Sorcery proved a thief of many things. Endest Silann found himself standing facing the centre of a square. Behind him was a portal that led back into the Winter Market, and from that canvas-lined throat drifted wailing and grief, only now dwindling as the day’s muted light hastened its surrender to dusk.
In the square before him crouched a dragon so vast and so close as to make his mind reel. Its scales were crimson edged in ochre or gold, deepening to bronze beneath its jaw and down the length of its throat. Black talons had punched deep into the cobbled ground. Its wings were folded behind humped shoulders, and the creature had lowered its massive, wedge-shaped head, fixing gold, lambent eyes upon the priest.
The dragon spoke into his mind with a woman’s voice. ‘Are you returned to us, mortal?’
He struggled to find his voice. Looking down, he saw that he held his hands upturned, the palms with their weeping wounds facing the dragon. She was witness. She was present.
‘You gave her the same peace, mortal. The same curse, and, with all those behind you, she now suffers its loss.’ The huge head tilted slightly. ‘But this did not occur to you, did it? The gift’s … other side. In your wake, mortal, a thousand Tiste now lie stricken with despair. I was drawn here – your effulgence was a beacon,
your sorcery a terrible flowering in a dark, and dangerous, forest.
‘You were lost in it, mortal. You would not have stopped. You would have taken the entire city, and indeed, perhaps your entire land.’
‘What if I had?’ Endest voiced the question quietly, in no way defiant, but honest with wonder and horror.
‘Your gift of peace, mortal, was not what you imagined it to be. Their moment of bliss was not bliss. An end to life’s torment has but one name and that name is death. An end to torment and, alas, also an end to joy, and love, and the sweet taste of being.’
‘It was not death! I brought creatures back!’
‘In surfeit of power, there is the instinct to redress the imbalance. For each instant of death that you delivered, mortal, you reawakened a life. But the sorcery seduces, yes? Beware its assurances. Too often in magic, the blessing proves a curse.’
Struck silent, numbed by the implications of the dragon’s hard words, Endest Silann stared into the creature’s eyes. After a long moment, he said, ‘Then I thank you, Eleint. But still I wonder, why did you bother?’
‘I am made curious by acts of love, no matter the path they take – after all, in such a state, you are blind, and can but stumble unwittingly. You Tiste interest me. Raw, unbridled, as if Draconean blood lingered in your own.
‘If indeed it does,’ the dragon continued, slowly spreading its wings, ‘then your civil war is no surprise.’
‘Wait!’ cried Endest Silann. ‘Is this all you will give us? Where do you go? What is your name?’
‘Questions! I will not travel far, but do not look to me for succour. Love is but a flavour, no more and no less enticing than bitter anguish, or sour regret. Still, it … entices.’ The dragon’s wings were now fully spread, belling to unfelt winds, and the claws plucked free of their grip upon the cobbled expanse, as if they alone had been holding the creature bound to the earth. ‘I yield to you, Endest Silann – whose heart is too vast, whose soul begins to comprehend its own infinite capacity – my love. This time, to stay your ecstasy, I set finger to your lips. Next time, it may fall to you to offer me the same.
‘I am named Silanah. Should you choose to seek me out, find me before passion’s gate, where I am known to abide. Curious and … as ever … enticed.’
The dragon rose effortlessly, and the air buffeting the priest with each snap of the enormous wings was thick with sorcery, sharp as spice on the tongue.
He would have fallen to his knees, but somehow Mother Dark prevented the gesture. Instead, he stood facing skyward, watching the dragon vanish into the low clouds as his crowd of followers rushed to join him, their questions a deafening chorus he ignored. Limbs shaking, he closed his eyes. Blood streamed from his hands, as Mother Dark wept within him, like a woman with a broken heart.
* * *
There was little mercy in the dusk, as the last light failed to hide the huge reptilian creature rising from the heart of Kharkanas. As one, the three travellers reined in, their mounts suddenly tossing heads and stamping on the frozen track.
Finarra Stone reached for her sword, then let her hand retreat back to the reins.
Winging southward, the dragon vanished into the heavy clouds.
Beside her, Caplo Dreem softly snorted. ‘Your sword, captain? As futile gestures go …’
‘And by the scent clinging to you,’ Warlock Resh retorted in her defence, ‘you were an instant away from scattering into the wilds of the wood upon either side of us. Grant the captain a more gentle regard, Caplo, lest you reveal the need to elevate yourself at the expense of others.’
‘Quickly stung, old friend. I meant nothing cruel by it.’
‘Naught but the intimation of your superiority, you mean.’
The assassin shrugged. ‘This ween is without pride, warlock. In any case, the beast is gone. Shall we resume this journey and so undertake our unremarked arrival in the Wise City?’
They set out once more, the horses nervous and reluctant.
‘I would think guards attend the city’s gate, assassin,’ said Finarra. ‘Thus, we will not escape remark, and word will precede us to the Citadel by way of signal from the tower.’