The wraiths floated forward and gathered around the platform, an ocean of black forms and red eyes. They whispered their pain and hate at Kesson Rel.
"Your promise binds you," the Silver Lords said in a whisper. "Bind you… bind you… bind you."
Cale looked out on them, the lost, and nodded.
"There's an army of them," Magadon said, his eyes wide.
"That there is," Cale answered.
The three men turned to the portal, shared a glance and a nod, and stepped through.
Abelar thundered northward across the plains. Late autumn and the prolonged drought had dried and faded the whipgrass. He pushed Swiftdawn to her limit. With each of Swiftdawn's strides, he cursed himself anew for leaving Elden behind in Saerb. He'd had little choice-his father had needed him in Ordulin and Elden could not easily travel-but he cursed himself nevertheless. His presence in the capital had accomplished nothing. But his absence from Saerb might cost him his son. He had no illusions about what Forrin would do to his son should he take him alive.
Two days out of the plague-afflicted village, he caught up with his company. They were making camp near a drought-shrunken pond under the fading light. The last rays of the setting sun cast the plains in gold and the sky in red.
He saw figures pointing to him, calling out. He held up his blade and caused it to flare with white light.
"It is Abelar!" someone shouted.
Abelar roared into the camp. Smiles and a chorus of hails greeted him. He swung out of his saddle, gave and received thumps on the back. Regg strode through the throng, grinning, but with a question in his eyes.
"The village, Abelar?" Regg asked.
The men and women around them went quiet.
Abelar touched the holy symbol he wore about his neck. "The Morninglord shined on the village, on me, on us. After you left, I spent the night in meditation, praying for the sick mother, asking the Morninglord to strengthen her, to let her hold on until I could heal her affliction. When morning came the dawn sun filled the sickroom with light the color of a rose."
The men and women around him murmured.
"We saw that dawn," Roen said from behind him. "All marveled at it."
Abelar nodded, continued. "As I stand here now, I swear that all who stood in the light of that dawn were healed. All of them. The entire village. It was miracle."
Regg bowed his head.
Roen said, "The light of renewal. The Morninglord is gracious."
Abelar nodded solemnly. "It is good to see you," he said to Regg. "All of you."
Regg clasped his forearm. "And you."
He and Regg had stood together through blood and steel for years. Neither had fought a battle without the other in more than a decade.
Regg said, "The miracle could not have been for naught. All will be well with Elden and my father, I think."
"You speak my hopes," Abelar said.
After the company ate, the men settled in for the night and Abelar lit a short candle. He meditated, prayed, and thanked Lathander for his blessings. He slept little. When the candle burned down, he roused the men and the company set off in the pre-dawn darkness. He did not like to start a day's ride in darkness, but he wanted to cover as much ground as possible. They had two hours behind them before they paused at dawn to greet the rising sun. Afterward, they rode hard and fast.
He let Swiftdawn set the pace. A gift from Lathander after he had matured in his faith, she was superior to an ordinary warhorse in every way: faster, stronger, more intelligent. Regg's mount, Firstlight, was of the same sire and exhibited the same qualities. The rest of the company's mounts struggled to stay with them but Abelar did not slow.
"Ride, Swiftdawn," he urged her. "Ride."
She whinnied and tore across the plains. Firstlight answered with her own snort of excitement and matched her stride for stride. Both horses neighed encouragement at the mounts near them.
Abelar reveled in the sunlight, and prayed to the god who had blessed his son's Nameday with light, to keep his son safe.
Regg spoke over the pound of hooves. "Kaesa is a wise woman. She will flee before Forrin's forces ever arrive. Everyone will."
Abelar nodded but knew his friend was overly hopeful. The Corrinthal estate of Fairhaven lay to the east of Saerb itself. No one in it, including Kaesa, Elden's nurse, would learn of the approach of Forrin's forces until it was too late to flee anywhere.
And war would hit the whole area hard. Saerb had no strategic value of any kind and it was not built with warfare in mind. It had no walls and no standing army. Abelar had not mustered his forces there precisely because he did not want to give the overmistress an excuse to bring battle to the city.
Forrin could have only two purposes in marching on Saerb-to draw Abelar into battle, and to make the fate of the city an example to others who might defy the overmistress. To do the latter, Forrin not only needed to burn, he needed to kill. Abelar figured he would send an advance force ahead, probably under cover of night, to cut off any possible retreat of Saerb's residents. The entire population would be penned and slaughtered. The overmistress and her vile niece would not restrict war to warriors. Yhaunn would be Mirabeta's excuse. Forrin would be her instrument.
Abelar dug his heels into Swiftdawn's flanks and rode.
Cale, Riven, and Magadon appeared on the other side of the gate.
"Still the Plane of Shadow," Magadon observed.
Cale was not so certain. The gloom felt… different.
They stood on a platform high above a wide, concave basin of smooth rock, not unlike a drained lake bed. Polished smooth by time, the surface of the basin glistened like black glass. The gate they had stepped through sizzled behind them. Sheer stone cliffs surrounded the basin on all sides, giving it an effect like a bowl. The jagged peaks of nearby mountains rose above the walls, looking like enormous fangs. Cool air stirred the men's cloaks.
Over the center of the basin floated a tower of black rock, a spear jutting into the gloom. Tall thin windows and numerous balconies dotted its facade. Clots of deeper darkness floated around it. Creatures of shadow-their forms impossible to distinguish in the distance-flitted through the air along its sides, in and out of the apertures. Green crystals dotted its surface here and there and cast a baleful luminescence. The glassy surface of the basin dully reflected the tower's image and the reflection pointed directly at Cale, Riven, and Magadon.
Four thick chains, the links as thick around as a man's waist, anchored the spire to the basin, as if it would otherwise launch itself like a quarrel. Directly below the floating tower swirled a vast pool of inky shadows, churning slowly, hypnotically. Ropes of shadow, eerily similar to veins, rose out of the pool, wound their way up the chains, and spiraled around the tower.
Looking upon that roiling pool put a pit in Cale's stomach. As he watched, three man-shaped shadows coagulated from the ink, struggled free of the pool, and burst into the air to join their brethren flitting about the tower.
A walkway of black metal, wide enough to accommodate two wagons abreast, described an enormous octagon around the basin, caging the tower. Like the tower, the walkway floated in the gloom, seemingly supported by nothing.
"We are moving," Magadon said, nodding at the walkway.
The motion was ponderous but Magadon was correct. The walkway was slowly rotating around the tower. The tower's reflection in the basin moved with them. Cale did not try to understand how.
A large metal platform stood at the intersection at each of the walkway's eight corners. Each featured two towering poles of rune-encrusted metal, all of them as tall as a giant. Shadows spiraled around them. Between each pair of poles hung a sizzling curtain of dim green energy.