away from his home, away from Stormbreaker and Nic and Dari. Aron knew he should be leaving the Ruined Keep, making his way back to the safety of Triune, and hearing the bells, the bells ringing to announce his triumph in the trial. By early afternoon, his friends would be worried. Then the bells would toll to mourn his failure. There would be a search, and blood would be found—much of it his, if anyone had the ability to assess that.
He would be given up for dead, and be trapped in the grip of this madman, this god-impostor. How long could the man keep him drugged? How long before he had use of his graal again? Was Thorn capable of preventing him from communicating through the Veil forever?
Thorn has need of your strength….
What did that mean?
Aron tried to struggle against his bindings, and found he had a shade more strength. Falconer’s healing had reduced the misery from his wound, and his side felt better. The wine and sleeping must have restored some of his strength, because he didn’t feel so close to blacking out.
From the levels of the Keep below Aron came bumping and thumping noises, along with whistling. The image of Falconer whistling as he disposed of the bodies of killers he had hired and sent to their doom made Aron gut-sick.
He tried again to move his wrists, and felt the cloth ties cut into his skin.
Do it, he told himself aloud, then in his mind, making it an order, making it a command, reaching for the force of his legacy, which he still couldn’t access.
Aron imagined Dari crying for him, saw the tears in Nic’s sad eyes. Stormbreaker and Zed would be more stoic, and Iko, and even Lord Baldric might grieve him. How could he let these people down, when they had invested so much time and trust in his success?
He kicked his leg, but his ankle only flopped against its ties as below him, the whistling continued.
Perhaps Falconer would climb the stairs and use his dagger to slice open Aron’s throat. If the man was truly insane, what boundaries did his madness know?
Aron strained backward, smacking his head against the stone wall hard enough to make himself see bursts of white light. He blinked against the bright flares and the throbbing ache blooming behind both of his temples. At the same moment, his wounded side stabbed at him, and he choked out a few curses, directed at Falconer and Thorn and the hunters.
As his vision cleared, an image rose before him as if it were sliding up from the floor that separated Aron from the murderous Thorn Brother. He leaned back to avoid it, figuring it for some mind-trick Falconer was playing to keep him off balance and helpless.
The image coalesced into a young woman with dark hair and dark skin, wearing a sparkling silver robe. Her braids hung in thin rows, pulled to her neck at the center, and her dark eyes glittered like night stars as she studied him.
“Dari,” Aron whispered, his surge of excitement helping him throw off another measure of Falconer’s drugging.
She was whole and solid and real, as beautiful as any vision had ever been, yet Aron couldn’t shake a sense of strangeness, of desperation and danger. His blood surged, and his instincts, dulled as they were, clamored for him to leap from the nearest window rather than deal with this creature.
Aron knew she could be a trick, a hood snake illusion, something false and treacherous, but his heart refused to accept that possibility. Dari didn’t seem to know him, yet she had clearly come to check on him, maybe even rescue him.
Was that possible?
Iko had walked on the other side of the Veil, seemingly with his real and actual body. If Sabor could manage such a feat, could Stregans do it?
Dari swept toward him, almost dancing across the floor, until she was standing only inches away.
“Help me,” Aron croaked, flopping against the wall and floor as he struggled to snap the bindings on his wrists and ankles. “It’s Falconer. I think his mind has gone over a cliff. I think he—”
Dari put a long, graceful finger against her lips, and glanced toward the chamber door as if Falconer might hear Aron’s pleas.
Aron clamped his teeth together.
Dari held out both hands, as if she might be assessing Aron. He felt the heat of her mental touch, but couldn’t discern it because of the lingering effects of the bullroot. Rainbow light played