Free Traitor's Knot by Janny Wurts

Avenor’s choleric ambassador harder still. ‘Served with timely warning, you can field the problem with diplomacy. I remind your Grace: the lady has borne a living son to s’Ilessid. Since she won’t realize her status under charter law, she could be advised of the fact she’s entitled to ask our Fellowship for assistance.’
    Before the harsh point was argued, that the Sorcerers might not have a free hand to answer in time to forestall repercussions, Machiel interrupted. ‘But Lysaer’s son passed Fate’s Wheel. Got himself scorched to heroic cinders by a Khadrim, so we heard.’ Never fully at ease within walls, the forest-bred steward retrieved the cross-bow stock and used his skinning knife to ream out the quarrel slot. ‘We were led to understand that breaking news of the tragedy was what caused his mother’s crazed flight in the first place.’
    â€˜Not exactly.’ The Sorcerer’s shade whisked over the patterned carpet, fanning groomed heads and lace and riffling the coals in the grate to a sullen flare of heat. ‘Prince Kevor’s still alive. An arcane recovery, not yet widely known.’ Now poised by the mantel, Luhaine’s presence all but bristled the air into hoar-frost. He required to say more. But today his fond penchant for diatribe was cut short as a hammering gust battered into the latched glass of the casement. The draught that seeped through stalled his windy voice and engendered a freezing silence.
    A crowned high king attuned to all four of the elements, Eldir stood up. Braced short by his move, the wiser council-men stilled, while Machiel shivered outright and ceased his idle fuss with the workings of dismantled weaponry.
    â€˜Spare us!’ Eldir cracked. ‘If it’s bad news for Havish, tell us quickly’
    Across the wrenched pause, Luhaine’s shade stopped cold as the urgent summons dispatched from Althain’s Warden exploded across hisawareness…
    â€¦in Erdane, amid crawling shadows in a cluttered attic, a strong man stands naked within a raised warding and lays a flint knife to his wrist. His swift stroke enacts the ritual cut. As the flow of let blood wakes a flash of raw light, his shocked outcry reflects an anguished note of betrayal.
    â€˜Oh yes, my fine man,’ whispers Enithen Tuer. ‘You have in fact consecrated that knife’s arcane properties. A binding act, born out of necessity, since that blade alone will enact your primary line of protection! Now listen well: here are the words you will swear, sealing your oath unto your dying breath, or take warning! You will fall to a hideous fate that’s far worse, and suffer the eternal consequence…’
    Luhaine recovered himself, jaggedly frantic. The dropped thread of his audience closed with a rush that distressed those who knew his staid character. ‘If the bereaved s’Ilessid mother should chance to make contact, she’s best left to believe that her royal son perished.’
    â€˜Ath’s Grace, Luhaine!’ The king’s shout chimed through the complaint of cleaned steel, as he slammed his closed fists on the table-top. ‘Don’t ask this! I can’t! The very idea’s a straight cruelty!’
    The Fellowship spirit whirled in tight agitation, scattering maps and requisition lists, and setting goose-quills to flight like chased leaves. ‘Not in this case! Had young Kevor died, he could not be any more lost to her!’
    Machiel’s granite features went pale. ‘Dharkaron avert! A wicked turn, if the boy’s in fact fallen to necromancy!’
    â€˜Mercy! No! Not in this case,’ Luhaine cracked as he spun in pained haste toward the casement. In actuality, that threat confronted the boy’s
father
, a horror too dire to contemplate. Forced away in the face of the High King’s stressed adamancy, the Sorcerer flung back on departure, ‘Trust us, yourGrace! In