The Rise and Fall of a Dragon King (Dark Sun: Chronicles of Athas 5)

Hamanu amused himself with her hair. Like Manu so many ages ago, Sadira had all the pieces in her hand, but she couldn't see the pattern. Unlike Manu, she had someone older and wiser who would make the pattern for her. And he would show it to her, without mercy.

"Dear lady—what is obsidian?"

"Black glass. Shards of sharp black glass mined by slaves in Urik."

"And before it was black glass?" Hamanu ignored her predictable provocations.

She didn't know, so he told her—

"Obsidian is lava, dear lady. Molten rock. When lava cools very fast it becomes obsidian. You, dear lady—as you said—put Rajaat's bones and the Dark Lens in a lava lake. Have you felt the Black, dear lady? It's so very cold, and Rajaat, dear lady, is both beneath the Black and at the bottom of a lava lake. Think of the Dark Lens sealed in an obsidian mountain. Think of Rajaat—or Tithian, if you'd rather—quickening a spell."

"No," Sadira whispered. She would have collapsed if his hands hadn't been there to support her. "No, my spells bind them."

"Have you returned to Ur Draxa recently?" Hamanu thrust an image of the fog-bound lake into Sadira's consciousness. "Your spells weaken each night." Her pulse slowed until it and the sullen red crevasses of the image throbbed in unison. "Rajaat is a shadow of what he was, but with the War-Bringer, shadow is essence. Tithian serves him as Sacha Arala once served him, so blinded by his own arrogance that he doesn't know he's a fool. A foolish enemy is sometimes the most dangerous enemy of all—"

Sadira writhed against the hands supporting her shoulders. Hamanu let her go. She reeled and stumbled her way to the window ledge where she crumpled into a small parcel of misery and fear. Her eyes and mouth were open wide. Her fingers fluttered against her voiceless throat.

&nb

sp; "I had to know," he explained. "I had to know what you're capable of."

Hamanu already knew what he was capable of—not merely the sundering of a woman's mind, but the planting of a thousand years of memories of Windreaver. Hamanu had seen to it that Windreaver wouldn't be forgotten by the woman whose spell had both freed him and—in the Lion-King's eyes—destroyed him. Whenever Sadira remembered, she'd remember the troll commander. It was rough justice: the Lion-King's sort of justice, and no real justice at all, only guilt and grief.

Sadira's hair fell over her face as she struggled against Hamanu's spell. Locks of red tangled in her fingers. She gasped, a rattling spasm that left her limp against the wall. Still, it had been a sound. The Lion-King's sorcery was fading.

"There's nothing to fear. No need to scream. You are Rajaat's creation, but you don't serve him willingly."

Sadira swept her hair back from her face. Her eyes were baleful, belying Hamanu's words. "I would die first," she whispered. "I'm not Rajaat's creation. I put his bones and the Dark Lens where I thought they'd be sealed away forever. If you knew otherwise, then you're to blame. I did what I thought was right. If I was wrong..." She shook her head and stared at the floor. "Kill me and be done with it."

"I'm not here for that. I have been to the lava lake and now I've come here for your help. In three—"

She laughed, a rasping sound that clearly hurt and left her gagging as she pushed herself to her feet. "Help? Me help you? You must—"

Sadira winced. Her eyes were drawn to the sooty stain that marked Windreaver's passage. She'd encountered a memory that wasn't hers. With a cold sweat blooming on her already pallid face, Sadira once again needed the wall to support her. Hamanu skimmed her thoughts. What he found was Deche, not Windreaver; Dorean as she was after the trolls finished with her.

Hamanu was an expert at the deceptive mind-bending art of suggestion and false memory. He didn't make many mistakes; he removed them if he had. But his memory of Dorean resonated through Sadira's mind faster than he could remove it. The image, fixed and frozen, had become an inextricable part of the half-elf's experience. As a memory, it was no longer false.

"Who was she?"

There'd be no apologies or explanations, no pleas for understanding or compassion; such notions had no place in Hamanu's life. "Call her Dorean. She was... would have been my wife." He wrenched himself away from the memory they shared. It was difficult, but he was the Lion-King. "And I have been a fool. Rajaat must not escape," he said as if Dorean weren't still bleeding in his mind. "Last time we needed a dragon. This time—"

"A dragon? Is that why you're here? You want me to help you replace Borys. You're no different than Tithian—"

"I'm very different than Tithian or Borys, dear lady. I want to preserve and protect my city and yours. I want—I need—to find a way to keep Rajaat in his prison that doesn't require me—or anyone else—replacing the Dragon of Tyr. I needed to be certain that we agreed—"

"We agree about nothing!" Sadira shouted, then she winced again. Another false memory.

Hamanu didn't skim the image from her mind. Whether she beheld Windreaver or another horror from his own past, he saw that he'd blundered badly when he'd hammered his memories into hers. He shouldn't have done it, and wouldn't have, if he hadn't strangled his rage after she cast her spell. His rage would have killed her, if Windreaver hadn't wished otherwise.

"I have made a mistake. I took a friend's—" He stopped short: friends, that was the greatest mistake of all. Rajaat's champions weren't friends, not toward themselves or anyone, and they didn't attract the friendship of others. "Your spells are failing, dear lady. Rajaat's essence is loose in the world. He says that Nibenay and Gulg and Giustenal dance to his tune. He says they'll destroy the world we know in three days' time. He lies, dear lady. The War-Bringer lies. I'll repair your spells, or replace them. I'll set them right, as they must be set right. You needn't fear—"

"Need not fear what?" she demanded. "You'll set my spells right? You can't make anything right—"

"Woman!" Hamanu shouted. "Curb your tongue, if you value your life!"

Sadira wasn't interested in his warnings. "I've seen how you set everything right for Dorean!"

Hamanu didn't need mind-bending to sense the invective brewing on the back of her tongue. Sadira had a champion's knack for cruelty. He'd given her the measure of his weakness, and she would grind salt in the wound until it killed her—and who knew how many others? Hamanu heard gongs clanging everywhere and pounding footfalls racing closer. Between screams and shouts, half the estate knew the sorceress was locked in a dangerous argument.