Free A Blackbird In Silver (Book 1) by Freda Warrington Page A

find an answer.’
    In a tone of cold rage, his mother replied, ‘Lie low? That is not a Gorethrian of the royal house I hear speaking. Meshurek shall be brought to justice, and I, as Empress and as your mother, command you to help me. Do you understand? I am a woman whose right arm has been severed, but my left can still hold a sword.’
    ‘Mother, Orkesh,’ Ashurek said as calmly as he could, ‘please leave. I will deal with Meshurek myself. For my sake, you must keep yourselves safe.’
    ‘Very well,’ Melkish said, after some argument, ‘but if you fail... you must not fail. I could not bear to lose you too. What would become of Gorethria then?’
    He kissed them and they left as quietly as they had come. Fired by rage – both at Meshurek and at himself – he felt dangerous, even invincible. He would force Meshurek to see sense, banish the demon, rule sensibly. It was the least Meshurek could do to atone for his father’s murder.
    He found Meshurek in a side room of the darkened library. ‘My brother,’ he began softly, ‘I have come to tell you that your foolishness has gone too far. It must end. I know that you murdered our father, with the help of a demon – or most likely at its instigation.’ Meshurek looked up and smiled blandly, without surprise or defensiveness but with the faintest trace of excitement.
    ‘I’m glad you know. It saves me all the trouble of explaining.’
    Ashurek felt himself shaking with anger and grief. Meshurek was indeed insane.
    ‘Explaining? You were planning to explain your crimes to me?’
    ‘Father had to be killed. I was sorry, of course, but there wasn’t time to wait for him to die of old age. Now the Empire can expand, as it should.’
    ‘Meshurek, why did you call that demon? I don’t want the throne, I never have. I am no danger to you!’
    ‘Are you not? Haven’t you come here now, believing me unfit to rule, to try to murder me? You’ve always hated me – I had to take precautions. You believe you were cheated of the throne at birth. I would have felt the same in your position.’
    Ashurek felt the dangerous emotion fading into a helpless despair as he realised nothing he could say or do would convince Meshurek that he had never wanted to be Emperor, in fact despised the idea. His brother lacked the perception to comprehend feelings other than his own.
    ‘The demon is using you, you fool!’ he exclaimed. ‘How can you believe otherwise? You must – you will – get rid of it!’
    Meshurek started laughing. And Ashurek, in his furious despair, flung himself forward and closed his hands on Meshurek’s throat. Meshurek stretched his arms out and silver light began to incandesce around his fingers.
    Ashurek felt an impossible pressure in his skull. His hands slid from his brother’s neck; he lost all strength and crumpled to the floor. Then Meshurek looked down at him with a smile.
    ‘Is the time ripe?’ he asked.
    And Ashurek heard a voice, like acid etching metal, reply, ‘It is ripe.’
    Ashurek was not easily frightened. He had been through many terrible and bloody battles without losing the cool detachment necessary for planning strategy. He had had nightmares and been able to laugh at them on waking. He had met many subjects of the Empire who hated him, yet he had never felt the need to look over his shoulder to see whether his guard was there, or an enemy with a knife.
    But the demon, Meheg-Ba, took him by the hand and led him to the Dark Regions where he was systematically taught Fear.
    A black door in the atmosphere closed and he was trapped, stumbling in darkness across a surface of living flesh where the only light was the searing, sick glow of the Shanin. When at last his eyes adjusted and he found his feet, he saw, stretching in every direction, a bleak landscape mottled with sick browns and blacks. Unnamable shapes rose here and there. Malformed birds, like bags of skin, uttered dreadful metallic shrieks as they flapped across a black