“Fifty years ago,” said Mikrin quietly, his lips barely moving as he looked out across the gently shimmering waters beneath him. A huge glowing Thunder Moon was just beginning to show between the trees across the lake, seeming to dance with a placid gracefulness as his little rowboat rose and fell in the soft waves of the Lake of Mirrors. Immediately behind him, towering bluffs rose up for nearly a hundred feet, pitted by centuries of rain and ice and beating sun. Of course, if he turned to look, he would see a dozen of his bodyguards standing at the foot of the long twisting stair which came down the treacherous cliffs to the level of the water, but he had no particular desire to see them now. His attention was riveted upon the furiously glowing orb, which was only a few minutes from climbing clear of all impediments and bathing the summer night in its pale, calm light. The lake would be transformed into a massive field of flowing silver, and he would relive that terrible, fateful night. He glanced down over the side of the boat, and saw his own reflection looking back up at him. He had a full beard now, and his wrinkled face was ringed about with a halo of silver and white, but he could still see the terrified boy of seven staring back up at him, petrified with horror at his inescapable fate, and utterly, totally lost.

A lot had changed since then, reflected Mikrin, gazing on the face beneath him with fondness. But far more had remained the same. There was so much of the hurt, frightened boy still within himself. There were still wounds in his heart that had never scarred over.

A new note seemed to sound in the night wind as the moon broke above the treeline and the lake was set ablaze with a white fire. It was time.

“Da,” began Mikrin, the word sounding like the beginning of a long rehearsed ritual, “why do those mountains look like teeth?”

Immediately, the lake and the shimmering waters vanished, and the long years fell away, and Mikrin could see before him the savage peaks of sharp mountains between trees as he rose and fell in his little pony’s saddle. His father did not immediately answer, and so he stood a little higher in the stirrups and raised a hand to shield against the brilliant sunlight that filtered through the sweeping hemlock boughs before them, partially concealing the black silhouette of the mountains.

“Psst! Casseel!” hissed Mikrin, pulling on his sister’s sleeve, then jerking his head toward the mountains which rose to the east, growing more and more clear with every passing hour. She only shrugged, her lip curled in mild disdain, and looked away. But Mikrin knew her better than that; she was every bit as scared as he was. She was just too tough to let it show.

“Da, why are we going to the mountains?” asked Mikrin a minute later. There was no disguising the fright in his voice now. “I remember Captain Brint saying that the Black Mountains were a terrible place, full of monsters and demons, and I don’t want to go there.”

“Well,” said Lord Brudor at last, “I suppose there’s no harm in telling a child such tales when he’s young and you want him to be frightened of something so he’ll behave. But you and Casseel aren’t weanlings anymore. You’ve got to grow up sometime, and the sooner the better. Do you remember how I was raised in Lord Montray’s city?”

“Yes,” replied Mikrin, not much comforted.

“Well, I am taking you and your sister to further your education in the court of a great ruler. Lord Montray was a grand fellow in his own right, but I shall do better by you than my father did for me. You shall be raised in a royal court, in the presence of the greatest king now living.”

“There’s no king in Riocht,” blurted out Mikrin, a moment before he realized what his father was saying. They were going over the mountains and into Fiaine: the Land of Shadow and Death, where Khadain the deathless ruled with a bloody, iron fist. His face turned white and the breath caught in his throat so that he could not speak or even move.

“You’re right; there is no king in Riocht,” scoffed Lord Brudor with a note of anger in his voice. “And there never will be. It’s nothing more than a few neighboring plots of sorry woodland, where savage foresters break their axes over eachothers’ heads when they’re angry, and bloodthirsty warlords throw their subjects into ranks and force them to fight for them, and for what? There’s got to be more to living, Mikrin, and I want it for you.”

He stopped and grabbed Mikrin’s shoulder tightly. The boy, already a bundle of firing nerves, screamed and recoiled, but Lord Brudor did not let go.

“Listen to me, boy,” he said, catching Mikrin’s eye and somehow forcing him to calm down with his own steady gaze. “I don’t care if you hate me for the rest of your life. I want more for you than I was given, and you’re not going to find it here.”

Mikrin said nothing, his eyes glassy, as he slumped back in the saddle and allowed his pony to be led on by the halter. Twice, Casseel glanced back at him as if to speak, but Mikrin never saw her. His eyes were glazed and his lips were soundlessly mouthing the words: “not the black mountains! Please father, not the black mountains!” over and over again. He was still unresponsive when night fell and they pitched camp beside a tall standing boulder. They lit no fire, for the night was warm, and the rising Thunder Moon cast such a brilliant light upon the earth that any other illumination was entirely unnecessary. Lord Brudor lay Mikrin down upon several blankets, a worried, half-guilty look upon his face. Casseel had already shaken her blankets out, and within minutes was breathing slow and shallow, her face as serene as the shimmering starlight.

“Mikrin!” hissed a voice almost savagely, directly into the boy’s ear. His eyes shot open and he screamed in fright, or at least tried to. There was a thin, pale figure bent over him, gleaming silver in the moonlight. He could feel a tight hand over his mouth, and the weight of a knee pressing down upon him, pinning him beneath the blankets. But the next moment, Casseel flung her hair back over her shoulder so that her face showed more plainly, and gradually, Mikrin’s body relaxed. The hand was lifted from his mouth and he sat up mutely, the fright still too fresh for him to speak.

“Run away now, Mikrin,” she demanded. “He’s sleeping.” Mikrin glanced over to where their father was slumped across a log, overtaken by weariness and worry.

“But what about you?” whimpered Mikrin. “They’ll kill you! I’ll never see you again!”

“I’ll be fine,” she replied coolly.

“But I’ll never see you again!”

“Then you’ll have to learn to manage for yourself,” she said with all the worldly sapience of an older sister. “You’ll have all summer to find a city. As long as you’re out of the wild by autumn you’ll be fine.”

“What if I run out of food?”

“Take your pack and mine.”

“You’ll starve!”

“Look,” she hissed, as anger flashed across her face for the first time. “Do you want to go or not? Because if all you’re going to do is find excuses and whine, then I might as well go back to bed.”

Silently, Mikrin stood up, his knees still shaky, and opened his small pack to receive her rations.

“Now run,” she said in a low voice as her little brother rose to his feet. “And let the moon guide you. Follow it until sunrise, and don’t stop until then.”

Mikrin bit his lip. “I’m going to miss you, Casseel,” he said. She started at the sudden change in his voice. The timid, cringing worrywart brother was gone, and in his place was a young man about to embark on the most terrifying adventure of his life. He had grown ten years older in a few seconds.

“I’ll miss you too, Mikrin,” she said, as a rare tear trickled down her face and then froze upon her cheek as time stood still and the entire scene was suspended in a breathless limbo.

Gradually, Casseel’s face began to break up and disintegrate, distorting and twisting, and eventually dissolving in the ever-changing shapes and patterns of the lake’s waves.

“I’m going to miss you, Casseel,” said Mikrin again. He waited for several minutes, hoping desperately for some answer from the heavens, but as always happened, none was forthcoming. Slowly he reached down and grasped the oars, then deftly maneuvered the boat around so that its sharp, graceful prow was pointed toward the quay, where sure enough, his guard was standing in perfect order, waiting to bring him back up to his quarters above the lake. A smile, both bitter and triumphant, spread across Mikrin’s face as his father’s words returned to him: “There is no king in Riocht. And there never will be.” Of course, it would be a stretch to claim that he was truly king of all Riocht. But nearly three quarters of the cities recognized his crown in return for his military protection and scrupulous, impartial administration of justice. It had been the work of a lifetime uniting the many lords under one banner, but it had been worth every second of it.

Nearer and nearer came the little stone quay as the light craft bobbed like a cork beneath the force of Mikrin’s mighty oarstrokes. But then suddenly, the wind changed, and a cold, dry blast smote Mikrins back with such force that he was thrown from his bench and nearly toppled over the stern and into the water. He gripped the gunwales and pulled himself up, his hair streaming behind him as he looked about. His oars were floating on the surface of the lake some twenty feet away, and receding further and further with every passing second. His guards were shouting wildly, and several were leaping into another boat to come after him, and soon their white oars were dipping and rising in vain pursuit. Vain, that much was sure. Mikrin swallowed the knot in his throat, taken utterly aback by his breakneck speed and the ferocity of the wind. Despite his bodyguards’ strength and cunning on the water, they were shrinking with every passing second, and were soon lost from sight as the waves began to rise and fall between them with a greater violence.

Breathlessly, Mikrin turned about and saw that the moonlight was rising from the lake almost like a mist into the air, while the waters themselves turned dark and choppy. And there, on the far bank, plain and unmistakable against the white sand, stood a tall dark figure, with both hands outstretched over the waters. Long tattered black robes streamed out behind it like the banners of a defeated army, but a tall jagged crown of steel was set upon the gaunt face, which was pallid and hollow and lifeless. As he gazed on the figure in repugnant fascination, the boat struck the shore, hurling him over the stern. He plowed through the sand and washed-up weeds, jolting to a halt before the figure in black. Mikrin reached instinctively for his sword, but it was, of course, not there.

“Who are you?” he demanded as he rose unsteadily to his feet. In reply, his assailant turned fully toward him and stared intently at his face. Mikrin’s eyes widened. There was no trace of womanliness in her gaunt, skeletal frame, and the dully gleaming silver eyes bore no resemblance to the shining blue of his sister’s, but there was no mistaking the lines of that face or the disdainful lip as it curled in reply to his question.

“Casseel?” blurted out Mikrin, appalled at the sight, as he staggered back a pace.

“You refused his service once, Mikrin,” she replied ominously. “And instead have set a crown of your own upon your brow. Do not think that you have escaped his eye, fool! Either you shall bow to him, or you shall die.”

“There is no king in Riocht,” replied Mikrin defiantly. “Not yet.”

Casseel laughed: a hollow, malicious sound so different from the innocent, childish laugh that Mikrin had longed for years to hear again. “There has always been a king in Riocht.”

“Of perhaps, but not in,” returned Mikrin, eyes flashing. “He has never been here, nor will he, if the old tales ring true. He is bound by an ancient curse to his own land. I would like to see him try.”

Casseel hissed angrily, raising a hand as if to slash it across Mikrin’s face. “Be careful, wretch, what you wish for. When you are brought before his face for an accounting, you will not find yourself so bold.” For a moment she stood rigid, and then she reached out an icy hand to grasp his shoulder with an unnatural strength. “Your days are numbered.”

“What did he do to you?” he demanded as he somehow pulled away, his eyes fixed on her intently. “Come away and leave him! He is far away, and you are in a free land! Be rid of that dread master and live again!”

A hollow laugh echoed from her thin chest and froze the breath in Mikrin’s throat.

“You simple fool,” she cooed. “There is no being rid of him. Not even in death.”

“I will not believe it,” replied Mikrin with savage stubbornness. “Buried somewhere deep in your soul, there is a corner that is still yours. There is still some hidden part of your spirit that you would not surrender. I know you too well, sister, to believe that you could ever wholly be a slave.”

The pale, icy light in Casseel’s eyes flickered, then vanished, as a lost and frightened look filled them.

“I have waited fifty years for this day,” pressed Mikrin, “and I will not be cheated. I want to see my sister again.”

“You will never see her again in life,” she replied, her breath coming shallow and fast. “The moment I disown him, I shall die.”

“Casseel,” said Mikrin, catching her frantic eye and holding it firmly, “his life is only a walking death. Will you be free of him?”

An hour later, the perfect white sand along the Lake of Mirrors was broken as three figures staggered gasping up the shore, barely able to stand. The dripping bodyguards, who had swum the great lake after their vessel was swamped by the sorcerer’s storm, were still armed, but could scarcely have lifted a finger against an adversary, however insignificant. They stopped for a moment at Mikrin’s little boat, which was driven up nearly twenty feet from the water’s edge, but then froze at the sight of something lying dark and still a dozen paces beyond it.

“Lord Mikrin? Lord Mikrin!” shouted the captain as he jolted forward, beckoning the others on after him. As they drew near, they faltered and held back, for in the light of the full moon, they could see Mikrin kneeling upon the white sand, bent in grief over the body of a woman who was cradled in his arms. Her face was thin and lined, and her sparse hair was grey, but there was a quiet stillness in her wide blue eyes, which gazed lifelessly up into the heavens.

Slowly, Mikrin rose to his feet, bearing Casseel as lightly as if she were made of straw, and laid her in the prow of his little boat.

“I’m going to miss you, Casseel,” he said as he gazed down upon her face. “I’m going to miss you.”