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  “Only you, my Lady.”

  “That’s not altogether true, Isuzeni. You might do so as well; your power is great, High Priest, it always has been. And this suggests that whoever the intruder may be, it’s not just someone with the Gift, but someone extraordinarily powerful.”

  “Yes, my Lady.”

  “Long have I meditated upon this, Isuzeni, all these years, and I have been unable to find an answer to this mystery. Who stole the Marked from between my fingers when I already had him? Who killed the Assassins we sent to find and kill him? This mystery has tortured my soul since then. I must find an answer to it, and I will.”

  Isuzeni closed his eyes for a moment and recalled a painful past, a past of unforgivable failure which shamed him and which his Lady was on the point of not forgiving. After the first failed attempt by the Dark Assassins, five new talismans of location had been forged with the power to recognize great power in infants and so locate the Marked. He had sent five of his most powerful acolytes to Tremia, expert Necromancers of the Cult of Imork, with the mission to comb not only Rogdon but the whole continent, leaving no stone unturned, and find the Marked wherever he might be hiding. Isuzeni specifically ordered them not to kill the baby but to bring it back to the Dark Lady, as the Empress wished to kill him with her own hands and so ensure the end of the Premonition. And his Lady’s wishes must be fulfilled. What the Dark Assassins had not been able to accomplish, his powerful Death Sorcerers certainly would.

  A long year went by. And only one of the five came back.

  What his acolyte told him left Isuzeni perplexed in the extreme. He had not been able to locate the Marked, and after roaming the south of the continent without results, he went in search of his brothers. He tracked them one by one, following the trail left by their unmistakable power. He found the first one dead, petrified in Rogdon, on the coast, near the fortress isle where an Order of Healers dwelt. He found the second burnt to ashes in the Masig steppes. The third he found frozen on the borders of the Usik forests. And the last he found right there, in the Kingdom of Erenal, struck as if by a bolt of lightning. Four powerful sorcerers, all dead, in different regions of Tremia, while they followed the trail of an infant of great power. That inexplicable mystery had haunted him all these years, and he had never found an explanation. Had they found the Marked in different places? Had the talismans led them to other infants with great power who were not the Marked? If so, who were they?

  But what puzzled him the most, without a doubt, was an uncontestable fact: they had all died. And that led to the great question: who had killed them? This mystery remained unsolved still and tortured his soul since it was the cause of his failure and shame.

  The Dark Lady insisted on sending more Dark Assassins after the Marked, for they had managed to locate him the first time and should have been able to do so again. The failure of the Necromancer acolytes enraged her so much that Isuzeni’s life was within a breath of coming to an end. He sent new Dark Assassins to the great continent, even though his hopes of success were few, as whoever had hidden the Marked before had had time to prepare and now had the advantage over them. For years Isuzeni’s agents combed Tremia without success, until now…

  “Whoever protected him is powerful and intelligent, but I shall find him, my Lady.” He said, coming back to reality.

  “Today we know something more, something supremely important,” the Dark Lady said. “The Marked was hiding in the highlands, among the Norriel.”

  “Yes, that’s right… This leads me to believe he was being protected from my location spell. The bracelets didn’t work, as both the assassins and my acolytes traveled all through the highlands. Someone protected the Marked with a very powerful hiding spell.”

  “Who, Isuzeni, who? That’s the question.”

  “A powerful sorcerer, a Witch very probably, someone adept at the mystical arts of hiding and discovery, capable of casting spells on the basis of enormous knowledge. But in order to be able to hide him for so long, this person had to count on the help of someone even more powerful: a Mage.”

  “A Witch and a Mage working together to hide a baby they knew nothing about? It’s a wild guess… and most unlikely.”

  “Perhaps because that is precisely what happened, we never found an answer to the disappearance of the Marked.”

  “Perhaps. In any case, I will find and kill them. The Marked, and all who have helped him in any way.”

  “Yes, my Lady.”

  “That I promise! They will all die! All!”

  Elusive answers

  Kayti, Hartz and Komir arrived at the Egia Lighthouse with Haradin. They went down from the basement of the great lighthouse to the underground Temple of Ether. Komir noticed that the Priests of the Light were working there without rest, coming and going without the need of the Dark Medallion to open the sealed chambers.

  “How did they manage to open the chambers?” he asked Haradin when they finally reached the funerary chamber of the Lord of Ether.

  “From what Abbot Dian has told me, one of the priests, a scholar devoted to the study of the Ilenian world, discovered how to keep them open. Something about solving a complicated hieroglyph…”

  “That must have been Lindaro, I’ll bet my left ear,” said Hartz, with a wide grin.

  “Of course it was Lindaro, you dimwit, who else could it be?” Kayti said. “And don’t you go betting your ears, you’re ugly enough as it is. Besides, I need your ears, to pull them.”

  Hartz winked at her playfully.

  “I see you know the scholarly Priest of the Light.” Said Haradin

  “He’s our friend,” Komir replied.

  “Abbot Dian told us he left for Erenal several weeks ago and that he’s had no news from him,” Kayti said. “He’s very worried.”

  “I believe he was heading for the Great Library of Bintantium…” said the Mage.

  “He was probably going to investigate some tangle of the damned Ilenians and their evil arts,” barked Hartz.

  “We don’t know that…” said Haradin.

  “Why else would he leave this place? The biggest discovery of the century, he called it. He’s in love with this place! No, if he’s gone away it’s because there are Ilenians involved and a major mess, you’ll see…”

  “He has a point…” said Kayti.

  “There’s nothing we can do for him right now,” Komir said. “We’d better keep to our own business and pray to the three Goddesses to look after him, wherever he may be.”

  They went down under the funerary chamber to the room with the portal, and Komir used his medallion to activate it. To his surprise it was not difficult at all. The more he used the medallion, the easier it became for him. It was as if without his being aware of it, his mind were learning to use it. The outer ring lit up with the golden glow of the Ilenian magic imbuing the runes engraved inside it with power.

  “It really is unbelievable…” Haradin said, looking at the portal.

  “That it is! It looks like a great mirror,” Hartz said. He went up to the liquid surface inside the ring. When he touched it with his finger a ripple spread throughout the silver surface, as if it were a miniature lake.

  “And now? How do we operate the portal?” Kayti asked.

  “Well… that’s why I came with you, my friends. Allow this Mage to interact with the artifact, because I might just be able to do something, although there’s no guarantee. My contacts are in the East, in the Thousand Lakes, and that’s where you must go. They know where the other two Bearers are and will lead you to them.”

  Haradin stretched out his arms and made a series of movements with his staff as he chanted. The golden ring shone intensely, and the runes carved on it began to move, changing position. Komir watched the Mage without understanding what he was doing as he interacted with the runes.

  “Help me, Komir. I need the power of your medallion to locate the Bearers.”

  “What do I have to do?” Komir asked, perplexed.

 
; “Think about the Bearers.”

  “The Masig? Um, all right, I’ll try.”

  Komir closed his eyes and concentrated, trying to recall the features of the beautiful red-skinned Masig. Her face appeared in his mind, and a moment later the medallion flashed intensely.

  “That’s it,” Haradin said. He went on manipulating the runes of the portal. “One more time, Komir, I almost have it.”

  Komir repeated his mental exercise, and a new flash came from the medallion.

  “That’s it!” cried Haradin with a broad smile. “Look!”

  The three companions looked at the portal. Komir noticed three runes at the top which were still shining with a golden light.

  “I don’t understand anything,” Hartz said.

  Kayti came closer to examine the runes.

  “The three runes Haradin has realigned mark the destination of the portal, right?”

  Haradin smiled.

  “It’s a little more complicated than that, but yes, we could say that’s it, Knight of the Custodian Brotherhood.”

  Kayti’s eyes lingered on him for a moment. There was intrigue on her face.

  “So are we ready to cross?” Hartz asked, his mouth twisting with impatience. He slung the bag of supplies over his shoulder, together with his massive Ilenian sword.

  “I think it’ll work. The portal should take you to the temple or building closest to the Bearer. What I don’t know is where that is or how close it will take you to the Bearer, but I’m sure it’s a shortcut.”

  “In that case what are we waiting for?” said Hartz with his usual optimism, and went to the portal. He stopped for a moment and winked at Kayti.

  “Wait, we’ll cross together,” she said. She took his hand, and together they walked into the portal, to disappear into its liquid silver surface.

  Komir was about to cross when Haradin stopped him.

  “There’s something I must tell you before you leave, Komir.”

  “You might have mentioned it before.”

  “It’s for our ears only.”

  “Go ahead, although anything you have to tell me you can say in front of Hartz.”

  “I’m not worried about your big friend. I trust the goodness of his heart and loyalty to you completely.”

  “Well then…?”

  “It’s her I’m worried about. You mustn’t trust her, Komir. She’s a Knight of the Custodian Brotherhood and she’s after her own ends. To be exact, those of the Master Knight of the Brotherhood.”

  “I’ve known that for a long time. I know she’s after something, and that’s the reason she’s tagging along. There’s something she doesn’t want me to know and I’ve had my doubts about her for a long time. If it wasn’t for Hartz… I would already have stopped her getting in the way…”

  “Keep your eyes open, because your friend’s certainly aren’t. He won’t recognize betrayal when it comes.”

  “I appreciate the warning, but it wasn’t necessary,” Komir said, looking at the pommel of his sword.

  “The warning wasn’t the only thing I wanted to talk about. Do you remember a medallion, one that your parents kept hidden? A round gem, black as night, with more than a hundred and fifty facets, the size of a large plum, set in a ring of pure gold and with a long chain, also gold.”

  “Do you mean the Dark Medallion, the one my mother had?”

  “I believe so, yes…”

  “The medallion which led us here and opened the sealed doors?”

  “That’s the one. Do you know where it is?”

  “I left it with Lindaro, he should still have it. Why are you so interested, Haradin?” Komir asked, intrigued. “More so, what do you know of it?”

  “That medallion… is very special … it must return to your hands.”

  A sudden anger surged within Komir.

  “Enough riddles. What do you know about the Dark Medallion? Why do you want it?”

  The Mage raised his arms.

  “It’s not that I want it, Komir. It’s just that it must be with you. It belongs to you, in a way. It’s a very rare Ilenian artifact of power… As your parents kept it you assumed it belonged to your mother, when that really wasn’t the case at all.”

  “It wasn’t? Then who did it belong to? And how come you know of the existence of this medallion?”

  “Komir… I know of its existence because I found it…”

  Komir looked at him with anger in his eyes.

  “Let me explain… In one of my expeditions in search of the Ilenian Book of the Sun —one of the two greatest volumes of knowledge of the Lost Civilization— accidentally or by pure luck, depending on how you choose to look at it, I found the medallion in some ruins in the midst of the Nocean deserts. It’s a very, very special medallion, for a reason I don’t fully understand.”

  “What reason is that?”

  “The reason is that the Dark Medallion led me to you that fateful night when I found you as a baby.”

  “How? Why? Explain yourself!” said Komir with increasing distress.

  “Please, Komir, calm yourself… I’ll explain everything. One morning I was studying the Book of the Sun, which is a grimoire of great value and critical importance whose whereabouts I only discovered after many years of fruitless search. After many failures it finally came into my hands, a book of enormous importance because it tells part of the secrets of the Ilenians. That morning something highly unusual happened: the Dark Medallion suddenly awoke. I still remember as if it was yesterday. It began to give out golden flashes at intervals as if it had a life of its own. At first I thought it had something to do with my study of the powerful Ilenian magic in the Book of the Sun, but I closed the book and made sure there was no spell at work. In spite of that, the medallion kept on pulsating, something it had never done before. Intrigued, I held it in my hand, and when I did, the medallion searched for my inner energy and began to use it. That left me completely baffled, since Objects of Power don’t usually require an external source of power to act. In general, these are enchanted objects with their own characteristics and limitations. But the Somber Medallion used my energy to create a Spell, to show me a vision, and that truly amazed me.”

  “What did it show you?”

  “That’s the most important thing of all, because it showed me you.” Haradin pointed at Komir’s chest. “A helpless baby sleeping placidly in its crib, well tucked in, an almost idyllic vision. But then it showed me a much more disturbing scene. It showed three Dark Assassins. On their wrists they wore silver bracelets, and from what I could guess from the vision, there was a spell on them to find you. That’s how they got to you, Komir, by following the flashes from those charmed bracelets.”

  “But… why me?”

  “That’s the answer I don’t have, not even now, eighteen years later. I’m sorry.”

  “Did you try to stop them? Save my parents?”

  “I tried, Komir. You have to believe me when I tell you that I tried. I went to your rescue at once, and guided by the Dark Medallion I reached your parents’ house… Unfortunately I was a fraction too late. The first of the Dark Assassins had arrived a hair’s-breadth ahead of me… your parents’ blood was still running from their lifeless bodies, still-warm… I found him over your crib, dagger raised, ready to make an end of you. I cast a spell and stopped him from killing you. It was a spine-chilling confrontation, and the skill of that Assassin was unbelievable. I survived more by instinct and luck than by my own fighting skill, I have to admit. Scared, wounded and fully aware there were two more on their way, I fled with you in my arms without looking back.”

  “Is that what you want me to believe, Mage?”

  “It’s the truth, Komir, just as it happened.”

  “Do you really expect me to believe you knew nothing of my parents? Of my origin? That a medallion guided you blindly?”

  “That’s how it happened, and it’s important in a way I don’t think you’ve grasped yet, my young friend.”

  �
��We’re not exactly friends, Mage. Your answers are never complete, you always keep something from me. You’re after your own goals, like everybody else around me… why is this? Don’t you see I can’t trust you if you don’t tell me everything I want to know?”

  “I’m deeply sorry not to have your trust, young Norriel. I can assure you that our paths run parallel. But even so, it’s vital that you understand the importance of all I’ve told you. The Dark Medallion is the key here, as it is the Object of Power which prevented your death. This is very significant, young Norriel, as it links your life to the Ilenians. Do you understand? There is a direct link between your person and the Lost Civilization.”

  “That can’t be!” Komir burst out. “You’ve spent too many hours with your nose deep in those damned Ilenian volumes!”

  “No, Komir. The Dark Medallion foretold your death and ultimately prevented it, warning me. Why? The answer is simple and yet fiendishly complex at the same time: the Ilenians want you to live.”

  “You’re crazy! You’re all crazy with your prophecies and cursed destinies! Leave me alone, please!” Komir’s head was spinning with confusion. “The Ilenians disappeared thousands of years ago, how could they want me to live? Don’t you see it’s madness? Or am I losing my mind?”

  “Komir, I don’t have all the answers… I can only tell you what I know, what I’ve managed to decipher and understand. For some reason your life is linked to the Ilenians, and sooner or later you’ll find out why. It’s crucial that you understand what it will mean, the repercussions it might have on you, on your friends, on the whole continent… The Dark Medallion is the first proof of this, the Medallion of Ether round your neck is the second. You might want to reject the truth, but it won’t stop being the truth. I’m trying to warn you so that when the time comes, you may act with courage, and above all with intelligence.”

  Komir turned towards the portal, away from the Mage. His head hurt: too many questions without answers, and too much unlikely information spinning around in it. He felt numb, unable to think. He turned to look at Haradin and said: