The Master of Heathcrest Hall (The Magicians and Mrs. Quent, Band 3) - Softcover

Beckett, Galen

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0553807609 ISBN 13: 9780553807608

Verlag: Random House Worlds, 2012

Inhaltsangabe

Even as her husband is about to attain undreamed-of power, Ivy Quent fears for her family’s safety. With war looming and turmoil sweeping the nation of Altania, Ivy finds the long-abandoned manor on the moors a temporary haven. But nowhere is really safe from the treachery that threatens all the Quents have risked to achieve. And an even greater peril is stirring deep within the countryside’s beautiful green estates. As Ivy dares an alliance with a brilliant illusionist and a dangerous lord, she races to master her forbidden talents and unravel the terrible truth at the heart of her land’s unrest—even as a triumphant, inhuman darkness rises to claim Altania eternally for its own.

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Galen Beckett

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CHAPTER ONE



The people huddled in the cave as the wind shook the branches of the trees outside.

The cave was damp and musty from disuse, for it had been a long while since they had last journeyed to it. In years past, they would dwell here during the darkest winter months, when the thick stone offered protection from the winds that swept out of the north—­and from the wolves that prowled the frozen land, their fur ragged, desperate enough to brave fire and arrow in search of something to fill their shrunken bellies.

For most of the year, the people lived five days’ walk to the south of this place, in a camp by the blue sea. There they would spend the long days as they had for time out of mind, prying mussels from the rocks and spearing fish and cormorants, until they became as sleek as the otters that basked on the shore in the sun.

At least, that was how things used to be. Layka still remembered what it had been like when she was smaller. She would spend the warm evenings walking along the beach, clad only in a supple doeskin, choosing shells that might be strung on a piece of leather—­saving them for the day when she was old enough to begin making herself beautiful for the young men who visited on occasion from the other camps down the shore.

But that was before everything changed.

It began one day with a violent shuddering of the ground. An awful groaning noise filled the air, and the sea pulled away from the shore. All knew this was a sign to flee to a higher place, but even as they did so a sudden night fell over the world. It was as if a fist had closed around the burning ember of the sun, snuffing it out. The people looked up and, for the first time, saw an unfamiliar red spark smoldering among the stars. What this new object in the night sky was, no one knew—­not even Nesharu, who of all the people was the oldest and wisest.

At last the trembling of the ground ceased, and the ocean roared back upon the beach. Dawn came, and the day seemed to pass as usual. But when it ended, the red spark again shone in the sky, a little brighter than before. The night that followed lasted too long. The world grew cold, and though it was yet early summer, stars that should only have risen in autumn spun into the sky. By morning, when Layka walked along the shore, she found it rimed with frost. She shivered despite the aurochs hide she had thrown over her shoulders, and had to use her nails to pry up shells from the sand.

After that, the days no longer continued their gradual and steady lengthening toward midsummer. Instead, one night might flit by, swift as a bat, followed by a day during which the sun seemed to hang motionless overhead, blazing so fiercely that the otters were forced to slip into the sea to escape its heat. Then, without warning, the heat would give way to bitter cold after the sun failed to show itself for what felt like days.

A fear came over the people. Plants wilted and shriveled in alternation. Animals grew torpid and confused, wandering across the land as if they did not know which direction to go. Many dead fish washed up on the shore, carried by currents that had gone too hot or cold to sustain them. Sometimes other things washed up on the beach as well: gelatinous remnants of unknown creatures that smelled so foul even the dogs would not touch them. And all the while the red spark grew larger in the sky, glaring like the eye of some angry beast.

That had been three years ago. Or at least so they guessed, for they could no longer count the years by the passage of the seasons. Winter no longer gave way to spring; bright summer never dulled to autumn. Instead, the sequence of days was as patternless as a handful of fish bones thrown on the midden heap. Yet it must have been three years since everything changed, or close to it, for Layka had been just past her thirteenth winter then, and now she was nearly a woman.

Not that it mattered. Young men never came from the other camps anymore. Nobody did, not since the red eye had shown itself. The pretty shells Layka had gathered remained unstrung, piled in a corner of the hut she shared with her parents and her brother. Anyway, there was no time to think about making herself beautiful. It was all she and the others could do to survive. Those first months had been especially awful. Game perished. Springs and rivulets went dry, and the sea grew barren of fish. The people froze and sweltered in alternation, and many succumbed to hunger or fever.

That any of them managed to live was due to Nesharu. For hours she would stand watching the sky, observing the movements of birds or listening to the wind. Then she would tell the people where to look for water or animals to hunt. At first they found little to sustain them. Yet over time some plants began to sprout again, spindly but green. A few animals returned, as did the fish in the sea. And though these were not nearly so plentiful as before, they were enough. The days and nights came and went, sometimes short, sometimes long. For three years the people struggled and endured.

Then a young man came to the camp.

It was one of those endless afternoons when the sunlight went flat and turned everything to white. The people looked up to see a hunter they did not know just beyond the huts. At once the men rushed toward him, spears at the ready, but it was soon obvious that he posed no threat. He was thin, his beard crusted with salt, and despite the heat of the day he was shivering. The people gathered around him and saw that the man bore deep gashes on his arm and side. The flesh around the wounds had turned the color of ash and gave off a rank odor.

The hunter fell to the ground and started to mutter, but it was difficult to understand him. By the ochre that stained the hides he wore, he came from one of the camps around the great curve in the shoreline many days’ walk to the south, and the language spoken there was not entirely like that of the people. However, they gave him water, and after a time Nesharu made out some of his speech.

They came during a long night, the hunter told them. Shadows that stalked, shadows with pointed teeth. They ate men from the inside out and put on their skins, so you could not tell what they were. Then, when darkness fell, they cast off the skins to feed, and no arrow could pierce them.

The people were frightened by these words. Layka looked at his wounds, counting the parallel lines in his flesh, and wondered what kind of animal had seven talons upon each of its paws.

“If an arrow will not pierce them, how can these shadows be hunted?” Nesharu asked as she knelt beside the man, a listless wind stirring her hair like the white tendrils of an anemone in the shallows.

“Take their heads,” the hunter croaked through cracked lips. “While they still wear a man’s skin, take their heads.”

Nesharu sat with the hunter for many more hours, her weathered face grim as she leaned close, trying to make out more of the man’s words. But the hunter’s voice grew fainter, until his lips moved without making any sound, and his eyes stared blindly. Then, as the sun at last dipped below the edge of the sea, his spirit left him.

The people gathered wood, and upon Nesharu’s direction they burned the body far away from the huts as the red eye looked down from above. It was a circle nearly as large as the moon now, its light staining the ground like blood after a hunt.

That night was short, but by the time a swift dawn swept across the land, three men were already heading out from the camp. They were the fastest runners among the people. Since the red eye appeared in the sky, no one had gone more than a long day’s walk away from the camp. Now the men intended to go all the way...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Random House Worlds
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2012
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0553807609
• ISBN 13: 9780553807608
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 736
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar