the base of the fourteen steps to the dais. Ursuul sat at the top of the steps in his black fireglass throne.
In the center of the vast room was a rolling plain at the base of the mountains. There were tiny figures on each side of the plain, moving in concert. Kylar realized they were miniature armies, lining up in the dawn light. It wasn’t a painting or embroidery of a battle; it was a battle. Fifteen thousand tiny, tiny figures strode across the plain. Kylar could even pick out flags of the noble houses. The Cenarian lines were forming up, following . . . Logan? Logan was leading the charge? Madness! How could Agon let the king lead a charge?
The great doors closed behind Vi as the Godking waved her in. Kylar had never seen the man, or even heard him described. He’d expected someone old and decrepit, swollen or sagging from a life of evil, but Garoth Ursuul was in excellent health. He was perhaps fifty, looked at least ten years younger, and though he had the thick body and cool skin of a Khalidoran highlander, he had a fighting man’s arms, a lean face with an oiled black beard, and a head shaved bald and gleaming. He looked like the kind of man who not only would shake your hand but when he did, you’d find calluses and a firm grip.
“Don’t mind the battle,” the Godking said. “You can walk through it; it won’t harm the magic, but be quick. The rebels are about to charge. It’s my favorite part.”
Through the ka’kari, however, Garoth Ursuul was a miasma. Twisted, screaming faces streamed behind him like a cloud. Murder lay so thick on him it blotted out his features. Betrayals and rapes and casual tortures wreathed his limbs. Threaded through it all, like noxious green smoke, was the vir. It somehow fed off and deepened all that darkness, and it was so powerful it seemed to fill the room.
As he stood behind the pillar, Kylar noticed a small group of the tiny men fighting three feet away from him. Off the battlefield proper, a big man was about to be ridden down by four Khalidoran lancers.
Except the man wasn’t ridden down. In seconds, he killed three lancers. There was something familiar about him. Feir Cousat!
Kylar knew he should be trying to figure out a way to move without being seen, but he was rapt in the drama unfolding silently, inches away. The Ceurans’ parted leader came forward. Feir drew a sword that looked like a bar of fire. It stunned the Ceurans. Feir and the leader fought for about half a second: the first time their swords crossed, there was a flash of light. The Ceuran came away with the sword.
“What was that?” the Godking said.
“What?” Vi asked.
“Out of the way, girl.”
As Feir knelt before the Ceuran (knelt? Feir?), the image of the battle suddenly spun around, putting the Khalidoran lines at the base of the steps and the Cenarian lines close to the great doors.
Garoth hmmphed. “Just some raiders.”
Kylar brought some of the ka’kari to his fingertips, sharpened it into a claw, and tested it against the pillar. His fingers sank in like it was butter. He eased back on the magic and tried again until he was able to sink his fingers in and get a grip. This is going to be fun.
He shook his head. It seemed the ka’kari had no limitations, and that was just making Kylar more aware of his own.
Kylar sent some of the ka’kari to his feet and climbed the pillar. There was a tiny hiss and a tinge of smoke at every step, but it was as effortless as climbing a ladder. Kylar reached the fifty-foot ceiling in seconds.
Figuring out how to adjust the claws to work on the ceiling took a few seconds, but then he was clinging to the throne room’s high, vaulted ceiling like a spider. His heart was in his throat. He crept across the ceiling until he was directly above the throne, his body shielded from view by one of the arches, only his invisible head exposed.
The Godking gave a running commentary to Vi. “No,” he was saying, “I don’t know why the Cenarians are using that formation. Seems awfully open to me.”
Kylar watched, upside down, as the Cenarian ranks slammed into the Khalidoran line. The first rank to hit them was thin—he wondered if they’d lost so many from the archers, but a few