The Lord of Lies

Book 0: The Strange Threads Series

by Sam Bowring

Genres: Fantasy; Epic Fantasy; Humorous Fantasy

Synopsis

The world is crumbling. Fissures crack the shaking ground, babes are born with twisted limbs and the taste of apples is just a memory. Rostigan and the Priestess Yalenna must face those Wardens who remain bent on steeping the land in ruin and, somehow, close the growing Wound in the Great Spell. Standing in their way is a pitiless army commanded by a madman, a sky full of silkjaws and, worst of all, an old friend, once betrayed, whom they must now convince to join them again. There is only one thing for it - Rostigan must break an ancient oath and use powers he has dared not touch, powers that could tip the balance in favour of the spreading corruption. Caught in a web of his own deceit, he struggles to live the lies he has spun, for if he cannot, Aorn itself may well be doomed.

Release date: August 28, 2012

Publisher: Hachette Australia

Print pages: 263

Sample

Salarkis appeared in Dapplewood, his instinctive retreat whenever he had to think. It was where he had grown up, and despite the changes he had since undergone, it still held some sway over his subconscious. Yet, as he stepped from the air beside the remains of a little house, looking upon a bubbling pool, he did not feel the desired sense of calm descend. He was, instead, angry.

Maybe being killed here had soured the place for him.

Forger had tried to kill him too, more recently than that initial death, in order to steal his threads. Although Forger may have been right to try – for certainly Salarkis did not feel allegiance towards him anymore, and had in fact all but sided with Yalenna – he still did not take kindly to being smashed across the head with a length of balcony rail.

Forger had apparently succeeded in killing Despirrow. A brief attempt to track Despirrow had brought Salarkis to Forger instead, and there was only one explanation for that – Despirrow’s threads lived in Forger now. So, the Lord of Pain, it seemed, was set upon a solitary path.

Damn it all, he was tired of this. Who was he anyway, anymore? He had a violence in him that persisted, despite Yalenna bestowing him with the gift of empathy. He felt like a badly painted picture, wet and running.

He sank down by the pool’s edge, slipping in his legs and tail. Wrapped in stone, he could not even feel the coolness of the water, and may as well have been dangling his feet in a fireplace.

He watched as a leaf spun past. It should have drifted downwards into the pool, but instead kept going along a horizontal plane, on and on until it hit a tree and simply stopped.

He needed to do something. He was itchy, restless, lurking out of sight while others battled for the world.

From his belt – the only thing he wore – he drew a dagger. All he had to do was speak a name to it, and the blade would seek that person out. He could not use Forger’s, unfortunately, but there were others to whom he had been ‘introduced’ in Tallahow during the long freeze. Who was that advisor Forger liked, the one he’d said was cold and objective, who served without question?

‘Threver,’ he whispered.

The dagger flew from his hand, a bright flash that disappeared through the trees.

He drew another. There was that torturer too, what was his name?

‘Yoj,’ he said, and the second blade followed the first.

Were there others as well? He could not remember. Forger wasn’t overly concerned with the keeping of friends, so perhaps those two were as close as it got.

Somehow the sunny wood began to feel stifling, but where else to go? It seemed too simple to seek Yalenna out and declare fealty to her cause. He wasn’t even sure what the cause was.

It was a terrible thing, to be struck by wanderlust, yet able to travel anywhere in an instant.

On an impulse he pictured a place about as far away as he could imagine, almost as if to taunt himself with how easy it would be to get there. A moment later he arrived on a plateau in the Roshous Peaks, overlooking the Tranquil Dale. Back when the Wardens had been mortals aligned, they had journeyed here together, having picked a path through the mountains to approach the Spire from its less-travelled side. There it stood, an ugly sceptre of grey stone, its flat and circular roof level with him across the gap. In the sky above, the angry Wound seemed to pulse, its red tattered rim framing the flow of colourful threads behind the world.

He was struck by an urge to look at it more closely. None of the others, that he knew of, had ever returned to the Spire to do so, but Salarkis was feeling recklessly curious, or maybe curiously reckless.

He shifted the short distance over to the Spire roof.

It was much as he remembered – not that there was much to remember. The main features were a stairway leading down to the lower levels, and Regret’s stone table, from which he had conducted his experiments and explorations. Dusty glasses, jars and pipes were littered about, weathered but otherwise untouched. Had no one been here in the last three hundred years? Nobody at all, since the Wardens had stood here combating the lone madman billowing out his horrible grey haze, his red hair flying about his grinning head as he tried to unravel their patterns? At the time, Salarkis had not understood what motivated Regret – had considered it hugely unfortunate for an insane person to have been born with power enough to inflict his destructive whims upon the world – but now he comprehended where the pleasure lay. To see what one could break, could create, could change … these were childlike compulsions that cared not for consequences.

He turned to stare up at the Wound. It hung some thirty paces above, and from here he could see how pieces had been torn from the larger threads beyond, leaving them looking like lengths of frayed rope. The missing fragments, stolen by Regret, were now inside him and the other Wardens, being used in ways not in keeping with the Spell’s design. They should have been part of the world’s hidden structures, functions of the natural order, but instead they were confusing things, corrupting things. As long as the Wound stayed open, the world would never be right.

The strangest feeling came upon Salarkis then, as if his pattern was vibrating. He cast about and, with rising fear, found he could not move. Almost outside his perception were threads he had not noticed, running between him and the Wound like the hanging tendrils of some carnivorous plant, holding him fast in their cobwebbed grip. Suddenly he was being lifted, the thrum increasing until his own threads twanged like the strings of a lute. Something broke free from his very core, and he opened his mouth to scream, but could not make any sound – or at least, could not hear himself, if he did.

Mercifully, he blacked out.



Ah, but it was all so confusing. What should I be doing? What is my purpose? Why have I been given this second chance? When he let it be.

Sitting tall in his throne, Forger smiled. He wasn’t sure why.

A servant girl was fussing around nearby, replacing an empty jug of water, trying her best to remain insubstantial.

‘You,’ he said.

Already pale in his presence, her skin now went the colour of her own buck teeth.

‘Yes, my lord? Is there something I can do for you?’

His eyes travelled along the threads wavering from her, which would have been invisible to him save for Braston’s stolen power.

‘You’ve always been teased,’ he said. ‘Yes?’

‘My … my lord?’

‘Had those teeth ever since you were just a baby rabbit, haven’t you? Children can be so cruel. You know, if ever I think I’ve learned all there is to know about causing pain, I watch a group of children for a while.’ He laughed gently. ‘“Chomper” they called you, eh? Very creative.’

The girl blinked. She had not heard that name in years, and had tried indeed to forget it.

‘Hard to forget though, isn’t it?’ said Forger. ‘Not when others carry on the tradition.’

This was marvellous. At first glance, her threads had given him a vague idea of how she fit into the world, but the more he chose to concentrate, the more he learned about her – her past, her present, how life had treated her. It struck him that he could become the very opposite of Braston – he could sense the injustice people had suffered and then inflict more upon them! Imagine the potential for pain when he could see where the sore spots already lay, to know people’s greatest fears, to treat them with sublime unfairness …

‘Delara is the worst,’ he said, ‘isn’t she? The prettiest of the servant girls, but with the meanest heart. Why does she laugh at you, when she has it all?’

The girl quaked as she sank to her knees at his feet. ‘Please, my lord … don’t kill me.’

‘Kill you? I’m trying to talk to you!’

‘I’m sorry about my teeth.’

Forger laughed. ‘Why should you be sorry? You didn’t choose them, did you? You were born with them! So this Delara calls you “Peggy”, yes? Does it in front of the other girls, so routinely that it’s become casual … “Peggy” has, in fact, become your name. And it means that you can never forget, doesn’t it? Every small interaction makes you recall your dangling stalactites. If only they just let you get on with things, if only they would leave you alone. But you’ll never get a man, says Delara, for even if he could forget the barriers standing in his way long enough for a single kiss on your wedding day, he would surely remember them once they closed around his manhood – would fear for its safety indeed, so she says, doesn’t she, Peggy? Then she laughs, and they laugh at you with her.’

Tears showed in the girl’s eyes, accompanied by fear and confusion. Forger savoured the misery that came from her, a subtler flavour than he was used to.

‘You can’t even eat,’ he went on, ‘in front of a man, can you? You don’t want him to see those pillars crashing down. Why did the Spell make you this way? Why are you being punished like this? Your entire person, reduced to a single physical aberration that no one can ever see past.’

She spoke in a choked whisper. ‘Damn the Spell.’

‘Aha! Well, I see you, miss. I see the face behind those chompers.’

He reached out to cup her cheek, his touch stilling her quivering.

‘My lord?’

Her eyes bulged, and he withdrew his hand. Her falling tears dried up at once, as if a door had closed on them forever.

‘What … have you done to me?’

‘All that we have spoken of, I have taken away.’

She touched her chest as if to check whether her heart was still beating.

‘How do you feel?’ he asked.

‘Good,’ she said, in surprise. ‘By the Spell … I do not care anymore!’ She looked at him in wonder. ‘My lord, I do not care about being called stupid names!’

‘Good for you, Peggy.’

‘But why have you done this?’

Forger shrugged. ‘I know what it’s like to be ugly. Now, how about you fetch this Delara, eh? Time that someone made her understand what it’s like too, don’t you think? Maybe it can be you.’

She stared at him a moment, then smiled slowly.

‘As you command, lord.’

She left the throne room, passing Threver on her way out.

‘Ah, Threver,’ said Forger. ‘What report?’

‘Your army is set to march.’

‘Excellent. Tell them to commence. We will catch them up in an hour or two.’

‘Very good, lord.’

Yes, thought Forger, very good. Soon it would be time for the screaming, the fire, the injustice of it all.

Well, maybe he didn’t always know what he should be doing, but at least he knew what he liked.



Salarkis opened his eyes before knowing he was awake. Lying on his stomach, he blinked slowly, eventually focusing on a small piece of grit lodged under the fingernail closest to his face. His whole side was sore, as if bruised from a fall. Dimly he tried to reconstruct what had happened.

Fingernail …

Bruised and sore …

He sat up with a start, staring at his hand. His flesh was soft, pale. His stony scales were gone! He was light again, lighter than if he’d come ashore after swimming through mud for leagues. He was naked too, save for the belt loosely encircling his waist, one of the dagger points scratching his leg.

‘Wind and fire …’

He unclasped the belt, letting it fall away. Not only was his body lighter, his mind was too. Gone were the threads that had invaded his pattern so long ago, twisting him with murderous desires and chaotic thoughts. His sense of self was solid – he knew exactly who he was!

He was a man again.

He stared up at the Wound in wonder. How had this happened? Had the Spell really retrieved that which had been taken from it, without any prompting from him, no effort made on his behalf? Was his presence in its vicinity enough for it to swipe back what it needed to heal itself? He thought about the corpse of Regret, the stolen bundles lifting from it to go into him and the other Wardens as they had stood in this very place. Why hadn’t the Spell taken its threads back then? Had it needed time to make some strange adjustment, whatever was necessary to allow it to retrieve itself? The Spell, he knew, was a changeable thing.

‘Stupid Spell,’ he said, and laughed. ‘You could have saved us a lot of trouble by working this out an age ago.’

He pinched his cheeks, knocked a fist to his forehead, gave his manhood a swish, and laughed again. It was like waking from a long, vivid dream – but, he quickly realised, not a very good one. Memories flashed through his mind, quickly quelling his joy – people screaming while he cackled, blades travelling impossible distances to sink into innocent breasts, cities burning, Karrak gleefully slapping him hard on the shoulder while a dying king sagged on his knees before them …

It’s not my fault, he told himself. It’s the price we paid for ridding Aorn of Regret.

His crimes were not so easy to dispense with, but he did not intend to wallow in self-loathing or self-pity. That was not the kind of man he was. He was a good, happy fellow – that was right, wasn’t it? The thoughts and actions of his previous self he did not empathise with at all. Thinking about what had driven him was like trying to recall a colour he had never seen.

Not me. It was not me!

Troubled or not, there was no denying he was in quite a predicament. The Dale below crawled with Unwoven, the sight of them making him shiver. They lived in the ruins of what had been a proud city, stretching along the length of the valley floor. Spilling up the slopes on either side were less permanent dwellings scraped together from mud and branch, all the way up to what looked like fields in the higher reaches. Grey figures moved about everywhere, and Salarkis crouched down lest one of them spy him. He experienced his first sinking feeling since waking – it was probable he could not escape by threadwalking, since it was not a talent he had possessed in mortal life.

He decided to try anyway. Maybe the fact that he now remembered how it was done would help him? He concentrated hard, imagining himself coming apart at the seams, as he had done before so habitually and often that it had required no thought. His pattern, formerly so easy to unravel, was now stubbornly firm and solid. After a long while of trying, he sighed and opened his eyes. His limits now felt drastically constrictive in comparison to what they had been.

I’ll adjust, he told himself. I am still a powerful threader.

It had to be true, but what had been strength now felt like weakness, and self assurance did not change the fact that he was stranded.

Maybe he could fashion something to cross the gap back to the plateau and flee into the Peaks? Although, was that really an answer, with the mountains riddled by silkjaws and worms?

He quickly ran through his options, and without much else available, took a dagger and made his way towards the flight of stairs which led into the Spire proper. He heard nothing below, so crept down the stairs to a doorway with no actual door, and peeped through into the room beyond. Mould and patches of moss grew everywhere, lit up by a couple of portholes punched in the wall. It did not look like anyone had been here in a long time, which somehow seemed incredible. Did not the hordes of Unwoven outside revere the tower of their master? Even if they didn’t put it to practical use, surely they would visit it sometimes?

The only way onwards was a corkscrew stairwell, down which he discovered more dark rooms. As he went he poked about in corners and crevices, padded along empty corridors. Once or twice he thought some lump beneath mould might prove to be something useful, and lifted up a sheet of the stuff. Each time clouds of spores sent him hacking, while the space beneath revealed itself empty of anything save more tightly compacted mould. As his coughs echoed loudly through the tower he feared they would be answered by the sound of running footsteps, and yet, each time, nothing.

Everything had rotted to dust. There was nothing in the Spire.

Eventually he reached an antechamber at the bottom, dispirited that he had not found a single thing. At least, he supposed, as long as he stayed inside, he was apparently safe from the Unwoven.

Not from starvation, however.

The only way out was a small archway. There may have been a door there once, or double doors even, but now it stood permanently open – the breeze that came through was a welcome relief after the musty Spire air. He paused just inside it, peeking out.

The Spire was built at the top of a rise at the Dale’s northern end. About thirty paces down a slope of patchy earth and grass, the huts began. If the Spire was as abandoned as it seemed, Salarkis found it odd that the Unwoven lived so close to it. If there was something about it that they venerated, or feared, surely they would keep a little distance? Instead, many of them moved about just outside, and all around.

He receded into the dark to consider his next move.

As Yalenna strode through Althala Castle, people pressed their backs against walls to get out of her way. Her eyes projected fury in a focused beam and, with her white Priestess’s robe flaring behind her, she seemed to take up the entire corridor.

Braston, her friend and ally, a force for good in a troubled world, had been murdered for nothing more prosaic than power. Responsibility for the act was shared, in part by the Warden Despirrow, in part by Loppolo, the former king of Althala who Braston had dethroned – and who Yalenna was now on her way to see.

‘Yalenna,’ tried Rostigan, struggling to keep up without breaking into a jog, ‘should we not speak on this a little?’

‘We’ve spoken. For weeks.’

During the long night they had recently spent together, when Despirrow had stopped time for longer than he had ever done before, she and Rostigan had had nothing to do but talk. Surprisingly, she had actually grown to enjoy his company. Maybe it was because they had known each other as mortals, before the Spell’s stolen threads had changed them so drastically, and now he seemed more like the man he had once been. She could sometimes forget, for a while, that he had become the Lord of Crows and ground the people of Aorn under his heel.

‘And when we spoke,’ he said, ‘you advocated forgiveness for Loppolo, yes?’

‘That was before I knew he’d succeeded, when I thought he was but toying with fancies, before I imagined such an insignificant man actually capable of killing Braston.’

As they approached Loppolo’s quarters, the two guards outside grew tense. They were plainly unsure about what to do if Yalenna tried to storm past them without permission, which, unfortunately for them, was also quite clearly what she intended to do. She helped solve their dilemma by swiping a hand and sending them stumbling away down the corridor to collapse in an undignified heap. Without breaking stride she gestured at the door and sent it crashing inwards.

Voices from inside rose in alarm as she moved through an antechamber into Loppolo’s entertaining area. The man himself sat on a couch, a plate of biscuits on the low table before him, while a few other nobles were scattered about clutching goblets of wine. All stared at Yalenna with startled expressions.

‘Well,’ she said, ‘what’s this? A nice little celebration?’

‘Er …’ Loppolo rose. ‘Just some afternoon refreshment.’ He became aware of others watching and tried to hide his nervousness. ‘That aside,’ he said, forcing a haughtier tone, ‘by what right do you enter here unannounced, Priestess? You may be a Warden but, with the passing of Braston, I am King of Althala once again!’

‘Sit down.’

Loppolo oomphed as she took invisible hold of the seat of his pants and slammed them, and him, back onto the couch.

‘How dare you!’ This from one fat noble, who she remembered was called Tursa. ‘You have no right –’

‘How dare I?’ she said, the ice in her voice stilling his tongue. ‘How dare I? I am not the one who conspired to poison the Lord Braston.’

Tursa paled, and the others too.

Yalenna sneered. ‘What a pathetic excuse for a collection of rats. Whose tongue was it, stuck deepest into Loppolo’s ear? Who convinced him that murdering my friend was an excellent plan? Was it you?’

At her wave Tursa slammed against the wall with a yelp, the goblet in his hand breaking to splatter red wine.

‘What was so precious that you stood to gain? A few trifles, a king’s gratitude? A larger slice of land, a bag of cold metal? For such mediocrity you’d gladly risk the safety of Aorn?’

She advanced on Tursa as she spoke, and though he tried to squirm away, she pinned him fast. He cast a desperate look at Rostigan, as if that would somehow save him.

‘You sicken me,’ she said, grabbing his cheeks and squashing them together as she forced his eyes back to hers, ‘with your small, transitive wants. If I hear another squeak out of you, I will tie knots in your guts.’

May acquaintances never forget your name.

She released him, turning back to the king.

‘Castle threaders will be on their way,’ Loppolo said. ‘If you harm me –’

‘Do you deny it, Loppolo? The worst thing is, it wasn’t even your idea –’

‘That’s right, it wasn’t!’

‘– yet you let it in, allowed it to take root, came to convince yourself it was justified.’

‘It was justified! He should not have taken my throne.’

Yalenna swayed, letting herself feel the truth of Loppolo’s statement. Despite everything, he was right in this. Braston should have known better.

‘So you,’ she said, ‘deem yourself a worthy replacement? You will strive to reverse the degradation of the Spell? To hold back Forger and his fearless army, to fight the Unwoven and their monstrous companions, to rid Aorn of them forever? You, little man?’

‘The Spell is degrading,’ he answered angrily, ‘because the Wardens came back!’

‘No. We came back because the Spell is degrading. You do not even begin to understand the consequences of your actions, do you? I should burst your heart in your royal chest.’

‘Yalenna,’ interjected Rostigan sombrely, as if just speaking her name could bring her back from the brink.

‘Everyone out!’ she shouted. ‘Everyone save for King Loppolo!’

For a moment the nobles hovered, unsure whether or not to move. Yalenna growled, and several more goblets exploded in hands. There was a rush from the room, while Loppolo looked stricken at being abandoned.

‘I’ll alert the threaders, my king,’ called someone from the threshold, then squealed as Yalenna forcefully reinstated the door back in place.

She walked around the couch opposite Loppolo and sat down. Absently she picked up a biscuit, crunching it without really tasting it as she collected her thoughts. Then she licked her fingers and smacked her lips.

Loppolo cast Rostigan a plaintive look. ‘Aren’t you going to help me, Skullrender?’

Rostigan rested his hands on the back of Yalenna’s couch. ‘Why?’

‘You did so once before!’

‘That was to help Aorn. What would you have me do? Stick a sword into the Priestess’s back?’

Loppolo fell silent.

‘All right,’ Yalenna said, wiping crumbs from her mouth. ‘Here’s how it goes, Loppolo. Despite my very strong inclination, I am not going to kill you.’

He sat up a little straighter at that, for a moment looking ridiculously like an eager dog.

‘It may help the overall pattern of things,’ she continued, ‘to see you reinstated, in some small way.’

‘Yes, that’s all I want! To do what’s best!’

‘Shut up and listen. Here is the condition under which you are spared.’ She leant forward. ‘You will be a good king.’

Loppolo’s eyes brightened further and he nodded enthusiastically. ‘You have my word, Priestess. I was a good king before, I swear it, and I shall strive to be even better! I will be –’

‘You mistake my meaning,’ said Yalenna. ‘Yes, you will be a good king. You will, in fact, be a very good little king, indeed, who does exactly what he’s told.’

The light went out of Loppolo.

‘Ah,’ he said.



Yalenna unsealed the door and she and Rostigan exited Loppolo’s quarters. Outside they found Jandryn waiting with the guards, and the nobles they had cast out.

‘Look,’ said Tursa, ‘here she is, Captain! This woman has taken the king hostage!’

Jandryn’s eyes remained fixed upon Yalenna. ‘My lady,’ he said, ‘this fellow labours under the misconception I am here to arrest you. I admit that I allowed him to, it being the easiest way to keep him here, and the rest, until discovering what you wish done with them.’

Tursa gaped, aghast, and Yalenna favoured Jandryn with a smile.

‘Thank you, Captain.’

‘But this is outrageous!’

‘Quiet,’ ordered Jandryn, and his guards moved to stand behind Tursa.

Jandryn lowered his voice. ‘Is it true, my lady? Did they poison Braston?’

‘Yes.’

Jandryn nodded grimly. ‘I’m very sorry.’

‘You did all you could. Besides, Despirrow had a hand in events too. I do not really know who shoulders the greater share of blame.’

‘If we want Loppolo as king,’ put in Rostigan, ‘we cannot let the truth of what happened spread.’

Jandryn glanced at him uncertainly. ‘I know you, sir. You are Skullrender. Do you also share my lady’s confidence?’

Yalenna glanced between the two men uneasily, for Jandryn did not know that Rostigan was also a Warden. What he saw was a famous warrior standing by her side, who she had taken with her into Loppolo’s quarters, who she must therefore trust explicitly. There was something strange in his tone and stance, and with surprise she realised what it was … he was jealous! The reaction caught her totally off guard.

Rostigan caught it too, for he gave her a knowing little smile, which made Jandryn go even stiffer. Rostigan knew what little there was to know about her and Jandryn for, during the long while that they had spent together waiting for Despirrow to unstop time, they had spoken of many things, and on one occasion in particular, their words had turned to love …



Sitting. . .