Grand Conspiracy: Second Book of The Alliance of Light
Where there is light, there must always be shadow… The fifth volume in Janny Wurts’s spectacular epic fantasy, now re-released with a striking new cover design along with the rest of the series.The wars began when two half-brothers, gifted of light and shadow, stood shoulder to shoulder to defeat the Mistwraith. Their foe cast a lifelong curse of enmity between them that has so far woven three bitter conflicts and uncounted deadly intrigues.It is a time of political upheavel, fanaticism and rampaging armies. Distrust of sorcery has set off a purge of the talented mageborn – none reviled more than Arithon, Master of Shadow. Through clever manipulation of events at the hands of his half-brother Lysaer, Lord of Light, Arithon’s very name has become anathema. Now the volatile hatreds that spearheaded the campaign against Shadow have overtaken all reason.Those that still stand in Arithon’s desperate defence are downtrodden, in retreat and close to annihilation. The stage is set for the ultimate betrayal.
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Janny Wurts
GRAND CONSPIRACY
The Wars of Light and Shadow
VOLUME 5
SECOND BOOK OF THE ALLIANCE OF LIGHT
HarperVoyager An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 1999
Copyright © Janny Wurts 1997
The author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
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Source ISBN: 9780007102228
Ebook Edition © FEBRUARY 2009 ISBN: 9780007318070 Version: 2016-09-22
For Roderick MacDonald, with profound thanks forthe opportunity to study music under a master
Contents
Second Book
Map
One child, four possible fates looped through the thread of his life span. He will grow to manhood. Should he die in fire, none suffers but he. Yours to choose when the time comes, Fferedonâli.
â from Fionn Arethâs birth augury
Third Age 5647
The hard frost came to the downs of Araethura early, and the rains at their cusp laced crusts of ice through the peat stacks under the sheds. Indoors, with no fire lit to fend off autumnâs breezes, the invasive cold settled at will. Crouched on her knees on the packed earthen floor beside her darkened cottage hearthstone, the Koriani enchantress Elaira cast aside her flint striker. She cupped her chilled fingers, blew on the caught spark. Well versed in the contrary nature of wet peat, she launched into strings of ridiculous endearments, coaxing damp fodder to nourish its struggling wisp of caught flame.
The fateful knock at her door, which shattered her peace, interrupted her then.
Elaira damped back her annoyance. The spill in her fingers fluttered out as she arose, resigned to the usual request for a cough remedy or a tincture to dose a sick goat. For seven years, she had lived alone, plying her herbal wisdom on the moorlands. Time had eased the innate distrust the local herders held toward practice of her craft, and families now came to her freely when trouble visited their livestock and farmsteads. While the leaves turned, and the seasonâs late foraging sent her deep into the hills, such supplicants knew she was best found at home after sundown.
The dark in the cottage weighed like felt soaked in the sweet meadow scents of the herbs bundled to dry in the rafters. Elaira breathed in the oily must from her fleece jacket, just pulled from storage in her clothes chest. While she threaded between her sparse furnishings by touch, the pounding resumed, impatient.
âDaelionâs bollocks, I hear you!â Elaira clawed under her collar, hooked out the silver chain that hung her spell crystal. The quartz as her focus, she invoked mage-sight to steer past the tumbledown stacks of herb hampers and clay jars, long since overcrowding the niche underneath the cluttered board of her work trestle. Barefoot and cold, she reached the door and fumbled with numbed hands for the latch.
Apprehension swept her, unbidden. For the crystallized span of a heartbeat, every fiber of her being clamored in primal, precognitive warning.
Then her roan gelding whinnied from the shed. His call was answered by a strange horseâs whicker; a shod hoof chinked against rock, and a distinct chime of bit rings sliced the night. Innocuous sounds; yet their import snapped away the false calm she had wrested from whole years of disciplined solitude.
âSithaerâs begotten demons!â Elaira released her crystal, swept over by needling gooseflesh in the chill embrace of the dark. Those downsland herders who called needing help came on foot, or else they rode in astride scruffy moor ponies with hackamores braided from leather. Their mounts wore no tack with metal fittings. Nor did they ever fare shod.
Her left hand hovered, indecisive, while the knock resounded a third time. The rickety wood panel jounced in its frame and threatened the strapped leather hinges. Before the door gave way under punishment, Elaira tripped up the latch. Wind flung the panel against her braced shoulder and revealed what the fell night had brought her.
