Dark Moon

'She was innocent,' he said.

'How does that help you unlock the Pearl's secrets?'

'It made a choice, my beauty. Don't you see? It is sentient. So we will offer it more choices. And very soon I will have more power than any man who ever walked this land.'

For six days Karis saw no sign of Sirano. At midnight on the seventh day a tremor ran through the castle.

Karis, who was lying in bed nursing a goblet of wine in her hands, leapt to her feet and ran to the balcony.

Bright lights were blazing from the highest rooms of the keep, and lightning forked up from the top turret.

Blocks of stone cascaded down to the courtyard below, some smashing through the stable roof.

The naked man who moments before had been lying alongside Karis moved out onto the balcony. 'His magic will kill us all,' he said, gripping the bronze balcony rail. Darkly handsome, his strong face now showed signs of fear. It was not an attractive sight, thought Karis.

'He says he is close to the secrets of the Pearl,' Karis told him.

Giriak swore. 'You told me that a week ago. Yesterday a section of the main wall came crashing down -

killed three of my men. He'll wreck the entire city if this goes on much longer. Have you seen the columns of refugees? They're leaving the city in droves.'

Karis shrugged. 'What do you care?' she asked him. 'He gives you gold.'

'I'd like to live to spend it.'

Another tremor struck, and a small crack appeared on the facing wall of the balcony. 'Son of a whore!'

hissed Giriak, leaping back into the main room. Karis grinned as she turned to face him. Holding out her arms, she gestured to him.

'Come!' she called. 'Make love to me on the balcony, before it falls.'

'Don't be foolish,' he urged her. Karis let fall the green robe she wore, her naked body glistening in the moonlight. Another tremor struck and the crack in the stone opened wider, tracing a thick black line all the way to the wall. 'Come in!' yelled Giriak.

'Come out,' she taunted. 'Show me you are a man.'

'You are mad, woman! Do you want to die?'

'Collect your clothes and get out,' she said, contemptuously turning from him and climbing to the bronze rail. Balanced delicately, she walked along it, feeling the cold, smooth metal beneath her feet. One more tremor and she would fall. She knew it, and a delicious sense of excitement swept through her. This was life! For some moments she stood there with arms raised.

Lightning swept up from the turret, followed by a clap of thunder that shook the foundations of the building. Karis lost her balance, then spun and launched herself back into the bedchamber, landing on her shoulder and rolling to her feet. Behind her the balcony sheared away and crashed to the courtyard below.

Karis shivered, then glanced around the room. Giriak had gone.

Gathering the wine jug and a goblet, she sat down on the round embroidered rug at the centre of the room.

Giriak was a disappointment. Like all the men she had known. Is it a fault in men themselves, she wondered, or merely a flaw in the kind of men I find exciting? Indeed, is the flaw in me?

Her father had maintained that it was. He claimed she was devil-possessed, and tried for years to thrash the devil from her. He would drag her from the cabin and tie her to a post in the barn. The words that followed were always the same. 'Recant! Open your heart to the Source. Beg for forgiveness.' Karis had tried all that, but it made no difference. If she proclaimed her innocence, he would beat her. If she admitted guilt and called upon the Source to forgive her, her father's rage would grow incandescent. 'You lie and mock me!' he would shout. Then he would beat her legs and buttocks with the birch until she bled. So she learned to stay silent through it all, head twisted, her deep brown eyes holding to his insane gaze.

There was no knight at hand to rescue the child, no hero to stride through the forest and pluck her away.

Just her and her world-weary mother, a woman old before her time, beaten down by the years and the cold fists of her husband.

'One day I will go back and kill him,' she thought, swilling down the last of the wine. Lying on her back, she stared up at the ornate, painted ceiling. Cracks were showing here too. Giriak was right, Sirano was destroying his own city. 'It is nothing to me,' she said.

Does anything matter to you? she asked herself. Or does life have nothing more to offer than a stunning victory in battle or a sweaty rut with a powerful man?

'Both are one and the same thing,' she said aloud. The ceiling shifted and swam. At first she thought it was another tremor, but then, as her stomach lurched, she realized it was the effect of the wine. Rolling to her knees, she forced herself upright. Taking a deep drink from a pitcher of water, she moved to the bed and sat down. As always her powerful constitution began to override the alcohol in her system.

Weariness flowed over her, and she wished now that she had not sent Giriak away. It would have been pleasant to lie close, feeling the warmth of his body as she drifted into sleep.

The bedroom door opened and she felt the touch of a cool breeze. Opening her eyes, she sat up. But it was not Giriak who entered.

Sirano stood in the doorway, and Karis was surprised by the change in the man. His handsome face was thin and drawn, his cheeks covered by black stubble, his eyes dark-rimmed and weary. His clothes, so beautifully fashioned from black silk, were sweat-stained and creased, and his black hair was lank and dark with sweat. Moving to the bedside, he gave a tired smile.

'You are beautiful naked, Karis,' he said. The words were forced, no more than echoes of what would only a few days before have been genuine emotion.

'You look dreadful,' she told him. 'How long since you slept?'

'Days. I swear I am close though. The Pearl's defences are thin. If I had the energy, I would have stayed for the breakthrough tonight. The Spell of Seven almost made it. It could not save all the victims. That's when I knew.'

'How many did you kill, Saro?'

'Kill? Oh, the girls . . . two. Five survived. But I am almost there, Karis.'

'You will ruin your city and destroy yourself in the process. Do you know the quakes are spreading further? A rider came in today. He said Corduin was struck three times in the last month. Is this your doing?'

He nodded. 'Do not concern yourself. With the power of the Pearl, I can rebuild and Morgallis will be a hundred times more beautiful than before. And we will have eternity to make it even better.

Immortality lies within that sphere.'

'We?' she countered.

'Why not, Karis? You and I. Young for ever.'

'Perhaps I do not want to be young for ever,' she told him.

'You say that only because you have not yet felt the winter fingers of the grave upon your skin.' His eyes were bright and feverish. Karis rose from the bed and filled a goblet with water, which she offered to him. 'Wine,' he said. 'Give me wine.'

Hurling the water to the floor, she poured the last of the wine into the goblet. He took it from her with a trembling hand and drank deeply. 'I am so tired.'

'Then go to your room and sleep.'

For a moment he was silent, his expression thoughtful. 'I am not a vain man,' he said at last. 'I know that you find me attractive. And I truly believe you are the most divine of women. Why then do we never sleep together?'

'This is not the time to talk of it, Saro,' she told him.

He smiled. 'I know the answer - but I wanted to hear you say it. You are a mercenary. When your contract is finished, you move to the highest bidder. It would complicate matters if you were emotionally involved with one of the four Dukes. Not so?'

'Exactly so,' she agreed. 'Knowing this, why do you persist?'