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  Caelum shifted his gaze to Zenith, who was so pale as to be ashen, and held a trembling hand to her throat as if deeply disturbed, and then he looked at RiverStar. She had recovered quickly from her shock, it seemed, for she held his gaze easily, her lips curled in one of her secretive smiles.

  The gathering was quickly recovering from its surprise, and now voices rose and fell, asking questions, demanding explanations. WolfStar was a name well known throughout Tencendor, and equally deeply distrusted. The renegade Enchanter-Talon had not only murdered hundreds of Icarii children, but had – to all intents and purposes – allied himself with Gorgrael, enabling the frightful creature to all but destroy Tencendor with his ice and Skraelings.

  True, he had fathered Azhure, and she had been instrumental in enabling Axis to eventually defeat Gorgrael, and true, the word was that WolfStar had been fighting on behalf of Axis all the time he had stood at Gorgrael’s side.

  But that was almost beside the point. WolfStar was an Enchanter of frightening power – enough to see him come back from death through the Star Gate – and who worked only for his own purposes. And even if WolfStar’s purposes might ultimately be for Tencendor’s well-being, they had an appalling habit of causing the death of tens of thousands in their unravelling.

  FreeFall locked eyes with Caelum. “I like this not!” he spat. “What mischief does WolfStar now?”

  Caelum shrugged, made as if to say something, and then turned to Zenith as she spoke.

  “I felt a horror last night,” she said, her eyes huge and round, her cheeks still pasty. “A sense of doom, as if the stars were falling in. Was this WolfStar?”

  “Undoubtedly, Zenith.” Caelum swept his eyes about the room. “He appeared at the Star Gate, while Orr was there. And what they heard, and then what I heard, needs to be told so that –”

  “Has Council been called already? Without my presence?”

  An extraordinary figure had appeared in their midst. No-one was sure if he had slipped in through the door unnoticed or had simply used his extensive powers, a combination of both the Earth magic and the Star Dance, to materialise among them.

  The man was tall, slender, bare-footed, bare-chested and smooth-backed, his lower body wrapped in a cloth that, although it hung gracefully about him, looked as if it had been woven from bark and twigs. His eyes were emerald green, and fierce, as if he might snap at any moment. His hair was a tangle of wild curls the colour of sun-faded wheat, and at his hairline, on each side of his forehead, curled two unmistakable horns.

  Isfrael, hope of the Avar, conceived of Axis StarMan and Faraday, when she had been Tree Friend.

  Zenith shifted nervously, as did most others in the room. She was slightly apprehensive of her older brother. Although he was only a few years older than her, and although they had shared a childhood at Sigholt, Isfrael had changed since leaving to live with the Avar in the great forests to the east. Where once had been laughter was now only studied silence. Where once had been shared warmth was now only wary distance. Now Isfrael was all forest, all for the Avar. Alien, as if he had never shared a childhood with the other SunSoar children. There was a darkness, almost violent in its intensity, about the Mage-King. A tension within him, as if he would uncoil and strike at any moment.

  His mother, the creature that had once been Faraday, still roamed the Minstrelsea and Avarinheim forests, but was so fey and so shy that Zenith did not know anyone who had seen her over the past thirty years.

  “Isfrael,” Caelum finally said with commendable calmness. “This is not a Council, but rather a hastily convened gathering to discuss my late-night meeting with WolfStar.”

  Isfrael’s eyebrows rose almost to his horns. “Then I am indeed glad I made the effort to arrive a day or so ahead of schedule. I have long held a wish to meet this demon of myth.”

  “You should have spoken earlier, Isfrael. Had I known, I would have walked the paths of the Sacred Groves to meet you long before now.”

  Barely over the shock of Isfrael’s sudden appearance, everyone in the room now looked towards the gloomy, shadowy fireplace at Caelum’s back; Caelum himself whipped about, and stepped to one side.

  There was a movement within the vast interior of the hearth, and then a figure stepped out.

  WolfStar. For everyone in the room who had never seen him – and that was most – it was immediately apparent from whom so many of the present-day SunSoars had inherited their copper hair and violet eyes. With his colouring and his golden wings, WolfStar was not only remarkably handsome, but radiated such power that everyone in the room found themselves either stepping back, or inching as far down in their seats as they could.

  Zenith cringed against a far wall, her knees threatening to buckle, her heart thumping erratically in her chest, barely able to breathe. The doom that had surrounded her last night had returned thrice-fold the instant WolfStar had spoken, and now Zenith did not know how anyone else in the room could stay so calm, when to her the entire universe seemed in danger of self-destruction.

  A hand grasped her arm and prevented her sliding to the floor.

  Drago.

  Zenith tried to speak, to thank him, but could not, for now WolfStar was staring at her, now walking towards her, and Drago had to slide his arm about her waist to stop her toppling over in the extremity of her horror.

  “Zenith,” WolfStar said, stopping a pace away. It was not a question, not a greeting, just a statement, but Zenith felt as if he had somehow taken command of her soul with that one word.

  What was wrong with her? Why fear him so much? Why did he affect her this badly?

  Zenith, be calm. I am with you, I will protect you.

  Caelum, speaking to her with the mind voice that all Enchanters used. Together with Drago’s arm about her waist, it saved Zenith from fainting completely away.

  WolfStar’s eyes moved fractionally; he had also caught Caelum’s thought.

  No-one can best me, fool boy! His mind moved back to the birdwoman before him. Zenith, do not fear me. Never fear me.

  And he reached out and touched her cheek.

  Some of the unreasoning fear vanished with that touch, but with it came a muddle of confused thoughts and images: the Dome of Stars on the Island of Mist and Memory, but seen from the interior, where Zenith had never been; a room in a peasant house, a man advancing to her, his hands outstretched in anger; a child, a ravenhaired girl, nursing at her breast.

  WolfStar’s fingers dropped from her cheek, and with them went the images.

  WolfStar smiled, his eyes tender, then turned slightly to Drago – and snarled.

  It was a horrible, harsh, totally aggressive sound, and it appalled everyone in the room. Drago himself literally thudded back against the wall, and no-one watching knew if it was simply his own fear and shock that had caused him to leap backwards, or WolfStar’s power.

  “Vile creature!” WolfStar spat at him, his hands twitching. “Azhure should have killed you for your efforts in trying to murder Caelum!”

  “Why quibble about a few years between deed and execution?” Drago shot back. “My mother may not have killed me then, but she ensured my inevitable death!”

  Zared, watching, was consumed with two equally strong reactions. First, incredulity that Drago should have so quickly recovered to meet such frightening anger, and secondly, a sudden insight into how Drago must feel living with virtually immortal siblings – and knowing he had once shared that future – while he lined and aged day by day.

  WolfStar hissed in Drago’s face, but this time the man did not flinch, holding WolfStar’s furious eyes with the ease that he’d previously held Caelum’s.

  By the gods of Earth and Stars, Zared thought, that man has more courage than a battalion of battlehardened soldiers put together!

  “WolfStar!” Caelum snapped, and the Enchanter turned about, rearranging his expression into one of genial goodwill as he did so.

  “But there is one more I must yet greet,” he said, as he stepped over
to RiverStar and kissed her full on the lips.

  Zared blinked, then decided to be unsurprised. RiverStar’s lusts were so widely gossiped about that no doubt even WolfStar had heard of her escapades. And, as sexual liaisons between grandparent and grandchild within the SunSoar clan were not forbidden, he supposed WolfStar had full right to so lingeringly enjoy RiverStar’s mouth.

  Certainly RiverStar was in no hurry to end the kiss.

  About the room eyes dropped and cheeks reddened. Zared himself eventually looked away; even high Tencendorian society has its pruderies, he thought, although both WolfStar and RiverStar seemed intent on making an exhibition of themselves.

  “What a beautiful girl Azhure birthed,” WolfStar whispered. “And so practised.”

  RiverStar almost visibly preened.

  “WolfStar!” Caelum’s voice cut across the tableau, and WolfStar straightened and looked about, locking eyes here and there, smiling as people shifted and dropped their own gazes, acknowledging FreeFall and Sa’Domai with a nod.

  Zared himself felt WolfStar’s power as the Enchanter’s eyes swept over him, but WolfStar apparently thought Zared of no account, for he spared him nothing more than a fleeting glance.

  For the first time since he’d entered the room, Zared let himself relax. Caelum knew nothing about the troop movements to the west (and of course, Zared told himself, they are only there in case Askam moves against me), and even if WolfStar had reappeared, no-one yet had been burned to ashes, and Sigholt still stood as solid as ever.

  But Zared flicked a glance at Zenith. She had recovered somewhat, but still appeared nervous and shaky.

  Isfrael, who of all in the room appeared least put out by WolfStar’s presence, now stood with his arms folded across his chest and his feet well apart. “Where have you been, WolfStar? The last anyone heard of you was when you confounded my father amid the icy drifts of the northern tundra forty years ago.”

  WolfStar grinned at the memory. “Axis thought to best me. He failed. But to answer your question, I have been…” he paused, his face set in a theatrical expression of thoughtfulness, “…about. Drifting.”

  “That explanation will hardly relieve any minds within this room,” Caelum said. “Much can be accomplished in forty years.”

  “But no mischief, Caelum. No mischief. Now, would you like me to explain to this group of open-eyed and slack-mouthed listeners what we –”

  “What we heard,” Caelum interrupted, obviously increasingly irritated by the way WolfStar so effortlessly commanded the room, “was something beyond the Star Gate. Something that whispers. Something that has caused WolfStar to reappear. Whatever it is, or they are, it calls for WolfStar.”

  Voices again rose in shock and bewilderment. Something beyond the Star Gate?

  Caelum’s voice cut across the murmuring. “WolfStar, will you speak? Will you offer, for once, some degree of explanation?”

  WolfStar, whose eyes had drifted back to Zenith, her own gaze now firmly on the floor, sighed and looked about.

  “I threw two hundred and twelve Icarii through the Star Gate,” he said bluntly, horrifyingly, into the slight silence that had followed Caelum’s request. “I killed them. Including my wife, StarLaughter.”

  “And her son,” FreeFall put in grimly. The SunSoar Talons had long lived with the guilt that one of their number had committed such atrocities.

  “We had named him…” WolfStar shifted his weight slightly, hiding the momentary gleam of amusement in his eyes. “We had named him DragonStar.”

  Utter, horrible silence.

  Zared could not believe his ears. DragonStar had been Drago’s birth name, given to him by his grandfather StarDrifter, and stripped from him by Azhure when she’d also taken his Enchanter powers and Icarii heritage. Zared risked a look at Drago – the man appeared as frozen as a trapped hare, his eyes locked with WolfStar’s.

  “Imagine my amusement,” WolfStar continued, now moving his gaze about the room, “when I discovered that StarDrifter, insipid fool that he is, had unwittingly named you after my lost son.”

  Caelum took a step forward, his eyes sharp, his voice heavy with angry power. “Is this your manipulation, WolfStar? Did you twist StarDrifter’s mind so that you could enjoy your amusement and our discomfort so many years later?”

  WolfStar laughed merrily, driving the witting cruelty yet deeper into Drago’s heart, and waved a casual hand. “No. It was sheer coincidence. Or maybe Fate. I do not know.”

  He looked back at Drago. “I believe, Drago, that had you not mishandled your infancy so badly you would have grown into an Enchanter unparalleled in the history of the Icarii. As my DragonStar would have done.”

  Drago was now staring fixedly at a lamp far across the room, as if he could not trust himself to look at WolfStar.

  “And yet here my unfortunate brother is,” RiverStar said, unable even in this crisis to control her vicious tongue, “a cripple in every sense save the physical one. Even then, I hear the kitchen girls laugh behind his –”

  “Hold your tongue, girl!” Zared had heard enough, and gods knew what Drago was going through. “Enough, RiverStar! Can you not see or understand what Drago is feeling? Can you not feel his pain?”

  Drago looked at Zared with complete astonishment, and Zared wondered if this was the first time in his life someone had actually spoken on his behalf.

  RiverStar slowly stood to her feet, furious that this…this mortal had spoken so harshly to her. “Do not forget, uncle,” she hissed, “that I also witnessed Gorgrael tear Caelum from Imibe’s arms because of Drago’s persistent jealousy, and I watched as Gorgrael sliced the flesh from Imibe’s bones. I believed then,” she turned her gaze to Drago, “that he would direct Gorgrael to my murder as well. I feared for my own life. That is a fear, Zared, that twists and warps.”

  Along with everyone else, Caelum was looking at his sister. But he had lost all sense and understanding of being in this chamber. All he could see was the horror of Gorgrael plummeting from the sky, all he could feel was the terror of knowing his brother had plotted to kill him by the vilest means possible.

  For decades Caelum had fought to bury that memory, fought to forget the frightful weeks he’d spent trapped in Gorgrael’s Ice Fortress, fought to heal himself of the scars on his soul as his body had healed itself of the scars inflicted by Gorgrael’s talons.

  But now the emotions and words of this room had called it all back, brought the fear and the pain and the uncertainty slithering to the surface again.

  He blinked, blinked again, and finally managed to control himself. He was beyond that now, far beyond it. Surely. His eyes drifted to Drago, and a lump of unreasoning fear rose in his throat.

  And Zared thought to defend Drago? Why? Was he in league with Drago?

  FreeFall watched the emotions flow over the faces of Axis’ children. Fear, hatred, bitterness, sadness – all were evident. How is it, FreeFall thought, that Axis and Azhure united a land so deeply divided, yet left a brood of children separated by such appalling antipathy that they can barely keep themselves from each other’s throats?

  He sighed, and spoke. “WolfStar, is this coincidence of naming of any consequence?”

  “No, FreeFall. None. It is not even surprising, when you think about it. The son whom StarLaughter carried was very, very powerful, and DragonStar was an appropriate name for him. Azhure also carried an immensely powerful son, and DragonStar was also an appropriate name for that baby.”

  “And yet as I was stripped of name and heritage,” Drago said, his voice under tight control, “so was he. Both DragonStars doomed just before or just after birth.”

  Caelum stared flatly at him. “WolfStar’s son did not deserve his fate, Drago. You did.”

  Drago visibly winced, and dropped his eyes. But WolfStar grinned impishly at him. Oh, but he did, he did, he thought, his mind masked from all the other Enchanters in the room. Like you, Drago, my son plotted to steal my heritage as you plotted to steal Caelum�
��s. Maybe it is something to do with the name…

  “Continue, WolfStar,” Caelum said, his eyes still on Drago. “We have not yet got beyond the front gate of your explanation.”

  WolfStar shook himself from his entertaining train of thought. “I killed two hundred and twelve,” he repeated. “I threw them through the Star Gate in my obsession to discover a way back. I thought that if one of those children, just one, managed to come back, then I would be able to do so as well.”

  “You wasted two hundred and twelve lives,” FreeFall said flatly.

  “At the time I thought it was necessary,” WolfStar replied. “I was afraid that the Star Gate held more terrors than wonders. What if someone, some thing, crawled through that could threaten Tencendor?”

  “An admirable sentiment,” Caelum interrupted, “if only it were true. My father told me you were also intent on expanding your own power.”

  WolfStar smiled humourlessly. “No, not entirely. I was genuinely afraid of the potential threat that the Star Gate posed. I wanted to understand all its mysteries, not only to expand my own power, but also to ensure Tencendor’s protection.

  “Well, to continue. Every Icarii birdman and birdwoman in this room has the right, as the Icarii nation has the right, to sit in judgment for that act. None of the two hundred and twelve came back, and I had lost the two I valued most dearly, StarLaughter and our son. Before I could commit acts of even greater horror, CloudBurst ended my misery, and the misery of the entire Icarii people, with a heavy dagger thrust to my back.”

  WolfStar twisted in his seat, clearly remembering the feel of the blade sliding in, the taste in his mouth as his lungs filled with blood. “I died, I was entombed, and I walked through the Star Gate.”

  “What did you find there, WolfStar?” Caelum’s voice was very, very soft.

  “I found…other existences. I found knowledge. I found that life, as death, are but passing dreams.” And there were other things I found and that found me, Caelum StarSon, that I am unwilling to disclose. Not until I am sure there is the need. But this thought WolfStar shared with no-one.