Sinner by Sara Douglass. Book One of The Wayfarer Redemption

Each one of the peaks in the Icescarp Alps was a majesty in itself, but of them all the fabled Star Finger was the most exalted. Once it had been called Talon Spike, and had been the home of the Icarü during their exile, but it was now a place of contemplation and study, where the most powerful and knowledgeable among the Icarü Enchanters studied the mysteries of the stars. The mountain had become a place of libraries and halls, of music and enchantments, and of tremulous discoveries and lingering silences.

Star Finger’s hauntingly beautiful ice-shrouded cliffs and ethereal mists cast a shadow, if not literally then metaphorically, over all of Tencendor.

From the northern and eastern faces of Star Finger a great glacier ground its way yet further north to calve its icebergs in the Iskruel Ocean. Here curved the extraordinary landscape of the Icebear Coast. To the south the alps rose sheer and black, while to the north the grey-blue sea crashed onto the pebbled beach, the icepack grinding behind it, the sea birds wheeling and crying with eerie voices above.

Few mortal steps ever trod the Icebear Coast. Sometimes a tribe of Ravensbund would move silently along the shoreline, seeking seaweed to make their Tekawai tea, very occasionally a fur trader from the plains far to the south would stand overawed on the pebbles, staring over the unknown waters that extended further north.

More often the pebbles rasped and rattled beneath the great paws of the strange icebear Urbeth as she chased down sea birds and seals, scattering their blood over the shoreline before she retreated to her ice den and her waiting cubs.

And sometimes the Icebear Coast played host to beings far stranger and far more powerful than Urbeth.

They sat about a campfire somewhere on the Icebear Coast. Nine of them, the complete Circle of the Star Gods. Adamon, turning a roasting partridge and smiling about the fire. Xanon, his wife, and Goddess of the Firmament. Zest, Goddess of Earth, and her companion, Narcis, God of the Sun. Across from them sat Flulia, Goddess of Water, Pors, God of Air, and Silton, God of Fire. Making up the Nine were Axis, Song, and Azhure, Moon.

“You frown, Axis,” Adamon said. “Why?”

Axis sighed. “I worry.”

“The worries of Tencendor should be far behind you.”

“I fought for that land, I watched those who fought with me die. It is hard now to just sit, and watch.”

“Axis,” Adamon said gently, handing him a piece of roast bird. “You are one of us now, and you must let Tencendor and Caelum find their own feet.”

“The weight of Tencendor rests on Caelum’s shoulders. What if he falters? Am I to let Tencendor falter with him?”

“Oh, Axis!” Azhure said shortly. “Caelum will not falter! Trust your own son.”

“We understand how you feel, Axis,” Xanon said in her gentle voice. “That Tencendor relives, and that we are Nine, is so much due to your and Azhure’s efforts. But now you are not what you once were. You must move on.”

“You let me deal with Gorgrael. You were happy enough to let me wander the plains and mountains of Tencendor then.”

“Gorgrael was personal, Axis,” Adamon said, “and your battle with him concerned us greatly. If you had lost then he would have taken his place among us as God of Song. Now we must all move on, and you must let Caelum rule from the Throne of the Stars. Leave mortal worries for mortal shoulders.”

“You are right,” Axis said after a small silence. “It is just that the past few days have been so disturbing. I long to be there. To help in some way. Stars! Our daughter is dead!”

“We grieve with you and Azhure for RiverStar’s death,” Pors said, and by his side Flulia took Azhure’s hand, and stroked it.

Axis nodded, unable for the moment to speak.

“I knew here,” Azhure touched her head, “that Axis and I would eventually outlive our children. But we thought that we had hundreds of years… that we could watch them grow and love and give us grandchildren. To see RiverStar die, and so cruelly, and,” her voice hardened, “at her own brother’s hands makes it hard for Axis and me to sit and watch.”

Her hand now touched her breast. “My heart cannot let go my mortal concerns so easily.”

There was silence as the other gods shared their grief, and tried to impart comfort. They were much older than Axis and Azhure, and had seen their own mortal families die into dust thousands of years previously. They had come to terms with their immortality – Axis and Azhure still had to embrace unending life with equanimity.

“And now Drago has run,” Axis said. All the gods were aware of the search for Drago.

“Leave it, Axis,” Xanon said, and touched his knee. “Leave it. They inhabit a different world to you and I. Leave them to that world and all the pain it contains.”

“There is one problem we should not discard so quickly,” Azhure said, and looked about the Circle. “WolfStar.”

The others nodded slowly. WolfStar. His reappearance was disturbing. For all their powers, the Star Gods still could not entirely understand WolfStar, nor where he went for so many years or what he did when he was gone.

Anything they did not understand made them wonder if they should fear it.

“We will watch,” Adamon said eventually. “It is all we can do.”

“And the Star Gate?” Azhure asked. “Should we watch that, too?”

“The voices,” Adamon reflected. “The Icarü nation’s murdered children, come back to haunt their killer.”

“There is something wrong,” Axis said, and he suddenly leapt to his feet and paced back and forth just inside the circle of light from the fire. “There is something wrong!”

“Axis?” Azhure glanced worriedly at Adamon, then rose to her feet and took Axis’ arm, bringing him to a halt. “What?”

“I don’t know!” Axis cried, and kicked at a pebble in utter frustration. “I don’t know what it is, but there is something wrong. The Star Dance seems… not quite as it should.”

“It is your grief and worry about your family that so disturbs you,” Xanon said soothingly. “The voices are nothing. They will not hurt us, nor this wondrous land.”

“We heard them occasionally during the time when Artor imprisoned us in the interstellar wastes,” Silton said. “Trifling voices.”

“They are there,” Zest agreed, “but they are harmless enough.”

“Are you certain?” Axis said.

“Absolutely,” Adamon replied. “They drift about the interstellar spaces calling WolfStar’s name, looking for vengeance.” He suddenly laughed. “No wonder he chose to return from his death so quickly! I would not like to have such as these on my tail!”

“And they will not come back through the Star Gate?” Axis asked.

“WolfStar was right when he told Caelum they do not have the skills to step back through,” Adamon said as firmly as he could. “They are relatively powerless, kept alive only by their need for revenge. Axis, leave it be. Drift with us. We are your home now, not Sigholt. We are your family, not Caelum.”

Leagh dressed herself in the dawn chill, despondent and apathetic. She was to go home with Herme and Theod, it seemed, and there wait for however Askam and Caelum decided to dispose of her future.

Over the past few days she had wept until she’d realised that weeping did no good. Then she had sat and wiped her eyes and decided that her only choice was to accept what life had dealt her. She loved Zared, but she was not to be allowed to consummate that love. Well, that was the lot of a princess. It was foolish to dream of being a peasant woman and choosing as her mate a man she loved. She was not. She had been raised in privilege, and lived in privilege, and for that privilege she had to mate with whomever her brother and Caelum decided would be best.

“I must trust them,” she muttered as she laced her boots over her breeches – Leagh always rode astride -“and I must believe that they will choose a man kind and compassionate.” Her mouth curled bitterly. “As well as politically acceptable.”

She must forget Zared. She would rarely, if ever, see him again anyway. “Gods, let Caelum find me a husband a thousand leagues away from Zared,” she said, staring at the door. “For I could not bear to meet with him again.”

Mentally shaking herself from her thoughts, Leagh looked about the room, finally picking up a blue cloak. There was nothing else to take home, for she’d brought nothing with her. In the time she’d been in Sigholt, she had shared with Zenith.

Gods! Where was Zenith? If anything served to take her mind away from her own problems, it was fear for her friend. Where could Zenith have got to? Something had been troubling her in the past few days, but Zenith had not been able to speak of it, and now she had gone. Had Drago been involved? Having killed one sister, had he then stolen his other one?