The Blood King

THE BLOOD KING

Book Two of the
CHRONICLES OF THE NECROMANCER

GAIL Z. MARTIN

By the same author

THE SUMMONER

Book One of the Chronicles of the Necromancer

SOLARIS

First published 2008 by Solaris

an imprint of BL Publishing

Games Workshop Ltd, Willow Road

Nottingham, NG7 2WS

UK

www.solarisbooks.cojn

ISBN-13: 978 1 84416 531 5 ISBN-10: 1 84416 531 0

Copyright © Gail Z. Martin 2008

Map by Kirk Caldwell

The right of the author to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owners.

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

A CTP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Designed & typeset by BL Publishing Printed in the UK by CPI Bookmarque, Croydon, CR0 4TD

For everyone who believed in my dreams and helped to make them happen.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This book was made possible by the loving indul-gence of my family, who were used to sharing me with Tris and now has been kind enough to share more of my time with readers and the obligations of publishing. To my husband Larry, a wonderful first editor and muse. To my daughters Kyrie and Chandler, who read rough drafts and told their friends about the books. And to my son Cody, for being patient while I write! Thanks also to the crew at Solaris—Mark, Christian, George, Vincent, and Caroline. And of course, for my agent Ethan, who got the ball rolling.

Contents

Cover

Map

Story So Far

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Twenty-three

Chapter Three

Chapter Twenty-four

Chapter Four

Chapter Twenty-five

Chapter Five

Chapter Twenty-six

Chapter Six

Chapter Twenty-seven

Chapter Seven

Chapter Twenty-eight

Chapter Eight

Chapter Twenty-nine

Chapter Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Ten

Chapter Thirty-one

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Thirty-two

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirty-three

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Thirty-four

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Thirty-five

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Thirty-six

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Thirty-seven

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Thirty-eight

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Thirty-nine

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Fourty

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IT SHOULD HAVE been an evening of feasting and court merriment. But on the night of the Yeast of the Departed, nineteen year-old Prince Martris Drayke’s life is changed forever when his half-brother, fared, kills their father and seizes the throne. Aided by his dark mage, Foor Arontala, fared murders the royal family—all except Martris, who barely escapes with the help of a handful of friends.

Tris is now an outlaw, hunted by fared’s assassins. As danger and grief push Tris to his limits, he dis-covers that he is the mage-heir of his sorcerer grandmother Bava K’aa, a powerful sorceress whose spirit magic made her a Summoner, able to intercede among the living, dead, and undead. In a world where ghosts walk freely and where the undead vayash moru walk the night, this wild and powerful magic may be the advantage Tris needs to win back the throne—if he can keep his newfound power from destroying him first.

Tris flees the palace Shekerishet with three good friends: Carroway, a master bard; Ban Soterius, captain of the king’s guard; and Tov Harrtuck, a loyal officer.

Desperate to find sanctuary in one of the neighboring kingdoms, the four are pursued by bounty hunters hired by fared to kill Tris. Harrtuck leads them to Jonmarc Vahanian, a mercenary and smuggler who can guide them through the danger-ous mountain passes to reach sanctuary in Principality. Taking cover with a traveling caravan, they meet the healer Carina and her brother Cam, who are on their own quest to find a way to heal King Donelan of Isencroft from a mage-sent illness.

When slavers sent by fared destroy the caravan seeking Tris and his friends, Cam, Soterius and Harrtuck are presumed dead. Only Tris’s half-harnessed power is able to save him in the Ruune Videya forest, where malicious ghosts take their long-overdue revenge. Tris and his friends take with them one of the slaver’s captives, a young girl named Berry, who helped them escape. Two of the undead vayash mora, Gabriel and Mikhail, join the group along the way.

On the road, Tris meets Kiara, daughter of King Donelan of Isencroft, who has gone on a dangerous coming-of-age Journey to evade a long-ago arranged betrothal to fared of Margolan. Kiara believes that Arontala is behind the wasting spell that is killing her father. She pledges herself to Tris’s cause.

Hounded by the king’s troops, Tris and his friends find sanctu-ary at the legendary Library at Westmarch. The Library is a repository of ancient magical lore run by

the eccentric Keeper Royster. At Westmarch, Tris’s training begins with the Sisterhood, a reclusive group of powerful sorceresses.

Tris learns from the Sisterhood that Arontala has stolen the orb in which Bava K’aa once trapped the soul of the Obsidian King, a dark and powerful Summoner who nearly destroyed the Winter Kingdoms fifty years ago during the cataclysmic Mage Wars. Arontala plans to free the spirit of the Obsidian King on the night of the summer sol-stice—the Hawthorn Moon—and permit it to possess him, making that ancient evil incarnate and assuring fared’s power over Margolan and the entire realm of the Winter Kingdoms.

In spite of the danger, Tris and Kiara fall in love. When they leave the safety of Westmarch so that Tris can continue his mage training ivith the Sisterhood, they are ambushed by Margolan assas-sins. Fighting their way free from one ambush, they are captured by the guards of King Staden of Principality. Expecting to be sent back to fared in chains, Tris and the others discover that their cap-ture was Staden’s way of bringing them safely to his court, where Soterius and Harrtuck have won the king’s support. Berry, Staden’s daughter Berwyn, urged her father to support Tris’s quest. Now, as the last month of the year approaches, Tris finds him-self in exile, struggling to master powerful spirit magic that has the potential to destroy him. Tris must find a way to take back the throne from fared and defeat Arontala in order to free Margolan and keep the dark magic of the Obsidian King from ris-ing again.

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MARTRIS DRAYKE, MARGOLAN’S exiled prince, looked up sharply as the door to the war room swung open and King Staden of Principality strode into the council chamber.

“Today, we talk of war,” Staden said as those assembled rose in deference. With him were a stiff-stanced man whose military bearing made plain his vocation, and another nervous man whose eyes constantly scanned the room.

“I gave you my word that you’d have access to my best strategists, Prince Drayke,” Staden said proudly. “Here they are. This,” he pointed toward the tall man who, even at rest, stood at attention, “is General Darrath, and this,” he gestured toward his other com-panion, “is my chief rat catcher, Hant. If a successful campaign can be planned, they can do it.”

Tris Drayke bowed in acknowledgement. “Thank you, Your Majesty,” Tris replied. “I’m in your debt.” Only a day had passed since Tris and his companions had been brought to Staden’s palace. They had been captured by the king’s guards at the border as they fled an ambush by assassins sent from Jared of Margolan. At the time, with their weapons confiscated and transported under heavy guard, Tris was sure they would be turned over to Jared, like bargaining chips in a high-stakes game of contre dice. Instead, Staden welcomed them as heroes, grateful for the return of his daughter, Berry. The past evening was spent at a banquet celebrating the princess’s safe return and honoring Tris and his friends. They were richly rewarded with gold and gems, and Jonmarc Vahanian was named Lord of Dark Haven for his heroism. The reward money would be enough to help Tris raise an army of mer-cenaries to take back the throne.

Undeterred by Jared’s threats, Staden openly welcomed Tris and his companions. And so Tris found himself seated at the table with Principality’s leading military strategists, beginning the task of waging war to free Margolan from Jared’s rule.

“Nonsense,” Staden boomed. “Let’s not get into that again. I’ll have your meals sent to you. Take as long as you like. I’ve got work to do elsewhere,” he bustled, heading for the massive wooden doors. “Do join me for supper,” he invited over his shoul-der as he left, pulling the door closed with a bang behind him.

“So you are Martris Drayke?” Darrath said in a voice rough enough to sand wood. “I am,” Tris replied.

“Come closer, boy.” Darrath beckoned with a long finger. “I want to see you.”

Tris stepped closer, but the general beckoned once more. “Close enough to look in your eyes. I want to know what you’re made of.”

Tris stood a head taller than the sharp-featured general. Darrath regarded Tris coldly through eyes that seemed as if they could see down to his bones, and for a long, uncomfortable moment, Darrath’s eyes met his. Tris felt as if he were being measured. “You realize,” General Darrath said finally, “that if we support you, Principality will be at war with your homeland.”

“I realize that.”

“And you realize,” Darrath continued, “that many men will die to put you on Margolan’s throne. Some might say that’s none of our affair.”

“It’s already Principality’s affair,” Tris replied. “Jared sent his troops across your borders to hunt down Kiara, persecute the Sisterhood, and look for me. He bargained with slavers who kidnapped your princess, and who took prisoners a day’s ride from the Principality border. Margolan refugees crowd your borders.

What Arontala hasn’t taken already, he’ll take once The Hawthorn Moon is past. Margolan’s troubles are already Principality’s con-cern.”

Darrath regarded him silently for a moment, then nodded. “Well said, Prince Drayke. Yet you ask an enormous favor. I wonder: do you have the mettle to stand against King Jared and his dark mage? You’re barely twenty summers old.”

“I’m not a boy,” Tris replied. “I’m a mage— and a Summoner. And by the will of the Lady, I’ll rid Margolan of Jared and his sorcerer or die try-ing.”

Darrath nodded once more. “You’re willing to give your life. Are you willing to offer up your friends’ lives too?”

“I’d give my life willingly to save theirs,” Tris replied. “I haven’t asked them to go with me. They have reasons of their own to wish Margolan free of its darkness. It’s their choice.”

“Tris speaks for all of us,” Kiara Sharsequin put in. The Isencroft princess, dressed as she had been on the road in the tunic and trews of a soldier, was unmistakably a warrior in her own right. “He hasn’t asked us to follow him. But none of us can let Foor Arontala gain the power of the Obsidian King.” From beside her, Jae, her hunting gyregon, hissed. Tris exchanged glances with his compan-ions. Jonmarc Vahanian, a fighter whose escapades—and lawbreaking—were legend. Ban Soterius, former captain of the late King Bricen’s guard. Tov Harrtuck, Bricen’s armsmaster. Carroway the bard, who together with Soterius and Harrtuck spirited Tris out of Margolan after Jared’s coup. Carina Jesthrata, sworn to Tris’s cause to break Arontala’s mage-born curse on King Donelan of Isencroft. Their faces and their murmured assent made their solidarity clear. They were unlikely rebels, each brought into the quest for their own reasons, and now, bound by shared danger and fierce friendship, they were preparing to wage war against Jared the Usurper to destroy the Obsidian King.

Darrath remained silent for a moment, as if con-sidering Kiara’s words. “Very well,” he said finally, motioning them to sit. “Let’s get to it.”

EVENING FOUND THEM still so deeply engrossed in their discussion that Staden joined them, and bade the servant fetch them dinner. Mikhail joined them at sundown.

“I trust our kitchen was well-stocked with fresh deer’s blood?” Staden asked Mikhail.

Enough faint color tempered Mikhail’s usual pal-lor to indicate that the vayash moru had recently fed. “Your cook has been most generous. I dined very well.”

Although his face and form were that of a young man in his early twenties, Mikhail, one of the undead, had been liegeman to Tris’s ancestor, King Hotten, two hundred years before. Now, Mikhail pledged his allegiance to the effort to unseat Jared Drayke.

By the evening bells, the group had reviewed the qualifications of every mercenary company in Principality. Famous for the paid companies that operated within its borders, Principality more than compensated for its own relatively small army. Small but wealthy, Principality’s northern gold mines were known for their rich veins. A spoil of war in conflicts among Margolan, Eastmark and Dhasson over generations, Principality seized its independence three hundred years before, when the squabbles of the major powers distracted them as a local warlord rose to power.