Fleetfoot, though, appeared to have a goal, and while Flint wasn't too happy about trusting the situation to a bone-brained, lovesick mule, it was the best choice he had right now.

The killer must be Tyresian, Tanis thought as he ran. The half-elf no longer made any attempt to hide the slapping of his sword between his robe and his leggings. The elves in the street, acting in accordance with Kentommen strictures, carefully averted their eyes as he passed. Just in case, he continued to hold the hood before his face, however.

Perhaps it was Litanas, Tanis added to himself. The young elf lord, who had completed his own Kentommen only a year earlier, had gained considerably from Xenoth's death; Litanas had succeeded the old adviser and won the wealthy Lady Selena. And perhaps Ailea had found a way to link Litanas with Xenoth's death.

This was discouraging and frightening. Tanis didn't have enough information to know who had masterminded Ailea's and Xenoth's deaths and attempted two more-Gilthanas's and Tanis's own. All he knew was that the attempt on Gilthanas had meant Flint was right: Porthios, the Speaker, and Laurana were in terrible danger. Ignoring his aching lungs, he ran on.

It was the same clearing, Flint was sure. The same huge boulder, the same stand of spruce. Trees still lay in splinters on the ground, and a path had been crushed through the understory of trees. Trees and stone alike showed slash marks.

He had found the clearing where the tylor had first attacked him.

From here, he hoped, he could find the sla-mori.

If he could just get there in time.

If he could just remember everything he had done to open the sla-mori the first time.

Miral looked down at the assemblage from the deserted second balcony. His clear eyes glinted.

He saw Laurana's golden hair glittering in the torchlight, and for a moment, he felt sadness-over what he had to do, over what he'd done, over what the Graystone had ordered him to do. The killing had started with the death of Kethrenan Kanan, the Speaker's brother, fifty years earlier. Miral had commanded, through magic, the human brigands who had attacked Kethrenan and his wife, Elansa, and while Miral had not wielded the swords that had struck Kethrenan down, it was his deed, born of jealousy.

That had been the first time he had sought to influence humans. And the last. They'd been too unpredictable to suit him. Originally, he had told them to slay Elansa as well. Instead, he had arrived in time to see her lying unconscious in the road as the brigands argued over who would get to murder her. Caught by a sudden upsurge of feeling that had taken him by surprise, he had ordered them to return Elansa's steel pendant to her neck and to leave her.

He knew, of course, all about the Graystone, that it was capable of great good-and great evil. Since his childhood, he had felt the same pendulumlike swing within himself. Within one body was the person who could order the death of one elf, then befriend the child of that elf's ravaged wife. Then kill that child when he grew up.

Movement below caught his eye, and he leaned over the bannister. The drums roared and the trumpets sang; it was the time in the ceremony when Gilthanas, garbed in his traditional gray robe, should have stepped through the entry hall of the Tower of the Sun, circled around to a small door at the back of the Tower, and gone through the door to find Porthios waiting for him at the end of the Yathen-ilara, the Pathway to Illumination.

Ah, how tired Miral was of infernal elven tradition. They kept the most trivial traditions, while the important one, the one that made Qualinesti uniquely pure, they threatened to let go. He would… Miral shook away the thought and sought to return his focus to the Yathen-ilara.

Today's celebration would stop there, for Gilthanas was dead.

It would be his, Miral's, joke on the nobles, on Porthios, on Solostaran especially. One last jest before they died. The mage imagined them all standing there waiting in their gold-threaded finery, secure in their wealth, in their status, in their belief that somehow they deserved all this. They would wonder where Gilthanas was. Eventually, they would grow restless, begin to murmur, look around.

Had things gone as normal, Gilthanas would have waited by the small door. Thus would have begun the Kentommen proper, where Solostaran would address the onlookers in an ancient prescribed speech, explaining that he had lost a child in the Grove and that he now had no heir. The three Ulathi would have stepped forward, still masked, to proclaim their lines. The gong would have sent Gilthanas into the corridor, from which he would have sent Porthios forth into adulthood. Porthios would have received from the Speaker a goblet of deep red wine, symbolizing Solostaran's bloodline-and his formal selection as heir. And Porthios, from that moment, would forever be considered adult.

Miral laughed. Instead of all the folderol that the elves liked so well, Miral would stand forward, call Porthios forth from the sacred corridor to join the others, then utter the words that would seal all the doorways. The ceremony would be over.

As would their lives. And when the dying ceased, he would be Speaker.

The drums boomed again. Miral leaned forward to chant. Then he stopped, speechless.

Gilthanas had entered the Tower.

Chapter 31

Miral stood stock-still as the gray-robed figure entered the Tower. The murmuring that had begun among the onlookers quieted, and they watched expectantly as Gilthanas passed along the inner edge of the Tower.

But Gilthanas is dead! the mage screamed to himself.

There was something different about Gilthanas, though, he thought. The youth appeared larger; the robe was stretched taut across his shoulders. The figure in the robe was more like Tanis than Gilthanas.

But Tanis was dead, too.

Miral's gaze followed the gray robe as it moved gracefully to the appointed portal and waited.

Solostaran, dressed in his golden-green robes of state, entered from an anteroom and crossed to the rostrum. Solemnly, he mounted the steps to the platform and turned to face the crowd with the small speech that every noble parent had delivered upon a child's Kentommen for two thousand years.

"This day is one of sorrow for me," he said simply in the old elven tongue. "I have lost a child."

In the balcony, Miral suddenly caught the humor of that statement. He rocked with silent laughter. Little did Solostaran know, he thought. The mage decided to allow the charade to continue a bit longer. Who knew what other tidbits of unwitting mirth the Speaker might come forth with?

His hawklike features somber, Solostaran continued, "I have lost a child to the Grove. Thus, I have no heir. Can anyone offer comfort?"

One drum roll boomed from the first balcony, below Miral. He heard a door open far below, and three elves, dressed in black silk leggings and capes, with masks and gloves of black leather, stepped into view. The Ulathi.

"We have found a child," said the first.

"He is pure of heart," added the second.

"This child is an empty vessel waiting to be filled," said the third.

They all intoned, "We have found a child who will be made your heir, your blood."

The gong sounded. Gilthanas swung the door open and passed within. The door closed.