He caught up with Al Hestian, finding the noble standing uncertainly over the kneeling figure of a young Cumbraelin, a boy of no more than fifteen years. His eyes were closed, his lips moving in a murmured prayer. His weapons lay at his side and his hands were clasped in front of his chest.

Vaelin paused, catching his breath and wiping blood from his sword. From the direction of the river he could hear the clamour of weapons and shouts of combat as his brothers finished the last of Black Arrow’s men. Dawn was rising fast now, revealing the horrid spectacle of the camp. Bodies lay all around, some still twitching or writhing in pain, streaks of blood discolouring the snow between the blazing tents. Al Hestian’s men wandered through the destruction, looting the dead and finishing off the wounded.

“What should we do with him?” Al Hestian said. He face was streaked with sweat and ash, his expression grim. The bloodlust evident in his men has not reached him, he did not relish the killing. Vaelin was very glad he had abandoned his bargain with the king.

He will be angry, his watcher told him.

I’ll answer to the King, he replied. He can have my life if he wants it. At least I won’t die a murderer.

Vaelin glanced at the boy. He seemed oblivious to their words or the sounds of death around him, intent on his prayer. He spoke a language Vaelin didn’t know, the prayer flowing from his lips in a soft, almost melodious tone. Was he asking his god to accept his soul or deliver him from impending death?

“It seems we have our first prisoner, my lord.” He nudged the boy with his boot. “Stand up! And stop yammering.”

The boy ignored him. His expression unchanged as he continued to pray.

“I said get up!” Vaelin reached down to grab the boy’s pelt. There was a rush on air on his neck as something flicked past his ear following by the hard smack of an arrow finding flesh. He looked up to see Al Hestian staring at the black shaft buried in his shoulder, his eyebrows raised in a faint expression of surprise. “Faith,” he breathed and collapsed heavily to the snow. His limbs already twitching as the poison mingled with his blood.

Vaelin whirled, catching a blur of powdered snow in a nearby cluster of trees. Rage filled him then, sprinting in pursuit of the archer with red mist clouding his vision. “You there!” he called to a group of soldiers. “See to his Lordship, he needs a healer!”

He ran full pelt into the trees, all senses alive to the song of the forest, searching, hunting. There was a faint crunch of snow off to the left and he sprinted after it, his nostrils finding the scent of fear-born sweat. He had never been so alive to the song of the forest before, never so possessed by the desire to kill. His mouth was flooded with drool and his mind devoid of all thought but the need for blood. How long he hunted would always be lost to him, it was a dream of blurred trees and half-remembered scents as his quarry led him deeper into the forest. He ran tirelessly, immune to any strain. He knew only the hunt and the prey.

The song of the forest changed as he entered a small clearing. The birdsong greeting the dawn was muted here, stilled by an unwelcome presence. He stopped, fighting to control his heaving chest, searching with all his senses, straining for the faintest sign. The clearing was well lit by the rising sun, the sunlight playing over an oddly shaped stone in its centre. Something about the stone drew his attention, lessening his concentration on the forest’s song. It stood about four feet in height with a narrow base rising to a wide flat top in a roughly mushroomed shape, part overgrown with creepers. Looking closer he realised it was not a natural feature at all but fashioned, chiselled from one of the many granite boulders that littered the Martishe.

If his senses hadn’t been so alive he would have missed the faint creak of the bowstring. He ducked, the arrow passing over his head in a black streak. The archer leapt from the bushes, hatchet raised high, his war cry shrill and savage. Vaelin’s sword slashed into the man’s wrist, his hatchet spinning away along with the hand that held it, the back-swing laying his throat open as he staggered back in shock. He took only seconds to bleed to death.

Vaelin sagged as his body woke to the end of the hunt, the ache of the battle and the chase seeping into his limbs, his pulse raging in his ears as he fought for breath. He stumbled away, slumping against the stone, sinking to the ground, wanting nothing more than sleep. His eyes were drawn to the archer’s corpse. The lines and weathering in his slack features betrayed him as a man with more years than most of their enemies. Black Arrow? Vaelin wondered but found he was too tired to search the body for any evidence of the man’s identity.

The song of the forest returned as he lay there, head sagging to his chest, the bird song louder now. A sudden warmth in his limbs roused him and he looked up to find the clearing bathed in bright sunlight. Oddly the sun was now high overhead and he realised he must have surrendered to sleep. Fool! He climbed to his feet, making to brush the snow from his cloak… Except there was none. No snow on his cloak or his boots. No snow on the ground or the trees. Instead the ground was covered in lush green grass and the trees were liberally adorned with leaves. The air had lost the sharp chill of winter and through the forest canopy the sky was a deep shade of blue. Summer... It’s summer!

He looked around wildly. Black Arrow’s body, if it was indeed his, was gone. The stone structure that had drawn his gaze when he first entered the clearing was now bare of foliage, revealing a finely carved plinth of grey granite, its top perfectly flat save for a circular indentation in the centre. He moved closer, reaching out to trace a finger along the surface.

“You shouldn’t touch that.”

He whirled, levelling his sword at the source of the voice. The woman was of medium height and dressed in a simple robe of loosely woven fabric, the design of which was completely unfamiliar. Her hair was black and long, tumbling over her shoulders and framing an angular pale skinned face. But it was her eyes that fixed him, or rather the fact that she had no eyes. They were a milky pink in colour, devoid of pupils. As she neared he saw they were shot through with a fine web of veins, like two orbs of red marble regarding him above a faint smile. Blind? But how could she be? He could tell she was seeing him, she had seen him reach out to the stone. Something about the set of her features triggered a memory from a few years ago, a grave, hawk-faced man shaking his head sadly and speaking in a language Vaelin didn’t know.

“Seordah,” he said. “You’re of the Seordah Sil.”

Her smile widened a little. “Yes. And you are Beral Shak Ur of the Marelim Sil.” She raised her arms, encompassing the clearing. “And this is the place and time of our meeting.”

“My… name is Vaelin Al Sorna,” he said, mystification making him stumble over the words. “I am a Brother of the Sixth Order.”

“Really? What’s that?”

He stared at her. The Seordah were renowned for their insularity but then how could she know his language but not know of the Order.

“I am a warrior in service to the Faith,” he explained.

“Oh, you’re still doing that.” She came closer, her brows furrowed, head angled, red marble eyes regarding him for a moment of unblinking scrutiny. “Ah, still so young. I always assumed you would be older when we met. There is still so much for you to do, Beral Shak Ur. I wish I could tell you it will be an easy road.”

“You speak riddles, lady.” He glanced around at the impossible summer day. “This is a dream, a phantom in my mind.”

“There are no dreams in this place.” She moved past him, reaching out to the stone plinth, her hand hovering over the circular indentation in the centre. “Here there is only time and memory, trapped in this stone until the ages turn it to dust.”

“Who are you?” he demanded. “What do you want of me? Did you bring me here?”

“You brought yourself.” She withdrew her hand and turned back to him. “As for who I am, my name is Nersus Sil Nin and I want many things, none of which you can give me.”

He realised he was still holding his sword and sheathed it, feeling faintly foolish. “The man I killed, where is he?”

“You killed a man here?” She closed her eyes and a note of sadness coloured her voice. “How weak have we become? I had hoped I was wrong, that my sight had failed me. But if blood can be spilled here then it has all happened.” She opened her eyes again. “My people are scattered are they not? They hide in the forests whilst you hunt them to extinction?”

“You do not know of your own people?”

“Please. Tell me.”

“The Seordah Sil dwell in the Great Northern Forest. My people do not go there. We do not hunt the Seordah. It is said they are greatly feared. Even more than the Lonak.”

“Lonak? So they survived the coming of your kind. I should have known the High Priestess would find a way.” She turned her blank gaze on him once more, the impression of scrutiny was overpowering, his sense of wrongness flaring with it. But the sensation was different this time, not so much a warning of danger, more a feeling of disorientation, as if he had climbed a cliff and found himself awed by the sight of the ground far below.

“So,” said Nersus Sil Nin, her head tilted. “You can hear the song of your blood.”