Author: JS Groves

Betrayal after betrayal after betrayal. I would have fallen to my knees from shock even had the tolling of the Rorgoth Throne not already toppled me with its force. The Usurper’s … Aemillian’s death had been quick, but brutal. Thick black blood – was it still blood, or had it become ichor, like Derrek’s? –… Read more

Wizards are used to bleeding. We are inured and jaded to certain amounts and certain kinds of pain. A knife in the kidney is more blood and more pain than any but the most hardened warrior or criminal can endure and still think, and even she would be hard pressed to think usefully, let alone… Read more

Elana and Rennin gave no warning battle cry as they charged the guards who stood outside the great doors to the throne room. Rennin hit the first Heart’s Guard full force with the Blade of Xadaer, cutting him in two with a single stroke. Elana was only a step behind, running the Solirium soldier next… Read more

There was a symmetry to it, a self-conscious poetry. Even when we had first planned it, I hadn’t been sure that we weren’t being unnecessarily cruel. The worst of it, bringing the prince and her consort back into the palace through the very passages by which they had escaped, wasn’t even Aemillian’s idea; he’d no… Read more

We met over breakfast, which we ate in stony silence without tasting any of it. A long and complex look passed between us. One by one we nodded. We were all still tired from the weeks we’d spent on horseback since crossing back into Vencar. We were still tired from the strange and unfamiliar journey… Read more

Ten years and a few weeks ago, Aemillian and I and a small army had stormed the imperial palace and slaughtered the royal family and their guards and courtiers and retainers. I had not participated in the slaughter, but I had helped to plan it; my hands would never again be clean. Sometimes, in the… Read more

Nothing had prepared me for the true splendor of Vencar City. The gargantuan walls with their elaborate bronze-clad gates and the lovely caryatids that flanked them. The impossible towers that soared even higher than the walls, countless fingers reaching for the distant sky. The broad boulevards, paved in granite. The tall buildings of stone and… Read more

The rain I’d called followed us for three days. Perhaps I could have stopped it, but it suited my mood. It slowed our cross-country travel, but I couldn’t bring myself to be bothered by that, either, despite our urgent need for speed. The twin visions I had seen with the Oracle of Ghol Vidar weighed… Read more

Derrek told us that, using his magical throne, our enemy now knew exactly where the court-in-exile was hidden. Our scouts reported, though, and we soon confirmed with our own eyes, that his generals were not so blessed. Knowing that the prince’s allies and army were in Liddarn was not the same as finding the long-abandoned… Read more

I was not pleased to be sent from the council room so summarily, only to be summoned back early the next morning. When I arrived to see that the prince, herself, had clearly not left the audience chamber except possibly to visit the latrine, I decided that I would afford her a modicum of sympathy.… Read more