Standing with her on the rooftop of the Moon Tower, I looked out to the mound that had taken root in the center of Etalpalli. I thought it a strange, ugly lump, like a boil amid the green of our beautiful demesne. But I did not fear it then. I did not know. I was too young.
But I quickly learned.
The old scrubber was not permitted in the family wing of Gaheris Castle, but none was awake in the dead of night to shoo him away. So, on withered hands and bony knees, he scrubbed and shined each paving stone with the care a jeweler might take over a diamond. He had no candle but worked entirely by the light of the blue star shining through a narrow window.
An icy breath wafted beneath a certain door. The scrubber felt it and sat up slowly on his heels, every joint and bone creaking. He moistened his shriveled lips, which froze immediately after. Then he crawled closer to the door and put his ear against it. Closing his eyes, he listened.
He said, “Ah! There it is again.”
In the chamber beyond the door, he heard the beat of horses’ hooves.
Alistair rides in glorious hunt.
Out here, flying over the grounds of Gaheris beside the shining, twisting rush of River Hanna, the full wildness of spring bursting on every side, he is free. Here, the sun chases away all darkness, and he himself chases his prey. His dogs—sight hounds, scent hounds, and massive curs—streak before him, their voices raised in bloodthirsty chorus, singing out death warnings to the wolf.
This is what it means to be Master of Gaheris. To protect his people and their flocks. Danger sets upon the village, and who would ride out and subdue it? None other than the lord of the castle.
Flanked by his uncle’s huntsmen, Alistair urges his horse onward, pursuing the trail of the lone wolf deeper into the wilds of Gaheris’s estates, beyond the tilled fields and hamlets. His heart beats with a certainty that he never feels within the confines of the castle itself. He will be lord of this house; he will be protector.
And when the earls of the North Country offer Gaheris the crown, as surely they must, he will be king. He will hunt down the North Country’s oppressors and put them to the blade even as he hunts down this wolf!
The sun goes black.
It does not vanish behind a cloud, nor even sink beneath the horizon. It simply blackens as completely as a blown candle.
Alistair stands in darkness. He feels it crawling up his skin, beneath his clothing, sliding down over his ramming heart. Where is his horse? Where are his dogs? Where are his uncle’s huntsmen?
All gone. All devoured in the black.
He tries to take a step but cannot see whether or not he has succeeded. He tries another, then another.
A white light flickers in the distance. And he sees the shadowy silhouette of the child.
He screams.
The scrubber drew back from the door, putting a finger in his ear as though he could rub out the ringing sound of Alistair’s scream. With a shiver, he turned around and went back to his work. Bending to the stone, he blew away invisible dirt. Then, dipping his soiled cloth in a bucket of soiled water, he wetted down the floor.
He muttered to no apparent listener, “His night terrors are getting worse.”
Through the window above, the blue star winked twice.
“The time is near; that’s what it means,” the scrubber said in answer to a question no one heard spoken. Then he whispered, softly:
“Starlight, star bright, guide her footsteps through the night . . .”
The simple children’s rhyme rolled from his tongue and danced its way down the dark, sleep-filled corridors of Gaheris Castle.
For possibly the hundredth time that hour, Alistair rubbed his eyes and watched again as the words on the page before him swam slowly back into focus. He could hear the Chronicler’s voice droning in lecture. He knew he should be paying at least cursory attention to whatever was being said.
But his gaze kept sliding to the illumination on the opposite page of the day’s selected reading. An unskilled artist’s portrayal of Sir Akilun standing with the Asha lantern in his outstretched arm.
On the brink of a bottomless chasm.
“And you have heard not a single word I have said for the last quarter of an hour.” The Chronicler snapped shut the book he had been reading. He inspected the young lord slouched over the table. There was nothing lordly in Alistair’s bearing or demeanor that morning. His hair stood up in wild tufts as though he’d made no attempt to tame it, and his clothes, though finely made and trimmed in fur, were mismatched and buckled in odd places.
Worst of all was his face. It was so full of dumb dullness, it made the Chronicler want to slap him.
The Chronicler crossed the room and stood at Alistair’s elbow. And still Alistair stared at the page before him, his eyes glazed over without a notion of what he was meant to be reading. “My lord?” said the Chronicler, and again more loudly, “My lord?”