house, pondering for just a moment how much things could change in seventeen years.
THE CELEBRATION WOUND gradually down, leaving all of Denathere deliciously exhausted.
The westerly sun shed the last rays of the day upon the lingering vestiges of barely controlled chaos. Streamers of bright cloth littered the roads, as though a rainbow had shattered above the city, strewing shards carelessly about. Children, their exuberance not quite worn down by a full week of freedom and too much sugar, ran around madly, laughing happily or shouting at one another, determined to experience the absolute maximum of fun before their parents called them home for supper and bed. Even a few adults still danced in the streets, one hand clenched about a flagon of ale or mead or wine, the other clenched about the waist or wristâor, in a few of the darker alleys, other partsâof a second like-minded citizen. Vendors shouted hoarsely to passersby, trying doggedly for one final holiday sale.
But most of the city residents, worn out from a full week of revels, were snug in their beds, beginning the painful recovery that all too often follows excessive jubilation.
At the edge of town, Guild-hired mercenaries cranked the handles of a huge wooden wheel. Chains clanked, gears rotated, wood creaked, and the gates of the city ponderously slammed shut. The sound, a solitary clap of thunder, rolled across the city. Drunk men sobered slightly at the sound, and the happiest citizens shivered briefly, for it was a palpable reminder of what they were celebratingâwhat they had so very nearly lost.
Outside those walls, atop the same small rise on which the regentâs tent rested so long ago, a figure stood, watching the cityâs lights wink out one by one. The people of Denathere would sleep soundly this night, worn out from celebrating their liberation from the Terror of the East, safely ensconced behind their walls. And impressive walls they were, higher and thicker than those that had fallen before Rebaineâs assault, topped by guard towers equipped with catapults and ballistae. Even given Denathereâs poor position, the new walls alone made the prospect of taking the city a daunting one.
Or they would have, had their enemy not already waltzed in unchallenged, bearing food and drink and gifts for the celebration.
Cold, dead eyes narrowed as a nasty grin crept its way across his face. Even with its violent history, Denathere remained a city of naïve, complacent people.
It was astounding how little had changed in the seventeen years since heâd been betrayed and abandoned within those walls.
âReport, Valescienn.â The voice was hollow, with the faintest of echoes.
Well
, Valescienn amended slightly, turning slowly around,
there
have
been a
few
changes â¦
Valescienn himself had aged little. His hair was still a moonlight blond, his ice-blue eyes still utterly devoid of anything resembling humanity, and the same spiked ball-and-chain still hung at his side. There were a few more circles beneath those eyes, and a second scarâacross the right side of his foreheadâjoined the one heâd sported for years. Otherwise, he showed little indication that nearly two decades had come and gone since his last visit.
The master he faced now, however, was most certainly not Corvis Rebaine.
He was shorter than the Terror of the East, for one; shorter, in fact, than many of his own soldiers, standing several inches below six feet. A flowing black tunic covered his arms, emerging from beneath a set of bracers and cuirass that appeared, bizarre as it seemed, to be made of dark reflective stone. His black leggings and leather boots were similarly guarded by greaves of the same material. Spidery runes were etched in silver into the onyx-like substance. Numerous ringsâall of silver, save for one of a simple pewter, with an emerald stone-adorned his fingers, slid on over thin lambskin gloves.
The entire