CHAPTER 1

Evening fell with a whisper. The day's thick-falling snow had abated with the failing light and now, as the sky turned deepest blue, the air was clear and still. Venn felt the silence of the forest stretch away in every direction, disturbed only by his own laboured breath and heavy footsteps. The bite of the chill night air was savage and he urged himself on, knowing he had to reach the clearing before the cold took him. Too many travellers misjudged their journeys and succumbed. The Vukotic could keep their Saljin Man; winter was a daemon all on its own in these parts.

At last he reached the clearing and, against all common sense, stopped at its edge staring dumbly forward. It had been years since he had last been here. The Land itself seemed to catch its breath, as if waiting for the tremors his return would bring. At last he stepped forward into the clearing, the ruin of his people hidden in his shadow.

He walked hesitantly, somewhat humbled by the grand, silent scene. Above him pink wisps of cloud catching the last of the light provided an unearthly backdrop for the place he had never expected to see again. The only sounds were his boots crunching through the snow and the occasional creak and groan of laden branches in the forest behind. He fumbled at his bearskin, trying to tug it tighter around his shoulders, but the weight of his shadow made it hard and after two attempts he gave up, leaving it open at his throat. His goal was visible now, and that was all that mattered.

The entrance to the cavern was only a hundred paces off, crowned by snow-burdened dwarf pines that covered much of these crumpled mountains. It abutted a long slow rise in the ground that continued for miles into the distance and formed one of the two crooked 'legs' of what was called Old Man Mountain. There was a shrine to a God no one remembered, derelict, yet still imposing, near the top. Venn remembered visiting it once, out of youthful curiosity. The God, whatever his name was, had been stooped and aged; like the bare mountain that served as his memorial. He had been no match for Ushull when the reckoning came.

Venn paused halfway to the entrance and looked back over the expanse of pine studded by enormous cloud-oaks like nails driven part-way into the slopes, but before he could dwell on his childhood love of this view Jackdaw's wheezing broke the spell. Shaking his head, Venn turned away. He had been spared the sight of Jackdaw's twitching tattoos and scowling face that final day at least, as well as the man's incessant chatter, and for that much, Venn was glad. Once the former priest had cast the spell to bind himself within Venn's own shadow, he had learned not to waste his strength on complaints.

The cavern entrance up ahead was unchanged since he had first marched out into the Land, his swords strapped proudly to his back and his white mask hiding the man underneath. Free-standing brass braziers on either side of the enlarged cleft cast a weak light over the darkened interior and the sap of fresh spitting pine cones mingled with incense in the evening air. Each brazier stood atop an octagonal stem thicker than a man's waist, high enough that some priests had to stand on tiptoe to see over the battered edge.

They were centuries old and had suffered during those years. Venn remembered his disappointment when he had learnt the truth about the faint markings that covered the braziers. He had thought them incantations in a secret language, when instead they were only scratches, the effect of weather and time, of careless priests and gales tipping them onto the stony ground. His father had huffed and frowned at his imagination where others would have laughed.

Was that the first step on this path? he wondered. That first loss of wonder: was that the day I saw my father as something other than an otherworldly servant of the Gods? Where once I beheld priestly robes and a half-mask of obsidian shards, I found just a tired man with thinning hair and a piercing wheeze when he slept.

'Hey-! Hey, you!'

Venn stopped walking. He didn't turn, knowing the speaker would have to walk into his line of sight. The speaker turned out to be a round-faced priest, his arms laden with logs. In his ear Venn heard an intake of breath from Jackdaw. He was invisible and near-incorporeal, at least as long as he stayed in Venn's lee, and yet Jackdaw remained a coward.

Venn recognised the priest despite the smooth black porcelain that hid half his face. They were of a similar age and from the same clan, which had forced them to be something approximating friends as children. Corerr was his name, a foolish, fat little boy who'd grown up into a bewildered junior priest who'd never even lost his puppy-fat in the process, a man still sent to fetch the wood for the fires in the cave, though doubtless there were younger priests to do that tiresome duty.

'Who are you? Why are you here?' Corerr called as he trotted forward to place himself between Venn and the cave entrance. Under the bearskin Venn's dyed-black clothes were just visible, clearly marking him as not belonging to any of the clans.

Venn didn't respond, preferring to wait for a grander audience. One face had already appeared at the cave entrance, his lined cheeks and lank, wispy hair illuminated by the weak light. Corerr took another step forward, peering anxiously into the gloom of Venn's snow-capped hood. In the twilight he would be able to make out that Venn wore no mask, yet he had a blood-red teardrop falling from his right eye, the same teardrop that Harlequin masks bore.

Venn kept his eyes on the cave entrance, knowing Corerr wouldn't have the courage to do anything more than look. At last another face appeared, this time that of a woman. She loomed over the first by at least half a head. Venn saw her mouth move. She was speaking softly to her companion, while never taking her eyes off Venn. He took that as his cue to abruptly move again, causing Corerr to yelp in alarm and almost fall over backwards. As Venn closed on the cave mouth he recognised the woman with eyes like polished cairngorm. Even after the long years of his absence she retained the bearing of a warrior-queen.

'Venn ab Teier? Merciful Gods, is that really you?' Corerr twittered in sudden shock and scrambled to walk alongside Venn. 'Your face, your clothes – where have you been? What happened to you?'

Venn walked forward, careful to let the man's words drift over him without reacting. The other priests hadn't moved or spoken; the man was positioned slightly in the lee of one brazier, as though ready to hide behind it, and the priestess stood with hands entwined

at her breast, falling naturally into the conventions of piety learned decades before. Her hair was greying and crow's feet marked the corner of her eye, but for all that she looked a younger woman, one whose heart hadn't been broken by this wilderness.

Her half-mask was covered in obsidian shards, as his father's had been, but hers, crucially, also lacked the tear-trails of moonstone signifying high rank. He held his breath and focused directly on her right eye, letting the glazed look fall away for the barest moment. He saw her reaction, though it was so slight he doubted she was even aware of it – only someone looking for it would have seen that flicker in the eye, but to a follower of Azaer it was enough.

Ambition in a place such as this… you must hate them as much as I do.

After a moment, the priestess stepped to one side and offered Venn the path into the cavern. He shuffled forward, eyes vague as he ignored the icons and prayers painted on the rough stone walls either side of the passage and started on the downward slope, breathing in the incense-laced air of his boyhood.

He continued in silence, feeling as if he were being towed by some unseen rope. So focused was he on the image he was presenting that he found himself jerking to a halt at the far end of the tunnel as it suddenly opened out into an immense space. His eyes were still glazed over, but in his peripheral vision he spotted movement in the dim light of the cavern. He listened to the priestess catching up to him. It wouldn't do to let his herald fall behind. Herald: the word reminded him of Rojak's rasping, plague-ravaged voice and that final whispered commandment of twilight's herald: 'Give them a king.'