Chapter 1

In a kingdom whose name doesn’t truly matter, there was once a truly fine king.

His name, Yenwolf, mattered a great deal – for he was named for his grandfather, Yenwolf the Elder, who carved the kingdom from many parts of a map with sword, lance, and bow. Yenwolf II, or Yenwolf the Just, inherited a kingdom seething with rebellion and intrigue, his father’s weak willed and short sighted reign working to inflame every wound left by his grandfather’s sword. And so, Yenwolf the Just set forth sweeping changes to the kingdom. He reformed the clergy, so the old gods and new might live in harmony and the tithes required by the peasantry was lessened. He granted power to the guildsmen of the capital city and the river and port towns, bringing great wealth into his kingdom as they devised many new arts and techniques. He opened the University of Two Skies, and there, in the high tower known by many as the Magestaff, robed men and women conjured miracles and devils alike, and were able to whisper in his ear of dangers both oblique and obscure.

But of these, all agreed the most impressive conquest of Yenwolf the Just was that of the Lady Morgan, whose home was in the wild countries to the east, the place whose men painted their faces, and called their Kings by the title of Tulthan, which means tree speaker in the oldest language.

With her hand and the strange magics of her people, the eastern country became peaceful and the bloody hatred that so often stained the borderlands with the blood of kingfolk and treefolk along eased. The people of the kingdom spoke fondly of their new queen, and fondly of their wise King, whose blade remained sheathed – but ever present at his side.

Born to King Yenwolf and Queen Morgan came their children. The first were the twins.

Adrin was hale, dark of hair, piercing of eye, and commanding even in his youth. By the time he was a young man, he could lance better than any knight on the field, shoot as well as the fiercest treefolk warrior, and was master of hatchet, knife, gauntlet, all the weapons that many sneered at for being commoner tools. He proved those tools in the bloody fighting against a kingdom to the north, called by them the Black Kingdom for their dark temperament and their gloomy climate. Where other knights were unhorsed by a rain of arrows and spearmen surging from behind mist shrouded rocks, Adrin wrestled free and slew twelve men before the attack was broken and the day was won.

Lyrian was none of that. Born bent and twisted, with hair as shocking white as a wizened crone, and a stuttering tone that made many think he was as dumb as a post, Lyrian could scarcely be believed to have come from the same union as his brother. And yet, Lyrian proved to be every part the prince that his brother-twin was. But rather than lance or bow, sword or dagger, Lyrian’s mastery was in the tomes of ancient lore, in the speaking of the oldest tongue, in the knowing of ways and names. By the time he was a young man, he could whisper to the mice in the larders and convince them to stay away, and he could straighten a limb withered by injury or disease with nothing but a muttered chant.

Two years after the twins were born, Queen Morgan had their youngest child, the Princess Miryan. As she grew of age, Miryan drew suitors and doting admirers from far and beyond. Even the Black Prince, Koltk, came to offer a dance when she was fifteen years of age, and many in the kingdom wondered if King Yenwolf would bring peace between even that stern and forbidding land.

But three years later, when the question came to a head ... another suitor came.

And nothing would be the same in the kingdom after that.

Never again.

Lyrian sat upon the stone stairs leading to the training chamber, his spellbook spread on his lap, his back bent over it, while his brother sought, quite vigorously, to kill him. The him in the field of battle wasn’t really him, any more than his shadow was. But in the oldest tongue, he had called that shadow to move, to hold a blade, to parry a blow, to swing a mace and to give his brother a good workout. He had plucked from the sages of Aristotle and his mentor Prospero, and Zhongli Chun, one of the four Ugly Women, the idea to give the shadow more seeming with a mace that had been bloodied in battle. It was the kind of working that the Magestaff wizards shook their heads at and clucked their tongues.

Frivolous!

Flashy!

Showy!

Fie on that. Lyrian lifted his gaze from his spellbook and smirked as his brother ducked under the rusted mace as it swung at his head. The blow would have cracked his skull, but instead, it rebounded off one of the stone pillars keeping the high, narrow roof up. “Nicely done,” Adrin said, his voice muffled by his helmet, then chuckled. “But not nicely done enough.” His gauntlet clad hand gripped onto the shadow and used the weight of his armor to cast him to the ground. His longsword, gripped in two hands, flicked down and the shadow lay still, black blood puddling beneath it, flowing between the tiles on the stone. Adrin was panting heavily, his shoulders rising and falling, while Lyrian closed his book with a flick of his long fingered palm.

“My thanks, brother,” he said, his voice wry. “You have once more shown that you are the martial master.”

“Bullshit,” Adrin said, the sudden soldierly tone always making Lyrian laugh. He reached up and swung the hound visor of his helm up and from his eyes, showing his face as a brilliant moon in the steel. Lyrian always had to bite his lip when he saw his brother like this. Without his helmet, in a bright gold and purple doublet, with red hose, with those fine curled shoes that Mother had bought him, Adrin could set the entire population of the kingdom’s women to fluttering, sighing, and regretting their choices in husband. But stick him in armor, he was imposing and terrifying ... until he lifted his visor and became a puffy, red faced egg peeking out of its shell.

“You won the fight,” Lyrian said, then started to stand. Despite what tales and rumors said, his back was not hunched. Anymore. It had taken some effort, and many exhausting, agonizing exercises with his brother, but his weakened youth was slowly beginning to recede behind him. He would never have Adrin’s easy expertise with weapons, nor his boundless vitality, nor his casual charms – but he would at least not have to flinch when he saw himself in a mirror. It had helped, also, to take Adrin’s advice and grow his hair long and tie it back. It made the unnatural whiteness of it more striking. More like a statement of intent.

Adrin walked over, then placed his glittering gauntlet upon Lyrian’s shoulder.

“You brought a shadow to life with a word, brother. You won the fight.” His smile was warm. “Come! I have to get this suit off me.”

Lyrian nodded and walked with his brother, his book clasped behind his back by cupping it in his hands. His smile grew thin and playful. “You have heard that Prince Koltk is riding from the Black Kingdom – he may actually convince father to give sister away in marriage. You may not need to bloody your sword again.”

Adrin’s face grew grave. “I hope so,” he said, quietly.

“Really?” Lyrian asked, arching an eyebrow.

“Warfare isn’t like studying your books, brother,” Adrin said, his voice growing softer. “Or. Maybe it is. You remember every book you read – I remember every man I’ve had to kill.”

Lyrian hesitated, thinking for a moment. Most who had not sought to learn the oldest language, who had not walked among the trees in the deepest parts of the eastern forest, who had not felt the sheer hatred seething from those trees, a hatred of men and their axes, and fire, and burning ... they had no idea quite how close to warfare learning the ways of magic could be. His eyes grew shadowed, and he murmured. “True. I spoke in haste, brother.”

The two hesitated at the door from the training chamber, looking at one another. Both twin smiled, and Adrin tugged his gauntlet off, so he could clasp his brother’s shoulder as well. “With you covering the obscure and me the direct, I think the kingdom will be in good stead, brother.”

The conversation grew lighter as they emerged from the tower and headed to the baths of the castle. The castle, which had been given many names throughout the years but was currently called the Wolf’s Castle, was built on a hill overlooking the capital city and had served as a bastion for the town that the city had grown from. Now, it was far too small to defend everything and everyone there and most sieges fought around the city used the city’s walls. And so, the Wolf’s Castle had grown somewhat less defended in many ways – one of those ways was that the lower chambers had been expanded and warm water had been drawn from the ground with clever engineering that would have given any attacking siege engineer a cause to dance for joy.