“I think there’s no need for this,” she said.

Every human eye was on Aeglyss. They stared at this ghastly apparition in horrified fascination. None of them would have seen Tyn before. Only na’kyrim ever entered the Dreamer’s chamber. The figure now before them must appear to be a corpse, dead and on the verge of decay yet still, impossibly, moving.

“I am sorry for the disturbance, Captain,” Cerys said, with an apologetic nod of the head. “We need not trouble you or your men, I think. This is a problem we can deal with ourselves.”

Herraic looked both suspicious and relieved. He was as transfixed by the sight of Aeglyss as any of his warriors, but managed to tear his gaze away to concentrate on Cerys for at least a moment or two.

“Bannain said-”

“Yes,” Cerys interrupted him. “We thought we might need your assistance, but it seems… perhaps we were mistaken. It would be best if we took ourselves back to our own chambers. I will speak to you later, if I may.”

Herraic did not seem convinced, but he and his men withdrew.

“Feeble little allies you have here to protect you,” Aeglyss scoffed as the sound of footsteps receded down the corridor. “Should you ever meet them, you’d find mine rather more impressive.”

“No doubt,” Cerys muttered. Alian, still prostrate, was waking. Amonyn crouched over her, hands cradling her head. Faint though it was, Cerys could feel the shifting pattern in the Shared as he wove what comfort he could for Alian out of it. To her consternation, Aeglyss clearly caught the same scent, for he stared at Amonyn.

“I’ll make no bargains with you,” she said hurriedly, eager to distract his attention. “But I’ll speak with you further, if that’s what you wish. Our rooms, our libraries, are not in this part of Highfast. Will you come with us?”

“Very well.”

Bannain and Mon Dyvain escorted him out, keeping him at more than an arm’s length of distance. Cerys followed, but paused to kneel at Amonyn’s side and whisper to him:

“How is Alian?”

“She will recover soon enough. His strength – his weight – took us all by surprise.”

“I will talk to him; do what I can to persuade him to leave.”

“Whatever happens, we cannot offer him any aid,” Amonyn murmured. “His presence is as dark, as deranged, as anything I’ve ever felt.”

“I know. He could… this might end badly. Once Alian is on her feet, go to Herraic. Tell him as much, or as little, as you see fit, but make sure he understands that there is something very dangerous inside Highfast now. And that, despite anything I might have said, we might need his swords.”

Cerys had descended into the rock of Highfast many times, over many years. It was the only place that had ever felt like a home to her, the only place to which she had ever belonged. Its sounds, the cool stability of its stone, the deep, old quality of its air: all these things had, for as long as she could remember, been comforting companions. Now, following Aeglyss and the others down, everything seemed to be imbued with foreboding. The distant hum of the mountain breezes sounded threatening; the air stirred with uneasy eddies. Her home had been rendered inhospitable to her by this uninvited guest.

She felt strangely empty, though. Powerless, as if she was standing in the path of a great rockfall and could do nothing but remain, staring up at the boulders rushing towards her. It seemed very cruel to her, that she should have the misfortune to be the Elect of Highfast in such times.

They put Aeglyss into a small antechamber adjoining one of the disused dormitories. It was dank and cobwebbed, but he did not seem to notice. He sat at the old, split table there and waited. Cerys sent the others away. She was afraid of what might happen, even though she had no clear idea of it.

“Do you know this man whose body you have stolen?” she asked Aeglyss once they were alone. “His name is Tyn. He was born near the Kyresource Lakes. His mother took him to Kilvale when he was only a few weeks old. She protected him for a time, but she died when he was young, and he…”

“Enough!” The anger – and pain, perhaps – in that word shook Cerys.

“Enough,” Aeglyss said again, quietly this time. He rested his elbows on the table, lowered his head to his hands. “Talk, talk. You think you can solve everything, trick anyone, with talk. Is that all you do here? I was told you had books here, and learning; that you were great na’kyrim, with great understanding of the Shared. Inurian came from here, did he not?”

“He did,” breathed Cerys. She felt as if she stood upon fragile ice that cracked under her feet, a torrent roaring beneath it. She wanted to retreat, but did not know which way to turn. Aeglyss lifted his head once more. There was a vicious, contemptuous smirk on his haggard face.

“You want to ask me about Inurian,” he growled.

She shook her head, just once, in denial. She did not trust herself to speak.

“Oh, but you do. I can see it in you. You loved him. Why? What was so deserving about him? He was not remarkable. Just another poor halfbreed like you. Like me. Tell me what he did to earn such affection.”

Again Cerys shook her head and bit her lip. But she could feel his will upon her now, prising open her mouth, breaking down whatever wall she might try to raise in her mind.

“Tell me!” he insisted.

“He had a good heart,” she gasped. “His instinct was always to listen, to understand, to be patient. He knew more than most of us ever can about other people, and yet still he liked them. Loved them. That is what he did to earn affection.”

Tyn’s face twisted, distorted by whatever powerful emotions tormented Aeglyss. Cerys could hear his confusion, his hurt, ringing in her ears. There’s a child in there somewhere, she thought.

“A good heart,” Aeglyss mimicked her. “A good heart. I didn’t find it so. Not at all. I didn’t find it so. He’d have nothing to do with me, fool that he was. And yes, I killed him. That’s what you want to know, isn’t it? I killed him. I put a spear through him.”

To her numb astonishment, Cerys saw that he was weeping. Tiny tears tracked down Tyn’s pale, sunken cheeks. His lips trembled. His hands were clenched into fists.

“I killed him.” His grief was such a potent thing, so limitless and invasive, that Cerys found her own eyes moistening, her own throat tightening. The borders of her sense of self were overrun.

“I still hear his voice, though, sometimes,” Aeglyss groaned. “I feel him, at my shoulder, watching. How can that be? Tell me that.”

“The Shared remembers many things. All things. It is not Inurian you sense, but the memory of him. The memories of him that all those who still live carry with them; the echo of the pattern he himself made in the Shared before he… before you killed him.”

Cerys could not tell how much of what she felt was her own grief, her own anger, and how much belonged to Aeglyss. She – all of them here in Highfast – had concluded some time ago that this man had played a part in Inurian’s death. For that, she despised him. Yet she pitied him too. Or perhaps she was participating in his own corrosive self-pity.

“There’s so much I don’t know,” he said. “He could have helped me, guided me. I think… sometimes I feel like I am losing myself. Do you understand?” He flicked a needful glance at her. “Even now, I am here, in this shell, and I do not fully understand how I came to be here. My body lies somewhere back in Glasbridge, and I can see it, sometimes, through her eyes. Through Wain. I… Oh, I have done a terrible thing to her. Terrible, but beautiful.

“I can’t hold on to myself. It’s all too much. And the Anain. I hear them, feel them, circling about: great beasts in the darkness. I know they’re there, but I can’t see them, can’t drive them off. They tried to kill me, you know. To silence my thoughts, tear me apart. But I turned them back. I am stronger than they knew. But, please… please help me. You must.”