CHAPTER ONE
“Yield to me, Master of Crows, and I will make you ruler of kingdoms.”
Silhara of Neith groaned and doubled over, clutching his midriff. Blood streamed from his nose and dripped on the balcony’s worn stones. The god’s voice, familiar and insidious, wrapped around his mind. Transfixed beneath the rays of a jaundiced star, he huddled against the crumbling parapet, fighting an evil the priests assumed long vanquished.
The god seduced him, filled his head with images fantastic and horrific—sacrificial blood pooling on a killing stone, armies marching across a sun-scorched desert, a sea of starving people kneeling in adulation. Magic surged through him, a colossal power bred of hate. Unstoppable. Terrifying. He was drunk on the knowledge that the armies moved on his orders, and the people worshipped at his feet. The victims sacrificed were offered to the god, and Silhara reigned over all before him.
The voice sang its malevolent song. ”You will be an emperor unchallenged, a sorcerer unequaled.”
Silhara ground his teeth against the agony splitting his skull. “And be a thrall to a beggar god?” His lips bled with the question. “I will not yield.”
Soft laughter echoed within him. “You will, Avatar. You always do."
The god released him suddenly, a wrenching pull that almost sucked the marrow from his bones. He cried out and dropped to his knees. The visions and the voice faded, leaving an unseen foulness in their wake. The saltiness of blood burned his throat; sweat and urine drenched his robes. Poisonous light pulsed from the yellow star above him.
Silhara collapsed on the balcony floor. “Help me,” he prayed to no one.
His servant found him hours later as the rising sun set fire to the eastern horizon. Silhara clambered to his feet beneath Gurn’s steadying hands. The giant gazed in sympathy, gesturing at the mage’s face. Silhara touched his nose, tracing a rough, crusted line from nostril to jaw.
“Blood?”
The servant nodded and nudged him toward his room. Silhara ignored him and gazed at the star suspended like a cats-eye moonstone on an invisible cord. No true illumination flowed from the star’s center, only a turbid haze that suffocated the sky.
“Gurn, can you see the star?”
Gurn shook his head, blunt features wary. His hands traced intricate patterns, and Silhara sighed, his suspicions confirmed. While anyone possessing a thread of intuition might sense the god’s presence, the Gifted alone saw the physical manifestation. The priests of Conclave were surely running around in their seaside fortress, panicked over the knowledge that their illustrious forbearers had ultimately failed to defeat the god called Corruption.
Suspicious of Silhara’s activities and resentful of his refusal to swear allegiance to them, the priests—pretentious clerics who couldn’t scratch their backsides without uttering an incantation—would turn a baleful eye on him now. Still, the malevolent force hovering at his back and slithering into his consciousness with promises of untold power and subjugation made Conclave nothing more than a nuisance by comparison.
Silhara picked at his soiled robes, disgusted. Corruption’s presence lingered in the smell of his sweat, his clothing, even his hair. He spat twice, ridding himself of its taste. “That parasite has reduced me to a babe,” he said. “I pissed myself.”
He stripped off the ruined garments, dropping them in a damp pile at his feet. Naked and shivering in the cool, pre-dawn air, he motioned Gurn back and recited a spell. His clothes burst into flame, leaving a circle of blackened ash on the stone pavers.
Gurn’s mouth turned down in disapproval. Silhara smiled. He knew that look. Paupers did not destroy good clothing, no matter the justification. “They had Corruption’s stench on them, Gurn.” Just as he did now. “Power like that defiles whatever it touches.”
He strode to his room, grateful for the warmth from the hearth fire blazing in the corner. Gurn had brought wash water and laid a clean, threadbare shirt and breeches across the bed. Silhara went directly to the wash bowl, desperate to scrub Corruption’s taint off his skin. He reached for the sponge, hands still trembling from the residual shock of the god’s assault.
The subtle voice returned, whispered in his mind. “Welcome me, servant reborn.”
Silhara growled low in his throat. He couldn’t deny such seduction, more deft than the practiced hand of any painted whore. The visions of empires at his feet and limitless power at his fingertips were the god’s bait. Greater men than he had fallen before such temptation, and there were many men greater than he.
Gurn’s light touch on his shoulder brought him back to earth, and he banished the enticing thoughts. Blood from his nose trickled onto his hand and ran across his knuckles.
“Peace, Gurn,” he said. “I’m not broken yet.” The servant’s eyes narrowed at his words, but he stepped away and allowed his master his bath.
Water sluiced over Silhara’s arms and torso as he issued instructions. “Prepare one of the chambers on the third floor—whichever one doesn’t have a hole in the roof.” Gurn’s eyebrows rose. “I’m inviting a guest to Neith.”
The giant servant’s eyebrows lifted higher.
Gurn’s reaction amused him. No one visited Neith. The manor’s reputation as the home of a dark mage—a crow wizard—kept all comers at bay, and Silhara encouraged that reputation, uninterested in entertaining dull aristocrats or killing young sorcerers intent on making names for themselves by challenging the notorious Master of Crows.
Circumstances had changed. As much as Silhara despised the idea, he needed Conclave’s help. Nothing was immune to destruction, not even a god. The priests returned his contempt in full measure, but they might each use the other in the common goal of defeating Corruption. Conclave was known to turn a blind eye to crow mages and their forbidden arts if such practices aided them. Silhara wanted one of Conclave’s novitiates, a cleric-scribe versed in ancient tomes, one with knowledge of forgotten and arcane languages. Killing a god required magic far older and much darker than a Conclave ritual, and such knowledge was often buried in dead languages or ancient scrolls. Conclave had its strictures, but its scribes were unmatched in their skills for translations. He had little doubt an exception to the ban on reading the black arcana would be granted if necessary.
Morning brought burgeoning sunlight streaming through the open window as he finished his bath. A discordant caw greeted the day, followed by a symphony of like calls. A black mantle of crow wings burst from the orange grove, blotting the sky before veering north to circle the manor.
The mage smiled. He’d send his letter by messenger crow. The priests would cluck, conjecture and wonder why the Master of Crows, who had always rejected their overtures and insistence for allegiance, suddenly asked for aid. They would answer, eager for the chance to place a Conclave spy in his house.
He turned away from the window, from Corruption’s star still hovering low on the horizon, and sat at his writing table. The surface lay buried beneath scrolls, inkwells and broken quills. Finding one quill still whole, he pulled a piece of blank parchment from beneath a stack of manuscripts and dipped the quill in a nearby inkwell. For a moment, the tip hovered over the paper. Silhara smirked and wrote.
The old gods are not dead. Your demon has awakened…
CHAPTER TWO
Martise studied the long path leading to Neith manor and considered whether she was an apprentice or a sacrifice. The scent of curse magic streamed from the fog-shrouded road, making her nostrils twitch.
“I still allow you the choice, Martise, but there’s no turning away once we take this road.”
She gazed at her master, saw the silver chain holding her spirit stone threaded through his fingers. Cut into flawless facets that caught the sunlight and bounced rainbows into her eyes, the azure jewel was the cage for a part of her soul. Memories assailed her. At seven years old, she’d been terrified of the stern, beak-nosed priest who’d assessed her with an icy, measuring eye and bought her from a starving mother with a handful of coins. He’d enslaved her with a magic that had made her scream in agony, one that ensured she would serve the house of Asher until her death or until Cumbria sold her and passed on the secret of the stone to a new master. Or until she won her freedom.
Her resolve strengthened. Desperate people didn’t have the luxury of fear. There were things worth dying for, even if the endeavor failed.
“I haven’t changed my mind, Your Grace.”
She didn’t lower her eyes as Cumbria, the High Bishop of Conclave, stared at her, his graven face harsh in the late afternoon light. Whatever he saw in her expression satisfied him. He motioned to his three retainers waiting nearby with the horses. One approached, bearing a large crow on his forearm. The bird hopped to Cumbria’s outstretched arm, fluttering dark wings until he ran a gentle finger down the feathered back.
“Micah. My best watcher. He will act as the messenger between us. Silhara’s groves are infested with crows. One more won’t be noticed. When you have information, call Micah down using the Nanteri lullaby. He will deliver your message.”
The crow squawked once in protest as the bishop lifted his arm and sent him skyward. He flew south, over the gnarled Solaris oaks guarding Neith’s road, toward Corruption’s star.
Cumbria relayed his instructions to the retainer. “Stay here and tend the horses. They won’t walk the path willingly. I should return in no more than two hours.” He frowned, a spark of anger flitting through his gray eyes. “I doubt Silhara will do anything foolish, but if I don’t return at the appointed time, summon my brethren. They’ll know what to do.”
The servant bowed. Martise might have pitied his lot and those of his comrades. Dressed in the heavy livery robes of the Asher household, they would broil in the merciless summer heat as they waited for their master’s return, but the reciprocal pity in the servant’s eyes squelched her own. He and the others might sweat like mules, but they remained behind in a far safer place.
Cumbria tapped her shoulder. “Come, Martise. It will be dark soon, and I’ve no wish to linger here.”
A seeping cold penetrated her layered clothing the moment they stepped onto the road, and the scent of dark magic blanketed the air. She peered over her shoulder, half expecting the sun-filled plain behind her to have disappeared, cut off by more of the sinuous mists caressing her ankles.
Bathed in natural light, the sea of swaying grass remained, beckoning her away from the gloom and a dangerous task. She turned her back before temptation took hold.
Cumbria sneered. “Typical of him. Silhara would find a means to scare off visitors or lost travelers who come too near Neith.”
They continued on, their steps strangely muffled on the gravel as they passed beneath the thick canopy of Solaris oaks. Martise had always admired the stately giants with their widespread branches and thick foliage. Most wealthy manors had them planted along their grand entrances—avenues preparing guests for even grander homes.
The road to Neith, however, left a different impression. The great oaks offered respite from the heat but cast the surroundings in semi-darkness. Black, crippled limbs arched overhead, twining together in a grappling dance, as if each tree sought to wrench its adversary from the roots.
Not only did the trees quell the light, but so did those smaller things growing beneath them. Weak sunlight pierced the gloom in a few places and faded midway to the ground, snuffed by stunted shrubbery dressed in gray leaves and menacing thorns.
She hugged herself for comfort and warmth. “This is a dark place,” she whispered.
As if punctuating her words, a lean phantom shape burst from a stand of bushes, running low and fast before disappearing into the forest depths. Martise gasped and closed the gap between her and the bishop.
“What was that?” She peered into the wood’s murk, half afraid of what she might see.
Cumbria’s voice, normally forceful and carrying, was stifled. He shrugged. “Who can say? A leopard. A fox.” He scowled. “Something more unnatural. Silhara is a dark mage, and his mentor, the first Master of Crows, experimented with…things. Any number of horrors may roam these woods.”
He noted her shudder. “The manor will be your greatest protection, Martise. Never seek sanctuary in this wood.”
Her skin danced around her body at his words.
They completed their journey without further incident, though she sensed something watched them–either a shadow of the wood or the misshapen trees themselves.
The forest gave way to a treeless courtyard flooded in sunlight and framed by dilapidated metal gates. A hot breeze spun off the plain, dissipating the unnatural chill permeating the forest.
The gates swayed and creaked in the wind like bones hanging from a gallows tree. A rusted chain and lock fastening them struck the metal with a dissonant clang.
Beyond, the remains of a large manor sprawled across a stretch of rocky terrain and withered grass. The structure’s western half was reduced to rubble, as if smashed by a giant hand. Broken stones and mortar littered the courtyard, and the skeleton of a winding staircase spiraled into nothingness. Rotting fabric clung to the splintered risers, fluttering in the wind. She was hemmed in by the bleak and the dead.
Martise turned away from the ruins and surveyed the part of the manor still intact. Graceful arches and spires, silhouetted against the setting sun, reflected an age before men reigned supreme, when those who built Neith and laid the path to it had not yet vanished into history.
Her eyes widened when a figure suddenly emerged from the remnants of the west wing, as if rising from the parched ground. No one had lurked in that spot moments ago, and the giant approaching them couldn’t have stayed hidden from view long. Dressed in a tunic sporting the Neithian coat of arms, he crossed the courtyard in graceful strides despite his gangly form and size. His bald pate glistened in the afternoon light.
He smiled a greeting and motioned with huge hands that they step aside so he could open the gates. Martise considered his strange sign language and wordless commands. A mute. Somehow that didn’t surprise her, here in this eerie place forgotten by the living world.
The chain and lock fell away as the gates swung open on a thin scream. Martise stayed close as Cumbria strode into the courtyard. The bishop ignored the servant, but she smiled shyly and nodded as she passed. He grinned in return.
He overtook the bishop, directing them to the part of the manor still intact. They halted in front of an ornately carved door weathered by the elements. A trickle of nervous sweat slid between her breasts.
She stiffened in self-reproach. Images of her spirit stone in Cumbria’s hand flashed in her mind, and she admonished herself. So far they had seen shadows in the wood, a ruined estate and a mute servant. Nothing truly frightening. But she couldn’t rid herself of the tiny voice that said “They are all ruled by a crow wizard, and soon he will rule you as well.”
To her relief, nothing attacked them when they entered the house. Bursin’s wings, when did you become such a coward? She reddened, shamed by her fright. Braver souls were more suited for this work. Again that inner voice taunted her. But few are as motivated.
They moved from an empty vestibule into a more spacious room suffused in muted sunlight. Martise blinked until her eyes adjusted, then gasped at the sight before her.
Lost beneath a shroud of dust, the main hall’s faded grandeur left her breathless. Blackened timbers soared above her head, their beams crossing in a massive spider's web of support for the lofty ceiling. An enormous fireplace stretched across one wall, the mantel and surround carved into the shapes of mythical beasts entwined in eternal combat. This was once a grand place, far larger than Cumbria’s estate–a place built for kings and their fighting champions.
How low the great had sunk. Brittle rushes snapped beneath their feet. The few pieces of furniture stood gray with dirt, and the tapestries bore moth holes. Light filtered through windows caked in layers of grime, creating a false gloaming. Though the walls still stood, the hall was abandoned as surely as the west wing’s battered ruins.
The servant bent, patting a cushioned stool in a coaxing gesture. A cloud of dust swirled into the air. Cumbria's lip curled in disgust.
"No, I don’t want to sit." He gathered his robes around him and took in his surroundings. "No better than a hovel. Why should have I expected more?"
Martise stared at the bishop, shocked by his rudeness. She glanced at the servant and saw his smile fade to a blank, waiting stare. She knew that look—had used it often with her master.
Cumbria frowned and kicked the stool out of his path. "Well," he snapped. “Get on with it, man. I won’t linger at your master's pleasure. Fetch him!"
The servant shrugged before disappearing into a corridor dimly lit by tallow candles in bent sconces. Their flames flickered as he passed.
Cumbria’s voice resonated with loathing. “An insolent servant to an insolent carrion mage. See what happens when you elevate street filth?”
He touched her arm. “Guard your words and remain silent unless he addresses you, Martise. Silhara is fond of entrapment. He possesses a sharp tongue and has eviscerated more than one hapless opponent in a conversation. You’d be no match.”
Martise lowered her head and hid her smile. Cumbria had chosen her for this endeavor because of her abilities, among them the talents for staying silent and unnoticed. His warning amused her and revealed a hint of his unease in the upcoming meeting. How interesting that a man didn’t always admire his own traits in another.
The mute servant reappeared, followed by a slender shadow silhouetted against the hallway’s weak light. Cumbria stood rigid next to her as their host emerged from the shadows. Martise sucked in a sharp breath, enthralled by her first sight of the Master of Crows.
A living flame in the begrimed room, he burned with a cold, still fire. Long scarlet robes swirled around his ankles like bloodied smoke. Taller than most men and lean, he wore his black hair in a tight braid that fell over his shoulder. The severe style accentuated a sun-burnished face neither handsome nor kind but carved from the same rock strewn across the courtyard. His black eyes and aquiline nose reminded her of those Kurman nomads she’d sometimes seen in the markets, selling their rugs and weaponry. Her belly tightened in dread as he gazed at her and Cumbria with sloe-eyed malevolence.
"I see you didn't get lost. A pity. To what do I owe the honor of your august presence, Your Grace? I expected a Conclave minion. Instead I get the High Bishop himself."
His deep voice grated against her ears, broken and harsh, as if he forced the words from a ruined throat. Contempt laced his greeting, and a scornful half-smile curved his lips.
Cumbria’s face froze. The antipathy between the two men swelled in the room, seeping into the walls and floors.
“Still ruler of your squalid little kingdom, Silhara?” Cumbria’s derisive stare raked the servant. “You and your army of one."
Silhara’s rough laughter drifted through the room. "King of Filth, Master of Crows. What will be my title tomorrow, Your Grace? As usual, Conclave can never reach a final decision."
The bishop’s eyes burned. "'Tis a shame they didn't choke the life out of you all those years ago."
In her years of serving Cumbria and the house of Asher, Martise had never seen the patriarch on the edge of losing control. His counsel for silence made more sense now. Even he found it difficult maintaining a level head around the sorcerer.
Silhara’s dark eyes narrowed; his tanned features paled. Cumbria's curious statement had drawn blood.
"'Tis a testimony to the will and longevity of wickedness, Your Grace. It does not go down easily."
Silhara’s hard face suddenly relaxed, and Martise’s instincts buzzed in warning. Mercurial and shrewd, he’d make a deadly adversary. Suddenly the price of her freedom seemed too high, and she wished herself back in the familiar warmth and comfort of the kitchens at home.
Suspicion glittered in that obsidian gaze as he scrutinized her. He addressed Cumbria without looking away from her, and her burgeoning fear of him transformed to instant dislike.
"Never let it be said this emperor cannot be gracious. You have made a long journey. Gurn will bring tea. You can tell me of your trip and the pet you have brought for my entertainment."
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