Salvatore, R A - Demon Wars 2 - Mortalis

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MORTALIS - Demon Wars Book 2

SALVATORE, RA

PROLOGUE

Jilseponie-Pony-sat on the crenellated roof of the one squat tower of St.

Precious Abbey in the great city of Palmaris, looking out over the snow-

covered rooftops, her gaze drifting inevitably to the dark flowing waters of

the Masur Delaval. A bitterly cold wind nipped at her, but Pony, deep in

memories, hardly noticed the sting. All the region, the northwestern expanses

of the kingdom of Honce-the-Bear, had experienced an early snow only a week

before, winter coming on in full force, though the year had not seen the end

of the tenth month.

By all estimations, the war against the demon Bestesbulzibar and its goblin,

giant, and powrie minions had gone unexpectedly well, had been completed with

minimal loss of human life and without a single major city burned to the

ground. Now with winter, though, the aftereffects of that war were beginning

to show, most notably the food shortages in villages whose supplies had been

diverted to towns that had harbored the King's soldiers. Rumors had come to

Palmaris of uprisings in some of those villages against King Danube and

against the Abellican Church, whose leader had surely acted in the interests

of the demon. Other rumors spoke of several mysterious deaths along the coast

of the Mantis Arm and of a group of fanatics threatening to break away from

the Abellican Church while rejecting outright the notion of any church

dedicated to Avelyn Desbris.

So the war had ended here in Palmaris, but it seemed to the grieving Pony as

if the turmoil had only begun.

Or was it merely a continuing thing? she wondered. Was such travesty and

turmoil, such unrest, merely a reflection of the human condition, an unending

procession of one battle after another, of one cause of bitterness replacing

another? The notion stung Pony deeply, for if that were the case, then what

had they really accomplished? What had been bought by their sacrifice?

Why had Elbryan, her beloved husband, died?

Pony gave a helpless sigh at the futility of it all. She thought back to her

early days, up in the wild Timberlands, in Dundalis, when she and Elbryan had

grown up together, carefree. She remembered running down the wooded trails

beside the boy, running particularly among the white caribou moss in the pine-

filled valley north of their village. She remembered climbing the northern

slope beside him one chilly night, looking up at the sky to see Corona's Halo,

the beautiful multicolored ring that encircled the world, the source, she had

later come to learn, of the blessed magical gemstones that served as the power

and focus of faith of the Abellican Church.

The next dawn, Pony and Elbryan had witnessed the return of their fathers and

the other hunters. How clearly Pony now remembered that, running, full of

excitement, full of anticipation, full of-Horror. For suspended from a

shoulder pole had hung a most curious and ugly little creature: a goblin.

Never could Pony or Elbryan have foreseen that slain little brute as a

harbinger of such doom. But soon after, the goblins had attacked in force,

burning Dundalis to the ground, slaughtering everyone except Pony and Elbryan,

the two of them somehow managing separately to elude the monsters, each not

knowing that the other had survived.

And afterward Pony had wound up here, in Palmaris, bereft of memory and

identity, adopted by Graevis and Pettibwa Chilichunk, patrons of the bustling

tavern Fellowship Way.

Pony looked out across the quiet city now, in the direction where that

establishment had stood. What wild turns fate had placed in her path: married

to the favored nephew of the city's Baron Bildeborough; the wedding annulled

forthwith and Pony indentured in the King's army; her ascension to the elite

Coastpoint Guard and her appointment to Pireth Tuime; the coming of the

powries and the fall of that fortress. It had all taken years, but to Pony now

it seemed as if it had happened overnight. She could again feel the chill deep

in her bones as she had escaped doomed Pireth Tuime, floating in the cold

waters of the Gulf of Corona. Perhaps it was fate, perhaps mere chance, that

had pulled her from those waters in the vicinity of Avelyn Desbris, the "mad

friar" from St.-Mere-Abelle who was being hunted by the Church for the death

of a master and the theft of many of the sacred magical gemstones. Avelyn had

taken Pony back to Dundalis, and there she had been reunited with Elbryan, who

had returned to the region after being trained as a ranger by the mysterious

Touel'alfar.

What a dark road the three had walked from there: to Aida and the demon

dactyl; back across the kingdom to St.-Mere-Abelle, where Pony's adoptive

parents had been imprisoned and had died; and then back again-a road that

should have lightened, despite the grief, but that had only darkened more as

the evil that was Bestesbulzibar, the dactyl demon, infected Father Abbot

Markwart with a singular desire to do battle with Elbryan and Pony.

And so he had, in that same mansion where Pony had spent her wedding night

with Connor Bildeborough, the mansion of horrors where Elbryan and Pony had

waged the final fight against Markwart, and had won, though at the price of

Elbryan's life.

Now Pony wasn't sure what they had won and what it had been worth. She

recognized the almost circular nature of her long journey; but instead of

drawing comfort from that, she felt restless and trapped.

"It is far too cold for you to be up here, I fear," came a gentle voice behind

her, the voice of Brother Braumin Herde, the leader of the band of monks who

had followed Master Jojonah away from the Church, believing as they did in

Avelyn's goodness, one of the monks who had come to join Elbryan and Pony in

their efforts against Markwart.

She turned to regard the handsome man. He was older than Pony by several

years-in his early thirties-with black, woolly hair just starting to gray and

a dark complexion made even more so by the fact that no matter how often he

shaved his face, it was always shadowed by black hair.

"It is too unimportant for me to care," she answered quietly. Pony looked back

over the city as he walked up to lean on the wall beside her.

"Thinking of Elbryan? " he asked.

Pony smiled briefly, believing the answer to be obvious.

"Many are saddened," Brother Braumin began-the same hollow words Pony had been

hearing from so many for the last three months. She appreciated their efforts-

of course she did!-but, in truth, she wished they would all leave her to her

thoughts in private.

"The passage of time will heal ..." Brother Braumin started to say, but when

Pony fixed him with a skeptical glance, he let his words die away.

"Your pain is to be expected," he tried again a moment later. "You must take

solace and faith in God and in the good that came of your actions."

Now Pony glared sternly at him, and the gentle monk retreated a step.

"Good?" she asked.

Braumin held up his hands as if he did not understand.

"They are fighting again, aren't they? " Pony asked, looking back over the

snowy city. "Or should I say that they are fighting still? "

"They?"

"The leaders of your Church," Pony clarified, "and King Danube and his

advisers. Fighting again, fighting always. It changes not at all."

"If the Church is in turmoil, that is understandable, you must admit," Braumin

returned firmly. "We have lost our Father Abbot."

"You lost him long before I killed him," Pony interjected.

"True enough," the monk admitted. "But still it came as a shock to so many who

supported Dalebert Markwart to learn the truth: to learn that Bestesbulzibar-

curse his name, the ultimate darkness-had so infiltrated our ranks as to

pervert the Father Abbot himself."

"And now he is gone and you are better off," Pony remarked.

Brother Braumin didn't immediately respond, and Pony understood that she

wasn't being fair to him. He was a friend, after all, who had done nothing but

try to help her and Elbryan, and her sarcasm was certainly wounding him. She

looked at him directly and started to say something but bit it back

immediately. So be it, she decided, for she could not find generosity in her

heart. Not yet.

"We are better off by far," Braumin decided, turning the sarcasm back. "And

better off we would be by far if Jilseponie would reconsider the offer."

Pony was shaking her head before he completed the all-too-predictable request.

Reconsider the offer. Always that. They wanted her to become the mother abbess

of the Abellican Church, though nothing of the sort had ever been heard of in

the long history of the patriarchal Order. Brother Francis, Markwart's

staunchest follower, had suggested it, even while holding the dying Markwart

in his arms, the demon burned from the Father Abbot's body by the faith and

strength of Pony and Elbryan. Francis had seen the truth during that terrible

battle, and the truth of his terrible master. Pony had killed the demon that

Markwart had become, and now several very influential monks were hinting that

they wanted Pony to replace him.

Some of them were, at least. Pony didn't delude herself into thinking that

such a break with tradition as appointing a woman to head the Churchand a

woman who had just killed the previous leader!-would be without its vehement

opponents. The battles would be endless, and, to Pony's way of thinking,

perfectly pointless.

If that wasn't complicated enough, another offer had come to her, one from

King Danube himself, offering to name her Baroness of Palmaris, though she

obviously had no qualifications for the position either, other than her

newfound heroic reputation. Pony wasn't blind to the reality of it:

in the aftermath of the war both Church and Crown were jockeying for power.

Whichever side could claim Jilseponie, companion of Elbryan the Nightbird, as

friend, could claim to have promoted her to a position of power, would gain

much in the battle for the hearts and loyalty of the common folk of Palmaris

and the surrounding region.

Pony began to laugh quietly as she looked away from Brother Braumin, out over

the snow-blanketed city. She loved the snow, especially when it fell deep from

blustery skies, draping walls of white over the sides of buildings. Far from a

hardship such weather seemed to Pony. Rather, she considered it a reprieve, an

excuse to sit quietly by a blazing fire, accountable to no one and without

responsibility. Also, because of the unexpectedly early storm, King Danube had

been forced to delay his return to Ursal. If the weather did not cooperate,

the king might have to wait out the winter in Palmaris, which took some of the

pressure off Pony to either accept or reject his offer of the barony.

Though the weather had cooperated, Pony felt little reprieve. Once she had

called this city home. But now, with so much pain associated with the place-

the ruins of Fellowship Way, the loss of her adoptive family and her beloved

Elbryan-no longer could she see any goodness here or recall any warm memories.

"If he retains the barony, Duke Kalas will battle St. Precious in every

policy," Brother Braumin remarked, drawing Pony from her thoughts. But only

temporarily, for the mere mention of the forceful Duke, the temporary Baron of

Palmaris, inevitably led her to consider the man's residence, the very house

in which her marriage to Connor Bildeborough had swiftly descended into chaos,

the house wherein Markwart had taken Elbryan from her forever.

"How will we win those battles without heroic Jilseponie leading us? " Braumin

dared ask. He draped his arm about Pony's shoulders, and that brought, at

last, a genuine smile to the woman's beautiful face. "Or perhaps Jilseponie

could take the King's offer instead. . . ."

"Am I to be a figurehead, then? " she asked. "For you or for the Crown? A

symbol that will allow Braumin and his friends to attain that which they

desire? "

"Never that!" the monk replied, feigning horror; for it was obvious that he

understood Pony was teasing him.

"I told Bradwarden and Roger Lockless that I would join them up in Dundalis,"

Pony remarked; and, indeed, as she said it, she was thinking that traveling

back to her first home might not be such a bad thing. Elbryan was buried up

there, where it was . . . cleaner. Yes, that was a good word to describe it,

Pony decided. Cleaner. More removed from the dirt of humankind's endless

bickering. Of course, she, too, was trapped here, and likely for the entire

winter, for the road north was not an easy one this season.

She glanced over to see a disappointed Brother Braumin. She honestly liked the

man and his eager cohorts, idealists all, who believed they would repair the

Abellican Church, put it back on a righteous course by following the teachings

of Avelyn. That last thought made Pony smile again: laughing inside but

holding her mirth there because she did not want to seem to mock this man.

Braumin and his friends hadn't even known Avelyn-not the real Avelyn, not the

man known as the mad friar. Braumin had joined the Abellican Order the year

before Avelyn, God's Year 815. Both Master Francis and Brother Marlboro

Viscenti, Braumin's closest friend, had come in with Avelyn's class in the

fall of God's Year 816. But Avelyn and three others had been separated from

the rest of their class as they had begun their all-important preparations for

the journey to the Isle of Pimaninicuit. The only recollection Braumin,

Viscenti, or Francis even had of Avelyn was on the day when the four chosen

monks had sailed out of All Saints Bay, bound for the island where they would

collect the sacred gemstones. Braumin had never seen Avelyn after he had run

off from St.-Mere-Abelle, after he had become the mad friar, with his barroom

brawling and his too-frequent drinking-and wouldn't the canonization process

of rowdy Avelyn Desbris be colorful indeed!

"Too cold up here," Brother Braumin said again, tightening his grip on Pony's

shoulders, pulling her closer that she might share his warmth. "Pray come

inside and sit by a fire. There is too much sickness spreading in the

aftermath of war, and darker would the world be ifJilseponie took ill."

Pony didn't resist as he led her toward the tower door. Yes, she did like

Brother Braumin and his cohorts, the group of monks who had risked everything

to try to find the truth of the world after the turmoil stirred up by the

defection of Avelyn Desbris and his theft of so many magical gemstones. It

went deeper than liking, she recognized, watching the true concern on his

gentle and youthful face, feeling the strong and eager spring in his energetic

step. She envied him, because he was full of youth, much more so than she,

though he was the older.

But Brother Braumin, Pony realized within her darkened perception, was

possessed of something she could no longer claim.

Hope.

"Brennilee! Ye've not fed the chickens, ye silly lass!" Merry Cowsenfed called

out the front door of her small house. "Oh, Brennilee, where've ye got yerself

to, girl?" She shook her head and grumbled. Truly Brennilee, her youngest

child, was the most troublesome seven-year-old Merry had ever heard of, always

running across the rocky cliffs and the dunes below, sometimes daring the

brutal tidewaters of Falidean Bay-which could bring twenty feet of water

rushing across the muddy ground in a matter of a few running strides-in her

endless quest for adventure and enjoyment.

And always, always, did Brennilee forget her chores before she went on her

wild runs. Every morning, Merry Cowsenfed heard those chickens complaining,

and every morning, the woman had to go to her door and call out.

"I'm here. Mum," came a quiet voice behind her, a voice Merry hardly

recognized as that of her spirited daughter.

"Ye missed yer breakfast," Merry replied, turning, "and so've the chickens."

"I'll feed 'em," Brennilee said quietly, too quietly. Merry Cowsenfed quickly

closed the distance to her unexpectedly fragile-looking daughter and brought

her palm up against Brennilee's forehead, feeling for fever.

"Are ye all right, girl? " she asked, and then her eyes widened, for Brennilee

was warm to the touch.

"I'm not feelin' good, Mum," the girl admitted.

"Come on, then. I'll get ye to bed and get ye some soup to warm ye," the woman

said, taking Brennilee by the wrist.

"But the chickens..."

"The chickens'll get theirs after ye're warm in yer bed," Merry Cowsenfed

started to say, turning back with a wide, warm smile for her daughter.

Her smile evaporated when she saw on the little girl's arm a rosy spot

encircled by a white ring.

Merry Cowsenfed composed herself quickly for her daughter's sake, and brought

the arm up for closer inspection. "Did ye hurt yerself, then?" she asked the

girl, and there was no mistaking the hopeful tone of her question.

"No," Brennilee replied, and she moved her face closer, too, to see what was

so interesting to her mother.

Merry studied the rosy spot for just a moment. "Ye go to bed now," she

instructed. "Ye pull only the one sheet over ye, so that ye're not overheatin'

with the little fever ye got."

"Am I going to get sicker? " Brennilee asked innocently.

Merry painted a smile on her face. "No, ye'U be fine, me girl," she lied, and

she knew indeed how great a lie it was! " Now get ye to bed and I'll be

bringing ye yer soup."

Brennilee smiled. As soon as she was out of the room, Merry Cowsenfed

collapsed into a great sobbing ball of fear.

She'd have to get the Falidean town healer to come quickly and see the girl.

She reminded herself repeatedly that she'd need a wiser person than she to

confirm her suspicion, that it might be something altogether different: a

spider bite or a bruise from one of the sharp rocks that Brennilee was forever

scrambling across. It was too soon for such terror, Merry Cowsenfed told

herself repeatedly.

Ring around the rosy.

It was an old song in Falidean town, as in most of the towns of Honcethe-Bear.

It was a song about the plague. Was the victory worth the cost?

It pains me even to speak those words aloud, and, in truth, the question seems

to reflect a selfishness, an attitude disrespectful to the memory of all those

who gave their lives battling the darkness that had come to Corona. If I wish

Elbryan back alive-and Avelyn and so many others-am I diminishing their

sacrifice? I was there with Elhryan, joined in spirit, bonded to stand united

against the demon dactyl that had come to reside in the corporeal form of

father Abbot Markwart. I watched and felt Elbryan's spirit dimmish and

dissipate into nothingness even as I witnessed the breaking of the blackness,

the destruction of Bestesbulzibar.

And I felt, too, Elbryan's willingness to make the sacrifice, his desire to

see the battle through to the only acceptable conclusion, even though that

victory, he knew, would take his life. He was a ranger, trained by the

Touel'alfar, a servant and protector of mankind, and those tenets demanded of

him responsibility and the greatest altruism.

And so he died contented, in the knowledge that he had lifted the blackness

from the Church and the land.

All our lives together, since I had returned to Dundalis and found Elbryan,

had been one of willing sacrifice, of risk taking. How many battles did we

fight, even though we might have avoided them? We walked to the heart of the

dactyl, to Mount Aida in the Karbacan, though we truly believed that to be a

hopeless road, though we fully expected that all of us would die, and likely

in vain, in our attempt to battle an evil that seemed so very far beyond us.

And yet we went. Willingly. With hope, and with the understanding that we had

to do this thing, whatever the cost, for the betterment of the world.

It came full circle that day in Chasewind Manor, when finally, finally, we

caught, not the physical manifestation of Kestesbulzibar, but rather the

demon's spirit, the very essence of evil. We won the day, shattering that

evil.

But was the victory worth the cost?

I look back on the last few years of my life, and I cannot discount that

question. I remember all the good people, all the great people, who passed

from this world in the course of the journey that led me to this point, and,

at times, it seems to me to be a great and worthless waste.

I know that I dishonor Elbryan and likely anger his ghost with these emotions,

but they are very real.

We battled, we fought, we gave of ourselves all that we could and more. Most

of all, though, it seems to me as if we've spent the bulk of time burying our

dead. Even that cost, I had hoped, would prove worthwhile in those few shining

moments after I awakened from my battle with the demon spirit, in the

proclamations of Brother Francis, of Brother Braumin, and of the King himself

that Elbryan had not died in vain, that the world, because of our actions,

would, he a better place. I dared to hope that my love's sacrifice, that our

sacrifice, would be enough, would turn the tide of humankind and better the

world for all.

Is Honce-the-Bear better off for the fall ofMarkwart?

With sudden response, the answer seems obvious; in that shining moment of

clarity and hope, the answer seemed obvious.

That moment, I fear, has passed. In the fog of confusion, in the shifting and

shoving for personal gain, in the politics of court and Church, that moment of

glory, of sadness, and of hope has diminished into bickering.

Like Elbryan s spirit, it becomes something less than substantial and drifts

away on unseen winds.

And I am left alone in Palmaris, watching the world descend into chaos. Demon

inspired? Perhaps, or perhaps-and this is my greatest fear-this confusion is

merely the nature of humankind,, as eternal as the human spirit, an unending

cycle of pain and sacrifice, a series of brilliant, twinkling hopes that fade

as surely as do the stars at dawn. Did I, and Elbryan, bring the world through

its darkness, or did we merely guide it safely through one long night, with

another sure to follow?

That is my fear and my belief. When I sit and remember all those who gave

their lives so that we could walk this road to its end, I fear that we have

merely returned to the beginning of that same path.

In light of that understanding, I say with conviction that the victory was not

worth the cost.

-JILSEPONIE WYNDON

CHAPTER 1

The Show of Strength

The mud sucked at his boots as he walked along the narrow, smoky corridor, a

procession of armored soldiers in step behind him. The conditions were not to

his liking-he didn't want his "prisoners" growing obstinate, after all.

Around a bend in the tunnel the light increased and the air cleared, and

before Duke Targon Bree Kalas loomed a wider and higher chamber, its one

entrance securely barred. Kalas motioned to a soldier behind him, and the man

hustled forward, fumbling with keys and hastily unlocking the cell door. Other

soldiers tried to slip by, to enter the cell protectively before their leader,

but Kalas slapped them back and strode in.

A score of dwarvish faces turned his way, the normally ruddy-complexioned

powries seeming a bit paler after months imprisoned underground.

Kalas studied those faces carefully, noting the narrowing of eyes, a

reflection, he knew, of seething hatred. It wasn't that the powries hated him

particularly, but rather that they merely hated any human.

Again, almost as one, the dwarves turned away from him, back to their

conversations and myriad games they had invented to pass the tedious hours.

One of the soldiers began calling them to attention, but Duke Kalas cut him

short and waved him and the others back. Then he stood by the door, calmly,

patiently letting them come to him.

"Yach, it's to wait all the damned day if we isn't to spake with it," one

powrie said at last. The creature removed its red beret-a cap shining bright

with the blood of its victims-and scratched its itchy, lice-filled hair, then

replaced the cap and hopped up, striding to stand before the Duke.

"Ye comin' down to see our partyin'? " the dwarf asked.

Kalas didn't blink, staring at the powrie sternly. This dwarf, the leader, was

always the sarcastic one, and he always seemed to need a reminder that he had

been captured while waging war on the kingdom, that he and his wretched little

fellows were alive only by the grace of Duke Kalas.

"Well?" the dwarf, Dalump Keedump by name, went on obstinately.

"I told you that I would require your services at the turn of the season,"

Duke Kalas stated quietly.

"And we're to be knowin' that the season's turned?" Keedump asked

sarcastically. He turned to his fellows. "Are ye thinkin' the sun to be ridin'

lower in the sky these days? " he asked with a wicked little laugh.

"Would you like to see the sun again?" Duke Kalas asked him in all

seriousness.

Dalump Keedump eyed him long and hard. "Ye think ye're to break us, then?" the

dwarf asked. "We spent more time in a barrelboat, tighter and dirtier than

this, ye fool."

Kalas let a long moment slip past, staring at the dwarf, not daring to blink.

Then he nodded slighdy and turned, leaving the cell, pulling its door closed

behind him as he returned to the muddy corridor with his soldiers. "Very well,

then," he said. "Perhaps I will return in a few days-the first face you will

see, I assure you. Perhaps after you have murdered some of your companions for

food, you will better hear my propositions." And he walked away, as did his

men, having every intention of carrying through with his threat.

He had gone several steps before Dalump called out to him. "Ye came all the

way down here. Ye might as well be tellin' us what ye gots in mind."

Kalas smiled and moved back to the cell door. Now the other dwarves, suddenly

interested in the conversation, crowded behind Dalump.

"Extra rations and more comfortable bedding," the Duke teased.

"Yach, but ye said we'd be walkin' free!" Dalump Keedump protested. "Or

sailin' free, on a boat back to our homes."

"In time, my little friend, in time," Kalas replied. "I am in need of an

enemy, that I might show the rabble the strength of the Allhearts and thus

bring them the security they desperately need. Assist me in this, and the

arrangements will be made for your release soon enough."

Another of the dwarves, his face a mask of frustration, rushed forward,

shouldering past Dalump. "And if we doesn't?" he asked angrily.

Duke Kalas' fine sword was out in the blink of a powrie eye, its point

snapping against the obstinate fellow's throat, pressing firmly. "If you do

not, then so be it," Kalas said calmly, turning to eye Dalump directly as he

spoke. "From our first meeting, I have been clear in my intentions and honest

in our dealings. Choose your course, Dalump Keedump, and accept the

consequences."

The powrie leader glared at his upstart second.

"Fairly caught," Duke Kalas reminded, rather poignantly, considering that his

sword was still out and the statement was true enough. Dalump and his group

had been fairly caught on the field of battle, as they had attacked this city.

Duke Kalas was bound by no codes or rules in dealing with the powries. He

could execute them openly and horribly in Palmaris' largest square, or he

could let them starve to death down here in the dungeons beneath Chasewind

Manor, forgotten by all.

Dalump shifted his gaze back and forth between Kalas and the upstart powrie,

his expression hinting that he wanted to choke them both-wanted to choke

anybody or anything-just to relieve the mounting frustration accompanying this

wretched situation. "Tell me yer stinkin' plan," he reluctantly agreed.

Duke Kalas nodded and smiled again.

Duke Kalas walked onto the rear balcony of Chasewind Manor early in the

morning a few days later. The air was heavy with fog and drizzle, a perfectly

miserable day, but one to Kalas' liking. It had turned warmer again, though

they still had more than a month before the winter solstice. The remnants of

the previous blizzard, winter's first blast, were fast melting, and the

reports Kalas had received the day before indicated that grass was showing

again on the windblown western fields.

That fact, plus the gathering storm clouds in the west threatening a second

storm, had prompted the Duke's action, and now, with the poor visibility, he

could not have asked for a better morning. He heard the door open behind him,

and he turned to see King Danube Brock Ursal step out to join him.

He was a few years older than his dear friend Kalas, and rounder in the

middle, but his hair remained thick and black, and his beard, a new addition,

showed no signs of graying.

"I hope to sail within the week," Danube remarked. Kalas was not surprised,

since Bretherford, Duke of the Mirianic and commander of the King's navy, had

indicated as much to him the previous evening.

"You will have favorable weather all the way back to Ursal," Duke Kalas

assured his beloved king, though he feared the decision to travel. If winter

weather came on again with the fleet still in the northern waters of the Masur

Delaval, the result could be catastrophic.

"So Bretherford believes," said Danube. "In truth, I am more concerned about

the situation I leave behind."

Kalas looked at him, his expression wounded.

"Brother Braumin seems formidable and, to the common man, likable," Danube

elaborated. "And if the woman Jilseponie stands by him-along with Markwart's

former lackey Francis-then their appeal to the folk of Palmaris will be

considerable. I remind you that Brother Francis endeared himself to the people

in the last days of Markwart, when he served the city as bishop."

Kalas could find little to dispute, for he and Danube had discussed the

situation at length many times since the fall of Markwart and the hero,

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MORTALIS-DemonWarsBook2SALVATORE,RAPROLOGUEJilseponie-Pony-satonthecrenellatedroofoftheonesquattowerofSt.PreciousAbbeyinthegreatcityofPalmaris,lookingoutoverthesnow-coveredrooftops,hergazedriftinginevitablytothedarkflowingwatersoftheMasurDelaval.Abitterlycoldwindnippedather,butPony,deepinmemories,ha...

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Salvatore, R A - Demon Wars 2 - Mortalis.pdf

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Salvatore, R A - Demon Wars 2 - Mortalis

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