Sarabande: River of Falcons Book 4

Epilogue: Out of Time

It was the beginning of Fallowmoon. The earth was frozen everywhere except down by the sea, but even there everything was lifeless and still and the greens of summer were long gone. Up north in the stone structures of Sorcerers' Keep, it was a cold evening and the fires were lit in the fireplaces. Magus was talking with his parents: An ordinary-sounding evening for an extraordinary family.

"There must be a way to break the spell," Magus complained. "I want to live in the Palace again." Magus was sitting close to the roaring fire by the big stone fireplace of the great hall of the Keep, his feet up on the fender. He seemed to like to be close to the fire ever since he had taken on the powers of a demon. Vultan and Nautilus were sitting in wing-back chairs a little further away.

"You're out of luck," Vultan said. "There's no easy way to undo what that girl did. She seems to be able to channel the power of a very strong demon of some kind, and that was no ordinary spell, it was an exorcism. I doubt you'll ever be able to set foot in the Palace grounds again, at least for as long as you continue to host that demon within your body."

Magus frowned. "I'm not going to give it up. I need its powers."

"And it needs your body," Nautilus pointed out. "It's able to feast on blood now, making it stronger than before. It probably wouldn't leave as easily as it came, even if you did want to get rid of it."

Magus glared at her. "You might have thought of that before you invoked it, Mother," he complained.

"At least you have powers again," she pointed out.

Vultan nodded. "And the others are terrified of you. That's a good thing."

Magus smiled. "I've noticed," he said. "None of the apprentices will even speak with me. They tend to run away when they see me coming."

"Well, if you hadn't sucked the blood out of one of them just because he spilled his tray of food on your robe, the others wouldn't be so terrified," Nautilus pointed out.

"Fear is a good thing," Vultan said. "Don't worry about the apprentices. I'm stepping up our recruiting. There will be more of them soon."

"That's all well and good," Nautilus said, "but how are we to feed them? This famine you caused is an inconvenience. It seems to have effected us more than anyone else."

Vultan frowned. "That's because the Palace has been using magic to grow food this winter, and they've been sending wagonloads of it out to the countryside. You know growth magic, Nautilus! Why didn't you think to plant a garden here at the Keep?"

Nautilus sat up and glared at Vultan. "How was I to know—"

"Stop arguing," Magus growled, his eyes flashing a menacing red for a moment. "All we have to do is intercept those wagons and take them for ourselves. Send a raiding party out tomorrow, Father. And stop grumbling, Mother. It's your fault we didn't take the Palace. Your plan failed. Even with that scrying mirror, you didn't realize that the Princess had enlisted help from First Garden."

"It wasn't my fault," Nautilus snapped. "You're the one who lost your head and ran around trying to bite people! We wouldn't have lost half our forces if it weren't for your lack of self-control."

"Well, at least I'm not going hungry," Magus said smugly, leaning back and stretching luxuriously in front of the fire. "There's always plenty of blood to be had."

"All right," Nautilus said with a sigh. "We send out raiding parties tomorrow. Is this really what we've been reduced to? Having to steal vegetables just to survive the winter?"

You ought to invoke demons of your own," Magus said. "I've been slipping into town on dark nights and feasting on the blood of children. It's an enjoyable way to live. I highly recommend it."