Battleaxe: Book One of the Axis Trilogy
Epic fantasy in the tradition of Trudi Canavan, Fiona McIntosh and Robert Jordan.A thousand years ago, the people of Achar drove the Forbidden from their lands.But now the northern tribes of the Ravensbund are fleeing south again, with nightmarish tales of creatures who feed upon the terror of their prey. Winter has come early, and with it the promise of war.Axis, bastard son of the dead Princess Rivkah, is sent north to the battlefront at Gorkenfort with his elite Axe-Wielders. Once there, he must hand over command to his hated half-brother, Borneheld, Duke of Ichar and heir to the throne. But during the long journey Axis falls in love with Faraday – Borneheld's betrothed – and finds himself reassessing the very essence of his beliefs.With the fate of the world hanging in the balance, Axis must unite the feuding lands under one banner before it is too late and the evil rising in the north engulfs them all for good.
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Sara Douglass
Battle Axe
Book One of The Axis Trilogy
HarperVoyager An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 1999
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © Sara Douglass 1995
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Source ISBN: 9780006511069
Ebook Edition © FEBRUARY 2012 ISBN:9780007378593
Version: 2016-03-01
The books of The Axis Trilogy are for three respectable historians. A. Lynn Martin, Tim Stretton and Frances Gladwin, who have regarded with amiable tolerance their colleague’s slow drift into the Star Dance. May Fran eventually win her own battle with prophecy and may the realm and people of Achar help Lynn and Tim recall the days of the twelve months.
If my fortunes torment me, my hopes shall content me.
Contents
Copyright
4 At the Foot of the Fortress Ranges
7 In the Brother-Leader’s Palace Apartment
12 At the Edge of the Silent Woman Woods
14 Inside the Silent Woman Keep
21 Inside the Enchanter-Talon’s Tomb
When will the hundred summers die,
And thought and time be born again,
And newer knowledge, drawing nigh,
Bring truth that sways the soul of men?
Here all things in their place remain,
As were all order’d, ages since.
Come, Care and Pleasure, Hope and Pain,
And bring the fated fairy Prince.
ALFRED LORD TENNYSON,
“The Slewing Palace”
A day will come when born will be
Two babes whose blood will tie them.
That born to Wing and Horn will hate
The one they call the StarMan.
Destroyer! rises in the north
And drives his Ghostmen south;
Defenceless lie both flesh and field
Before Gorgrael’s ice.
To meet this threat you must release
The StarMan from his lies,
Revive Tencendor, fast and sure
Forget the ancient war,
For if Plough, Wing and Horn can’t find
The bridge to understanding,
Then will Gorgrael earn his name
And bring Destruction hither.
StarMan, listen, heed me well,
Your power will destroy you
If you should wield it in the fray
’Ere these prophecies are met:
The Sentinels will walk abroad
’Til power corrupt their hearts;
A child will turn her head and cry
Revealing ancient arts;
A wife will hold in joy at night
The slayer of her husband;
Age-old souls, long in cribs,
Will sing o’er mortal land;
The remade dead, fat with child
Will birth abomination;
A darker power will prove to be
The father of salvation.
Then waters will release bright eyes
To form the Rainbow Sceptre.
StarMan, listen, for I know
That you can wield the sceptre
To bring Gorgrael to his knees
And break the ice asunder.
But even with the power in hand
Your pathway is not sure:
A Traitor from within your camp
Will seek and plot to harm you;
Let not your Lover’s pain distract
For this will mean your death;
Destroyer’s might lies in his hate
Yet you must never follow;
Forgiveness is the thing assured
To save Tencendor’s soul.
The woman struggled through the knee-deep snow, the bundle of dead wood she had tied to her back almost as great a burden as the weight of the child she carried in her belly. Her breath rasped in her throat before frosting heavily in the bitterly cold southerly wind. She was short and strong, her legs and shoulders finely muscled by twenty-eight years of hard-won survival in her harsh homeland. But she had always had the help and company of her people to aid her. Now she was alone, and this, her third child, she would have to bear without assistance.
