Free Black Sun Rising by C.S. Friedman

skill, Ciani’s vision ... the barriers that kept him human. Merely human.
    Every few earthquakes some tormented soul took that chance, and added his dying scream to the siren’s din. Ciani couldn’t understand why—but Senzei could, all too well. He understood the hunger that consumed such people, the need that coursed through them like blood, until every living cell was saturated with it. Desire. For the one thing on Erna that Senzei might never have. The one precious thing that Nature had denied him.
    In the other room another bit of crystal fell, and shattered noisily against the floor.
    He wept.

    Not until the sunlight was wholly gone and the worst of the tremors had subsided—the immediate tremors, at any rate—did the stranger come up out of his subterranean shelter. The fae still vibrated with tectonic echoes; it was the work of mere moments to read them, determine their origin, and speculate upon the implications.
    The Forest will shake, he decided. Soon. Too big a seismic gap there to ignore. And the rakhlands.... But there was no way to know that, for sure. No news had come out of the rakhlands for generations, of earthquakes or lack of them—or anything else, for that matter. He could do no more then speculate that the plate boundaries there would be stressed past endurance ... but he had speculated that many times before, with no way of ever confirming his hypothesis. In a world where Nature’s law was not absolute, but rather reactive, one could never be certain.
    Then he squatted down close to the earth and touched one gloved finger to its surface. Watching the earth-fae as it flowed about that obstacle, tasting its tenor through the contact.
    The current had changed.
    Impossible.
    For a moment he simply watched it, aware that he might have erred. Then he sat back on his heels and looked off into the distance, watching the flow of his taint upon the current. And yes, it was different. A minute change, but it was noticeable.
    He watched it for a moment more, then corrected himself: Improbable. But true. Any bit of the fae contaminated by his person should have scurried off toward the Forest, subject to that whirlpool of malignant power. It took effort for him not to travel there himself, not to unconsciously prefer that direction every time he made a decision to move. That the taint of his personal malevolence was being channeled elsewhere meant that some new factor was involved. A Working or a being—more likely the latter—headed in this direction. Focused upon Jaggonath in both its malevolence and its hunger.
    It would have to be very focused, to come here against the current. And nasty as hell, to have the effect it did.
    Nastier than the Hunter, perhaps?
    The stranger laughed, softly.

    If not for the siren— the damned warning the damned , he thought—Jaggonath’s Patriarch might never have known there was an earthquake. That, and the sloshing of tee over the side of his cup. He picked up the delicate porcelain piece and sipped it thoughtfully. While the siren screamed. And some damned fool of a sorceror screamed, too—but that served him right. There was no free ride in this world, least of all with the fae. It was time they learned that, all of them.
    It occurred to him briefly that he should have warned his visitor about that particular danger. Coming from the westlands, where quakes were less frequent and far less severe, he might not be aware of it. Might even try to harness that surging flow, to bend it to his sorcerous will.
    Then there would be justice , he mused. And I would be free of this burden. But for how long? They would just send someone else. And I would have to start all over again.
    He put his cup down carefully, watched for a moment to see that it didn’t slide, and then walked to the window. The floor trembled beneath his feet, and a low rumbling sound filled the air, but except for that there was little evidence of any disturbance. There never was, in Jaggonath’s