all but admitted it. He was not Leiard. The person she had loved had only existed as an illusion, a lie.
To her surprise the realization brought a wave of relief. She did not know this man. He was only the trickster sorcerer of legend, a man the world was once rid of and should be again.
I can kill him, she told herself. But instead of gathering magic to strike, she found herself blurting out a question.
“Why did you do it?”
His chin lifted. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
The challenge in his eyes sent a chill of warning down her spine. “No, because there is no way I can know if anything you say is true.”
Huan is right. My questions can only remain unanswered. Suddenly she wanted only to get it done and over with.
:Good, Huan said. Further talk will only leave you vulnerable to trickery. Attack him now.
Auraya looked down as she drew magic to herself. As she did she considered how she should attack. He would have created a shield, but it might not be strong enough for an attack of great power. If he wasn’t able to strengthen his shield in time it could be all over in moments. She heard him take a few footsteps closer to her.
“There is a way you can know—” he began.
Without looking up, she let loose a bolt of power. He gave a yelp of surprise and staggered backward. His shield held.
“Wait…” he exclaimed, catching his balance. “Auraya!”
She attacked again. Though she now knew who he really was, she could not help feeling surprise at his strength. She had known Leiard was powerful, but not this powerful.
“What of your promise?” he half-shouted at her. “You said I would not be harmed. You swore on the gods!”
She paused, then battered him with magic again.
“I swore that Leiard would not be harmed. You are not Leiard.”
He wasn’t fighting back. He must know he has no chance of winning, she thought. I have only to increase the strength of my attack until it overwhelms him. As she drew in more magic his expression changed to one of determination and she braced herself for a counter attack.
“But I am Leiard,” he said quietly. “It is time you knew the truth.”
Where there had been nothing suddenly there was a mind. She saw a flood of memories and images and felt intentions and emotions.
:No! Huan hissed. Don’t look!
It was too late. The answers to all Auraya’s questions were there for her to see. Mirar’s mental voice spoke to her and she could not stop herself listening.
:This is how I died…
She saw Juran fighting and felt Mirar’s disbelief and betrayal as his strength failed. He reviewed all he had done and could not see how any of it justified his execution. His only crime had been to annoy the gods. Nobody had died. Nobody had been harmed. He’d only encouraged people to question and offered them a choice. And in return…
She saw a great explosion of dust and stone and felt an echo of the agony of being crushed. She understood that Mirar had reached out for enough magic to sustain a fragment of himself, and how he had evaded the gods and Juran by suppressing his personality and creating another to replace it.
:This is what I became.
Not the man she had known as Leiard. Not at first. His body twisted and scarred, his memory gone, he had roamed the world a miserable cripple. Only after many years did his body recover. Only when he came to Jarime and became Dreamweaver Adviser did his true identity begin to stir.
:This is why I remembered.
His disguise had unravelled because of her. His instincts, created when he’d made Leiard, told him to stay away from Jarime, but the desire to stay near her was stronger. She felt her heart twist. Leiard had loved her. She had not been deceived. But Leiard was not real.
:He is. This is what I have become.
She saw what she had only glimpsed before. The link memories of Mirar were his real self returning, but Leiard had spent a century becoming a real person. After the battle he had travelled to Si with a friend. Glimpsing this beautiful young woman, Auraya felt a stab of jealousy. Who is she? The friend had helped him realize that Leiard could not be anything that Mirar was not capable of being. Accepting that if Leiard loved Auraya then he must too had been the moment he had become whole