Page 3 of Path of the Dark
Eleven years later …
1
Messenger of Peace
The Royal City
The Kingdom of Rithmar
THANK THE SHADOWS that’s done.
Ryana stepped through the heavy oaken door. It swung shut with a dull thud, and a weary breath gusted out of her. After an afternoon in the Hall of Charms, doling out assistance to desperate folk, her temples ached and her temper felt frayed.
She really didn’t have the patience for such tasks. She much preferred her training sessions with Ninia; it was exciting to see how fast the girl was improving. However, she only trained Ninia in the mornings. Other, unavoidable, duties took up the afternoons.
Drawing in another breath, Ryana willed for the day’s tension to seep out of her. Irritation and a familiar restlessness churned through her—as it often did after hours spent inside the House.
Some things never changed, it seemed.
She’d spent years away from the Order, and had missed many things about her life as an enchanter. But she couldn’t change the fact that this life sometimes felt oppressive.
There were times when she needed a break from it.
Ryana turned her face up to the sun. The afternoon was fine, the air balmy. The wet and windy spring had stripped the trees of the last of their blossom, but the warmth had returned. The willows lining the riverbank below the city now wore their bright green summer dresses.
She stood upon a wide cobbled expanse before the House of Light and Darkness: a square, dun-colored building—so different from most of the elegant edifices within the upper town. Two annexes flanked the House, where the Halls of Charms and Healing sat. A massive oaken door with a stag’s head knocker was the only feature of an otherwise austere façade.
I need an ale.
Ryana knew she should join Asher and the new apprentices in the library, but she needed to have a few hours away from the House. The messy chaos ofThe Black Boar Inn, one of her favorite establishments in the lower town, beckoned. She didn’t want to sit in the shadowy library and answer earnest questions. Instead, she longed to breathe in the pungent aroma of pipe-smoke and sawdust, to relax to the sound of a harp, and to listen to the rumble of men’s voices arguing over games of dice.
She didn’t really have time to skive off. The palace was holding a ball that evening, to celebrate Queen Eldia’s birthday, and she still hadn’t picked out a suitable gown.
However,The Black Boarand a tankard of local ale beckoned.
Ryana turned left and descended The King’s Way, a wide thoroughfare that corkscrewed its way down through The Royal City’s upper town.
As she walked, she hummed a tune. It was ‘The Sailor and the selkie’, a song she’d been thinking about since waking that day. It was a pity the ball was taking place tonight, for she was in the mood for singing.
Ryana’s mouth curved, thinking nostalgically back to the decade she’d spent living as a wandering scop upon the Isle of Orin. She’d lived a hand to mouth existence during those years, often sleeping rough when her purse emptied, yet life had been simpler then. These days, she had returned to the Order of Light and Darkness and taken up the role of Head of the Dark. She should have been happy, for she’d dreamed for years of receiving a pardon.
But there were times, like today, when she longed to be elsewhere.
Continuing down the hill, Ryana noted how busy The Royal City was these days. Men garbed in leather armor thronged the streets and lounged in doorways: fighting men who’d come from all over Rithmar. The clang of weapons being forged echoed down the hillside, from the plethora of forges that had sprung up all over the city.
A king’s army needed swords and spears. With a dictator sitting over the border, King Nathan of Rithmar was wise to prepare himself for war. Sooner or later, Reoul of Anthor would likely strike.
Ryana had nearly reached the great square before the gates leading into the lower town, when the thunder of shod hooves approaching up The King’s Way made her pause. A moment later a company of riders rounded the corner.
Four members of the King’s Guard—resplendent in iron helms and mail shirts, and sitting upon heavy destriers—led the way. That wasn’t unusual, for the king often sent out patrols to secure the kingdom’s borders.
Yet there was something about this company that made Ryana pause. She looked closer.
A group of riders followed the King’s Guard on warhorses of their own. But these men didn’t wear the silver and pine-green of Rithmar. Instead, dark leather encased their bodies and blood-red cloaks rippled from their shoulders.
Ryana stared.
Men of Anthor … here?
