A Rule of Queens (Book #13 in the Sorcerer's Ring) Read Online Free PDF Page A

drink from the fountain of truth!”
    Bowyer scanned the faces of the crowd.
    “Is there anyone here who dares defy my claim?”
he shouted, turning, meeting everyone’s gaze, defiant.
    Alistair looked about, hopeful; but one by one,
all the men, all brave warriors, mostly from Bowyer’s tribe, looked down, not one
of them willing to challenge him in combat.
    “I am your champion,” Bowyer boomed. “I
defeated all opponents on tournament day. There is no one here who could beat
me. Not one. If there is, I challenge you to step forward.”
    “No one, save Erec!” Dauphine called out.
    Bowyer turned and scowled at her.
    “And where is he now? He lies dying. We Southern
Islanders shall not have a cripple for a King. I am your King. I am your
next best champion. By the laws of this land. As my father’s father was King
before Erec’s father.”
    Erec’s mother and Dauphine both lunged forward to
stop him; but his men grabbed them and pulled them back, detaining them.
Alistair saw beside them, Erec’s brother, Strom, wrists bound behind his back;
he struggled, too, but could not break free.
    “You shall pay for this, Bowyer!” Strom called
out.
    But Bowyer ignored him. Instead, he turned back
to Alistair, and she could see from his eyes he was determined to proceed. Her
time had come.
    “Time is dangerous when deceit is on your side,”
Alistair said to him.
    He frowned down at her; clearly, she had struck
a nerve.
    “And those words will be your last,” he said.
    Bowyer suddenly hoisted the ax, raising it high
overhead.
    Alistair closed her eyes, knowing that in but a
moment, she would be gone from this world.
    Eyes closed, Alistair felt time slow down.
Images flashed before her. She saw the first time she had met Erec, back in the
Ring, at the Duke’s castle, when she had been a serving girl and had fallen in
love with him at first sight. She felt her love for him, a love she still felt
to this day, burning inside her. She saw her brother, Thorgrin, saw his face,
and for some reason, she did not see him in the Ring, in King’s Court, but
rather in a distant land, on a distant ocean, exiled from the Ring. Most of
all, she saw her mother. She saw her standing at the edge of a cliff, before
her castle, high above an ocean, before a skywalk. She saw her holding out her
arms and smiling sweetly at her.
    “My daughter,” she said.
    “Mother,” Alistair said, “I will come to join
you.”
    But to her surprise, her mother slowly shook
her head.
    “Your time is not now,” she said. “Your destiny
on this earth is not yet complete. You still have a great destiny before you.”
    “But how, Mother?” she asked. “How can I
survive?”
    “You are bigger than this earth,” her mother
replied. “That blade, that metal of death, is of this earth. Your shackles are
of this earth. Those are earthly limitations. They are only limitations if you
believe in them, if you allow them to have authority over you. You are spirit
and light and energy. That is where your real power is. You are above it all.
You are allowing yourself to be held back by physical constraints. Your problem
is not one of strength; it is one of faith. Faith in yourself. How strong is
your faith?”
    As Alistair knelt there, trembling, eyes shut,
her mother’s question rang in her head.
    How strong is your faith?
    Alistair let herself go, forgot her shackles,
put herself in the hands of her faith. She began to let go of her faith in the physical
constraints of this planet, and instead shifted her faith to the supreme power,
the one and only supreme power over everything else in the world. A power had
created this world, she knew. A power had created all of this. That was the
power she needed to align herself with.
    As she did, all within a fraction of a second, Alistair
felt a sudden warmth coursing through her body. She felt on fire, invincible,
bigger than everything. She felt flames emanating from her palms, felt her mind
buzzing and swarming,