Crown of Vengeance (Dragon Prophecy) Read Online Free

Elithreth’s help, Maeredhiel lifted the supplicant to her feet and helped her inside. Many came to the Sanctuary of the Star seeking that which only it could supply. Normally such a one would place a hand upon the bronze doors of the Shrine and make their formal petition before being sent to hospital or resting chamber. Maeredhiel did not think this one had that much strength left in her body—if she and Elithreth had not supported her, she would have collapsed. Every footstep she took left pools of muddy, bloody water upon the stone floor, but in the stronger light of the antechamber, Maeredhiel saw the glitter of silver, moonsilver, and gems.
    Noble—and with child—and hurt—and alone. None of these things boded well for the peace of the Sanctuary. “Your name and your House, Lady?” Maeredhiel asked, her voice low and urgent. Celelioniel would wish to know these things—and at once.
    The traveler struggled to answer, turning her face toward Maeredhiel—Maeredhiel saw blood-bitten lips, bruises, abrasions—but any reply she might have made was cut off by a gasp of pain.
    Best to place her in a retiring room until I can call Mistress Healer’s lazy servants to bring a litter. “Come, Elithreth, we will—” she began.
    But her words were cut short by the arrival of the Astromancer herself.
    “Is it she? Is it now? Oh, this creature has come in an evil time!” Celelioniel Astromancer cried. She looked like a creature demented, with her shorn hair in disorder and her thin woolen robe kilted up past her knees. Her feet were bare and earth-smeared. She has come from the Shrine, Maeredhiel realized with a pang of unease.
    “I know not who she is, Lady,” Maeredhiel said. “But surely this poor creature cannot be anyone’s great enemy?” She struggled with the visitor’s full weight now, for at Celelioniel’s cry, Elithreth had released his hold on her and backed away.
    “ ‘When stars and clouds together point the way—And of a hundred deer one doe can no longer counted be ’! It is the Prophecy, Maeredhiel! It comes true—now—for has not Caerthalien a sennight hence led the breaking of Farcarinon? Here— here! —lies the Doom of the Hundred Houses!”
    Maeredhiel turned away so that Celelioniel would not see her face. When Celelioniel had begun her research, she had known no more of Amrethion’s Curse or the Child of Prophecy than any Sanctuary-trained Lightborn might know. Maeredhiel would never know what steps had led Celelioniel to The Song of Amrethion , and what hints gleaned from ancient histories had led her to decide she alone could unriddle Amrethion’s Curse. But whatever she had found there had terrified her. Maeredhiel had watched the obsession—the madness—grow from the day Celelioniel had become Astromancer, nearly a century ago.
    I pray the Vilya fruits soon, she thought sorrowfully. And my lady goes far from this place that has done her such harm.
    “Lady, no harm may enter here,” Maeredhiel said soothingly. “Only let me bring this one to Mistress Healer Nithrithuin before her babe is brought to harm, and—”
    “It is the babe I fear!” Celelioniel wailed. “Does not The Song of Amrethion Aradruiniel speak of the birth of a babe who will cast down the High Houses? A babe whose birth will herald the beginning of great Darkness?”
    Suddenly Celelioniel darted forward and seized the woman’s chin, gazing into her eyes for a moment before springing back and wailing as if she were but a babe herself.
    “Sanctuary … I claim … I must…” the Lady whispered. The Astromancer’s touch seemed to drain the last strength from the supplicant; rather than drop her, Maeredhiel knelt with her upon the stone floor. As she did, her heart sank further: nestled in the hollow of her throat was a pendant, a Vilya blossom of moonsilver. Somewhere, this woman’s Bondmate awaited her. The Soulbond was the greatest joy any alfaljodthi could know, and the greatest sorrow as well,