Malice
Dear Reader,
Thank you for buying this book. You may have noticed that it is free of Digital Rights Management. This means we have not enforced copy protection on it. All Tor ebooks are available DRM-free so that once you purchase one of our ebooks, you can download it as many times as you like, on as many e-readers as you like.
We believe that making our Tor ebooks DRM-free is the best for our readers, allowing you to use legitimately-purchased ebooks in perfectly legal ways, like moving your library from one e-reader to another. We understand that DRM can make your ebooks less easy to read. It also makes building and maintaining your digital library more complicated. For these reasons, we are committed to remaining DRM-free.
We ask you for your support in ensuring that our DRM-free ebooks are not subject to piracy. Illegally downloaded books deprive authors of their royalties, the salaries they rely on to write. If you want to report an instance of piracy, you can do so by emailing us:
[email protected]
.
Very best wishes,
The Tor UK team & our authors
F
OR MY CHILDREN
,
H
ARRIETT
, J
AMES
, E
DWARD AND
W
ILLIAM
.
A
ND OF COURSE MY WIFE
, C
AROLINE,
WITHOUT WHOM IT WOULD ALL MEAN NOTHING
.
A
CKNOWLEDGEMENTS
There have been many helping hands along the way. Firstly I must say a thank-you to Paul Isted, whose thumbs-up was just the encouragement I needed at a pivotal moment.
I would also like to thank those that took the time to read my doorstep of a manuscript, when I am sure they all had much better things to be doing. Edward Gwynne, Mark Brett, Dave Dean, Irene Gwynne, Mike Howell, Alex Harrison, Mandy Jeffrey, Pete Kemp-Tucker, and my good wife Caroline, without whom I would never have put pen to paper in the first place.
Thanks are due to John Jarrold, my agent extraordinaire, for his belief and guidance – a true gent and a scholar, if ever I met one – and also to Julie Crisp and Bella Pagan, my editors at Tor. Their polishing skills are immense.
Thanks also to my mate Andy Campbell for some cracking photos, affectionately referred to as The Blackadder Sessions.
Oh, and a note to my oldest friend Sadak. Are you going to read this now?
‘For whence
But from the author of all ill could spring
So deep a malice.’
John Milton,
Paradise Lost
C
ONTENTS
PROLOGUE
EVNIS
The Year 1122 of the Age of Exiles, Wolf Moon
Forest litter crunched under Evnis’ feet, his breath misting as he whispered a curse. He swallowed, his mouth dry.
He was scared, he had to admit, but who would not be? What he was doing this night would make him traitor to his king. And worse.
He paused and looked back. Beyond the forest’s edge he could still see the stone circle, behind it the walls of Badun, his home, its outline silvered in the moonlight. It would be so easy to turn back, to go home and choose another path for his life. He felt a moment of vertigo, as if standing on the edge of a great chasm, and the world seemed to slow, waiting on the outcome of his decision.
I have come this far, I will see it through
. He looked up at the forest, a wall of impenetrable shadow; he pulled his cloak tighter and walked into the darkness.
He followed the giantsway for a while, the stone-flagged road that connected the kingdoms of Ardan and Narvon. It was long neglected, the giant clan that built it vanquished over a thousand years ago, great clumps of moss and mushroom growing between crumbling flagstone.
Even in the darkness he felt too vulnerable on this wide road, and soon slithered down its steep bank and slipped amongst the trees. Branches scratched overhead, wind hissing in the canopy above as he sweated his way up and down slope and dell. He knew where he was going, had walked the path many times before, though never at night. Nineteen summers old, yet he knew this part of the Darkwood as well as any woodsman twice his age.
Soon he saw a flicker amongst the trees: firelight. He crept closer, stopping before the light touched him, scared to leave the anonymity of the shadows.
Turn around, go home, a voice whispered in his head. You are nothing, will never equal your brother
. His mother’s words, cold and sharp as the day she had died. He ground his teeth and stepped into the firelight.
An iron cauldron hung on a spit over a fire, water bubbling. Beside it a figure, cloaked and hooded.
‘Greetings.’ A female voice. She pushed the hood back, firelight making the silver in her hair glow copper.
‘My lady,’ Evnis said to Rhin, Queen of Cambren. Her beauty made him catch his breath.
She smiled at him, wrinkles creasing around her eyes and held out her hand.
Evnis stepped forward hesitantly and kissed the ring on her finger, the stone cold on his lips. She smelled sweet, heady, like overripe fruit.
‘It is not too late, you may still turn back,’ she said, tilting his head with a finger under his chin. They stood so close he could feel her breath. Warm, laced with wine.
He sucked in a breath. ‘No. There is nothing for me if I turn back. This is my chance to . . .’
His brother’s face filled his mind, smiling, controlling,
ruling
him. Then his mother, her lips twisted, judging,
discounting
.
‘. . . matter. Gethin has arranged a marriage for me, to the daughter of the poorest baron in Ardan, I think.’
‘Is she pretty?’ Rhin said, still smiling, but with an edge in her voice.
‘I have only met her once. No, I cannot even remember what she looks like.’ He looked at the cauldron on its spit. ‘I must do this. Please.’
‘And in return, what would you give me?’
‘The whole realm of Ardan. I shall govern it, and bow to you, my High Queen.’
She smiled, teeth glinting. ‘I like the sound of that. But there is more to this than Ardan. So much more. This is about the God-War. About Asroth made flesh.’
‘I know,’ he whispered, the fear of it almost a solid thing, dripping from his tongue, choking him. But exciting him, too.
‘Are you scared?’ Rhin said, her eyes holding him.
‘Yes. But I will see it through. I have counted the cost.’
‘Good. Come then.’ She raised a hand and clicked her fingers.
A hulking shadow emerged from the trees and stepped into the firelight. A giant. He stood a man-and-a-half tall, his face pale, all sharp angles and ridged bone, small black eyes glittering under a thick-boned brow. A long black moustache hung to his chest, knotted with leather. Tattoos swirled up one arm, a creeping, thorn-thick vine disappearing under a chainmail sleeve, the rest of him wrapped in leather and fur. He carried a man in his arms, bound at wrist and ankle, as effortlessly as if it were a child.
‘This is Uthas of the Benothi,’ Rhin said with a wave of her hand, ‘he shares our allegiances, has helped me in the past.’