No mystery now why the Mavelans wanted Lineas, not with this kind of power running through Highjorune going untapped and unused. He could almost pity the mage-lords. It must be like living next to people who mined up precious gems with their copper, and threw the gems out with the tailings, but wouldn't let you in to glean them. Got to hurry this. We're running out of time.

Cautiously he pulled at the power, until it responded, flowing faster into him.

That's it. Now I make it mine.

He tapped into the wild power he'd taken; learned it, tamed it to his hand.

He was sweating now; both with effort and impatience. Gods, this takes too much time, but I can't afford any surprises.

Slowly, carefully, he began to spin the energy out into threads, visible only to his Othersight, making a cocoon of the threads that would absorb sound within it, and send the eyes that lit upon it to looking elsewhere. Layer on layer, thread on delicate thread, this was a spell that required absolute concentration and attention, for the slightest defect would mean a place where the eye could catch and hold, where sound could leak out. Yfandes stood like a statue of ice in the moonlight, no longer fidgeting.

Finally, with a sigh of relief, he completed.the web. He replaced what he had spent, then cut off his connection to the mother-stream.

His arms hurt, but he had the feeling that more was going to hurt than his arms before this was over.

:Go!: he told Yfandes, who leaped off into the dark, heading for the open city gates ahead of them.

He grabbed for the reins and pommel as she shot forward, a white arrow speeding toward a target only she knew.

:'Fandes! Where are we going?:

:The palace!:

The streets wound crazily round about, with no sense and no pattern; some were illuminated by torches and lanterns, some only by the moon. They sped from dark to light to dark again, Yfandes' hooves sliding on the slippery cobbles. They splashed through puddles of water and less pleasant liquids. He could hear her hooves, oddly muffled, beneath him; and both intriguing scents and noisome, foul stenches that met his nose only to be snatched away before he could recognize them. There were people about; street cleaners, beggars, whores, drunks, others he couldn't identify. The spell held; the eyes of the townsfolk they passed slid past the two of them with no interest whatsoever.

:The first Companion, the young one - I can't even reach him now, he's too crazed, Van, he's so frightened!: Yfandes was not particularly coherent herself; stress was distorting her mind-voice into a wash of emotion through which it was hard to pick up words. :The second one - she's - her Chosen - she can't bear what he's doing, she's shutting everything out. :

Vanyel clung to the pommel and balanced out sideways a bit as Yfandes rounded a corner, hindquarters skewing as her hooves slipped a little. This “second one”-she was probably the Companion with Randale's envoy. But what could a Herald be doing that would stress his Companion to the point of breakdown?

Vanyel didn't have long to wait to discover the answer; they entered a zone of wider streets and enormous residences; homes of the noble and rich. The streets were near daylight - bright with cressets and lanterns of scentless oils. The palace can't be far, he thought, and just as he finished the thought, they pounded around a corner and into a huge square, then down a broad avenue. At the end of that processional avenue was a huge structure, half fortress, half fantasy, looming above the city, a black eagle mantling above her nest against the setting moon. And at the eagle's feet, an egg of light-the main courtyard, brightly lit. Vanyel banished the spell of unsight as they thundered in the gilded gates.

The dark-charcoal palace walls cupped the courtyard on three sides, the wall they'd just passed beneath forming the fourth. There must have been a hundred lanterns burning.

He only got a glimpse of confusion; to his right, half a dozen armed and armored men, and a Companion down and moaning on the black cobbles. To his left-a younger Companion, blood streaked shockingly red on his white coat, teeth bared and screaming with rage and battle - fury; a blond boy clinging dazedly to his back, and-

It was like something out of his worst nightmares. A Herald, with a heavy carter's whip, beating the stallion until his skin came away in strips and blood striped bright on the snowy hide, trying to separate him from the boy.

Yfandes literally rode the Herald down, swerving at the last moment to shoulder him aside instead of trampling him. Vanyel leaped from her saddle as he had so many times before in Border - fights; hit the cobbles and tumbled to kill his momentum, and sprang to his feet with sword drawn.

He didn't give the other Herald a breath to react. Whatever insanity was going on here had to be stopped. Without thinking, Van reversed the grip on the sword in his hand.

And lashed up to catch the stranger squarely on the chin with a handful of metal.

The other Herald went flying backward, and landed in an untidy heap.

Damn, he's still moving.

Vanyel put himself in righting stance between the young stallion and his abuser. He touched the young ones' minds just long enough to try and get some sense out of either the boy or the stallion - but from the first picked up only shock, and from the second, fear that drowned everything else out.

Vanyel pulled on the power within him, feeling it leap, wild and undisciplined, as the other Herald staggered to his feet, bleeding from a split lip, and prepared to lash out with the whip again. Flinging out his left hand, Van sent a lash of his own, a lash of lightning from his outstretched finger to the whipstock. The spark arced across the space between them with a crackle and the pungent smell of burning leather, and the dark, sallow-faced Herald dropped the whip with an exclamation of pain. Behind him, Yfandes was holding off the armsmen with squeals, lashing hooves and bared teeth; faced with her anger, they were not inclined to come to the Herald's rescue.

“What in hell do you think you're doing?” Vanyel thundered, letting the other feel his outrage, a wave of red anger. The older man backed up an involuntary pace. “What in the name of the gods themselves is going on here?”

Vanyel sheathed his sword then. The other Herald drew himself up, nursing his injured hand against his chest, rubbing the blood off his bruised chin with the other. “Who are you to interfere -” he began, his face a caricature of thwarted authority.

Vanyel tried to Mindspeak, but the other's channel was weak, and he was blocking it besides. And the personality was not one for much hope of compromise. Stolid and methodical - and affronted by the stranger's intervention in his jurisdiction. The young stranger, too young, surely, to have any authority.

Gods bless - I'm going to have to pull rank on this thickheaded idiot. And he's never going to forgive me for that.

And the only reason I didn't put him out is because he's so damn thick - headed!

“Herald-Mage Vanyel Ashkevron,” Vanyel cut him off. “Called Demonsbane, called Shadowstalker, First Herald-Mage in Valdemar. I outrank you, Herald, and your damn fool actions tonight called me out of my bed and across the Border. You've exceeded your authority, and I'm ordering you to let this boy be. Who in hell are you?”

Vanyel could feel the older man's resentment and smoldering anger, heavy and hot, a ponderous weight of molten emotional metal. “Herald Lores,” he said sullenly, rubbing his hand. “King Randale's envoy to the court of Lineas.”

Over his shoulder, Vanyel watched Yfandes backing away from the armsmen. She cautiously nudged the downed Companion's shoulder-still keeping one eye on them. After a couple of false tries, the other mare managed to get back to her feet, but stood with her head down and her legs splayed and shaking.