched into whiteness on the windowsill as 
he carefully dismissed that last errant thought.
    Grukkar Goatleap smiled coldly and stepped back from 
the window. Yes, Rowan was beautiful, with its silver 
streets and enormous silver buildings wrought in the 
images of plants and animals both fanciful and real. The 
prison where he worked, for example, was shaped as a bear, 
rearing on its hind legs, clawing at the air with one 
forepaw. Thus the odd shape of this office, located in the 
bear's muzzle.
    But he had other things to attend to. The master 
torturer of Rowan could not afford to be idle.
    He settled behind his table- not the more sinister 
ones that waited in the bear's Paws, but an innocuous one 
where he dealt with and kept much of his paperwork. There 
was a whole slew of new reports tonight, all saying that 
the latest instrument, a knife that peeled slowly through 
skin while leaving the victim alive, was not performing as 
well as expected.
    Silver eyes beneath a crown of jade-green hair focused 
on the reports with a frown. Grukkar reached for a quill 
pen, located in a jar of goldu, the golden flower-ink, to 
write suggestions, but was disturbed by footsteps in the 
hall. Putting down his pen and the report he held, he 
waited with the patience of his namesake, a spider.
    The door opened. Inside slipped a radiant Elwen woman 
with silver skin as brilliant as water lit by starlight, 
setting her apart from the poor shadowed Elwen cousins 
both of them had in common. Her hair, the blue-white blaze 
of a forging fire, cascaded almost to the middle of her 
back, and her eyes were a light, clear blue, the exact 
color of summer skies at dawn. Blue-white wings trembled 
on her shoulders.
    She was, in short, a sonorqui, a star Elwen.
    She started to fall to one knee before him, but 
Grukkar cut the courtesy short with an impatient gesture. 
He had no time for such things when she obviously had 
something important to tell him. "Well, Sinniltra?" he 
asked in a voice unusually musical even for one of his 
kind. "Is the new knife finally working properly?"
    "Yes, my lord," she said in a voice as cool and devoid 
of emotions as the starlight she seemed crafted of. 
"Still, Coronar is having some difficulty, even with it, 
with this latest one. He keeps insisting he's innocent no 
mater what we do to him."
    Grukkar shook his head and looked back down at the 
reports. "Nonsensical. Everyone who comes here has been 
offered a fair trial at a court of law, and turned it 
down. Did you remind him of that?"
    "We've tried, lord, but it doesn't do any good." 
Sinniltra watched him carefully, her eyes half-hooded, 
like a sleeping lizard's. "I think this one requires your 
expert touch."
    Grukkar shook his head again, this time with a touch 
of regret in the movement. "I would like to, but-" He 
waved a sheaf of reports helplessly.
    "Yes, I thought you would like to, lord." Sinniltra 
molted to her feet, ignoring the tapping of his fingers on 
the desk. "You see, this latest one's a human."
    The tapping fingers suddenly stilled. The star Elwen 
waited a long moment, eyes on the floor, before looking at 
her master again.
    She looked quickly away. Grukkar noted that, and for a 
moment a distant corner of his mind smiled. Many found it 
hard to face the master torturer when his quicksilver 
hatred for humans blazed in his eyes.
    "I'll come," he said, standing so abruptly that the 
chair slammed back into the wall and the floor. "What cell 
is he in?"
    "Allow me to lead you, lord." Sinniltra scuttled ahead 
of him, looking pleased. Grukkar started to speak, to 
check her, but then gave it up, settling for a disgusted 
frown at the sonorqui's back. He found the fad that had 
prevailed over the last three thousand years- to be as 
humble as possible, in memory of Herran Turnlong- 
unsettling to the stomach. Pride was the natural state of 
an Elwen's soul. 
    They walked quickly through silver corridors where 
fellow torturers and glorla-handlers alike bowed to him. 
The great cats pacing proudly beside their masters did 
not, and Grukkar made a point of nodding to them as he 
would to an equal. No one seemed to notice, though, and by 
the time they reached the lower levels a boiling 
frustration had stirred up inside of him, a frustration he 
willingly mixed with the hatred to form a potent wine the 
human would drink in full.
    And quicksilver was widely known to be poisonous. 
    Sinniltra opened the door and held it for him, Grukkar 
gliding easily into the darkness beyond. His eyes made the 
transition in a second, from the torchlight of the hall to 
the nightsight needed to see here, the gift that would 
permit him to see the auras shed by the force of 
existence. He reflected with grim amusement that the human 
must be terrified; the light pouring through the door, 
supposedly a symbol of hope, only backlit the one come to 
hurt him.
    The human lay, trembling and soaked with sweat and 
less pleasant fluids, on the table that Grukkar worked at 
so seldom now. The silver surface, polished smooth with 
constant cleanings, winked solemnly at Grukkar as he bent 
over the prisoner. With one hand, he touched the table's 
surface, admiring the shine. With the other, he touched 
the chains that held the human, to make sure they were 
secure.
    The man's eyes flared open, wild and wide. He croaked, 
a gabbling noise from a throat parched with lack of water, 
and flung his head back and forth, making a sound that 
might have been laughter.
    Grukkar smiled coolly to let the human know he saw 
through the pretense of madness. The man fell silent, 
staring up at the cold silver eyes, gulping a little.
    Grukkar's vision slowly vanished under a shrouding 
curtain of silver, and yet he could see perfectly. His 
hatred burned in him, hot and furious, wild and raging, 
sweetly sour as the scent of burned flesh that hung thick 
in the chamber. Yet his mind remained as cold as the table 
under his hand. The other hand moved from the chains, 
creeping slowly toward the whip belted at his side. Most 
thought it strictly ornamental, a badge of his office, and 
yet it could still hurt if wielded by a strong wrist.
    "My lord?"
    Slowly, Grukkar brought himself back from 
quicksilver's ringing depths, a touch of regret haunting 
his mind. He looked up and did his best to smile 
soothingly at the figure who stood in the shadows. "Yes, 
Coronar? You wanted to say something?"
    Coronar stepped forward, his face smooth as always 
save for the faint gleam in his eyes. His skin was an odd 
mixture of silver and white, proclaiming his mixed land 
Elwen and shadowed Elwen heritage, but the look in those 
pewter eyes came entirely from the dark curalli gift for 
torture that he had inherited.
    "I am sorry I failed, my lord. But this knife-" He 
held up the knife about which bad reports lay on Grukkar's 
desk, a tiny thing with a thousand individual jagged 
teeth, long in the forging. "It works wonders, my lord! 
You may want to use it."
    The land Elwen's face relaxed in a brief, but sincere, 
smile. "I should have known, Coronar. Others reported it 
as a failure, but they don't have your level of skill." 
The shiny eyes lit up like the eyes of a dog watching its 
master. "Thank you. I will consider it."
    The half-curalli retreated again, patiently swallowing 
the eager words he might have used to urge the master 
torturer on. All who worked in the building knew that 
Grukkar Goatleap's hatred for humans needed no 
encouragement.
    Grukkar bent over the human again and let himself 
descend into that strange mingling of hatred for humans 
and love for his work, wild emotion and exquisite control, 
that defined him in a job like this. 
    The man's eyes were brown, an ugly color, a color only 
fit for mud. His hair was the same, having none of the 
wildly glorious colors of Elwen manes. Grukkar smiled in 
that inner corner that never lost control, and directed 
the hatred now. Every time he encountered one of the 
shorter-lived creatures, he found more and more reasons to 
loathe them.
    He drew his whip, with a motion that was almost 
loving, a motion with which he might have touched dark 
hair, long ago...
    He forced the thought away from him, channeling it 
into emotion. The whip cracked down on the human's 
stomach, falling perfectly between the ragged tatters of 
tunic that still clung there, sparing the human none of 
the pain of its twenty-one tails. Twenty-one, the number 
of Council members of Rowan, the number of the branches of 
the rowan tree.
    All Elwen things, all things no human could ever 
understand.
    The whip lifted and fell with more energy, more rapid 
speed and power. The human continued to bite his lip, the 
insanity pretended earlier creeping nearer and nearer in 
his eyes. But he did not cry out.
    Grukkar did not worry. Though the whole purpose of 
torture was to wring a confession from a victim, he loved 
nothing better than when they bravely tried to hold the 
pain in. Then no one could blame him for having his fun.
    He lashed one more time, then stepped back and closed 
his eyes, funneling the emotion in a new direction. 
Emotion became magic, the magic given to him by his 
ancestors and heritage, the silver blood that flowed in 
his veins. Another thing no human could share, for none of 
them wielded magic.
    He opened his eyes, and saw the human shrink back in 
terror. He wondered idly, for a moment, if the same glow 
that filled the flickering red-orange ball on his fingers 
in truth filled his eyes, as he had so many times been 
assured that it did.
    "Do you know what this is, uman?" He deliberately used 
the Primal name for this creature's race, a term they 
insisted was degrading, a name Herran Turnlong had tried 
to banish from Rowan's collective lips forever.
    "No." The man could refrain from speaking no more than 
he could from nervously licking his lips. His people did 
not live long enough to learn to master terror.
    "No," Grukkar echoed, tossing the ball lightly in the 
air. It settled back to his upraised fingers again, as 
tame as any child's pet dog, or a butterfly who had chosen 
an Elwen hand for an alighting place. "But I do." He 
juggled the ball from hand to hand, feeling the tension 
build, feeling the admiration from Coronar and the 
sweetness of the delight that broke Sinniltra's mask of 
coolness. Drawing it all into him, he spun it delicately 
into terror finer than any silk, almost letting the ball 
fall on the sprawled, chained body time after time.
    At last he tired of that amusement and leaned close, 
deliberately holding the ball just over the man's face. 
His voice was utterly free of inflection.
    "This is acid, human."
    The man tried to keep up a brave front, a brave face, 
but his throat shook as he swallowed, and Grukkar saw the 
instinctive, involuntary flinch, the attempt to shrink 
backwards. For once he did not greet fear with contempt. 
In the man's position, he would have been frightened 
himself, of himself. He was in fine form today.
    "But not just any acid, oh no. This is magical acid. 
It eats its meals slowly, takes its pleasure at whatever 
pace I command it." He raised an eyebrow. "As you will 
feel fear."
    The man began a steady whimpering that verged on the 
mindless. Grukkar watched him for a long moment, judging 
the time to be right at last and blowing gently on the 
ball, as one blows on a candle's flame to snuff it out.
    The ball fractured and crazed as if made of glass. Two 
tiny drops of acid escaped through the crack, falling on 
the human's skin and lying there like quivering tears, 
doing nothing until commanded so by their creator. Grukkar 
heard the creature's slight gasp of disbelief, and might 
have showed pity if his rage had allowed it. 
    So often they disbelieved Elwens, doubted them, to 
their own ultimate betrayal.
    He salted the man's skin with acid, from head to foot, 
paying particular attention to the face, the throat, the 
chest, and the groin area. He did none directly above the 
heart, the liver, or other vital organs. He never wanted 
to slay too quickly.
    But of course, before he commenced the final 
discipline, he had a question to ask. With a sigh, a 
silent complaint to whoever had invented this rule, he 
leaned over to stare into the man's eyes, small and dark 
and mousy almost beyond belief.
    "Do you, Hegen Regersin," he asked with all due 
ceremony, "have anything to say concerning your foul rape 
and murder of an Elwen woman?"
    Hegen stared at him, forgetting the acid, forgetting 
everything save the silver eyes looking at him. Grukkar 
felt the balance waver and tip within his mind, and was 
aware of his own distant surprise. Perhaps Hegen, unlike 
so many others, might tell the truth.
    Hegen closed his eyes, tears squeezing from under his 
lids to mingle with the deadly acid. His words were soft, 
the merest susurration of breath, but Grukkar heard them, 
those little words that sealed the human's doom.
    "I did not do it."
    The last of the words was almost overwhelmed by a 
gentle buzz, like the song of a solitary cricket, in 
Grukkar's ears. He drew back, shaking with his own pain 
and the righteous wrath that had first driven him to enter 
the business of justice, the determination that no 
wrongdoer should escape unpunished.
    "You have forgotten that Elwens can detect lies, 
haven't you?" His voice mimicked an autumn breeze, steady, 
cold, gentle in its way, and faintly sad.
    Hegen looked at him and shook his head, the tears 
flying off but the acid clinging with all the tenacity of 
a web to a fly. "No, I am telling the truth, I swear it! I 
am, I-"
    "Two lies." Grukkar lifted his hand high, staring at 
the man, ready to bring it down in the chopping sideways 
motion that would signal the acid to begin its work.
    The human uttered a tortured scream; one of his hands 
writhed as if he would tear it free of the chain and grab 
the Elwen's wrist. "No! Listen to me, I beg you! Listen to 
me!"
    Grukkar's mind seized control of his heart and the 
memories that danced and paraded in front of his eyes, 
silken and seductive as the rage. His purpose was to 
extract confessions, after all, not solely to torture. 
"What is it?"
    "It wasn't my fault! It's these bouts I get sometimes, 
like insanity, only worse, because I can remember what 
I've done!"
    No buzzing. Grukkar let his hand fall, staring at 
Hegen, as if his eyes were grasping fingers that could 
sink into the man's brain and drag the truth out. "You 
have had these bouts before?"
    "Yes, yes!" Hegen pumped his head, encouraged by the 
land Elwen's willingness to accept the truth. "I have 
escaped accusations of murder before because no one could 
believe that I would do it. And I didn't want to be 
caught, so I never told anyone."
    "Never told anyone?" Grukkar did not recognize his own 
voice. This was not quicksilver, this flood of fury 
catching him up, but the wrath of the just, clear as 
glass, hot as magma, and utterly beyond his ability to 
control. The best he could achieve was a stalemate for a 
few seconds, enough time to ask this unbelievable criminal 
one precious question. "Why?"
    "Because I didn't want this to happen to me!" The 
human's eyes went to the acid on himself, then back to 
Grukkar, pleading as no one had done in so long. They 
either went insane by now or poured out their broken, 
torrential confessions. "I swear by all that you Elwens 
hold holy that I will allow myself to be beheaded if you 
will only let me out of here."
    "How many people have you killed?" The fury exploded, 
filling all his vision with the glass-like haze.
    He could hear the puzzlement in Hegen's voice, the 
sudden uncertainty that replaced the conviction that he 
had these Elwens by the throat. "Why do you want to know 
that?"
    "So I will know how long to let you suffer."
    "But I confessed!" A shifting, rattling noise, 
somewhere beyond the lucent barrier that was swiftly 
muffling all noise. "Aren't you supposed to take these 
chains and acid off me now?" Incredibly, his voice adopted 
a tone of outraged bluster.
    "The Judges can give you only one death, only one, and 
that swift and painless," Grukkar whispered. His voice 
felt as it should have been shaking, sounded as if it 
should have been shaking, but was instead cold and soft 
and under perfect control. "I can give you the pain of a  
thousand deaths, if that is how many you have killed. 
Criminals have been known to die under the torturer's 
whip. No one questions it; all know that those who we 
bring here are guilty. We want the details of their 
crimes, not the fact of them.
    "It is even its own kind of justice, in a way, justice 
that can happen nowhere else."
    "No," said Hegen, in a small broken voice like a hurt 
child's. "It's not justice. What will happen to me during 
these thousand deaths?"
    "It may not be a thousand. I need to know how many you 
killed."
    An audible swallow. "Sixteen."
    Grukkar nodded, and then brought his hand down, a 
swift, sharp, decisive cut, like the sword that would 
never cleave this human's throat and bring a calm end to 
his crimes.
    The man's screams rebounded off the walls of the 
chamber for a single moment before the glassy rage shut 
Grukkar away in a world of silence and peace. He turned to 
walk from the room, then turned back. He could not see the 
writhing figure, but he could imagine it well enough. He 
had seen many such.
    In the glass walls he could hear only his own voice.
    "It is justice," he said. "For the victims."
    And he left the room, his steps silent as any Elwen's 
should be, but his heart colder than theirs ever could be. 
Even after the screams died behind him and the glassy 
walls lifted, the halls seemed silent, the torchlight 
invisible behind a swimming wall of tears.
----------------------------------------------------------
    Grukkar shoved the reports about the knife to one side 
of his desk and looked out the window to note the rising 
sun creeping slowly over the eastern horizon. He smiled 
wanly and stretched until his spine crackled. He could 
leave now for home, if he wanted to.
    "But then," he said, eyes fixed on the sun, the 
Lordstar, as if he spoke to him personally, "neither of us 
have homes, do we, Uunul? We both wander from one place to 
another, chained in a path and yet never content with it. 
Would you like to roll down and char our continent to a 
cinder, I wonder? Would I like to do something else 
besides rotate from the house to my work and back?"
    The sun did not answer, of course, and Grukkar did not 
expect it to. He had long grown used to not receiving 
answers to things. 
    He chose to remain. No one would expect him at home, 
anyway; though things were not exactly strained between 
him and his parents, neither were they very comfortable.
    He put his folded arms on the desk and piled his head 
atop them. Just a few minutes' rest...
    Whether it was the sudden closeness of the memories to 
the surface or not, he never knew, but Jesetara filled all 
his dreams. Here she was riding, laughing as she spurred 
her horse along the rim of the great sunken Corallen 
Valley where Rowan sat. Here she accepted his offer to 
marry her with no more emotion than a very faint silver 
touch of blood in her cheeks. Here she was on the day she 
had parted from him, wind stirring her incredibly dark 
hair, gray eyes distressed, telling him she had learned 
something from a human that must not be shared.
    Humans. Humans had driven his love from him. And if he 
ever found out how, he would kill all he could catch, one 
by one and slowly.
    Grukkar returned to himself soaked with sweat, shaking 
his head and rubbing his fingers slowly across his 
forehead. He cast a glance of distaste around the room. 
All at once it seemed too close, cramped and confining. 
And he had yearned to break the tame little path he 
trotted.
    Standing with a force that nearly sent his chair 
banging back against the wall for a second time in eight 
hours, he ducked out of his office. He moved with the 
grace of long confidence down the slightly sloping ramp 
that was the bear's throat to touch the door of 
Sinniltra's office. She opened it before he could knock, 
however. Somehow, she always kept track of his movements.
    "Going out, my lord?"
    "Yes." Grukkar looked over his shoulder, estimating 
the depth and color of the newborn sunrise, then turned 
back to the star Elwen, meeting her light, curious eyes 
with a blank mask. "I must be alone for a while. Tell them 
to expect me back at the latest in around two hours."
    Sinniltra inclined her head and closed the door 
calmly. Grukkar, suddenly filled with restless energy, 
turned and strode down the hall, ignoring the bows this 
time as well as the inquiring looks.
    He came at last to the bear's belly, where a silver 
ladder led to the ground, and shinnied down it. The guards 
on the gates of the walled prison compound saluted him, 
though they seemed a little startled when he turned toward 
the Swan Gate instead of the Goatleap family home. But 
they kept silent. No one really wanted to get involved in 
the business of the master torturer, just in case that 
business might be him.
    Grukkar walked the streets feeling as if he had been 
reborn. In a city so large, the traffic was thick even 
during the night, and especially night's last fading 
moments, when the Swan Gate was opened. Smells- onions, 
winter wheat, magically grown fruit, and other crops-  
filled the air as carts rumbled past him, some drawn by 
oxen or horses, a few by more exotic beasts of burden. The 
clatter of hooves was overmasked only by the shouting of 
the vendors, of whatever race, displaying everything from 
blueberry palm pies to delicately woven bird-cages, from 
crudely carved wooden whistles as gifts for children to 
shining swords worth more than many Elwens made in a year.
    Grukkar, dodging to avoid a cart of dried fruit drawn 
by two lumbering graybrutes, drifted toward and lingered 
by a booth that held falcons. He had once enjoyed hawking 
with Jesetara, and he would have liked to buy a raptor in 
memory of her- not that he was sure he would have known 
how to handle one anymore.
    The merchant noted his interest and immediately begun 
her spiel. "Only three silvers, my lord," she said, 
holding up the cage the falcon sat in. At a prod from her, 
either physical or telepathic, the merlin grudgingly 
spread its wings. The shafts of gray feathers cast back 
the sunlight like icy, shining golden spears.
    Grukkar hesitated. The amount was just what he 
received from a full night's work, and yet less than he 
would have expected to pay for a mature, trained falcon. 
"Is there something wrong with him?" he asked rather 
bluntly.
    "Oh, no, my lord! Nothing that cannot be overcome with 
training, at least," the merchant conceded when she saw 
the master torturer staring doubtfully at her. "He is new- 
caught, and was not easily tamed to hand. I often leave 
them that way on purpose, that they might be more easily 
tamed to love a new master."
    Grukkar looked down, pretending to study the cages of 
other birds, in order to hide his disgust. New-caught, 
indeed! The falcon hissed at everyone who came near, in a 
mixture of fury and terror. He had not even been granted a 
hood that would blot out, at least in part, the traffic of 
the city streets. Probably wilder than when he had been 
taken, he would be useless for hunting.
    Yet somehow he found himself slipping a hand into his 
moneypouch, retrieving the silver coins, and saying as if 
in a dream, "I'll take him."
    The woman nodded and beamed, bowing, barely 
remembering to set the cage down before she clapped her 
hands in delight, though she scooped up the money adroitly 
enough. "Oh, my lord, you won't be disappointed, I'm 
sure!" she chattered as she retrieved a heavy hawking 
glove, a hood, and jesses from behind the stall's counter. 
"Merlins are fine birds, from what I hear."
    Grukkar lifted his eyes from the merlin's feral dark 
stare, staring at her in turn. "From what you hear? You've 
never flown one yourself?"
    The woman blinked at him, clear green eyes with all 
the seeming innocence of a child's gaze. "Why, no. Is that 
a problem?"
    Grukkar lowered his eyes to the ground and shook his 
head wearily, But deep in his mind, behind the mask of not 
being bothered, he had chosen to report this woman to the 
Council. There were laws in Rowan about practicing some 
things without prior experience and a licence.
    He took the merlin's cage, speaking soothingly and 
ignoring the poor thing's frantic attempts to bite him 
through the bars. When he tried to touch the bird's mind, 
however, and break down the barriers barring telepathic 
communication, he felt a swirling mass of wildness that 
summarily rejected him. He gave a grim nod. The woman's 
commands must have been telepathic, and painful.
    He slipped the glove on when the woman handed it to 
him and secured the jesses to the rings on either side. 
Making the half-remembered hissing sound through his teeth 
to somewhat calm the bird, he opened the cage door.
    The merlin hopped out and reached for his face with 
that cruelly curved beak and short but powerful talons. 
Before the startled vendor could even make a move to help, 
Grukkar had reached through that mess of flying feathers 
and frantic screeching to hook the hood over his head and 
tie the half-jesses dangling from the bird's talons to the 
straps on either side of the glove. Bound and blinded 
before he even knew what was happening, the bird sat on 
Grukkar's hand in bewildered silence.
    The woman released a breath she had seemingly been 
holding during the bird's onslaught of wildness, brief 
though it was. "You have a surer touch with it than I ever 
had," she whispered, in a tone one part fear and two parts 
admiration.
    Grukkar smiled in that distant corner of his mind. The 
feeling, the need, to ride out beyond the valley's borders 
and think of Jesetara for no reason had left him. He was 
in command of the situation again, and had a purpose. 
After setting this merlin free, he needed to report this 
woman to the Council.
    "What is your name, my lady?" He worked hard to keep 
from sneering over the title, and the false humility in 
his voice.
    The merchant dipped her head low at the honor of this 
unexpected notice. "Merella Desdende, my lord."
    "Merella Desdende." Grukkar repeated it to himself, 
nodding, then walked off, the hooded falcon hanging on 
like grim death to his gloved hand. The torturer felt his 
face melt in a sympathetic smile. It seemed a lesson that 
all hawks, no matter how young when taken, knew: When in 
doubt, grip.
    He came to the guards' compound beside the Swan Gate, 
in times past an honored home and hard training ground for 
those who defended the city but in these times of peace 
little more than a place where one could rent horses and 
acquire skill in the fighting arts. No one glanced twice 
at him when he asked for a horse, not even because he had 
a falcon on his hand. The Elwens here, mostly veterans who 
could remember back to the early days of the Age of 
Arcadia, had all seen stranger things before.
    They lent him a horse without asking for the hourly 
fee. Certain officials of Rowan, such as Council members 
and master torturers, didn't need to pay for such public 
services. The mare they lent him was gray and spirited, 
stepping backwards and sideways until he laid a gentle 
hand on her neck and touched her mind with his. Then she 
calmed at once, turning to look at him with an almost 
Elwen spark of mischief in her brown eyes. Yes, definitely 
spirited.
    He swung onto the horse and cantered to the Gate, her 
hooves ringing off the silver cobbles, wondering why brown 
eyes looked ugly on a human and not a horse. He came to a 
conclusion which pleased him- that anything looked ugly on 
a human because the damned things were so unnatural- and 
lifted his head to study the line waiting ahead of him at 
the Gate.
    Mostly merchants who had done a night's worthy 
business, it appeared, and their guards. At least there 
were no humans. Grukkar didn't know if he could stand the 
sight of one right now.
    The guards at the Swan Gate seemed to droop, 
desultorily, like wilted flowers. Grukkar reached to his 
neck for the rowan tree pendant that would proclaim his 
citizenship and right to pass, but they waved him through 
without looking up from the game of a'lo a third guard was 
drawing in the dirt.
    Cantering through the Swan Gate- which was actually 
shaped like an enormous swan, her wings spread to act as 
ramps in and out of the city- Grukkar swallowed his sneer. 
Yes, humility, humility everywhere.
    A bit of his earlier frustration returned, and the 
moment the mare's hooves thumped not on something the 
color of gold and yet stronger than steel, but soft earth, 
he turned her toward the edge of the valley and spurred 
her.
    The mare took her head with a glad whinny, fighting 
the bit in her eagerness to run. The merlin spread his 
wings to counterbalance the weight of the wind. He 
couldn't fall, bound as he was by the jesses, but Grukkar 
couldn't touch his mind and tell him that without sending 
him into another flapping frenzy. Besides, he wasn't sure 
the merlin would take to the notion of being bound even if 
he did understand it.
    The odd trio thundered along a worn path that led up 
and over the valley's steep bluffs, a path unexpectedly 
clear with the first rush of morning traffic abated. On 
either side of them lay fields of corn, among the most 
important of crops; Rowan's horses bred on this magical 
maize were famous throughout the Tableland. The workers 
stooped over it- mostly mages who renewed the earth with 
their spells so that the earth could grow and produce a 
new crop every season- looked up and waved to him, 
smiling. If they could see the badge affixed to his dark 
blue tunic, that of a red chain wound over a whip, they 
wisely chose not to make an issue of it.
    The mare snorted and pranced briefly as a dark shadow 
swept over them, but Grukkar steadied her with a single 
practiced hand as he looked up. Overhead flew a bronklo, 
one of the mighty winged lizards bonded to an Elwen of the 
city. They resembled nothing so much as fifteen-foot 
crocodiles with long, slender necks, wings of almost 
translucent leather, and breath of fire that could flay an 
enemy's skin from his bones. Besides defense, they also 
ate the city's garbage and used their waste to water the 
fields. Grukkar suspected he knew what purpose this one 
was about to accomplish, and spurred the mare on. He 
didn't particularly care about witnessing it.
    The horse slowed her run to a sedate walk for the long 
climb out of the Corallen Valley. Grukkar slipped off to 
walk beside her, holding his arm out straight and steady 
for the merlin to have a secure perch. The poor bird, 
stunned into silence again, only gripped the harder.
    They came out into wide, open fields just dotted with 
the first stubby shoots of some crop or another. Grukkar 
did not really care where they were; all that mattered was 
that he could see no workers. This was the perfect place 
to let the merlin go free.
    He slipped the hood free, and then unsnapped the 
jesses, dodging the beak. Dangerous as it was to free the 
head first, it was either that or take the chance that the 
bird would fly away blind.
    When he released the straps, the merlin sprang 
immediately and powerfully for the sky. Grukkar watched 
him, smiling as the bird curvetted in the sunlight, 
letting it warm his wings as he rose higher and ever 
higher.
    "Fly free, brother!" he called, not certain how the 
merlin would understand him, yet somehow confident that it 
would happen. "Fly free."
    The practical side of him tried to tell him that there 
went flying a waste of three silvers, and why was he 
gazing up in such wonder and happiness anyway? It was his 
mind that invested the falcon's dance with joy, and even 
called it a dance. He was doing nothing more than flying.
    But to the land Elwen standing and gazing up at the 
rapidly diminishing shape striking for the unknown lands 
of sky, it was a dance, pure and free, clean and clear. 
When he vanished, Grukkar found the smile still on his 
lips, and climbed on the mare to ride her still away from 
the city. He had to work off some of this giddy joy before 
he returned.
    The mare snorted, a soft, questioning sound. 
    "No, I'm sorry." Grukkar laughed, ruffling her mane. 
"You don't know how to care for yourself out there, or I 
would let you go. But I can make you another deal: I'll 
ride you out as often as possible. Deal?"
    The mare snorted agreeably, and then stretched her 
legs as he again gave her her head.
---------------------------------------------------------- 
    Sometime later, the pair jogged lightly back toward 
Rowan, both of them having had their fill of running 
through hidden meadows and forests where rowan trees and 
hyleas swayed wildly in the winds of their passage. The 
mare panted as she labored the final steps down into the 
valley, but when Grukkar patted her lathered neck in some 
concern and slipped off her back to walk beside her, she 
turned her head and nudged him with her nose, eyes 
sparking as vividly as ever.
    The land Elwen lost his still slightly giddy feeling 
immediately when he saw someone pacing about near the Swan 
Gate. It was an unusual thing, and unusual things in Rowan 
almost always affected the master torturer. He walked more 
slowly, savoring his last moments of freedom to the hilt.
    The figure, he saw when he neared, was Sinniltra, and 
she rushed toward him the moment she saw him, all but 
flinging herself into the air, though it was a short 
distance. Landing before him, she reached out to clasp his 
hands, her blue eyes looking deeply into his. Still, only 
a slight sheen of sweat stood on her forehead as she said 
in her chiming voice, "My lord, a summons has come for 
you."
    "A summons?" Grukkar regarded her with a mixture of 
frustration and interest. "A new one?" It had been several 
days since the last one.
    The star Elwen shook her head, hair curling about her 
face and neck like tongues of living fire. "No, my lord." 
She swallowed audibly and looked off until he almost 
exploded into frustration with her dramatics, then turned 
back, fumbling in the pouch at her waist. "I did not break 
the seal," she said in an undertone as she held the letter 
out. "It comes from-"
    "The Council," said Grukkar, in a slightly awed and 
dazed tone, recognizing the dragon and rowan tree seal. He 
broke it, hardly registering what he was doing, and held 
the letter inside up to the light.
    My Dear Master Torturer,
    It is my pleasure and duty to request your presence at 
the Council Hall immediately. There is a matter of some 
delicacy the Council must discuss with you. Keep this 
letter secret, and come at once. Only your assistant 
Sinniltra and the guards at the Swan Gate have been told 
of this.
    Councilmaster Fomkame Deerfriend.
    Grukkar balled the paper into his fist, troubled. If 
the Councilmaster had sent a private summons, he would 
have told no one, and said only that it was his pleasure 
to invite Grukkar to the Council Hall. The language of the 
letter, distinctly in the opposite direction, indicated a 
matter of great severity as well as delicacy.
    He heard a cough and looked up to see the two guards 
who had appeared so apathetic earlier watching him 
closely. They held their spears angled the slightest bit 
toward him, and yet poised to throw. One look at their 
slowly whitening knuckles told him they would pin him to 
the earth in an instant if he tried to flee.
    Swallowing, Grukkar took a step forward, touching the 
chain-and-whip badge on his tunic as if for reassurance. 
But even the master torturer was subordinate to the 
Council, and most especially the Councilmaster. There was 
talk going on that Fomkame Deerfriend, the latest scion of 
an ancient and proud line, might actually hold the post 
for more than two years, as had been the case of no one 
since Herran Turnlong.
    And the Paws of the Prison were not the only place 
where accidents might happen.
    The guards closed around him, one land Elwen and the 
other pureblooded curalli, with skin a far darker silver 
than Sinniltra's, dark hair and watchful dark eyes, and 
magic deadlier, in its way, than a land Elwen's. Grukkar 
did not even consider trying to escape, or glance at 
Sinniltra, hovering watchfully behind, for help. He must 
stand or fall on his own.
    The people going through the streets on legitimate 
business of their own turned to gape at the small 
procession as they might at a caravan of slaves. Grukkar 
realized he was ducking his head low, as if attempting to 
avoid stones and flung filth, and immediately lifted his 
head, shaking his hair back proudly from his face.
    People murmured, saying things he did not want to hear 
or remember. But he did both.
    "The master torturer? I never thought he would step on 
the wrong side of the law. They always said he has a 
passion for justice that rivals that of an elven priest."
    "I don't know if he's been arrested. Look at those 
guards on the sides of him. Walking like they're afraid of 
him, almost. And see how proud he looks? Would he be doing 
that if he were afraid of punishment?"
    "Grukkar Goatleap? But he's always been in the right, 
and he comes of a good family. What could the law want 
with him?"
    "Perhaps it's all a sham. I hear he's been gaining in 
power lately. Perhaps the Councilmaster wants to remind 
him who really rules, curtail that starlight a little."
    "That's ridiculous! Why would the Councilmaster and 
the painmaster argue? Why..."
    Grukkar's ears closed at last, and he walked along in 
a self-constructed shell of silence. He would not bow his 
head again, even when someone hidden well back in the 
crowd beginning to follow them did throw a stone. It 
deflected off the spear of the curalli guard, and the 
shadowed Elwen spun to scan those who watched, as if 
daring someone to make a further issue of it. 
    No more stones came their way.
    The murmuring grew in agitation and intensity, though, 
when they approached the Council building, a rearing hall 
shaped like a dragon clawing at the sky. Grukkar was 
startled to hear a few voicing outrage. He had accepted 
the nearly universal hatred certain to be accorded one in 
his office, and had not thought a few might actually 
approve of his harsh method of defending the law-abiding.
    The guards closed the silver gates to the gardens 
surrounding the hall firmly behind them, leaving the idle 
and the curious, Sinniltra included, plastered up against 
the bars. As they walked through flowerbeds, along cool 
stone paths shaded by weeping willows, and past pools 
glimmering like Sinniltra's skin, the other land Elwen 
turned to look at Grukkar, something like respect in his 
eyes.
    "You seem to have some friends, Tormentor."
    Grukkar could hear the capital letter, understood the 
half-sarcastic manner in which the praise was offered, and 
let a dark smile tug at his lips in answer. "Don't worry 
for the safety of your masters. The news came as a 
surprise to me, too."
    "We're supposed to be getting him inside, not talking 
to him," the curalli broke in impatiently. "There's the 
door right there."
     The other nodded and escorted Grukkar forward with a 
prompting tug on his arm.
    Grukkar shook off the hand as soon as possible and 
walked on proudly, his stiff neck and clenched jaw hiding 
the trembling and the chattering his muscles and his 
teeth, respectively, wanted to do. He had been here only 
once before, a thousand years ago, to be sworn in as 
master torturer of Rowan, and that had passed him in a 
blur of fright and ecstasy.
    He was determined that this time would not be the 
same.
    They stepped into a wide, cool, curving silver hall, 
following the coiled sweep of the dragon's tail around its 
half-bent hind legs. Sunlight lay on the floor in spots, 
for the corridor was dotted with windows and mirrors. 
Those who paced back and forth were dressed almost 
exclusively in the silver livery of Council servants or 
personal guards.
    Grukkar grimaced as the guards shoved him forward 
again, though he strode out on his own soon enough, as if 
he were leading the way. He knew he must show up like a 
bloodstain on snow with his brilliant white tunic, 
brilliant red and yellow badge, and shivering leggings and 
boots of a nondescript tan color. People kept pausing to 
stare at him.
    He did not let the silver blood creep to his ears and 
face, as it so desperately wanted to. He kept his pace and 
his course steady.
    They at last reached a bronze portal carved in the 
shape of a dragon, with so many coils and loops in both 
body and tail that it made the door a solid piece, with 
none of the gaps one might expect. This was one of three 
doors to the immense Council Chamber. Grukkar laid a hand 
on the bronze neck of the door, determined to shove it 
open and show his courage.
    The curalli caught his wrist. Having worked himself up 
to face unfriendly faces, Grukkar snapped a glare on the 
shadowed Elwen that actually made his hand fall nerveless 
to his side, though he did not back a step.
    "The Councilmaster has asked to speak with you 
privately first, before you face the Council," the man 
explained, his voice shaded in tones of respect. "If you 
will follow me, Lord Grukkar?"
    Grukkar nodded and followed the curalli, hoping they 
would think the motion of his hand through his hair a 
gesture of impatience and not one designed to hide his 
wiping away of sweat. Abruptly, though, he remembered 
something and turned to call after the departing land 
Elwen guard.
    "My horse. The gray mare I was riding. Would you 
return her to the guards' compound? And reassure Sinniltra 
that I will be all right?"
    The man did not slow his pace, but merely gave a 
slight nod and vanished around the curve- it could not be 
called a corner- of the hall. Grukkar sighed, mopped his 
brow again unobtrusively, and continued following the 
silver-skinned one who had waited patiently for him.
    They halted at last before a door carved of some blue- 
green stone Grukkar did not recognize. Embossed on it was 
the running stag, famous symbol of the Deerfriends. The 
curalli knocked, then nodded to Grukkar as his companion 
had and retreated down the hall. Grukkar stood there, 
feeling foolish, and yet compelled to wait.
    The door clicked open, releasing the heavy sugary feel 
of magic in the air, and a voice rushed and harried with 
the pressure of duties called, "Come!"
    Grukkar slipped inside, barely noticing that the door 
shut behind him in smooth silence, or that rich cushions, 
tapestries, and other treasures surrounded him. He was too 
busy concentrating on the man working behind an 
unexpectedly plain desk of gray granite.
    His hair was pale- white, in fact, and blinding as 
Frigid Waste snow with the sun from the window behind him. 
As Grukkar quietly adjusted his position, moving to the 
side so that Fomkame would not appear as a black 
silhouette when he stood, he found he could see little of 
the man's bent face but a brow furrowed in thought.
    Abruptly the face snapped up, and a pair of hazel eyes 
gleaming like the merlin's met his.
    Grukkar stared in some puzzlement. He had come 
prepared to meet a formidable adversary; surely no Elwen 
could have risen to the post of Councilmaster without 
strength of character that would put an ordinary Elwen, 
like him, to shame. But his first impression of Fomkame, 
despite the hard eyes, was of weakness.
    The man wore pale clothes that at first did not appear 
to be very special, until one noticed the intricate, 
delicate embroidery along the silken sleeves. Prancing 
lions, coiling dragons, running stags, and more, so that 
Grukkar had to pull his eyes back from following them. In 
addition to the fine clothes, the torture master's 
experienced eye did not miss the soft, slight rolls of 
fat. The man had been a warrior once, muscles hardened and 
honed, and from the wary look on his face as he took 
Grukkar in, he retained the warrior's skill of judging the 
enemy. But that was all he retained. He had lost much of 
his grace and agility.
    Throughout all this, despite these startling 
revelations, Grukkar knew his face remained as smooth and 
cool as the surface of a mirror, or a torture table. He 
had long ago learned never to reveal his emotions to a 
prisoner, and Fomkame had acquired some of that status in 
his mind.
    "Your name is Grukkar Goatleap?" Fomkame asked 
suddenly, seemingly hoping that shattering the stillness 
so might force some emotion out of the inscrutable man 
facing him. But Grukkar had seen and understood his 
intention in his eyes before he ever spoke, and answered 
as he might have answered a question about the weather.
    "Yes, my lord."
    "I see." Fomkame narrowed his eyes and stood. Grukkar 
measured his stride. Yes, his steps were fluid, graceful, 
flowing, and his hand remained balanced at his side, 
missing the presence of his sword's hilt. But he did not 
walk with the confident, almost dancing manner even 
Grukkar possessed to some extent.
    "The offense for which you have been called here is 
quite severe," the Councilmaster began again, those human- 
like eyes noting every motion of his counterpart.
    "I am sorry to hear that," Grukkar said, tilting his 
head and staring at him. "May I know what it is, my lord? 
For I must confess I have no idea of what I have been 
called here for."
    Fomkame's eyes heated. Grukkar remained silent as the 
tirade began, silently marveling how easy it was to set 
sparks to the tinder of this one's temper.
    "Do you think I have the time to waste on such things? 
I cannot tell you the offense until you stand before the 
Council, by law! I thought you knew that, at least." The 
contempt in his voice was unmistakable, but Grukkar chose 
to treat it as a question. Even more valuable than 
estimating your enemy correctly was encouraging him to 
underestimate you.
    "No, my lord. I have not often been involved with the 
law, save on the right side of it."
    Fomkame's face heated, but he offered nothing in 
response. Grukkar smirked inwardly. So the rumors of a few 
years ago were correct. Fomkame had often been in trouble 
in his irresponsible youth, grand-nephew of a hero or not.
    Insulted, but having no way to prove it, Fomkame 
nevertheless pushed this dangerous man a little further. 
"No, I called to see you privately for a different reason. 
I have recently been reading the records of the archives. 
Some Councilmasters and master torturers worked together 
in the past, though they did not want it widely known. But 
those old Elwens confessed everything to their diaries, 
and those diaries were donated to the archives when they 
died or resigned."
    He paused, but when Grukkar stood there, staring at 
the floor, the irritable Elwen demanded, "Do you even 
understand the language I speak?"
    Grukkar lifted his eyes to Fomkame's hazel ones and at 
last allowed a bit of emotion to show, although he was not 
sure how the Deerfriend read his cold smile. "My lord, I 
have made a study of every major language, every tongue 
spoken in Rowan, save for the foul and base speech of the 
humans. Yes, I can understand that you are offering me an 
alliance. My question is why?"
    "I need allies," Fomkame said simply, speaking with an 
honesty that won Grukkar's attention. "I approach the mark 
no Councilmaster since Herran the Great has succeeded in 
passing." Reverence entered his voice for a moment with 
that name, then vanished in the next, brisk words. "I will 
have been Councilmaster for two years in a few days. No 
one is sure if they should keep me on after that." He 
smiled, but Grukkar could not read any emotion into it 
save a certain wistfulness. "I have done some good things, 
but I do have a past for them to consider."
    "Yes." Grukkar nodded, and when the man only stared at 
him, offered something more. "I know that you have need of 
allies. But I am not sure if I can be one. My work for the 
right must take precedence."
    "Oh, come now." Fomkame smiled as he would at another 
Elwen with whom he shared a secret. "Surely you are not as 
strait-laced as you appear to be from a distance. Surely 
you have indulged in a bit of fun."
    Grukkar let his direct gaze linger on Fomkame's until 
the hazel eyes and the small smile withered like a flower 
in the frost. "No, my lord," he said at last. "I have done 
nothing that will threaten my job or the position I hold. 
I fought long and hard to get it, and I do not want to fan 
the hatred already felt for torturers to such a degree 
that I could no longer do my job."
    Fomkame shook his head and turned away, running one 
hand through his shock of fair hair, the other toying with 
the small, curved knife at his belt, a blade Grukkar had 
not noticed before. He took the opportunity to study it 
now, while the Councilmaster tried to think of something 
cutting and witty to say in response.
    It was not very long, perhaps no more than four inches 
of slightly curved steel beneath a distinctive hilt. The 
hilt was ebony inlaid with orange metal of a kind he did 
not know, showing an elaborate scene of battle, with one 
Elwen knifing another. Grukkar wondered if that were 
symbolic of Fomkame's intentions toward him.
    At last the Councilmaster turned around again. "Look 
here," he began, dropping the formal and slightly subtle 
front. "I have a problem."
    "So sorry to hear it," Grukkar murmured.
    Fomkame continued as if he had not spoken. "I, too, 
fought long and hard for this position, and intend to keep 
it. I do not ask you to do anything illegal, or at least 
not strictly illegal. It may even help you to keep your 
job a bit longer."
    Silence as still as starlight hung in the room for a 
long while before Grukkar asked calmly, "Is that a 
threat?"
    Fomkame shrugged. The sun slanting through the window 
again caught his hair, again surrounded him with a sheen 
like a dazzling halo. "Even master torturers can be 
replaced. Even Councilmasters can. I am asking you to help 
me prevent one, that the other does not happen."
    Grukkar felt himself shaking with suppressed fury. For 
the first time in a very long time, he contended with his 
own hot rage, with fire rather than ice. He thought he 
managed to keep it from showing on his face; Fomkame's 
sudden small smile could be for his words alone. "I 
understand what you say, and I will not help you. Not if 
it means compromising my honor."
    "Honor? You whip people, use acid on them, twist their 
arms until the joints crack, use experimental magic on 
them, and yet call yourself an Elwen of honor?"
    Grukkar shook his head, back in control and berating 
himself soundly for the momentary lapse. "If you can ask 
that question, you understand nothing of honor, and you 
will indeed fail in your bid to stay Councilmaster. Honor 
is not the standard other people hold you up to, but the 
standard you hold yourself up to."
    Another long moment passed unfilled by voices before 
Fomkame said, in a kind of wonder, "A proud sentiment. I 
did not ever think to hear a proud sentiment again."
    "Why should you, when your very name means humility?" 
Grukkar did not put the sneer in his voice that he could 
have. In one way, at least, Fomkame was already his ally. 
But that did not really raise his opinion of him.
    The wonder faded at once from the Councilmaster's eyes 
and voice. "Yes. Many have judged me by the mistake my 
parents made when they named me. But just because my name 
means foolish fault literally, do not think I am the fool 
they thought me."
    "Past tense. Interesting," Grukkar said, luring his 
thoughts, and Fomkame's, into the open. "Does that not 
mean you killed them?"
    "I did not slay them, not with my own hands," the 
Councilmaster said. "But they are gone, yes." A slight 
note of satisfaction entered his voice, and his hand 
strayed to that odd knife, suggesting that the part about 
not killing them was, in one way, at least, a lie.
    "You are swift and subtle, if you have no enemies 
left." Grukkar dipped his head. "But I am afraid you have 
just made a new one."
    He looked up to see a pair of hazel eyes like steel 
points trying to nail him to the wall. Having seen such 
gazes from new prisoners first brought in, denying 
everything with their bluster, he met and held it calmly, 
with the mask that plainly said he didn't care.
    "And why is that?" Fomkame said, his voice light and 
casual, in no way matching his eyes.
    "You ask me to do something wrong in order to do 
something right. There is no way of doing that. Either 
your actions are on the right side of the law, or they are 
not."
    "But surely morality can be set aside for a short 
time." Fomkame leaned forward. "If I become Councilmaster 
once more, I can do much that is good, projects that will 
take years to finish. A better sewage system. Cleaner 
inns. Trade connections with other cities that 
Councilmasters have been trying to win for decades, 
centuries, perhaps even millennia. Can you not see? Your 
small sin would be forgiven for the good it produced."
    "I do not need my sins forgiven. I forgive them or 
not, as I choose. My virtue is my only champion, my only 
torturer, my only executioner." Grukkar met that direct 
gaze with one of his own, even more candid. "I am aware of 
the corruption you speak of- bribery, and so on- but until 
I can prove it, I have no choice but to hold myself apart 
from it as much as I can. Once I have proved it, then I 
can act."
    Fomkame's eyes had grown hooded again, and this time 
Grukkar could not, for all his vast experience, judge the 
expression in them with any accuracy. "You are a proud one 
indeed," he said, with no inflection or emphasis on any of 
the words. "Will you pull me to trial before the law if 
you find out that I have bribed, or something of the sort? 
Which is not to say I will."
    Which is not to say you haven't, rather, Grukkar 
answered in the silence of his mind. But aloud he said, "I 
would be reluctant to use my power against one in so high 
an office only because I would fear the consequences were 
I wrong for any reason. If I had sure proof, I would 
accuse you, yes. You are no more sacred than anyone else, 
after all."
    "And if you found out you had done something wrong 
without knowing it?"
    "I would have to be very sure, my lord. And if I were 
very sure something was wrong, I would never do it in the 
first place."
    Fomkame shook his head as if awaking from a nightmare. 
"Ah, well! Idle speculation, really, as it seems you will 
not do it." He turned, staring thoughtfully at the papers 
on his desk.
    Grukkar sighed. The man was waiting for him to ask the 
question, and he might as well do it, both because he was 
as curious as the next Elwen and because he wanted to 
convince his enemy of his own seeming foolishness.
    "What did you want me to consider, my lord?" Despite 
the pretense, the title and false respect suddenly back in 
his voice, he was unable to resist saying "consider" 
instead of "do."
    The Deerfriend suddenly spun, his eyes wide with 
almost childish delight. "I knew my estimation of you 
wasn't off!" he cried, slapping Grukkar on the back. "I 
knew you were the kind of man who wanted to do right no 
matter the cost."
    "It matters who the cost is to."
    Fomkame's suspicion returned for just a moment before 
he smiled and wagged a finger. "Ah, ah. The cost would be 
to you, only to you. Surely you can live with that."
    "I repeat," said Grukkar, eyes on the floor. "What did 
you want me to consider, my lord?"
    "You are being too hard on the humans you torture," 
Fomkame said. "More of them are dying under your whip than 
anywhere else, or any other race. Likely only a few people 
who have access to the records, like myself, have noticed, 
but it has started some murmuring. Our human Council 
member, Aman, has already started an inquiry to see if we 
might remove you."
    Grukkar stood there, cursing himself. His actions had 
become noticeable, and therefore predictable. And yet he 
could not tame the mercury that seared his blood at the 
mere mention of the word human.
    What did he care more about? Punishing those who had 
stolen his love from him, in whatever way, or maintaining 
his position, so that he might do more good?
    He knew, and opened his mouth to speak. Fomkame, 
leaning forward again, turned in irritation at a knock on 
the door. "Come," he instructed, waving a hand, and the 
door opened again.
    A short woman in silver livery poked her head in and 
said without preamble, "The Council begins, my lords."




                        Chapter 2
                    The Councilmaster
    "I have always thought it wisest and most important to 
know one's equals in this world. The enemies are 
important, of course, the friends even more so. But it is 
your equals, no matter what side they are on, who have the 
power to hurt you."
    -Erlinde Avtelon.

    Grukkar walked a few respectful steps behind the 
Councilmaster and the servant who escorted him, drawing 
some curious looks. No matter how well-protected Fomkame 
thought the secret of his summons to Grukkar was, 
apparently the news had spread, and the underfolk could 
not figure out why Grukkar paced along, free of guards and 
like hindrances.
    But they did not question, hardly even whispered among 
themselves, and went about their tasks without glancing at 
the odd, tiny procession twice. Grukkar shook his head 
disdainfully. Humility, humility everywhere.
    They came back to the bronze door, but the servant 
opened it, bowing as if to a king. Fomkame did not seem to 
note the courtesy, sweeping into the Council Chamber with 
an arrogance befitting royalty, but Grukkar, hardly able 
to stand it any more, halted by the young woman. She 
looked up at him from under thick lashes, her eyes a 
startling and rich shade of black, startling because her 
hair was a frosty blue.
    "Will my lord require anything else?"
    "Please, don't call me that," Grukkar said with a 
gentleness that surprised him. It was not often he got to 
practice such virtues in the Paws of the Prison, after 
all. "I have not strictly earned the title by my actions 
or my merit, and thus it is not mine. And do not bow so 
deeply, young one." He correctly read the woman as being 
no more than nine hundred years old, not yet old enough 
even to go on the Wanderfree, the two-year trial of 
adulthood. "In doing so, you shame your own status as an 
Elwen, your own right to pride."
    Wonder bloomed, a rich, rare flower, in her eyes. "I 
never thought of it that way..." she murmured.
    "Grukkar Goatleap!" Fomkame's voice rang out from 
inside the Chamber, sounding as if he had spoken more than 
once, but Grukkar did not care. Instilling even the seed 
of pride in another Elwen was more important. He paused to 
look back at the scurrying servant, and saw a woman 
walking slowly, meeting the eyes of every person she 
passed. He smiled quietly and entered the room.
    The Council Chamber was vaster than he had ever 
imagined, with tiers of seats arranged around a central 
dais where speeches might be made and heard by everyone in 
the room. Sunlight rained in profusion through stained- 
glass windows whose intricate scenes Grukkar could not be 
bothered to decipher at this moment, save to note them as 
luxury and dismiss them. When people put value on things 
rather than themselves, they had trouble.
    The Council members, save for Fomkame, sat in their 
chairs already, twenty grave, solemn faces of several 
races, though the non-land Elwens cowered a bit under the 
influence and prestige of their counterparts. The 
Councilmaster stood before the high seat that was 
seemingly his own, waiting for Grukkar to take his place 
on the dais before he sat.
    "If you will stand there," he said, pointing to a spot 
on the mini-stage with thinly veiled impatience, "we will 
begin."
    Grukkar stood casually where he was until the stifled 
chuckles and the hasty coughs at the Councilmaster's 
expense became noticeable, then strode to the place where 
Fomkame had asked him to go. Standing there, he folded his 
hands in front of him as if in prayer and smiled brightly, 
a child's eager expression, at all those assembled.
    He had a momentary problem retaining that expression 
when his eyes swept across the face of a dark-haired, 
green-eyed human seated in the second tier of seats. That 
must be Aman. A ridiculous name, Primal for "lion," it 
contrasted sharply with the look in the man's pale eyes 
and his general appearance.
    Before Fomkame could seize control of the conversation 
and steer it to where he wanted it, Grukkar took the 
chance. He might never get an opportunity again, 
particularly if they intended to imprison or execute him 
for his imaginary crime.
    "My lords and ladies," he said, keeping his eyes away 
from the human's face in order that he might control his 
own features, "I must tell you that there is one 
practicing the art of selling raptors, Merella Desdende, 
who does not have experience with falcons or hawks. I have 
reason to believe she did not pass the test to gain a 
licence, either."
    "What reason?" Fomkame demanded. "Some birds are 
simply difficult to handle."
    The Councilmaster was not going to make this easy? 
Very well. The painmaster was quite experienced in making 
things excruciating. "She admitted that she did not have a 
sure touch with them, and that is one of the things a 
licence is awarded for. Anyone who does not have such a 
licence is forbidden to sell hawks anywhere in the city- 
state of Rowan. Am I not correct?"
    "So a choice of wording-" Fomkame began. But one of 
the female Council members stood, shaking her long red 
hair behind her and snorting aloud to break the flow of 
the Councilmaster's words.
    "You speak nonsense, as usual," she said, with the 
crisp, flowing accent of the northern farmlands, those who 
most often fought off curalli attacks from Shadows and 
were in some ways a little independent city-state of their 
own. "I happen to know Grukkar Goatleap; he is an 
excellent hawker, or was, and whatever he says about 
birds, I believe."
    "Yes," Fomkame drawled, turning to face her. "We saw 
your unqualified good opinion in action last week."
    The Council members chuckled at whatever private joke 
that implied, and the woman stiffened. Her eyes, unusual 
diamond eyes filled with clear blue-white fire, flashed at 
him now, like real jewels. "Hertha Leaflaughter does not 
lie."
    "I never said you did," said Fomkame, with contempt 
that dismissed Hertha and her rather minor family as 
beneath his notice. He turned back to Grukkar. "So this 
woman was selling hawks without a licence. What prompted 
you to bring this minor crime to the Council?" His face 
filled with a patronizing expression of amused disgust 
that Grukkar was suddenly morbidly certain he must 
practice before a mirror.
    The words came from between clenched teeth, but he 
forced himself to say them, as he could not use the 
stronger insults he favored at the moment. "In the old 
days, my lord, the Council heard all petitions and 
answered all crimes by punishing the wrongdoers, no matter 
how minor. I thought the glory of the ancient Council was 
what you desired to emulate. It seems I was wrong." He 
swept a low bow. "Forgive my, my lord."
    He came up to see Fomkame scowling. The insult had 
gone to his heart, as an insult to Grukkar's dedication to 
the right would have done to him. But the Councilmaster, 
knowing when he was beaten, simply moved on to the next 
topic.
    "Very well. We may see about punishing her. But more 
important matters await us." He leaned forward again, a 
gesture he seemed fond of, and Grukkar found himself 
making a bet with himself that the Councilmaster would 
spring the surprise, this mysterious crime, on him 
bluntly.
    It did come suddenly, a lightning strike from heaven, 
a bolt from the blue.
    "You profess ignorance of this crime. You were not 
aware, then, that your henchman, Coronar, has been accused 
of fomenting a rebellion?"
    Grukkar grimaced in that corner of his mind that 
oversaw everything, and felt emotion without being touched 
by it. Coronar possessed in full measure the fury and fire 
of his land Elwen mother. Grukkar had long wondered when 
that, combined with the decidedly darker nature he had 
inherited from his curalli father, would cause trouble.
    He pushed the regret away. Coronar had the finest 
touch with torture after his own, and he had accepted the 
half-curalli into his employment fully aware of and 
accepting the possible consequences. It was fashionable, 
at least in the last thousand years, to make those masters 
as close to their lieutenants as Grukkar was to Coronar 
answerable for their seconds' actions.
    "I did not know that, my lord, but I must confess 
myself not surprised. What group did he stir rebellion 
among?"
    "At least call it by its proper name," Hertha 
Leaflaughter intervened. "It was more a riot than a 
rebellion, more a disturbance than either."
    "Perhaps," Fomkame said, before turning to face 
Grukkar again. "The curalli of the Sanctuary."
    Grukkar arched a brow, intrigued by that. The full- 
blooded shadowed Elwens who chose to dwell in the most 
ancient city of Elwenkind were fully aware of the perils 
that surrounded them, not least the blood-hatred of their 
pale-skinned kin, a hereditary emotion which would force 
them into battle if they saw enough curalli. Usually, 
those with curalli blood kept a low profile, though they 
had the same rights as everyone else.
    And Coronar, brutal and sadistic even by curalli 
standards, was not accepted any more comfortably by the 
majority of his father's kindred than by the majority of 
his mother's.
    "What was he saying?"
    "I see no need to go into detail right now," Fomkame 
said, directing a frown at the master torturer, as if he 
were impudent to ask to know the cause. "Something 
troublesome and persuasive is all you need know about it. 
But we must-"
    "I think he needs to know more."
    The soft voice came from the third tier of seats, just 
behind the human, Aman. Grukkar glanced up at the figure 
standing just then, and caught his breath, staring. He had 
never seen anything like the air of majesty that cloaked 
this curalli, young as he was. So might Herran Turnlong 
and other ancient heroes have looked.
    The curalli had very dark silver skin, verging almost 
on the color of tarnished metal. His dark hair had been 
neatly combed, but danced on the edge of growing into a 
rat's nest even so, so curly was it. That gave him an odd 
air of childish mischief, contrasting even more oddly with 
the grave demeanor he affected generally and the severity 
in his blue eyes. Grukkar knew him, though he had never 
before seen him. Maresl Alvyon, speaker for the Sanctuary, 
a post that had only been made into a Council membership a 
century ago.
    "May I question this man?" Maresl asked in a softly 
musical voice, his gaze returning Grukkar's with all the 
respect and admiration the master torturer was suddenly 
prepared to grant the curalli.
    Fomkame nodded, seemingly realizing that he had little 
choice. His frustration bubbled just beneath the surface. 
Grukkar wondered suddenly if the Councilmaster had meant 
to use this to blackmail him, hiding the severity of the 
crime until the last moment, when Grukkar would have no 
choice but to cooperate with him, no time to think through 
his options and choose a different path.
    Maresl picked his way down the tiers, moving with that 
light, enchanting grace that made curalli almost natural 
fighters, at least in the dancing Elwen style. Grukkar 
noticed that Aman glanced at him, then away again as 
though sickened, or reminded of something too close to 
home. He hid his smile, suspecting the human, like so 
many, was jealous of the beauty of both form and movement 
that came so naturally to Elwens.
    Maresl halted before him, blue eyes gazing deeply into 
his. They were a deeper blue than Sinniltra's, the color 
of a sapphire rather than of heaven in summer, but somehow 
softer.
    "What the half-blood Coronar said was quite serious," 
Maresl began.
    "It was not," the Councilmaster interrupted, a 
perversely pleased expression on his face.
    Maresl sent a quelling look his way. "Kindly let me do 
my own questioning, Fomkame. I have never noted your 
success when you do it." The Councilmaster subsided, an 
almost petulant expression overwhelming his features for a 
moment before he looked the other way and smirked in 
cleverly faked boredom.
    "He said that you were a leader worth following, first 
of all," Maresl continued. "From there, it moved toward 
overthrowing the Council and setting you up as 
Councilmaster, perhaps even as king." A shudder ran 
through him, through every Elwen present, at that dreaded 
last word. There was a reason Rowan's flag bore five 
broken crowns.
    Grukkar felt one corner of one eye dart to Fomkame no 
matter how hard he tried to get it to stop. No wonder the 
Councilmaster seemed so intent on securing the master 
torturer's cooperation! If he did not, there was always a 
chance he might have more than one threat to his power on 
his hands. He must fear the thoughts of the master 
reflected the thoughts of the servant.
    "My people did not listen at first, but apparently 
several of them know you and approve of you." Maresl said 
this as if he had not been sure why, but could now see. 
Grukkar thought this the first man he had ever known who 
could put so much emotion into so few words. "They urged 
the others on, and had several of us drunk, as your minion 
obviously had, things might have turned ugly. But the 
guards arrived on the scene then and rather firmly 
escorted Coronar back to the Prison."
    Grukkar gave Maresl a small smile. "I never said he 
was not a good watchdog. But even the best must be kept on 
a short leash at times."
    He saw a sparkle in the shadowed Elwen's eyes at his 
apt analogy. "True."
    "Do you think we could press on?" Fomkame sounded 
remarkably like the curalli guard who had told his 
companion they didn't need to talk to Grukkar. "This is an 
interrogation, not a time for chitchat."
    Maresl ignored the other land Elwen completely as he 
said to Grukkar, "I do not think you guilty of any crimes. 
It was the ravings of a drunk man. Whatever your 
punishment, know that I, and through me the curalli of the 
Sanctuary, will extend hands in friendship to you." He 
bowed like one of the weeping willows in the gardens and 
whirled up the stairs again.
    "Now that the welcoming session is over," Fomkame said 
with more than a hint of sarcasm, "I suppose we can get on 
with the real work?"
    As if on cue, a door slid open in the side of the 
Chamber and a woman clad in the white, silver-trimmed 
robes of a Judge entered the room. The Council members 
stood in respect; those already standing, Grukkar and 
Maresl among them, dipped their heads.
    Long ago, the Council had simply decided fine points 
of law for itself, with the Councilmaster casting the 
deciding vote. That had been fine when an Elwen like 
Herran Turnlong sat in command, a willing captain easily 
able to steer the ship past rocks. But when the 
Councilmaster turned out to be a fool, like the one 
sitting in front of Grukkar, or a personal enemy of the 
one on trial, no one could be sure justice was done.
    So the Judges came into being, people sent off to 
dragons to be trained, as were their Judges, in complete 
impartiality. The woman's face, her eyes a deep blue 
verging on black, her clasped hands and sedate walk, all 
bespoke a serenity unusual and frightening in one of 
Grukkar's emotional people.
    She came to stand beside him, and Grukkar could barely 
hear the calm beating of her heart. He threw her an 
impressed glance and restored to his enemies the status 
they had lost when he found out what Fomkame was really 
like.
    "My lords, my ladies," said the woman in a voice oddly 
like a bird singing in more ways than the musical. It had 
the same quality as that common melody, an aura of 
timeless joy. "I have come to Judge the trial of one 
Grukkar Goatleap. My name is Lera Summereyes." She touched 
the skin beneath her deep blue eyes as if in greeting or 
to prove her right to her family's name. "Show me the 
prisoner, and I will give him justice," she finished, an 
ancient motto of the dragons that Elwen Judges had taken 
for their own.
    Fomkame nodded. He seemed more relaxed now, more 
confident. He must think I will find myself impossible to 
face, Grukkar thought. It could not be because the Judge 
was on his side. This one- Lera Summereyes, Grukkar 
reminded himself, knowing it was dangerous to think of her 
as more than a person- was impassive even by her class's 
standards.
    "I think we are ready to begin, Lera," said Fomkame, 
his eyes sparking with something akin to glee, or joy. 
Grukkar wondered with something that might have been 
interest if he simply liked seeing a crystal star in 
action, or what. Resignation slumped so strongly through 
him right now that he couldn't seem to care about 
anything. He turned toward Lera, hands folded at his sides 
and head bowed.
    The Judge said nothing, but responded more clearly 
than any words by pulling the crystal star from beneath 
her tunic. It hung on a fine silver chain, this five- 
pointed pendant seemingly carved of smoky crystal, its 
surface alive with dancing clouds. Singing softly under 
her breath, Lera reached out and brushed the crystal star 
gently across Grukkar's brow and throat.
    In moments the land Elwen could neither think clearly, 
nor speak. Burning flashes of cold fire assaulted him, not 
really painful but so chill that he shook all over, shook 
as if he would fly apart, tried to move and found he could 
not.
    In moments, his spirit flew out of his body, into 
another realm altogether. He landed on what passed for his 
feet here and stared warily about at the things that 
surrounded him. He had been warned that such things 
appeared different to different people, yet hoped against 
hope that he might find something to help him.
    He saw a shape take form out of the swirling lucent 
fog and braced himself. In moments a short shape stood 
before him, its uplifted face, almost inElwen, 
transfigured by sadness.
    Grukkar winced and turned his head away. It was a 
werehun, one of a race of creatures he had created as 
imaginary companions for himself when very young. It 
looked exactly as he had imagined it: like a great hound, 
but with the long legs of a cheetah and Elwen eyes. It 
could run fast and chase away any nightmare. The silver 
eyes fixed on his own with an intensity that stole his 
breath, at least until he turned his head the other way.
    "I am here, Grukkar." He heard the werehun's soft 
snarl, the lips sliding back from the wolfish teeth that a 
younger Grukkar had given his companions so that they 
might defend him. "Show me your enemies."
    "I do not know who they are," Grukkar admitted, 
looking back at him. "I do not know now who stands with me 
and against me." He winced. How much simpler it had been, 
in some ways, to be a child, control surrendered to 
another and enemies simply all shadows.
    "You do not know?" The werehun made no move to attack, 
but just stood there, staring at him. Then it seemed to 
shift and flow, and when Grukkar looked back, he saw 
Coronar facing him, staring at him in disbelief.
    "But you have always known!" the image cried in the 
half-curalli's voice. "It's one of the reasons I accept 
you as leader, lord. You know where you plan to go, and 
you won't let anyone stand in your way."
    Grukkar shook his head, closing his eyes, trying to 
remind himself that none of this was real. He also had to 
accept it as truth, however. What they said, and his 
responses, were pure and primal truth, pulled from his 
mind by the crystal star and set opposite him to see how 
he would react.
    "You won't," Coronar continued relentlessly, a flow of 
words that beat at Grukkar's fragile defenses. Defenses 
against what? the land Elwen had to wonder, in the moment 
before he was forced to care solely about the present and 
the need to defend. "I know you, lord, and that's why I 
admire you. None has a surer touch on the torturer's whip 
and wheel, or on life's trail. If you want something, you 
walk straight and steady to it." Envy laced the half- 
curalli's voice. "How I wish I could do that."
    Grukkar opened his eyes, met the blue ones he knew so 
well, and asked simply, "Did you almost incite the 
Sanctuary to rebellion?"
    "And what if I did?" Coronar countered. Truth this 
might be, but rarely would he get a straight answer. "Do 
you not deserve to rule Rowan in the place of that fool 
Fomkame? You have seen what he is like. Can you not 
imagine that you would do a better job?"
    Grukkar folded his arms across his chest and shook  
his head, but his disobedient mind filled with images, 
showing him driving back the curalli that always plagued 
Rowan's borders, finally casting the humans from the city, 
always enacting justice until at last children were safe 
to walk in the deepest, darkest alley in Rowan.
    "All this, you could do," Coronar murmured in a 
silken, seductive whisper, his voice suddenly turning soft 
and feminine. Grukkar looked up again, and nearly fainted 
when he saw who now stood before him.
    Jesetara came over to him and gently laid her hand on 
his arm. She was as lovely as he remembered, with long 
black hair falling almost to her waist, glimmering with 
all the colors of a raven's wing. How that wing of hair 
had blurred and shone when she rode ahead of him on 
horseback, a race he let her win unless the temptation was 
too great! How the gray eyes could change their mood and 
color in moments, from the soft silver of melancholy they 
were now to a steel-gray, stormcloud hue of anger!
    "I always regretted abandoning you, Grukkar," Jesetara 
said, staring at him in that same way she had always 
looked at him when she thought no one was watching, a mix 
of adoration and love. "At the time it seemed I had no 
choice, but now I have to wonder: Was that true?"
    Dying inside, Grukkar tore his arm free from her grasp 
and retreated several steps. "Why did you come here?" He 
worked hard to keep from sounding as if he were choking on 
a mix of bile and tears, as indeed he was.
    "Why?" Jesetara spread her hands wide, giving him that 
look of wounded and artless innocence he knew too well. 
"Does not a woman desire to see the man she loves 
occasionally? Is it not a legitimate desire? This is the 
only place we can come together, Grukkar, as you would not 
want to see me in the material world."
    "I would."
    Jesetara shook her head, then began dancing softly, 
feet tapping on crystal fog as she sang nonsense words to 
herself. Grukkar stood studying her, trying to determine 
the purpose of this visit.
    Trying, too, to restrain the wild joy that urged him 
to rush over, take her in his arms, and never let her go 
again as long as that joy surged through them and bound 
them together.
    Jesetara stopped dancing then and stood looking at 
him, hands clasped in front of her. "The thoughts of the 
servant do not reflect the thoughts of the master. You do 
not desire to rule Rowan." Something touched her voice and 
was gone too quickly for him to identify it.
    "Do you think I ever would?" Grukkar spread his hands 
and shrugged angrily when she looked at him, her face 
melting slowly into that of Lera Summereyes. "It is a job 
of much power, yes, but one in which power's poison seeps 
and eats at the soul, until it seems as if you can do good 
by doing evil."
    Lera straightened alertly, and the mist about them, 
slowly drawing back to reveal the solid shapes of the room 
where his physical body stood, suddenly snapped back to 
opaque. "What do you mean? Speak swiftly," she added when 
he hesitated. "The enchantment of the crystal star is 
imperfect, and the others will be able to hear what we say 
soon."
    Grukkar figured he had nothing to lose. "The 
Councilmaster, Fomkame Deerfriend, wants me to ally with 
him and let up on my torturing of humans. I have not 
decided whether or not I will."
    "Why do you want to kill humans?"
    Grukkar smiled, a bitter light in his eyes. "You are a 
Judge. Could you not find that out for yourself?"
    "I could dig into your mind." Lera regarded him with 
eyes as bright as the moons. "Yes, I could. But that is a 
very painful process, not to mention messy. I would prefer 
that you simply tell me."
    "Humans drove my love away from me."
    "Elwens have loved and lost before. Is that any reason 
to blame the whole race for the mistakes of one, and kill 
them? I have seen the form of your hatred, the form it 
would wear here, and I will not show it to you. The horror 
would break your mind."
    Grukkar swallowed slowly and clasped his hands in 
front of him. He had never imagined that he would have a 
chance to speak so, to give his beliefs to another who 
might come to share them, and who possessed the power to 
change things.