Read The High Lord for Free Online Page A

following entries were haphazard, often skipping several days. Then came a short entry, underlined several times.
    I know what I have found! These are the missing records!
    He named some of the books, but Sonea did not recognize any of them. These missing volumes were “full of forbidden knowledge” and Coren was reluctant to describe their contents. After a gap of several weeks there was a long entry describing an experiment, the conclusion of which read:
    At last I have succeeded! It has taken so long. I feel both triumph and the fear I should have felt before. I’m not sure why this is. While I was failing to discover the ways to use this power I was still somehow uncorrupted. Now, I cannot truly deny that I have ever used black magic. I have broken my vow. I hadn’t realized how ill that would feel.
    Yet it did not deter him. Sonea found herself struggling to understand why this young man continued to do something that he clearly saw was wrong. He seemed unable to stop, driven forward to whatever end this discovery was leading him to, even if it be the discovery of his crime.
    But it led to something else…
    All who know me know my love of stone. It is the beautiful flesh of the earth. It has cracks and creases like skin, it has veins and pores. It can be hard, soft, brittle or flexible. When the earth spills forth its molten core, it is as red as blood.
    After learning of the black magics, I expected to be able to place my hands on stone and feel a tremendous store of life energy within, but I was disappointed. I felt nothing; less than the tingling of water. I wanted it to be full of life. That’s when it happened. Like a healer trying to will a dying man back to health, I started to infuse energy into the stone. I willed it to live. Then a remarkable thing began to happen.
    Sonea gripped the little book tightly, unable to take her eyes from the lines of text. This was the discovery that made Coren famous, and influenced Guild architecture for centuries to come. It was said to be the greatest development in magical knowledge for centuries. Though what he had done was not actually black magic, the forbidden arts had led to the discovery.
    Sonea closed her eyes and shook her head. Lord Larkin, the architecture teacher, would give all his wealth for this diary, but he would be devastated if he learned the truth about his idol. She sighed, looked down at the pages and continued to read.

3
Old Friends, New Allies
    Cery signed the letter with a flourish, then regarded his work with satisfaction. His writing was neat and elegant. The paper was quality, and the ink dark and black. Despite the slang terms throughout—he had requested that Serin teach him to read and write, not make him sound like a member of one of the Houses—and the fact that it was a request for the execution of a man who had cheated him and fled to the Southside, it was a fine, well-written letter.
    He smiled as he remembered asking Faren, the Thief who had hidden Sonea from the Guild, if he could “borrow” Faren’s scribe for a while. From Faren’s mixed expression of reluctance and gratitude, Cery knew that the Thief would have refused if he hadn’t desperately needed the boost to his position that the arrangement would bring.
    Faren’s hold on his status as Thief had been precarious for the first year after he had turned Sonea over to the Guild. A Thief’s ability to do business relied on a network of people willing to work for him. While some worked for money, most preferred to “help out” and be paid back in kind later. Favors were the second currency of the underworld.
    Faren had used a lot of the favors owed to him while keeping Sonea out of the Guild’s hands, but that should not have held him back for long. People knew he had made a deal with Sonea to hide her from the Guild in exchange for her using her magic for him—a deal he had broken. The other Thieves, worried by the Guild’s warnings that her powers would grow dangerous