Child of the Sword, Book 1 of The Gods Within (63 page)

“Yes, my lord. Will that be all?”

“Yes. You may go.”

DaNoel bowed. “Thank you, my lord,” he said,
then turned and left.

Valso laughed openly. It was so easy to
control that one, and some day it would be just as easy to control
them all.

~~~

Morgin had trouble getting up the next
morning. He’d had a fitful night’s sleep, filled with dreams he
couldn’t remember and a struggle he couldn’t name. He awoke late,
groggy and slowwitted, and found it impossible to move with any
degree of haste. His sword filled him with unease, and couldn’t put
it out of his thoughts. But he pulled himself together, headed for
the kitchens, wolfed down some food, then made his way to the Hall
of Wills.

The central floor of the Hall was recessed
three steps below the periphery, with a high vaulted ceiling
overhead. With everyone packed around the edges of the Hall the
difference in elevation gave the central floor the air of a stage,
while the three steps that raised the surrounding periphery above
it formed a boundary beyond which those who were merely observers
dare not pass.

The last session of the Council was well
under way when Morgin arrived. The twelve council members—three
chosen from each of the Lesser Clans—were seated at a large table
placed in the center of the main floor. Everyone else stood along
the outer periphery, and anyone who wished to address the council
would step forth and do so from that floor.

As was customary, though not required, none
of the clan Leaders had chosen to place themselves on the Council,
perhaps feeling they could be more effective addressing the Council
from the floor. To address the Council all one needed to do was
walk down the three steps to the central floor and wait patiently
to be recognized. At any given moment there were usually two or
three clansmen or clanswomen, already recognized, standing in the
middle of the floor before the Council, discussing or arguing the
topic of the moment, while a half dozen more waited quietly to be
recognized at the bottom of the steps along the periphery. Morgin
had observed that the speed with which one was recognized was quite
dependent upon one’s status within the Lesser Clans, status through
rank, money, power, birth—it really didn’t matter. And if one
weren’t highly placed, it would be foolish to speak without proper
recognition.

He slipped quietly through the observers
standing on the periphery and headed toward the back of the Hall.
There were more than a few eyebrows raised at his tardiness, though
Olivia showed no reaction whatsoever. But Morgin knew that
steel-gray stare too well to be fooled by her apparent impassivity,
and there was no doubt in his mind she would have words with him
later.

It was customary to come armed to the
Council, but to place one’s weapons aside once there. At the back
of the Hall Morgin unbuckled his sheathed sword and placed it on a
rack among a great number of weapons against the wall. But just as
he put it down his fingers refused to release it, and it took a
decided effort of will to let it go, though doing so heightened his
unease. He turned back toward the crowd feeling almost ill, spotted
JohnEngine not too far away and moved quietly to his brother’s
side.

JohnEngine looked worse than Morgin felt.
“What’s the trouble?” Morgin whispered.

JohnEngine took a deep breath and exhaled it
slowly. “Too much wine last night. Or not enough. I’m not sure
which.”

“Be silent!” someone hissed at them.

At the moment a Penda lord named Tarare was
carrying on an argument with Alcoa, marchlord of the western
Elhiyne lands that bordered Penda. Morgin knew Alcoa only vaguely,
for the man kept to his own lands. Nor did he personally know
Tarare, but it was common knowledge that the Penda lord was simply
a mouthpiece for BlakeDown.

“They are always a threat,” Alcoa said
loudly, “And until they are taught the proper lesson, they will
always be a threat.”

“And what lesson would you teach them?”
Tarare demanded. “That you can take our hands from the fields and
turn them into soldiers? That you can march them off to a war in a
distant land while our crops wither without care? That you
can—”

“Enough of this,” Alcoa shouted.

AnnaRail stepped onto the edge of the
central floor. It was a measure of the respect she commanded that
she was recognized instantly, and by a Penda councilman at that.
“My lords,” she said carefully. “We speak of war, and we speak of
peace, as if our lives are carried on in either one or the other
state. But that is rarely the case, for most often we live in a
gray limbo between the two . . .”

While AnnaRail debated with Tarare, Olivia
ambled her way through the crowd at the periphery. She hesitated
here and there, to have a whispered word with this lord or that,
but she worked her way slowly, purposefully, toward Morgin, and
when she reached him she took him by the arm and pulled him to an
empty corner of the Hall. He was careful not to make a scene by
resisting her.

“That wife of yours,” she hissed at him,
trying to keep her voice to a whisper. “You need to control her
better. She’s allowing ErrinCastle to make a fool of himself.”

For the first time Morgin realized that he
now towered over the old woman. He had spent so many years as a
young boy looking up at her, but now she had to look up at him. He
stepped in close to her to emphasize the difference in their
heights. “My wife has done nothing untoward or inappropriate. But
ErrinCastle has come very close to crossing the line. Tell
BlakeDown that ErrinCastle needs to control himself, because if he
doesn’t I’ll kill him.”

Morgin yanked his arm out of Olivia’s hand
and turned away from her. But she stepped quickly around him,
stepped in front of him. “Oh Lord of Shadow,” she hissed quietly.
“Lord without power. You can no longer even claim the rights of a
clansman, can you?”

Morgin ignored her, stepped around her and
elbowed his way back into the crowd on the periphery. She’d have to
make a scene if she wanted to stop him, or drag him back to that
corner for more of her threats.

The debate had grown even more heated during
his conversation with Olivia, and Tarare was snarling something at
AnnaRail. Morgin’s unease grew, his stomach churned, and Rhianne
suddenly seemed very distant.

Olivia stepped down to the floor, didn’t
wait to be recognized by the Council. “If Lord Tarare ye Penda
feels so strongly about peace, we of Elhiyne will not fault him if
he chooses to lay his arms aside when his enemies plunder his
lands.”

The crowd buzzed momentarily at the open
insult in her words, but the old witch outclassed the Penda lord
and he knew it, so he wisely chose not to strike back with an
insult of his own. “But my enemies have not plundered my lands,
most gracious lady. It is your lands that have suffered. It is your
fight, and a wise man does not champion another without careful
consideration.”

Olivia smiled that stone-hard,
straight-lipped smile of hers. “Be careful, Tarare, that you are
not too careful, for you might find that your lands have already
been plundered before you finish your consideration.”

BlakeDown appeared suddenly out of the
periphery and moved to join his kinsman. “Is that a threat,
Olivia?”

AnnaRail started to speak, but BlakeDown cut
her off. “Silence, woman,” he shouted. His magic flared for an
instant, but he brought it under control quickly.

AnnaRail’s eyes grew livid, though she held
herself in check, but Morgin could sense her anger as if it were
his own. His magic flared within his soul, a magic he thought he no
longer possessed; it washed slowly over him, crawled up the back of
his spine as if it were a living creature from beyond life. He
could sense something growing within the Hall, something wrong,
something evil. For a moment he thought only
he
sensed it,
but in the midst of the argument raging about her he saw AnnaRail
perk up and cock her head, and then slowly she turned her eyes
toward the back of the Hall.

Morgin was close to the end of the Hall
where the weapons had been placed, and she was at the other end,
but even from that distance he could see the fear in her eyes. She
began walking toward him, slowly at first, then more quickly. But
just as she approached him she veered away from him, walked past
him, and he realized she was moving toward the back of the
Hall.

There came a clattering of steel from the
weapons there, not a loud or alarming sound, but Morgin couldn’t
see anyone near enough to the weapons to have caused such a
disturbance. AnnaRail hesitated, blocking Morgin’s view of the
weapons. She tensed, and the sudden sound of steel sliding clear of
a sheath cut through to everyone’s ears. A harsh, red light flared
near the amassed weapons, and raw, uncontrolled power growled at
Morgin’s soul.

Not understanding what was happening, but
knowing only that AnnaRail stood between him and his sword, he
charged at her as if she were an opponent in battle. He hit her
from behind, slammed her protectively to the floor and hurtled over
the top of her. He caught only a glimpse of an angry red power as
it arced up from the pile of weapons high over his head. He tried
to convert his forward momentum into a leap, stretched his muscles
to the limit to intercept it in midair and caught something in his
outstretched hand that felt like the hilt of a sword. Its momentum
jerked him back in midair, pulled him toward the center of the Hall
where he crashed painfully to the stone floor in a tumbling
sprawl.

There was an instant of stunned silence as
he lay there with one hand wrapped about the hilt of his sword, all
eyes in the Hall questioning him. But he sensed what was coming,
and there was no time to explain or shout a warning, so he brought
his free hand around to join the other in a two handed death grip,
and suddenly the sword screamed at him to release it, to free it so
it could taste blood as it was meant to. He was still lying on his
back as it jerked and bucked in his grip, swinging from side to
side and cutting chips of stone from the floor. But in his soul he
sensed the carnage it would lay upon the land if he released it,
and he vowed to hold it, even if it pulled him into the very depths
of the Ninth Hell itself.

Suddenly it stopped jerking about and shot
upward, lifting him high off his feet and well into the air. Then
just as suddenly it let go, and still holding onto it he crashed to
the floor. It then started pulling him down the length of the Hall,
dragging him on his back toward the lone figure of BlakeDown, who
stood at the far end entranced with fear. Morgin swung his legs
about, got his heels in front of him and dug them in. It pulled him
to his feet, then crashed through the table of councilmen, upending
the heavy plank table and sending them all sprawling.

Desperately Morgin wrapped both legs about a
table leg and locked his ankles, tried to use it as an anchor, but
the sword jerked and pulled in his hands, slowly dragging both him
and the massive table forward. But he’d slowed it, and that enraged
it. The sound of its hatred became a growl, and it now turned upon
him, cutting spasmodically toward his own throat while he struggled
to hold it at bay. He fought it with nothing but the strength in
his arms, sensing that it would choose him over any other victim if
it could have him. But when it couldn’t it turned outward, and to
his surprise it sought Rhianne. “Nooooo!” he screamed, and a
momentary flood of power crashed through his soul.

It changed tactics, chopped toward the table
and bit deeply into the wooden planks, sending a shower of
splinters in all directions. Blistering waves of black-hot hatred
washed over him, igniting the splinters and scorching his tunic.
With a dozen blows the blade dismembered the table into four large
pieces, and with the size of its anchor now diminished it began
dragging Morgin again in spasmodic jerks across the floor.

At the far end of the Hall BlakeDown backed
fearfully up the steps to the periphery as Morgin unlocked his legs
and released the last remnant of the table. The sword pulled him in
a long skid the length of the Hall, but at the last moment he swung
his legs in front of him, got them beneath the sword so that he was
sliding on his heels and butt, and caught his heels on the lowest
of the steps beneath BlakeDown. He put his back into it, pulled
with all his might, brought the sword to a momentary halt.

He was on his back with his heels locked
against the lowest step, stretched to his full length, but the
sword slowly started lifting him off his back, like a rigid timber
being raised as a flagpole. Gritting his teeth, trembling with the
strain of holding the blade back, he looked down the length of the
sword at BlakeDown, whose eyes were filled with stark terror. He
realized then that the Penda leader was the sword’s intended prey,
and that he could no longer restrain it. Morgin gave one last
effort, knowing he could only delay the blade, and through his
gritted teeth he growled at BlakeDown, “I . . .
can’t . . . hold it . . . I
have . . . no . . . power
to . . . hold it.”

BlakeDown’s eyes widened with fear, but too
they widened with a strange mixture of triumph and gladness, and in
an instant he backed through the heavy plank door at the end of the
Hall, slammed the door shut and threw the bolt loudly into place.
Morgin’s strength finally reached its limit; the sword tore from
his grip, dropping him on his back, and without the least faltering
it buried itself to the hilt in the planking of the door. The blade
hesitated for an instant, then pulled itself half way from the
door, and slammed back into it with such force the door’s hinges
groaned with the sound of overstrained iron.

Morgin scrambled to his feet, shot up the
steps, locked his fingers about the hilt. It shot suddenly
backwards, slamming the hilt into his stomach, knocking the wind
from him and driving him out into the center of the Hall where it
dropped him painfully on his back. It turned on him, and he
screamed as he struggled against it. Then it picked him up, swung
him from side to side, tossed him onto the steps of the periphery,
and like the time it had cut the Kulls to pieces he could only hold
on, and hope that his strength would not fail him.